“By all the prophets and the patriarchs,” he groaned wearily, “’tis not in me to make it!  Had I endeavored this before eating I could have slipped through, scarcely touching either side.  But now I am scraped like a pig for the feast.  Baste me, friend Benteen, but I can move neither forward nor back in this accursed place; I am full aground in the centre, and can never hope to progress without aid.”

I reached down until I laid firm hold upon his groping fingers.

“Find some projection to push against with your feet,” I advised disgustedly.

“Fervently will I endeavor to dig in, and thus render all assistance in my power, yet I feel little to encourage me here in good works.  Would it not be wise to test the potency of prayer?  Verily the prayer of the righteous availeth much.”

“I try earthly power first,” I returned testily.  “So lay to it, and we will have you out.”

I braced my knees against the firm wall, exerting all the strength I possessed.  There followed a series of moans and heated expostulations, then the sound of rending cloth, and the disgruntled Puritan came forth with a suddenness of exit which landed us both in a heap on the floor.

“May all the spawn of hell be your playmates,” he roared in mad anger.  “By the bones of Moses! you have scraped every bit of skin off me, and half my coat is ripped loose and left behind.  Thou art an ungodly, blaspheming—­”

He gasped wildly for breath as I throttled him, but the grip of my hands stilled his speech.

“It was only that you gorged like a bear preparing for Winter, or you would have passed through even as I did,” I muttered, heedless of his effort to release my clutch.  “Lie still now, or, by all the devils in the pit, I ’ll shut down harder on your throat.  Ah, so you can keep quiet, friend?  Then I will let you go, for I would be free to explore this passage.”

I could perceive, by means of the faint light streaming through the narrow opening, that he was busily engaged in rubbing his sorely lacerated sides, and I noted his brown jerkin had been fairly wrenched off his shoulders.

“Where did you leave your coat?”

“Yonder in that accursed hole!  It has store of provisions in its pockets.  Lord save me, but was there ever such a time!”

He turned, groping anxiously about in the scene of his late adventure until he finally brought forth the missing garment.  Carefully testing the pockets to see their contents remained intact, a smile lit up his leathern face, and he flung it across his shoulders, like a pair of well-filled saddle-bags.  I reached in also, lowered the drapery, and then led down the dark tunnel as rapidly as the grim uncertainty of the way would permit.

The passage proved long and tedious; at least so it seemed to us compelled to grope slowly onward through the darkness.  However, it ran straight and upon a level, although the numerous supports of the roof gave us occasional foul blows, and proved so confusing we were considerable time in traversing its distance.  All I have already pictured as occurring since I departed from the presence of Madame, and first plunged blindly into the underground labyrinths, had required several hours, and it must have been close upon sunset when we emerged from the gloom of the tunnel into the fresh sweet air.