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66 ANCIENT TIMES.
attending it, calls in other doctors so that he may confer
with them and place on a firmer basis the treatment for
the relief of the patient."*
Many doctors practised not only at their own place of
residence but even undertook journeys for this purpose.
On these occasions they took instruments with them which
were of simple manufacture and easy to carry, t The
doctors were entitled to demand a fee for services rendered
to patients. J But the Hippokratic author exhorts them " to
allow themselves to be influenced only by the motive of
gaining in this way a greater opportunity for improving
their knowledge. They were also to conduct themselves
in this respect in not too sordid a spirit, but to consider the
means and position of the patient, sometimes indeed to
afford gratuitous aid and to consider that the recollection
of a good deed is of more value than a temporary profit.
The opportunity should not be neglected of helping a
stranger or a poor man, for a love for humanity goes hand
in hand with a love for knowledge." §
Quite at an early period the practice of paying doctors
out of public funds was instituted, the obligation being
laid on them of treating patients without further charge.
This regulation must have existed before CHARONDAS (7th
century B.C.).|| In any case it was, an ancient institution,
and DEMOKEDES who was mentioned in the preceding
chapter affords a well-known instance of it from the sixth .
century B.C. for he, before coming to Darius, had been district
medical officer in ^Egina with the yearly pay of a talent, was
then appointed to a similar post in Athens with a salary of
one hundred minae, and was called thence to Samos by POLY-
KRATES, who settled upon him the salary of two talents.^f
* HIPPOKRATES op. cit. T. ix, 260, 262.
t HIPPOKRATES op, cit. T. ix, 236.
X PLATO : Politikos, c. 37.—ARISTOTLE : Rep. iii, 16.—XENOPHON : Memorabil.
i, 2, 54.—PLINIUS: Hist. Nat. xxix, 2.
§ HIPPOKRATES op. cit. T. ix, 258.
|| Diodor. xii, 13.
% Herodot. iii, 131.