“You see them? You see them? You see the things that float and flop about you and through you every moment of your life? You see the creatures that form what men call the pure air and the blue sky? Have I not succeeded in breaking down the barrier; have I not shewn[50] you worlds that no other living men have seen?” I heard him[51] scream through the horrible chaos, and looked at the wild face thrust so offensively close to mine. His eyes were pits of flame, and they glared at me with what I now saw was overwhelming hatred. The machine droned detestably.
“You think those floundering things wiped out the servants? Fool, they are harmless! But the servants are gone, aren’t they? You tried to stop me; you discouraged me when I needed every drop of encouragement I could get; you were afraid of the cosmic truth, you damned coward, but now I’ve got you! What swept up the servants? What made them scream so loud? . . . Don’t know, eh?[52] You’ll know soon enough![53] Look at me—listen to what I say—do you suppose there are really any such things as time and magnitude?[54] Do you fancy there are such things as form or matter?[55] I tell you, I have struck depths that your little brain can’t picture![56] I have seen beyond the bounds of infinity and drawn down daemons[57] from the stars. . . . I have harnessed the shadows that stride from world to world to sow death and madness. . . . Space belongs to me, do you hear? Things are hunting[58] me now—the things that devour and dissolve—but I know how to elude them. It is you they will get, as they got the servants. . . .[59] Stirring, dear sir? I told you it was dangerous to move.[60] I have saved you so far by telling you to keep still—saved you to see more sights and to listen to me. If you had moved, they would have been at you long ago. Don’t worry, they won’t hurt you. They didn’t hurt the servants—it was[61] seeing that made the poor devils scream so. My pets are not pretty, for they come out of places where aesthetic standards are—very different. Disintegration is quite painless, I assure you—but[62] I want you to see them. I almost saw them, but I knew how to stop. You are not[63] curious? I always knew you were no scientist![64] Trembling, eh?[65] Trembling with anxiety to see the ultimate things I have discovered?[66] Why don’t you move, then? Tired? Well, don’t worry, my friend, for they are coming.[67] . . . Look! Look,[68] curse you, look![69] . . . It’s just over your left shoulder. . . .”
What remains to be told is very brief, and may be familiar to you from the newspaper accounts. The police heard a shot in the old Tillinghast house and found us there—Tillinghast dead and me unconscious. They arrested me because the revolver was in my hand, but released me in three hours, after they found it was apoplexy which had finished Tillinghast and saw that my shot had been directed at the noxious machine which now lay hopelessly shattered on the laboratory floor. I did not tell very much of what I had seen, for I feared the coroner would be sceptical;[70] but from the evasive outline I did give, the doctor told me that I had undoubtedly been hypnotised by the vindictive and homicidal madman.
I wish I could believe that doctor. It would help my shaky nerves if I could dismiss what I now have to think of the air and the sky about and above me. I never feel alone or comfortable, and a hideous sense of pursuit sometimes comes chillingly on me when I am weary. What prevents me from believing the doctor is this one simple fact—that the police never found the bodies of those servants whom they say Crawford Tillinghast murdered.
Notes
Editor’s Note: The A.Ms. is HPL’s original draft, written on the back of correspondence to him. No T.Ms. has come to light, but one must have prepared for the tale’s first appearance (Fantasy Fan, June 1934). That appearance contains certain important divergences from the A.Ms. (particularly in paragraphing) that are probably not printing errors but revisions made in the hypothetical T.Ms. It appears, however, that HPL may not have prepared the T.Ms. himself: although the Fantasy Fan appearance contains some phrases not in the A.Ms. (which might easily have been added on the T.Ms. by hand), there are other omissions and errors in the appearance that may be attributed more to its derivation from a faulty T.Ms. than from errors of its own. Moreover, the A.Ms. contains certain marks and annotations by HPL (e.g., the fact that the central character’s name is to be changed from “Henry Annesley” to “Crawford Tillinghast”) that would be superfluous unless HPL were making instructions for someone else preparing the T.Ms. Nevertheless, some of the divergences between the A.Ms. and the Fantasy Fan appearance are surely due to wilful revisions by HPL. The Arkham House editions followed the Fantasy Fan text. The posthumous Weird Tales appearance (February 1938) is not relevant to the tale’s textual history.
