She didn't know what a contagious disease was,
but on the hypothesis that he had reference to sparking, she blushed and
said she had, but only two evenings, because John had only just got back
from the woods where he had been chopping, and she had to sit up with him.
The doctor got out his pill bags and made some quinine powders, and gave
her some medicine in two tumblers, to be taken alternately, and
told her to soak her feet and go to bed, and put a hot mustard plaster on
her chest, and some onions around her neck.
She was mad, and flared right up, and said she wasn't very well posted,
and lived in the country, but if she knew her own heart she would not play
such a trick as that on a new husband.
The doctor got mad, and asked her if she thought he didn't understand his
business; and he was about to go and let her die, when the bridegroom came
in and told him to go ahead with the marrying. The doc. said that altered
the case. He said next time he came he should know what to bring, and then
she blushed, and told him he was an old fool anyway, but he pronounced
them man and wife, and said the prescription would be five dollars, the
same as though there had been somebody sick.
But the doc. had cheek. Just as he was leaving he asked the bridegroom if
he didn't want to ride up to Ashland with him, it was only eighteen miles,
and the ride would be lonesome, but the bride said not if the court knew
herself, and the bridegroom said now he was there he guessed he would
stay.
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