Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930Pelcher, Anthony
Science
Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930
Pelcher, Anthony
Science fiction -- Periodicals; Science fiction, American -- Periodicals
"I cannot read Russian," said Dr. Bird slowly, "and so was forced to
depend on one of my assistants to translate the papers which Mr. Bolton
found in Stokowsky's room. There is nothing in them to definitely
connect him with the Russian Union of Soviet Republics, but there is
little doubt in my mind that he was a Red agent and that Russia supplied
the money which he spent. It would be disastrous to Russia's plans to
have too close an accord between this country and the British Empire,
and I have no doubt that the coming visit of Premier McDougal was the
underlying cause of the attempt. So much for the reason.
"As to how I came to suspect what was happening, the explanation is very
simple. When Carnes first told me of your malady, Mr. President, I
happened to be checking Von Beyer's results in the alleged discovery of
a new element, lunium. In the article describing his experiments, Von
Beyer mentions that when he tried to observe the spectra, he encountered
a mild form of opthalmia which was quite stubborn to treatment. He also
mentions a peculiar mental unbalance and intense exhilaration which the
rays seemed to cause both in himself and in his assistants. The analogy
between his observations and your case struck me at once.
* * * * *
"For ages the moon has been an object of worship by various religious
sects, and some of the most obscene orgies of which we have record
occurred in the moonlight. The full moon seems to affect dogs to a state
of partial hypnosis with consequent howling and evident pain in the
eyes. Certain feeble minded persons have been known to be adversely
affected by moonlight as well as some cases of complete mental
aberration. In other words, while moonlight has no practical effect on
the normal human in its usual concentration, it does have an adverse
effect on certain types of mentality and, despite the laughter of
medical science, there seems to be something in the theory of 'moon
madness.' This effect Von Beyer attributed to the emanations of lunium,
which element he detected in the spectra of the moon, in the form of a
wide band in the ultra-violet region.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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