Then he drew back a space, for a
perspective view. Then he made me put out my tongue and laid a slip of
blue paper on it, which turned red and scared me a little. Next he took
my wrist; but instead of counting my pulse in the old-fashioned way, he
fastened a machine to it that marked all the beats on a sheet of
paper,--for all the world like a scale of the heights of mountains, say
from Mount Tom up to Chimborazo and then down again, and up again, and so
on. In the mean time he asked me all sorts of questions about myself and
all my relatives, whether we had been subject to this and that malady,
until I felt as if we must some of us have had more or less of them, and
could not feel quite sure whether Elephantiasis and Beriberi and
Progressive Locomotor Ataxy did not run in the family.
After all this overhauling of myself and my history, he paused and looked
puzzled. Something was suggested about what he called an "exploratory
puncture." This I at once declined, with thanks. Suddenly a thought
struck him. He looked still more closely at the discoloration I have
spoken of.
--Looks like--I declare it reminds me of--very rare! very curious! It
would be strange if my first case--of this kind--should be one of our
boarders!
What kind of a case do you call it?--I said, with a sort of feeling that
he could inflict a severe or a light malady on me, as if he were a judge
passing sentence.
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