Page:How I Met a Very Ignorant Practitioner.pdf/4

Rh safely turned a corner of the road, I was forced to tumble off the machine, and sitting on a bank, laughed till the tears cascaded from my cheeks.

After such an experience I had a curious anxiety about the next patient. I looked him up in my visiting list. "Warkwell, wharf labourer, erysipelas." Inns, truly, called it "St. Anthony's fire," but this had been too unscientific for me, although it was clear that diagnosis was not his strong point. I doubted if he could have gone far wrong in such a case.

I had been directed none too clearly to the place, and must have gone altogether astray, for after inquiring the road several times I seemed to be moving in a circle and only arrived at the house at dinner-time, to judge by the smell that reminded me how long ago I had breakfasted. The whole family, including the patient, were enjoying a leg of salt pork—hardly the most suitable diet for erysipelas. My first impulse was to retire, with an apology for interrupting the meal, but this was so warmly opposed that I stayed on. I was not very much surprised to find no evidence of erysipelas either present or recent; it was only what I expected, but I did wonder how Inns had failed to see that the man was really suffering from scurvy. I recognised it as such at the first glance; indeed, I never met with a more typical case.

"It's main catchin' this," observed Warkwell. "We've all had it, but somehow it's sarved me worsern' any."

"Perhaps you eat a good deal of pork?" I ventured.

"Yes; I gets it cheap from the shippin' stores."

"I think you'd be better without it."

"Why, Dr. Inns takes it an' thrives on it. I've heard 'um say theer's nothin' like it."

I felt conscientiously indignant at this, and straightway attacked his pork dietary, telling him he would never get well until he took fresh meat, with plenty of vegetables, and especially lemons, or at least homemade lemonade. But I could see that neither Warkwell nor his wife believed me, and fearing they might construe my advice into an attack upon Inns, I rode away home in a much less cheerful frame of mind than when I arrived. It was impossible, I thought, to regard Inns as anything else than an incompetent ass, yet he was well qualified, and had a fair record in the "Medical Directory." It was a good thing his practice was small, or Heaven help Hestford! And then I began to wonder if his incompetence was getting known, and whether that might not be the reason for his wanting to clear out, while he still had any practice left to dispose of. Anyhow, I determined to let him know on the first opportunity what I thought of Warkwell's case, for I felt I should otherwise be an accessory to the practical murder of the poor creature.

Towards the end of the fortnight, I seized