NOSTALGIA.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2090, 8 July 1887, Page 1 (Supplement)

NOSTALGIA.

A Story of Doctor's Latin.

Farmer Connover strode into the house, took off his fur cap and thick mittens, and unwound numerous kinks of red woollen comforter from his ample throat. Then he sat down by the warm wood fire and said to his wife :

“ Seems like I had somethin' to tell you, Sairy Ann, but I can’t for the life of me just remember it ncow.” Was it somebody got married ?" inquired Mrs. Connover, who was bustling about setting the tabic for supper. ” No, didn’t seem as ’twas. Lemme think,” and be pressed a meditative forefinger on that portion of his forehead where beseemed to locate the faculty of memory, “ fs anybody dead that we’re acquainted with?” “ No, no, tain’t cyethcr marryin’ or dyin’ as 1 kin Sec. Gurus how I forget things sometimes.” ’■ We ain’t heard from Ben for quite awhile,” suggested Mrs. Connover. 11 That’s it I” cried the farmer, jumping to his feet as sprightly as a log. “ ’Tain’t from Ben,'leastwise it ain’t his handwritin’, but it's a letter. I’ve got it right here in my pocket.” “ Do tell I” said his wife, dropping the dishes she was holding in a promiscuous heap. “ If it ain't from Ben, who’s it from ?” *■ It’s writ to you," said her husband produing it at last. Mrs. Connover reached up to the clockshelf and took down her Bible-reading spectacles. ” it’s a strange hand to me," she said,scanning it carefully, " must be some of Cicely’s folks.” So she stepped to the door leading above stairs and called at the top of her voice ; “ C-i-c e-l-y 1 C-i-c e-l-y 1" " Here 1 am, mother,”’ answered a sweet voice. “• What is it /" For every infiection of her good mother's voice was familiar to her,and this one bristled with exclamation points. 11 Here is a letter, in a strange handwrite. Do you know who it is from!” handing it to her.

“ Why, it is addressed to you, mother. It seems to me the easiest way to find out would be just to open and read it.” “ Well, then, do," said her mother. “ I'm so fidgeted thinking about Ben off there alone that I can't open it." “ This isn't anything about Ben,” said Cicely, deftly opening the envelope after she bad admired the smart, college style superscription. “ It’s from some lawyer or fruit tree agent, likely, on business."

“What would he write to your mother for V suggested father Connover gruffly. Cicely read it over to herself first, and at once changed color. “ It it about Ben, mother,” she said, the tears rushing into her eyes and her voice, '* he is sick, and this is from the doctor who is taking care of him. Oh, mother don't cry. Ben needs you. Keep up your strength." “ What ails him 7" asked bis father in an unsteady tone. Cicely read the doctor’s letter.

He said that Ben was his patient, and he was doing all he could for him, but his parents bad better come, as it required more skill than he—the physician—had to cure him. He ended by saying that the boy was suffering from a severe attack of nostalgia. “What in the world is that? I never beard of it before,” exclaimed Ur. Connover.

“ What is it, Cicely 7” asked Mrs. Conn over. Cicely was a graduate of the Normal school, and her parents expected her to know everything. She shook her head. “ It means that we must go to Ben just as soon as we can. If there had been any hope the doctor would have said so.” She cried and worked at the same time Ben, her only brother, was her idol. She had opposed his going away from first to last,but the father was wiser. “ If the boy ain’t contented here, let him go to the city, and clerk it for a year or two. He's king of two hands anywhere,” said the gruff old farmer. And Ben bad been ill, and too proud to let them know. They took the evening train. At the depot some of their friends had gathered to bear the news. Of each and all, they asked the same question. “ Hcv you ever heerd of Nostalgy 7” And none of them had ever heard of it,but nil agreed that it must be a dreadful thing to have such a difficult name. When they reached the city they had cried and worried themselves sick. At least the two women had. The father, with the stoicism of his kind, had beata constant tattoo on the car window and whistled an accompaniment—all the time he was crying in bis heart: “ Oh, Absalom 1 my son 1 my son I” There was no one to meet them, as no one was interested in their coming except Ben and the doctor, and they neither of them bad beard of their intentions.

