The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1880-08-07

He was abundantly able to own one; he
needed one; forever there was some
body sick among his workmen. He'd
have one; he'd go to the city and hire
one; tip-top doctor, who should do
the factory practice and the practice for
the poor who were struggling to keep
out of pauperism; and he, Hobbs, would
stand between and see that there was
fair play-no gouging or Sinking. Aud
while he was about it he fit up home
to which such poor could go in misfor-
tune and make believe they were board
ing. He might as well spend some of
his money before he died, as to leave it
all for. those lazy nephews of his to
scatter.
And so it came to pass that Mr.. Hobbs
did buy in the suburbs a roomy house,
with orchards about it, for the homeless
poor who were not willing to be pau
perized; where the nominal charge for
board and service kept up the fiction
that the inmate was not receiving char
ity, to the end that his self-respect
might not be broken down.
In getting his medical and collegiate
education, DIR. Joe had spent all his
patrimony; much more than this. In
deed. He had pieced out his means by
putting up herbariums for his medical
preceptor and for the college, to meet
tuition bills. His herbarium, gathered
with much loving pains, he had parted
with at half its value.
To paw his board he had measured
the depths of tedious drudgery. But
forever in his faithful soul were sound
ing the stirring words which Benjamin
Rush used to speak to his graduates:
Gentlemen, you are the inheritors
of the accumulated knowledge of a long
past. Doctors, you are among the in
tellectual magnates, equal with the best.
Your profession is your capital. 1t is
worth anywhere at least twenty thou
sand dollars good inheritance"
So DIR. Joe put in heart and brain and
years and all the money he could scrape
together. to bring his capital, il it might
be, above the average twenty thousand
dollars.
In the end, all he had to show the
world was diploma. If this had been
definite expression, like an algebraic
exponent, it would have been satisfac-
tory. But when DIR. Joe opened his
office and furnished it with table and
two chairs, right beside his sign hung
DR.. Henry Beans, though DIR. Henry
had hardly made the examination which
DIR. Joe had cleared with applause.
Yet they each held the same grade
certificates. DIR. Henry's Office was
attractive with bright carpeting, pretty
curtains, easy-chairs. There were
shelves of the latest medical works,
brand-new; patent surgical instruments,
silver-bright; there was an operating
chair, very inviting.
Is it any wonder that people discrim-
mated against DIR. Joe, with the power
ty-marks about himp that they prefer
red DIR. Henry? He seemed prosperous
and the prosperous man presumably
deserves his prosperity. The shrewdest
of us thus argue.
So DIR. Henry flourished and DIR. Joe
waited in his Office, getting poorer and
shabbier, despite his wood-sawing and
his poetry-writing-for he contributed
poem a month to the Ladies Garland
at four dollars poem.
He kept on thus waiting through four
years, with now and then a tooth to
pull, or boil to open, or an ague case
to dose with quinine; called occasional
ly into the homes of the poor who could
not pay and where the prosperous ply
stefan would not go.
He had kept up courage through the
weary waiting with a secret gratifica-
ton that he had not been rusting. find
ing a measure of compensation for his
small practice in the time afforded him
for studying.
He had gone on hoping, that in some
lucky day somebody would find him out.
But when the fourth year had closed
and he found himself apparently no
farther along except that he was better
read, DIR. does heart began to falter.
He even had thoughts of changing his
business; of applying for a clerkship in
a certain notion-shop, or of taking an
agency to sell patent egg-beaters.
ABOUT this time came word that the
cholera had appeared in a Southern
port Then as time passed there were
kilograms announcing its advance up
the river towards DIR. Joe's city.
A stranger was dining at the Green
Tree Restaurant; stranger with a
puckered face, who grumbled at every
dish brought him; lis quality, or quanti-
ty, or price, or at the wslEer's manner
in serving it.
He had ordered off veal-pie and or.
dered on roast beef and the waiter had
shot out like a meteor. When this
functionary had returned, the grumb.
ling guest was found on the lounge in q
fit Of agony. The mouth was open, the
lips moving. the head bobbing in a way
idiotic, while the gesticulation was
something indescribable. The beef
was almost pitched on the table, there
was an ejaculation of cholera, and into
the street hurried the waiter, crying
for doctor. The celebrated DIR. Jor.
don was at that moment walking leis