Pigeons From Hell and Other Classic Horror Selections

By Patrick Aengus Wolfe

You won't want to be alone after you've read this chilling anthology of timeless horror stories penned by the masters of short fiction. Creeping and crawling with thrills and suspense enough for readers of all ages, this collection of terror filled tales is a brilliantly entertaining introduction to classic literature. When I started this project, it appeared to be obvious which stories I'd select. Then a curious thing happened...I read, in depth, many stories from each potential author, and I found out the "Cliff Notes" reading style of my younger academic years served as a grave injustice to these amazing authors. My job, now, was immensely more difficult...so many eerie and macabre stories...what to choose...what to choose? These final selections practically jumped off the pages and literally, as well as literately, raised the hair on the back of my neck. Collectively, they provide an exciting and suspenseful sampling of various writing styles and themes across the horror genre. So, forget the modern film adaptations, or what you remember from adolescent academics and tap into terror straight from its' literary source. Turn on your night-light and pull up the covers...the horror...the horror!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Patrick Aengus Wolfe
• Release date: Apr 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301437887

Patrick Aengus Wolfe

Patrick Aengus Wolfe is the pen name for the CEO of Lone Wolfe Enterprises, Inc., the Founder of Wolfe Cubs Foundation for Children, LLC,and a hardscrabble veteran of lifelong struggles with addiction. No stranger to broken roads, broken promises and broken hearts...Patrick lives by the philosophy: "Learn from the past, Live for today, Lay the groundwork for tomorrow." It is his hope that some of the lessons he's learned from the school of hard knocks will ease the journey and burden of others who may be heading down some of the same self-destructive trails that he has already blazed.

Book preview

Pigeons From Hell

And Other Classic Horror Selections

Selected and Edited by

Patrick Wolfe

**Smashwords Edition**

Published on Smashwords by Lone Wolfe Enterprises

Pigeons From Hell

And Other Classic Horror Selections

Copyright 2013 by Patrick Wolfe

ISBN: 9781301437887

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Table of Contents

Introduction...Patrick Wolfe

Are We Really Alone?

H. F. Arnold Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Night Wire...H. F. Arnold

Algernon Blackwood Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Willows...Algernon Blackwood

Dealing With the Devil

J. Sheridan Le Fanu Bio...Patrick Wolfe

Sir Dominick's Bargain...J. Sheridan Le Fanu

Folklore...the Original Urban Legends

Washington Irving Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow...Washington Irving

Monsters, Ghouls and Other Beasties

H. P. Lovecraft Bio…Patrick Wolfe

Dagon...H. P. Lovecraft

Ambrose Bierce Bio…Patrick Wolfe

The Death of Halpin Frayser...Ambrose Bierce

Robert E. Howard Bio…Patrick Wolfe

The Horror from the Mound...Robert E. Howard

The Shadow Over Innsmouth...H. P. Lovecraft

The Wendigo...Algernon Blackwood

Portents of Evil

Pigeons From Hell...Robert E. Howard

The Evil Within

Edgar Allen Poe Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Black Cat...Edgar Allen Poe

The Moral of the Story is...

W. W. Jacobs Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Monkey's Paw...W. W. Jacobs

Was It My Imagination?

H. H. Munro (Saki) Bio...Patrick Wolfe

The Open Window...Saki

End Notes...Patrick Wolfe

Introduction

"From goulies and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties, and things that go bump in the night – Good Lord, deliver us"!

The Cornish and West Country Litany, 1926

What is it about a good scary story that is so seductive?

Horror...is not so much a genre...as it is written stimuli for primal emotional responses. If written well...a horror story galvanizes our reptilian brains into action and fright initiates neurochemical impulses that result in a fight or flight response. These instinctive reactions...perhaps, echoes of our hostile histories...release the electric surge of adrenalin...that exhilarating rush that accompanies fear. Do we gravitate toward horror fiction due to some primordial instinct for self-preservation...fear that we'll disregard our evolutionary past and curtail our vigilance against evil and predation? "We stay alert and alive in the vanished forests of the world", mused E. O. Wilson when considering how our fear response appears to instinctively tie to the past.

