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THE LAST REDOUBT
Since Mirdath, My Beautiful One, died and left me lonely in this world,
I have suffered an anguish, and an utter and dreadful pain of longing,
such as truly no words shall ever tell; for, in truth, I that had all
the world through her sweet love and companionship, and knew all the joy
and gladness of Life, have known such lonesome misery as doth stun me to
think upon.
Yet am I to my pen again; for of late a wondrous hope has grown in me,
in that I have, at night in my sleep, waked into the future of this
world, and seen strange things and utter marvels, and known once more
the gladness of life; for I have learned the promise of the future, and
have visited in my dreams those places where in the womb of Time, she
and I shall come together, and part, and again come together--breaking
asunder most drearly in pain, and again reuniting after strange ages, in
a glad and mighty wonder.
And this is the utter strange story of that which I have seen, and
which, truly, I must set out, if the task be not too great; so that, in
the setting out thereof, I may gain a little ease of the heart; and
likewise, mayhap, give ease of hope to some other poor human, that doth
suffer, even as I have suffered so dreadful with longing for Mine Own
that is dead.
And some shall read and say that this thing was not, and some shall
dispute with them; but to them all I say naught, save "Read!" And having
read that which I set down, then shall one and all have looked towards
Eternity with me--unto its very portals. And so to my telling:
To me, in this last time of my visions, of which I would tell, it was
not as if I dreamed; but, as it were, that I waked there into the
dark, in the future of this world. And the sun had died; and for me
thus newly waked into that Future, to look back upon this, our Present
Age, was to look back into dreams that my soul knew to be of reality;
but which to those newly-seeing eyes of mine, appeared but as a far
vision, strangely hallowed with peacefulness and light.
Always, it seemed to me when I awaked into the Future, into the
Everlasting Night that lapped this world, that I saw near to me, and
girdling me all about, a blurred greyness. And presently this, the
greyness, would clear and fade from about me, even as a dusky cloud, and
I would look out upon a world of darkness, lit here and there with
strange sights. And with my waking into that Future, I waked not to
ignorance; but to a full knowledge of those things which lit the Night
Land; even as a man wakes from sleep each morning, and knows immediately
he wakes, the names and knowledge of the Time which has bred him, and in
which he lives. And the same while, a knowledge I had, as it were
sub-conscious, of this Present--this early life, which now I live so
utterly alone.
In my earliest knowledge of that place, I was a youth, seventeen years
grown, and my memory tells me that when first I waked, or came, as it
might be said, to myself, in that Future, I stood in one of the
embrasures of the Last Redoubt--that great Pyramid of grey metal which
held the last millions of this world from the Powers of the Slayers.
And so full am I of the knowledge of that Place, that scarce can I
believe that none here know; and because I have such difficulty, it may
be that I speak over familiarly of those things of which I know; and
heed not to explain much that it is needful that I should explain to
those who must read here, in this our present day. For there, as I stood
and looked out, I was less the man of years of this age, than the
youth of that, with the natural knowledge of that life which I had
gathered by living all my seventeen years of life there; though, until
that my first vision, I (of this Age) knew not of that other and Future
Existence; yet woke to it so naturally as may a man wake here in his bed
to the shining of the morning sun, and know it by name, and the meaning
of aught else. And yet, as I stood there in the vast embrasure, I had
also a knowledge, or memory, of this present life of ours, deep down
within me; but touched with a halo of dreams, and yet with a conscious
longing for One, known even there in a half memory as Mirdath.
As I have said, in my earliest memory, I mind that I stood in an
embrasure, high up in the side of the Pyramid, and looked outwards
through a queer spy-glass to the North-West. Aye, full of youth and with
an adventurous and yet half-fearful heart.
And in my brain was, as I have told, the knowledge that had come to me
in all the years of my life in the Redoubt; and yet until that moment,
this Man of this Present Time had no knowledge of that future
existence; and now I stood and had suddenly the knowledge of a life
already spent in that strange land, and deeper within me the misty
knowings of this our present Age, and, maybe, also of some others.
To the North-West I looked through the queer spy-glass, and saw a
landscape that I had looked upon and pored upon through all the years of
that life, so that I knew how to name this thing and that thing, and
give the very distances of each and every one from the "Centre-Point" of
the Pyramid, which was that which had neither length nor breadth, and
was made of polished metal in the Room of Mathematics, where I went
daily to my studies.
