|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 51
"The sleeper stirred; a thrill of terror ran through me. Should she
indeed awake, and see me, and curse me, and denounce the murderer? Thus
would she assuredly act if her darkened eyes opened and she beheld me.
The thought was madness; it stirred the fiend within me--not I, but
she, shall suffer; the murder I have committed because I am forever
robbed of all that she could give me, she shall atone. The crime had
its source in her; be hers the punishment! Thanks to the lessons of
Felix and the sanguinary laws of man, I had learned now to work
mischief. I bent over her and placed the portrait securely in one of
the folds of her dress. She moved again, and I fled.
"For some days I haunted the spot where these scenes had taken place,
sometimes wishing to see you, sometimes resolved to quit the world and
its miseries forever. At length I wandered towards these mountains,
and have ranged through their immense recesses, consumed by a burning
passion which you alone can gratify. We may not part until you have
promised to comply with my requisition. I am alone and miserable; man
will not associate with me; but one as deformed and horrible as myself
would not deny herself to me. My companion must be of the same species
and have the same defects. This being you must create."
Chapter 17
The being finished speaking and fixed his looks upon me in the
expectation of a reply. But I was bewildered, perplexed, and
unable to arrange my ideas sufficiently to understand the full
extent of his proposition. He continued,
"You must create a female for me with whom I can live in the
interchange of those sympathies necessary for my being. This you alone
can do, and I demand it of you as a right which you must not refuse to
concede."
The latter part of his tale had kindled anew in me the anger that had
died away while he narrated his peaceful life among the cottagers, and
as he said this I could no longer suppress the rage that burned within
me.
"I do refuse it," I replied; "and no torture shall ever extort a
consent from me. You may render me the most miserable of men, but you
shall never make me base in my own eyes. Shall I create another like
yourself, whose joint wickedness might desolate the world. Begone! I
have answered you; you may torture me, but I will never consent."
"You are in the wrong," replied the fiend; "and instead of threatening,
I am content to reason with you. I am malicious because I am
miserable. Am I not shunned and hated by all mankind? You, my
creator, would tear me to pieces and triumph; remember that, and tell
me why I should pity man more than he pities me? You would not call it
murder if you could precipitate me into one of those ice-rifts and
destroy my frame, the work of your own hands. Shall I respect man when
he condemns me? Let him live with me in the interchange of kindness,
and instead of injury I would bestow every benefit upon him with tears
of gratitude at his acceptance. But that cannot be; the human senses
are insurmountable barriers to our union. Yet mine shall not be the
submission of abject slavery. I will revenge my injuries; if I cannot
inspire love, I will cause fear, and chiefly towards you my arch-enemy,
because my creator, do I swear inextinguishable hatred. Have a care; I
will work at your destruction, nor finish until I desolate your heart,
so that you shall curse the hour of your birth."
A fiendish rage animated him as he said this; his face was wrinkled
into contortions too horrible for human eyes to behold; but presently
he calmed himself and proceeded--
"I intended to reason. This passion is detrimental to me, for you do
not reflect that YOU are the cause of its excess. If any being felt
emotions of benevolence towards me, I should return them a hundred and
a hundredfold; for that one creature's sake I would make peace with the
whole kind! But I now indulge in dreams of bliss that cannot be
realized. What I ask of you is reasonable and moderate; I demand a
creature of another sex, but as hideous as myself; the gratification is
small, but it is all that I can receive, and it shall content me. It
is true, we shall be monsters, cut off from all the world; but on that
account we shall be more attached to one another. Our lives will not
be happy, but they will be harmless and free from the misery I now
feel. Oh! My creator, make me happy; let me feel gratitude towards
you for one benefit! Let me see that I excite the sympathy of some
existing thing; do not deny me my request!"
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|