Or...

Perhaps...we're so far removed from the hostile environment of our ancestors...we attempt to experience...according to Peter Straub, "extremity of circumstance in perfect safety".

Regardless of why...we can't resist a dance with denizens of the dark...traipsing through graveyards...inviting all sorts of ghouls, goblins, vampires and werewolves into our dreams or more appropriately...nightmares!

There are many excellent authors currently residing in the realm of fear: Stephen King...Dean Koontz...Anne Rice...Clive Barker...Peter Straub...are just a few of the more contemporary popular and unsettling wordsmiths...and, there is some indication that to induce terror one must be current with the culture and geography of one's readers.

However...

There are some classic tales of terror that inspire horror and fear...transcendent of time.

A few, such as Edgar Allen Poes', "The Raven", are popularly discussed and dissected in modern literature classes...but so many more are relegated to remote shadows on dusty shelves down the unfrequented corridors of libraries, museums and private collections.

I've put together a small collection of stories that should compel you to put a night light on your shopping list. These are some lesser read tales from authors whom although popular...their works have...to a great extent...receded to the dominion of antiquaries and scholars.

Some of the authors you may recognize and a couple you may never have heard of...but each deserves a contemporary audience for their timeless tales of terror and horror.

Now please...read and enjoy...but don't forget...never...ever...turn out the lights!

Patrick Wolfe

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Are We Really Alone?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

H. F. Arnold (Henry Ferris Arnold)

1902-1963

It's unfortunate, there is very little background information available on Mr. Arnold...nor did he contribute a large body of fiction. It's sad because his writing is so captivating and addictive...when you finish reading this story you’ll be eager for more. Among his many fans...I believe it's worth mentioning...was H. P. Lovecraft.

But...first and foremost...Henry was a journalist...his working knowledge of news agencies and wire services lend absolute authenticity to this particular story, "The Night Wire".

In the early 1800's the electrical telegraph became a primary source of long distance communication. It allowed otherwise detached journalists to share world news as it came down the wire. But for every newsworthy story...hundreds had to be analyzed, thus the nights in the wire room could be extremely monotonous and boring. Though cutting edge technology at the time... the telegraph required unbelievable talent from the operators to accurately decrypt simultaneous messages. Reporters' reputations relied heavily on the accuracy of this transcribed information that I'm sure lent to some doubt and cynicism when a fantastic story manifested from those series of dots and dashes.

This story revolves around one such talented operator and his night manager. Simultaneously insulated from...yet ethereally connected to the outside world by the night wire...they face a departure from the normal tedium of their nightly grind.

I don't want to spoil the story for you...so please...read and enjoy!

If you like this short story I'd recommend:

H. F. Arnold

"The City of Iron Cubes"...serialized in the March and April issues of Weird Tales (1929)

"When Atlantis Was"...October and December issues of Amazing Stories (1937)

Stephen King

"The Mist"(1980, 1985, 2007)

Stephen Graham Jones

"Xebico"(2012)

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The Night Wire

Henry Ferris Arnold

"Dark, dark! The horror of darkness, like a shroud, wraps me and bears me on through mist and cloud".

Sophocles

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"New York, September 30 CP FLASH

"Ambassador Holliwell died here today. The end came

suddenly as the ambassador was alone in his study...."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is something ungodly about these night wire jobs. You sit up here on the top floor of a skyscraper and listen in to the whispers of a civilization. New York, London, Calcutta, Bombay, Singapore — they're your next-door neighbors after the streetlights go dim and the world has gone to sleep.

Alone in the quiet hours between two and four, the receiving operators doze over their sounders and the news comes in. Fires and disasters and suicides. Murders, crowds, catastrophes. Sometimes an earthquake with a casualty list as long as your arm. The night wire man takes it down almost in his sleep, picking it off on his typewriter with one finger.

