For, as you well know, sir--or, as I presume I should say, Doctor; you
have the medical diploma, no doubt?"
"You give me credit for an honour I cannot claim," interrupted the
other.
"An under-graduate!--or perhaps your degrees have been taken in some
other of the liberal sciences?"
"Still wrong, I do assure you."
"Surely, young man, you have not entered on this important--I may say,
this awful service, without some evidence of your fitness for the
task! Some commission by which you can assert an authority to proceed,
or by which you may claim an affinity and a communion with your
fellow-workers in the same beneficent pursuits!"
"I know not by what means, or for what purposes, you have made
yourself master of my objects!" exclaimed the youth, reddening and
rising with a quickness which manifested how little he regarded the
grosser appetites, when a subject nearer his heart was approached.
"Still, sir, your language is incomprehensible. That pursuit, which in
another might perhaps be justly called beneficent, is, in me, a dear
and cherished duty; though why a commission should be demanded or
needed is, I confess, no less a subject of surprise.
Pages:
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244