, 1884-08-20
THE CoNsUMPTIvES.
The Experience of a St. Louis Bar
Der at San Diego.
Living with People Who Talked
About Nothing But Their Lungs,
Cod Liver OIL and FIan-
mel Bandnges-

LUZ III NGl lgu VIM ~ nAAbtGA 1ulu
the LAclede hotel barber, when / hear people
here talking about dull times l say to myself,
Ny friends5you don't know anything
about it, and they don't. Does tho
razor hurt youl Now, II you want 10
know what dull times are you'll have to take
a trip TO San Diego, just on the Mexican Dor
der, in California. lived in that town in
1869 and it beat any place / ever saw. l had
been n bookkeeper at East Saginaw, Mich,
and l worked so steady indoors that my
health broke down. My brother was an
Eplscopalian minister at Kalamazoo, and 1
went to his home and staid n while. II was
finally decided that l had consumption, and
the doctor told my brother that unless 1
could go to some part OF the country where
the climate was more mild and regular 1
would be n dead man inside OF a year. So
my brother sent me TO San Diego. / was too
weak and sick TO take much interest In the
place at first, but as soon as / was able to
move aroun1 | took In the town. There
were 100 or 400 ~consumptives beside myself,
and you couldn't walk as far as from
here to Fourth street without meeting
a dozen Of them-does the razor puIlf Well,
sir. It beat anything 1 ever saw.
I'd get up In the morning, and take a little
walk along the beach, meeting a number OF
the c~onsumptives, and after n While we all
became acquainted. We didn't have much
10 say TO each other, for most OF them were
under medical Instructions not to talk in the
open mir, and not to talk much any where for
fear it might bring on a fit Of coughing and
burst a blood vessel or something. Just raise
your chin little, please.
Well, sir, 1t was too funny. l had been
meeting the animated stifrs on the beach and
on tho hotel verandas for about n week, whom
ILesrme intimate enough with u few OF
than 20 fuIr al TvI.l >. II ~. -. -.
felt. / remember the first morning / talked
with ono Of them They always spoke of
zach other as the one with the dry hack the
ono with the soft cough that poor fellow
who lost his left, the young man In the last
stage the elderly gentleman who had the
hemorrhage on the front porch and SO on.
They talked about nothing else but their
lungs, bursting blood vessels, hemorrhages,
cod liver oil, whey and flannel ~bandages.
The hotel proprietor spoke a little English,
and l tried To lead him OF on some other
subject one day, but he broke me all up
with a story about a Bostonian who diod In a
COUGHING fit the winter before, while at
tempting to deliver q lecture to the COM
slmrt.vca on how to keep our pulmonary or
gans IN Their normal condition. Tho pro-
prietor raid that FIVE Of the lecturers audi
ence Lad hemorrhages IN the hall, n ono of
them went into q spasm which carried him
off the mex day. He wouldn't talk about
anything else lut consumption. Have a lit
tie powdeif There were eleven stores in tho
town, nino Of them drug stores, and tho
other two a butchers shop a d a grocery.
Nearly the entire population were conSump-
tive, so that they ate scarcely anything. The
butcher sold meat for beef-tea, nd the gro
Ger kept nothing but oatmeal for cruel, somo
mu ttard for plasters, and milk Tor whey.
The druggists sold cod-liver oil almost ex-
elusively, but they had u fair trade In brandy
ana simple syrup.
"a lew Mexican fishermen and Greasers
came In occasi nllly; but during tho entire
year l lived there / never heard anybody
laugh, l never saw a dog-hght, I never saw a
runaway, l never heard a shout, l never sayy
moro than two persons on the street At one
time, never saw even q game OF dominoes,
and never talked to anybody on any sub
ject but consumption.
u vent into the-have a little pomndo on
your hniri-gro,er's store ono day, after l
had picked up a little Spanish, and asked him
Low business was He said it was looking up.
at is good, signor,' said he; very good. 1
have sold in a month, Of goods, 81. think
tie times will be better l asked the butcher
nov things were going with him, and he told
me that be had taken Ia 10 cents during tho
W *, and was satisfied with the condition Of
t ade. Iulll Well, the only thing that
stirred up the town while I was there was the
funerals OF the consumptives. Nearly iorty
Of them died during the year.
and l think every one of them
tjld me before they died that they
didn't have anything which bore the slightest
r semblance 70 consumption. The funerals
were pretty dull, too-one donkey, a two
wheeled cart and "a Mexican driver was all
there was to them. After every funeral the
consainptives would grow worse, and when
tley ali got to coughing together in the
hotel, YOU could hear them a mile away"
"But you get well" sold the wearied re-
porter as the uarUer took oil the towels.
ayes, but not there. You see l didn't have
consumption. l had dyspepsia, and as soon
ms the doctors found 1t out my brother sent
mo to Carlsbad, Bohemia. That wasn't so
dull, but IL was tic queerest place / ever
Seruck except Sydney. Australia, or, per-
maps, Rio Janeiro, Brazil
You must have travelled said the re-
porter.
"A little, said the barber. II spent four
teen motifs at the cape of Good Hope, and
passed one winter in Alexandria I was up
the Nile when new OF my brothers death
rea he'd me, and learned this business partly
in Paris, partly in Vienna, and partly in
Berlin. had a shop in -Constantinople when
the ear was killed.. was educated to be a
minister. tried law awhile, did some report
ing for the New York papers, kept a saloon
in Brooklyn, ran q book-stall in Boston, sold
popcorn balls in Philadelphia, and operated
II the Chicago bard of trade, but l like
this business better than any OF them-.t
brings one into contact with all sorts of tcO-
pie, and l like 20 study human nature. Some
time when you're in again III tell you about
Carlsbad"