Once in a long time you prick up your ears and listen. You've heard of some one you knew in Singapore, Halifax or Paris, long ago. Maybe they've been promoted, but more probably they've been murdered or drowned. Perhaps they just decided to quit and took some bizarre way out. Made it interesting enough to get in the news.

But that doesn't happen often. Most of the time you sit and doze and tap, tap on your typewriter and wish you were home in bed. Sometimes, though, queer things happen. One did the other night, and I haven't got over it yet. I wish I could.

You see, I handle the night manager's desk in a western seaport town; what the name is, doesn't matter. There is, or rather was, only one night operator on my staff, a fellow named John Morgan, about forty years of age, I should say, and a sober, hard-working sort. He was one of the best operators I ever knew, what is known as a double man. That means he could handle two instruments at once and type the stories on different typewriters at the same time. He was one of the three men I ever knew who could do it consistently, hour after hour, and never make a mistake.

Generally, we used only one wire at night, but sometimes, when it was late and the news was coming fast, the Chicago and Denver stations would open a second wire, and then Morgan would do his stuff. He was a wizard, a mechanical automatic wizard which functioned marvelously but was without imagination.

On the night of the sixteenth he complained of feeling tired. It was the first and last time I had ever heard him say a word about himself, and I had known him for three years. It was just three o'clock and we were running only one wire. I was nodding over the reports at my desk and not paying much attention to him, when he spoke.

"Jim, he said, does it feel close in here to you?"

"Why, no, John, I answered, but I'll open a window if you like."

"Never mind, he said. I reckon I'm just a little tired."

That was all that was said, and I went on working. Every ten minutes or so I would walk over and take a pile of copy that had stacked up neatly beside the typewriter as the messages were printed out in triplicate.

It must have been twenty minutes after he spoke that I noticed he had opened up the other wire and was using both typewriters. I thought it was a little unusual, as there was nothing very hot coming in.

On my next trip I picked up the copy from both machines and took it back to my desk to sort out the duplicates. The first wire was running out the usual sort of stuff and I just looked over it hurriedly. Then I turned to the second pile of copy. I remembered it particularly because the story was from a town I had never heard of: Xebico. Here is the dispatch. I saved a duplicate of it from our files:

____________________

"Xebico, Sept 16 CP BULLETIN

"The heaviest mist in the history of the city settled over the town at 4 o'clock yesterday afternoon. All traffic has stopped and the mist hangs like a pall over everything. Lights of ordinary intensity fail to pierce the fog, which is constantly growing heavier.

"Scientists here are unable to agree as to the cause, and the local weather bureau states that the like has never occurred before in the history of the city.

"At 7 P.M. last night the municipal authorities...(more)

____________________

That was all there was. Nothing out of the ordinary at a bureau headquarters, but, as I say, I noticed the story because of the name of the town.

It must have been fifteen minutes later that I went over for another batch of copy. Morgan was slumped down in his chair and had switched his green electric light shade so that the gleam missed his eyes and hit only the top of the two typewriters. Only the usual stuff was in the right-hand pile, but the left-hand batch carried another story from Xebico. All press dispatches come in takes, meaning that parts of many different stories are strung along together, perhaps with but a few paragraphs of each coming through at a time. This second story was marked add fog. Here is the copy:

____________________

"At 7 P.M. the fog had increased noticeably. All lights were now invisible and the town was shrouded in pitch darkness.

As a peculiarity of the phenomenon, the fog is accompanied by a sickly odor, comparable to nothing yet experienced here.

____________________

Below that in customary press fashion was the hour, 3:27, and the initials of the operator, JM. There was only one other story in the pile from the second wire. Here it is:

____________________

"2nd add Xebico Fog.

"Accounts as to the origin of the mist differ greatly. Among the most unusual is that of the sexton of the local church, who groped his way to headquarters in a hysterical condition and declared that the fog originated in the village churchyard.