Texts: A = A.Ms.; B = Fantasy Fan 1, No. 10 (June 1934): 147–51; C = Beyond the Wall of Sleep (Arkham House, 1943), 28–32; D = Dagon and Other Macabre Tales (Arkham House, 1965), 66–72. Copy-text: A (with some readings from B).
1. Crawford Tillinghast.] Henry Annesley. A [and so on throughout text]
2. had] om. C, D
3. rage.] rage, B, C, D
4. repellent unkemptness;] repellant unkemptness; B; repellent unkemptness, C D
5. pure] om. B, C, D
6. half-coherent] half coherent B, C, D
7. such] such was B, C, D
8. house . . . Street.] house. A
9. investigator,] investigator B, C, D
10. despair] despair, B, C, D
11. voice. ¶] voice. A
12. know,” ] know”, A
13. unrecognised] unrecognized B, C, D
14. recognise.] recognize. B, C, D
15. rage.] rage. ¶ Up two flights of stairs I followed the bobbing candle held by the shaking parody on a man. Annesley muttered, but evidently not to me. We entered the laboratory, where the electrical machine stood silently, emitting a violet glow; and my companion started a gasoline engine to generate power. This was necessary, since the rambling, antiquated house was not wired for electricity. I wondered at the glow, but Annesley told me that it was not electrical in any sense that I could understand. He now directed me to sit near the machine, while he connected some wires with a rheostat which he held in his hands. After that he took a ________________ the range of the human senses, according to your original theory?” A [excised]
16. Tillinghast] Tillinghart B
17. reason. ¶] reason. A
18. dare,”] dare”, A
19. sinister,] sinister B, C, D
20. outré] outre A, B
21. whispered. “That] whispered, “That A; whispered, “that B, C, D
22. ultra-violet.”] ultr-violet.” B
23. seen] seen the D
24. shew] show A, B, C, D
25. sense-organs] sense organs A
26. I laugh . . . Freudian.] om. A
27. sense-organ] sense organ A, B, C, D
28. organs—I . . . out.] organs. A
29. from] from B, C, D
30. and] om. D
31. soundless] soundless, A; soundiess, B
32. after . . . Providence.] at night. A; after . . . Provirence. B
33. machine,] machines, C, D
34. experienced,] experienced B, C, D
35. me] me to D
36. possible. ¶] possible. A
37. housekeeper] house-/keeper C; house-keeper D
38. called] cailed B
39. “beyond”.] “beyond.” B, C, D
40. unrecognisable] unrecognizable B, C, D
41. aërial] aerial A, B, C, D
42. felt] felt the D
43. preternatural] preternaturl B
44. permanence.] per-/mance. B
45. terrestrial] tereestrial B
46. theatre.] theater. B, C, D
47. electrical] elrctrical B
48. material] om. B, C, D
49. great] om. B, C, D
50. shewn] shown A, B, C, D
51. him] his B, C, D
52. eh?] eh! B, C, D
53. enough!] enough. B, C, D
54. magnitude?] magnitude. B
55. matter?] matter. B
56. picture!] picture. B,
C, D
57. daemons] demons B
58. hunting] hunthing B
59. servants. . . .] servants. A
60. move.] move, B, C, D
61. was] was the B, C, D
62. but] but B, C, D
63. not] om. D
64. scientist!] scientist. B, C, D
65. eh?] eh. B, C, D
66. discovered?] discovered. B, C, D
67. coming.] coming. Anxious to go? You can’t, dear sir, whilst I am looking at you. No—it will do you no good to attack me, for my friends are already on the way. A [excised]
68. Look! Look,] Look, look, B, C, D
69. look!] look. B, C, D
70. sceptical;] skeptical; B, C, D
Nyarlathotep
Nyarlathotep . . . the crawling chaos . . . I am the last . . . I will tell the audient void. . . .
