n wasted, then. Some eye had
picked them out and marked the name of the writer. Who could say that
work was ever wasted, or that merit did not promptly meet with its
reward?

"Yes, I have written on the subject."

"Ha! Well, then, where's Mason?"

"I have not the pleasure of his acquaintance."

"No?--that's queer too. He knows you and thinks a lot of your opinion.
You're a stranger in the town, are you not?"

"Yes, I have only been here a very short time."

"That was what Mason said. He didn't give me the address. Said he
would call on you and bring you, but when the wife got worse of course
I inquired for you and sent for you direct. I sent for Mason, too, but
he was out. However, we can't wait for him, so just run away upstairs
and do what you can."

"Well, I am placed in a rather delicate position," said Dr. Horace
Wilkinson, with some hesitation. "I am here, as I understand, to meet
my colleague, Dr. Mason, in consultation. It would, perhaps, hardly be
correct for me to see the patient in his absence. I think that I would
rather wait."

"Would you, by Jove! Do you think I'll let my wife get worse while the
doctor is coolly kicking his heels in the room below? No, sir, I am a
plain man, and I tell you that you will either go up or go out."

The style of speech jarred upon the doctor's sense of the fitness of
things, but still when a man's wife is ill much may be overlooked. He
contented himself by bowing somewhat stiffly. "I shall go up, if you
insist upon it," said he.

"I do insist upon it. And another thing, I won't have her thumped
about all over the chest, or any hocus-pocus of the sort. She has
bronchitis and asthma, and that's all. If you can cure it well and
good. But it only weakens her to have you tapping and listening, and
it does no good either."

Personal disrespect was a thing that the doctor could stand; but the
profession was to him a holy thing, and a flippant word about it cut
him to the quick.

"Thank you," said he, picking up his hat. "I have the honour to wish
you a very good day. I do not care to undertake the responsibility of
this case."

"Hullo! what's the matter now?"

"It is not my habit to give opinions without examining my patient. I
wonder that you should suggest such a course to a medical man. I wish
you good day."

But Sir John Millbank was a commercial man, and believed in the
commercial principle that the more difficult a thing is to attain