"'It was first visible as a soft gray blanket clinging to the earth above the graves,' he stated.

'Then it began to rise, higher and higher. A subterranean breeze seemed to blow it in billows, which split up and then joined together again.

"'Fog phantoms, writhing in anguish, twisted the mist into queer forms and figures. And then, in the very thick midst of the mass, something moved.

"'I turned and ran from the accursed spot. Behind me I heard screams coming from the houses bordering on the graveyard.'

Although the sexton's story is generally discredited, a party has left to investigate. Immediately after telling his story, the sexton collapsed and is now in a local hospital, unconscious.

____________________

Queer story, wasn't it?

Not that we aren't used to it, for a lot of unusual stories come in over the wire. But for some reason or other, perhaps because it was so quiet that night, the report of the fog made a great impression on me.

It was almost with dread that I went over to the waiting piles of copy. Morgan did not move, and the only sound in the room was the tap-tap of the sounders. It was ominous, nerve- racking.

There was another story from Xebico in the pile of copy. I seized on it anxiously.

____________________

"New Lead Xebico Fog CP

"The rescue party which went out at 11 P.M. to investigate a weird story of the origin of a fog which, since late yesterday, has shrouded the city in darkness has failed to return. Another and larger party has been dispatched.

"Meanwhile, the fog has, if possible, grown heavier. It seeps through the cracks in the doors and fills the atmosphere with a depressing odor of decay. It is oppressive, terrifying, bearing with it a subtle impression of things long dead.

"Residents of the city have left their homes and gathered in the local church, where the priests are holding services of prayer. The scene is beyond description. Grown folk and children are alike terrified and many are almost beside themselves with fear.

"Amid the wisps of vapor which partly veil the church auditorium, an old priest is praying for the welfare of his flock. They alternately wail and cross themselves.

From the outskirts of the city may be heard cries of unknown voices. They echo through the fog in queer uncadenced minor keys. The sounds resemble nothing so much as wind whistling through a gigantic tunnel. But the night is calm and there is no wind. The second rescue party... (more)

____________________

I am a calm man and never in a dozen years spent with the wires, have I been known to become excited, but despite myself I rose from my chair and walked to the window. Could I be mistaken, or far down in the canyons of the city beneath me did I see a faint trace of fog? Pshaw! It was all imagination.

In the press room the click of the sounders seemed to have raised the tempo of their tune. Morgan alone had not stirred from his chair. His head sunk between his shoulders, he tapped the dispatches out on the typewriters with one finger of each hand. He looked asleep, but no; endlessly, efficiently, the two machines rattled off line after line, as relentlessly and effortlessly as death itself. There was something about the monotonous movement of the typewriter keys that fascinated me. I walked over and stood behind his chair, reading over his shoulder the type as it came into being, word by word. Ah, here was another:

____________________

"Flash Xebico CP

"There will be no more bulletins from this office. The impossible has happened. No messages have come into this room for twenty minutes. We are cut off from the outside and even the streets below us.

"I will stay with the wire until the end.

"It is the end, indeed. Since 4 P.M. yesterday the fog has hung over the city. Following reports from the sexton of the local church, two rescue parties were sent out to investigate conditions on the outskirts of the city. Neither party has ever returned nor was any word received from them. It is quite certain now that they will never return.

"From my instrument I can gaze down on the city beneath me. From the position of this room on the thirteenth floor, nearly the entire city can be seen. Now I can see only a thick blanket of blackness where customarily are lights and life.

"I fear greatly that the wailing cries heard constantly from the outskirts of the city are the death cries of the inhabitants. They are constantly increasing in volume and are approaching the center of the city.

"The fog yet hangs over everything. If possible, it is even heavier than before, but the conditions have changed. Instead of an opaque, impenetrable wall of odorous vapor, there now swirls and writhes a shapeless mass in contortions of almost human agony. Now and again the mass parts and I catch a brief glimpse of the streets below.

