Monmouth weekly herald. [volume] (Freehold, N.J.) 1854-1860, 1857-12-10
Oh fanllIp Girfls,
A STORY OF DEATH.

Reader, have you ever been dead? ]
have been. / will tell you the story Of
death. DIR. Benaiah W. Somes, Of Essex
county, New Jersey. was my physician
| shall not curse him now. Time has
taught me that it is better to bless than
to curse. And | fell, bitter as my mail
son might be, that a more miserable con-
dition were not possible to him than the
consciousness of his murderous w~antonness
must bring upon himself, hardened as |
fear his nature is. But let that pass.
I will tell you the story Of my death.
l died at the age of twenty three. A
stulwart man, who on my farm moved
my swath or hoed my row with the best,
in an unfortunate hour | became the vic
tim of the practise of medicine which
then prevailed, but which now, happily,
is nearly disuse9. | had some sort of te-
yer. No doubt I was i'll enough. From
my right arm one day the physician took
ounces Of blood-how many | knew not;
certainly in liquid measure, a gallon Of
the red fluid flowed. I did not mend
that day; at least, I suppose I did not
for on the next day he cut my left arm
and thence took a like measure-the
crimson measure of halfta life. | was a
dead man then. But a shudder or two
always must come before the frame
With me the ~shudders were in the shape
of cold sweats. There were three of
them. By the clock-so some one at my
bedside whispered the chill and sweat
lasted six hour. Six dim, dark centuries
they were to me. The third-its com
%mencement, its fierce chill, it's dread slow
march. l remember but nothing more
In the the midst of it, I lost all sense of
life and its pains. The great gates of the
valley Of death rolled on their pondefoas
hinges and shut me in.
l do not recollect the circumstances of
funeral and interment. In fact, | do not
deem that I was buried. The weight /
felt above me I knew was no mere ten
feet Of earth. in a quiet nook, with dais-
sizes springipg from it. The mountains
were resting on me. | realized their
weight. Straight up to the light-iflight
existed-as under the centre of the cen
trail mountain / lay, it was many miles
through solid rock. I was no imbedded
in the rock like a. cold toad caught in
during the formative era of the geolo-
gist. 1t lay upon me. [ felt all its
weight. Sense had gone, but concious-
ness was with me. Oh, how I sufffocated
and ~smothcred! Time had passed away;
there was no day no night. But if NOR
tai measure could indicate the period |
lay alone, and dark, and suffocate beneath
that weight, centuries might have flown
above my head.
The silence was as dread as the suffo-
cation was terrible. There was no sound.
All was still, still dark and hopeless
Had the mountain roared as it crushed, it
would have been an alienation. But it
did its work without remorse, like Fate,
grim and silent.
l have said there was no measure OF
time to tell how long this measureless
weight pressed me down. There came a
relief. A sense of hearing came to me,
or, the internal fires of earth had rolled
nearer to me. I heard their voice, dis
tant as yet, like the wind in the leaves OF
ten thousand forests-like the surge of a
thousand unseen oceans. | felt its heat.
But it was far away.-A new sense Of
suffocation CAME upon me. This s~ufoca-
ting force now surrounded me, came with
in me, and pressed me GSiwiIh snfoca-
/, zion ~i.siI