Date and Paper Unknown.

SALT and PEPPER

"The time has come", the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things;
 Of shoes and ships and sealing wax
 And cabbages and kings."
   From "Alice In Wonderland"
         
One afternoon last week Ed Cressman, well known Olive farmer and John (Jack) 
Millman, retired druggist, sat in the Masonic club room.  They were talking 
about old times.  "Say Jack, what is it that makes a feller feel so dumpy and
dead this time of year?" Ed asked.  "Golly, I don't know Ed", replied the 
quiet-spoken Jack.
         
Ed shifted his cigar to the left corner of his mouth, swung one leg up over the 
arm of an easy chair, squinted out the window at the weather, and volunteered,
"Guess it's an accumulation of too much sittin' 'round the fire and too much 
eatin' during the cold winter.  Say Jack, you used to sell somethin' up there 
when it was Fildew & Millman that used to do the trick."
         
Mr. Millman grinned.  "Yeah, Ed, we used to sell a lot of Lemon Bitters this 
time of year.  Used to put 'em up ourselves and you're right, it used to do 
the trick."  Ed snorted.  "Guess they did all right... feller wanted to know 
what he was takin' when he took them Lemon Bitters.  Say Jack, do you remember 
Doc Pollard who used to be here?  Had an office right up there where Doc 
LeVanseler is now."
         
Having lived in St. Johns for many many years, Mr. Millman remembered Doc Pollard.
"Sure Ed, wasn't he a dandy?  Used to wear a plug hat."  Ed swung around in his 
chair.  "That's right Jack.  Used to wear a plug hat and stand down in front 
on the sidewalk when he wasn't busy.  Come from Wichita, Kansas, didn't he?  
Gosh, I remember how he cured me once for 42 years."
         
"Forty-two years?  Whatda ya mean, Ed?"  Again Ed eased his left leg - the one 
which is rheumatic -  and started in.  "Yes sir, Doc Pollard cured me so that 
I never went near a doctor for 42 years.  It was when I was a kid.  I was 
working on a farm for eight dollars a month.  Came downtown with a load of baled
hay in the spring.  Wasn't feelin' very good.  Doc was standing out in front 
and when I come along I stopped to talk with him.

"I sez to Doc, 'I ain't feelin' very good, Doc'.  He sez, 'Come up to the office'.
I went up.  He sez, 'Run out your tongue.'  I run 'er out as far as I could and 
Doc looked her over.  'Well, no wonder you don't feel good.  Here take these 
pills and come back in a day or two.'  I went home and took the pills.  
They worked.  It was mebbe two weeks or more when I came downtown again."
         
Ed related to his listener how he was feeling all right that time and he had 
about forgotten about the pills that Dr. Pollard had given him and for which 
he had paid $1.00.  "I was comin' along up the street and there was Doc Pollard
standin' right there in front of his office stairway.  He sez to me, 'How ya 
feelin' kid?' and I sez, 'All right Doc'.  He looked at me kinda funny and 
he said, 'Well, you don't look very well.  Come up to the office.'
         
"I followed him up the stairway tellin' him  every step that I was feeling okeh
and that I didn't need any more pills, but he kept right on going and I was so 
dumb that I followed him into the office.  When we got inside he said, 'Run out
your tongue', and I run 'er out as far as I could.  He squinted at it and said,
'Uh huh, Just as I thought.  You don't want to have a long sick spell do you - 
have to stay in bed for three, four weeks?'  That kind of scairt me and I said 
I didn't."
         
"Well, he put up some more pills and I reached in my pocket for a dollar -
that's what he charged me other time.  Doc never looked at the dollar bill 
I was holdin' out.  He just said 'That'll be three-fifty'."  Mr. Cressman 
stopped his narration to laugh and Jack Mlllman nearly doubled up with glee.
"That was Doc right", the druggist chuckled. "He used to take 'em - that baby did."
         
Cressman told how he paid the doctor the $3.50 which left him so short that 
he couldn't buy the new pair of overalls he had intended to get up to Jess 
Sullivan's.  He walked out of Dr. Pollard's office rather stunned.  He didn't 
want the pills.  He was feeling perfectly fit. The two fees of $1.00 and $3.50
represented more than half of a month's hard work on the farm.  Ed, then 
a young fellow in his teens was stumped.  He walked down the stairway from
Dcc's office feeling pretty law.
         
"Well sir, Jack", Ed related, "I went home that night with that envelope of pills
in my pocket.  I never took 'em.  The more I thought about it the madder I got.
I vowed I'd never go near a doctor again - and by jinks I didn't for forty-two
years.  That's right, Jack - forty-two years before I got some misery in my 
left leg and had to have it looked after."  Mr. Millman laughed at Ed's story,
and reminisced: "That Doc was a corker - wore a plug hat and finally went west 
some place.  Guess it was Los Angeles - and did right well I heard."