To the North-West I looked, and in the wide field of my glass, saw plain
the bright glare of the fire from the Red Pit, shine upwards against the
underside of the vast chin of the North-West Watcher--The Watching Thing
of the North-West.... "That which hath Watched from the Beginning, and
until the opening of the Gateway of Eternity" came into my thoughts, as
I looked through the glass ... the words of Aesworpth, the Ancient
Poet (though incredibly future to this our time). And suddenly they
seemed at fault; for I looked deep down into my being, and saw, as
dreams are seen, the sunlight and splendour of this our Present Age.
And I was amazed.
And here I must make it clear to all that, even as I waked from this
Age, suddenly into that life, so must I--that youth there in the
embrasure--have awakened then to the knowledge of this far-back life
of ours--seeming to him a vision of the very beginnings of eternity, in
the dawn of the world. Oh! I do but dread I make it not sufficient clear
that I and he were both I--the same soul. He of that far date seeing
vaguely the life that was (that I do now live in this present Age);
and I of this time beholding the life that I yet shall live. How utterly
strange!
And yet, I do not know that I speak holy truth to say that I, in that
future time, had no knowledge of this life and Age, before that
awakening; for I woke to find that I was one who stood apart from the
other youths, in that I had a dim knowledge--visionary, as it were, of
the past, which confounded, whilst yet it angered, those who were the
men of learning of that age; though of this matter, more anon. But this
I do know, that from that time, onwards, my knowledge and assuredness of
the Past was tenfold; for this my memory of that life told me.
And so to further my telling. Yet before I pass onwards, one other thing
is there of which I shall speak--In the moment in which I waked out of
that youthfulness, into the assured awaredness of this our Age, in
that moment the hunger of this my love flew to me across the ages; so
that what had been but a memory-dream, grew to the pain of Reality,
and I knew suddenly that I lacked; and from that time onwards, I went,
listening, as even now my life is spent.
And so it was that I (fresh-born in that future time) hungered strangely
for My Beautiful One with all the strength of that new life, knowing
that she had been mine, and might live again, even as I. And so, as I
have said, I hungered, and found that I listened.
And now, to go back from my digression, it was, as I have said, I had
amazement at perceiving, in memory, the unknowable sunshine and
splendour of this age breaking so clear through my hitherto most vague
and hazy visions; so that the ignorance of, Aesworpth was shouted to me
by the things which now I knew.
And from that time, onward, for a little space, I was stunned with all
that I knew and guessed and felt; and all of a long while the hunger
grew for that one I had lost in the early days--she who had sung to me
in those faery days of light, that had been in verity. And the
especial thoughts of that age looked back with a keen, regretful wonder
into the gulf of forgetfulness.
But, presently, I turned from the haze and pain of my dream-memories,
once more to the inconceivable mystery of the Night Land, which I viewed
through the great embrasure. For on none did it ever come with weariness
to look out upon all the hideous mysteries; so that old and young
watched, from early years to death, the black monstrosity of the Night
Land, which this our last refuge of humanity held at bay.
To the right of the Red Pit there lay a long, sinuous glare, which I
knew as the Vale of Red Fire, and beyond that for many dreary miles the
blackness of the Night Land; across which came the coldness of the light
from the Plain of Blue Fire.
And then, on the very borders of the Unknown Lands, there lay a range of
low volcanoes, which lit up, far away in the outer darkness, the Black
Hills, where shone the Seven Lights, which neither twinkled nor moved
nor faltered through Eternity; and of which even the great spy-glass
could make no understanding; nor had any adventurer from the Pyramid
ever come back to tell us aught of them. And here let me say, that down
in the Great Library of the Redoubt, were the histories of all those,
with their discoveries, who had ventured out into the monstrousness of
the Night Land, risking not the life only, but the spirit of life.
And surely it is all so strange and wonderful to set out, that I could
almost despair with the contemplation of that which I must achieve; for
there is so much to tell, and so few words given to man by which he may
make clear that which lies beyond the sight and the present and general
knowings of Peoples.
