For two years the little boy throve well in the good air of Kensington, without any illness. But in the third year he was attacked by ague. Fifty years before he would probably have been bled and reduced in every way, and would speedily have died. But medical science was improving; and a wonderful discovery had been made in far-off Peru. The ague was cured by Doctor Radcliffe and Sir Charles Scarborough, "who prescribed the Jesuit's Powder, of which the Duke took large quantities early in the spring of 1694, for the same complaint most manfully."[110]
This Jesuit's Powder was none other than the famous Peruvian Bark, made as we all know from the bark of the Chinchona trees, so-called by Linnæus after the Countess of Chincon, wife of the Viceroy of Peru. This lady's cure in 1638 from a desperate fever, brought the quinine--the "bark-of-barks" as its Indian name signifies--into notice, and gave the world one of the most precious remedies we possess against disease.
This ague was the first, but by no means the last illness our poor little boy had to endure; for all through his short life he was delicate.
His faithful attendant, Jenkin Lewis, a young man who was tenderly attached to him, has left us a most interesting memoir of the young prince. And from this we get charming details of his daily life, his many illnesses, and his character.
When first he began to walk about and speak plain, he fancied he must be of all trades; one day a carpenter, another day a smith, and so on; which the queen observing sent him a box of ivory tools, said to cost twenty-five pounds, which he used till he learnt the names of them, and also the terms of those mechanical arts.[111]
[Illustration: THE OLD DORMITORY AT WESTMINSTER SCHOOL.]
But from his infancy the little duke began to show his passion for horses, drums, and anything to do with soldiers. In 1693, when he was only four years old, he threw away childish toys, saying he was a man and a soldier. And he had up from Kensington village a little company of twenty-two boys, wearing paper caps and armed with wooden swords, who enlisted themselves as his guard. The duke was enchanted; and appointed a very pretty boy, Sir Thomas Lawrence's son, to be lieutenant. This little army was his constant delight. In a short time the child gained a real knowledge of military matters; and before long he began to use his bodyguard to some purpose. In 1694, seeing how active he was, and that "his stiff-bodied coats were very troublesome to him in his military amusements," the Prince and Princess put him into breeches on Easter Day.