33

I. 18.

T. H. JOHNSTON.]

Friday, 3rd October, 1913. Thomas Henry Johnston further examined on oath. (No. 5.) 1. Hon. Mr. Fisher.] When the Committee concluded yesterday I was examining you about your admission to the Auckland Hospital, and we had a statement from you about it I think you said you had been three or four days in the hospital?— Yes. 2. What were you treated for? —At that time Dr. Kinder, I believe, rang up and told them that the muscles of the chest were contracted, and that I had either been poisoned or else had had an epileptic fit. 3. You heard him say that? —Yes, through the telephone. 4. Did anybody in the hospital ever say anything to you about epilepsy? —Nobody. 5. Were you conscious the whole time in the hospital except when asleep?— Yes. 6. You knew all the food you were getting? —Yes. 7. You complained of the treatment of your wife at the time you were in the hospital?— Yes. 8. In what respect? —The way they looked at her. 9. You might give the Committee some better idea than that? —They did not speak to her roughly, but there was a difference in the way in which my wife was treated xvhen she came in as compared with others in the same ward. Mrs. Johnston had a great difficulty in seeing me in the first place. 10. Did they attempt to stop her seeing you? -Yes. 11. Who attempted to stop her? —She told me that the people you see as you go into the hospital—both the doctors and the nurses. 12. What did you think was the reason of that?—l think the reason of it was because Dr. Kinder had telephoned. That is why I mentioned having stolen the fruit. 13. Have you ever suffered at all from loss of consciousness?— No. never at any time. 14. Except when under an anaesthetic? —Yes. 15. Have you ever lost your speech?—No, never. 16. Have you never told any one that you had lost your speech?— No. 17. Is there anything the matter with any of your children in that respect? —There are none of my children who have lost their speech at any time, but my second boy is broken-winded, but that is only since we sent him to school and he got knocked about. He is a very nervous boy—a nervous disposition like myself. 18. I am going to read to you a telegram from the Superintendent of the Auckland Hospital, and you can contradict it if you like. It states. " Patient Thomas Johnston in Auckland Hospital three days, 13th, 14th, and 15th April, 1911. Had history of epileptic convulsions." Where did the hospital doctor get that from—did you tell him? —No. 19. You did not have an epileptic fit? —No. 20. Mrs. Johnston does not know of your having an epileptic fit?— Mrs. Johnston knows that I never even fainted in my life. 21. Where do you think the doctor got that from? —The only way he could have got it was from what I told him about my father's health when he asked me. I told him my father was an invalid, and I described it as I did to you yesterday. I might say he used very nearly the same words as Sergeant Wohlmann did after the two doctors left—that is, epilepsy. 22. Then, listen to what the doctor says further: "No fits in hospital; seemed rather dull mentally. Gave a history of having been deaf and dumb for seven months seven years before." Is that so?— No. . 23. Do you suggest the doctor has invented that statement? —I do not suggest he invented it at all, but I suggest that the doctor who was there was only a mere lad—a student. It was well known by the nurses and by the patients in the beds adjoining. I told that doctor that I put together a work when I was lying ill in bed—not only a novel, but also another book—and was offered £2 10s. per thousand in Melbourne; and I told him that I had a huskiness in my voice. 24. The telegraphed, statement also says, " Gave a history of having been deaf and dumb for seven months seven years before admission, and had been attended by fifteen different doctors in Australia with no improvement." Did you ever tell him that? —I did not tell him of fifteen doctors. 25. How many did you tell him of? —Five. 26. What did the five doctors treat you for?— Well, every doctor treated me for something different. 27. What did you go to the five doctors for? —Because I was not satisfied with any of them. 28. What was the nature of your complaint?—l considered it was a severe cold and weakness. 29. Was it loss of speech?—No, it was not; it was huskiness of the voice and being run down in the system. 30. And you went to five doctors for the same trouble?— Yes. 31. And none could cure you?— Each of them gave me a bottle of medicine but I would not take it. I would take two or three doses, but I considered it would not do me any good. It was similar to Dr. Craig's medicine—l have it at home. I wrote to a Sydney doctor, filling in a form, and my brother-in-law paid, and what I got from the doctor cured me within a week. 32. What did you put in the form?— What I told you yesterday about my father and grandfather and my mother. 33. Do you know what your father died of?— No. I was eights years of age at the time and do not know. I could describe to you the way my father died. 34. What was the nature of "the death?—My father went dead at the toes first, and at the fingers, and no matter how they were rubbed they could not keep life in him. It crept right

s—l. Ib.