DOCTORS
"What is your greatest wish, Doctor, now that you have successfully passed for your degree?"
YOUNG DOCTOR—"To put 'Dr.' before my own name, and 'Dr.' after the name of other people."—Life.
"Who is your family doctor?"
"I can't tell you."
"Why not? Don't you know his name?"
"Yes. Dr. Johnson used to be our family doctor but nowadays mother goes to an eye specialist; father to a stomach specialist; my sister goes to a throat specialist; my brother is in the care of a lung specialist, and I'm taking treatments from an osteopath."
A young suburban doctor whose practice was not very great sat in his study reading away a lazy afternoon in early summer. His man servant appeared at the door.
"Doctor, them boys is stealin' your green peaches again. Shall I chase them away?"
The doctor looked thoughtful for a moment, then leveled his eyes at the servant.
"No," he said.
Once an old darky visited a doctor and was given definite instructions as to what he should do. Shaking his head he started to leave the office, when the doctor said:
"Here, Rastus, you forgot to pay me."
"Pay yo for what, boss?"
"For my advice," replied the doctor.
"Naw, suh; naw, suh; I ain't gwine take it," and Rastus shuffled out.
M.D.—"Would you have the price if I said you needed an operation?"
MANNING—"Would you say I needed an operation if you thought I didn't have the price?"—Life.
"How do you pronounce 'pneumonia'?" asked the French boy, who had come to England to learn the language.
His only chum told him.
"That's odd," replied the young Gaul. "It says in this story I am reading that the doctor pronounced it fatal."
Mr. Roger W. Babson says that in looking up appendicitis cases he learned that in 17 per cent. of the operations for that disease the post-mortem examinations showed that the appendix was in perfect condition.
"The whole subject," he adds, "reminds me of a true story I heard in London recently. In the hospitals there, the ailment of the patient, when he is admitted, is denoted by certain letters, such as 'T. B.' for tuberculosis. An American doctor was examining these history slips when his curiosity was aroused by the number on which the letters 'G.O.K.' appeared. He said to the physician who was showing him around:
"'There seems to be a severe epidemic of this G.O.K. in London. What is it, anyhow?'
"Oh, that means 'God only knows,'" replied the English physician.
The fashionable physician walked in, in his breezy way, and nodded smilingly at his patient.
"Well, here I am, Mrs. Adams," he announced. "What do you think is the matter with you this morning?"
"Doctor, I hardly know," murmured the fashionable patient languidly. "What is new?"
"When I was a boy," said the gray-haired physician, who happened to be in a reminiscent mood, "I wanted to be a soldier; but my parents persuaded me to study medicine."
"Oh, well," rejoined the sympathetic druggist, "such is life. Many a man with wholesale aspirations has to content himself with a retail business."
The eminent physicians had been called in consultation. They had retired to another room to discuss the patient's condition. In the closet of that room a small boy had been concealed by the patient's directions to listen to what the consultation decided and to tell the patient who desired genuine information.
"Well, Jimmy," said the patient, when the boy came to report, "what did they say?"
"I couldn't tell you that," said the boy. "I listened as hard as I could, but they used such big words I couldn't remember much of it. All I could catch was when one doctor said:
"'Well, we'll find that out at the autopsy.'"
YOUNG WOMAN (to be neighbor at dinner)—"Guess whom I met today, doctor?"
DOCTOR—"I'm afraid I'm not a good guesser."
"You're too modest. Aren't you at the top of your profession?"—Life.
DOCTOR—"My dear sir, it's a good thing you came to me when you did."
"Why, Doc? Are you broke?"—Life.
"It's a little hard for young doctors to get a start."
"I know. I'm raising whiskers."
"They will help. And I'll loan you some of my magazines for 1876 to put in your anteroom."
PATIENT—"I want to see doctor. Be this the place?"
DOCTOR—"This is where I practice."
PATIENT—"Don't want no person for to practice on me; I want a doctor for to cure me."
FRIEND—"To what do you attribute your rapid rise in your profession?"
SURGEON—"It has been my rule all along never to perform an operation unless I was sure it would be a success either way."
