Historical works of Barts

THERE'S no delicate way to put this, so I'll just have to tell it as it is. Halfway through this programme, we watch a poor woman having her legs removed. And it's done while she's wide awake. But, as dreadful as this makes me sound, I have to say it doesn't upset me that much.

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Why? Well, because she's only an actress.

By that, I don't mean this is the sort of punishment members of the acting profession deserve. God, no! What do you think I am, some kind of monster?

No, most of them I'd let off with a caution. What I mean is, we're watching a reenactment, specifically of an operation that took place at London's St Bartholomew's Hospital, the focus of this new series, back in the 1600s. The patient was a lady called Ellen French, and her limbs had become so gangrenous that the barber had no choice.