Village Squire, 1974-06, Page 26village there way a hotel with a bar. this was a
sumptuous place with dark mahogany,
gleaming brass foot -rail and ornate cuspidors
strategically placed. It was almost sacrilige to
spit in these, but many did. There was a large
picture of a naked, plump, and comely lady
reclining seductively. (I never did get a real
good look at that lady. The few times
entered the bar I was too bashful to take more
than a sideways squint). Behind the bar were
rows of shiny sinful bottles. All this was made
doubly attractive by a large brass -framed
mirror. The mirror reflected the splendours of
the bar and the only moderately splendid
customers in derby hats and coloured
waistcoats. Here and there a farmer with
The mirror
reflected splendours
overalls decorated with dried pig feed added
to the cosmopolitan scene.
Doc was welcome here, being esteemed
about equally for his knowledge of medicine,
his wit and his acquaintance with bears.
To this restful oasis there came one day a
number of strangers, a noisy uncouth group
who defied all tradition. They got a little
drunk and were soon arguing with everyone,
calling the regular customers hicks and
hay -tossers, with appropriate adjectives.
They did the unthinkable; they got into a
dispute with Doc and called him a
pussyfooting fat little pig -poisoner. Obviously
something had to be done. Like a good
tactician Doc retired temporarily. He padded
across the street and returned with his latest
bear on, a chain. The bar was cleared in some
haste, the dispute was settled unilaterally as
we say now and order was restored.
This story went around the village, then up
and down Huron County. It even spilled over
into Middlesex where it rivalled tales of the
Black Donnellys. It was embellished and
elaborated. It was said that :^ar ripped
the trousers off some of those slowest '-
retreat. This is not so. I relate the event as it
actually happened.
This, then, was the mild little man who
alighted in our yard, greeted us agreeably,
led the way to the barn talking of the weather
and the crops and perhaps cracking a small
joke. He never mentioned horse. Somehow
the tension and the anxiety disappeared.
There was no room for these around Doc. In
the Eastern world he might have been a guru.
One could have sat at his feet and acquired all
the merit in the world. He entered the stall
and Doc the horse recognized him and
stretched out his nose in greeting.
"Well Doctor," said Doc the vet, as if
politely greeting a confrere, "and have you
got a little pain? Where would it be now?
Here? Or here, or here? Oh, my, that hurt,
didn't it?" So gently probing and
communing, the two doctors came to an
agreement on the diagnosis. Doc the horse
agreed to swallow a ball. A ball was a bolus of
powdered drugs wrapped in a piece of
newspaper. "The paper keeps everything
tidy when it passes through," Doc the vet
kindly explained to me.
"The paper keeps
everything tidy".
So there would be a happy ending to the
episode and Doc the horse would soon be
back in harness.
I started out talking of horses and I seem to
have ended up talking of Doc. And a very
good way to end. As we look back through the
haze of years to childhood memories things
become altered or distorted, and it may well
be that Doc, being human, was not quite as
wise, as equal to all emergencies, or as
perfectly admirable as I have made him seem
here. But there are only a few individuals who
can leave this sort of impression behind and it
seems to me not a bad thing that we should
remembei, and honour, and believe in them.
Groves TV.
Appliance
Centre
10 Huron St. Clintor
Phone 482-9414
14drn1ro/ MARK OF QUALITY
Visit our booth at the Clinton Spring Fair - Friday
evening, May 31 and Saturday, June 1.
)4, VILLAGE SQUIRE/MAY 1974