Edgar Allan Poe

The Pit and the Pendulum

Impia tortorum longos hic turba furores

Sanguinis innocui, non satiata, aluit.

Sospite nunc patria, fracto nunc funeris antro,

Mors ubi dira fuit vita salusque patent.

(Quatrain composed for the gates of a market to he erected upon the site of the 
Jacobin Club House at Paris.)

I WAS sick --sick unto death with that long agony; and when they at length 
unbound me, and I was permitted to sit, I felt that my senses were leaving me. 
The sentence --the dread sentence of death --was the last of distinct 
accentuation which reached my ears. After that, the sound of the inquisitorial 
voices seemed merged in one dreamy indeterminate hum. It conveyed to my soul the 
idea of revolution --perhaps from its association in fancy with the burr of a 
mill wheel. This only for a brief period; for presently I heard no more. Yet, 
for a while, I saw; but with how terrible an exaggeration! I saw the lips of the 
black-robed judges. They appeared to me white --whiter than the sheet upon which 
I trace these words --and thin even to grotesqueness; thin with the intensity of 
their expression of firmness --of immoveable resolution --of stern contempt of 
human torture. I saw that the decrees of what to me was Fate, were still issuing 
from those lips. I saw them writhe with a deadly locution. I saw them fashion 
the syllables of my name; and I shuddered because no sound succeeded. I saw, 
too, for a few moments of delirious horror, the soft and nearly imperceptible 
waving of the sable draperies which enwrapped the walls of the apartment. And 
then my vision fell upon the seven tall candles upon the table. At first they 
wore the aspect of charity, and seemed white and slender angels who would save 
me; but then, all at once, there came a most deadly nausea over my spirit, and I 
felt every fibre in my frame thrill as if I had touched the wire of a galvanic 
battery, while the angel forms became meaningless spectres, with heads of flame, 
and I saw that from them there would be no help. And then there stole into my 
fancy, like a rich musical note, the thought of what sweet rest there must be in 
the grave. The thought came gently and stealthily, and it seemed long before it 
attained full appreciation; but just as my spirit came at length properly to 
feel and entertain it, the figures of the judges vanished, as if magically, from 
before me; the tall candles sank into nothingness; their flames went out 
utterly; the blackness of darkness supervened; all sensations appeared swallowed 
up in a mad rushing descent as of the soul into Hades. Then silence, and 
stillness, night were the universe.

I had swooned; but still will not say that all of consciousness was lost. What 
of it there remained I will not attempt to define, or even to describe; yet all 
was not lost. In the deepest slumber --no! In delirium --no! In a swoon --no! In 
death --no! even in the grave all is not lost. Else there is no immortality for 
man. Arousing from the most profound of slumbers, we break the gossamer web of 
some dream. Yet in a second afterward, (so frail may that web have been) we 
remember not that we have dreamed. In the return to life from the swoon there 
are two stages; first, that of the sense of mental or spiritual; secondly, that 
of the sense of physical, existence. It seems probable that if, upon reaching 
the second stage, we could recall the impressions of the first, we should find 
these impressions eloquent in memories of the gulf beyond. And that gulf is --
what? How at least shall we distinguish its shadows from those of the tomb? But 
if the impressions of what I have termed the first stage, are not, at will, 
recalled, yet, after long interval, do they not come unbidden, while we marvel 
whence they come? He who has never swooned, is not he who finds strange palaces 
and wildly familiar faces in coals that glow; is not he who beholds floating in 
mid-air the sad visions that the many may not view; is not he who ponders over 
the perfume of some novel flower --is not he whose brain grows bewildered with 
the meaning of some musical cadence which has never before arrested his 
attention.

Amid frequent and thoughtful endeavors to remember; amid earnest struggles to 
regather some token of the state of seeming nothingness into which my soul had 
lapsed, there have been moments when I have dreamed of success; there have been 
brief, very brief periods when I have conjured up remembrances which the lucid 
reason of a later epoch assures me could have had reference only to that 
condition of seeming unconsciousness. These shadows of memory tell, 
indistinctly, of tall figures that lifted and bore me in silence down --down --
still down --till a hideous dizziness oppressed me at the mere idea of the 
interminableness of the descent. They tell also of a vague horror at my heart, 
on account of that heart's unnatural stillness. Then comes a sense of sudden 
motionlessness throughout all things; as if those who bore me (a ghastly train!) 
had outrun, in their descent, the limits of the limitless, and paused from the 
wearisomeness of their toil. After this I call to mind flatness and dampness; 
and then all is madness --the madness of a memory which busies itself among 
forbidden things.

