Another witness was Gergen, the surgeon, a young man with eye-glasses, a tiny gold chain, and a scant black beard trimmed closely to his pale skin and pointed after the French fashion. He retained his overcoat and kept on his glasses while he testified, as if he must get through with this business and return to his practice as quickly as possible. With the greatest care he couched all his testimony in scientific phrases. "I was summoned to the hospital," he said, "at seven-sixteen on that evening and found the patient prostrated by hemorrhage and shock. I supplemented the superficial examination of the internes and found that there were contusions on the left hip, and severe bruises on the entire left side. The most severe injury, however, developed in the right foot. The tibiotarsal articulation was destroyed, the calcaneum and astragalus were crushed and inoperable, the metatarsus and phalanges, and the internal and external malleolus were also crushed, and the fibula and tibia were splintered to the knee." "Well, what then?" "I gave orders to have the patient prepared, and proceeded to operate. My assistant, Doctor Remack, administered the anesthetic, and I amputated at the lower third." Doctor Gergen then explained that what he had said meant that he had found Koerner’s foot, ankle and knee crushed, and that he had cut off his leg above the knee. After this he told what fee he had charged; he did this in plain terms, calling dollars dollars, and cents cents. But Koerner himself was a sufficient witness in his own behalf. Sitting on the stand, his crutches in the hollow of his arm, the stump of his leg thrust straight out before him and twitching now and then, he told of his long service with the railroad, pictured the blinding snow-storm, described how he had slipped and caught his foot in the unblocked frog--then the switch-engine noiselessly stealing down upon him. The jurymen roused from their lethargy as he turned his white and bony face toward them; the atmosphere was suddenly charged with the sympathy these aged men felt for him. Sharlow paused in his writing, the clerk ceased from his monotonous work, and Mrs. Koerner, whose expression had not changed, wiped her eyes with the handkerchief which, fresh from the iron, she had held all day without unfolding. When Ford began his cross-examination, Koerner twisted about with difficulty in his chair, threw back his head, and his face became hard and obdurate. He ran his stiff and calloused hand through his white hair, which seemed to bristle with leonine defiance. Ford conducted his cross-examination in soft, pleasant tones, spoke to Koerner kindly and with consideration, scrupulously addressed him as "Mr. Koerner," and had him repeat all he had said about his injury. "As I understand it, then, Mr. Koerner," said Ford, "you were walking homeward at the end of the day through the railroad yards." "Yes, sir, dot’s right." "You’d always gone home that way?"