It was a lovely morning in late September. The sun almost shone through
the film of light gray clouds which lay serenely over all the heavens.
There was a golden gleam in the atmosphere,
"And a tender touch upon everything
As if Autumn remembered the days of Spring."
The doctor and his wife were keenly alive to the beauty of the day.
After they had driven several miles they stopped before a little brown
house. The doctor said he would like Mary to go in and she followed him
into the low-ceiled room.
"Here, you youngsters, go out into the yard," said the mother of the
children. "There ain't room to turn around when you all get in." They
went. A baby seven or eight months old sat on the floor and stared up at
Mary as she seated herself near it. Two women of the neighborhood sat
solemnly near by. The doctor approached the bed on which a young woman
of eighteen or twenty years was lying.
"My heart hain't beat for five minutes," she said.
"Is that so?" said the doctor, quite calm in the face of an announcement
so startling. "Well, we'll have to start it up again."
"That's the first time she has spoke since yesterday morning," said one
of the solemn women in a low tone to the doctor.
"It didn't hurt her to keep still. She could have spoken if she had
wanted to." The two women looked at each other. "No, she couldn't speak,
Doctor," said one of them.
"Oh, yes she could," replied the doctor with great nonchalance.
"I _couldn't_!" said the patient with much vigor. This was just what he
wanted. He examined her carefully but said not a word.
"How long do you think I'll live?" she asked after a little.
"Well, that's a hard question to answer--but you ought to be good for
forty or fifty years yet."
The patient sniffed contemptuously. "Huh, I guess you don't know it all
if you _are_ a doctor."
"I know enough to know there's mighty little the matter with _you_." He
turned to one of the women. "I would like to see her mother," he said.
The mother had left the room on an errand; the woman rose and went out.
There was a pause which Mary broke by asking the baby's name.
"We think we'll call her Orient."
"Why not Occident?" thought Mary, but she kept still. Not so the doctor.
"_That's_ no name. Give her a good sensible _name_--one she won't be
ashamed of when she's a woman."
Here Mary caught sight of a red string around the baby's neck, and asked
if it was a charm of some sort. The mother took hold of the string and
drew up the charm. "It's a blind hog's tooth," she said simply, "to make
her cut her teeth easy."
The mother of the patient came into the room. "How do you think she is,
Doctor?"
"Oh, she's not so sick as you thought she was, not near."
The mother looked relieved. "She had an awful bad spell last night. Do
you think she won't have any more?"
"No, she won't have any more." The look on the patient's face said
plainly, "We'll see about that." It did not escape the doctor.
"But in case you should see any signs of a spell coming on, and if she
gets so she can't speak again, then you must--but come into the next
room," he said in a low voice.
They went into an adjoining room, the doctor taking care to leave the
door ajar. Then in a voice ostensibly low enough that the patient might
not hear and yet so distinct that she could hear every word, he
delivered his instructions: "Now, if she has any more spells she must be
blistered all the way from her neck down to the end of her spine." The
mother looked terrified. "And if she gets so she can't speak again, it
will be necessary to put a seton through the back of her neck."
"What _is_ a seton?" faltered the woman.
"Oh, it's nothing but a big needle six or eight inches long, threaded
with coarse cord. It must be drawn through the flesh and left there for
a while." Then in a tone so low that only the mother could hear, he
said, "Don't pay much attention to her. She'll never have those spells
unless there is somebody around to see her."
He walked into the other room and took up his hat and case.
"I left some powders on the table," he said to the mother. "You may give
her one just before dinner and another tonight."
"Will it make any difference if she doesn't take it till tonight?"
"Not a bit."
"Pa's gone and I didn't 'low to git any dinner today."
At this announcement Mary heard something between a sigh and a groan and
turning, saw a rosy-cheeked boy in the doorway. There was a look of
resigned despair on his face and Mary smiled sympathetically at him as
she went out. How many lads and lassies could have sympathized with him
too, having been victims to that widespread feeling among housewives
that when "Pa" is gone no dinner need be got and sometimes not much
supper.
As the doctor and his wife started down the walk they heard a voice say,
"Ma, don't you ever send for that smart-aleck doctor agin. I won't
_have_ him." The doctor shook with laughter as he untied the horse.
"They won't need to send for me 'agin.' I like to get hold of a fine
case of hysterics once in a while--it makes things lively."
"The treatment you prescribed was certainly heroic enough," said Mary.
They had driven about a mile, when, in passing a house a young man
signaled the doctor to stop. "Mother has been bleeding at the nose a
good deal," he said, coming down to the gate. "I wish you would stop and
see her. She'll be glad to see you, too, Mrs. Blank."
They were met at the door by a little old woman in a rather short dress
and in rather large ear-rings. Her husband, two grown daughters and
three children sat and stood in the room.
