Frigyes Karinthy — THE CIRCUS

 

 

No doubt, it was a passionate yearning that drew me to the circus, but perhaps I longed just as much to play the violin. I got the violin first, however, and I was not taken to the circus; so this may be why, from time to time, I kept now and than dreaming of the latter. Once I saw that circus far away, behind the hills, and I felt as if somebody were leading me there by the hand. Another time I was standing in the very middle of a great unknown city; yet there it was – the same circus, the same entrance, and the lobby with doors opening in opposite directions. This time I might even have had a ticket and gone in, but at this point, my dream became confused, and again I was left outside.

At last, I dreamed the dream out to the end. There I was standing at the entrance, behind the box-office, and a limping, bearded, excited man, the manager of the circus, stood next to me, drawing aside the gaudy-coloured curtain with one hand and gabbling loudly: “Come in, gentlemen, come in, this way, please, just step in, the show is about to begin, this way, this way, please!” People were streaming in, no end of people – a motley crowd, domestics, soldiers, well-dressed women, well shaved men – pushing one another, laughing and chatting at the top of their voices. I knew very well that the manager would spot me immediately. He noticed me indeed and, grabbing my arm, asked angrily: “Hullo, hullo, have you got a ticket? If not, out with you!” My heart died within me, I began to stammer that I had no ticket, that I did not want to enter as a spectator anyway, but here, look at my violin, I want to… and I desperately showed him my fiddle, which I was carrying under my arm. He bent down close to my face and waited angrily till I had finished stammering that I had no ticket but had composed a song, all by myself, on my fiddle, and if he would but let me in, I should play it to the audience. At this he laughed so loud that I could see right down his throat, like into a deep, deep tunnel, and then he said roughly: “Young fellow, you are off your beam, your head is surely full of steam.” I found this a very witty piece of poetry and saw that the manager was flattered by my involuntary acknowledgement. He gave me a pat on the back and told me to wait a moment, something could be done about it perhaps, anyway we would talk it over.

Later on he actually came into the dark gangway where I was standing all a-tremble, and said with a patronizing air that fiddling was just gobbledygook. I understood immediately that he had not much confidence in my prowess. I protested vehemently, whereupon he became serious and told me, well, all right, we might as well have a try, but first he had to speak to the superior military authorities where I could get a stamp as an imperial and royal hoity-toity. Till this was arranged, he would like to show me the whole circus from behind the scenes – the actors, the animals, everything – so that I should have an idea what it was all about and what the audience wanted.

My heart beat with joy and happiness at the thought that I was in on the show at last; nevertheless, I was scared, too. Tightly pressing the violin under my arm, I endeavoured not to forget the melody. The manager led me past many, many curtains on which all kinds of pictures were painted. High above, men in red garments were working. I expected to see actors and lady riders now, but no! a broad, high staircase came next. The manager scampered up the stairs so quickly that I could hardly follow him. Then we passed through rooms hung with velvet drapery. By mistake I opened a door, through which poured a deafening din, and I saw a swarm of human heads inside. The manager shouted at me to close the door immediately. That was the audience, he said, waiting for the performance, and it ought not to see what was going on here.

Then he opened a small iron door. An enormous, semicircular hall spread out deep below us. In the middle of this magnificent hall with its fountains and palms, a good-looking man with taut lips and wild eyes was in the act of strangling a woman. Her throat merely gave forth heavy, rattling sounds. It was horrible to behold. I began to scream and curse, and demanded that the woman be freed from the man’s grip. But the manager held me back.

“You fool,” he said, “don’t you see, these are my actors, it’s only a play; besides, they are not human beings at all, they are only wax-dolls, like in a wax-cabinet.” I looked more closely and saw that the woman’s face was quite unnatural and that her eyes were of glass.

I was ashamed and began to speak of something else, but my heart was still throbbing wildly. Now the manager led me into a big, untidy room, where gaudily dressed boys and girls with made-up faces were sitting on benches like in a school-room. This was the school for clowns. I too had to sit down on a bench, and the manager called one pupil after the other to the teacher’s desk. One of them came up walking on his hands and intermittently striking the floor with his head. He had to repeat this act. Then the manager called a tall man who drew out a knife and ripped open his own breast. Lungs and blood and guts streamed from the wound, and the man collapsed with a loud groan. The manager nodded approval.

“That’s good,” he said, “they’ll like that.”

The suicide went back to his place, took needle and yarn from his bench and sewed up his breast, hissing and grimacing all the while. Now I saw that his chest was stitched together in ever so many places.

He was followed by others, who distinguished themselves in a variety of ways. There were ventriloquists who imitated human and animal voices with such admirable accuracy that I could hardly believe my ears. One of them impersonated a child so perfectly that tears rushed into my eyes when his voice became that of a dying child; but looking into his face I saw with amazement that his eyes and mouth remained motionless. Another one created the illusion of a crying and scolding woman. He was succeeded by other imitators of women’s voices; lewd, hoarse laughter struck my ears, and I saw threatening eyes glowering in the darkness.

Then the manager glanced into a book and called me by my name. I rose from my bench, his eyes measured me from head to foot, and he shot this question at me:

“Well, what can you do?”

I pointed to my fiddle and again stammered something about the melody I had composed. A burst of laughter rang through the room, and the manager furiously banged his desk.

“Do you still want to annoy me with that damned fiddle of yours?” he asked. “What rubbish!”

I wanted to tell him that the melody I had composed was quite exceptional, and that I should like his permission to play it. However, he hailed one of the boys and ordered him to show me the musical instruments.

I was taken to another room. Enormous engines and tools stood there, each representing a musical instrument. Gigantic trumpets emitted a deafening thunder when the bellows, to which they were attached, were compressed. Triangles as large as a room were sounded by means of steam hammers. On top of an enormous kettle-drum trained elephants moved in a circle, beating the drum with their feet. There was also a prodigious organ driven by an electric machine which simultaneously operated thirty pianos and a thousand steel-whistles, ranging in size to the bulk of a factory chimney. The conductor was standing on a high bridge; as he threw out his arms, a single chord blared forth, producing such a blast of wind that I thought I would be swept away. Before each musician there was a keyboard like that of a type-setting machine. They all were wearing spectacles and kept peering at the score.

Giddy and my ears roaring I now found myself in another room where the manager already was waiting for me. I told him I had seen the musical instruments but did not know any of them and was unable to play them. He shrugged his shoulders and said he regretted very much, but in this case I was a goner. Then we were standing before two doors covered with curtains, which led into the theatre. Through one of them the actors, wearing a thousand masks, were hurrying towards the stage. Each time the curtain flapped, the twinkling of varicoloured lights could be seen. I wanted to go in, but the manager told me that as I did not know anything, it would perhaps be better if I visited the mortuary first.

We entered the other door. A dark gangway led down to the cellar. Flickering gaslight was hissing far away, in the dense and foggy shadow, niches opened on both sides. Grimy-faced servants in white aprons were moving in and out. I was seized with fear and did not dare to look in. At the end of the gangway the manager stopped and talked to somebody. I looked around surreptitiously; all along the wall long tin tables were lurking, on which naked corpses were lying in rows: old people, children – I even caught sight of preserved parts of long-deceased bodies. A suffocating, heavy smell of formalin streamed out of the depths. I espied yet another completely dark gangway leading downwards. The manager was speaking about me; he seemed to be recommending me to the doctor with a view to my staying there. The doctor was looking in the direction of the dark gangway.

At this, I implored them not to compel me to stay there; I told them I would rather – if there were no other choice – learn something which would enable me to appear on the stage. They wagged their heads, and the doctor remarked that only acrobatics would do as the audience was already impatient.

Now they took me high up, into a kind of attic. Through little vent-holes I could see the town way below. Long, narrow ladders were leaning against the walls. Ropes, bars and nets lay strewn about, and youthful acrobats, in pink tights, were practising on the ladders. A ladder was placed before me, and I was told to climb up. As I reached the top, the ladder was swung out over the street – I held on tight and looking down could see the whole town with people running about the streets like ants. Then, screaming faintly, I lost consciousness.

But there I was again, and for many a week and month I continued to learn and practice. Up and down the ladder I climbed, and when this went fairly well and I was able to stand on the very top, they reached up a chair which I carefully balanced on the highest rung and then climbed onto myself. Later on, we did the same with two and even three chairs. What seemed like an age, went by in this manner.

And then, at long last, I stood on the stage – but my face had become thin and wrinkled and caked with rouge, like those I had seen at the beginning. It was as though I had been with the circus for many, many years, and I knew every nook and corner in it. I was wearing pink tights, and I prowled about in the semi-darkness of the side-curtains in a state of great fatigue. Perspiring servants were running about with carpets. I heard a continuous wearysome humming, but I was too tired to want to know what it was. Suddenly a sickeningly bright light broke in upon me – and before my eyes the velvet curtains parted. Beyond, a sea of hands came into view. There was a brief clapping, followed by an expectant, whispering silence.

There I stood, all alone, on the carpet in the broad, white light of the stage. I ran to the centre with noiseless steps, the cone of the searchlight following me everywhere. With snakelike movements I bowed repeatedly towards the boxes, on either side. Then I got the ladder and quickly, without making a sound, and so easily that I did not even feel my body, I climbed to a height of four storeys. Up there I cautiously crawled still higher up a single thin pole, swaying a bit, until I got my equilibrium. Next, a table with iron feet, placed on the end of a pole, was reached up to me. I grabbed the table and supported two of its legs on the top rung of the ladder. Then climbing upon the table, I stood up straight, carefully keeping my balance. Now three chairs were set one above the other, and I could hear a contented murmur from below as I climbed up the structure. The legs of the last chair pointed upward, they quietly swayed to and fro, as with bated breath I set an enormous cube point downward on the end of one of the legs. The whole construction was lightly throbbing under me as if the beating of my pulse were running right down to the lowest rung of the ladder. Then slowly I crawled up it. I reached the pinnacle and relaxed. Hot drops of sweat slid slowly down my face. All my muscles were taut as a bowstring, and trembling. I waited till the structure stopped swaying, then, in a deadly silence, I straightened out, opened my robe, and drew out the violin… With a tremulous hand I laid the bow across the strings… now, groping with my foot, I cautiously let go of the pole… bent forward… balanced for a few moments… and, making use of the silence of terror, which tore open the mouths and gripped the hearts in the depths below me, slowly and quiveringly I began to play the melody, which long, long ago had resounded and sobbed in my heart.

