University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.

Doctor Elnathan Todd, for such was the
unworthy name of the man of physic, was commonly
thought to be, among the settlers, a gentleman
of great mental endowments; and he was
assuredly of rare personal proportions. In height
he measured, without his shoes, exactly six feet
and four inches. His hands, feet, and knees, corresponded
in every respect with this formidable
stature; but every other part of his frame appeared
to have been intended for a man several
sizes smaller, if we except the length of the limbs.
His shoulders were square, in one sense at least,
being in a right line from one side to the other;
but they were so narrow, that the long, dangling
arms that they supported, seemed to issue
out of his back. His neck possessed, in an eminent
degree, the property of length to which we
have alluded, and it was topped by a small bullet-head,
that exhibited, on one side, a bush of bristling
brown hair, and on the other, a short, twinkling
visage, that appeared to maintain a constant
struggle with itself in order to look wise. He was
the youngest son of a farmer in the western part of
Massachusetts, who, being in somewhat easy circumstances,
had allowed this boy to shoot up to
the height we have mentioned, without the ordinary

interruptions of field-labour, wood-chopping,
and such other toils as were imposed on his brothers.
Elnathan was indebted for this exemption
from labour, in some measure, to his extraordinary
growth, which, leaving him pale, inanimate,
and listless, induced his tender mother to pronounce
him “a sickly boy, and one that was not
equal to work, but who might arn a living, comfortably
enough, by taking to pleading law, or
turning minister, or doctoring, or some sitch-like
easy calling.” Still there was a great uncertainty
which of these vocations the youth was best endowed
to fill with credit and profit; but, having
no other employment, the strippling was constantly
lounging about the “homestead,” munching green
apples, and hunting for sorrel; when the same
sagacious eye, that had brought to light his latent
talents, seized upon this circumstance, as a clue
to direct his future path through the turmoils of
the world. “Elnathan was cut out for a doctor,”
she knew, “for he was for ever digging for yarbs,
and tasting all kinds of things that grow'd about the
lots. Then again he had a nateral love for doctor-stuff,
for when she had left the bilious pills
out for her man, all nicely covered with maple
sugar, just ready to take, Nathan had come in, and
swallowed them, for all the world as if they were
nothing, while Ichabod (her husband) could never
get one down without making sitch desperate faces,
that it was awful to look on.”

This discovery decided the matter. Elnathan,
then about fifteen, was, much like a wild colt,
caught and trimmed, by clipping his bushy locks;
dressed in a suit of homespun, died in the butternut
bark; furnished with a “New Testament,”
and a “Webster's Spelling-Book,” and sent to
school. As the boy was by nature quite shrewd
enough, and had previously, at odd times, laid the

foundations of reading, writing, and arithmetic, he
was soon conspicuous in the school for his learning.
The delighted mother had the gratification
of hearing, from the lips of the master, that her
son was a “prodigious boy, and far above all his
class.” He also thought that “the youth had a
natural love for doctoring, as he had known him
frequently advise the smaller children against eating
too much; and once or twice, when the ignorant
little things had persevered in opposition to
Elnathan's advice, he had known her son to empty
the school-baskets with his own mouth, to prevent
the consequences.”

Soon after this comfortable declaration from his
schoolmaster, the lad was removed to the house of
the village doctor, a gentleman whose early career
had not been unlike that of our hero, where he was
to be seen, sometimes watering a horse, at others
watering medicines, blue, yellow, and red; then
again he might be noticed, lolling under an apple
tree, with Ruddiman's Latin Grammar in his hand,
and a corner of Denman's Midwifery sticking out
of the pocket of his coat;—for his instructer held
it absurd to teach his pupil how to despatch a patient
regularly from this world, before he knew
how to bring him into it.

This kind of life continued for a twelvemonth,
when he suddenly appeared at meeting in a long
coat (and well did it deserve the name!) of black
homespun, with little bootees, bound with uncoloured
calf-skin, for the want of red morocco.