Very suddenly there came back to my soul motion and sound --the tumultuous 
motion of the heart, and, in my ears, the sound of its beating. Then a pause in 
which all is blank. Then again sound, and motion, and touch --a tingling 
sensation pervading my frame. Then the mere consciousness of existence, without 
thought --a condition which lasted long. Then, very suddenly, thought, and 
shuddering terror, and earnest endeavor to comprehend my true state. Then a 
strong desire to lapse into insensibility. Then a rushing revival of soul and a 
successful effort to move. And now a full memory of the trial, of the judges, of 
the sable draperies, of the sentence, of the sickness, of the swoon. Then entire 
forgetfulness of all that followed; of all that a later day and much earnestness 
of endeavor have enabled me vaguely to recall.

So far, I had not opened my eyes. I felt that I lay upon my back, unbound. I 
reached out my hand, and it fell heavily upon something damp and hard. There I 
suffered it to remain for many minutes, while I strove to imagine where and what 
I could be. I longed, yet dared not to employ my vision. I dreaded the first 
glance at objects around me. It was not that I feared to look upon things 
horrible, but that I grew aghast lest there should be nothing to see. At length, 
with a wild desperation at heart, I quickly unclosed my eyes. My worst thoughts, 
then, were confirmed. The blackness of eternal night encompassed me. I struggled 
for breath. The intensity of the darkness seemed to oppress and stifle me. The 
atmosphere was intolerably close. I still lay quietly, and made effort to 
exercise my reason. I brought to mind the inquisitorial proceedings, and 
attempted from that point to deduce my real condition. The sentence had passed; 
and it appeared to me that a very long interval of time had since elapsed. Yet 
not for a moment did I suppose myself actually dead. Such a supposition, 
notwithstanding what we read in fiction, is altogether inconsistent with real 
existence; --but where and in what state was I? The condemned to death, I knew, 
perished usually at the autos-da-fe, and one of these had been held on the very 
night of the day of my trial. Had I been remanded to my dungeon, to await the 
next sacrifice, which would not take place for many months? This I at once saw 
could not be. Victims had been in immediate demand. Moreover, my dungeon, as 
well as all the condemned cells at Toledo, had stone floors, and light was not 
altogether excluded.

A fearful idea now suddenly drove the blood in torrents upon my heart, and for a 
brief period, I once more relapsed into insensibility. Upon recovering, I at 
once started to my feet, trembling convulsively in every fibre. I thrust my arms 
wildly above and around me in all directions. I felt nothing; yet dreaded to 
move a step, lest I should be impeded by the walls of a tomb. Perspiration burst 
from every pore, and stood in cold big beads upon my forehead. The agony of 
suspense grew at length intolerable, and I cautiously moved forward, with my 
arms extended, and my eyes straining from their sockets, in the hope of catching 
some faint ray of light. I proceeded for many paces; but still all was blackness 
and vacancy. I breathed more freely. It seemed evident that mine was not, at 
least, the most hideous of fates.

And now, as I still continued to step cautiously onward, there came thronging 
upon my recollection a thousand vague rumors of the horrors of Toledo. Of the 
dungeons there had been strange things narrated --fables I had always deemed 
them --but yet strange, and too ghastly to repeat, save in a whisper. Was I left 
to perish of starvation in this subterranean world of darkness; or what fate, 
perhaps even more fearful, awaited me? That the result would be death, and a 
death of more than customary bitterness, I knew too well the character of my 
judges to doubt. The mode and the hour were all that occupied or distracted me.