 

Rainer Maria Rilke — TO MUSIC

 a Danse Macabre classique supplémentaire

Music: breathing of statues. Perhaps: silence of paintings.
You language where all language ends.
You time standing vertically on the motion of mortal hearts.

Feelings for whom? O you the transformation
of feelings into what? –: into audible landscape.
You stranger: music. You heart-space
grown out of us. The deepest space in us,
which, rising above us, forces its way out,–
holy departure: when the innermost point in us stands
outside, as the most practiced distance, as the other
side of the air: pure, boundless, no longer habitable.

Jorgen Wilhelm Bergsoe — THE AMPUTATED ARMS

par danse macabre supplémentaires classique

It happened when I was about eighteen or nineteen years old (began
Dr. Simsen).  I was studying at the University, and being coached
in anatomy by my old friend Solling.  He was an amusing fellow,
this Solling.  Full of jokes and whimsical ideas, and equally
merry, whether he was working at the dissecting table or brewing a
punch for a jovial crowd.

He had but one fault–if one might call it so–and that was his
exaggerated idea of punctuality.  He grumbled if you were late two
minutes; any longer delay would spoil the entire evening for him.
He himself was never known to be late.  At least not during the
entire years of my studying.

One Wednesday evening our little circle of friends met as usual in
my room at seven o’clock.  I had made the customary preparations
for the meeting, had borrowed three chairs–I had but one myself–
had cleaned all my pipes, and had persuaded Hans to take the
breakfast dishes from the sofa and carry them downstairs.  One by
one my friends arrived, the clock struck seven, and to our great
astonishment, Solling had not yet appeared.  One, two, even five
minutes passed before we heard him run upstairs and knock at the
door with his characteristic short blows.

When he entered the room he looked so angry and at the same time so
upset that I cried out: “What’s the matter, Solling?  You look as
if you had been robbed.”

“That’s exactly what has happened,” replied Solling angrily.  “But
it was no ordinary sneak thief,” he added, hanging his overcoat
behind the door.

“What have you lost?” asked my neighbor Nansen.

“Both arms from the new skeleton I’ve just recently received from
the hospital,” said Solling with an expression as if his last cent
had been taken from him.  “It’s vandalism!”

We burst out into loud laughter at this remarkable answer, but
Solling continued: “Can you imagine it?  Both arms are gone, cut
off at the shoulder joint;–and the strangest part of it is that
the same thing has been done to my shabby old skeleton which stands
in my bedroom.  There wasn’t an arm on either of them.”

“That’s too bad,” I remarked.  “For we were just going to study the
ANATOMY of the arm to-night.”

“Osteology,” corrected Solling gravely.  “Get out your skeleton,
little Simsen.  It isn’t as good as mine, but it will do for this
evening.”

I went to the corner where my anatomical treasures were hidden
behind a green curtain–”the Museum,” was what Solling called it–
but my astonishment was great when I found my skeleton in its
accustomed place and wearing as usual my student’s uniform–but
without arms.

“The devil!” cried Solling.  “That was done by the same person who
robbed me; the arms are taken off at the shoulder joint in exactly
the same manner.  You did it, Simsen!”

I declared my innocence, very angry at the abuse of my fine
skeleton, while Nansen cried: “Wait a moment, I’ll bring in mine.
There hasn’t been a soul in my room since this morning, I can swear
to that.  I’ll be back in an instant.”

He hurried into his room, but returned in a few moments greatly
depressed and somewhat ashamed.  The skeleton was in its usual
place, but the arms were gone, cut off at the shoulder in exactly
the same manner as mine.

The affair, mysterious in itself, had now come to be a serious
matter.  We lost ourselves in suggestions and explanations, none of
which seemed to throw any light on the subject.  Finally we sent a
messenger to the other side of the house where, as I happened to
know, was a new skeleton which the young student Ravn had recently
received from the janitor of the hospital.

Ravn had gone out and taken the key with him.  The messenger whom
we had sent to the rooms of the Iceland students returned with the
information that one of them had used the only skeleton they
possessed to pummel the other with, and that consequently only the
thigh bones were left unbroken.

What were we to do?  We couldn’t understand the matter at all.
Solling scolded and cursed and the company was about to break up
when we heard some one coming noisily upstairs.  The door was
thrown open and a tall, thin figure appeared on the threshold–our
good friend Niels Daae.

He was a strange chap, this Niels Daae, the true type of a species
seldom found nowadays.  He was no longer young, and by reason of a
queer chain of circumstances, as he expressed it, he had been
through nearly all the professions and could produce papers proving
that he had been on the point of passing not one but three
examinations.

He had begun with theology; but the story of the quarrel between
Jacob and Esau had led him to take up the study of law.  As a law
student he had come across an interesting poisoning case, which had
proved to him that a study of medicine was extremely necessary for
lawyers; and he had taken up the study of medicine with such energy
that he had forgotten all his law and was about to take his last
examinations at the age of forty.

Niels Daae took the story of our troubles very seriously.  “Every
pot has two handles,” he began.  “Every sausage two ends, every
question two sides, except this one–this has three.”  (Applause.)
“When we look at it from the legal point of view there can be no
doubt that it belongs in the category of ordinary theft.  But from
the fact that the thief took only the arms when he might have taken
the entire skeleton, we must conclude that he is not in a
responsible condition of mind, which therefore introduces a medical
side to the affair.  From a legal point of view, the thief must be
convicted for robbery, or at least for the illegal appropriation of
the property of others; but from the medical point of view, we must
acquit him, because he is not responsible for his acts.  Here we
have two professions quarreling with one another, and who shall say
which is right?  But now I will introduce the theological point of
view, and raise the entire affair up to a higher plane.
Providence, in the material shape of a patron of mine in the
country, whose children I have inoculated with the juice of wisdom,
has sent me two fat geese and two first-class ducks.  These animals
are to be cooked and eaten this evening in Mathiesen’s
establishment, and I invite this honored company to join me there.
Personally I look upon the disappearance of these arms as an all-
wise intervention of Providence, which sets its own inscrutable
wisdom up against the wisdom which we would otherwise have heard
from the lips of my venerable friend Solling.”

Daae’s confused speech was received with laughter and applause, and
Solling’s weak protests were lost in the general delight at the
invitation.  I have often noticed that such improvised festivities
are usually the most enjoyable, and so it was for us that evening.
Niels Daae treated us to his ducks and to his most amusing jokes,
Solling sang his best songs, our jovial host Mathiesen told his
wittiest stories, and the merriment was in full swing when we heard
cries in the street, and then a rush of confused noises broken by
screams of pain.

“There’s been an accident,” cried Solling, running out to the door.

We all followed him and discovered that a pair of runaway horses
had thrown a carriage against a tree, hurling the driver from his
box, under the wheels.  His right arm had been broken near the
shoulder.  In the twinkling of an eye the hall of festivities was
transformed into an emergency hospital.  Solling shook his head as
he examined the injury, and ordered the transport of the patient to
the city hospital.  It was his belief that the arm would have to be
amputated, cut off at the shoulder joint, just as had been the case
with our skeleton.  “Damned odd coincidence, isn’t it?” he remarked
to me.

Our merry mood had vanished and we took our way, quiet and
depressed, through the old avenues toward our home.  For the first
time in its existence possibly, our venerable “barracks,” as we
called the dormitory, saw its occupants returning home from an
evening’s bout just as the night watchman intoned his eleven
o’clock verse.

“Just eleven,” exclaimed Solling.  “It’s too early to go to bed,
and too late to go anywhere else.  We’ll go up to your room, little
Simsen, and see if we can’t have some sort of a lesson this
evening.  You have your colored plates and we’ll try to get along
with them.  It’s a nuisance that we should have lost those arms
just this evening.”

“The Doctor can have all the arms and legs he wants,” grinned Hans,
who came out of the doorway just in time to hear Solling’s last
word.

“What do you mean, Hans?” asked Solling in astonishment.

“It’ll be easy enough to get them,” said Hans.  “They’ve torn down
the planking around the Holy Trinity churchyard, and dug up the
earth to build a new wall.  I saw it myself, as I came past the
church.  Lord, what a lot of bones they’ve dug out there!  There’s
arms and legs and heads, many more than the Doctor could possibly
need.”

“Much good that does us,” answered Solling.  “They shut the gates
at seven o’clock and it’s after eleven already.”

“Oh, yes, they shut them,” grinned Hans again.  “But there’s
another way to get in.  If you go through the gate of the porcelain
factory and over the courtyard, and through the mill in the fourth
courtyard that leads out into Spring Street, there you will see
where the planking is torn down, and you can get into the
churchyard easily.”

“Hans, you’re a genius!” exclaimed Solling in delight.  “Here,
Simsen, you know that factory inside and out, you’re so friendly
with that fellow Outzen who lives there.  Run along to him and let
him give you the key of the mill.  It will be easy to find an arm
that isn’t too much decayed.  Hurry along, now; the rest of us will
wait for you upstairs.”

To be quite candid I must confess that I was not particularly eager
to fulfill Solling’s command.  I was at an age to have still a
sufficient amount of reverence for death and the grave, and the
mysterious occurrence of the stolen arms still ran through my mind.
But I was still more afraid of Solling’s irony and of the laughter
of my comrades, so I trotted off as carelessly as if I had been
sent to buy a package of cigarettes.

It was some time before I could arouse the old janitor of the
factory from his peaceful slumbers.  I told him that I had an
important message for Outzen, and hurried upstairs to the latter’s
room.  Outzen was a strictly moral character; knowing this, I was
prepared to have him refuse me the key which would let me into the
fourth courtyard and from there into the cemetery.  As I expected,
Outzen took the matter very seriously.  He closed the Hebrew Bible
which he had been studying as I entered, turned up his lamp and
looked at me in astonishment as I made my request.

“Why, my dear Simsen, it is a most sinful deed that you are about
to do,” he said gravely.  “Take my advice and desist.  You will get
no key from me for any such cause.  The peace of the grave is
sacred.  No man dare disturb it.”