Soon after, he was seen shaving with a dull razor;
and but three or four months elapsed before
several elderly ladies were observed hastening towards
the house of a poor woman in the village,
while others were running to and fro in great apparent
distress. One or two boys were mounted,
bareback, on horses, and sent off at speed in various

directions. Several indirect questions were
put concerning where the physician was last observed;
but all would not do; and at length Elnathan
was seen issuing from his door, with a very
grave air, preceded by a little white-headed boy,
who, out of breath, was trotting before him. The
following day the youth appeared in the street,
as the highway was called, and the neighbourhood
was astonished in observing how much he had
grown lately. The same week he bought a new
razor; and the succeeding Sunday he entered the
meeting-house with a red silk handkerchief in his
hand, and with an extremely demure countenance.
In the evening he called upon a young woman of
his own class in life, for there were no others to be
found, and, when he was left alone with the fair,
he was called, for the first time in his life, Doctor
Todd, by her prudent mother. The ice once broken
in this manner, Elnathan was greeted from
every mouth with his official appellation.

Another year was passed under the superintendence
of the same master, during which the young
physician had the credit of “riding with the old
doctor,” although they were generally observed
to travel different roads. At the end of that period,
Dr. Todd attained his legal majority. He
then took a jaunt to Boston, to purchase medicines,
and, as some intimated, to walk the hospital; we
know not how the latter might have been, but
if true, he soon walked through it, for he returned
within a fortnight, bringing with him a suspiciously
looking box, that smelt powerfully of
brimstone.

The next Sunday he was married; and the following
morning he entered a one-horse sleigh
with his bride, having before him the box we have
mentioned, with another filled with home-made
household linen, a paper-covered trunk, with a

red umbrella lashed to it, a pair of quite new saddle-bags,
and a bandbox. The next intelligence
that his friends received of the bride and bride-groom
was, that the latter was “settled in the new
countries, and well to do as a doctor, in Templetown,
in York state.”

If a templar would smile at the qualifications of
Marmaduke to fill the judicial seat that he occupied,
we are certain that a graduate of Leyden or
Edinburgh would be extremely amused with this
true narration of the servitude of Elnathan in the
temple of Æsculapius. But the same consolation
was afforded to both the jurist and the leech; for
Dr. Todd was quite as much on a level with his
compeers in the profession in that country, as
was Marmaduke with his brethren on the bench.

Time and practice did wonders for the physician.
He was naturally humane, but possessed no
small share of moral courage; or, in other words,
he was chary of the lives of his patients, and never
tried uncertain experiments on such members
of society as were considered useful; but once or
twice, when a luckless vagrant had come under his
care, he was a little addicted to trying the effects
of every vial in his saddle-bags on the stranger's
constitution. Happily their number was small,
and in most cases their natures innocent. By
these means Elnathan had acquired a certain degree
of knowledge in fevers and agues, and could
talk with much judgment concerning intermittents,
remittents, tertians, quotidians, &c. In certain
cutaneous disorders, very prevalent in new settlements,
he was considered to be infallible; and there
was no woman on the Patent, but would as soon
think of becoming a mother without a husband,
as without the assistance of Dr. Todd. In short,
he was rearing, on this foundation of sand, a superstructure,
cemented by practice, though composed

of somewhat brittle materials. He, however,
occasionally renewed his elementary studies,
and, with the observation of a shrewd mind, was
applying his practice to his theory.

