  We describe a representation of the Bolthausen-Sznitman coalescent in terms
of the cutting of random recursive trees. Using this representation, we prove
results concerning the final collision of the coalescent restricted to [n]: we
show that the distribution of the number of blocks involved in the final
collision converges as n tends to infinity, and obtain a scaling law for the
sizes of these blocks. We also consider the discrete-time Markov chain giving
the number of blocks after each collision of the coalescent restricted to [n];
we show that the transition probabilities of the time-reversal of this Markov
chain have limits as n tends to infinity. These results can be interpreted as
describing a ``post-gelation'' phase of the Bolthausen-Sznitman coalescent, in
which a giant cluster containing almost all of the mass has already formed and
the remaining small blocks are being absorbed.
