A HOSPITAL JOKE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 1017, 9 March 1912, Page 4

A HOSPITAL JOKE.

Nurses and wardsmeu at the Melbourne Hospital have not yet recovered from their amusement at an incident which happened at the institution about a month ago. though it was attended by serious consequences to the principal actress in the comedy (says a local paper). One evening a whitehaired, discrepit old woman hobbled painfully into the casualty room, and in a husky voice demanded to be admitted. She was accompanied by her daughter, a shabbily-dressed girl, who wept copiously, but was unable to give much inlormation regarding the nature of her mother’s illness. The old woman, however, pointed to her swollen limbs, and declared that she was suffering from ulceration of the legs. A young resident doctor felt the old woman’s pulse, which was galloping at 120, and ordered her into a ward. The patient was put to bed. Then the truth came out. The supposed old hag was in reality a handsome, high-spirited girl—a nurse in the institution —who had successfully ca:ried out a ruse which had often been discussed and several times attempted in a half-hearted way. Her stockings stuffed with straw had given her limbs the necessary gouty appearance, her golden hair was hidden under a trousle wig, and her make-up was perfect. Her supposed daughter was an accomplice, whose tears were tears 01 real excitement. The same emotion accounted for the patient’s high pulse. But the hospital committee in its corporate capacity is not endowed with a sense of humour, immediate suspension of the culprits followed, and subsequently the sham patient was asked to leave the institution.