Mrs.St.John is always promising to lend me the fashion-book, but she never remembers it." "And you'll have proper advice for Matilda at once ?" "Certainly, my dear." Mrs.Buller was in the habit of asking the regimental Surgeon's advice in small matters, and of employing a civilian doctor (whose fees made him feel better worth having) in serious illness.

She estimated the seriousness of a case by danger rather than delicacy.

So the Surgeon came to see Matilda, and having heard her cough, promised to send a "little something," and she was ordered to keep indoors and out of draughts, and take a tablespoonful three times a day.
Matilda had not gone graciously through the ordeal of facing the principal Surgeon in his uniform, and putting out her tongue for his inspection; and his prescriptions did not tend to reconcile her to being "doctored." Fresh air was the only thing that hitherto had seemed to have any effect on her aches and pains, or to soothe her hysterical irritability, and of this she was now deprived.

When Aunt Theresa called in an elderly civilian practitioner, she was so sulky and uncommunicative, and so resolutely refused to acknowledge to any ailments, that (his other prescriptions having failed to cure her lassitude, and his pompous manner and professional visits rather provoking her feverish perversity) the old doctor also recommended that she should be sent to school.
Medical advice is very authoritative, and yet Uncle Buller hesitated.
"It's like packing a troublesome son off to the Colonies, my dear," said he.

"And though Dr.Brown may be justified in transferring his responsibilities elsewhere, I don't think that parents should get rid of theirs in this easy fashion." But when Eleanor came, the Major's views underwent a change.