Wimpole Street, Part 4 of 7

(Sir Frederick Treves, Victorian surgeon, has the following claims to our respect: (1) he discovered and cared for Joseph Merrick, "The Elephant Man": (2) He followed the route in Italy of the characters in Browning's "The Ring & the Book", taking priceless photos: and many more things!) The Eloquent Man Sir Frederick Treves enjoys four claims to fame: the lifelong friend of Thomas Hardy, who supped with him in the King’s Arms snug: the name of Joseph Merrick (Robert Browning, too!) is intimately linked with his: he’s due a place in heaven for his healing feats: and yes, he lived here, on the street of streets. It’s Dorchester, or Casterbridge to some. And Treves, a native, knew its ways and whims as well as Hardy did. When he succumbed to his appendix, genteel pseudonyms were dropped. Tom Hardy chose the funeral hymns. He also honored Treves in gentle rhymes, to mark his passing, in the London Times. The wretch named Merrick, or the Elephant Man, could well have lived his loveless life untended, had Treves not found him. Merrick’s mortal span was made more bearable, being befriended by one of London’s foremost. When it ended, poor Joseph Merrick, long reviled and scorned, found home in Wimpole Street, where he was mourned. King Edward feels a grumble in his tripes, and sends for Surgeon Treves, the kingdom’s best. “You mustn’t operate,” the sovereign gripes, “My coronation’s looming.” “Which seems best,” asks Treves – “a crowning, or cremation?” Pressed to give an answer, Edward takes the knife – and Treves the genius saves his monarch’s life. The poet Browning wrote some novel verse, or rather, a verse novel: ring and book, Italian murder tale. Treves was immersed in it, obsessed with it, completely hooked: went off to Tuscany, made notes, and took some photographs, made sketches, thus preserving the base of fact. The man defines “deserving”!