I do not recall distinctly when it began, but it was months ago. The general tension was horrible. To a season of political and social upheaval was added a strange and brooding apprehension of hideous physical danger; a danger widespread and all-embracing, such a danger as may be imagined only in the most terrible phantasms of[1] the night. I recall that the people went about with pale and worried faces, and whispered warnings and prophecies[2] which no one dared consciously repeat or acknowledge to himself that he had heard. A sense of monstrous guilt was upon the land, and out of the abysses between the stars swept chill currents that made men shiver in dark and lonely places. There was a daemoniac[3] alteration in the sequence of the seasons—the autumn heat lingered fearsomely, and everyone felt that the world and perhaps the universe had passed from the control of known gods or forces to that of gods or[4] forces which were unknown.
And it was then that Nyarlathotep came out of Egypt. Who he was,[5] none could tell, but he was of the old native blood and looked like a Pharaoh. The fellahin knelt when they saw him, yet could not say why. He said he had risen up out of the blackness of twenty-seven centuries,[6] and that he had heard messages from places not on this planet. Into the lands of civilisation[7] came Nyarlathotep, swarthy, slender, and sinister, always buying strange instruments of glass and metal and combining them into instruments yet stranger. He spoke much of the sciences—of electricity and psychology—[8]and gave exhibitions of power which sent his spectators away speechless,[9] yet which swelled his fame to exceeding magnitude. Men advised one another to see Nyarlathotep, and shuddered. And where Nyarlathotep went, rest vanished;[10] for the small hours were rent with the screams of nightmare. Never before had the screams of nightmare been such a public problem; now the wise men almost wished they could forbid sleep in the small hours, that the shrieks of cities might less horribly disturb the pale, pitying moon as it glimmered on green waters gliding under bridges, and old steeples crumbling against a sickly sky.
I remember when Nyarlathotep came to my city—the great, the old, the terrible city of unnumbered crimes. My friend had told me of him, and of the impelling fascination and allurement of his revelations, and I burned with eagerness to explore his uttermost mysteries. My friend said they were horrible and impressive beyond my most fevered imaginings; that what was thrown on a screen in the darkened room prophesied things none but Nyarlathotep dared prophesy, and that[11] in the sputter of his sparks there was taken from men that which had never been taken before yet which shewed only in the eyes. And I heard it hinted abroad that those who knew Nyarlathotep looked on sights which others saw not.
It was in the hot autumn that I went through the night with the restless crowds to see Nyarlathotep; through the stifling night and up the endless stairs into the choking room. And shadowed on a screen,[12] I saw hooded forms amidst ruins, and yellow evil faces peering from behind fallen monuments. And I saw the world battling against blackness; against the waves of destruction from ultimate space; whirling, churning;[13] struggling around the dimming, cooling sun. Then the sparks played amazingly around the heads of the spectators, and hair stood up on end whilst shadows more grotesque than I can tell came out and squatted on the heads. And when I, who was colder and more scientific than the rest, mumbled a trembling protest about “imposture” and “static electricity”,[14] Nyarlathotep drave[15] us all out, down the dizzy stairs into the damp, hot, deserted midnight streets. I screamed aloud that I was not[16] afraid; that I never could be afraid; and others screamed with me for solace. We sware[17] to one another that the city was[18] exactly the same, and still alive; and when the electric lights began to fade we cursed the company over and over again, and laughed at the queer faces we made.
