On the third morning, he awoke from a troubled sleep, and, as he rose with aching bones from the bare planks, his limbs trembled and tottered beneath him. Finding that he could not stand, he sat down in the corner of the dungeon, and leaned against the wall. His head was hot, and his throat parched, and the blood beat in throbs through his veins. A sort of delirious excitement began to creep over him, and his mind was filled with strange reveries.
He saw, or fancied he saw, great spiders crawling over the wall, and serpents, lizards, and indescribable reptiles, creeping about on the floor; and he shouted at them, and kicked at them, as they seemed to come near him. Soon they were viewed without dread or terror. He laughed at their motions, and thought he should have companions and pets in his loneliness; still he did not wish them to come too near.
Then there seemed to be other shapes in his cell. His old grandmother sat in one corner, reading, through her familiar spectacles, the well-worn family Bible. His sister sat there, playing with her baby, and his mother was singing as she sewed. And he laughed and talked to them, but could get no answer. Occasionally he felt a half-consciousness that it was all a delusion,—a mere vision of the brain; and yet their fancied presence made him happy, and he laughed and talked incessantly, as if they heard him, and were wondering at his own strange emotions.
And then the gruff voice of the jailer scared away his visions, and roused him for a moment from his reveries.
"You are merry, my boy, and you make too much noise," said the keeper.
The interruption made his head swim, and he attempted to rise; but he was very weak and faint, and fell back again. He turned to say, "I believe I am sick;" but before the words found utterance, the man had set down his pitcher and bread, and was gone.
There was an interval of dreary, blank darkness, and then there were other visions, too wild and strange to describe, and soon the darkness of annihilation settled upon his soul. How long a time elapsed while in this state of insensibility, he could not say; but he was at length half-aroused by voices near him, and he was conscious that some hand was feeling for his pulse, and that men were carrying him out of the dungeon. He afterwards learned that it was the jailer and the physician.