The knowledge of secrets
like this he had gathered during journeys through France and
Italy, in which countries he had spent his life since he was
fifteen years old. Those who had travelled in the latter country
knew what a miracle art there performs in behalf of beauty; how
women of forty bear the same countenance as those of fifteen,
ages being in no way distinguished by appearances; whereas in
England, by looking at a horse in the mouth and a woman in the
face, it was possible to tell the number of their years. He
could, therefore, give such remedies as would render those who
came to him perfectly fair; clearing and preserving them from all
spots, freckles, pimples, marks of small-pox, or traces of
accidents. He would, moreover, cure the teeth, clear the breath,
take away fatness, and add flesh.
A man who vouched to perform such wonders was not long without
patients. At first these were drawn from his immediate
neighbourhood, but soon his fame reached the heart of the city.
Accordingly, many ladies of whose hospitality he had partaken,
and of whose secrets he had become possessed, hurried to consult
him; and the marvellous insight he betrayed regarding their past,
and strange predictions he pronounced concerning their future,
filled them with amazement, and occasionally with alarm. And
they, proclaiming the marvels of his wisdom, widened the circle
of his reputation, until his name was spoken within the precincts
of Whitehall.
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