BY- S-WE1R 
 MITCHELL
 
 "i fi 
 
 t 
 
 ue
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 OF A QUACK
 
 AND DO YOU MEA 
 
 T POiSOSEl) ? SAIl) SHE.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 
 A QUACK 
 
 AND 
 
 THE CASE OF 
 GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 BY- 
 
 S. WEIR MITCHELL, M. D., 
 
 LL. D. HARVARD AND EDINBURGH 
 
 ILLUSTRATED BY 
 A.J.KELLER 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THE CENTURY CO. 
 1900
 
 Copyright, 1899, 1900, by 
 THE CENTURY Co. 
 
 THE DEVINNE PRESS.
 
 Stack 
 Annex 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK . . 1 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW . . . 113 
 
 1711416
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 AND DO You MEAN TO SAY HE WAS N T POI 
 SONED ? " SAID SHE Frontispiece 
 
 PAGE 
 
 "I DID N T UNDERSTAND THIS, OR I WOULD 
 
 NOT HAVE COME" 23 
 
 THEN I KNEW IT WAS SERIOUS 39 
 
 "SiT DOWN," HE SAID. WHAT A FOOL You 
 
 ARE!" 53 
 
 "ANY OF You BEEN SCALPED, GENTLEMEN?" . 69 
 HE WARNED ME THAT . . . HE WOULD SHOOT 
 
 ME 83 
 
 THE BIG BIBLE LAY OPEN ON THE FLOOR ... 89 
 I KNEW I WAS THAT BOY . . 97
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 BOTH of the tales in this little volume ap 
 peared originally in the " Atlantic Monthly " 
 as anonymous contributions. I owe to the 
 present owners of that journal permission to 
 use them. " The Autobiography of a Quack" 
 has been recast with large additions. 
 
 " The Case of George Dedlow " was not 
 written with any intention that it should ap 
 pear in print. I lent the manuscript to the 
 Rev. Dr. Furness and forgot it. This gentle 
 man sent it to the Rev. Edward Everett Hale. 
 He, presuming, I fancy, that every one de 
 sired to appear in the u Atlantic," offered it 
 to that journal. To my surprise, soon after 
 wards I received a proof and a check. The 
 story was inserted as a leading article without 
 my name. It was at once accepted by many 
 as the description of a real case. Money was
 
 x INTRODUCTION 
 
 collected in several places to assist the un 
 fortunate man, and benevolent persons went 
 to the " Stump Hospital," in Philadelphia, to 
 see the sufferer and to offer him aid. The 
 spiritual incident at the end of the story was 
 received with joy by the spiritualists as a 
 valuable proof of the truth of their beliefs. 
 
 S. WEIR MITCHELL
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 OF A QUACK
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY 
 OF A QUACK 
 
 [T this present moment of time 
 I am what the doctors call an 
 interesting case, and am to be 
 found in bed No. 10, Ward 
 11, Massachusetts General Hos 
 pital. I am told that I have what is called 
 Addison s disease, and that it is this pleasing 
 malady which causes me to be covered with 
 large blotches of a dark mulatto tint. How 
 ever, it is a rather grim subject to joke about, 
 because, if I believed the doctor who comes 
 around every day, and thumps me, and listens 
 to my chest with as much pleasure as if I 
 were music all through I say, if I really 
 believed him, I should suppose I was going to 
 die. The fact is, I don t believe him at all. 
 Some of these days I shall take a turn and 
 get about again ; but meanwhile it is rather 
 i l
 
 2 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 dull for a stirring, active person like me to 
 have to lie still and watch myself getting big 
 brown and yellow spots all over me, like a 
 map that has taken to growing. 
 
 The man on my right has consumption 
 smells of cod-liver oil, and coughs all 
 night. The man on my left is a down-easter 
 with a liver which has struck work ; looks 
 like a human pumpkin ; and how he contrives 
 to whittle jackstraws all day, and eat as he 
 does, I can t understand. I have tried reading 
 and tried whittling, but they don t either of 
 them satisfy me, so that yesterday I concluded 
 to ask the doctor if he could n t suggest some 
 other amusement. 
 
 I waited until he had gone through the 
 ward, and then seized my chance, and asked 
 him to stop a moment. 
 
 "Well, my man," said he, "what do you 
 want?" 
 
 I thought him rather disrespectful, but I 
 replied, " Something to do, doctor." 
 
 He thought a little, and then said : "I 11 
 tell you what to do. I think if you were to 
 write out a plain account of your life it 
 would be pretty well worth reading. If half 
 of what you told me last week be true, you 
 must be about as clever a seamp as there is
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 3 
 
 to be met with. I suppose you would just 
 as lief put it on paper as talk it." 
 
 " Pretty nearly," said I. " I think I will 
 try it, doctor." 
 
 After he left I lay awhile thinking over 
 the matter. I knew well that I was what the 
 world calls a scamp, and I knew also that I 
 had got little good out of the fact. If a man 
 is what people call virtuous, and fails in life, 
 he gets credit at least for the virtue; but 
 when a man is a is well, one of liberal 
 views, and breaks down, somehow or other 
 people don t credit him with even the intel 
 ligence he has put into the business. This 
 I call hard. If I did not recall with satisfac 
 tion the energy and skill with which I did 
 my work, I should be nothing but disgusted 
 at the melancholy spectacle of my failure. 
 I suppose that I shall at least find occupa 
 tion in reviewing all this, and I think, there 
 fore, for my own satisfaction, I shall try to 
 amuse my convalescence by writing a plain, 
 straightforward account of the life I have 
 led, and the various devices by which I have 
 sought to get my share of the money of my 
 countrymen. It does appear to me that 1 
 have had no end of bad luck. 
 
 As no one will ever see these pages, I find it
 
 4 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 pleasant to recall for my own satisfaction the 
 fact that I am really a very remarkable man. 
 I am, or rather I was, very good-looking, five 
 feet eleven, with a lot of curly red hair, and 
 blue eyes. I am left-handed, which is another 
 unusual thing. My hands have often been no 
 ticed. I get them from my mother, who was 
 a Fishbourne, and a lady. As for my father, 
 he was rather common. He was a little man, 
 red and round like an apple, but very strong, 
 for a reason I shall come to presently. The 
 family must have had a pious liking for Bible 
 names, because he was called Zebulon, my 
 sister Peninnah, and I Ezra, which is not 
 a name for a gentleman. At one time I 
 thought of changing it, but I got over it 
 by signing myself "E. Sandcraft." 
 
 "Where my father was born I do not know, 
 except that it was somewhere in New Jersey, 
 for I remember that he was once angry be 
 cause a man called him a Jersey Spaniard. 
 I am not much concerned to write about my 
 people, because I soon got above their level ; 
 and as to my mother, she died when I was 
 an infant. I get my manners, which are 
 rather remarkable, from her. 
 
 My aunt, Rachel Sandcraft, who kept 
 house for us, was a queer character. She
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 5 
 
 had a snug little property, about seven thou 
 sand dollars. An old aunt left her the money 
 because she was stone-deaf. As this defect 
 came upon her after she grew up, she still 
 kept her voice. This woman was the cause 
 of some of my ill luck in life, and I hope she 
 is uncomfortable, wherever she is. I think 
 with satisfaction that I helped to make her 
 life uneasy when I was young, and worse 
 later on. She gave away to the idle poor 
 some of her small income, and hid the rest, 
 like a magpie, in her Bible or rolled in her 
 stockings, or in even queerer places. The 
 worst of her was that she could tell what 
 people said by looking at their lips ; this I 
 hated. But as I grew and became intelligent, 
 her ways of hiding her money proved useful, 
 to me at least. As to Peninnah, she was 
 nothing special until she suddenly bloomed 
 out into a rather stout, pretty girl, took to 
 ribbons, and liked what she called " keeping 
 company." She ran errands for every one, 
 waited on my aunt, and thought I was a 
 wonderful person as indeed I was. I never 
 could understand her fondness for helping 
 everybody. A fellow has got himself to 
 think about, and that is quite enough. I 
 was told pretty often that I was the most
 
 6 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 selfish boy alive. But, then, I ain an un 
 usual person, and there are several names 
 for things. 
 
 My father kept a small shop for the sale 
 of legal stationery and the like, on Fifth 
 street north of Chestnut. But his chief in 
 terest in life lay in the bell-ringing of 
 Christ Church. He was leader, or No. 1, and 
 the whole business was in the hands of a 
 kind of guild which is nearly as old as the 
 church. I used to hear more of it than I 
 liked, because my father talked of nothing 
 else. But I do not mean to bore myself 
 writing of bells. I heard too much about 
 "back shake," " raising in peal," "scales," 
 and " touches," and the Lord knows what. 
 
 My earliest remembrance is of sitting on 
 my father s shoulder when he led off the 
 ringers. He was very strong, as I said, by 
 reason of this exercise. With one foot 
 caught in a loop of leather nailed to the 
 floor, he would begin to pull No. 1, and by 
 and by the whole peal would be swinging, 
 and he going up and down, to my joy ; I used 
 to feel as if it was I that was making the 
 great noise that rang out all over the town. 
 My familiar acquaintance with the old church 
 and its lumber-rooms, where were stored the
 
 THE AUTOBIOGKAPHY OF A QUACK 7 
 
 dusty arms of William and Mary and George 
 II., proved of use in my later days. 
 
 My father had a strong belief in my tal 
 ents, and I do not think he was mistaken. 
 As he was quite uneducated, he determined 
 that I should not be. He had saved enough 
 to send me to Princeton College, and when I 
 was about fifteen I was set free from the 
 public schools. I never liked them. The last 
 I was at was the high school. As I had to 
 come down-town to get home, we used to 
 meet on Arch street the boys from the 
 grammar-school of the university, and there 
 were fights every week. In winter these 
 were most frequent, because of the snow 
 balling. A fellow had to take his share or be 
 marked as a deserter. I never saw any per 
 sonal good to be had out of a fight, but it 
 was better to fight than to be cobbed. That 
 means that two fellows hold you, and the 
 other fellows kick you with their bent knees. 
 It hurts. 
 
 I find just here that I am describing a 
 thing as if I were writing for some other 
 people to see. I may as well go on that way. 
 After all, a man never can quite stand off 
 and look at himself as if he was the only 
 person concerned. He must have an audi-
 
 8 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 ence, or make believe to have one, even if it 
 is only himself. Nor, on the whole, should I 
 be unwilling, if it were safe, to let people 
 see how great ability may be defeated by the 
 crankiness of fortune. 
 
 I may add here that a stone inside of a 
 snowball discourages the fellow it hits. But 
 neither our fellows nor the grammar-school 
 used stones in snowballs. I rather liked it. 
 If we had a row in the springtime we all 
 threw stones, and here was one of those bits 
 of stupid custom no man can understand ; 
 because really a stone outside of a snowball 
 is much more serious than if it is merci 
 fully padded with snow. I felt it to be a 
 rise in life when I got out of the society of the 
 common boys who attended the high school. 
 
 When I was there a man by the name of 
 Dallas Bache was the head master. He had a 
 way of letting the boys attend to what he called 
 the character of the school. Once I had to 
 lie to him about taking another boy s ball. 
 He told my class that I had denied the charge, 
 and that he always took it for granted that a 
 boy spoke the truth. He knew well enough 
 what would happen. It did. After that I 
 was careful. 
 
 Princeton was then a little college, not ex-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 9 
 
 pensive, which was very well, as my father 
 had some difficulty to provide even the mod 
 erate amount needed. 
 
 I soon found that if I was to associate with 
 the upper set of young men I needed money. 
 For some time I waited in vain. But in my 
 second year I discovered a small gold-mine, on 
 which I drew with a moderation which shows 
 even thus early the strength of my character. 
 
 I used to go home once a month for a Sun 
 day visit, and on these occasions I was often 
 able to remove from my aunt s big Bible a 
 five- or ten-dollar note, which otherwise would 
 have been long useless. 
 
 Now and then I utilized my opportunities 
 at Princeton. I very much desired certain 
 things like well-made clothes, and for these 
 I had to run in debt to a tailor. When he 
 wanted pay, and threatened to send the bill 
 to my father, I borrowed from two or three 
 young Southerners; but at last, when they 
 became hard up, my aunt s uncounted hoard 
 proved a last resource, or some rare chance 
 in a neighboring room helped me out. I 
 never did look on this method as of perma 
 nent usefulness, and it was only the tem 
 porary folly of youth. 
 
 Whatever else the pirate necessity appro-
 
 10 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 priated, I took no large amount of education, 
 although I was fond of reading, and espe 
 cially of novels, which are, I think, very in 
 structive to the young, especially the novels 
 of Smollett and Fielding. 
 
 There is, however, little need to dwell on 
 this part of my life. College students in 
 those days were only boys, and boys are very 
 strange animals. They have instincts. They 
 somehow get to know if a fellow does not 
 relate facts as they took place. I like to put 
 it that way, because, after all, the mode of 
 putting things is only one of the forms of 
 self-defense, and is less silly than the ordi 
 nary wriggling methods which boys employ, 
 and which are generally useless. I was rather 
 given to telling large stories just for the fun 
 of it, and, I think, told them well. But some 
 how I got the reputation of not being strictly 
 definite, and when it was meant to indicate 
 this belief they had an ill-mannered way of 
 informing you. This consisted in two or 
 three fellows standing up and shuffling noisily 
 with their feet on the floor. When first I 
 heard this I asked innocently what it meant, 
 and was told it was the noise of the bearers 
 feet coming to take away Ananias. This was 
 considered a fine joke.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 11 
 
 During my junior year I became unpopu 
 lar, and as I was very cautious, I cannot see 
 why. At last, being hard up, I got to be 
 foolishly reckless. But why dwell on the 
 failures of immaturity ? 
 
 The causes which led to my leaving Nas 
 sau Hall were not, after all, the mischievous 
 outbreaks in which college lads indulge. In 
 deed, I have never been guilty of any of 
 those pieces of wanton wickedness which 
 injure the feelings of others while they lead 
 to no useful result. When I left to return 
 home, I set myself seriously to reflect upon 
 the necessity of greater care in following out 
 my inclinations, and from that time forward 
 I have steadily avoided, whenever it was pos 
 sible, the vulgar vice of directly possessing 
 myself of objects to which I could show no 
 legal title. My father was indignant at the 
 results of my college career ; and, according 
 to my aunt, his shame and sorrow had some 
 effect in shortening his life. My sister be 
 lieved my account of the matter. It ended 
 in my being used for a year as an assistant 
 in the shop, and in being taught to ring bells 
 a fine exercise, but not proper work for a 
 man of refinement. My father died while 
 training his bell-ringers in the Oxford triple
 
 12 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 bob broke a blood-vessel somewhere. How 
 I could have caused that I do not see. 
 
 I was now about nineteen years old, and, 
 as I remember, a middle-sized, well-built 
 young fellow, with large eyes, a slight mus 
 tache, and, I have been told, with very good 
 manners and a somewhat humorous turn. 
 Besides these advantages, my guardian held 
 in trust for me about two thousand dollars. 
 After some consultation between us, it was 
 resolved that I should study medicine. This 
 conclusion was reached nine years before the 
 Rebellion broke out, and after we had set 
 tled, for the sake of economy, in Woodbury, 
 New Jersey. From this time I saw very little 
 of my deaf aunt or of Peninnah. I was reso 
 lute to rise in the world, and not to be weighted 
 by relatives who were without my tastes and 
 my manners. 
 
 I set out for Philadelphia, with many good 
 counsels from my aunt and guardian. I look 
 back upon this period as a turning-point of 
 my life. I had seen enough of the world 
 already to know that if you can succeed 
 without exciting suspicion, it is by far the 
 pleasantest way; and I really believe that 
 if I had not been endowed with so fatal a 
 liking for all the good things of life I might
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 13 
 
 have lived along as reputably as most men. 
 This, however, is, and always has been, my 
 difficulty, and I suppose that I am not re 
 sponsible for the incidents to which it gave 
 rise. Most men have some ties in life, but I 
 have said I had none which held me. Penin- 
 nah cried a good deal when we parted, and 
 this, I think, as I was still young, had a very 
 good effect in strengthening my resolution to 
 do nothing which could get me into trouble. 
 The janitor of the college to which I went 
 directed me to a boarding-house, where I en 
 gaged a small third-story room, which I after 
 wards shared with Mr. Chaucer of Georgia. 
 He pronounced it, as I remember, " Jawjah." 
 In this very remarkable abode I spent the 
 next two winters, and finally graduated, 
 along with two hundred more, at the close 
 of my two years of study. I should previ 
 ously have been one year in a physician s 
 office as a student, but this regulation was 
 very easily evaded. As to my studies, the 
 less said the better. I attended the quizzes, 
 as they call them, pretty closely, and, being 
 of a quick and retentive memory, was thus 
 enabled to dispense with some of the six or 
 seven lectures a day which duller men found 
 it necessary to follow.
 
 14 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 Dissecting struck me as a rather nasty 
 business for a gentleman, and on this ac 
 count I did just as little as was absolutely 
 essential. In fact, if a man took his tickets 
 and paid the dissection fees, nobody troubled 
 himself as to whether or not he did any more 
 than this. A like evil existed at the gradu 
 ation : whether you squeezed through or 
 passed with credit was a thing which was 
 not made public, so that I had absolutely 
 nothing to stimulate my ambition. I am told 
 that it is all very different to-day. 
 
 The astonishment with which I learned of 
 my success was shared by the numerous 
 Southern gentlemen who darkened the floors 
 and perfumed with tobacco the rooms of our 
 boarding-house. In my companions, during 
 the time of my studies so called, as in other 
 matters of life, I was somewhat unfortunate. 
 All of them were Southern gentlemen, with 
 more money than I had. Many of them car 
 ried great sticks, usually sword-canes, and 
 some bowie-knives or pistols ; also, they de 
 lighted in swallow-tailed coats, long hair, 
 broad-brimmed felt hats, and very tight 
 boots. I often think of these, gentlemen 
 with affectionate interest, and wonder how 
 many are lying under the wheat-fields of
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 15 
 
 Virginia. One could see them any day saun 
 tering along with their arms over their com 
 panions shoulders, splendidly indifferent to 
 the ways of the people about them. They 
 hated the " Nawth" and cursed the Yankees, 
 and honestly believed that the leanest of 
 them was a match for any half a dozen of 
 the bulkiest of Northerners. I must also do 
 them the justice to say that they were quite 
 as ready to fight as to brag, which, by the 
 way, is no meager statement. With these 
 gentry for whom I retain a respect which 
 filled me with regret at the recent course of 
 events I spent a good deal of my large 
 leisure. The more studious of both sections 
 called us a hard crowd. What we did, or 
 how we did it, little concerns me here, except 
 that, owing to my esteem for chivalric blood 
 and breeding, I was led into many practices 
 and excesses which cost my guardian and 
 myself a good deal of money. At the close 
 of my career as a student I found myself aged 
 twenty-one years, and the owner of some 
 seven hundred dollars the rest of my small 
 estate having disappeared variously within 
 the last two years. After my friends had 
 gone to their homes in the South I began to 
 look about me for an office, and finally settled
 
 16 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 upon very good rooms in one of the down 
 town localities of the Quaker City. I am not 
 specific as to the number and street, for 
 reasons which may hereafter appear. I liked 
 the situation on various accounts. It had 
 been occupied by a doctor; the terms were 
 reasonable ; and it lay on the skirts of a 
 good neighborhood, while below it lived a 
 motley population, among which I expected 
 to get my first patients and such fees as were 
 to be had. Into this new home I moved my 
 medical text-books, a few bones, and myself. 
 Also, I displayed in the window a fresh sign, 
 upon which was distinctly to be read : 
 
 DE. E. SANDCRAPT. 
 
