"I want you to sign this," said he.
The doctor scowled over the paper, got out his iron-bowed spectacles, adjusted them, and read aloud: "I, Justinus Emmons, practising doctor of medicine, do hereby declare that the death of Lot Gordon of Ware Centre will, when it takes place, be due to phthisis, and phthisis alone, and not in any degree, however small, to the wound inflicted by himself some months since.
And, furthermore, I declare that his death will follow from the natural progress of the disease of phthisis, which has not in any respect been accelerated by his self-inflicted wound." "You want me to sign this, do you ?" said the doctor.
"I will call in Margaret Bean and her husband for witnesses," said Lot.
"You think I am going to sign this ?" "I want it in addition to the certificate of the cause of death which you will have to make out after my decease.

'Tis an unnecessary formality, but I would have it so," Lot returned.
The doctor dashed the paper on the bed.

"If you think I am going to subscribe to a lie for you, or any other man, you're mistaken," he cried.

"It was enough for me to hold my tongue when you made that fool statement of yours that wouldn't have deceived a man with the brains of an ox." "My death will be due to phthisis; my left lung is almost consumed, and you know it," affirmed Lot.
"And I tell you," said the doctor, stoutly, "that your death from phthisis might not have occurred for ten years to come.

Does a tree die because half its boughs are gone?
When you die, you die of that wound.