"I learned very quickly that rural General Practice is the real sharp end of Medicine and not for the faint-hearted, even when you've managed to find your way to where you're needed in the pitch dark with the rain coming down faster than the wipers can cope with it."Thus, almost by chance, Doctor Hugh Alport and his GP wife Alice came to serve the rural folk of Ulster. Their experiences over the decades range from the hilarious to the horrific, and include the reclusive woman who shared her home with a flatulent horse, working by torchlight in small farms, poteen poisoning and the elderly inhabitant of the Witches' Cottage.