“Now, stop that there row, young man; it’s all for your good! The doctors is a-settin’ of your leg, and if you ’oller like that, you’ll make ’em nervous. You may thank yer stars there’s ’orspitals for poor sufferers like yourself to come to, and have so many kind gents to make yer all right agen.” And the old girl would wink at the boys, give them all a good chance with the case, and when everybody had quite done, and had got all their points, the poor suffering wretch was sent into the wards, there to undergo as many further examinations as the pursuit of knowledge demanded. Did he scream, she bade him desist; did he struggle, she called another and a stronger nurse to her assistance; did he rebel yet, a porter or two came in to reduce him to order. Chloroform was not often resorted to, it had an element of risk; and ether was too troublesome to be given unnecessarily. The house surgeons always prided themselves on an air of nonchalance and dignity; they were never in a hurry; it was undignified and unprofessional to be anything but perfectly calm under any circumstances. To speak loftily, in measured tones, and with studied stand-offishness, was no less necessary than the binaural stethoscope they never appeared without, the gold spectacles or eye-glass they usually affected, and the patronising manner they adopted towards the men with whom they had been fellow-students, whose larks and escapades they had shared in with equal relish, but who, not having yet attained the dignity of membership of the College of Surgeons, and the still greater honour of house surgeon to St. Bernard’s, were no longer their companions, nor participants in their enjoyments.