My outstretched hands at length encountered some solid obstruction. It was a 
wall, seemingly of stone masonry --very smooth, slimy, and cold. I followed it 
up; stepping with all the careful distrust with which certain antique narratives 
had inspired me. This process, however, afforded me no means of ascertaining the 
dimensions of my dungeon; as I might make its circuit, and return to the point 
whence I set out, without being aware of the fact; so perfectly uniform seemed 
the wall. I therefore sought the knife which had been in my pocket, when led 
into the inquisitorial chamber; but it was gone; my clothes had been exchanged 
for a wrapper of coarse serge. I had thought of forcing the blade in some minute 
crevice of the masonry, so as to identify my point of departure. The difficulty, 
nevertheless, was but trivial; although, in the disorder of my fancy, it seemed 
at first insuperable. I tore a part of the hem from the robe and placed the 
fragment at full length, and at right angles to the wall. In groping my way 
around the prison, I could not fail to encounter this rag upon completing the 
circuit. So, at least I thought: but I had not counted upon the extent of the 
dungeon, or upon my own weakness. The ground was moist and slippery. I staggered 
onward for some time, when I stumbled and fell. My excessive fatigue induced me 
to remain prostrate; and sleep soon overtook me as I lay.

Upon awaking, and stretching forth an arm, I found beside me a loaf and a 
pitcher with water. I was too much exhausted to reflect upon this circumstance, 
but ate and drank with avidity. Shortly afterward, I resumed my tour around the 
prison, and with much toil came at last upon the fragment of the serge. Up to 
the period when I fell I had counted fifty-two paces, and upon resuming my walk, 
I had counted forty-eight more; --when I arrived at the rag. There were in all, 
then, a hundred paces; and, admitting two paces to the yard, I presumed the 
dungeon to be fifty yards in circuit. I had met, however, with many angles in 
the wall, and thus I could form no guess at the shape of the vault; for vault I 
could not help supposing it to be.

I had little object --certainly no hope these researches; but a vague curiosity 
prompted me to continue them. Quitting the wall, I resolved to cross the area of 
the enclosure. At first I proceeded with extreme caution, for the floor, 
although seemingly of solid material, was treacherous with slime. At length, 
however, I took courage, and did not hesitate to step firmly; endeavoring to 
cross in as direct a line as possible. I had advanced some ten or twelve paces 
in this manner, when the remnant of the torn hem of my robe became entangled 
between my legs. I stepped on it, and fell violently on my face.

In the confusion attending my fall, I did not immediately apprehend a somewhat 
startling circumstance, which yet, in a few seconds afterward, and while I still 
lay prostrate, arrested my attention. It was this --my chin rested upon the 
floor of the prison, but my lips and the upper portion of my head, although 
seemingly at a less elevation than the chin, touched nothing. At the same time 
my forehead seemed bathed in a clammy vapor, and the peculiar smell of decayed 
fungus arose to my nostrils. I put forward my arm, and shuddered to find that I 
had fAllan at the very brink of a circular pit, whose extent, of course, I had 
no means of ascertaining at the moment. Groping about the masonry just below the 
margin, I succeeded in dislodging a small fragment, and let it fall into the 
abyss. For many seconds I hearkened to its reverberations as it dashed against 
the sides of the chasm in its descent; at length there was a sullen plunge into 
water, succeeded by loud echoes. At the same moment there came a sound 
resembling the quick opening, and as rapid closing of a door overhead, while a 
faint gleam of light flashed suddenly through the gloom, and as suddenly faded 
away.

I saw clearly the doom which had been prepared for me, and congratulated myself 
upon the timely accident by which I had escaped. Another step before my fall, 
and the world had seen me no more. And the death just avoided, was of that very 
character which I had regarded as fabulous and frivolous in the tales respecting 
the Inquisition. To the victims of its tyranny, there was the choice of death 
with its direst physical agonies, or death with its most hideous moral horrors. 
I had been reserved for the latter. By long suffering my nerves had been 
unstrung, until I trembled at the sound of my own voice, and had become in every 
respect a fitting subject for the species of torture which awaited me.

Shaking in every limb, I groped my way back to the wall; resolving there to 
perish rather than risk the terrors of the wells, of which my imagination now 
pictured many in various positions about the dungeon. In other conditions of 
mind I might have had courage to end my misery at once by a plunge into one of 
these abysses; but now I was the veriest of cowards. Neither could I forget what 
I had read of these pits --that the sudden extinction of life formed no part of 
their most horrible plan.

