"O, thunder! Doctor; you have been so excited all night that you couldn't tell what he called."
"I couldn't?" he thundered out. "Don't you s'pose I could tell the difference between Pocahontas and—and—well, Johnston, you cussed fool, I'll never be able to call this infernal town by its right name again. I am going to retire."
We remained at that hotel but one day, not being able to make satisfactory rates, besides being dunned for our board in advance.
We then called on an elderly widow lady who was running a fourth-class hotel. She seemed favorably impressed with the Doctor, which fact made us feel quite comfortable, for the time being.
I "hus'led" out with a lot of hand-bills, which I scattered over the town, and returned to the hotel to await results.
The first afternoon there came a middle-aged Irish woman to consult the doctor while in a Clairvoyant state. He seated her opposite himself, put his hands on the table, looked wise, and began:
"Madam you have been married several years, and have three children. You are forty-six years of age, have been afflicted several years, and have a cancer in the stomach. It will cost you twenty dollars for medicine enough to last you——"
"To last me a life-time, I s'pose," she cried out, and continued: "Docther, me dear old man, you're an old jackass! a hombug, a hypocrite and an imposcher! Sure, I niver had a married husband, and a divil of a choild am I the mither of. I am liss than thirty-foive, and a healthier, more robust picture of humanity niver stood before your domm miserable gaze! The cancer in me stomick is no more nor liss than a pain in me left shoulder, which any domn fool of a docther wud know was the rheumatics. To the divil wid yer domned impostorousness and highfalutin hombuggery! Good day, Docther, darlint; good day. May the divil transmogrify you into a less pretentious individual, wid more brains and a domm sight less impecuniosity!"