“And how about the gravedigger?  He puts the newly dead down beside
the old corpses, and lives as peacefully as anyone else.”

“He is doing his duty,” answered Outzen calmly.  “But to disturb
the peace of the grave from sheer daring, with the fumes of the
punch still in your head,–that is a different matter,–that will
surely be punished!”

His words irritated me.  It is not very flattering, particularly if
one is not yet twenty, to be told that you are about to perform a
daring deed simply because you are drunk.  Without any further
reply to his protests I took the key from its place on the wall and
ran downstairs two steps at a time, vowing to myself that I would
take home an arm let cost what it would.  I would show Outzen, and
Solling, and all the rest, what a devil of a fellow I was.

My heart beat rapidly as I stole through the long dark corridor,
past the ruins of the old convent of St. Clara, into the so-called
third courtyard.  Here I took a lantern from the hall, lit it and
crossed to the mill where the clay was prepared for the factory.
The tall wheels and cylinders, with their straps and bolts, looked
like weird creatures of the night in the dim light of my tallow
candle.  I felt my courage sinking even here, but I pulled myself
together, opened the last door with my key and stepped out into the
fourth courtyard.  A moment later I stood on the dividing line
between the cemetery and the factory.

The entire length of the tall blackened planking had been torn
down.  The pieces of it lay about, and the earth had been dug up to
considerable depth, to make a foundation for a new wall between
Life and Death.  The uncanny emptiness of the place seized upon me.
I halted involuntarily as if to harden myself against it.  It was a
raw, cold, stormy evening.  The clouds flew past the moon in jagged
fragments, so that the churchyard, with its white crosses and
stones, lay now in full light, now in dim shadow.  Now and then a
rush of wind rattled over the graves, roared through the leafless
trees, bent the complaining bushes, and caught itself in the little
eddy at the corner of the church, only to escape again over the
roofs, turning the old weather vane with a sharp scream of the
rusty iron.

I looked toward the left–there I saw several weird white shapes
moving gently in the moonlight.  “White sheets,” I said to myself,
“it’s nothing but white sheets!  This drying of linen in the
churchyard ought to be stopped.”

I turned in the opposite direction and saw a heap of bones scarce
two paces distant from me.  Holding my lantern lower, I approached
them and stretched out my hand–there was a rattling in the heap;
something warm and soft touched my fingers.

I started and shivered.  Then I exclaimed: “The rats! nothing but
the rats in the churchyard!  I must not get frightened.  It will be
so foolish–they would laugh at me.  Where the devil is that arm?
I can’t find one that isn’t broken!”

With trembling knees and in feverish haste I examined one heap
after another.  The light in my lantern flickered in the wind and
suddenly went out.  The foul smell of the smoking wick rose to my
face and I felt as if I were about to faint, it took all my energy
to recover my control.  I walked two or three steps ahead, and saw
at a little distance a coffin which had been still in good shape
when taken out of the earth.

I approached it and saw that it was of old-fashioned shape, made of
heavy oaken boards that were already rotting.  On its cover was a
metal plate with an illegible inscription.  The old wood was so
brittle that it would have been very easy for me to open the coffin
with any sort of a tool.  I looked about me and saw a hatchet and a
couple of spades lying near the fence.  I took one of the latter,
put its flat end between the boards–the old coffin fell apart with
a dull crackling protest.

I turned my head aside, put my hand in through the opening, felt
about, and taking a firm hold on one arm of the skeleton, I
loosened it from the body with a quick jerk.  The movement loosened
the head as well, and it rolled out through the opening right to my
very feet.  I took up the skull to lay it in the coffin again–and
then I saw a greenish phosphorescent glimmer in its empty eye
sockets, a glimmer which came and went.  Mad terror shook me at the
sight.  I looked up at the houses in the distance, then back again
to the skull; the empty sockets shone more brightly than before.  I
felt that I must have some natural explanation for this appearance
or I would go mad.  I took up the head again–and never in my life
have I had so overpowering an impression of the might of death and
decay than in this moment.  Myriads of disgusting clammy insects
poured out of every opening of the skull, and a couple of shining,
wormlike centipedes–Geophiles, the scientists call them–crawled
about in the eye sockets.  I threw the skull back into the coffin,
sprang over the heaps of bones without even taking time to pick up
my lantern, and ran like a hunted thing through the dark mill, over
the factory courtyards, until I reached the outer gate.  Here I
washed the arm at the fountain, and smoothed my disarranged
clothing.  I hid my booty under my overcoat, nodded to the sleepy
old janitor as he opened the door to me, and a few moments later I
entered my own room with an expression which I had attempted to
make quite calm and careless.

“What the devil is the matter with you, Simsen?” cried Solling as
he saw me.  “Have you seen a ghost?  Or is the punch wearing off
already?  We thought you’d never come; why, it’s nearly twelve
o’clock!”

Without a word I drew back my overcoat and laid my booty on the
table.

“By all the devils,” exclaimed Solling in anatomical enthusiasm,
“where did you find that superb arm?  Simsen knows what he’s about
all right.  It’s a girl’s arm; isn’t it beautiful?  Just look at
the hand–how fine and delicate it is!  Must have worn a No. 6
glove.  There’s a pretty hand to caress and kiss!”

The arm passed from one to the other amid general admiration.
Every word that was said increased my disgust for myself and for
what I had done.  It was a woman’s arm, then–what sort of a woman
might she have been?  Young and beautiful possibly–her brothers’
pride, her parents’ joy.  She had faded away in her youth, cared
for by loving hands and tender thoughts.  She had fallen asleep
gently, and those who loved her had desired to give her in death
the peace she had enjoyed throughout her lifetime.  For this they
had made her coffin of thick, heavy oaken boards.  And this hand,
loved and missed by so many–it lay there now on an anatomical
table, encircled by clouds of tobacco smoke, stared at by curious
glances, and made the object of coarse jokes.  O God! how terrible
it was!

“I must have that arm,” exclaimed Solling, when the first burst of
admiration had passed.  “When I bleach it and touch it up with
varnish, it wild be a superb specimen.  I’ll take it home with me.”

“No,” I exclaimed, “I can’t permit it.  It was wrong of me to bring
it away from the churchyard.  I’m going right back to put the arm
in its place.”

“Well, will you listen to that?” cried Solling, amid the hearty
laughter of the others.  “Simsen’s so lyric, he certainly must be
drunk.  I must have that arm at any cost.”

“Not much,” cut in Niels Daae; “you have no right to it.  It was
buried in the earth and dug out again; it is a find, and all the
rest of us have just as much right to it as you have.”

“Yes, everyone of us has some share in it,” said some one else.

“But what are you going to do about it?” remarked Solling.  “It
would be vandalism to break up that arm.  What God has joined
together let no man put asunder,” he concluded with pathos.

“Let’s auction it off,” exclaimed Daae.  “I will be the auctioneer,
and this key to the graveyard will serve me for a hammer.”

The laughter broke out anew as Daae took his place solemnly at the
head of the table and began to whine out the following
announcement: “I hereby notify all present that on the 25th of
November, at twelve o’clock at midnight, in corridor No. 5 of the
student barracks, a lady’s arm in excellent condition, with all its
appurtenances of wrist bones, joints, and finger tips, is to be
offered at public auction.  The buyer can have possession of his
purchase immediately after the auction, and a credit of six weeks
will be given to any reliable customer.  I bid a Danish shilling.”

“One mark,” cried Solling mockingly.

“Two,” cried somebody else.

“Four,” exclaimed Solling.  “It’s worth it.  Why don’t you join in,
Simsen?  You look as if you were sitting in a hornet’s nest.”

I bid one mark more, and Solling raised me a thaler.  There were no
more bids, the hammer fell, and the arm belonged to Solling.

“Here, take this,” he said, handing me a mark piece; “it’s part of
your commission as grave robber.  You shall have the rest later,
unless you prefer that I should turn it over to the drinking fund.”
With these words Solling wrapped the arm in a newspaper, and the
gay crowd ran noisily down the stairs and through the streets,
until their singing and laughter were lost in the distance.

I stood alone, still dazed and bewildered, staring at the piece of
money in my hand.  My thoughts were far too much excited that I
should hope to sleep.  I turned up my lamp and took out one of my
books to try and study myself into a quieter mood.  But without
success.

Suddenly I heard a sound like that of a swinging pendulum.  I
raised my head and listened attentively.  There was no clock either
in my room or in the neighboring ones–but I could still hear the
sound.  At the same moment my lamp began to flicker.  The oil was
apparently exhausted.  I was about to rise to fill it again, when
my eyes fell upon the door, and I saw the graveyard key, which I
had hung there, moving slowly back and forth with a rhythmic swing.
Just as its motion seemed about to die away, it would receive a
gentle push as from an unseen hand, and would swing back and forth
more than ever.  I stood there with open mouth and staring eyes,
ice-cold chills ran down my back, and drops of perspiration stood
out on my forehead.  Finally, I could endure it no longer.  I
sprang to the door, seized the key with both hands and put it on my
desk under a pile of heavy books.  Then I breathed a sigh of
relief.

My lamp was about to go out and I discovered that I had no more
oil.  With feverish haste I threw my clothes off, blew out the
light and sprang into bed as if to smother my fears.

But once alone in the darkness the fears grew worse than ever.
They grew into dreams and visions.  It seemed to me as if I were
out in the graveyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty
weather vane as the wind turned it.  Then I was in the mill again;
the wheels were turning and stretching out ghostly hands to draw me
into the yawning maw of the machine.  Then again, I found myself in
a long, low, pitch-black corridor, followed by Something I could
not see–Something that drove me to the mouth of a bottomless
abyss.  I would start up out of my half sleep, listen and look
about me, then fall back again into an uneasy slumber.

Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto the bed, and “buzz–
buzz–buzz” sounded about my head.  It was a huge fly which had
been sleeping in a corner of my room and had been roused by the
heat of the stove.  It flew about in great circles, now around the
bed, now in all four corners of the chamber–”buzz–buzz–buzz”–it
was unendurable!  At last I heard it creep into a bag of sugar
which had been left on the window sill.  I sprang up and closed the
bag tight.  The fly buzzed worse than ever, but I went back to bed
and attempted to sleep again, feeling that I had conquered the
enemy.

