"How'd you like to try your hand at giving an anæsthetic? I'll have a shot at surgery—I've never done it before. I'd like to see if I'm any good at it."
"Right you are," replied Captain Calthrop, "we'll change over."
"Jolly good idea," added Captain Wycherley at the next table, "we'll change over too."
"Right-o," said his anæsthetist.
And so the two anæsthetists operated and the two surgeons gave anæsthetics. It was, perhaps, rather a dangerous thing to do, but as the wounded men were only Germans it did not matter.
Captain Dowden took no part in this experiment. In fact he even suggested that it was "a bit thick," but his disapproval did not assume a more tangible form.
After finishing one case each, the four surgeons and anæsthetists changed back again.
"Surgery, isn't so bad as I thought it would be."
"Isn't it—you wait till you get an abdominal!"
"Giving an anæsthetic's rather a ticklish affair. I thought my man was going to choke to death, he got so blue in the face."