another fall from above came, half burying head and shoulders, and compelling me to do the work over. The air grew foul and sluggish, but I was toiling for life, and dug at the _debris_ madly, reckless of what might fall from above. Better to be crushed, than to die of suffocation, and the very desperation with which I strove proved my salvation. For what remained of the roof held, and I struggled through into the firmer gallery beyond, faint from exhaustion, yet as quickly reviving in the fresher air. I had reached the end of the passage before I comprehended the truth. It opened in the side of a gulley, coming out between the roots of a great tree, and could only have been discovered through sheerest accident. Years of exposure had plastered the small opening with clay, and I was compelled to break this away before I could creep through out into the open air. I was a wreck in body and mind, my face streaked with earth, my hair filled with dirt, my clothing torn and disreputable. Laboring for breath, my fingers raw and bleeding, I lay there, with scarcely enough strength remaining to keep from rolling to the bottom of the ravine. For some moments I was incapable of either thought or action, every ounce of energy having been expended in that last desperate struggle. I lay panting, with eyes closed, hardly realizing that I was indeed alive. Slowly, throb by throb, my heart came back into regularity of beat, and my brain into command. My eyes opened, and I shuddered with horror, as I recognized that dismal opening into the side of the hill. Clinging to the tree trunk I attained my feet, still swaying from weakness, and was thus able to glance about over the edge of the bank, and gain some conception of my immediate surroundings.