A doctor who had a custom of cultivating the lawn and walk in front of his home every spring engaged O'Brien to do the job. He went away for three days and when he returned found O'Brien waiting for his money. The doctor was not satisfied with his work and said: "O'Brien, the walk is covered with gravel and dirt, and in my estimation it's a bad job."
O'Brien looked at him in surprise for a moment and replied: "Shure, Doc, there's many a bad job of yours covered with gravel and dirt."
"You say this doctor has a large practice?"
"It's so large that when a patient has nothing the matter with him he tells him so."
Why She Objected
An old woman's son was seriously ill and the attending surgeon advised an operation. But the mother bitterly objected.
"I don't believe in operations!" she exclaimed. "Even the Scriptures is agin it. Don't the Bible say plain and flat: 'What God hath j'ined togither, let not man put asunder'?"
REDD—"The doctor said he'd have me on my feet in a fortnight."
GREENE—"And did he?"
"Sure. I've had to sell my automobile."
SPECIALIST—"You are suffering from nerve exhaustion. I can cure you for the small sum of $2,000."
PATIENT—"And will my nerve be as good as yours then?"
In a confidential little talk to a group of medical students an eminent physician took up the extremely important matter of correct diagnosis of the maximum fee.
"The best rewards," he said, "come, of course, to the established specialist. For instance, I charge twenty-five dollars a call at the residence, ten dollars for an office consultation, and five dollars for a telephone consultation."
There was an appreciative and envious silence, and then a voice from the back of the theater, slightly thickened, spoke:
"Doc," it asked, "how much do you charge a fellow for passing you on the street?"
An insurance agent was filling out an application blank.
"Have you ever had appendicitis?" he asked.
"Well," answered the applicant, "I was operated on but I have never felt quite sure whether it was appendicitis or professional curiosity."
"Oh, doctor, I have sent for you, certainly; still, I must confess that I have not the slightest faith in modern medical science."
"Well," said the doctor, "that doesn't matter in the least. You see, a mule has no faith in the veterinary surgeon, and yet he cures him all the same."
A Great Difference
A noted physician, particularly expeditious in examining and prescribing for his patients, was sought out by an army man whom he "polished off" in almost less than no time. As the patient was leaving, he shook hands heartily with the doctor and said:
"I am especially glad to have met you, as I have often heard my father, Colonel Blank, speak of you."
"What!" exclaimed the physician, "are you old Tom's son?"
"Certainly."
"My dear fellow," cried the doctor, "fling that infernal prescription in the fire and sit down and tell me what is the matter with you."
"Father, what is a convalescent?"
"A patient who is still alive, son."
Young M.D.—"Well, Dad, I'm hanging out my shingle; can't you give me some rules for success?"
"Always write your prescriptions illegibly and your bills very plainly."
MOTHER (after visitor had gone)—"Bobby, what on earth made you stick out your tongue at our pastor? Oh, dear!..."
BOBBY—"Why, muvver, I just showed it to him. He said, 'Littul man, how do you feel?'—and I thort he was a doctor!"
An Irishman coming out of ether in the ward after an operation, exclaimed audibly: "Thank God! That's over!" "Don't be too sure," said the man in the next bed, "they left a sponge in me and had to cut me open again." And the patient on the other side said, "Why they had to open me, too, to find one of their instruments." Just then the surgeon who had operated on the Irishman, stuck his head in the door and yelled, "Has anybody seen my hat!" Pat fainted.
Dr. A., physician at Newcastle, being summoned to a vestry, in order to reprimand the sexton for drunkenness, dwelt so long on the sexton's misconduct as to draw from him this expression: "Sir, I thought you would have been the last man alive to appear against me, as I have covered so many blunders of yours!"
DOCTOR (to patient)—"You've had a pretty close call. It's only your strong constitution that pulled you through."
PATIENT—"Well, doctor, remember that when you make out your bill."
A quack doctor was holding forth about his "medicines" to a rural audience.
"Yes, gentlemen," he said, "I have sold these pills for over twenty-five years and never heard a word of complaint. Now, what does that prove?"
From a voice in the crowd came: "That dead men tell no tales."
See also Bills; Remedies.