In surgery, having the least experience, and it
being a business that spoke directly to the senses,
he was most apt to distrust his own powers; but
he had applied oils to several burns, cut round the
roots of sundry defective teeth, and sewed up
the wounds of numberless wood-choppers, with
considerable eclat, when an unfortunate jobber
suffered a fracture of his leg, by the tree that he
had been felling. It was on this occasion that our
hero encountered the greatest trial that his nerves
and moral feeling had ever sustained. In the hour
of need he was, however, not found wanting.—
Most of the amputations in the new settlements,
and they were quite frequent, were performed by
some one practitioner, who, possessing originally
a reputation, was enabled by this circumstance to
acquire an experience that rendered him deserving
of it; and Elnathan had been present at one or
two of these operations. But on the present occasion
the man of practice was not to be obtained,
and the duty fell, as a matter of course, to the
share of Mr. Todd. He went to work with a kind
of blind desperation, observing, at the same time,
all the externals of decent gravity and great skill.
The sufferer's name was Milligan, and it was to
this event that Richard alluded, when he spoke of
assisting the Doctor, at an amputation—by holding
the leg! The limb was certainly cut off, and the
patient survived the operation. It was, however,
two years before poor Milligan ceased to complain
that they had buried the leg in so narrow a box,
that it was straitened for room; he knew this to
be true, for he could feel the pain shooting up from

the inhumed fragment into his living members.
Marmaduke suggested that the fault might lie in
the living arteries and nerves, but Richard, considering
the amputation as part of his own handy-work,
strongly repelled the insinuation, at the
same time declaring, that he had often heard of
men who could tell when it was about to rain, by
the toes of amputated limbs. After two or three
years, notwithstanding that Milligan's complaints
gradually diminished, the leg was dug up, and a
larger box furnished. and from that hour no one
had heard the sufferer utter another complaint on
the subject. This gave the public great confidence
in Doctor Todd, whose reputation was hourly increasing,
and luckily for his patients, his information
also.

Notwithstanding Mr. Todd's six years' practice,
and his success with the leg, he was not a
little appalled, on entering the hall of the mansion-house.
It was glaring with the light of day; it
looked so splendid and imposing, compared with
the hastily built and scantily furnished apartments
which he frequented in his ordinary practice, and
contained so many well-dressed persons, and anxiously
looking faces, that his usually firm nerves
were a good deal discomposed. He had heard
from the messenger who summoned him, that
it was a gun-shot wound, and had come from his
own home, wading through the snow, with his
saddle-bags thrown over his arm, while separated
arteries, penetrated lungs, and injured vitals, were
whirling through his brain, as if he were stalking
over a field of battle, instead of Judge Temple's
peaceable enclosure.

The first object that met his eye, as he moved
into the room, was Elizabeth, in her riding-habit,
richly laced with gold cord, her fine form bending
towards him, with her face expressing deep anxiety

in every one of its beautiful features. The
enormous bony knees of the physician struck each
other with a noise that was audible; for in the absent
state of his mind, he mistook her for a general
officer, perforated with bullets, hastening from
the field of battle to implore his assistance. The
delusion, however, was but momentary, and his
eye glanced rapidly from the daughter to the earnest
dignity of the father's countenance; thence to
the busy strut of Richard, who was cooling his
impatience at the hunter's indifference to his offered
assistance, by pacing the hall and cracking his
whip; from him to the Frenchman, who had
stood for several minutes unheeded with a chair
for the lady; thence to Major Hartmann, who
was very coolly lighting a pipe three feet long by
a candle in one of the chandeliers; thence to Mr.
Grant, who was turning over a manuscript with
much earnestness at one of the lustres; thence to
Remarkable, who stood, with her arms demurely
folded before her, surveying with a look of admiration
and envy the dress and beauty of the young
lady; and from her to Benjamin, who, with his
feet standing wide apart, and his arms a-kimho,
was balancing his square little body, with the indifference
of one who was accustomed to wounds
and bloodshed. All of these seemed to be unhurt,
and the operator began to breathe more freely;
but before he had time to take a second look, the
Judge, advancing, shook him kindly by the hand,
and spoke.

“Thou art welcome, my good sir, quite welcome,
indeed; here is a youth, whom I have unfortunately
wounded in shooting a deer this evening,
and who requires some of thy assistance.”

“Shooting at a deer, 'duke,” interrupted Richard,
abruptly—“Shooting at a deer. Who do
you think can prescribe, unless he knows the truth

of the case? It is always so, with some people;
they think a doctor can be deceived, with the same
impunity as another man.”

