The window of the workshop--opening to the ground--gave us admission as the rector had foretold.

We entered the room.
There he lay--poor harmless, unlucky Oscar--senseless, in a pool of his own blood.

A blow on the left side of his head had, to all appearance, felled him on the spot.

The wound had split the scalp.

Whether it had also split the skull was more than I was surgeon enough to be able to say.