Hanging

“ The hanging is a device of my own, of which I am perhaps pardonably proud, and it pleases me that it is to be first tried on so worthy an assemblage. With much labour we have elevated to the battlements an oaken tree, lopped of its branches, which will not burn the less brightly next winter in that it has helped to commit some of you to hotter flames, if all ye say be true. ”

“ Hanging—though as a punishment for thieves, ascribed to the reign of Henry I., occurs in a charter of Edgar. In hanging for public spectacle, an iron hoop with a strong chain was put round the body; but the chain was longer than the halter, so that when the latter was cut, the hoop slipped to the armpits, and left them suspended. When criminals escaped, an image of them was often hung up for several days; whence our hanging in effigy. ”

“ Nay, some have proceeded to the paradoxical extreme of suggesting that certain modes of death are attended with pleasurable sensations, as for instance, hanging; and a late reviewer, who regards this sombre topic with a most cheerful eye, gives us instances which he considers in point. I have seen many men hung, forty at least, a strangely large number. ”

“ All the evidence goes to show that death by hanging is painless, and there is positively no fact or well-founded opinion to the contrary. If this be the case, then, what is the explanation of it? Simply this: That in every form of strangulation the blood-vessels of the neck are compressed, as well as the air-passages. ”

“ Even in regard to the way of mere hanging, the problem presented difficulties. In France, a rigid etiquette guarded the method of hanging. A franchise might give the right to hang upon trees only. [19] Some gallows had two pillars, some three, four, six, eight, according to the rank of the person erecting the gallows. ”

“ My neck is thin and long, and whether it be the axe or the cord that has to do with it, it will neither give the cord nor the edge much trouble; while I have always one consolation, which is, that if the experiment of hanging should prove disagreeable, it cannot be tried upon me twice. ”

“ Hanging is not a very fit end for any man, and hanged you will be if we carry you back to the city. I cannot tell what is your intent in stooping to this dishonour, but I think in letting you pass I can do but little harm. ”

“ With what difficulty and pain he worked, supported by his fragile rope ladder, compelled to brace himself against the sides of the chimney, and often to find relief from his cramped position by hanging to the iron bar, is hardly to be imagined. ”

“ Any person with contracted arms and thighs may be regarded as having been killed by hanging.
Any dead person with swollen hands, legs and belly, with sunken eyes and inflated navel may be regarded as having been killed by hanging. ”

“ The horrifying spectre of being hanged by the neck and the apprehension of being made to suffer a painful and lingering death is, if at all, never far from mind. Grim accounts exist of hangings not properly performed. ”

“ Hanging is too good for him, said Mr. ”

“ These magnificent hangings are woven of wool and silk, and one yet perceives almost throughout, golden and silver threads which time has spared. When the artist prepared to copy them for the work we are quoting, no one dreamt of the richness buried beneath the accumulated dust and dirt of centuries. ”

“ In such an emergency, all our thoughts and energies would be directed to the one mighty object of extending our premises, that we might have a sufficiency of rooms for the display of our priceless hangings. ”

“ The warp and nap being relatively thin, and color and design not being dependent upon strong or direct light to emphasize them, they are excellently adapted 37for hangings—indeed, they are too tender and precious to be placed upon the floor. ”

“ Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. ”

“ The waves come in slowly, vast and green, curve their translucent necks, and burst with a surprising uproar, that runs, waxing and waning, up and down the long key-board of the beach. The foam of these great ruins mounts in an instant to the ridge of the sand glacis, swiftly fleets back again, and is met and buried by the next breaker. The interest is perpetually fresh. On no other coast that I know shall you enjoy, in calm, sunny weather, such a spectacle of Ocean’s greatness, such beauty of changing colour, or such degrees of thunder in the sound. ”

“ Alas, in the cycle of the ages when shall such another be proposed for the judgment of man? Now when the sun shines and the winds blow, the wood is filled with an innumerable multitude of shadows, tumultuously tossed and changing; and at every gust the whole carpet leaps and becomes new. ”

