for a while, and then gave his advice in the following learned manner. "Oh, my children," he cried, "here is such a simple matter, and yet you could not find a way out of the difficulty. I am surprised that my fellow-men should be so ignorant." Then they all crowded round Uncle Goro, beseeching him out of his great wisdom to tell them what to do. "First," said Uncle Goro, "you must cut off the cow's head, then break the water-pot and take out the head!" This brilliant suggestion was at once put into practice, the owner of the cow being the only one who was not quite so sure of the exceeding greatness of the wisdom of Uncle Goro. When the deed was accomplished and the head extricated from its awkward position, the old man stood and proudly addressed the assembled crowd who had flocked to hear his words of wisdom. "My beloved children," said he, "a day will come when your old Uncle Goro will die, and then what will you do when you have no one to settle such difficult matters as these for you? Pray to God that your Uncle Goro may long be spared to advise and counsel you." A rather pretty custom exists in Mosul which gives people titles according to their work, or any special characteristics belonging to them. For example, the butcher is called "the father of meat"; the baker, "the father of bread." In the hospital, when I am giving orders for the diet list, we hardly ever speak of the patients by name, but according to their disease, as "Aboo" (father) liver abscess, "Aboo-mai-abiyud" (father of cataract). One of the assistants in the hospital was named "The Angel of Death" by a poor little girl who was brought to the doctor a mass of burns. It was the duty of this assistant to dress the terrible wounds of the child every day, and though as gentle as a woman, he necessarily pained her a great deal--hence the term "Angel of Death." The women are designated in the same way as the men, only substituting "mother" for "father," as "Em haleeb," milk-woman; "Em saba' saba'een," mother of seventy-seven (or centipede), this last simply referring to a girl suffering from hysteria.