I always found my coffin again, and the cave seemed to be more spacious and fuller of corpses than it appeared to be at first.  I lived for some days upon my bread and water; which being all spent, at last I prepared for death.  As I was thinking of death, I heard the stone lifted from the mouth of the cave, and immediately the corpse of a man was let down.  When men are reduced to necessity, it is natural for them to come to extreme resolutions.  While they let down the woman, I approached the place where her coffin was to be put, and as soon as I perceived they were covering the mouth of the cave, I gave the unfortunate wretch two or three great blows over the head with a large bone that I found; which stunned, or, to say the truth, killed her.  I committed this horrid action merely for the sake of the bread and water that were in her coffin, and thus I had provisions for some days more.  When that was spent, they let down another dead woman, and a living man; I killed the man in the same manner; and, as good luck would have it for me, there was then a sort of mortality in the town, so that by this means I did not want for provisions.

One day, as I had despatched another woman, I heard something walking, and blowing or panting as it walked.  I advanced towards that side from whence I heard the noise, and, upon my approach, the thing puffed and blew harder, as if it had been running away from me.  I followed the noise, and the thing seemed to stop sometimes, but always fled and blew as I approached.  I followed it so long and so far, that at last I perceived a light resembling a star:  I went on towards the light, and sometimes lost sight of it, but always found it again; and at last discovered that it came through a hole in the rock, large enough for a man to get out at.  Upon this, I stopped for some time to rest myself, being much fatigued with pursuing this discovery so fast:  Afterwards coming up to the hole, I went out at it, and found my self upon the banks of the sea.  I leave you to guess at the excess of my joy; it was such, that I could scarcely persuade myself of its being real.  But when I recovered from my surprise, and was convinced of the truth of the matter, I found the thing which I had followed, and heard puff and blow, to be a creature which came out of the sea, and was accustomed to enter at that hole to feed upon the dead carcases.  I considered the mountain, and perceived it to be situate betwixt the sea and the town, but without any passage or way to communicate with the latter, the rocks on the side of the sea being rugged and steep.  I fell down upon the shore to thank God for his mercy, and afterwards entered the cave again to fetch bread and water, which I did by daylight, with a better appetite than I had done since my interment in the dark hole.  I returned thither again, and groped about among the biers for all the diamonds, rubies, pearls, gold, bracelets, and rich stuffs I could find; these I brought to the shore, and tying