Fig. 89. Squeezing out the Air from the Lungs. over the body with his elbows on his knees and hands extended, as illustrated in Fig. 88. Then I swung the arms up and back to the sides of the body, but just before the hands touched the ground Uncle Ed seized the body in both hands just below the ribs, and as soon as I touched the arms to the ground he swung forward with all his weight on his hands, squeezing the waist and pushing upward so as to force out the air in the chest. Then he slowly counted, one, two, three, four, all the time steadily increasing the pressure, until at the signal four, with a final push, he shoved himself to the first position, shown in Fig. 88. At the same signal I drew the arms up again over the head, and held them there while Uncle Ed again counted four; then I returned the arms to the sides, and Uncle Ed repeated the squeezing process. These movements were continued for about three minutes, and then Bill gave a short, faint gasp. We kept on with the artificial respiration, assisting the gasps, which gradually grew stronger, until they had deepened into steady breathing. Then we stripped off the wet bathing suit, and wrapping Bill in Uncle Ed’s clothing, laid him in the bottom of the boat. While Dutchy hurried the boat across, Uncle Ed rubbed the patient’s arms and legs. The rest of us swam over and ran for blankets from the tent. Bill was wrapped in one of the blankets and the other was used as a stretcher, on which we carried him to the tent. Then one of us was sent post-haste across to Lumberville for some whiskey, which was diluted in hot water and given the patient a teaspoonful at a dose, every fifteen minutes at first, and then at less frequent intervals. Uncle Ed kept Bill in bed all the next day for fear of congestion of the lungs. He told us that unless the patient kept perfectly quiet for a couple of days, he was liable to be seized with a sudden attack of hard breathing that might choke him to death in a short time. To stop such an attack he told us that the best plan was to apply a mustard plaster to the chest, and if the patient commenced to gasp, to start pumping the arms and squeezing the waist so as to help him breathe. After Bill had come around and was himself again Uncle Ed gave us a thorough drill in methods of restoring the drowned. He laid down on the grass and made us practise on him the various directions which he gave us.
How to Work Over a Patient Alone.
“If you boys hadn’t been so excited,” he said, “I would have made you rub Bill’s body and limbs while we were pumping the air into him, but I knew you would get in the way, and be more of a bother than a help. You must learn to be calm in any accident; excitement doesn’t pay. Keep steadily and slowly at your pumping, for you might have to do it for four hours before the patient comes to.” He taught us just how to swing the arms and squeeze the ribs to best advantage, and how to hold the tongue without getting in the way of the arms as they were pumped back and forth. There was also a special way of rubbing the arms and legs. The
Fig. 90. Working alone over a Patient. limbs were always rubbed upward, or toward the body, with the bare hands, or a dry cloth if there was one at hand, but this all had to be done without interfering with the pumping action. “If the patient doesn’t come around in five minutes,” he said, “turn him on his face again over the roll of clothing, or any other suitable substitute, and press out the water from the stomach, rolling him first to one side and then to the other; be sure to get all the water out.” When we had learned our lesson well, Uncle Ed took Dutchy for his patient, and proceeded to show us how a man could work over him alone. First he went through the operation of squeezing the water out of him, and drying his nose and mouth, much to the patient’s discomfort; then he drew Dutchy’s tongue out of the corner of his mouth, holding it there by closing the jaws on it, and holding the jaws together by passing a handkerchief over his chin and lapping it over his head. After that he began to pump, seizing the patient’s arms and swinging them up over the head and back, as before. Just as the arms were dropped back to the sides of the body, he squeezed them in against the ribs, at the same time drawing upward toward the head and counting four each time, as he had done before. But the lesson was abruptly interrupted by Dutchy, whose imagination was worked up to such a pitch that I actually believe he thought he had been drowning. Anyway, he squirmed out of Uncle Ed’s grasp, and wouldn’t play patient any longer. For several days after that we couldn’t persuade him to venture near deep water.
CHAPTER IX.
BRIDGE BUILDING.
Willow Clump Island was, for the most part, a trackless wilderness, and as soon as we had made our map we laid out roads to the different important points. Our main highway ran from Point Lookout to Tiger’s Tail. This road was made rather winding, to add to its picturesqueness, and from it a number of shorter roads branched off.
Spar Bridge.