A CHINESE DOCTOR AND HIS FEES.

Waikato Times, Volume XXX, Issue 2465, 28 April 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

A CHINESE DOCTOR AND HIS FEES.

♦— Tin: now District Magistrate of Shanghai, some of whose doings have already been reported, has taken the native doctors in hand. Litely lie sent one of his messengers to a well known doctor with i f'jc of GOO tush— alo it halfacrown —to ask him to visit a patient. As the messenger had strict orders not to say he came from the Magistrate the doctor was under the impression that the patient was not an olHuial and accordingly refused to go. Again the messenger was sent and again the doctor refused to attend, saying tint the fo was too small and that he uoul 1 not go for three times the amount. The third time the Magistrate sent hisowu card, and the doctor at once hastened to see him. On being interrogated why he had not come in the first instance, lie made various excuses, which the Magistrate cut short by observing that in future he would cut down the doctor's fees to such a low figure that it would not he worth his while t> continue practising. He gave the doctor the alternative of paying 5000 tiels (£1250) to the Yellow River Fund. The fine was ultimately reduced to 3000 taels (£750), and the doctor, it is recorded, was very glad to get ufl" so easily.