Belford's Magazine, Vol. II, No. 3, February 1889 / Dec 1888-May 1889

Transcriber's Note
The following Table of Contents was not present in the original and has been added for the convenience of readers.
Remaining transcriber's notes are located at the end of the text.

Vol. II.FEBRUARY, 1889.No. 3.
I am a physician practising in a small manufacturing town, and am doing very well so far as getting business goes—might even be able to save a little money if it were not for the bad debts. They make my income pretty small, considering the amount of hard work I am compelled to do; and the time spent in endeavoring to collect my bills takes a great many hours which, in justice to my patients who pay, ought to be used in brushing up my medical studies and trying to keep abreast with the rest of the profession.
It is hard to get out of a warm bed at night and tramp off a mile or so to look after a patient when you are not certain of ever getting your pay, and it seems to grow worse instead of better. The number of people who, because of their poverty, need a doctor the most are on the increase; and yet so long as they are not poor because of vicious habits, one really hasn't the heart to refuse when called upon. I hear a great deal said about the prosperity of the workingman and the high wages he receives, but observe as a matter of experience that only a few are able to save enough to carry them through a few weeks' illness, let alone paying the doctor, who is forced to wait months and sometimes even years for his pay, getting it then a dollar or two at a time.
To be sure, some of my patients own homes of their own, but the most of them are in debt, a mortgage being about as regular an attachment to a workingman's house as a chimney.
Wages, too, are not quite so high as they were when I began practice: they fell pretty low at one time, and then, when human nature could endure it no longer, came a strike. The employers were horrified; there never had been a strike in this town before: the working men, women, and children all received high wages. There is John Smith, for instance—earns eighty dollars a month. There is Miss Jones, who makes two dollars a day. There are some who earn even more. True enough! But one day I was called to see John Smith lying dead on his kitchen floor; fell dead on coming home from work, died in the harness, worked to death; a young man at that, and ought to have been good for twenty years more. His employers wouldn't have allowed one of their horses to work that way.