"People are running to and fro, screaming in despair. A vast bedlam of sound flies up to my window, and above all is the immense whistling of unseen and unfelt winds.

"The fog has again swept over the city and the whistling is coming closer and closer.

"It is now directly beneath me.

"God! An instant ago the mist opened and I caught a glimpse of the streets below.

"The fog is not simply vapor — it lives! By the side of each moaning and weeping human is a companion figure, an aura of strange and vari-colored hues. How the shapes cling! Each to a living thing!

"The men and women are down. Flat on their faces. The fog figures caress them lovingly. They are kneeling beside them. They are — but I dare not tell it.

"The prone and writhing bodies have been stripped of their clothing. They are being consumed — piecemeal.

"A merciful wall of hot, steaming vapor has swept over the whole scene. I can see no more.

"Beneath me the wall of vapor is changing colors. It seems to be lighted by internal fires. No, it isn't. I have made a mistake. The colors are from above, reflections from the sky.

"Look up! Look up! The whole sky is in flames. Colors as yet unseen by man or demon. The flames are moving; they have started to intermix; the colors are rearranging themselves. They are so brilliant that my eyes burn, they they are a long way off.

"Now they have begun to swirl, to circle in and out, twisting in intricate designs and patterns. The lights are racing each with each, a kaleidoscope of unearthly brilliance.

"I have made a discovery. There is nothing harmful in the lights. They radiate force and friendliness, almost cheeriness. But by their very strength, they hurt.

"As I look, they are swinging closer and closer, a million miles at each jump. Millions of miles with the speed of light. Aye, it is light of quintessence of all light. Beneath it the fog melts into a jeweled mist radiant, rainbow-colored of a thousand varied spectra.

I can see the streets. Why, they are filled with people! The lights are coming closer. They are all around me. I am enveloped. I...

____________________

The message stopped abruptly. The wire to Xebico was dead. Beneath my eyes in the narrow circle of light from under the green lampshade, the black printing no longer spun itself, letter by letter, across the page.

The room seemed filled with a solemn quiet, a silence vaguely impressive, powerful. I looked down at Morgan. His hands had dropped nervelessly at his sides, while his body had hunched over peculiarly. I turned the lampshade back, throwing light squarely in his face. His eyes were staring, fixed.

Filled with a sudden foreboding, I stepped beside him and called Chicago on the wire. After a second the sounder clicked its answer.

Why?

But there was something wrong. Chicago was reporting that Wire Two had not been used throughout the evening.

"Morgan! I shouted. Morgan! Wake up it isn't true. Some one has been hoaxing us. "Why..." In my eagerness I grasped him by the shoulder.

His body was quite cold. Morgan had been dead for hours. Could it be that his sensitized brain and automatic fingers had continued to record impressions even after the end?

I shall never know, for I shall never again handle the night shift. Search in a world atlas discloses no town of Xebico. Whatever it was that killed John Morgan will forever remain a mystery.

(back to the top)

Algernon Blackwood

1869-1951

Born in England to an upper crust family with strict Calvinistic beliefs, it's ironic that Algernon Blackwood would become a theosophist and adherent to Eastern religions. His younger years were filled with a variety of occupations; from dairy farmer to special agent in Military Intelligence, a world traveler and avid outdoorsman, he also worked as a New York Times reporter and storyteller on BBC radio and television. Somehow, he still found the time to write more than 200 short stories and 12 novels. He also penned poetry, plays and an autobiography. Toward the end of his illustrious career he received the Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire award.

Blackwood is regarded as one of the greatest writers of supernatural fiction in the 20th century. According to H. P. Lovecraft, "he is the one absolute and unquestioned master of weird atmosphere. He also concluded, with regard to The Willows, it was the foremost of all Mr. Blackwood's fiction and the best weird tale" of all time.