“Shooting at a deer truly,” returned the Judge,
with a smile, “although it is by no means certain
that I did not aid in destroying the buck; but the
youth is injured by my hand, be that as it may;
and it is thy skill, that must cure him, and my
pocket, that shall amply reward thee for it.”

“Two ver good tings to depend on,” observed
Monsieur Le Quoi, bowing politely, with a sweep
of his head, to the Judge and the practitioner.

“I thank you, Monsieur,” returned the Judge;
“but we keep the young man in pain. Remarkable,
thou wilt please to provide linen, for lint and
bandages.”

This remark caused a cessation of the compliments,
and induced the physician to turn an inquiring
eye in the direction of his patient. During
the dialogue, the young hunter had thrown aside
his over coat, and now stood clad in a plain suit of
the common, light-coloured, homespun of the country,
that was evidently but recently made. His
hand was on the lapels of his coat, in the attitude
of removing the garment, when he suddenly suspended
the movement, and looked towards the
commiserating Elizabeth, who was standing in an
unchanged posture, too much absorbed with her
anxious feelings to heed his actions. A slight colour
appeared, passing over the brow of the youth,
as he spoke.

“Possibly the sight of blood may alarm the lady;
I will retire to another room, while the wound
is dressing.”

“By no means,” said Doctor Todd, who,
having discovered that his patient was far from
being a man of importance, felt wonderfully emboldened
to perform his duty.—“The strong light

of these candles is favourable to the operation, and
it is seldom that we hard students enjoy good
eyesight.”

While speaking, Elnathan placed a pair of
large iron-rimmed spectacles on his face, where
they dropped, as it were by long practice, to the
extremity of his slim, pug nose; and if they were
of no service as assistants to his eyes, neither were
they any impediment to his vision; for his little,
gray organs were twinkling above them, like two
stars emerging from the cover of an envious cloud.
The action was unheeded by all but Remarkable,
who observed to Benjamin—

“Doctor Todd is a comely man to look on, and
a disp'ut pretty spoken one too. How well he
seems in spectacles. I declare, they give a grand
look to a body's face. I have quite a great mind
to try them myself.”

The speech of the stranger recalled the recollection
of Miss Temple, who started, as if from
deep abstraction, and, colouring excessively, she
motioned to a young woman, who served in the
capacity of a maid, and retired, with an air of
womanly reserve.

The field was now left to the physician and his
patient, while the different personages who remained,
gathered around the latter, with faces
expressing the various degrees of interest, that
each one felt in his condition. Major Hartmann
alone retained his seat, where he continued to
throw out vast quantities of smoke, now rolling
his eyes up to the ceiling, as if musing on the uncertainty
of life, and now bending them on the
wounded man, with an expression, that bespoke
some consciousness of his situation.

In the mean time, Elnathan, to whom the sight
of a gun-shot wound was a perfect novelty, commenced
his preparations, with a solemnity and

care that were worthy of the occasion. An old
shirt was procured by Benjamin, and placed in
the hands of the other, who tore divers bandages
from it, with an exactitude, that marked both his
own skill, and the importance of the operation.

The moment Richard heard the sound that
was produced by rending the linen, he stepped up
to the group, with the air of one who well understood
the business in hand. When this preparatory
measure was taken, Dr. Todd selected
a piece of the shirt with great care, and, handing
it to Mr. Jones, without moving a muscle,
said—

“Here, Squire Jones, you are well acquainted
with these things; will you please to scrape the
lint? It should be fine, and soft, you know, my
dear sir; and be cautious that no cotton gets in,
or it may p'ison the wownd. The shirt has been
made with cotton thread, but you can easily pick
it out.”

Richard assumed the office, with a nod at his
cousin, that said, quite plainly, “you see. this
fellow can't get along without me;” and began to
scrape the piece of linen on his knee, with great
diligence.

