A young Irish girl, with a wild shriek, an "Och, hone!" and "Ah, murther!"
and "Hulla-boo--a--hulla-boo, poor Terry! Ah, why did I taze ye?" burst
into my office one evening, upsetting the servant, and actually laying
hold on me with her hands, as she exclaimed,--
"Ah, docther, docther, come now, for the love o' the moother that bore ye;
come this blessed minute. I've killed poor Terry, an' niver shall see him
again. Ah, murther, murther! Why did I taze ye?"
[Illustration: "WHY DID I TAZE YE?"]
Trying in vain to calm her, I hastily drew on my boots, and almost ran
after her to a wretched tenement, some quarter of a mile off, and found
the object of the girl's solicitude alive and kicking, with his lungs in
the best of order, standing on the stairs that led to his miserable
chamber, with a broken scissors in his hand, stirring busily the contents
of a tea-cup.
It seems that he had been courting my fair guide, and after the period she
had fixed for her final answer to his declaration, she had bantered him
with a refusal, which her solicitude for his life plainly showed was far
enough from her real intentions.
In his despair he had swallowed an ounce of laudanum, which he had
procured from some injudicious druggist, which act had sent Biddy off
after me in such terror. He was now mixing a powder which he had obtained
from another druggist, who, knowing of his love affair, it will be seen
acted with more wisdom than the first, as Terry let slip enough in his
hearing to show what he wanted to do with the "ratsbane" for which he
inquired; and Biddy, like a true daughter of Eve, had made no secret in
the neighborhood that she valued her charms beyond the poor fellow's bid.
As soon as she approached, he, by some inopportune remark, re-excited her
wrath, and she again declared she wouldn't have him, "if he wint to the
divil."
Poor Terry, in his red shirt and blue stockings, and an attitude of the
grandest kind, but covering, as we soon found, a desperate purpose,
flourished his tea-cup, and stirred its contents with the scissors,
constantly exclaiming,--
"Ah, Biddy, will ye have me? Ye'll have me now--will ye not?"
Still Biddy refused.
"Divil a bit will I let the docther come near me till ye say yis! Sure,
weren't we children together in the ould counthry? and didn't we take our
potaties and butthermilk out o' the same bowl? And yer mother, that's now
dead, always said ye were to be me wife; and now ye're kapin' coompany
with that dirty blackguard, Jim O'Connor,--divil take him for a spalpeen.
Ah, Biddy, will ye have me?"
And he flourished the cup, and stirred away vigorously with the scissors.
Biddy's blood was up at the disrespectful mention made of Jimmy's name,
for "he had a winnin' way wid him," and she shouted at the top of her
voice,--
"No, be the St. Patrick, I'll niver have ye."
With an awful gulp, Terry drained the cup, rolled up his eyes, and with
one most impassioned yet ludicrous look at her, he fell upon his knees on
the step.
Biddy followed, in strong hysterics.
The whole affair was so irresistibly ludicrous that I scarce could keep
from laughing; but on observing the bottle, labelled "laudanum," and
looking into the bottom of the tea-cup, and discovering a white powder, I
changed my prognosis, and hastened to the druggist's near, to see what it
was, and procure an antidote, should it really prove "ratsbane."
To my great relief, the man of drugs informed me, laughingly, that he had
given Terry a quantity of chalk and _eight grains of tartar emetic_, as he
learned that Terry was already in possession of the ounce of laudanum, and
all the neighbors knew that Biddy had driven him to desperation by
flirting with his rival, Jim O'Connor. The young man had judiciously told
Terry that the powder would make the laudanum sure to operate more
effectually.
"How long will it take?" he asked, and bagged all for use when the refusal
should come.
My course was now clear. I was in for sport. Sending the druggist's clerk
for my stomach-pump, to be in readiness in case the emetic should not
operate,--which was scarcely impossible, for eight grains of tartar
emetic, taken at a dose, would almost vomit the potatoes out of a bag,--I
waited the result.
As for Biddy, I let her lie; for I thought she deserved her punishment. My
heart was always tender towards the sex, and I generally expected a
"fellow-feeling."
[Illustration: SUCCESS OF TERRY'S COURTSHIP.]
In a short time it became evident that Terry's stomach was not so tough as
his will, and he began to intermingle long and portentous sighs with his
prayers, and to perspire freely. I gave him a wide berth, in anticipation
of the Jonah that was to come up shortly. I was anxious now that Biddy
should revive in time to witness his grand effort. Terry was tough, and
held out. Shortly she revived, and suddenly starting up, and recollecting
the situation, she made one bound for Terry, crying,--
"Ah, Terry, Terry, dear Terry! I'll have ye now. Yis, I will; and I don't
care who hears me. I always loved ye, but that divil's baby, Mag, always
kept tellin' me ye'd love me the betther if I didn't give in to ye too
soon. Ah, Terry, dear, only live, and I'll go to the ends of the world for
ye. Ah, an' what would me poor mother say, if she was here? Och, hone!
Och, hone! Docther, now what are ye doin'? A purty docther ye are; an' ye
pumped out yer own counthryman, that didn't die, sure, an' he tuk twice as
much as poor Terry."
Meantime the boy had arrived with the pump.
"Up wid ye now, and use the black pipe ye put down the poor fellow's
throat over the way last summer. I'd take it mesilf, if it would do; but
God knows whether I'd be worth the throuble."
As Terry had not yet cast up his accounts, and the stomach-pump was at
hand, I determined to make a little more capital out of the case, and
thrusting the long, flexible India rubber tube down poor Terry's throat,
having separated his teeth by means of a stick, and holding his head
between my knees, I soon had the satisfaction of depositing the laudanum
and tartar emetic in a swill pail, the only article of the toilet the
place afforded.
After years proved Terry and Biddy most loving companions. He never, even
when drunk, more than threatened her "wid a batin', which she was
desarvin'," and she never forgave "that divil's baby, Mag," for her cruel
experiment on her heroic and devoted Terry.--_Practice of a New York
Surgeon._