I began to count: I counted slowly to one hundred, two hundred,
finally up to one thousand, and then at last I experienced that
pleasant weakness which is the forerunner of true sleep.  I seemed
to be in a beautiful garden, bright with many flowers and odorous
with all the perfumes of spring.  At my side walked a beautiful
young girl.  I seemed to know her well, and yet it was not possible
for me to remember her name, or even to know how we came to be
wandering there together.  As we walked slowly through the paths
she would stop to pick a flower or to admire a brilliant butterfly
swaying in the air.  Suddenly a cold wind blew through the garden.
The young girl trembled and her cheeks grew pale.  “I am cold,” she
said to me, “do you not see?  It is Death who is approaching us.”

I would have answered, but in the same moment another stronger and
still more icy gust roared through the garden.  The leaves turned
pale on the trees, the flowerets bent their heads, and the bees and
butterflies fell lifeless to the earth.  “That is Death,” whispered
my companion, trembling.

A third icy gust blew the last leaves from the bushes, white
crosses and gravestones appeared between the bare twigs–and I was
in the churchyard again and heard the screaming of the rusty
weather vane.  Beside me stood a heavy brass-bound coffin with a
metal plate on the cover.  I bent down to read the inscription, the
cover rolled off suddenly, and from out the coffin rose the form of
the young girl who had been with me in the garden.  I stretched out
my arms to clasp her to my breast–then, oh horror!  I saw the
greenish-gleaming, empty eye sockets of the skull.  I felt bony
arms around me, dragging me back into the coffin.  I screamed aloud
for help and woke up.

My room seemed unusually light; but I remembered that it was a
moonlight night and thought no more of it.  I tried to explain the
visions of my dream with various natural noises about me.  The
imprisoned fly buzzed as loudly as a whole swarm of bees; one half
of my window had blown open, and the cold night air rushed in gusts
into my room.

I sprang up to close the window, and then I saw that the strong
white light that filled my room did not come from the moon, but
seemed to shine out from the church opposite.  I heard the chiming
of the bells, soft at first, as if in far distance, then stronger
and stronger until, mingled with the rolling notes of the organ, a
mighty rush of sound struck against my windows.  I stared out into
the street and could scarcely believe my eyes.  The houses in the
market place just beyond were all little one-story buildings with
bow windows and wooden eave troughs ending in carved dragon heads.
Most of them had balconies of carved woodwork, and high stone
stoops with gleaming brass rails.

But it was the church most of all that aroused my astonishment.
Its position was completely changed.  Its front turned toward our
house where usually the side had stood.  The church was brilliantly
lighted, and now I perceived that it was this light which filled my
room.  I stood speechless amid the chiming of the bells and the
roaring of the organ, and I saw a long wedding procession moving
slowly up the center aisle of the church toward the altar.  The
light was so brilliant that I could distinguish each one of the
figures.  They were all in strange old-time costumes; the ladies in
brocades and satins with strings of pearls in their powdered hair,
the gentlemen in uniform with knee breeches, swords, and cocked
hats held under their arms.  But it was the bride who drew my
attention most strongly.  She was clothed in white satin, and a
faded myrtle wreath was twisted through the powdered locks beneath
her sweeping veil.  The bridegroom at her side wore a red uniform
and many decorations.  Slowly they approached the altar, where an
old man in black vestments and a heavy white wig was awaiting them.
They stood before him, and I could see that he was reading the
ritual from a gold-lettered book.

One of the train stepped forward and unbuckled the bridegroom’s
sword, that his right hand might be free to take that of the bride.
She seemed about to raise her own hand to his, when she suddenly
sank fainting at his feet.  The guests hurried toward the altar,
the lights went out, the music stopped, and the figures floated
together like pale white mists.

But outside in the square it was still brighter than before, and I
suddenly saw the side portal of the church burst open and the
wedding procession move out across the market place.

I turned as if to flee, but could not move a muscle.  Quiet, as if
turned to stone, I stood and watched the ghostly figures that came
nearer and nearer.  The clergyman led the train, then came the
bridegroom and the bride, and as the latter raised her eyes to me I
saw that it was the young girl of the garden.  Her eyes were so
full of pain, so full of sad entreaty that I could scarce endure
them; but how shall I explain the feeling that shot through me as I
suddenly discovered that the right sleeve of her white satin gown
hung empty at her side?  The train disappeared, and the tone of the
church bells changed to a strange, dry, creaking sound, and the
gate below me complained as it turned on its rusty hinges.  I faced
toward my own door.  I knew that it was shut and locked, but I knew
that the ghostly procession were coming to call me to account, and
I felt that no walls could keep them out.  My door flew open, there
was a rustling as of silken gowns, but the figures seemed to float
in in the changing forms of swaying white mists.  Closer and closer
they gathered around me, robbing me of breath, robbing me of the
power to move.  There was a silence as of the grave–and then I saw
before me the old priest with his gold-lettered book.  He raised
his hand and spoke with a soft, deep voice: “The grave is sacred!
Let no one dare to disturb the peace of the dead.”

“The grave is sacred!” an echo rolled through the room as the
swaying figures moved like reeds in the wind.

“What do you want?  What do you demand?” I gasped in the grip of a
deathly fear.

“Give back to the grave that which belongs to it,” said the deep
voice again.

“Give back to the grave that which belongs to it,” repeated the
echo as the swaying forms pressed closer to me.

“But it’s impossible–I can’t–I have sold it–sold it at auction!”
I screamed in despair.  “It was buried and found in the earth–and
sold for five marks eight shillings–”

A hideous scream came from the ghostly ranks.  They threw
themselves upon me as the white fog rolls in from the sea, they
pressed upon me until I could no longer breathe.  Beside myself, I
threw open the window and attempted to spring out, screaming aloud:
“Help! help! murder! they are murdering me!”

The sound of my own voice awoke me.  I found myself in my night
clothes on the window sill, one leg already out of the window and
both hands clutching at the center post.  On the street below me
stood the night watchman, staring up at me in astonishment, while
faint white clouds of mist rolled out of my window like smoke.  All
around outside lay the November fog, gray and moist, and as the
fresh air of the early dawn blew cool on my face I felt my senses
returning to me.  I looked down at the night watch man–God bless
him!  He was a big, strong, comfortably fat fellow made of real
flesh and blood, and no ghost shape of the night.  I looked at the
round tower of the church–how massive and venerable it stood
there, gray in the gray of the morning mists.  I looked over at the
market place.  There was a light in the baker shop and a farmer
stood before it, tying his horse to a post.  Back in my own room
everything was in its usual place.  Even the little paper bag with
the sugar lay there on the window sill, and the imprisoned fly
buzzed louder than ever.  I knew that I was really awake and that
the day was coming.  I sprang back hastily from the window and was
about to jump into bed, when my foot touched something hard and
sharp.

I stooped to see what it was, felt about on the floor in the half
light, and touched a long, dry, skeleton arm which held a tiny roll
of paper in its bony fingers.  I felt about again, and found still
another arm, also holding a roll of paper.  Then I began to think
that my reason must be going.  What I had seen thus far was only an
unusually vivid dream–a vision of my heated imagination.  But I
knew that I was awake now, and yet here lay two-no, three (for
there was still another arm)–hard, undeniable, material proofs
that what I had thought was hallucination, might have been reality.
Trembling in the thought that madness was threatening me, I tore
open the first roll of paper.  On it was written the name:
“Solling.”  I caught at the second and opened it.  There stood the
word: “Nansen.”  I had just strength enough left to catch the third
paper and open it–there was my own name: “Simsen.”

Then I sank fainting to the floor.

When I came to myself again, Niels Daae stood beside me with an
empty water bottle, the contents of which were dripping off my
person and off the sofa upon which I was lying.  “Here, drink
this,” he said in a soothing tone.  “It will make you feel better.”

I looked about me wildly, as I sipped at the glass of brandy which
put new life into me once more.  “What has happened?” I asked
weakly.

“Oh, nothing of importance,” answered Niels.  “You were just about
to commit suicide by means of charcoal gas.  Those are mighty bad
ventilators on your old stove there.  The wind must have blown them
shut, unless you were fool enough to close them yourself before you
went to bed.  If you had not opened the window, you would have
already been too far along the path to Paradise to be called back
by a glass of brandy.  Take another.”

“How did you get up here?” I asked, sitting upright on the sofa.

“Through the door in the usual simple manner,” answered Niels Daae.
“I was on watch last night in the hospital; but Mathiesen’s punch
is heavy and my watching was more like sleeping, so I thought it
better to come away in the early morning.  As I passed your
barracks here, I saw you sitting in the window in your nightshirt
and calling down to the night watchman that some one was murdering
you.  I managed to wake up Jansen down below you, and got into the
house through his window.  Do you usually sleep on the bare floor?”

“But where did the arms come from?” I asked, still half bewildered.

“Oh, the devil take those arms,” cried Niels.  “Just see if you can
stand up all right now.  Oh, those arms there?  Why, those are the
arms I cut off your skeletons.  Clever idea, wasn’t it?  You know
how grumpy Solling gets if anything interferes with his tutoring.
You see, I’d had the geese sent me, and I wanted you to all come
with me to Mathiesen’s place.  I knew you were going to read the
osteology of the arm, so I went up into Solling’s room, opened it
with his own keys and took the arms from his skeleton.  I did the
same here while you were downstairs in the reading room.  Have you
been stupid enough to take them down off their frames, and take
away their tickets?  I had marked them so carefully, that each man
should get his own again.”

I dressed hastily and went out with Niels into the fresh, cool
morning air.  A few minutes later we separated, and I turned toward
the street where Solling lived.  Without heeding the protest of his
old landlady, I entered the room where he still slept the sleep of
the just.  The arm, still wrapped in newspaper, lay on his desk.  I
took it up, put the mark piece in its place and hastened with all
speed to the churchyard.

