An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge

by Ambrose Bierce

Death is a dignitary who when he comes announced is to be received with formal manifestations of respect, even by those most familiar with him.

As Peyton Farquhar fell straight downward through the bridge he lost consciousness and was as one already dead.

There was no additional strangulation; the noose about his neck was already suffocating him and kept the water from his lungs. To die of hanging at the bottom of a river!—the

"To be hanged and drowned," he thought, "that is not so bad; but I do not wish to be shot. No; I will not be shot; that is not fair."

Peyton Farquhar was dead; his body, with a broken neck, swung gently from side to side beneath the timbers of the Owl Creek bridge.