How shall you ever know, as I know in verity, of the greatness and
reality and terror of the thing that I would tell plain to all; for we,
with our puny span of recorded life must have great histories to tell,
but the few bare details we know concerning years that are but a few
thousands in all; and I must set out to you in the short pages of this
my life there, a sufficiency of the life that had been, and the life
that was, both within and without that mighty Pyramid, to make clear to
those who may read, the truth of that which I would tell; and the
histories of that great Redoubt dealt not with odd thousands of years;
but with very millions; aye, away back into what they of that Age
conceived to be the early days of the earth, when the sun, maybe, still
gloomed dully in the night sky of the world. But of all that went
before, nothing, save as myths, and matters to be taken most cautiously,
and believed not by men of sanity and proved wisdom.
And I, ...how shall I make all this clear to you who may read? The thing
cannot be; and yet I must tell my history; for to be silent before so
much wonder would be to suffer of too full a heart; and I must even ease
my spirit by this my struggle to tell to all how it was with me, and how
it will be. Aye, even to the memories which were the possession of that
far future youth, who was indeed I, of his childhood's days, when his
nurse of that Age swung him, and crooned impossible lullabies of this
mythical sun which, according to those future fairy-tales, had once
passed across the blackness that now lay above the Pyramid.
Such is the monstrous futureness of this which I have seen through the
body of that far-off youth.
And so back to my telling. To my right, which was to the North, there
stood, very far away, the House of Silence, upon a low hill. And in that
House were many lights, and no sound. And so had it been through an
uncountable Eternity of Years. Always those steady lights, and no
whisper of sound--not even such as our distance-microphones could have
discovered. And the danger of this House was accounted the greatest
danger of all those Lands.
And round by the House of Silence, wound the Road Where The Silent Ones
Walk. And concerning this Road, which passed out of the Unknown Lands,
nigh by the Place of the Ab-humans, where was always the green, luminous
mist, nothing was known; save that it was held that, of all the works
about the Mighty Pyramid, it was, alone, the one that was bred, long
ages past, of healthy human toil and labour. And on this point alone,
had a thousand books, and more, been writ; and all contrary, and so to
no end, as is ever the way in such matters.
And as it was with the Road Where The Silent Ones Walk, so it was with
all those other monstrous things ... whole libraries had there been made
upon this and upon that; and many a thousand million mouldered into the
forgotten dust of the earlier world.
I mind me now that presently I stepped upon the central
travelling-roadway which spanned the one thousandth plateau of the Great
Redoubt. And this lay six miles and thirty fathoms above the Plain of
the Night Land, and was somewhat of a great mile or more across. And so,
in a few minutes, I was at the South-Eastern wall, and looking out
through The Great Embrasure towards the Three Silver-fire Holes, that
shone before the Thing That Nods, away down, far in the South-East.
Southward of this, but nearer, there rose the vast bulk of the
South-East Watcher--The Watching Thing of the South-East. And to the
right and to the left of the squat monster burned the Torches; maybe
half-a-mile upon each side; yet sufficient light they threw to show the
lumbered-forward head of the never-sleeping Brute.
To the East, as I stood there in the quietness of the Sleeping-Time on
the One Thousandth Plateau, I heard a far, dreadful sound, down in the
lightless East; and, presently, again--a strange, dreadful laughter,
deep as a low thunder among the mountains. And because this sound came
odd whiles from the Unknown Lands beyond the Valley of The Hounds, we
had named that far and never-seen Place "The Country Whence Comes The
Great Laughter." And though I had heard the sound, many and oft a time,
yet did I never hear it without a most strange thrilling of my heart,
and a sense of my littleness, and of the utter terror which had beset
the last millions of the world.
Yet, because I had heard the Laughter oft, I paid not over-long
attention to my thoughts upon it; and when, in a little it died away
into that Eastern Darkness, I turned my spy-glass upon the Giants' Pit,
which lay to the South of the Giants' Kilns. And these same Kilns were
tended by the giants, and the light of the Kilns was red and fitful, and
threw wavering shadows and lights across the mouth of the pit; so that I
saw giants crawling up out of the pit; but not properly seen, by reason
of the dance of the shadows. And so, because ever there was so much to
behold, I looked away, presently, to that which was plainer to be
examined.
To the back of the Giants' Pit was a great, black Headland, that stood
vast, between the Valley of The Hounds (where lived the monstrous Night
Hounds) and the Giants. And the light of the Kilns struck the brow of
this black Headland; so that, constantly, I saw things peer over the
edge, coming forward a little into the light of the Kilns, and drawing
back swiftly into the shadows. And thus it had been ever, through the
uncounted ages; so that the Headland was known as The Headland From
Which Strange Things Peer; and thus was it marked in our maps and charts
of that grim world.