 Office hours, 8 to 9 A. M. ? 7 to 9 p. M. 
 
 I felt now that I had done my fair share 
 toward attaining a virtuous subsistence, and 
 so I waited tranquilly, and without undue 
 enthusiasm, to see the rest of the world do 
 its part in the matter. Meanwhile I read up 
 on all sorts of imaginable cases, stayed at 
 home all through my office hours, and at in 
 tervals explored the strange section of the 
 town which lay to the south of my office. I 
 do not suppose there is anything like it else-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 17 
 
 where. It was then filled with grog-shops, 
 brothels, slop-shops, and low lodging-houses. 
 You could dine for a penny on soup made 
 from the refuse meats of the rich, gathered 
 at back gates by a horde of half-naked chil 
 dren, who all told varieties of one woeful 
 tale. Here, too, you could be drunk for five 
 cents, and be lodged for three, with men, 
 women, and children of all colors lying about 
 you. It was this hideous mixture of black 
 and white and yellow wretchedness which 
 made the place so peculiar. The blacks pre 
 dominated, and had mostly that swollen, 
 reddish, dark skin, the sign in this race of 
 habitual drunkenness. Of course only the 
 lowest whites were here rag-pickers, pawn 
 brokers, old-clothes men, thieves, and the 
 like. All of this, as it came before me, I 
 viewed with mingled disgust and philosophy. 
 I hated filth, but I understood that society 
 has to stand on somebody, and I was only 
 glad that I was not one of the undermost 
 and worst-squeezed bricks. 
 
 I can hardly believe that I waited a month 
 without having been called upon by a single 
 patient. At last a policeman on our beat 
 brought me a fancy man with a dog-bite. 
 This patient recommended me to his brother,
 
 18 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 the keeper of a small pawnbroking-shop, and 
 by very slow degrees I began to get stray 
 patients who were too poor to indulge in up 
 town doctors. I found the police very useful 
 acquaintances; and, by a drink or a cigar 
 now and then, I got most of the cases of cut 
 heads and the like at the next station-house. 
 These, however, were the aristocrats of my 
 practice ; the bulk of my patients were soap- 
 fat men, rag-pickers, oystermen, hose-house 
 bummers, and worse, with other and name 
 less trades, men and women, white, black, 
 or mulatto. How they got the levies, fips, 
 and quarters with which I was reluctantly 
 paid, I do not know; that, indeed, was none 
 of my business. They expected to pay, 
 and they came to me in preference to the 
 dispensary doctor, two or three squares away, 
 who seemed to me to spend most of his days 
 in the lanes and alleys about us. Of course 
 he received no pay except experience, since 
 the dispensaries in the Quaker City, as a 
 rule, do not give salaries to their doctors; 
 and the vilest of the poor prefer a "pay 
 doctor " to one of these disinterested gentle 
 men, who cannot be expected to give their 
 best brains for nothing, when at everybody s 
 beck and call. I am told, indeed I know,
 
 that most young doctors do a large amount 
 of poor practice, as it is called; but, for my 
 own part, I think it better for both parties 
 when the doctor insists upon some compen 
 sation being made to him. This has been 
 usually my own custom, and I have not found 
 reason to regret it. 
 
 Notwithstanding my strict attention to my 
 own interests, I have been rather sorely dealt 
 with by fate upon several occasions, where, 
 so far as I could see, I was vigilantly doing 
 everything in my power to keep myself out 
 of trouble or danger. I may as well relate 
 one of them, merely to illustrate of how little 
 value a man s intellect may be when fate and 
 the prejudices of the mass of men are against 
 him. 
 
 One evening, late, I myself answered a ring 
 at the bell, and found a small black boy on 
 the steps, a shoeless, hatless little wretch, 
 curled darkness for hair, and teeth like new 
 tombstones. It was pretty cold, and he was 
 relieving his feet by standing first on one 
 and then on the other. He did not wait for 
 me to speak. 
 
 " Hi, sah, Missey Barker she say to come 
 quick away, sah, to Numbah 709 Bedford 
 street."
 
 20 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 The locality did not look like pay, but 
 it is hard to say in this quarter, because 
 sometimes you found a well-to-do " brandy- 
 snifter " (local for gin-shop) or a hard-working 
 "leather- jeweler" (ditto for shoemaker), with 
 next door, in a house better or worse, dozens 
 of human rats for whom every police trap in 
 the city was constantly set. 
 
 With a doubt in my mind as to whether I 
 should find a good patient or some dirty nig 
 ger, I sought the place to which I had been 
 directed. I did not like its looks; but I 
 blundered up an alley and into a back room, 
 where I fell over somebody, and was cursed 
 and told to lie down and keep easy, or some 
 body, meaning the man stumbled over, would 
 make me. At last I lit on a staircase which 
 led into the alley, and, after much useless in 
 quiry, got as high as the garret. People here 
 about did not know one another, or did not 
 want to know, so that it was of little avail 
 to ask questions. At length I saw a light 
 through the cracks in the attic door, and 
 walked in. To my amazement, the first per 
 son I saw was a woman of about thirty-five, 
 in pearl-gray Quaker dress one of your 
 quiet, good-looking people. She was seated 
 on a stool beside a straw mattress upon
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 21 
 
 which lay a black woman. There were three 
 others crowded close around a small stove, 
 which was red-hot an unusual spectacle in 
 this street. Altogether a most nasty den. 
 
 As I came in, the little Quaker woman got 
 up and said : " I took the liberty of sending 
 for thee to look at this poor woman. I am 
 afraid she has the smallpox. Will thee be so 
 kind as to look at her ? " And with this she 
 held down the candle toward the bed. 
 
 Good gracious ! " I said hastily, seeing 
 how the creature was speckled, "I did n t 
 understand this, or I would not have come. 
 I have important cases which I cannot sub 
 ject to the risk of contagion. Best let her 
 alone, miss," I added, "or send her to the 
 smallpox hospital." 
 
 Upon my word, I was astonished at the 
 little w r oman s indignation. She said just 
 those things which make you feel as if some 
 body had been calling you names or kicking 
 you Was I really a doctor ? and so on. It 
 did not gain by being put in the ungram- 
 matical tongue of Quakers. However, I 
 never did fancy smallpox, and what could a 
 fellow get by doctoring wretches like these ! 
 So I held my tongue and went away. About 
 a week afterwards I met Evans, the dispen-
 
 22 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 sary man, a very common fellow, who was 
 said to be frank. 
 
 " Helloa ! " says he. " Doctor, you made a 
 nice mistake about that darky at No. 709 
 Bedford street the other night. She had 
 nothing but measles, after all." 
 
 " Of course I knew," said I, laughing ; " but 
 you don t think I was going in for dispensary 
 trash, do you ? " 
 
 " I should think not," said Evans. 
 
 I learned afterwards that this Miss Barker 
 had taken an absurd fancy to the man be 
 cause he had doctored the darky and would 
 not let the Quakeress pay him. The end 
 was, when I wanted to get a vacancy in the 
 Southwark Dispensary, where they do pay 
 the doctors, Miss Barker was malignant 
 enough to take advantage of my oversight 
 by telling the whole story to the board ; so 
 that Evans got in, and I was beaten. 
 
 You may be pretty sure that I found rather 
 slow the kind of practice I have described, 
 and began to look about for chances of bet 
 tering myself. In this sort of locality rather 
 risky cases turned up now and then ; and as 
 soon as I got to be known as a reliable man, 
 I began to get the peculiar sort of practice I 
 wanted. Notwithstanding all my efforts, I
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 25 
 
 found myself, at the close of three years, with 
 all my means spent, and just able to live 
 meagerly from hand to mouth, which by no 
 means suited a man of my refined tastes. 
 
 Once or twice I paid a visit to my aunt, 
 and was able to secure moderate aid by over 
 hauling her concealed hoardings. But as to 
 these changes of property I was careful, and 
 did not venture to secure the large amount I 
 needed. As to the Bible, it was at this time 
 hidden, and I judged it, therefore, to be her 
 chief place of deposit. Banks she utterly 
 distrusted. 
 
 Six months went by, and I was worse off 
 than ever two months in arrears of rent, 
 and numerous other debts to cigar-shops and 
 liquor-dealers. Now and then some good job, 
 such as a burglar with a cut head, helped me 
 for a while; but, on the whole, I was like 
 Slider Downeyhylle in Neal s " Charcoal 
 Sketches," and kept going " downer and 
 downer " the more I tried not to. Something 
 had to be done. 
 
 It occurred to me, about this time, that if 
 I moved into a more genteel locality I might 
 get a better class of patients, and yet keep 
 the best of those I now had. To do this it 
 was necessary to pay my rent, and the more
 
 26 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 so because I was in a fair way to have no 
 house at all over my head. But here fortune 
 interposed. I was caught in a heavy rain 
 storm on Seventh street, and ran to catch an 
 omnibus. As I pulled open the door I saw 
 behind me the Quaker woman, Miss Barker. 
 I laughed and jumped in. She had to run a 
 little before the bus again stopped. She got 
 pretty wet. An old man in the corner, who 
 seemed in the way of taking charge of other 
 people s manners, said to me : " Young man 
 you ought to be ashamed to get in before the 
 lady, and in this pour, too ! " 
 
 I said calmly, " But you got in before her." 
 He made no reply to this obvious fact, as 
 he might have been in the bus a half -hour. 
 A large, well-dressed man near by said, with a 
 laugh, " Rather neat, that," and, turning, tried 
 to pull up a window-sash. In the effort 
 something happened, and he broke the glass, 
 cutting his hand in half a dozen places. 
 While he was using several quite profane 
 phrases, I caught his hand and said, u I am a 
 surgeon," and tied my handkerchief around 
 the bleeding palm. 
 
 The guardian of manners said, " I hope you 
 are not much hurt, but there was no reason 
 why you should swear."
 
 THE AUTOBIOGKAPHY OF A QUACK 27 
 
 On this my patient said, "Go to ," 
 
 which silenced the monitor. 
 
 I explained to the wounded man that the 
 cuts should be looked after at once. The 
 matter was arranged by our leaving the bus, 
 and, as the rain had let up, walking to his 
 house. This was a large and quite luxurious 
 dwelling on Fourth street. There I cared for 
 his wounds, which, as I had informed him, 
 required immediate attenion. It was at this 
 time summer, and his wife and niece, the 
 only other members of his family, were ab 
 sent. On my second visit I made believe 
 to remove some splinters of glass which I 
 brought with me. He said they showed how 
 shamefully thin was that omnibus window- 
 pane. To my surprise, my patient, at the 
 end of the month, for one wound was long 
 in healing, presented me with one hundred 
 dollars. This paid my small rental, and as 
 Mr. Poynter allowed me to refer to him, I 
 was able to get a better office and bedroom on 
 Spruce street. I saw no more of my patient 
 until winter, although I learned that he was 
 a stock-broker, not in the very best repute, 
 but of a well-Jmown family. 
 
 Meanwhile my move had been of small use. 
 I was wise enough, however, to keep up my
 
 28 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 connection with my former clients, and con 
 trived to live. It was no more than that. 
 One day in December I was overjoyed to see 
 Mr. Poynter enter. He was a fat man, very 
 pale, and never, to my remembrance, without a 
 permanent smile. He had very civil ways, and 
 now at once I saw that he wanted something. 
 
 I hated the way that man saw through me. 
 He went on without hesitation, taking me 
 for granted. He began by saying he had 
 confidence in my judgment, and when a man 
 says that you had better look out. He said 
 he had a niece who lived with him, a brother s 
 child ; that she was out of health and ought 
 not to marry, which was what she meant to 
 do. She was scared about her health, be 
 cause she had a cough, and had lost a brother 
 of consumption. I soon came to understand 
 that, for reasons unknown to me, my friend 
 did not -wish his niece to marry. His wife, 
 he also informed me, was troubled as to the 
 niece s health. Now, he said, he wished to 
 consult me as to what he should do. I sus 
 pected at once that he had not told me all. 
 
 I have often wondered at the skill with 
 which I managed this rather delicate mat 
 ter. I knew I was not well enough known 
 to be of direct use, and was also too young
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 29 
 
 to have much weight. I advised him to get 
 Professor C. 
 
 Then my friend shook his head. He said 
 in reply, " But suppose, doctor, he says there 
 is nothing wrong with the girl ? " 
 
 Then I began to understand him. 
 
 " Oh," I said, " you get a confidential writ 
 ten opinion from him. You can make it what 
 you please when you tell her." 
 
 He said no. It would be best for me to 
 ask the professor to see Miss Poynter ; might 
 mention my youth, and so on, as a reason. I 
 was to get his opinion in writing. 
 
 "Well? "said I. 
 
 " After that I want you to write me a joint 
 opinion to meet the case all the needs of 
 the case, you see." 
 
 I saw, but hesitated as to how much would 
 make it worth while to pull his hot chestnuts 
 out of the fire one never knows how hot 
 the chestnuts are. 
 
 Then he said, " Ever take a chance in 
 stocks ? " 
 
 I said, " No." 
 
 He said that he would lend me a little 
 money and see what he could do with it. And 
 here was his receipt from me for one thou 
 sand dollars, and here, too, was my order to
 
 30 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 buy shares of P. T. Y. Would I please to 
 sign it ? I did. 
 
 I was to call in two days at his house, and 
 meantime I could think it over. It seemed 
 to me a pretty weak plan. Suppose the 
 young woman well, supposing is awfully 
 destructive of enterprise; and as for me, I 
 had only to misunderstand the professor s 
 opinion. I went to the house, and talked to 
 Mr. Poynter about his gout. Then Mrs. Poyn- 
 ter came in, and began to lament her niece s 
 declining health. After that I saw Miss 
 Poynter. There is a kind of innocent-look 
 ing woman who know r s no more of the world 
 than a young chicken, and is choke-full of 
 emotions. I saw it would be easy to frighten 
 her* There are some instruments anybody 
 can get any tune they like out of. I was 
 very grave, and advised her to see the pro 
 fessor. And would I write to Lok him, said 
 Mr. Poynter. I said I would. 
 
 As I went out Mr. Poynter remarked: 
 " You will clear some four hundred easy. 
 Write to the professor. Bring my receipt 
 to the office next week, and we will settle." 
 
 We settled. I tore up his receipt and gave 
 him one for fifteen hundred dollars, and re 
 ceived in notes five hundred dollars.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 31 
 
 In a day or so I had a note from the pro 
 fessor stating that Miss Poynter was in no 
 peril ; that she was, as he thought, worried, 
 and had only a mild bronchial trouble. He 
 advised me to do so-and-so, and had ventured 
 to reassure my young patient. Now, this 
 was a little more than I wanted. However, 
 I wrote Mr. Poynter that the prof essor thought 
 she had bronchitis, that in her case tubercle 
 would be very apt to follow, and that at pres 
 ent, and until she was safe, we considered 
 marriage undesirable. 
 
 Mr. Poynter said it might have been put 
 stronger, but he would make it do. He made 
 it. The first effect was an attack of hyster 
 ics. The final result was that she eloped with 
 her lover, because if she was to die, as she 
 wrote her aunt, she wished to die in her hus 
 band s arms. Human nature plus hysteria 
 will defy all knowledge of character. This 
 was what our old professor of practice used 
 to say. 
 
 Mr. Poynter had now to account for a 
 large trust estate which had somehow dwin 
 dled. Unhappily, princes are not the only 
 people in whom you must not put your trust. 
 As to myself, Professor L. somehow got to 
 know the facts, and cut me dead. It was
 
 32 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 unpleasant, but I had my five hundred dol 
 lars, and I needed them. I do not see how 
 I could have been more careful. 
 
 After this things got worse. Mr. Poynter 
 broke, and did not even pay my last bill. I 
 had to accept several rather doubtful cases, 
 and once a policeman I knew advised me 
 that I had better be on my guard. 
 
 But, really, so long as I adhered to the 
 common code of my profession I was in dan 
 ger of going without my dinner. 
 
 Just as I was at my worst and in despair 
 something always turned up, but it was sure 
 to be risky ; and now my aunt refused to see 
 me, and Peninnah wrote me goody-goody 
 letters, and said Aunt Rachel had been un 
 able to find certain bank-notes she had hid 
 den, and vowed I had taken them. This Pe 
 ninnah did not think possible. I agreed 
 with her. The notes were found somewhat 
 later by Peninnah in the toes of a pair of my 
 aunt s old slippers. Of course I wrote an 
 indignant letter. My aunt declared that 
 Peninnah had stolen the notes, and restored 
 them when they were missed. Poor Penin 
 nah ! This did not seem to me very likely, 
 but Peninnah did love fine clothes. 
 
 One night, as I was debating with myself
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 33 
 
 as to how I was to improve my position, I 
 heard a knock on my shutter, and, going to 
 the door, let in a broad-shouldered man with 
 a whisky face and a great hooked nose. He 
 wore a heavy black beard and mustache, and 
 looked like the wolf in the pictures of Red 
 Riding-hood which I had seen as a child. 
 
 " Your name s Sandcraf t ? " said the man. 
 
 "Yes; that 7 s my name Dr. Sandcraf t." 
 
 As he sat down he shook the snow over 
 everything, and said coolly : " Set down, doc; 
 I want to talk with you." 
 
 " What can I do for you ? " said I. 
 
 The man looked around the room rather 
 scornfully, at the same time throwing back 
 his coat and displaying a red neckerchief 
 and a huge garnet pin. " Guess you re not 
 overly rich," he said. 
 
 "Not especially," said I. "What s that 
 your business ? " 
 
 He did not answer, but merely said, 
 " Know Simon Stagers ? " 
 
 " Can t say I do," said I, cautiously. Simon 
 was a burglar who had blown off two fingers 
 when mining a safe. I had attended him 
 while he was hiding. 
 
 " Can t say you do. Well, you can lie, and 
 no mistake. Come, now, doc. Simon says
 
 34 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 you re safe, and I want to have a leetle 
 plain talk with you." 
 
 With this he laid ten gold eagles on the 
 table. I put out my hand instinctively. 
 
 "Let em alone," cried the man, sharply. 
 " They re easy earned, and ten more like em." 
 
 "For doing what?" I said. 
 
 The man paused a moment, and looked 
 around him ; next he stared at me, and loos 
 ened his cravat with a hasty pull. " You re 
 the coroner," said he. 
 
 " I ! What do you mean ? " 
 
 " Yes, you re the coroner ; don t you un 
 derstand ? " and so saying, he shoved the gold 
 pieces toward me. 
 
 " Very good," said I ; " we will suppose I m 
 the coroner. What next ? " 
 
 " And being the coroner/ said he, " you get 
 this note, which requests you to call at No. 9 
 Blank street to examine the body of a young 
 man which is supposed only supposed, you 
 see to have well, to have died under sus 
 picious circumstances." 
 
 " Go on," said I. 
 
