When the World Shook: Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and ArbuthnotHaggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
Science
When the World Shook: Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot
Haggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider)
Adventure stories; Science fiction
“Yes,” he said; “the God of the Mountain of whom the tradition has come
down to us from our forefathers. He is awake again; he sees, he hears
and we are afraid. Plead with him for us, O Friend-from-the-Sea.”
As he spoke we were passing through a little patch of thick bush.
Suddenly from out of this bush, I saw a lad appear. He wore a mask upon
his face, but from his shape could not have been more than thirteen or
fourteen years of age. In his hand was a wooden club. He ran forward,
stopped, and with a yell of hate hurled it, I think at Bastin, but it
hit me. At any rate I felt a shock and remembered no more.
Dreams. Dreams. Endless dreams! What were they all about? I do not
know. It seemed to me that through them continually I saw the stately
figure of old Oro contemplating me gravely, as though he were making up
his mind about something in which I must play a part. Then there was
another figure, that of the gracious but imperial Yva, who from time to
time, as I thought, leant over me and whispered in my ear words of rest
and comfort. Nor was this all, since her shape had a way of changing
suddenly into that of my lost wife who would speak with her voice. Or
perhaps my wife would speak with Yva’s voice. To my disordered sense it
was as though they were one personality, having two shapes, either of
which could be assumed at will. It was most strange and yet to me most
blessed, since in the living I seemed to have found the dead, and in
the dead the living. More, I took journeys, or rather some unknown part
of me seemed to do so. One of these I remember, for its majestic
character stamped itself upon my mind in such a fashion that all the
waters of delirium could not wash it out nor all its winds blow away
that memory.
I was travelling through space with Yva a thousand times faster than
light can flash. We passed sun after sun. They drew near, they grew
into enormous, flaming Glories round which circled world upon world.
They became small, dwindled to points of light and disappeared.
We found footing upon some far land and passed a marvelous white city
wherein were buildings with domes of crystal and alabaster, in the
latter of which were set windows made of great jewels; sapphires or
rubies they seemed to me. We went on up a lovely valley. To the left
were hills, down which tumbled waterfalls; to the right was a river
broad and deep that seemed to overflow its banks as does the Nile.
Behind were high mountains on the slopes of which grew forests of
glorious trees, some of them aflame with bloom, while far away up their
crests stood colossal golden statues set wide apart. They looked like
guardian angels watching that city and that vale. The land was lit with
a light such as that of the moon, only intensified and of many colours.
Indeed looking up, I saw that above us floated three moons, each of
them bigger than our own at the full, and gathered that here it was
night.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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