The Disease, To Be Respectable, Must Invariably Be
Connected With One Of The Four Temperaments, Or The Four Elements, Or
The "humours of Hippocrates." Cure is easy, but it will take time, and
you, the doctor, require attention; any little
Rudeness it is in your
power to punish by an alteration in the pill, or the powder, and, so
unknown is professional honour, that none will brave your displeasure.
If you would pass for a native practitioner, you must finally proceed
to the most uncomfortable part of your visit, bargaining for fees.
Nothing more effectually arouses suspicion than disinterestedness in a
doctor. I once cured a rich Hazramaut merchant of rheumatism, and
neglected to make him pay for treatment; he carried off one of my
coffee cups, and was unceasingly wondering where I came from. So I made
him produce five piastres, a shilling, which he threw upon the carpet,
cursing Indian avarice. "You will bring on
[p.54]another illness," said my friend, the Haji, when he heard of it.
Properly speaking, the fee for a visit to a respectable man is 20
piastres, but with the rich patient you begin by making a bargain. He
complains, for instance, of dysentery and sciatica. You demand L10 for
the dysentery, and L20 for the sciatica. But you will rarely get it.
The Eastern pays a doctor's bill as an Oirishman does his "rint,"
making a grievance of it. Your patient will show indisputable signs of
convalescence: he will laugh and jest half the day; but the moment you
appear, groans and a lengthened visage, and pretended complaints,
welcome you.
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