How different it looked in the early dawn!  The fog had risen and
shining frost pearls hung in the bare twigs of the tall trees where
the sparrows were already twittering their morning song.  There was
no one to be seen.  The churchyard lay quiet and peaceful.  I
stepped over the heaps of bones to where the heavy oaken coffin lay
under a tree.  Cautiously I pushed the arm back into its interior,
and hammered the rusty nails into their places again, just as the
first rays of the pale November sun touched a gleam of light from
the metal plate on the cover.–Then the weight was lifted from my
soul.

Ingeborg Bachmann A KIND OF LOSS

Shared: seasons, books, and music.

Keys, teacups, the breadbasket, linens and a bed.

A dowry of words, of gestures, carried along,

     used up, spent. 

House rules followed. Said. Done. And always

   the extended hand.

 

In winter, in a Viennese septet, and in summer

     I have been in love.

With maps, in a mountain hut, on a beach

     and in a bed.

A cult made up of dates and irrevocable promises,

enraptured before something, reverent over nothing. 

 

( — to the folded newspaper, the cold ashes, the note

          on a piece of paper)

fearless in religion, for the church was this bed.

 

From the sea view came my unstoppable painting.

From my balcony I greeted the people, my neighbors, below.

By the open fire, in safety, my hair took on its deepest color.

The doorbell’s ring was the alarm for my joy.

 

It is not you I have lost,

but the world. 

Translation by Joan Harvey

Sabine Baring-Gould A GALICIAN WERE-WOLF

a danse macabre classique supplémentaire

In vain he attempted to speak; from that very instant
His jaws were bespluttered with foam, and only he thirsted
For blood, as he raged among flocks and panted for slaughter.
His vesture was changed into hair, his limbs became crooked;
A wolf-he retains yet large trace of his ancient expression,
Hoary he is afore, his countenance rabid,
His eyes glitter savagely still, the picture of fury
Ovid

The inhabitants of Austrian Galicia are quiet, inoffensive people, take them as a whole. The Jews, who number a twelfth of the population, are the most intelligent, energetic, and certainly the most money-making individuals in the province, though the Poles proper, or Mazurs, are not devoid of natural parts.

In the most quiet and well-disposed neighbourhoods, occasionally the most startling atrocities are committed, occurring when least expected, and sometimes perpetrated by the very person who is least suspected.

Just sixteen years ago there happened in the circle of Tornow, in Western Galicia — the province is divided into nine circles — a circumstance which will probably furnish the grandames with a story for their firesides, during their bitter Galician winters, for many a long year…

In the circle of Tornow, in the lordship of Parkost, is a little hamlet called Polomyja, consisting of eight hovels and a Jewish tavern. The inhabitants are mostly woodcutters, hewing down the firs of the dense forest in which their village is situated, and conveying them to the nearest water, down which they are floated to the Vistula. Each tenant pays no rent for his cottage and pitch of field, but is bound to work a fixed number of days for his landlord: a practice universal in Galicia, and often productive of much discontent and injustice, as the proprietor exacts labour from his tenant on those days when the harvest has to be got in, or the land is m best condition for tillage, and just when the peasant would gladly be engaged upon his own small plot. Money is scarce in the province, and this is accordingly the only way in which the landlord can be sure of his dues.

Most of the villagers of Polomyja are miserably poor; but by cultivating a little maize, and keeping a few fowls or a pig, they scrape together sufficient to sustain life. During the summer the men collect resin from the pines, from each of which, once in twelve Years, they strip a slip of bark, leaving the resin to exude and trickle into a small earthenware jar at its roots; and, during the winter, as already stated, they fell the trees and roll them down to the river.

Polomyja is not a cheerful spot — nested among dense masses of pine, which shed a gloom over the little hamlet; yet, on a fine day, it is pleasant enough for the old women to sit at their cottage doors, scenting that matchless pine fragrance, sweeter than the balm of the Spice Islands, for there is nothing cloying in that exquisite and exhilarating odour; listening to the harp-like thrill of the breeze in the old grey tree-tops, and knitting quietly at long stockings, whilst their little grandchildren romp in the heather and tufted fern.

Towards evening, too, there is something indescribably beautiful in the firwood. The sun dives among the trees, and paints their boles with patches of luminous saffron, or falling over a level clearing, glorifies it with its orange dye, so visibly contrasting with the blue-purple shadow on the western rim of unreclaimed forest, deep and luscious as the bloom on a plum. The birds then are hastening to their nests, a ger-falcon, high overhead, is kindled with sunlight; capering and gambolling among the branches, the merry squirrel skips home for the night.

The sun goes down, but the sky is still shining with twilight. The wild cat begins to hiss and squall in the forest, the heron to flap hastily by, the stork on the top of the tavern chimney to poise itself on one leg for sleep. To-whoo! An owl begins to wake up. Hark! The woodcutters are coming home with a song.

Such is Polomyja in summer time, and much resembling it are the hamlets scattered about the forest, at intervals of a few miles; in each, the public-house being the most commodious and best-built edifice, the church, whenever there is one, not remarkable for anything but its bulbous steeple.

You would hardly believe that amidst all this poverty a beggar could have picked up any subsistence, and yet, a few years ago, Sunday after Sunday, there sat a white-bearded venerable man at the church door, asking alms.

Poor people are proverbially compassionate and liberal, so that the old man generally got a few coppers, and often some good woman bade him come into her cottage, and let him have some food.

Occasionally Swiatek — that was the beggar’s name, went his rounds selling small pinchbeck ornaments and beads; generally, however, only appealing to charity.

One Sunday, after church, a Mazur and his wife invited the old man into their hut and gave him a crust of pie and some meat. There were several children about, but a little girl, of nine or ten, attracted the old man’s attention by her artless tricks.

Swiatek felt in his pocket and produced a ring, enclosing a piece of coloured glass set over foil. This he presented to the child, who ran off delighted to show her acquisition to her companions.

“Is that little maid your daughter?” asked the beggar.

“No,” answered the house-wife, “she is an orphan; there was a widow in this place who died, leaving the child, and I have taken charge of her; one mouth more will not matter much, and the good God will bless us.”

“Ay, ay! To be sure He will; the orphans and fatherless are under His own peculiar care.”

“She’s a good little thing, and gives no trouble,” observed the woman. “You go back to Polomyja tonight, I reckon.”

“I do — ah!” exclaimed Swiatek, as the little girl ran up to him. You like the ring, is it not beautiful? I found it under a big fir to the left of the churchyard — there may be dozens there. You must turn round three times, bow to the moon, and say, ‘Zaboï!’ then look among the tree-roots till you find one.”

“Come along!” screamed the child to its comrades; “we will go and look for rings.”

“You must seek separately,” said Swiatek.

The children scampered off into the wood.

“I have done one good thing for you,” laughed the beggar, “in ridding you, for a time, of the noise of those children.”

“I am glad of a little quiet now and then,” said the woman; “the children will not let the baby sleep at times with their clatter. Are you going?”

“Yes; I must reach Polomyja to-night. I am old and very feeble, and poor” — he began to fall into his customary whine — very poor, but I thank and pray to God for you.”

Swiatek left the cottage.

That little orphan was never seen again.

The Austrian Government has, of late years, been vigorously advancing education among the lower orders, and establishing schools throughout the province.

The children were returning from class one day, and were scattered among the trees, some pursuing a field-mouse, others collecting juniper-berries, and some sauntering with their hands in their pockets, whistling.

“Where’s Peter?” asked one little boy of another who was beside him. “We three go home the same way, let us go together.”

“Peter!” shouted the lad.

“Here I am!” was the answer from among the trees; “I’ll be with you directly.”

“Oh, I see him!” said the elder boy. “There is some one talking to him.”

“Where?”

“Yonder, among the pines. Ah! they have gone further into the shadow, and I cannot see them any more. I wonder who was with him; a man, I think.”

The boys waited till they were tired, and then they sauntered home, determined to thrash Peter for having kept them waiting. But Peter was never seen again.

Some time after this a servant-girl, belonging to a small store kept by a Russian, disappeared from a village five miles from Polomyja. She had been sent with a parcel of grocery to a cottage at no very great distance, but lying apart from the main cluster of hovels, and surrounded by trees.

The day closed in, and her master waited her return anxiously, but as several hours elapsed without any sign of her, he — assisted by the neighbours — went in search of her.

A slight powdering of snow covered the ground, and her footsteps could be traced at intervals where she had diverged from the beaten track. In that part of the road where the trees were thickest, there were marks of two pair of feet leaving the path; but owing to the density of the trees at that spot and to the slightness of the fall of snow, which did not reach the soil, where shaded by the pines, the footprints were immediately lost. By the following morning a heavy fall had obliterated any further traces which day-light might have discovered.

The servant-girl also was never seen again.

During the winter of 1849 the wolves were supposed to have been particularly ravenous, for thus alone did people account for the mysterious disappearances of children.

A little boy had been sent to a fountain to fetch water; the pitcher was found standing by the well, but the boy had vanished. The villagers turned out, and those wolves which could be found were despatched.

We have already introduced our readers to Polomyja, although the occurrences above related did not take place among those eight hovels, but in neighbouring villages. The reason for our having given a more detailed account of this cluster of houses–rude cabins they were — will now become apparent.

In May, 1849, the innkeeper of Polomyja missed a couple of ducks, and his suspicions fell upon the beggar who lived there, and whom he held in no esteem, as he himself was a hard-working industrious man, whilst Swiatek maintained himself, his wife, and children by mendicity, although possessed of sufficient arable land to yield an excellent crop of maize, and produce vegetables, if tilled with ordinary care.

As the publican approached the cottage a fragrant whiff of roast greeted his nostrils.

“I’ll catch the fellow in the act,” said the innkeeper to himself, stealing up to the door, and taking good care not to be observed.

As he threw open the door, he saw the mendicant hurriedly shuffle something under his feet, and conceal it beneath his long clothes. The publican was on him in an instant, had him by the throat, charged him with theft, and dragged him from his seat. Judge of his sickening horror when from beneath the pauper’s clothes rolled forth the head of a girl about the age of fourteen or fifteen years, carefully separated from the trunk.

In a short while the neighbours came up. The venerable Swiatek was locked up, along with his wife, his daughter — a girl of sixteen — and a son, aged five.