 " No," he returned ; " not till I know how 
 you like it. Stagers and another knows it ; 
 and it would n t be very safe for you to split, 
 besides not making nothing out of it. But
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 35 
 
 what I say is this, Do you like the business 
 of coroner ? " 
 
 I did not like it ; but just then two hun 
 dred in gold was life to me, so I said : " Let 
 me hear the whole of it first. I am safe." 
 
 "That s square enough/ said the man. 
 "My wife s got" correcting himself with 
 a shivery shrug "my wife had a brother 
 that took to cutting up rough because when 
 I d been up too late I handled her a leetle 
 hard now and again. 
 
 " Luckily he fell sick with typhoid just 
 then you see, he lived with us. When he 
 got better I guessed he d drop all that ; but 
 somehow he was worse than ever clean off 
 his head, and strong as an ox. My wife said 
 to put him away in an asylum. I did n t 
 think that would do. At last he tried to get 
 out. He was going to see the police about 
 well the thing was awful serious, and my 
 wife carrying on like mad, and wanting doc 
 tors. I had no mind to run, and something 
 had got to be done. So Simon Stagers and 
 I talked it over. The end of it was, he took 
 worse of a sudden, and got so he did n t know 
 nothing. Then I rushed for a doctor. He 
 said it was a perforation, and there ought to 
 have been a doctor when he was first took sick.
 
 36 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 "Well, the man died, and as I kept about 
 tlie house, my wife had no chance to talk. 
 The doctor fussed a bit, but at last he gave a 
 certificate. I thought we were done with it. 
 But my wife she writes a note and gives it to 
 a boy in the alley to put in the post. We 
 suspicioned her, and Stagers was on the 
 watch. After the boy got away a bit, Simon 
 bribed him with a quarter to give him the 
 note, which was n t no less than a request to 
 the coroner to come to the house to-morrow 
 and make an examination, as foul play was 
 suspected and poison." 
 
 When the man quit talking he glared at 
 me. I sat still. I was cold all over. I was 
 afraid to go on, and afraid to go back, besides 
 which, I did not doubt that there was a good 
 deal of money in the case. 
 
 " Of course," said I, " it s nonsense ; only 
 I suppose you don t want the officers about, 
 and a fuss, and that sort of thing." 
 
 " Exactly," said my friend. "It s all bosh 
 about poison. You re the coroner. You 
 take this note and come to my house. Says 
 you: Mrs. File, are you the w r oman that 
 wrote this note ? Because in that case I must 
 examine the body. " 
 
 11 1 see," said I ; " she need n t know who I
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 37 
 
 am, or anything else ; but if I tell her it s all 
 right, do you think she won t want to know 
 why there is n t a jury, and so on ? " 
 
 " Bless you," said the man, " the girl is n t 
 over seventeen, and does n t know no more 
 than a baby. As we live up-town miles 
 away, she won t know anything about you." 
 
 " I 11 do it," said I, suddenly, for, as I saw, 
 it involved no sort of risk ; " but I must have 
 three hundred dollars." 
 
 " And fifty," added the wolf, " if you do it 
 well." 
 
 Then I knew it was serious. 
 
 With this the man buttoned about him a 
 shaggy gray overcoat, and took his leave 
 without a single word in addition. 
 
 A minute later he came back and said : 
 " Stagers is in this business, and I was to re 
 mind you of Lou Wilson, I forgot that, 
 the woman that died last year. That s all." 
 Then he went away, leaving me in a cold 
 sweat. I knew now I had no choice. I un 
 derstood why I had been selected. 
 
 For the first time in my life, that night I 
 could n t sleep. I thought to myself, at last, 
 that I would get up early, pack a few clothes, 
 and escape, leaving my books to pay as they 
 might my arrears of rent. Looking out of
 
 38 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 the window, however, in the morning, I saw 
 Stagers prowling about the opposite pave 
 ment ; and as the only exit except the street 
 door was an alleyway which opened along 
 side of the front of the house, I gave myself 
 up for lost. About ten o clock I took my case 
 of instruments and started for File s house, fol 
 lowed, as I too well understood, by Stagers. 
 
 I knew the house, which was in a small up 
 town street, by its closed windows and the 
 craped bell, which I shuddered as I touched. 
 However, it was too late to draw back, and I 
 therefore inquired for Mrs. File. A haggard- 
 looking young woman came down, and led 
 me into a small parlor, for whose darkened 
 light I was thankful enough. 
 
 " Did you write this note ? " 
 
 " I did," said the woman, " if you re the 
 coroner. Joe File he s my husband he s 
 gone out to see about the funeral. I wish it 
 was his, I do." 
 
 " What do you suspect ? " said I. 
 
 " I 11 tell you," she returned in a whisper. 
 " I think he was made away with. I think 
 there was foul play. I think he was poisoned. 
 That s what I think." 
 
 "I hope you may be mistaken," said I. 
 " Suppose you let me see the body."
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 41 
 
 " You shall see it," she replied ; and follow 
 ing her, I went up-stairs to a front chamber, 
 where I found the corpse. 
 
 " Get it over soon," said the woman, with 
 strange firmness. " If there ain t no murder 
 been done I shall have to run for it ; if there 
 was" and her face set hard " I guess I 11 
 stay." With this she closed the door and 
 left me with the dead. 
 
 If I had known what was before me I 
 never could have gone into the thing at all. 
 It looked a little better when I had opened 
 a window and let in plenty of light ; for al 
 though I was, on the whole, far less afraid 
 of dead than living men, I had an absurd 
 feeling that I was doing this dead man a 
 distinct wrong as if it mattered to the 
 dead, after all ! When the affair was over, 
 I thought more of the possible consequences 
 than of its relation to the dead man himself ; 
 but do as I would at the time, I was in a 
 ridiculous funk, and especially when going 
 through the forms of a post-mortem exami 
 nation. 
 
 I am free to confess now that I was care 
 ful not to uncover the man s face, and that 
 when it was over I backed to the door and 
 hastily escaped from the room. On the stairs
 
 42 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 opposite to me Mrs. File was seated, with her 
 bonnet on and a bundle in her hand. 
 
 " Well," said she, rising as she spoke, and 
 with a certain eagerness in her tone, " what 
 killed him ? Was it poison ? " 
 
 " Poison, my good woman ! " said I. "When 
 a man has typhoid fever he don t need poison 
 to kill him. He had a relapse, that s all." 
 
 " And do you mean to say he was n t poi 
 soned," said she, with more than a trace of 
 disappointment in her voice " not poisoned 
 at all?" 
 
 " No more than you are," said I. "If I had 
 found any signs of foul play I should have 
 had a regular inquest. As it is, the less said 
 about it the better. The fact is, it would 
 have been much wiser to have kept quiet at 
 the beginning. I can t understand why you 
 should have troubled me about it at all. The 
 man had a perforation. It is common enough 
 in typhoid." 
 
 " That s what the doctor said I did n t 
 believe him. I guess now the sooner I leave 
 the better for me." 
 
 " As to that," I returned, " it is none of my 
 business ; but you may rest certain about the 
 cause of your brother s death." 
 
 My fears were somewhat quieted that
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 43 
 
 evening when Stagers and the wolf appeared 
 with the remainder of the money, and I 
 learned that Mrs. File had fled from her 
 home and, as File thought likely, from the 
 city also. A few months later File himself 
 disappeared, and Stagers found his way for 
 the third time into the penitentiary. Then I 
 felt at ease. I now see, for my own part, 
 that I was guilty of more than one mistake, 
 and that I displayed throughout a want of 
 intelligence. I ought to have asked more, 
 and also might have got a good fee from 
 Mrs. File on account of my services as 
 coroner. It served me, however, as a good 
 lesson; but it was several months before I 
 felt quite comfortable. 
 
 Meanwhile money became scarce once more, 
 and I was driven to my wit s end to devise 
 how I should continue to live as I had done. 
 I tried, among other plans, that of keeping 
 certain pills and other medicines, which I 
 sold to my patients ; but on the whole I found 
 it better to send all my prescriptions to one 
 druggist, who charged the patient ten or 
 twenty cents over the correct price, and 
 handed this amount to me. 
 
 In some cases I am told the percentage is 
 supposed to be a donation on the part of the
 
 44 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 apothecary; but I rather fancy the patient 
 pays for it in the end. It is one of the ab 
 surd vagaries of the profession to discoun 
 tenance the practice I have described, but I 
 wish, for my part, I had never done anything 
 more foolish or more dangerous. Of course 
 it inclines a doctor to change his medicines a 
 good deal, and to order them in large quan 
 tities, which is occasionally annoying to the 
 poor ; yet, as I have always observed, there is 
 no poverty as painful as your own, so that I 
 prefer to distribute pecuniary suffering among 
 many rather than to concentrate it on myself. 
 That s a rather neat phrase. 
 
 About six months after the date of this an 
 noying adventure, an incident occurred which 
 altered somewhat, and for a time improved, 
 my professional position. During my morn 
 ing office-hour an old woman came in, and 
 putting down a large basket, wiped her face 
 with a yellow-cotton handkerchief, and after 
 wards with the corner of her apron. Then 
 she looked around uneasily, got up, settled 
 her basket on her arm with a jerk which may 
 have decided the future of an egg or two, and 
 remarked briskly : " Don t see no little bottles 
 about; got the wrong stall, I guess. You 
 ain t no homeopath doctor, are you ? "
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 45 
 
 With great presence of mind, I replied: 
 " Well, ma am, that depends upon what you 
 want. Some of my patients like one, and 
 some like the other." I was about to add, 
 " You pay your money and you take your 
 choice," but thought better of it, and held my 
 peace, refraining from classical quotation. 
 
 " Being as that s the case," said the old lady, 
 " I 11 just tell you my symptoms. You said 
 you give either kind of medicine, did n t you ? " 
 
 " Just so," replied I. 
 
 " Clams or oysters, whichever opens most 
 lively, as my old Joe says tends the oyster- 
 stand at stall No. 9. Happen to know Joe ? " 
 
 No, I did not know Joe ; but what were the 
 symptoms ? 
 
 They proved to be numerous, and included 
 a stunning in the head and a misery in the 
 side, with bokin after victuals. 
 
 I proceeded, of course, to apply a stetho 
 scope over her ample bosom, though what I 
 heard on this and similar occasions I should 
 find it rather difficult to state. I remember 
 well my astonishment in one instance where, 
 having unconsciously applied my instrument 
 over a clamorous silver watch in the watch- 
 fob of a sea-captain, I concluded for a mo 
 ment that he was suffering from a rather
 
 46 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 remarkable displacement of the heart. As to 
 my old lady, whose name was Checkers, and 
 who kept an apple-stand near by, I told her 
 that I was out of pills just then, but would 
 have plenty next day. Accordingly, I pro 
 ceeded to invest a small amount at a place 
 called a homeopathic pharmacy, which I re 
 member amused me immensely. 
 
 A stout little German, with great silver 
 spectacles, sat behind a counter containing 
 numerous jars of white powders labeled 
 concisely "Lac.," "Led.," "Onis./> "Op.," 
 " Puls.," etc., while behind him were shelves 
 filled with bottles of what looked like minute 
 white shot. 
 
 "I want some homeopathic medicine," 
 said I. 
 
 " Vat kindt ! " said my friend. " Vat you 
 vants to cure ? " 
 
 I explained at random that I wished to 
 treat diseases in general. 
 
 " Veil, ve gifs you a case, mit a pook," and 
 thereon produced a large box containing bot 
 tles of small pills and powders, labeled vari 
 ously with the names of the diseases, so that 
 all you required was to use the headache or 
 colic bottle in order to meet the needs of 
 those particular maladies.
 
 I was struck at first with the exquisite sim 
 plicity of this arrangement ; but before pur 
 chasing, I happened luckily to turn over the 
 leaves of a book, in two volumes, which lay 
 on the counter ; it was called " Jahr s Man 
 ual." Opening at page 310, vol. i, I lit upon 
 " Lachesis," which proved to my amazement 
 to be snake- venom. This Mr. Jahr stated to 
 be indicated for use in upward of a hundred 
 symptoms. At once it occurred to me that 
 " Lach." was the medicine for my money, and 
 that it was quite needless to waste cash on 
 the box. I therefore bought a small jar of 
 "Lach." and a lot of little pills, and started 
 for home. 
 
 My old woman proved a fast friend ; and 
 as she sent me numerous patients, I by and 
 by altered my sign to u Homeopathic Physi 
 cian and Surgeon," whatever that may mean, 
 and was regarded by my medical brothers as 
 a lost sheep, and by the little-pill doctors as 
 one who had seen the error of his ways. 
 
 In point of fact, my new practice had de 
 cided advantages. All pills looked and tasted 
 alike, and the same might be said of the pow 
 ders, so that I was never troubled by those 
 absurd investigations into the nature of 
 remedies which some patients are prone to
 
 48 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 make. Of course I desired to get business, 
 and it was therefore obviously unwise to give 
 little pills of " Lac.," or " Puls.," or " Sep.," 
 when a man needed a dose of oil, or a white- 
 faced girl iron, or the like. I soon made the 
 useful discovery that it was only necessary 
 to prescribe cod-liver oil, for instance, as a 
 diet, in order to make use of it where re 
 quired. When a man got impatient over an 
 ancient ague, I usually found, too, that I 
 could persuade him to let me try a good dose 
 of quinine ; while, on the other hand, there 
 was a distinct pecuniary advantage in those 
 cases of the shakes which could be made to 
 believe that it "was best not to interfere 
 with nature." I ought to add that this kind 
 of faith is uncommon among folks who cany 
 hods or build walls. 
 
 For women who are hysterical, and go 
 heart and soul into the business of being 
 sick, I have found the little pills a most 
 charming resort, because you cannot carry 
 the refinement of symptoms beyond what my 
 friend Jahr has done in the way of fitting 
 medicines to them, so that if I had taken 
 seriously to practising this double form of 
 therapeutics, it had, as I saw, certain con 
 veniences.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 49 
 
 Another year went by, and I was begin 
 ning to prosper in my new mode of life. My 
 medicines (being chiefly milk-sugar, with va 
 riations as to the labels) cost next to nothing ; 
 and as I charged pretty well for both these 
 and my advice, I was now able to start a gig. 
 
 I solemnly believe that I should have con 
 tinued to succeed in the practice of my pro 
 fession if it had not happened that fate was 
 once more unkind to me, by throwing in my 
 path one of my old acquaintances. I had a 
 consultation one day with the famous homeo 
 path Dr. Zwanzig. As we walked away we 
 were busily discussing the case of a poor 
 consumptive fellow who previously had lost 
 a leg. In consequence of this defect, Dr. 
 Zwanzig considered that the ten-thousandth 
 of a grain of aurum would be an overdose, 
 and that it must be fractioned so as to allow 
 for the departed leg, otherwise the rest of the 
 man would be getting a leg-dose too much. 
 I was particularly struck with this view of 
 the case, but I was still more, and less pleas 
 ingly, impressed at the sight of my former 
 patient Stagers, who nodded to me familiarly 
 from the opposite pavement. 
 
 I was not at all surprised when, that even 
 ing quite late, I found this worthy waiting in
 
 50 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 my office. I looked around uneasily, which 
 was clearly understood by my friend, who 
 retorted : " Ain t took nothin of yours, doc. 
 You don t seem right awful glad to see me. 
 You need n t be afraid I ve only fetched 
 you a job, and a right good one, too." 
 
 I replied that I had my regular business, 
 that I preferred he should get some one else, 
 and pretty generally made Mr. Stagers aware 
 that I had had enough of him. I did not ask 
 him to sit down, and, just as I supposed him 
 about to leave, he seated himself with a grin, 
 remarking, "No use, doc; got to go into it 
 this one time." 
 
 At this I, naturally enough, grew angry 
 and used several rather violent phrases. 
 
 " No use, doc," said Stagers. 
 
 Then I softened down, and laughed a little, 
 and treated the thing as a joke, whatever it 
 was, for I dreaded to hear. 
 
 But Stagers was fate. Stagers was in 
 evitable. "Won t do, doc not even money 
 would n t get you off." 
 
 " No ? " said I, interrogatively, and as coolly 
 as I could, contriving at the same time to 
 move toward the window. It was summer, 
 the sashes were up, the shutters half drawn 
 in, and a policeman whom I knew was loung-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 51 
 
 ing opposite, as I had noticed when I entered. 
 I would give Stagers a scare, charge him 
 with theft anything but get mixed up with 
 his kind again. It was the folly of a moment 
 and I should have paid dear for it. 
 
 He must have understood me, the scoun 
 drel, for in an instant I felt a cold ring of 
 steel against my ear, and a tiger clutch on 
 my cravat. " Sit down," he said. " What a 
 fool you are ! Guess you forgot that there 
 coroner s business and the rest." Needless to 
 say that I obeyed. " Best not try that again," 
 continued my guest. "Wait a moment"; 
 and rising, he closed the window. 
 
 There was no resource left but to listen ; 
 and what followed I shall condense rather 
 than relate it in the language employed by 
 Mr. Stagers. 
 
 It appeared that my other acquaintance 
 Mr. File had been guilty of a cold-blooded 
 and long-premeditated murder, for which he 
 had been tried and convicted. He now lay 
 in jail awaiting his execution, which was to 
 take place at Carsonville, Ohio. It seemed 
 that with Stagers and others he had formed 
 a band of expert counterfeiters in the West. 
 Their business lay in the manufacture of 
 South American currencies. File had thus
 
 52 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 acquired a fortune so considerable that I was 
 amazed at his having allowed his passion to 
 seduce him into unprofitable crime. In his 
 agony he unfortunately thought of me, and 
 had bribed Stagers largely in order that he 
 might be induced to find me. "When the 
 narration had reached this stage, and I had 
 been made fully to understand that I was now 
 and hereafter under the sharp eye of Stagers 
 and his friends, that, in a word, escape was 
 out of the question, I turned on my tor 
 mentor. 
 
 "What does all this mean?" I said. 
 " What does File expect me to do ? " 
 
 "Don t believe he exactly knows," said 
 Stagers. " Something or other to get him 
 clear of hemp." 
 
 " But what stuff I " I replied. " How can I 
 help him"? What possible influence could 
 I exert ? " 
 
 " Can t say," answered Stagers, imperturb- 
 ably. " File has a notion you re most cun 
 ning enough for anything. Best try some 
 thing, doc." 
 
 "And what if I won t do it?" said I. 
 "What does it matter to me if the rascal 
 swings or no 1 ?" 
 
 " Keep cool, doc," returned Stagers. " I in
 
 " SIT DOWN, HE
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 55 
 
 only agent in this here business. My prin 
 cipal, that s File, he says: Tell Sandcraft 
 to find some way to get me clear. Once out, 
 I give him ten thousand dollars. If he don t 
 turn up something that will suit, I 11 blow 
 about that coroner business and Lou Wilson, 
 and break him up generally. " 
 
 " You don t mean," said I, in a cold sweat 
 " you don t mean that, if I can t do this im 
 possible thing, he will inform on me ? " 
 
 "Just so," returned Stagers. "Got a 
 cigar, doc?" 
 
 I only half heard him. What a frightful 
 position ! I had been leading a happy and an 
 increasingly profitable life no scrapes and 
 no dangers; and here, on a sudden, I had 
 presented to me the alternative of saving a 
 wretch from the gallows or of spending un 
 limited years in a State penitentiary. As 
 for the money, it became as dead leaves for 
 this once only in my life. My brain seemed 
 to be spinning round. I grew weak all over. 
 
