'And what did you do to him?'

'Sent him to hell before me!' replied the miscreant.

'Wretch,' said Mac-Morlan, 'you have crowned a life spent without
a single virtue with the murder of your own miserable accomplice!'

'Virtue?' exclaimed the prisoner. 'Donner! I was always faithful
to my shipowners--always accounted for cargo to the last stiver.
Hark ye! let me have pen and ink and I'll write an account of the
whole to our house, and leave me alone a couple of hours, will ye;
and let them take away that piece of carrion, donnerwetter!'

Mac-Morlan deemed it the best way to humour the savage; he was
furnished with writing materials and left alone. When they again
opened the door it was found that this determined villain had
anticipated justice. He had adjusted a cord taken from the
truckle-bed, and attached it to a bone, the relic of his
yesterday's dinner, which he had contrived to drive into a crevice
between two stones in the wall at a height as great as he could
reach, standing upon the bar. Having fastened the noose, he had
the resolution to drop his body as if to fall on his knees, and to
retain that posture until resolution was no longer necessary. The
letter he had written to his owners, though chiefly upon the
business of their trade, contained many allusions to the younker
of Ellangowan, as he called him, and afforded absolute
confirmation of all Meg Merrilies and her nephew had told.

To dismiss the catastrophe of these two wretched men, I shall only