THE ADVENTURES OF DEMO.-
CEDES.

Wuen Pythagoras, the celebrated Greek philoso-
pher, settled in the ancient Italian city of Crotona
(between 550 and 520 B.c.) there was living in that
town a youthful surgeon who was destined to have
a remarkable history. Democedes by name, the son
of a Crotonian named Calliphon, he strongly inclined
while still a mere boy to the study of medicine and
surgery, for which arts that city had then a reputa-
tion higher than any part of Greece.

The boy had two things to contend with, the hard
study in his chosen profession and the high temper
of his father. The latter at length grew unbear-
able, and the youthful surgeon ran away from home,
making his way to the Greek island of gina.
Here he began to practise what he had learned at
home, and, though he was very poorly equipped with
the instruments of his profession, he proved far abler
and more successful than the surgeons whom he
found in that island. So rapid, indeed, was his
progress that his first year’s service brought him an
offer from the citizens of Aigina to remain with them
for one year, at a salary of one talent,—the Aiginetan
talent being nearly equal to two thousand dollars.
The next year he spent at Athens, whose people had

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