George Canning (11 April 1770 – 8 August 1827 / London, England)

"Ambubaiarum Collegia Pharmacopeiæ."


--Horace.

If the health and the strength, and the pure vital breath
Of old England, at last must be doctor'd to death,
Oh! why must we die of one doctor alone?
And why must that doctor be just such a one
As Doctor Henry Addington?


Oh! where is the great Doctor Dominicetti,
With his stews and his flues, and his vapours to sweat ye?
O! where is that Prince of all Mountebank fame,
With his baths of hot earth, and his beds of hot name.
Oh! where is Doctor Graham?


Where are Sonmambule Mesmer's convulsions magnetic?
Where is Myersbach, renown'd for his skills diuretic
Where is Perkins, with tractors of magical skill?
Where's the anodyne necklace of Basil Burchell?
Oh! where is the great Van Butchell?


Where's Sangrado Rush, so notorious for bleedings;
Where's Rumford, so famed for his writings and readings;
Where's that Count of the Kettle, that friend to the belly,
So renown'd for transforming old bones into jelly--
Where, too, is the great Doctor Kelly?


While Sam Solomon's lotion the public absterges,
He gives them his gold[1] as well as his purges;
But our frugal doctor this practice to shun,
Gives his pills to the public, the Pells to his Son
Oh! fie! fie! Doctor Addington!
Oh! where is Doctor Solomon?


Where are all the great Doctors? No longer we want
This farrago of cowardice, cunning and cant,
These braggarts! that one moment know not what fear is,
And the next moment, trembling, no longer know where is--
Lord Hawkesbury's[2] march to Paris?


Then for Hobart and Sullivan, Hawkey and Hervey,
For Wallace and Castlereagh, Bleeke and Glenbervie,
For Sergeant, Vansittart, Monkhouse, and Lee,
Gives us Velno and Anderson, Locke, Spilsbury,
Doctor Ball, Doctors Brodum and Bree.


And instead of the jack-pudding bluster of Sherry,
With his "dagger of lath," and his speeches so merry![3]
Let us bring to the field--every foe to appal--
Aldini's galvanic deceptions--and all
The slight of hand tricks of Conjuror Val.


So shall Golding and Bond, the Doctor's tall yeomen,
Dame Hiley, Dame Bragge, and the other old Women,
For new mountebanks changed, their old tricks bid farewell to,
And to the famed D'Ivernois his arithmetic sell to,
That wonderful wonder, the great Katterfelto!


So shall England, escaped from her "safe politicians,"
Such an army array of her quacks and physicians,
Such lotions and potions, pills, lancets, and leeches,
That Massena shall tremble our coasts when he reaches,
And the Consul himself--his breeches.