There are personal habits of less gravity than the one I have mentioned which it is well to guard against, or, if they are formed, to relinquish.  A man who may be called at a moment’s warning into the fragrant boudoir of suffering loveliness should not unsweeten its atmosphere with reminiscences of extinguished meerschaums.  He should remember that the sick are sensitive and fastidious, that they love the sweet odors and the pure tints of flowers, and if his presence is not like the breath of the rose, if his hands are not like the leaf of the lily, his visit may be unwelcome, and if he looks behind him he may see a window thrown open after he has left the sick-chamber.  I remember too well the old doctor who sometimes came to help me through those inward griefs to which childhood is liable.  “Far off his coming “—­shall I say “shone,” and finish the Miltonic phrase, or leave the verb to the happy conjectures of my audience?  Before him came a soul-subduing whiff of ipecacuanha, and after him lingered a shuddering consciousness of rhubarb.  He had lived so much among his medicaments that he had at last become himself a drug, and to have him pass through a sick-chamber was a stronger dose than a conscientious disciple of Hahnemann would think it safe to administer.

Need I remind you of the importance of punctuality in your engagements, and of the worry and distress to patients and their friends which the want of it occasions?  One of my old teachers always carried two watches, to make quite sure of being exact, and not only kept his appointments with the regularity of a chronometer, but took great pains to be at his patient’s house at the time when he had reason to believe he was expected, even if no express appointment was made.  It is a good rule; if you call too early, my lady’s hair may not be so smooth as could be wished, and, if you keep her waiting too long, her hair may be smooth, but her temper otherwise.

You will remember, of course, always to get the weather-gage of your patient.  I mean, to place him so that the light falls on his face and not on yours.  It is a kind of, ocular duel that is about to take place between you; you are going to look through his features into his pulmonary and hepatic and other internal machinery, and he is going to look into yours quite as sharply to see what you think about his probabilities for time or eternity.

No matter how hard he stares at your countenance, he should never be able to read his fate in it.  It should be cheerful as long as there is hope, and serene in its gravity when nothing is left but resignation.  The face of a physician, like that of a diplomatist, should be impenetrable.  Nature is a benevolent old hypocrite; she cheats the sick and the dying with illusions better than any anodynes.  If there are cogent reasons why a patient should be undeceived, do it deliberately and advisedly, but do not betray your apprehensions through your tell-tale features.