GOOCH. .325 early life, than his health becanie sufficiently im- paired to fill his mind with gloomy anticipations. In the spring of 1815 he suffered from an in- flammatory attack on his lungs, and in a letter thus alludes to his illness, — "At one time I was more alarmed about myself than I ever remember. I say alarmed, for I did not feel afraid of death, so lowly do I estimate the pleasures of life — so diluted and mingled are even its best hours, and so uncertain is their continuance, even when we are going most merrily adown the current ; yet I v/as alarmed — for I shuddered at the thought of dying just when I had come within reach of, but before I had time to grasp success, and leaving my wife pregnant and almost unprovided for. I am slowly recovering, my chest is well, but I am not!' A few days' residence in the country restored him to his usual health. In April his first boy was born : at this time, Gooch's business was rapidly increasing, and more particularly in the west end of the town, where he profited by the overflowing of his friend Knighton's practice ; this circumstance led to his removal, early in 1816, from Alder- manbury to Berners Street. Although there was little or no risk attending this removal, it was not without some misgivings that he changed his abode, and he was for some time anxious lest the increase of connexion in one part of London should not equal the loss of patients in the other. A few months settled the question satisfactorily. Towards the close of this year, Gooch went on a professional visit to the Marquis Wellesley, at Ramsgate, to whom he was introduced by Sir William Knighton ; here he was taken alarmingly
