| Citation |
MG-A(G.780.019
15 Dec 1780:13,21 (1770)
The following paragraphs are extracted from late London
papers, viz. When the King was informed of the capture of
the East and West-India fleet, by Don Louis de Cordova, he
was immediately seized with horrid paroxysms, indicating the
most violent symptoms of the species of madness, which
attends persons in the east, when bit by a tarantula. Lord
North, the chief physician in politics, sent directly for
the band of state fidlers, who having, as on such occasions
is usual, played over several delectable tunes to humour his
majesty's disorder; they at last fiddled him into his sense,
but he unfortunately relapsed again--Lord North caught the
disorder, and in a moment, with epidemic swiftness, the
whole court by its baneful influence, were in a state of
lunacy--Her majesty the Queen leaped out of bed naked as
Venus; and the Prince of Wales appeared as bare as Apollo of
Delphi--The maids of honour forgot their modesty; the lords
in waiting forgot their breeches. A general tumult ensued.-
-the guards--the menial domestics--and the lord of the
council, with their secretaries, mingled together in the
great anti-chamber, tag-rag and bobtail, where they danced
and capered to and fro, belly to belly, back to back, right
and left, hands across, &c. The doctors are disputing on the
nature of the distemper--the doctors of divinity are
preparing to exorcise the spirit of madness which possessed
the court--the doctors of law are taking down notes of the
case--the doctors of physick are preparing the clysters and
emeticks, to drive the disorder up and down, and the
undertakers of the Kingdom are snuffing for the funerals of
such as might become defunct.
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