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The Island of Dr. Moreau - HG Wells · Timeless H.G. Wells Stories

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  Speaker 1: The Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G. Wells introduction
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  Speaker 1: on February the first, eighteen eighty seven. The Lady Vain
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  Speaker 1: was lost by collision with a derelict when about the
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  Speaker 1: latitude one degree south and longitude one hundred seven degrees
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  Speaker 1: west on January the fifth, eighteen eighty seven, that is,
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  Speaker 1: eleven months and four days after my uncle Edward Prendick,
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  Speaker 1: a private gentleman who certainly went aboard the Lady Vain
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  Speaker 1: at Callao, and who had been considered drowned, was picked
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  Speaker 1: up in latitude five degrees three minutes south and longitude
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  Speaker 1: one hundred one degrees west, in a small open boat
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  Speaker 1: of which the name was illegible, but which is supposed
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  Speaker 1: to have belonged to the missing schooner, a Pecaquana. He
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  Speaker 1: gave such a strange account of himself that he was
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  Speaker 1: supposed to minted. Subsequently, he alleged that his mind was
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  Speaker 1: a blank from the moment of his escape from the
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  Speaker 1: Lady Vain. His case was discussed among psychologists at the
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  Speaker 1: time as a curious instance of the lapse of memory
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  Speaker 1: consequence upon physical and mental stress. The following narrative was
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  Speaker 1: found among his papers by the undersigned, his nephew an heir,
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  Speaker 1: but unaccompanied by any definite request for publication. The only
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  Speaker 1: island known to exist in the region at which my
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  Speaker 1: uncle was picked up is Noble's Isle, a small volcanic
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  Speaker 1: islet and uninhabited. It was visited in eighteen ninety one
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  Speaker 1: by each a mess scorpion. A party of sailors then landed,
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  Speaker 1: but found nothing living thereon except certain curious white moths,
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  Speaker 1: some hogs and rabbits, and some rather peculiar rats. So
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  Speaker 1: that this narrative is without confirmation in its most essential particular.
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  Speaker 1: With that understood, there seems no harm in putting this
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  Speaker 1: strange story before the public in accordance, as I believe,
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  Speaker 1: with my uncle's intentions. There is at least this much
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  Speaker 1: in its behalf. My uncle passed out of human knowledge
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  Speaker 1: about latitude five degrees south and longitude one hundred five
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  Speaker 1: degrees east, and reappeared in the same part of the
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  Speaker 1: ocean after a space of eleven months. In some way
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  Speaker 1: he must have lived during the interval, and it seems
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  Speaker 1: that a schooner called the Yepecacuana, with the drunken captain
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  Speaker 1: John Davies, did start from Africa with a puma and
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  Speaker 1: certain other animals aboard in January eighteen eighty seven, and
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  Speaker 1: that the vessel was well known at several ports in
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  Speaker 1: the South Pacific, and that it finally disappeared from those seas,
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  Speaker 1: with a considerable amount of copra aboard, sailing to its
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  Speaker 1: unknown fate from Bayna in December eighteen eighty seven, a
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  Speaker 1: date that tallies entirely with my uncle's story Charles Edward Prendick,
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  Speaker 1: the story written by Edward Prendick one in the Dinghy
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  Speaker 1: of the Lady Vain. I do not propose to add
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  Speaker 1: anything to what has already being written concerning the loss
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  Speaker 1: of the Lady Vain. As every one knows, she collided
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  Speaker 1: with a derelict when ten days out from Callao, the
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  Speaker 1: longboat with seven of the crew, was picked up eighteen
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  Speaker 1: days after by each chim gun boat myrtle, and the
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  Speaker 1: story of their terrible privations has become quite as well
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  Speaker 1: known as the far more horrible Medusa case. But I
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  Speaker 1: have to add to the published story of the Lady Vain, another,
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  Speaker 1: possibly as horrible and far stranger. It has hitherto been
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  Speaker 1: supposed that the four men who were in the dinghy perished,
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  Speaker 1: but this is incorrect. I have the best of evidence
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  Speaker 1: for this assertion. I was one of the four men.
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  Speaker 1: But in the first place, I must state that there
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  Speaker 1: were never four men in the dinghy. The number was three. Constance,
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  Speaker 1: who was seen by the captain to jump into the
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  Speaker 1: gig Daily News, March seventeenth, eighteen eighty seven, luckily for
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  Speaker 1: us and unluckily for himself, did not reach us. He
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  Speaker 1: came down out of the tangle of ropes under the
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  Speaker 1: stays of the smashed bowsprit Some small rope caught his
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  Speaker 1: heel as he let go, and he hung for a
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  Speaker 1: moment head downward, and then fell and struck a block
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  Speaker 1: or spar floating in the water. We pulled towards him,
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  Speaker 1: but he never came up. I say, luckily for us
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  Speaker 1: he did not reach us, and I might almost say
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  Speaker 1: luckily for himself, for he had only a small beaker
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  Speaker 1: of water and some sodden ship's biscuits with us. So
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  Speaker 1: sudden had been the alarm, so unprepared the ship for
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  Speaker 1: any disaster. We thought the people on the launch would
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  Speaker 1: be better provisioned, though it seems they were not, and
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  Speaker 1: we tried to hail them. They could not have heard us,
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  Speaker 1: and the next morning, when the drizzle cleared, which was
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  Speaker 1: not until past midday, we could see nothing of them.
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  Speaker 1: We could not stand up to look about us because
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  Speaker 1: of the pitching of the boat. The two other men
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  Speaker 1: who had escaped so far with me were a man
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  Speaker 1: named Helmar, a passenger like myself, and a seaman whose
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  Speaker 1: name I don't know, a short, sturdy man with a stammer.
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  Speaker 1: We drifted famishing, and after our water had come to
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  Speaker 1: an end, tormented by an intolerable thirst, for eight days altogether.
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  Speaker 1: After the second day the sea subsided slowly to a
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  Speaker 1: glassy calm. It is quite possible for the ordinary reader
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  Speaker 1: to imagine those eight days. He has not, luckily for
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  Speaker 1: himself anything in his memory to imagine with. After the
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  Speaker 1: first day, we said little to one another, and lay
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  Speaker 1: in our places in the boat and stared at the horizon,
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  Speaker 1: or watched with eyes that grew larger and more haggard
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  Speaker 1: every day, the misery and weakness gaining upon our companions.
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  Speaker 1: The sun became pitiless. The water ended on the fourth day,
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  Speaker 1: and we were already thinking strange things in saying them
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  Speaker 1: with our eyes. But it was I think the sixth
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  Speaker 1: before Helmar gave voice to the thing we had all
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  Speaker 1: been thinking. I remember our voices were dry and thin,
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  Speaker 1: so that we bent towards one another and spared our words.
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  Speaker 1: I stood out against it with all my might, was
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  Speaker 1: rather for scuttling the boat and perishing together among the
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  Speaker 1: sharks that followed us. But when Helma said that if
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  Speaker 1: his proposal was accepted, we should have drink, the sailor
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  Speaker 1: came round to him. I would not draw lots, however,
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  Speaker 1: and in the night the sailor whispered to Helmar again
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  Speaker 1: and again, and I sat in the boughs with my
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  Speaker 1: clasp knife in my hand, though I doubt if I
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  Speaker 1: had the stuff in me to fight. And in the
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  Speaker 1: morning I agreed to Helmar's proposal, and we handed halfpence
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  Speaker 1: to find the odd man. The lot fell upon the sailor,
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  Speaker 1: but he was the strongest of us and would not
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  Speaker 1: abide by it, and attacked Helmar with his hands. They
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  Speaker 1: grappled together and almost stood up. I crawled along the
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  Speaker 1: boat to them, intending to help Helmar by grasping the
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  Speaker 1: sailor's legs, but the sailors stumbled with the swaying of
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  Speaker 1: the boat, and the two fell upon the gun wale
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  Speaker 1: and rolled overboard. Together they sank like stones. I remember
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  Speaker 1: laughing at that, and wondering why I laughed. The laugh
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  Speaker 1: caught me suddenly, like a thing from without. I lay
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  Speaker 1: across one of the thwarts for I know not how long,
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  Speaker 1: thinking that if I had the strength, I would drink
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  Speaker 1: sea water and mad myself to die quickly. And even
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  Speaker 1: as I lay there, I saw, with no more interest
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  Speaker 1: than if it had been a picture, a sail come
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  Speaker 1: up towards me over the sky line. My mind must
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  Speaker 1: have been wandering, And yet I remember all that happened
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  Speaker 1: quite distinctly. I remember how my head swayed with the
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  Speaker 1: seas and the horizon, with the sail above it danced
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  Speaker 1: up and down. But I also remember as distinctly that
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  Speaker 1: I had a persuasion that I was dead, and that
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  Speaker 1: I thought what a jest it was that they should
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  Speaker 1: come too late, by such a little to catch me
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  Speaker 1: in my body. For an endless period, as it seemed
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  Speaker 1: to me, I lay with my head on the thwart,
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  Speaker 1: watching the schooner. She was a little ship, schooner rigged
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  Speaker 1: fore and aft, come up out of the sea. She
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  Speaker 1: kept tacking to and fro in a widening compass, for
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  Speaker 1: she was sailing dead into the wind. It never entered
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  Speaker 1: my head to attempt to attract attention, and I do
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  Speaker 1: not remember anything distinctly after the sight of her, until
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  Speaker 1: I found myself in a little cabin aft. There's a
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  Speaker 1: dim half memory of being lifted up to the gangway,
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  Speaker 1: and of a big, round countenance, covered with freckles and
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  Speaker 1: surrounded with red hair, staring at me over the bulwarks.
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  Speaker 1: I also had a disconnected impression a dark face with
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  Speaker 1: extraordinary eyes close to mine, but that I thought was
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  Speaker 1: a nightmare until I met it again. I fancy I
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  Speaker 1: recollect some stuff being poured in between my teeth, and
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  Speaker 1: that is all two. The man who was going nowhere
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  Speaker 1: the cabin in which I found myself was small and
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  Speaker 1: rather untidy. A youngish man with flaxen hair, a bristly
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  Speaker 1: straw colored mustache, and dropping nether lip was sitting and
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  Speaker 1: holding my wrist. For a minute. We stared at each
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  Speaker 1: other without speaking. He had waterly gray eyes, oddly void
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  Speaker 1: of expression. Then just overhead came a sound like an
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  Speaker 1: iron bedstead being knocked about, and the low, angry growling
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  Speaker 1: of some large animal. At the same time, the man
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  Speaker 1: spoke up. He repeated his question, how do you feel now?
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  Speaker 1: I think I I felt all right. I could not
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  Speaker 1: recollect how I had got there. He must have seen
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  Speaker 1: the question in my face, for my voice was inaccessible
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  Speaker 1: to me. Here picked up in a boat starving. The
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  Speaker 1: name on the boat was the Lady Vain, and there
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  Speaker 1: a spot of blood on the gunwale. At the same time,
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  Speaker 1: my eye caught my hand, so thin that it looked
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  Speaker 1: like a dirty skin purse full of loose bones. And
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  Speaker 1: all the business of the boat came back to me.
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  Speaker 1: Have thumb of this, said he, and gave me a
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  Speaker 1: dose of some scarlet stuff iced. It tasted like blood
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  Speaker 1: and made me feel stronger. You were in luck, said he,
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  Speaker 1: to get picked up by a ship with a medical
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  Speaker 1: man aboard. He spoke with a slobbering articulation, with the
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  Speaker 1: ghost of a lisp. What ship is this, I said, slowly,
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  Speaker 1: hoarse from my long silence. It's a little trade of
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  Speaker 1: Arica and Callao. I never asked where she came from
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  Speaker 1: in the beginning, out of the land of born fools.
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  Speaker 1: I guess I'm a passenger myself from Adica. The Siliads
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  Speaker 1: who owns her he's captain too named Davies. He's lost
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  Speaker 1: his certificate or something. You know, the kind of man
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  Speaker 1: calls the thing the apecacuana of all thilly infernal names.
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  Speaker 1: Though when there's much of a thiegh without any wind,
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  Speaker 1: she certainly acts according Then the noise of a head
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  Speaker 1: began again, a snarling growl and the voice of a
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  Speaker 1: human being together, then another voice telling some heaven forsake
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  Speaker 1: an idiot to desist. You were nearly dead, said my interlocutor.
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  Speaker 1: Twas the very near thing, indeed, But they've put some
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  Speaker 1: stuff into you. Now. Notice your arm's sore injections. You've
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  Speaker 1: been insensible for nil thirty hours, I thought slowly. I
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  Speaker 1: was distracted now by the helping of a number of dogs.
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  Speaker 1: Am I eligible for solid food? I asked, Thank to me,
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  Speaker 1: he said, even now the mutton is boiling. Yes, I said,
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  Speaker 1: with assurance, I could eat some mutton. But said he
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  Speaker 1: with a momentary hesitation. You know I'm dying to hear
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  Speaker 1: how you came to be alone in that boat. Damn
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  Speaker 1: that howling, I thought. I detected a certain suspicion in
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  Speaker 1: his eyes. He suddenly left the cabin, and I heard
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  Speaker 1: him in violent controversy with some one who seemed to
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  Speaker 1: me to talk gibberish. In response to him, the matter
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  Speaker 1: sounded as though it ended in blows. But in that
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  Speaker 1: I thought my ears were mistaken. Then he shouted at
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  Speaker 1: the dogs and returned to the cabin. Well, said he
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  Speaker 1: in the doorway. You were just beginning to tell me.
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  Speaker 1: I told him my name, Edward Prindick, and how I
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  Speaker 1: had taken to natural history as a relief from the
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  Speaker 1: dulness of my comfortable independence. He seemed interested in this.
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  Speaker 1: I've done some thianth myself. I did my biology at
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  Speaker 1: University College, getting out the ovary of the earthworm and
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  Speaker 1: the rat. You loveth nail and all that. Lord, it's
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  Speaker 1: ten years ago. Go on, go on, tell me about
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  Speaker 1: the boat. He is evidently satisfied with the frankness of
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  Speaker 1: my story, which had hold in concise sentences enough for
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  Speaker 1: I felt horribly weak, And when it was finished he
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  Speaker 1: reverted at once to the topic of natural history and
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  Speaker 1: his own biological studies. He began to question me closely
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  Speaker 1: about Tottenham Court Road and Gower Street, with Kaplathi still flourishing.
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  Speaker 1: What a shop that was. He had evidently been a
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  Speaker 1: very ordinary medical student, and drifted incontinently to the topic
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  Speaker 1: of the music. Hause he told me some anecdotes left
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  Speaker 1: it all. He said, ten years ago, how jolly it
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  Speaker 1: all youth to be. But I made a young ath
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  Speaker 1: of my felf, plained myself out before I was twenty one.
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  Speaker 1: I dare say, it's all different now. But I must
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  Speaker 1: look up that ath of a cook and thie what
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  Speaker 1: he's done to your mutton. The growling overhead was renewed
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  Speaker 1: so suddenly and with so much savage anger, that it
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  Speaker 1: startled me. What's that? I called after him, but the
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  Speaker 1: door had closed. He came back again with the boiled mutton,
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  Speaker 1: and I was so excited by the appetizing smell of
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  Speaker 1: it that I forgot the noise of the beast that
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  Speaker 1: had troubled me. After a day of alternate sleep and feeding,
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  Speaker 1: I was so far recovered to be able to get
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  Speaker 1: from my bunk to the scuttle and see the green
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  Speaker 1: seas trying to keep pace of Thus, I judge the
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  Speaker 1: schooler was running before the wind. Montgomery, that was the
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  Speaker 1: name of the flaxen haired man came in again as
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  Speaker 1: I stood there, and I asked him for some clothes.
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  Speaker 1: He lent me some duck things of his own, for
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  Speaker 1: those I had worn in the boat had been thrown overboard.
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  Speaker 1: They were rather loose for me, for he was large
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  Speaker 1: and long in his limbs. He told me casually that
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  Speaker 1: the captain was three parts drunk in his own cabin.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: As I assumed the clothes, I began asking him some
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: questions about the destination of the ship. He said the
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  Speaker 1: ship was bound to Hawaii, but that it had to
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  Speaker 1: land him first. Where, said I. It's an island where
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  Speaker 1: I live, so far as I know it, hathn't got
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  Speaker 1: a name. He stared at me with his nether lip dropping,
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  Speaker 1: and looked so wilfully stupid of a sudden that it
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  Speaker 1: came into my head that he desired to avoid my questions.
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  Speaker 1: I had the discretion to ask no more. Three the
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  Speaker 1: strange face, we left the cabin and found a man
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  Speaker 1: at the campion obstructing our way. He was standing on
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  Speaker 1: the ladder with his back to us, peering over the
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  Speaker 1: combing of the hatchway he was I could see an
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  Speaker 1: a shapen man, short, broad and clumsy, with a crooked back,
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  Speaker 1: a hairy neck, and a head sunk between his shoulders.
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  Speaker 1: He was dressed in dark blue surge, and had peculiarly thick,
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  Speaker 1: coarse black hair. I heard the unseen dogs growl furiously
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  Speaker 1: and forthwith. He ducked back, coming into contact with the
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  Speaker 1: hand I put out to find him. Off from myself.
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  Speaker 1: He turned with animal swiftness in some indefinable way. The
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: black face thus flashed upon me shocked me profoundly. It
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: was a singularly deformed one. The facial part projected forming
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  Speaker 1: something dimly suggestive of a muzzle, and the hued half
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  Speaker 1: open mouth showed as big white teeth as I had
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  Speaker 1: ever seen in a human mouth. His eyes were blood
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  Speaker 1: shot at the edges, with scarcely a rim of white
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  Speaker 1: round the hazel pupils. There was a curious glow of
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  Speaker 1: excitement in his face. Confound you, said Montgomery, Why the
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: devil don't you get out of the way. The black
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  Speaker 1: faced man started aside without a word. I went on
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  Speaker 1: up the companion, staring at him instinctively. As I did so,
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: Montgomery stayed at the foot for a moment. You have
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  Speaker 1: no bitterness here, you know, he said, in a deliberate tone.
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  Speaker 1: Your place is forward. The black faced man cowered, nay,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: won't have me forward. He spoke slowly, with a queer,
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  Speaker 1: hoarse quality in his voice. Won't have you forward, said Montgomery,
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  Speaker 1: in a menacing tone. But I tell you to go.
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  Speaker 1: He was on the brink of saying something further, then
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: looked up at me suddenly, and followed me up the ladder.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: I paused half way through the hatchway, looking back, still
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: astonished beyond measure at the grotesque ugliness of this black
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: faced creature. I had never beheld such a repulse of
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: an extraordinary face before, and yet if the contradiction is credible,
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: I experienced at the same time an odd feeling that
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: in some way I had already encountered exactly the features
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: and gestures that now amazed me. Afterwards, it occurred to
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  Speaker 1: me that probably I had seen him as I was
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  Speaker 1: lifted aboard, and yet that scarcely satisfied my suspicion of
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: a previous acquaintance. Yet, how one could have set eyes
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: on so singular a face and yet have forgotten the
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  Speaker 1: precise occasion passed my imagination. Montgomery's movement to follow me
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: released my attention, and I turned and looked about me
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: at the flushed deck of the little schooner. I was
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: already half prepared by the sounds I had heard for
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: what I saw, certainly, I never beheld a deck so dirty.
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  Speaker 1: It was littered with scraps of carrot, shreds of green stuff,
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  Speaker 1: and indescribable filth. Fastened by chains to the mainmast were
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  Speaker 1: a number of grisly staghounds, who now began leaping and
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  Speaker 1: barking at me. And by the mizzen, a huge puma
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  Speaker 1: was cramped in a little iron cage, far too small
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  Speaker 1: even to give a turning room. Farther under the starboard
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  Speaker 1: bowlwark were some big hutches containing a number of rabbits,
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  Speaker 1: and the solitary lama was squeezed in a mere box
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  Speaker 1: of a cage. Forward, the dogs were muzzled by leather straps.
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  Speaker 1: The only human being on deck was a gaunt and
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: silent sailor at the wheel. The thatched and dirty spankers
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: were tense before the wind, and up aloft the little
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: ship seemed carrying every sail she had. The sky was clear,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: the sun midway down the western sky. Long waves capped
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: by the breeze with froth, were running with us. We
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: went past the steersman to the taffrail and saw the
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: water come foaming under the stern, and the bubbles go
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: dancing and vanishing in her wake. I turned and surveyed
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: the unsavory length of the ship. Is this an ocean menagerie? Said?
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: I look like it? Said Montgomery. What are these beasts
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: for merchandise? Curios? Does the captain think he is going
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: to sell them somewhere in the south seas? It looked
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: like it, dothn't it, said Montgomery, and turned towards the
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: wake again. Suddenly we heard a yelp and a volley
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: of furious blasphemy from the companion Hatchway, and the deformed
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: man with the black face came up hurriedly. He was
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: immediately followed by a heavy, red haired man in a
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: white cap. At the sight of the former, the staghounds,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: who had all tired of barking at me by this time,
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: became furiously excited, howling and leaping against their chains. The
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: black hesitated before them, and this gave the red haired
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: man time to come up with him and deliver a
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: tremendous blow between the shoulder blades. The poor devil went
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: down like a felled ox and rolled in the dirt
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: among the furiously excited dogs. It was lucky for him
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: that they were muzzled. The red haired man gave a
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: yop of exultation and stood staggering and as it seemed
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: to me in serious danger of either going backwards down
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: the companion hatchway or forwards upon his victim. So soon
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: as the second man had appeared, Montgomery had started forward
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: study on there he cried in a tone of remonstrance.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: A couple of sailors appeared on the forecastle. The black
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: faced man, howling in a singular voice, rolled about under
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: the feet of the dogs. No one attempted to help him.
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: The brutes did their best to worry him, butting their
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: muzzles at him. There was a quick dance of their
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: lithe gray figured bodies over the clumsy, prostrate figure. The
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: sailors forward shouted as though it was admirable sport. Montgomery
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: gave an angry exclamation and went striding down the deck,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: and I followed him. The black faced man scrambled up
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: and staggered forward, going and leaning over the bulwark by
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: the main shrouds, where he remained panting and glaring over
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: his shoulders at the dogs. The red haired man laughed
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: a satisfied laugh. Look here, captain, said Montgomery, with his
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: lisp a little accentuated, gripping the elbows of the red
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: haired man. This won't do. I stood behind Montgomery. The
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: captain came half round and regarded him with the dull
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: and solemn eyes of a drunken man. Wah won't do,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: he said, and added, after looking sleepily into Montgomery's face
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: for a minute, blast ditch sore bones. With a sudden movement,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: he shook his arms free and, after two ineffectual attempts,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: stuck his freckled fists into his side pockets. That man,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: the passenger, said Montgomery, I'd advise you to keep your
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: hands off him. Go do well, said the captain loudly.
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: He suddenly turned and staggered towards the side. Do what
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: I like on my own ship, he said. I think
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: Montgomery might have left him then, seeing the brute was drunk,
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: but he only turned a shade paler and followed the
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: captain to the bulwarks. Look you here, captain, he said.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: That man of mine is not to be ill treated.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: He hath been haathed ever. Thinth he came aboard for
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: a minute. Alcoholic fumes kept the captain speechless. Blasted sow
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: bones was all he considered necessary. I could see that
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: Montgomery had one of those slow, pertinacious tempers that were
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: warm day after day to a white heat, and never
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: again cool to forgiveness. And I saw too that this
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: quarrel had been some time growing. The man's drunk, said I,
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: perhaps officiously, it'll do no good. Montgomery gave an ugly
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: twist to his drooping lip. He's always drunk. Do you
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: think that excludeth the tholting his passengers? My ship began
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: the captain, waving his hand unsteadily towards the cages. Was
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: a clean ship? Look at it now? It was certainly
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: anything but clean, crew, continued the captain, Clean, respectable crew.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: You agreed to take the beasts. I wish I'd never
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: set eyes on your infernal island. What the devil want
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: beasts for on an island like that? Then that man
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: of yours understood. He was a man. He's a lunatic,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: and he hadn't no business aft. Do you think the
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: whole damned ship belongs to you? Your theilith began to
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: hathe the poor devil a thunith. He came aboard that's
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: just what he is. He's a devil, an ugly devil.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: My men can't stand him. I can't stand him. None
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: of us can stand him, nor you either. Montgomery turned away.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: You leave that man alone, anyhow, he said, nodding his
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: head as he spoke. But the Captain meant to quarrel now,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: he raised his voice. If he comes this end of
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: the ship again, I'll cut his insides out. I tell you,
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: cut out his blasted insides. Who are you to tell
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: me what I'm to do? I tell you, I'm the
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: captain of this ship, captain and owner. I'm the law here.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: I tell you the law and the prophets. I'd bargain
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: to take a man and his attendants to and from
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Erika and bring back some animals. I never bargain to
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: carry a mad devil and a silly saw bones. Bah. Well,
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: never mind what he called Montgomery. I saw the latter
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: take a step forward and interposed. He's drunk, said I.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: The captain began some abuse, even fouler than the last.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: Shut up, I said, turning on him sharply, for I
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: had seen danger in Montgomery's white face. With that, I
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: brought the downpour on myself. However, I was glad to
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: avert what was uncommonly near a scuffle, even at the
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: price of the captain's drunken ill will. I do not
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: think I have ever heard quite so much vile language
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: come in a continuous stream from any man's lips before.
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: Though I have frequented eccentric company enough, I found some
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: of it hard to endure, though I am a mild
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: tempered man. But certainly when I told the captain to
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: shut up, I had forgotten that I was merely a
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: bit of humor flotsam, cut off from my resources, and
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: with by fair unpaid, a mere casual, dependent on the
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: bounty or speculative enterprise of the ship. He reminded me
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: of it with considerable vigor, But at any rate I
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: prevented a fight four at the schooner's rail that night.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: Land was sighted at the sundown, and the schooner hove too.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: Montgomery intimated that was his destination. It was too far
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: to see in the details. It seemed to me then,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: simply a low lying patch of dim blue and the
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: uncertain blue gray sea. An almost vertical streak of smoke
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: went up from it into the sky. The captain was
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: not on deck when it was sighted. After he had
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: vented his wrath on me, he had staggered below, and
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: I understand he went to sleep on the floor of
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: his own cabin. The mate practically assumed the command. He
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: was the gaunt, taciturn individual we had seen at the wheel.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: Apparently he was in an evil temper with Montgomery. He
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: took not the slightest notice of either of us. We
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: dined with him in a sulky silence, after a few
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: ineffectual efforts on my part to talk. It struck me
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: too that the men regarded my companion and his animals
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: in a singularly unfriendly manner. I found Montgomery very reticent
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: about his purpose with these creatures and about his destination,
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: and though I was sensible of a growing curiosity as
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: to both, I did not press him. We remained talking
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: on the quarter deck until the sky was thick with stars.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Except for an occasional sound in the yellow lit forecastle
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: and a movement of the animals. Now and then the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: night was very still. The puma lay crouched together, watching
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: us with shining eyes, a black heap in the corner
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: of its cage. Montgomery produced some cigars. He talked to
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: me of London in a tone of half painful reminiscence,
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: asking all kinds of questions about changes that had taken place.
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: He spoke like a man who had loved his life
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: there and had been suddenly and irrevocably cut off from it.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: I gossiped as well as I could of this and that.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: All the time the strangeness of him was shaping itself
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: in my mind. And as I talked, I peered at
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: his odd, pallid face in the dim light of the
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: binnacle lantern behind me. Then I looked out at the
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: darkling sea, where in the dimness his little island was hidden.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: This man, it seemed to me, had come out of
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: a mincity merely to save my life. Tomorrow he would
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: drop over the side and vanish again, out of my existence.
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: Even had it been under common place circumstances, it would
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: have made me a trifle thoughtful. But in the first
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: place was the singularity of an educated man living on
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: this unknown little island, and coupled with that the extraordinary
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: nature of his luggage. I found myself repeating the Captain's question,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: what did he want with the beasts? Why? Too, had
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: he pretended they were not his, when I had remarked
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: about them at first, then again in his personal attendant.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: There was a bizarre quality which had impressed me profoundly.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: These circumstances threw a haze of mystery round the man.
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: They laid hold of my imagination and hampered my tongue.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Towards midnight, our talk of London died away, and we
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: stood side by side, leaning over the bulwarks and staring
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: dreamily over the silent Starlit sea, each pursuing his own thoughts.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: It was the atmosphere for sentiment. And I began upon
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: my gratitude, if I may say it, said I, after
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: a time you saved my life. Chance, he answered, just chance.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: I prefer to make my thanks to the accessible agent.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: Thanked no one. You had the need and I had
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: the knowledge, And I injected and fed you much as
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: I might have collected a spathaman. I was bored and
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: wanted something to do. If i'd being jaded that day,
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: or hadn't liked your faith, well it's the curedieth question
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: where you would have been. Now this damped my mood
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: a little. At any rate, I began, it's a chance,
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: I tell you, he interrupted, as everything is in a
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: man's life, only the aths won't see it. Why am
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: I here now an outcast from civilization instead of being
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: a happy man enjoying all the pleasures of London, simply
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: because eleven years ago I lost my head for ten
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: minutes on a foggy night. He stopped. Yes, said I,
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: that's all. We relapsed into silence. Presently, he laughed, there's
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: something in the starlight that louthens one's tongue. I'm an ath,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: and yet somehow I would like to tell you. Whatever
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: you tell me, you may rely upon my keeping to myself.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: If that's it. He was on the point of beginning,
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: and then shook his head doubtfully, don't, said I. It
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: is all the same to me. After all, it is
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: better to keep your secret. There's nothing gained but a
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: little relief if I respect your confidence. If I don't, well,
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: he grunted undecidedly. I felt I had him at a disadvantage,
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: had caught him in the mood of indiscretion, and to
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: tell the truth, I was not curious to learn what
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: might have driven a young medical student out of London.
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: I have an imagination. I shrugged my shoulders, and turned
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: away over the taffrail into silent black figure watching the stars.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: It was Montgomery's strange attendant. It looked over its shoulder
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: quickly with my movement, then looked away again. It may
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: seem a little thing to you, perhaps, but it came
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: like a sudden blow to me. The only light near
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: us was a lantern at the wheel. The creature's face
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: was turned for one brief instant out of the dimness
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: of the stern, towards this illumination, and I saw that
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: the eyes that glanced at me shone with a pale
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: green light. I did not know then that a reddish luminosity,
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: at least is not uncommon in human eyes. The thing
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: came to me as stark inhumanity. That black figure, with
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: its eyes of fire, struck down through all my adult
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: thoughts and feelings, and for a moment the forgotten horrors
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: of childhood came back to my mind. Then the effect
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: passed as it had come. An uncouth black figure of
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: a man, a figure of no particular import, hung over
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: the taffrail against the starlight, and I found Montgomery was
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: speaking to me. I'm thinking of turning in, then said he,
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: if you've had enough of this, I answered him incongruously.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: We went below, and he wished me good night at
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: the door of my cabin. That night I had some
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: very unpleasant dreams. The waning moon rose late. Its light
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: struck a ghostly white beam across my cabin and made
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: an ominous shape on the planking of my bunk. Then
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: the staghounds woke and began howling and baying, so that
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: I dreamt fitfully and scarcely slept until the approach of
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: dawn five the man who had nowhere to go. In
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: the early morning, it was the second morning after my recovery,
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: and I believed the fourth. After I was picked up,
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: I awoke through an avenue of tumultuous dreams, dreams of
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: guns and howling mobs, and became sensible of a hoarse
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: shouting above me. I rubbed my eyes and lay listening
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: to the noise, doubtful for a little while of my whereabouts.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: Then came a sudden pattering of bare feet, the sound
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: of heavy objects being thrown about, a violent creaking, and
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: the rattling of chains. I heard the swish of the
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: water as the ship was suddenly brought round, and a foamy,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: yellow green wave flew across the little round window and
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: left it streaming. I jumped into my clothes and went
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: on deck. As I came up the ladder, I saw
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: against the flushed sky, for the sun was just rising,
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: the broad back and red hair of the captain, and
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: over his shoulder the puma spinning from a tackle rigged
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: on the mizzen spanker boom. The poor brute seemed horribly
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: scared and crouched in the bottom of its little cage.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: Over borrow them, bawled the captain. Over borrow them, We'll
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: have a clean ship sooner, the whole bilin of em.
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: He stood in my way so that I had perforce
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: to tap his shoulder to come on deck. He came
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: round with a start and staggered back a few paces
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: to stare at me. It needed no expertise to tell
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: that the man was still drunk. Hello, said he stupidly,
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: and then with a light coming into his eyes. Why
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: it's mister, mister Prindick, said I Prindick, be damned, said
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: he shot up. That's your name, mister shot up. It
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: was no good answering the brute, but I certainly did
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: not expect his next move. He held out his hand
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: to the gangway, by which Montgomery stood talking to a massive,
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: gray haired man in dirty blue flannels who had apparently
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: just come aboard that way. Mister blasted shot up that way,
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: roared the captain. Montgomery, and his companion turned as he spoke.
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: What do you mean that way, mister blasted? Shut up?
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: That's what I mean. Overboard, mister shut up and sharp
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: were cleaning the ship out, cleaning the whole blessed ship out,
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: and overboard you'll go. I stared at him, dumbfound it.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: Then it occurred to me that it was exactly the
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: thing I wanted, the last prospect of a journey. A
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: sole passenger with this quarrelsome sot was not one to
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: mourn over. I turned towards Montgomery. Can't have you, said
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: Montgomery's companion. Concisely, you can't have me, said I aghast.
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: He had the squarest and most resolute face I had
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: ever set eyes upon. Look here, I began, turning to
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: the captain. Overboard, said the captain. This ship ain't for
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: beasts and gallibals, and worse than beasts anymore. Overboard you go,
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: mister shut up. If they can't have you, you goes overboard.
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: But anyhow, you go with your friends. I've done with this,
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: blessed I learned for evermore. Amen, I've got enough of it.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: But Montgomery, I appealed. He distorted his lower lip and
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: nodded his head hopelessly at the gray haired man beside him,
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: to indicate his powerlessness to help me. Then began a
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: curious three cornered altercation. Alternately, I appealed to one and
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: another of the three men, first to the gray haired
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: man to let me land, and then to the drunken
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: captain to keep me aboard. I even bawled entreaties to
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: the sailors. Montgomery said never a word, only shook his head.
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: You'll go and overboard, I tell you. Was the captain's refrain.
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: Law be damned. I'm king here at last, I must confess.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: My voice suddenly broke in the middle of a vigorous threat.
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: I felt a gust of hysterical petulance, and went aft
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: and stared dismally at nothing. Meanwhile, the sailors progressed rapidly
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: with the task of unshipping the packages and caged animals.
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: A large launch with two standing lugs lay under the
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: lee of the schooner, and into this the strange assortment
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: of goods was swung. I did not then see the
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: hands from the island that were receiving the packages, for
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: the whole of the launch was hidden from me by
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: the side of the schooner. Neither Montgomery nor his companion
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: took the slightest notice of me, but busied themselves in
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: assisting and directing the four or five sailors who were
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: unloading the goods. The captain went forward interfering rather than insisting.
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: I was alternately despairful and desperate. Once or twice, as
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: I stood waiting there for things to accomplish themselves, I
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: could not resist an impulse to laugh at my miserable quandary.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: I felt all the wretcheder for the lack of a breakfast, hunger,
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: and a lack of blood. Corpuscles take all the manhood
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: from a man. I perceived pretty clearly that I had
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: not the stamina either to resist what the captain chose
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: to do to expel me, or to force myself upon
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: Montgomery and his companion. So I waited passively upon fate
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: and the work of transferring Montgomery's possessions to the launch.
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: When on as if I did not exist. Presently that
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: work was finished, and then came a struggle. I was hauled,
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: resisting weakly enough to the gangway. Even then I noticed
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: the oddness of the brown faces of the men who
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: were with Montgomery in the launch, for the launch was
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: now fully laden and was shoved off hastily. A broadening
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: gap of green water appeared under me, and I pushed
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: back with all my strength to avoid falling headlong. The
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: hands in the launch shouted derisively, and I heard Montgomery
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: curse at them, and then the captain, the mate, and
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: one of the seamen helping him ran me aft towards
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: the stern. The dinghy of the Lady Van had been
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: towing behind. It was half full of water, had no oars,
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: and was quite unvictualled. I refused to go aboard her
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: and flung myself full length on the deck. In the
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: end they swung me into her by a rope, for
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: they had no stern ladder, and then they cut me adrift.
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: I drifted slowly from the schooner in a kind of stupor.
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: I watched all hands take to the rigging, and slowly
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: but surely she came round to the wind The sails
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: fluttered and then bellied out as the wind came into them.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: I stared at her weather beaten side, healing steeply towards me,
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: and then she passed out of my range of view.
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: I did not turn my head to follow her. At first,
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: I could scarcely believe what had happened. I crouched in
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: the bottom of the dinghy, stunned and staring blankly at
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: the vacant, oily sea. Then I realized that I was
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: in that little hell of mine again, now half swamped,
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: and looking back over the gunwale, I saw the schooner
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: standing away from me, with the red haired captain mocking
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: at me over the taffrail, and turning towards the island,
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: saw the launch growing smaller as she approached the beach. Abruptly,
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: the cruelty of this desertion became clear to me. I
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: had no means of reaching the land unless I should
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: chance to drift there. I was still weak, you must
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: remember from my exposure in the boat. I was empty
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: and very faint, or I should have had more heart,
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: But as it was, I suddenly began to sob and weep,
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: as I had never done since I was a little child.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: The tears ran down my face. In a passion of despair,
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: I struck with my fists at the water in the
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: bottom of the boat, and kicked savagely at the gunwale.
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: I prayed aloud for God to let me die six
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: the evil looking boatman. But the islanders, seeing that I
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: was really adrift, took pity on me. I drifted very
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: slowly to the eastward, approaching the island slantingly, and presently
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: I saw with hysterical relief, the launch come round and
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: returned towards me. She was heavily laden, and I could
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: make out as she drew nearer. Montgomery's white haired, broad
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: shouldered compared sitting cramped up with the dogs in several
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: packing cases in the stern sheets. This individual stared fixedly
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: at me, without moving or speaking. The black faced cripple
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: was glaring at me as fixedly. In the boughs near
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: the puma, there were three other men, besides three strange,
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: brutish looking fellows, at whom the stag hounds were snarling savagely. Montgomery,
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: who was steering, brought the boat by me, and rising
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: caught and fastened my painter to the tiller. To tow me,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: for there was no room aboard. I had recovered from
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: my hysterical face by this time, and answered his hail
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: as he approached. Bravely enough. I told him that dinghy
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: was nearly swamped, and he reached me a pigan. I
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: was jerked back as the rope tightened between the boats.
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: For some time I was busy baling. It was not
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: until I had got the water under, for the water
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: and the dinghy had been shipped the boat was perfectly sound,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: that I had leisure to look at the people in
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: the launch again. The white haired man I found was
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: still regarding me steadfastly, but with an expression, as I
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: now fancied, of some perplexity. When my eyes met his,
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: he looked down at the staghound that sat between his knees.
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: He was a powerfully built man, as I have said,
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: with a fine forehead and rather heavy features. But his
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: eyes had that odd drooping of the skin above the
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: lids which often comes with advancing years, and the fall
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: of his mouth at the corners gave him an expression
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: of pugnacious resolution. He talked to Montgomery in a tone
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: too low for me to hear from him. My eyes
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: traveled to his three men and a strange crew. They
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: were I saw only their faces. There was something in
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: their faces I knew not what. That gave me a
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: queer spasm of disgust. I looked steadily at them, and
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: the impression did not pass, though I failed to see
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: what had occasioned it. They seemed to me then to
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: be brown men, but their limbs were oddly swathed in
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: some thin, dirty white stuff down even to the fingers
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: and feet. I have never seen men so wrapped up afore,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: and women so only in the East. They wore turbans, too,
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: and thereunder peered out their elfin faces at me, faces
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: with protruding lower jaws and bright eyes. They had lank
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: black hair, almost like horse hair, and seemed, as they sat,
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: to exceed in stature any race of men I have seen.
