from the house for a fresh supply. The thunder and lightning being excessive during her absence, I said to him, 'Why did you not send that girl (the slave) for water on such a night as this, instead of exposing your wife to the storm?' 'Oh, no,' replied he, 'that would never do. That slave cost me forty pounds.'"
Miss Anne Trelawny was not a little simple and credulous, and Wolcot delighted in hoaxing her. On one occasion, he informed her that a cherub had been caught in the Blue Mountains, and had been put in a cage with a parrot. Before morning, unhappily, the parrot had pecked out the eyes of the poor cherub, all which the lady believed as an indisputable fact. "The Nymph of Tauris," which was printed in the Annual Register for 1773, was written by Wolcot on the death of this young lady, which occurred in Jamaica.
Sir William Trelawny also died in Jamaica on 11 December, 1772, whereupon Wolcot obtained leave from the new Governor, Dalling, 20 February, 1773, to return to England, accompanying Lady Trelawny, and it was thought not improbable by some that the lady would dry her tears and take Wolcot as her second husband, but death put an end to this scheme, if ever entertained, as she died in the month of August ensuing.
Dr. Wolcot had now entirely dropped his clerical character. He settled at Truro, where he established himself with a view to practising as a doctor. His peculiar treatment, which consisted in giving his fever patients doses of cold water, and his openly proclaimed opinion that a physician did more harm than good by cupping, bleeding, clystering, and by the administration of boluses and draughts, as also that the only good he could effect was by nudging on Dame Nature in the back when slow in recovering the sick, raised a