 " Cheer up a little," said Stagers. " Take 
 a nip of whisky. Things ain t at the worst, 
 by a good bit. You just get ready, and we 11 
 start by the morning train. Guess you 11 try 
 out something smart enough as we travel 
 along. Ain t got a heap of time to lose."
 
 56 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 I was silent. A great anguish had me in 
 its grip. I might squirm as I would, it was 
 all in vain. Hideous plans rose to my mind, 
 born of this agony of terror. I might mur 
 der Stagers, but what good would that do? 
 As to File, he was safe from my hand. At 
 last I became too confused to think any 
 longer. " When do we leave ? " I said feebly. 
 
 " At six to-morrow," he returned. 
 
 How I was watched and guarded, and how 
 hurried over a thousand miles of rail to my 
 fate, little concerns us now. I find it dreadful 
 to recall it to memory. Above all, an aching 
 eagerness for revenge upon the man who had 
 caused me these sufferings was uppermost in 
 my mind. Could I not fool the wretch and 
 save myself ? Of a sudden an idea came into 
 my consciousness. Then it grew and formed 
 itself, became possible, probable, seemed to 
 me sure. "Ah," said I, "Stagers, give me 
 something to eat and drink." I had not 
 tasted food for two days. 
 
 Within a day or two after my arrival, I 
 was enabled to see File in his cell, on the 
 plea of being a clergyman from his native 
 place. 
 
 I found that I had not miscalculated my 
 danger. The man did not appear to have the
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 57 
 
 least idea as to how I was to help him. He 
 only knew that I was in his power, and he 
 used his control to insure that something 
 more potent than friendship should be en 
 listed in his behalf. As the days went by, 
 his behavior grew to be a frightful thing to 
 witness. He threatened, flattered, implored, 
 offered to double the sum he had promised 
 if I would save him. My really reasonable 
 first thought was to see the governor of the 
 State, and, as Stagers s former physician, 
 make oath to his having had many attacks of 
 epilepsy followed by brief periods of homicidal 
 mania. He had, in fact, had fits of alcoholic 
 epilepsy. Unluckily, the governor was in a 
 distant city. The time was short, and the 
 case against my man too clear. Stagers said 
 it would not do. I was at my wit s end. 
 " Got to do something," said File, " or I 11 
 attend to your case, doc." 
 
 "But," said I, "suppose there is really 
 nothing?" 
 
 " Well," said Stagers to me when we were 
 alone, " you get him satisfied, anyhow. He 11 
 never let them hang him, and perhaps well, 
 I m going to give him these pills when I get 
 a chance. He asked to have them. But 
 what s your other plan ? "
 
 58 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 Stagers knew as much about medicine as 
 a pig knows about the opera. So I set to 
 work to delude him, first asking if he could 
 secure me, as a clergyman, an hour alone 
 with File just before the execution. He said 
 money would do it, and what was my plan ? 
 
 "Well," said I, "there was once a man 
 named Dr. Chovet. He lived in London. A 
 gentleman who turned highwayman was to 
 be hanged. You see," said I, " this was about 
 1760. Well, his friends bribed the jailer and 
 the hangman. The doctor cut a hole in the 
 man s windpipe, very low down where it could 
 be partly hid by a loose cravat. So, as they 
 hanged him only a little while, and the breath 
 went in and out of the opening below the 
 noose, he was only just insensible when his 
 friends got him " 
 
 "And he got well," cried Stagers, much 
 pleased with my rather melodramatic tale. 
 
 "Yes," I said, "he got well, and lived to 
 take purses, all dressed in white. People had 
 known him well, and when he robbed his 
 great-aunt, who was not in the secret, she 
 swore she had seen his ghost." 
 
 Stagers said that was a fine story ; guessed 
 it would work ; small town, new business, lots 
 of money to use. In fact, the attempt thus to
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 59 
 
 save a man is said to have been made, but, by 
 ill luck, the man did not recover. It answered 
 my purpose, but how any one, even such an 
 ass as this fellow, could believe it could suc 
 ceed puzzles me to this day. 
 
 File became enthusiastic over my scheme, 
 and I cordially assisted his credulity. The 
 thing was to keep the wretch quiet until the 
 business blew up or and I shuddered 
 until File, in despair, took his pill. I should 
 in any case find it wise to leave in haste. 
 
 My friend Stagers had some absurd mis 
 givings lest Mr. File s neck might be broken 
 by the fall ; but as to this I was able to re 
 assure him upon the best scientific authority. 
 There were certain other and minor questions, 
 as to the effect of sudden, nearly complete 
 arrest of the supply of blood to the brain ; 
 but with these physiological refinements I 
 thought it needlessly cruel to distract a man 
 in File s peculiar position. Perhaps I shall 
 be doing injustice to my own intellect if I do 
 not hasten to state again that I had not the 
 remotest belief in the efficacy of my plan for 
 any purpose except to get me out of a very 
 uncomfortable position and give me, with 
 time, a chance to escape. 
 
 Stagers and I were both disguised as clergy-
 
 60 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 men, and were quite freely admitted to the 
 condemned man s cell. In fact, there was in 
 the little town a certain trustful simplicity 
 about all their arrangements. The day but 
 one before the execution Stagers informed 
 me that File had the pills, which he, Stagers, 
 had contrived to give him. Stagers seemed 
 pleased with our plan. I was not. He was 
 really getting uneasy and suspicious of me 
 as I was soon to find out. 
 
 So far our plans, or rather mine, had 
 worked to a marvel. Certain of File s old 
 accomplices succeeded in bribing the hang 
 man to shorten the time of suspension. Ar 
 rangements were made to secure me two 
 hours alone with the prisoner, so that no 
 thing seemed to be wanting to this tomfool 
 business. I had assured Stagers that I 
 would not need to see File again previous to 
 the operation ; but in the forenoon of the day 
 before that set for the execution I was seized 
 with a feverish impatience, which luckily 
 prompted me to visit him once more. As 
 usual, I was admitted readily, and nearly 
 reached his cell when I became aware, from the 
 sound of voices heard through the grating in 
 the door, that there was a visitor in the cell. 
 " Who is with him ?" I inquired of the turnkey.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 61 
 
 " The doctor," lie replied. 
 
 "Doctor ?" I said, pausing. "What doctor f 
 
 " Oh, the jail doctor. I was to come back 
 in half an hour to let him out ; but he s got 
 a quarter to stay. Shall I let you in, or will 
 you wait ? " 
 
 "No," I replied; "it is hardly right to in 
 terrupt them. I will walk in the corridor for 
 ten minutes or so, and then you can come 
 back to let me into the cell." 
 
 " Very good," he returned, and left me. 
 
 As soon as I was alone, I cautiously ad 
 vanced until I stood alongside of the door, 
 through the barred grating of which I was 
 able readily to hear what went on within. 
 The first words I caught were these : 
 
 " And you tell me, doctor, that, even if a 
 man s windpipe was open, the hanging would 
 kill him are you sure ? " 
 
 " Yes, I believe there would be no doubt 
 of it. I cannot see how escape would be pos 
 sible. But let me ask you why you have 
 sent for me to ask these singular questions. 
 You cannot have the faintest hope of escape, 
 and least of all in such a manner as this. I 
 advise you to think about the fate which is 
 inevitable. You must, I fear, have much to 
 reflect upon."
 
 62 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 " But," said File, " if I wanted to try this 
 plan of mine, could n t some one be found to 
 help me, say if he was to make twenty thou 
 sand or so by it? I mean a really good doc 
 tor." Evidently File cruelly mistrusted my 
 skill, and meant to get some one to aid me. 
 
 "If you mean me/ answered the doctor, 
 " some one cannot be found, neither for 
 twenty nor fifty thousand dollars. Besides, 
 if any one were wicked enough to venture on 
 such an attempt, he would only be deceiving 
 you with a hope which would be utterly vain. 
 You must be off your head." 
 
 I understood all this with an increasing 
 fear in my mind. I had meant to get away 
 that night at all risks. I saw now that I must 
 go at once. 
 
 After a pause he said : " Well, doctor, you 
 know a poor devil in my fix will clutch at 
 straws. Hope I have not offended you." 
 
 "Not in the least," returned the doctor. 
 "Shall I send you Mr. Smith? This was 
 my present name ; in fact, I was known as 
 the Rev. Eliphalet Smith. 
 
 "I would like it," answered File; "but as 
 you go out, tell the warden I want to see 
 him immediately about a matter of great 
 importance."
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 63 
 
 At this stage I began to apprehend very 
 distinctly that the time had arrived when it 
 would be wiser for me to delay escape no 
 longer. Accordingly, I waited until I heard 
 the doctor rise, and at once stepped quietly 
 away to the far end of the corridor. I had 
 scarcely reached it when the door which 
 closed it was opened by a turnkey who had 
 come to relieve the doctor and let me into the 
 cell. Of course my peril was imminent. If 
 the turnkey mentioned my near presence to the 
 prisoner, immediate disclosure would follow. 
 If some lapse of time were secured before the 
 warden obeyed the request from File that he 
 should visit him, I might gain thus a much- 
 needed hour, but hardly more. I therefore 
 said to the officer : " Tell the warden that the 
 doctor wishes to remain an hour longer with 
 the prisoner, and that I shall return myself 
 at the end of that time." 
 
 " Very good, sir," said the turnkey, allow 
 ing me to pass out, and, as he followed me, 
 relocking the door of the corridor. " I 11 tell 
 him," he said. It is needless to repeat that 
 I never had the least idea of carrying out the 
 ridiculous scheme with which I had deluded 
 File and Stagers, but so far Stagers s watch 
 fulness had given me no chance to escape.
 
 64 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 In a few moments I was outside of the 
 jail gate, and saw my fellow-clergyman, Mr. 
 Stagers, in full loroadcloth and white tie, 
 coming down the street toward me. As 
 usual, he was on his guard; but this time 
 he had to deal with a man grown perfectly 
 desperate, with everything to win and no 
 thing to lose. My plans were made, and, 
 wild as they were, I thought them worth the 
 trying. I must evade this man s terrible 
 watch. How keen it was, you cannot ima 
 gine; but it was aided by three of the in 
 famous gang to which File had belonged, 
 for without these spies no one person could 
 possibly have sustained so perfect a system. 
 
 I took Stagers s arm. "What time," said I, 
 " does the first train start for Dayton ? ; 
 
 " At twelve. What do you want 1 " 
 
 "How far is it?" 
 
 " About fifteen miles," he replied. 
 
 "Good. I can get back by eight o clock 
 to-night." 
 
 " Easily," said Stagers, " if you go. What 
 do you want ? " 
 
 " I want a smaller tube to put in the wind 
 pipe must have it, in fact." 
 
 " Well, I don t like it," said he, " but the 
 thing s got to go through somehow. If you
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 65 
 
 must go, I will go along myself. Can t lose 
 sight of you, doc, just at present. You re 
 monstrous precious. Did you tell File ? " 
 
 "Yes," said I; "he s all right. Come. 
 We ve no time to lose." 
 
 Nor had we. Within twenty minutes we 
 were seated in the last car of a long train, 
 and running at the rate of twenty miles an 
 hour toward Dayton. In about ten minutes 
 I asked Stagers for a cigar. 
 
 " Can t smoke here," said he. 
 
 "No," I answered ; "of course not. I 11 go 
 forward into the smoking-car." 
 
 " Come along," said he, and we went 
 through the train. 
 
 I was not sorry he had gone with me when 
 I found in the smoking-car one of the spies 
 who had been watching me so constantly. 
 Stagers nodded to him and grinned at me, 
 and we sat down together. 
 
 " Chut ! " said I, " left my cigar on the 
 window-ledge in the hindmost car. Be back 
 in a moment." 
 
 This time, for a wonder, Stagers allowed 
 me to leave unaccompanied. I hastened 
 through to the nearer end of the hindmost 
 car, and stood on the platform. I instantly 
 cut the signal-cord. Then I knelt down, and,
 
 66 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 waiting until the two cars ran together, I 
 tugged at the connecting-pin. As the cars 
 came together, I could lift it a little, then as 
 the strain came on the coupling the pin held 
 fast. At last I made a great effort, and out 
 it came. The car I was on instantly lost 
 speed, and there on the other platform, a 
 hundred feet away, was Stagers shaking his 
 fist at me. He was beaten, and he knew it. 
 In the end few people have been able to get 
 ahead of me. 
 
 The retreating train was half a mile away 
 around the curve as I screwed up the brake 
 on my car hard enough to bring it nearly to 
 a stand. I did not wait for it to stop entirely 
 before I slipped off the steps, leaving the 
 other passengers to dispose of themselves as 
 they might until their absence should be dis 
 covered and the rest of the train return. 
 
 As I wish rather to illustrate my very re 
 markable professional career than to amuse 
 by describing its lesser incidents, I shall not 
 linger to tell how I succeeded, at last, in 
 reaching St. Louis. Fortunately, I had never 
 ceased to anticipate the moment when escape 
 from File and his friends would be possible, 
 so that I always carried about with me the 
 very small funds with which I had hastily
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 67 
 
 provided myself upon leaving. The whole 
 amount did not exceed sixty-five dollars, but 
 with this, and a gold watch worth twice as 
 much, I hoped to be able to subsist until my 
 own ingenuity enabled me to provide more 
 liberally for the future. Naturally enough, 
 I scanned the papers closely to discover some 
 account of File s death and of the disclo 
 sures concerning myself which he was only 
 too likely to have made. 
 
 I came at last on an account of how he had 
 poisoned himself, and so escaped the hangman. 
 I never learned what he had said about me, 
 but I was quite sure he had not let me off easy. 
 I felt that this failure to announce his confes 
 sions was probably due to a desire on the part 
 of the police to avoid alarming me. Be this 
 as it may, I remained long ignorant as to 
 whether or not the villain betrayed my part 
 in that unusual coroner s inquest. 
 
 Before many days I had resolved to make 
 another and a bold venture. Accordingly ap 
 peared in the St. Louis papers an advertise 
 ment to the effect that Dr. von Ingerihoff, the 
 well-known German physician, who had spent 
 two years on the Plains acquiring a know 
 ledge of Indian medicine, was prepared to 
 treat all diseases by vegetable remedies alone.
 
 68 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 Dr. von Ingenhoff would remain in St. Louis 
 for two weeks, and was to be found at the 
 Grayson House every day from ten until two 
 o clock. 
 
 To my delight, I got two patients the first 
 day. The next I had twice as many, when at 
 once I hired two connecting rooms, and made 
 a very useful arrangement, which I may de 
 scribe dramatically in the f ollowing way : 
 
 There being two or three patients waiting 
 while I finished my cigar and morning julep, 
 enters a respectable-looking old gentleman 
 who inquires briskly of the patients if this is 
 really Dr. von IngenhofP s. He is told it is. 
 My friend was apt to overact his part. I 
 had often occasion to ask him to be less 
 positive. 
 
 " Ah," says he, " I shall be delighted to see 
 the doctor. Five years ago I was scalped on 
 the Plains, and now" exhibiting a well-cov 
 ered head " you see what the doctor did for 
 me. T is n t any wonder I ve come fifty 
 miles to see him. Any of you been scalped, 
 gentlemen ? " 
 
 To none of them had this misfortune ar 
 rived as yet ; but, like most folks in the lower 
 ranks of life and some in the upper ones, it 
 was pleasant to find a genial person who
 
 NY OK VOr BKES 3UAI.PKU. (IENTLEMKN r
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 71 
 
 would listen to their account of their own 
 symptoms. 
 
 Presently, after hearing enough, the old 
 gentleman pulls out a large watch. " Bless 
 me ! it s late. I must call again. May I 
 trouble you, sir, to say to the doctor that his 
 old friend called to see him and will drop in 
 again to-morrow ? Don t forget : Governor 
 Brown of Arkansas." A moment later the 
 governor visited me by a side door, with his 
 account of the symptoms of my patients. 
 
 Enter a tall Hoosier, the governor having 
 retired. " Now, doc," says the Hoosier, " I ve 
 been handled awful these two years back." 
 " Stop ! " I exclaimed. " Open your eyes. 
 There, now, let me see," taking his pulse as I 
 speak. " Ah, you ve a pain there, and there, 
 and you can t sleep ; cocktails don t agree any 
 longer. Were n t you bit by a dog two years 
 ago ? " "I was," says the Hoosier, in amaze 
 ment. "Sir," I reply," you have chronic hy 
 drophobia. It s the water in the cocktails 
 that disagrees with you. My bitters will cure 
 you in a week, sir. No more whisky drink 
 milk." 
 
 The astonishment of my patient at these 
 accurate revelations may be imagined. He is 
 allowed to wait for his medicine in the ante-
 
 72 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 room, where the chances are in favor of his 
 relating how wonderfully I had told all his 
 symptoms at a glance. 
 
 Governor Brown of Arkansas was a small 
 but clever actor, whom I met in the billiard- 
 room, and who day after day, in varying dis 
 guises and modes, played off the same tricks, 
 to our great common advantage. 
 
 At my friend s suggestion, we very soon 
 added to our resources by the purchase of 
 two electromagnetic batteries. This special 
 means of treating all classes of maladies has 
 advantages which are altogether peculiar. In 
 the first place, you instruct your patient that 
 the treatment is of necessity a long one. A 
 striking mode of putting it is to say, "Sir, 
 you have been six months getting ill ; it will 
 require six months for a cure." There is a 
 correct sound about such a phrase, and it is 
 sure to satisfy. Two sittings a week, at two 
 dollars a sitting, will pay. In man} r cases the 
 patient gets well while you are electrifying 
 him. Whether or not the electricity cured 
 him is a thing I shall never know. If, how 
 ever, he began to show signs of impatience, I 
 advised him that he would require a year s 
 treatment, and suggested that it would be 
 economical for him to buy a battery and use
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 73 
 
 it at home. Tims advised, he pays you twenty 
 dollars for an instrument which cost you ten, 
 and you are rid of a troublesome case. 
 
 If the reader has followed me closely, he 
 will have learned that I am a man of large 
 and liberal views in my profession, and of a 
 very justifiable ambition. The idea has often 
 occurred to me of combining in one establish 
 ment all the various modes of practice which 
 are known as irregular. This, as will be 
 understood, is really only a wider application 
 of the idea which prompted me to unite in my 
 own business homeopathy and the practice of 
 medicine. I proposed to my partner, accord 
 ingly, to combine with our present business 
 that of spiritualism, which I knew had been 
 very profitably turned to account in connec 
 tion with medical practice. As soon as he 
 agreed to this plan, which, by the way, I hoped 
 to enlarge so as to include all the available 
 isms, I set about making such preparations as 
 were necessary. I remembered having read 
 somewhere that a Dr. Schiff had shown that 
 he could produce remarkable "knockings," so 
 called, by voluntarily dislocating the great 
 toe and then forcibly drawing it back into its 
 socket. A still better noise could be made by 
 throwing the tendon of the peroneus longus
 
 74 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 muscle out of the hollow in which it lies, 
 alongside of the ankle. After some effort I 
 was able to accomplish both feats quite readily, 
 and could occasion a remarkable variety of 
 sounds, according to the power which I em 
 ployed or the positions which I occupied at 
 the time. As to all other matters, I trusted 
 to the suggestions of my own ingenuity, 
 which, as a rule, has rarely failed me. 
 