I believe we felt something coming down from the greenish moon, for when we began to depend on its light we drifted into curious involuntary marching formations and seemed to know our destinations though we dared not think of them. Once we looked at the pavement and found the blocks loose and displaced by grass, with scarce a line of rusted metal to shew[19] where the tramways had run. And again we saw a tram-car, lone, windowless, dilapidated, and almost on its side. When we gazed around the horizon,[20] we could not find the third tower by the river, and noticed that the silhouette of the second tower was ragged at the top. Then we split up into narrow columns, each of which seemed drawn in a different direction. One disappeared in a narrow alley to the left, leaving only the echo of a shocking moan. Another filed down a weed-choked subway entrance,[21] howling with a laughter that was mad. My own column was sucked toward the open country, and presently[22] felt a chill which was not of the hot autumn; for as we stalked out on the dark moor,[23] we beheld around us the hellish moon-glitter of evil snows. Trackless, inexplicable snows, swept asunder in one direction only, where lay a gulf all the blacker for its glittering walls. The column seemed very thin indeed as it plodded dreamily into the gulf. I lingered behind, for the black rift in the green-litten[24] snow was frightful, and I thought I had heard the reverberations of a disquieting wail as my companions vanished; but my power to linger was slight. As if beckoned by those who had gone before,[25] I half floated[26] between the titanic snowdrifts, quivering and afraid, into the sightless vortex of the unimaginable.
Screamingly sentient, dumbly delirious, only the gods that were can tell. A sickened, sensitive shadow writhing in[27] hands that are not hands,[28] and whirled blindly past ghastly midnights of rotting creation, corpses of dead worlds with sores that were cities, charnel winds that brush the pallid stars and make them flicker low. Beyond the worlds vague ghosts of monstrous things; half-seen columns of unsanctified temples that rest on nameless rocks beneath space and reach up to dizzy vacua above the spheres of light and darkness. And through this revolting graveyard of the universe the muffled, maddening beating of drums, and thin, monotonous whine of blasphemous flutes from inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond Time; the detestable pounding and piping whereunto dance slowly, awkwardly, and absurdly the gigantic, tenebrous ultimate gods—the blind, voiceless, mindless gargoyles whose soul is Nyarlathotep.
Notes
Editor’s Note: In the absence of a manuscript, we are reliant on the first appearance, in the United Amateur (November 1920). This was typeset by E. E. Ericson, the Official Printer of the UAPA for the 1920–21 term, and appears to be reasonably accurate. It was presumably the basis for the reprint in the National Amateur (July 1926); the divergences between the two texts appear to be the result of printing errors rather than deliberate revisions by HPL. The Arkham House edition (there is only one) follows the United Amateur text.
Texts: A = United Amateur 20, No. 2 (November 1920): 19–21; B = National Amateur 48, No. 6 (July 1926): 53–54; C = Beyond the Wall of Sleep (Arkham House, 1943), 6–7. Copy-text: A.
1. of] fo B
2. prophecies] prophesies B
3. daemoniac] demoniac A, B, C
4. or] and A, B
5. was,] was B
6. centuries,] centuries B
7. civilisation] civilization B
8. psychology—] psychology C
9. speechless,] speechless B
&
nbsp; 10. vanished;] vanished, C
11. that] om. C
12. screen,] screen B
13. churning;] churning, C
14. electricity”,] electricity,” A, C
15. drave] drove C
16. not] not B
17. sware] swore C
18. was] was B
19. shew] show A
20. horizon,] horizon B
21. entrance,] entrance B
22. presently] presently I C
23. moor,] moor B
24. green-litten] greenlitten B
25. before,] before B
26. half floated] half-floated A, B, C
27. in] in the B
28. hands,] hands B
The Picture in the House
Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places. For them are the catacombs of Ptolemais,[1] and the carven mausolea of the nightmare countries. They climb to the moonlit towers of ruined Rhine castles, and falter down black cobwebbed steps beneath the scattered stones of forgotten cities in Asia. The haunted wood and the desolate mountain are their shrines, and they linger around the sinister monoliths on uninhabited islands. But the true epicure in the terrible, to whom a new thrill of unutterable ghastliness is the chief end and justification of existence, esteems most of all the ancient, lonely farmhouses of backwoods New England; for there the dark elements of strength, solitude, grotesqueness,[2] and ignorance combine to form the perfection of the hideous.