the other of those she herself, in the course
of many years, had ordered or compounded,--not only for her own use, but
for that of others. She had long prided herself on her skill in this sort
of thing, and was always willing to prepare almost any sort of medicine
for ailing people, asking nothing in payment but the pleasure of seeing
them take it.

When everything had been examined and placed on its appropriate end of
the table, Miss Panney called for an empty coalscuttle, into which she
tumbled, without regard to spilling or breakage, the whole mass of
medicaments which had been prepared or prescribed by herself, and she
then requested the servant to deposit the contents of the scuttle in
the ash-hole.

"After this," she said to herself, "I will get somebody else to do my
concocting," and she carefully replaced her physician's medicines on
the shelves.

It was three days later when Miss Panney was told that Dr. Tolbridge was
in the parlor and wished to see her.

"Well," said the old lady, as she entered the parlor, "I supposed that
after your last call here, you would not come again."

"Oh, bless my soul!" said the doctor, "I haven't any time to consider
what has happened, I must give my whole attention to what is happening or
may happen. How are you? and how have you been during my absence?"

"Oh, I had medicines enough" said she, "if I had needed them, but
I didn't."

"Well, I wanted to see for myself, and, besides, I was obliged to come,"
said the doctor; "I want to know what has happened since we left. We got
home late last night, and I have not seen anybody who knows anything."

"And so," said the old lady, "you will swallow an insult in order to
gratify your curiosity."

"Insult, indeed!" said he. "I have a regular rule about insults. When
anybody under thirty insults me, I give her a piece of my mind if she is
a woman, and a taste of my horsewhip if he is a man. But between thirty
and fifty, I am very careful about my resentments, because people are
then very likely to be cracked or damaged in some way or other, either in
body or mind, and unless I am very cautious, I may do more injury than I
intend. But toward folks over fifty, especially when they are old
friends, I have no resentments at all. I simply button up my coat and
turn up my collar, and let the storm pelt; and when it is fine weather
again, I generally find that I have forgotten that it ever rained."

"And when a person is in the neigh