about them.

Suddenly Frycollin began to give unequivocal signs of being unwell.
He began to writhe in a most lamentable fashion, either with cramp in
his stomach or in his limbs; and Uncle Prudent, thinking it his duty
to put an end to these gymnastics, cut the cords that bound him.

He had cause to be sorry for it. Immediately there was poured forth
an interminable litany, in which the terrors of fear were mingled
with the tortures of hunger. Frycollin was no worse in his brain than
in his stomach, and it would have been difficult to decide to which
organ the chief cause of the trouble should be assigned.

"Frycollin!" said Uncle Prudent.

"Master Uncle! Master Uncle!" answered the Negro between two of his
lugubrious howls.

"It is possible that we are doomed to die of hunger in this prison,
but we have made up our minds not to succumb until we have availed
ourselves of every means of alimentation to prolong our lives,"

"To eat me?" exclaimed Frycollin.

"As is always done with a Negro under such circumstances! So you had
better not make yourself too obvious --"

"Or you'll have your bones picked!" said Evans.

And as Frycollin saw he might be used to prolong two existences more