a slip-knot, and brought it down round my neck, taking good care to have it short enough that it would not choke me, and in this way I stood upon the stool for some considerable time, groaning and struggling, and making every kind of noise that might make her believe that I was choking or strangling; but still Mary sat deliberately smoking her pipe with the utmost coolness, and seemed to take no notice of me or what I was doing.  I thought my situation worse now than if I had not commenced this job at all.  My object in pretending to hang myself was to frighten Mary into compliance with my demand, and her conduct turned out to be everything but what I had expected.  I had thought that the moment I ascended the stool she would have clung to me and tried to dissuade me from committing suicide, and in this case my plan was to persist in carrying it out, unless she would consent to give Dan up; but instead of this she sat smoking her pipe apparently at ease and unmoved.  Now I found I had been mistaken—­what was I to do, to hang or kill myself was the last thing I meant to do—­in fact I had not the courage to do it for five hundred Marys.  But now, after mounting the stool and adjusting the rope round my neck, I was positively ashamed to come down without hanging myself, and then I stood like a fool.  At this moment in came the dog carlow, racing after the cat, right across the kitchen floor, and the dog coming in contact with the stool, knocked it right away from under my feet, and brought my neck suddenly to the full length of the rope, which barely allowed my toes to touch the floor.  Here I seized the rope with both hands to keep the weight of my whole body off my neck, and in this situation I soon found I must hang, and that dead enough, unless I had some assistance, for the stool had rolled entirely out of the reach of my feet, and the knot I had tied behind the beam I could not reach for my life.  My arms began to tremble with holding on to the rope, and still my mortification and pride for some time refused to let me call on Mary for assistance.  Such a moment of terror and suspense! heaven forbid that I should ever see or experience again.  Thoughts rushed into my mind of every bad deed that I had done in my life; and I thought that old cloven foot, as we called the devil, was waiting to nab me.  The stretch upon my arms exhausted me, with holding on by the rope, nothing was left me but despair; my pride and courage gave up the ghost, and I roared out, Mary! for God’s sake cut the rope!  No, answered Mary, you went up there to hang yourself, so now hang on.  Oh!  Mary, Mary!  I did not mean to hang!  I was only doing so to see what you would say.  Well, then, said Mary; you hear what I have to say—­hang on.  Oh, Mary! for heaven’s sake cut this rope, or I shall strangle to death!—­oh, dear, good Mary, save me this time:  and I roared out like a jackass, and must too have fainted, for when I came round Doctor Tillotson and his wife and Mary stood over me as I lay on the floor.  How