'It is,' replied Berry. 'The thigh should be pulled up more. Rhodes, instead of sending you up there again, to straddle over this poor fellow, we'd better put you at the halyards, and let Featherbody mount the rostrum.'
'It will take nothing less than the devil or a handspike to lift it out. My handkerchief around the upper end of the thigh was a point d'appui to the bodies of four mortal surgeons, and served as a pivot to balance two of them on his extremities, and two at his head.'
'Faith, you did resemble Jupiter, weighing the ponderous merits of the adverse parties; and 'long time in even scale the doctors hung;' but —— seemed inclined to kick the beam.'
'Do you observe,' said Berry, 'the doctor himself looks a little puzzled? J—— and D—— are no better off. I thought —— would break the femur more than once.'
'That bone is just at this time encased in an impenetrable mail of rigid muscles. If you broke that, you would break an iron bar of equal size,' replied Parcels.
'In truth,' said Berry, 'the relaxing medicines and bleeding seem to have had little effect in weakening them. How much blood did you take, Parcels, before he was brought in?'
'Two pounds.'
'He has lost two here, and I should think he might spare a couple more.'
'Yes, and two more added to them, before the bone would be in its place,' remarked Parcels.
'You have no faith in nauseating mixtures, and debilitating remedies?'