ering in the sun, "yesterday I formed the wicked intention of cutting my throat, all for the want of a few miserable florins, and now today Fortune has showered them

as impossible for me to take those four sweeps of the pencil; I had lost the thread of my inspiration, and the mysterious personage no longer stood out in my brain. I tried in vain to

according to his praiseworthy custom. His eyes fell

still persist in telling me, Mr.

that nervous trembling that the sig

econds I wa

s covetous look, and his impudent smile exasperated me. With a single bound, I c

e crack and rapidity

he old usurer scre

you thief

me out of thei

matter? What

ve Mister Rap a kick in the spine that se

Then I shut the door and bolted it, while bursts of laug

s adventure had put new life into me; I resumed my work, and

looked out of my window and saw three soldiers in

Can it be that that scoundrel of

he night before had wanted to cut my own throat, shook from hea

es. It was an ascending flood of heavy foo

tried to open my

was a gener

me of the

bling and wea

e same voi

their bird-cages, and their gratings. Lower, the balcony; still lower, the street-lamp; still lower again, the sign of the "Red Cask" framed in iron-work; and, finally, three glittering bayonets, only awaiting my fall to r

, intensity, and rapidity the human

ird summo

we shall

possible, I staggered to

on my collar. A dumpy, little

rest

chin, and a stovepipe hat. He had large brown whis

e chief o

s like pistols, and lower jaws turn

want?" I as

roughly, as he gave a sign t

ad than alive, while several othe

person in the last stages of consumption-with

aritably let me see the ends of their clubs, held to their w

he feet of all the

ne?" I asked on

other with a stra

sks what h

le froze

ses' hoofs resounded under an archway. We were ent

cet

t bien comm

point comme

e claws of Rap I fell into a dungeon, from whic

gs; not a sprig of verdure, not a festoon of ivy, not even a weathercock in perspect

anied by the jailer, took m

is teeth, and his bunch of keys at his belt, he reminded me of the Owl-God of the Caribs. He had the same go

nutes with my hands behind my back and my head bowed. At the end of that time I made the following reflection: "When falling, Rap cried out, 'I a

and the walls were bare of designs, except in one corner, where a gallows had been crudely sketched by my predecessor. The ligh

ty that I could think clearly; but suddenly imagining that Rap, before dying, had denounced me, my legs

he opened the lock-up, and told me to follow him. He was still

thin. Behind a grating I saw the famous Jic-Jack, who was going to be execut

roi de ces

e, he ca

l keep a place fo

at each other and smiled, while I felt the goos