or speak, or groan.  A horrible fear came over me that they would bury me alive.  I seemed to die at the thought, but, had mountains been heaped upon me, it would have been as easy for me to show that I was not dead.  But I would gradually regain the power of articulation, and then again would hope rise in the hearts of those who were watching.  At last, but slowly, I recovered sufficiently to be able to leave my room.  I procured a pair of crutches, and by their aid I could go about the house.  Next I went out riding in a buggy, and after a time got so that I could walk without difficulty, though not without my crutches, for I did not yet dare to bear weight on my afflicted knee.

One day I went to Rushville, and—­O, curse of curses!—­gave way to my appetite.  The moment the whisky began to affect me, I forgot that I had crutches, and set my lame leg down with my whole weight upon it.  The sudden and agonizing pain caused me to give a scream, and yet I repeated the step a number of times.  But the insufferable pain caused me to return home.

It was now winter.  The Legislature was in session at Indianapolis, and I was promised a position, and, with this end in view, packed my trunk and bid good-by to the folks at home.  At Shelbyville, at which place I had a little business to attend to, I took a drink.  Just how and why I took it has been already told, for the same cause always influenced me.  The same result followed, and at Indianapolis I kept up the debauch until I had traded a suit of clothes worth sixty dollars for one worth, at a liberal estimate, about sixty-five cents.  I even pawned my crutches, which I still used and still needed.  One day I went to a bath-room, and after remaining in the bath for half an hour, with the water just as warm as I could bear it, I resolved to change the programme, and, without further reflection, I turned off the warm and turned on water as cold as ice could make it.  It almost caused my death.  In an instant every pore of my body was closed, and I was as numb as one would be if frozen.  Even my sight was destroyed for a few minutes, but I contrived to get out of the bath and put on my rags.  I found my way, with some difficulty, to the Union Depot, and boarded a train, but I did not notice that it was not the train I wanted to travel on until it was too late for me to correct the mistake.  I went to Zionsville, and lay there three days under the charge of two physicians.  I then started again to go home, expecting to die at any moment.  At last I reached Falmouth, and was carried to my father’s, where I passed two weeks in suffering only equaled by that which I had already borne.