Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1886-11-24
A CHINESE DOCTOR.
a Prescription From a Picturesque
Celestial Physician.

Here L was, face to face wlta-tIIe
Chinese doctor, whose advertisement
were printed in English, but who sadly
complicated things by talking the
Chinee. 1 told him that L hadn't
learned Chinee yet. His mouth widslcd
into grin, and he motioned me TO
wOoden-bottomed chair.
''Chin Foo comee light vale, he
said.
Chin Foo was the interpreter. He
came back In ten minutes as happy and
dapper a looking .Chinaman as ever
trotted through Mott street, New York
City. Until he came 1 amused myEelI
critically ogling this physician from the
Flowery Kingdom. He was decidedly
picturesque. His tall figure was en-
veloped in long, loose robe Of yellow
figured Chinese silk, like the magician s
garb in juvenile fairy tales. All 0Gt
the extreme top of his head was shaYen
as smooth as billiard pail. From the
crown depended queue Of raven hair,
almost as long as the man was tall and
braided like German maiden's locks.
From his upper lip drooped black
mustache. The ends were OF extraor-
dinary length. But surprising as The
mouStache looked it wasn't half as
strange as his left hand. He had let
the nails grow until they were fully an
inch in length They were polished
until they gIistened. The nails Of his
other hand were pared close to the fin
ger tips. He leisurely pulled a cigarette
OF very strong black tobacco as be sat
opposite me against the background Of
brilliant curtains.
See here. Foo,n said. "I've got
malaria. I've had it long time-a good
deal longer than l want 1t. Pm told
! your doctor makes speciality of knock
ing out malaria in single round"
''That's right" rejoined Foo, with
grin, ''let the doctor feel your pulse"
Foo jabbered to his fantastic princI-
pal in Chinese, and held out my hand
to HIM. The long-nailed Celestial took
one of my wrists in either hand, pressed
his fingers against the pulSe,and studied
the floor with bowed head in silence
so long that looked quizeingly up at
Chm Foo and requested an explanation.
whats the matter with your doe
tor, Foo?" l said. ''Does the case
stagger him? And what in thunder
does he want to feel both my pulses
for?"
''Oh, that's the regular professional
method In China" the dapper little in
terpreter returned, smiling at my myS-
tlfication. HES orthodox as ortho-
] dOxy in China can make him. It's a
popularity Of physicians in the Flowery
Kingdom to study the beat of both
pulses"
The pig-talled Celestial medicine man
looked up from the floor and let go both
my wrists as lively Chin Foo got u :,ss
| end of his remarks Then ne IeachSa
for pencil and one Of the great sheets
, of yellow paper that were piled high "a
red table in front of him.
"IIe is going to build you prescribe
tion now," Chin Foo SAID admiringlys
"Watch him; it'll interest you.'
The prescription was corker in size.
The medicine man began at the upper
right hand corner of the big yellow
sheet with jerky sort OF scribble that
built up curiously Chinese characters
in columns of three so fast that / could
hardly follow him with my eye. He built
other columns under the first one until,
after he had been at work something
less than five minutes, the Chinese
characters were piled up on top of each
other in huge rows like the Navarro
flats.
THAT'S ALL" cried Foo, as, with a
sigh of relief, saw the medicine man
from Canton drop his pencil and shove
over the yellow prescription. "You
can get this put up down in Mott street,
and nowhere else. The Doctors fee is
g, please"
when you get this medicine you
must fix it up into tea, and take half
cupful at dose three times day.
Half a teacup is rather small dose,
too. for you must remember that the
Chinese take their medicine by the
wholesale when they take any at all.
Their medicines are all aliopathic to a
heroic extent so far as the consumption
of remedies is concerned"
An hour later found the Chinese
pharmacy of Hong Wah. Hoe King Il
Co., the solitary Chinese drug store OF
Gotham. 1t was on the ground floor
of a ee-story building on the south
side of Mott street, that looked very
much like a little German grocery
decked with no placards. The clerk
laid his mammoth pipe carefully aside,
with the punk still sticking in the hole
in the side, glanced at the prescription,
and then started to make it up. He
drew handful of what resembled Gin
namon sticks from one drawer, and
laid them in big metal scoop. This
scoop was fastened on one end of
wooden rod that the clerk held poised
in the air by string. He hung num-
Der of dangling weights on the other
end of this astonishing pharmaceutical
scale, until, after tedious delay, he
linally struck balance. Then he
dropped the whole thing on the counter
and grabbed something else from AIN
other drawer. This he weighed in the
same tlresome fashion.
There were fifteen or sixteen different
and desperate looking drugs or herbs in
that big yellow prescription, and when
that m0on-eyed Mongolian had weighed
them all out separately he bundled
them all together again in red paper In
a package bigger than my head. and an
assistant who sac In far off corner
walked over to him, listened to him
jabber something In Chinese and said
in very fair English; dollar and
half"
gave him the money, tucked the
heroic dose under my arm and rode
home.
When 1 got there 1 dumped the
whole pile Of medicine, sticks and pow
ders and roots, into Kettle OF hot
water and boiled them for an hour un-
til they became a tea, as Foo had di-
rected. 1t was almost villalnous and
uninviting decoction when lifted the
lid at the expiration of the hour and
poured out half capful. Long
wrestling with the multitudinous aches
and pains and ills Of life had made me
familiar with a varied and terrible
series of unsavory medical drinks, but
never in my life had 1 introduced into
my poor stomach anything so horrible
to the taste as the tea that came of
boiling these Chinese drugs and herbs.
BY a mighty effort forced the dose
down my Throat, and kept it there by
a heroic and masterful struggle of the
will. The nightmare that made my