Most physicians scout the idea of terrestrial animals or reptiles living
in one's stomach. The wife of Captain Hodgden, of Mount Desert, presented
the writer with a singular looking reptile some three inches in length,
looking not unlike an earwig, excepting having two horns on its head,
which animal she said crawled from her mouth the night previous. She
declared for years that there was a live animal in her stomach, and
attributed its dislodgment to the use of some bitters (Chelone glabra).
A nice old lady called at our office one day, some years ago, during my
absence, and informed Dr. Colley, who was attending my patients
temporarily, that she had a live animal in her stomach. The doctor tells
the story as follows:--
"'Now don't you laugh at me, doctor, 'cause all the doctors do, and I
know it ain't no whim nor notion I've got in my _head_, but a real live
animal I've got into my stomach,' she said.
"I looked at the good old lady, and could not find it in my heart to tell
her she was laboring under a delusion, therefore I replied, very
sympathetically,--
[Illustration: REPTILES FROM THE STOMACH.]
"'O, no doubt you are right, and all the doctors have been wrong. Why,
just sit quiet a moment, and I will show you a whole bottle full that the
doctor has from time to time taken from the stomachs of patients.' So
saying, I went into the laboratory, and got down a bottle of centipedes,
lizards, and a big, black, southern horn-bug, which the doctor's brother
had collected in the South, and, dusting off the bottle, took it to the
old lady, who sat comfortably in a rocking-chair, taking snuff, and
nervously humming a little pennyroyal tune.
"'There, madam--there is a host of various kinds of reptiles, which the
doctor has compelled to abandon the living stomach.'
"'Du tell,' she exclaimed, readjusting her glasses, 'if them all come out
of folks' stomachs! Let me take the bottle.'
"'I suppose they really did, marm.'
"'And the big black one; who did that come out of?' she asked, turning the
bottle around to get a view of the ugly monster--horns two inches long!
"'O, let me see. That came out of a colored man--awful appetite, madam.'
"'Du tell! Well, I'm much obleeged to you for showing them to me. Now I'll
go right home, and pitch into them doctors. I knowed they're all wrong.'
And so saying, the old lady arose, buzzed round and round like a bee in a
bottle, got her reticule, and started for the door.
"'O, I forgot,' she exclaimed, coming back. 'Give me some of the medicine
to get this animal out of my system, doctor.'
"I gave her a quantity of gentian, told her to use no snuff for two
months, and she would have no further trouble with the animal; that she
must not expect to see him, as they seldom came away whole, like those in
the bottle. She promised, with a sigh, and a sorry look at the snuff-box,
and went away. I have no doubt _but I did the best thing possible for her
case_."