In China and some other places one has a fever getting acclimated. One in Shanghai left man pretty weak when the usual plague of boils broke out. Then there was less rest for the wicked than ever, and he balanced himself on a boil and thought about Job. The doctor says that the man is better and that this is a crisis he wanted (man wishes doctor had it). But man does get well after many dawns, watching the bats come home to roost in the round tiles used in the roofs here. Then cats come along the edge and reaching paws over extract the bats and put them away and go after more. The man thinks he's glad he's not a bat and goes to sleep and wakes up better and forgets about it till some day years after he dreams dreams. Talking of fevers, when the oil wells started in Canada it was rather rough living. The water to drink very bad, and so on. At all events we got a bad mixture of typhoid and smallpox and not much doctor. So a great many died. One of us had it and another nursed him till he got to his bed and forgot everything except sticking a favorite pin in a rafter overhead. Baggage. A Night on the Grimsel Pass—Switzerland |