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: The white haired man, whom I knew was a good
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: six feet in height, sat a head below any one
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: of the three. I found afterwards that really none were
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: taller than myself. But their bodies were abnormally long, and
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: the thigh part of the leg short and curiously twisted.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: At any rate, they were an amazingly ugly gang, and
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: over the heads of them under the forward lug peered
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: the black face of the man, whose eyes were luminous
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: in the dark. As I stared at them, they met
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: my gaze, and then first one and then another turned
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: away from my direct stare and looked at me in
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: an ard furtive manner. It occurred to me that I
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: was perhaps annoying them, and I turned my attention to
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: the island we were approaching. It was low and covered
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: with vegetation, chiefly a kind of palm that was new
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: to me. From one point, a thin white thread of
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: vapor rose slantingly to an immense height, and then frayed
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: out like a down feather. We were now within the
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: embrace of a broad bay, flanked on either hand by
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: a low promontory. The beach was of dull gray sand
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: and sloped steeply up to a ridge perhaps sixty or
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: seventy feet above the sea level, and regularly set with
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: trees and undergrowth. Half Way up was a square enclosure
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: of some grayish stone, which I found subsequently was built
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: partly of coral and partly of pumicious lava. Two thatched
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: roofs peeped from within this enclosure. A man stood awaiting
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: us at the water's edge. I fancied, while we were
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: still far off that I saw some other and very
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: grotesque looking creatures scuttle into the bushes upon the slope.
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: But I saw nothing of these as we drew nearer.
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: This man was of a moderate size and with a
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: black negroid face. He had a large, almost lipless mouth,
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: extraordinary lank arms, long thin feet and bow legs, and
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: stood with his heavy face thrust forwards staring at us.
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: He was dressed, like Montgomery and his white haired companion,
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: in jacket and trousers of blue surge. As we came
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: still nearer, this individual began to run to and fro
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: on the beach, making the most grotesque movements. At a
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: word of command from Montgomery, the four men in the
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: launch sprang up and, with singularly awkward gestures, struck the lugs.
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: Montgomery steered us round into a narrow little dock excavated
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: into the beach. Then the man on the beach hastened
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: towards us. This dock, as I call it, was really
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: a mere ditch, just long enough at this phase of
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: the tide to take the long boat. I heard the
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: boughs ground in the sand, staved the dinghy off the
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: rudder of the big boat with my pigan, and freeing
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: the painter landed. The three muffled men, with the clumsiest movements,
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: scrambled out upon the sand and forthwith set to landing
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: the cargo, assisted by the man on the beach. I
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: was struck, especially by the curious movements of the legs
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: of the three swathed and bandaged boatmen. Not stiff they were,
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: but distorted in some odd way, almost as if they
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: were jointed in the wrong place. The dogs were still
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: snarling and strained at their chains after these men. As
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: the white haired man landed with them, the three big
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: fellows spoke to one another in odd guttural tones, and
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: the man who had waited for us on the beach
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: began chattering to them excitedly a foreign language. As I fancied,
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: as they laid hands on some bales piled near the stern.
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: Somewhere I had heard such a voice before, and I
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: could not think where the white haired man stood, holding
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: in a tumult of six dogs and bawling orders over
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: their din. Montgomery, having unshipped the rudder, landed likewise, and
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: all set to work at unloading. I was too faint,
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: what with my long fast in the sun beating down
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: on my bare head, to offer any assistance. Presently, the
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: white haired man seemed to recollect my presence and came
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: up to me. You look, said he, as though you
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: had scarcely breakfast it. His little eyes were a brilliant
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: black under his heavy brows. I must apologize for that.
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: Now you are our guest. We must make you comfortable,
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: though you are uninvited. You know, he looked keenly into
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: my face. Montgomery says, you are an educated man. Mister
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: Priddick says, you know something of science. May I ask
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: what that signified? I told him I had spent some
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: years at the Royal College of Science and had done
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: some researches in biology under Huxley. He raised his eyebrows slightly.
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: At that. That alters the case a little, Mister Prindick,
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: he said, with a trifle more respect in his manner.
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: As it happens, we are biologists here. This is a
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: biological station of a sort. His eyes rested on the
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: men in white, who were busily hauling the puma on
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: rollers towards the walled yard. Ay and Montgomery at least,
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: he added, then when you will be able to get away,
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: I can't say we are off the track to anywhere.
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: We see a ship once in a twelve month or so.
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: He left me abruptly and went up the beach past
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: this group, and I think entered the enclosure. The other
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: two the men were with Montgomery erecting a pile of
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: smaller packages on a low wheeled truck. The lama was
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: still on the launch with the rabbit hutches. The staghounds
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: were still lashed to the thwarts. The pile of things completed,
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: all three men laid hold of the truck and began
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: shoving the ton weight or so upon it after the puma. Presently,
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: Montgomery left them, and, coming back to me, held out
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: his hand. I'm glad, said he for my own part.
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: That captain w a thilly asth he'd have made things
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: lively for you. It was you, said I that saved
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: me again, that de pinhe you'll find the island an
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: infirmly rum plaith. I promise you I'd watch my goings
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: carefully if I were you. He he hesitated, and seemed
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: to alter his mind about what was on his lips.
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: I with you'd help me with these rabbits, he said.
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: His procedure with the rabbits was singular. I waded in
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: with him and helped him lug one of the hatches ashore.
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: No sooner was that done than he opened the door
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: of it, and, tilting the thing on one end, turned
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: its living contents out on the ground. They fell in
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: a struggling heap, one on top of the other. He
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: clapped his hands, and forthwith they went off at that
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: hopping run of theirs, fifteen or twenty of them. I
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: should think up the beach in greath and multiply, my friend,
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: said Montgomery. Replyneth the island hitherto. We've had a certain
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: lack of meat here. As I watched them disappearing, the
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: white haired man returned with a brandy flask and some biscuits.
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: Something to go on with, Priddick, said he in a
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: far more familiar tone than I made no ado, but
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: set to work on the biscuits at once, while the
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: white haired man helped Montgomery to release about a score
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: more of the rabbits. Three big hutches, however, went up
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: to the house with the puma. The brandy I did
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: not touch, for I have been an abstainer from my
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: berth seven the Locked Door. The reader will perhaps understand
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: that at first everything was so strange about me, and
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: my position was the outcome of such unexpected adventures, that
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: I had no discernment of the relative strangeness of this
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: or that thing. I followed the lama up the beach
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: and was overtaken by Montgomery, who asked me not to
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: enter the stone enclosure. I noticed then that the puma,
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: in its cage in the pile of packages, had been
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: placed outside the entrance to this quadrange. I turned and
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: saw that the launch had now been unloaded, ran out
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: again and was being beached, and the white haired man
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: was walking towards us. He addressed Montgomery, and now comes
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: the problem of this uninvited guest. What are we to
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: do with him? He know something of scianth, said Montgomery.
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: I'm itching to get to work again with this new stuff,
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: said the white haired man, nodding towards the enclosure. His
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: eyes grew brighter. Ay dath say you are, said Montgomery,
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: in anything but a cordial tone. We can't send him
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: over there, and we can't spare the time to build
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: him a new shanty. And we certainly can't take him
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: into our confidence just yet. I'm in your hands, said I.
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: I had no idea of what he meant by over there.
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: I've been thinking of the same things, Montgomery answered. There's
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: my room with the outer door. That's it, said the
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: elder man, promptly, looking at Montgomery, and all three of
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: us went towards the enclosure. I'm sorry to make a mystery,
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: mister Prendick, but you'll remember your uninvited. Our little establishment
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: here contains a secret or so, and is kind of
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: a bluebeard's chamber. In fact, nothing very dreadful really to
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: a sane man. But just now, as we don't know
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: you decidedly said I. I should be a fool to
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: take offense at any want of confidence. He twisted his
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: heavy mouth into a faint smile. He was one of
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: those saturnine people whose smile with the corners of the
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: mouth down and bowed his acknowledgment of my complaisance. The
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: main entrance to the enclosure was pasted. It was a
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: heavy wooden gate, framed in iron and locked with the
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: cargo of the launch piled outside it. And at the
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: corner we came to a small doorway. I had not
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: previously observed. The white haired man produced a bundle of
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: keys from the pocket of his greasy blue jacket, opened
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: the door and entered his keys. And the elaborate locking
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: up of the place, even while it was still under
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: his eye, struck me as peculiar. I followed him and
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: found myself in a small apartment, plainly but not uncomfortably furnished,
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: and with its inner door, which was slightly ajar, opening
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: into a paved courtyard. This inner door, Montgomery at once closed.
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: A hammock was slung across the darker corner of the room,
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: and a small unglazed window, defended by an iron bar,
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: looked out toward towards the sea. This, the white haired
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: man told me, was to be my apartment, and the
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: inner door, which for fear of accidents he said he
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: would lock on the other side, was my limit. Inward.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: He called my attention to a convenient deck chair before
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: the window, and to an array of old books. Chiefly
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: I found surgical works and editions of the Latin and
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: Greek classics, languages I cannot read with any comfort, on
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: a shelf near the hammock. He left the room by
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: the outer door, as if to avoid opening the inner
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: one again. We usually have our meals in here, said Montgomery,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: and then, as if in doubt, went out after the
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: other Moreau. I heard him call, and for the moment
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: I do not think I noticed. Then, as I handled
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: the books on the shelf, it came up in consciousness
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: where had I heard the name of Moreau before? I
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: sat down before the window, took out the biscuits that
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: still remained to me and ate them with an excellent
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: appetite Moreau. Through the window, I saw one of those
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: unaccountable men in white lugging a packing case along the beach.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: Presently the window frame hid him. Then I heard a
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: key inserted and turned in the lock behind me. After
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: a little while, I heard through the locked door the
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: noise of the staghounds that had now been brought up
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: from the beach. They were not barking, but sniffing and
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: growling in a curious fashion. I could hear the rapid
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: patter of their feet, and Montgomery's voice soothing them. I
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: was very much impressed by the elaborate secrecy of these
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: two men regarding the contents of the place, and for
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: some time I was thinking of that, and of the
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: unaccountable familiarity of the name of Moreau. But so odd
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: is the human memory that I could not then recall
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: that well known name in its proper connection. From that,
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: my thoughts went to the indefinable queerness of the deformed
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: man on the beach. I never saw such a gait,
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: such odd motions. As he pulled at the box. I
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: recalled that none of these men had spoken to me,
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: though most of them I had found looking at me
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: one time or another in a peculiarly furtive manner, quite
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: unlike the frank stare of your unsophisticated savage. Indeed, they
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: had all seemed remarkably taciturn, and when they did speak,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: endowed with very uncanny voices. What was wrong with them? Then?
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: I recalled the eyes of Montgomery's ungainly attendant. Just as
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: I was thinking of him, he came in. He was
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: now dressed in white, and carried a little tray with
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: some coffee and boiled vegetables. Thereon, I could hardly repress
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: a shuddering recoil as he came, bending amiably, and placed
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: the tray before me on the table. Then astonishment paralyzed
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: me under his stringy black locks. I saw his ear.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: It jumped upon me, suddenly, close to my face. The
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: man had pointed ears covered with a fine brown fur.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: Your breakfast, sir, he said. I stared at his face,
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: without attempting to answer him. He turned and went towards
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: the door, regarding me oddly over his shoulder. I followed
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: him out with my eyes, and as I did so,
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: by some odd trick of unconscious cerebration, there came surging
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: into my head the phrase the Moreau hollows. Was it? Moreau? Ah?
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 1: It sent my memory back ten years, the Moreau horrors.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: The phrase drifted loose in my mind for a moment,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: and then I saw it in red lettering on a
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: little buff colored pamphlet to read, which made one shiver
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: and creep. Then I remembered distinctly all about it. That
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: long forgotten pamphlet came back with startling vividness to my mind.
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: I had been a mere lad then. And Moreau was
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: I suppose about fifty, a prominent and masterful physiologist, well
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: known in scientific circles for his extraordinary imagination and his
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: brutal directness in discussion. Was this the same? He had
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: published some very astonishing facts in connection with the transfusion
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: of blood, and an addition, was known to be doing
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: valuable work on morbid growths. Then suddenly his career was closed.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: He had to leave England. A journalist obtained access to
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: his laboratory in the capacity of laboratory assistant, with the
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: deliberate intention of making sensational exposures, and by the help
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: of a shocking accident. If it was an accident, his
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: gruesome pamphlet became notorious. On the day of it's publication,
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: a wretched dog, flayed and otherwise mutilated, escaped from Moreau's house.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: It was in the silly season, and a prominent editor,
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: a cousin of the temporary laboratory assistant, appealed to the
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: conscience of the nation. It was not the first time
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: that conscience has turned against the methods of for search.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: The doctor was simply howled out of the country. It
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: may be that he deserved to be, but I still
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: think that the tepid support of his fellow investigators and
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: his desertion by the great body of scientific workers was
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: a shameful thing. Yet some of his experiments, by the
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: journalist's account, were wantonly cruel. He might perhaps have purchased
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: his social peace by abandoning his investigations, But he apparently
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: preferred the latter, as most men would who have once
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: fallen under the overmastering spell of research. He was unmarried,
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: and had indeed nothing but his own interest to consider.
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: I felt convinced that this must be the same man.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: Everything pointed to it. It dawned upon me to what
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: end the puma and the other animals, which had now
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: been brought with other luggage into the enclosure behind the house,
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: were destined. And a curious, faint odor, the halitus of
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: something familiar, an odor that had been in the background
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: of my consciousness hitherto, suddenly came forward into the forefront
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: of my thoughts. It was the antiseptic odor of the
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: dissecting room. I heard the puma growling through the wall,
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: and one of the dogs yelped as though it had
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: been struck. Yet surely, and especially to another scientific man,
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: there was nothing so horrible in vivisection as to account
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: for this secrecy, And by some odd leap in my thoughts,
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: the pointed ears and luminous eyes of Montgomery's attendant came
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: back again before me with the sharpest definition. I stared
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: before me out at the green sea, frothing under a
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: freshening breeze, and let thee and other strange memories of
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: the last few days chase one another through my mind.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: What could it all mean? A locked enclosure on a
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 1: lonely island, A notorious vivisector, and these crippled and distorted
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: men eight the crying of the puma. Montgomery interrupted my
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: tangle of mystification and suspicion about one o'clock, and his
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: grotesque tintant followed him with the tray bearing bread, some
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: herbs and other eatables, a flask of whiskey, a jug
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: of water, and three glasses and knives. I glanced askance
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: at this strange creature and found him watching me with
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: his queer, restless eyes. Montgomery said he would lunch with me,
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: but that Moreau was too preoccupied with the some work
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: to come. Moreau said, I I know that name the devil,
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: you do? Said he? What an ath I was to
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: mention it to you. I might have thought, anyhow, it
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: will give you an inkling of our myth to wreath
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: with GI No thanks. I'm an abstainer I with I
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: had been, but it's no use locking the door after
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: the steed hath stolen. It was that infernal stuff which
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: led to my coming here, that and a foggy night,
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: I thought myself in luck at the time when Moreau
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: offered to get me off. It's queer, Montgomery said I suddenly,
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: as the outer door closed. Why has your man pointed ears? Damn?
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: He said, over his first mouth full of food. He
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: stared at me for a moment, and then repeated pointed earth,
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 1: little points to them, said I, as calmly as possible,
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: with a catch in my breath and a fine black
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: fur at the edges. He helped himself to whiskey and
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: water with great deliberation. I was under the impression that
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: his hair covered his earth. I saw them as he
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: stooped by me to put that coffee assent to me
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: on the table, and his eyes shine in the dark.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: By this time Montgomery had recovered from the surprise of
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: my question. I always thought, he said, deliberately, with a
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: certain accentuation of his flavoring of lisp, that there was
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: something the matter with the earth from the way he
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: covered them. What were they like? I was persuaded from
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: his manner that this ignorance was a pretense. Still, I
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: could hardly tell the man that I thought him a liar, pointed,
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: I said, rather small and furry, distinctly furry. But the
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: whole man is one of the strangest beings I ever
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: set eyes on. A sharp, hoarse cry of animal pain
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: came from the enclosure behind us. Its depth and volume
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: testified to the puma. I saw Montgomery WinCE. Yes, he said,
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: where did you pick up the creature than Francisco Heath
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: an ugly brute. I admit, half witted, you know, can't
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: remember where he came from. But I'm youth to him,
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: you know, we both are. How does he strike? He's unnatural,
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: I said, there's something about him. Don't think me fanciful,
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: but it gives me a nasty little sensation, a tightening
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: of my muscles when he comes near me. It's a
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 1: touch of the diabolical. In fact, Montgomery had stopped eating
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: while I told him this rum. He said, I can't
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: see it. He resumed his meal. I had no idea
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: of it, he said, and masticated. The crew of the
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: schooner must have felt it. The fame made a dead
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: fetter at the poor devil you saw the captain. Suddenly,
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: the puma howled again, this time more painfully. Montgomery swore
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: under his breath I had half a mind to attack
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: him about the men on the beach. Then the poor
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: brute within gave vent to a series of short, sharp cries.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: Your men on the beach, said I what race? Are they?
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: Excellent fellows, aren't they? Said he absent mindedly, knitting his brows.
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: As the animal yelled out sharply, I said no more.
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: There was another outcry, worse than the former. He looked
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 1: at me with his dull gray eyes, and then took
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: some more whiskey. He tried to draw me into a
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: discussion about alcohol, professing to have saved my life with it.
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: He seemed anxious to lay stress on the fact that
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: I owed my life to him. I answered him distractedly.
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 1: Presently our meal came to an end. The misshapen monster
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: with the pointy years cleared the remains away, and Montgomery
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: left me alone in the room again. All the time
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: he had been in a state of illa concealed irritation
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: at the noise of the vivisected puma. He had spoken
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: of his odd want of nerve, and left me to
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: the obvious application. I found myself that the cries were
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: singularly irritating, and it grew in depth and intensity as
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 1: the afternoon wore on. They were painful at first, but
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: their constant resurgence at last altogether upset my balance. I
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: flung aside a crib of horrce I had been reading,
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: and began to clinch my fists, to bite my lips,
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: and to pace the room. Presently I got to stopping
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: my ears with my fingers. The emotional appeal of those
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: yells grew upon me steadily, grew at last to such
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: an exquisite expression of suffering that I could stand it
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: in that confined room no longer. I stepped out of
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: the door into the slow heat of the late afternoon,
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: and walking past the main entrance, locked again, I noticed
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: turned the corner of the wall the crying sounded even
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: louder out of doors. It was as if all the
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: pain in the world had found a voice. Yet had
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 1: I known such pain was in the next room, and
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: had it been dumb, I believe I have thought, since
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: I could have stood it well enough. It is when
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: suffering finds a voice and sets our nerves quivering that
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: this pity comes troubling us. But in spite of the
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: brilliant sunlight and the green fans of the trees waving
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: in the soothing sea breeze, the world was a confusion,
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: blurred with drifting black in red phanfasms. Until I was
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: out of earshot of the house in the checkered wall
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: nine the thing in the forest. I strode through the
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: undergrowth that closed the ridge behind the house, scarcely heating.
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: Whither I went passed on through the shadow of a
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: thick cluster of straight stem trees beyond it, and so
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: presently found myself some way on the other side of
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: the ridge and descending towards a streamlet that ran through
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: a narrow valley. I paused and listened the distance I
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: had come, or the intervening masses of thicket deadened any
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 1: sound that might be coming from the enclosure. The air
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: was still. Then, with a rustle, a rabbit emerged and
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: went scampering up the slope before me. I hesitated and
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: sat down in the edge of the shade. The place
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: was a pleasant one. The rivulet was hidden by the
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: luxuriant vegetation of the banks, save at one point where
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: I caught a triangular patch of its glittering water. On
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 1: the farther side, I saw, through a bluish haze a
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 1: tangle of trees and creepers, and above these again the
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: luminous blue of the sky. Here and there a splash
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: of white or crimson marked the blooming of some trailing epiphyte.
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: I let my eyes wander over this scene for a while,
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 1: and then began to turn over in my mind again
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: the strange peculiarities of Montgomery's man. But it was too
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: hot to think elaborately, and presently I fell into a
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: tranquil state midway between dozing and waking. From this, I
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: was aroused, after I know not how long, by a
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: rustling amidst the greenery on the other side of the stream.
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: For a moment I could see nothing but the waving
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: summit of the ferns and reeds. Then suddenly, upon the
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: bank of the stream appeared something. At first I could
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 1: not distinguish what it was. It bowed its round head
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: to the water and began to drink. Then I saw
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: it was a man, going on all fours like a beast.
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 1: He was clothed in bluish cloth and was of a
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: copper colored hue with black hair. It seemed that grotesque
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 1: ugliness was an invariable character of these islanders. I could
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 1: hear the suck of the water at his lips as
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: he drank. I leant forward to see him better, and
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: a piece of lava detached by my hand went pattering
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: down the slope. He looked up guiltily, and his eyes
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 1: met mine. Forthwith, he scrambled to his feet and stood,
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: wiping his clumsy hand across his mouth and regarding me.
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: His legs were scarcely half the length of his body,
• 1:19:53
  Speaker 1: so staring one another out of countenance, we remained for
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: perhaps the space a minute, then stopping to look back
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 1: once or twice. He slunk off among the bushes to
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: the right of me, and I heard the swish of
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 1: the frands grow faint in the distance and die away.
• 1:20:13
  Speaker 1: Long after he had disappeared, I remained sitting up, staring
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: in the direction of his retreat. My drowsy tranquility had gone.
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: I was startled by a noise behind me, and turning,
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: suddenly saw the flapping white tail of a rabbit vanishing
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: up the slope. I jumped to my feet. The apparition
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: of this grotesque half bestial creature had suddenly populated the
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: stillness of the afternoon for me. I looked round me
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 1: rather nervously, and regretted that I was unarmed. Then I
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: thought that the man I had just seen had been
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: clothed in bluish cloth, had not been naked, as a
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: savage would have been. And I tried to persuade myself
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: from that fact that he was, after all, probably a
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: peaceful character, that the dull ferocity of his countenance belied him.
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 1: Yet I was greatly disturbed at the apparition. I walked
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: to the left along the slope, turning my head about
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: and peering this way and that, among the straight stems
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: of the trees. Why should a man go on all
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: fours and drink with his lips? Presently I heard an
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: animal wailing again, and, taking it to be the puma,
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: I turned about and walked in a direction diametrically opposite
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: to the sound. This led me down to the stream,
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: across which I stepped and pushed my way up through
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: the undergrowth. Beyond. I was startled by a great patch
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: of vivid scarlet on the ground, and going up to it,
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: found it to be a peculiar fungus branched and corrugated
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 1: like a fallacious lichen, but deliquescing into slime at the touch.
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: And then, in the sh shadow of some luxuriant ferns,
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 1: I came upon an unpleasant thing, the dead body of
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 1: a rabbit, covered with shining flies, but still warm, and
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: with a head torn off. I stopped, aghast at the
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: sight of the scattered blood. Here, at least was one
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 1: visitor to the island disposed of. There were no traces
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: of other violence about it. It looked as though it
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: had been suddenly snatched up and killed. And as I
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: stared at the little furry body came the difficulty of
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: how the thing had been done. The vague dread that
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: had been in my mind since I had seen the
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 1: inhuman face of the man at the stream grew distinct.
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: As I stood there, I began to realize the hardihood
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 1: of my expedition among these unknown people. The thicket about
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: me became altered. To my imagination. Every shadow became something
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: more than a shadow, became an ambush, every rustle became
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 1: a threat. Invisible things seemed watching me. I resolved to
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: go back to the enclosure on the beach. I suddenly
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 1: turned away and thrust myself violently, possibly even frantically, through
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: the bushes, anxious to get a clear space about me again.
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: I stopped just in time to prevent myself emerging upon
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 1: an open space. It was a kind of glade in
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: the forest made by a fall. Seedlings were already starting
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 1: up to struggle for the vacant space, and beyond the
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: dense growth of stems and twining vines and splashes of
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: fungus and flowers closed in again before me, squatting together
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: upon the fungoid ruins of a huge fallen tree, and
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: still unaware of my approach, with three grotesque human figures.
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: One was evidently a female, the other two were men.
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 1: They were naked save for swathings of scarlet cloth about
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: the middle, and their skins were of a dull, pinkish
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 1: drab color, such as I had seen in nose savages before.
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 1: They had fat, heavy chinless faces, retreating foreheads, and a scant,
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: bristly hair upon their heads. I never saw such bestial
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: looking creatures. They were talking, or at least one of
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: the men was talking to the other two, and all
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: three had been too closely interested to heed the rustling
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: of my approach. They swayed their heads and shoulders from
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 1: side to side. The speaker's words came thick and sloppy,
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: and though I could hear them distinctly, I could not
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: distinguish what he said. He seemed to me to be
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: reciting some complicated gibberish. Presently, his articulation became shriller and spread,
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: heading his hands, he rose to his feet. At that
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 1: the others began to gibber in unison, also rising to
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: their feet, spreading their hands and swaying their bodies in
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: rhythm with their chant. I noticed then the abnormal shortness
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: of their legs and their lank, clumsy feet. All three
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 1: began slowly to circle round, raising and stamping their feet
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: and waving their arms. A kind of tune crept into
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 1: their rhythmic recitation, and a refrain, bah lu la or
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 1: bah lu la. It sounded like their eyes began to sparkle,
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: and their ugly faces to brighten with an expression of
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: strange pleasure. Saliva tripped from their lipless mouths. Suddenly, as
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: I watched their grotesque and unaccountable gestures, I perceived clearly
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: for the first time what it was that had offended
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: me what had given me the two inconsistent and conflicting
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 1: impressions of utter strangeness and yet of the strangest familiarity.
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 1: The three creatures engaged in this mysterious right were human
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 1: in shape, and yet human beings with the strangest air
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 1: about them of some familiar animal. Each of these creatures,
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: despite its human form, its rag of clothing, and the
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: rough humanity of its bodily form, had woven into it,
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: into its movements, into the expression of its countenance, into
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 1: its whole presence, some now irresistible suggestion of a hog,
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: a Swinish taint, the unmistakable mark of the beast. I
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: stood overcome by this amazing realization, and then the most
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: horrible questionings came rushing into my mind. They began leaping
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 1: in the first one and then the other, whooping and grunting.
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 1: Then one slipped, and for a moment was on all
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 1: fours to recover, indeed forthwith. But the transitory gleam of
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 1: the true animalism of these monsters was enough. I turned
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 1: as noiselessly as possible, and becoming every now and then
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: rigid with the fear of being discovered as a branch
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 1: cracked or a leaf rustled, I pushed back into the bushes.
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: It was long before I grew bolder and dared to
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: move freely. My only idea for the moment was to
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: get away from these foul beings. And I scarcely noticed
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: that I had emerged upon a faint pathway amidst the trees. Then,
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: suddenly traversing a little glade, I saw with an unpleasant start,
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 1: two clumsy legs among the trees, walking with noiseless footsteps,
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 1: parallel with my course, and perhaps thirty yards away from me.
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: The head and upper part of the body were hidden
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 1: by a tangle of creeper I stopped abruptly, hoping the
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 1: creature did not see me. The feet stopped as I did. So.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: Nervous was I that I controlled an impulse to headlong
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 1: flight with the utmost difficulty. Then, looking hard, I distinguished
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: through the interlacing net work the head and body of
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 1: the brute I had seen drinking. He moved his head.
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: There was an emerald flash in his eyes as he
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 1: glanced at me from the shadow of the trees, a
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: half luminous color that vanished as he turned his head again.
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 1: He was motionless for a moment and then, with a
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: noiseless tread, began running through the green confusion. In another moment,
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: he had vanished behind some bushes. I could not see him,
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: but I felt that he had stopped and was watching
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: me again. What on earth was he? Man or beast?
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: What did he want with me? I had no weapon,
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: not even a stick. Flight would be madness at any rate.
• 1:29:14
  Speaker 1: The thing, whatever it was, lacked the courage to attack me.
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: Setting my teeth hard, I walked straight towards him. I
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: was anxious not to show the fear that seemed chilling
• 1:29:27
  Speaker 1: my backbone. I pushed through a tangle of tall, white
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: flowered bushes and saw him twenty paces beyond, looking over
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: his shoulder at me, and hesitating, I advanced a step
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 1: or two, looking steadfastly into his eyes. Who are you?
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: Said I? He tried to meet my gaze. No, he said, suddenly,
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: and turning, went bounding away from me through the undergrowth.
• 1:30:00
  Speaker 1: Then he turned and stared at me again, his eyes
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: shone brightly out of the dusk under the trees. My
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: heart was in my mouth, but I felt my only
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: chance was bluff, and walked steadily towards him. He turned
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 1: again and vanished into the dusk. Once more, I thought
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: I caught the glint of his eyes, and that was all.
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: For the first time I realized how the lateness of
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 1: the hour might affect me. The sun had set some
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: minutes since the swift dusk of the tropics was already
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: fading out of the eastern sky, and a pioneer mouth
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: fluttered silently by my head. Unless I would spend the
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: night among the unknown dangers of the mysterious forest, I
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: must hasten back to the enclosure. The thought of a
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: return to that pain haunted refuge was extremely disagreeable, but
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 1: still more so was the idea of being overtaken in
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: the open by dark and all that darkness might conceal.
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: I gave one more look into the blue shadows that
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: had swallowed up this odd creature, and then retraced my
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: way down the slope towards the stream, going as I judged,
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: in the direction from which I had come. I walked eagerly,
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: my mind confused with many things, and presently found myself
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: in a level place among scattered trees. The colorless clearness
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 1: that comes after the sunset flush was darkling. The blue
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 1: sky above grew momentarily deeper, and the little stars one
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 1: by one pierced the attenuated light the interspaces of the trees.
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 1: The gaps in the further vegetation that had been hazy
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 1: blue in the daylight grew black and mysterious. I pushed
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: on the color vanished from the world. The tree tops
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 1: rose against the luminous blue sky and inky luette, and
• 1:32:01
  Speaker 1: all below that outline melted into one formless blackness. Presently,
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: the trees grew thinner and the shrubby undergrowth more abundant.
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: Then there was a desolate space covered with a white sand,
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 1: and then another expanse of tangled bushes. I did not
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: remember crossing the sand opening before I began to be
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 1: tormented by a faint rustling upon my right hand. I
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 1: thought at first it was fancy, for whenever I stopped
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 1: there was silence save for the evening breeze in the
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: tree tops. Then when I turned to hurry on again,
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: there was an echo to my footsteps. I turned away
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: from the thickets, keeping to the more open ground and
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: endeavoring by sudden turns now, and then, to surprise, something
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 1: in the act of creeping upon me. I saw nothing,
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: and nevertheless, my sense of another presence grew steadily. I
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: increased my pace, and after some time to a slight ridge,
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: crossed it and turned sharply, regarding it steadfastly from the
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: further side. It came out black in clear cut against
• 1:33:11
  Speaker 1: the darkening sky, and presently a shapeless lump heaved up
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 1: momentarily against the sky line and vanished again. I felt
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 1: assured now that my tawny faced antagonist was stalking me
• 1:33:25
  Speaker 1: once more, and coupled with that was another unpleasant realization
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 1: that I had lost my way for a time. I
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 1: heard on hopelessly, perplexed and pursued by that stealthy approach.
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 1: Whatever it was, the thing either lacked the courage to
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 1: attack me, or it was waiting to take me at
• 1:33:46
  Speaker 1: some disadvantage. I kept studiously to the open. At times
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 1: I would turn and listen, and presently I had half
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 1: persuaded myself that my pursuer had abandoned the chase, or
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: was a mere creation of my disordered imagination. Then I
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: heard the sound of the sea. I quickened my footsteps
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: almost into a run, and immediately there was a stumble
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 1: in my rear. I turned suddenly and stared at the
• 1:34:16
  Speaker 1: uncertain trees behind me, one black shadow seemed to leap
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: into another. I listened rigid and heard nothing but the
• 1:34:26
  Speaker 1: creep of the blood in my ears. I thought that
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: my nerves were unstrung, and that my imagination was tricking me,
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: and turned resolutely towards the sounds of the sea again.
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: In a minute or so, the trees grew thinner, and
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: I emerged upon a bare, low headland, running out into
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 1: the somber water. The night was calm and clear, and
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: the reflection of the growing multitude of the stars shivered
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: in the tranquil heaving of the sea. Some Way out
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: the wash, upon an irregular band of reef shone with
• 1:35:02
  Speaker 1: the pallid light of its own. Westward, I saw the
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: zodiacal light mingling with the yellow brilliance of the evening star.
• 1:35:12
  Speaker 1: The coast fell away from me to the east and westward.
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: It was hidden by the shoulder of the cape. Then
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: I recalled the fact that Moreau's beach lay to the west.
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: A twig snapped behind me, and there was a rustle.
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 1: I turned and stood facing the dark trees. I could
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: see nothing, or else I could see too much. Every
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: dark form in the dimness had its ominous quality, its
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: peculiar suggestion of alert watchfulness. So I stood for perhaps
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: a minute, and then, with an eye to the tree,
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 1: still turned westward to cross the headland. And as I moved,
• 1:35:55
  Speaker 1: one among the lurking shadows moved to follow me. My
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 1: heart beat quickly. Presently the broad sweep of a bay
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 1: to the westward became visible, and I halted again. The
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 1: noiseless shadow halted a dozen yards from me. A little
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 1: point of light shone on the further bend of the curve,
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: and the gray sweep of the sandy beach lay faint
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: under the starlight. Perhaps two miles away was that little
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 1: point of light. To get to the beach, I should
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: have to go through the trees where the shadows lurked,
• 1:36:31
  Speaker 1: and down a bushy slope. I could see the thing
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: rather more distinctly. Now it was no animal, for it
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: stood erect. At that. I opened my mouth to speak
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 1: and found a hoarse phlam choked my voice. I tried
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 1: again and shouted, who is there? There was no answer.
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: I advanced a step. The thing did not move, only
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: gathered itself together. My foot struck a stone that gave
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 1: me an idea. Without taking my eyes off the black
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 1: form before me. I stooped and picked up this lump
• 1:37:11
  Speaker 1: of rock. But at my motion the thing turned abruptly
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: as a dog might have done, and slunk obliquely into
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: the further darkness. Then I recalled a schoolboy expedient against
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 1: big dogs, and twisted the rock into my handkerchief, and
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 1: gave this a turn round my wrist. I heard a
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: movement further off among the shadows, as if the thing
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: was in retreat. Then suddenly my tense excitement gave way.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 1: I broke into a profuse perspiration and fell a trembling,
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: with my adversary routed and this weapon in my hand.
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 1: It was some time before I could summon resolution to
• 1:37:53
  Speaker 1: go down through the trees and bushes upon the flank
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: of the headland to the beach. At last I did
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 1: it at a run, and as I emerged from the
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 1: thicket upon the sand, I heard some other body come
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 1: crashing after me. At that I completely lost my head
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: with fear, and again running along the sand forthwith there
• 1:38:15
  Speaker 1: came the swift patter of soft feet in pursuit. I
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: gave a wild cry and redoubled my pace. Some dim
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: black things about three or four times the size of
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: rabbits went running or harping up from the beach towards
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 1: the bushes as I passed. So long as I live,
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 1: I shall remember the terror of that chase. I ran
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: near the water's edge and heard every now and then
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 1: the splash of the feet that gained upon me. Far away,
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 1: hopelessly far was the yellow light. All the night about
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 1: us was black, and still splash, splash came the pursuing feet,
• 1:38:59
  Speaker 1: nearer and nearer. I felt my breath going, for I
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 1: was quite out of training. It whooped as I drew it,
• 1:39:09
  Speaker 1: and I felt a pain like a knife at my side.
• 1:39:12
  Speaker 1: I perceived the thing would come up with me long
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: before I reached the enclosure, and desperate and sobbing for
• 1:39:20
  Speaker 1: my breath, I wheeled round upon it and struck at
• 1:39:23
  Speaker 1: it as it came up to me. Struck with all
• 1:39:27
  Speaker 1: my strength, the stone came out of the sling of
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 1: the handkerchief as I did so. As I turned, the thing,
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 1: which had been running on all fours, rose to its feet,
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: and the missile fell fair on its left temple. The
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: skull rang loud, and the animal man blundered into me,
• 1:39:48
  Speaker 1: thrust me back with its hands, and went staggering past me,
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 1: to fall headlong upon the sand, with its face in
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 1: the water, and there it lay still. I could not
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: bring myself to approach that black heap. I left it there,
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 1: with the water rippling round it, under the still stars,
• 1:40:10
  Speaker 1: and giving it a wide berth, pursued my way towards
• 1:40:13
  Speaker 1: the yellow glow of the house, and presently, with a
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 1: positive effect of relief, came the pitiful moaning of the puma,
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: the sound that had originally driven me out to explore
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 1: this mysterious island, and that that though I was faint
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 1: and horribly fatigued, I gathered together all my strength and
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: began running again towards the light. I thought I heard
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 1: a voice calling me ten, the crying of the man.
• 1:40:48
  Speaker 1: As I drew near the house, I saw that the
• 1:40:51
  Speaker 1: light shone from the open door of my room. And
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 1: then I heard, coming from out of the darkness at
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: the side of that orange oblong of light, the voice
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 1: of Montgomery, shouting prindic. I continued running. Presently I heard
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 1: him again, I replied by a feeble hello, and in
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 1: another moment had staggered up to him. Where have you been?
• 1:41:16
  Speaker 1: Said he holding me at arm's length so that the
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: light from the door fell on my face. We have
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: both been so busy that we forgot you until about
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 1: half an hour ago. He led me into the room
• 1:41:28
  Speaker 1: and sat me down in the deck chair. For a
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: while I was blinded by the light. We did not
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: think you would thought to explore the island of ours
• 1:41:38
  Speaker 1: without telling of he said. And then I was afraid.
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 1: But but hallo, My last remaining strength slipped from me,
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 1: and my head fell forward on my chest. I think
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 1: he found a certain satisfaction in giving me brandy. For
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 1: God's sake, said I fasten the door. You've been meeting
• 1:42:06
  Speaker 1: some of our curiosity, they said he. He locked the
• 1:42:11
  Speaker 1: door and turned to me again. He asked me no questions,
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 1: but gave me some more brandy and water and pressed
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 1: me to eat. I was in a state of collapse.
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 1: He said something vague about forgetting to warn me, and
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 1: asked me briefly when I left the house and what
• 1:42:31
  Speaker 1: I had seen. I answered him as briefly, in fragmentary sentences.
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 1: Tell me what it all means, said I, in a
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: state bordering on hysterics. It's nothing so dreadful, said he.
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 1: But I think you have had but enough for one day.
• 1:42:56
  Speaker 1: The puma suddenly gave a sharp yell of pain. At that,
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: he swore under his breath. I'm damned, said he. If
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: this plaieth not it badath Gareth dreet with its cat.
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: Montgomery said, I what was that thing that came after me?
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: Was it a beast? Or was it a man? If
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: you don't sleep to night, he said, you'll be off
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: your head to morrow. I stood up in front of him.
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 1: What was that thing that came after me? I asked?
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: He looked me squarely in the eyes and twisted his
• 1:43:39
  Speaker 1: mouth askew. His eyes, which had seemed animated a minute before,
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 1: went dull from your account, said he. I'm thinking it
• 1:43:52
  Speaker 1: was a bogul. I felt a gust of intense irritation,
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 1: which passed as quickly as it came. I flung myself
• 1:44:01
  Speaker 1: into the chair again and pressed my hands on my forehead.
