In the course of two weeks, or thereabouts, my foot had so far recovered that I was able to put it on the ground, and hobble about a little with a crutch; but I had lost all hope of ever being able to resume my exercises in the field. I was therefore reduced to despair; and my wife becoming more intolerable every day, I began to be so weary of existence, that I was once or twice on the point of making away with myself.
She was, in truth, the nonpareil of women and of scolders. I have called her a shrew; but it must not be supposed she was of that species to which men give the name of Tartar. She was none of your fierce, pepper-tempered creatures, who wrangle in a loud voice over the whole house, and sometimes take broomsticks to the servants. Such viragoes are in a measure sufferable, for they are sometimes in a good-humour. My Margaret was of the family of Croakers, as they are called; that is, of a lugubrious, grumbling complexion, always sad and whining, full of suspicions and reproaches, now in tears, now in hysterics, always in an ill-humour, and so keeping every one about her in a state of misery. I never knew a servant, male or female, old or young, black or white, to remain in the house two weeks at a time, except a poor little negress that had been bound to me—that is, my prototype—under indentures; and she, after running away a dozen times, began to mope, and pine, and look so sorrowful, that, out of pity, I sent her home to her mother. As for myself, being incapable of flying, and exposed all day long to her lectures and reproaches, I became melancholy and desperate, wished myself Sheppard Lee again, with the constable and sheriff both after me, and, twice or thrice, as I have hinted before, resolved to put an end to my life.
One day, while I was reading the papers, I fell upon the account of a man who had hanged himself. "He was in good circumstances," said the journal, "and had a wife and three children. No reason has been assigned or suspected for his rash act."
"No doubt his wife was a shrew!" said I to myself, "and there was no way of getting rid of her; and so it was the wisest thing the poor man could do."
I thought over this occurrence so long, that it produced a great effect upon my mind; and my wife leaving me one day more incensed and desperate than ever, I snatched up a bit of cord that lay in my way, and resolved to strangle myself forthwith. I should have hanged myself over the chamber door, but was in dread I might slip down to the floor, and hurt my foot; and thinking it more genteel to die in my bed, I made the cord into a noose, or ring, through which, having placed it about my neck, I clapped a silver candlestick, by means of which I thought I might twist the cord tight enough to strangle me. And so I might, had I possessed the nerve; but in truth, I no sooner found my breath a little obstructed, than I became alarmed with the idea of apoplexy, which was always frightful to me, and so gave over my purpose.
On another occasion I sent to an apothecary whom I knew, for a vial of prussic acid, which takes life so expeditiously, that, as I supposed, one could have no time to be in pain. But that I might know in what manner it operated, I gave a quantity to a neighbour's cat, which had found her way into my chamber, and made friends with me during my confinement; and the creature was thrown into such horrible convulsions, and set up such a diabolical yell, that although she was stone-dead in less than half a minute, I was convinced this was the most uncomfortable way of dying that could be hit on.
I had then some thoughts of drowning myself, and only hesitated whether I should try the experiment in the bath-tub, or wait until I could bear a ride over the paving-stones to the river. As to cutting my throat, or blowing my brains out, I had never the slightest idea of trying either; for in respect to the former, besides that it makes such a horrible puddle of blood about one's body, it causes one to look as vulgar and low-lived as a slaughtered bullock; and as for the latter, I was so familiar with fire-arms, that I knew them to be weapons one cannot trifle with.
But fortune, that had served me such a scurvy trick in saddling me with gout and a scolding wife, along with the wealth of John H. Higginson, willed that I should employ none of these deadly expedients against my life, but get rid of my distresses in a manner much more remarkable and novel.