Traveller.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2055, 15 April 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

Traveller.

A Chinese Quack Doctor.

A quack medicine dealer was offering to a crowd nostrums for every complaint. This gentleman, whoso stock m trade consisted of a few bottles, had a number of diagrams purporting to represent the course of illness in the human body. As a matter of fact, they were absolute nonsense, but the good Ciiincse.who stood with open mouths around him and listened to all ho said, knew no belter, so that for all practical purposes his pictures were good enough. Curiously enough, however, he was most eloquent upon a medicine which I have since found has just made its appearance in England under a patented name —Menthol. Ho declared it would cure all nervous diseases if rubbed into the skin. Our chemists and druggists now advertise it as an antidote to neuralgia ; so that, after all, the Chinese quack doctor was not such a rogue as he looked. The price of his drugs was high. He had nothing under twopence which is a large sum among the peasants in China. But he sold great numbers of packets and did a roaring trade for hours. L had presently an opportunity of seeing how little difference existed between him and the recognized professors of Chinese medicine, being taken by the learned doctor Eiticr to a native hospital. Hero seated on three little stools at three tables sat the “ faculty” waiting for patients. The indigent crowd as it came in selected its own physician and went to him. Then ensued a species of treatment which was about as curious as can well be imagined. The Chinese have a theory that there is adilferent pulse in every limb. They also hold that all complaints are connected with cither fire, air or, water. And they place immense faith in the benefit to be derived from puncturing any affected part with a long needle. So it came about when a man entered and consulted the faculty about a pain in his log—probably rheumatic in its nature—the learned man, after glaring for some time at him through an enormous pair of goggles, proceeded to feel for his •‘ankle-pulse.’’ which, when found to his satisfaction indicated some very wonderful facts. The man was suffering,ho remarked, from fire in the leg, and must be punctured; saying which, he stirred up the limb with a long needle, till I, who only looked on, felt positively ill. This operation completed, he produced a tiny plaster, probaby about an inch and a half square, and giving it (o the man told him to put it on his leg at night. The patient, who seemed to have perfect confidence in the doctor, hobbled off, and tbo turn of tbe next victim Then came. He bad a pain in Ids bead, probably having drunk too much samttchu. The doctor was quite equal to the occasion. Ho seized his victim by the head, and taking a small iron rod proceeded to rub his neck till he made an abrasion at least an inch square. Then he rubbed at another spot, and yet another,till the skin was off in three places. This was all. The patient was told logo. He, too, was suffering from tiro. Yet there was no sound of a murmur. The operator was evidently considered a very clover person. Inside the hospital the wards seemed to be in excellent condition. The patients there might have gone to a European hospital had they so chosen j but they preferred the doctoring of their own people, who, from all I heard, are certainly very clever at potting fractures or dislocations right. I went into the pharmacy and found the medicines wore nearly all vegetable—one, the rind of oranges, being in great request. But everything seemed harmless enough ; and if the patients die 1 should say they arc killed by the disease and not by tbo doctors, which is more than can be averred of every English hospital. One thing I noted, however, and it was that the notions of anatomy were very vague at this place of healing, for all the diagrams 1 saw wore woefully wrong, and could not have existed an hour had the Chinese surgeons ever examined a dead subject.

The t'reole Housekeeper.

The creole mistress is not ashamed to own her familiarity with the small economies of housekeeping. The daily bill of fare passes under her supervision. She prepares her own mayonnaise, bisque, deviled crabs, ices, and sweets, and is most particular that coffee is strong and abundant enough. To come up to the required standard of strength it must dye the cup, but then a very small quantity is drunk. The instinct of economy is her birthright, handed down by mother and grandmother. With a few onions, a little lard, some celery or parsley, pepper and sail, and a quart of water, she will brew you a most savory soup at a minimum, of cost, and it is one oi a large family of low-priced and toothsome broths. The crayfish, caught in sport by her children, will come to the table as bisque or fricassee. Few things arc. without possibilities in her hands. Copper grass “sour grass.” and many other green growing things which Die ignorant call weeds, fail into line at her command, and march to the table in the noble army of salads. The tender stalks of the thistle when boiled and served with cream gravy do not betray their plebiau birth ; and when peas areshclied for -(inner, tiiink you t lie pods arc thrown awav .’ Thrown into boiling water, they are cooked to a pulp : mashed through a colander, and served hot with butler, pepper, and salt, they make a delicious, marrowy dish. I’ea-pods ami the cars of gn-i-n com form tie: ba-e of a summer soup. Th • i onrse outer leaves of lettuce are cooked as spinach, and are harvllv distingiii-hablc from (hat regulable, bettnee leaves are also fri- d iu butter. Nothing is was: -il. Ta- -Tao-. i p'-uliiy or meal left from one nn.-alivvill reappear in the next, cut small, -c-asoitcd highly, mixed with tomatoes and cold ri"C, the mixture fried with a little lar !. and the dish i- excellent. All bits of vegetable left from dinner are carefully put aw.iy, and icappear as salads. Heels, peas, beans, potaii"-.-. and c-hra are mingled with the indispensable onion and Frciicli dre-sring, and the. happa-st of famines are not more hnnnouion-, than i.- this vegetable alliance. meal Is clmppi-d tine, mixed with bread-'-rumb- and savory heibs. roiled into V- ens they call them, mi l baked or fried. Of the undesirable portions of meat I hey make deli' ions sb-\vs. tiire.-n six pennyworth of the coarser kinds of fish, tin- Creole cook will work out a <nrl-h,<iiiHnii not, one whit inferior to that •• bouillabaisse" whose praises Thackeray did not disdain to sing.

Canadian Physique —' was particularly struck by l lie piiysiijuc of young Canada, beini; s ix feel myself, and having'bcen built to match. Vottr little man is tin judge of stature and limb. He does not discern between five feet ten and six feet two. Your tall man is a better measurer of height. Thus I realized growth when many of these Canadian youngsters looked over my head, ami strode past me like giants, as they were. If halt of those young gentlemen who wear pointed boots and write with steel pens, chained in foes and heats to the counters of, sav. a bank, with no prospects of becoming partners in the business which enslaves them, could lint once get their lungs tilled with this grand prairie air. they would slam to their ledgers, roll up their gloves, and. pitching fhem'ont of the window, find themselves striding over this sweet grass, building their own log houses (and yon can make a log house as warm as a I Hiteh oven in the coldest wintert, galloping after half-wild cattle, cooking their own dinners, measuring monthly more, round the chest, and feeling that il will be their fault it they do not take their places among the strong, independent men who are masterin'./ this oevr land. And, remember, astrong youngster, who will labour, working with his own lands, will soon get at least Ids seventy to eighty pounds a year, with his board, and be tempted to no great expense at his tailor’s.