A surgeon said it was a miracle a reveller did not lose his eye after he was glassed in face during a fight at The Beach Bar.

John Arthur Cook, 22, of Tranquillity Lane, Smith?s has pleaded not guilty to a charge of wounding with intent to do grievous bodily harm to Neil Carroll on February 19, 2005.

In Supreme Court on Thursday, King Edward VII Memorial Hospital (KEMH) surgeon Dr. Philip Jones said Mr. Carroll?s eyeball was miraculously uninjured in an attack which resulted in him needing 100 stitches in his face.

?What I mean when I say miraculously is the distance between where the laceration stopped and the eyeball began was millimetres, at most away a hairsbreadth from the eyeball,? Dr. Jones said.

Mr. Carroll also had a ?through and through? laceration on his lip into the mouth and teeth were exposed, Dr. Jones said.

?He had lost a great deal of blood. We needed to give him fluid to keep his blood pressure up and his heart rate down,? he said. ?The cuts were caused by something very sharp and irregular. They classically had curvy edges which are commonly seen in glass cuts.?

At around 2.45 a.m. on February 19, 2005, Mr. Carroll was brought to the emergency room at KEMH, he said.

Dr. Jones said he repaired the laceration closest to Mr. Carroll?s mouth because it posed a greater risk of infection but left the eye-cut to plastic surgeon Dr. Christopher Johnson.

Dr. Johnson ? the new Road Safety Council chairman ? said he found a shard of glass near Mr. Carroll?s left eyelid.

?I noted a fracture of the orbital wall ? which is the eye socket ? which I repaired with a small plate,? Dr. Johnson said.

The outer corner of Mr. Carroll?s eyelid was completely disrupted and needed to be replaced, he said.

Without plastic surgery, his eyelid would not have closed properly, he would have had permanent double vision, very large scars on the cheek and eyelid and probably no movement in his eyelid, he said.

?It was a very serious injury and I suspect he will require further surgery to repair his external injuries,? Dr. Johnson said.

P.c. Glen Kellman arrested Cook on Front Street after Mr. Carroll was attacked. Cook was identified by Mr. Carroll?s friend Greg Reid.

?I told the defendant I was arresting him on suspicion of assault and cautioned him,? P.c. Kellman said.

?What if anything did he say,? Crown counsel Wayne Caines asked.

??Yes, but it was in self defence.?? P.c. Kellman said. ?I asked the defendant how he sustained cuts on the face and hand. He replied, ?The guy slapped me.??

Under cross-examination by defence lawyer Craig Attridge, P.c. Kellman admitted Cook was arrested because he matched the description of one of the suspects in The Beach assault.

Det. Con. Malcolm Dill also said Maria Louise Barry, who Mr. Carroll said on Tuesday he went over to check on at The Beach Bar because she was so intoxicated, did not remember what happened.

?Do you recall Maria Barry saying she had no recollection of having a conversation with the defendant on the night in question,? Mr. Attridge said.

Det. Con. Dill agreed.

The Prosecution completed its presentation of evidence.

While Cook has elected not to testify in his own defence, Mr. Attridge said a defence witness would be called.

The witness failed to appear on Friday, however, and the trial was adjourned until today.