"I see two chaps who were bit by snakes out in 'Stralia, gentlemen," said Dan, "and one of them died; and they said that if there had been someone there who had known how to cut his arm off so as he shouldn't bleed to death, it would have saved his life." "Kept the pison from running right through him, mate," growled Buck, with a look of sympathy at the injured lad. "That's so, messmate," continued Dan; "but they sucked t'other one where he was stung for ever so long. He got better." "Now, then," said the doctor sharply, "no more anecdotes, if you please;" and as he spoke he made a slight cut across the speck-like puncture with the keen-pointed lancet, so that the blood started out in a pretty good-sized bead. "Hurt you, my lad?" he asked, while Dean looked on in horror. "Just a little," said Mark. "But hadn't you better do more than that?" "No," said the doctor coolly. "There is a little poison there, and the bleeding will relieve it. It has begun to fester." "What, so soon?" said Sir James. "Yes," was the calm reply. "Now, Dean, I must come to you for another of your surgical instruments--the tweezers." "Yes," cried the boy excitedly; and in his hurry he broke his thumb nail in drawing the tweezers out of the haft of the knife, for the instrument was a little rusted in. "Now," said the doctor, as he pressed the two little spring sides of the tweezers right down into the cut and got hold of something. "Oh! hurts!" cried Mark. "Yes, but it would have hurt more if I had taken your finger off," said the doctor, laughing. "There we are," he continued, as he drew out a sharp glistening point and held it up in the sun. "There's your snake sting, my boy, and the little cut will soon heal up. There, suck the wound a little yourself, and draw out the poison." "But, doctor," cried Sir James, "surely a venomous snake injects the poison through hollow fangs. Are you sure that that is a tooth?" "No, sir," said the doctor. "That is the point of one of those exceedingly sharp thorns that we are so infested with here. Look at it;" and he held out the tweezers for everyone to examine the point. "It's a false alarm, Mark, my lad. I can see no sign of any snake bite." "But I felt it!" cried Mark, as he stared at the thorn. "I can't see any mark, and if the snake did bite it was only a prick with one of its tiny sharp teeth. Look, Sir James; you see there's no sign of any swelling, and no discoloration such as I believe would very soon appear after the injection of venom." "But what's that?" said Sir James anxiously, pointing. "That? That's a thorn prick," said the doctor. "Well, but that?" "That's the stain from some crushed leaf." "Well, that, then?" cried Sir James angrily at finding the doctor so ready to give explanations to his doubts. "That's another prick." "Tut, tut, tut! Well, that?" "That's a scratch." "Well, that, then?" cried Sir James, almost fiercely. "There's the discoloration you said would appear."