has pulled you through, he expects a present in addition to the annual
honorarium, just as you would send the minister a present after a
marriage or a funeral or some other special occasion at which his
services are required. The amount you pay depends upon your ability
and the value of his services, but it is a violation of the
most sacred canon of professional etiquette for a doctor to ask
compensation or question the amount he receives. He keeps no accounts
of his visits and no books. If a stranger or an acquaintance who does
not contribute regularly makes one call or two upon the doctor to ask
his advice or a prescription, he leaves something on the table, but it
would be equivalent to an insult if he should ask for a bill.

When a person is very sick, he is taken to a hospital. Sweden has some
of the best hospitals in the world. His own doctor looks after him
there, assisted by the house physician and nurses, who expect fees,
but the regular doctor gets none. He supervises the treatment and acts
as adviser to the house physician.

The government pays subsidies to doctors in remote parts of the
country, just as it pays the salaries of the ministers where the
people are so poor that they can not support a doctor and a parson.
In fact, all the clergymen of the established church are paid by the
government and are government officials. The members of their parishes
give them presents, something on the donation party order, because
their salaries are small, and if there happen to be rich men in the
parish, it is their custom to send around a handsome present to the
minister's wife or to himself on Christmas Day.

The Swedes have a short summer, and so far as possible spend it in the
open air. Every citizen of Stockholm who can afford it has a place in