Our Girls

by Dio Lewis

A TRUE LOVE STORY.

For years I have advised idle young ladies, who were longing for something to do, to look up poor, unhappy families, and minister to their hungry bodies and hungry hearts. I could give you a great many interesting cases, but one is such a pleasant little love story, I must tell it to you. With the exception of the names, the story is a true one.

Twenty years ago I was practising my profession in a western city. Among my patients was a Miss Dinsmore, a lady of nearly thirty years. Her case was what she called the dumps. I thought it indigestion and general debility. After two weeks, she began to ride out again, and seemed to be doing well enough, when one day she astonished me by exclaiming, "Oh! I wish I was dead!" After some hesitation, she told me that she was perfectly disgusted with life, etc., etc.

I advised her to go out a mile on Marble Street and look up a poor widow woman, a patient of mine, and see if she could not do something to make her comfortable. She couldn't think of it; she had troubles enough of her own; but, after a little urging, she consented to ride that way in the morning, and see if she could do anything. Before the next noon she was at my office with a most pitiful story about "that poor sufferer." I rode out with her at once, and found that Mrs. Ramsey needed some beef-soup and some flannels. Miss Dinsmore volunteered to bring them within an hour. My poor Mrs. Ramsey had pretty good times after that.

I soon had about ten poor patients in Miss Dinsmore's hands. Her sympathy and devotion were often more curative than my doctor- stuffs. At length, she gave me carte blanche to send any poor, sick ones, who needed help; and, from having been a slave to a round of fashionable dissipations, she soon became the most devoted friend of the sick and suffering. To those who have studied the causes of bad health among the devotees of fashion, I need not say that Miss Dinsmore soon became healthy and very happy.

Charles Finlay, a young man of twenty-five years, came to our city, from Philadelphia, to establish a large manufacturing business. He was immediately successful, and quickly won his way to the confidence of our business men. Possessed of noble person, fine culture, and singularly sweet manners, he was soon regarded as the greatest "catch" in town, and innumerable caps were accordingly set for him.

While trying an agricultural machine, one of his hands was seriously hurt, and he sent for me. It was my first personal acquaintance with him, though I had long known him by reputation. After amputating one finger, I contrived to save the residue of his hand. Our daily intercourse continued for several weeks, and we became very good friends. Among other subjects, we discussed matrimony.

I said, one evening, "Finlay, why don't you get a wife?"

"Well, my friend," said he, "that's a long story. I will tell you all about that, sometime."

At my next visit he said:—

"Doctor, speaking of matrimony, did you know that I had purchased the Temple estate on Bernard Street?"

"No; and then you have concluded to establish a home of your own. And who is the happy woman? for most sincerely I do regard her as happy in such an union."

"Ah, my friend, you are getting on too fast. I have no definite purpose in regard to matrimony. Mrs. Oliver, on hearing that I had purchased a house, sought me out directly, and exclaimed, 'Now you have a cage, of course you must have a bird to put into it.' I wonder if she thinks me silly enough to marry one of her daughters? Why, I should infinitely prefer one of those show-figures in the shop windows. They look full as well, have about as much heart, and then they won't get sick. I don't want a bird for my cage. That's just what fashionable wives are,—pretty birds, kept in beautiful cages. I don't want, and I won't have anything of the kind. What I want is a true wife, a real, substantial woman, a companion, an adviser, a friend, one whose voice is not a mere echo of mine, but who has a distinct individuality, with judgment, opinions and will of her own. Of course I know that most fashionable ladies are better than they seem, that this contemptible disguise which they wear,— this falsehood which they repeat in the hair, the skin, the shape and form of each and every part of the body, is not deliberate falsehood, but the result of a thoughtless compliance with fashion; but it is very difficult for me to separate the woman from the lie. And then their voices! how utterly affected! no matter what the natural voice may be, every one learns exactly the same ridiculous intonation."

Here I interrupted him with:—

"Hold on, my friend, hold on! I really can't stand this any longer. You greatly underrate fashionable ladies. They seem to you silly, false and unworthy; but many of them are not a hundredth part as false and silly as their dress and conversation. Many of these ladies who now seem so preposterous and absurd, will, when married, and fairly settled down, cast off this burlesque, and become sober, solid women."

"But, as they all dress and talk exactly alike, how am I to tell which is which and who is who?"

