Middletown transcript., 1893-09-02

wen. come 10 that she dlun u kuOV
!, what To say or do, SO, wOman-llke, SIT
upped and cried; and then she said h'
9 burt her feelings. And the upshot o
it was he said he'd come, and thel
0 shook hands on it-Abe givin' hiE
other haud, of course.
Well, Abe kept his word and took uI
schoolin' as If nothing had happened
and such schoolin' as there wastha
winter! don't belive any regular
academy had more learnin' and teachIn
that winter than what that district
school did. Seemed as if all the scholar:
had turned over new leaf. Even wild
ornery, ,no-account Ephe Dodge couldn't
help but get ahead some-but then he
was crazy to get the school na-am, and
she never paid no attention to him; just
went with Abe. Abe was teachin her
mathematics, seeing that was the one
thing he knowed more than she did
outside Of farming, Folks used to
say that if Ephe had Abe's head, or
Abe had Ephe's face, the school ma 'am
would have half of the Dodge farm
whenever ol' man Dodge got through
with it; but neither of them did have
what the other did, and so there it
was. YOU see.
Well, you've heard of Squire Cation.
of course: Judge Cation, they call him
since he got to be Judge of the Su-
preme Court-and Chief Justice at
that. Well, he had farm down there
not ar from Fox river, and when he
was there he was just plain farmer
like the rest of US, though up in Chic
ago he was high-up lawyer-leader
of the bar. Now it so happened that
young doctor named Brainard-
Daniel Brainard-had just come to
Chicago ana was startin' in, and Squire
Cation was helpin' him, gave him desk
room in his Office and made him known
to the folks-Kinzles, and Butterfields.
and Ogdens, and Hamiltons, and
Arnolds, and all of those folks-about
all there was in Chicago in those days.
Brainard had been to- Paris-Paris,
France, not Paris, Illinois, you under
stand and knew all the doctorin'
there was to know then. Well, come
spring, Squire Cation had Doc Brainard
down to visit him, and they shot ducks
and geese and prairie chickens and
some wild turkeys and deer, too-game
was just swarmin' at that time. All
the while Cation was doin' what law
business there was to do; and Brain
ard thought he ought to be doin' some
doctorin' to keep his hand in, SO he
asked Cation if there wasn't any cases |
he could take up-surgery cases espec-
tally he hankered after, seein' he had |
more carving tools than you could |
shake stick at. He asked him par. |
ticularly if there wasn't sny body he |
could treat for ''strabismuS." The |
Squire hadn't heard of anybody dying
of that complaint, but when the doctor
explained that strabismus was French
for cross-eyts, he naturally thought of
poor Abe Dodge, and the young lawyer
was right up ON his ear. He smelled
the battle afar off, and most before
you could say Jack Robinson the
Squire and the doctor we're on horse
back and down to the Dodge farm,
tool chest and all.
Well, it so happened that nobody was
at home but Abe and Ephe and it
didn't take but few words before Abe
was ready to sit right down, then and
there, and let anybody do anything he
was a mind to with his misfortunate
eyes. No, he wouldn't wait till the old
folks come home; be didn't want to
ask no advice; he wasn't afraid of pain
nor of what anybody could do to his
eyes-couldn't be made any wol Sc than
they were whatever you did to 'em.
Take 'em out and boil 'em and put 'em
back if you had mind to, only go to
work. He knew he was of age and he
guessed he was master of his own eyes
such as they we're.
Well, there wasn't nothing else to do
but to 60 ahead. The doctor opened
up his killing tools and tried to keep
Abe from seeing them; but Abe he just
come right over and peektd at 'em,
handled 'em and called 'em ''splendidn, :
-and so they were, barrin' havin' 'em !,
Ised on your own flesh and blood and !
ZONES.
Then they got some cloths and
,asin, and one thing and another, and
et Abe right down in chair. mo !.
uch thing rs chlorofOrm in those days,
'Ou III remember). And Squire Catun
!, as 10 hold an instrument that spread a
he eye-lid wide open, while Ephe WIS !,
o hold Abe's head steady. First =
ouch Of he lancet, ard frs. spirit Of
Hood, and what do you thinkI That h
rnery Ephe wilted and fell fiat ON the \
Ioor behind the chaill h
esquire" said Brainard, step around v
nd hold his head" S
II can hold my own head" says q
Abe, as steady as you please. But I
'quire Cation, he straddled over Ephe I
nd held his head between his arms j
nd the two handles Of the eye-spreader g
vitn his hands. C
1t was all over in half minute, and v
hen Abe, he leaned forward and shook
he blood out of his eye lashes and i
ooked straight out of that eye for the t
irst time since he was born. And the t
irst words he said were:
"Thank the Lord she's minel'' Q
About that time Ephe he crawled /
outdoors, sick as dog; and Abe spoke 9
up. Says he:
"Now, for the other eye, DOCTOR"
"Oh," says the doctor. "We'd better ]
n = E