第4章 THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A QUACK(3)

Indeed, I have never been guilty of any of those pieces of wanton wickedness which injure the feelings of others while they lead to no useful result.When I left to return home, I set myself seriously to reflect upon the necessity of greater care in following out my inclinations, and from that time forward I have steadily avoided, whenever it was possible, the vulgar vice of directly possessing myself of objects to which I could show no legal title.My father was indignant at the results of my college career; and, according to my aunt, his shame and sorrow had some effect in shortening his life.My sister believed my account of the matter.It ended in my being used for a year as an assistant in the shop, and in being taught to ring bells --a fine exercise, but not proper work for a man of refinement.My father died while training his bell-ringers in the Oxford triple bob--broke a blood-vessel somewhere.How I could have caused that I do not see.

I was now about nineteen years old, and, as I remember, a middle-sized, well-built young fellow, with large eyes, a slight mustache, and, I have been told, with very good manners and a somewhat humorous turn.

Besides these advantages, my guardian held in trust for me about two thousand dollars.

After some consultation between us, it was resolved that I should study medicine.This conclusion was reached nine years before the Rebellion broke out, and after we had settled, for the sake of economy, in Woodbury, New Jersey.From this time I saw very little of my deaf aunt or of Peninnah.I was resolute to rise in the world, and not to be weighted by relatives who were without my tastes and my manners.

I set out for Philadelphia, with many good counsels from my aunt and guardian.I look back upon this period as a turning-point of my life.I had seen enough of the world already to know that if you can succeed without exciting suspicion, it is by far the pleasantest way; and I really believe that if I had not been endowed with so fatal a liking for all the good things of life I might have lived along as reputably as most men.

This, however, is, and always has been, my difficulty, and I suppose that I am not responsible for the incidents to which it gave rise.Most men have some ties in life, but Ihave said I had none which held me.Peninnah cried a good deal when we parted, and this, I think, as I was still young, had a very good effect in strengthening my resolution to do nothing which could get me into trouble.

The janitor of the college to which I went directed me to a boarding-house, where Iengaged a small third-story room, which Iafterwards shared with Mr.Chaucer of Georgia.

He pronounced it, as I remember, ``Jawjah.''

In this very remarkable abode I spent the next two winters, and finally graduated, along with two hundred more, at the close of my two years of study.I should previously have been one year in a physician's office as a student, but this regulation was very easily evaded.As to my studies, the less said the better.I attended the quizzes, as they call them, pretty closely, and, being of a quick and retentive memory, was thus enabled to dispense with some of the six or seven lectures a day which duller men found it necessary to follow.

Dissecting struck me as a rather nasty business for a gentleman, and on this account I did just as little as was absolutely essential.In fact, if a man took his tickets and paid the dissection fees, nobody troubled himself as to whether or not he did any more than this.A like evil existed at the graduation: whether you squeezed through or passed with credit was a thing which was not made public, so that I had absolutely nothing to stimulate my ambition.I am told that it is all very different to-day.

The astonishment with which I learned of my success was shared by the numerous Southern gentlemen who darkened the floors and perfumed with tobacco the rooms of our boarding-house.In my companions, during the time of my studies so called, as in other matters of life, I was somewhat unfortunate.