"I believe," said the groom, as he surveyed the trembling charger,
"that your son has broke the noo 'oss, sir, better nor I could 'ave
done myself."
"I believe that my son has broken his neck," said Mr. Kennedy
wrathfully. "Come here and help me to dig him out."
In a few minutes Charley was dug out, in a state of insensibility,
and carried up to the fort, where he was laid on a bed, and
restoratives actively applied for his recovery.
CHAPTER V.
Peter Mactavish becomes an amateur doctor; Charley promulgates his
views of tilings in general to Kate; and Kate waxes sagacious.
Shortly after the catastrophe just related, Charley opened his eyes
to consciousness, and aroused himself out of a prolonged fainting
fit, under the combined influence of a strong constitution and the
medical treatment of his friends.
Medical treatment in the wilds of North America, by the way, is very
original in its character, and is founded on principles so vague that
no one has ever been found capable of stating them clearly. Owing to
the stubborn fact that there are no doctors in the country, men have
been thrown upon their own resources, and as a natural consequence
_every_ man is a doctor. True, there _are_ two, it may be three, real
doctors in the Hudson's Bay Company's employment; but as one of these
is resident on the shores of Hudson's Bay, another in Oregon, and a
third in Red River Settlement, they are not considered available for
every case of emergency that may chance to occur in the hundreds of
little outposts, scattered far and wide over the whole continent of
North America, with miles and miles of primeval wilderness between
each.
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