The Physician’s Widow and Orphan.
Scenes from “Practice of a New York Surgeon.”
I have abridged the following truthful story from the above work, which book I recommend to the perusal of all lovers of moral and entertaining literature.
The Summons.—The experienced physician knows, from the sound of the door bell, whether it is the representative of wealth or penury who is outside at the bell-pull.
The doctor opened the door to the timid summons.
“Will you please come and see my mother?” asked a little delicate and thinly-dressed girl. “She has been very ill for nearly a year, and I’m afraid she’s going to die.” The poor little heart was swelling with grief.
Almost ashamed as I donned my heavy coat, for the night was bitter cold, and the shivering little girl pattered after me with her well-worn shoes and scanty dress, I hurried along to the abode of poverty.
The Tenement.—The faint rays of a candle issuing from an upper window of one of those wretched wooden buildings, guided us to the invalid’s tenement, and as we approached the house the little girl ran ahead of me, and stood shivering in the doorway, while I carefully walked up the rickety steps.
Poor as the tenement was, its cleanliness was noticeable, from the fact that it was isolated from the loathsome Irish neighbors, whose superior means and brutal habits allowed them to occupy the lower and more accessible apartments almost in common with the swine which are fed from their very doorsteps.