The hut was thoroughly examined, and the mutilated remains of the poor girl discovered. In a vat were found the legs and thighs, partly raw, partly stewed or roasted. In a chest were the heart, liver, and entrails, all prepared and cleaned, as neatly as though done by a skilful butcher; and, finally, under the oven was a bowl full of fresh blood. On his way to the magistrate of the district, the wretched man flung himself repeatedly on the ground, struggled with his guards, and endeavoured to suffocate himself by gulping clown clods of earth and stones, but was prevented by his conductors.

When taken before the Protokoll at Dabkow, he stated that he had already killed and — assisted by his family — eaten six persons: his children, however, asserted most positively that the number was much greater than he had represented, and their testimony is borne out by the fact, that the remains of fourteen different caps and suits of clothes, male as well as female, were found in his house.

The origin of this horrible and depraved taste was as follows, according to Swiatek’s own confession:

In 1846, three years previous, a Jewish tavern in the neighbourhood had been burned down, and the host had himself perished in the flames. Swiatek, whilst examining the ruins, had found the half-roasted corpse of the publican among the charred rafters of the house. At that time the old man was craving with hunger, having been destitute of food for some time. The scent and the sight of the roasted flesh inspired him with an uncontrollable desire to taste of it. He tore off a portion of the carcase and satiated his hunger upon it, and at the same time he conceived such a liking for it, that he could feel no rest till he had tasted again. His second victim was the orphan above alluded to; since then — that is, during the period of no less than three years — he had frequently subsisted in the same manner, and had actually grown sleek and fat upon his frightful meals.

The excitement roused by the discovery of these atrocities was intense; several poor mothers who had bewailed the loss of their little ones, felt their wounds reopened agonisingly. Popular indignation rose to the highest pitch: there was some fear lest the criminal should be torn in pieces himself by the enraged people, as soon as he was brought to trial: but he saved the necessity of precautions being taken to ensure his safety, for, on the first night of his confinement, he hanged himself from the bars of the prison-window.

Phillip K. Dick THE EYES HAVE IT

THE EYES HAVE IT

Phillip K. Dick

It was quite by accident I discovered this incredible invasion of Earth by lifeforms from another planet. As yet, I haven’t done anything about it; I can’t think of anything to do. I wrote to the Government, and they sent back a pamphlet on the repair and maintenance of frame houses. Anyhow, the whole thing is known; I’m not the first to discover it. Maybe it’s even under control.

I was sitting in my easy-chair, idly turning the pages of a paperbacked book someone had left on the bus, when I came across the reference that first put me on the trail. For a moment I didn’t respond. It took some time for the full import to sink in. After I’d comprehended, it seemed odd I hadn’t noticed it right away.

The reference was clearly to a nonhuman species of incredible properties, not indigenous to Earth. A species, I hasten to point out, customarily masquerading as ordinary human beings. Their disguise, however, became transparent in the face of the following observations by the author. It was at once obvious the author knew everything. Knew everything — and was taking it in his stride. The line (and I tremble remembering it even now) read:

… his eyes slowly roved about the room.

Vague chills assailed me. I tried to picture the eyes. Did they roll like dimes? The passage indicated not; they seemed to move through the air, not over the surface. Rather rapidly, apparently. No one in the story was surprised. That’s what tipped me off. No sign of amazement at such an outrageous thing. Later the matter was amplified.

… his eyes moved from person to person.

There it was in a nutshell. The eyes had clearly come apart from the rest of him and were on their own. My heart pounded and my breath choked in my windpipe. I had stumbled on an accidental mention  of a totally unfamiliar race. Obviously non-Terrestrial. Yet, to the characters in the book, it was perfectly natural — which suggested they belonged to the same species.

And the author? A slow suspicion burned in my mind. The author was taking it rather too easily in his stride. Evidently, he felt this was quite a usual thing. He made absolutely no attempt to conceal this knowledge. The story continued:

… presently his eyes fastened on Julia.

Julia, being a lady, had at least the breeding to feel indignant. She is described as blushing and knitting her brows angrily. At this, I sighed with relief. They weren’t all non-Terrestrials. The narrative continues:

… slowly, calmly, his eyes examined every inch of her.

Great Scott! But here the girl turned and stomped off and the matter ended. I lay back in my chair gasping with horror. My wife and family regarded me in wonder.

“What’s wrong, dear?” my wife asked.

I couldn’t tell her. Knowledge like this was too much for the ordinary run-of-the-mill person. I had to keep it to myself. “Nothing,” I gasped. I leaped up, snatched the book, and hurried out of the room.

---

In the garage, I continued reading. There was more. Trembling, I read the next revealing passage:

… he put his arm around Julia. Presently she asked him if he would remove his arm. He immediately did so, with a smile.

It’s not said what was done with the arm after the fellow had removed it. Maybe it was left standing upright in the corner. Maybe it was thrown away. I don’t care. In any case, the full meaning was there, staring me right in the face.

Here was a race of creatures capable of removing portions of their anatomy at will. Eyes, arms — and maybe more. Without batting an eyelash. My knowledge of biology came in handy, at this point. Obviously they were simple beings, uni-cellular, some sort of primitive single-celled things. Beings no more developed than starfish. Starfish can do the same thing, you know.

I read on. And came to this incredible revelation, tossed off coolly by the author without the faintest tremor:

… outside the movie theater we split up. Part of us went inside, part over to the cafe for dinner.

Binary fission, obviously. Splitting in half and forming two entities.  Probably each lower half went to the cafe, it being farther, and the upper halves to the movies. I read on, hands shaking. I had really stumbled onto something here. My mind reeled as I made out this passage:

… I’m afraid there’s no doubt about it. Poor Bibney has lost his head again.

Which was followed by:

… and Bob says he has utterly no guts.

Yet Bibney got around as well as the next person. The next person, however, was just as strange. He was soon described as:

… totally lacking in brains.

---

There was no doubt of the thing in the next passage. Julia, whom I had thought to be the one normal person, reveals herself as also being an alien life form, similar to the rest:

… quite deliberately, Julia had given her heart to the young man.

It didn’t relate what the final disposition of the organ was, but I didn’t really care. It was evident Julia had gone right on living in her usual manner, like all the others in the book. Without heart, arms, eyes, brains, viscera, dividing up in two when the occasion demanded. Without a qualm.

… thereupon she gave him her hand.

I sickened. The rascal now had her hand, as well as her heart. I shudder to think what he’s done with them, by this time.

… he took her arm.

Not content to wait, he had to start dismantling her on his own. Flushing crimson, I slammed the book shut and leaped to my feet. But not in time to escape one last reference to those carefree bits of anatomy whose travels had originally thrown me on the track:

… her eyes followed him all the way down the road and across the meadow.

I rushed from the garage and back inside the warm house, as if the accursed things were following me. My wife and children were playing Monopoly in the kitchen. I joined them and played with frantic fervor, brow feverish, teeth chattering.

I had had enough of the thing. I want to hear no more about it. Let them come on. Let them invade Earth. I don’t want to get mixed up in it.

I have absolutely no stomach for it.

Phillip K. Dick was brilliant, and Danse Macabre is pleased to bring you what public-domain Dick we can find.

Saki THE RETICENCE OF LADY ANNE

THE RETICENCE OF LADY ANNE

Saki

Egbert came into the large, dimly lit drawing-room with the air of a man who is not certain whether he is entering a dovecote or a bomb factory, and is prepared for either eventuality. The little domestic quarrel over the luncheon-table had not been fought to a definite finish, and the question was how far Lady Anne was in a mood to renew or forgo hostilities. Her pose in the arm-chair by the tea-table was rather elaborately rigid; in the gloom of a December afternoon Egbert’s pince-nez did not materially help him to discern the expression of her face.

By way of breaking whatever ice might be floating on the surface he made a remark about a dim religious light. He or Lady Anne were accustomed to make that remark between 4.30 and 6 on winter and late autumn evenings; it was a part of their married life. There was no recognised rejoinder to it, and Lady Anne made none.

Don Tarquinio lay astretch on the Persian rug, basking in the firelight with superb indifference to the possible ill-humour of Lady Anne. His pedigree was as flawlessly Persian as the rug, and his ruff was coming into the glory of its second winter. The page- boy, who had Renaissance tendencies, had christened him Don Tarquinio. Left to themselves, Egbert and Lady Anne would unfailingly have called him Fluff, but they were not obstinate.

Egbert poured himself out some tea. As the silence gave no sign of breaking on Lady Anne’s initiative, he braced himself for another Yermak effort.

“My remark at lunch had a purely academic application,” he announced; “you seem to put an unnecessarily personal significance into it.”

Lady Anne maintained her defensive barrier of silence. The bullfinch lazily filled in the interval with an air from Iphigenie en Tauride. Egbert recognised it immediately, because it was the only air the bullfinch whistled, and he had come to them with the reputation for whistling it. Both Egbert and Lady Anne would have preferred something from The Yeomen of the Guard, which was their favourite opera. In matters artistic they had a similarity of taste. They leaned towards the honest and explicit in art, a picture, for instance, that told its own story, with generous assistance from its title. A riderless warhorse with harness in obvious disarray, staggering into a courtyard full of pale swooning women, and marginally noted “Bad News”, suggested to their minds a distinct interpretation of some military catastrophe. They could see what it was meant to convey, and explain it to friends of duller intelligence.

The silence continued. As a rule Lady Anne’s displeasure became articulate and markedly voluble after four minutes of introductory muteness. Egbert seized the milkjug and poured some of its contents into Don Tarquinio’s saucer; as the saucer was already full to the brim an unsightly overflow was the result. Don Tarquinio looked on with a surprised interest that evanesced into elaborate unconsciousness when he was appealed to by Egbert to come and drink up some of the spilt matter. Don Tarquinio was prepared to play many roles in life, but a vacuum carpet-cleaner was not one of them.

“Don’t you think we’re being rather foolish?” said Egbert cheerfully.

If Lady Anne thought so she didn’t say so.

“I dare say the fault has been partly on my side,” continued Egbert, with evaporating cheerfulness. “After all, I’m only human, you know. You seem to forget that I’m only human.”

He insisted on the point, as if there had been unfounded suggestions that he was built on Satyr lines, with goat continuations where the human left off.

