| By the same Author. |
| A LITTLE PILGRIM: |
| In the Unseen. |
| Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. |
| MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON. |
THE LAND OF DARKNESS
THE
LAND OF DARKNESS
ALONG WITH SOME
FURTHER CHAPTERS IN THE EXPERIENCES
OF
THE LITTLE PILGRIM
London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
AND NEW YORK
1888
All rights reserved
CONTENTS
| PAGE | |
| The Land of Darkness | 1 |
| The Little Pilgrim | 127 |
| On the Dark Mountains | 177 |
I
THE LAND OF DARKNESS
I found myself standing on my feet, with the tingling sensation ofhaving come down rapidly upon the ground from a height. There was asimilar feeling in my head, as of the whirling and sickening sensationof passing downward through the air, like the description Dante gives ofhis descent upon Geryon. My mind, curiously enough, was sufficientlydisengaged to think of that, or at least to allow swift passage for therecollection through my thoughts. All the aching of wonder, doubt, andfear which I had been conscious of a little while before was gone. There{2}was no distinct interval between the one condition and the other, norin my fall (as I supposed it must have been) had I any consciousness ofchange. There was the whirling of the air, resisting my passage, yetgiving way under me in giddy circles, and then the sharp shock of oncemore feeling under my feet something solid, which struck yet sustained.After a little while the giddiness above and the tingling below passedaway, and I felt able to look about me and discern where I was. But notall at once: the things immediately about me impressed me first—thenthe general aspect of the new place.
First of all the light, which was lurid, as if a thunderstorm werecoming on. I looked up involuntarily to see if it had begun to rain; butthere was nothing of the kind, though what I saw above me was a loweringcanopy of cloud, dark, threatening, with a faint reddish tint diffusedupon the vaporous darkness. It was, however, quite sufficiently clear to{3}see everything, and there was a good deal to see. I was in a street ofwhat seemed a great and very populous place. There were shops on eitherside, full appare