The saving of his life during these dangerous years Gibbon
unhesitatingly ascribes to the more than maternal care of his aunt,
Catherine Porten, on writing whose name for the first time in his
Memoirs, "he felt a tear of gratitude trickling down his cheek." "If
there be any," he continues, "as I trust there are some, who rejoice
that I live, to that dear and excellent woman they must hold
themselves indebted. Many anxious and solitary hours and days did she
consume in the patient trial of relief and amusement; many wakeful
nights did she sit by my bedside in trembling expectation that every
hour would be my last." Gibbon is rather anxious to get over these
details, and declares he has no wish to expatiate on a "disgusting
topic." This is quite in the style of the _ancien regime_. There was
no blame attached to any one for being ill in those days, but people
were expected to keep their infirmities to themselves. "People knew
how to live and die in those days, and kept their infirmities out of
sight. You might have the gout, but you must walk about all the same
without making grimaces. It was a point of good breeding to hide one's
sufferings.
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