 The largest success attended the novel plan 
 which my lucky genius had devised, so that 
 soon we actually began to divide large profits 
 and to lay by a portion of our savings. It is, 
 of course, not to be supposed that this desir 
 able result was attained without many annoy 
 ances and some positive danger. My spiritual 
 revelations, medical and other, were, as may 
 be supposed, only more or less happy guesses ; 
 but in this, as in predictions as to the weather 
 and other events, the rare successes always 
 get more prominence in the minds of men 
 than the numerous failures. Moreover, 
 whenever a person has been fool enough to 
 resort to folks like myself, he is always glad 
 to be able to defend his conduct by bringing 
 forward every possible proof of skill on the 
 part of the men he has consulted. These con 
 siderations, and a certain love of mysterious
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 75 
 
 or unusual means, I have commonly found 
 sufficient to secure an ample share of gullible 
 individuals. I may add, too, that those who 
 would be shrewd enough to understand and 
 expose us are wise enough to keep away alto 
 gether. Such as did come were, as a rule, 
 easy enough to manage, but now and then we 
 hit upon some utterly exceptional patient 
 who was both foolish enough to consult us 
 and sharp enough to know he had been swin 
 dled. When such a fellow made a fuss, it 
 was occasionally necessary to return his 
 money if it was found impossible to bully 
 him into silence. In one or two instances, 
 where I had promised a cure upon prepayment 
 of two or three hundred dollars, I was either 
 sued or threatened with suit, and had to re 
 fund a part or the whole of the amount ; but 
 most people preferred to hold their tongues 
 rather than expose to the world the extent of 
 their own folly. 
 
 In one most disastrous case I suffered per 
 sonally to a degree which I never can recall 
 without a distinct sense of annoyance, both 
 at my own want of care and at the disgusting 
 consequences which it brought upon me. 
 
 Early one morning an old gentleman called, 
 in a state of the utmost agitation, and ex-
 
 76 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 plained that he desired to consult the spirits 
 as to a heavy loss which he had experienced 
 the night before. He had left, he said, a sum 
 of money in his pantaloons pocket upon going 
 to bed. In the morning he had changed his 
 clothes and gone out, forgetting to remove the 
 notes. Returning in an hour in great haste, 
 he discovered that the garment still lay upon 
 the chair where he had thrown it, but that the 
 money was missing. I at once desired him to 
 be seated, and proceeded to ask him certain 
 questions, in a chatty way, about the habits 
 of his household, the amount lost, and the like, 
 expecting thus to get some clue which would 
 enable me to make my spirits display the re 
 quisite share of sagacity in pointing out the 
 thief. I learned readily that he was an old 
 and wealthy man, a little close, too, I suspected, 
 and that he lived in a large house with but 
 two servants, and an only son about twenty- 
 one years old. The servants were both women 
 who had lived in the household many years, 
 and were probably innocent. Unluckily, re 
 membering my own youthful career, I pres 
 ently reached the conclusion that the young 
 man had been the delinquent. When I ven 
 tured to inquire a little as to his habits, the 
 old gentleman cut me very short, remarking
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 77 
 
 that he came to ask questions, and not to be 
 questioned, and that he desired at once to 
 consult the spirits. Upon this I sat down at 
 a table, and, after a brief silence, demanded 
 in a solemn voice if there were any spirits 
 present. By industriously cracking my big 
 toe-joint I was enabled to represent at once 
 the presence of a numerous assembly of these 
 worthies. Then I inquired if any one of them 
 had been present when the robbery was ef 
 fected. A prompt double knock replied in 
 the affirmative. I may say here, by the way, 
 that the unanimity of the spirits as to their 
 use of two knocks for "yes" and one for 
 "no" is a very remarkable point, and shows, 
 if it shows anything, how perfect and univer 
 sal must be the social intercourse of the re 
 spected departed. It is worthy of note, also, 
 that if the spirit I will not say the medium 
 perceives after one knock that it were wiser 
 to say yes, he can conveniently add the second 
 tap. Some such arrangement in real life 
 would, it appears to me, be highly desirable. 
 
 It seemed that the spirit was that of Vidocq, 
 the French detective. I had just read a trans 
 lation of his memoirs, and he seemed to me a 
 very available spirit to call upon. 
 
 As soon as I explained that the spirit who
 
 78 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 answered had been a witness of the theft, the 
 old man became strangely agitated. "Who 
 was it?" said he. At once the spirit indi 
 cated a desire to use the alphabet. As we 
 went over the letters, always a slow method, 
 but useful when you want to observe excitable 
 people, my visitor kept saying, "Quicker- 
 go quicker." At length the spirit spelled out 
 the words, "I know not his name." 
 
 "Was it," said the gentleman" was it a 
 was it one of my household ? " 
 
 I knocked "yes" without hesitation; who 
 else, indeed, could it have been f 
 
 " Excuse me," he went on, " if I ask you for 
 a little whisky." 
 
 This I gave him. He continued : " Was it 
 Susan or Ellen ? " 
 
 " No, no ! " 
 
 " Was it" He paused. " If I ask a ques 
 tion mentally, will the spirits reply ? " I knew 
 what he meant. He wanted to ask if it was 
 his son, but did not wish to speak openly. 
 
 " Ask," said I. 
 
 " I have," he returned. 
 
 I hesitated. It was rarely my policy to 
 commit myself definitely, yet here I fancied, 
 from the facts of the case and his own terrible 
 anxiety, that he suspected, or more than sus-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 79 
 
 pected, his sou as the guilty person. I be 
 came sure of this as I studied his face. At 
 all events, it would be easy to deny or explain 
 in case of trouble ; and, after all, what slan 
 der was there in two knocks ? I struck twice 
 as usual. 
 
 Instantly the old gentleman rose up, very 
 white, but quite firm. " There," he said, and 
 cast a bank-note on the table, " I thank you," 
 and bending his head on his breast, walked, 
 as I thought, with great effort out of the room. 
 
 On the following morning, as I made my 
 first appearance in my outer room, which con 
 tained at least a dozen persons awaiting ad 
 vice, who should I see standing by the window 
 but the old gentleman with sandy-gray hair? 
 Along with him was a stout young man with 
 a head as red as mine, and mustache and 
 whiskers to match. Probably the son, I 
 thought ardent temperament, remorse, come 
 to confess, etc. I was never more mistaken 
 in my life. I was about to go regularly 
 through my patients when the old gentleman 
 began to speak. 
 
 " I called, doctor," said he, " to explain the 
 little matter about which I about which I " 
 
 "Troubled your spirits yesterday," added 
 the youth, jocosely, pulling his mustache.
 
 80 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 "Beg pardon," I returned; "had we not 
 better talk this over in private ? Come into 
 my office," I added, touching the younger man 
 on the arm. 
 
 Would you believe it ? he took out his hand 
 kerchief and dusted the place I had touched. 
 "Better not," said he. "Go on, father; let 
 us get done with this den." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the elder person, address 
 ing the patients, " I called here yesterday, like 
 a fool, to ask who had stolen from me a sum 
 of money which I believed I left in my room 
 on going out in the morning. This doctor 
 here and his spirits contrived to make me sus 
 pect my only son. Well, I charged him at 
 once with the crime as soon as I got back 
 home, and what do you think he did? He 
 said, Father, let us go up-stairs and look for 
 it, and" 
 
 Here the young man broke in with : " Come, 
 father ; don t worry yourself for nothing " ; 
 and then turning, added : "To cut the thing 
 short, he found the notes under his candle 
 stick, where he left them on going to bed. 
 This is all of it. We came here to stop this 
 fellow " (by which he meant me) " from carry 
 ing a slander further. I advise you, good 
 people, to profit by the matter, and to look up
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 81 
 
 a more honest doctor, if doctoring be what 
 you want." 
 
 As soon as he had ended, I remarked sol 
 emnly : " The words of the spirits are not my 
 words. Who shall hold them accountable ? " 
 
 " Nonsense," said the young man. " Come, 
 father " ; and they left the room. 
 
 Now was the time to retrieve my character. 
 "Gentlemen," said I, "you have heard this 
 very singular account. Trusting the spirits 
 utterly and entirely as I do, it occurs to me 
 that there is no reason why they may not, 
 after all, have been right in their suspicions 
 of this young person. Who can say that, 
 overcome by remorse, he may not have seized 
 the time of his father s absence to replace the 
 money ? " 
 
 To my amazement, up gets a little old man 
 from the corner. " Well, you are a low cuss ! " 
 said he, and taking up a basket beside him, 
 hobbled hastily out of the room. You may 
 be sure I said some pretty sharp things to him, 
 for I was out of humor to begin with, and it 
 is one thing to be insulted by a stout young 
 man, and quite another to be abused by a 
 wretched old cripple. However, he went away, 
 and I supposed, for my part, that I was done 
 with the whole business.
 
 82 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 An hour later, however, I heard a rough 
 knock at my door, and opening it hastily, saw 
 my red-headed young man with the cripple. 
 
 " Now," said the former, taking me by the 
 collar, and pulling me into the room among 
 my patients, "I want to know, my man, if 
 this doctor said that it was likely I was the 
 thief after all?" 
 
 " That s what he said," replied the cripple ; 
 "just about that, sir." 
 
 I do not desire to dwell on the after con 
 duct of this hot-headed young man. It was 
 the more disgraceful as I offered but little re 
 sistance, and endured a beating such as I 
 would have hesitated to inflict upon a dog. 
 Nor was this all. He warned me that if I 
 dared to remain in the city after a week he 
 would shoot me. In the East I should have 
 thought but little of such a threat, but here 
 it was only too likely to be practically carried 
 out. Accordingly, with my usual decision of 
 character, but with much grief and reluctance, 
 I collected my whole fortune, which now 
 amounted to at least seven thousand dollars, 
 and turned my back upon this ungrateful 
 town. I am sorry to say that I also left be 
 hind me the last of my good luck. 
 
 I traveled in a leisurely way until I reached
 
 ffV 
 
 HK WARNED ME THAT . . . HK WOULD SHOOT ME.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 85 
 
 Boston. The country anywhere would have 
 been safer, but I do not lean to agricultural 
 pursuits. It seemed an agreeable city, and I 
 decided to remain. 
 
 I took good rooms at Parker s, and conclud 
 ing to enjoy life, amused myself in the com 
 pany of certain, I may say uncertain, young 
 women who danced at some of the theaters. 
 I played billiards, drank rather too much, 
 drove fast horses, and at the end of a delight 
 ful year was shocked to find myself in debt, 
 and with only seven dollars and fifty-three 
 cents left I like to be accurate. I had only 
 one resource : I determined to visit my deaf 
 aunt and Peninnah, and to see what I could 
 do in the role of the prodigal nephew. At 
 all events, I should gain time to think of what 
 new enterprise I could take up ; but, above 
 all, I needed a little capital and a house over 
 my head. I had pawned nearly everything 
 of any value which I possessed. 
 
 I left my debts to gather interest, and went 
 away to Woodbury. It was the day before 
 Christmas when I reached the little Jersej 
 town, and it was also by good luck Sunday- 
 I was hungry and quite penniless. I wan 
 dered about until church had begun, because 
 I was sure then to find Aunt Rachel and Pe-
 
 86 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 ninnah out at the service, and I desired to 
 explore a little. The house was closed, and 
 even the one servant absent. I got in with 
 ease at the back through the kitchen, and hav 
 ing at least an hour and a half free from in 
 terruption, I made a leisurely search. The 
 role of prodigal was well enough, but here 
 was a better chance and an indulgent oppor 
 tunity. 
 
 In a few moments I found the famous Bible 
 hid away under Aunt Rachel s mattress. The 
 Bible bank was fat with notes, but I intended 
 to be moderate enough to escape suspicion. 
 Here were quite two thousand dollars. I re 
 solved to take, just now, only one hundred, 
 so as to keep a good balance. Then, alas ! I 
 lit on a long envelop, my aunt s will. Every 
 cent was left to Christ Church ; not a dime to 
 poor Pen or to me. I was in a rage. I tore 
 up the will and replaced the envelop. To 
 treat poor Pen that way Pen of all people ! 
 There was a heap more will than testament, 
 for all it was in the Bible. After that I 
 thought it was right to punish the old witch, 
 and so I took every note I could find. When 
 I was through with this business, I put back 
 the Bible under the mattress, and observing 
 that I had been quite too long, I went down-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGKAPHY OF A QUACK 87 
 
 stairs with a keen desire to leave the town as 
 early as possible. I was tempted, however, 
 to look further, and was rewarded by finding 
 in an old clock case a small reticule stuffed 
 with bank-notes. This I appropriated, and 
 made haste to go out. I was too late. As I 
 went into the little entry to get my hat and 
 coat, Aunt Rachel entered, followed by Pe- 
 ninnah. 
 
 At sight of me my aunt cried out that I was 
 a monster and fit for the penitentiary. As 
 she could not hear at all, she had the talk to 
 herself, and went by me and up-stairs, rum 
 bling abuse like distant thunder overhead. 
 
 Meanwhile I was taken up with Pen. The 
 pretty fool was seated on a chair, all dressed 
 up in her Sunday finery, and rocking back 
 ward and forward, crying, " Oh, oh, ah ! " like 
 a lamb saying, " Baa, baa, baa ! " She never 
 had much sense. I had to shake her to get a 
 reasonable word. She mopped her eyes, and 
 I heard her gasp out that my aunt had at last 
 decided that I was the person who had thinned 
 her hoards. This was bad, but involved less 
 inconvenience than it might have done an 
 hour earlier. Amid tears Pen told me that a 
 detective had been at the house inquiring for 
 me. When this happened it seems that the
 
 88 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 poor little goose had tried to fool deaf Aunt 
 Rachel with some made-up story as to the man 
 having come about taxes. I suppose the girl 
 was not any too sharp, and the old woman, I 
 guess, read enough from merely seeing the 
 man s lips. You never could keep anything 
 from her, and she was both curious and sus 
 picious. She assured the officer that I was a 
 thief, and hoped I might be caught. I could 
 not learn whether the man told Pen any par 
 ticulars, but as I was slowly getting at the 
 facts we heard a loud scream and a heavy 
 fall. 
 
 Pen said, " Oh, oh ! " and we hurried up 
 stairs. There was the old woman on the 
 floor, her face twitching to right, and her 
 breathing a sort of hoarse croak. The big 
 Bible lay open on the floor, and I knew what 
 had happened. It was a fit of apoplexy. 
 
 At this very unpleasant sight Pen seemed 
 to recover her wits, and said : " Go away, go 
 away ! Oh, brother, brother, now I know 
 you have stolen her money and killed her, 
 and and I loved you, I was so proud of 
 you ! Oh, oh ! 
 
 This was all very fine, but the advice was 
 good. I said : " Yes, I had better go. Run 
 and get some one a doctor. It is a fit of
 
 THK BIG BIBLE LAV OPEN ON THE FLOOR.
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 91 
 
 hysterics; there is no danger. I will write 
 to you. You are quite mistaken." 
 
 This was too feeble even for Pen, and she 
 cried : 
 
 " No, never ; I never want to see you again. 
 You would kill me next." 
 
 " Stuff ! " said I, and ran down-stairs. I 
 seized my coat and hat, and went to the 
 tavern, where I got a man to drive me to 
 Camden. I have never seen Pen since. As 
 I crossed the ferry to Philadelphia I saw that 
 I should have asked when the detective had 
 been after me. I suspected from Pen s terror 
 that it had been recently. 
 
 It was Sunday and, as I reminded myself, 
 the day before Christmas. The ground was 
 covered with snow, and as I walked up Mar 
 ket street my feet were soon soaked. In my 
 haste I had left my overshoes. I was very 
 cold, and, as I now see, foolishly fearful. I 
 kept thinking of what a conspicuous thing a 
 fire-red head is, and of how many people 
 knew me. As I reached Woodbury early 
 and without a cent, I had eaten nothing all 
 day. I relied on Pen. 
 
 Now I concluded to go down into my old 
 neighborhood and get a lodging where no 
 references were asked. Next day I would
 
 92 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 secure a disguise and get out of the way. I 
 had passed the day without food, as I have 
 just said, and having ample means, concluded 
 to go somewhere and get a good dinner. It 
 was now close to three in the afternoon. I 
 was aware of two things : that I was making 
 many plans, and giving them up as soon as 
 made ; and that I was suddenly afraid with 
 out cause, afraid to enter an eating-house, 
 and in fear of every man I met. 
 
 I went on, feeling more and more chilly. 
 When a man is really cold his mind does not 
 work well, and now it was blowing a keen 
 gale from the north. At Second and South 
 I came plump on a policeman I knew. He 
 looked at me through the drifting snow, as if 
 he was uncertain, and twice looked back after 
 having passed me. I turned west at Chris 
 tian street. When I looked behind me the 
 man was standing at the corner, staring after 
 me. At the next turn I hurried away north 
 ward in a sort of anguish of terror. I have 
 said I was an uncommon person. I am. I 
 am sensitive, too. My mind is much above 
 the average, but unless I am warm and well 
 fed it does not act well, and I make mistakes. 
 At that time I was half frozen, in need of 
 food, and absurdly scared. Then that old fool
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 93 
 
 squirming on the floor got on to my nerves. 
 I went on and on, and at last into Second 
 street, until I came to Christ Church, of all 
 places for me. I heard the sound of the 
 organ in the afternoon service. I felt I must 
 go in and get warm. Here was another silly 
 notion : I was afraid of hotels, but not of the 
 church. I reasoned vaguely that it was a 
 dark day, and darker in the church, and so I 
 went in at the Church Alley entrance and sat 
 near the north door. No one noticed me. I 
 sat still in a high-backed pew, well hid, and 
 wondering what was the matter with me. It 
 was curious that a doctor, and a man of my 
 intelligence, should have been long in guess 
 ing a thing so simple. 
 
 For two months I had been drinking hard, 
 and for two days had quit, being a man ca 
 pable of great self-control, and also being 
 short of money. Just before the benediction 
 I saw a man near by who seemed to stare at 
 me. In deadly fear I got up and quickly 
 slipped through a door into the tower room. 
 I said to myself, " He will follow me or wait 
 outside." I stood a moment with my head 
 all of a whirl, and then in a shiver of fear 
 ran up the stairs to the tower until I got 
 into the bell-ringer s room. I was safe. I
 
 94 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 sat down on a stool, twitching and tremulous. 
 There were the old books on bell-ringing, and 
 the miniature chime of small bells for in 
 struction. The wind had easy entrance, and 
 it swung the eight ropes about in a way I did 
 not like. I remember saying, " Oh, don t do 
 that." At last I had a mad desire to ring 
 one of the bells. As a loop of rope swung 
 toward me it seemed to hold a face, and this 
 face cried out, " Come and hang yourself ; 
 then the bell will ring." 
 