Agitation of spirit kept me awake for many long hours; but at length I again 
slumbered. Upon arousing, I found by my side, as before, a loaf and a pitcher of 
water. A burning thirst consumed me, and I emptied the vessel at a draught. It 
must have been drugged; for scarcely had I drunk, before I became irresistibly 
drowsy. A deep sleep fell upon me --a sleep like that of death. How long it 
lasted of course, I know not; but when, once again, I unclosed my eyes, the 
objects around me were visible. By a wild sulphurous lustre, the origin of which 
I could not at first determine, I was enabled to see the extent and aspect of 
the prison.

In its size I had been greatly mistaken. The whole circuit of its walls did not 
exceed twenty-five yards. For some minutes this fact occasioned me a world of 
vain trouble; vain indeed! for what could be of less importance, under the 
terrible circumstances which environed me, then the mere dimensions of my 
dungeon? But my soul took a wild interest in trifles, and I busied myself in 
endeavors to account for the error I had committed in my measurement. The truth 
at length flashed upon me. In my first attempt at exploration I had counted 
fifty-two paces, up to the period when I fell; I must then have been within a 
pace or two of the fragment of serge; in fact, I had nearly performed the 
circuit of the vault. I then slept, and upon awaking, I must have returned upon 
my steps --thus supposing the circuit nearly double what it actually was. My 
confusion of mind prevented me from observing that I began my tour with the wall 
to the left, and ended it with the wall to the right.

I had been deceived, too, in respect to the shape of the enclosure. In feeling 
my way I had found many angles, and thus deduced an idea of great irregularity; 
so potent is the effect of total darkness upon one arousing from lethargy or 
sleep! The angles were simply those of a few slight depressions, or niches, at 
odd intervals. The general shape of the prison was square. What I had taken for 
masonry seemed now to be iron, or some other metal, in huge plates, whose 
sutures or joints occasioned the depression. The entire surface of this metallic 
enclosure was rudely daubed in all the hideous and repulsive devices to which 
the charnel superstition of the monks has given rise. The figures of fiends in 
aspects of menace, with skeleton forms, and other more really fearful images, 
overspread and disfigured the walls. I observed that the outlines of these 
monstrosities were sufficiently distinct, but that the colors seemed faded and 
blurred, as if from the effects of a damp atmosphere. I now noticed the floor, 
too, which was of stone. In the centre yawned the circular pit from whose jaws I 
had escaped; but it was the only one in the dungeon.

All this I saw indistinctly and by much effort: for my personal condition had 
been greatly changed during slumber. I now lay upon my back, and at full length, 
on a species of low framework of wood. To this I was securely bound by a long 
strap resembling a surcingle. It passed in many convolutions about my limbs and 
body, leaving at liberty only my head, and my left arm to such extent that I 
could, by dint of much exertion, supply myself with food from an earthen dish 
which lay by my side on the floor. I saw, to my horror, that the pitcher had 
been removed. I say to my horror; for I was consumed with intolerable thirst. 
This thirst it appeared to be the design of my persecutors to stimulate: for the 
food in the dish was meat pungently seasoned.

Looking upward, I surveyed the ceiling of my prison. It was some thirty or forty 
feet overhead, and constructed much as the side walls. In one of its panels a 
very singular figure riveted my whole attention. It was the painted figure of 
Time as he is commonly represented, save that, in lieu of a scythe, he held 
what, at a casual glance, I supposed to be the pictured image of a huge pendulum 
such as we see on antique clocks. There was something, however, in the 
appearance of this machine which caused me to regard it more attentively. While 
I gazed directly upward at it (for its position was immediately over my own) I 
fancied that I saw it in motion. In an instant afterward the fancy was 
confirmed. Its sweep was brief, and of course slow. I watched it for some 
minutes, somewhat in fear, but more in wonder. Wearied at length with observing 
its dull movement, I turned my eyes upon the other objects in the cell.

A slight noise attracted my notice, and, looking to the floor, I saw several 
enormous rats traversing it. They had issued from the well, which lay just 
within view to my right. Even then, while I gazed, they came up in troops, 
hurriedly, with ravenous eyes, allured by the scent of the meat. From this it 
required much effort and attention to scare them away.

It might have been half an hour, perhaps even an hour, (for in cast my I could 
take but imperfect note of time) before I again cast my eyes upward. What I then 
saw confounded and amazed me. The sweep of the pendulum had increased in extent 
by nearly a yard. As a natural consequence, its velocity was also much greater. 
But what mainly disturbed me was the idea that had perceptibly descended. I now 
observed --with what horror it is needless to say --that its nether extremity 
was formed of a crescent of glittering steel, about a foot in length from horn 
to horn; the horns upward, and the under edge evidently as keen as that of a 
razor. Like a razor also, it seemed massy and heavy, tapering from the edge into 
a solid and broad structure above. It was appended to a weighty rod of brass, 
and the whole hissed as it swung through the air.

