by the direst pang that he had
yet experienced. His neck ached horribly; his brain was on fire, his
heart, which had been fluttering faintly, gave a great leap, trying to
force itself out at his mouth. His whole body was racked and wrenched
with an insupportable anguish! But his disobedient hands gave no heed
to the command. They beat the water vigorously with quick, downward
strokes, forcing him to the surface. He felt his head emerge; his
eyes were blinded by the sunlight; his chest expanded convulsively,
and with a supreme and crowning agony his lungs engulfed a great
draught of air, which instantly he expelled in a shriek!

He was now in full possession of his physical senses. They were,
indeed, preternaturally keen and alert. Something in the awful
disturbance of his organic system had so exalted and refined them that
they made record of things never before perceived. He felt the
ripples upon his face and heard their separate sounds as they struck.
He looked at the forest on the bank of the stream, saw the individual
trees, the leaves and the veining of each leaf--he saw the very
insects upon them: the locusts, the brilliant bodied flies, the gray
spiders stretching their webs from twig to twig. He noted the
prismatic colors in all the dewdrops upon a million blades of grass.
The humming of the gnats that danced above the eddies of the stream,
the beating of the dragon flies' wings, the strokes of the water
spiders' legs, like oars which had lifted their boat--all these made
audible music. A fish slid along beneath his eyes and he heard the
rush of its body parting the water.

He had come to the surface facing down the stream; in a moment the
visible world seemed to wheel slowly round, himself the pivotal point,
and he saw the bridge, the fort, the soldiers upon the bridge, the
captain, the sergeant, the two privates, his executioners. They were
in silhouette against the blue sky. They shouted and gesticulated,
pointing at him. The captain had drawn his pistol, but did not fire;
the others were unarmed. Their movements were grotesque and horrible,
their forms gigantic.

Suddenly he heard a sharp report and something struck the water
smartly within a few inches of his head, spattering his face with
spray. He heard a second report, and saw one of the sentinels with
his rifle at his shoulder, a light cloud of blue smoke rising from the
muzzle. The man in the water saw the eye of the man on the brid