is arms, entered it with me, and ordering a mattress to be
brought, placed him on it, shouting out--

"Be quick, now; fetch a doctor, some of you!"

My countrymen, though willing enough to crack each others' pates, are
quite as ready to help a fellow-creature in distress; and, as my uncle
spoke, two, if not three, of the bystanders hurried off to obey his
order.

Meanwhile, the stable-boy having taken our horses, my uncle and I did
our best to resuscitate our unfortunate follower. His countenance was
pale as a sheet, except where the streaks of blood had run down it; his
hair was matted, and an ugly wound was visible on his head. On taking
off his handkerchief, I discovered a black mark on his neck, which
alarmed me more than the wound. I fully believed that my poor
foster-brother was dead.

Scarcely a minute had elapsed before two persons rushed into the room;
one short and pursy, the other tall and gaunt, both panting as if they
had run a race.

"I have come at your summons, sir!" exclaimed the tall man.

"And shure, so have I! and was I not first in the room?" cried the
second.

"In that, Doctor Murphy, you are mistaken!" exclaimed the tall man, "for
didn't I put my head over your shoulder as we came through the door?"

"But my body was in before yours, Mr O'Shea; and I consider that you
are bound to give place to a doctor of medicine!"

"But this appears to me to be a surgical case," said the tall man; "and
as the head, as all will allow, is a more honourable part of the body
than the paunch, I claim to be the first on the field; and, moreover, to
have seen the patient before you could possibly have done so, Doctor
Murphy. Sir," he continued, stalking past his brother practitioner, and
making a bow with a battered hat to the major, "I come, I presume, on
your summons, to attend to the injured boy; and such skill as I
possess--and I flatter myself it's considerable--is at your service.
May I ask what is the matter with him?"

"Here's a practitioner who doesn't know what his patient is suffering
from by a glance of the eye!" cried the doctor of medicine. "Give
place, Mr O'Shea, to a man of superior knowledge to yourself,"
exclaimed Doctor Murphy. "It's easy enough to see with half a glance
that the boy has broken his neck, and by this time, unless he possesses
a couple of spines,--and I never knew a man have more than one,
though,--he must be dead as a door nail!"

"Dead!" cried Mr O'Shea; "the doc