 If I slept I do not know. I may have done 
 so. Certainly I must have stayed there many 
 hours. I was dull and confused, and yet on 
 my guard, for when far into the night I 
 heard noises below, I ran up the steeper 
 steps which ascend to the steeple, where are 
 the bells. Half-way up I sat down on the 
 stair. The place was cold and the darkness 
 deep. Then I heard the eight ringers down 
 below. One said : " Never knowed a Christ 
 mas like this since Zeb Sandcraf t died. Come, 
 boys ! " I knew it must be close on to mid 
 night. Now they would play a Christmas 
 carol. I used every Christmas to be roused 
 up and carried here and set on dad s shoulder. 
 When they were done ringing, Number Two 
 always gave me a box of sugar-plums and a
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 95 
 
 large red apple. As they rang off, my father 
 would cry out, "One, two," and so on, and 
 then cry, "Elias, all over town people are 
 opening windows to listen." I seemed to 
 hear him as I sat in the gloom. Then I 
 heard, " All ready; one, two," and they rang 
 the Christmas carol. Overhead I heard the 
 great bells ringing out : 
 
 And all the bells on earth shall ring 
 On Christmas day, on Christmas day. 
 
 I felt suddenly excited, and began to hum 
 the air. Great heavens ! There was the old 
 woman, Aunt Rachel, with her face going 
 twitch, twitch, the croak of her breathing 
 keeping a sort of mad time with " On Christ 
 mas day, on Christmas day." I jumped up. 
 She was gone. I knew in a hazy sort of way 
 what was the matter with me, but I had still 
 the sense to sit down and wait. I said now 
 it would be snakes, for once before I had 
 been almost as bad. But what I did see was 
 a little curly-headed boy in a white frock and 
 pantalets, climbing up the stairs right leg 
 first ; so queer of me to have noticed that. I 
 knew I was that boy. He was an innocent- 
 looking little chap, and was smiling. He 
 seemed to me to grow and grow, and at last
 
 96 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 was a big, red-headed man with a live rat in his 
 hand. I saw nothing more, but I surely 
 knew I needed whisky. I waited until all 
 was still, and got down and out, for I knew 
 every window. I soon found a tavern, and 
 got a drink and some food. At once my fear 
 left me. I was warm at last and clear of 
 head, and had again my natural courage. I 
 was well aware that I was on the edge of 
 delirium tremens and must be most prudent. 
 I paid in advance for my room and treated 
 myself as I had done many another. Only a 
 man of unusual force could have managed 
 his own case as I did. I went out only at 
 night, and in a week was well enough to 
 travel. During this time I saw now and 
 then that grinning little fellow. Sometimes 
 he had an apple and was eating it. I do not 
 know why he was worse to me than snakes, 
 or the tvvitchy old woman with her wide eyes 
 of glass, and that jerk, jerk, to right. 
 
 I decided to go back to Boston. I got to 
 New York prudently in a roundabout way, 
 and in two weeks time was traveling east 
 from Albany. 
 
 I felt well, and my spirits began at last to 
 rise to their usual level. When I arrived in 
 Boston I set myself to thinking how best I
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 99 
 
 could contrive to enjoy life and at the same 
 time to increase my means. I possessed suffi 
 cient capital, and was able and ready to em 
 bark in whatever promised the best returns 
 with the smallest personal risks. I settled 
 myself in a suburb, paid off a few pressing 
 claims, and began to reflect with my ordinary 
 sagacity. 
 
 We were now in the midst of a most absurd 
 war with the South, and it was becoming 
 difficult to escape the net of conscription. It 
 might be wise to think of this in time. 
 Europe seemed a desirable residence, but I 
 needed more money to make this agreeable, 
 and an investment for my brains was what 
 I wanted most. Many schemes presented 
 themselves as worthy the application of in 
 dustry and talent, but none of them alto 
 gether suited my case. I thought at times 
 of traveling as a physiological lecturer, com 
 bining with it the business of a practitioner : 
 scare the audience at night with an enumera 
 tion of symptoms which belong to ten out of 
 every dozen healthy people, and then doctor 
 such of them as are gulls enough to consult 
 me next day. The bigger the fright the 
 better the pay. I was a little timid, how 
 ever, about facing large audiences, as a man
 
 100 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 will be naturally if he has lived a life of ad 
 venture, so that upon due consideration I 
 gave up the idea altogether. 
 
 The patent medicine business also looked 
 well enough, but it is somewhat overdone at 
 all times, and requires a heavy outlay, with 
 the probable result of ill success. Indeed, I 
 believe one hundred quack remedies fail for 
 one that succeeds, and millions must have 
 been wasted in placards, bills, and advertise 
 ments, which never returned half their value 
 to the speculator. I think I shall some day 
 beguile my time with writing an account of 
 the principal quack remedies which have met 
 with success. They are few in number, after 
 all, as any one must know who recalls the 
 countless pills and tonics which are puffed 
 awhile on the fences, and disappear, to be 
 heard of no more. 
 
 Lastly, I inclined for a while to undertake 
 a private insane asylum, which appeared to 
 me to offer facilities for money-making, as to 
 which, however, I may have been deceived by 
 the writings of certain popular novelists. I 
 went so far, I may say, as actually to visit 
 Concord for the purpose of finding a pleasant 
 locality and a suitable atmosphere. Upon 
 reflection I abandoned my plans, as involv-
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 101 
 
 ing too much personal labor to suit one of 
 my easy frame of mind. 
 
 Tired at last of idleness and lounging on 
 the Common, I engaged in two or three little 
 ventures of a semi-professional character, 
 such as an exhibition of laughing-gas, ad 
 vertising to cure cancer, "Send twenty-five 
 stamps by mail to J. B., and receive an infal 
 lible receipt," etc. I did not find, however, 
 that these little enterprises prospered well in 
 New England, and I had recalled very for 
 cibly a story which my father was fond of 
 relating to me in my boyhood. It was about 
 how certain very knowing flies went to get 
 molasses, and how it ended by the molasses 
 getting them. This, indeed, was precisely 
 what happened to me in all my efforts to 
 better myself in the Northern States, until 
 at length my misfortunes climaxed in total 
 and unexpected ruin. 
 
 Having been very economical, I had now 
 about twenty-seven hundred dollars. It was 
 none too much. At this time I made the 
 acquaintance of a sea-captain from Maine. 
 He told me that he and two others had char 
 tered a smart little steamer to run to Jamaica 
 with a variety cargo. In fact, he meant to 
 run into Wilmington or Charleston, and he
 
 102 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 was to carry quinine, chloroform, and other 
 medical requirements for the Confederates. 
 He needed twenty-five hundred dollars more, 
 and a doctor to buy the kind of things which 
 army surgeons require. Of course I was 
 prudent and he careful, but at last, on his 
 proving to me that there was no risk, I 
 agreed to expend his money, his friends , 
 and my own up to twenty-live hundred dol 
 lars. I saw the other men, one of them a 
 rebel captain. I was well pleased with the 
 venture, and resolved for obvious reasons to 
 go with them on the steamer. It was a 
 promising investment, and I am free to re 
 flect that in this, as in some other things, I 
 have been free from vulgar prejudices. I 
 bought all that we needed, and was well sat 
 isfied when it was cleverly stowed away in 
 the hold. 
 
 We were to sail on a certain Thursday 
 morning in September, 1863. I sent my 
 trunk to the vessel, and went down the even 
 ing before we were to start to go on board, 
 but found that the little steamer had been 
 hauled out from the pier. The captain, who 
 met me at this time, endeavored to get a 
 boat to ferry us to the ship ; but a gale was 
 blowing, and he advised me to wait until
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 103 
 
 morning. My associates were already on 
 board. Early next day I dressed and went 
 to the captain s room, which proved to be 
 empty. I was instantly filled with doubt, 
 and ran frantically to the Long Wharf, 
 where, to my horror, I could see no signs 
 of the vessel or captain. Neither have I 
 ever set eyes on them from that time to this. 
 I thought of lodging information with the 
 police as to the unpatriotic design of the ras 
 cal who swindled me, but on the whole con 
 cluded that it was best to hold my tongue. 
 
 It was, as I perceived, such utterly spilt 
 milk as to be little worth lamenting, and I 
 therefore set to work, with my accustomed 
 energy, to utilize on my own behalf the re 
 sources of my medical education, which so 
 often before had saved me from want. The 
 war, then raging at its height, appeared to 
 offer numerous opportunities to men of talent. 
 The path which I chose was apparently a 
 humble one, but it enabled me to make very 
 practical use of my professional knowledge, 
 and afforded for a time rapid and secure re 
 turns, without any other investment than a 
 little knowledge cautiously employed. In the 
 first place, I deposited my small remnant of 
 property in a safe bank. Then I went to
 
 104 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 Providence, where, as I had heard, patriotic 
 persons were giving very large bounties in 
 order, I suppose, to insure the government 
 the services of better men than themselves. 
 On my arrival I lost no time in offering my 
 self as a substitute, and was readily accepted, 
 and very soon mustered into the Twentieth 
 Rhode Island. Three months were passed 
 in camp, during which period I received 
 bounty to the extent of six hundred and 
 fifty dollars, with which I tranquilly de 
 serted about two hours before the regiment 
 left for the field. With the product of my 
 industry I returned to Boston, and deposited 
 all but enough to carry me to New York, 
 where within a month I enlisted twice, earn 
 ing on each occasion four hundred dollars. 
 
 After this I thought it wise to try the same 
 game in some of the smaller towns near to 
 Philadelphia. I approached my birthplace 
 with a good deal of doubt ; but I selected a 
 regiment in camp at Norristown, which is 
 eighteen miles away. Here I got nearly 
 seven hundred dollars by entering the ser 
 vice as a substitute for an editor, whose pen, 
 I presume, was mightier than his sword. I 
 was, however, disagreeably surprised by being 
 hastily forwarded to the front under a foxy
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 105 
 
 young lieutenant, who brutally shot down a 
 poor devil in the streets of Baltimore for at 
 tempting to desert. At this point I began 
 to make use of my medical skill, for I did 
 not in the least degree fancy being shot, 
 either because of deserting or of not desert 
 ing. It happened, therefore, that a day or 
 two later, while in Washington, I was seized 
 in the street with a fit, which perfectly im 
 posed upon the officer in charge, and caused 
 him to leave me at the Douglas Hospital. 
 Here I found it necessary to perform fits 
 about twice a week, and as there were sev 
 eral real epileptics in the ward, I had a 
 capital chance of studying their symptoms, 
 which, finally, I learned to imitate with the 
 utmost cleverness. 
 
 I soon got to know three or four men who, 
 like myself, were personally averse to bullets, 
 and who were simulating other forms of 
 disease with more or less success. One of 
 them suffered with rheumatism of the back, 
 and walked about like an old man ; another, 
 who had been to the front, was palsied in the 
 right arm. A third kept open an ulcer 011 
 the leg, rubbing in a little antimomal oint 
 ment, which I bought at fifty cents, and sold 
 him at five dollars a box.
 
 106 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 A change in the hospital staff brought all 
 of us to grief. The new surgeon was a quiet, 
 gentlemanly person, with pleasant blue eyes 
 and clearly cut features, and a way of look 
 ing at you without saying much. I felt so 
 safe myself that I watched his procedures 
 with just that kind of enjoyment which one 
 clever man takes in seeing another at work. 
 
 The first inspection settled two of us. 
 
 "Another back case," said the assistant 
 surgeon to his senior. 
 
 " Back hurt you ? " says the latter, mildly. 
 
 "Yes, sir; run over by a howitzer; ain t 
 never been able to stand straight since." 
 
 "A howitzer!" says the surgeon. "Lean 
 forward, my man, so as to touch the floor- 
 so. That will do." Then turning to his aid, 
 he said, "Prepare this man s discharge 
 papers." 
 
 "His discharge, sir?" 
 
 " Yes ; I said that. Who s next ? " 
 
 "Thank you, sir," groaned the man with 
 the back. "How soon, sir, do you think it 
 will be?" 
 
 "Ah, not less than a month," replied the 
 surgeon, and passed on. 
 
 Now, as it was unpleasant to be bent like 
 the letter C, and as the patient presumed that
 
 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 107 
 
 his discharge was secure, he naturally allowed 
 himself a little relaxation in the way of be 
 coming straighter. Unluckily, those nice 
 blue eyes were everywhere at all hours, and 
 one fine morning Smithson was appalled at 
 finding himself in a detachment bound for 
 the field, and bearing on his descriptive list 
 an ill-natured indorsement about his malady. 
 
 The surgeon came next on O Callahan, 
 standing, like each of us, at the foot of his 
 own bed. 
 
 11 1 ve paralytics in my arm," he said, with 
 intention to explain his failure to salute his 
 superior. 
 
 " Humph ! " said the surgeon ; " you have 
 another hand." 
 
 " An it s not the rigulation to saloot with 
 yer left," said the Irishman, with a grin, while 
 the patients around us began to smile. 
 
 " How did it happen ? " said the surgeon. 
 
 11 1 was shot in the shoulder," answered the 
 patient, "about three months ago, sir. I 
 have n t stirred it since." 
 
 The surgeon looked at the scar. 
 
 "So recently?" said he. "The scar looks 
 older; and, by the way, doctor," to his jun 
 ior, "it could not have gone near the 
 nerves. Bring the battery, orderly."
 
 108 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 In a few moments the surgeon was testing 
 one after another, the various muscles. At 
 last he stopped. " Send this man away with 
 the next detachment. Not a word, my man. 
 You are a rascal, and a disgrace to honest 
 men who have been among bullets." 
 
 The man muttered something, I did not 
 hear what. 
 
 "Put this man in the guard-house," cried 
 the surgeon, and so passed on without smile 
 or frown. 
 
 As to the ulcer case, to my amusement he 
 was put in bed, and his leg locked up in a 
 wooden splint, which effectually prevented 
 him from touching the part diseased. It 
 healed in ten days, and he too went as food 
 for powder. 
 
 The surgeon asked me a few questions, and 
 requesting to be sent for during my next fit, 
 left me alone. 
 
 I was, of course, on my guard, and took 
 care to have my attacks only during his ab 
 sence, or to have them over before he arrived. 
 At length, one morning, in spite of my care, 
 he chanced to enter the ward as I fell on the 
 floor. I was laid on the bed, apparently in 
 strong convulsions. Presently I felt a finger 
 on my eyelid, and as it was raised, saw the
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 109 
 
 surgeon standing beside me. To escape his 
 scrutiny I became more violent in my mo 
 tions. He stopped a moment and looked at 
 me steadily. " Poor fellow ! " said he, to my 
 great relief, as I felt at once that I had suc 
 cessfully deceived him. Then he turned to 
 the ward doctor and remarked : " Take care 
 he does not hurt his head against the bed; 
 and, by the by, doctor, do you remember the 
 test we applied in Carstairs s case ? Just tickle 
 the soles of his feet and see if it will cause 
 those backward spasms of the head." 
 
 The aid obeyed him, and, very naturally, 
 I jerked my head backward as hard as I 
 could. 
 
 "That will answer," said the surgeon, to 
 my horror. "A clever rogue. Send him to 
 the guard-house." 
 
 Happy had I been had my ill luck ended 
 here, but as I crossed the yard an officer 
 stopped me. To my disgust, it was the cap 
 tain of my old Rhode Island company. 
 
 "Hello ! " said he; "keep that fellow safe. 
 I know him." 
 
 To cut short a long story, I was tried, con 
 victed, and forced to refund the Rhode Island 
 bounty, for by ill luck they found my bank 
 book among my papers. I was finally sent
 
 110 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 to Fort Delaware and kept at hard labor, 
 handling and carrying shot, policing the 
 ground, picking up cigar-stumps, and other 
 light, unpleasant occupations. 
 
 When the war was over I was released. I 
 went at once to Boston, where I had about 
 four hundred dollars in bank. I spent nearly 
 all of this sum before I could satisfy the ac 
 cumulated cravings of a year and a half with 
 out drink or tobacco, or a decent meal. I 
 was about to engage in a little business as a 
 vender of lottery policies when I first began 
 to feel a strange sense of lassitude, which 
 soon increased so as quite to disable me from 
 work of any kind. Month after month passed 
 away, while my money lessened, and this 
 terrible sense of weariness went on from 
 bad to worse. At last one day, after nearly 
 a year had elapsed, I perceived on my face a 
 large brown patch of color, in consequence 
 of which I went in some alarm to consult a 
 well-known physician. He asked me a multi 
 tude of tiresome questions, and at last wrote 
 off a prescription, which I immediately read. 
 It was a preparation of arsenic. 
 
 " What do you think," said I, " is the matter 
 with me, doctor ? " 
 
 "I am afraid," said he, "that you have a
 
 THE AUTOBIOGEAPHY OF A QUACK 111 
 
 very serious trouble what we call Addison s 
 disease." 
 
 "What s that? "said I. 
 
 "I do not think you would comprehend 
 it," he replied; "it is an affection of the 
 suprarenal capsules." 
 
 I dimly remembered that there were such 
 organs, and that nobody knew what they 
 were meant for. It seemed that doctors had 
 found a use for them at last. 
 
 " Is it a dangerous disease ? " I said. 
 
 " I fear so," he answered. 
 
 " Don t you really know," I asked, " what s 
 the truth about it ? " 
 
 "Well," he returned gravely, "I m sorry 
 to tell you it is a very dangerous malady." 
 
 "Nonsense ! " said I; "I don t believe it"; 
 for I thought it was only a doctor s trick, and 
 one I had tried often enough myself. 
 
 " Thank you," said he ; " you are a very ill 
 man, and a fool besides. Good morning." 
 He forgot to ask for a fee, and I did not 
 therefore find it necessary to escape payment 
 by telling him I was a doctor. 
 
 Several weeks went by; my money was 
 gone, my clothes were ragged, and, like my 
 body, nearly worn out, and now I am an 
 inmate of a hospital. To-day I feel weaker 
 
 7
 
 112 THE AUTOBIOGKAPHY OF A QUACK 
 
 than when I first began to write. How it 
 will end, I do not know. If I die, the doctor 
 will get this pleasant history, and if I live, I 
 shall burn it, and as soon as I get a little 
 money I will set out to look for my sister. 
 I dreamed about her last night. What I 
 dreamed was not very agreeable. I thought 
 it was night. I was walking up one of the 
 vilest streets near my old office, and a girl 
 spoke to me a shameless, worn creature, 
 with great sad eyes. Suddenly she screamed, 
 " Brother, brother ! " and then remembering 
 what she had been, with her round, girlish, 
 innocent face and fair hair, and seeing what 
 she was now, I awoke and saw the dim light 
 of the half -darkened ward. 
 
 I am better to-day. Writing all this stuff 
 has amused me and, I think, done me good. 
 That was a horrid dream I had. I suppose I 
 must tear up all this biography. 
 
 " HeUo, nurse ! The little boy boy " 
 
 " GOOD HEAVENS ! " said the nurse, " he is 
 dead ! Dr. Alston said it would happen this 
 way. The screen, quick the screen and 
 let the doctor know."
 
 THE CASE OF 
 GEORGE DEDLOW
 
 THE CASE OF 
 GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 JHE following notes of my own 
 case have been declined on vari 
 ous pretexts by every medical 
 journal to which I have offered 
 them. There was, perhaps^ 
 some reason in this, because many of the 
 medical facts which they record are not al 
 together new, and because the psychical de 
 ductions to which they have led me are not 
 in themselves of medical interest. I ought 
 to add that a great deal of what is here re 
 lated is not of any scientific value whatso 
 ever; but as one or two people on whose 
 judgment I rely have advised me to print 
 my narrative with all the personal details, 
 rather than in the dry shape in which, as a 
 psychological statement, I shall publish it 
 elsewhere, I have yielded to their views. I 
 115
 
 116 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 suspect, however, that the very character of 
 my record will, in the eyes of some of my 
 readers, tend to lessen the value of the meta 
 physical discoveries which it sets forth. 
 