• 1:44:05
  Speaker 1: The puma began once more. Montgomery came round behind me
• 1:44:11
  Speaker 1: and put his hand on my shoulder. Look here, Prindick,
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 1: he said, I had no bithness to let you drift
• 1:44:19
  Speaker 1: out into the thilly island of our earth. But it's
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 1: not so bad as you feel. Man. Your nerve all
• 1:44:27
  Speaker 1: work to rags. Let me give you something that will
• 1:44:31
  Speaker 1: make you sleep, that will keep on for hours. Yet
• 1:44:36
  Speaker 1: you must simply get to sleep, or I won't answer
• 1:44:40
  Speaker 1: for it. I did not reply. I bowed forward and
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 1: covered my face with my hands. Presently he returned with
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 1: a small measure containing a dark liquid. This he gave me.
• 1:44:56
  Speaker 1: I took it unresistingly, and he helped me into the hammock.
• 1:45:01
  Speaker 1: When I awoke, it was broad day. For a little while,
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 1: I lay flat, staring at the roof above me. The rafters,
• 1:45:10
  Speaker 1: I observed, were made out of the timbers of a ship.
• 1:45:15
  Speaker 1: Then I turned my head and saw a meal prepared
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: for me on the table. I perceived that I was hungry,
• 1:45:22
  Speaker 1: and prepared to clamber out of the hammock, which, very politely,
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 1: anticipating my intention, twisted round and deposited me upon all
• 1:45:31
  Speaker 1: falls on the floor. I got up and sat down
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 1: before the food. I had a heavy feeling in my head,
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 1: and only the vaguest memory at first of the things
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 1: that happened over night. The morning breeze blew very pleasantly
• 1:45:49
  Speaker 1: through the unglazed window, and that in the food contributed
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: to the sense of animal comfort which I experienced. Presently
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 1: the door behind me. The door inward towards the yard
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 1: at the enclosure opened. I turned and saw Montgomery's face
• 1:46:08
  Speaker 1: all right, said he I'm frightfully busy, and he shut
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: the door. Afterwards I discovered that he forgot to relock it.
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: Then I recalled the expression of his face the previous night,
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: and with that the memory of all I had experienced
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 1: reconstructed itself before me. Even as that fear came back
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 1: to me, came a cry from within, But this time
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 1: it was not the cry of a puma. I put
• 1:46:38
  Speaker 1: down the mouthful that hesitated upon my lips and listened silence,
• 1:46:45
  Speaker 1: save for the whisper of the morning breeze. I began
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 1: to think my ears had deceived me. After a long pause,
• 1:46:54
  Speaker 1: I resumed my meal, but with my ears still vigilant.
• 1:46:59
  Speaker 1: Presently I heard something else, very faint and low. I
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 1: sat as if frozen in my attitude. Though it was
• 1:47:07
  Speaker 1: faint and low, it moved me more profoundly than all
• 1:47:12
  Speaker 1: that I had hitherto heard of the abominations behind the wall.
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: There was no mistake this time in the quality of
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 1: the dim broken sounds, no doubt at all of their source,
• 1:47:26
  Speaker 1: for it was groaning broken by sobs and gasps of anguish.
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 1: It was no brute this time, it was a human
• 1:47:37
  Speaker 1: being in torment. As I realized this, I rose and
• 1:47:43
  Speaker 1: in three steps had crossed the room, seized the handle
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 1: of the door into the yard, and flung it open
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 1: before me. Prindick man, stop, cried Montgomery, intervening a start
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 1: deer hound yelped and snarled. There was blood I saw
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 1: in the sink, brown and some scarlet, and I smelt
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 1: the peculiar smell of carbolic acid. Then through an open
• 1:48:14
  Speaker 1: doorway beyond, in the dim light of the shadow, I
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 1: saw something bound painfully upon a framework, scarred, red and bandaged.
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 1: And then, blotting this out, appeared the face of old Moreau,
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 1: white and terrible. In a moment, he had gripped me
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 1: by the shoulder with a hand that was smeared red,
• 1:48:35
  Speaker 1: had twisted me off my feet and flung me headlong
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 1: back into my own room. He lifted me as though
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 1: I was a little child. I fell at full length
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: upon the floor, and the door slammed and shut out
• 1:48:50
  Speaker 1: the passionate intensity of his face. Then I heard the
• 1:48:55
  Speaker 1: key turn in the lock, and Montgomery's voice in expostulation
• 1:49:01
  Speaker 1: ruin the work of a lifetime. I heard Moreau say,
• 1:49:06
  Speaker 1: he does not understand, said Montgomery, and other things that
• 1:49:10
  Speaker 1: were inaudible. I can't spare the time yet, said Moreau.
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 1: The rest I did not hear. I picked myself up
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 1: and stood trembling my mind a chaos of the most
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: horrible misgivings. Could it be possible? I thought that such
• 1:49:30
  Speaker 1: a thing as vivisection of men was carried on here.
• 1:49:35
  Speaker 1: The question shot like lightning across a tumultuous sky, and
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 1: suddenly the clouded horror of my mind condensed into a
• 1:49:45
  Speaker 1: vivid realization of my own danger. Eleven, the hunting of
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: the man. It came before my mind with an unreasonable
• 1:49:58
  Speaker 1: hope of escape that the the outer door of my
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: room was still open to me. I was convinced, now,
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 1: absolutely assured, that Moreau had been vivisecting a human being.
• 1:50:12
  Speaker 1: All the time since I had heard his name, I
• 1:50:14
  Speaker 1: had been trying to link in my mind in some
• 1:50:17
  Speaker 1: way the grotesque animalism of the Islanders with his abominations,
• 1:50:23
  Speaker 1: and now I thought I saw it all. The memory
• 1:50:27
  Speaker 1: of his work on the transfusion of blood recurred to me.
• 1:50:30
  Speaker 1: These creatures I had seen were the victims of some
• 1:50:33
  Speaker 1: hideous experiment. These sickening scoundrels had merely intended to keep
• 1:50:40
  Speaker 1: me back, to fool me with their display of confidence,
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 1: and presently to fall upon me with a fate more
• 1:50:48
  Speaker 1: horrible than death, with torture, and after torture, the most
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 1: hideous degradation it is possible to conceive, to send me
• 1:50:58
  Speaker 1: off a lost soul, a beast to the rest of
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: their comus route. I looked around for some weapon. Nothing.
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 1: Then with an inspiration, I turned over the deck chair,
• 1:51:11
  Speaker 1: put my foot on the side of it, and tore
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: away the side rail. It happened that a nail came
• 1:51:17
  Speaker 1: away with the wood, and projecting gave a touch of
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: danger to an otherwise petty weapon. I heard a step outside,
• 1:51:26
  Speaker 1: and incontinently flung open the door and found Montgomery within
• 1:51:30
  Speaker 1: a yard of it. He meant to lock the outer door.
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 1: I raised this nailed stick of mine and cut at
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 1: his face, but he sprang back. I hesitated a moment,
• 1:51:42
  Speaker 1: then turned and fled round the corner of the house.
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: Prindic man. I heard his astonished cry, don't be a
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 1: thiliath man. Another minute, thought I, and he would have
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 1: had me locked in and as red as a hospital
• 1:52:00
  Speaker 1: rabbit for my feet. He emerged behind the corner, for
• 1:52:05
  Speaker 1: I heard him shout prynd dick. Then he began to
• 1:52:09
  Speaker 1: run after me, shouting things as he ran, this time
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 1: running blindly. I went northeastward, in the direction at right
• 1:52:17
  Speaker 1: angles to my previous expedition. Once, as I went running
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 1: headlong up the beach, I glanced over my shoulder and
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 1: saw his attendant with him. I ran furiously up the
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 1: slope over it, then turning eastward along a rocky valley
• 1:52:34
  Speaker 1: fringed on either side with jungle, I ran for perhaps
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 1: a mile altogether, my chest straining, my heart beating in
• 1:52:44
  Speaker 1: my ears, and then hearing nothing of Montgomery or his man,
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 1: and feeling upon the verge of exhaustion, I doubled sharply
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 1: back towards the beach as I judged, and lay down
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 1: in the shelter of a cane brake. There I remained
• 1:53:02
  Speaker 1: for a long time, too fearful to move, and indeed
• 1:53:06
  Speaker 1: too fearful even to plan a course of action. The
• 1:53:11
  Speaker 1: wild scene about me lay sleeping silently under the sun,
• 1:53:15
  Speaker 1: and the only sound near me was the thin hum
• 1:53:18
  Speaker 1: of some small gnats that had discovered me. Presently, I
• 1:53:23
  Speaker 1: became aware of a drowsy breathing sound, the sowing of
• 1:53:28
  Speaker 1: the sea upon the beach. After about an hour I
• 1:53:33
  Speaker 1: heard Montgomery shouting my name far away to the north.
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 1: That set me thinking of my plan of action as
• 1:53:43
  Speaker 1: I interpreted it. Then, this island was inhabited only by
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 1: these two vivisectors and their animalized victims. Some of these,
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 1: no doubt they could press into their service against me
• 1:53:55
  Speaker 1: if need arose. I knew both Moreau and Montgomery carried revolvers, and,
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: save for a feeble bar of deal spiked with a
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 1: small nail, the merest mockery of a mace, I was unarmed.
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 1: So I lay still there until I began to think
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 1: of food and drink. And at that thought the real
• 1:54:20
  Speaker 1: hopelessness of my situation came home to me. I knew
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 1: no way of getting anything to eat. I was too
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 1: ignorant of botany to discover any resort of root or
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 1: fruit that might lie about me. I had no means
• 1:54:35
  Speaker 1: of trapping the few rabbits upon the island. It grew
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 1: blanker the more I turned the prospect over. At last,
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 1: in the desperation of my position, my mind turned to
• 1:54:46
  Speaker 1: the animal men I had encountered. I tried to find
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 1: some hope in what I remembered of them. In turn,
• 1:54:55
  Speaker 1: I recalled each one I had seen, and tried to
• 1:54:59
  Speaker 1: draw some augury of assistance from my memory. Then suddenly
• 1:55:04
  Speaker 1: I heard a stag hound bay, and at that realized
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 1: a new danger. I took little time to think, or
• 1:55:13
  Speaker 1: they would have caught me then, but snatching up my
• 1:55:16
  Speaker 1: nailed stick, rushed headlong from my hiding place towards the
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: sound of the sea. I remember a growth of thorny
• 1:55:24
  Speaker 1: plants with spines that stabbed like pin knives. I emerged,
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 1: bleeding and with torm clothes, upon the lip of a
• 1:55:32
  Speaker 1: long creek opening northward. I went straight into the water
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 1: without a minute's hesitation, wading up the creek and presently
• 1:55:40
  Speaker 1: finding myself knee deep in a little stream, I scrambled
• 1:55:44
  Speaker 1: out at last on the westward bank, and with my
• 1:55:47
  Speaker 1: heart beating loudly in my ears, crept into a tangle
• 1:55:51
  Speaker 1: of ferns to await the issue. I heard the dog.
• 1:55:56
  Speaker 1: There was only one draw nearer, and yet help when
• 1:56:00
  Speaker 1: it came to the thorns. Then I heard no more,
• 1:56:04
  Speaker 1: and presently began to think I had escaped. The minutes passed,
• 1:56:11
  Speaker 1: the silence lengthened out, and at last, after an hour
• 1:56:15
  Speaker 1: of security, my courage began to return to me. By
• 1:56:20
  Speaker 1: this time I was no longer very much terrified or
• 1:56:23
  Speaker 1: very miserable. I had, as it were, past the limit
• 1:56:28
  Speaker 1: of terror and despair. I felt now that my life
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: was practically lost, and that persuasion made me capable of
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 1: daring anything. I had even a certain wish to encounter
• 1:56:40
  Speaker 1: mo Row face to face. And as I had waded
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 1: into the water, I remembered that if I were too
• 1:56:47
  Speaker 1: hard pressed, at least one path of escape from torment
• 1:56:51
  Speaker 1: still lay open to me. They could not very well
• 1:56:55
  Speaker 1: prevent my drowning myself. I had had for mine to
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 1: drown myself then, but not wished to see the whole
• 1:57:04
  Speaker 1: adventure out. A queer impersonal spectacular interest in myself restrained me.
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 1: I stretched my limbs, sore and painful from the pricks
• 1:57:17
  Speaker 1: of the spiny plants, and stared around me at the trees,
• 1:57:22
  Speaker 1: and so suddenly that it seemed to jump out of
• 1:57:25
  Speaker 1: the green tracery about it. My eyes lit upon a
• 1:57:28
  Speaker 1: black face watching me. I saw that it was the
• 1:57:33
  Speaker 1: Simian creature who had met the launch upon the beach.
• 1:57:38
  Speaker 1: He was clinging to the oblique stem of a palm tree.
• 1:57:43
  Speaker 1: I gripped my stick and stood up facing him. He
• 1:57:46
  Speaker 1: began chattering, you, you, You was all I could distinguish
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 1: at first. Suddenly he dropped from the tree, and in
• 1:57:56
  Speaker 1: another moment was holding the fronds apart and staring and
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: curiously at me. I did not feel the same repugnance
• 1:58:05
  Speaker 1: towards this creature which I had experienced in my encounters
• 1:58:09
  Speaker 1: with the other beast men. You, he said in the bolt.
• 1:58:16
  Speaker 1: He was a man, then, at least as much of
• 1:58:19
  Speaker 1: a man as Montgomery's attendant, for he could talk. Yes,
• 1:58:24
  Speaker 1: I said, I came in the boat from the ship. Oh,
• 1:58:30
  Speaker 1: he said, And his bright, restless eyes traveled over me,
• 1:58:35
  Speaker 1: to my hands, to the stick I carried, to my feet,
• 1:58:39
  Speaker 1: to the tattered places in my coat, and the cuts
• 1:58:42
  Speaker 1: and scratches I had received from the thorns. He seemed
• 1:58:47
  Speaker 1: puzzled at something. His eyes came back to my hands.
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: He held out his own hand and counted his digits slowly, one, two, three, four, five. Ay.
• 1:59:07
  Speaker 1: I did not grasp his meaning. Then afterwards I was
• 1:59:11
  Speaker 1: to find that a great proportion of these beast men
• 1:59:14
  Speaker 1: had malformed hands, lacking sometimes even three digits. But guessing
• 1:59:21
  Speaker 1: this was in some way a greeting, I did the
• 1:59:24
  Speaker 1: same thing by way of reply. He grinned with immense satisfaction.
• 1:59:31
  Speaker 1: Then his swift, roving glance went round again. He made
• 1:59:35
  Speaker 1: a swift movement and vanished. The fern franz he had
• 1:59:39
  Speaker 1: stood between came swishing together. I pushed out of the
• 1:59:44
  Speaker 1: break after him, and was astonished to find him swinging
• 1:59:48
  Speaker 1: cheerfully by one lank arm from a rope of creepers
• 1:59:51
  Speaker 1: that looped down from the foliage overhead. His back was
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 1: to me. Hullo, said I. He came down with a
• 2:00:02
  Speaker 1: twisting jump and stood facing me. I say, said I,
• 2:00:08
  Speaker 1: where can I get something to eat? Eat? He said,
• 2:00:13
  Speaker 1: eat man's food now, and his eye went back to
• 2:00:18
  Speaker 1: the swing of ropes at the huts. But where are
• 2:00:23
  Speaker 1: the huts? Oh, I'm new, you know? At that? He
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 1: swung round and set off at a quick walk. All
• 2:00:36
  Speaker 1: his motions were curiously rapid. Come along, said he. I
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 1: went with him to see the adventure out. I guessed
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 1: the huts were some rough shelter where he and some
• 2:00:50
  Speaker 1: more of these beast people lived. I might perhaps find
• 2:00:55
  Speaker 1: them friendly, find some handle in their minds to take
• 2:00:59
  Speaker 1: hold of. I did not know how far they had
• 2:01:03
  Speaker 1: forgotten their human heritage. My ape like companion trotted along
• 2:01:09
  Speaker 1: by my side, with his hands hanging down and his
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 1: jaw thrust forward. I wondered what memory he might have
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 1: in him. How long have you been on this island?
• 2:01:22
  Speaker 1: Said I? How long? He asked, And after having the
• 2:01:28
  Speaker 1: question repeated, he held up three fingers. The creature was
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 1: little better than an idiot. I tried to make out
• 2:01:38
  Speaker 1: what he meant by that, and it seems I bored him.
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 1: After another question or two, he suddenly left my side
• 2:01:46
  Speaker 1: and went leaping at some fruit that hung from a tree.
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 1: He pulled down a handful of prickly husks and went
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: on eating the contents. I noted this with satisfaction, for here,
• 2:01:59
  Speaker 1: at least was a hint for feeding. I tried him
• 2:02:03
  Speaker 1: with some other questions, but his chattering prompt responses were,
• 2:02:08
  Speaker 1: as often as not, quite at cross purposes with my question.
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 1: Some few were appropriate, others quite parrot like. I was
• 2:02:18
  Speaker 1: so intent upon these peculiarities that I scarcely noticed the
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: path we followed. Presently we came to trees all charred
• 2:02:28
  Speaker 1: and brown, and so to a bare place covered with
• 2:02:32
  Speaker 1: a yellow white incrustation, across which a drifting smoke, pungent
• 2:02:37
  Speaker 1: in whiffs to nose and eyes. When drifting on our
• 2:02:42
  Speaker 1: right over a shoulder of bare rock, I saw the
• 2:02:46
  Speaker 1: level blue of the sea. The path coiled down abruptly
• 2:02:50
  Speaker 1: into a narrow ravine between two tumbled and knotty masses
• 2:02:55
  Speaker 1: of blackish scory eye. Into this we plunged. It was
• 2:03:00
  Speaker 1: extremely dark this passage. After the blinding sunlight reflected from
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 1: the sulfurous ground, its walls grew steep and approached each other.
• 2:03:13
  Speaker 1: Blotches of green and crimson drifted it across my eyes.
• 2:03:18
  Speaker 1: My conductor stopped suddenly, home, said he. And I stood
• 2:03:24
  Speaker 1: in a floor of a chasm that was at first
• 2:03:27
  Speaker 1: absolutely dark to me. I heard some strange noises and
• 2:03:32
  Speaker 1: thrust the knuckles of my left hand into my eyes.
• 2:03:36
  Speaker 1: I became aware of a disagreeable odor, like that of
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: a monkey's cage. Ill cleaned beyond the rock opened again
• 2:03:46
  Speaker 1: upon a gradual slope of sunlit greenery, and on either
• 2:03:50
  Speaker 1: hand the lights smote down through narrow ways into the
• 2:03:55
  Speaker 1: central gloom. Twelve the sail of the law. Then something
• 2:04:04
  Speaker 1: cold touched my hand. I started violently and saw close
• 2:04:08
  Speaker 1: to me a pinkish thing, looking more like a flayed
• 2:04:12
  Speaker 1: child than anything else in the world. The creature had
• 2:04:16
  Speaker 1: exactly the mild but repulsive features of a sloth, the
• 2:04:19
  Speaker 1: same low forehead and slow gestures. As the first shock
• 2:04:25
  Speaker 1: of the change of light passed, I saw about me
• 2:04:27
  Speaker 1: more distinctly. The little slothlike creature was standing and staring
• 2:04:32
  Speaker 1: at me. My conductor had vanished. The place was a
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 1: narrow passage between high walls of lava, a crack in
• 2:04:40
  Speaker 1: the knotted rock, and on either side interwoven heaps of
• 2:04:44
  Speaker 1: sea mat, palm, fans, and reeds leaning against the rock
• 2:04:48
  Speaker 1: formed rough and impenetrably dark dens. The winding way up
• 2:04:53
  Speaker 1: the ravine between these was scarcely three yards wide, and
• 2:04:56
  Speaker 1: was disfigured by lumps of decaying fruit, pulp, and other refuse,
• 2:05:01
  Speaker 1: which accounted for the disagreeable stench of the place. The
• 2:05:06
  Speaker 1: little pink sloth creature was still blinking at me when
• 2:05:09
  Speaker 1: my ape man reappeared at the aperture the nearest of
• 2:05:12
  Speaker 1: these dens, and beckoned me in. As he did so,
• 2:05:17
  Speaker 1: a slouching monster wriggled out of one of the places
• 2:05:21
  Speaker 1: further up this strange street, and stood up in featureless
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 1: silhouette against the bright green beyond, staring at me. I hesitated,
• 2:05:31
  Speaker 1: having half a mind to bolt the way I had come,
• 2:05:34
  Speaker 1: and then determined to go through with the adventure. I
• 2:05:39
  Speaker 1: gripped my nailed stick about the middle and crawled into
• 2:05:42
  Speaker 1: the little, evil smelling lean to after my conductor. It
• 2:05:46
  Speaker 1: was a semicircular space, shaped like the half of a
• 2:05:49
  Speaker 1: bee hive, and against the rocky wall that formed the
• 2:05:52
  Speaker 1: inner side of it was a pile of variegated fruits, cocoanuts,
• 2:05:56
  Speaker 1: among others. Some rough vessels of lava and woods stood
• 2:06:00
  Speaker 1: about the floor, and one on a rough stool. There
• 2:06:03
  Speaker 1: was no fire. In the darkest corner of the hut
• 2:06:06
  Speaker 1: sat a shapeless mass of darkness that grunted hey as
• 2:06:11
  Speaker 1: I came in, and my ape man stood in the
• 2:06:14
  Speaker 1: dim light of the doorway and held out a split
• 2:06:17
  Speaker 1: cocoanut to me. As I crawled into the other corner
• 2:06:20
  Speaker 1: and squatted down, I took it and began gnawing it
• 2:06:26
  Speaker 1: as serenely as possible, in spite of a certain trepidation
• 2:06:30
  Speaker 1: and the nearly intolerable closeness of the den. The little
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: pink slothed creature stood in the aperture of the hut,
• 2:06:38
  Speaker 1: and something else with a drab face and bright eyes
• 2:06:41
  Speaker 1: came staring over its shoulder. Hey came out of the
• 2:06:47
  Speaker 1: lump of mystery opposite. It is a man. It is
• 2:06:53
  Speaker 1: a man, gabbled my conductor. A man, a man, a
• 2:06:58
  Speaker 1: five man like me. Shut up, said the voice from
• 2:07:03
  Speaker 1: the dark and grunted. I gnawed my cocoanut amid an
• 2:07:07
  Speaker 1: impressive stillness. I peered hard into the blackness, but could
• 2:07:13
  Speaker 1: distinguish nothing. It is a man, the voice repeated, he
• 2:07:19
  Speaker 1: comes to live with us. It was a thick voice
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 1: with something in it, a kind of whistling overtone that
• 2:07:28
  Speaker 1: struck me as peculiar, but the English accent was strangely good.
• 2:07:34
  Speaker 1: The ape man looked at me as though he expected
• 2:07:37
  Speaker 1: something I perceived. The pause was interrogative. He comes to
• 2:07:42
  Speaker 1: live with you, I said. It is a man. He
• 2:07:47
  Speaker 1: must learn the law. I began to distinguish now a
• 2:07:52
  Speaker 1: deeper blackness in the black, a vague outline of hunched
• 2:07:56
  Speaker 1: up figure. Then I noticed the opening of the place
• 2:08:00
  Speaker 1: was darkened by two more black heads. My hand tightened
• 2:08:05
  Speaker 1: on my stick. The thing in the dark repeated, in
• 2:08:09
  Speaker 1: a louder tone, say the words I had missed its
• 2:08:14
  Speaker 1: last remark, not to go on all fours, that is
• 2:08:19
  Speaker 1: the law, it repeated, in a kind of sing song.
• 2:08:24
  Speaker 1: I was puzzled, say the words, said the ape man, repeating,
• 2:08:31
  Speaker 1: and the figures in the doorway echoed this with a
• 2:08:34
  Speaker 1: threat in the tone of their voices. I realized that
• 2:08:38
  Speaker 1: I had to repeat this idiotic formula, and then began
• 2:08:42
  Speaker 1: the insanest ceremony. The voice in the dark began intoning
• 2:08:47
  Speaker 1: a mad litany, line by line, and I in the
• 2:08:50
  Speaker 1: rest to repeat it. As they did so, they swayed
• 2:08:54
  Speaker 1: from side to side in the oddest way, and beat
• 2:08:57
  Speaker 1: their hands upon their knees, and I followed their example.
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 1: I could have imagined I was already dead, and in
• 2:09:05
  Speaker 1: another world, that dark hut. These grotesque dim figures just
• 2:09:12
  Speaker 1: flecked here and there by a glimmer of light, and
• 2:09:15
  Speaker 1: all of them swaying in unison, enchanting not to go
• 2:09:19
  Speaker 1: on all fours? That is the law. Are we not
• 2:09:22
  Speaker 1: men not to suck up drink? That is the law?
• 2:09:26
  Speaker 1: Are we not men not to eat fish or flesh?
• 2:09:30
  Speaker 1: That is the law. Are we not men not to
• 2:09:33
  Speaker 1: claw the bark of trees? That is the law? Are
• 2:09:36
  Speaker 1: we not men not to chase other men? That is
• 2:09:40
  Speaker 1: the law? Are we not men? And so from the
• 2:09:44
  Speaker 1: prohibition of these acts of folly on to the prohibition
• 2:09:47
  Speaker 1: of what I thought then were the maddest, most impossible,
• 2:09:51
  Speaker 1: and most indecent things one could well imagine, a kind
• 2:09:56
  Speaker 1: of rhythmic fervor fell on all of us. We gabbled
• 2:10:00
  Speaker 1: and swayed faster and faster, repeating this amazing law. Superficially.
• 2:10:07
  Speaker 1: The contagion of these brutes was upon me, but deep
• 2:10:10
  Speaker 1: down within me the laughter and disgust struggled together. We
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 1: ran through a long list of prohibitions, and then the
• 2:10:22
  Speaker 1: chance swung round to a new formula. His is the
• 2:10:26
  Speaker 1: house of pain. His is the hand that makes, His
• 2:10:31
  Speaker 1: is the hand that wounds, His is the hand that heals,
• 2:10:36
  Speaker 1: and so on for another long series, mostly quite incomprehensible
• 2:10:41
  Speaker 1: gibberish to me about him, whoever he might be. I
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: could have fancied it was a dream, But never before
• 2:10:50
  Speaker 1: have I heard chanting in a dream. His is the lightning,
• 2:10:55
  Speaker 1: we flash, we sang, His is the deep salt sea.
• 2:11:01
  Speaker 1: A horrible fancy came into my head. That moreau, after animalizing,
• 2:11:06
  Speaker 1: these men had infected their dwarfed brains with a kind
• 2:11:10
  Speaker 1: of deification of himself. However, I was too keenly aware
• 2:11:16
  Speaker 1: of white teeth and strong claws about me to stop
• 2:11:19
  Speaker 1: my chanting on that account. His are the stars in
• 2:11:24
  Speaker 1: the sky. At last, that song hinded. I saw the
• 2:11:30
  Speaker 1: ape man's face shining with perspiration, and my eyes, being
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 1: now accustomed to the darkness, I saw more distinctly the
• 2:11:38
  Speaker 1: figure in the corner from which the voice came. It
• 2:11:43
  Speaker 1: was the size of a man, but it seemed covered
• 2:11:45
  Speaker 1: with the dull gray hair, almost like a sky terrier.
• 2:11:50
  Speaker 1: What was it? What were they all? Imagine yourself surrounded
• 2:11:56
  Speaker 1: by all the most horrible cripples and maniacs. It is
• 2:11:58
  Speaker 1: possible to conceive, and you may understand a little of
• 2:12:02
  Speaker 1: my feelings. With these grotesque caricatures of humanity about me.
• 2:12:09
  Speaker 1: Here's a five man, a five man, a five man
• 2:12:14
  Speaker 1: like me, said the ape man. I held out my hands.
• 2:12:20
  Speaker 1: The gray creature in the corner leant forward, not two,
• 2:12:24
  Speaker 1: an on all fours. That is the law. Are we
• 2:12:28
  Speaker 1: not men? He said? He put out a strangely distorted
• 2:12:34
  Speaker 1: talon and gripped my fingers. The thing was almost like
• 2:12:38
  Speaker 1: the hoof of a deer produced into claws. I could
• 2:12:42
  Speaker 1: have yelled with surprise and pain. His face came forward
• 2:12:47
  Speaker 1: and peered at my nails, came forward into the light
• 2:12:51
  Speaker 1: of the opening of the hut, and I saw, with
• 2:12:54
  Speaker 1: a quivering disgust, that it was like the face of
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: neither man nor beast, but mere shock of gray hair,
• 2:13:02
  Speaker 1: with three shadowy over archings to mark the eyes and mouth.
• 2:13:08
  Speaker 1: He has little nails, said this grisly creature in his
• 2:13:12
  Speaker 1: hairy beard. It is well. He threw my hand down,
• 2:13:20
  Speaker 1: and instinctively I gripped my stick, heat roots and herbs.
• 2:13:26
  Speaker 1: It is his will, said the ape man. I am
• 2:13:31
  Speaker 1: the sayer of the law, said the gray figure. Here
• 2:13:35
  Speaker 1: come all that be new to learn the law. I
• 2:13:40
  Speaker 1: sit in the darkness and say the law. It is
• 2:13:46
  Speaker 1: even so, said one of the beasts in the doorway.
• 2:13:50
  Speaker 1: Evil are the punishments of those who break the law?
• 2:13:54
  Speaker 1: None escape, None escape, said the beast folk, glancing furtively
• 2:14:00
  Speaker 1: at one another. None none, said the ape man. None escape.
• 2:14:08
  Speaker 1: See I did a little thing. A wrong thing wants
• 2:14:13
  Speaker 1: a Jabbert Jabbert stop talking. None could understand. I am
• 2:14:19
  Speaker 1: burnt branded in the hand. He is great, he is good.
• 2:14:25
  Speaker 1: None escape, said the gray creature in the corner. None escape,
• 2:14:30
  Speaker 1: said the beast. People looking askance at one another. For
• 2:14:35
  Speaker 1: every one the want that is bad, said the gray
• 2:14:39
  Speaker 1: sayer of the law. What you will want, we do
• 2:14:43
  Speaker 1: not know. We shall know. Some want to follow things
• 2:14:48
  Speaker 1: that move, to watch and snink and wait and spring,
• 2:14:52
  Speaker 1: to kill and bite by deep and rich, sucking the blood.
• 2:14:57
  Speaker 1: It is bad not to chase other men. That is
• 2:15:02
  Speaker 1: the law. Are we not men? Not to eat flesh
• 2:15:06
  Speaker 1: or fish? That is the law? Are we not men?
• 2:15:11
  Speaker 1: None escape, said a dappled brute standing in the doorway.
• 2:15:17
  Speaker 1: For every one the want is bad, said the gray
• 2:15:21
  Speaker 1: Sayer of the law. Some want to go tearing with
• 2:15:25
  Speaker 1: teeth and hands into the roots of things, snuffing into
• 2:15:29
  Speaker 1: the earth. It is bad. None escape, said the men
• 2:15:35
  Speaker 1: in the door. Some go clawing trees, Some go scratching
• 2:15:41
  Speaker 1: at the graves of the dead. Some go fighting with
• 2:15:45
  Speaker 1: foreheads or feet or claws. Some bite suddenly, none giving occasion.
• 2:15:52
  Speaker 1: Some love uncleanness. None escape, said the ape man, scratching
• 2:15:59
  Speaker 1: his calf. None escape, said the little pink sloth creature.
• 2:16:05
  Speaker 1: Punishment is sharp and sure. Therefore learn the law, say
• 2:16:11
  Speaker 1: the words. And incontinently he began again the strange litany
• 2:16:16
  Speaker 1: of the law. And again I and all these creatures
• 2:16:19
  Speaker 1: began singing and swaying. My head reeled with this jabbering
• 2:16:24
  Speaker 1: in the close stench of the place, But I kept on,
• 2:16:28
  Speaker 1: trusting to find presently some chance of a new development.
• 2:16:34
  Speaker 1: Not to go on all fours, that is the law.
• 2:16:37
  Speaker 1: Are we not men? We were making such a noise
• 2:16:41
  Speaker 1: that I noticed nothing of a tumult outside, until some one,
• 2:16:45
  Speaker 1: who I think was one of the two swine men
• 2:16:48
  Speaker 1: I had seen, thrust his head over the little pink
• 2:16:51
  Speaker 1: sloth creature and shouted something excitedly, something that I did
• 2:16:56
  Speaker 1: not catch. Incontinently, those at the opening of the hut vanished.
• 2:17:01
  Speaker 1: My ape man rushed out. The thing that had sat
• 2:17:04
  Speaker 1: in the dark followed him. I only observed that it
• 2:17:07
  Speaker 1: was big and clumsy and covered with silvery hair, and
• 2:17:12
  Speaker 1: I was left alone. Then, before I reached the aperture,
• 2:17:16
  Speaker 1: I heard the yelp of a staghound. In another moment,
• 2:17:22
  Speaker 1: I was standing outside the hovel, my chair rail in
• 2:17:25
  Speaker 1: my hand, every muscle of me quivering before me were
• 2:17:30
  Speaker 1: the clumsy backs of perhaps a score of these beast
• 2:17:33
  Speaker 1: people that misshapen heads half hidden by their shoulder blades.
• 2:17:39
  Speaker 1: They were gesticulating excitedly. Other half animal faces glared interrogation
• 2:17:46
  Speaker 1: out of their hovels, looking in the direction which they faced,
• 2:17:51
  Speaker 1: I saw coming through the haze under the trees, beyond
• 2:17:54
  Speaker 1: the end of the passage of Dens, the dark figure
• 2:17:57
  Speaker 1: and awful white face of Moreau. He was holding the
• 2:18:01
  Speaker 1: leaping staghound back, and close behind him came Montgomery, revolver
• 2:18:06
  Speaker 1: in hand. For a moment, I stood horror struck. I
• 2:18:12
  Speaker 1: turned and saw the passage behind me blocked by another
• 2:18:15
  Speaker 1: heavy brute with a huge gray face and twinkling little eyes,
• 2:18:20
  Speaker 1: advancing towards me. I looked round and saw to the
• 2:18:25
  Speaker 1: right of me, and a half dozen yards in front
• 2:18:27
  Speaker 1: of me a narrow gap in the wall of rock,
• 2:18:30
  Speaker 1: through which a ray of light slanted into the shadows. Stop,
• 2:18:36
  Speaker 1: cried Moreau, as I strode towards this and then hold
• 2:18:40
  Speaker 1: him at that. First one face turned towards me, and
• 2:18:45
  Speaker 1: then others. The best your minds were happily slow. I
• 2:18:50
  Speaker 1: dashed my shoulder into a clumsy monster who was turning
• 2:18:53
  Speaker 1: to see what Moreau meant, and flung him forward into
• 2:18:56
  Speaker 1: another I felt his hands fly round, clutching at me
• 2:19:01
  Speaker 1: and missing me. The little, pink slothe creature dashed at me,
• 2:19:05
  Speaker 1: and I gashed down its ugly face with the nail
• 2:19:08
  Speaker 1: in my stick, and in another minute was scrambling up
• 2:19:11
  Speaker 1: a steep side of pathway, a kind of sloping chimney
• 2:19:16
  Speaker 1: out of the ravine. I heard howl behind me and
• 2:19:20
  Speaker 1: cries of catch him, hold him, and the gray faced
• 2:19:25
  Speaker 1: creature peered behind me and jammed his hued bulk into
• 2:19:29
  Speaker 1: the cleft. Go On, go on, they howled. I clambered
• 2:19:35
  Speaker 1: up the narrow cleft in the rock and came out
• 2:19:38
  Speaker 1: upon the sulfur on the westward side of the village
• 2:19:40
  Speaker 1: of the beast Men. That gap was altogether fortunate for me,
• 2:19:46
  Speaker 1: for the narrow chimney slanting obliquely upward must have impeded
• 2:19:51
  Speaker 1: the nearer pursuers. I ran over the white space and
• 2:19:56
  Speaker 1: down a steep slope through a scattered growth of trees,
• 2:20:00
  Speaker 1: and came to a low lying stretch of tall reeds,
• 2:20:03
  Speaker 1: through which I pushed into a dark, thick undergrowth that
• 2:20:06
  Speaker 1: was black and succulent. Under foot. As I plunged into
• 2:20:11
  Speaker 1: the reeds, my foremost pursuers emerged from the gap. I
• 2:20:16
  Speaker 1: broke my way through this undergrowth for some minutes. The
• 2:20:19
  Speaker 1: air behind me and about me was soon full of
• 2:20:22
  Speaker 1: threatening cries. I heard the tumult of my pursuers in
• 2:20:27
  Speaker 1: the gap up the slope, then the crashing of the reeds,
• 2:20:31
  Speaker 1: and every now and then the crackling crash of a branch.
• 2:20:35
  Speaker 1: Some of the creatures roared like excited beasts of prey.
• 2:20:40
  Speaker 1: The staghound yelped to the left. I heard Moreau and
• 2:20:43
  Speaker 1: Montgomery shouting in the same direction. I turned sharply to
• 2:20:47
  Speaker 1: the right. It seemed to me even then that I
• 2:20:50
  Speaker 1: heard Montgomery shouting for me to run for my life.
• 2:20:55
  Speaker 1: Presently the ground gave rich and oozy under my feet,
• 2:21:00
  Speaker 1: but I was desperate and went headlong into struggled through
• 2:21:03
  Speaker 1: knee deep, and so came to a winding path among
• 2:21:07
  Speaker 1: tall canes. The noise of my pursuers passed away to
• 2:21:11
  Speaker 1: my left. In one place, three strange pink hopping animals
• 2:21:16
  Speaker 1: about the size of cats, bolted before my footsteps. This
• 2:21:21
  Speaker 1: pathway ran up hill across another open space covered with
• 2:21:24
  Speaker 1: white incrustation and plunged into a cane brake again. Then
• 2:21:30
  Speaker 1: suddenly it turned parallel with the edge of a steep
• 2:21:32
  Speaker 1: walled gap, which came without warning like a ha ha
• 2:21:36
  Speaker 1: of an English park, turned with an unexpected abruptness. I
• 2:21:42
  Speaker 1: was still running with all my might, and I never
• 2:21:45
  Speaker 1: saw this drop until I was flying headlong through the air.
• 2:21:49
  Speaker 1: I fell on my forearms and head among thorns, and
• 2:21:54
  Speaker 1: rose with a torn ear and bleeding face. I had
• 2:21:58
  Speaker 1: fallen into a pursuit. But is ravine rocky and thorny,
• 2:22:03
  Speaker 1: full of a hazy mist, which drifted about me in wisps,
• 2:22:07
  Speaker 1: and with a narrow streamlet from which this mist came
• 2:22:10
  Speaker 1: meandering down the ciner. I was astonished at this thin
• 2:22:14
  Speaker 1: fog in the full blaze of daylight, but I had
• 2:22:18
  Speaker 1: no time to stand wandering. Then I turned to my
• 2:22:22
  Speaker 1: right down stream, hoping to come to the sea in
• 2:22:25
  Speaker 1: that direction and so have my way open to drown myself.
• 2:22:30
  Speaker 1: It was only later I found that I had dropped
• 2:22:33
  Speaker 1: my nail stick in my fall. Presently, the ravine grew
• 2:22:37
  Speaker 1: narrower for a space, and carelessly I stepped into the stream.
• 2:22:42
  Speaker 1: I jumped out again pretty quickly, for the water was
• 2:22:45
  Speaker 1: almost boiling. I noticed too there was a thin, sulfurous
• 2:22:50
  Speaker 1: scum drifting upon its coiling water. Almost immediately came a
• 2:22:56
  Speaker 1: turn in the ravine, and the indistinct blue horizon the
• 2:23:01
  Speaker 1: nearer sea was flashing the sun from a myriad facets.
• 2:23:06
  Speaker 1: I saw my death before me, but I was hot
• 2:23:10
  Speaker 1: and panting, with the warm blood oozing out on my
• 2:23:13
  Speaker 1: face and running pleasantly through my veins. I felt more
• 2:23:18
  Speaker 1: than a touch of exultation too, at having distanced my pursuers.
