“Well, upon my word, it’s the most extraordinary thing I ever heard of!”

“Oh,” said Aunt Patsy, as pleased as a mother whose child is being admired and wondered at; “you’ll find that there’s more about them that’s wonderful than their just being made in the image of God like the rest of His creatures, now you can depend on that, I tell you,” and she wagged her complacent head like one who could reveal marvelous things if she chose.

The boy Joe began: 

“Why, ma, they ain’t made in the im—­”

“You shut up, and wait till you’re asked, Joe.  I’ll let you know when I want help.  Are you looking for something, doctor?”

The doctor asked for a few sheets of paper and a pen, and said he would write a prescription; which he did.  It was one of Galen’s; in fact, it was Galen’s favorite, and had been slaying people for sixteen thousand years.  Galen used it for everything, applied it to everything, said it would remove everything, from warts all the way through to lungs and it generally did.  Galen was still the only medical authority recognized in Missouri; his practice was the only practice known to the Missouri doctors, and his prescriptions were the only ammunition they carried when they went out for game.

By and by Dr. Claypool laid down his pen and read the result of his labors aloud, carefully and deliberately, for this battery must be constructed on the premises by the family, and mistakes could occur; for he wrote a doctor’s hand the hand which from the beginning of time has been so disastrous to the apothecary and so profitable to the undertaker: 

“Take of afarabocca, henbane, corpobalsamum, each two drams and a half:  of cloves, opium, myrrh, cyperus, each two drams; of opobalsamum, Indian leaf, cinnamon, zedoary, ginger, coftus, coral, cassia, euphorbium, gum tragacanth, frankincense, styrax calamita, Celtic, nard, spignel, hartwort, mustard, saxifrage, dill, anise, each one dram; of xylaloes, rheum ponticum, alipta, moschata, castor, spikenard, galangals, opoponax, anacardium, mastich, brimstone, peony, eringo, pulp of dates, red and white hermodactyls, roses, thyme, acorns, pennyroyal, gentian, the bark of the root of mandrake, germander, valerian, bishop’s-weed, bayberries, long and white pepper, xylobalsamum, carnabadium, macedonian, parsley seeds, lovage, the seeds of rue, and sinon, of each a dram and a half; of pure gold, pure silver, pearls not perforated, the blatta byzantina, the bone of the stag’s heart, of each the quantity of fourteen grains of wheat; of sapphire, emerald and jasper stones, each one dram; of hazel-nuts, two drams; of pellitory of Spain, shavings of ivory, calamus odoratus, each the quantity of twenty-nine grains of wheat; of honey or sugar a sufficient quantity.  Boil down and skim off.”

“There,” he said, “that will fix the patient; give his brother a dipperful every three-quarters of an hour—­”

“—­while he survives,” muttered Luigi—­