| THE SYMPATHIZING WOMAN.
If we were called upon to describe Mrs. Dobbs, we should,
without hesitation, call her a sympathizing woman. Nobody was troubles
with any malady she hadn’t suffered.
“She knew all about it by experience, and could
sympathize with them form the bottom of her heart.”
Bob Turner was a wag, and when one day he saw Mrs. Dobbs
coming along the road towards his house, he knew that, in the absence
of his wife, he should be called upon to entertain her; so he resolved
to play a little on the good woman’s abundant store of sympathy.
Hastily procuring a large blanket, he wrapped himself up in it, and threw
himself on a sofa near by.
“Why, goodness gracious! Mr. Turner, are you sick?”
asked Mrs. Dobbs, as she saw his position.
“Oh, dreadfully,” groaned the imaginary invalid.
“What’s the matter?”
“Oh, a great many things. In the first place, I’ve got the
congestion of the brain*.”
“That’s dreadful,” sighed Mrs. Dobbs; “I come
pretty near dying of it ten years ago come next spring. What else?”
“Dropsy,”
again groaned Bob.
“There I can sympathize with you; I was trouble with it, but finally
got over it.”
“Neuralgia,
continued Bob.
“Nobody can tell, Mr Turner, what I’ve suffered from neuralgia.
It’s an awful complaint.”
“Then, again, I am much distressed by inflammation of the bowels.”
“If you’ve got that, I pity you,” commented Mrs. Dobbs;
“for three years steady I was afflicted with it, and I don’t
think I am fully recovered yet.”
“Rheumatism,” added Bob.
“Yes, that’s pretty likely to go along with neuralgia. It
did with me.”
“Toothache,” suggested Bob.
“There have been times, Mr. Turner, when I thought I should have
gone distracted with the toothache,” said the sympathizing woman.
“Then,” said Bob, who having temporarily run out of medical
terms, resorted to a scientific name, “I am very much afraid that
I’ve got the tethysaures.”
“I shouldn’t be at all surprised,” said the ever-ready
Mrs. Dobbs; “I had it when I was young.”
Though it was with great difficulty that he could resist
laughing, but Bob continued, -
“I am suffering a good deal from a sprained ankle.”
“Then you can sympathize with me, Mr. Turner. I sprained mine when
I was coming along.”
“But that isn’t the worst of it.”
“What is it?” asked Mrs. Dobbs, with curiosity.
“I wouldn’t tell any one but you, Mrs. Dobbs, “but the
fact it” – here Bob groaned – “I am afraid, and
my doctor agrees with me, that my reason is affected – that, in
short, I’m a little crazy.”
Bob took breath, and wondered what Mrs. Dobbs would say
to that.
“Oh, Mr. Turner! is it possible?” exclaimed the lady. “It’s
horrible, I know it is. I frequently have spells of being out of my head
myself.”
Bob could not stand it any longer; he burst into a roar
of laughter, which Mrs. Dobbs taking for a precursor of violent paroxysm
of insanity, she was led to take a hurried leave.
*Congestion of the Brain - a 19th Century term used to describe
many conditions including hydrocephalus, stroke, cerebral hemorrhage,
meningitis, and sunstroke.
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