The morning call., 1890-07-13
WEIRD AND GHOSTLY.
Singular Experiences That Medi.
cal Students Sometimes Have.

E@VERYBODY has always wondered
ny why young Sawbones ever went in
@S for studying to be a surgeon. He is
such nervous chap that it is mystery
how he will ever be able to chop people up
with any of that GOODNESS of blood which,
whether natural or acquired, must be so in
dispensable requisite in the practice of
such profession. 1t was only the other
evening that his courage was severely tested
by an adventure which befell him at the
medical college.
He was alone in the dissecting-room, the
other students having taken their departure
some hours before, and his own detention
was occasioned merely by the extreme in
terest he felt in the study he was making of
certain important muscles of the chest and
side. The Subject" was an unusually fine
one, having been in life tramp of very
powerful build, and afforded an exceptional
opportunity for anatomical observation.
To get the right arm out of the way Saw
bones forced it up with no little difficulty,
aud managed finally to secure it by fasten-
ing the right hand of the corpse beneath
the head, whereupon lie proceeded TO eX-
anime at leisure the muscular structure
aforesaid
1t was with no little surprise that upon
hearing clock strike not long after, he
listened and counted twelve mOurnful
strokes i'll succession, so absorbed had he
been in his labor. Midnight! He could
hardly realize it and for the first time he
felt rather oppressed by the solemn still
ess of the dreary place at such an hour,
when all the city was asleep and grim death
in mutilated forms lay all around him.
With something of feeling OF dread that
he could not altogether control he bent over
Ii i,l-i ntr m pf ha
had heard of adventures in dissectlng-
rooms.
For instance. he remembered being told Of
a grewsOme thing that happened to a medi-
cal student in a Philadelphia dissecting-
room, working, like himself, alone at night
over cadaver. The place, silent as atomb,
was rather nervous spot to toll in, and it
is not astonishing that the student should
have been startled when he heard q strange.
unearthly SORT OF squeak proceeding from
The other end of the apartment
The graves were opened and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the streets OF Rome.
Like a flash the lines passed across his
mind-the unburied dead lying covered
with sheets. upon the tables near. SUI
pose upon turning round he should find
them all sitting up and looking at him, si-
lentlyl Again that squeak This time
there was certainly no mistake about it.
1t came from the further end of the room,
and, as it was repeated at intervals of
few seconds he perceived that it was ap-
preaching. He looked steadily into the
gloom that thickened toward the distant
part of the hall, trying to pierce it. when
suddenly there came into the edge of a
space on the floor that was lighted by Il
shaded gas-burner three tables away hui
man skull.
From the skull there came another squeak
and then another, as it slowly crawled, if
one might so phrase it-across the lighted
space on the floor toward the student. 1t
proceeded by little jerks. utteTing now and
again the curious squeak described and
grlnning with its yellow teeth-One Of which
was missing, the student noticed-at the
embryo physician, who stood rooted TO the
spot until the awful thing got within two
yards of him, and then he gave one yell and
tainted dead away.
The janitUr of the medical school, who
slept above, heard the cry. and ran down
stairs, to find the student lying on the floor
of the diSsecting-room, and near by skull
with large brown rat imprisoned in it,
How the beast became so entrapptd WAS
a mystery; but, in trying to make its
escape, it had dragged the skull all around
the hall, suuraking plaintively as it went.
Dung Sawbones, as he bent over the
cadayer dlsSecting out an important muscle
from the right chest, had got himself into
raIher an unpleasant frame of mind over
the recollection of this story and had just
come to the conclusion that he would spend
only five minutes more over his task, when
he was suddenly felled to the ground by 4
terrific blow. lie did not wait to see what
had struck him, but made three jumps for
the door, tumbled down short flight Of
stairs and fled for home.
On the corner just block away he found
two policemen, who promptly seized him on
suspicion and demanded what he was run
ming away from. He explained as we'll as
he could, and 1t was arranged that they
should go back with him to the medical
school and see if there were any ghosts or
live persons about who had no right on the
premises. Upon entering the dissecting-
room, however, everything was found in
statu quo, save that the right arm of the
subject on which SawbOnes had been Oper-
atinG was lying by the side of the corpse.
Evidently the fist had come out from under
the head, where it had been fastened, and
the rigid and once powerful arm had re-
Sumed the position from which it had been
forced with an energy that sufficed to knock
young Sawbones down.
Sawbones procured a bottle of whisky
from private shelf and gave each of the pO-
licemen taste of it, They filled each Of the
tumblers up to the brim with the raw ma
terial and drank it off without so much as
blinking, while the embryo physician told
them Of q similar story he had once heard
about student, who, while dissecting at
night alone, felt grasp upon his shoulder,
and turning his head saw skeleton hand
resting there He was badly frightened,
but the explanation was simply that one of
the fellows had hung the bones of an arm
and hand, articu!ated together, from the
gas fixture over the table to dry. The piece
of string fastening up the end toward the
hand had been singed by the match in light
ing the gas and il broke later on, letting the
hand fall upon tile students shoulder. Saw
bones says that he dGesu't mean to do any
more dssecting at night misunderstanding
ton Star.