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-he is a real old extortioner. I wish he could pitch into a cistern himself."

Some hours after, passing up through the main entrance, through hall after hall, and room after room, lined on each side with rows of cot beds, upon which in all attitudes were suffering invalids, Dr. Gunether came to the surgical ward in the rear building, where were a group of students receiving medical instruction from an old surgeon. The nurse announced the arrival of a new patient in the ward. Well, my little girl, what is the matter with you ?" "Mrs. Pridefit thinks, she says, that I have some of my bones broken or out of joint."

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Surgeon Nurse, remove the patient's dress from the left arm and chest."

"Stand up, my little girl. Ah! gentlemen, there is a language in that patient's attitude and in the deformity of the injured part that tells you distinctly and unequivocably the nature of the accident. What is it, gentlemen?"

Several voices respond: "A compound fracture of the left clavicle, sir.”

"You are right, gentlemen-this is a compound fracture of the clavicle. No trouble in the diagnosis. It is a compound oblique fracture of the clavicle and notwithstanding the amount of tumefaction which exists in the parts, our diagnosis is about as easy as if it were made upon the dry skeleton. The wound is a lacerated one, passing directly up over the left breast and clavicle, with which it slightly communicates at the fracture. You perceive, gentlemen, that motion from before or backwards can only be performed with the greatest difficulty and suffering, and the patient is rendered incapable of performing rotary motions with the arm. The great pain produced by the weight of the arm stretching the injured parts, causes the patient to incline her body to the affected side. The support thus given to the arm by the inclination of the body, generally alleviates the pain. By tracing along the upper surface of the bone, you will detect a depression at the point of fracture, and by grasping the two fragments with the fingers of each hand and moving their broken surfaces on each other, you will find the crepitus very perceptible. You will observe that by thus moving her shoulder upwards, backwards and outwards, that I reduce the fragments to their natural

position with the greatest facility. Now gentlemen, the indications of treatment in this case are to retain the arm and shoulder in the position in which I now hold them, and with your assistance we will proceed to apply apparatus for that purpose."

After an application of a healing and emollient nature, Nepenthe was bandaged with long strips of muslin passing these rollers over each shoulder, and crossing them in the form of a figure eight, acting in a manner similar to an ordinary shoulder brace.

Hanging over her little bed a board bearing her name, age, birth-place, date of admission and name of injury, the old surgeon and his disciples passed into another ward.

"Dr. Gunether tells me," said Mrs. Brown to Mrs. Pridefit, whom she happened to meet while shopping, "that one of the patients at the hospital is one you sent there."

"Yes," said Mrs. Pridefit, blushing," it is rather a painful topic to me. The other day I found a poor penniless orphan girl who had no home. My heart would not permit me to refuse her a temporary asylum beneath my roof. I brought her home with the intention to protect and watch over her as a parent until I found some good religious family, willing to adopt her; but the other day while I was absent for a little exercise, in the exuberance of her sportiveness, while playing around the cistern, she stumbled over its margin, and was only prevented from drowning by a projecting stick of timber which fortunately caught into her dress by means of a spike driven in its extremity. After watching her with intense solicitude and finding my own health failing, and my neuralgia being so much worse- -the doctor was afraid it might go to the heart-Mr. Pridefit and myself concluded that she ought to have the close watching and careful and constant attention of old and experienced nurses usually found at the hospitals. I am exceedingly sensitive-my health is extremely delicate, and my servants uncommonly inefficient. This is a trial, but as Dr. Smoothers says, 'We are often called upon to make great sacrifices in the path of duty.'

Mrs. Pridefit wiped her eyes with her new embroidered mouchoir, and bowing gracefully bade Mrs. Brown good morning.

"I feel so relieved, John," said Mrs. Pridefit that evening when Mr. Pridefit came home, now Nepenthe is off

our hands. I wish I never had brought her here. It makes my neuralgia so much worse to think about hospitals," said she, sitting down to finish some embroidery.

By Nepenthe's bed that night, sat a strange-looking woman -that gaunt form, those hollow eyes, those muttering lipsshe turned uneasily on her pillow; was it a dream? No! no! she had seen her once-she was the watcher by her dead mother. Did this strange woman always come to sit by the dead? would she die too?

No, it was only a nurse at the hospital, and Nepenthe fell into an unquiet, feverish sleep.

"It is the twenty-fourth to-day, and to-morrow will be the twenty-fifth," said the nurse, as she stood gazing at the sleeping Nepenthe. "Yes, to-morrow will be the twentyfifth." The morning dawned; it was the twenty-fifth; well might the old nurse at the hospital remember it.

