The Mysteries of Montreal | Page 2

too
proud to compound with his correspondents in the old country, and
insisted on conscientiously paying a hundred cents for a dollar, we
found ourselves in less than three years, with diminished capital in
specie, and an increased one as regards future candidates for the
Presidency, on our way back to our common Fatherland. Through the
influence of his friends, Gustav procured a good situation in a
merchant's office, but he was altogether unsuited both by temperament
and education for such a position, and I soon made up my mind that I
must either prepare to enter the world's great battlefield in person, or
live in helpless dependence on my husband's relations.
I had often while in America wondered why the ladies of that Republic
(so advanced and enlightened in everything else) should submit to a
practice so revolting, so contrary to all ideas of morality and refinement
as is the system of man-midwifery so widely practiced in the United
States. No German lady would think of permitting the attendance of a
man at her bedside on such an occasion, and though custom in England
seems generally to sanction the absurd practice, yet Her Majesty Queen
Victoria never allows her medical advisers to be in attendance in any
other capacity than that of consulting physicians. I had discussed the
matter frequently with married ladies in New York, and they were
generally agreed, that, could only competent ladies be found in the
United States, man-midwifery would soon cease to be practiced in that
Republic. I accordingly resolved to devote all my energies to the study
of that particular branch of the medical profession, and my efforts were
crowned with success. In two years I obtained a diploma from the
Hamburg University, and soon after prepared to return to America.
[Footnote: Dr. Playfair, President of the Obstetrical Society of London,
in his address delivered in February, 1879, said:--"I confess that it is
with a feeling of regret, something akin to shame, when I reflect that I
am supposed to teach a class of young men the entire subject of
midwifery, and the diseases of women and children, in a short summer
course of something under forty lectures. The thing is a manifest and
ridiculous absurdity, hence we have, of necessity, to omit, year by year,

at least half of midwifery proper."
The Principal of Calcutta Medical College writes Dr. Playfair thus:--
"To what a hideous extent is the practice of midwifery carried on in
England, by utterly unqualified men, whom the unhappy women and
their friends believe to be qualified, and the system in your hospitals
sadly favors this."
"Yet there are some women who will smother every feeling of modesty
and morality, and trust their lives to one of these licentiates rather than
commit themselves to the care of a thoroughly trained midwife of their
own sex. Surely nothing can be more absurd and irrational."]
About this time a friend of my husbands' informed us that the climate
of Canada was very much superior to that of the Eastern States, and
much more like that of Germany, and that in Montreal I would be likely
to find, not only a pleasant city, but a people more European in style
and custom, also a capital field for the exercise of my profession. For
Montreal then we sailed with hearts full of hope, and, being fifty-four
days at sea, I was summoned by the Captain to attend a lady on board
(which I did with the success which has since invariably attended my
efforts), and this was my debut as a professional accoucheur.
On our arrival at Montreal we presented letters of introduction to the
German Consul, and the leading members of the German Society, and I
soon became fully occupied in the exercise of my profession. Dr. X----
(now one of our most distinguished physicians) not only tolerated my
vocation, but, with a magnanimity worthy of his genius and ability,
gave me counsel and advice, and recommended me as highly as
possible to his confrères and the public. Some few resident doctors
threw cold water on my enterprise, but, to their credit be it spoken, the
profession at large treated me invariably with the greatest kindness and
courtesy, shewing thereby a liberality and largeness of heart which is
ever the outcome of real ability.
I was not long installed in my new home when, as we were sitting
cosily round the fire, the door bell was rung furiously, and on my going
down to receive my visitor, I was astonished to find a gentleman with a

newborn baby wrapped in the tail of his broadcloth coat. He said he
was its father, and that the mother had taken suddenly ill before any
provision could be made for its reception, and he implored me to