ncle, or else my
craft hath failed of its purpose."

"So I am told, Master Pottercarrier; but, saving your clerkship, unless
you tell me your trick, I will take leave to doubt of its success."

"A simple toy, Master Buncle, not likely to please a genius so acute as
that of your valiancie. Marry, thus it is. This suspension of the human
body, which the vulgar call hanging, operates death by apoplexia--that
is, the blood being unable to return to the heart by the compression
of the veins, it rushes to the brain, and the man dies. Also, and as an
additional cause of dissolution, the lungs no longer receive the needful
supply of the vital air, owing to the ligature of the cord around the
thorax; and hence the patient perishes."

"I understand that well enough. But how is such a revulsion of blood to
the brain to be prevented, sir mediciner?" said the third person, who
was no other than Ramorny's page, Eviot.

"Marry, then," replied Dwining, "hang me the patient up in such fashion
that the carotid arteries shall not be compressed, and the blood will
not determine to the brain, and apoplexia will not take place; and
again, if there be no ligature around the thorax, the lungs will be
supplied with air, whether the man be hanging in the middle heaven or
standing on the firm earth."

"All this I conceive," said Eviot; "but how these precautions can be
reconciled with the execution of the sentence of hanging is what my dull
brain cannot comprehend."

"Ah! good youth, thy valiancie hath spoiled a fair wit. Hadst thou
studied with me, thou shouldst have learned things more difficult than
this. But here is my trick. I get me certain bandages, made of the same
substance with your young valiancie's horse girths, having especial care
that they are of a kind which will not shrink on being strained, since
that would spoil my experiment. One loop of this substance is drawn
under each foot, and returns up either side of the leg to a cincture,
with which it is united; these cinctures are connected by divers straps
down the breast and back, in order to divide the weight. And there are
sundry other conveniences for easing the patient, but the chief is this:
the straps, or ligatures, are attached to a broad steel collar, curving
outwards, and having a hook or two, for the better security of the
halter, which the friendly executioner passes around that part of the
machine, instead of applying it to the bare throat of the patient.
Thus, w