And so I could go on ever; but that I fear to weary; and yet, whether I
do weary, or not, I must tell of this country that I see, even now as I
set my thoughts down, so plainly that my memory wanders in a hushed and
secret fashion along its starkness, and amid its strange and dread
habitants, so that it is but by an effort I realise me that my body is
not there in this very moment that I write. And so to further tellings:
Before me ran the Road Where The Silent Ones Walk; and I searched it, as
many a time in my earlier youth had I, with the spy-glass; for my heart
was always stirred mightily by the sight of those Silent Ones.
And, presently, alone in all the miles of that night-grey road, I saw
one in the field of my glass--a quiet, cloaked figure, moving along,
shrouded, and looking neither to right nor left. And thus was it with
these beings ever. It was told about in the Redoubt that they would harm
no human, if but the human did keep a fair distance from them; but that
it were wise never to come close upon one. And this I can well believe.
And so, searching the road with my gaze, I passed beyond this Silent
One, and past the place where the road, sweeping vastly to the
South-East, was lit a space, strangely, by the light from the
Silver-fire Holes. And thus at last to where it swayed to the South of
the Dark Palace, and thence Southward still, until it passed round to
the Westward, beyond the mountain bulk of the Watching Thing in the
South--the hugest monster in all the visible Night Lands. My spy-glass
showed it to me with clearness--a living hill of watchfulness, known to
us as The Watcher Of The South. It brooded there, squat and tremendous,
hunched over the pale radiance of the Glowing Dome.
Much, I know, had been writ concerning this Odd, Vast Watcher; for it
had grown out of the blackness of the South Unknown Lands a million
years gone; and the steady growing nearness of it had been noted and set
out at length by the men they called Monstruwacans; so that it was
possible to search in our libraries, and learn of the very coming of
this Beast in the olden-time.
And, while I mind me, there were even then, and always, men named
Monstruwacans, whose duty it was to take heed of the great Forces, and
to watch the Monsters and the Beasts that beset the great Pyramid, and
measure and record, and have so full a knowledge of these same that, did
one but sway an head in the darkness, the same matter was set down with
particularness in the Records.
And, so to tell more about the South Watcher. A million years gone, as I
have told, came it out from the blackness of the South, and grew
steadily nearer through twenty thousand years; but so slow that in no
one year could a man perceive that it had moved.
Yet it had movement, and had come thus far upon its road to the Redoubt,
when the Glowing Dome rose out of the ground before it--growing slowly.
And this had stayed the way of the Monster; so that through an eternity
it had looked towards the Pyramid across the pale glare of the Dome, and
seeming to have no power to advance nearer.
And because of this, much had been writ to prove that there were other
forces than evil at work in the Night Lands, about the Last Redoubt. And
this I have always thought to be wisely said; and, indeed, there to be
no doubt to the matter, for there were many things in the time of which
I have knowledge, which seemed to make clear that, even as the Forces of
Darkness were loose upon the End of Man; so were there other Forces out
to do battle with the Terror; though in ways most strange and unthought
of by the human mind. And of this I shall have more to tell anon.
And here, before I go further with my telling, let me set out some of
that knowledge which yet remains so clear within my mind and heart. Of
the coming of these monstrosities and evil Forces, no man could say much
with verity; for the evil of it began before the Histories of the Great
Redoubt were shaped; aye, even before the sun had lost all power to
light; though, it must not be a thing of certainty, that even at this
far time the invisible, black heavens held no warmth for this world; but
of this I have no room to tell; and must pass on to that of which I have
a more certain knowledge.
The evil must surely have begun in the Days of the Darkening (which I
might liken to a story which was believed doubtfully, much as we of this
day believe the story of the Creation). A dim record there was of olden
sciences (that are yet far off in our future) which, disturbing the
unmeasurable Outward Powers, had allowed to pass the Barrier of Life
some of those Monsters and Ab-human creatures, which are so wondrously
cushioned from us at this normal present. And thus there had
materialized, and in other cases developed, grotesque and horrible
Creatures, which now beset the humans of this world. And where there was
no power to take on material form, there had been allowed to certain
dreadful Forces to have power to affect the life of the human spirit.