A table was now spread by the practitioner,
with vials, boxes of salve, and divers surgical instruments.
As the latter appeared, in succession,
from a case of red morocco, their owner held up
each implement, to the strong light of the chandelier
near to which he stood, and examined it,
with the nicest care and precision. A red silk
handkerchief was frequently applied to the glittering
steel, as if to remove from the polished surfaces,
the least impediment, which might exist, to
the most delicate operation. After the rather
scantily furnished pocket-case, which contained
these instruments, was exhausted, the physician

turned to his saddle-bags, and produced various
vials, filled with liquids, of the most radiant colours.
These were arranged, in due order, by
the side of the murderous saws, knives, and scissors,
when Elnathan stretched his long body to its
utmost elevation, placing his hand on the small of
his back, as if for support, and looked about him
to discover what effect this display of his professional
skill, was likely to produce on the spectators.

“Upon my wort, toctor,” observed Major Hartmann.
with a roguish roll of his little black eyes,
but with every other feature of his face in a state
of perfect rest, “put you have a very pretty pocket
pook of tools tere, and your toctor-stuff glitters,
as if it was petter for ter eyes as for ter
pelly.”

Elnathan gave a somewhat equivocal hem, before
he replied—one that might have been equally
taken, for that kind of noise, which cowards are
said to make, in order to awaken their dormant
courage, or for a natural effort, to clear the throat:
if for the latter, it was successful; for, turning
his face to the veteran German, he said—

“Very true, Major Hartmann, very true. sir;
a prudent man will always strive to make his remedies
agreeable to the eyes, though they may
not altogether suit the stomach. It is no small
part of our art, sir,” and he now spoke with the
confidence of a man who understood his subject,
“to reconcile the patient to what is for his own
good, though, at the same time, it may be unpalatable.”

“Sartain! Doctor Todd is right,” said Remarkable,
“and has scripter for what he says.
The Bible tells us, how things mought be sweet to
the mouth, and bitter to the inwards.”

“True, true,” interrupted the Judge, a little

impatiently; “but here is a youth who needs no
deception to lure him to his own benefit. I see,
by his eye, that he fears nothing more than delay.”

The stranger had, without assistance, bared his
own shoulder, when the slight perforation, produced
by the passage of the buck-shot, was plainly
visible. The intense cold of the evening had
stopped the bleeding, and Dr. Todd, casting a
furtive glance at the wound, thought it by no
means so formidable an affair as he had anticipated.
Thus encouraged, he approached his patient,
and made some indication of an intention
to trace the route that had been taken by the
lead.

Remarkable often found occasions, in after
days, to recount the minutiæ of that celebrated
operation; and when she arrived at this point,
she commonly proceeded as follows:—“And then
the Doctor tuck out of the pocket-book a long
thing, like a knitting-needle, with a button fastened
to the end on't; and then he pushed it into the
wownd; and then the young man looked awful;
and then I thought I should have swaned away—
I felt in sitch a disp'ut taking; and then the
Doctor had run it right through his shoulder, and
shoved the bullet out on t'other side; and so Doctor
Todd cured the young man—of a ball that the
Judge had shot into him, for all the world, as easy
as I could pick out a splinter, with my darning-needle.”

Such were the impressions of Remarkable on
the subject; and such, doubtless, were the opinions
of most of those, who felt it necessary to
entertain a species of religious veneration for the
abilities and skill of Elnathan; but such was far
from the truth.

When the physician attempted to introduce the

instrument, described by Remarkable, he was repulsed
by the stranger, with a good deal of decision,
and some little contempt, in his manner.

“I believe, sir,” he said, “that a probe is not
necessary; the shot has missed the bone, and has
passed directly through the arm, to the opposite
side, where it remains, but skin-deep, and whence,
I should think, it might be easily extracted.”

“The gentleman knows best,” said Dr. Todd,
laying down the probe, with the air of a man who
had assumed it merely in compliance with forms;
and, turning to Richard, he fingered the lint,
with the appearance of great care and foresight.
“Admirably well scraped, squire Jones! it is
about the best lint I have ever seen. I want your
assistance, my good sir, to hold the patient's arm,
while I make an incision for the ball. Now, I
rather guess, there is not another gentleman present,
who could scrape the lint so well as squire
Jones.”

