THE TEXAN HUNTRESS. 815 
dim—her face deathly’ pale, and dropping her rifle to the 
floor, she fell upon the body, clutching it convulsively about 
the neck. 
Now came the time for me to repay, in some measure at 
least, the kindness of this singular couple. They both lay 
stretched upon the floor insensible, and apparently dead. It 
was a horrid sight—for a moment I was stupefied as I gazed 
upon them—but the last few moments, in thoroughly rousing 
my whole life to new sensations, had learned me a stern lesson 
in presence of mind. I sprang first for some water, and 
dashed it into the faces of the motionless pair, and then 
kneeling beside them, rubbed their hands and feet with all 
my strength. It was but a little time before I convinced 
myself that neither one of them was yet dead. This relieved 
and encouraged me greatly, so that I urged my efforts to 
resuscitate them, and, after a few minutes more, commenced 
examining the old man’s body, to find and staunch the wound. 
TI had seen no blood as yet, and therefore supposed it must, 
of course, bleed internally, and consequently be fatal. What 
was my hopeful surprise to find that it was apparently a 
graze-shot—as the ball had ploughed up the flesh along the 
hinder part of the neck near the base of the skull; and as it 
was, evidently, not deep when I probed it with my finger, I 
came to the conclusion that the bone had been merely indented 
—not shattered—and that the spinal chord had been more 
paralyzed by the shock than seriously injured. Warmed still 
more pleasantly by this discovery, I rapidly staunched the 
blood, which had been running down inside the collar of his 
buckskin coat, and was, therefore, not visible. 
The wound of the woman was bleeding profusely. I soon 
found that it consisted of an ugly flesh wound in the right 
arm, which passed ‘through into the breast, but whether into 
the chest or not I could only conjecture—but hoped for the 
best, as I saw it, too, bled externally and freely. I staunched 
the wounds as well as my poor skill in surgery would admit. 
