"Excellent, Scalscope! Delightful! Where is she?"
At that moment a large Maltese cat, cognizant by some unknown instinct that she was the subject of this matutinal conversation, stalked slowly out of a patch of sunshine and rubbed herself between Sir Penniston's broadcloth-covered calves. The surgeon bent over and felt carefully of her foreleg, but the feline did not flinch; on the contrary, she screwed round her head and thrust it into the doctor's hand.
"Perfect!" exclaimed Sir Penniston, his face lighting with a smile of scientific satisfaction. "Absolutely perfect! Scalscope, you have lived to participate in the highest achievement of modern surgery! Is the patient in the operating room? Very good. The gentlemen assembled? Excellent! While you are administering the somni-chloride I will announce our success."
He bowed to the other assistants and, followed by the Marchioness of Cheshire, opened the door which led to the platform of the operating theater. Some dozen or fifteen professional-looking gentlemen rose as he made his appearance and bowed. A young woman with her arm in a sling sat by the table attended by a couple of women nurses.
"Good morning, gentlemen! Good morning!" remarked Sir Penniston. "Mr. Jermyn, will you kindly prepare the patient? My friends, I have the pleasure of being able to announce to you, and thus permitting you in a measure to share in, what I regard as the most extraordinary achievement of our profession."
A murmur of interest and appreciation made itself audible from the physicians who had resumed their seats upon the benches. If Sir Penniston regarded anything as remarkable, it must indeed be so, and they awaited his next words expectantly.
"The problem, gentlemen, of limb-grafting has been solved!" he announced modestly.
The assembled surgeons gazed at one another in amazement.
"You may perhaps recall," continued the baronet, "that it has for years been my particular hobby, or, I should more properly say, theory, that there was no reason in the world why, if a severed finger or a nose could be replaced by surgery, the same should not be true of a major part, such as a hand or leg; and why, if a limb once severed could be replaced upon its stump, another person's might not be used.
"Many gentlemen eminent in our profession, some of whom I believe I see before me, gave it as their opinion that such an operation was impossible. A few—and most of these, I regret to say, were upon the other side of the Atlantic—agreed with me that it could and would ultimately be accomplished. I studied the problem for years. Was it our inability to nourish a part once severed or so to reënervate it as to unite tendons, muscles, or bone? The latter surely gave no trouble. Tendons were sutured every day, and under favorable circumstances their functions were restored, while nerves were frequently sutured and functional restoration recorded.
"The question, therefore, seemed to narrow itself down to whether or not it was impossible to restore an arterial supply once cut off. Veins, of course, were frequently cut and sutured, and performed perfectly afterwards. Was there no way to restore an artery? In other words, could a limb once severed be sufficiently nourished to restore it? This, then, became my special study—a fascinating study indeed, involving as it did the possibilities of untold benefit to mankind."
Sir Penniston paused and glanced toward the table upon which was extended the now almost unconscious form of the patient. There was still plenty of time for him to conclude his remarks.
"With a view, therefore, to observing whether a thin glass tube would be tolerated in a sterilized state within an artery (the only possible means I could devise to allow a continued flow of blood and contemporaneous restoration), I made a number of half-inch pieces to suit the caliber of a dog's femoral, constricted them very slightly to an hour-glass shape, and smoothed their ends by heat, so that no surface roughness should induce clotting. Cutting the femorals across, I tied each end on the tube by a fine silk thread, and tied the thread ends together. Primary union resulted, and the dog's legs were as good as ever! The first step had been successfully accomplished."
The assembled surgeons clapped their hands faintly in token of appreciation, and one or two murmured, "My word!—Extraordinary!—Marvelous!" Sir Penniston bowed slightly and resumed:
"I now added one more step to my experiments. I dissected out the trachial artery and vein near the axilla of a dog's forelimb, and, holding these apart, amputated the limb through the shoulder muscles and sawed through the bone, leaving the limb attached only by the vessels. I then sutured the bone with a silver wire and the nerves with fine silk. Each muscle I sutured by itself with catgut, making a separate series of continuous suturing of the fascia lata and skin. The leg was then enveloped in sterilized dressing, a liberal use of iodoform gauze being the essential part. Over all, cotton and a plaster jacket were placed, leaving him three legs to walk on. The dog's leg united perfectly."
The assembled gentlemen broke into loud applause. The patient was lying motionless, her deep inspirations showing that she was under the anæsthetic. But Sir Penniston was now lost in the enthusiasm of his subject.
"Thus, gentlemen, I demonstrated that, if in an amputated limb an artery could be left, the limb would survive the division and reuniting of everything else, and had good ground for the belief that if an arterial supply could be restored to a completely amputated limb, that limb also might be grafted back to its original or to a corresponding stump.
"The final experiment only remained—the complete amputation of a limb and its restoration—a combination of all the others—difficult, dangerous, delicate—and requiring much preparation, assistance, and time. I finally selected a healthy cat, amputated its foreleg, inserted a glass tube in the artery, and sutured bone, muscles, nerves, and skin. Complete restoration occurred! And after four months you have here before you this morning the cat herself, fat, well, and strong, and as good as ever!—Here, kitty, kitty, kitty!"
The Marchioness of Cheshire ran quickly to Sir Penniston and leaped into his lap, while the gentlemen left the benches and hastened forward to seize the master's hand and to examine the cat in wonder.
"There is nothing, therefore, in the way of grafting which cannot be successfully undertaken. A human arm or leg crushed at thigh or shoulder, and requiring amputation, would admit of Esmarch's bandage being applied to expel its blood and of being used after amputation. Why not another man's blood as well as its owner's? No reason in the world! Had we here a suitable forearm ready to be applied I have no doubt but that I could successfully replace it upon the stump of the one I am now about to remove. Hereafter, so long as there are limbs enough to go round—so long as the demand does not transcend the supply—none of our patients need fear the permanent loss of a member!"
The surgeons overwhelmed him with their congratulations, but Sir Penniston modestly waived them aside. His triumph was the triumph of science—and its purity was not marred by any thought of personal glorification.
"The Crispan operation," some one whispered. The others caught it up. "The Crispan operation," they repeated. A slight look of gratification made itself apparent upon Sir Penniston's rosy countenance.
"Thank you, gentlemen! Thank you! Mr. Jermyn, is the patient quite ready? Yes? We will proceed, gentlemen. My instruments, if you please."
Among those who left the operating theater an hour later was Sir Richard Mortmain.
II
The opalescent light from the bronze electric lamp on the mahogany writing table disclosed two gentlemen, whose attitudes and expressions left no doubt as to the serious import of their discussion. At the same time the membra disjecta of afternoon tea which remained upon the teak tabaret, together with the still smoking butt of an Egyptian cigarette distilling its incense in a steadily perpendicular gray column toward the ceiling from a jade jar used as an ash receiver, showed that for one of them at least the situation had admitted of physical amelioration. The gentleman beside