"The next couple don't use the same letters. Or at least, I can't think of any English words that will work, like:
"O—that's Oede, or leisure time, and he talks about avoidance of excess during it. It's a sort of 'you ought not to pig out on junk food or get drunk' for the seventeenth century;
"N—that's Nutzung, or use and exercise of the body. Maybe I could use 'Nuts about exercise,' because he really is.
"Then we're back to something I got English for:
"D—daily fresh air; and
"T—trustful attitude. That seems to involve being up-beat.
"Or maybe, I guess, for that last, an up-timer would be more likely to say 'optimism' or 'confidence.' But for Guarinoni, it really comes back to Trost—'consolation' or 'relying on God,' so he's back where he started."
Janie made a face. "I could have gotten that out of just about any women's magazine on the grocery store shelves up-time."
Stew nodded. "Yup. High school health classes, too. Except that he thinks that being healthy and being holy are pretty much interchangeable, so it's closer to the stuff that the Fellowship of Christian Athletes used to hand out on campus. The body is the temple of the holy spirit and all that stuff. On the other hand, the health advice can't hurt anyone. Good diet, regular exercise, plenty of fresh air. He wrote a whole book on the importance of watering down your wine. Given how drunk people get around here, watering down your wine is probably a good idea."
Stew shuffled through the pile of books the duchess had sent. "And he's absolutely convinced that premarital chastity and post-marital fidelity prevent VD and thus produce healthier children. Which a person has got to admit is perfectly true in a world that doesn't have much in the way of antibiotics. Hey, here's his manual of advice for Christian married couples. The Joy of Sex for the here and now. Right down your alley, Janie." He slid it down the table.
"I took a look at it. It's more on the order of a pre-Cana manual."
"Ah. Well, too bad."
Vince got the meeting back on track. Or tried, at least. "What makes the duchess think that Kronach will let them in? Can we head them off?"
Cliff Priest shook his head. "Telling Duchess Claudia not to send them isn't an option. They're already on their way."
"Right through the middle of a peasant revolt?" Wade Jackson sounded skeptical.
"Well, it hasn't started yet, really. We're just expecting it. They'll probably get here before April."
"They've probably all been through peasant revolts before, anyhow," Stewart Hawker said mildly.
"Yeah. I sort of keep forgetting that they're all over the place."
"The doctors?"
"Naw. Peasant revolts."
Vince could hardly wait for Matt Trelli to arrive. He'd been to Grantville for his first R&R in over a year. They'd sent Tom O'Brien up to Kronach to sub for him. When he came through, he would escort the doctors up to Kronach so Tom could come back and contribute his bit to handling the peasant revolt. However a munitions specialist chose to do that.
Vince could hardly wait for the day that the three doctors departed hence into another place. Ever since they set foot in town, Dr. Guarinoni had treated the entire Bamberg administration, up-time and down-time, to large free helpings of his health advice. Bennett Norris would have called it "patented health advice" if they had patents.
He never stopped. Stacey O'Brien told Janie that if the man had been born up-time, he would have found his calling as a motivational speaker holding success seminars at the Holiday Inn for twenty-five dollars a head.
From Stacey, this didn't count as a compliment. She'd said it after Guarinoni gave a critique of her child-rearing methods.
He didn't limit his efforts to the administration, either. He got out and around in the streets of the city. He even—since he turned out to be really and truly pretty famous in this time and place—got an invitation to address the city council.
According to Else Kronacher, the Bamberg Committee of Correspondence had no particular objection to the health component of his message, but wasn't reacting well to the intransigence with which he wrapped it up in Catholic dogma.
As long as they avoided theology, though, he got along great with Willard and Emma Thornton. Most of his practical policies—applied health practices, Vince supposed—fit right in with Mormon ideas about what was good for you.
Weinhart and Gatterer spent their time following Matewski around, observing both his military medicine and his volunteer efforts at the orphanages and city hospital. He didn't seem to mind them. He might have minded Guarinoni, he said honestly to Wade Jackson, but that guy was too busy blowharding to hassle a man who had work to do.