believe me; although myself I'd rather 'ave died at fifty and got it
over. Then another paper dug up from somewhere a sort of animated
corpse that said was a 'undred and two, and attributed the
unfortunate fact to 'is always 'aving 'ad 'is food as 'ot as 'e could
swallow it. A bit of sense did begin to dawn upon 'im then, but too
late in the day, I take it. 'E'd played about with 'imself too long.
'E died at thirty-two, looking to all appearance sixty, and you can't
say as 'ow it was the result of not taking advice."

[Only just in time.]

"On this subject of health we are much too ready to follow advice," I
agreed. "A cousin of mine, Mrs. Wilkins, had a wife who suffered
occasionally from headache. No medicine relieved her of them--not
altogether. And one day by chance she met a friend who said: 'Come
straight with me to Dr. Blank,' who happened to be a specialist
famous for having invented a new disease that nobody until the year
before had ever heard of. She accompanied her friend to Dr. Blank,
and in less than ten minutes he had persuaded her that she had got
this new disease, and got it badly; and that her only chance was to
let him cut her open and have it out. She was a tolerably healthy
woman, with the exception of these occasional headaches, but from
what that specialist said it was doubtful whether she would get home
alive, unless she let him operate on her then and there, and her
friend, who appeared delighted, urged her not to commit suicide, as
it were, by missing her turn.

"The result was she consented, and afterwards went home in a four-
wheeled cab, and put herself to bed. Her husband, when he returned
in the evening and was told, was furious. He said it was all humbug,