You heard
no cries, scarcely a groan; whatever anguish wrung them as they were
lifted into their berths, or were turned or raised for comfort, found
little outward sign,--a long, gasping breath now and then; a suppressed
exclamation; sometimes a laugh, to cover what would else be a cry of
mortal agony; almost no swearing; these men had been too near the awful
realities of death and eternity, some of them were still too near, to
make a mock at either. Having demonstrated themselves heroes in action,
they would, one and all, be equally heroes in the hour of suffering, or
on the bed of lingering death.
Jim, so wounded as to make every movement a pang, had been carefully
carried in on a stretcher, and as carefully lifted into a middle berth.
"Good," said one of the men, as he eased him down on his pillow.
"What's good?" queried Jim.
"The berth; middle berth. Put you in as easy as into the lowest one: bad
lifting such a leg as yours into the top one, and it's the comfortablest
of the three when you're in."
"O, that's it, is it? all right; glad I'm here then; getting in didn't
hurt more than a flea-bite,"--saying which Jim turned his face away to
put his teeth down hard on a lip already bleeding. The wrench to his
shattered leg was excruciating, "But then," as he announced to himself,
"no snivelling, James; you're not going to make a spooney of yourself.
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