I wanted to quit the cruel
bonds of nature and be free--free to roam and ramble. But where? "At length, as I gazed into the moonlight, I lost all cognizance of the
objects around me, and my eyes became fixed on the mountains of the
moon, which I discovered, with a start, were no longer specks. I found,
to my amazement, I had left my body and was careering swiftly through
space--infinite space. The range opened up in front of me, spreading out
far and wide, winding, black and awful--their solemn grandeur lost in
that terrible desolation which makes the moon appear like a hideous
nightmare. I could see with amazing clearness the sides of the
mountains; there were enormous black fissures, some of them hundreds of
feet in width--and the more I gazed the more impressed I grew with the
silence. There was no life. There were no seas, no lakes, no trees, no
grass, no sighing nor moaning of the wind, nothing to remind me of the
earth I now found to my terror I had actually quitted. Everything around
me was black--the sky, the mountains, the vast pits, the dried-up mouths
of which gaped dismally. "With the movements of a man in a fit, I essayed to hinder the finis of
my mad plunge. I waved my limbs violently, kicking out and shrieking in
the agonies of fear. I cursed and prayed, wept and laughed alternately,
did everything, yet nothing, that could save me from contact with the
lone desert so horribly close. Nearer and nearer I approached, until at
last my feet rested on the hard caked soil. For the first few minutes
after my arrival I was too overwhelmed with fear to do other than remain
stationary. The ground beneath my feet swarmed with myriads of foul and
long-legged insects, things with unwieldy pincers and protruding eyes;
things covered with scaly armour; hybrids of beetles and scorpions. I
have a distinct recollection of one huge-jointed centipede making a
vicious grab at my leg; he failed to make his teeth meet in anything
tangible, and emitting a venomous hiss disappeared in a circular pit. "Whilst I was the victim of this insect's ferocity the horizon had
become darkened by the shadowy outline of an enormous apish form. I
wanted to run away, but could not, and was compelled, sorely against my
will, to witness its approach. Never shall I forget the agonies of doubt
I endured during its advance. No man in a tiger's den, nor deer tied to
a tree awaiting its destroyer, could have suffered more than I did then,
and my terror increased tenfold when I recognized in the
monster--Neppon--a young gorilla that had been under my charge and had
given me no end of trouble when I was head keeper in the Zoological
Gardens at Berne. "I never hated anything so much as I had hated that baboon. At my hands
it had undergone a thousand subtle torments. I had pinched it, poked it,
pulled its hair, frightened it by putting on masks and making all sorts
of queer noises, and finally I had secretly poisoned it. And now we
stood face to face without any bars between us. Never shall I forget the
look of intense satisfaction in its hideous eyes, as its gaze
encountered mine. "In that strange forlorn world we faced each other; I, the tyrant once,
now the quarry. In the wildness of its glee it capered about like a mad
thing, executing the most exaggerated antics that augmented my terror. Every second I anticipated an assault, and the knowledge of my fears
lent additional fierceness to its gambols. A sudden change in my
attitude at length made it cease. The use had returned to my limbs; my
muscles were quivering, and before it could stop me I had fled! The
wildest of chases then ensued. I ran with a speed that would have shamed
a record-beater on earth. With extraordinary nimbleness I vaulted over
titanic boulders of rocks; jumped across dykes of infinite depth,
scurried like lightning over tracts of rough, lacerating ground, and
never for one instant felt like flagging. "Suddenly, to my horror, I came to an abrupt standstill, and the cry of
some hunted animal burst from my lips. Unwittingly I had run against a
huge wall of granite, and escape was now impossible. Again and again I
clawed the hard rock, until the skin hung in shreds from my fingers, and
the blood pattered on the dark soil, that in all probability had never
tasted moisture before. All this amused my pursuer vastly; it watched
with the leisure of one who knows its fish will be landed in safety, and
there suddenly came to me, through my olfactory nerves, a knowledge that
it was speaking to me in the language of scents--the language I never
understood till now was the language of all animals. "'Reach, a little higher,' it said; 'there are niches up there, and you
must stretch your limbs. Ha! ha! Do you remember how you used to make me
stretch mine? You do! Well, you needn't shiver. Explain to me how it is
I find you here.' "'I cannot comprehend,' I gasped with a gesticulation that was
grotesque. "The great beast laughed in my face. 'How so?' it queried. 'You used to
quibble me upon my dull wits; must I now return the compliment? Ha! There's blood on your hands. Blood! I will lick it up.' And with a
mocking grin it advanced. "'Keep off! Keep off!' I shouted. 'My God, will this dream never cease?' "'The dream, as you call it,' the gorilla jeered, 'has only just begun;
the climax of your horrors has yet to come. If you cannot tell me the
purport of your visit I will tell you mine. Can your lordship spare the
time to listen?' "I gave no answer. I clutched the wall and uttered incoherent cries like
some frightened madman. "The gorilla felt the muscles in its hairy fingers, and showed its huge
teeth. I looked eagerly at my enemy. "'Come, you haven't yet guessed my riddle; you are dull to-night,' it
said lightly. 'That old wine of yours made you sleep too soundly. Don't
let me disturb you. I will explain. This moon is now my home--I share it
with the spirits of all the animals and insects that were once on your
earth. And now that we are free from such as you--free to wander
anywhere we like without fear of being shot, or caught and caged--we are
happy. And what makes us still happier is the knowledge that the
majority of men and women will never have a joyous after-state like
ours. They will be earth-bound in that miserable world of theirs, and
compelled to keep to their old haunts, scaring to death with their ugly
faces all who have the misfortune to see them. There is another fate in
store for you, however. Do you know what it is?' "It paused. No sound other than that occasioned by his bumping on the
soil broke the impressive hush. "'Do you know?' it said again. 'Well, I will tell you. I'm going to kill
you right away, so that your spirit--it's all nonsense to talk about
souls, such as you have no soul--will be earth-bound here--here for
ever--and will be a perpetual source of amusement to all of us animal
ghosts.' "It then began to jabber ferociously, and, crouching down, prepared to
spring.