I was torn between two of his stories while determining content for this anthology, "The Willows and The Wendigo". They both involve the themes man vs. nature and man vs. self...alluding to the unsuspected predatory and malicious aspect of a perceived pristine wilderness and our ability to conjure evil from commonplace objects and environments.

"The Willows" is so eloquent and flows so smoothly you are not aware how deeply you're invested in its horror until the first involuntary shudder. I defy you not to flinch at the rustle of windblown branches after reading this classic tale.

The "Wendigo is a little crass in its depiction of vernacular. Some descriptions and colloquialisms are a little off-putting...based on current standards and sensitivities. When you realize this was written before the term politically correct" was in common use and understand his characterizations were considered popular and acceptable for the times you can disregard these particular misrepresentations and enjoy the sheer terror of a supernatural malignancy stalking the back country of the northern wilderness.

If you enjoyed these stories I recommend:

"The Listener"(1907)

"Max Hensig"(1907)

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THE WILLOWS

Algernon Blackwood

I

After leaving Vienna, and long before you come to Budapest, the Danube enters a region of singular loneliness and desolation, where its waters spread away on all sides regardless of a main channel, and the country becomes a swamp for miles upon miles, covered by a vast sea of low willow-bushes. On the big maps this deserted area is painted in a fluffy blue, growing fainter in color as it leaves the banks, and across it may be seen in large straggling letters the word Sumpfe, meaning marshes.

In high flood this great acreage of sand, shingle-beds, and willow-grown islands is almost topped by the water, but in normal seasons the bushes bend and rustle in the free winds, showing their silver leaves to the sunshine in an ever-moving plain of bewildering beauty. These willows never attain to the dignity of trees; they have no rigid trunks; they remain humble bushes, with rounded tops and soft outline, swaying on slender stems that answer to the least pressure of the wind; supple as grasses, and so continually shifting that they somehow give the impression that the entire plain is moving and alive. For the wind sends waves rising and falling over the whole surface, waves of leaves instead of waves of water, green swells like the sea, too, until the branches turn and lift, and then silvery white as their underside turns to the sun.

Happy to slip beyond the control of the stern banks, the Danube here wanders about at will among the intricate network of channels intersecting the islands everywhere with broad avenues down which the waters pour with a shouting sound; making whirlpools, eddies, and foaming rapids; tearing at the sandy banks; carrying away masses of shore and willow-clumps; and forming new islands innumerably which shift daily in size and shape and possess at best an impermanent life, since the flood-time obliterates their very existence.

Properly speaking, this fascinating part of the river's life begins soon after leaving Pressburg, and we, in our Canadian canoe, with gipsy tent and frying pan on board, reached it on the crest of a rising flood about mid-July. That very same morning, when the sky was reddening before sunrise, we had slipped swiftly through still-sleeping Vienna, leaving it a couple of hours later a mere patch of smoke against the blue hills of the Wienerwald on the horizon; we had breakfasted below Fischeramend under a grove of birch trees roaring in the wind; and had then swept on the tearing current past Orth, Hainburg, Petronell (the old Roman Carnuntum of Marcus Aurelius), and so under the frowning heights of Thelsen on a spur of the Carpathians, where the March steals in quietly from the left and the frontier is crossed between Austria and Hungary.

Racing along at twelve kilometers an hour soon took us well into Hungary, and the muddy waters—sure sign of flood—sent us aground on many a shingle-bed, and twisted us like a cork in many a sudden belching whirlpool before the towers of Pressburg (Hungarian, Poszony) showed against the sky; and then the canoe, leaping like a spirited horse, flew at top speed under the grey walls, negotiated safely the sunken chain of the Fliegende Brucke ferry, turned the corner sharply to the left, and plunged on yellow foam into the wilderness of islands, sandbanks, and swamp-land beyond—the land of the willows.

