IT was with great sorrow, I assure you, my dear Potts, that I found by your last letter that you are again laid up with an attack of your old complaint. From your description of the symptoms, I apprehend no danger, but still you cannot be too cautious, and I recommend you to take particular care of yourself for a month or two at least. I wish to God I had you under my hands. I am quite sure I know your constitution better, and could cure you sooner than any other practitioner—What is even Mr Cline, with all his genius, to me, that have known you ever since you had the measles?

The truth is, my good lad, that, after all, you have need of very little beyond what nature puts in your own power—but, my dear Potts, do take good care of yourself, I beg of you. Do not proceed in the old courses, my good fellow,—do not drink such enormous quantities of Vauxhall punch at night, nor smoke so many segars at the Cyder Cellar, nor guzzle so much Burton ale at that house in Henrietta Street, nor make a point of swallowing as much flip as would swim a goose at the Shades, nor give such liberal orders for champagne at the Cheshire, nor discuss such a quantity of gin twist at the Blue Posts, and the One Tun, nor go so often to that vile alley that runs between King Street and Pall Mall, nor sit so late at Roubel’s. In a word, you must remember that the indiscretions of a day are sometimes paid for by the sufferings of years. Do now, turn over a new leaf, and I have no doubt that my physic and your own sobriety, will soon make a man of you again.

I am glad, however, to find that the arguments I employed in my former letter, to induce you to visit Scotland, have not wholly failed of their effect. But you have been accustomed to move in so extended a circle of society, that you seem rather dubious whether you could easily reconcile yourself to the more limited one, to which in this country you would necessarily be confined.