• 2:23:24
  Speaker 1: It was not in me then to go out and
• 2:23:25
  Speaker 1: drown myself. Yet I stared back the way I had come.
• 2:23:32
  Speaker 1: I listened, save for the hum of the gnats and
• 2:23:36
  Speaker 1: the chirp of some small insects that hopped among the thorns,
• 2:23:40
  Speaker 1: the air was absolutely still. Then came the help of
• 2:23:44
  Speaker 1: a dog, very faint, and a chattering and gibbering, the
• 2:23:48
  Speaker 1: snap of a whip, and voices. They grew louder, then
• 2:23:54
  Speaker 1: fainter again. The noise receded up the stream and faded away.
• 2:24:00
  Speaker 1: For a while. The chase was over, but I knew
• 2:24:04
  Speaker 1: now how much hope of help for me lay in
• 2:24:07
  Speaker 1: the beast people thirteen a parley. I turned again and
• 2:24:15
  Speaker 1: went on down towards the sea, I found the hot
• 2:24:18
  Speaker 1: stream broadened out to a shallow, weedy sand, in which
• 2:24:21
  Speaker 1: an abundance of crabs and long bodied, many legged creatures
• 2:24:25
  Speaker 1: started From my footfall. I walked to the very edge
• 2:24:29
  Speaker 1: of the salt water, and then I felt I was safe.
• 2:24:33
  Speaker 1: I turned and stared arms akimbo at the thick green
• 2:24:37
  Speaker 1: behind me, into which the steamy ravine cut like a
• 2:24:41
  Speaker 1: smoking gash. But as I say, I was too full
• 2:24:46
  Speaker 1: of excitement, and a true saying, though those who have
• 2:24:49
  Speaker 1: never known danger may doubt it, too desperate to die.
• 2:24:54
  Speaker 1: Then it came into my head that there was one
• 2:24:56
  Speaker 1: chance before me. Yet, while Moreau and montgomer and their
• 2:25:00
  Speaker 1: bestial rabble chased me through the island, might I not
• 2:25:04
  Speaker 1: go round the beach until I came to their enclosure,
• 2:25:07
  Speaker 1: make a flank, march upon them, in fact, and then,
• 2:25:10
  Speaker 1: with a rock lugged out of their loosely built wall,
• 2:25:13
  Speaker 1: perhaps smash it in the lock of a smaller door,
• 2:25:16
  Speaker 1: and see what I could find knife, pistol or what
• 2:25:20
  Speaker 1: not to fight them with when they returned. It was,
• 2:25:24
  Speaker 1: at any rate something to try. So I turned to
• 2:25:27
  Speaker 1: the westward and walked along by the water's edge. The
• 2:25:31
  Speaker 1: setting sun flashed his blinding heat into my eyes. The
• 2:25:35
  Speaker 1: slight pacific tide was running in with a gentle ripple. Presently,
• 2:25:40
  Speaker 1: the shore fell away southward, and the sun came round
• 2:25:43
  Speaker 1: upon my right hand. Then, suddenly, far in front of me,
• 2:25:49
  Speaker 1: I saw first one and then several figures emerging from
• 2:25:52
  Speaker 1: the bushes, Moreau with his gray staghound, then Montgomery, and
• 2:25:57
  Speaker 1: two others. At that I stopped. They saw me and
• 2:26:02
  Speaker 1: began gesticulating and advancing. I stood watching them approach. The
• 2:26:08
  Speaker 1: two beast men came running forward to cut me off
• 2:26:10
  Speaker 1: from the undergrowth inland. Montgomery came running also, but straight
• 2:26:16
  Speaker 1: towards me. Moreau followed slower with the dog. At last,
• 2:26:22
  Speaker 1: I roused myself from my inaction, and, turning seaward, walked
• 2:26:26
  Speaker 1: straight into the water. The water was very shallow at first,
• 2:26:30
  Speaker 1: I was thirty yards out before the waves reached to
• 2:26:33
  Speaker 1: my waist. Dimly, I could see the intertidal creatures darting
• 2:26:38
  Speaker 1: away from my feet. What are you doing, man, cried Montgomery.
• 2:26:46
  Speaker 1: I turned, standing waist deep, and stared at them. Montgomery
• 2:26:50
  Speaker 1: stood panting at the margin of the water. His face
• 2:26:54
  Speaker 1: was bright red with exertion, his long flaxen hair blown
• 2:26:58
  Speaker 1: about his head, and his dropping lip showed his irregular teeth.
• 2:27:03
  Speaker 1: Moreau was just coming up, his face pale and firm,
• 2:27:07
  Speaker 1: and the dog at his hand barked at me. Both
• 2:27:10
  Speaker 1: men had heavy whips. Farther up the beach, stared the
• 2:27:14
  Speaker 1: beast men. What am I doing? I'm going to drown myself,
• 2:27:20
  Speaker 1: said I. Montgomery and Moreau looked at each other. Why,
• 2:27:26
  Speaker 1: asked Moreau. Because that is better than being tortured by you.
• 2:27:31
  Speaker 1: I told you, though, said Montgomery, And Moreau said something
• 2:27:36
  Speaker 1: in a low tone. What makes you think I shall
• 2:27:39
  Speaker 1: torture you? Asked Moreau. What I saw, I said, And
• 2:27:45
  Speaker 1: those yonder hush, said Moreau, and held up his hand.
• 2:27:53
  Speaker 1: I will not, said I. They were men, What are
• 2:27:56
  Speaker 1: they now? I, at least will not be like them.
• 2:28:01
  Speaker 1: I looked past my interlocutors. Up the beach were imling
• 2:28:06
  Speaker 1: Montgomery's attendant and one of the white swathed brutes from
• 2:28:09
  Speaker 1: the boat. Farther up, in the shadow of the trees,
• 2:28:13
  Speaker 1: I saw my little ape man, and behind him some
• 2:28:16
  Speaker 1: other dim figures. Who are these creatures? Said I, pointing
• 2:28:23
  Speaker 1: to them, and raising my voice more and more that
• 2:28:26
  Speaker 1: it might reach them. They were men, men like yourselves,
• 2:28:31
  Speaker 1: whom you have infected with some best you'll taint, men
• 2:28:35
  Speaker 1: whom you have enslaved in, whom you still fear. You
• 2:28:40
  Speaker 1: who listen, I cried, pointing now to Moreau and shouting
• 2:28:44
  Speaker 1: past him to the beastmen, you who listen, Do you
• 2:28:48
  Speaker 1: not see these men still fear you go and dread
• 2:28:51
  Speaker 1: of you? Why then do you fear them? You are many?
• 2:28:55
  Speaker 1: For God's sake, cried Montgomery. Stop that prendick prindic, cried Moreau.
• 2:29:04
  Speaker 1: They both shouted together, as if to drown my voice,
• 2:29:08
  Speaker 1: and behind them lowered the staring faces of the beast men, wondering,
• 2:29:14
  Speaker 1: the deformed hands hanging down, their shoulders hunched up. They seemed,
• 2:29:19
  Speaker 1: as I fancied, to be trying to understand me, to
• 2:29:23
  Speaker 1: remember I thought something of their human past, I went
• 2:29:29
  Speaker 1: on shouting. I scarcely remember what that Moreau and Montgomery
• 2:29:33
  Speaker 1: could be killed, that they were not to be feared.
• 2:29:37
  Speaker 1: That was the burden of what I put into the
• 2:29:38
  Speaker 1: heads of the beast people. I saw the green eyed
• 2:29:42
  Speaker 1: man in the dark rags who had met me on
• 2:29:45
  Speaker 1: the evening of my arrival, come out from among the trees,
• 2:29:48
  Speaker 1: and others followed him to hear me better. At last,
• 2:29:53
  Speaker 1: for want of breath, I paused. Listen to me for
• 2:29:57
  Speaker 1: a moment, said the steady voice of Moreau. Oh, and
• 2:30:01
  Speaker 1: then say what you will, well, said I. He coughed, thought,
• 2:30:09
  Speaker 1: then shouted Latin prindic bad Latin, schoolboy Latin. But try
• 2:30:15
  Speaker 1: and understand. Hi, non sunt homonez sont anamelia quinos abimis
• 2:30:22
  Speaker 1: vivisected a humanizing process. I will explain. Come ashore, I laughed.
• 2:30:29
  Speaker 1: A pretty story, said I. They talk build houses, they
• 2:30:33
  Speaker 1: were men. It's likely I'll come ashore. The water just
• 2:30:38
  Speaker 1: beyond you where you stand is deep and full of sharks.
• 2:30:42
  Speaker 1: That's my way, said I, short and sharp. Presently, wait
• 2:30:49
  Speaker 1: a minute. He took something out of his pocket that
• 2:30:52
  Speaker 1: flashed back the sun and dropped the object at his feet.
• 2:30:57
  Speaker 1: That's a loaded revolver, said he. Montgomery here would do
• 2:31:01
  Speaker 1: the same. Now we are going up the beach. Until
• 2:31:04
  Speaker 1: you are satisfied the distance is safe, then come and
• 2:31:08
  Speaker 1: take the revolvers. Not I. You have a third one
• 2:31:12
  Speaker 1: between you. I want you to think over things, pre Dick.
• 2:31:16
  Speaker 1: In the first place, I never asked you to come
• 2:31:18
  Speaker 1: upon this island. If we vivisected men, we should import men,
• 2:31:23
  Speaker 1: not beasts. In the next, we had you drugged last night,
• 2:31:28
  Speaker 1: had we wanted to work you any mischief? And in
• 2:31:31
  Speaker 1: the next. Now your first panic is over, and you
• 2:31:34
  Speaker 1: can think a little. Is Montgomery here quite up to
• 2:31:37
  Speaker 1: the character you give him. We have chased you for
• 2:31:40
  Speaker 1: your good because this island is full of inimical phenomena. Besides,
• 2:31:46
  Speaker 1: why should we want to shoot you when you have
• 2:31:48
  Speaker 1: just offered to drown yourself? Why did you set your
• 2:31:53
  Speaker 1: people areunto me? When I was in the hut, we
• 2:31:57
  Speaker 1: felt sure of catching you and bringing you out out
• 2:32:00
  Speaker 1: of danger. Afterwards, we drew away from the sint for
• 2:32:03
  Speaker 1: your own good. I m mused, it seemed possible. Then
• 2:32:09
  Speaker 1: I remembered something again. But I saw, said I in
• 2:32:14
  Speaker 1: the enclosure that was the puma. Look here, Prindick, said Montgomery,
• 2:32:21
  Speaker 1: your thilly ath come out of the water and take
• 2:32:24
  Speaker 1: thee through volverth and talk. We can't do anything more
• 2:32:28
  Speaker 1: than we could do now. I will confess that then
• 2:32:33
  Speaker 1: and indeed, always a distrusted and dreaded Moreau. But Montgomery
• 2:32:38
  Speaker 1: was a man I felt I understood. Go up the
• 2:32:42
  Speaker 1: beach said I, after thinking, and added holding up your hands.
• 2:32:49
  Speaker 1: Can't do that, said Montgomery, with an explanatory nod over
• 2:32:53
  Speaker 1: his shoulder, undignified. Go up the trees, then said I,
• 2:32:59
  Speaker 1: as you please. It's a damn thilly ceremony, said Montgomery.
• 2:33:06
  Speaker 1: Both turned and faced the six or seven grotesque creatures
• 2:33:10
  Speaker 1: who stood there in the sunlight, solid casting shadows, moving
• 2:33:15
  Speaker 1: and yet so incredibly unreal. Montgomery cracked his whip at
• 2:33:20
  Speaker 1: them and forthwith. They all turned and fled helter skelter
• 2:33:23
  Speaker 1: into the trees. And when Montgomery and Moreau were at
• 2:33:27
  Speaker 1: a distance, I judged sufficient. I waded ashore and picked
• 2:33:31
  Speaker 1: up and examined the revolvers. To satisfy myself against the
• 2:33:37
  Speaker 1: subtlest trickery, I discharged one at a round lump of
• 2:33:40
  Speaker 1: lava and had the satisfaction of seeing the stone pulverized
• 2:33:45
  Speaker 1: and the beach splashed with lead. Still I hesitated for
• 2:33:50
  Speaker 1: a moment. I'll take the risk, said I at last,
• 2:33:55
  Speaker 1: and with a revolver in each hand, I walked up
• 2:33:57
  Speaker 1: the beach towards them. That's better, said Moreau, without affection.
• 2:34:04
  Speaker 1: As it is, you have wasted the better part of
• 2:34:06
  Speaker 1: my day with your confounded imagination, and with a touch
• 2:34:09
  Speaker 1: of contempt which humiliated me. He and Montgomery turned and
• 2:34:13
  Speaker 1: went on in silence. Before me the knot of the beast. Men,
• 2:34:18
  Speaker 1: still wandering, stood back among the trees. I passed them
• 2:34:23
  Speaker 1: as serenely as possible. One started to follow me, but
• 2:34:27
  Speaker 1: retreated again when Montgomery cracked his whip. The rest stood silent, watching.
• 2:34:34
  Speaker 1: They may once have been animals, but I never before
• 2:34:38
  Speaker 1: saw an animal trying to think. Fourteen, Doctor Moreau explains,
• 2:34:47
  Speaker 1: And now, Prindick, I will explain, said doctor Moreau. As
• 2:34:52
  Speaker 1: soon as we had eaten and drunk, I must confess
• 2:34:55
  Speaker 1: that you are the most dictatorial guest I ever entertained.
• 2:35:00
  Speaker 1: I warn you that this is the last I shall
• 2:35:02
  Speaker 1: do to oblige you. The next thing you threaten to
• 2:35:04
  Speaker 1: commit suicide about I shan't do, even at some personal inconvenience.
• 2:35:11
  Speaker 1: He sat in my deck chair, a cigar, half consumed
• 2:35:15
  Speaker 1: in his white dexterous looking fingers. The light of the
• 2:35:19
  Speaker 1: swinging lamp fell on his white hair. He stared through
• 2:35:22
  Speaker 1: the little window out at the starlight. I sat as
• 2:35:26
  Speaker 1: far away from him as possible, The table between us
• 2:35:29
  Speaker 1: and the revolvers to hand Montgomery was not present. I
• 2:35:34
  Speaker 1: did not care to be with the two of them
• 2:35:35
  Speaker 1: in such a little room. You admit that the vivisected
• 2:35:40
  Speaker 1: human being, as you called it, is, after all, only
• 2:35:44
  Speaker 1: the puma, said Moreau. He made me visit that horror
• 2:35:49
  Speaker 1: in the inner room to assure myself of its inhumanity.
• 2:35:55
  Speaker 1: It is the puma, I said, still alive, but so
• 2:35:58
  Speaker 1: cut and mutilated as I pray, I may never see
• 2:36:01
  Speaker 1: living flesh again. Of all vile, Never mind that, said Moreau.
• 2:36:07
  Speaker 1: At least spare me your youthful horrors. Montgomery used to
• 2:36:11
  Speaker 1: be just the same. You admit that it is the puma.
• 2:36:16
  Speaker 1: Now be quiet while I reel off my physiological lecture
• 2:36:19
  Speaker 1: to you, and forthwith, beginning in the tone of a
• 2:36:23
  Speaker 1: man supremely bored, but presently warming a little, he explained
• 2:36:28
  Speaker 1: his work to me. He was very simple and convincing.
• 2:36:33
  Speaker 1: Now and then there was a touch of sarcasm in
• 2:36:35
  Speaker 1: his voice. Presently I found myself hot with shame at
• 2:36:39
  Speaker 1: our mutual positions. The creatures I had seen were not men,
• 2:36:44
  Speaker 1: had never been men. They were animals, humanized animals, triumphs
• 2:36:50
  Speaker 1: of vivisection. You forget all that a skilled vivisector can
• 2:36:55
  Speaker 1: do with living things, said Moreau. For my own part,
• 2:37:00
  Speaker 1: I am puzzled why the things I have done here
• 2:37:02
  Speaker 1: have not been done before. Small efforts, of course, have
• 2:37:06
  Speaker 1: been made amputation, tongue cutting, excisions. Of course, you know
• 2:37:11
  Speaker 1: a squint may be induced or cured by surgery. Then
• 2:37:16
  Speaker 1: in the case of excisions you have all kinds of
• 2:37:18
  Speaker 1: secondary changes, pigmentary disturbances, modifications of the passions, alterations in
• 2:37:24
  Speaker 1: the secretion of fatty tissue. I have no doubt you
• 2:37:27
  Speaker 1: have heard of these things, of course, said I. But
• 2:37:32
  Speaker 1: these foul creatures of yours, all in good time, said he,
• 2:37:36
  Speaker 1: waving his hand at me. I am only the beginning.
• 2:37:41
  Speaker 1: Those are trivial cases of alteration. Surgery can do better
• 2:37:45
  Speaker 1: things than that. There is building up as well as
• 2:37:49
  Speaker 1: breaking down and changing. You have heard, perhaps of a
• 2:37:53
  Speaker 1: common surgical operation resorted to in cases where the nose
• 2:37:57
  Speaker 1: has been destroyed. A flap of skin is cut from
• 2:38:01
  Speaker 1: the forehead, turned down on the nose, and heels in
• 2:38:04
  Speaker 1: the new position. This is a kind of grafting, and
• 2:38:08
  Speaker 1: a new position of part of an animal upon itself.
• 2:38:12
  Speaker 1: Grafting of freshly obtained material from another animal is also
• 2:38:16
  Speaker 1: possible the case of teeth. For example, the grafting of
• 2:38:20
  Speaker 1: skin and bone is done to facilitate healing. The surgeon
• 2:38:23
  Speaker 1: places in the middle of the wound pieces of skin
• 2:38:26
  Speaker 1: snipped from another animal, or fragments of bone from a
• 2:38:30
  Speaker 1: victim freshly killed hunter's cock spur, possibly you have heard
• 2:38:34
  Speaker 1: of that flourished on the bull's neck. And the rhinoceros
• 2:38:38
  Speaker 1: rats of the Algerian zouaves are also to be thought of.
• 2:38:43
  Speaker 1: Monsters manufactured by transferring a slip from the tail of
• 2:38:46
  Speaker 1: an ordinary rat to its snout and allowing it to
• 2:38:49
  Speaker 1: heal in that position. Monsters manufactured, said I, then you
• 2:38:56
  Speaker 1: mean to tell me, yes, these creatures you have seen
• 2:39:01
  Speaker 1: are animals carving and rot into new shapes. To that,
• 2:39:05
  Speaker 1: to the study of the plasticity of living forms, my
• 2:39:08
  Speaker 1: life has been devoted. I have studied for years, gaining
• 2:39:13
  Speaker 1: a knowledge as I go. I see you look horrified,
• 2:39:16
  Speaker 1: and yet I am telling you nothing new. It all
• 2:39:19
  Speaker 1: lay in the surface of practical anatomy years ago, but
• 2:39:23
  Speaker 1: no one had the temerity to touch it. It is
• 2:39:26
  Speaker 1: not simply the outward form of an animal which I
• 2:39:29
  Speaker 1: can change. The physiology, the chemical rhythm of the creature
• 2:39:33
  Speaker 1: may also be made to undergo an enduring modification, of
• 2:39:37
  Speaker 1: which vaccination and other methods of inoculation with living or
• 2:39:40
  Speaker 1: dead matter are examples that will no doubt be familiar
• 2:39:44
  Speaker 1: to you. A similar operation is the transfusion of blood,
• 2:39:49
  Speaker 1: with which subject, indeed, I began. These are all familiar cases.
• 2:39:56
  Speaker 1: Less so, and probably far more extensive, were the operationtions
• 2:40:00
  Speaker 1: of those medieval practitioners who made dwarfs and beggar cripples
• 2:40:04
  Speaker 1: show monsters, some vestiges of whose art still remains in
• 2:40:08
  Speaker 1: the preliminary manipulation of the young montebank or contortionist. Victor
• 2:40:14
  Speaker 1: Hugo gives an account of them in lum Quirie. But
• 2:40:18
  Speaker 1: perhaps my meaning grows plain now you begin to see
• 2:40:22
  Speaker 1: that it is a possible thing to transplant tissue from
• 2:40:26
  Speaker 1: one part of an animal to another, or from one
• 2:40:29
  Speaker 1: animal to another, to alter its chemical reactions and methods
• 2:40:33
  Speaker 1: of growth, to modify the articulations of its limbs, and
• 2:40:38
  Speaker 1: indeed to change it in its most intimate structure. And
• 2:40:44
  Speaker 1: yet this extraordinary branch of knowledge has never been sought
• 2:40:47
  Speaker 1: as an end and systematically my modern investigators, until I
• 2:40:52
  Speaker 1: took it up, some such things have been hit upon
• 2:40:55
  Speaker 1: in the last resort of surgery. Most of the kindred
• 2:40:58
  Speaker 1: evidence that will recur to your mind has been demonstrated,
• 2:41:02
  Speaker 1: as it were, by accident, by tyrants, by criminals, by
• 2:41:06
  Speaker 1: the breeders of horses and dogs, by all kinds of untrained,
• 2:41:10
  Speaker 1: clumsy handed men working for their own immediate ends. I
• 2:41:16
  Speaker 1: was the first man to take up this question, armed
• 2:41:18
  Speaker 1: with antiseptic surgery and with a really scientific knowledge of
• 2:41:22
  Speaker 1: the laws of growth. Yet one would imagine it must
• 2:41:26
  Speaker 1: have been practiced in secret before such creatures as the
• 2:41:31
  Speaker 1: Siamese twins, and in the vaults of the Inquisition. No
• 2:41:35
  Speaker 1: doubt their chief aim was artistic torture. But some at
• 2:41:39
  Speaker 1: least of the inquisitors must have had a touch of
• 2:41:41
  Speaker 1: scientific curiosity. But said I, these things, these animals talk.
• 2:41:51
  Speaker 1: He said that was so, and proceeded to point out
• 2:41:54
  Speaker 1: that the possibility of vivisection does not stop at a
• 2:41:57
  Speaker 1: mere physical metamorphosis. A pig may be educated. The mental
• 2:42:03
  Speaker 1: structure is even less determinate than the bodily. In our
• 2:42:07
  Speaker 1: growing science of hypnotism, we find the promise of a
• 2:42:10
  Speaker 1: possibility of superseding old inherent instincts by new suggestions grafting
• 2:42:16
  Speaker 1: upon or replacing the inherited fixed ideas. Very much indeed,
• 2:42:21
  Speaker 1: of what we call moral education, he said, is such
• 2:42:24
  Speaker 1: an artificial modification and perversion of instinct. Pugnacity is trained
• 2:42:30
  Speaker 1: into courageous self sacrifice, and suppressed sexuality into religious emotion.
• 2:42:36
  Speaker 1: And the great difference between man and monkey is in
• 2:42:39
  Speaker 1: the larynx, he continued, in the capacity to frame delicately
• 2:42:43
  Speaker 1: different sound symbols by which thought could be sustained. In
• 2:42:48
  Speaker 1: this I failed to agree with him, but with a
• 2:42:51
  Speaker 1: certain incivility, he declined to notice my objection. He repeated
• 2:42:56
  Speaker 1: that the thing was so, and continued his account of
• 2:42:58
  Speaker 1: his work. I asked him why he had taken the
• 2:43:02
  Speaker 1: human form as a model. There seemed to me then,
• 2:43:05
  Speaker 1: and there still seems to me now, a strange wickedness
• 2:43:09
  Speaker 1: for that choice. He confessed that he had chosen that
• 2:43:13
  Speaker 1: form by chance. I might as well have worked to
• 2:43:16
  Speaker 1: form sheep into lamas and llamas into sheep. I suppose
• 2:43:20
  Speaker 1: there is something in the human form that appeals to
• 2:43:23
  Speaker 1: the artistic turn of mind more powerfully than any animal
• 2:43:26
  Speaker 1: shape can, but have not confined myself to man making
• 2:43:31
  Speaker 1: once or twice he was silent for a minute. Perhaps
• 2:43:37
  Speaker 1: these years, how they have slipped by, And here I
• 2:43:41
  Speaker 1: have wasted a day saving your life, and am now
• 2:43:45
  Speaker 1: wasting an hour explaining myself. But said I, I still
• 2:43:51
  Speaker 1: do not understand. Where is your justification for inflicting all
• 2:43:56
  Speaker 1: this pain. The only thing that could excuse vivisection to
• 2:44:00
  Speaker 1: me would be some application precisely said he. But you
• 2:44:06
  Speaker 1: see I am differently constituted. We are on different platforms.
• 2:44:11
  Speaker 1: You are a materialist. I am not a materialist. I
• 2:44:17
  Speaker 1: began hotly in my view. In my view, for it
• 2:44:22
  Speaker 1: is just this question of pain that parts us. So
• 2:44:26
  Speaker 1: long as visible or audible pain turns you sick, so
• 2:44:30
  Speaker 1: long as your own pain drives you, so long as
• 2:44:33
  Speaker 1: pain underlies your propositions about sin, so long I tell
• 2:44:38
  Speaker 1: you are an animal, thinking a little less obscurely what
• 2:44:42
  Speaker 1: an animal feels this pain? I gave an impatient shrug
• 2:44:48
  Speaker 1: at such sophistry. Oh, but it is such a little thing.
• 2:44:53
  Speaker 1: A mind truly open to what science has to teach
• 2:44:56
  Speaker 1: must see that it is a little thing. It may
• 2:44:59
  Speaker 1: be save in this little planet, this speck of cosmic dust,
• 2:45:03
  Speaker 1: invisible long before the nearest star could be attained. It
• 2:45:08
  Speaker 1: may be I say that nowhere else does this thing
• 2:45:12
  Speaker 1: called pain occur, but the laws we feel our way
• 2:45:17
  Speaker 1: towards why, even on this earth, even among living things,
• 2:45:23
  Speaker 1: what pain is there? As he spoke, he drew a
• 2:45:27
  Speaker 1: little pinknife from his pocket, opened the smaller blade, and
• 2:45:31
  Speaker 1: moved his chair so that I could see his thigh. Then,
• 2:45:36
  Speaker 1: choosing the place deliberately, he drove the blade into his
• 2:45:39
  Speaker 1: leg and withdrew it. No doubt, he said, you have
• 2:45:44
  Speaker 1: seen that before. It does not hurt a pinbrick. But
• 2:45:48
  Speaker 1: what does it show? The capacity for pain is not
• 2:45:52
  Speaker 1: kneeded in the muscle, and is not placed. There is
• 2:45:56
  Speaker 1: but little kneeded in the skin, And only here and
• 2:45:59
  Speaker 1: there over the thigh is a spot capable of feeling pain.
• 2:46:03
  Speaker 1: Pain is simply our intrinsic medical adviser to warn us
• 2:46:07
  Speaker 1: and stimulate us. Not all living flesh is painful, nor
• 2:46:11
  Speaker 1: is all nerve, not even all sensory nerve. There's no
• 2:46:16
  Speaker 1: taint of pain, real pain in the sensations of the
• 2:46:19
  Speaker 1: optic nerve. If you wound the optic nerve, you merely
• 2:46:23
  Speaker 1: see flashes of light, just as disease of the auditory
• 2:46:26
  Speaker 1: nerve merely means a humming in our ears. Plants do
• 2:46:30
  Speaker 1: not feel pain, nor the lower animals. It's possible that
• 2:46:34
  Speaker 1: such animals as the starfish and crayfish do not feel
• 2:46:38
  Speaker 1: pain at all. Then with men, the more intelligent they become,
• 2:46:43
  Speaker 1: the more intelligently they will see after their own welfare,
• 2:46:47
  Speaker 1: and the less they will need to God to keep
• 2:46:49
  Speaker 1: them out of danger. I never heard of a useless
• 2:46:53
  Speaker 1: thing that was not ground out of existence by evolution.
• 2:46:56
  Speaker 1: Sooner or later did you, And pain gets needless? Then
• 2:47:04
  Speaker 1: I am a religious man, predict as every sane man
• 2:47:07
  Speaker 1: must be. It may be I fancy that I have
• 2:47:11
  Speaker 1: seen more of the ways of this world's maker than you,
• 2:47:14
  Speaker 1: for I have sought his laws in my way all
• 2:47:18
  Speaker 1: my life, while you, I understand, have been collecting butterflies.
• 2:47:24
  Speaker 1: And I tell you, pleasure and pain have nothing to
• 2:47:26
  Speaker 1: do with heaven or hell. Pleasure and pain, Bah, what
• 2:47:31
  Speaker 1: is your theologian's ecstasy but Mahomet's owerie in the dark.
• 2:47:36
  Speaker 1: This store which men and women set on pleasure and pain,
• 2:47:39
  Speaker 1: predict is the mark of the beast upon them, the
• 2:47:44
  Speaker 1: mark of the beast from which they came. Pain, pain
• 2:47:48
  Speaker 1: and pleasure they are for us only so long as
• 2:47:51
  Speaker 1: we wriggle in the dust. You see. I went on
• 2:47:56
  Speaker 1: with this research just the way it led me. That
• 2:47:59
  Speaker 1: is the only way I ever heard of true research going.
• 2:48:02
  Speaker 1: I asked a question, devised some method of obtaining an answer,
• 2:48:07
  Speaker 1: and got a fresh question. Was this possible or that possible?
• 2:48:13
  Speaker 1: You cannot imagine what this means to an investigator, what
• 2:48:16
  Speaker 1: an intellectual passion grows upon him. You cannot imagine the strange,
• 2:48:22
  Speaker 1: colorless delight of these intellectual desires. The thing before you
• 2:48:26
  Speaker 1: is no longer an animal, a fellow creature, but a
• 2:48:30
  Speaker 1: problem sympathetic pain. All I know of it I remember
• 2:48:35
  Speaker 1: as a thing I used to suffer from years ago.
• 2:48:38
  Speaker 1: I wanted it was the one thing I wanted to
• 2:48:43
  Speaker 1: find out the extreme limit of plasticity in a living shape.
• 2:48:49
  Speaker 1: But said I, the thing is in abomination. To this
• 2:48:54
  Speaker 1: day I have never troubled about the ethics of the matter,
• 2:48:56
  Speaker 1: he continued. The study of nature makes a man at
• 2:49:00
  Speaker 1: last as remorseless as nature. I have gone on, not
• 2:49:04
  Speaker 1: heeding anything but the question I was pursuing, and the
• 2:49:08
  Speaker 1: material has tripped into the huts yonder. It is nearly
• 2:49:13
  Speaker 1: eleven years since we came here. I in Montgomery and
• 2:49:16
  Speaker 1: six cannakers. I remember the green stillness of the island
• 2:49:21
  Speaker 1: and the empty ocean about us, as though it was yesterday.
• 2:49:25
  Speaker 1: The place seemed waiting for me. The stores were landed
• 2:49:29
  Speaker 1: and the house was built. The Cannarkas found some huts
• 2:49:32
  Speaker 1: near the ravine. I went to work here upon what
• 2:49:35
  Speaker 1: I had brought with me. There were some disagreeable things happened.
• 2:49:39
  Speaker 1: At first I began with the sheep and killed it
• 2:49:42
  Speaker 1: after a day and a half by a slip of
• 2:49:44
  Speaker 1: the scalpel. I took another sheep and made a thing
• 2:49:48
  Speaker 1: of pain and fear, and left it bound up to heal.
• 2:49:52
  Speaker 1: It looked quite human to me when I had finished it,
• 2:49:55
  Speaker 1: but when I went to it I was discontented with it.
• 2:50:00
  Speaker 1: It remembered me and was terrified beyond imagination, and it
• 2:50:05
  Speaker 1: had no more than the wits of a sheep. The
• 2:50:08
  Speaker 1: more I looked at it, the clumsier it seemed, until
• 2:50:11
  Speaker 1: at last I put the monster out of its misery.
• 2:50:14
  Speaker 1: These animals without courage, these fear haunted, pain driven things,
• 2:50:19
  Speaker 1: without a spark of pugnacious energy to face torment, they
• 2:50:23
  Speaker 1: are no good for man making. Then I took a
• 2:50:26
  Speaker 1: gorilla I had, and upon that, working with infinite care
• 2:50:31
  Speaker 1: and mastering difficulty after difficulty, I made my first man
• 2:50:37
  Speaker 1: all the week, night and day. I molded him with him.
• 2:50:41
  Speaker 1: It was chiefly the brain that needed molding. Much had
• 2:50:44
  Speaker 1: to be added, much changed. I thought him a fair
• 2:50:48
  Speaker 1: specimen of the negroid type when I had finished him,
• 2:50:51
  Speaker 1: and he lay bandaged, bound and motionless before me. It
• 2:50:56
  Speaker 1: was only when his life was assured that I left
• 2:50:59
  Speaker 1: him and came to his room again and found Montgomery
• 2:51:02
  Speaker 1: much as you are. He had heard some of the
• 2:51:06
  Speaker 1: cries as the thing grew, human cries like those that
• 2:51:09
  Speaker 1: disturbed you. So I didn't take him completely into my
• 2:51:14
  Speaker 1: confidence at first. And the Kannakers too had realized something
• 2:51:19
  Speaker 1: of it. They were scared out of the wits by
• 2:51:22
  Speaker 1: the sight of me. I got Montgomery over to me
• 2:51:26
  Speaker 1: in a way, but I and he had the hardest
• 2:51:29
  Speaker 1: job to prevent the Kannaker's deserting. Finally they did, and
• 2:51:33
  Speaker 1: so we lost the yacht. I spent many days educating
• 2:51:38
  Speaker 1: the brute. Altogether I had him for three or four months.
• 2:51:42
  Speaker 1: I taught him the rudiments of English, gave him ideas
• 2:51:45
  Speaker 1: of counting, even made the thing read the alphabet. But
• 2:51:49
  Speaker 1: at that He was slow, though I've met with idiots slower.
• 2:51:54
  Speaker 1: He began with a clean sheet mentally, had no memories
• 2:51:57
  Speaker 1: left in his mind of what he had been. When
• 2:52:01
  Speaker 1: his scars were quite healed, and he was no longer
• 2:52:04
  Speaker 1: anything but painful and stiff, and able to converse a little,
• 2:52:08
  Speaker 1: I took him yonder and introduced him to the cannachers
• 2:52:11
  Speaker 1: as an interesting stowaway. They were horribly afraid of him
• 2:52:16
  Speaker 1: at first, somehow, which offended me rather, for I was
• 2:52:20
  Speaker 1: conceited about him. But his ways seemed so mild, and
• 2:52:24
  Speaker 1: he was so abject, that after a time they received
• 2:52:27
  Speaker 1: him and took his education in hand. He was quick
• 2:52:31
  Speaker 1: to learn, very imitative and adaptive, and built himself a hovel,
• 2:52:35
  Speaker 1: rather better, it seemed to me, than their own shanties.
• 2:52:39
  Speaker 1: There was one among the boys, a bit of a missionary,
• 2:52:42
  Speaker 1: and he taught the thing to read, or at least
• 2:52:44
  Speaker 1: to pick out letters, and gave him some rudimentary ideas
• 2:52:48
  Speaker 1: of morality. But it seems the beast's habits were not
• 2:52:52
  Speaker 1: all that is desirable. I rested from work for some
• 2:52:57
  Speaker 1: days after this, and it was in mine to write
• 2:53:00
  Speaker 1: an account of the whole affair, to wake up English physiology.
• 2:53:06
  Speaker 1: Then I came upon the creature squatting up in a
• 2:53:08
  Speaker 1: tree and gibbering at two of the Kannakers who had
• 2:53:11
  Speaker 1: been teasing him. I threatened him, told him the inhumanity
• 2:53:16
  Speaker 1: of such a proceeding, aroused his sense of shame, and
• 2:53:19
  Speaker 1: came home, resolved to do better. Before I took my
• 2:53:22
  Speaker 1: work back to England. I have been doing better, but
• 2:53:28
  Speaker 1: somehow the things drift back again. The stubborn beast flesh
• 2:53:32
  Speaker 1: grows day by day back again. But I mean to
• 2:53:37
  Speaker 1: do better things still. I mean to conquer that, this puma.
• 2:53:45
  Speaker 1: But that's the story. All the Kannaker boys are dead now.
• 2:53:50
  Speaker 1: One fell overboard of the launch, and one died of
• 2:53:52
  Speaker 1: a wounded heel that he poisoned in some way with
• 2:53:55
  Speaker 1: plant juice. Three went away in the yacht, and I
• 2:53:59
  Speaker 1: suppose and Hope were drowned. The other one was killed. Well,
• 2:54:07
  Speaker 1: I have replaced them, Montgomery went on, as much as
• 2:54:11
  Speaker 1: you are disposed to do at first, And then what
• 2:54:14
  Speaker 1: became of the other one, said I sharply, the other
• 2:54:17
  Speaker 1: Kannaker who was killed. The fact is, after I had
• 2:54:23
  Speaker 1: made a number of human creatures, I made a thing.
• 2:54:28
  Speaker 1: He hesitated, Yes, said I it was killed. I don't understand,
• 2:54:36
  Speaker 1: said I do you mean to say it killed the kannaker? Yes,
• 2:54:41
  Speaker 1: it killed several other things that it caught. We chased
• 2:54:45
  Speaker 1: for a couple of days. It got loose by accident.
• 2:54:49
  Speaker 1: I never meant it to get away. It was unfinished.
• 2:54:52
  Speaker 1: It was purely an experiment. It was a limbless thing
• 2:54:56
  Speaker 1: with a horrible face that writhed along the ground in
• 2:55:00
  Speaker 1: a serpentine fashion. It was immensely strong and in infuriating pain.
• 2:55:06
  Speaker 1: It lurked in the woods for some days until we
• 2:55:09
  Speaker 1: hunted it, and then it wriggled into the northern part
• 2:55:12
  Speaker 1: of the island, and we divided the party to close
• 2:55:15
  Speaker 1: in upon it. Montgomery insisted upon coming with me. The
• 2:55:20
  Speaker 1: man had a rifle, and when his body was found,
• 2:55:23
  Speaker 1: one of the beryls was curved into the shape of
• 2:55:25
  Speaker 1: an ass and very nearly bitten through. Montgomery shot the thing.
• 2:55:32
  Speaker 1: After that, I stuck to the ideal of humanity except
• 2:55:36
  Speaker 1: for little things. He became silent. I sat in silence
• 2:55:43
  Speaker 1: watching his face. So for twenty years altogether, counting nine
• 2:55:49
  Speaker 1: years in England, I have been going on, and there
• 2:55:53
  Speaker 1: is still something in everything I do that defeats me,
• 2:55:57
  Speaker 1: makes me dissatisfied, challenge me to further effort. Sometimes I
• 2:56:03
  Speaker 1: rise above my level, sometimes I fall below it, But
• 2:56:07
  Speaker 1: always I fall short of the things I dream. The
• 2:56:11
  Speaker 1: human shape I can get now almost with ease, so
• 2:56:15
  Speaker 1: that it is lithe and graceful, or thick and strong.
• 2:56:20
  Speaker 1: But often there is trouble with the hands and the claws,
• 2:56:23
  Speaker 1: painful things that I dare not shape too freely. But
• 2:56:29
  Speaker 1: it is in the subtle grafting and reshaping one must
• 2:56:32
  Speaker 1: needs do to the brain that my trouble lies. The
• 2:56:36
  Speaker 1: intelligence is often oddly low, with unaccountable blank ends, unexpected gaps,
• 2:56:43
  Speaker 1: and least satisfactory of all is something that I cannot touch.
• 2:56:48
  Speaker 1: Somewhere I cannot determine where in the seat of the emotions, cravings, instincts,
• 2:56:57
  Speaker 1: desires that harm humanity, a strange hidden reservoir to burst
• 2:57:02
  Speaker 1: forth suddenly and inundate the whole being of the creature
• 2:57:06
  Speaker 1: with anger, hate, or fear. These creatures of mine seemed
• 2:57:12
  Speaker 1: strange and uncanny to you so soon as you began
• 2:57:15
  Speaker 1: to observe them. But to me, just after I make them,
• 2:57:21
  Speaker 1: they seemed to be indisputably human beings. It's afterwards, as
• 2:57:27
  Speaker 1: I observed them that the persuasion fades. First one animal trait,
• 2:57:32
  Speaker 1: then another creeps to the surface and stares out at me.
