“But it can’t be so hopeless here. You were with him and attended him from the first.”
“Yes; I have done all I can for him, poor fellow, and with his fine physique he may fight through it.”
“Would amputation have saved him?” asked Sir John.
“I do not believe it would have had any effect upon a wound like that, even if it had been performed ten minutes after the injury,” said the doctor. “The circulation is so rapid that the poison is running through the system at once, and to proceed to such an extremity seems to be giving the patient another terrible shock to fight against when his state is bad enough without.”
“Then you have done everything you can?”
“Everything. He is beyond human aid.”