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2 intentionally. I am sorry to say that a student of the high
3 college died in consequence of an operation performed by me.
4 My enemies, however, could do me no harm, as I had effected
5 several important cures, among which was that of the Emir
6 himself, whom I recovered from a gastric-bilious fever. The
7 unfortunate operation was the extraction of a stone from the
8 bladder ; and the proverb is true, which says — “ Non est in
9 medico semper relevetur ut aeger , interdum docta plus valet
10 arte malum? I had a presentiment on that occasion that I should
11 not succeed in the operation ; the patient was already so weak-
12 ened and enervated, that I felt no wish to operate on him, and
13 yielded only to the request of the minister, who told me that the
14 student was about to kill himself in despair, in case I persisted in
15 my refusal. To secure myself from reproach, should the operation
16 happen to fail, I caused a document to be drawn up, with the
17 signatures of the patient and his brother, declaring me not be
18 responsible for the result of the operation, as I undertook it only
19 because they insisted on my doing so. This document was legal-
20 ised by the seals of the emir, minister, and judge. I performed
21 the operation in the presence of several witnesses, whom I invited
22 for the purpose, among whom there were several hakims. The
23 extraction of the stone was performed in one of the apartments
24 of the high college. Fortunately I used the apparatus altus, or
25 I should certainly not have been able to extract it. The patient
26 behaved very quietly during the operation, which was more than
27 I had expected, and said nothing but “ Ya Allah ! Ya Allah ! ”
28 (O God ! O God !) To my grief, and to the surprise of all
29 present, the stone was found to be immoveable, having grown
30 into the substance of the bladder, in such a manner that I have
31 never seen or heard of a similar case. The reader may imagine
32 the difficulty, when, while such operations usually occupy only
33 two or three minutes, I was fully five and twenty minutes en-
34 gaged in loosening with the fingers of both hands the stone, which
35 had upwards of twenty points, every one of which resembled
36 a thick apple-stalk, half-an-inch long. The size of the calculus,
37 however, did not surpass that of a hen's egg, and it was as white