• 2:57:37
  Speaker 1: But I will conquer. Yet, each time I dip a
• 2:57:41
  Speaker 1: living creature into the bath of burning pain, I say,
• 2:57:45
  Speaker 1: this time I will burn out all the animal. This
• 2:57:48
  Speaker 1: time I will make a rational creature of my own.
• 2:57:53
  Speaker 1: After all, what is ten years? Men have been a
• 2:57:56
  Speaker 1: hundred thousand in the making, he thought darkly. But I'm
• 2:58:01
  Speaker 1: drawing near the fastness this puma of mine. After a silence,
• 2:58:08
  Speaker 1: and they revert. As soon as my hand is taken
• 2:58:11
  Speaker 1: from them. The beast begins to creep back, begins to
• 2:58:15
  Speaker 1: assert itself again. Another long silence. Then you take the
• 2:58:23
  Speaker 1: things you make into those dens, said I. They go.
• 2:58:28
  Speaker 1: I turn them out when I begin to feel the
• 2:58:30
  Speaker 1: beast in them, And presently they wander there. They all
• 2:58:34
  Speaker 1: dread this house and me. There's a kind of travesty
• 2:58:38
  Speaker 1: of humanity over there. Montgomery knows about it, for he
• 2:58:42
  Speaker 1: interferes in their affairs. He has trained one or two
• 2:58:47
  Speaker 1: of them to our service. He's ashamed of it, but
• 2:58:50
  Speaker 1: I believe he half likes some of those beasts. It's
• 2:58:54
  Speaker 1: his business, not mine. They only sicken me with a
• 2:58:58
  Speaker 1: sense of failure. I take no interest in them. I
• 2:59:03
  Speaker 1: fancy they follow in the lines that Cannock a missionary
• 2:59:06
  Speaker 1: marked out, and have a kind of mockery of a
• 2:59:09
  Speaker 1: rational life. Poor beasts, there's something they call the law,
• 2:59:14
  Speaker 1: seeing hymns about all thine. They build themselves their dins,
• 2:59:20
  Speaker 1: gather fruit and pull herbs, marry even. But I can
• 2:59:25
  Speaker 1: see through it all, see into their very souls, and
• 2:59:29
  Speaker 1: see they are nothing but the souls of beasts, beasts
• 2:59:32
  Speaker 1: that perish, anger and the lusts to live and gratify themselves.
• 2:59:38
  Speaker 1: Yet there odd complex, like everything else alive. There is
• 2:59:44
  Speaker 1: a kind of upward striving in them, part vanity, part
• 2:59:48
  Speaker 1: waste sexual emotion, part waste curiosity. It only mocks me.
• 2:59:55
  Speaker 1: I have some hope of this puma. I have worked
• 2:59:58
  Speaker 1: hard at her head and brain. And now, said he,
• 3:00:05
  Speaker 1: standing up, after a long gap of silence, during which
• 3:00:08
  Speaker 1: we had each pursued our own thoughts. What do you think?
• 3:00:13
  Speaker 1: Are you in fear of me? Still? I looked at
• 3:00:17
  Speaker 1: him and saw but a white faced, white haired man
• 3:00:20
  Speaker 1: with calm eyes. Save for his serenity, the touch almost
• 3:00:25
  Speaker 1: of beauty that resulted from his set tranquility and his
• 3:00:29
  Speaker 1: magnificent build. He might have passed muster among a hundred
• 3:00:33
  Speaker 1: other comfortable old gentlemen. Then I shivered. By way of
• 3:00:40
  Speaker 1: answer to his second question, I handed him a revolver
• 3:00:44
  Speaker 1: with either hand. Keep them, he said, and snatched a yawn.
• 3:00:51
  Speaker 1: He stood up, stared at me for a moment, and smiled.
• 3:00:56
  Speaker 1: You have had two eventful days, said he. I should
• 3:01:00
  Speaker 1: advise some sleep. I'm glad it's all clear. Good night,
• 3:01:06
  Speaker 1: he thought me over for a moment that went out
• 3:01:09
  Speaker 1: by the inner door. I immediately turned the key in
• 3:01:14
  Speaker 1: the outer one. I sat down again, sat for a
• 3:01:18
  Speaker 1: time in a kind of stagnant mood, so weary emotionally, mentally,
• 3:01:23
  Speaker 1: and physically that I could not think beyond the point
• 3:01:26
  Speaker 1: at which he had left me. The black window stared
• 3:01:30
  Speaker 1: at me like an eye. At last, with an effort,
• 3:01:34
  Speaker 1: I put out the light and got into the hammock.
• 3:01:38
  Speaker 1: Very soon I was asleep fifteen concerning the beast folk,
• 3:01:48
  Speaker 1: I woke early. Moreau's explanation stood before my mind, clear
• 3:01:53
  Speaker 1: and definite. From the moment of my awakening. I got
• 3:01:57
  Speaker 1: out of the hammock and went to the door to
• 3:01:59
  Speaker 1: assure me myself that the key was turned. Then I
• 3:02:02
  Speaker 1: tried the window bar and found it firmly fixed. That
• 3:02:07
  Speaker 1: these manlike creatures were, in truth only bestial monsters. Mere
• 3:02:13
  Speaker 1: grotesque travesties of men filled me with a vague uncertainty
• 3:02:17
  Speaker 1: of their possibilities, which was far worse than any definite fear.
• 3:02:23
  Speaker 1: The tapping came at the door, and heard the gluttonous
• 3:02:26
  Speaker 1: accents of himling speaking. I pocketed one of the revolvers,
• 3:02:31
  Speaker 1: keeping one hand upon it, and opened to him. Good morning, sir,
• 3:02:38
  Speaker 1: he said, bringing in, in addition to the customary herb breakfast,
• 3:02:42
  Speaker 1: an ill cooked rabbit. Montgomery followed him. His roving eye
• 3:02:48
  Speaker 1: caught the position of my arm, and he smiled askew.
• 3:02:53
  Speaker 1: The puma was resting to heal that day, but Moreau,
• 3:02:57
  Speaker 1: who was singularly solitary in his habits, did not join us.
• 3:03:03
  Speaker 1: I talked with Montgomery to clear my ideas of the
• 3:03:05
  Speaker 1: way in which the beast folk lived. In particular, I
• 3:03:09
  Speaker 1: was urgent to know how these inhuman monsters were kept
• 3:03:12
  Speaker 1: from falling upon Moreau and Montgomery, and from rending one another.
• 3:03:17
  Speaker 1: He explained to me that the comparative safety of Moreau
• 3:03:20
  Speaker 1: and himself was due to the limited mental scope of
• 3:03:23
  Speaker 1: these monsters. In spite of their increased intelligence and the
• 3:03:28
  Speaker 1: tendency of their animal instincts to reawaken, they had certain
• 3:03:32
  Speaker 1: fixed ideas implanted by Moreau into their minds which absolutely
• 3:03:37
  Speaker 1: bounded their imaginations. They were really hypnotized, had been told
• 3:03:43
  Speaker 1: that certain things were possible, and that certain things were
• 3:03:46
  Speaker 1: not to be done, and these prohibitions were woven into
• 3:03:51
  Speaker 1: the texture of their minds beyond any possibility of disobedience
• 3:03:56
  Speaker 1: or dispute. Certain matters, however, in which all instinct was
• 3:04:03
  Speaker 1: at war with Moreau's convenience, were in a less stable condition.
• 3:04:08
  Speaker 1: A series of propositions called the Law I had already
• 3:04:13
  Speaker 1: heard them recited, battled in their minds with the deep seated,
• 3:04:17
  Speaker 1: ever rebellious cravings of their animal natures. This law they
• 3:04:22
  Speaker 1: were ever repeating, I found and ever breaking. Both Montgomery
• 3:04:28
  Speaker 1: and Moreau displayed particular solicitude to keep them ignorant of
• 3:04:32
  Speaker 1: the taste of blood. They feared the inevitable suggestions of
• 3:04:36
  Speaker 1: that flavor. Montgomery told me that the law, especially among
• 3:04:41
  Speaker 1: the feline beast people, became oddly weakened about nightfall. That
• 3:04:46
  Speaker 1: then the animal was at its strongest that a spirit
• 3:04:50
  Speaker 1: of adventure sprang up in them at the dusk, when
• 3:04:53
  Speaker 1: they would dare things they never seemed to dream about
• 3:04:55
  Speaker 1: by day. To that I owed my stalking by the
• 3:05:00
  Speaker 1: leopard man on the night of my arrival. But during
• 3:05:04
  Speaker 1: these earlier days of my stay they broke the law
• 3:05:07
  Speaker 1: only furtively, and after dark. In the daylight there was
• 3:05:11
  Speaker 1: a general atmosphere of respect for its multifarious prohibitions. And
• 3:05:17
  Speaker 1: here perhaps I may give a few general facts about
• 3:05:20
  Speaker 1: the island and the beast people. The island, which was
• 3:05:23
  Speaker 1: of irregular outline and lay low upon the wide sea,
• 3:05:27
  Speaker 1: had a total area, I suppose of seven or eight
• 3:05:31
  Speaker 1: square miles. It was volcanic in origin, and was now
• 3:05:36
  Speaker 1: fringed on three sides by coral reefs. Some fumaroles to
• 3:05:41
  Speaker 1: the northward, and a hot spring were the only vestiges
• 3:05:45
  Speaker 1: of the forces that had long since originated it. Now
• 3:05:49
  Speaker 1: and then a faint quiver of an earthquake would be sensible,
• 3:05:53
  Speaker 1: and sometimes the ascent of the spire of smoke would
• 3:05:56
  Speaker 1: be rendered tumultuous by gusts of steam, But that was all.
• 3:06:02
  Speaker 1: The population of the island, Montgomery informed me, now numbered
• 3:06:06
  Speaker 1: rather more than sixty of these strange creations of Moreau's art,
• 3:06:12
  Speaker 1: not counting these smaller monstrosities which lived in the undergrowth
• 3:06:16
  Speaker 1: and were without human form. Altogether he had made nearly
• 3:06:21
  Speaker 1: a hundred and twenty, but many had died, and others,
• 3:06:27
  Speaker 1: like the writhing, footless thing of which he had told me,
• 3:06:31
  Speaker 1: had come by violent ends. In answer to my question,
• 3:06:36
  Speaker 1: Montgomery said that they actually bore offspring, but that these
• 3:06:41
  Speaker 1: generally died when they lived. Moreau took them and stamped
• 3:06:46
  Speaker 1: the human form upon them. There was no evidence of
• 3:06:50
  Speaker 1: the inheritance of their acquired human characteristics. The females were
• 3:06:55
  Speaker 1: less numerous than the males, and liable to much furtive persecution.
• 3:07:00
  Speaker 1: In spite of the monogamy, the law enjoined, it would
• 3:07:05
  Speaker 1: be impossible for me to describe these beast people in detail.
• 3:07:10
  Speaker 1: My eye has had no training in details, and unhappily
• 3:07:14
  Speaker 1: I cannot sketch. Most striking, perhaps in their general appearance,
• 3:07:20
  Speaker 1: was the disproportion between the legs of these creatures and
• 3:07:23
  Speaker 1: the length of their bodies. And yet so relative is
• 3:07:28
  Speaker 1: our idea of grace. My eye became habituated to their forms,
• 3:07:34
  Speaker 1: and at last I even fell in with their persuasion
• 3:07:36
  Speaker 1: that my own long thighs were ungainly. Another point was
• 3:07:41
  Speaker 1: the forward carriage of the head and the clumsy and
• 3:07:45
  Speaker 1: inhuman curvature of the spine. Even the ape man lacked
• 3:07:50
  Speaker 1: that inward, sinuous curve of the back which makes the
• 3:07:53
  Speaker 1: human figure so graceful. Most had their shoulders hunched clumsily,
• 3:08:00
  Speaker 1: and their short forearms hung weakly at their sides. Few
• 3:08:04
  Speaker 1: of them were conspicuously hairy, at least until the end
• 3:08:07
  Speaker 1: of my time upon the island. The next most obvious
• 3:08:12
  Speaker 1: deformity was in their faces, almost all of which were
• 3:08:15
  Speaker 1: prognathus malformed about the ears, with large protiberent noses, very
• 3:08:21
  Speaker 1: furry or very bristly hair, and often strangely colored or
• 3:08:25
  Speaker 1: strangely placed eyes. None could laugh, though the ape man
• 3:08:30
  Speaker 1: had a chattering titter. Beyond these general characters, their heads
• 3:08:36
  Speaker 1: had little in common. Each preserved the quality of its
• 3:08:39
  Speaker 1: particular species. Their human mark distorted, but did not hide
• 3:08:45
  Speaker 1: the leopard, the ox, or the sow, or other animal
• 3:08:50
  Speaker 1: or animals from which the creature had been molded. The voices, too,
• 3:08:56
  Speaker 1: varied exceedingly. The hands were always malformed, and though some
• 3:09:01
  Speaker 1: surprised me by their unexpected human appearance, almost all were
• 3:09:05
  Speaker 1: deficient in the number of digits, clumsy about the finger nails,
• 3:09:09
  Speaker 1: and lacking any tactile sensibility. The two most formidable animal
• 3:09:15
  Speaker 1: men were my leopard man and a creature made of
• 3:09:18
  Speaker 1: hyena and swine. Larger than these were the three bull
• 3:09:23
  Speaker 1: creatures who pulled in the boat. Then came the silvery
• 3:09:27
  Speaker 1: hairy man, who was also the sayer of the law, imling,
• 3:09:32
  Speaker 1: and a satyaike creature of ape and goat. There were
• 3:09:36
  Speaker 1: the three swine men and a swine woman, a mere
• 3:09:40
  Speaker 1: rhinoceros creature, and several other females whose sources I did
• 3:09:44
  Speaker 1: not ascertain. There were several wolf creatures, a bare bull,
• 3:09:50
  Speaker 1: and a Saint Bernard man I have already described the
• 3:09:55
  Speaker 1: ape man. And there was a particularly hateful and evil
• 3:09:59
  Speaker 1: smelling old woman made of vixen and bear, whom I
• 3:10:03
  Speaker 1: hated from the beginning. She was said to be a
• 3:10:06
  Speaker 1: passionate votary of the law. Smaller creatures were certain dappled youths,
• 3:10:12
  Speaker 1: and my little sloth creature. But enough of this catalog.
• 3:10:19
  Speaker 1: At first I had a shivering horror of the brutes,
• 3:10:22
  Speaker 1: felt all too keenly that they were still brutes. But
• 3:10:26
  Speaker 1: Insensibly I became a little habituated to the idea of them,
• 3:10:30
  Speaker 1: and moreover I was affected by Montgomery's attitude towards them.
• 3:10:34
  Speaker 1: He had been with them so long that he had
• 3:10:36
  Speaker 1: come to regard them as almost normal human beings. His
• 3:10:41
  Speaker 1: London days seemed a glorious, impossible pass to him. Only
• 3:10:46
  Speaker 1: once in a year or so did he go to
• 3:10:48
  Speaker 1: Arica to deal with Moreau's agents, a trader in animals.
• 3:10:52
  Speaker 1: There he hardly met the finest type of mankind. In
• 3:10:56
  Speaker 1: that seafaring village of Spanish mongrels. The men aboard ship,
• 3:11:02
  Speaker 1: he told me, seemed at first just as strange to
• 3:11:04
  Speaker 1: him as the beast men seemed to me, unnaturally long
• 3:11:08
  Speaker 1: in the leg, flat in the face, prominent in the forehead, suspicious, dangerous,
• 3:11:14
  Speaker 1: and cold hearted. In fact, he did not like men.
• 3:11:19
  Speaker 1: His heart had warmed to me, he thought, because he
• 3:11:22
  Speaker 1: had saved my life. I fancied even then that he
• 3:11:26
  Speaker 1: had a sneaking kindness for some of these metamorphosed brutes,
• 3:11:30
  Speaker 1: a vicious sympathy with some of their ways, but that
• 3:11:34
  Speaker 1: he attempted to veil it from me at first, imling
• 3:11:39
  Speaker 1: the black faced man, Montgomery's attendant the first of the
• 3:11:43
  Speaker 1: beast folk I had encountered did not live with the
• 3:11:46
  Speaker 1: others across the island, but in a small kennel at
• 3:11:49
  Speaker 1: the back of the enclosure. The creature was scarcely so
• 3:11:53
  Speaker 1: intelligent as the ape man, but far more docile and
• 3:11:57
  Speaker 1: the most human looking of all the beasts folk. And
• 3:12:01
  Speaker 1: Montgomery had trained it to prepare food and indeed to
• 3:12:04
  Speaker 1: discharge all the trivial domestic offices that were required. It
• 3:12:09
  Speaker 1: was a complex trophy of Moreau's horrible skill, a bear
• 3:12:14
  Speaker 1: tainted with dog and ox, and one of the most
• 3:12:17
  Speaker 1: elaborately made of all his creatures. It treated Montgomery with
• 3:12:23
  Speaker 1: a strange tenderness and devotion. Sometimes he would notice it,
• 3:12:27
  Speaker 1: pat it, call it half mocking, half jocular names, and
• 3:12:32
  Speaker 1: so make it caper with extraordinary delight. Sometimes he would
• 3:12:36
  Speaker 1: ill treat it, especially after he had been at the whiskey,
• 3:12:40
  Speaker 1: kicking it, beating it, pelting it with stones or lighted fuses.
• 3:12:46
  Speaker 1: But whether he treated it well or ill, it loved
• 3:12:49
  Speaker 1: nothing so much as to be near him. I say,
• 3:12:54
  Speaker 1: I became habituated to the beast people, that a thousand
• 3:12:58
  Speaker 1: things which had seemed unnatural and repulsive speedily became natural
• 3:13:02
  Speaker 1: and ordinary to me. I suppose everything in existence takes
• 3:13:07
  Speaker 1: its color from the average hue of our surroundings. Montgomery
• 3:13:12
  Speaker 1: and Moreau were too peculiar and individual to keep my
• 3:13:15
  Speaker 1: general impression of humanity well defined. I would see one
• 3:13:20
  Speaker 1: of the clumsy bovine creatures who worked the launch, treading
• 3:13:24
  Speaker 1: heavily through the undergrowth, and find myself asking, trying hard
• 3:13:29
  Speaker 1: to recall how he differed from some really human yokel
• 3:13:33
  Speaker 1: trudging from his mechanical labors. Or I would meet the fox,
• 3:13:38
  Speaker 1: spare woman's vulpene, shifty face, strangely human in its speculative cunning,
• 3:13:44
  Speaker 1: and even imagine I had met it before in some
• 3:13:47
  Speaker 1: city by way. Yet every now and then the beast
• 3:13:51
  Speaker 1: would flash out upon me, beyond any doubt or denial,
• 3:13:56
  Speaker 1: an ugly looking man, a hunched back human, savage to
• 3:13:59
  Speaker 1: all appearance, squatting in the aperture of one of the
• 3:14:02
  Speaker 1: dens which stretches arms in yonn showing with startling suddenness,
• 3:14:07
  Speaker 1: scissor edged incisors and saber like canines, keen and brilliant
• 3:14:13
  Speaker 1: as knives, Or in some narrow pathway, glancing with a
• 3:14:17
  Speaker 1: transitory daring into the eyes of some lithe white swathed
• 3:14:21
  Speaker 1: female figure, I would suddenly see with a spasmodic revulsion
• 3:14:27
  Speaker 1: that she had slit like pupils, or glancing down, note
• 3:14:32
  Speaker 1: the curving nail with which she held her shapeless wrap
• 3:14:35
  Speaker 1: about her. It is a curious thing, by the bye,
• 3:14:39
  Speaker 1: for which I am quite unable to account. That these
• 3:14:42
  Speaker 1: weird creatures, the females I mean, had in the earlier
• 3:14:47
  Speaker 1: days of my stay, an instinctive sense of their own
• 3:14:50
  Speaker 1: repulsive clumsiness, and displayed in consequence a more than human
• 3:14:56
  Speaker 1: regard for the decency and decorum of extensive costs. Dom sixteen.
• 3:15:04
  Speaker 1: How the beast folk taste blood. My experience as a
• 3:15:09
  Speaker 1: writer betrays me, and I wander from the thread of
• 3:15:12
  Speaker 1: my story. After I had breakfasted with Montgomery, he took
• 3:15:18
  Speaker 1: me across the island to see the fumarole in the
• 3:15:20
  Speaker 1: source of the hot spring into whose scalding waters I
• 3:15:23
  Speaker 1: had blundered on the previous day. Both of us carried
• 3:15:27
  Speaker 1: whips in loaded revolvers. While going through a leafy jungle
• 3:15:31
  Speaker 1: on our road thither, we heard a rabbit squealing. We
• 3:15:35
  Speaker 1: stopped and listened, but we heard no more, and presently
• 3:15:41
  Speaker 1: we went on our way. And the incident dropped out
• 3:15:43
  Speaker 1: of our minds. Montgomery called my attention to certain little
• 3:15:49
  Speaker 1: pink animals with long hind legs that went leaping through
• 3:15:52
  Speaker 1: the undergrowth. He told me they were creatures made of
• 3:15:56
  Speaker 1: the offspring of the beast people that Moreau had invented.
• 3:16:01
  Speaker 1: He had fancied they might serve for meat, but a
• 3:16:05
  Speaker 1: rabbit like habit of devouring their young had defeated this intention.
• 3:16:10
  Speaker 1: I had already encountered some of these creatures, once string
• 3:16:13
  Speaker 1: my moonlight flight from the Leopard Man, and once during
• 3:16:16
  Speaker 1: my pursuit by Moreau on the previous day. By chance,
• 3:16:21
  Speaker 1: one hopping to avoid us, leapt into the hall caused
• 3:16:23
  Speaker 1: by the uprooting of a wind blown tree. Before it
• 3:16:27
  Speaker 1: could extricate itself, we managed to catch it. It spat
• 3:16:31
  Speaker 1: like a cat, scratched and kicked vigorously with its hind legs,
• 3:16:35
  Speaker 1: and made an attempt to bite, but its teeth were
• 3:16:38
  Speaker 1: too feeble to inflict more than a painless pinch. Seemed
• 3:16:42
  Speaker 1: to me rather a pretty little creature, and as Montgomery
• 3:16:46
  Speaker 1: stated that it never destroyed the turf by burrowing, and
• 3:16:49
  Speaker 1: was very cleanly in its habits, I should imagine it
• 3:16:53
  Speaker 1: might prove a convenient substitute for the common rabbit in
• 3:16:56
  Speaker 1: gentlemen's parks. We also saw on our way the trunk
• 3:17:01
  Speaker 1: of a tree barked in long strips and splintered deeply.
• 3:17:06
  Speaker 1: Montgomery called my attention to this, not to claw the
• 3:17:10
  Speaker 1: bark of truth. That is the law, he said, much
• 3:17:16
  Speaker 1: thumb of them care for it. It was after this,
• 3:17:20
  Speaker 1: I think that we met the satyr and the ape man.
• 3:17:24
  Speaker 1: The satyr was a gleam of classical memory on the
• 3:17:27
  Speaker 1: part of Moreau. His face so vine an expression like
• 3:17:31
  Speaker 1: the coarser Hebrew type, his voice a harsh bleat his
• 3:17:35
  Speaker 1: nether extremity satanic. He was gnawing the husk of a
• 3:17:40
  Speaker 1: part like fruit. As he passed us. Both of them
• 3:17:44
  Speaker 1: saluted Montgomery. Hail, said they to the other with the whip.
• 3:17:51
  Speaker 1: They're the third with a whip, Now, said Montgomery. Though
• 3:17:55
  Speaker 1: you'd better mind, would he not made? Said the ape man?
• 3:18:02
  Speaker 1: He said, he said he was made. The satire man
• 3:18:08
  Speaker 1: looked curiously at me. The third with the whip, he
• 3:18:13
  Speaker 1: that walks weeping into the sea, has a thin white face.
• 3:18:19
  Speaker 1: He hath a thin, long whip, said Montgomery. Yet did
• 3:18:24
  Speaker 1: they he bled and wept said the satier. You never
• 3:18:29
  Speaker 1: bleed nor weep. The Master does not bleed or weep.
• 3:18:34
  Speaker 1: All n darf h beggar, said Montgomery. You'll bleed and
• 3:18:40
  Speaker 1: weep if you don't look out. He has five fingers.
• 3:18:45
  Speaker 1: He is a five man, like me, said the ape man.
• 3:18:51
  Speaker 1: Come along, Prindick, said Montgomery, taking my arm, and I
• 3:18:55
  Speaker 1: went on with him. The satier and the ape man
• 3:18:59
  Speaker 1: stood watching up and making other remarks to each other.
• 3:19:03
  Speaker 1: He says nothing, said the satier. Men have voices yeth
• 3:19:11
  Speaker 1: to day. He asked me of things to eat, said
• 3:19:14
  Speaker 1: the ape man. He did not know. Then they spoke
• 3:19:21
  Speaker 1: inaudible things, and I heard the satier laughing. It was
• 3:19:27
  Speaker 1: on our way back that we came upon the dead rabbit.
• 3:19:30
  Speaker 1: The red body of the wretched little beast was rent
• 3:19:32
  Speaker 1: to pieces, many of the ribs stripped white, and the
• 3:19:36
  Speaker 1: backbone indisputably gnawed. At that, Montgomery stopped. Good God, said
• 3:19:44
  Speaker 1: he stooping down and picking up some of the crushed
• 3:19:47
  Speaker 1: vertebrae to examine them more closely. Good God, he repeated,
• 3:19:53
  Speaker 1: What can this mean? Some carnivore of yours has remembered
• 3:19:58
  Speaker 1: its old habits? I said, after a pause, this backbone
• 3:20:03
  Speaker 1: has been bitten through. He stood, staring with his face
• 3:20:08
  Speaker 1: white and his lip pulled askew. I don't like this,
• 3:20:15
  Speaker 1: he said slowly. I saw something of the same kind,
• 3:20:19
  Speaker 1: said I. The first day I came here, the devil
• 3:20:24
  Speaker 1: you did. What was it? A rabbit with its head
• 3:20:28
  Speaker 1: twisted off the day you came here, the day I
• 3:20:33
  Speaker 1: came here in the undergrowth at the back of the enclosure.
• 3:20:36
  Speaker 1: When I went out in the evening, the head was
• 3:20:39
  Speaker 1: completely wrung off. He gave a long, low whistle. And
• 3:20:46
  Speaker 1: what is more, I have an idea of which your
• 3:20:48
  Speaker 1: brutes did the thing. It's only a suspicion, you know.
• 3:20:53
  Speaker 1: Before I came on the rabbit, I saw one of
• 3:20:55
  Speaker 1: your monsters drinking in the stream, fucking his drink. Yes,
• 3:21:01
  Speaker 1: not to Thirk, you'll drink. That is the law. Much
• 3:21:04
  Speaker 1: the brutes care for the law? Eh would moreaud not
• 3:21:08
  Speaker 1: about it was the brute who chased me, of course,
• 3:21:13
  Speaker 1: said Montgomery. It's just the way with the carnivorf. After
• 3:21:18
  Speaker 1: a keel, they'd drink. It's the teeth of blood. You know.
• 3:21:23
  Speaker 1: What was the brute like? He continued, Would you know
• 3:21:27
  Speaker 1: him again? He glanced about us, standing astride over the
• 3:21:31
  Speaker 1: mass of dead rabbit, his eyes roving among the shadows
• 3:21:34
  Speaker 1: and screens of greenery, the lurking places and ambuse gards
• 3:21:38
  Speaker 1: of the forest that bounded us in the teethte of blood,
• 3:21:45
  Speaker 1: he said again. He took out his revolver, examined the
• 3:21:49
  Speaker 1: cartridges in it, and replaced it. Then he began to
• 3:21:53
  Speaker 1: pull at his dropping lip. I think I should know
• 3:21:57
  Speaker 1: the brute again, I said, I stunned him. He ought
• 3:22:02
  Speaker 1: to have a handsome bruise on the forehead of him.
• 3:22:05
  Speaker 1: But then we have to prove that he killed the rabbit,
• 3:22:08
  Speaker 1: said Montgomery. I with I'd never brought the things here.
• 3:22:13
  Speaker 1: I should have gone on, But he stayed there, thinking
• 3:22:17
  Speaker 1: over the mangled rabbit in a puzzle headed way. As
• 3:22:21
  Speaker 1: it was, I went to such a distance that the
• 3:22:23
  Speaker 1: rabbit's remains were hidden. Come on, I said. Presently he
• 3:22:29
  Speaker 1: woke and came towards me. You see, he said, almost
• 3:22:35
  Speaker 1: in a whisper. They are all for both to have
• 3:22:38
  Speaker 1: a fixed idea against eating anything that runs on land.
• 3:22:43
  Speaker 1: If thumb brute hath by any accident, taithe did blood.
• 3:22:49
  Speaker 1: We went on some way in silence. I wonder what
• 3:22:53
  Speaker 1: can have happened he said to himself. Then, after a
• 3:22:58
  Speaker 1: pause again, I did a foolish thing the other day.
• 3:23:03
  Speaker 1: The servent of mine I throwed him how to skin
• 3:23:06
  Speaker 1: and cook a rabbit. He thought I saw him licking
• 3:23:12
  Speaker 1: his hands. It never occurred to me. Then we must
• 3:23:19
  Speaker 1: put a stop to this. I must tell Moreau he
• 3:23:23
  Speaker 1: could think of nothing else on our homeward journey. Moreau
• 3:23:27
  Speaker 1: took the matter even more seriously than Montgomery. And I
• 3:23:31
  Speaker 1: need scarcely say that I was affected by the evident consternation.
• 3:23:36
  Speaker 1: We must make an example, said Moreau. I've no doubt
• 3:23:40
  Speaker 1: in my mind that the leopard man was the sinner,
• 3:23:43
  Speaker 1: But how can we prove it? I wish, Montgomery, you
• 3:23:47
  Speaker 1: had kept your taste for meat in hand and gone
• 3:23:50
  Speaker 1: without these exciting novelties. We may find ourselves in a mess.
• 3:23:55
  Speaker 1: Yet through it, I was a thiliath, said Montgomery. But
• 3:24:00
  Speaker 1: the thing's done now, and you said I might have them.
• 3:24:03
  Speaker 1: You know we must see to the thing at once,
• 3:24:06
  Speaker 1: said Morreau. I suppose if anything should turn up, Imling
• 3:24:10
  Speaker 1: can take care of himself. I'm not though suer of Imling,
• 3:24:15
  Speaker 1: said Montgomery. I think I ought to know him. In
• 3:24:20
  Speaker 1: the afternoon, Moreau, Montgomery myself and Imling went across the
• 3:24:24
  Speaker 1: island to the huts in the ravine. We three were armed.
• 3:24:29
  Speaker 1: Imling carried the little hatchet he used in chopping firewood,
• 3:24:32
  Speaker 1: and some coils of wire. Moreau had a huge coward's
• 3:24:36
  Speaker 1: horn slung over his shoulder. You will see a gathering
• 3:24:41
  Speaker 1: of the beast people, said Montgomery. It is a pretty fight.
• 3:24:49
  Speaker 1: Moreau said, not a word on the way, but the
• 3:24:51
  Speaker 1: expression of his heavy, white fringed face was grimly set.
• 3:24:58
  Speaker 1: We crossed the ravine down which smoked the stream of
• 3:25:01
  Speaker 1: hot water, and followed the winding pathway through the cane
• 3:25:05
  Speaker 1: breaks until we reached a wide area covered over with
• 3:25:08
  Speaker 1: a thick, powdery yellow substance, which I believe was sulfur.
• 3:25:14
  Speaker 1: Above the shoulder of a weedy bank, the sea glittered.
• 3:25:18
  Speaker 1: We came to a kind of shallow natural amphitheater, and
• 3:25:22
  Speaker 1: here the four of us halted. Then Moreau sounded the
• 3:25:26
  Speaker 1: horn and broke the sleeping stillness of the tropical afternoon.
• 3:25:31
  Speaker 1: He must have had strong lungs. The hooting note rose
• 3:25:35
  Speaker 1: and rose amidst its echoes to at last an ear
• 3:25:38
  Speaker 1: penetrating intensity, Ah, said Moreau, letting the curved instrument fall
• 3:25:45
  Speaker 1: to his side again. Immediately there was a crashing through
• 3:25:49
  Speaker 1: the yellow canes, and a sound of voices from the
• 3:25:52
  Speaker 1: dinse green jungle that marked the morass through which I
• 3:25:55
  Speaker 1: had run on the previous day. Then at three four
• 3:26:00
  Speaker 1: points on the edge of the sulfurous area appeared the
• 3:26:03
  Speaker 1: grotesque forms of the beast people, hurrying towards us. I
• 3:26:08
  Speaker 1: could not help a creeping horror as I perceived first
• 3:26:12
  Speaker 1: one and then another trot out from the trees or
• 3:26:15
  Speaker 1: reeds and come shambling along over the hot dust. But
• 3:26:20
  Speaker 1: Moreau and Montgomery stood calmly enough, and perforce I stuck
• 3:26:24
  Speaker 1: beside them. First to arrive was the satyr, strangely unreal
• 3:26:30
  Speaker 1: for all that he cast a shadow and tossed the
• 3:26:32
  Speaker 1: dust with his hoofs after him from the break became
• 3:26:36
  Speaker 1: a monstrous lout, a thing of horse and rhinoceros, chewing
• 3:26:41
  Speaker 1: a straw as it came. Then appeared the swine woman
• 3:26:46
  Speaker 1: and two wolf women, then the foxpare witch with her
• 3:26:50
  Speaker 1: red eyes and her peaked red face, and then others,
• 3:26:55
  Speaker 1: all hurrying eagerly. As they came forward. They began to
• 3:27:00
  Speaker 1: cringe towards Moreau and chant quite regardless of one another.
• 3:27:06
  Speaker 1: Fragments of the latter half of the litany of the law.
• 3:27:09
  Speaker 1: His is the hand that wounds, His is the hand
• 3:27:12
  Speaker 1: that heals, and so forth. As soon as they had
• 3:27:17
  Speaker 1: approached within a distance of perhaps thirty yards, they halted, and,
• 3:27:21
  Speaker 1: bowing on knees and elbows, began flinging the white dust
• 3:27:25
  Speaker 1: upon their heads. Imagine the scene, if you can. We
• 3:27:31
  Speaker 1: three blue clad men, with our misshapen, black faced attendant,
• 3:27:36
  Speaker 1: standing in a wide expanse of sunlit yellow dust, under
• 3:27:40
  Speaker 1: the blazing blue sky, and surrounded by this circle of
• 3:27:44
  Speaker 1: crouching and gesticulating monstrosities, some almost human, save in their
• 3:27:50
  Speaker 1: subtle expression and gestures, some like cripples, some so strangely
• 3:27:56
  Speaker 1: distorted as to resemble nothing but the denizens of our
• 3:28:00
  Speaker 1: wildest dreams. And beyond the ready lines of a cane
• 3:28:05
  Speaker 1: break in one direction, a dense tangle of palm trees
• 3:28:08
  Speaker 1: on the other, separating us from the ravine with the huts,
• 3:28:12
  Speaker 1: and to the north the hazy horizon of the Pacific Ocean.
• 3:28:17
  Speaker 1: Sixty two sixty three, counted Moreau. There are four more.
• 3:28:24
  Speaker 1: I do not see, the leopard man, said I. Presently.
• 3:28:29
  Speaker 1: Moreau sounded the great horn again, and at the sound
• 3:28:32
  Speaker 1: of it, all the beast people writhed and graveled in
• 3:28:35
  Speaker 1: the dust. Then, slinking out of the cane brake, stooping
• 3:28:39
  Speaker 1: near the ground and trying to join the dust throwing circle.
• 3:28:43
  Speaker 1: Behind Moreau's back, came the leopard Man. The last of
• 3:28:48
  Speaker 1: the beast people to arrive was the little ape Man.
• 3:28:52
  Speaker 1: The earlier animals, hot and weary with their groveling, shot
• 3:28:56
  Speaker 1: vicious glances at him. Cease, said Moreau in his firm,
• 3:29:02
  Speaker 1: loud voice, And the beast people sat back upon their
• 3:29:05
  Speaker 1: hands and wrested from their worshiping. Where is the sayer
• 3:29:10
  Speaker 1: of the law? Said Moreau, And the hairy gray monster
• 3:29:14
  Speaker 1: bowed his face in the dust. Say the words, said Moreau.
• 3:29:21
  Speaker 1: Forthwith all in the kneeling assembly, swaying from side to
• 3:29:25
  Speaker 1: side and dashing up the sulfur with their hands. First
• 3:29:29
  Speaker 1: the right hand and a puff of dust, and then
• 3:29:32
  Speaker 1: the left began once more to chant their strange litany.
• 3:29:37
  Speaker 1: When they reached not to eat flesh or fish, that
• 3:29:41
  Speaker 1: is the law, Moreau held up his lank white hand. Stop,
• 3:29:46
  Speaker 1: he cried, and there fell absolute silence upon them all.
• 3:29:52
  Speaker 1: I think they all knew and dreaded what was coming.
• 3:29:56
  Speaker 1: I looked round at their strange faces. When I saw
• 3:29:59
  Speaker 1: their wind attitudes and the furtive dread in their bright eyes,
• 3:30:03
  Speaker 1: I wondered that I had ever believed them to be men.
• 3:30:07
  Speaker 1: That law has been broken, said Moreau. None escape from
• 3:30:15
  Speaker 1: the faceless creature with the silvery hair. None escape, repeated
• 3:30:21
  Speaker 1: the kneeling circle of beast people. Who is he cried Moreau,
• 3:30:27
  Speaker 1: and looked round at their faces, cracking his whip. I
• 3:30:31
  Speaker 1: fancy the hyena swine looked dejected, so too did the
• 3:30:35
  Speaker 1: leopard man. Moreau stopped facing this creature, who cringed towards
• 3:30:43
  Speaker 1: him with the memory and dread of infinite torment. Who
• 3:30:48
  Speaker 1: is he? Repeated Moreau in a voice of thunder. Evil
• 3:30:54
  Speaker 1: is he who breaks the law? Chanted the sayer of
• 3:30:58
  Speaker 1: the law? Moreau looked into the eyes the leopard man
• 3:31:03
  Speaker 1: and seemed to be dragging the very soul out of
• 3:31:06
  Speaker 1: the creature. Who breaks the law? Said Moreau, taking his
• 3:31:11
  Speaker 1: eyes off his victim and turning towards us. Seemed to
• 3:31:16
  Speaker 1: me there was a touch of exultation in his voice.
• 3:31:20
  Speaker 1: Goes back to the house of pain, they all clamored.
• 3:31:24
  Speaker 1: Goes back to the house of pain ol master work
• 3:31:30
  Speaker 1: to the house of pain. Work to the house of pain,
• 3:31:35
  Speaker 1: gabbled the ape man, as though the idea was sweet
• 3:31:37
  Speaker 1: to him. Do you hear, said Moreau, turning back to
• 3:31:42
  Speaker 1: the criminal, my friend, hullo for the leopard man, released
• 3:31:49
  Speaker 1: from Moreau's eye, had risen straight from his knees, and now,
• 3:31:53
  Speaker 1: with his eyes aflame and his huge feline tusks flashing
• 3:31:56
  Speaker 1: out from under his curling lips, leaped towards his tormentor.
• 3:32:02
  Speaker 1: I am convinced that only the madness of unendurable fear
• 3:32:05
  Speaker 1: could have prompted this attack. The whole circle of three
• 3:32:10
  Speaker 1: score monsters seemed to rise about us. I drew my revolver.