 I AM the son of a physician, still in large 
 practice, in the village of Abington, Scofield 
 County, Indiana. Expecting to act as his 
 future partner, I studied medicine in his 
 office, and in 1859 and 1860 attended lectures 
 at the Jefferson Medical College in Philadel 
 phia. My second course should have been in 
 the following year, but the outbreak of the 
 Rebellion so crippled my father s means that 
 I was forced to abandon my intention. The 
 demand for army surgeons at this time be 
 came very great ; and although not a gradu 
 ate, I found no difficulty in getting the place 
 of assistant surgeon to the Tenth Indiana 
 Volunteers. In the subsequent Western 
 campaigns this organization suffered so se 
 verely that before the term of its service 
 was over it was merged in the Twenty-first In 
 diana Volunteers ; and I, as an extra surgeon, 
 ranked by the medical officers of the latter 
 regiment, was transferred to the Fifteenth 
 Indiana Cavalry. Like many physicians, I 
 had contracted a strong taste for army life,
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 117 
 
 and, disliking cavalry service, sought and 
 obtained the position of first lieutenant in 
 the Seventy-ninth Indiana Volunteers, an 
 infantry regiment of excellent character. 
 
 On the day after I assumed command of 
 my company, which had no captain, we were 
 sent to garrison a part of a line of block 
 houses stretching along the Cumberland 
 River below Nashville, then occupied by a 
 portion of the command of General Rose- 
 crans. 
 
 The life we led while on this duty was 
 tedious and at the same time dangerous in 
 the extreme. Food was scarce and bad, the 
 water horrible, and we had no cavalry to 
 forage for us. If, as infantry, we attempted 
 to levy supplies upon the scattered farms 
 around us, the population seemed suddenly 
 to double, and in the shape of guerrillas 
 "potted" us industriously from behind dis 
 tant trees, rocks, or fences. Under these 
 various and unpleasant influences, combined 
 with a fair infusion of malaria, our men rap 
 idly lost health and spirits. Unfortunately, 
 no proper medical supplies had been for 
 warded with our small force (two com 
 panies), and, as the fall advanced, the want 
 of quinine and stimulants became a serious
 
 118 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 aunoyance. Moreover, our rations were run 
 ning low; we had been three weeks without 
 a new supply; and our commanding officer, 
 Major Henry L. Terrill, began to be uneasy as 
 to the.saf ety of his men. About this time it was 
 supposed that a train with rations would be 
 due from the post twenty miles to the north 
 of us ; yet it was quite possible that it would 
 bring us food, but no medicines, which were 
 what we most needed. The command was 
 too small to detach any part of it, and the 
 major therefore resolved to send an officer 
 alone to the post above us, where the rest of 
 the Seventy-ninth lay, and whence they could 
 easily forward quinine and stimulants by the 
 train, if it had not left, or, if it had, by a 
 small cavalry escort. 
 
 It so happened, to my cost, as it turned 
 out, that I was the only officer fit to make 
 the journey, and I was accordingly ordered 
 to proceed to Blockhouse No. 3 and make 
 the required arrangements. I started alone 
 just after dusk the next night, and during 
 the darkness succeeded in getting within 
 three miles of my destination. At this time 
 I found that I had lost my way, and, although 
 aware of the danger of my act, was forced to 
 turn aside and ask at a log cabin for direc-
 
 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 119 
 
 tions. The house contained a dried-up old 
 woman and four white-headed, half-naked 
 children. The woman was either stone-deaf 
 or pretended to be so ; but, at all events, she 
 gave me no satisfaction, and I remounted 
 and rode awa} r . On coming to the end of a 
 lane, into which I had turned to seek the 
 cabin, I found to my surprise that the bars 
 had been put up during my brief parley. 
 They were too high to leap, and I therefore 
 dismounted to pull them down. As I touched 
 the top rail, I heard a rifle, and at the same 
 instant felt a blow on both arms, which fell 
 helpless. I staggered to my horse and tried 
 to mount; but, as I could use neither arm, 
 the effort was vain, and I therefore stood still, 
 awaiting my fate. I am only conscious that 
 I saw about me several graybacks, for I must 
 have fallen fainting almost immediately. 
 
 When I awoke I was lying in the cabin 
 near by, upon a pile of rubbish. Ten or 
 twelve guerrillas were gathered about the fire, 
 apparently drawing lots for my watch, boots, 
 hat, etc. I now made an effort to find out 
 how far I was hurt. I discovered that I 
 could use the left forearm and hand pretty 
 well, and with this hand I felt the right limb 
 all over until I touched the wound. The ball
 
 120 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 had passed from left to right through the left 
 biceps, and directly through the right arm 
 just below the shoulder, emerging behind. 
 The right arm and forearm were cold and 
 perfectly insensible. I pinched them as well 
 as I could, to test the amount of sensation 
 remaining ; but the hand might as well have 
 been that of a dead man. I began to under 
 stand that the nerves had been wounded, and 
 that the part was utterly powerless. By this 
 time my friends had pretty well divided the 
 spoils, and, rising together, went out. The 
 old woman then came to me, and said : 
 " Reckon you d best git up. They- uns is 
 a-goin to take you away." To this I only 
 answered, u Water, water." I had a grim 
 sense of amusement on finding that the old 
 woman was not deaf, for she went out, and 
 presently came back with a gourdful, which 
 I eagerly drank. An hour later the gray- 
 backs returned, and finding that I was too 
 weak to walk, carried me out and laid me on 
 the bottom of a common cart, with which 
 they set off on a trot. The jolting was hor 
 rible, but within an hour I began to have in 
 my dead right hand a strange burning, which 
 was rather a relief to me. It increased as the 
 sun rose and the day grew warm, until I felt
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 121 
 
 as if the hand was caught and pinched in a 
 red-hot vise. Then in my agony I begged 
 my guard for water to wet it with, but for 
 some reason they desired silence, and at every 
 noise threatened me with a revolver. At 
 length the pain became absolutely unendur 
 able, and I grew what it is the fashion to call 
 demoralized. I screamed, cried, and yelled 
 in my torture, until, as I suppose, my captors 
 became alarmed, and, stopping, gave me a 
 handkerchief, my own, I fancy, and a can 
 teen of water, with which I wetted the hand, 
 to my unspeakable relief. 
 
 It is unnecessary to detail the events by 
 which, finally, I found myself in one of the 
 rebel hospitals near Atlanta. Here, for the 
 first time, my wounds were properly cleansed 
 and dressed by a Dr. Oliver T. Wilson, who 
 treated me throughout with great kindness. 
 I told him I had been a doctor, which, per 
 haps, may have been in part the cause of the 
 unusual tenderness with which I was man 
 aged. The left arm was now quite easy, 
 although, as will be seen, it never entirely 
 healed. The right arm was worse than ever 
 the humerus broken, the nerves wounded, 
 and the hand alive only to pain. I use this 
 phrase because it is connected in my mind
 
 with a visit from a local visitor, I am not 
 sure he was a preacher, who used to go 
 daily through the wards, and talk to us or 
 write our letters. One morning he stopped 
 at my bed, when this little talk occurred : 
 
 "How are you, lieutenant?" 
 
 " Oh," said I, " as usual. All right, but this 
 hand, which is dead except to pain." 
 
 "Ah," said he, "such and thus will the 
 wicked be such will you be if you die in 
 your sins : you will go where only pain can 
 be felt. For all eternity, all of you will be 
 just like that hand knowing pain only." 
 
 I suppose I was very weak, but somehow I 
 felt a sudden and chilling horror of possible 
 universal pain, and suddenly fainted. When 
 I awoke the hand was worse, if that could be. 
 It was red, shining, aching, burning, and, as 
 it seemed to me, perpetually rasped with hot 
 files. When the doctor came I begged for 
 morphia. He said gravely: "We have none. 
 You know you don t allow it to pass the 
 lines." It was sadly true. 
 
 I turned to the wall, and wetted the hand 
 again, my sole relief. In about an hour Dr. 
 Wilson came back with two aids, and ex 
 plained to me that the bone was so crushed 
 as to make it hopeless to save it, and that,
 
 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 123 
 
 besides, amputation offered some chance of 
 arresting the pain. I had thought of this 
 before, but the anguish I felt I cannot say 
 endured was so awful that I made no more 
 of losing the limb than of parting with a 
 tooth on account of toothache. Accordingly, 
 brief preparations were made, which I 
 watched with a sort of eagerness such as 
 must forever be inexplicable to any one who 
 has not passed six weeks of torture like that 
 which I had suffered. 
 
 I had but one pang before the operation. 
 As I arranged myself on the left side, so as 
 to make it convenient for the operator to use 
 the knife, I asked: "Who is to give me the 
 ether?" "We have none," said the person 
 questioned. I set my teeth, and said no 
 more. 
 
 I need not describe the operation. The 
 pain felt was severe, but it was insignificant 
 as compared with that of any other minute of 
 the past six weeks. The limb was removed 
 very near to the shoulder- joint As the sec 
 ond incision was made, I felt a strange flash 
 of pain play through the limb, as if it were 
 in every minutest fibril of nerve. This was 
 followed by instant, unspeakable relief, and 
 before the flaps were brought together I was
 
 124 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 sound asleep. I dimly remember saying, as 
 I pointed to the arm which lay on the floor : 
 " There is the pain, and here am I. How 
 queer ! " Then I slept slept the sleep of 
 the just, or, better, of the painless. From 
 this time forward I was free from neuralgia. 
 At a subsequent period I saw a number of 
 cases similar to mine in a hospital in Phila 
 delphia. 
 
 It is no part of my plan to detail my weary 
 months of monotonous prison life in the 
 South. In the early part of April, 1863, I 
 was exchanged, and after the usual thirty days 
 furlough returned to my regiment a captain. 
 
 On the 19th of September, 1863, occurred 
 the battle of Chickamauga, in which my regi 
 ment took a conspicuous p*art. The close of 
 our own share in this contest is, as it were, 
 burned into my memory with every least de 
 tail. It was about 6 P. M., when we found our 
 selves in line, under cover of a long, thin 
 row of scrubby trees, beyond which lay a 
 gentle slope, from which, again, rose a hill 
 rather more abrupt, and crowned with an 
 earthwork. We received orders to cross this 
 space and take the fort in front, while a 
 brigade on our right was to make a like 
 movement on its flank.
 
 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 125 
 
 Just before we emerged into the open 
 ground, we noticed what, I think, was com 
 mon in many fights that the enemy had 
 begun to bowl round shot at us, probably 
 from failure of shell. We passed across the 
 valley in good order, although the men fell 
 rapidly all along the line. As we climbed 
 the hill, our pace slackened, and the fire grew 
 heavier. At this moment a battery opened 
 on our left, the shots crossing our heads 
 obliquely. It is this moment which is so 
 printed on my recollection. I can see now, 
 as if through a window, the gray smoke, lit 
 with red flashes, the long, wavering line, 
 the sky blue above, the trodden furrows, 
 blotted with blue blouses. Then it was as if 
 the window closed, and I knew and saw no 
 more. No other scene in my life is thus 
 scarred, if I may say so, into my memory. I 
 have a fancy that the horrible shock which 
 suddenly fell upon me must have had some 
 thing to do with thus intensifying the mo 
 mentary image then before my eyes. 
 
 When I awakened, I was lying under a tree 
 somewhere at the rear. The ground was 
 covered with wounded, and the doctors were 
 busy at an operating-table, improvised from 
 two barrels and a plank. At length two of
 
 126 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 them who were examining the wounded 
 about me came up to where I lay. A hos 
 pital steward raised my head and poured 
 down some brandy and water, while another 
 cut loose my pantaloons. The doctors ex 
 changed looks and walked away. I asked 
 the steward where I was hit. 
 
 " Both thighs," said he ; " the doctors won t 
 do nothing." 
 
 "No use?" said I. 
 
 " Not much," said he. 
 
 " Not much means none at all," I answered. 
 
 When he had gone I set myself to thinking 
 about a good many things I had better have 
 thought of before, but which in no way con 
 cern the history of my case. A half-hour 
 went by. I had no pain, and did not get 
 weaker. At last, I cannot explain why, I 
 began to look about me. At first things 
 appeared a little hazy. I remember one 
 thing which thrilled me a little, even then. 
 
 A tall, blond-bearded major walked up to 
 a doctor near me, saying, "When you ve a 
 little leisure, just take a look at my side." 
 
 " Do it now," said the doctor. 
 
 The officer exposed his wound. "Ball 
 went in here, and out there." 
 
 The doctor looked up at him half pity,
 
 THE CASE OF GEOKGE DEDLOW 127 
 
 half amazement. " If you 7 ve got any mes 
 sage, you d best send it by me." 
 
 " Why, you don t say it 7 s serious ? " was the 
 reply. 
 
 " Serious ! Why, you 7 re shot through the 
 stomach. You won t live over the day." 
 
 Then the man did what struck me as a 
 very odd thing. He said, " Anybody got a 
 pipe ? " Some one gave him a pipe. He filled 
 it deliberately, struck a light with a flint, and 
 sat down against a tree near to me. Pres 
 ently the doctor came to him again, and 
 asked him what he could do for him. 
 
 " Send me a drink of Bourbon." 
 
 " Anything else ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 As the doctor left him, he called him back. 
 " It s a little rough, doc, is n t it?" 
 
 No more passed, and I saw this man no 
 longer. Another set of doctors were han 
 dling my legs, for the first time causing pain. 
 A moment after a steward put a towel over 
 my mouth, and I smelled the familiar odor of 
 chloroform, which I was glad enough to 
 breathe. In a moment the trees began to 
 move around from left to right, faster and 
 faster ; then a universal grayness came be 
 fore me, and I recall nothing further until
 
 128 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 I awoke to consciousness in a hospital-tent. 
 I got hold of my own identity in a moment 
 or two, and was suddenly aware of a sharp 
 cramp in my left leg. I tried to get at it to 
 rub it with my single arm, but, finding my 
 self too weak, hailed an attendant. "Just 
 rub my left calf," said I, " if you please." 
 
 "Calf?" said he. "You ain t none. It 7 s 
 took off." 
 
 " I know better," said I. " I have pain in 
 both legs." 
 
 " Wall, I never ! " said he. " You ain t 
 got nary leg." 
 
 As I did not believe him, he threw off the 
 covers, and, to my horror, showed me that I 
 had suffered amputation of both thighs, very 
 high up. 
 
 " That will do," said I, faintly. 
 
 A month later, to the amazement of every 
 one, I was so well as to be moved from the 
 crowded hospital at Chattanooga to Nash 
 ville, where I filled one of the ten thousand 
 beds of that vast metropolis of hospitals. Of 
 the sufferings which then began I shall pres 
 ently speak. It will be best just now to de 
 tail the final misfortune which here fell upon 
 me. Hospital No. 2, in which I lay. was in 
 conveniently crowded with severely wounded
 
 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 129 
 
 officers. After my third week an epidemic 
 of hospital gangrene broke out in my ward. 
 In three days it attacked twenty persons. 
 Then an inspector came, and we were trans 
 ferred at once to the open air, and placed in 
 tents. Strangely enough, the wound in my 
 remaining arm, which still suppurated, was 
 seized with gangrene. The usual remedy, 
 bromine, was used locally, but the main 
 artery opened, was tied, bled again and 
 again, and at last, as a final resort, the re 
 maining arm was amputated at the shoulder- 
 joint. Against all chances I recovered, to 
 find myself a useless torso, more like some 
 strange larval creature than anything of 
 human shape. Of my anguish and horror 
 of myself I dare not speak. I have dictated 
 these pages, not to shock my readers, but to 
 possess them with facts in regard to the rela 
 tion of the mind to the body ; and I hasten, 
 therefore, to such portions of my case as best 
 illustrate these views. 
 
 In January, 1864, 1 was forwarded to Phila 
 delphia, in order to enter what was known 
 as the Stump Hospital, South street, then in 
 charge of Dr. Hopkinson. This favor was 
 obtained through the influence of my father s 
 friend, the late Governor Anderson, who has
 
 130 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 always manifested an interest in my case, for 
 which I am deeply grateful. It was thought, 
 at the time, that Mr. Palmer, the leg-maker, 
 might be able to adapt some form of arm to 
 my left shoulder, as on that side there re 
 mained five inches of the arm-bone, which I 
 could move to a moderate extent. The hope 
 proved illusory, as the stump was always too 
 tender to bear any pressure. The hospital 
 referred to was in charge of several surgeons 
 while I was an inmate, and was at all times 
 a clean and pleasant home. It was filled with 
 men who had lost one arm or leg, or one of 
 each, as happened now and then. I saw one 
 man who had lost both legs, and one who had 
 parted with both arms ; but none, like myself, 
 stripped of every limb. There were collected 
 in this place hundreds of these cases, which 
 gave to it, with reason enough, the not very 
 pleasing title of Stump Hospital. 
 
 I spent here three and a half months, be 
 fore my transfer to the United States Army 
 Hospital for Injuries and Diseases of the Ner 
 vous System. Every morning I was carried 
 out in an arm-chair and placed in the library, 
 where some one was always ready to write or 
 read for me, or to fill my pipe. The doctors 
 lent me medical books ; the ladies brought me
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 131 
 
 luxuries and fed me; and, save that I was 
 helpless to a degree which was humiliating, I 
 was as comfortable as kindness could make me. 
 I amused myself at this time by noting in 
 my mind all that I could learn from other 
 limbless folk, and from myself, as to the pe 
 culiar feelings which were noticed in regard 
 to lost members. I found that the great 
 mass of men who had undergone amputa 
 tions for many months felt the usual con 
 sciousness that they still had the lost limb. 
 It itched or pained, or was cramped, but 
 never felt hot or cold. If they had painful 
 sensations referred to it, the conviction of its 
 existence continued unaltered for long peri 
 ods; but where no pain was felt in it, then 
 by degrees the sense of having that limb 
 faded away entirely. I think we may to 
 some extent explain this. The knowledge 
 we possess of any part is made up of the 
 numberless impressions from without which 
 affect its sensitive surfaces, and which are 
 transmitted through its nerves to the spinal 
 nerve-cells, and through them, again, to the 
 brain. We are thus kept endlessly informed 
 as to the existence of parts, because the im 
 pressions which reach the brain are, by a law 
 of our being, referred by us to the part from
 
 132 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 which they come. Now, when the part is cut 
 off, the nerve-trunks which led to it and from 
 it, remaining capable of being impressed by 
 irritations, are made to convey to the brain 
 from the stump impressions which are, as 
 usual, referred by the brain to the lost parts 
 to which these nerve-threads belonged. In 
 other words, the nerve is like a bell-wire. 
 You may pull it at any part of its course, 
 and thus ring the bell as well as if you pulled 
 at the end of the wire; but, in any case, 
 the intelligent servant will refer the pull to 
 the front door, and obey it accordingly. The 
 impressions made on the severed ends of the 
 nerve are due often to changes in the stump 
 during healing, and consequently cease when 
 it has healed, so that finally, in a very healthy 
 sutmp, no such impressions arise ; the brain 
 ceases to correspond with the lost leg, and, 
 as les absents ont toujours tort, it is no longer 
 remembered or recognized. But in some 
 cases, such as mine proved at last to my sor 
 row, the ends of the nerves undergo a curious 
 alteration, and get to be enlarged and al 
 tered. This change, as I have seen in my 
 practice of medicine, sometimes passes up 
 the nerves toward the centers, and occasions 
 a more or less constant irritation of the nerve-
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 133 
 
 fibers, producing neuralgia, which is usually 
 referred by the brain to that part of the lost 
 limb to which the affected nerve belonged. 
 This pain keeps the brain ever mindful of 
 the missing part, and, imperfectly at least, 
 preserves to the man a consciousness of pos 
 sessing that which he has not. 
 
