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- 222 REMINISCENCES OF OLD VICTORIA
of Alexander McLean, J. D. Robinson, Henry Short and Alexander Wilson, Dr. Davie was duly elected, and at a salary of ?100 per annum, and held the position for over twenty years. He entered on his duties with great zeal, his first surgical case being that of an Indian girl who was accidentally shot on Salt Spring Island. The poor girl's arm was badly shattered, and she was brought down from the island in a canoe. It was a bad case, but the doctor pulled her through and, saving her arm, sent her home again as good as ever.
Dr. Davie was fond of music, and in early days was proficient on the flute, contributing to the programme of many a concert for charity in those days when amateurs did so much to entertain the public.
That the subject of this sketch was a clever man goes without saying. Many there are, and have been, who have been snatched from grim death by this skilful surgeon. By some he was thought to be bearish and unsympathetic, but they who thought so did not know him as I did, or they would not have thought so. Where there was real suffering and danger there could not have been a more gentle, kinder-hearted or careful man. Because he did not always respond to a friend's salutation in passing it was taken as bearishness or in-difference. It was really pre-occupation. He was thinking out a difficult case for the next morning at the hospital. As he once said to a lady friend, " They little know the hours I pass walking up and down at night thinking out a case I have to operate on?how I shall do it to make it a success." I went into his office one day and found him with a surgical instrument on his knee which he seemed very intent on, and I asked him what it was for. He hesitated for a moment, then said, " You would not understand." But still he ex-
JOHN CHAPMAN DAVIE, M.D. 223
plained it all to me. It was for an operation in the morning on the stomach of a patient at one of the hospitals, and I have no doubt it was successful. About seven years ago he attended me for typhoid fever, and even then he had his bad spells of sickness, but still he came regularly, and on reaching the top of the stairs to my room he would hold on till his coughing fit was over. " Well, old man, how are you to-day ?" After I had taken a turn for the better and was very susceptible to the smell of good things cooking downstairs, I asked him when I should be allowed to have something solid, and added, " Oh, I am so tired of milk and egg-nog; when may I have a bit of chicken or mutton?"
" Well, how many days is it since your temperature was normal? Well, in so many days you may have jelly and junket."
" Is that all ?" I replied, disappointed.
" Look here, old man, I want to get you well, and you must be patient.'
" That reminds me of a little story," said the doctor. " Some years ago two men were digging a deep ditch on Johnson Street to repair a sewer. Some time after both the men were taken sick, which turned out to be typhoid fever, and, being single men, they were taken to the hospital. I saw them every day in my regular round of visits, and they progressed towards recovery until they got to the stage that you have, and complained of my bill of fare. They asked for ` something solid,' and I put them off with the same answer you got. A day or two after in making my regular rounds I noticed that one of my patients was not in evidence and I asked his friend where he was. Then the story was told me of his friend having had some visitors, one of whom brought a cooked chicken, part of which was
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