THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2041, 8 September 1880, Page 3

THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

A Visit to this Dentist and Othbb Pastimes.

Strolling along the street recently I met a party who is equally remarkable for charioteering ability and genial habits. When yet many yards distant I observed that his usually gay style was absent. He blobbed along, if I may be allowed the expression, like a sick fowl in a sou’-wester. His features were a cross between those of the Knight of La Mancha and those of Mr Cass when cogitating on the mysteries of “Eternal Suffering.” He requested me to inform him when wo met if he looked like a toothaohist. I said—Very much like teeth. Ho then said, “ I don’t know much how this thing is carried on; would you see me through ?” I, of course, said I would, though not a good cicerone in tho path of dentistry, the fact being that ago and increasing decrepitude have reduced my grinders to a society of one member, and he jibs a bit now. Of course, the first thing to do was to go and have a drink. I knew that much at any rate. While taking the oath, as the saying is, we consulted several of our acquaintance [as to the most reliable manipulator of tho cooling pincers. A great number of opinions were put out, and not progressing much we had another drink and put it to the vote. This resulted in favor of the recreation saloonsin Gloucester street,and thither we proceeded. Not for some time though If ever a man had a hank of important business on hand that morning it was my genial friend, but we got to the Abodes of Bliss after a while and rang the bell. The effect of ringing bolls is very various—exceedingly various. There is the hilarious boy who rings tho bell and runs away. There is the diffident youth who rings and shakes like a wet ’possum while waiting to ask for a billet. There is the ring of the patrician lady (a remark which applies equally to all the fair readers of the “ Press’’) who is devoutly praying tho people may be out. There is tho ring of the collector. You know all about that sound. But for effect none are like the sweetly mellifluous tone of the dentist’s bell. Your tooth, which a few seconds before was sending pangs into every portion of your system, stops aching instantaneously, and you are struck with the absurdity of fooling round a dentist’s show. You want to elide for it. But, in this game the path of the backslider is terrible. I saw what was passing in the mind of the chivalrous charioteer, but he blenched not, and we passed into the antechamber where dentists allow their victims some moments of pleasant reflection before proceeding to their dooms in tho inner sanctum. In this apartment there is nothing to alarm the visitor. Indeed, quite the reverse. Such rooms might he taken for little temples of Momus. Funny pictures on tho wall ; “ Punch,” and probably “ Artemus Ward,” and the “Church Nows” on the table. A good fire and the company most respectable if not facetious. A painter wishing to depict a family in a state of the most abject misery or the deepest bereavement, would have sweet chances of models any morning in the antechamber. In a snug arm chair in one corner is an exceedingly nice looking young lady who evidently has not come as a client. She is in charge of a boy. A youth whose soul is racked with anguish, whose brow is “ sicklied o’er with the pale oast of thought,” whose life s a burden, and who is wishing he could live a while without a head. Three of this darling’s teeth have to come out. He knows it. Ho has been there before, and trembles. Further on is a young lady with an embroidered kerchief to her ruby lips ; to one who, like the old man, has a love for the young and beautiful, a most heart-rending object. Farther along is a gentleman who I attempted to engage in conversation. He seemed cm barrassed. I subsequently ascertained his mouth was as it were in an embryo state, by which I mean his teeth were all gone and his jaws were all filled up with plaster of Paris Next to me sat a schoolboy, who came to. “ have his teeth looked at,” he informed mo, a practise which would save much eventual agony were parents to allow it to obtain a little more. On the other side was tho knightly lieutenant, my friend. In my endeavors to be jovial, I must allow ho backed mo up sadly, but courageously, but the rebukes and frowns which our attempts at merriment produced from the other sufferers, more particularly from the Plastor-of-Paris man (if ho will forgive my thus terming him), choked us right down. We lapsed into silence and deep gloom. It was like being at an oratorio performed by bad amateurs. Thus did the happy moments slip away.