• 3:32:16
  Speaker 1: The two figures collided. I saw Marile reeling back from
• 3:32:20
  Speaker 1: the leper man's blow. There was a furious yelling and
• 3:32:23
  Speaker 1: howling all about us. Every one was moving rapidly. For
• 3:32:29
  Speaker 1: a moment I thought it was a general revolt. The
• 3:32:33
  Speaker 1: furious face of the leopard man flashed by mine, with
• 3:32:36
  Speaker 1: imling close in pursuit. I saw the yellow eyes of
• 3:32:39
  Speaker 1: the hyena swine blazing with excitement his attitude, as if
• 3:32:43
  Speaker 1: he were half resolved to attack me. The sat here, too,
• 3:32:48
  Speaker 1: glared at me over the hyena swine's hunched shoulders. I
• 3:32:52
  Speaker 1: heard the crack of moreause pistol and saw the pink
• 3:32:55
  Speaker 1: flash dart across the tumult The whole crowd seemed to
• 3:32:59
  Speaker 1: swing round in the direction of the glint of fire,
• 3:33:03
  Speaker 1: and I too was swung round by the magnetism of
• 3:33:05
  Speaker 1: the movement. In another second, eye was running one of
• 3:33:11
  Speaker 1: a tumultuous, shouting crowd in pursuit of the escaping leopard man.
• 3:33:16
  Speaker 1: That is all I can tell. Definitely. I saw the
• 3:33:20
  Speaker 1: leopard man strike Moreau, and then everything spun about me
• 3:33:23
  Speaker 1: until I was running headlong. Imling was ahead, close in
• 3:33:27
  Speaker 1: pursuit of the fugitive. Behind their tongues already lolling out
• 3:33:33
  Speaker 1: ran the wolf women in great leaping strides. The swine
• 3:33:37
  Speaker 1: folk followed, squealing with excitement, and the two bull men
• 3:33:40
  Speaker 1: in their swathings of white. Then came a row and
• 3:33:44
  Speaker 1: a cluster of the beast people, his wide brimmed straw
• 3:33:47
  Speaker 1: hat blown off, his revolver in hand, and his lank
• 3:33:51
  Speaker 1: white hair streaming out. The hyena swine ran beside me,
• 3:33:56
  Speaker 1: keeping pace with me and glancing furtively at me out
• 3:33:59
  Speaker 1: of his feline eyes, and the others came pattering and
• 3:34:03
  Speaker 1: shouting behind us. The leopard man went bursting his way
• 3:34:08
  Speaker 1: through the long canes, which sprang back as he passed,
• 3:34:12
  Speaker 1: and rattled in Imling's face. We others in the rear
• 3:34:16
  Speaker 1: found a trampled path for us. When we reached the break.
• 3:34:19
  Speaker 1: The chaise lay through the break for perhaps a quarter
• 3:34:22
  Speaker 1: of a mile, and then plunged into a dense thicket,
• 3:34:25
  Speaker 1: which retarded our movements exceedingly, though we went through it
• 3:34:29
  Speaker 1: in a crowd together, franz flicking into our faces, ropey
• 3:34:33
  Speaker 1: creepers catching us under the chin or gripping our ankles,
• 3:34:38
  Speaker 1: thorny plants, hooking into and tearing cloth, and fleshed together.
• 3:34:44
  Speaker 1: He has gone on all fours through this, panted morreau,
• 3:34:47
  Speaker 1: now just ahead of me. None escape, said the wolf bear,
• 3:34:54
  Speaker 1: laughing into my face. With the exultation of hunting, we
• 3:34:58
  Speaker 1: burst out again among rocks and saw the quarri ahead,
• 3:35:02
  Speaker 1: running lightly on all fours and snarling at us over
• 3:35:06
  Speaker 1: his shoulder. At that, the wolf folk howled with delight.
• 3:35:11
  Speaker 1: The thing was still clothed, and at a distance its
• 3:35:14
  Speaker 1: face still seemed human, but the carriage of its four
• 3:35:18
  Speaker 1: limbs was feline. And the furtive droop of its shoulder
• 3:35:21
  Speaker 1: was distinctly that of a hunted animal. It leaped over
• 3:35:25
  Speaker 1: some thorny, yellow flowering bushes and was hidden imling was
• 3:35:30
  Speaker 1: half way across the space. Most of us now had
• 3:35:35
  Speaker 1: lost the first speed of the chase and had fallen
• 3:35:38
  Speaker 1: into a longer and steadier stride. I saw, as we
• 3:35:42
  Speaker 1: traversed the open that the pursuit was now spreading from
• 3:35:44
  Speaker 1: a column into a line. The hyena swine still rang
• 3:35:49
  Speaker 1: close to me, watching me as it ran every now
• 3:35:52
  Speaker 1: and then, puckering its muzzle with a snarling laugh. At
• 3:35:57
  Speaker 1: the edge of the rocks, the leopard man, realizing that
• 3:35:59
  Speaker 1: he was making for the projecting cape upon which he
• 3:36:02
  Speaker 1: had stalked me on the night of my arrival, had
• 3:36:05
  Speaker 1: doubled in the undergrowth, but Montgomery had seen the maneuver
• 3:36:10
  Speaker 1: and turned him again. So, panting, tumbling against rocks, torn
• 3:36:16
  Speaker 1: by brambles, impeded by ferns and reeds, I helped to
• 3:36:20
  Speaker 1: pursue the leopard man who had broken the law, and
• 3:36:23
  Speaker 1: the hyena swine ran, laughing savagely by my side. I
• 3:36:30
  Speaker 1: staggered on my head, reeling and my heart beating against
• 3:36:34
  Speaker 1: my ribs, tired almost to death, and yet not daring
• 3:36:38
  Speaker 1: to lose sight of the chase, lest I should be
• 3:36:40
  Speaker 1: left alone with this horrible companion. I staggered on in
• 3:36:46
  Speaker 1: spite of infinite fatigue and the dense heat of the
• 3:36:49
  Speaker 1: tropical afternoon. At last, the fury of the hunt slackened.
• 3:36:55
  Speaker 1: We had pinned the wretched brute into a corner of
• 3:36:58
  Speaker 1: the island. Moreau, whip in hand, marshaled us all into
• 3:37:03
  Speaker 1: an irregular line, and we advanced, now slowly, shouting to
• 3:37:08
  Speaker 1: one another as we advanced, and tightening the cordon about
• 3:37:11
  Speaker 1: our victim. He lurked, noiseless and invisible in the bushes
• 3:37:16
  Speaker 1: through which I had run from him during that midnight pursuit. Steady,
• 3:37:22
  Speaker 1: cried Moreau, Steady, as the ends of the line crept
• 3:37:26
  Speaker 1: round the tangle of undergrowth and hemmed the brute in
• 3:37:31
  Speaker 1: where the rush came the voice of Montgomery from beyond
• 3:37:35
  Speaker 1: the thicket. I was on the slope above the bushes.
• 3:37:39
  Speaker 1: Montgomery and Moreau beat along the beach beneath. Slowly we
• 3:37:43
  Speaker 1: pushed in among the fretted network of branches and leaves.
• 3:37:47
  Speaker 1: The quarry was silent. Back to the house of pain,
• 3:37:52
  Speaker 1: the house of pain. The house of pain, yelped the
• 3:37:56
  Speaker 1: voice of the ape man some twenty yards to the right.
• 3:38:00
  Speaker 1: When I heard that, I forgave the poor wretch all
• 3:38:04
  Speaker 1: the fear he had inspired in me. I heard the
• 3:38:08
  Speaker 1: twigs snap and the boughs swish aside before the heavy
• 3:38:11
  Speaker 1: tread of the horse Rhinoceros upon my right. Then, suddenly,
• 3:38:16
  Speaker 1: through a polygon of green in the half darkness under
• 3:38:19
  Speaker 1: the luxuriant growth, I saw the creature we were hunting.
• 3:38:24
  Speaker 1: I halted. He was crouched together into the smallest possible compass,
• 3:38:30
  Speaker 1: his luminous green eyes turned over his shoulder regarding me.
• 3:38:36
  Speaker 1: It may seem a strange contradiction in me I cannot
• 3:38:40
  Speaker 1: explain the fact. But now seeing the creature there in
• 3:38:45
  Speaker 1: a perfectly animal attitude, with the light gleaming in its eyes,
• 3:38:49
  Speaker 1: and its imperfectly human face distorted with terror, I realized
• 3:38:54
  Speaker 1: again the fact of its humanity. In another moment, other
• 3:39:00
  Speaker 1: of its pursuers would see it, and it would be
• 3:39:02
  Speaker 1: overpowered and captured to experience once more the horrible tortures
• 3:39:08
  Speaker 1: of the enclosure. Abruptly, I slipped out my revolver, aimed
• 3:39:14
  Speaker 1: between its terror struck eyes and fired. As I did so,
• 3:39:20
  Speaker 1: the hyena swine saw the thing and flung itself upon
• 3:39:24
  Speaker 1: it with an eager cry, thrusting thirsty teeth into its neck.
• 3:39:30
  Speaker 1: All about me, the green masses of the thicket were
• 3:39:32
  Speaker 1: swaying and cracking as the beast people came rushing together.
• 3:39:37
  Speaker 1: One face and then another appeared. Don't kill it, Prindic, cried, Piroux,
• 3:39:44
  Speaker 1: don't kill it, And I saw him stooping as he
• 3:39:48
  Speaker 1: pushed through under the fronds of the big ferns. In
• 3:39:53
  Speaker 1: another moment, he had beaten off the hyena swine with
• 3:39:56
  Speaker 1: the handle of his whip, and he and Montgomery were
• 3:40:00
  Speaker 1: keeping away the excited carnivorous beast people, and particularly imling
• 3:40:05
  Speaker 1: from the still quivering body. The hairy gray thing came
• 3:40:10
  Speaker 1: sniffing at the corpse under my arm. The other animals,
• 3:40:15
  Speaker 1: in their animal ardor jostled me to get a nearer view.
• 3:40:20
  Speaker 1: Confound you, Prindick, said Moreau. I wanted him. I'm sorry,
• 3:40:28
  Speaker 1: said I, though I was not. It was the impulse
• 3:40:32
  Speaker 1: of the moment. I felt sick with exertion and excitement. Turning,
• 3:40:39
  Speaker 1: I pushed my way out of the crowding beast people
• 3:40:41
  Speaker 1: and went on alone. Up the slope towards the highest
• 3:40:44
  Speaker 1: part of the headland. Under the shouted directions of Moreau,
• 3:40:49
  Speaker 1: I heard the three white swathed bull men begin dragging
• 3:40:52
  Speaker 1: the victim down towards the water. It was easy now
• 3:40:58
  Speaker 1: for me to be alone. The beast people manifested a
• 3:41:02
  Speaker 1: quite human curiosity about the dead body and followed it
• 3:41:06
  Speaker 1: in a thick knot, sniffing and growling at it as
• 3:41:10
  Speaker 1: the bull men dragged it down the beach. I went
• 3:41:13
  Speaker 1: to the headland and watched the bull men, black against
• 3:41:16
  Speaker 1: the evening sky, as they carried the weighted dead body
• 3:41:19
  Speaker 1: out to sea, And like a wave across my mind
• 3:41:24
  Speaker 1: came the realization of the unspeakable aimlessness of things upon
• 3:41:28
  Speaker 1: the island. Upon the beach, among the rocks beneath me
• 3:41:33
  Speaker 1: were the ape man, the hyena swine, and several other
• 3:41:36
  Speaker 1: of the beast people standing about Montgomery and Moreau. They
• 3:41:41
  Speaker 1: were all still intensely excited and all overflowing with noisy
• 3:41:46
  Speaker 1: expressions of their loyalty to the law. Yet I felt
• 3:41:51
  Speaker 1: an absolute assurance in my own mind that the hyaena
• 3:41:54
  Speaker 1: swine was implicated in the rabbit killing. A strange persuasion
• 3:41:59
  Speaker 1: came upon me that save for the grossness of the line,
• 3:42:03
  Speaker 1: the grotesqueness of the forms. I had here before me,
• 3:42:07
  Speaker 1: the whole balance of human life in miniature, the whole
• 3:42:11
  Speaker 1: interplay of instinct, reason and fate in its simplest form.
• 3:42:17
  Speaker 1: The leopard man had happened to go under. That was
• 3:42:20
  Speaker 1: all the difference, Poor brute, poor brutes. I began to
• 3:42:28
  Speaker 1: see the viler aspect of Moreau's cruelty. I had not
• 3:42:32
  Speaker 1: thought before of the pain and trouble that came to
• 3:42:35
  Speaker 1: these poor victims after they had passed from Moreau's hands.
• 3:42:40
  Speaker 1: I had shivered only at the days of actual torment
• 3:42:43
  Speaker 1: in the enclosure. But now that seemed to me the
• 3:42:47
  Speaker 1: lesser part. Before they had been beasts, their instincts fitly
• 3:42:52
  Speaker 1: adapted to their surroundings, and happy as living things may be.
• 3:42:57
  Speaker 1: Now they stumbled in the shackles of humanity, lived in
• 3:43:01
  Speaker 1: a fear that never died, fretted by a law they
• 3:43:04
  Speaker 1: could not understand. Their mock human existence begun in an agony,
• 3:43:10
  Speaker 1: was one long internal struggle, one long dread of Moreau.
• 3:43:15
  Speaker 1: And for what it was the wantonness of it that
• 3:43:19
  Speaker 1: stirred me. Had Moreau had any intelligible object I could
• 3:43:25
  Speaker 1: have sympathized at least a little with him. I am
• 3:43:29
  Speaker 1: not so squeamish about pain as that I could have
• 3:43:33
  Speaker 1: forgiven him a little even had his motive been only hate.
• 3:43:37
  Speaker 1: But he was so irresponsible, so utterly careless. His curiosity,
• 3:43:44
  Speaker 1: his mad, aimless investigations drove him on, and the things
• 3:43:49
  Speaker 1: were thrown out to live a year or so, to
• 3:43:52
  Speaker 1: struggle and blunder and suffer, and at last to die painfully.
• 3:43:58
  Speaker 1: They were wretched in themselves. The old animal hate moved
• 3:44:02
  Speaker 1: them to trouble one another. The law held them back
• 3:44:06
  Speaker 1: from a brief, hot struggle and a decisive end to
• 3:44:09
  Speaker 1: their natural animosities. In those days, my fear of the
• 3:44:14
  Speaker 1: beast people went the way of my personal fear of Moreau.
• 3:44:18
  Speaker 1: I fell, indeed into a morbid state, deep and enduring
• 3:44:23
  Speaker 1: and alien to fear, which has left permanent scars upon
• 3:44:27
  Speaker 1: my mind. I must confess that I lost faith in
• 3:44:32
  Speaker 1: the sanity of the world when I saw it suffering.
• 3:44:35
  Speaker 1: The painful disorder of this island, a blind fate, a vast,
• 3:44:41
  Speaker 1: pitiless mechanism seemed to cut in shape the fabric of existence,
• 3:44:46
  Speaker 1: and I Moreau, by his passion for research, Montgomery by
• 3:44:51
  Speaker 1: his passion for drink. The beast people, with their instincts
• 3:44:55
  Speaker 1: and mental restrictions, were torn and crop rushed ruthlessly, inevitably
• 3:45:03
  Speaker 1: amid the infinite complexity of its incessant wheels. But this
• 3:45:08
  Speaker 1: condition did not come all at once. I think, indeed
• 3:45:12
  Speaker 1: that I anticipate a little in speaking of it now
• 3:45:17
  Speaker 1: seventeen a catastrophe. Scarcely six weeks passed before I had
• 3:45:24
  Speaker 1: lost every feeling but dislike, in abhorrence for this infamous
• 3:45:28
  Speaker 1: experiment of morose. My one idea was to get away
• 3:45:32
  Speaker 1: from these horrible caricatures of my maker's image, back to
• 3:45:36
  Speaker 1: the sweet and wholesome intercourse of men. My fellow creatures
• 3:45:41
  Speaker 1: from whom I was thus separated, began to assume my
• 3:45:44
  Speaker 1: dilic virtue and beauty. In my memory, my first friendship
• 3:45:48
  Speaker 1: with Montgomery did not increase. His long separation from humanity,
• 3:45:53
  Speaker 1: his secret vice of drunkenness, his evident sympathy with the
• 3:45:56
  Speaker 1: beast people tainted into me. Several times I let him
• 3:46:01
  Speaker 1: go alone among them. I avoided intercourse with them in
• 3:46:04
  Speaker 1: every possible way. I spent an increasing proportion of my
• 3:46:07
  Speaker 1: time upon the beach, looking for some liberating sail that
• 3:46:12
  Speaker 1: never appeared until one day there fell upon us an
• 3:46:15
  Speaker 1: appalling disaster, which put an altogether different aspect upon my
• 3:46:20
  Speaker 1: strange surroundings. It was about seven or eight weeks after
• 3:46:25
  Speaker 1: my landing. Rather more, I think, though I had not
• 3:46:29
  Speaker 1: troubled to keep account of the time when this catastrophe occurred.
• 3:46:35
  Speaker 1: It happened in the early morning, I should think about six.
• 3:46:39
  Speaker 1: I had risen and breakfasted early, having been aroused by
• 3:46:43
  Speaker 1: the noise of three beast men carrying wood into the enclosure.
• 3:46:48
  Speaker 1: After breakfast, I went to the open gateway of the
• 3:46:50
  Speaker 1: enclosure and stood there, smoking a cigarette and enjoying the
• 3:46:54
  Speaker 1: freshness of the early morning. Moreau presently came round the
• 3:46:59
  Speaker 1: corner of the enclosure and greeted me. He passed by me,
• 3:47:03
  Speaker 1: and I heard him behind me in lock and into
• 3:47:05
  Speaker 1: his laboratory. So indurated was I at that time to
• 3:47:10
  Speaker 1: the abomination of the place that I heard, without a
• 3:47:13
  Speaker 1: touch of emotion, the puma victim begin another day of torture.
• 3:47:18
  Speaker 1: It met its persecutor with a shriek almost exactly like
• 3:47:21
  Speaker 1: that of an angry virago. Then suddenly something happened. I
• 3:47:27
  Speaker 1: do not know what to this day, I heard a short,
• 3:47:31
  Speaker 1: sharp cry behind me a fall, and turning saw an
• 3:47:35
  Speaker 1: awful face rushing upon me, not human, not animal, but
• 3:47:41
  Speaker 1: hellish brown, seamed with red branching scars, red drops starting
• 3:47:46
  Speaker 1: out upon it, and the lidless eyes ablaze. I threw
• 3:47:52
  Speaker 1: up my arm to defend myself from the blow that
• 3:47:54
  Speaker 1: flung me headlong with a broken forearm, and the great monster,
• 3:47:59
  Speaker 1: swathed lint and with red stained bandages fluttering about it,
• 3:48:03
  Speaker 1: leapt over me and passed. I rolled over and over
• 3:48:08
  Speaker 1: down the beach, tried to sit up, and collapsed upon
• 3:48:12
  Speaker 1: my broken arm. Then Moreau appeared, his massive white face,
• 3:48:18
  Speaker 1: all the more terrible for the blood that trickled from
• 3:48:21
  Speaker 1: his forehead. He carried a revolver in one hand. He
• 3:48:25
  Speaker 1: scarcely glanced at me, but rushed off at once, in
• 3:48:28
  Speaker 1: pursuit of the puma. I tried the other arm and
• 3:48:34
  Speaker 1: sat up. The muffled figure in front ran in great
• 3:48:38
  Speaker 1: striding leaps along the beach, and Moreau followed her. She
• 3:48:42
  Speaker 1: turned her head and saw him, then, doubling, abruptly made
• 3:48:46
  Speaker 1: for the bushes. She gained upon him at every stride.
• 3:48:50
  Speaker 1: I saw her plunge into them, and Moreau running slantingly
• 3:48:54
  Speaker 1: to intercept her, fired and missed as she disappeared. Then
• 3:48:59
  Speaker 1: he too vanished in the green confusion. I stared after them,
• 3:49:05
  Speaker 1: and then the pain in my arm flamed up, and
• 3:49:08
  Speaker 1: with a groan, I staggered to my feet. Montgomery appeared
• 3:49:13
  Speaker 1: in the doorway, dressed and with his revolver in his hand.
• 3:49:18
  Speaker 1: Great God, prendick, he said, not noticing that I was hurt.
• 3:49:24
  Speaker 1: That brutes louth tore the fetter out of the wall.
• 3:49:28
  Speaker 1: Have you seen them? Then? Sharply seeing, I gripped my arm.
• 3:49:34
  Speaker 1: What's the matter, I was standing in the doorway, said I.
• 3:49:41
  Speaker 1: He came forward and took my arm. Blood on the leave,
• 3:49:45
  Speaker 1: said he, and rolled back the flannel. He pocketed his weapon,
• 3:49:51
  Speaker 1: felt my arm about painfully, and led me inside. Your
• 3:49:55
  Speaker 1: arm is broken, he said, And then tell me exactly
• 3:50:00
  Speaker 1: how it happened. What happened? I told him what I
• 3:50:04
  Speaker 1: had seen, told him in broken sentences, with gasps of
• 3:50:09
  Speaker 1: pain between them, and very dexterously and swiftly he bound
• 3:50:13
  Speaker 1: my arm. Meanwhile, he slung it from my shoulder, stood
• 3:50:18
  Speaker 1: back and looked at me. You'll do, he said, And
• 3:50:23
  Speaker 1: now he thought. Then he went out and locked the
• 3:50:28
  Speaker 1: gates of the enclosure. He was absent some time. I
• 3:50:33
  Speaker 1: was chiefly concerned about my arm. The incident seen merely
• 3:50:37
  Speaker 1: one more of many horrible things. I sat down in
• 3:50:41
  Speaker 1: the deck chair, and I must admit, swore heartily at
• 3:50:45
  Speaker 1: the island. The first all feeling of injury in my
• 3:50:48
  Speaker 1: arm had already given way to a burning pain. When
• 3:50:51
  Speaker 1: Montgomery reappeared, his face was rather pale, and he showed
• 3:50:56
  Speaker 1: more of his lower gums than ever. I can neither
• 3:51:00
  Speaker 1: thigh nor hear anything of him. He said, I've been
• 3:51:05
  Speaker 1: thinking he may want my help. He stared at me
• 3:51:09
  Speaker 1: with his expressionless eyes. That was a strong brute, he said.
• 3:51:15
  Speaker 1: It simply wrenched its fetter out of the wall. He
• 3:51:19
  Speaker 1: went to the window, then to the door, and there
• 3:51:23
  Speaker 1: turned to me. I shall go after him. He said
• 3:51:27
  Speaker 1: that another revolver I can leave with you to tell
• 3:51:31
  Speaker 1: you the truth. I feel anxious somehow. He obtained the
• 3:51:37
  Speaker 1: weapon and put it ready to my hand on the table. Then,
• 3:51:40
  Speaker 1: without leaving a restless contagion in the air, I did
• 3:51:45
  Speaker 1: not sit long after he left, but took the revolver
• 3:51:48
  Speaker 1: in hand and went to the doorway. The morning was
• 3:51:52
  Speaker 1: as still as death, not a whisper of wind was stirring.
• 3:51:57
  Speaker 1: The sea was like polished glass, the sky empty, the
• 3:52:00
  Speaker 1: beach desolate. In my half excited, half feverish state, this
• 3:52:06
  Speaker 1: stillness of things oppressed me. I tried to whistle, and
• 3:52:11
  Speaker 1: the tune died away. I swore again the second time
• 3:52:16
  Speaker 1: that morning. Then I went to the corner of the
• 3:52:19
  Speaker 1: enclosure and stared inland at the green bush that had
• 3:52:22
  Speaker 1: swallowed up Moreau and Montgomery. When would they return? And howl? Then,
• 3:52:29
  Speaker 1: far away up the beach, a little gray beast man appeared,
• 3:52:33
  Speaker 1: ran down to the water's edge and began splashing about.
• 3:52:38
  Speaker 1: I strolled back to the doorway, then to the corner again,
• 3:52:42
  Speaker 1: and so began pacing to and fro, like a sentinel
• 3:52:45
  Speaker 1: upon duty. Once I was arrested by the distant voice
• 3:52:50
  Speaker 1: of Montgomery, bawling Couie Moreau. My arm became less painful,
• 3:52:58
  Speaker 1: but very hot. I got feverish and thirsty. My shadow
• 3:53:05
  Speaker 1: grew shorter. I watched the distant figure until it went
• 3:53:09
  Speaker 1: away again. Would Moreau and Montgomery never return? Three sea
• 3:53:16
  Speaker 1: birds began fighting for some stranded treasure. Then, from far
• 3:53:22
  Speaker 1: away behind the enclosure, I heard a pistol shot a
• 3:53:25
  Speaker 1: long silence, and then came another, then a yelling cry nearer,
• 3:53:31
  Speaker 1: and another dismal gap of silence. My unfortunate imagination set
• 3:53:36
  Speaker 1: to work to torment me. Then suddenly a shot close by.
• 3:53:42
  Speaker 1: I went to the corner, startled, and saw Montgomery, his
• 3:53:46
  Speaker 1: face scarlet, his hair disordered, and the knee of his
• 3:53:50
  Speaker 1: trousers torn. His face expressed profound consternation. Behind him slouched
• 3:53:58
  Speaker 1: the beast man inmling and round Nimbling's jaws were some
• 3:54:02
  Speaker 1: queer dark stains. Hath he come? Said Montgomery. Moreau said,
• 3:54:09
  Speaker 1: I no, my god. The man was panting, almost sobbing.
• 3:54:16
  Speaker 1: Go back in, he said, taking my arm. They're mad,
• 3:54:21
  Speaker 1: they're all rustling about mad. What can have happened? I
• 3:54:24
  Speaker 1: don't know. I'll tell you when my breath comes where
• 3:54:29
  Speaker 1: thum brandy? Montgomery limped before me into the room and
• 3:54:33
  Speaker 1: sat down in the deck chair emilying flung himself down
• 3:54:37
  Speaker 1: just outside the doorway and began panting like a dog.
• 3:54:41
  Speaker 1: I got Montgomery some brandy and water. He sat staring
• 3:54:45
  Speaker 1: in front of him at nothing, recovering his breath. After
• 3:54:50
  Speaker 1: some minutes he began to tell me what had happened.
• 3:54:55
  Speaker 1: He had followed their track for some way. It was
• 3:54:58
  Speaker 1: plain enough at first, on account of the crow rushed
• 3:55:00
  Speaker 1: and broken bushes, white rags torn from the puma's bandages,
• 3:55:04
  Speaker 1: and occasional smears of blood on the leaves of the
• 3:55:06
  Speaker 1: shrubs and undergrowth. He lost track, however, on the stony
• 3:55:11
  Speaker 1: ground beyond the stream where I had seen the beast
• 3:55:14
  Speaker 1: man drinking, and went wandering aimlessly westward, shouting Moreau's name.
• 3:55:20
  Speaker 1: Then Imling had come to him carrying a light hatchet.
• 3:55:24
  Speaker 1: Imling had seen nothing of the puma affair, had been
• 3:55:27
  Speaker 1: felling wood and heard him calling. They went on shouting together.
• 3:55:34
  Speaker 1: Two beast men came, crouching and peering at them through
• 3:55:36
  Speaker 1: the undergrowth, with gestures and a furtive carriage that alarmed
• 3:55:41
  Speaker 1: Montgomery by their strangeness. He hailed them, and they fled guiltily.
• 3:55:47
  Speaker 1: He stopped shouting after that, and, after wandering some time
• 3:55:51
  Speaker 1: farther in an undecided way, determined to visit the huts.
• 3:55:56
  Speaker 1: He found the ravine deserted, Growing more alarmed every minute,
• 3:56:01
  Speaker 1: he began to retrace his steps. Then it was he
• 3:56:05
  Speaker 1: encountered the two swine men I had seen dancing on
• 3:56:08
  Speaker 1: the night of my arrival, blood stained they were about
• 3:56:12
  Speaker 1: the mouth and intensely excited. They came crashing through the
• 3:56:17
  Speaker 1: ferns and stopped with fierce faces. When they saw him.
• 3:56:22
  Speaker 1: He cracked his whip in some trepidation, and forthwith they
• 3:56:26
  Speaker 1: rushed at him. Never before had a beast man dared
• 3:56:30
  Speaker 1: to do that. One he shot through the head, Imling
• 3:56:35
  Speaker 1: flung himself upon the other, and the two rolled grappling.
• 3:56:41
  Speaker 1: Imling got his brute under and with his teeth in
• 3:56:44
  Speaker 1: its throat, and Montgomery shot that too, as it struggled
• 3:56:48
  Speaker 1: in Imling's grip. He had some difficulty in inducing Imling
• 3:56:54
  Speaker 1: to come on with him. Thence they had hurried back
• 3:56:57
  Speaker 1: to me. On the way, Imling had suddenly rushed into
• 3:57:01
  Speaker 1: a thicket and driven out an undersized ocelot man, also
• 3:57:05
  Speaker 1: blood stained and lame, throw a wound in the foot.
• 3:57:09
  Speaker 1: This brute had run a little way and then turned
• 3:57:12
  Speaker 1: savagely at Bay and Montgomery, with a certain wantonness, I
• 3:57:18
  Speaker 1: thought had shot him. What does it all mean? Said I?
• 3:57:27
  Speaker 1: He shook his head and turned once more to the
• 3:57:30
  Speaker 1: Brandy eighteen the finding of Moreau. When I saw Montgomery
• 3:57:40
  Speaker 1: swallow a third dose of brandy, I took it upon
• 3:57:43
  Speaker 1: myself to interfere. It was already more than half fuddled.
• 3:57:48
  Speaker 1: I told him that some serious thing must have happened
• 3:57:50
  Speaker 1: to Moreau by this time, or he would have returned
• 3:57:53
  Speaker 1: before this, and that it behooved us to ascertain what
• 3:57:56
  Speaker 1: that catastrophe was. Montgomery raised some feeble objections, and at
• 3:58:02
  Speaker 1: last agreed. We had some food, and then all three
• 3:58:06
  Speaker 1: of us started. It is possibly due to the tension
• 3:58:11
  Speaker 1: of my mind at the time, but even now that
• 3:58:14
  Speaker 1: start into the hot stillness of the tropical afternoon is
• 3:58:17
  Speaker 1: a singularly vivid expression. Imling went first, his shoulder hunched,
• 3:58:24
  Speaker 1: his strange black head, moving with quick starts as he peered,
• 3:58:28
  Speaker 1: first on this side of the way and then on that.
• 3:58:32
  Speaker 1: He was unarmed his axe he had dropped when he
• 3:58:35
  Speaker 1: encountered the swine men. Teeth were his weapons when it
• 3:58:40
  Speaker 1: came to fighting. Montgomery followed with stumbling footsteps, his hands
• 3:58:46
  Speaker 1: in his pockets, his face downcast. He was in a
• 3:58:50
  Speaker 1: state of muddled sullenness. With me on account of the brandy.
• 3:58:54
  Speaker 1: My left arm was in a sling. It was lucky
• 3:58:57
  Speaker 1: it was my left, and I carried my revolver in
• 3:59:00
  Speaker 1: my right. Soon we traced a narrow path through the
• 3:59:04
  Speaker 1: wild luxuriance of the island going northwestward, and presently Amling
• 3:59:10
  Speaker 1: stopped and became rigid with watchfulness. Montgomery almost staggered into him,
• 3:59:16
  Speaker 1: and then stopped too. Then, listening intently, we heard coming
• 3:59:22
  Speaker 1: through the trees the sound of voices and footsteps approaching us.
• 3:59:27
  Speaker 1: He is dead, said a deep vibrating voice. He is
• 3:59:34
  Speaker 1: not dead. He is not dead, jabbered another. We saw,
• 3:59:40
  Speaker 1: we saw, said several voices. Hello, suddenly shouted Montgomery. Hello, there,
• 3:59:49
  Speaker 1: confound you, said I and gripped my pistol. There was
• 3:59:54
  Speaker 1: a silence, then a crashing among the interlacing vegetation, first here,
• 4:00:00
  Speaker 1: then there, and then half a dozen faces appeared, strange
• 4:00:04
  Speaker 1: faces lit by a strange light. Imling made a growling
• 4:00:10
  Speaker 1: noise in his throat. I recognized the ape man, I
• 4:00:14
  Speaker 1: had indeed already identified his voice, and two of the
• 4:00:18
  Speaker 1: white swathed, brown featured creatures I had seen in Montgomery's
• 4:00:21
  Speaker 1: boat with These were the two dappled brutes and that gray,
• 4:00:26
  Speaker 1: horribly crooked creature who said the law, with his gray
• 4:00:31
  Speaker 1: hair streaming down its cheeks, heavy gray eyebrows, and gray
• 4:00:35
  Speaker 1: locks pouring off from a central parting upon its sloping forehead,
• 4:00:40
  Speaker 1: A heavy, faceless thing with strange red eyes looking at
• 4:00:45
  Speaker 1: us curiously from amidst the green For a space, no
• 4:00:51
  Speaker 1: one spoke. Then Montgomery hiccoughed, who said he worth dead?
• 4:01:00
  Speaker 1: The monkey man looked guiltily at the hairy gray thing.
• 4:01:04
  Speaker 1: He is dead, said this monster. They saw there was
• 4:01:13
  Speaker 1: nothing threatening about this detachment at any rate. They seemed
• 4:01:17
  Speaker 1: awe stricken and puzzled. Where is he? Said Montgomery? Beyond
• 4:01:25
  Speaker 1: and the gray creature pointed. Is there a law? Now?
• 4:01:31
  Speaker 1: Asked the monkey man. Is it still to be this?
• 4:01:36
  Speaker 1: And that? Is he dead? Indeed? Is there a law?
• 4:01:42
  Speaker 1: Repeated the man in white. Is there a law? That
• 4:01:46
  Speaker 1: weather with the whip? He is dead, said the hairy
• 4:01:52
  Speaker 1: gray thing. And they all stood watching us. Prindic, said Montgomery,
• 4:01:59
  Speaker 1: turning his dull eyes to me. He's dead. Evidently I
• 4:02:06
  Speaker 1: had been standing behind him during this colloquy. I began
• 4:02:10
  Speaker 1: to see how things lay with them. I suddenly stepped
• 4:02:14
  Speaker 1: in front of Montgomery and lifted up my voice. Children
• 4:02:18
  Speaker 1: of the law, I said, he is not dead. Imling
• 4:02:24
  Speaker 1: turned his sharp eyes on me. He has changed his shape,
• 4:02:30
  Speaker 1: he has changed his body. I went on for a time.
• 4:02:35
  Speaker 1: You will not see him. He is there, I pointed upward,
• 4:02:40
  Speaker 1: where he can watch you. You cannot see him, but
• 4:02:43
  Speaker 1: he can see you. Fear the law. I looked at
• 4:02:49
  Speaker 1: them squarely. They flinched. He is great, he is good,
• 4:02:56
  Speaker 1: said the ape man, peering fearfully upward among the dense
• 4:02:59
  Speaker 1: tree and the other thing. I demanded the thing that
• 4:03:06
  Speaker 1: bled and ran, screaming and sobbing. That is dead too,
• 4:03:13
  Speaker 1: said the gray thing, still regarding me. That's well, grunted Montgomery.
• 4:03:20
  Speaker 1: The other with the whip began. The gray thing well said,
• 4:03:26
  Speaker 1: I said he was dead. But Montgomery was still sober
• 4:03:33
  Speaker 1: enough to understand my motive in denying Moreau's death. He
• 4:03:38
  Speaker 1: is not dead, he said, slowly, not dead at all,
• 4:03:44
  Speaker 1: no more dead than I am. Some said I have
• 4:03:50
  Speaker 1: broken the law. They will die. Some have died. Show
• 4:03:55
  Speaker 1: us now his old body lies, the body he cast
• 4:03:59
  Speaker 1: away because he had no more need of it. It
• 4:04:03
  Speaker 1: is this way man who walked in the sea, said
• 4:04:08
  Speaker 1: the gray thing, And with these six creatures guiding us,
• 4:04:13
  Speaker 1: we went through the tumult of ferns and creepers and
• 4:04:15
  Speaker 1: tree stems towards the northwest. Then came a yelling, a
• 4:04:20
  Speaker 1: crashing among the branches, and a little pink harmunculus rushed
• 4:04:24
  Speaker 1: by us, shrieking. Immediately after appeared a monster in headlong pursuit,
• 4:04:30
  Speaker 1: blood bedabbled who was amongst us. Almost before he could
• 4:04:34
  Speaker 1: stop his career, the gray thing leaped aside Imling with
• 4:04:39
  Speaker 1: a snarl, flew at it, and was struck aside. Montgomery
• 4:04:44
  Speaker 1: fired and missed, bowed his head, threw up his arm,
• 4:04:48
  Speaker 1: and turned to run. I fired, and the thing still
• 4:04:52
  Speaker 1: came on. Fired again, point blank into its ugly face.
• 4:04:59
  Speaker 1: I saw its features vanish in a flash. Its face
• 4:05:03
  Speaker 1: was driven in yet it passed me. Gripped Montgomery, and
• 4:05:07
  Speaker 1: holding him, fell headlong beside him and pulled him, sprawling
• 4:05:12
  Speaker 1: upon itself in its death agony. I found myself alone
• 4:05:16
  Speaker 1: with him, ling the dead brute and the prostrate man.
• 4:05:21
  Speaker 1: Montgomery raised himself slowly and stared in a muddled way
• 4:05:25
  Speaker 1: at the shattered beast man beside him. It more than
• 4:05:29
  Speaker 1: half sobered him. He scrambled to his feet. Then I
• 4:05:33
  Speaker 1: saw the gray thing returning cautiously through the trees. See,
• 4:05:39
  Speaker 1: said I, pointing to the dead brute. Is the law
• 4:05:43
  Speaker 1: not alive? This came of breaking the law. He peered
• 4:05:50
  Speaker 1: at his body. He sends the fire that kills, said he,
• 4:05:58
  Speaker 1: in his deep voice, repea eating part of the ritual.
• 4:06:03
  Speaker 1: The others gathered round and stared for a space. At
• 4:06:08
  Speaker 1: last we drew near the westward extremity of the island.
• 4:06:12
  Speaker 1: We came upon the nod and mutilated body of the puma,
• 4:06:15
  Speaker 1: its shoulder bone smashed by a bullet, and perhaps twenty
• 4:06:19
  Speaker 1: yards farther found at last what we sought. Moreau lay
• 4:06:24
  Speaker 1: face downward in a trampled space in a cane break.
• 4:06:29
  Speaker 1: One hand was almost severed at the wrist, and his
• 4:06:32
  Speaker 1: silvery hair was dabbled in blood. His head had been
• 4:06:36
  Speaker 1: battered in by the fetters of the puma. The broken
• 4:06:40
  Speaker 1: canes beneath him were smeared with blood. His revolver could
• 4:06:44
  Speaker 1: not be found. Montgomery turned him over, resting at intervals,
• 4:06:51
  Speaker 1: and with the help of the seven beast people, for
• 4:06:53
  Speaker 1: he was a heavy man, we carried Moreau back to
• 4:06:57
  Speaker 1: the enclosure. The night was darkling. Twice we heard unseen
• 4:07:03
  Speaker 1: creatures howling and shrieking past our little band, and once
• 4:07:08
  Speaker 1: the little pink sloth creature appeared and stared at us,
• 4:07:11
  Speaker 1: and vanished again. But we were not attacked again at
• 4:07:17
  Speaker 1: the gates of the enclosure. Our company of beast people
• 4:07:19
  Speaker 1: left us imbling. Going with the rest. We locked ourselves
• 4:07:24
  Speaker 1: in and then took Moreau's mangled body into the yard
• 4:07:27
  Speaker 1: and laid it upon a pile of brushwood. Then we
• 4:07:31
  Speaker 1: went into the laboratory and put an end to all
• 4:07:34
  Speaker 1: we found living there. Nineteen Montgomery's bank holiday. When this
• 4:07:44
  Speaker 1: was accomplished and we had washed and eaten, Montgomery and
• 4:07:48
  Speaker 1: I went into my little room and seriously discussed our
• 4:07:51
  Speaker 1: position for the first time. It was then near midnight.