“ At length, as I stretched my hand upward, I found somewhat that seemed like a recession in the wall: it was possible that this was the top of the cavity, and this might be the avenue to liberty. My heart leaped with joy, and I proceeded to climb the wall. No undertaking could be conceived more arduous than this: the space between this verge and the floor was nearly smooth; the verge was higher from the bottom than my head; the only means of ascending that were offered me were by my hands, with which I could draw myself upward, so as at length to maintain my hold with my feet. ”

“ The farmer's son followed, and warning the hangman not to touch the ring, he directed him to stretch his hands forwards in hopes of catching hold of some one. In a few minutes the wind blew the chaplain's cassock against the hangman's fingers, and he caught the parson round the waist. The farmer's son then seized him in like fashion, and each holding firmly by the other, the fiddler, the judge, the sheriff, the gaoler, the parson, the hangman, and the farmer's son all got safely out of the charmed circle. ”

“ Inch by inch, the wind contests the ground; another struggle, and he stands upon the veranda. On such occasions I make it a point to open the door myself, with a calmness and serenity that shall offer a marked contrast to his feverish and excited air, and shall throw suspicion of inebriety upon him. If he be inclined to timidity and bashfulness, during the best of the evening he is all too conscious of the disarrangement of his hair and cravat. ”

“ The chain at every oscillation made a grinding sound, with hideous regularity. It appeared to take breath, and then to resume. This grinding was like the cry of a grasshopper.
An approaching squall is heralded by sudden gusts of wind. All at once the breeze increased into a gale. The corpse emphasized its dismal oscillations. It no longer swung, it tossed; the chain, which had been grinding, now shrieked. It appeared that its shriek was heard. If it was an appeal, it was obeyed. From the depths of the horizon came the sound of a rushing noise. ”

“ Then the hangman kneeled downe and asked her forgevenesse, whome she forgave most willingly. Then he willed her to stand upon the strawe; which doing, she sawe the blocke. Then she sayd, ‘I pray you dispatch me quickly.’ Then she kneeled down, saying, ‘Wil you take it (her head) off before I lay me downe?’ and the hangman answered her, ‘No, madame.’ She tyed the kercher about her eys ”

“ The latter made ready to mount the ladder leaning against the gibbet, which, impassive, was about to draw with extended arm the soul out of a body, and he attempted to make the condemned mount in front of him, but it was not an easy thing to do. One does not know, in general, what obstacles those condemned to death will put in the way of their dying.
The hangman and the man there had the air of passing civilities one to another. ”

“ I would be loathe, good fellow, to take more.
Point me the block; I ne’er was here before.
HANGMAN.
To the east side, my lord.
MORE.
Then to the east
We go to sigh; that o’er, to sleep in rest.
Here More forsakes all mirth; good reason why;
The fool of flesh must with her frail life die.
No eye salute my trunk with a sad tear:
Our birth to heaven should be thus, void of fear.
[Exit with Hangman, etc.]
SURREY.
A very learned worthy gentleman
Seals error with his blood. Come, we’ll to court. ”

“ Thus I retourned into the said roome where I found the hangman making his instruments ready for the worke, and myne accusers; who being ravished with joy because they had brought their designe to an expected end, continued to increase the sadness of my spirit with many insolent and hart breaking expressions, and drinking an health to my confusion, another to my speedy journey to the gallows. Now the temptations of that day (which was a day of distresse and unspeakable greife to me) came to their height ”

“ As soon as thy feet are on the moss, cut the rope, stop not to untie it, fall on thy breast, and crawl into that hole—my finger shows it now—where slab of stone leans unto stone, and the body of a large heart may lie hidden. ”

