The Mesmerist's Victim

“Proceed,” repeated Balsamo with the manner of an inspired prophet.

Mastered as Marat and the patient had been and as all the rest were, the surgeon put the knife edge to the flesh: it “squeaked” literally at the cut, but the patient did not flinch or utter a sigh.

“What countryman are you, friend?” asked the mesmerist.

“From Brittany, my lord.”

“Do you love your country?”

“Ay, it is such a fine one,” and he smiled.

Meanwhile the operator was making the circular incisions which are the preliminary steps in amputations to lay the bone bare.

“Did you leave it when early in life?” continued Balsamo.

“I was only ten years old, my lord.”

The cuts being made, the surgeon applied the saw to the gash.

“My friend,” said Balsamo, “sing me that song the saltmakers of Batz sing on knocking off work of an evening. I only remember the first line which goes:

‘Hail to the shining salt!’”

The saw bit into the bone: but at the request of the magnetiser, the patient smilingly commenced to sing, slowly and melodiously like a lover or a poet:

“Hail to the shining salt,
Drawn from the sky-blue lake:
Hail to the smoking kiln,
And my rye-and-honey cake!
Here comes wife and dad,
And all my chicks I love:
All but the one who sleeps,
Yon, in the heather grove.
Hail! for there ends the day,
And to my rest I come:
After the toil the pay;
After the pay, I’m home.”

The severed limb fell on the board, but the man was still singing. He was regarded with astonishment and the mesmeriser with admiration. They thought both were insane. Marat repeated this impression in Balsamo’s ear.

“Terror drove the poor lad out of his wits so that he felt no pain,” he said.

“I am not of your opinion,” replied the Italian sage: “far from having lost his wits, I warrant that he will tell us if I question him, the day of his death if he is to die; or how long his recovery will take if he is to get through.”

Marat was now inclined to share the general opinion that his friend was mad, like the patient.

In the meantime the surgeon was taking up the arteries from which spirted jets of blood.

Balsamo took a phial from his pocket, let a few drops fall on a wad of lint, and asked the chief surgeon to apply this to the cut. He obeyed with marked curiosity.

He was one of the most celebrated operators of the period, truly in love with his science, repudiating none of its mysteries, and taking hazard as the outlet to doubt. He clapped the plug to the wound, and the arteries seared up, hissing, and the blood came through only drop by drop. He could then tie the grand artery with the utmost facility.

Here Balsamo obtained a true triumph, and everybody wanted to know where he had studied and of what school he was.

“I am a physician of the University of Gottingen,” he replied, “and I made the discovery which you have witnessed. But, gentlemen and brothers of the lancet and ligature, I should like it kept secret, as I have great fear of being burnt at the stake, and the Parliament of Paris might once again like the spectacle of a wizard being so treated.”

The head surgeon was brooding; Marat was dreaming and reflecting. But he was the first to speak.

“You asserted,” he said, “that if this man were interrogated about the result of his operation he would certainly tell it though it is in the womb of the future?”

“I said so: what is the man’s name?”

“Havard.”

Balsamo turned to the patient, who was still humming the lay.

“Well, friend, what do you augur about our poor Havard’s fate?” he asked.

“Wait till I come back from Brittany, where I am, and get to the Hospital where Havard is.”

“Of course. Come hither, enter, and tell me the truth about him.”

“He is in a very bad way; they have cut off his leg. That was neatly done, but he has a dreadful strait to go through; he will have fever to-night at seven o’clock – ”

The bystanders looked at each other.

“This fever will pull him down; but I am sure he will get through the first fit.”

“And will be saved?”

“No: for the fever returns and – poor Havard! he has a wife and little ones!”

His eyes filled with tears.

“His wife will be left a widow and the little ones orphans?”

“Wait, wait – no, no!” he cried, clasping his hands. “They prayed so hard for him that their prayers have been granted.”

“He will get well?”

“Yes, he will go forth from here, where he came five days ago, a hale man, two months and fifteen days after.”

“But,” said Marat, “incapable of working and consequently to feed his family.”

“God is good and he will provide.”

“How?” continued Marat: “while I am gathering information, I may as well learn this?”