He Babbled About Incalculable
Sums; Fancied Himself Engaged In Money Digging; Threw The Bed-Clothes
Right And Left, In The Idea That He Was Shovelling Among The Dirt,
Groped Under The Bed In Quest Of The Treasure, And Lugged Forth, As He
Supposed, An Inestimable Pot Of Gold.
Dame Webber and her daughter were in despair at what they conceived a
returning touch of insanity.
There are two family oracles, one or other
of which Dutch housewives consult in all cases of great doubt and
perplexity: the dominie and the doctor. In the present instance they
repaired to the doctor. There was at that time a little, dark, mouldy
man of medicine famous among the old wives of the Manhattoes for his
skill not only in the healing art, but in all matters of strange and
mysterious nature. His name was Dr. Knipperhausen, but he was more
commonly known by the appellation of the High German doctor.[4] To him
did the poor women repair for counsel and assistance touching the
mental vagaries of Wolfert Webber.
[Footnote 4: The same, no doubt, of whom mention is made in the history
of Dolph Heyliger.]
They found the doctor seated in his little study, clad in his dark
camblet robe of knowledge, with his black velvet cap, after the manner
of Boorhaave, Van Helmont, and other medical sages: a pair of green
spectacles set in black horn upon his clubbed nose, and poring over a
German folio that seemed to reflect back the darkness of his
physiognomy.
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