I always
found my coffin again, and the cave seemed to be more spacious
and fuller of bodies than it had appeared to be at first. I lived
for some days upon my bread and water, which being all spent, I
at last prepared for death.

As I was thinking of death, I heard the stone lifted up from the
mouth of the cave, and immediately the corpse of a man was let
down When reduced to necessity, it is natural to come to extreme
resolutions. While they let down the woman I approached the place
where her coffin was to be put, and as soon as I perceived they
were again covering the mouth of the cave, gave the unfortunate
wretch two or three violent blows over the head, with a large
bone; which stunned, or, to say the truth, killed her. I
committed this inhuman action merely for the sake of the bread
and water that was in her coffin, and thus I had provision for
some days more. When that was spent, they letdown another dead
woman, and a living man; I killed the man in the same manner,
and, as there was then a sort of mortality in the town, by
continuing this practice I did not want for provisions.

One day after I had dispatched another woman, I heard something
tread, and breathing or panting as it walked. I advanced towards
that side from whence I heard the noise, and on my approach the
creature puffed and blew harder, as if running away from me. I
followed the noise, and the thing seemed to stop sometimes, but
always fled and blew as I approached. I pursued it for a
considerable time, till at last I perceived a light, resembling a
star; I went on, sometimes lost sight of it, but always found it
again, and at last discovered that it came through a hole in the
rock, large enough to admit a man.

Upon this, I stopped some time to rest, being much fatigued with
the rapidity of my progress: afterwards coming up to the hole, I
got through, and found myself upon the sea shore. I leave you to
guess the excess of my joy: it was such, that I could scarcely
persuade myself that the whole was not a dream.

But when I was recovered from my surprise, and convinced of the
reality of my escape, I perceived what I had followed to be a
creature which came out of the sea, and was accustomed to enter
the cavern and feed upon the bodies of the dead.

I examined the mountain, and found it to be situated betwixt the
sea and the town, but without any passage to or communication
with the latter; the rocks on the sea side being high and
perpendi