"So you've been bleeding at the nose, Mrs. Haig?" said the doctor,
looking at his patient who now sat down.
"Yes, sir, and it's a-gittin' me down. I've been in bed part of the
day."
"It's been bleedin' off and on for two days and nights," said the
husband.
"Did you try pretty hard to stop it?"
"Yes, sir, I tried everything I ever heerd tell of, and everything the
neighbors wanted me to try, but it didn't do no good."
"Open the door and sit here where I can have a good light to examine
your nose by," the doctor said to the patient. She brought her chair and
the young man opened the door. As he did so there was a mad rush between
the old man and his two daughters for the door opposite.
"Shet that door, quick!" the old man shouted, and it was instantly done.
Mary looked around with frightened eyes. Had some wild beast escaped
from a passing menagerie and was it coming in to devour the household?
There was a swirl of ashes and sparks from the big fireplace.
"This is the blamedest house that ever was built," said Mr. Haig.
"Who built it?" queried the doctor.
"I built it myself and like a derned fool went an' put the fireplace
right between these two outside doors, so if you open one an' the other
happens to be open the fire and ashes just flies."
The doctor took an instrument from his pocket and proceeded with his
examination.
"But there's a house back here on the hill about a mile that beats
this," said the old man.
"That is a queer-looking house," said Mary. "It has no front door at
all."
"No side door, neither. When a feller wants to get in _that_ house
there's just one of three ways: he has to go around and through the
kitchen, or through a winder, or down the chimney."
"If he was little enough he might go through the cat-hole," suggested
the young man, at which they all laughed.
"And what may that be?" asked the mystified Mary.
"It's a square hole cut in the bottom of the door for the cat to go in
and out at. The man that owns the place said he believed in having
things handy."
"Now, let me see your throat," said the doctor. The patient opened her
mouth to such an amazing extent that the doctor said, "No, I will stand
on the outside!" which made Mary ashamed of him, but the old couple
laughed heartily. They had known this doctor a good many years.
"What have you been doing to stop the bleeding?" he asked.
"I've been a-tryin' charms and conjurin', mostly."
Mary saw that there was no smile on her face or on any other face in the
room. She spoke in a sincere and matter-of-fact way. "Old Uncle Peter,
down here a piece, has cured many a case of nose-bleed but he hain't
'peared to help mine."
"How does he go about it?" asked Mary.
"W'y, don't you know nothin' 'bout conjurin'?"
"Nothing at all."
"I thought you bein' a doctor's wife would know things like that."
"I don't believe my husband practises conjuring much."
"Well, Uncle Peter takes the Bible, and opens it, and says some words
over it, and pretty soon the bleedin' stops."
"Which stops it, the Bible or the words?"
"W'y--both I reckon, but the words does the most of it. They're the
charm and nobody knows 'em but him."
"Where did he learn them?"
"His father was a conjurer and when he died he tol' the words to Uncle
Peter an' give the power to him."
"Did he come up here to conjure you?" asked the doctor.
"No, he says he can do it just as well at home."
"He can. But I think we can stop the bleeding without bothering Uncle
Peter any more. I'd like a pair of scissors," he said, meaning to cut
some papers for powders.
"They won't do no good. I've tried 'em."
"What do you think I want with them?"
"I 'lowed you wanted to put 'em under the piller. That'll cure
nose-bleed lots of times. Maybe you don't believe it, but it's so."
"Can Uncle Peter cure other things?" asked Mary.
"He can _that_. My nephew had the chills last year and shook and shook.
At last he went to Uncle Peter an' he cured _him_."
"He shot 'em," said Mr. Haig.
"Yes, he told him to take sixteen shot every mornin' for sixteen days
and by the time he got through he didn't shake a bit."
"By jings! he was so heavy he couldn't," said Mr. Haig, and in the laugh
that followed the doctor and his wife rose to go. A neighboring woman
with a baby in her arms had come in and seated herself near the door. As
he passed out the doctor stopped to inquire, "How's that sore breast?
You haven't been back again."
"It's about well. William found a mole at last and when I put the skin
of it on my breast it cured it. I knowed it would, but when we wanted a
mole there wasn't none to be found, so I had to go and see _you_ about
it."
"I thought it would soon be well. Good for the mole-skin," laughed the
doctor, as they took their leave.
When they had started homeward they looked at each other, the doctor
with a smile in his eyes--he had encountered this sort of thing so often
in his professional life that he was quite accustomed to it. But Mary's
brown eyes were serious. "John," she said, "when will the reign of
ignorance and superstition end?"
"When Time shall be no more, my dear."
"So it seems. Those people, while lacking education, seem to be fairly
intelligent and yet their lives are dominated by things like these."
