The Yale expositor., 1900-05-11

VI~ ! W"" HHIM
destruction. The fence posts were
old. and some of them rotten. Though
Johnson twitched and jerked to loose
himself. freedom would have been the
freedom of death, and the wire and
the post next to his foot held securely.
1t was agonizing to hang there, but it
was not death. Still, flesh and blood
could not have held out much longer,
and discovery and the difficult rescue
came not minute too soon.
Below the cliff were quarries, skirted
on the outer edge by the Iron Noun
tain Railroad. Beyond the tracks
rushes the swollen Mississippi. John
son. who can remember little of how
he got into his plight, had been out
in the country a day or two before,
looking for work. Not finding it, he
used up his small store of money in
rum, and then started to walk back to
the city. He had been sick and early
in the evening he lay down in the rain
upon pile of boards near house that
stands on the top Of the bluff. Finally
he got up, and lurched along, uncon-
scious Of the yawning chasm only a
few rods away Suddenly his foot
caught in a barbed wire that ran close
to the ground, and he was flung head
long. 1t happened to be a loop that
tripped him, and he fell over the edge;
the wire twisted his body around so
that his back was against the cliff.
The wire frightened about his ankle
and then sagged. The shock of the
fall sobered him partly, and he twisted
and turned to get loose. His finger
tips could just touch ledge of rock,
but he could grasp nothing, though he
could relieve the weight of his body
somewhat. He could not see in the
murky night, but below he could hear
the swishing of the river.
The granite cutters in the quarry
come to work at o'clock in the morn
ing, and little before that hour Her
man Spieckerman, the first of the
force, entered the quarry and went to
a shed to put on his working clothes.
He happened to look up, and could
hardly believe his eyes when he saw
a man hanging head down from the
face of the cliff away above. He ran
to the office of the boss and GREATNESS
ly told the men there what he had
seen. They telephoned to the fire de-
partment for a hook and ladder truck
and to a hospital for an ambulance. In
the meantime a gang of workmen hur-
ried to the spot and stretched a tar
pauin under the swinging form, SD
that if the man should drop he might
not be dashed to death on the jagged
rocks. Other men bounded up a road
that led to the top of the cliff. Lying
face down on the edge and peering
over they could see the swaying body,
held in the loop of wire. None of them
dared try to pull up the man by the
wire. for fear that it would slip of
the foot. In the meantime the fire
men and the ambulance had come into
the quarry. and with them a crowd OF
men from the city. Advice was plenty,
but deeds were few. The firemen took
out their longest ladder and carried
IL from ledge to ledge up the cliff
until the top round was within reach
of Johnson. He gripped it with des-
peration, though his blood-swollen
hands had little life in them. A fire.
man mounting the ladder fastened to
the negro's legs rope that had been
lowered from the top of the cliff, and
slowly and carefully Johnson was
pulled up.
The head was distorted to abnormal
size by the tremendous pressure OF
blood; the pupils of the eyes were dis
tended and fecked with angry. red
spots; the lips were pulled to unusual
proportions and the cords Of the neck
were knotted and hardened. The arms
and hands were swollen to grotesque
hugeness. The lungs were contracted
so that not a word came from the
parched throat The vital organs and
lower limbs were cold with the creep
ing death dew.
The man was chafed by rough hands
hut the reactionary movement of the
blood current was so swift after the
body was placed in a normal position
that this remedy was unnecessary. Il
surged from the flooded head back int
the lower extremities, and, released
frcm the thrall of suffocation, the mar