A QUIET TIME.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XIII, Issue XVIII, 3 November 1894, Page 432

A QUIET TIME.

‘ Mr Akenhead,’ said the eminent specialist on nervous disorders, severely, ‘ it is useless for you to expect to derive benefit from my treatment unless you consent to follow my directions. I recommended you to go to the quiet hamlet of Lonesomehurst and spend at least six months in strict retirement, and yet I find you back in the turmoil and excitement of the city in less than four weeks.’ ‘ The trouble, doctor,’ replied the patient, ‘ is that the monotony of a quiet, uneventful country existence is more than I can endure. * In this short time we have had fourteen different cooks, one of whom was discharged for setting fire to the house while intoxicated, another for asaulting me with a frying pan, and a thitd for poisoning us, whether accidentally or maliciously I do not know. ‘ I have been mixed up in four different runaway accidents, and twice bitten by dogs. ‘ Because of my kindness of heart, I was drawn into an elopement episode which resulted in my being shot at and narrowly missed by the bride’s father, who claimed that he was near-sighted and mistook me for the groom. ‘ One night somebody hung a total stranger to a tree on the lawn. About the same time, a tramp burned the barn and several out-buildings. A large tree was blown down so near the house that the verandah roof was crushed in. I was arrested three times for unknowingly violating some of the rural laws. My wife’s mother was thrown from a carriage in front of the house and fatally injured. There was a smallpox scare in the neighbourhood about half the time, and a mad dog fright every now and then. ‘Taking it all in all, I finally concluded that the turmoil and excitement of city life was less enervating than the peace and quiet of a monotonous country existence.’