Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 January 1894 — A DIAMOND IN HIS FLESH. [ARTICLE]

A DIAMOND IN HIS FLESH.

Mystery of a Valuable Gem Cut From a Mao’s Arm by a Physician. “Like the rain that favors none, but (alls on the unjust as well as the just, a physician has to minister to the vicious as conscientiously as to the righteous and to keep as scrupulously for the former such secrets as he learns in bis attendance on them,” remarked a doctor to a Philadelphia Timea reporter. “I was a much younger man than lam now, when one night my bell rang after I bad retired. I got up and let in a man who seemed to shrink from observation until my door was fairly closed on him. Then he took off his coat and rolled np the sleeve of his shirt, exposing the whole of his left arm. He then directed my attention to a hard knot on the under side of the arm. “I felt this and was at a loss to diagnose its character, but the man, who seemed to be amused at my perplexity, finally said: ‘I might as well tell you, doctor, what it is. It is that that has brought me to you to-night That is an artificial substance inserted in the flesh of my arm by myself. And I want you to cut it out.’ “I stared and at first refused, when he said: ‘lf you don’t do it the doctor next door will, and from what I’ve heard of you I think you’ll act the straightest with me about this matter.’ “I was not influenced by his threat to go to some other physician nor by his compliment, but I was curious myself to know what that imbedded substance could be. So I got out my knife and asked the fellow if he would take ether or chloroform, but he declared that he had opened the arm to insert the thing without not only an ansesthetic but any instrument except a dull dinner knife. The thing, whatever it was, had been in the arm some time, as it was covered with flesh aud skin that had grown since it had been there, but a few gashes with my lancet bioight it to the surface, but it was so bloody that I could not make but its nature. The fellow was ghastly pale, but had set his teeth and borne without a murmur the pain, and now laughed. “ ‘Drop it in your basin of water thgre, Doc., and see what you’ll see,’ he said. “I did so, and saw as fine an uncut diamond as was ever brought to this country. lam not lapidary enough to have a very correct idea of its value, but it must have been many thousands of dollars. “Involuntarily, I exolaimed, ‘Why, where did you get such a stone?' but the man’s eyes hardened in a moment, and he said: ‘lf you’re the sharp fellow I take you to be, you know from the pains with which it was hidden that there’s a story to that diamond that I ain’t giving away. But I’m willing to pay you well for your trouble, and I know from what I heard of you that you ain’t peaching of what takes place here.’ “I dressed the cut and he left me S3OO for the job, though I only asked him S2O, and then I let him out, and that was the last I ever saw or heard of him, though I have often speculated how and where he came into possession of the stone, for that he was a common smuggler I do not believe.”