• 4:07:56
  Speaker 1: He was almost sober, but greatly disturbed in him his mind.
• 4:08:02
  Speaker 1: He had been strangely under the influence of Moreau's personality.
• 4:08:06
  Speaker 1: I do not think it had ever occurred to him
• 4:08:08
  Speaker 1: that Moreau could die. This disaster was the sudden collapse
• 4:08:12
  Speaker 1: of the habits that had become part of his nature
• 4:08:15
  Speaker 1: in the ten or more monotonous years he had spent
• 4:08:18
  Speaker 1: on the island. He talked vaguely, answered my questions crookedly,
• 4:08:25
  Speaker 1: wandered into general questions. The thilly ath of a world,
• 4:08:32
  Speaker 1: he said, what a muddle it all is. I haven't
• 4:08:37
  Speaker 1: heard any life. I wonder when it's going to begin
• 4:08:41
  Speaker 1: sixteen years of being bullied by nursies and schoolmath turth
• 4:08:45
  Speaker 1: at their own sweep will five in London, grinding hard
• 4:08:50
  Speaker 1: at medicine, bad food, shabby lodgings, shabby clothes, shabby vice,
• 4:08:57
  Speaker 1: A blunder. I didn't know any better, and hustled off
• 4:09:01
  Speaker 1: to this Beethly island ten yearth here? What it all for, Preddick?
• 4:09:08
  Speaker 1: Are we bubbles blown by a baby? It was hard
• 4:09:12
  Speaker 1: to deal with such ravings. The thing we have to
• 4:09:16
  Speaker 1: think of now, said I, is how to get away
• 4:09:19
  Speaker 1: from this island? What the good of giving away? I'm
• 4:09:23
  Speaker 1: an outcast? Where am I to join on? It's all
• 4:09:28
  Speaker 1: very well for you, Prendick, poor old Moreau. We can't
• 4:09:32
  Speaker 1: leave him here to have his bones picked as it is,
• 4:09:37
  Speaker 1: and beside what will become of the death and part
• 4:09:39
  Speaker 1: of the beef folk, Well, said I, that will do tomorrow.
• 4:09:47
  Speaker 1: I've been thinking we might make the brushwood into a
• 4:09:49
  Speaker 1: pyre and burn his body and those other things. Then
• 4:09:55
  Speaker 1: what will happen with the beast folk? I don't know.
• 4:09:59
  Speaker 1: I the poe, those that were made beasts of prey,
• 4:10:03
  Speaker 1: we'll make thilly aths of themselves sooner or later. We
• 4:10:09
  Speaker 1: can't mafacre the lot, can we I suppose that's what
• 4:10:13
  Speaker 1: your humanity would suggest. But they'll change. They are sure
• 4:10:20
  Speaker 1: to change. He talked thus inconclusively, until at last I
• 4:10:25
  Speaker 1: felt my temper going dar nation, he exclaimed, at some
• 4:10:31
  Speaker 1: petulance of mine. Can't you see I'm in a worth
• 4:10:35
  Speaker 1: hole than you are? And got up and went for
• 4:10:39
  Speaker 1: the brandy drink, he said, returning you logic chopping chalky faith.
• 4:10:45
  Speaker 1: Think of an atheist drink not, I said I, and
• 4:10:52
  Speaker 1: sat grimly watching his face under the yellow paraffin flare
• 4:10:56
  Speaker 1: as he drank himself into a garrulous misery. I have
• 4:11:01
  Speaker 1: a memory of infinite tedium. He wandered into a model
• 4:11:05
  Speaker 1: in defense of the beast people and of Imling. Imling,
• 4:11:09
  Speaker 1: he said, was the only thing that had ever really
• 4:11:12
  Speaker 1: cared for him, And suddenly an idea came to him.
• 4:11:17
  Speaker 1: I'm damned, said he, staggering to his feet and clutching
• 4:11:22
  Speaker 1: the brandy bottle. By some flash of intuition, I knew
• 4:11:27
  Speaker 1: what it was. He intended. You don't give drink to
• 4:11:31
  Speaker 1: that beast, I said, rising and facing him. Beast said
• 4:11:37
  Speaker 1: he you're the beast. He takes hith liquor like a Christian,
• 4:11:43
  Speaker 1: Come out of my way, Prindick, for God's sake, said I.
• 4:11:49
  Speaker 1: Get out of the way. He roared, and suddenly whipped
• 4:11:54
  Speaker 1: out his revolver. Very well, said I, and stood aside,
• 4:12:00
  Speaker 1: half minded to fall upon him as he put his
• 4:12:03
  Speaker 1: hand upon the latch, but deterred by the thought of
• 4:12:06
  Speaker 1: my useless arm. You've made a beast of yourself. To
• 4:12:12
  Speaker 1: the beasts, you may go. He flung the doorway open
• 4:12:17
  Speaker 1: and stood half facing me between the yellow lamp light
• 4:12:20
  Speaker 1: and the pallid glare of the moon. His eye sockets
• 4:12:23
  Speaker 1: were blotches of black under his stubby eyebrows. You're a
• 4:12:28
  Speaker 1: solemn prig prendick, a thilliath. You're always fearing and fancying.
• 4:12:36
  Speaker 1: We're on the edge of things. I'm bound to cut
• 4:12:41
  Speaker 1: my throat to morrow. I'm going to have a damned
• 4:12:44
  Speaker 1: bank holiday to night. He turned and went out into
• 4:12:48
  Speaker 1: the moonlight. Jim Ling, he cried, jim Ling, old friend.
• 4:12:57
  Speaker 1: Three dim creatures in the silvery light came along the
• 4:12:59
  Speaker 1: air edge of the wan beach, one a white wrapped creature,
• 4:13:04
  Speaker 1: the other two blotches of blackness. Following it. They halted, staring.
• 4:13:10
  Speaker 1: Then I saw Imling's hunched shoulders as he came round
• 4:13:14
  Speaker 1: the corner of the house. Drink, cried Montgomery. Drink, you brute,
• 4:13:23
  Speaker 1: drink and be man. Damn, I'm the Cleverest Moreau forgot this.
• 4:13:29
  Speaker 1: This is the last touch drink, I tell you, And
• 4:13:34
  Speaker 1: waving the bottle in his hand, he started off at
• 4:13:37
  Speaker 1: a kind of quick trot to the westward, Imling, ranging
• 4:13:40
  Speaker 1: himself between him and the three dim creatures who followed.
• 4:13:45
  Speaker 1: I went to the doorway. They were already indistinct in
• 4:13:49
  Speaker 1: the midst of the moonlight before Montgomery halted. I saw
• 4:13:53
  Speaker 1: him in minister a dose of the raw brandy to Imling,
• 4:13:56
  Speaker 1: and saw the five figures melt into one vague patch thing.
• 4:14:02
  Speaker 1: I heard Montgomery shout, thing all together. Confound Old Prendick.
• 4:14:09
  Speaker 1: That's right now again, confound Old Prendick. The black group
• 4:14:15
  Speaker 1: broke up into five separate figures and wound slowly away
• 4:14:19
  Speaker 1: from me along the band of shining Beach. Each went
• 4:14:22
  Speaker 1: howling at his own sweet will yelping insults at me,
• 4:14:26
  Speaker 1: or giving whatever other vent this new inspiration of brandy demanded. Presently,
• 4:14:32
  Speaker 1: I heard Montgomery's voice shouting right, turn, and they passed
• 4:14:38
  Speaker 1: with their shouts and howls into the blackness of the
• 4:14:40
  Speaker 1: landward trees. Slowly, very slowly, they receded into silence. The
• 4:14:49
  Speaker 1: peaceful splendor of the night healed again. The moon was
• 4:14:53
  Speaker 1: now past the meridian, and traveling down the west, it
• 4:14:57
  Speaker 1: was at its full and very bright. Riding through the
• 4:15:00
  Speaker 1: empty blue sky, the shadow of the wall lay a
• 4:15:05
  Speaker 1: yard wide and of inky blackness at my feet. The
• 4:15:09
  Speaker 1: eastward sea was a featureless, gray, dark and mysterious. And
• 4:15:14
  Speaker 1: between the sea and the shadow, the gray sands of
• 4:15:17
  Speaker 1: volcanic glass and crystals flashed and shone like a beach
• 4:15:21
  Speaker 1: of diamonds. Behind me, the paraffine lamp flared hot and ruddy.
• 4:15:29
  Speaker 1: Then I shut the door, locked it, and went into
• 4:15:32
  Speaker 1: the enclosure, where Moreau lay beside his latest victims, the
• 4:15:36
  Speaker 1: staghounds and the Lama and some other wretched brutes, with
• 4:15:40
  Speaker 1: his massive face calm even after his terrible death, and
• 4:15:45
  Speaker 1: with his hard eyes open staring at the dead white
• 4:15:48
  Speaker 1: moon above. I sat down upon the edge of the sink,
• 4:15:53
  Speaker 1: and with my eyes upon that ghastly pile of silvery
• 4:15:56
  Speaker 1: light and ominous shadows, began to turn over my plans.
• 4:16:01
  Speaker 1: In the morning, I would gather some provisions in the dinghy,
• 4:16:04
  Speaker 1: and after setting fire to the pyre before me, push
• 4:16:07
  Speaker 1: out into the desolation of the high sea. Once more,
• 4:16:11
  Speaker 1: I felt that for Montgomery there was no help, that
• 4:16:14
  Speaker 1: he was, in truth half akin to these beast folk,
• 4:16:18
  Speaker 1: unfitted for human kindred. I do not know how long
• 4:16:22
  Speaker 1: I sat there scheming, It must have been an hour
• 4:16:26
  Speaker 1: or so. Then my planning was interrupted by the return
• 4:16:29
  Speaker 1: of Montgomery to my neighborhood. I heard a yelling from
• 4:16:33
  Speaker 1: many throats, a tumult of exultant cries passing down towards
• 4:16:37
  Speaker 1: the beach, whooping and howling, and excited shrieks that seemed
• 4:16:42
  Speaker 1: to come to a stop near the water's edge. The
• 4:16:46
  Speaker 1: riot rose and fell. I heard heavy blows and the
• 4:16:50
  Speaker 1: splintering smash of wood, but it did not trouble me.
• 4:16:53
  Speaker 1: Then a discordant chanting began. My thoughts were back to
• 4:17:00
  Speaker 1: my means of escape. I got up, brought the lamp,
• 4:17:04
  Speaker 1: and went into a shed to look at some kegs
• 4:17:06
  Speaker 1: I had seen there. Then I became interested in the
• 4:17:09
  Speaker 1: contents of some biscuit tins and opened one. I saw
• 4:17:14
  Speaker 1: something out of the tail of my eye, a red figure,
• 4:17:18
  Speaker 1: and turned sharply. Behind me lay the yard, vividly black
• 4:17:24
  Speaker 1: and white in the moonlight, and the pile of wood
• 4:17:26
  Speaker 1: and faggots on which Moreau and his mutilated victims lay
• 4:17:29
  Speaker 1: one over another. They seemed to be gripping one another
• 4:17:34
  Speaker 1: in one last revengeful grapple. His wounds gaped black as night,
• 4:17:40
  Speaker 1: and the blood that had dripped lay in black patches
• 4:17:43
  Speaker 1: upon the sand. Then I saw, without understanding the cause
• 4:17:48
  Speaker 1: of my phantom, a ruddy glow that came and danced
• 4:17:52
  Speaker 1: and went upon the wall opposite. I misinterpreted this, fancied
• 4:17:57
  Speaker 1: it was a reflection of my flickering lamp, and turned
• 4:18:00
  Speaker 1: again to the stalls in the shed. I went on
• 4:18:04
  Speaker 1: rummaging among them as well as a one armed man could,
• 4:18:07
  Speaker 1: finding this convenient thing and that, and putting them aside
• 4:18:11
  Speaker 1: for tomorrow's launch. My movements were slow, and the time
• 4:18:16
  Speaker 1: passed quickly. Insensibly, the daylight crept upon me. The chanting
• 4:18:22
  Speaker 1: died down, giving place to a clamor. Then it began again,
• 4:18:27
  Speaker 1: and suddenly broke into a tumult. I heard cries of
• 4:18:31
  Speaker 1: more more, a sound like quarreling, and a sudden wild shriek.
• 4:18:37
  Speaker 1: The quality of the sounds changed so greatly that it
• 4:18:40
  Speaker 1: arrested my attention. I went out into the yard and listened. Then,
• 4:18:45
  Speaker 1: cutting like a knife across the confusion, came the crack
• 4:18:49
  Speaker 1: of a revolver. I rushed at once through my room
• 4:18:53
  Speaker 1: to the little doorway. As I did so, I heard
• 4:18:56
  Speaker 1: some of the packing cases behind me go sliding down
• 4:18:59
  Speaker 1: and smashed together with a clatter of glass on the
• 4:19:02
  Speaker 1: floor of the shed. But I did not heed these.
• 4:19:06
  Speaker 1: I flung the door open and looked out up the
• 4:19:09
  Speaker 1: beach by the boat house. A bonfire was burning, reining
• 4:19:13
  Speaker 1: up sparks into the indistinctness of the dawn. Around this
• 4:19:18
  Speaker 1: struggled a mass of black figures. I heard Montgomery call
• 4:19:21
  Speaker 1: my name. I began to run at once towards this fire,
• 4:19:26
  Speaker 1: revolver in hand. I saw the pink tongue of Montgomery's
• 4:19:29
  Speaker 1: pistol lick out. Once close to the ground, he was down.
• 4:19:35
  Speaker 1: I shouted with all my strength and fired into the air.
• 4:19:38
  Speaker 1: I heard someone cry. The mass stir The knotted black
• 4:19:42
  Speaker 1: struggle broke into scattering units. The fire leaped and sank down.
• 4:19:48
  Speaker 1: The crowd of beast people fled in sudden panic before
• 4:19:51
  Speaker 1: me up the beach. In my excitement, I fired at
• 4:19:55
  Speaker 1: their retreating backs as they disappeared among the bushes. Then
• 4:20:00
  Speaker 1: I turned to the black heaps upon the ground. Montgomery
• 4:20:05
  Speaker 1: lay on his back, with a hairy gray beast man
• 4:20:08
  Speaker 1: sprawling across his body. The brute was dead, but still
• 4:20:14
  Speaker 1: gripping Montgomery's throat with its curving claws. Near By lay
• 4:20:19
  Speaker 1: him ling on his face and quite still, his neck
• 4:20:22
  Speaker 1: bitten open, and the upper part of the smashed brandy
• 4:20:25
  Speaker 1: bottle in his hand. Two other figures lay near the fire,
• 4:20:31
  Speaker 1: the one motionless, the other groaning fitfully every now and then,
• 4:20:35
  Speaker 1: raising its head slowly, then dropping it again. I caught
• 4:20:41
  Speaker 1: hold of the gray man and pulled him off Montgomery's body.
• 4:20:45
  Speaker 1: His claws drew down the torn coat reluctantly as I
• 4:20:49
  Speaker 1: dragged him away. Montgomery was dark in the face and
• 4:20:53
  Speaker 1: scarcely breathing. I splashed sea water on his face and
• 4:20:58
  Speaker 1: pillowed his head on my rollder imling was dead. The
• 4:21:04
  Speaker 1: wounded creature by the fire. It was a wolf brute
• 4:21:07
  Speaker 1: with the bearded gray face, lay I found with the
• 4:21:12
  Speaker 1: fore part of its body upon the still glowing timber.
• 4:21:16
  Speaker 1: The wretched thing was injured so dreadfully that in mercy
• 4:21:19
  Speaker 1: I blew its brains out at once. The other brute
• 4:21:23
  Speaker 1: was one of the bull men swathed in white. He
• 4:21:27
  Speaker 1: too was dead. The rest of the beast people had
• 4:21:30
  Speaker 1: vanished from the beach. I went to Montgomery again and
• 4:21:35
  Speaker 1: knelt beside him, cursing my ignorance of medicine. The fire
• 4:21:41
  Speaker 1: beside me had sunk down, and only charred beams of
• 4:21:44
  Speaker 1: timber glowing at the central ends, and mixed of the
• 4:21:47
  Speaker 1: gray ash of brushwood remained. I wondered casually where Montgomery
• 4:21:52
  Speaker 1: had got his wood. Then I saw that the dawn
• 4:21:56
  Speaker 1: was upon us. The sky had grown brighter, the setting
• 4:22:00
  Speaker 1: moon was becoming pale and opaque in the luminous blue
• 4:22:04
  Speaker 1: of the day. The sky to the eastward was rimmed
• 4:22:08
  Speaker 1: with red. Suddenly I heard a thud and a hissing
• 4:22:13
  Speaker 1: behind me, and looking round, sprang to my feet with
• 4:22:16
  Speaker 1: a cry of horror. Against the warm dawn, great tumultuous
• 4:22:21
  Speaker 1: masses of black smoke were boiling up out of the enclosure,
• 4:22:25
  Speaker 1: and through their stormy darkness shot flickering threads of blood
• 4:22:28
  Speaker 1: red flame. Then the thatched roof caught I saw the
• 4:22:34
  Speaker 1: curving charge of the flames across the sloping straw. A
• 4:22:38
  Speaker 1: spurt of fire jetted from the window of my room.
• 4:22:42
  Speaker 1: I knew at once what had happened. I remembered the
• 4:22:46
  Speaker 1: crash I had heard when I had rushed out to
• 4:22:49
  Speaker 1: Montgomery's assistance. I had overturned the lamp. The hopelessness of
• 4:22:55
  Speaker 1: saving any of the contents of the enclosure stared me
• 4:22:57
  Speaker 1: in the face. My mind came back to my plan
• 4:23:01
  Speaker 1: of flight, and turning swiftly, I looked to see where
• 4:23:04
  Speaker 1: the two boats lay upon the beach. They were gone.
• 4:23:09
  Speaker 1: Two axes lay upon the sands beside me. Chips and
• 4:23:12
  Speaker 1: splinters were scattered broadcast, and the ashes of the bonfire
• 4:23:17
  Speaker 1: were blackening and smoking under the jawn. Montgomery had burnt
• 4:23:22
  Speaker 1: the boats to revenge himself upon me and prevent our
• 4:23:26
  Speaker 1: return to mankind. A sudden convulsion of rage shook me.
• 4:23:33
  Speaker 1: I was almost moved to batter his foolish head in
• 4:23:37
  Speaker 1: as he lay there helpless at my feet. Then suddenly
• 4:23:41
  Speaker 1: his hand moved so feebly, so pitifully, that my wrath vanished.
• 4:23:48
  Speaker 1: He groaned and opened his eyes. For a minute, I
• 4:23:52
  Speaker 1: knelt down beside him and raised his head. He opened
• 4:23:56
  Speaker 1: his eyes again, staring silently at the dawn, and then
• 4:24:00
  Speaker 1: they met mine. The lids fell. Sorry, he said, presently,
• 4:24:09
  Speaker 1: with an effort he seemed trying to think. The laughed.
• 4:24:17
  Speaker 1: He murmured, the laugh of this silly universe. What a mess.
• 4:24:28
  Speaker 1: I listened. His head fell helplessly to one side. I
• 4:24:33
  Speaker 1: thought some drink might revive him, but there was neither
• 4:24:37
  Speaker 1: drink nor vessel in which to bring drink. At hand.
• 4:24:42
  Speaker 1: He seemed suddenly heavier. My heart went cold. I bent
• 4:24:47
  Speaker 1: down to his face, put my hand through the rent
• 4:24:50
  Speaker 1: in his blouse. He was dead, and even as he
• 4:24:55
  Speaker 1: dyed a line of white heat, the limb of the
• 4:24:57
  Speaker 1: sun rose eastward beyond the project of the bay, splashing
• 4:25:02
  Speaker 1: its radiance across the sky, and turning the dark sea
• 4:25:05
  Speaker 1: into a weltering tumult of dazzling light. It fell like
• 4:25:10
  Speaker 1: a glory upon his death, shrunken face, I let his
• 4:25:15
  Speaker 1: head fall gently upon the rough pillow I had made
• 4:25:18
  Speaker 1: for him, and stood up. Before me was the glittering
• 4:25:22
  Speaker 1: desolation of the sea, the awful solitude upon which I
• 4:25:26
  Speaker 1: had already suffered so much. Behind me, the island hushed
• 4:25:31
  Speaker 1: under the dawn, its beast people silent and unseen. The enclosure,
• 4:25:38
  Speaker 1: with all its provisions and ammunition burnt noisily, with sudden
• 4:25:42
  Speaker 1: gusts of flame, a fitful crackling, and now and then
• 4:25:46
  Speaker 1: a crash. The heavy smoke drove up the beach away
• 4:25:50
  Speaker 1: from me, rolling low over the distant treetops, towards the
• 4:25:54
  Speaker 1: huts in the ravine beside me with the charred vestiges
• 4:25:59
  Speaker 1: of the boats and these five dead bodies. Then out
• 4:26:04
  Speaker 1: of the bushes came three beast people with hunched shoulders,
• 4:26:07
  Speaker 1: protruding heads, misshapen hands awkwardly held, and inquisitive, unfriendly eyes,
• 4:26:14
  Speaker 1: and advanced towards me with hesitating gestures. Twenty Alone with
• 4:26:21
  Speaker 1: the beast folk, I faced these people, facing my fate
• 4:26:27
  Speaker 1: in them, single handed, now literally single handed, for I
• 4:26:31
  Speaker 1: had a broken arm. In my pocket was a revolver
• 4:26:35
  Speaker 1: with two empty chambers. Among the chips scattered about the
• 4:26:39
  Speaker 1: beach lay the two axes that had been used to
• 4:26:41
  Speaker 1: chop up the boats. The tide was creeping in behind me.
• 4:26:47
  Speaker 1: There was nothing for it but courage. I looked squarely
• 4:26:50
  Speaker 1: into the faces of the advancing monsters. They avoided my eyes,
• 4:26:55
  Speaker 1: and their quivering nostrils investigated the bodies that lay beyond
• 4:26:58
  Speaker 1: me on the beach. I took a half dozen steps,
• 4:27:02
  Speaker 1: picked up the blood stained whip that lay beneath the
• 4:27:05
  Speaker 1: body of the wolf man, and cracked it. They stopped
• 4:27:09
  Speaker 1: and stared at me. Salute, said I bow down. They hesitated,
• 4:27:19
  Speaker 1: one bent his knees. I repeated my command with my
• 4:27:23
  Speaker 1: heart in my mouth, and advanced upon them. One knelt,
• 4:27:28
  Speaker 1: then the other two. I turned and walked towards the
• 4:27:32
  Speaker 1: dead bodies, keeping my face towards the three kneeling beast men,
• 4:27:37
  Speaker 1: very much as an actor passing up the stage faces
• 4:27:39
  Speaker 1: the audience. They broke the law, said I, putting my
• 4:27:45
  Speaker 1: foot on the sayer of the law. They have been slain,
• 4:27:49
  Speaker 1: even the sayer of the law, even the other with
• 4:27:53
  Speaker 1: the whip. Great is the law. Come and see none escape,
• 4:27:59
  Speaker 1: said one of them, advancing and peering. None escape. Said I,
• 4:28:05
  Speaker 1: therefore hear and do as I command. They stood up,
• 4:28:10
  Speaker 1: looking questioningly at one another. Stand there, said I. I
• 4:28:17
  Speaker 1: picked up the hatchets and swung them by their heads
• 4:28:20
  Speaker 1: from the sling of my arm. Turning Montgomery over, picked
• 4:28:24
  Speaker 1: up his revolver, still loaded in two chambers, and bending
• 4:28:28
  Speaker 1: down to rummage, found a half dozen cartridges in his pocket.
• 4:28:33
  Speaker 1: Take him, said I, standing up again, and pointing with
• 4:28:37
  Speaker 1: a whip, take him and carry him out, and cast
• 4:28:41
  Speaker 1: him into the sea. They came forward, evidently still afraid
• 4:28:46
  Speaker 1: of Montgomery, but still more afraid of my cracking red whiplash.
• 4:28:52
  Speaker 1: And after some fumbling and hesitation, some whip cracking and shouting,
• 4:28:56
  Speaker 1: they lifted him gingerly, carried him down to the beach,
• 4:29:00
  Speaker 1: and went splashing into the dazzling welter of the sea. On,
• 4:29:05
  Speaker 1: said I, on carry him far. They went in up
• 4:29:10
  Speaker 1: to their arm pits and stood regarding me. Let go,
• 4:29:15
  Speaker 1: said I, and the body of Montgomery vanished with a splash.
• 4:29:20
  Speaker 1: Something seemed to tighten across my chest. Good, said I,
• 4:29:27
  Speaker 1: with a break in my voice. And they came back,
• 4:29:30
  Speaker 1: hurrying and fearful, to the margin of the water, leaving
• 4:29:34
  Speaker 1: long wakes of black in the silver at the water's edge.
• 4:29:38
  Speaker 1: They stopped turning and glaring into the sea, as though
• 4:29:42
  Speaker 1: they presently expected Montgomery to arise therefrom and exact vengeance.
• 4:29:48
  Speaker 1: Now these, said I, pointing to the other dead bodies.
• 4:29:55
  Speaker 1: They took care not to approach the place where they
• 4:29:57
  Speaker 1: had thrown Montgomery into the water, but instead carried the
• 4:30:01
  Speaker 1: four dead beast people slantingly along the beach for perhaps
• 4:30:05
  Speaker 1: a hundred yards before they waded out and cast them away.
• 4:30:10
  Speaker 1: As I watched them disposing of the mangled remains of imling,
• 4:30:14
  Speaker 1: I heard a light footfall behind me, and, turning quickly,
• 4:30:18
  Speaker 1: saw the big hyena swine, perhaps a dozen yards away.
• 4:30:22
  Speaker 1: His head was bent down, his bright eyes were fixed
• 4:30:25
  Speaker 1: upon me, his stumpy hands clinched and held close by
• 4:30:29
  Speaker 1: his side. He stopped in this crouching attitude when I turned,
• 4:30:34
  Speaker 1: his eyes a little averted. For a moment we stood
• 4:30:39
  Speaker 1: eye to eye. I dropped the whip and snatched at
• 4:30:42
  Speaker 1: the pistol in my pocket, for I meant to kill
• 4:30:45
  Speaker 1: this brute, the most formidable of any left now upon
• 4:30:48
  Speaker 1: the island, at the first excuse. It may seem treacherous,
• 4:30:53
  Speaker 1: but so I was resolved. I was far more afraid
• 4:30:57
  Speaker 1: of him than any of the other two of the
• 4:30:59
  Speaker 1: beast folk. His continued life was. I knew a great
• 4:31:03
  Speaker 1: threat against mine. I was perhaps a dozen seconds collecting myself,
• 4:31:10
  Speaker 1: then cried, I salute, bow down. His teeth flashed upon
• 4:31:17
  Speaker 1: me in a snarl. Who are you that I should
• 4:31:22
  Speaker 1: perhaps a little too Spasmodically, I drew my revolver, aimed
• 4:31:26
  Speaker 1: quickly and fired. I heard him. Yelp saw him run
• 4:31:30
  Speaker 1: sideways and turn. Knew I had missed and clicked back
• 4:31:34
  Speaker 1: the cock with my thumb for the next shot. But
• 4:31:37
  Speaker 1: he was already running headlong, jumping from side to side,
• 4:31:41
  Speaker 1: and I dared not risk another miss. Every now and
• 4:31:44
  Speaker 1: then he looked back at me over his shoulder. He
• 4:31:47
  Speaker 1: went slanting along the beach and vanished beneath the driving
• 4:31:50
  Speaker 1: masses of dense smoke that was still pouring out from
• 4:31:53
  Speaker 1: the burning enclosure. For some time I stood staring after him.
• 4:31:59
  Speaker 1: I turned to my three years obedient beast folk again
• 4:32:01
  Speaker 1: and signaled them to drop the body they still carried that.
• 4:32:06
  Speaker 1: I went back to the place by the fire where
• 4:32:07
  Speaker 1: the bodies had fallen, and kicked the sand until all
• 4:32:10
  Speaker 1: the brown blood stains were absorbed and hidden. I dismissed
• 4:32:15
  Speaker 1: my three serfs with the wave of the hand and
• 4:32:18
  Speaker 1: went up the beach into the thickets. I carried my
• 4:32:21
  Speaker 1: pistol in my hand, my whip thrust with the hatches,
• 4:32:26
  Speaker 1: and the sling of my arm. I was anxious to
• 4:32:28
  Speaker 1: be alone, to think out the position in which I
• 4:32:31
  Speaker 1: was now placed. A dreadful thing that I was only
• 4:32:35
  Speaker 1: beginning to realize was that over all this island. There
• 4:32:39
  Speaker 1: was now no safe place where I could be alone
• 4:32:42
  Speaker 1: and secure to rest or sleep. I had recovered strength
• 4:32:47
  Speaker 1: amazingly since my landing, but I was still inclined to
• 4:32:50
  Speaker 1: be nervous and to break down under any great stress.
• 4:32:54
  Speaker 1: I felt that I ought to cross the island and
• 4:32:56
  Speaker 1: establish myself with the beast people and make myself secret
• 4:33:00
  Speaker 1: in their confidence. But my heart failed me. I went
• 4:33:05
  Speaker 1: back to the beach, and turning eastward past the burning enclosure,
• 4:33:09
  Speaker 1: made for a point where a shallow spit of coral
• 4:33:12
  Speaker 1: sand ran out towards the reef. Here I could sit
• 4:33:16
  Speaker 1: down and think my back to the sea and my
• 4:33:19
  Speaker 1: face against any surprise. And there I sat, chin on knees,
• 4:33:26
  Speaker 1: the sun beating down upon my head, and unspeakable dread
• 4:33:29
  Speaker 1: in my mind, plotting how I could live on against
• 4:33:33
  Speaker 1: the hour of my rescue if other rescue came. I
• 4:33:38
  Speaker 1: tried to review the whole situation as calmly as I could,
• 4:33:42
  Speaker 1: but it was difficult to clear the thing of emotion.
• 4:33:46
  Speaker 1: I began turning over in my mind the reason of
• 4:33:48
  Speaker 1: Montgomery's despair. They will change, he said, they are through
• 4:33:54
  Speaker 1: are to change. And moreau, what was it that Moreau
• 4:33:58
  Speaker 1: had said, the stubborn beast flesh grows day by day
• 4:34:02
  Speaker 1: back again. Then I came round to the hyena swine.
• 4:34:07
  Speaker 1: I felt sure that if I did not kill that brute,
• 4:34:11
  Speaker 1: he would kill me. The sayer of the law was dead.
• 4:34:15
  Speaker 1: Worse luck, they knew now that we of the whips
• 4:34:19
  Speaker 1: could be killed, even as they themselves were killed. Were
• 4:34:24
  Speaker 1: they peering at me already out of the green masses
• 4:34:26
  Speaker 1: of ferns and palms of a yonder, watching until I
• 4:34:29
  Speaker 1: came within their spring? Were they plotting against me? What
• 4:34:35
  Speaker 1: was the hyaena swine telling them? My imagination was running
• 4:34:39
  Speaker 1: away with me into a morass of unsubstantial fears. My
• 4:34:44
  Speaker 1: thoughts were disturbed by a crying of sea birds, hurrying
• 4:34:47
  Speaker 1: towards some black object that had been stranded by the
• 4:34:50
  Speaker 1: waves on the beach near the enclosure. I knew what
• 4:34:54
  Speaker 1: the object was, but I had not the heart to
• 4:34:56
  Speaker 1: go back and drive them off. I began walking along
• 4:35:00
  Speaker 1: the beach in the opposite direction, designing to come round
• 4:35:03
  Speaker 1: the eastward corner of the island, and so approached the
• 4:35:06
  Speaker 1: ravine of the huts without traversing the possible ambuse scards
• 4:35:11
  Speaker 1: of the thickets. Perhaps half a mile along the beach,
• 4:35:15
  Speaker 1: I became aware of one of my three beast folk
• 4:35:18
  Speaker 1: advancing out of the landward bushes towards me. I was
• 4:35:22
  Speaker 1: now so nervous with my own imaginings that I immediately drew
• 4:35:25
  Speaker 1: my revolver. Even the propitiatory gestures of the creature failed
• 4:35:30
  Speaker 1: to disarm me. He hesitated as he approached. Go away.
• 4:35:36
  Speaker 1: I cried. There was something very suggestive of a dog
• 4:35:40
  Speaker 1: in the cringing attitude of the creature. It retreated a
• 4:35:44
  Speaker 1: little way, very like a dog being sent home, and
• 4:35:48
  Speaker 1: stopped looking at me imploringly with canine brown eyes. Go away,
• 4:35:54
  Speaker 1: said I do not come near me. May I not
• 4:36:00
  Speaker 1: near you? It said? Now go away? I insisted, and
• 4:36:06
  Speaker 1: snapped my whip. Then, putting my whip in my teeth,
• 4:36:10
  Speaker 1: I stooped for a stone, and with that threat drove
• 4:36:13
  Speaker 1: the creature away. So in solitude I came round by
• 4:36:17
  Speaker 1: the ravine of the beast people, and hiding among the
• 4:36:20
  Speaker 1: weeds and reeds that separated this crevice from the sea,
• 4:36:23
  Speaker 1: I watched such of them as appeared, trying to judge
• 4:36:26
  Speaker 1: from them their gestures and appearance. Had the death of
• 4:36:28
  Speaker 1: Moreau and Montgomery and the destruction of the House of
• 4:36:32
  Speaker 1: Pain had affected them. I know now the folly of
• 4:36:36
  Speaker 1: my cowardice. Had I kept my courage up to the
• 4:36:39
  Speaker 1: level of the dawn, had I not allowed it to
• 4:36:41
  Speaker 1: ebb away in solitary thought, I might have grasped the
• 4:36:45
  Speaker 1: vacant scepter of Moreau and ruled over the beast people.
• 4:36:49
  Speaker 1: As it was, I lost the opportunity and sank to
• 4:36:52
  Speaker 1: the position of a mere leader among my fellows. Towards noon,
• 4:36:57
  Speaker 1: certain of them came and squatted, basking in the hot sand.
• 4:37:01
  Speaker 1: The imperious voices of hunger and thirst prevailed over my dread.
• 4:37:06
  Speaker 1: I came out of the bushes, and revolver in hand,
• 4:37:10
  Speaker 1: walked down towards these seated figures. One, a wolf woman,
• 4:37:15
  Speaker 1: turned her head and stared at me, and then the others.
• 4:37:19
  Speaker 1: None attempted to rise or salute me. I felt too
• 4:37:23
  Speaker 1: faint and weary to insist, and I let the moment pass.
• 4:37:29
  Speaker 1: I want food, said I, almost apologetically, and drawing near.
• 4:37:37
  Speaker 1: There is food in the huts, said an ox bore man, drowsily,
• 4:37:42
  Speaker 1: and looking away from me. I passed them and went
• 4:37:46
  Speaker 1: down to the shadow and odors of the almost deserted
• 4:37:49
  Speaker 1: ravine in an empty hut, I feasted on some specked
• 4:37:53
  Speaker 1: and half decayed fruit, And then, after I had propped
• 4:37:56
  Speaker 1: some branches and sticks about the opening, and placed myself
• 4:38:00
  Speaker 1: with my face towards it and my hand upon my revolver.
• 4:38:04
  Speaker 1: The exhaustion of the last thirty hours claimed its own,
• 4:38:08
  Speaker 1: and I fell into a light slumber, hoping that the
• 4:38:12
  Speaker 1: flimsy barricade I had erected would cause sufficient noise in
• 4:38:16
  Speaker 1: its removal to save me from surprise twenty one, the
• 4:38:22
  Speaker 1: reversion of the beast folk. In this way, I became
• 4:38:26
  Speaker 1: one among the beast people in the island of Doctor Moreau.
• 4:38:31
  Speaker 1: When I awoke, it was dark about me, my arm
• 4:38:34
  Speaker 1: ached in its bandages. I sat up, wondering at first
• 4:38:38
  Speaker 1: where I might be. I heard coarse voices talking outside.
• 4:38:44
  Speaker 1: Then I saw that my barricade had gone, and that
• 4:38:47
  Speaker 1: the opening of the hut stood clear. My revolver was
• 4:38:50
  Speaker 1: still in my hand. I heard something breathing, saw something
• 4:38:54
  Speaker 1: crouch together close beside me. I held my breath, trying
• 4:38:59
  Speaker 1: to see what it was. It began to move slowly interminably.
• 4:39:04
  Speaker 1: Then something soft and warm and moist passed across my hand.
• 4:39:08
  Speaker 1: All my muscles contracted. I snatched my hand away. A
• 4:39:13
  Speaker 1: cry of alarm began and was stifled in my throat.
• 4:39:17
  Speaker 1: Then I just realized what had happened sufficiently to stay
• 4:39:19
  Speaker 1: my fingers on the revolver. Who is that? I said
• 4:39:25
  Speaker 1: in a hoarse whisper. The revolver still pointed, I Master,
• 4:39:33
  Speaker 1: Who are you? They say there is no master now,
• 4:39:39
  Speaker 1: But I know, I know. I carried the bodies into
• 4:39:45
  Speaker 1: the sea. O walker in the sea, the bodies of
• 4:39:49
  Speaker 1: those you slew. I am your slave. Master? Are you
• 4:39:55
  Speaker 1: the one I met on the beach? I asked the same, Master.
• 4:40:02
  Speaker 1: The thing was evidently faithful enough for it might have
• 4:40:05
  Speaker 1: fallen upon me as I slept. It is well, I said,
• 4:40:10
  Speaker 1: extending my hand for another licking kiss. I began to
• 4:40:14
  Speaker 1: realize what its presence meant, and the tide of my
• 4:40:17
  Speaker 1: courage flowed. Where are the others, I asked? They are mad?
• 4:40:24
  Speaker 1: They are fools, said the dog man. Even now they
• 4:40:29
  Speaker 1: talked together beyond there, they say the master is dead.
• 4:40:36
  Speaker 1: The other with the whip is dead. The other who
• 4:40:40
  Speaker 1: walked in the sea is as we are. We have
• 4:40:45
  Speaker 1: no master, no whips, no house of pain any more.
• 4:40:50
  Speaker 1: There is an end. We love the law and will
• 4:40:54
  Speaker 1: keep it. But there is no pain, no master, no
• 4:40:58
  Speaker 1: whips for ever again, so they say, But I know, Master,
• 4:41:06
  Speaker 1: I know, I felt in the darkness and patted the
• 4:41:11
  Speaker 1: dog man's head. It is well, I said again. Presently
• 4:41:18
  Speaker 1: you will slay them all, said the dog man. Presently,
• 4:41:24
  Speaker 1: I answered, I will slay them all. After certain days
• 4:41:29
  Speaker 1: and certain things have come to pass. Every one of them,
• 4:41:32
  Speaker 1: save those you spare, every one of them shall be slain.
• 4:41:37
  Speaker 1: What the Master wishes to kill, the Master kills, said
• 4:41:43
  Speaker 1: the dog man, with a certain satisfaction in his voice.
• 4:41:48
  Speaker 1: And that their sins may grow, I said. Let them
• 4:41:51
  Speaker 1: live in their folly until their time is ripe. Let
• 4:41:55
  Speaker 1: them not know that I am the master. The master's
• 4:41:59
  Speaker 1: well is sweet, said the dog man, with the ready
• 4:42:04
  Speaker 1: tact of his canine blood. But one has sinned, said
• 4:42:10
  Speaker 1: I him. I will kill whenever I may meet him.
