I saw him high in the air, pigeon-winging it to admiration just over the
top of the stile; and of course I thought it an unusually singular thing
that he did not continue to go over. But the whole leap was the affair of
a moment, and, before I had a chance to make any profound reflections,
down came Mr. Dammit on the flat of his back, on the same side of the
stile from which he had started. At the same instant I saw the old
gentleman limping off at the top of his speed, having caught and wrapt up
in his apron something that fell heavily into it from the darkness of the
arch just over the turnstile. At all this I was much astonished; but I had
no leisure to think, for Dammit lay particularly still, and I concluded
that his feelings had been hurt, and that he stood in need of my
assistance. I hurried up to him and found that he had received what might
be termed a serious injury. The truth is, he had been deprived of his
head, which after a close search I could not find anywhere; so I
determined to take him home and send for the homoeopathists. In the
meantime a thought struck me, and I threw open an adjacent window of the
bridge, when the sad truth flashed upon me at once. About five feet just
above the top of the turnstile, and crossing the arch of the foot-path so
as to constitute a brace, there extended a flat iron bar, lying with its
breadth horizontally, and forming one of a series that served to
strengthen the structure throughout its extent. With the edge of this
brace it appeared evident that the neck of my unfortunate friend had come
precisely in contact.

He did not long survive his terrible loss. The homoeopathists did not give
him little enough physic, and what little they did give him he hesitated
to take. So in the end he grew worse, and at length died, a lesson to all
riotous livers. I bedewed his grave with my tears, worked a bar sinister
on his family escutcheon, and, for the general expenses of his funeral,
sent in my very moderate bill to the transcendentalists. The scoundrels