As we have said, Don Miguel Ortega, saved by the tried courage and presence of mind of the two wood rangers, was carried by them to the foot of a tree, beneath which they laid him.
The young man had fainted. The hunters' first care was to examine his wounds: he had two, one on the right arm, the other on the head, but neither of them was dangerous. The wound in the arm bled profusely, a bullet had torn the flesh, but had produced no fracture of the bone, or any grave accident; as for the wound in the head, evidently produced by a sharp instrument, the hair had already matted over it, and checked the haemorrhage.
Don Miguel's faintness was produced by the loss of blood in the first place, and next by the nervous excitement of a long and obstinate struggle, and the immense amount of strength he had been compelled to expend to resist the numerous enemies who had treacherously attacked him.
The wood rangers, owing to the life they led, and the innumerable accidents to which they are constantly exposed, are obliged to possess some practical knowledge of medicine, and particularly of surgery. Pupils of the Redskins, simples play a great part in their medical system. Brighteye and Marksman were masters of the art of treating wounds summarily, after the Indian fashion. After carefully washing the wounds, and removing the hair from that on the head, they plucked oregano leaves, formed them into a species of cataplasm, by slightly moistening them with spirits diluted in water, and applied this primitive remedy to the wounds, fastening it on with leaves of the abanigo, cut into strips, round which they wound aloe threads. Then, with the blade of a knife, they slightly opened the wounded man's tightly closed jaws, and poured a few drops of spirits into his mouth. In a few moments Don Miguel half opened his eyes, and a fugitive glow coloured his pallid cheeks.
The hunters, with their hands crossed on the muzzles of their rifles, carefully inspected the wounded man's face, trying to read on his features the probable results of the means they had thought it necessary to employ, in order to relieve him.
The man who recovers from a deep fainting fit is not at the first moment conscious of external objects, nor does he remember what has happened: the equilibrium of his faculties, suddenly interrupted by the successive blows they have experienced, is only re-established slowly and gradually, in proportion as the eye grows brighter, the memory clearer. Don Miguel looked around him with a glance that contained no warmth or expression, and almost immediately closed his eyes again, as if already wearied by the effort he had been forced to make in opening them.
"In a few hours his strength will be restored, and before three days there will not be a trace of it," Brighteye said, tossing his head sententiously. "By Jove! he is one of those sturdy fellows I like."
"Is he not?" Marksman answered,—"so young and so valiant? What a rude attack he sustained."
"Yes, and bravely, we must say; still, for all that, if we had not been there, he would have found it difficult to get out of the scrape."
"He would have perished, there is not the least doubt of it, and that would have been unfortunate."