Eng102- English Composition Ii

Throughout the story, we are able to see the different worlds Ambrose Bierce lived in compared to the one that we know. This is the first part of the story that I noticed, because in today’s world, no man would ever be hung, let alone executed for tampering with a bridge.
Peyton Farquhar grew up as a rich southerner. He had everything that a man wanted at his point in time: a wife, children, land and slaves. However, he had always thought that something was missing. Because of the fact he was not able to fight in the army, he didn’t feel like he was really a man because of that. This is why he was willing to do anything as “no service was too humble to him to perform in aid of the south, no adventure too perilous for him to undertake, consistent with the character of a civilian who was a soldier at heart”. Farquhar was blinded by his enthusiasm as it resulted in his death. His actions to tamper with the bridge did not totally end in failure. The illusion of escape and heroism that he went through prior to his death was the only time he ever really felt alive. Looking back at Farquhar imagined journey back to his house, you begin to see the pains and emotions that we was experiencing were more of a man hanging, than of one that just escaped from one. The first example is when Farquhar enters the forest and is amazed to see how dense the forest was, as “he had not known that he lived in so wild a region” and the stars were in a different pattern that night also. He also refers to the pain he was going through in his neck and his were feeling “congested” and he could not close them. This is because there is great force being applied to his neck and head from the nose. Farquhar was also because to experience thirst so great that his tongue was beginning to swell, but his tongue was really swelling from the pressure applied by the rope. He began to walk on the unfamiliar avenue, which symbolizes the avenue of death, and could no longer feel the ground