The change came suddenly, as when a series of bioscope pictures snaps down on the streets of a town and shifts without warning into the scenery of lake and forest. We entered the land of desolation on wings, and in less than half an hour there was neither boat nor fishing-hut nor red roof, nor any single sign of human habitation and civilization within sight. The sense of remoteness from the world of humankind, the utter isolation, the fascination of this singular world of willows, winds, and waters, instantly laid its spell upon us both, so that we allowed laughingly to one another that we ought by rights to have held some special kind of passport to admit us, and that we had, somewhat audaciously, come without asking leave into a separate little kingdom of wonder and magic—a kingdom that was reserved for the use of others who had a right to it, with everywhere unwritten warnings to trespassers for those who had the imagination to discover them.

Though still early in the afternoon, the ceaseless buffetings of a most tempestuous wind made us feel weary, and we at once began casting about for a suitable camping-ground for the night. But the bewildering character of the islands made landing difficult; the swirling flood carried us in shore and then swept us out again; the willow branches tore our hands as we seized them to stop the canoe, and we pulled many a yard of sandy bank into the water before at length we shot with a great sideways blow from the wind into a backwater and managed to beach the bows in a cloud of spray. Then we lay panting and laughing after our exertions on the hot yellow sand, sheltered from the wind, and in the full blaze of a scorching sun, a cloudless blue sky above, and an immense army of dancing, shouting willow bushes, closing in from all sides, shining with spray and clapping their thousand little hands as though to applaud the success of our efforts.

"What a river!" I said to my companion, thinking of all the way we had traveled from the source in the Black Forest, and how he had often been obliged to wade and push in the upper shallows at the beginning of June.

"Won't stand much nonsense now, will it?" he said, pulling the canoe a little farther into safety up the sand, and then composing himself for a nap.

I lay by his side, happy and peaceful in the bath of the elements—water, wind, sand, and the great fire of the sun—thinking of the long journey that lay behind us, and of the great stretch before us to the Black Sea, and how lucky I was to have such a delightful and charming traveling companion as my friend, the Swede.

We had made many similar journeys together, but the Danube, more than any other river I knew, impressed us from the very beginning with its aliveness. From its tiny bubbling entry into the world among the pinewood gardens of Donaueschingen, until this moment when it began to play the great river-game of losing itself among the deserted swamps, unobserved, unrestrained, it had seemed to us like following the growth of some living creature. Sleepy at first, but later developing violent desires as it became conscious of its deep soul, it rolled, like some huge fluid being, through all the countries we had passed, holding our little craft on its mighty shoulders, playing roughly with us sometimes, yet always friendly and well-meaning, till at length we had come inevitably to regard it as a Great Personage.

How, indeed, could it be otherwise, since it told us so much of its secret life? At night we heard it singing to the moon as we lay in our tent, uttering that odd sibilant note peculiar to itself and said to be caused by the rapid tearing of the pebbles along its bed, so great is its hurrying speed. We knew, too, the voice of its gurgling whirlpools, suddenly bubbling up on a surface previously quite calm; the roar of its shallows and swift rapids; its constant steady thundering below all mere surface sounds; and that ceaseless tearing of its icy waters at the banks. How it stood up and shouted when the rains fell flat upon its face! And how its laughter roared out when the wind blew up-stream and tried to stop its growing speed! We knew all its sounds and voices, its tumblings and foamings, its unnecessary splashing against the bridges; that self-conscious chatter when there were hills to look on; the affected dignity of its speech when it passed through the little towns, far too important to laugh; and all these faint, sweet whisperings when the sun caught it fairly in some slow curve and poured down upon it till the steam rose.

It was full of tricks, too, in its early life before the great world knew it. There were places in the upper reaches among the Swabian forests, when yet the first whispers of its destiny had not reached it, where it elected to disappear through holes in the ground, to appear again on the other side of the porous limestone hills and start a new river with another name; leaving, too, so little water in its own bed that we had to climb out and wade and push the canoe through miles of shallows.