I could no longer doubt the doom prepared for me by monkish ingenuity in 
torture. My cognizance of the pit had become known to the inquisitorial agents -
-the pit whose horrors had been destined for so bold a recusant as myself --the 
pit, typical of hell, and regarded by rumor as the Ultima Thule of all their 
punishments. The plunge into this pit I had avoided by the merest of accidents, 
I knew that surprise, or entrapment into torment, formed an important portion of 
all the grotesquerie of these dungeon deaths. Having failed to fall, it was no 
part of the demon plan to hurl me into the abyss; and thus (there being no 
alternative) a different and a milder destruction awaited me. Milder! I half 
smiled in my agony as I thought of such application of such a term.

What boots it to tell of the long, long hours of horror more than mortal, during 
which I counted the rushing vibrations of the steel! Inch by inch --line by line 
--with a descent only appreciable at intervals that seemed ages --down and still 
down it came! Days passed --it might have been that many days passed --ere it 
swept so closely over me as to fan me with its acrid breath. The odor of the 
sharp steel forced itself into my nostrils. I prayed --I wearied heaven with my 
prayer for its more speedy descent. I grew frantically mad, and struggled to 
force myself upward against the sweep of the fearful scimitar. And then I fell 
suddenly calm, and lay smiling at the glittering death, as a child at some rare 
bauble.

There was another interval of utter insensibility; it was brief; for, upon again 
lapsing into life there had been no perceptible descent in the pendulum. But it 
might have been long; for I knew there were demons who took note of my swoon, 
and who could have arrested the vibration at pleasure. Upon my recovery, too, I 
felt very --oh, inexpressibly sick and weak, as if through long inanition. Even 
amid the agonies of that period, the human nature craved food. With painful 
effort I outstretched my left arm as far as my bonds permitted, and took 
possession of the small remnant which had been spared me by the rats. As I put a 
portion of it within my lips, there rushed to my mind a half formed thought of 
joy --of hope. Yet what business had I with hope? It was, as I say, a half 
formed thought --man has many such which are never completed. I felt that it was 
of joy --of hope; but felt also that it had perished in its formation. In vain I 
struggled to perfect --to regain it. Long suffering had nearly annihilated all 
my ordinary powers of mind. I was an imbecile --an idiot.

The vibration of the pendulum was at right angles to my length. I saw that the 
crescent was designed to cross the region of the heart. It would fray the serge 
of my robe --it would return and repeat its operations --again --and again. 
Notwithstanding terrifically wide sweep (some thirty feet or more) and the its 
hissing vigor of its descent, sufficient to sunder these very walls of iron, 
still the fraying of my robe would be all that, for several minutes, it would 
accomplish. And at this thought I paused. I dared not go farther than this 
reflection. I dwelt upon it with a pertinacity of attention --as if, in so 
dwelling, I could arrest here the descent of the steel. I forced myself to 
ponder upon the sound of the crescent as it should pass across the garment --
upon the peculiar thrilling sensation which the friction of cloth produces on 
the nerves. I pondered upon all this frivolity until my teeth were on edge.

Down --steadily down it crept. I took a frenzied pleasure in contrasting its 
downward with its lateral velocity. To the right --to the left --far and wide --
with the shriek of a damned spirit; to my heart with the stealthy pace of the 
tiger! I alternately laughed and howled as the one or the other idea grew 
predominant.

Down --certainly, relentlessly down! It vibrated within three inches of my 
bosom! I struggled violently, furiously, to free my left arm. This was free only 
from the elbow to the hand. I could reach the latter, from the platter beside 
me, to my mouth, with great effort, but no farther. Could I have broken the 
fastenings above the elbow, I would have seized and attempted to arrest the 
pendulum. I might as well have attempted to arrest an avalanche!

