Sinking down at the foot of the wall, I now gave myself up for lost. Even had the torch not been quite burnt out, I had no means of relighting it, having used my last match when we stopped to smoke, just before I broke away from my guide. I think I must have become somewhat delirious now; for I have a faint recollection of wild songs chanted, and of yells that made the vaulted roof ring again. Then a heavy sleep must have fallen upon me, which probably lasted for several hours; and then I awoke to a dim consciousness of horror, as I began to realize the terrible situation into which I had brought myself by my reckless folly. My dog was still nestling close to me; and it may have been to his presence, perhaps, that I owed the fact of my not having been mangled by rats during my sleep. Rising with difficulty to my feet, for I was stiff from lying so long upon the damp, cold ground, I once more tried to shout; but my voice was utterly gone, from my previous exertion of it, and I could not raise it above a whisper. Then, in sheer desperation, I dragged myself along the wall, feeling the way with my hands, and had not gone many paces when I felt an angle in the masonry, on rounding which a ray of hope dawned upon me, as I discerned a faint light, far, far away, at the end of what seemed to be all but, an endless shaft of darkness. The prospect of escape infused new vigor into my weary limbs, and I kept steering onward for the light, which grew larger and larger as I approached it. At last I got near enough to see that it came through a small _grille_, or iron door, which terminated the branch of the sewer in which I was. When I reached the grating, I saw that it looked out upon the river, between which and it, however, there lay a deep indentation, or channel, of some fifty or sixty yards in length. It was gray morning, and I could see boats and steamers and ships, passing and repassing upon the river. Surely deliverance was now at hand! but how was I to make my situation known? My voice, as I have said, was utterly gone, and I had barely strength left to wave my pocket-handkerchief from the grating. There I stood for hours,--a prisoner looking wistfully through the bars of a dungeon to which no wayfarer came. I had sunk down at the foot of the grating, from mere exhaustion, when the whining of my little dog attracted me, and I gave him a caressing pat. He licked my face and whined again, as much as to say, "Can't I be of some use to you?" This brought a bright idea to my mind. Tearing a leaf from my note-book, I wrote the following words upon it, with pencil:--