NIGHT LANDING--CARRYING A WOUNDED PERSON--SETTING ONE'S OWN LIMBS WHEN BROKEN--SPLINTING A LIMB--REST TO THE WEARY
It was a picturesque scene as the raft drew near shore. The soft moonlight upon the bluff--the faint sparkle of the briny water broken by the oars--the lurid light from the resinous fire--the dark shadows and excited movements of Mary and Frank--formed altogether a group worthy of a painter's skill.
Frank could scarcely be restrained from rushing through the water to welcome the new comer; but when he heard how weak he was, and in what bad condition, he waited in quietness. Harold took him in his arms, and Robert made a stepping place for Mary with the oars, and they both shook hands with the poor fellow, and told him how sorry they were to see him so badly hurt.
Leaving Harold and Frank at the raft, Robert and Mary hastened to the tent to prepare a place for the invalid, that he need not be disturbed after being once removed. They lit a candle, piled the trunks in a corner of the room, and taking most of the moss that constituted their beds, laid it in another corner, remarking, "We can easily obtain more; or we can even sleep on the ground tonight, if necessary, for his sake."
"I wish we had an old door, or even a plank long enough for him to lie upon, as we bring him from the raft," said Robert, "it would be so much easier to his broken bones, if they could be kept straight. But the blanket is next best, and with that we must be content."
By the time the transfer was completed, the boys were exceedingly weary, having been disturbed all the preceding night, and engaged in vigorous and incessant effort ever since they arose from their short sleep. They sat for half an hour revelling in the luxury of rest. Sam appeared to suffer so much and to be so weak, that they discouraged him from talking, and took their own seats outside the tent, that he might be able to sleep.
"What have you done with the fawn, sister?" inquired Robert, willing to divert their minds from the painful thoughts that were beginning to follow the excitement of hearing from home.
"O, we fed it with sassafras leaves and grass," said she, "and gave it water. After that we sewed the torn skin to its place upon the neck, and it appears to be doing very well."
"You are quite a surgeon, cousin Mary," Harold remarked. "I think we shall have to call you our 'Sister of Mercy.' If, however, our handkerchiefs are still tied to it, I will suggest that it may be best for it, as well as for us, that you make a soft pad for its neck, and put on the dog's collar."
"We have done that already," she replied. "I thought of it as soon as we returned to the tent and saw the dog's chain. But as for my being a surgeon, it requires very little skill to know that the sooner a fresh wound is attended to, and the parts brought to the right place for healing the better."
"That is a fact," said Robert, starting, as a deep groan from the tent reached his ears; "and that reminds me that perhaps Sam is suffering at this moment for the want of having his bones set. We must attend to them at once."
"Set a broken arm and leg!" exclaimed Harold in surprise. "Why, Robert, do you know how to do it?"
"Certainly," he replied. "There is no mystery about it; and father, you know, teaches us children everything of the kind, as soon as we are able to learn it. I have never set the bones of a person, but I did once of a dog, and succeeded very well."
Harold asked him to describe the process. Robert replied, "If the bones appear to have moved from their proper place, all that you have to do is to pull them apart lengthways by main strength so that they will naturally slide together, or else can be made to do so by the pressure of your hand. Then you must bandage the limb with strips of cloth, beginning at its extremity, so as to keep the parts in place; and over this you must bind a splint, to keep the bone from being bent or jostled out of place. That is all."
They went into the tent, and made inquiry of Sam whether his bones did not need attention. He replied that maybe his leg was in need of setting, but that as for his arm he had sot that himself, and that it was in need only of splintering.
"You set it yourself! Why, how did you manage that?" inquired Robert.
"You remember, Mas Robbut, I bin hab my arm broke once befo'e; so I knowed jes what to do," replied Sam, and then he went on to describe his process. He said that finding the bones out of place, he had tied the hand of his broken arm to a root of the cedar, and strained himself back until the bones were able to pass, when he pressed them into place by means of his well hand.
After that he tore some strips from his clothing, and tied the hand over his breast, at the same time stuffing his bosom full of moss, to keep the bone straight, and over all passing a bandage, to keep the arm against his side. He had made a similar attempt to set the bone of his leg, but it pained him so much that he had given up the attempt.
On examination, Robert learned that the arm was broken between the elbow and shoulder, and that the leg was fractured between the knee and ankle. "The leg," said he, "is safe enough. Below the knee are two bones, and only one of these is broken. Would you like to have the bandage and splints put on your arm tonight?"
Sam replied that he was sure he should sleep better if Mas Robert was not too tired to attend to it, for he would be "mighty onrestless" while his bones were in that "fix."
The wearied boy pondered a moment, and asked his sister to tear one of the sheets or table-cloths into strips about as wide as her three fingers, and to sew the ends together, to make a bandage five or six yards long, while he and Harold prepared the splints. They then went to the palmetto tree, half a mile distant, and selecting one of the broadest and straightest of its flat, polished limbs, returned to the tent, and produced from it a lath about the length of the arm. Having bandaged the limb from the finger-ends to the shoulder, they bound it to this splint, which extended from the armpit to the extremity, and Robert pronounced the operation complete.
Sam was profuse in his praise of Robert's surgery, bestowing upon it every conceivable term of laudation, and seeming withal to be truly grateful. "Tankee, Mas Robert! Tankee, Mas Harold! Tankee, my dear little misses! Tankee, Mas Frank too! Tankee, ebbery body! I sure I bin die on dat sand-bank, 'sept you all bin so kind to de poor nigger."
"No more of that, Sam," said Robert, "you were hurt in trying to help us; it is but right we should help you."
At the close of this scene, the young people prepared for bed. It was past ten o'clock, and they were sadly in need of rest; but so strongly had their sympathies been excited for their black friend, that even little Frank kept wide awake, waiting his turn to be useful. When, however, their work was done, and they had lain down to rest, they needed no lullaby to hush them into slumber. Within twenty minutes after the light was extinguished, and during the livelong night, nothing was to be heard in that tent but the hard breathing of the wearied sleepers. Thanks to God for sleep! None but the weary know its blessedness.