Page 263 - A Jacobite Exile

"Very well. Carry him to the camp, then. If he is alive, the general may
want to question him."

Seeing that he breathed, four of the Russian soldiers took him upon their

shoulders, and carried him away. The pain of his wound, caused by the
movement, was acute, but he retained consciousness until, after what
seemed to him a journey of immense length, he was again laid down on the

ground, close to a large fire. Several officers stood round him, and he
asked, first in Polish and then in Swedish, for water, and at the orders of

one who seemed of superior rank to the others, some was at once brought to
him.

"Your king treats his prisoners well," the officer said. "We will do
everything we can for you."

Half an hour later, a doctor came to his side, and cutting open his coat,
applied a bandage to his shoulder.

"Is it a serious wound?" Charlie asked in Swedish.

"It might be worse, but it will be a troublesome one; it is a sabre cut, and
has cleft right through your shoulder bone. Are you hurt anywhere else?"

"No, I do not think so. I was knocked down in the dark, and I believe

stunned, though I have a sort of recollection of being trampled on, and I
feel sore all over."

The surgeon felt his ribs and limbs, repeatedly asking him if it hurt him.
When he finished the examination, he said:

"You are doubtless badly bruised, but I don't think anything is broken. Our
Cossack horses are little more than ponies. Had they been heavy horse, they

would have trod your life out."

A few moments later there was a sound of trampling horses. They halted
close by. The officers drew back, and a moment later Marshal Scheremetof,