64 THE ITINERANT HORSE PHYSICIAN 



One had to admire their grit and optimism in 

 the face of grave cases of sickness or accident 

 among their animals. The most lowly and poor 

 among them would not be deterred from sub- 

 mitting the case to the doctor even if the fee 

 incurred was much beyond their means. If the 

 doctor could give them reasonable assurance that 

 the result would be good they would invariably 

 say, "go to it." 



Among the upper class of Mexicans it was the 

 custom of all American practitioners to charge 

 excessively high fees; it was not only a custom, 

 but a necessity in a way. In fact, should you do 

 your work for an ordinary fee the chances are 

 they would not employ you again, no matter 

 how successful you were. It seems that they 

 rated the practitioner's worth according to his 

 fee — within sane bounds, of course. 



Say you are called to treat a horse belonging to 

 an upper class Mexican — a case of acute indiges- 

 tion, for instance, requiring your constant attend- 

 ance for four or five hours of the night. If you 

 are not a tender-foot, and if you ever expect to 

 stand "ace-high" with that "grandee" you will 

 send your bill the next morning for one hundred 

 dollars. 



I made a trip to Torreon, Mexico, which is 

 518 miles below the border, one winter. I had 

 been given some inducement by a drug house 

 there to locate there for practice. There was no 

 veterinarian there and, in all, it was a good prop- 

 osition. I was doing fairly well in El Paso, how- 

 ever, and after I had gone down and looked the 



