Some time must have elapsed before I became, dimly at first, and then
distinctly, aware of a bluish phosphorescent emanation from the
skeletion. This seemed to rise above it like a faint smoke, which
gradually gained consistency, took form, and became distinct; and I saw
before me the misty, luminous form of a naked man, with wolfish
countenance, prognathous jaws, glaring at me out of eyes deeply sunk
under projecting brows. Although I thus describe what I saw, yet it gave
me no idea of substance; it was vaporous, and yet it was articulate.
Indeed, I cannot say at this moment whether I actually saw this
apparition with my eyes, or whether it was a dream-like vision of the
brain. Though luminous, it cast no light on the walls of the cave; if I
raised my hand it did not obscure any portion of the form presented to
me. Then I heard: "I will tear you with the nails of my fingers and
toes, and rip you with my teeth."
"What have I done to injure and incense you?" I asked.
And here I must explain. No word was uttered by either of us; no word
could have been uttered by this vaporous form. It had no material lungs,
nor throat, nor mouth to form vocal sounds. It had but the semblance of
a man. It was a spook, not a human being. But from it proceeded
thought-waves, odylic force which smote on the tympanum of my mind or
soul, and thereon registered the ideas formed by it. So in like manner I
thought my replies, and they were communicated back in the same manner.
If vocal words had passed between us neither would have been
intelligible to the other. No dictionary was ever compiled, or would be
compiled, of the tongue of prehistoric man; moreover, the grammar of the
speech of that race would be absolutely incomprehensible to man now. But
thoughts can be interchanged without words. When we think we do not
think in any language. It is only when we desire to communicate our
thoughts to other men that we shape them into words and express them
vocally in structural, grammatical sentences. The beasts have never
attained to this, yet they can communicate with one another, not by
language, but by thought vibrations.
I must further remark that when I give what ensued as a conversation, I
have to render the thought intercommunication that passed between the
Homo Præhistoricus--the prehistoric man--and me, in English as best I
can render it. I knew as we conversed that I was not speaking to him in
English, nor in French, nor Latin, nor in any tongue whatever. Moreover,
when I use the words "said" or "spoke," I mean no more than that the
impression was formed on my brain-pan or the receptive drum of my soul,
was produced by the rhythmic, orderly sequence of thought-waves. When,
however, I express the words "screamed" or "shrieked," I signify that
those vibrations came sharp and swift; and when I say "laughed," that
they came in a choppy, irregular fashion, conveying the idea, not the
sound of laughter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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