The physician had taken his patient's pulse and temperature, and proceeded to ask the usual questions.
"It - er - seems," said he, regarding the unfortunate with scientific interest, "that the attacks of fever and the chills appear on alternate days. Do you think - is it your opinion - that they have, so to speak, decreased in violence, if I may use that word?"
The patient smiled feebly. "Doc," said he, "on fever days my head's so hot I can't think, and on ague days I shake so I can't hold an opinion."