The bullfinch recommenced its air from Iphigenie en Tauride. Egbert began to feel depressed. Lady Anne was not drinking her tea. Perhaps she was feeling unwell. But when Lady Anne felt unwell she was not wont to be reticent on the subject. “No one knows what I suffer from indigestion” was one of her favourite statements; but the lack of knowledge can only have been caused by defective listening; the amount of information available on the subject would have supplied material for a monograph.

Evidently Lady Anne was not feeling unwell.

Egbert began to think he was being unreasonably dealt with; naturally he began to make concessions.

“I dare say,” he observed, taking as central a position on the hearth-rug as Don Tarquinio could be persuaded to concede him, “I may have been to blame. I am willing, if I can thereby restore things to a happier standpoint, to undertake to lead a better life.”

He wondered vaguely how it would be possible. Temptations came to him, in middle age, tentatively and without insistence, like a neglected butcher-boy who asks for a Christmas box in February for no more hopeful reason that than he didn’t get one in December. He had no more idea of succumbing to them than he had of purchasing the fish-knives and fur boas that ladies are impelled to sacrifice through the medium of advertisement columns during twelve months of the year. Still, there was something impressive in this unasked-for renunciation of possibly latent enormities.

Lady Anne showed no sign of being impressed.

Egbert looked at her nervously through his glasses. To get the worst of an argument with her was no new experience. To get the worst of a monologue was a humiliating novelty.

“I shall go and dress for diner,” he announced in a voice into which he intended some shade of sternness to creep.

At the door a final access of weakness impelled him to make a further appeal.

“Aren’t we being very silly?”

“A fool” was Don Tarquinio’s mental comment as the door closed on Egbert’s retreat. Then he lifted his velvet forepaws in the air and leapt lightly on to a bookshelf immediately under the bullfinch’s cage. It was the first time he had seemed to notice the bird’s existence, but he was carrying out a long-formed theory of action with the precision of mature deliberation. The bullfinch, who had fancied himself something of a despot, depressed himself of a sudden into a third of his normal displacement; then he fell to a helpless wing-beating and shrill cheeping. He had cost twenty-seven shillings without the cage, but Lady Anne made no sign of interfering. She had been dead for two hours.

Saki (1870 -1916), was the pen name of the British author Hector Hugh Munro, whose witty and sometimes macabre stories satirised Edwardian society and culture. The name Saki is often thought to be a reference to the cupbearer in the Rubiyat of Omar Khayyam, a poem mentioned disparagingly by the eponymous character in “Reginald on Christmas Presents.”

Ambrose Bierce OIL OF DOG

OIL OF DOG

Ambrose Bierce

My name is Boffer Bings. I was born of honest parents in one of the humbler walks of life, my father being a manufacturer of dog-oil and my mother having a small studio in the shadow of the village church, where she disposed of unwelcome babes. In my boyhood I was trained to habits of industry; I not only assisted my father in procuring dogs for his vats, but was frequently employed by my mother to carry away the debris of her work in the studio. In performance of this duty I sometimes had need of all my natural intelligence for all the law officers of the vicinity were opposed to my mother’s business. They were not elected on an opposition ticket, and the matter had never been made a political issue; it just happened so. My father’s business of making dog-oil was, naturally, less unpopular, though the owners of missing dogs sometimes regarded him with suspicion, which was reflected, to some extent, upon me. My father had, as silent partners, all the physicians of the town, who seldom wrote a prescription which did not contain what they were pleased to designate as Ol. can. It is really the most valuable medicine ever discovered. But most persons are unwilling to make personal sacrifices for the afflicted, and it was evident that many of the fattest dogs in town had been forbidden to play with me—a fact which pained my young sensibilities, and at one time came near driving me to become a pirate.

Looking back upon those days, I cannot but regret, at times, that by indirectly bringing my beloved parents to their death I was the author of misfortunes profoundly affecting my future.

One evening while passing my father’s oil factory with the body of a foundling from my mother’s studio I saw a constable who seemed to be closely watching my movements. Young as I was, I had learned that a constable’s acts, of whatever apparent character, are prompted by the most reprehensible motives, and I avoided him by dodging into the oilery by a side door which happened to stand ajar. I locked it at once and was alone with my dead. My father had retired for the night. The only light in the place came from the furnace, which glowed a deep, rich crimson under one of the vats, casting ruddy reflections on the walls. Within the cauldron the oil still rolled in indolent ebullition, occasionally pushing to the surface a piece of dog. Seating myself to wait for the constable to go away, I held the naked body of the foundling in my lap and tenderly stroked its short, silken hair. Ah, how beautiful it was! Even at that early age I was passionately fond of children, and as I looked upon this cherub I could almost find it in my heart to wish that the small, red wound upon its breast—the work of my dear mother—had not been mortal.

It had been my custom to throw the babes into the river which nature had thoughtfully provided for the purpose, but that night I did not dare to leave the oilery for fear of the constable. “After all,” I said to myself, “it cannot greatly matter if I put it into this cauldron. My father will never know the bones from those of a puppy, and the few deaths which may result from administering another kind of oil for the incomparable ol. can. are not important in a population which increases so rapidly.” In short, I took the first step in crime and brought myself untold sorrow by casting the babe into the cauldron.

The next day, somewhat to my surprise, my father, rubbing his hands with satisfaction, informed me and my mother that he had obtained the finest quality of oil that was ever seen; that the physicians to whom he had shown samples had so pronounced it. He added that he had no knowledge as to how the result was obtained; the dogs had been treated in all respects as usual, and were of an ordinary breed. I deemed it my duty to explain—which I did, though palsied would have been my tongue if I could have foreseen the consequences. Bewailing their previous ignorance of the advantages of combining their industries, my parents at once took measures to repair the error. My mother removed her studio to a wing of the factory building and my duties in connection with the business ceased; I was no longer required to dispose of the bodies of the small superfluous, and there was no need of alluring dogs to their doom, for my father discarded them altogether, though they still had an honorable place in the name of the oil. So suddenly thrown into idleness, I might naturally have been expected to become vicious and dissolute, but I did not. The holy influence of my dear mother was ever about me to protect me from the temptations which beset youth, and my father was a deacon in a church. Alas, that through my fault these estimable persons should have come to so bad an end!

Finding a double profit in her business, my mother now devoted herself to it with a new assiduity. She removed not only superfluous and unwelcome babes to order, but went out into the highways and byways, gathering in children of a larger growth, and even such adults as she could entice to the oilery. My father, too, enamored of the superior quality of oil produced, purveyed for his vats with diligence and zeal. The conversion of their neighbors into dog-oil became, in short, the one passion of their lives—an absorbing and overwhelming greed took possession of their souls and served them in place of a hope in Heaven—by which, also, they were inspired.

So enterprising had they now become that a public meeting was held and resolutions passed severely censuring them. It was intimated by the chairman that any further raids upon the population would be met in a spirit of hostility. My poor parents left the meeting broken-hearted, desperate and, I believe, not altogether sane. Anyhow, I deemed it prudent not to enter the oilery with them that night, but slept outside in a stable.

At about midnight some mysterious impulse caused me to rise and peer through a window into the furnace-room, where I knew my father now slept. The fires were burning as brightly as if the following day’s harvest had been expected to be abundant. One of the large cauldrons was slowly “walloping” with a mysterious appearance of self-restraint, as if it bided its time to put forth its full energy. My father was not in bed; he had risen in his night clothes and was preparing a noose in a strong cord. From the looks which he cast at the door of my mother’s bedroom I knew too well the purpose that he had in mind. Speechless and motionless with terror, I could do nothing in prevention or warning. Suddenly the door of my mother’s apartment was opened, noiselessly, and the two confronted each other, both apparently surprised. The lady, also, was in her night clothes, and she held in her right hand the tool of her trade, a long, narrow-bladed dagger.

She, too, had been unable to deny herself the last profit which the unfriendly action of the citizens and my absence had left her. For one instant they looked into each other’s blazing eyes and then sprang together with indescribable fury. Round and round, the room they struggled, the man cursing, the woman shrieking, both fighting like demons—she to strike him with the dagger, he to strangle her with his great bare hands. I know not how long I had the unhappiness to observe this disagreeable instance of domestic infelicity, but at last, after a more than usually vigorous struggle, the combatants suddenly moved apart.

My father’s breast and my mother’s weapon showed evidences of contact. For another instant they glared at each other in the most unamiable way; then my poor, wounded father, feeling the hand of death upon him, leaped forward, unmindful of resistance, grasped my dear mother in his arms, dragged her to the side of the boiling cauldron, collected all his failing energies, and sprang in with her! In a moment, both had disappeared and were adding their oil to that of the committee of citizens who had called the day before with an invitation to the public meeting.

Convinced that these unhappy events closed to me every avenue to an honorable career in that town, I removed to the famous city of Otumwee, where these memoirs are written with a heart full of remorse for a heedless act entailing so dismal a commercial disaster.

Sabine Baring-Gould A GALICIAN WERE-WOLF

Sabine Baring-Gould

A Galician Were-wolf

a danse macabre classique supplémentaire

In vain he attempted to speak; from that very instant
His jaws were bespluttered with foam, and only he thirsted
For blood, as he raged among flocks and panted for slaughter.
His vesture was changed into hair, his limbs became crooked;
A wolf-he retains yet large trace of his ancient expression,
Hoary he is afore, his countenance rabid,
His eyes glitter savagely still, the picture of fury
Ovid

The inhabitants of Austrian Galicia are quiet, inoffensive people, take them as a whole. The Jews, who number a twelfth of the population, are the most intelligent, energetic, and certainly the most money-making individuals in the province, though the Poles proper, or Mazurs, are not devoid of natural parts.

In the most quiet and well-disposed neighbourhoods, occasionally the most startling atrocities are committed, occurring when least expected, and sometimes perpetrated by the very person who is least suspected.

