slowly emptied its contents into the region that immediately
surrounds the spinal cord.

For a few minutes the child retained his sitting posture as if
nothing extraordinary had happened. Dr. Jonnesco patted him on the
back and said a few pleasant words in French, while the nurses and
assistants chatted amiably in English.

"How do you feel now?" the attending surgeon asked, after the lapse
of three or four minutes.

"All right," replied the boy animatedly, "'cept that my legs feel
like they was going to sleep."

The nurses now laid the patient down upon his back, throwing a
handkerchief over his eyes, so that he could not himself witness the
subsequent proceedings. There was, naturally, much holding of breath
as Dr. Virgil P. Gibney, the operating surgeon, raised his knife and
quickly made a deep incision in the heel of this perfectly conscious
patient. From the child, however, there was not the slightest
evidence of sensation.

"Didn't you feel anything, my boy?" asked Dr. Gibney, pausing.

"No, I don't feel nothin'," came the response from under the
handkerchief.

An operation lasting nearly half an hour ensued. The deepest tissues
were cut, the tendons were stretched, the incision was sewed up, all
apparently without the patient's knowledge.