At a card-party, say, in the house surgeon's room, her manner was much appreciated. A knock. "Come in!" "Accident sir!" "Oh, bother, Podger, what a fidget you are!" "Well, sir, it wasn't me as caused it; there's three of 'em, for the matter of that, and they have been here about half-an-hour, and I thought as you'd like to know." "Fifteen two, and a pair's four, and his nob! Now, Podger, wet your whistle, old girl; here, have a toothful, and tell them you have called the doctors, and they are all in the wards over a bad case, but are coming to see them directly." "Bless you, sir," says Podger, having bobbed a curtsey, "I told 'em that when they came in. Here's your very good 'ealth, gentlemen, and long life and plenty of practice for you all." And she returns to the receiving-room refreshed in spirit and better able to contend with the grumbling of the unhappy victims it contained. She would have dressed their wounds, and sent them all off packing about their business, but it was against the rules, grave scandals having arisen from this "unqualified treatment." Not but that the work would have been often done quite as well as if the students, to the number of say eight or nine, had all had "a go" at it, and with infinitely less discomfort and even agony to the patient; but it was "agin' the rules," as she declared "'cos why? it didn't seem proper for 'a nuss' to set broken limbs; besides, it pervented the boys from gettin' 'the experience' they paid for." She was very anxious they should avail themselves of every opportunity that arose to improve themselves. No member of the staff was more interested than she in the pass list of the College of Surgeons; she felt it as a reproach against her teaching when any of them failed, and on the eve of a "Pass Exam." or a "Final College," she spared the patients in the receiving-room no agony as long as any one of the men "going up," could extract useful information about fracture, dislocation, or the adjustment of a splint.
"Now, stop that there row, young man; it's all for your good! The doctors is a-settin' of your leg, and if you 'oller like that, you'll make 'em nervous. You may thank yer stars there's 'orspitals for poor sufferers like yourself to come to, and have so many kind gents to make yer all right agen." And the old girl would wink at the boys, give them all a good chance with the case, and when everybody had quite done, and had got all their points, the poor suffering wretch was sent into the wards, there to undergo as many further examinations as the pursuit of knowledge demanded. Did he scream, she bade him desist; did he struggle, she called another and a stronger nurse to her assistance; did he rebel yet, a porter or two came in to reduce him to order. Chloroform was not often resorted to, it had an element of risk; and ether was too troublesome to be given unnecessarily. The house surgeons always prided themselves on an air of nonchalance and dignity; they were never in a hurry; it was undignified and unprofessional to be anything but perfectly calm under any circumstances. To speak loftily, in measured tones, and with studied stand-offishness, was no less necessary than the binaural stethoscope they never appeared without, the gold spectacles or eye-glass they usually affected, and the patronising manner they adopted towards the men with whom they had been fellow-students, whose larks and escapades they had shared in with equal relish, but who, not having yet attained the dignity of membership of the College of Surgeons, and the still greater honour of house surgeon to St. Bernard's, were no longer their companions, nor participants in their enjoyments.