“ The slow sad hours that bring us all things ill,” glode on, as Mr Tennyson would say, and you see

“ Be the day weary or the pain so strong, At length the Boss Dentist will fetch you along,” And be did. We wont first, being by appointment. The other patients, even I'm afraid I must add the pretty young lady, glared at us. The Plaster of Paris Man mumbled his stuccoed jaws in a blood-thirsty manner, and thinking of how much he reminded me of Giants Pope and Pagan as described by the ancient Bun, wo passed into the next apartment. Need I describe the preliminaries? Need I say that “the chivalrous” sank naturally into the artfully constructed receptacle for the habitues of the Torture Chamber p Casting a sort of morituri te salutant glance at me, he suddenly started, and, observing that the artist was engaged amongst the silvery implements of his profession, he pointed with a troubled look at a tas’eful scroll illuminating the wall opposite to him. These were its mystic words :

“ Visitors Are Particularly Requested To Take Notice That The Terms are Strictly Cash.” Honorable to tho last, even in such a perilous and trying hour, the gallant soldier retained his presence of mind, and said, in the sepulchral whisper similar to that used by dying tragedians on the stage, “ Sling us a quid.” It was, of course, utterly impossible to convey to him at such a moment tho fact that a pound was more than I had seen since the Grey Government scattered affluence amongst onr class, but I did the best I could. I said : “Toll him you’ll call again," These are —so collectors and business men generally inform me —talismanio words. We should try their effect even in this sombre pageant. The genial lessee of the show now approached, and sweeping his dental field glass around tho leonine jaws of his patient, announced tho awful fact, gradually and kindly, but firmly, that no less than ten stumps must be removed. I was thinking of going for my blankets, when the lieutenant, with great presence of mind, said : “ Then perhaps I’d better call again.” “ Certainly,” said the artist, “ but this maxillary smasher must come out to-day,” and before you could say “ knife ” it came out. After tying up tho arteries, and in fact concluding the usual process, the charioteer, who was naturally much exhausted by the operation, said, in a tone of diffidence I have never before observed in him, “ la it not usually customary on these occasions to give the patient some slight stimulant at the conclusion of the business P A scintillation of Hennessy, or even tho merest sensation of Old Tom, would pick up my shattered nerves.” Unfortunately a member of the fairer sex, who had just had four molars removed, had taken tho last sup ; but the courteous and urbane operator promised,whonhis client “called again” to have the lot removed, that stimulants would be in readiness —from chloroform to Wanganui wine. There’s a lot of joviality about dentistry, you must understand, if ycu know where to look for it.

The above paragraph has lengthened out to such an extent that tho space at my command on this occasion is to say the least of it a bit limited, but really you do have some very funny things in your columns sometimes. I quite feel there must be heaps of far higher class humorists about than I could over dream of being. Hera is a sample of one of them —

“ A concert in aid of the local library was held in the Schoolroom, Kyle, last Friday evening. The chair was occupied l»j Mr Lambic, and Misses Lambic, Royers, Mrs London, and Messrs Johns, Thompson, lilachbwrn, Sail, and Parlter. There was a good attendance, and the applause was frequent and enthusiastic.” I don’t know quite where Kyle is, but I should like to go to their next show if only to see the OH AIR. You will observe on the occasion under notice it was occupied by at least ten persons. The Great Bed of Ware would bo a fool to the Chair of Kyle. No wonder we are informed that “ the applause was frequent and enthusiastic.” As to the other fragments, the beneath is your telegraphic agent’s account of an event likely to come off in Spain—

“An Austrian physician in the Queen of Spain’s household quarrelled with the Spanish doctors on the subject of the Queen’s health. The Austrian favours the Queen remaining at Lagra Palace till the birth of the heir to the • throne. She purposes to do so, and the Spanish doctors have resigned.” Speaking entirely as a layman, I should say this was rather like counting one’s chickens before they were hatched, but the strides of science are now so extraordinary, that after the vaticination displayed as above by tho Austrian medico one is not so much surprised as one otherwise would have been by tho extraordinary telegraphic announcement from a neighboring province that— V Tho Chinaman who was referred to in a certain telegram is reported to have died again this evening.” It may be that Chinamen are differently constituted from other men, but the only other instance I remember of such a circumstance occuring was in “ Bombastes ITurioso,” where tho whole of the dramatis persona; announce their intention—- “ To fling away all sorrow, And, if the audience wish. To die again to-morrow.” But that’s tragedy.