And this growing very dreadful, and the world full of lawlessness and
degeneracy, there had banded together the sound millions, and built the
Last Redoubt; there in the twilight of the world--so it seems to us, and
yet to them (bred at last to the peace of usage) as it were the
Beginning; and this I can make no clearer; and none hath right to expect
it; for my task is very great, and beyond the power of human skill.
And when the humans had built the great Pyramid, it had one thousand
three hundred and twenty floors; and the thickness of each floor was
according to the strength of its need. And the whole height of this
pyramid exceeded seven miles, by near a mile, and above it was a tower
from which the Watchmen looked (these being called the Monstruwacans).
But where the Redoubt was built, I know not; save that I believe in a
mighty valley, of which I may tell more in due time.
And when the Pyramid was built, the last millions, who were the Builders
thereof, went within, and made themselves a great house and city of this
Last Redoubt. And thus began the Second History of this world. And how
shall I set it all down in these little pages! For my task, even as I
see it, is too great for the power of a single life and a single pen.
Yet, to it!
And, later, through hundreds and thousands of years, there grew up in
the Outer Lands, beyond those which lay under the guard of the Redoubt,
mighty and lost races of terrible creatures, half men and half beast,
and evil and dreadful; and these made war upon the Redoubt; but were
beaten off from that grim, metal mountain, with a vast slaughter. Yet,
must there have been many such attacks, until the electric circle was
put about the Pyramid, and lit from the Earth-Current. And the lowest
half-mile of the Pyramid was sealed; and so at last there was a peace,
and the beginnings of that Eternity of quiet watching for the day when
the Earth-Current shall become exhausted.
And, at whiles, through the forgotten centuries, had the Creatures been
glutted time and again upon such odd bands of daring ones as had
adventured forth to explore through the mystery of the Night Lands; for
of those who went, scarce any did ever return; for there were eyes in
all that dark; and Powers and Forces abroad which had all knowledge; or
so we must fain believe.
And then, so it would seem, as that Eternal Night lengthened itself upon
the world, the power of terror grew and strengthened. And fresh and
greater monsters developed and bred out of all space and Outward
Dimensions, attracted, even as it might be Infernal sharks, by that
lonely and mighty hill of humanity, facing its end--so near to the
Eternal, and yet so far deferred in the minds and to the senses of those
humans. And thus hath it been ever.
And all this but by the way, and vague and ill told, and set out in
despair to make a little clear the beginnings of that State which is so
strange to our conceptions, and yet which had become a Condition of
Naturalness to Humanity in that stupendous future.
Thus had the giants come, fathered of bestial humans and mothered of
monsters. And many and diverse were the creatures which had some human
semblance; and intelligence, mechanical and cunning; so that certain of
these lesser Brutes had machinery and underground ways, having need to
secure to themselves warmth and air, even as healthy humans; only that
they were incredibly inured to hardship, as they might be wolves set in
comparison with tender children. And surely, do I make this thing clear?
And now to continue my telling concerning the Night Land. The Watcher of
the South was, as I have set to make known, a monster differing from
those other Watching Things, of which I have spoken, and of which there
were in all four. One to the North-West, and one to the South-East, and
of these I have told; and the other twain lay brooding, one to the
South-West, and the other to the North-East; and thus the four watchers
kept ward through the darkness, upon the Pyramid, and moved not, neither
gave they out any sound. Yet did we know them to be mountains of living
watchfulness and hideous and steadfast intelligence.
And so, in a while, having listened to the sorrowful sound which came
ever to us over the Grey Dunes, from the Country of Wailing, which lay
to the South, midway between the Redoubt and the Watcher of the South, I
passed upon one of the moving roadways over to the South-Western side of
the Pyramid, and looked from a narrow embrasure thence far down into the
Deep Valley, which was four miles deep, and in which was the Pit of the
Red Smoke.
And the mouth of this Pit was one full mile across, and the smoke of the
Pit filled the Valley at times, so that it seemed but as a glowing red
circle amid dull thunderous clouds of redness. Yet the red smoke rose
never much above the Valley; so that there was clear sight across to the
country beyond. And there, along the further edge of that great depth,
were the Towers, each, maybe, a mile high, grey and quiet; but with a
shimmer upon them.