Down --still unceasingly --still inevitably down! I gasped and struggled at each 
vibration. I shrunk convulsively at its every sweep. My eyes followed its 
outward or upward whirls with the eagerness of the most unmeaning despair; they 
closed themselves spasmodically at the descent, although death would have been a 
relief, oh! how unspeakable! Still I quivered in every nerve to think how slight 
a sinking of the machinery would precipitate that keen, glistening axe upon my 
bosom. It was hope that prompted the nerve to quiver --the frame to shrink. It 
was hope --the hope that triumphs on the rack --that whispers to the death-
condemned even in the dungeons of the Inquisition.

I saw that some ten or twelve vibrations would bring the steel in actual contact 
with my robe, and with this observation there suddenly came over my spirit all 
the keen, collected calmness of despair. For the first time during many hours --
or perhaps days --I thought. It now occurred to me that the bandage, or 
surcingle, which enveloped me, was unique. I was tied by no separate cord. The 
first stroke of the razorlike crescent athwart any portion of the band, would so 
detach it that it might be unwound from my person by means of my left hand. But 
how fearful, in that case, the proximity of the steel! The result of the 
slightest struggle how deadly! Was it likely, moreover, that the minions of the 
torturer had not foreseen and provided for this possibility! Was it probable 
that the bandage crossed my bosom in the track of the pendulum? Dreading to find 
my faint, and, as it seemed, in last hope frustrated, I so far elevated my head 
as to obtain a distinct view of my breast. The surcingle enveloped my limbs and 
body close in all directions--save in the path of the destroying crescent.

Scarcely had I dropped my head back into its original position, when there 
flashed upon my mind what I cannot better describe than as the unformed half of 
that idea of deliverance to which I have previously alluded, and of which a 
moiety only floated indeterminately through my brain when I raised food to my 
burning lips. The whole thought was now present --feeble, scarcely sane, 
scarcely definite, --but still entire. I proceeded at once, with the nervous 
energy of despair, to attempt its execution.

For many hours the immediate vicinity of the low framework upon which I lay, had 
been literally swarming with rats. They were wild, bold, ravenous; their red 
eyes glaring upon me as if they waited but for motionlessness on my part to make 
me their prey. "To what food," I thought, "have they been accustomed in the 
well?"

They had devoured, in spite of all my efforts to prevent them, all but a small 
remnant of the contents of the dish. I had fAllan into an habitual see-saw, or 
wave of the hand about the platter: and, at length, the unconscious uniformity 
of the movement deprived it of effect. In their voracity the vermin frequently 
fastened their sharp fangs in my fingers. With the particles of the oily and 
spicy viand which now remained, I thoroughly rubbed the bandage wherever I could 
reach it; then, raising my hand from the floor, I lay breathlessly still.

At first the ravenous animals were startled and terrified at the change --at the 
cessation of movement. They shrank alarmedly back; many sought the well. But 
this was only for a moment. I had not counted in vain upon their voracity. 
Observing that I remained without motion, one or two of the boldest leaped upon 
the frame-work, and smelt at the surcingle. This seemed the signal for a general 
rush. Forth from the well they hurried in fresh troops. They clung to the wood -
-they overran it, and leaped in hundreds upon my person. The measured movement 
of the pendulum disturbed them not at all. Avoiding its strokes they busied 
themselves with the anointed bandage. They pressed --they swarmed upon me in 
ever accumulating heaps. They writhed upon my throat; their cold lips sought my 
own; I was half stifled by their thronging pressure; disgust, for which the 
world has no name, swelled my bosom, and chilled, with a heavy clamminess, my 
heart. Yet one minute, and I felt that the struggle would be over. Plainly I 
perceived the loosening of the bandage. I knew that in more than one place it 
must be already severed. With a more than human resolution I lay still.

Nor had I erred in my calculations --nor had I endured in vain. I at length felt 
that I was free. The surcingle hung in ribands from my body. But the stroke of 
the pendulum already pressed upon my bosom. It had divided the serge of the 
robe. It had cut through the linen beneath. Twice again it swung, and a sharp 
sense of pain shot through every nerve. But the moment of escape had arrived. At 
a wave of my hand my deliverers hurried tumultuously away. With a steady 
movement --cautious, sidelong, shrinking, and slow --I slid from the embrace of 
the bandage and beyond the reach of the scimitar. For the moment, at least, I 
was free.

