Finger Posts on the Way of Life Part 20

"I am a stranger, and you have taken advantage of me. But remember, the gains of dishonesty will never prosper!" and turning upon his heel, left the office.

"Who would be a doctor?" murmured Dr. Elton, forcing the unpleasant thoughts occasioned by the incident from his mind, and endeavouring to fix it upon a case of more than usual interest which he had been called to that day.

A word to the wise is sufficient; it is therefore needless to multiply scenes ill.u.s.trative of the manner in which too many people pay the doctor.

When any one is sick, the doctor is sent for, and the family are all impatient until he arrives. If the case is a bad one, he is looked upon as a ministering angel; the patient's eye brightens when he comes, and all in the house feel more cheerful for hours after. Amid all kinds of weather, at all hours in the day or night, he obeys the summons, and brings all his skill, acquired by long study, and by much laborious practice, to bear upon the disease. But when the sick person gets well, the doctor is forgotten; and when the bill appears, complaint at its amount is almost always made; and too frequently, unless he proceed to legal measures, it is entirely withheld from him. These things ought not so to be. Of course, there are many honourable exceptions; but every physician can exclaim--"Would that their number was greater!"

THE LITTLE BOUND-BOY.

IN a miserable old house, in Commerce street, north of Pratt street Baltimore,--there are fine stores there now--lived a shoemaker, whose wife took a particular fancy to me as a doctor, (I never felt much flattered by the preference,) and would send for me whenever she was sick. I could do no less than attend her ladys.h.i.+p. For a time I tried, by pretty heavy bills, to get rid of the honour; but it wouldn't do. Old Maxwell, the husband, grumbled terribly, but managed to keep out of my debt. He was the reputed master of his house; but I saw enough to satisfy me that if he were master, his wife was mistress of the master.

Maxwell had three or four apprentices, out of whom he managed to get a good deal of work at a small cost. Among these was a little fellow, whose peculiarly delicate appearance often attracted my attention. He seemed out of place among the stout, vulgar-looking boys, who st.i.tched and hammered away from morning until night in their master's dirty shop.

"Where did you get that child?" I asked of the shoemaker one day.

"Whom do you mean? Bill?"

"Yes, the little fellow you call Bill."

"I took him out of pure charity. His mother died about a year and a half ago, and if I hadn't taken him in, he would have gone to the poor house as like as not."

"Who was his mother?"

"She was a poor woman, who sewed for the slopshops for a living--but their pay won't keep soul and body together."

"And so she died?"

"Yes, she died, and I took her child out of pure charity, as I have said."

"Is he bound to you?"

"Oh yes. I never take a boy without having him bound."

"What was his mother's name?"

"I believe they called her Mrs. Miller."

"Did you ever meet with her?"

"No: but my wife knew her very well. She was a strange kind of woman--feeling something above her condition, I should think. She was always low-spirited, my wife says, but never complained about any thing. Bill was her only child, and he used to go for her work, and carry it home when it was finished. She sent him out, too, to buy every thing. I don't believe she would have stirred beyond her own door if she had starved to death."

"Why not?"

"Pride, I reckon."

"Pride? Why should she be proud?"

"Dear knows! Maybe she once belonged to the bettermost cla.s.s of people, and was afraid of meeting some of them in the street."

This brief conversation awoke an interest in my mind for the lad. As I left the shop, I met him at the door with a large bucket of water in his hand--too heavy for his strength. I looked at him more narrowly than I had ever done before. There was a feminine delicacy about every feature of his face, unusual in boys who ordinarily belong to the station he was filling. His eyes, too, had a softer expression, and his brow was broader and fairer. The intentness with which I looked at him, caused him to look at me as intently. What thoughts were awakened in his mind I could not tell. I put my hand upon his head, involuntarily; but did not speak to him; and then pa.s.sed on. I could not help turning to take another glance at the boy. He had turned also. I saw that there were tears in his eyes.

"Poor fellow!" I murmured, "he is out of his place." I did, not go back to speak to him, as I wished afterward that I had done, but kept on my way.

Not having occasion to visit the shoemaker's wife again for some months, this boy did not, during the time, fall under my notice. It was midwinter when I next saw him.

I was preparing to go out one stormy morning in February, when a lad came into my office. He was drenched to the skin by the rain, that was driving fiercely along under the pressure of a strong northeaster, and s.h.i.+vering with cold. His teeth chattered so that it was some time before he could make known his errand. I noticed that he was clad in a much worn suit of common corduroy, the cracks in which, here and there, showed the red skin beneath, and proved clearly enough that this was all that protected him from the bitter cold. One of his shoes gaped widely at the toe; and the other was run down at the heel so badly, that part of his foot and old ragged stocking touched the floor. A common sealskin cap, with the front part nearly torn off, was in his hand. He had removed this from his head on entering, and stood, with his eyes now resting on mine, and now dropping beneath my gaze, waiting for me to ask his errand. I did not recognise him.

"Well, my little man," I said, "is any one sick?"

"Please sir, Mr. Maxwell wants you to come down and see Johnny."

"Mr. Maxwell! Do you live with Mr. Maxwell?"

"Yes, sir."

I now recognized the lad. He was a good deal changed since I last saw him, and changed for the worse.

"What is the matter with Johnny?" I asked.

"I believe he's got the croup."

"Indeed! Is he very sick?"

"Yes, sir. He can't hardly breathe at all, and goes all the time just so--" Imitating the wheezing sound attendant upon constricted respiration.

"Very well, my boy, I will be there in a little while, But, bless me! you will get the croup as well as Johnny, if you go out in such weather as this and have on no warmer clothing than covers you now.

Come up to the stove and warm yourself--you are s.h.i.+vering all over.

Why did not you bring an umbrella?"

"Mr. Maxwell never lets me take the umbreller," said the boy innocently.

"He doesn't? But he sends you out in the rain?"

"Oh yes--always. Sometimes I am wet all day."

"Doesn't it make you sick?"

"I feel bad, and ache all over sometimes after I have been wet; and sometimes my face swells up and pains me so I can't sleep."

"Do not your feet get very cold? Have you no better shoes than these?"

"I've got a better pair of shoes: but they hurt my feet so I can't wear them. Thomas, one of the boys, gave me these old ones."

"Why do they hurt your feet? Are they too small?"