Doctor Syntax Lamenting the Loss of his Wife. The Doctor on his knees at his wife's deathbed turns away and covers his eyes as the maid spills a bowl of gruel and a woman on the other side of the bed are horrified to find the Doctor's wife dead. The cat has come into the room through and open leaded casement (window) and is stealing food from the table. Thomas Rowlandson illustration for The Tours of Dr Syntax by William Combe (London, 1820). Aquatint.