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 that would certainly kill him without all question, and being once dead, our issue would be easy enough. This we also put in practice, and began our project at the tail end, which burnt seven days and as many nights before he had any feeling of our fireworks: upon the eighth and ninth days we perceived he began to grow sickly: for he gaped more dully than he was wont to do, and sooner closed his mouth again: the tenth and eleventh he was thoroughly mortified and began to stink: upon the twelfth day we bethought ourselves, though almost too late, that unless we underpropped his chops when he gaped next to keep them from closing, we should be in danger of perpetual imprisonment within his dead carcase and there miserably perish. We therefore