Just sixteen years ago there happened in the circle of Tornow, in Western Galicia — the province is divided into nine circles — a circumstance which will probably furnish the grandames with a story for their firesides, during their bitter Galician winters, for many a long year…

In the circle of Tornow, in the lordship of Parkost, is a little hamlet called Polomyja, consisting of eight hovels and a Jewish tavern. The inhabitants are mostly woodcutters, hewing down the firs of the dense forest in which their village is situated, and conveying them to the nearest water, down which they are floated to the Vistula. Each tenant pays no rent for his cottage and pitch of field, but is bound to work a fixed number of days for his landlord: a practice universal in Galicia, and often productive of much discontent and injustice, as the proprietor exacts labour from his tenant on those days when the harvest has to be got in, or the land is m best condition for tillage, and just when the peasant would gladly be engaged upon his own small plot. Money is scarce in the province, and this is accordingly the only way in which the landlord can be sure of his dues.

Most of the villagers of Polomyja are miserably poor; but by cultivating a little maize, and keeping a few fowls or a pig, they scrape together sufficient to sustain life. During the summer the men collect resin from the pines, from each of which, once in twelve Years, they strip a slip of bark, leaving the resin to exude and trickle into a small earthenware jar at its roots; and, during the winter, as already stated, they fell the trees and roll them down to the river.

Polomyja is not a cheerful spot — nested among dense masses of pine, which shed a gloom over the little hamlet; yet, on a fine day, it is pleasant enough for the old women to sit at their cottage doors, scenting that matchless pine fragrance, sweeter than the balm of the Spice Islands, for there is nothing cloying in that exquisite and exhilarating odour; listening to the harp-like thrill of the breeze in the old grey tree-tops, and knitting quietly at long stockings, whilst their little grandchildren romp in the heather and tufted fern.

Towards evening, too, there is something indescribably beautiful in the firwood. The sun dives among the trees, and paints their boles with patches of luminous saffron, or falling over a level clearing, glorifies it with its orange dye, so visibly contrasting with the blue-purple shadow on the western rim of unreclaimed forest, deep and luscious as the bloom on a plum. The birds then are hastening to their nests, a ger-falcon, high overhead, is kindled with sunlight; capering and gambolling among the branches, the merry squirrel skips home for the night.

The sun goes down, but the sky is still shining with twilight. The wild cat begins to hiss and squall in the forest, the heron to flap hastily by, the stork on the top of the tavern chimney to poise itself on one leg for sleep. To-whoo! An owl begins to wake up. Hark! The woodcutters are coming home with a song.

Such is Polomyja in summer time, and much resembling it are the hamlets scattered about the forest, at intervals of a few miles; in each, the public-house being the most commodious and best-built edifice, the church, whenever there is one, not remarkable for anything but its bulbous steeple.

You would hardly believe that amidst all this poverty a beggar could have picked up any subsistence, and yet, a few years ago, Sunday after Sunday, there sat a white-bearded venerable man at the church door, asking alms.

Poor people are proverbially compassionate and liberal, so that the old man generally got a few coppers, and often some good woman bade him come into her cottage, and let him have some food.

Occasionally Swiatek — that was the beggar’s name, went his rounds selling small pinchbeck ornaments and beads; generally, however, only appealing to charity.

One Sunday, after church, a Mazur and his wife invited the old man into their hut and gave him a crust of pie and some meat. There were several children about, but a little girl, of nine or ten, attracted the old man’s attention by her artless tricks.

Swiatek felt in his pocket and produced a ring, enclosing a piece of coloured glass set over foil. This he presented to the child, who ran off delighted to show her acquisition to her companions.

“Is that little maid your daughter?” asked the beggar.

“No,” answered the house-wife, “she is an orphan; there was a widow in this place who died, leaving the child, and I have taken charge of her; one mouth more will not matter much, and the good God will bless us.”

“Ay, ay! To be sure He will; the orphans and fatherless are under His own peculiar care.”

“She’s a good little thing, and gives no trouble,” observed the woman. “You go back to Polomyja tonight, I reckon.”

“I do — ah!” exclaimed Swiatek, as the little girl ran up to him. You like the ring, is it not beautiful? I found it under a big fir to the left of the churchyard — there may be dozens there. You must turn round three times, bow to the moon, and say, ‘Zaboï!’ then look among the tree-roots till you find one.”

“Come along!” screamed the child to its comrades; “we will go and look for rings.”

“You must seek separately,” said Swiatek.

The children scampered off into the wood.

“I have done one good thing for you,” laughed the beggar, “in ridding you, for a time, of the noise of those children.”

“I am glad of a little quiet now and then,” said the woman; “the children will not let the baby sleep at times with their clatter. Are you going?”

“Yes; I must reach Polomyja to-night. I am old and very feeble, and poor” — he began to fall into his customary whine — very poor, but I thank and pray to God for you.”

Swiatek left the cottage.

That little orphan was never seen again.

The Austrian Government has, of late years, been vigorously advancing education among the lower orders, and establishing schools throughout the province.

The children were returning from class one day, and were scattered among the trees, some pursuing a field-mouse, others collecting juniper-berries, and some sauntering with their hands in their pockets, whistling.

“Where’s Peter?” asked one little boy of another who was beside him. “We three go home the same way, let us go together.”

“Peter!” shouted the lad.

“Here I am!” was the answer from among the trees; “I’ll be with you directly.”

“Oh, I see him!” said the elder boy. “There is some one talking to him.”

“Where?”

“Yonder, among the pines. Ah! they have gone further into the shadow, and I cannot see them any more. I wonder who was with him; a man, I think.”

The boys waited till they were tired, and then they sauntered home, determined to thrash Peter for having kept them waiting. But Peter was never seen again.

Some time after this a servant-girl, belonging to a small store kept by a Russian, disappeared from a village five miles from Polomyja. She had been sent with a parcel of grocery to a cottage at no very great distance, but lying apart from the main cluster of hovels, and surrounded by trees.

The day closed in, and her master waited her return anxiously, but as several hours elapsed without any sign of her, he — assisted by the neighbours — went in search of her.

A slight powdering of snow covered the ground, and her footsteps could be traced at intervals where she had diverged from the beaten track. In that part of the road where the trees were thickest, there were marks of two pair of feet leaving the path; but owing to the density of the trees at that spot and to the slightness of the fall of snow, which did not reach the soil, where shaded by the pines, the footprints were immediately lost. By the following morning a heavy fall had obliterated any further traces which day-light might have discovered.

The servant-girl also was never seen again.

During the winter of 1849 the wolves were supposed to have been particularly ravenous, for thus alone did people account for the mysterious disappearances of children.

A little boy had been sent to a fountain to fetch water; the pitcher was found standing by the well, but the boy had vanished. The villagers turned out, and those wolves which could be found were despatched.

We have already introduced our readers to Polomyja, although the occurrences above related did not take place among those eight hovels, but in neighbouring villages. The reason for our having given a more detailed account of this cluster of houses–rude cabins they were — will now become apparent.

In May, 1849, the innkeeper of Polomyja missed a couple of ducks, and his suspicions fell upon the beggar who lived there, and whom he held in no esteem, as he himself was a hard-working industrious man, whilst Swiatek maintained himself, his wife, and children by mendicity, although possessed of sufficient arable land to yield an excellent crop of maize, and produce vegetables, if tilled with ordinary care.

As the publican approached the cottage a fragrant whiff of roast greeted his nostrils.

“I’ll catch the fellow in the act,” said the innkeeper to himself, stealing up to the door, and taking good care not to be observed.

As he threw open the door, he saw the mendicant hurriedly shuffle something under his feet, and conceal it beneath his long clothes. The publican was on him in an instant, had him by the throat, charged him with theft, and dragged him from his seat. Judge of his sickening horror when from beneath the pauper’s clothes rolled forth the head of a girl about the age of fourteen or fifteen years, carefully separated from the trunk.

In a short while the neighbours came up. The venerable Swiatek was locked up, along with his wife, his daughter — a girl of sixteen — and a son, aged five.

The hut was thoroughly examined, and the mutilated remains of the poor girl discovered. In a vat were found the legs and thighs, partly raw, partly stewed or roasted. In a chest were the heart, liver, and entrails, all prepared and cleaned, as neatly as though done by a skilful butcher; and, finally, under the oven was a bowl full of fresh blood. On his way to the magistrate of the district, the wretched man flung himself repeatedly on the ground, struggled with his guards, and endeavoured to suffocate himself by gulping clown clods of earth and stones, but was prevented by his conductors.

When taken before the Protokoll at Dabkow, he stated that he had already killed and — assisted by his family — eaten six persons: his children, however, asserted most positively that the number was much greater than he had represented, and their testimony is borne out by the fact, that the remains of fourteen different caps and suits of clothes, male as well as female, were found in his house.

The origin of this horrible and depraved taste was as follows, according to Swiatek’s own confession:

In 1846, three years previous, a Jewish tavern in the neighbourhood had been burned down, and the host had himself perished in the flames. Swiatek, whilst examining the ruins, had found the half-roasted corpse of the publican among the charred rafters of the house. At that time the old man was craving with hunger, having been destitute of food for some time. The scent and the sight of the roasted flesh inspired him with an uncontrollable desire to taste of it. He tore off a portion of the carcase and satiated his hunger upon it, and at the same time he conceived such a liking for it, that he could feel no rest till he had tasted again. His second victim was the orphan above alluded to; since then — that is, during the period of no less than three years — he had frequently subsisted in the same manner, and had actually grown sleek and fat upon his frightful meals.

The excitement roused by the discovery of these atrocities was intense; several poor mothers who had bewailed the loss of their little ones, felt their wounds reopened agonisingly. Popular indignation rose to the highest pitch: there was some fear lest the criminal should be torn in pieces himself by the enraged people, as soon as he was brought to trial: but he saved the necessity of precautions being taken to ensure his safety, for, on the first night of his confinement, he hanged himself from the bars of the prison-window.

The Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould (28 Jan 1834 – 2 Jan 1924) was an English hagiographer, antiquarian, novelist and eclectic scholar. His bibliography lists more than 1240 separate publications, though this list continues to grow, rather amazing when one considers Baring-Gould is said to have died 87 years ago. He is  remembered particularly as a writer of hymns, the best-known being “Onward, Christian Soldiers” and “Now the Day Is Over.” And, as you see, he also had an enduring interest in…werewolves. He habitually wrote standing up, making those 1240 (and growing) publications all the more impressive. Can we be assured the man is actually dead?