It was a desert, bare, and blasted country, without grass, or vegetation, or woods, and without animals, with the exception of deadly monsters, and venomous reptiles of every kind; serpents, snakes, lice, toads, maw-worms, locusts, ear-wigs, and the like, which all exist on human corruption. Through myriads of shades, and creeping things, graves, sepulchres, and cemeteries, we proceeded, without interruption, to observe the country. At last I perceived some of the shades turning and looking upon me; and suddenly, notwithstanding the great silence that had prevailed before, there was a whispering from one to the other that there was a _living man_ at hand. "A living man," said one; "a living man," said the other; and they came thronging about me like caterpillars from every corner. "How did you come hither, sirrah?" said a little morkin of a death who was there. "Truly sir," said I, "I know no more than yourself." "What do they call you?" he demanded. "Call me what you please, here in your own country," I replied, "but at home I am called _the Sleeping Bard_." At that word I beheld a crooked old man, with a double head like to a rough-barked thorn tree, raising himself erect, and looking upon me worse than the black devil himself; and lo! without saying a word, he hurled a large human skull at my head--many thanks to a tombstone which shielded me. "Pray be quiet, sir," said I. "I am but a stranger, who was never here before, and you may be sure I will never return, if I can once reach home again." "I will give you cause to remember having been here," said he; and attacked me with a thigh-bone, like a very devil, whilst I avoided his blows as well as I could. "By heavens," said I, "this is a most inhospitable country to strangers. Is there a justice of the peace here?" "Peace!" said he, "what peace do you deserve, who will not let people rest in their graves?" "Pray, sir," said I, "may I be allowed to know your name, because I am not aware of ever having disturbed any one in this country." "Sirrah," said he, "know that not you are the Sleeping Bard, but that I am that person; and I have been allowed to rest here for nine hundred years, by every one but yourself." And he attacked me again.