“Such things run in families,” observed Richard,
rising with alacrity, to render the desired
assistance. “My father, and my grandfather before
him, were both celebrated for their knowledge
of surgery; they were not, like Marmaduke here,
puffed up with an accidental thing, such as the
time when he drew in the hip-joint of the man
who was thrown from his horse: that was the fall
before you came into the settlement, Doctor; but
they were men who were taught the thing regularly,
spending half their lives in learning
those litle niceties; though, for the matter of that,
my grandfather was a college-bred physician, and
the best in the colony, too—that is, in his neighbourhood.”

“So it goes with the world, Squire,” cried Benjamin;
“if-so-be that a man wants to walk the
quarter-deck with credit, d'ye see, and with regular

built swabs on his shoulders, he mus'nt think
to do it, by getting in at the cabin-windows.
There are two ways to get into a top, besides the
lubber-holes. The true way to walk aft, is to begin
forrard; tho'f it be only in an humble way,
like myself, d'ye see, which was, from being only
a hander of top-gallant-sails, and a stower of the
flying-jib, to keeping the key of the Captain's
locker.”

“Benjamin speaks quite to the purpose,” continued
Richard, with a benevolent smile, directed
to the Doctor. “I dare say, that he has often
seen shot extracted, in the different ships in which
he has served; suppose we get him to hold the basin;
he must be used to the sight of blood.”

“That he is, Squire, that he is,” interrupted
the ci-devant steward: “many's the good shot,
round, double-headed, and grape, that I've seen
the doctors at work on. For the matter of that,
I was in a boat, alongside the ship, when they cut
out the twelve-pound shot from the thigh of the
Captain of the Foody-rong, one of Mounsheer Ler
Quaw's countrymen, there!”

“A twelve-pound ball, from the thigh of a human
being!” exclaimed Mr. Grant, with great
simplicity, dropping the sermon he was again
reading, and raising his spectacles, from before
his eyes, to the top of his forehead.

“A twelve-pounder!” echoed Benjamin, staring
around him, with much confidence; “a twelve-pounder!
ay! a twenty-four pound shot can easily
be taken from a man's body, if- o-be a doctor
only knows how. There's Squire Jones, now,
ask him, sir; he reads all the books; ask him, if
he never fell in with a page, that keeps the reckoning
of such things.”

“Certainly, more important operations than
that have been performed,” observed Richard;

“the Encyclopædia mentions much more incredible
circumstances than that, as, I dare say, you
know, Doctor Todd.”

“Certainly, there are incredible tales told of
such matters,” returned Elnathan, “though I cannot
say, that I have ever seen, myself, any thing
larger than a musket bullet extracted.”

During this discourse, an incision had been
made through the skin of the young hunter's
shoulder, and the lead was laid bare. Elnathan
now took into his hand, with a solemn air, a pair
of glittering forceps, and was in the act of applying
them to the wound, when a sudden motion of
the patient, caused the shot to fall out of itself.
The long arm and broad hand of the operator
were now of singular service; for the latter expanded
itself, and caught the lead, while at the
same time, an extremely ambiguous motion was
made, by its brother, so as to leave it doubtful
to the spectator, how great was its agency in releasing
the shot. Richard, however, put the
matter at rest, by exclaiming—

“Very neatly done, Doctor! I have never
seen a shot more neatly extracted; and, I dare
say, Benjamin will say the same.”

“Why, considering,” returned Benjamin, “I
must say, that it was ship-shape, and Brister-fashion.—Now
all that the Doctor has to do, is
to clap a couple of plugs in the shot-holes, and
the lad will float in any gale, that blows in these
here hills.”

“I thank you, sir, for what you have done,”
said the youth, with a little distance: “But here
is a man, who will take me under his care, and
spare you all, gentlemen, any further trouble on
my account”

The whole group turned their heads, in surprise,
and beheld, standing at one of the distant
doors of the hall, the person of Indian John.