OCR Text |
Show ion JTCatijafaiCHE twenty students of yEsculapius (history tells us there were but twenty) had wandered upon the face of the earth for centuries, seeking a place where they could peacefully follow the divine teachings of their beloved Master. Their bodies had shrunken and dried away until only the skeletons remained. As skeletons then, they had to exist, invisible to men, until they could have access to properly equipped laboratories and the necessary drugs to restore them. The first opportunity which they thought worthy of their consideration came when the Medic Department of the U. of U. began to be. Anxiously they waited and watched progress.Even before laboratories were completed, however, several important mass meetings were held in the Museum Building, after the janitor had closed up, and the shades of evening were closing down. On November 9, 1906, wrapped in thin black shrouds, they crept through transoms and windows into the Lab. and seated themselves upon the tops of the disarranged desks,- in darkness, except for a sickly phosphorescent glow from the eye sockets of each, and in perfect silence. The night watchman came along the hall and startled them. They sprang to the floor with a rattle of dry bones. The watchman had duties elsewhere. In silence they resumed their places. At last a thin, high voice proposed that the disciples organize, as was the custom among modern people.So it was that, by December 18, the ^Esculapion Mathatai (Disciples of the God of Medicine) came into existence, with a Constitution.and permanent officers. The Labs, were soon completed and with weird ceremonies and ill-smelling solutions, each disciple was restored to flesh and registered regularly at the University. But at frequent intervals these strange beings, in black89 |