Beyond these, South and West of them, was the enormous bulk of the
South-West Watcher, and from the ground rose what we named the Eye
Beam--a single ray of grey light, which came up out of the ground, and
lit the right eye of the monster. And because of this light, that eye
had been mightily examined through unknown thousands of years; and some
held that the eye looked through the light steadfastly at the Pyramid;
but others set out that the light blinded it, and was the work of those
Other Powers which were abroad to do combat with the Evil Forces. But
however this may be, as I stood there in the embrasure, and looked at
the thing through the spy-glass, it seemed to my soul that the Brute
looked straightly at me, unwinking and steadfast, and fully of a
knowledge that I spied upon it. And this is how I felt.
To the North of this, in the direction of the West, I saw The Place
Where The Silent Ones Kill; and this was so named, because there, maybe
ten thousand years gone, certain humans adventuring from the Pyramid,
came off the Road Where The Silent Ones Walk, and into that place, and
were immediately destroyed. And this was told by one who escaped; though
he died also very quickly, for his heart was frozen. And this I cannot
explain; but so it was set out in the Records.
Far away beyond The Place Where The Silent Ones Kill, in the very mouth
of the Western Night was the Place of the Ab-humans, where was lost the
Road Where The Silent Ones Walk, in a dull green, luminous mist. And of
this place nothing was known; though much it held the thoughts and
attentions of our thinkers and imaginers; for some said that there was a
Place Of Safety, differing from the Redoubt (as we of this day suppose
Heaven to differ from the Earth), and that the Road led thence; but was
barred by the Ab-humans. And this I can only set down here; but with no
thought to justify or uphold it.
Later, I travelled over to the North-Eastern wall of the Redoubt, and
looked thence with my spy-glass at the Watcher of the North-East--the
Crowned Watcher it was called, in that within the air above its vast
head there hung always a blue, luminous ring, which shed a strange light
downwards over the monster--showing a vast, wrinkled brow (upon which an
whole library had been writ); but putting to the shadow all the lower
face; all save the ear, which came out from the back of the head, and
belled towards the Redoubt, and had been said by some observers in the
past to have been seen to quiver; but how that might be, I knew not; for
no man of our days had seen such a thing.
And beyond the Watching Thing was The Place Where The Silent Ones Are
Never, close by the great road; which was bounded upon the far side by
The Giant's Sea; and upon the far side of that, was a Road which was
always named The Road By The Quiet City; for it passed along that place
where burned forever the constant and never-moving lights of a strange
city; but no glass had ever shown life there; neither had any light ever
ceased to burn.
And beyond that again was the Black Mist. And here, let me say, that the
Valley of The Hounds ended towards the Lights of the Quiet City.
And so have I set out something of that land, and of those creatures and
circumstances which beset us about, waiting until the Day of Doom, when
our Earth-Current should cease, and leave us helpless to the Watchers
and the Abundant Terror.
And there I stood, and looked forth composedly, as may one who has been
born to know of such matters, and reared in the knowledge of them. And,
anon, I would look upward, and see the grey, metalled mountain going up
measureless into the gloom of the everlasting night; and from my feet
the sheer downward sweep of the grim, metal walls, six full miles, and
more, to the plain below.
And one thing (aye! and I fear me, many) have I missed to set out with
particularness:
There was, as you do know, all around the base of the Pyramid, which was
five and one-quarter miles every way, a great circle of light, which was
set up by the Earth-Current, and burned within a transparent tube; or
had that appearance. And it bounded the Pyramid for a clear mile upon
every side, and burned for ever; and none of the monsters had power ever
to pass across, because of what we did call The Air Clog that it did
make, as an invisible Wall of Safety. And it did give out also a more
subtile vibration, that did affect the weak Brain-Elements of the
monsters and the Lower Men-Brutes. And some did hold that there went
from it a further vibration of a greater subtileness that gave a
protecting against the Evil Forces. And some quality it had truly
thiswise; for the Evil Powers had no ability to cause harm to any
within. Yet were there some dangers against which it might not avail;
but these had no cunning to bring harm to any within the Great Redoubt
who had wisdom to meddle with no dreadfulness. And so were those last
millions guarded until the Earth-Current should be used to its end. And
this circle is that which I have called the Electric Circle; though with
failure to explain. But there it was called only, The Circle.
And thus have I, with great effort, made a little clear that grim land
of night, where, presently, my listening heard one calling across the
dark. And how that this grew upon me, I will set out forthwith.
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