CHAPTER XXXI.
JOHN CHAPMAN DAVIE, M.D.
Sincere will be the regret at the announcement of the death of the subject of this sketch. As I have known him since he arrived in the colony with his father (who was also John Chapman Davie), and his three brothers, William, Horace and Alexander, in 1862, it may not be inappropriate that I, one of his oldest friends, should tell what I know of him. Dr. Davie was born in Wells, Somersetshire, on the 22nd March, 1845, and was therefore sixty-six years of age. He, with his brother Horace (residing in Somenos), were educated at Silcoats College, England, and studied for the profession which afterwards made him known from north to south of the Pacific Coast, at the University of San Francisco. He also studied under a clever English physician, Dr. Lane, and under Dr. Toland, both eminent men who founded colleges in California.
After Dr. Davie had finished his medical course in California he came to Victoria and entered into practice with his father.
When I was about fifteen years old I was troubled a deal with my throat and was under his father’s treatment. I was obliged to give up singing in consequence, being a choir boy in Christ Church. In my frequent visits to the doctor’s surgery I became acquainted with Dr. Davie, Jr., who undertook the treatment of my throat until I was able to resume my choir duties. Both Dr. Davie and his brother Alexander were members of the choir at this time, and regular in attendance at service and choir practice. I can see with my mind’s eye at a choir practice both brothers. Mr. Cridge, the rector, always conducted these practices, and he asked each brother in turn to sing his individual part over in the anthem, as they were to take solos, he (Mr. Cridge) beating time as they sang. I might say that we had some fine singers in the choir in those days, and more anthems were sung than even now. His brother Horace and I were school-fellows at the Church Collegiate School, which was situated on Church Hill, just about where Mr. Keith Wilson’s residence now stands. It was built as a Congregational Church, and was destroyed by fire about 1870.
At the time I first became acquainted with Dr. Davie his father’s office was situated where Challoner & Mitchell’s store now stands, and was a very unpretentious affair—as most business places were in Victoria at that time—a wooden one-story frame cottage of three rooms. The doctor’s first office was on the corner of Government and Bastion, where Richardson’s cigar store stands. At the former office my friend studied and worked with his father until the latter’s death, when the son continued the practice in his own behalf.
From Mr. Alexander Wilson, who was a director of the Royal Hospital at the time, I am told a deal about Dr. Davie’s early medical career. He says the young doctor was ambitious to become medical officer to the Royal Hospital, then situated on the rock at the top of Pandora Street, and asked Mr. Wilson to try and get the position for him, even without salary, and Mr. Wilson, having great faith in the young man, promised to do his best, and at a meeting of the board, consisting of Alexander McLean, J. D. Robinson, Henry Short and Alexander Wilson, Dr. Davie was duly elected, and at a salary of £100 per annum, and held the position for over twenty years. He entered on his duties with great zeal, his first surgical case being that of an Indian girl who was accidentally shot on Salt Spring Island. The poor girl’s arm was badly shattered, and she was brought down from the island in a canoe. It was a bad case, but the doctor pulled her through and, saving her arm, sent her home again as good as ever.
Dr. Davie was fond of music, and in early days was proficient on the flute, contributing to the programme of many a concert for charity in those days when amateurs did so much to entertain the public.
That the subject of this sketch was a clever man goes without saying. Many there are, and have been, who have been snatched from grim death by this skilful surgeon. By some he was thought to be bearish and unsympathetic, but they who thought so did not know him as I did, or they would not have thought so. Where there was real suffering and danger there could not have been a more gentle, kinder-hearted or careful man. Because he did not always respond to a friend’s salutation in passing it was taken as bearishness or indifference. It was really pre-occupation. He was thinking out a difficult case for the next morning at the hospital. As he once said to a lady friend, "They little know the hours I pass walking up and down at night thinking out a case I have to operate on—how I shall do it to make it a success." I went into his office one day and found him with a surgical instrument on his knee which he seemed very intent on, and I asked him what it was for. He hesitated for a moment, then said, "You would not understand." But still he explained it all to me. It was for an operation in the morning on the stomach of a patient at one of the hospitals, and I have no doubt it was successful. About seven years ago he attended me for typhoid fever, and even then he had his bad spells of sickness, but still he came regularly, and on reaching the top of the stairs to my room he would hold on till his coughing fit was over. "Well, old man, how are you to-day?" After I had taken a turn for the better and was very susceptible to the smell of good things cooking downstairs, I asked him when I should be allowed to have something solid, and added, "Oh, I am so tired of milk and egg-nog; when may I have a bit of chicken or mutton?"
"Well, how many days is it since your temperature was normal? Well, in so many days you may have jelly and junket."
"Is that all?" I replied, disappointed.
"Look here, old man, I want to get you well, and you must be patient."
"That reminds me of a little story," said the doctor. "Some years ago two men were digging a deep ditch on Johnson Street to repair a sewer. Some time after both the men were taken sick, which turned out to be typhoid fever, and, being single men, they were taken to the hospital. I saw them every day in my regular round of visits, and they progressed towards recovery until they got to the stage that you have, and complained of my bill of fare. They asked for ‘something solid,’ and I put them off with the same answer you got. A day or two after in making my regular rounds I noticed that one of my patients was not in evidence and I asked his friend where he was. Then the story was told me of his friend having had some visitors, one of whom brought a cooked chicken, part of which was eaten on the sly and the balance hidden under the mattress. The result was that he was then out in the morgue, having died that day, and in due time, to conclude my little story, his friend, who had no chicken, left the hospital cured."
"Now," said Dr. Davie, "I’ll go; you are in good hands (my wife’s); be patient and ponder on my little story."
It is pretty well known that Dr. Davie had had only one lung for years past, but that did not prevent him attending to his numerous patients. The many who to-day are indebted to his skill and kindness of heart will feel a great sorrow at his passing. Many of his former patients have told me of his refusal of pay for valuable services rendered them. At the conclusion of a sickness a patient would likely say: "Well, doctor, I am grateful for your pulling me through. I shall have to pay by instalments. Here is something on account."
If the doctor did not know his circumstances he would say: "How much is your salary?" On his replying he (the doctor) would say: "If that is all you get you cannot afford to pay anything," and that was the last the patient would hear of it.
On a certain occasion I heard the experience of three in a small party who had this or something to this effect to relate. With his extensive practice he ought to have been a very wealthy man, but not with such patients as these, of course, but if all the patients he has had in years past had been charged for his valuable services he would have been worth half a million instead of dying a comparatively poor man. This last year I have visited him regularly, and many events of early Victoria life have been recalled on these visits. He repined at first when he knew that his days were numbered, saying, "Fawcett, old man, don’t I wish I could go back to the days when we were young and took those trips to Cowichan. It is pretty hard to go!" I fully agreed with him then, but when later he got so bad and suffered so much, he prayed to go, and I again agreed with him, poor fellow. This latter time was when to speak made him cough and suffocate. "Old man, I cannot talk to you," and he would lie back in an exhausted state, and I would go, sorry that I was unable to do anything to relieve him, to slightly repay all his kindness to me in the past.
Tuesday last I with my wife paid my last call on him, he having expressed a desire to see me. I little thought it was the last time I should see him alive, for he said he would not go till October, he thought, and I believed him.
Well, maybe I have said enough, but I could say a deal more if necessary. What I have said will be echoed by many, I’m sure.
So, in the words of Montgomery, the poet:
"Friend after friend departs, who has not lost a friend?
There is no union here of hearts, that finds not here an end,
Were this frail world our only rest, living or dying none were blest."