this operation indispensable?"
"It is: we have already lost too much time."
"Then perform it. God grant you may succeed!"
The girl's leg was horribly swollen; the part round the serpent's bite, terribly tumefied, was already taking a greenish hue.
"Alas," muttered the unknown, "there is not a moment to spare. Hold the child so that she cannot stir while I perform the operation."
In these last words the voice of the unknown had assumed such an accent of command, that the strangers obeyed without hesitation.
The former seated himself on the ground, took the limb of the girl upon his knee, and made his preparations. Luckily the moon shone at this moment so clearly, that her vivid rays flooded the landscape, and everything was almost as visible as in broad daylight.
When the girl had first felt the bite, she had immediately, and happily for herself, torn off her silk stocking. The unknown grasped the blade of his knife an inch from the point, and, lowering his brow with terrible determination, buried the point in the wound, and made a cruciform incision about six lines deep, and more than an inch long.
The poor child must have felt terrible anguish; for she gave utterance to a dreadful scream, and twisted herself about nervously.
"Hold her tight, cuerpo de Cristo!" shouted the unknown in a voice of thunder, while with admirable coolness and skill he pressed the lips of the wound, so as to force out the black and decomposing blood it contained; "And now the leaves – the leaves!"
The peon ran up.
The unknown took the leaves, parted asunder the lips of the wound, and gently, carefully expressed their juice on the palpitating flesh. Making a kind of plaster of the same leaves, he applied it to the wound, tied it down firmly with a bandage, placed the foot carefully on the ground, and rose.
As soon as a certain quantity of the sap of the creeper had fallen upon the wound, the girl had seemed to experience a sensation of great relief; the nervous spasms began to abate; she closed her eyes; and finally she leaned back without attempting to struggle any longer with the persons who held her in their arms.
"You may leave her now," whispered the unknown; "she is asleep."
In fact, the regular though feeble breathing of the patient proved her to be plunged in a profound slumber.
"God be praised!" exclaimed the poor father, clasping his hands in ecstasy; "Then she is really saved?"
"She is," answered the unknown leisurely; "bating unforeseen accidents, she has nothing more to fear."
"But what is the extraordinary remedy you have employed to obtain such a happy result?"
The unknown smiled with disdain, and did not seem willing to reply; however, after a short hesitation, yielding perhaps to that secret vanity which induces us all to make a parade of our wisdom, he decided upon giving the information demanded.
"The pettiest things astonish you fellows who dwell in cities," said he ironically; "the man who has passed his whole life in the wilderness knows many things of which the inhabitants of your brilliant towns are ignorant, although, with the sole aim of humiliating, they take pleasure in parading their false science before us poor savages. Nature hides not the secret of her mysterious harmonics from him who ceaselessly pries into the darkness of night and the brightness of day, with a patience beyond proof, without suffering himself to be discouraged by failure. The sublime Architect, when he had created this immense universe, did not let it fall from his omnipotent hands until it had been made perfect, nor till the amount of good should counterbalance everywhere the amount of evil – placing, so to say, the antidote side by side with the poison."
The stranger listened with increasing surprise to the words of this man, whose real character was an enigma to him, and who at every moment showed himself in lights diametrically opposed, and under forms entirely distinct.
"But," continued the unknown, "pride and presumption make man blind. Accustomed to make all things bear upon himself, imagining that all existence has been specially created for his convenience, he takes no pains to study the secrets of nature further than they seem to have a direct influence on his personal welfare, not caring to make inquiry into her simplest actions. So, for instance, the region in which we now are, being low and marshy, is naturally infested with reptiles, which are so much the more dangerous and to be dreaded, because they are half-calcined and rendered furious by the rays of a torrid sun. Therefore provident nature has produced in abundance throughout these same regions a creeper called mikania– the one I have just used – which is an infallible remedy for the bites of serpents."
"I cannot doubt it, after having witnessed its efficacy; but how were the virtues of this creeper discovered?" said the stranger, involuntarily interested in the highest degree.
"A hunter of the woods," continued the unknown, with a certain self-complacency, "observed that the black falcon, better known as the guaco, a bird which feeds chiefly upon reptiles, takes special delight in exterminating serpents. This hunter had also observed that if, during the struggle, the serpent contrived to wound the guaco, the latter immediately retired from the combat, and flying to the mikania, tore off a few leaves, which it bruised in its beak. It afterwards returned to the fight more resolute than ever, until it had vanquished its redoubtable enemy. The hunter was an astute man, and of great experience; one who knew that animals, being devoid of reason, are more especially under the providence of God, and that all their actions proceed from laws laid down at the beginning. After mature reflection, he resolved to test his experience upon himself."
"And did he execute his project?" cried the stranger.
"He did. He let a coral snake bite him, the deadliest of all; but, thanks to the mikania, the bite proved as harmless to him as the prick of a thorn. That is the manner in which this precious remedy was discovered. But," added the unknown, suddenly changing his tone, "I have complied with your wishes in bringing help to your daughter; she is safe. Adieu! I may stay no longer."
"You must not go before you have told me your name."
"What good will this pertinacity do you?"
"I wish to embalm the name in my memory as that of a man to whom I have vowed a gratitude which will only end with my life."
"You are mad!" rudely answered the unknown. "It is useless to pronounce to you a name which you will very likely learn but too soon."
"Let it be so; I will not persist, nor ask the reasons which compel you to act thus. I will not seek to learn it in despite of you; but, if you refuse to teach me your name, you cannot prevent my making you acquainted with my own – I am called Don Pedro de Luna. Although until today I have never penetrated thus far into the prairies, my residence is not very far off. I am proprietor of the Hacienda de las Norias de San Antonio, close to the frontiers of the Despoblado, near the embouchure of the Rio San Pedro."
"I know the Hacienda de las Norias de San Antonio. Its owner ought to belong to the happy ones of earth, according to the opinion of those who dwell in cities. So much the better: if it does belong to you, I do not envy riches with which I should not know what to do. Now, you have nothing more to say, have you? Well, then, adieu!"
"What! Adieu! You will leave us?"
"Certainly; do you think I intend to remain all night with you?"
"I hoped, at least, you would not leave unfinished the work you
