David Lindsay

“ Maskull was silent for a little while.
"How is it that your people are so unadventurous? I seem to be the only one travelling from curiosity."
"What do you mean by 'your people'?"
"True—you don't know that I don't belong to your planet at all. I've come from another world, Polecrab."
"What to find?"
"I came here with Krag and Nightspore—to follow Surtur. I must have fainted the moment I arrived. When I sat up, it was night and the others had—vanished. Since then I've been travelling at random." ”

“ Maskull lay on his stomach, propped his face on his hands, and stared at him. "What do you think, Polecrab? Is it possible for any man, while in the body, to gain a closer view of that other world than I have done?" ”

“ But that this marching of shapes (which we call 'forking') springs from the unconscious desire to find Surtur, but is in the opposite direction to the right one. For Surtur's world does not lie on this side of the one, which was the beginning of life, but on the other side; and to get to it we must repass through the one. But this can only be by renouncing our self-life, and reuniting ourselves to the whole of Crystalman's world. And when this has been done, it is only the first stage of the journey; though many good men imagine it to be the whole journey.... ”

“ But what is Surtur in this world?... How is he able to protect me against the blind and ungovernable forces of nature? Is he stronger than Nature?..."
Hungry as he was for food, he was hungrier still for human society, for he wished to inquire about all these things. He asked himself which way he should turn his steps. There were only two ways; along the shore, either east or west. The nearest creek lay to the east, cutting the sands about a mile away. He walked toward it.
The forest face was forbidding and enormously high. ”

“ In front of him, riding on the water, moored to the bank, was an elementary raft, consisting of the branches of trees, clumsily corded together.
Maskull addressed him. "Are you another of the wise men of the Wombflash Forest?"
The man answered him in a gruff, husky voice, looking up as he did so. "I'm a fisherman. I know nothing about wisdom."
"What name do you go by?"
"Polecrab. What's yours?"
"Maskull. If you're a fisherman, you ought to have fish. I'm famishing."
Polecrab grunted, and paused a minute before answering.
"There's fish enough. My dinner is cooking in the sands now. ”

“ Polecrab growled a little. "If Surtur chooses to speak to you in that fashion, it appears he's trying to say something."
"What else can I think? But, Polecrab, what's your opinion—is he calling me to the life after death?"
The old man stirred uneasily. "I'm a fisherman," he said, after a minute or two. "I live by killing, and so does everybody. ”

“ The animal immediately tumbled off the bank into the water. It swam gracefully to the middle of the creek and made a pivotal dive beneath the surface, where it remained a great while.
"Simple fishing," remarked Maskull. "But what's the raft for?"
"To go to sea with. The best fish are out at sea. These are eatable."
"That arg seems a highly intelligent creature."
Polecrab grunted again. "I've trained close on a hundred of them. The bigheads learn best, but they're slow swimmers. The narrowheads swim like eels, but can't be taught. ”

“ Maskull, who had listened attentively to all this, remained thoughtful at the end.
"It's plain enough," he said. "But what did he mean by our reuniting ourselves to Crystalman's world? If it is false, are we to make ourselves false as well?" ”

“ Pinnacles of water were slowly formed until they attained a height of perhaps ten or twenty feet, when they would suddenly sink downward and outward, creating in their descent a series of concentric rings for long distances around them. ”