Doctor Kline was holding the head and shoulders of the patient in such a way as to give tension to all the vessels of the neck, while my assistant held open the lips of the wound, so that I could see well into the cavity.
"My hand did not recover its steadiness.

As I began cutting down to find the artery I seemed suddenly to be smitten with blindness and to lose a clear perception of what I was doing.

It seemed as if some malignant spirit had for the moment got possession of me, coming in through the disorder wrought in my nervous system by over stimulation, and used the hand I could no longer see to guide the instrument I was holding, for death instead of life.

I remember now that a sudden impulse seemed given to my arm as if some one had struck it a blow.
Then a sound which it had never before been my misfortune to hear--and I pray God I may never hear it again--startled me to an agonized sense of the disaster I had wrought.

Too well I knew the meaning of the lapping, hissing, sucking noise that instantly smote our ears.