The
apparatus described in the case of the young officer was ready, and the
house-physician was waiting to give his assistance. The stimulation of
Will and Electricity was applied to resuscitate the patient--but with
the smallest success: there was only a faint flutter, a passing slight
rigidity of the muscles, and all seemed again as it had been. The
exhausting nature of the operation or experiment forbade its immediate
repetition. Disappointment pervaded the doctor's being, though it did
not appear in the doctor's manner.
"We'll try again in half an hour," said he to his assistant, and turned
away to complete his round of the ward.
At the end of the half-hour, Lefevre and the house-physician were again
by Lady Mary's bedside. Again, with fine but firm touch, Lefevre stroked
nerves and muscles to stimulate them into normal action; again he and
his assistant put out their electrical force through the electrode; and
again the result was nothing but a passing galvanic quiver. The doctor,
though he maintained his professional calm, was smitten with alarm,--as
a man is who, walking through darkness and danger to the rescue of a
friend, finds himself stopped by an unscalable wall.
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