iction that I was powerless left me unnerved, without
courage to make any fresh attempts. Another suffering--hunger--was
presently added to cold and want of air. The torture soon became
intolerable. With my finger I tried to pull small pinches of earth
through the hole of the dislodged knot, and I swallowed them eagerly,
only increasing my torment. Tempted by my flesh, I bit my arms and
sucked my skin with a fiendish desire to drive my teeth in, but I was
afraid of drawing blood.

Then I ardently longed for death. All my life long I had trembled at the
thought of dissolution, but I had come to yearn for it, to crave for an
everlasting night that could never be dark enough. How childish it had
been of me to dread the long, dreamless sleep, the eternity of silence
and gloom! Death was kind, for in suppressing life it put an end to
suffering. Oh, to sleep like the stones, to be no more!

With groping hands I still continued feeling the wood, and suddenly
I pricked my left thumb. That slight pain roused me from my growing
numbness. I felt again and found a nail--a nail which the undertaker's
men had driven in crookedly and which had not caught in the lower wood.
It was long and very sharp; the head was secured to the lid, but
it moved. Henceforth I had but one idea--to possess myself of that
nail--and I slipped my right hand across my body and began to shake
it. I made but little progress, however; it was a difficult job, for my
hands soon tired, and I had to use them alternately. The left one, too,
was of little use on account of the nail's awkward position.

While I was obstinately persevering a plan dawned on my mind. That nail
meant salvation, and I must have it. But should I get it in time? Hunger
was torturing me; my brain was swimming; my limbs were losing their
strength; my mind was becoming confused. I had sucked the drops that
trickled from my punctured finger, and suddenly I bit my arm and drank
my own blood! Thereupon, spurred on by pain, revived by the tepid, acrid
liquor that moistened my lips, I tore desperately at the nail and at
last I wrenched it off!

I then believed in success. My plan was a simple one; I pushed the
point of the nail into the lid, dragging it along as far as I could in
a straight line and working it so as to make a slit in the wood. My
fingers stiffened, but I doggedly persevered, and when I fancied that I
had sufficiently cut into the board I turned on my stomach and, lifting
myself