"It is the twenty-fifth to-day-it is your birthday," said Dr. Gunether to his little nephew. "You may go where you like. This is your day. We'll examine all the balls, tops and marbles in the city if you like." "And can I go where you do, uncle ?" "Yes, and what will you do first ?" "Let's take a walk in Broadway."

Dr. Gunether had so often paced with weary feet this crowded thoroughfare-he preferred a walk in some quiet street where he might go along leisurely without taxing his attention in steering straight. But Broadway sights and Broadway sounds, omnibusses, hand organs, shows of toys and confectionery, bright windows and gaily dressed ladies, all attracted Frank's curious eye, and as each new bright object attracted his attention the boy kept giving an extra tug at his uncle's coat.

They were soon at the florist's, where japonicas, heliotropes, roses, and pansies bloomed in elegant profusion. A bouquet of rare flowers was Frank's first birthday gift.

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Uncle, now take me to the hospital," he said, "I want to see where you go every day."

Clinging close to his uncle's coat, the child passed the portal of the building, and was soon by the row of little cot beds, upon one of which Nepenthe was lying, and her pale suffering face attracted his quick eye. While his uncle was conversing with one of the attendant physicians, Frank stole away

from his side and laid the flowers on her pillow. His uncle called him at that moment without waiting to observe his movements. Frank followed him, trying hard to keep up with his uncle's quick step and look back at Nepenthe.

"Has

As the massive door closed behind them, Frank drew a long breath once more, as he said with a tearful eye, she no father, no mother, Uncle? Who kisses her good-night, and what is her name ?"

"Nepenthe."

"Isn't it a pretty name, Uncle ?"

"Just like his mother," thought the doctor, "always looking after pale faces. I'm afraid he will never do for a doctor he is too tender-hearted. It is true enough the boy's heart will often take its mother's fine stamp ; he might be a poet, author, artist. He is uncommonly sensitive for so young a boy. I thought he valued those flowers too highly to dis pose of them so quickly."

The strange-looking nurse watched the child as he laid the flowers on Nepenthe's pillow, and said not a word, but, bringing a tumbler of fresh water, placed them carefully on a shelf in sight of Nepenthe, muttering between her halfclosed lips, "It costs me nothing-it costs me nothing."

A shrinking, painful feeling, an anxious dread, seized Nepenthe, as she gazed on the unknown but remembered watcher. But the heliotropes, rose buds and japonicas brightened up the gloom of the hospital. She slept and dreamed of the violets under the window of the old brick house, and now blooming on a grave in a Green-wood dell. She turned and awoke. There were those eyes still looking so cold and unfeeling.

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The Stuart hair, 'tis the Stuart eyes," the woman muttered, contemptuously and bitterly, "but she has an ugly name, and it is well she has no pretty name, with the life she has before her.-What will you have, child?" said she, harshly, as she came suddenly and stood by the bed, drawing the sheet over the hot hands of the feverish patient with an almost choking closeness.

The next week Mrs. Pridefit was again at Stewart's. There was a new assortment of chené silks and she was looking them She heard a voice in the next room say to another lady, "Mrs. Pridefit and I do not exchange visits; she does not move in our circle. Pridefit is a respectable lawyer, I

over.

believe, and I get small subscriptions from her occasionally; every little helps. When our church was first organized I called on her. The church was small then, and we wished to draw in all the new comers. She is a weak-minded woman; and flutters in every new fashion that comes out, and if she were really high-bred or well-bred I could not make a friend of her. She must lead her husband a merry kind of life."

Mrs. Pridefit bought no dress that day-and that night she was so quiet and yet so cross, Mr. Pridefit thought she must have a severe attack of neuralgia.

I cannot tell you why, reader, because I do not know, but Nepenthe Stuart was in a few days removed from that hospital to another, and that other not half as comfortable. Behind her pillow was a window-one of the panes was broken, and through the broken pane the wind blew roughly in on the pale cheek of the sufferer. Her fare was miserable,

she was much neglected, and many an occasional visitor at the hospital has said, "How can the child get well there?"

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"I hurry up heaven's viewless stairs,
And casting off life's weary cares,
Open the pearly gates of prayer."

"And some fell among thorns.

ALAN.

"And other fell on good ground, and sprang up and bore fruit an hundred fold." LUKE VIII. 7, 8.

"Dr. Wenden," said Mr. Douglass on their way to church one Sabbath morning, "I should think you would have the blues all the time; you see the saddest sights of humanity -wounds, bruises, agonies and broken limbs. I couldn't have the nerve to be a physician."

"Get used to it-get used to it," said the doctor.

Yes, but every terrible scene must make a wound in the spirit, and there'll be the scar-there's the scar."

"Have to get used to it, Richard, have to get used to it. When I first commenced practice, I took to heart every

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