Significant Change
A French paper revives the story of Alexandre Dumas being one day the guest of Dr. Gistal, an eminent medical man of Marseilles, who after dinner requested the novelist to enrich his album with one of his witty improvisations. “Certainly,” replied Dumas, with a smile, and drawing out his pencil he wrote, under the eyes of his entertainer, lines which may be imitated as follows:
“Since Dr. Gistal came to our town,
To cure diseases casual and hereditary,
The hospital has been pulled down”—
“You flatterer!” here exclaimed the doctor, mightily pleased; but the poet went on—
“And we have made a larger cemetery.”