 Where the pains come and go, as they do 
 in certain cases, the subjective sensations 
 thus occasioned are very curious, since in 
 such cases the man loses and gains, and loses 
 and regains, the consciousness of the presence 
 of the lost parts, so that he will tell you, 
 "Now I feel my thumb, now I feel my 
 little finger." I should also add that nearly 
 every person who has lost an arm above the 
 elbow feels as though the lost member were 
 bent at the elbow, and at times is vividly 
 impressed with the notion that his fingers are 
 strongly flexed. 
 
 Other persons present a peculiarity which 
 I am at a loss to account for. Where the 
 leg, for instance, has been lost, they feel as 
 if the foot were present, but as though the leg 
 were shortened. Thus, if the thigh has been 
 taken off, there seems to them to be a foot at 
 the knee ; if the arm, a hand seems to be at 
 the elbow, or attached to the stump itself.
 
 134 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 
 
 Before leaving Nashville I had begun to 
 suffer the most acute pain in my left hand, 
 especially the little finger ; and so perfect was 
 the idea which was thus kept up of the real 
 presence of these missing parts that I found 
 it hard at times to believe them absent. Often 
 at night I would try with one lost hand to 
 grope for the other. As, however, I had no 
 pain in the right arm, the sense of the exis 
 tence of that limb gradually disappeared, as 
 did that of my legs also. 
 
 Everything was done for my neuralgia 
 which the doctors could think of; and at 
 length, at my suggestion, I was removed, as 
 I have said, from the Stump Hospital to the 
 United States Army Hospital for Injuries 
 and Diseases of the Nervous System. It was 
 a pleasant, suburban, old-fashioned country- 
 seat, its gardens surrounded by a circle of 
 wooden, one-story wards, shaded by fine trees. 
 There were some three hundred cases of epi 
 lepsy, paralysis, St. Vitus s dance, and wounds 
 of nerves. On one side of me lay a poor fellow, 
 a Dane, who had the same burning neuralgia 
 with which I once suffered, and which I now 
 learned was only too common. This man 
 had become hysterical from pain. He car 
 ried a sponge in his pocket, and a bottle of
 
 THE CASE OP GEOEGE DEDLOW 135 
 
 water in oue hand, with which he constantly 
 wetted the burning hand. Every sound in 
 creased his torture, and he even poured water 
 into his boots to keep himself from feeling 
 too sensibly the rough friction of his soles 
 when walking. Like him, I was greatly 
 eased by having small doses of morphia in 
 jected under the skin of my shoulder with a 
 hollow needle fitted to a syringe. 
 
 As I improved under the morphia treat 
 ment, I began to be disturbed by the horrible 
 variety of suffering about me. One man 
 walked sideways; there was one who could 
 not smell ; another was dumb from an explo 
 sion. In fact, every one had his own ab 
 normal peculiarity. Near me was a strange 
 case of palsy of the muscles called rhom 
 boids, whose office it is to hold down the 
 shoulder-blades flat on the back during the 
 motions of the arms, which, in themselves, 
 were strong enough. When, however, he 
 lifted these members, the shoulder-blades 
 stood out from the back like wings, and got 
 him the sobriquet of the "Angel." In my 
 ward were also the cases of fits, which very 
 much annoyed me, as upon any great change 
 in the weather it was common to have a 
 
 dozen convulsions in view at once. Dr. Neek, 
 o
 
 136 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 one of our physicians, told me that on one 
 occasion a hundred and fifty fits took place 
 within thirty-six hours. On my complaining 
 of these sights, whence I alone could not fly, 
 I was placed in the paralytic and wound 
 ward, which I found much more pleasant. 
 
 A month of skilful treatment eased me 
 entirely of my aches, and I then began to 
 experience certain curious feelings, upon 
 which, having nothing to do and nothing 
 to do anything with, I reflected a good deal. 
 It was a good while before I could correctly 
 explain to my own satisfaction the phenom 
 ena which at this time I was called upon 
 to observe. By the various operations al 
 ready described I had lost about four fifths 
 of my weight. As a consequence of this I 
 ate much less than usual, and could scarcely 
 have consumed the ration of a soldier. I slept 
 also but little; for, as sleep is the repose of 
 the brain, made necessary by the waste of its 
 tissues during thought and voluntary move 
 ment, and as this latter did not exist in my 
 case, I needed only that rest which was neces 
 sary to repair such exhaustion of the nerve- 
 centers as was induced by thinking and the 
 automatic movements of the viscera. 
 
 I observed at this time also that my heart,
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 137 
 
 in place of beating, as it once did, seventy- 
 eight in the minute, pulsated only forty-five 
 times in this interval a fact to be easily 
 explained by the perfect quiescence to which 
 I was reduced, and the consequent absence of 
 that healthy and constant stimulus to the 
 muscles of the heart which exercise occa 
 sions. 
 
 Notwithstanding these drawbacks, my 
 physical health was good, which, I confess, 
 surprised me, for this among other reasons : 
 It is said that a burn of two thirds of the 
 surface destroys life, because then all the ex 
 cretory matters which this portion of the 
 glands of the skin evolved are thrown upon 
 the blood, and poison the man, just as hap 
 pens in an animal whose skin the physiologist 
 has varnished, so as in this way to destroy 
 its function. Yet here was I, having lost at 
 least a third of my skin, and apparently none 
 the worse for it. 
 
 Still more remarkable, however, were the 
 psychical changes which I now began to per 
 ceive. I found to my horror that at times I 
 was less conscious of myself, of my own ex 
 istence, than used to be the case. This sen 
 sation was so novel that at first it quite 
 bewildered me. I felt like asking some one
 
 138 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 constantly if I were really George Dedlow or 
 not; but, well aware how absurd I should 
 seem after such a question, I refrained from 
 speaking of my case, and strove more keenly 
 to analyze my feelings. At times the convic 
 tion of my want of being myself was over 
 whelming and most painful. It was, as well 
 as I can describe it, a deficiency in the egoistic 
 sentiment of individuality. About one half 
 of the sensitive surface of my skin was gone, 
 and thus much of relation to the outer world 
 destroyed. As a consequence, a large part 
 of the receptive central organs must be out 
 of employ, and, like other idle things, degen 
 erating rapidly. Moreover, all the great cen 
 tral ganglia, which give rise to movements in 
 the limbs, were also eternally at rest. Thus 
 one half of me was absent or functionally 
 dead. This set me to thinking how much a 
 man might lose and yet live. If I were un 
 happy enough to survive, I might part with 
 my spleen at least, as many a dog has done, 
 and grown fat afterwards. The other organs 
 with which we breathe and circulate the blood 
 would be essential ; so also would the liver ; 
 but at least half of the intestines might be 
 dispensed with, and of course all of the limbs. 
 And as to the nervous system, the only parts
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 139 
 
 really necessary to life are a few small ganglia. 
 Were the rest absent or inactive, we should 
 have a man reduced, as it were, to the lowest 
 terms, and leading an almost vegetative ex 
 istence. Would such a being, I asked myself, 
 possess the sense of individuality in its usual 
 completeness, even if his organs of sensation 
 remained, and he were capable of conscious 
 ness? Of course, without them, he could 
 not have it any more than a dahlia or a tulip. 
 But with them how then ? I concluded that 
 it would be at a minimum, and that, if utter 
 loss of relation to the outer world were capa 
 ble of destroying a man s consciousness of 
 himself, the destruction of half of his sensi 
 tive surfaces might well occasion, in a less 
 degree, a like result, and so diminish his 
 sense of individual existence. 
 
 I thus reached the conclusion that a man 
 is not his brain, or any one part of it, but all 
 of his economy, and that to lose any part 
 must lessen this sense of his own existence. 
 I found but one person who properly appre 
 ciated this great truth. She was a New Eng 
 land lady, from Hartford an agent, I think, 
 for some commission, perhaps the Sanitary. 
 After I had told her my views and feelings, 
 she said : " Yes, I comprehend. The frac-
 
 140 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 
 
 tional entities of vitality are embraced in the 
 oneness of the unitary Ego. Life," she added, 
 "is the garnered condensation of objective 
 impressions ; and as the objective is the re 
 mote father of the subjective, so must indi 
 viduality, which is but focused subjectivity, 
 suffer and fade when the sensation lenses, by 
 which the rays of impression are condensed, 
 become destroyed." I am not quite clear that 
 I fully understood her, but I think she ap 
 preciated my ideas, and I felt grateful for 
 her kindly interest. 
 
 The strange want I have spoken of now 
 haunted and perplexed me so constantly that 
 I became moody and wretched. While in 
 this state, a man from a neighboring ward 
 fell one morning into conversation with the 
 chaplain, within ear-shot of my chair. Some 
 of their words arrested my attention, and I 
 turned my head to see and listen. The 
 speaker, who wore a sergeant s chevron and 
 carried one arm in a sling, was a tall, loosely 
 made person, with a pale face, light eyes of 
 a washed-out blue tint, and very sparse yel 
 low whiskers. His mouth was weak, both 
 lips being almost alike, so that the organ 
 might have been turned upside down without 
 affecting its expression. His forehead, how-
 
 THE CASE OF GEOEGE DEDLOW 141 
 
 ever, was high and thinly covered with sandy 
 hair. I should have said, as a phrenologist, 
 will feeble; emotional, but not passionate; 
 likely to be an enthusiast or a weakly bigot. 
 
 I caught enough of what passed to make 
 me call to the sergeant when the chaplain 
 left him. 
 
 "Good morning," said he. "How do you 
 get on?" 
 
 "Not at all," I replied. "Where were you 
 hit?" 
 
 " Oh, at Chancellorsville. I was shot in the 
 shoulder. I have what the doctors call paral 
 ysis of the median nerve, but I guess Dr. 
 Neek and the lightnin battery will fix it. 
 When my time s out I 11 go back to Kear- 
 sarge and try on the school-teaching again. 
 I Ve done my share." 
 
 "Well," said I, "you re better off than I." 
 
 " Yes," he answered, " in more ways than 
 one. I belong to the New Church. It s a 
 great comfort for a plain man like me, when 
 he s weary and sick, to be able to turn away 
 from earthly things and hold converse daily 
 with the great and good who have left this 
 here world. We have a circle in Coates 
 street. If it wa n t for the consoling I get 
 there, I d of wished myself dead many a time.
 
 142 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 I ain t got kith or kin on earth ; but this 
 matters little, when one can just talk to them 
 daily and know that they are in the spheres 
 above us." 
 
 "It must be a great comfort/ I replied, 
 " if only one could believe it." 
 
 " Believe ! " he repeated. " How can you 
 help it ? Do you suppose anything dies ? " 
 
 " No," I said. " The soul does not, I am sure ; 
 and as to matter, it merely changes form." 
 
 " But why, then," said he, " should not the 
 dead soul talk to the living? In space, no 
 doubt, exist all forms of matter, merely in 
 finer, more ethereal being. You can t sup 
 pose a naked soul moving about without a 
 bodily garment no creed teaches that; and 
 if its new clothing be of like substance to 
 ours, only of ethereal fineness, a more deli 
 cate recrystallization about the eternal spir 
 itual nucleus, must it not then possess 
 powers as much more delicate and refined as 
 is the new material in which it is reclad ? " 
 
 "Not very clear," I answered; "but, after 
 all, the thing should be susceptible of some 
 form of proof to our present senses." 
 
 " And so it is," said he. " Come to-morrow 
 with me, and you shall see and hear for your 
 self."
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 143 
 
 "I will," said I, "if the doctor will lend 
 me the ambulance." 
 
 It was so arranged, as the surgeon in 
 charge was kind enough, as usual, to oblige 
 me with the loan of his wagon, and two 
 orderlies to lift my useless trunk. 
 
 On the day following I found myself, with 
 my new comrade, in a house in Coates 1 street, 
 where a "circle" was in the daily habit of 
 meeting. So soon as I had been comfortably 
 deposited in an arm-chair, beside a large pine 
 table, the rest of those assembled seated them 
 selves, and for some time preserved an 
 unbroken silence. During this pause I scru 
 tinized the persons present. Next to me, on 
 my right, sat a flabby man, with ill-marked, 
 baggy features and injected eyes. He was, 
 as I learned afterwards, an eclectic doctor, 
 who had tried his hand at medicine and sev 
 eral of its quackish variations, finally settling 
 down on eclecticism, which I believe professes 
 to be to scientific medicine what vegetarianism 
 is to common-sense, every-day dietetics. Next 
 to him sat a female authoress, I think, of 
 two somewhat feeble novels, and much pleas- 
 anter to look at than her books. She was, I 
 thought, a good deal excited at the prospect 
 of spiritual revelations. Her neighbor was a
 
 144 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 pallid, care-worn young woman, with very 
 red lips, and large brown eyes of great 
 beauty. She was, as I learned afterwards, 
 a magnetic patient of the doctor, and had 
 deserted her husband, a master mechanic, to 
 follow this new light. The others were, like 
 myself, strangers brought hither by mere 
 curiosity. One of them was a lady in deep 
 black, closely veiled. Beyond her, and op 
 posite to me, sat the sergeant, and next to 
 him the medium, a man named Brink. He 
 wore a good deal of jewelry, and had large 
 black side-whiskers a shrewd- visaged, large- 
 nosed, full-lipped man, formed by nature to 
 appreciate the pleasant things of sensual 
 existence. 
 
 Before I had ended my survey, he turned 
 to the lady in black, and asked if she wished 
 to see any one in the spirit-world. 
 
 She said, " Yes," rather feebly. 
 
 " Is the spirit present ? " he asked. Upon 
 which two knocks were heard in affirmation. 
 " Ah ! " said the medium, "the name is it is 
 the name of a child. It is a male child. It 
 is" 
 
 " Alfred !" she cried. " Great Heaven ! My 
 child ! My boy ! " 
 
 On this the medium arose, and became
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 145 
 
 strangely convulsed. "I see/ he said " I 
 see a fair-haired boy. I see blue eyes I 
 see above you, beyond you " at the same 
 time pointing fixedly over her head. 
 
 She turned with a wild start. "Where 
 whereabouts ? " 
 
 "A blue-eyed boy," he continued, "over 
 your head. He cries he says, l Mama, 
 mama ! 
 
 The effect of this on the woman was 
 unpleasant. She stared about her for a mo 
 ment, and exclaiming, "I come I am com 
 ing, Alfy ! " fell in hysterics on the floor. 
 
 Two or three persons raised her, and aided 
 her into an adjoining room; but the rest 
 remained at the table, as though well accus 
 tomed to like scenes. 
 
 After this several of the strangers were 
 called upon to write the names of the dead 
 with whom they wished to communicate. 
 The names were spelled out by the agency 
 of affirmative knocks when the correct letters 
 were touched by the applicant, who was 
 furnished with an alphabet-card upon which 
 he tapped the letters in turn, the medium, 
 meanwhile, scanning his face very keenly. 
 With some, the names were readily made 
 out. With one, a stolid personage of disbe-
 
 14G THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 lieving type, every attempt failed, until at 
 last the spirits signified by knocks that he 
 was a disturbing agency, and that while he 
 remained all our efforts would fail. Upon 
 this some of the company proposed that he 
 should leave, of which invitation he took 
 advantage, with a skeptical sneer at the whole 
 performance. 
 
 As he left us, the sergeant leaned over and 
 whispered to the medium, who next addressed 
 himself to me. " Sister Euphemia," he said, 
 indicating the lady with large eyes, "will 
 act as your medium. I am unable to do 
 more. These things exhaust my nervous 
 system." 
 
 " Sister Euphemia," said the doctor, " will 
 aid us. Think, if you please, sir, of a spirit, 
 and she will endeavor to summon it to our 
 circle." 
 
 Upon this a wild idea came into my head. 
 I answered : " I am thinking as you directed 
 me to do." 
 
 The medium sat with her arms folded, 
 looking steadily at the center of the table. 
 For a few moments there was silence. Then 
 a series of irregular knocks began. "Are 
 you present ? " said the medium. 
 
 The affirmative raps were twice given.
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 147 
 
 "I should think," said the doctor, "that 
 there were two spirits present." 
 
 His words sent a thrill through my heart. 
 
 "Are there two?" he questioned. 
 
 A double rap. 
 
 "Yes, two," said the medium. "Will it 
 please the spirits to make us conscious of 
 their names in this world ? " 
 
 A single knock. "No." 
 
 "Will it please them to say how they are 
 called in the world of spirits ? " 
 
 Again came the irregular raps 3, 4, 8, 6; 
 then a pause, and 3, 4, 8, 7. 
 
 "I think," said the authoress, "they must 
 be numbers. Will the spirits," she said, " be 
 good enough to aid us? Shall we use the 
 alphabet ? 
 
 " Yes," was rapped very quickly. 
 
 " Are these numbers ? " 
 
 "Yes," again. 
 
 " I will write them," she added, and, doing 
 so, took up the card and tapped the let 
 ters. The spelling was pretty rapid, and ran 
 thus as she tapped, in turn, first the letters, 
 and last the numbers she had already set 
 down : 
 
 " UNITED STATES ARMY MEDICAL MUSEUM, 
 Nos. 3486, 3487."
 
 148 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 
 
 The medium looked up with a puzzled ex 
 pression. 
 
 " Good gracious ! " said I, " they are my legs 
 my legs ! " 
 
 What followed, I ask no one to believe 
 except those who, like myself, have com 
 muned with the things of another sphere. 
 Suddenly I felt a strange return of my self- 
 consciousness. I was reindividualized, so to 
 speak. A strange wonder filled me, and, to 
 the amazement of every one, I arose, and, 
 staggering a little, walked across the room 
 on limbs invisible to them or me. It was no 
 wonder I staggered, for, as I briefly reflected, 
 my legs had been nine months in the strongest 
 alcohol. At this instant all my new friends 
 crowded around me in astonishment. Pres 
 ently, however, I felt myself sinking slowly. 
 My legs were going, and in a moment I was 
 resting feebly on my two stumps upon the 
 floor. It was too much. All that was left 
 of me fainted and rolled over senseless. 
 
 I have little to add. I am now at home in 
 the West, surrounded by every form of kind 
 ness and every possible comfort ; but alas ! 
 I have so little surety of being myself that I 
 doubt my own honesty in drawing my pen 
 sion, and feel absolved from gratitude to
 
 THE CASE OF GEORGE DEDLOW 149 
 
 those who are kind to a being who is uncer 
 tain of being enough himself to be conscien 
 tiously responsible. It is needless to add 
 that I am not a happy fraction of a man, 
 and that I am eager for the day when I shall 
 rejoin the lost members of my corporeal 
 family in another and a happier world.
 
 University of California Library 
 Los Angeles 
 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
 UUi
 
 A 000137502 1