How easy were all deaths compared to one like this! I was suffocating--I felt my eyes start from their sockets--blood sprung from my mouth and nostrils--and icy drops of sweat trickled from my forehead.

I paused, gasping for breath.

Then, suddenly nerving myself for one more wild effort, I hurled my limbs with all the force of agony and desperation against one side of my narrow prison.

It cracked--it split asunder!--and then--a new and horrid fear beset me, and I crouched back, panting heavily.

If--if I were buried in the ground--so ran my ghastly thoughts--of what use to break open the coffin and let in the mold--the damp wormy mold, rich with the bones of the dead--the penetrating mold that would choke up my mouth and eyes, and seal me into silence forever! My mind quailed at this idea--my brain tottered on the verge of madness! I laughed--think of it!--and my laugh sounded in my ears like the last rattle in the throat of a dying man.