Equinox I (04).pdf
Equinox I (04).pdf Equinox I (04).pdf
254 THE EQUINOX of hasheesh delirum, another dose, however small—yes, though it be no larger than half a pea—be employed to prolong the condition, such agony will inevitably ensue as will make the soul shudder at its own possibility of endurance without annihilation. By repeated experiments, which now occupy the most horrible place upon my catalogue of horrible remembrances, have I proved that, among all the variable phenomena of hasheesh, this alone stands unvarying. The use of it directly after any other stimulus will produce consequences as appalling. I extinguished my light. To say this may seem trivial, but it is as important a matter as any which it is possible to notice. The most direful suggestions of the bottomless pit may flow in upon the hasheesh eater through the very medium of darkness. The blowing out of a candle can set an unfathomed barathrum wide agape beneath the flower-wreathed table of his feast, and convert his palace of sorcery into a Golgotha. Light is a necessity to him, even when sleeping; it must tinge his visions, or they assume a hue as sombre as the banks of Styx. It was an awaking, which, for torture, had no parallel in all the stupendous domain of sleeping incubus. Beside my bed in the centre of the room stood a bier, from whose corners drooped the folds of a heavy pall; outstretched upon it lay in state a most fearful corpse, whose livid face was distorted with the pangs of assassination. The traces of a great agony were frozen into fixedness in the tense position of every muscle, and the nails of the dead man's fingers pierced
THE HASHEESH EATER his palms with the desperate clinch of one who has yielded not without agonising resistance. Two tapers at his head, two at his feet, with their tall and unsnuffed wicks, made the ghastliness of the bier more luminously unearthly, and a smothered laugh of derision from some invisible watcher ever and anon mocked the corpse, as if triumphant demons were exulting over their prey. I pressed my hands upon my eyeballs till they ached, in intensity of desire to shut out the spectacle; I buried my head in the pillow, that I might not hear that awful laugh of diabolic sarcasm. But—oh horror immeasurable! I behold the walls of the room slowly gliding together, the ceiling coming down, the floor ascending, as of old the lonely captive saw them, whose cell was doomed to be his coffin. Nearer and nearer am I born toward the corpse. I shrunk back from the edge of the bed; I cowered in most abject fear. I tried to cry out, but speech was paralysed. The walls came closer and closer together. Presently my hand lay on the dead man's fore- head. I made my arm as straight and rigid as a bar of iron; but of what avail was human strength against the contraction of that cruel masonry? Slowly my elbow bent with the ponderous pressure; nearer grew the ceiling—I fell into the fearful embrace of death. I was pent, I was stifled in the breathless niche, which was all of space still left to me. The stony eyes stared up into my own, and again the maddening peal of fiendish laughter rang close beside my ear. Now I was touched on all sides by the walls of the terrible press; there came a heavy crush, and I felt all sense blotted out in darkness. I awoke at last; the corpse was gone, but I had taken his 255
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THE HASHEESH EATER<br />
his palms with the desperate clinch of one who has yielded<br />
not without agonising resistance. Two tapers at his head, two<br />
at his feet, with their tall and unsnuffed wicks, made the<br />
ghastliness of the bier more luminously unearthly, and a<br />
smothered laugh of derision from some invisible watcher ever<br />
and anon mocked the corpse, as if triumphant demons were<br />
exulting over their prey. I pressed my hands upon my eyeballs<br />
till they ached, in intensity of desire to shut out the<br />
spectacle; I buried my head in the pillow, that I might not<br />
hear that awful laugh of diabolic sarcasm.<br />
But—oh horror immeasurable! I behold the walls of the<br />
room slowly gliding together, the ceiling coming down, the<br />
floor ascending, as of old the lonely captive saw them, whose<br />
cell was doomed to be his coffin. Nearer and nearer am I<br />
born toward the corpse. I shrunk back from the edge of the<br />
bed; I cowered in most abject fear. I tried to cry out, but<br />
speech was paralysed. The walls came closer and closer<br />
together. Presently my hand lay on the dead man's fore-<br />
head. I made my arm as straight and rigid as a bar of iron;<br />
but of what avail was human strength against the contraction<br />
of that cruel masonry? Slowly my elbow bent with the<br />
ponderous pressure; nearer grew the ceiling—I fell into the<br />
fearful embrace of death. I was pent, I was stifled in the<br />
breathless niche, which was all of space still left to me. The<br />
stony eyes stared up into my own, and again the maddening<br />
peal of fiendish laughter rang close beside my ear. Now I<br />
was touched on all sides by the walls of the terrible press;<br />
there came a heavy crush, and I felt all sense blotted out in<br />
darkness.<br />
I awoke at last; the corpse was gone, but I had taken his<br />
255