his
Scotch brigade. He was known to many of the officers personally, and no
time was lost in attending to him. He was nearly unconscious again by
the time that he reached the camp, for the movement had caused the wound
in his body to break out afresh.

His armour was at once unbuckled, and his clothes having been cut the
surgeons proceeded to examine his wounds. They shook their heads as
they did so. Passing a probe into the wound they found that the ball,
breaking one of the ribs in its course, had gone straight on. They
turned him gently over.

"Here it is," the surgeon said, producing a flattened bullet. The
missile indeed had passed right through the body and had flattened
against the back piece, which its force was too far spent to penetrate.

"Is the case hopeless, doctor?" one of the officers who was looking on
asked.

"It is well nigh hopeless," the doctor said, "but it is just possible
that it has not touched any vital part. The lad is young, and I judge
that he has not ruined his constitution, as most of you have done, by
hard drinking, so that there is just a chance for him. There is nothing
for me to do but to put a piece of lint over the two holes, bandage it
firmly, and leave it to nature. Now let me look at his arm.

"Ah!" he went on as he examined the wound, "he has had a narrow escape
here. The ball has cut a vein and missed the principal artery by an
eighth of an inch. If that had been cut he would have bled to death in
five minutes. Evidently the lad has luck on his side, and I begin to
think we may save him if we can only keep him quiet."

At the earnest request of the surgeons tents were brought up and a
hospital established on some rising ground near the field of battle for
the serious cases among the wounded, and when the army marched away
to join the Saxons at Leipzig a brigade was left encamped around the
hospital.

Here for three weeks Malcolm lay between life and death. The quantity of
blood he had lost was greatly in his favour, as it diminished the risk
of inflammation, while his vigorous constitution and the life of fatigue
and activity which he had led greatly strengthened his power. By a
miracle the bullet in its passage had passed through without injuring
any of the vital parts; and though his convalescence was slow it was
steady, and even at the end of the first week the surgeons were able to
pronounce a confident opinion that he would get over it.

But it was not until the e