“ No man can look attractive after having been hanged, and the indentation of the hangman's rope on every one of their necks, with the mark of the knot under the ear, gave such an impression of all that can be conceived of devilish horror as would baffle the conceptions of the most morbid genius. ”

“ When I look at myself, I find I have got hinges all over my body. I have hinges to my legs, hinges to my jaws, hinges to my feet. If I want to take hold of any thing, there are hinges to my hands to do it with. If my heart thinks, and I want to speak, I have got hinges to my jaws. If I want to walk, I have hinges to my feet. ”

“ He often took naps in the daytime on the floor with his head in the corner, like a bad boy in punishment, his head drawn down into his shoulders and his bill thrust up into the air at an angle of forty-five degrees. ”

“ There seemed a tension in the air—as if something was going to snap. Doubtless you have often felt it—a sensation as though pins and needles were pricking you all over. As though you wanted to scream—to cry out—against an uncertain sensation that gripped you. ”

“ A third attempts With leg dismembered to arise and stand, Whilst, on the ground hard by, the dying foot Twitches its spreading toes. And even the head, When from the warm and living trunk lopped off, Keeps on the ground the vital countenance And open eyes, until 't has rendered up All remnants of the soul. ”

“ Now one of them has his leg thrust out from under bed, so the lad brings his sword down and cuts it off. Then another thrusts his arm out at other side of the bed, and the lad cuts that off. So at last he had maimed them all, and they all went crying and wailing off, and forgot the ball, but he took it from under the bed, and went to seek his truelove.
Now the lass was taken to York to be hanged; she was brought out on the scaffold, and the hangman said, "Now, lass, thou must hang by the neck till thou be'st dead." But she cried out:
"Stop, stop, I think I see my mother coming! ”

“ On, on, on—on through the heat and the crowd and the dust—on, or they will be trampled down and lost—on, with throbbing brain and tottering limbs—on, till the heart grows sick, and the eyes grow blurred, and a gurgling groan tells those behind they may close up another space. ”

“ Every time that he lifted a rock, she gave some sign of a fiercer wrench of pain, as when the executioner gives another twist to the rack; sometimes she thrust one hand against the window sill and swung part way around, as though about to fall ”

“ Sometimes the wind would cause her veil for a few moments to rear straight up above her head in a monstrous black column of woe. Sometimes, if she stopped a moment waiting to cross the street, it would whip round the body of any one who happened to be near, like a cord. ”

“ It needs but a moment for the conversation to become general,—about roots under the shoulder, stubs in the back, a ridge on which it is impossible for the sleeper to balance, the non-elasticity of boughs, the hardness of the ground, the heat, the smoke, the chilly air. ”

“ In the deep sleep that had come upon the crawler, arms and legs kept raising in a deliberate, dreadful climbing motion. It was as though they had a life of their own—they kept their movement independently of the motionless body. ”

“ Men fall, tossing their arms; some leap into the air, some plunge headlong, falling like logs of wood or lumps of lead. Some reel, stagger, and tumble; others lie down gently as to a night’s repose, unheeding the din, commotion, and uproar. ”

“ So ravaged and raw and red,
Turned to the wall — in fine,
Wishing that I was dead. . . .
What has happened since then,
Since I lay with my face to the wall,
The most despairing of men?
Listen! I'll tell you all. ”

“ Once, at the dusk of the evening, we saw a figure all in white, apparently of more than human stature, flourishing about the road, now throwing up its arms, now leaping to an astonishing height in the air, then turning round several times successively, then raising itself to its full height and gesticulating violently. ”

“ The overwhelming mental tension, coupled with the knowledge of the proximity of death, has a fearsome reaction upon the Chair's victim. With each rapid inspiration, there is a slight elevation of the shoulders, and as expiration takes place the shoulders sag. ”

“ When the drunken comrade mutters and the great guard-lantern gutters And the horror of our fall is written plain, Every secret, self-revealing on the aching white-washed ceiling, Do you wonder that we drug ourselves from pain? ”