Edward Berdoe - St. Bernard's - The Romance of a Medical Student

Mrs. Harper, as we said, was not at all particular in the matter of larks, though she was rather annoyed when she went into Mr. Murphy’s sitting-room one morning to lay the breakfast, and saw, over the fireplace in front of her new looking-glass, a great black board, painted in large white letters, “To be Let or Sold, this desirable semi-detached Villa Residence. For cards to view, apply Buggins & Son, 113 Great Mowbray Street, E.C.”

She knew at once this was one of the trophies of last night’s spree. Knockers and bell-handles, brass plates of moderate size, stolen from milliners’ and dressmakers’ doors – to these there could be no objection; but sign-boards, barbers’ poles, doctors’ lamps (for even the profession was not sacred from the attacks of “the boys”), were “dead agen her rules,” as she was always insisting, because, being so big, they could hardly be got into the house without exciting observation, and perhaps might bring discredit on the hospital.

“Look here, Mr. Murphy, I have told you over and over again, I can’t have them things in my house. You will be caught like Mr. Hodder was when he stole the big gold coffee pot from over the grocer’s door, and a bobby as didn’t know him, and wouldn’t take no bribe, run him into Bow Street, and if he hadn’t been the son of a member of Parliament, and known to the beak, he’d ’a had to ’a gone to jail, he would; for the grocer was mortal angry, as he had had two coffee pots and a bell handle stole the winter before, and he always suspected the students. No! I draws the line at things like this. I have too much respect for you, and the character of my house, to harbour the likes of ’em, so don’t do it.” Not even “a toothful of summat short,” as Murphy phrased it, could appease the good woman. “No, bell-handles and sich is good enough sport,” she persisted, “for anybody. I have nothing to say agen them; you gents must have your larks, and bell-handles and knockers goes in your pockets, but I draws the line at these here; take it away. Stay, I’ll put it in the cellar. Why, the taxes, or the gas, or the water rate might see it, and give information. They’re none of ’em any too fond of you boys, and they are quite equal to it.” And so with much regret, Murphy gave up his “Desirable Villa Residence,” merely extorting a promise that it might appear on the mantel for one night only – the “trophy supper” he was to give at the end of the winter session, when he was to exhibit his museum of stolen curiosities to his companions in the midnight revels.

Murphy was very proud of his museum. He had twenty-nine brass and iron knockers, fifty-seven bell-handles, fourteen brass door-plates, three small and very neat Royal Arms, gilt and coloured, one pretty figure of a Scotchman in Highland costume taking a pinch of snuff, several gilt carved wood letters, which once formed parts of names over shop doors, and this latest acquisition, the “Villa Residence” board. Everything was neatly labelled and numbered, and a register kept, recording in the most methodical manner the story of its capture. Many hair-breadth escapes were recalled by a glance at some of these treasures; and to hear little Jack Murphy tell some of the stories connected with them was a treat that many a freshman yearned for with all his heart. Most of the men would rather have had the honour of which this stolen hardware was the symbol than all the medals and certificates of honour the hospital could bestow. Their friends sent them to earn these latter – that was task-work; their own inclination and Bohemian instincts urged the acquisition of bell-handles and door-knockers – in this was danger, and their love of surmounting it was gratified. They had yet to learn the nobler outlets for sentiments that have made the name of Englishman a proud distinction, especially in the practice of a profession on which they have shed so much glory.

But Lindsay Street was not wholly inhabited by the idlers. There were many men who led solitary lives at their lodgings, and worked night and day at books or bed side. Some took portions of their subjects home to dissect, and the back gardens at their lodgings were often used as places of sepulture for brains, hands, or as Tom Hood sings, —

Maternity cases were attended by the junior students at the homes of the patients within a radius of two miles of the hospital. This served to bring them into direct contact with the poor, and familiarized them with scenes of the most horrible destitution in the filthiest and lowest slums of the metropolis. The young men were usually favourites with the people, who are always taken with the free and easy, the good-humoured and generous behaviour of medical students, anxious to improve their own knowledge of work which will be of the greatest importance to them in their future career, and glad to render their – sometimes very far from skilled – services to uncomplaining poverty, with a view to getting their papers signed for the colleges, which demand a definite amount of this work to be performed while in connection with their medical school. It was hourly enforced upon them that such was their only chance of the free and unrestricted use of human “material” for acquiring this sort of information. Their blunders, their negligences, would not count against them whilst in a state of pupilage. A great city, a poverty-stricken population, a benevolent public, and the custom of their profession, had placed at their disposal an immense amount of raw material, unbounded facilities for picking up knowledge, and the deft use of mysterious and complicated instruments. This skill, this dexterous use of the tools of their art, would shortly enable them to earn a handsome living. Let, then, every moment be devoted to obtaining that knowledge at the cost of ignorant and uncomplaining patients who would only see in their attentions the desire of a charitable young gentleman to help them, just as the visiting lady and the clergyman helped them efficiently. Let, then, every day and every case enable them to use more skilfully, under such clinical conditions, those tools the awkward use of which would inevitably be detected in the higher walks of their art to which they are progressing. Such is the admirable way in which the highest skill and wisdom of medicine is combined with the attempts of the novices to attain it in the practice of the hospitals, that the shortcomings and feeble efforts of the learners are glorified and ennobled by the brilliant successes of the teachers, till the mistakes are lost sight of in the dazzling triumphs of their achievements. It is like the Catholic doctrine of works of supererogation. St. Francis Xavier was so much better than he had any occasion to be, that he had a fund of merit at his disposal for helping the deficiencies of those who fell short in their good works.

A great surgeon achieves a brilliant success in an operation which sends a man away from the wards to his own home restored in health and limbs to his family and his work. It is the hospital which gets the credit, and the credit is sufficient to atone for many of the maimings and other unfortunate terminations of a score of cases, which are looked upon as failures, not of much greater consequence than Beau Brummel’s cravats cast aside on his dressing-table. It will not do to be too hard on the failures. Even Professor Holloway did not publish them . The advertisements of quack and royal surgeon are alike in this respect at least, that they do not go into any such unnecessary details!