And a chief pleasure, in those early days of its irresponsible youth, was to lie low, like Brer Fox, just before the little turbulent tributaries came to join it from the Alps, and to refuse to acknowledge them when in, but to run for miles side by side, the dividing line well marked, the very levels different, the Danube utterly declining to recognize the newcomer. Below Passau, however, it gave up this particular trick, for there the Inn comes in with a thundering power impossible to ignore, and so pushes and incommodes the parent river that there is hardly room for them in the long twisting gorge that follows, and the Danube is shoved this way and that against the cliffs, and forced to hurry itself with great waves and much dashing to and fro in order to get through in time. And during the fight our canoe slipped down from its shoulder to its breast, and had the time of its life among the struggling waves. But the Inn taught the old river a lesson, and after Passau it no longer pretended to ignore new arrivals.

This was many days back, of course, and since then we had come to know other aspects of the great creature, and across the Bavarian wheat plain of Straubing she wandered so slowly under the blazing June sun that we could well imagine only the surface inches were water, while below there moved, concealed as by a silken mantle, a whole army of Undines, passing silently and unseen down to the sea, and very leisurely too, lest they be discovered.

Much, too, we forgave her because of her friendliness to the birds and animals that haunted the shores. Cormorants lined the banks in lonely places in rows like short black palings; grey crows crowded the shingle-beds; storks stood fishing in the vistas of shallower water that opened up between the islands, and hawks, swans, and marsh birds of all sorts filled the air with glinting wings and singing, petulant cries. It was impossible to feel annoyed with the river's vagaries after seeing a deer leap with a splash into the water at sunrise and swim past the bows of the canoe; and often we saw fawns peering at us from the underbrush, or looked straight into the brown eyes of a stag as we charged full tilt round a corner and entered another reach of the river. Foxes, too, everywhere haunted the banks, tripping daintily among the driftwood and disappearing so suddenly that it was impossible to see how they managed it.

But now, after leaving Pressburg, everything changed a little, and the Danube became more serious. It ceased trifling. It was halfway to the Black Sea, within seeming distance almost of other, stranger countries where no tricks would be permitted or understood. It became suddenly grown-up, and claimed our respect and even our awe. It broke out into three arms, for one thing, that only met again a hundred kilometers farther down, and, for a canoe, there were no indications which one was intended to be followed.

"If you take a side channel, said the Hungarian officer we met in the Pressburg shop while buying provisions, you may find yourselves, when the flood subsides, forty miles from anywhere, high and dry, and you may easily starve. There are no people, no farms, and no fishermen. I warn you not to continue. The river, too, is still rising, and this wind will increase."

The rising river did not alarm us in the least, but the matter of being left high and dry by a sudden subsidence of the waters might be serious, and we had consequently laid in an extra stock of provisions. For the rest, the officer's prophecy held true, and the wind, blowing down a perfectly clear sky, increased steadily till it reached the dignity of a westerly gale.

It was earlier than usual when we camped, for the sun was a good hour or two from the horizon, and leaving my friend still asleep on the hot sand, I wandered about in desultory examination of our hotel. The island, I found, was less than an acre in extent, a mere sandy bank standing some two or three feet above the level of the river. The far end, pointing into the sunset, was covered with flying spray, which the tremendous wind drove off the crests of the broken waves. It was triangular in shape, with the apex up stream.

I stood there for several minutes, watching the impetuous crimson flood bearing down with a shouting roar, dashing in waves against the bank as though to sweep it bodily away, and then swirling by in two foaming streams on either side. The ground seemed to shake with the shock and rush, while the furious movement of the willow bushes as the wind poured over them increased the curious illusion that the island itself actually moved. Above, for a mile or two, I could see the great river descending upon me; it was like looking up the slope of a sliding hill, white with foam, and leaping up everywhere to show itself to the sun.

The rest of the island was too thickly grown with willows to make walking pleasant, but I made the tour, nevertheless. From the lower end the light,