“In other words,” said Tressilian, “he was a quacksalver and common cheat; but what has all this to do with my nag, and the shoe which he has lost?”

“With your worshipful patience,” replied the diffusive man of letters, “you shall understand that presently—­PATENTIA then, right worshipful, which word, according to our Marcus Tullius, is ’DIFFICILIUM RERUM DIURNA PERPESSIO.’  This same Demetrius Doboobie, after dealing with the country, as I have told you, began to acquire fame inter magnates, among the prime men of the land, and there is likelihood he might have aspired to great matters, had not, according to vulgar fame (for I aver not the thing as according with my certain knowledge), the devil claimed his right, one dark night, and flown off with Demetrius, who was never seen or heard of afterwards.  Now here comes the Medulla, the very marrow, of my tale.  This Doctor Doboobie had a servant, a poor snake, whom he employed in trimming his furnace, regulating it by just measure—­compounding his drugs—­tracing his circles—­cajoling his patients, et Sic et CAETERIS.  Well, right worshipful, the Doctor being removed thus strangely, and in a way which struck the whole country with terror, this poor Zany thinks to himself, in the words of Maro, ’Uno AVULSO, non deficit alter;’ and, even as a tradesman’s apprentice sets himself up in his master’s shop when he is dead or hath retired from business, so doth this Wayland assume the dangerous trade of his defunct master.  But although, most worshipful sir, the world is ever prone to listen to the pretensions of such unworthy men, who are, indeed, mere SALTIM BANQUI and CHARLATANI, though usurping the style and skill of doctors of medicine, yet the pretensions of this poor Zany, this Wayland, were too gross to pass on them, nor was there a mere rustic, a villager, who was not ready to accost him in the sense of Persius, though in their own rugged words,—­

     DILIUS HELLEBORUM CERTO COMPESCERE PUNCTO
     NESCIUS examen?  VETAT hoc Natura VEDENDI;

which I have thus rendered in a poor paraphrase of mine own,—­

     Wilt thou mix hellebore, who dost not know
     How many grains should to the mixture go? 
     The art of medicine this forbids, I trow.

“Moreover, the evil reputation of the master, and his strange and doubtful end, or at least sudden disappearance, prevented any, excepting the most desperate of men, to seek any advice or opinion from the servant; wherefore, the poor vermin was likely at first to swarf for very hunger.  But the devil that serves him, since the death of Demetrius or Doboobie, put him on a fresh device.  This knave, whether from the inspiration of the devil, or from early education, shoes horses better than e’er a man betwixt us and Iceland; and so he gives up his practice on the bipeds, the two-legged and unfledged species called mankind, and betakes him entirely to shoeing of horses.”