10th November 1786

Fog.

 Churgeion Quint’s reciept for the Ague caused me to have a wild dream which I will now relate

.

I dreamt that I attended the burial of Lovelace Love and I resorted on a course assisted by my man servant Goiter to resurrect the vast corpse of Mr Love. I had been made aware through reading the journals of the experiments of Signor Galvani who had attempted to restore the vital spark of life into a dead frog by means of electricity. I too felt that I could carry out the same operation on the body of Love by means of an electric flux delivered by a storm. I was also aware of the work of the American Franklin. With Goiter’s help I used a derrick to expose Love’s body to the full fury of the storm. After a few moments I discerned that Love’s leg twitched “It’s alive”. I cried. The late Lovelace Love was now fully restored to life although the repose of death had further weakened what little intellectual capacity Mr Love possessed in life. I was now in possession of a 60 stone baby who thought that I was the parent. My anguish could only be imagined. I then proceeded to fashion a mate for the creature which bore a startling resemblance to Squinting Agnes. But so appalled was the creature by the ugliness of my late creation that he destroyed it. Leaving Goiter to fend off the rapacious creature I fled north and took a ship in the Orkneys for Ultima Thule, but at this stage the creature was in close pursuit. My dream ended in the polar regions when the creature, showing a surprising agility for one of 60 stones and now transformed into the Walrus of Love leapt from ice floe to ice floe until it had me in a deathly embrace “Father”, it said as we tumbled into the icy main.

 I awoke at this point in a sweaty clamour

9th November 1786

Showers

Died Lovelace Love. This gentleman was known for his extraordinary bulk. He weighed upwards of 60 stones and his coffin was 7 feet long and 4 feet deep. His death was occasioned by his immense corpulence

Am suffering from an Ague my servant Squinting Agnes sent for Quint the local churgeion. I must confess to feeling uneasy when this information was conveyed to me as Quint is a better Cow doctor than a human one and the sad death of Mistress Ralphs over bled by leeches is still the subject of gossip in the parish. But the alternative of Polk the Churgeion in Leek gives even more feelings of unease. Polk removed the left leg of a farmer badly gored by a bull and in haste removed  the left testicle.

Quint examined the stools and the urine and found the later somewhat discoursed and the colour of sack

Quint left a receipt for the Ague. It read "Take of the best bark in fine powder, half an ounce, venicle treacle, two drachms. Lemon juice as much as it will make a electuary. Divide it into three doses and taken over three nights in warm beer"