Of course, the answer was in the negative. Filled
with a thousand uneasy conjectures, the surgeon, without regarding, or
indeed without at all reflecting upon any dangers that might lie in his
way, strode over the ground at an enormous rate, to the point where he
knew the final struggle had been. Once before, the surgeon had rescued
his friend from death in a similar situation; and he felt a secret joy
in his own conscious skill, as he perceived Betty Flanagan seated on the
ground, holding in her lap the head of a man whose size and dress he
knew could belong only to the trooper. As he approached the spot, the
surgeon became alarmed at the aspect of the washerwoman. Her little
black bonnet was thrown aside, and her hair, which was already streaked
with gray, hung around her face in disorder.
"John! dear John!" said the doctor, tenderly, as he bent and laid his
hand upon the senseless wrist of the trooper, from which it recoiled
with an intuitive knowledge of his fate. "John! where are you hurt?--can
I help you?"
"Ye talk to the senseless clay," said Betty, rocking her body, and
unconsciously playing with the raven ringlets of the trooper's hair;
"it's no more will he hear, and it's but little will he mind yeer
probes and yeer med'cines. Och hone," och hone!--and where will be the
liberty now? or who will there be to fight the battle, or gain the day?"
"John!" repeated the surgeon, still unwilling to believe the evidence of
his unerring senses.
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