"'Who do you vote for?' said the sheriff.
"'Would you sell your country for a sheepskin?' shouted Terry, in one ear.
"'Would you sell your country for a sheepskin?' bellowed Lory, in the other ear.
"I was so frightened, I hardly knew what I did; but they tell me I voted for brother Phin! Dear, dear! the doctor never gave me a sheepskin while he lived after that. Dear, dear!--that was an ugly vote for me!"
Old Dr. Green (you knowed him, in course--everybody knowed him) lived on Digby Neck. He was reckoned a skilful man, and was known to be a regular rotated doctor; but he drank like a fish (and it's actilly astonishing how many country doctors have taken to drink), and, of course, he warn't always a very safe man in cases where a cool head and a steady hand was needed (though folks did say he knowed a plaguey sight more, even when he was drunk, than one-half of them do when they are sober). Well, one day old Jim Reid, who was a pot-companion of his, sent him a note to come into town immediately, without the loss of one moment of time, and bring his amputating instruments with him, for there was a most shocking accident had happened to his house. So in come the doctor as hard as he could drive, looking as sorry, all the time, as if he didn't live by misfortunes and accidents, the old hypocrite!
"My dear friend," said he solemnly, to Reid, and a-taking of him by the hand, and giving it a doleful shake--"My dear friend, what is the matter?--who is hurt? And what the devil is to pay now? How thankful we all ought to be that the accident hasn't occurred to one whom we all respect so much as you!"
And then he unpacked his instruments, off with his coat, and up with his sleeves; and, with one hand, pulls a hair out of his head, and, with the other, takes his knife and cuts it in two, to prove the edge was all right. Then he began to whistle while he examined his saw, for nothing puts these chaps in such good humour as cutting and slashing away at legs and arms--operating, as they call it--and, when all was ready, says he--
"Reid," says he, a-tapping him on the shoulder, "where is the patient?"
Well, Reid opened the door of another room, and there was a black boy a-holding of a duck on the table that had broke his leg!