"Well, well, I must leave you; I have an engagement."

On my rounds I kept thinking what a perfect couple Miss Dinsmore and Mr. Finlay would make! I determined, without saying a word to either, to give them an opportunity to see each other. Fortunately for my plan, Miss Dinsmore had just begun to make her rounds early in the morning, and on foot. I advised Mr. Finlay to take an early ride, and that he might have company, I invited him to go with me in my early morning round. I took him through Miss Dinsmore's parish, and, as I had calculated, we met her with a basket on her arm. I drew up to make some inquiries about several poor and sick ones, for whom we were both interested. Just before we started on, I said, "Mr. Finlay, this is my friend, Miss Dinsmore." Five mornings in succession we rode in the same direction, and every morning but one we met Miss Dinsmore. I was pleased to notice that, as we approached one particular neighborhood, my friend became a little wandering in his conversation, and used his eyes with a marked earnestness.

It struck me as very curious that, although Finlay protracted the conversation more and more each morning on meeting Miss Dinsmore, making many inquiries about her proteges, and showing a singular interest in her work, he did not allude to her during the subsequent part of the ride, nor at any other time.

After a week or so, he said, when I called for him, that he was getting so well, he thought it his duty to attend to business. The very next day, when calling upon the poor widow, to whom I had first sent Miss Dinsmore, she asked, as I was about to leave,—

"Doctor, who was that gentleman that came here with Miss Swan yesterday? He seemed a very nice man." (I will here state that, to save the feelings of her fashionable friends, Miss Dinsmore introduced herself as Miss Swan to all her beneficiaries.)

"What kind of a looking man was he?" I asked.

"A large, tall man, with a black beard, and he carried his right hand in a sling. He carried Miss Swan's basket in his other hand."

"Well," I said, "I suppose it's some friend of hers."

"Oh!" exclaimed the poor widow, "I trembled for fear that it might
be some one who was going to marry her, and take her away from me.
If that dear, blessed angel should be taken away from me, I am sure
I should die."

"Never you fear; I think I know all about him."

So, so, Mr. Charles Finlay, Esq., you are knocking all my plans into "pi." I had got it fixed in my mind that I should invite you to spend an evening at my house, and then I would invite Miss Dinsmore to drop in on some pretence, and so on, and so on, and in less than half a year, I should have you head over ears in love, and then all your lives you would think of me as the occasion of all your happiness; and here you are, just off a sick bed, with only one hand, carrying round a big provision basket before breakfast, at Miss Dinsmore's very heels. So, so, Mr. Charles Finlay, Esq.

Little Charley Finlay, during an attack of scarlatina, had a convulsion. The fond parents urged me, as a special favor, to remain during the night with them. As there was nothing to do but to wait while the little one slept, we fell into a pleasant talk about old times; and then I told them the part which I had played in their first acquaintance, and the hearty laughs I had had over that tall, black-whiskered porter, with one arm in a sling, following a quiet lady, with a basket of provisions. And, although they had been so very quiet about it all, and, although said porter had followed said quiet lady about among the hovels every day for two or three months, and, although both lady and porter saw me frequently, and always kept profoundly mum about things, that I presumed I had heard all about their doings and sayings among their parishoners, almost every day, from the time I took the porter in my carriage down Marble Street, one fine morning, on purpose to get him a situation, up to the time when said black-whiskered porter came into my office one evening, and revealed unto me as follows—

"My friend, do you remember that Miss Dinsmore, to whom you introduced me one morning, down in the mud in Marble Street?"

"Let me see; was she a tall blonde?"

"Yes, that's the one."

"Oh, certainly, I remember her very well. Where is she now, I wonder? (I had had an interview with her that very afternoon.)

And then the tall porter told me, with glistening eyes, that I would receive, the very next day, an invitation card or cards inviting me to attend, etc., etc. He was delighted at my surprise and astonishment.

Notwithstanding the occasion of our long night-watch, the mother declared she would, as soon as Charley was well, box my ears, while she did not forget, the next time she had occasion to rise to attend to our little patient, to take a seat by the side of her noble husband, and assure him, by a fond pressure of the hand, that the memories were all very precious to her.

Moral. Young women who desire the company and assistance of black- whiskered porters, should go down Marble Street early in the morning, with a basket of provisions for the widow Ramsey.