Free! --and in the grasp of the Inquisition! I had scarcely stepped from my 
wooden bed of horror upon the stone floor of the prison, when the motion of the 
hellish machine ceased and I beheld it drawn up, by some invisible force, 
through the ceiling. This was a lesson which I took desperately to heart. My 
every motion was undoubtedly watched. Free! --I had but escaped death in one 
form of agony, to be delivered unto worse than death in some other. With that 
thought I rolled my eves nervously around on the barriers of iron that hemmed me 
in. Something unusual --some change which, at first, I could not appreciate 
distinctly --it was obvious, had taken place in the apartment. For many minutes 
of a dreamy and trembling abstraction, I busied myself in vain, unconnected 
conjecture. During this period, I became aware, for the first time, of the 
origin of the sulphurous light which illumined the cell. It proceeded from a 
fissure, about half an inch in width, extending entirely around the prison at 
the base of the walls, which thus appeared, and were, completely separated from 
the floor. I endeavored, but of course in vain, to look through the aperture.

As I arose from the attempt, the mystery of the alteration in the chamber broke 
at once upon my understanding. I have observed that, although the outlines of 
the figures upon the walls were sufficiently distinct, yet the colors seemed 
blurred and indefinite. These colors had now assumed, and were momentarily 
assuming, a startling and most intense brilliancy, that gave to the spectral and 
fiendish portraitures an aspect that might have thrilled even firmer nerves than 
my own. Demon eyes, of a wild and ghastly vivacity, glared upon me in a thousand 
directions, where none had been visible before, and gleamed with the lurid 
lustre of a fire that I could not force my imagination to regard as unreal.

Unreal! --Even while I breathed there came to my nostrils the breath of the 
vapour of heated iron! A suffocating odour pervaded the prison! A deeper glow 
settled each moment in the eyes that glared at my agonies! A richer tint of 
crimson diffused itself over the pictured horrors of blood. I panted! I gasped 
for breath! There could be no doubt of the design of my tormentors --oh! most 
unrelenting! oh! most demoniac of men! I shrank from the glowing metal to the 
centre of the cell. Amid the thought of the fiery destruction that impended, the 
idea of the coolness of the well came over my soul like balm. I rushed to its 
deadly brink. I threw my straining vision below. The glare from the enkindled 
roof illumined its inmost recesses. Yet, for a wild moment, did my spirit refuse 
to comprehend the meaning of what I saw. At length it forced --it wrestled its 
way into my soul --it burned itself in upon my shuddering reason. --Oh! for a 
voice to speak! --oh! horror! --oh! any horror but this! With a shriek, I rushed 
from the margin, and buried my face in my hands --weeping bitterly.

The heat rapidly increased, and once again I looked up, shuddering as with a fit 
of the ague. There had been a second change in the cell --and now the change was 
obviously in the form. As before, it was in vain that I, at first, endeavoured 
to appreciate or understand what was taking place. But not long was I left in 
doubt. The Inquisitorial vengeance had been hurried by my two-fold escape, and 
there was to be no more dallying with the King of Terrors. The room had been 
square. I saw that two of its iron angles were now acute --two, consequently, 
obtuse. The fearful difference quickly increased with a low rumbling or moaning 
sound. In an instant the apartment had shifted its form into that of a lozenge. 
But the alteration stopped not here-I neither hoped nor desired it to stop. I 
could have clasped the red walls to my bosom as a garment of eternal peace. 
"Death," I said, "any death but that of the pit!" Fool! might I have not known 
that into the pit it was the object of the burning iron to urge me? Could I 
resist its glow? or, if even that, could I withstand its pressure And now, 
flatter and flatter grew the lozenge, with a rapidity that left me no time for 
contemplation. Its centre, and of course, its greatest width, came just over the 
yawning gulf. I shrank back --but the closing walls pressed me resistlessly 
onward. At length for my seared and writhing body there was no longer an inch of 
foothold on the firm floor of the prison. I struggled no more, but the agony of 
my soul found vent in one loud, long, and final scream of despair. I felt that I 
tottered upon the brink --I averted my eyes --

There was a discordant hum of human voices! There was a loud blast as of many 
trumpets! There was a harsh grating as of a thousand thunders! The fiery walls 
rushed back! An outstretched arm caught my own as I fell, fainting, into the 
abyss. It was that of General Lasalle. The French army had entered Toledo. The 
Inquisition was in the hands of its enemies.