“A doctor?”
“Not exactly,” he replied, rising on his elbow and winking at me significantly. “I cures people as hasn’t got nothink the matter vith ’em and thinks they has.”
This sentence was too deep for me to fathom, and on my intimating as much, he condescended to explain.
“I go round the country selling my own medicines, which is Norris’s Golden Balsam, wot cures all kinds of pains, cuts and bruises, whatsomedever they
may be; fifty cents a bottle, small bottles twenty-five. Then there’s the Lightning Toothache Drops, wot cures that hagonizing malady in one second, or money refunded—twenty-five cents a bottle. And finally, ’ere we ’ave the Great American Tooth Powder, which makes the blackest teeth vite in less’n no time, and makes the gums strong and ’elthy—ten cents a box. And each and every purchaser is presented vith a book containing fifty songs, all new and prime, free gratis and for nothink! Valk hup, ladies and gentlemen; who’ll ’ave another bottle?”
During this recital, Doctor Norris gradually assumed a professional demeanor, and near the close he rose to his feet, and gesticulated as if addressing a large audience.
But at the close he suddenly cooled down, and assuming his recumbent position, said, listlessly:
“Now you know me.”
“Certainly,” said I; “but then I do not see—”
“I hunderstand,” said he. “You don’t see no Balsam, nor Drops, nor Powder?”