t any thing that he called for. It is
true--and I mention it to his credit--that he was often rather moderate
in his use of interdicted articles; but then he took just about enough
of these unnatural or extra stimulants, to prevent the healing process
from going forward as fast as in a man of only thirty years might have
been expected.

Instead of being on his feet in a couple of months or so, he lay on his
bed three months or more. And then, instead of having a good leg, it was
not merely slightly crooked, but half an inch too short. And then, in
addition,--and what was very hard to endure,--he charged the whole blame
of its imperfection on the surgeon, and insisted that it was not "set"
right!

Now, while I confess to much awkwardness, and to the possibility that
the limb was not managed as well as it might have been, I must maintain,
notwithstanding, that such a charge was wholly misplaced and even
gratuitous. Had he employed the best surgeon in the world, and had the
leg received the best possible attention, it could not have been kept in
its proper place with so much distilled spirits in the house, and so
many slaves of the bottle! One might almost as well expect a leg to heal
in the nether pit. Though I have never said, either by way of
retaliating the abuse or otherwise, that his punishment was richly
merited, I _might_ have said so. A man is hardly entitled to good health
and a good frame who keeps such company as he did, whether in sickness
or in health. God has so connected law and penalty, that he who should
complain of the penalty would but insult the law given.

Many cases of petty surgery as well as of severe and complicated
disease, fell to my lot, which embarrassed me in a manner not unlike the
foregoing; though in no one did I suffer quite so much from
misrepresentation as in this. For at least twenty years, to my certain
knowledge, my patient took pains to speak of me in terms of reproach,
and to say that his leg was set badly; and all without the slightest
evidence. I do not positively aver, I again say, that the surgery in the
case was faultless; but whether it was so or not, neither he nor any
living individual could know, unless it were a more skilful surgeon than
myself; and no such surgeon, I am sure, ever saw him during the time I
was in attendance.

CHAPTER XLII.

DYING FROM MERE FILTHINESS.

The family of a wealthy farmer came under my hands, as physician, one
autumn, in circum