me to stay on it even if my legs were not broken by the fall, and that
to jump meant practically to commit suicide!

"At last a thought occurred to me that I might possibly make a rope out
of my clothes. I had a large pocket-knife and a hatchet, and no sooner
had the thought suggested itself than I commenced to undress. My canvas
coat, shirt, and trousers and some thin underclothes constituted my
entire wardrobe, and by carefully cutting them into strips wide enough
to bear my weight, and yet narrow enough to give sufficient length, I
succeeded in making a kind of a rope with which I hoped I could succeed
in reaching the second ladder without broken bones!

"I could not work steadily, as it was impossible for me to avoid getting
up and now and then walking about the cave. I suffered so with the heat
and thirst, that the hope of escape alone kept me from going mad. At
last the rope was done and tied together with various knots. It had a
creepy sort of stretchy feeling when I pulled on it, but I had no
alternative but to trust to it,--it was that or nothing, and nothing
meant death from thirst in a very short time.

"I succeeded in fixing the hatchet firmly into and across a cleft in the
rock where it was split, and it gave me something to tie the rope to
which I was satisfied would hold my weight. I tied the end of the rope
to the hatchet handle and threw the other end down, and was mighty glad
to see that it reached within four or five feet of the middle ledge.

"I was stark naked excepting my shoes, and I tell you it was no easy
task letting one's self down over the sharp edges of the rock. Every
moment I expected one of the knots to give way, and I shall never forget
the feeling which came over me as I swung myself clear of the ledge and
hung swaying on that improvised rope which seemed to stretch and grow
thin in a way which sent cold shivers running up and down my spine. It
seemed a year before I reached the ledge. I went down pretty slow,
sparing the rope as much as I could by supporting part of my weight by
digging my toes into every little crack and crevice I could find, but I
got there at last, and when I did, I sat down on the ledge and cried
like a baby.

"Well, that is the story. Of course I got down the rest of the way all
right, or I wouldn't be here; but I don't know as I would have done it
if Antonio had pulled down the second ladder instead of the bottom one.
He was evidently in too much of a hurry t