No More Learning

Not a day elapsed which did not bring us news of the decease of some
acquaintance. Then as the fatality increased, we learned to expect daily
the loss of some friend. At length we trembled at the approach of every
messenger. The very air from the South seemed to us redolent with death.
That palsying thought, indeed, took entire possession of my soul. I
could neither speak, think, nor dream of any thing else. My host was
of a less excitable temperament, and, although greatly depressed in
spirits, exerted himself to sustain my own. His richly philosophical
intellect was not at any time affected by unrealities. To the substances
of terror he was sufficiently alive, but of its shadows he had no
apprehension.

His endeavors to arouse me from the condition of abnormal gloom into
which I had fallen, were frustrated, in great measure, by certain
volumes which I had found in his library. These were of a character to
force into germination whatever seeds of hereditary superstition
lay latent in my bosom. I had been reading these books without his
knowledge, and thus he was often at a loss to account for the forcible
impressions which had been made upon my fancy.

A favorite topic with me was the popular belief in omens--a belief
which, at this one epoch of my life, I was almost seriously disposed
to defend. On this subject we had long and animated discussions--he
maintaining the utter groundlessness of faith in such matters,--I
contending that a popular sentiment arising with absolute spontaneity-
that is to say, without apparent traces of suggestion--had in itself the
unmistakable elements of truth, and was entitled to as much respect
as that intuition which is the idiosyncrasy of the individual man of
genius.

The fact is, that soon after my arrival at the cottage there had
occurred to myself an incident so entirely inexplicable, and which had
in it so much of the portentous character, that I might well have been
excused for regarding it as an omen.
It appalled, and at the same time
so confounded and bewildered me, that many days elapsed before I could
make up my mind to communicate the circumstances to my friend.

Near the close of exceedingly warm day, I was sitting, book in hand, at
an open window, commanding, through a long vista of the river banks, a
view of a distant hill, the face of which nearest my position had been
denuded by what is termed a land-slide, of the principal portion of its
trees. My thoughts had been long wandering from the volume before me to
the gloom and desolation of the neighboring city. Uplifting my eyes
from the page, they fell upon the naked face of the bill, and upon an
object--upon some living monster of hideous conformation, which very
rapidly made its way from the summit to the bottom, disappearing finally
in the dense forest below. As this creature first came in sight, I
doubted my own sanity--or at least the evidence of my own eyes; and
many minutes passed before I succeeded in convincing myself that I was
neither mad nor in a dream. Yet when I described the monster (which
I distinctly saw, and calmly surveyed through the whole period of
its progress), my readers, I fear, will feel more difficulty in being
convinced of these points than even I did myself.

Estimating the size of the creature by comparison with the diameter of
the large trees near which it passed--the few giants of the forest which
had escaped the fury of the land-slide--I concluded it to be far larger
than any ship of the line in existence. I say ship of the line, because
the shape of the monster suggested the idea--the hull of one of our
seventy-four might convey a very tolerable conception of the general
outline. The mouth of the animal was situated at the extremity of a
proboscis some sixty or seventy feet in length, and about as thick as
the body of an ordinary elephant. Near the root of this trunk was
an immense quantity of black shaggy hair--more than could have been
supplied by the coats of a score of buffaloes; and projecting from this
hair downwardly and laterally, sprang two gleaming tusks not unlike
those of the wild boar, but of infinitely greater dimensions. Extending
forward, parallel with the proboscis, and on each side of it, was a
gigantic staff, thirty or forty feet in length, formed seemingly of pure
crystal and in shape a perfect prism,--it reflected in the most gorgeous
manner the rays of the declining sun. The trunk was fashioned like a
wedge with the apex to the earth. From it there were outspread two pairs
of wings--each wing nearly one hundred yards in length--one pair being
placed above the other, and all thickly covered with metal scales; each
scale apparently some ten or twelve feet in diameter. I observed that
the upper and lower tiers of wings were connected by a strong chain. But
the chief peculiarity of this horrible thing was the representation of a
Death's Head, which covered nearly the whole surface of its breast, and
which was as accurately traced in glaring white, upon the dark ground of
the body, as if it had been there carefully designed by an artist. While
I regarded the terrific animal, and more especially the appearance
on its breast, with a feeling or horror and awe--with a sentiment of
forthcoming evil, which I found it impossible to quell by any effort of
the reason, I perceived the huge jaws at the extremity of the proboscis
suddenly expand themselves, and from them there proceeded a sound so
loud and so expressive of wo, that it struck upon my nerves like a knell
and as the monster disappeared at the foot of the hill, I fell at once,
fainting, to the floor.