"Yes, and not only people of fair intelligence but of fair education
too. While they would laugh at what we saw and heard back there they are
holding fast to things equally senseless and ridiculous. Then there are
thoroughly educated and cultured people holding fast to little
superstitions which had their birth in ignorance away back in the past
somewhere. How many people do you know who want to see the new moon over
the left shoulder? And didn't I hear you commanding Jack just the other
day to take the hoe right out of the house and to go out the same door
he came in?"
"O, ye-es, but then _nobody_ wants to have a _hoe_ carried through the
house, John. It's such a bad sign--"
The doctor laughed. "This thing is so widespread there seems to be no
hope of eliminating it entirely though I believe physicians are doing
more than anybody else toward crushing it out."
"Can they reason and argue people out of these things?"
"Not often. Good-natured ridicule is an effective shaft and one I like
to turn upon them sometimes. They get so they don't want to say those
things to me, and so perhaps they get to see after a while that it is
just as well not to say them too often to other people, too."
"Don't drive so fast, John, the day is too glorious."
Yellow butterflies flitted hither and thither down the road; the corn in
the fields was turning brown and out from among it peeped here and there
a pumpkin; the trees in apple orchards were bending low with their rosy
and golden treasures. They passed a pool of water and saw reflected
there the purple asters blooming above it. By and by the doctor turned
down a grassy road leading up to a farmhouse a short distance away. "Are
you to make another call today?" asked his wife.
"Yes, there is a very sick child here."
When he had gone inside three or four children came out. A curly-headed
little girl edged close and looked up into Mary's face.
"Miss' Blank, _you_ know where Mr. Blank got our baby, _don't_ you?"
Mary, smiling down at the little questioner, said, "The doctor didn't
tell me anything about it." The little faces looked surprised and
disappointed.
"We thought you'd know an' we come out to ask you," said another little
girl. "You make all the babies' dresses, don't you?"
"Dear me, no indeed!" laughed the doctor's wife.
"Does he keep all the babies at your house?" asked the little boy.
"I think not. I never see them there."
"Didn't he ever bring any to your house?"
"Oh, yes, five of them."
"I'd watch and see where he _gets_ 'em," said the little fellow stoutly.
"Jimmie Brown said Mr. Blank found their baby down in the woods in an
old holler log."
The doctor came out, and the little boy looking up at him asked, "Is
they any more babies down in the woods?"
"Yes, yes, 'the woods is full of 'em,'" laughed the doctor as he drove
off leaving the little group quite unsatisfied.
When they had gone some distance two wagons appeared on the brow of the
hill in front of them. "Hold on, Doctor," shouted the first driver, as
the doctor was driving rapidly by, "I want to sell you a watermelon."
"Will you take your pay in pills?"
"Don't b'lieve I have any use for pills."
"Don't want one then, I'm broke this morning," and he passed the second
wagon and pulled his horse into the road again.
"Wait a minute! _I'll_ trade you a melon for some pills," called the
driver. He spread the reins over the dashboard and clambered down; the
man in front looked back at him with a grin. "I've got two kinds here,
the Cyclone and the Monarch, which would you rather have?"
"Oh, I don't care," said the doctor.
"Let us have a Monarch, please," said Mary. Monarch was a prettier name
than Cyclone, and besides there was no sense in giving so violent a name
to so peaceful a thing as a watermelon. So the Monarch was brought and
deposited in the back of the buggy.
The doctor opened his case. "Take your choice."
"What do you call this kind?"
"I call that kind Little Devils."
"How many of 'em would a feller dare take at once?"
"Well, I wouldn't take more than three unless you have a lawyer handy to
make your will."
"Why, will they hurt me?"
"They'll bring the answer if you take enough of 'em."
The man eyed the pills dubiously,--"I believe I'll let that kind alone.
What kind is this?"
"These are podophyllin pills."
"Gee, the _name's_ enough to kill a feller."
"Well, Morning-Glories is a good name. If you take too many you'll be
wafted straight to glory in the morning, and the road will be a little
rough in places."
"Confound it, Jake," called the first driver, "don't you take _none_ of
'em. Don't monkey with 'em." But Jake had agreed to trade a melon for
pills. He held out his big hand. "Pour me out some of them Little
Devils. I'll risk 'em."
The doctor emptied the small bottle into Jake's hand, replaced it in the
case and drove off.
"John, why in the world didn't you give him some instructions as to how
to take them?" asked Mary, energetically.
"He didn't ask me to prescribe for him, my dear. He wanted to trade a
watermelon for pills and we traded."
"For pity's sake," said Mary indignantly, "and you're going to let that
man kill himself while you strain at a point of professional etiquette!"
She was gazing back at the unfortunate man.
"Don't you worry, he'll be too much afraid of them to hurt himself with
them," said the doctor, laughing.
"I sincerely hope he will."
As they came in sight of home the doctor, who had been silent for some
time, sighed heavily. "I am thinking of that little child out there. I
tell you, Mary, a case of meningitis makes a man feel his limitations."