I observed that the
      aperture through which I had thrust my head was an opening in the
      dial-plate of a gigantic clock, and must have appeared, from the
      street, as a large key-hole, such as we see in the face of the
      French watches. No doubt the true object was to admit the arm of
      an attendant, to adjust, when necessary, the hands of the clock
      from within. I observed also, with surprise, the immense size of
      these hands, the longest of which could not have been less than
      ten feet in length, and, where broadest, eight or nine inches in
      breadth. They were of solid steel apparently, and their edges
      appeared to be sharp. Having noticed these particulars, and some
      others, I again turned my eyes upon the glorious prospect below,
      and soon became absorbed in contemplation. From this, after some minutes, I was aroused by the voice of
      Pompey, who declared that he could stand it no longer, and
      requested that I would be so kind as to come down. This was
      unreasonable, and I told him so in a speech of some length. He
      replied, but with an evident misunderstanding of my ideas upon
      the subject. I accordingly grew angry, and told him in plain
      words, that he was a fool, that he had committed an ignoramus
      e-clench-eye, that his notions were mere insommary Bovis, and his
      words little better than an ennemywerrybor’em. With this he
      appeared satisfied, and I resumed my contemplations. It might have been half an hour after this altercation when, as I
      was deeply absorbed in the heavenly scenery beneath me, I was
      startled by something very cold which pressed with a gentle
      pressure on the back of my neck. It is needless to say that I
      felt inexpressibly alarmed. I knew that Pompey was beneath my
      feet, and that Diana was sitting, according to my explicit
      directions, upon her hind legs, in the farthest corner of the
      room. What could it be? Alas! I but too soon discovered. Turning
      my head gently to one side, I perceived, to my extreme horror,
      that the huge, glittering, scimetar-like minute-hand of the clock
      had, in the course of its hourly revolution, descended upon my
      neck. There was, I knew, not a second to be lost. I pulled back
      at once—but it was too late. There was no chance of forcing my
      head through the mouth of that terrible trap in which it was so
      fairly caught, and which grew narrower and narrower with a
      rapidity too horrible to be conceived. The agony of that moment
      is not to be imagined. I threw up my hands and endeavored, with
      all my strength, to force upward the ponderous iron bar. I might
      as well have tried to lift the cathedral itself. Down, down, down
      it came, closer and yet closer. I screamed to Pompey for aid; but
      he said that I had hurt his feelings by calling him “an ignorant
      old squint-eye.” I yelled to Diana; but she only said
      “bow-wow-wow,” and that I had told her “on no account to stir
      from the corner.” Thus I had no relief to expect from my
      associates. Meantime the ponderous and terrific Scythe of Time (for I now
      discovered the literal import of that classical phrase) had not
      stopped, nor was it likely to stop, in its career. Down and still
      down, it came. It had already buried its sharp edge a full inch
      in my flesh, and my sensations grew indistinct and confused. At
      one time I fancied myself in Philadelphia with the stately Dr.
      Moneypenny, at another in the back parlor of Mr. Blackwood
      receiving his invaluable instructions. And then again the sweet
      recollection of better and earlier times came over me, and I
      thought of that happy period when the world was not all a desert,
      and Pompey not altogether cruel. The ticking of the machinery amused me. Amused me, I say, for my
      sensations now bordered upon perfect happiness, and the most
      trifling circumstances afforded me pleasure. The eternal
      click-clak, click-clak, click-clak of the clock was the most
      melodious of music in my ears, and occasionally even put me in
      mind of the graceful sermonic harangues of Dr. Ollapod. Then
      there were the great figures upon the dial-plate—how intelligent
      how intellectual, they all looked! And presently they took to
      dancing the Mazurka, and I think it was the figure V. who
      performed the most to my satisfaction. She was evidently a lady
      of breeding. None of your swaggerers, and nothing at all
      indelicate in her motions. She did the pirouette to
      admiration—whirling round upon her apex. I made an endeavor to
      hand her a chair, for I saw that she appeared fatigued with her
      exertions—and it was not until then that I fully perceived my
      lamentable situation. Lamentable indeed! The bar had buried
      itself two inches in my neck. I was aroused to a sense of
      exquisite pain. I prayed for death, and, in the agony of the
      moment, could not help repeating those exquisite verses of the
      poet Miguel De Cervantes:

     Vanny Buren, tan escondida
     Query no te senty venny
     Pork and pleasure, delly morry
     Nommy, torny, darry, widdy! But now a new horror presented itself, and one indeed sufficient
      to startle the strongest nerves. My eyes, from the cruel pressure
      of the machine, were absolutely starting from their sockets. While I was thinking how I should possibly manage without them,
      one actually tumbled out of my head, and, rolling down the steep
      side of the steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which ran along
      the eaves of the main building. The loss of the eye was not so
      much as the insolent air of independence and contempt with which
      it regarded me after it was out. There it lay in the gutter just
      under my nose, and the airs it gave itself would have been
      ridiculous had they not been disgusting. Such a winking and
      blinking were never before seen. This behavior on the part of my
      eye in the gutter was not only irritating on account of its
      manifest insolence and shameful ingratitude, but was also
      exceedingly inconvenient on account of the sympathy which always
      exists between two eyes of the same head, however far apart. I
      was forced, in a manner, to wink and to blink, whether I would or
      not, in exact concert with the scoundrelly thing that lay just
      under my nose. I was presently relieved, however, by the dropping
      out of the other eye. In falling it took the same direction
      (possibly a concerted plot) as its fellow. Both rolled out of the
      gutter together, and in truth I was very glad to get rid of them. The bar was now four inches and a half deep in my neck, and there
      was only a little bit of skin to cut through.