So they went at once to the place where Ben boarded, a dr Ary house, with innumerable small, ill-ventilated rooms, where for the entire sum that he earned weekly, Ben Connover was permitted to lodge. The doctor bod made his hospital rounds that night, and his last call was on Ben. He was a (young physician, and very zealous over his patients. He took an interest in the handsome, whole-souled country boy who was unaccustomed to close rooms and sewer gas and lonely boars, and so wrote that letter to his mother.

And as they stood on the step ringing the grumbling bell be walked up and discovered who they were, and made himself known. Oh, Doctor, is there any hope? " Docter, will my boy get well? 11 Doctor, if he still alive I" These were the questions that were poured into the doctor’s ears. How very unfeeling of him to laugh 1 “ Why, there is nothing in the world the matter with him I As I wrote you it's only a bad case of nostalgia.” Doctor 1" said the father sternly, ‘‘put that 'ere word in plain English I” “ Oh, I see,” laughed the doctor. “It is the medical term for hometicknett” And that was all that ailed the boy. A good deal of mental longing and worry bad brought on fever, and Ben was fast Incoming really ill, but the sympathetic young doctor had diagnosed his case correctly. He was a soldier who was not sick from any fatal malady. He was homesick. “Now that we’re here we’ll stay and see the sights, Sary Ann,” Mr. Connover said to his wife, “ and you can coddle Ben all you want to.” And Ben was very willing to be coddled. But it was strange that after explaining that big medical word, the doctor still kept coming. It worried the old couple a little because they thought Ben must be dangrt after all. But it was the doctor who was in danger now. He had transferred his interest in the brother to the sister. And no word was big enough to diagnose hit case. But it came out right. Only Ben must have tonics -and directions, and at last the doctor went out there and established a practice, leaving out the Latin words. And he was right. There is no more insidious disease than homesickness. When the Swiss soldiers the bravest fighters in the world—hear the familiar Ranz det backet they lean on their carbines and weep for their loved glaciers and mountain pines,(and often die of that bidden wound of the heart —whose classical name is nostalgia, and which freely translated means “ sickness for home.”

How We Grow—A New York paper states that •* the growth of the human body stops by the time a person attains the age of twenty-five years.” It would have been interesting if the newspaper had told for how long it stopps. Certainly it goes on again, as any gentleman who was slender at thirty and has lost the hollow of his back at forty-five will testify. Procrustes used to make bodies grow at any time of life, provided they didn't fit his bed, and Nature seems to be about as competent a» Procrustes was, although she does her work latitudinally, and with a merciful deliberation.

Embarrassing Generosity of the Heiican- A thing that surprises you greatly tn Mexico is that nearly every man yoA meet makes yon a present of a residence. He grasps your band with ardent cordiality when he leaves you, and says : “My house is yours ; it stands Nuraero tres—esllc," and so on, “and is at your service. The next v man tells you that your house is at such and such a number, and he will be angry if you do not occupy it. As neither of them haa enjoyed the honor of your acquaintance for more than five minutes, and both are only casually introduced, this excessive generosity is quite embarrassing. A five-dollar greenback, appeared in the till of a Newaygo (U. 8.,) bank, the other day, bearing the following inscription ; “ Here sfaa goes—save your salary—don’t gamble—never play faro-bank—the last of a fortune of 910, 000.” There have been worse epitaphs written upon more important subjects.

Typewriter*.— The Russian is the most difficult of the language* now represented on the typewriters. There are thirty-eight letters, but the punctuation, accents, and other characters necessary bring the number on the key-board up to ninety. Next to that is the Bohemian, which is a crooked thing, because one must frequently strike two key* to produce a character. There ate thirty primary characters, and eighty-aix required in all. The American keyboard has twentvsix primary characters, and seventy six i* all. SSI