• 4:42:15
  Speaker 1: When I say to you, that is he, see that
• 4:42:18
  Speaker 1: you fall upon him. And now I will go to
• 4:42:22
  Speaker 1: the men and women who are assembled together for a moment.
• 4:42:26
  Speaker 1: The opening of the hut was blackened by the exit
• 4:42:29
  Speaker 1: of the dog man. Then I followed and stood up
• 4:42:33
  Speaker 1: almost in the exact spot where I had been when
• 4:42:35
  Speaker 1: I had heard Moreau and his staghound pursuing me. But
• 4:42:40
  Speaker 1: now it was night, and all the me as mattack
• 4:42:43
  Speaker 1: ravine about me was black, and beyond instead of a green,
• 4:42:47
  Speaker 1: sunlit slope, I saw a red fire, before which hunched
• 4:42:51
  Speaker 1: grotesque figures moved to and fro Farther were the thick trees,
• 4:42:57
  Speaker 1: a bank of darkness fringed above with the black leg
• 4:43:00
  Speaker 1: of the upper branches. The moon was just riding up
• 4:43:03
  Speaker 1: on the edge of the ravine, and like a bar
• 4:43:06
  Speaker 1: across its face drove the spire of vapor that was
• 4:43:09
  Speaker 1: forever streaming from the fumeroles of the island. Walk by me,
• 4:43:15
  Speaker 1: said I, nerving myself, and side by side, we walked
• 4:43:18
  Speaker 1: down the narrow way, taking little heed of the dim
• 4:43:22
  Speaker 1: things that peered at us out of the huts. None
• 4:43:26
  Speaker 1: about the fire attempted to salute me. Most of them
• 4:43:29
  Speaker 1: disregarded me ostentatiously. I looked round for the hyena swine,
• 4:43:34
  Speaker 1: but he was not there. Altogether, perhaps twenty of the
• 4:43:38
  Speaker 1: beast folks squatted, staring into the fire or talking to
• 4:43:42
  Speaker 1: one another. He is dead. He is dead. The master
• 4:43:48
  Speaker 1: is dead, said the voice of the ape man to
• 4:43:51
  Speaker 1: the right. Of me, the house of pain. There is
• 4:43:57
  Speaker 1: no house of pain. He is not dead, said I,
• 4:44:02
  Speaker 1: in a loud voice. Even now he watches us. This
• 4:44:07
  Speaker 1: startled them. Twenty pairs of eyes regarded me. The house
• 4:44:12
  Speaker 1: of pain is gone, said I. It will come again,
• 4:44:17
  Speaker 1: the Master. You cannot see yet, even now he listens
• 4:44:20
  Speaker 1: among you. True, true, said the dog man. They were
• 4:44:27
  Speaker 1: staggered at my assurance. An animal may be ferocious and
• 4:44:32
  Speaker 1: cunning enough, but it takes a real man to tell
• 4:44:35
  Speaker 1: a lie. The man with the bandaged arm speaks a
• 4:44:40
  Speaker 1: strange thing, said one of the beast folk. I tell
• 4:44:45
  Speaker 1: you it is so, I said the Master, and the
• 4:44:49
  Speaker 1: house of pain will come back again. Woe be to
• 4:44:52
  Speaker 1: him who breaks the law. They look curiously at one another,
• 4:44:58
  Speaker 1: with an affectation of indifference. I began to chop idly
• 4:45:01
  Speaker 1: at the ground in front of me with my hatchet.
• 4:45:04
  Speaker 1: They looked. I noticed at the deep cuts I made
• 4:45:07
  Speaker 1: in the turf. Then the satyr raised a doubt, I
• 4:45:12
  Speaker 1: answered him. Then one of the dapple things objected. An
• 4:45:15
  Speaker 1: an animated discussion sprang up round the fire. Every moment
• 4:45:20
  Speaker 1: I began to feel more convinced of my present security.
• 4:45:24
  Speaker 1: I talked now without the catching in my breath due
• 4:45:26
  Speaker 1: to the intensity of my excitement that had troubled me
• 4:45:29
  Speaker 1: at first. In the course of about an hour, I
• 4:45:32
  Speaker 1: had really convinced several of the beast folk of the
• 4:45:35
  Speaker 1: truth of my assertions, and talked most of the others
• 4:45:38
  Speaker 1: into a dubious state. I kept a sharp eye for
• 4:45:42
  Speaker 1: my enemy, the hyena swine, but he never appeared. Every
• 4:45:47
  Speaker 1: now and then a suspicious movement would startle me, but
• 4:45:50
  Speaker 1: my confidence grew rapidly. Then, as the moon crept down
• 4:45:54
  Speaker 1: from the zenith, one by one the listeners began to yawn,
• 4:45:59
  Speaker 1: showing the art less teeth in the light of the
• 4:46:01
  Speaker 1: sinking fire, and first one and then another retired towards
• 4:46:06
  Speaker 1: the dins in the ravine, and I, dreading the silence
• 4:46:10
  Speaker 1: and darkness, went with them, knowing it was safer with
• 4:46:14
  Speaker 1: several of them than with one alone. In this manner
• 4:46:18
  Speaker 1: began the longer part of my sojourn upon the island
• 4:46:21
  Speaker 1: of Doctor Moreau. But from that night until the end came,
• 4:46:26
  Speaker 1: there was but one thing happened to tell, save a
• 4:46:29
  Speaker 1: series of innumerable small, unpleasant details, and the fretting of
• 4:46:32
  Speaker 1: an incessant uneasiness, so that I prefer to make no
• 4:46:36
  Speaker 1: chronicle for that gap of time, to tell only one
• 4:46:39
  Speaker 1: cardinal incident of the ten months I spent as an
• 4:46:42
  Speaker 1: intimate of these half humanized brutes. There is much that
• 4:46:46
  Speaker 1: sticks in my memory that I could write, things that
• 4:46:49
  Speaker 1: I would cheerfully give my right hand to forget, but
• 4:46:53
  Speaker 1: they do not help the telling of the story. In
• 4:46:58
  Speaker 1: the retrospect, it is strange to remember how soon I
• 4:47:01
  Speaker 1: fell in with these monsters ways and gained my confidence again.
• 4:47:06
  Speaker 1: I had my quarrels with them, of course, and could
• 4:47:09
  Speaker 1: show some of their teeth marked still, But they soon
• 4:47:11
  Speaker 1: gained a wholesome respect for my trick of throwing stones
• 4:47:15
  Speaker 1: and for the bite of my hatchet, and my Saint
• 4:47:18
  Speaker 1: Bernard Men's loyalty was of infinite service to me. I
• 4:47:22
  Speaker 1: found their simple scale of honor was based mainly on
• 4:47:25
  Speaker 1: the capacity for inflicting trenchant wounds. Indeed, I may say,
• 4:47:30
  Speaker 1: without vanity, I hope that I held something like pre
• 4:47:33
  Speaker 1: eminence among them, one or two whom, in a rare
• 4:47:38
  Speaker 1: access of high spirits, I had scarred rather badly, bore
• 4:47:42
  Speaker 1: me a grudge, but invented itself chiefly behind my back
• 4:47:46
  Speaker 1: and at a safe distance. From my missiles in grimaces,
• 4:47:51
  Speaker 1: the Hyaena swine avoided me, and I was always on
• 4:47:54
  Speaker 1: the alert for him. My inseparable dog Man hated and
• 4:47:58
  Speaker 1: dreaded him intensely. I really believe that was at the
• 4:48:01
  Speaker 1: root of the brute's attachment to me. It was soon
• 4:48:05
  Speaker 1: evident to me that the former monster had tasted blood
• 4:48:09
  Speaker 1: and gone the way of the leopard man. He formed
• 4:48:12
  Speaker 1: a lair somewhere in the forest and became solitary once.
• 4:48:17
  Speaker 1: I tried to induce the beast folk to hunt him,
• 4:48:20
  Speaker 1: but I lacked the authority to make them co operate
• 4:48:23
  Speaker 1: for one end. Again and again I tried to approach
• 4:48:27
  Speaker 1: his den and come upon him unaware, but always he
• 4:48:31
  Speaker 1: was too acute for me and saw or winded me
• 4:48:34
  Speaker 1: and got away. He too, made every forest pathway dangerous
• 4:48:39
  Speaker 1: to me and my ally with his lurking ambuscards. The
• 4:48:44
  Speaker 1: dog Man scarcely dared to leave my side. In the
• 4:48:49
  Speaker 1: first month or so, the beast folk, compared with their
• 4:48:52
  Speaker 1: latter condition, were human enough, and for one or two
• 4:48:56
  Speaker 1: besides my canine friend, I even conceived a friendly tolerance.
• 4:49:00
  Speaker 1: The little pink sloth creature displayed in odd affection for
• 4:49:03
  Speaker 1: me and took to following me about the monkey man
• 4:49:08
  Speaker 1: bored me. However, he assumed, on the strength of his
• 4:49:11
  Speaker 1: five digits that he was my equal, and was forever
• 4:49:14
  Speaker 1: jabbering at me, jabbering the most errant nonsense. One thing
• 4:49:20
  Speaker 1: about him entertained me a little. He had a fantastic
• 4:49:23
  Speaker 1: trick of coining new words. He had an idea. I
• 4:49:27
  Speaker 1: believe that to gabble about names that meant nothing was
• 4:49:30
  Speaker 1: the proper use of speech. He called it big thinks,
• 4:49:34
  Speaker 1: to distinguish it from little thinks, the sane, every day
• 4:49:38
  Speaker 1: interests of life. If ever I made a remark he
• 4:49:42
  Speaker 1: did not understand, he would praise it very much, ask
• 4:49:46
  Speaker 1: me to say it again, learn it by heart, and
• 4:49:48
  Speaker 1: go off repeating it with a word wrong here or there,
• 4:49:52
  Speaker 1: to all the milder of the beast people. He thought
• 4:49:56
  Speaker 1: nothing of what was plain and comprehensible, in vented some
• 4:50:00
  Speaker 1: very curious big thinks for his especial use. I think
• 4:50:05
  Speaker 1: now he was the silliest creature I had ever met.
• 4:50:08
  Speaker 1: He had developed, in the most wonderful way the distinctive
• 4:50:10
  Speaker 1: silliness of man, without losing one jot of the natural
• 4:50:14
  Speaker 1: folly of a monkey. This, I say was in the
• 4:50:18
  Speaker 1: earlier weeks of my solitude among these brutes. During that time,
• 4:50:23
  Speaker 1: they respected the usage established by the law and behaved
• 4:50:26
  Speaker 1: with general decorum. Once I found another rabbit torn to
• 4:50:30
  Speaker 1: pieces by the hyena swine, I am assured, but that
• 4:50:34
  Speaker 1: was all. It was about May when I first distinctly
• 4:50:38
  Speaker 1: perceived a growing difference in their speech and carriage, a
• 4:50:42
  Speaker 1: growing coarseness of articulation, a growing disinclination to talk by
• 4:50:48
  Speaker 1: monkey man's jabber multiplied in volume, but grew less and
• 4:50:52
  Speaker 1: less comprehensible, more and more simian. Some of the others
• 4:50:57
  Speaker 1: seemed altogether slipping their hold upon some though they still
• 4:51:01
  Speaker 1: understood what I said to them at that time. Can
• 4:51:04
  Speaker 1: you imagine language, once clear cut and exact, softening and guttering,
• 4:51:09
  Speaker 1: losing shape and import becoming mere lumps of sound again?
• 4:51:15
  Speaker 1: And they walked erect with an increasing difficulty, though they
• 4:51:19
  Speaker 1: evidently felt ashamed of themselves. Every now and then I
• 4:51:23
  Speaker 1: would come upon one or another, running on toes and
• 4:51:26
  Speaker 1: finger tips, and quite unable to recover the vertical attitude.
• 4:51:31
  Speaker 1: They held things more clumsily, drinking by suction, feeding by gnawing,
• 4:51:36
  Speaker 1: grew commoner every day. I realized more keenly than ever
• 4:51:40
  Speaker 1: what Moreau had told me about the stubborn beast flesh.
• 4:51:45
  Speaker 1: They were reverting, and reverting very rapidly. Some of them,
• 4:51:51
  Speaker 1: the pioneers in this I noticed with some surprise, were
• 4:51:54
  Speaker 1: all females, began to disregard the injunction of decency deliberately
• 4:51:59
  Speaker 1: for the most part. Others even attempted public outrages. Upon
• 4:52:03
  Speaker 1: the institution of monogamy. The tradition of the law was
• 4:52:07
  Speaker 1: clearly losing its force. I cannot pursue this disagreeable subject.
• 4:52:14
  Speaker 1: My dog man imperceptibly slipped back to the dog again.
• 4:52:18
  Speaker 1: Day by day he became dumb, quadrupedal, hairy. I scarcely
• 4:52:23
  Speaker 1: noticed the transition from the companion on my right hand
• 4:52:26
  Speaker 1: to the lurching dog at my side. As the carelessness
• 4:52:30
  Speaker 1: and disorganization increased from day to day, the lane of
• 4:52:33
  Speaker 1: dwelling places, at no time very sweet, became so loathsome
• 4:52:38
  Speaker 1: that I left it, and, going across the island, made
• 4:52:41
  Speaker 1: myself a hovel of boughs amid the black ruins of
• 4:52:44
  Speaker 1: Moreause enclosure. Some memory of pain I found still made
• 4:52:49
  Speaker 1: that place the safest from the beast folk. It would
• 4:52:54
  Speaker 1: be impossible to detail every step of the lapsing of
• 4:52:57
  Speaker 1: these monsters, to tell how, day by day the human
• 4:53:01
  Speaker 1: semblance left them, how they gave up bandagings and wrappings,
• 4:53:05
  Speaker 1: abandoned at last every stitch of clothing, How the hair
• 4:53:09
  Speaker 1: began to spread over the exposed limbs, how their foreheads
• 4:53:13
  Speaker 1: fell away and their faces projected. How the quasi human
• 4:53:17
  Speaker 1: intimacy I had permitted myself with some of them in
• 4:53:19
  Speaker 1: the first month of my loneliness became a shuddering horror
• 4:53:23
  Speaker 1: to recall. The change was slow and inevitable for them,
• 4:53:30
  Speaker 1: For me, it came without any definite shock. I still
• 4:53:33
  Speaker 1: went among them in safety, because no jolt in the
• 4:53:36
  Speaker 1: downward glide had released the increasing charge of explosive animalism
• 4:53:40
  Speaker 1: that ousted the human day by day. But I began
• 4:53:45
  Speaker 1: to fear that soon now that shock must come. My
• 4:53:51
  Speaker 1: Saint Bernard Brute followed me to the enclosure every night,
• 4:53:54
  Speaker 1: and his vigilance enabled me to sleep at times in
• 4:53:57
  Speaker 1: something like peace. The pink sloth thing became shy and
• 4:54:02
  Speaker 1: left me to crawl back to its natural life once more.
• 4:54:05
  Speaker 1: Among the tree branches. We were in just the state
• 4:54:09
  Speaker 1: of equilibrium that would remain in one of those happy
• 4:54:12
  Speaker 1: family cages which animal tamers exhibit if the tamer were
• 4:54:16
  Speaker 1: to leave it forever. Of course, these creatures did not
• 4:54:20
  Speaker 1: decline into such beasts as the reader has seen in
• 4:54:23
  Speaker 1: zoological gardens, into ordinary bears, wolves, tigers, oxen, swine, and apes.
• 4:54:31
  Speaker 1: There was still something strange about each. In each Moreau
• 4:54:35
  Speaker 1: had blended this animal with that. One perhaps was ersine chiefly,
• 4:54:41
  Speaker 1: another feline chiefly, another bovine chiefly, But each was tainted
• 4:54:46
  Speaker 1: with other creatures, a kind of generalized animalism appearing through
• 4:54:51
  Speaker 1: the specific dispositions and the dwindling shreds of the humanity,
• 4:54:56
  Speaker 1: still startled me every now and then, a moment, momentary
• 4:55:00
  Speaker 1: recrudescence of speech, perhaps an unexpected dexterity of the forefoot,
• 4:55:05
  Speaker 1: a pitiful attempt to walk erect. I too must have
• 4:55:10
  Speaker 1: undergone strange changes. My clothes hung about me as yellow rags,
• 4:55:15
  Speaker 1: through whose rents showed the tanned skin. My hair grew
• 4:55:19
  Speaker 1: long and became matted together. I am told that even
• 4:55:24
  Speaker 1: now my eyes have a strange brightness, a swift alertness
• 4:55:27
  Speaker 1: of movement. At first, I spent the daylight hours on
• 4:55:32
  Speaker 1: the southward beach, watching for a ship, Hoping and praying
• 4:55:36
  Speaker 1: for a ship. I counted on the Ipaquana returning as
• 4:55:41
  Speaker 1: the year wore on, but she never came. Five times
• 4:55:46
  Speaker 1: I saw sails, and thrice smoke, but nothing ever touched
• 4:55:50
  Speaker 1: the island. I always had a bonfire ready, but no
• 4:55:55
  Speaker 1: doubt the volcanic reputation of the island was taken to
• 4:55:57
  Speaker 1: account for that. It was only about September or October
• 4:56:03
  Speaker 1: that I began to think of making a raft. By
• 4:56:06
  Speaker 1: that time my arm had healed and both hands were
• 4:56:08
  Speaker 1: at my service again. At first I found my helplessness appalling.
• 4:56:14
  Speaker 1: I had never done any carpentry or such like work
• 4:56:17
  Speaker 1: in my life, and I spent day after day in
• 4:56:20
  Speaker 1: experimental chopping and binding among the trees. I had no
• 4:56:25
  Speaker 1: ropes and could hit on nothing wherewith to make ropes.
• 4:56:29
  Speaker 1: None of the abundant creepers seemed limber or strong enough,
• 4:56:33
  Speaker 1: and with all my litter of scientific education, I could
• 4:56:36
  Speaker 1: not devise any way of making them. So I spent
• 4:56:40
  Speaker 1: more than a fortnight grubbing among the black ruins of
• 4:56:43
  Speaker 1: the enclosure and on the beach where the boats had
• 4:56:45
  Speaker 1: been burnt, looking for nails and other stray pieces of
• 4:56:49
  Speaker 1: metal that might prove of service. Now and then some
• 4:56:53
  Speaker 1: beast creature would watch me and go leaping off when
• 4:56:55
  Speaker 1: I called to it. There came a season of thunderstorm
• 4:57:00
  Speaker 1: and heavy rain, which greatly retarded my work. But at
• 4:57:04
  Speaker 1: last the raft was completed. I was delighted with it,
• 4:57:10
  Speaker 1: but with a certain lack of practical sense, which has
• 4:57:12
  Speaker 1: always been my bane. I had made it a mile
• 4:57:16
  Speaker 1: or more from the sea, and before I had dragged
• 4:57:19
  Speaker 1: it down to the beach, the thing had fallen to pieces.
• 4:57:23
  Speaker 1: Perhaps it is as well that I was saved from
• 4:57:26
  Speaker 1: launching it, But at the time my misery at my
• 4:57:29
  Speaker 1: failure was so acute that for some days I simply
• 4:57:32
  Speaker 1: moped on the beach and stared at the water and
• 4:57:35
  Speaker 1: thought of death. I did not, however, mean to die,
• 4:57:40
  Speaker 1: and an incident occurred that warn me unmistakably of the
• 4:57:43
  Speaker 1: folly of letting the days pass, so, for each fresh
• 4:57:47
  Speaker 1: day was fraught with increasing danger from the beast people.
• 4:57:51
  Speaker 1: I was lying in the shade of the enclosure wall,
• 4:57:54
  Speaker 1: staring out to sea, when I was startled by something
• 4:57:57
  Speaker 1: cold touching the skin of my heel, and stopped round.
• 4:58:00
  Speaker 1: Found the little pink sloth creature blinking into my face.
• 4:58:05
  Speaker 1: He had long since lost speech an active movement, and
• 4:58:08
  Speaker 1: the lank hair of the little brute grew thicker every day,
• 4:58:12
  Speaker 1: and his stumpy claws more askew. He made a moaning noise.
• 4:58:16
  Speaker 1: When he saw he had attracted my attention, went a
• 4:58:19
  Speaker 1: little way towards the bushes and looked back at me.
• 4:58:24
  Speaker 1: At first I did not understand, but presently it occurred
• 4:58:27
  Speaker 1: to me that he wished me to follow him, and
• 4:58:30
  Speaker 1: this I did at last, slowly, for the day was hot.
• 4:58:36
  Speaker 1: When we reached the trees, he clambered into them, for
• 4:58:39
  Speaker 1: he could travel better among their swinging creepers than on
• 4:58:42
  Speaker 1: the ground. And suddenly, in a trampled space, I came
• 4:58:46
  Speaker 1: upon a ghostly group. My Saint Bernard creature lay on
• 4:58:49
  Speaker 1: the ground, dead, and near his body crouched the hyena swine,
• 4:58:54
  Speaker 1: gripping the quivering flesh with its misshapen claws, gnawing at
• 4:58:58
  Speaker 1: it and snarling with delight. As I approached, the monster
• 4:59:03
  Speaker 1: lifted its glaring eyes to mine. Its lips went trembling
• 4:59:07
  Speaker 1: back from its red stained teeth, and it growled menacingly.
• 4:59:12
  Speaker 1: It was not afraid and not ashamed, The last vestige
• 4:59:16
  Speaker 1: of the human taint had vanished. I advanced a step farther, stopped,
• 4:59:21
  Speaker 1: and pulled out my revolver. At last, I had him
• 4:59:25
  Speaker 1: face to face. The brute made no sign of retreat,
• 4:59:30
  Speaker 1: but its ears went back, its hair bristled, and its
• 4:59:33
  Speaker 1: body crouched together. I aimed between the eyes and fired.
• 4:59:39
  Speaker 1: As I did so, the thing rose straight at me
• 4:59:41
  Speaker 1: in a leap, and I was knocked over like a
• 4:59:43
  Speaker 1: nine pin. It clutched at me with its crippled hand
• 4:59:47
  Speaker 1: and struck me in the face. Its spring carried it
• 4:59:51
  Speaker 1: over me. I fell under the hind part of its body,
• 4:59:55
  Speaker 1: but luckily I had hit as I meant, and it
• 4:59:58
  Speaker 1: had died even as it leapt. I crawled out from
• 5:00:02
  Speaker 1: under its unclean weight and stood up, trembling, staring at
• 5:00:06
  Speaker 1: its quivering body. That danger, at least was over. But this,
• 5:00:12
  Speaker 1: I knew was only the first of the series of
• 5:00:15
  Speaker 1: relapses that must come. I burnt both of the bodies
• 5:00:20
  Speaker 1: on a pyre of brushwood. But after that I saw
• 5:00:23
  Speaker 1: that unless I left the island, my death was only
• 5:00:26
  Speaker 1: a question of time. The beast people by that time had,
• 5:00:31
  Speaker 1: with one or two exceptions, left the ravine and made
• 5:00:34
  Speaker 1: themselves layers. According to their taste. Among the thickets of
• 5:00:38
  Speaker 1: the island. Few prowled. By day, most of them slept,
• 5:00:42
  Speaker 1: and the island might have seemed deserted to a newcomer.
• 5:00:46
  Speaker 1: But at night the air was hideous with their calls
• 5:00:49
  Speaker 1: and howling. I had half a mind to make a
• 5:00:53
  Speaker 1: massacre of them, to build traps, or fight them with
• 5:00:56
  Speaker 1: my knife. Had I possessed sufficient cartridge, I should not
• 5:01:01
  Speaker 1: have hesitated to begin the killing. There can now be
• 5:01:04
  Speaker 1: scarcely a score left of the dangerous carnivores. The braver
• 5:01:08
  Speaker 1: of these were already dead. After the death of this
• 5:01:12
  Speaker 1: poor dog of mine, my last friend, I too adopted
• 5:01:17
  Speaker 1: to some extent the practice of slumbering in the daytime.
• 5:01:20
  Speaker 1: In order to be on my guard at night. I
• 5:01:23
  Speaker 1: rebuilt my den in the walls of the enclosure, with
• 5:01:27
  Speaker 1: such a narrow opening that anything attempting to enter must
• 5:01:30
  Speaker 1: necessarily make a considerable noise. The creature had lost the
• 5:01:35
  Speaker 1: art of fire, too, and recovered their fear of it.
• 5:01:40
  Speaker 1: I turned once more, almost passionately, now to hammering together
• 5:01:44
  Speaker 1: stakes and branches to form a raft for my escape.
• 5:01:50
  Speaker 1: I found a thousand difficulties. I am an extremely unhandy man.
• 5:01:54
  Speaker 1: My schooling was over before the days of sliod, but
• 5:01:59
  Speaker 1: most of the require a raft. I met at last
• 5:02:01
  Speaker 1: in some clumsy, circuitous way or another, and this time
• 5:02:05
  Speaker 1: I took care of the strength. The only insurmountable obstacle
• 5:02:10
  Speaker 1: was that I had no vessel to contain the water
• 5:02:12
  Speaker 1: I should need if I floated forth upon these untraveled seas.
• 5:02:17
  Speaker 1: I would have even tried pottery, but the island contained
• 5:02:20
  Speaker 1: no clay. I used to go moping about the island,
• 5:02:24
  Speaker 1: trying with all my might to solve this one last difficulty.
• 5:02:29
  Speaker 1: Sometimes I would give way to wild outbursts of rage,
• 5:02:32
  Speaker 1: and hack and splinter some unlucky tree in my intolerable vexation.
• 5:02:37
  Speaker 1: But I could think of nothing. And then came a day,
• 5:02:41
  Speaker 1: a wonderful day, which I spent in ecstasy. I saw
• 5:02:46
  Speaker 1: a sail to the southwest, a small sail like that
• 5:02:49
  Speaker 1: of a little schooner, and forthwith I lit a great
• 5:02:52
  Speaker 1: pile of brushwood, and stood by it in the heat
• 5:02:54
  Speaker 1: of it and the heat of the midday sun, watching
• 5:02:58
  Speaker 1: all day. I watched that sail, eating or drinking nothing,
• 5:03:02
  Speaker 1: so that my head reeled, and the beasts came and
• 5:03:05
  Speaker 1: glared at me, and seemed to wonder and went away.
• 5:03:10
  Speaker 1: It was still distant when night came and swallowed it up.
• 5:03:14
  Speaker 1: And all night I toiled to keep my blaze bright
• 5:03:17
  Speaker 1: and high, and the eyes of the beasts shone out
• 5:03:20
  Speaker 1: of the darkness, marveling in the dawn. The sail was nearer,
• 5:03:25
  Speaker 1: and I saw it was the dirty lug sail of
• 5:03:27
  Speaker 1: a small boat, but it sailed strangely. My eyes were
• 5:03:33
  Speaker 1: weary with watching, and I peered and could not believe them.
• 5:03:38
  Speaker 1: Two men were in the boat, sitting low down, one
• 5:03:41
  Speaker 1: by the boughs, the other at the rudder. The head
• 5:03:44
  Speaker 1: was not kept in the wind. It yarred and fell away.
• 5:03:48
  Speaker 1: As the day grew brighter, I began waving the last
• 5:03:51
  Speaker 1: rag of my jacket to them, but they did not
• 5:03:54
  Speaker 1: notice me, and sat still facing each other. I went
• 5:03:59
  Speaker 1: to the lowest point of the low headland and gesticulated
• 5:04:02
  Speaker 1: and shouted. There was no response, and the boat kept
• 5:04:06
  Speaker 1: on her aimless course, making slowly, very slowly for the bay. Suddenly,
• 5:04:13
  Speaker 1: a great white bird flew up out of the boat,
• 5:04:15
  Speaker 1: and neither of the men stirred or noticed it. It
• 5:04:18
  Speaker 1: circled round and then came sweeping overhead with its strong
• 5:04:22
  Speaker 1: wings outspread. Then I stopped shouting and sat down on
• 5:04:27
  Speaker 1: the headland and rested my chin on my hands and
• 5:04:29
  Speaker 1: stared slowly, slowly, the boat drove past towards the west.
• 5:04:37
  Speaker 1: I would have swum out to it, but something, a cold,
• 5:04:41
  Speaker 1: vague fear, kept me back. In the afternoon, the tide
• 5:04:45
  Speaker 1: stranded the boat and lefted a hundred yards or so
• 5:04:48
  Speaker 1: to the westward of the ruins of the enclosure. The
• 5:04:52
  Speaker 1: men in it were dead, had been dead so long
• 5:04:56
  Speaker 1: that they fell to pieces when I tilted the boat
• 5:04:59
  Speaker 1: on its side and dragged them out. One had a
• 5:05:02
  Speaker 1: shock of red hair like the captain of the Ipaquana,
• 5:05:06
  Speaker 1: and a dirty white cap lay in the bottom of
• 5:05:08
  Speaker 1: the boat. As I stood beside the boat, three of
• 5:05:12
  Speaker 1: the beasts came slinking out of the bushes and sniffing
• 5:05:15
  Speaker 1: towards me. One of my spasms of disgust came upon me.
• 5:05:20
  Speaker 1: I thrust the little boat down the beach and clambered
• 5:05:23
  Speaker 1: on board her. Two of the brutes were wolfed beasts,
• 5:05:27
  Speaker 1: and came forward with quivering nostrils and glittering eyes. The
• 5:05:31
  Speaker 1: third was the horrible nondescript of bear and bull. When
• 5:05:36
  Speaker 1: I saw them approaching those wretched remains, heard them snarling
• 5:05:40
  Speaker 1: at one another, and caught the gleam of their teeth.
• 5:05:43
  Speaker 1: A frantic horror succeeded my repulsion. I turned my back
• 5:05:47
  Speaker 1: upon them, struck the lug, and began paddling out to sea.
• 5:05:52
  Speaker 1: I could not bring myself to look behind me. I lay, however,
• 5:05:57
  Speaker 1: between the reef and the island. That night, and the
• 5:06:00
  Speaker 1: next morning went round to the stream and filled the
• 5:06:03
  Speaker 1: empty keg aboard with water. Then, with such patience as
• 5:06:08
  Speaker 1: I could command, I collected a quantity of fruit and
• 5:06:12
  Speaker 1: waylaid and killed two rabbits with my last three cartridges.
• 5:06:17
  Speaker 1: While I was doing this, I left the boat moored
• 5:06:20
  Speaker 1: to an inward projection of the reef, for fear of
• 5:06:23
  Speaker 1: the beast people. Twenty two the man alone. In the evening,
• 5:06:32
  Speaker 1: I started and drove out to the sea before a
• 5:06:34
  Speaker 1: gentle wind from the southeast, slowly steadily, and the island
• 5:06:39
  Speaker 1: grew smaller and smaller, and the lank spire of smoke
• 5:06:44
  Speaker 1: dwindled to a finer and finer line. Against the hot sunset,
• 5:06:48
  Speaker 1: the ocean rose up around me, hiding that low dark
• 5:06:52
  Speaker 1: patch from my eyes. The daylight, the trailing glory of
• 5:06:56
  Speaker 1: the sun went streaming out of the sky, was drawn
• 5:07:01
  Speaker 1: aside like some luminous curtain. And at last I looked
• 5:07:04
  Speaker 1: into the blue gulf of immensity which the sunshine hides,
• 5:07:07
  Speaker 1: and saw the floating hosts of the stars. The sea
• 5:07:11
  Speaker 1: was silent, the sky was silent. I was alone with
• 5:07:16
  Speaker 1: the night and silence. So I drifted for three days,
• 5:07:21
  Speaker 1: eating and drinking sparingly, and meditating upon all that had
• 5:07:25
  Speaker 1: happened to me, not desiring very greatly then to see
• 5:07:29
  Speaker 1: men again. One unclean rag was about me, my hair
• 5:07:34
  Speaker 1: a black tangle. No doubt, my discoverers thought me a madman.
• 5:07:39
  Speaker 1: It is strange, but I felt no desire to return
• 5:07:43
  Speaker 1: to mankind. I was only glad to be quit of
• 5:07:47
  Speaker 1: the foulness of the beast people. And on the third
• 5:07:51
  Speaker 1: day I was picked up by a brig from Apia
• 5:07:53
  Speaker 1: to San Francisco. Neither the captain nor the mate would
• 5:07:57
  Speaker 1: believe my story. Judging that solid dude in danger had
• 5:08:01
  Speaker 1: made me mad, and fearing their opinion might be that
• 5:08:04
  Speaker 1: of others, I refrained from telling my adventure further, and
• 5:08:08
  Speaker 1: professed to recall nothing that had happened to me between
• 5:08:11
  Speaker 1: the loss of the Lady Vain and the time when
• 5:08:14
  Speaker 1: I was picked up again the space of a year,
• 5:08:19
  Speaker 1: I had to act with the utmost circumspection to save
• 5:08:21
  Speaker 1: myself from the suspicion of insanity. My memory of the
• 5:08:26
  Speaker 1: law of the two dead sailors, of the amuse cards,
• 5:08:29
  Speaker 1: of the darkness of the body in the canebrake haunted me,
• 5:08:33
  Speaker 1: and unnatural, as it seems, with my return to mankind
• 5:08:37
  Speaker 1: came instead of that confidence and sympathy I had expected,
• 5:08:42
  Speaker 1: a strange enhancement of the uncertainty and dread I had
• 5:08:45
  Speaker 1: experienced during my stay upon the island. No one would
• 5:08:50
  Speaker 1: believe me I was almost as queer to men as
• 5:08:54
  Speaker 1: I had been to the beast people. I may have
• 5:08:57
  Speaker 1: caught something of the natural wildness of my companions. They
• 5:09:01
  Speaker 1: say that terror is a disease, and anyhow I can
• 5:09:05
  Speaker 1: witness that for several years now a restless fear has
• 5:09:08
  Speaker 1: dwelt in my mind, such a restless fear as a
• 5:09:12
  Speaker 1: half tamed lion cub may feel. My trouble took the
• 5:09:17
  Speaker 1: strangest form. I could not persuade myself that the men
• 5:09:21
  Speaker 1: and women I met were not also another beast people,
• 5:09:24
  Speaker 1: animals half wrought into the outward image of human souls,
• 5:09:28
  Speaker 1: and that they would presently begin to revert to show
• 5:09:32
  Speaker 1: first this bestial mark and then that. But I have
• 5:09:36
  Speaker 1: confided my case to a strangely able man, a man
• 5:09:40
  Speaker 1: who had known Moreau and had seemed half to credit
• 5:09:43
  Speaker 1: my story, a mental specialist, and he has helped me mightily.
• 5:09:48
  Speaker 1: Though I do not expect that the terror of that
• 5:09:50
  Speaker 1: island will ever altogether leave me. At most times it
• 5:09:55
  Speaker 1: lies far in the back of my mind, a mere
• 5:09:58
  Speaker 1: distant cloud her memory, and a faint distrust. But there
• 5:10:03
  Speaker 1: are times when the little cloud spreads until it obscures
• 5:10:06
  Speaker 1: the whole sky. Then I look about me at my
• 5:10:10
  Speaker 1: fellow men, and I go and fear. I see faces
• 5:10:14
  Speaker 1: keen and bright, others dull or dangerous, others, unsteady, insincere,
• 5:10:20
  Speaker 1: none that have the calm authority of a reasonable soul.
• 5:10:24
  Speaker 1: I feel as though the animal were surging up through them,
• 5:10:28
  Speaker 1: that presently the degradation of the islanders will be played
• 5:10:31
  Speaker 1: over again on a larger scale. I know this is
• 5:10:35
  Speaker 1: an illusion, that these seeming men and women about me
• 5:10:38
  Speaker 1: are indeed men and women, men and women, forever perfectly
• 5:10:44
  Speaker 1: reasonable creatures, full of human desires and tender solicitude, emancipated
• 5:10:49
  Speaker 1: from instinct, and the slaves of no fantastic law. Being
• 5:10:53
  Speaker 1: altogether different from the beast folk. Yet I shrink from them,
• 5:10:59
  Speaker 1: from their cute, curious glances, their inquiries and assistants, and
• 5:11:04
  Speaker 1: long to be away from them and alone. For that reason,
• 5:11:10
  Speaker 1: I live near the broad, free Downland, and can escape
• 5:11:14
  Speaker 1: thither when this shadow is over my soul. And very
• 5:11:17
  Speaker 1: sweet is the empty downland, then under the wind swept sky.
• 5:11:23
  Speaker 1: When I lived in London, the horror was well nigh insupportable.
• 5:11:27
  Speaker 1: I could not get away from men. Their voices came
• 5:11:30
  Speaker 1: through windows, locked doors were flimsy safeguards. I would go
• 5:11:34
  Speaker 1: out into the streets to fight with my delusion, and
• 5:11:37
  Speaker 1: powling women would mew after me. Furtive craving men glanced
• 5:11:42
  Speaker 1: jealously at me. Weary pale workers go coughing by me
• 5:11:46
  Speaker 1: with tired eyes and eager paces like wounded deer, dripping blood.
• 5:11:52
  Speaker 1: Old people bent and dull past murmuring to themselves, and
• 5:11:58
  Speaker 1: all unheeding a ragged tale of gibing children. Then I
• 5:12:03
  Speaker 1: would turn aside into some chapel, and even there, such
• 5:12:06
  Speaker 1: was my disturbance. It seemed that the preacher gibbered big thinks,
• 5:12:11
  Speaker 1: even as the ape man had done, or into some library,
• 5:12:15
  Speaker 1: and there the intent faces over the books seemed but
• 5:12:18
  Speaker 1: patient creatures waiting for prey. Particularly nauseous were the blank,
• 5:12:24
  Speaker 1: expressionless faces of people in trains and omnibuses. They seemed
• 5:12:29
  Speaker 1: no more my fellow creatures than dead bodies would be.
• 5:12:33
  Speaker 1: So that I did not dare to travel unless I
• 5:12:35
  Speaker 1: was assured of being alone and deeming. It seemed that
• 5:12:39
  Speaker 1: I too was not a reasonable creature, but only an
• 5:12:42
  Speaker 1: animal tormented with some strange disorder in its brain, which
• 5:12:46
  Speaker 1: sent it to wander alone, like a sheep stricken with gid.
• 5:12:52
  Speaker 1: This is a mood, however, that comes to me now,
• 5:12:55
  Speaker 1: I thank God more rarely I have withdrawn myself from
• 5:12:59
  Speaker 1: the fusion of cities and multitudes, and spent my days
• 5:13:03
  Speaker 1: surrounded by wise books, bright windows. In this life of ours,
• 5:13:07
  Speaker 1: lit by the shining souls of men, I see few strangers,
• 5:13:13
  Speaker 1: and have but a small household. My days I devote
• 5:13:17
  Speaker 1: to reading and to experiments in chemistry, and I spend
• 5:13:20
  Speaker 1: many of the clear nights in the study of astronomy.
• 5:13:24
  Speaker 1: There is, though I do not know how there is
• 5:13:28
  Speaker 1: or why, there is a sense of peace and protection
• 5:13:31
  Speaker 1: in the glittering hosts of heaven. There it must be.
• 5:13:35
  Speaker 1: I think, in the past and eternal laws of matter,
• 5:13:39
  Speaker 1: and not in the daily cares and sins and troubles
• 5:13:42
  Speaker 1: of men, that whatever is more than animal within us
• 5:13:45
  Speaker 1: must find its solace and its hope. I hope, or
• 5:13:50
  Speaker 1: I could not live. And so in hope and solitude
• 5:13:56
  Speaker 1: my story ends. Edward. Note the substance of the chapter
• 5:14:05
  Speaker 1: entitled Doctor Moreau Explains, which contains the essential idea of
• 5:14:08
  Speaker 1: the story, appeared as a middle article in the Saturday
• 5:14:12
  Speaker 1: Review in January eighteen ninety five. This is the only
• 5:14:15
  Speaker 1: portion of this story that has been previously published, and
• 5:14:18
  Speaker 1: it has been entirely recast to adapt it to the
• 5:14:21
  Speaker 1: narrative form. End of the Island of Doctor Moreau by H. G.
• 5:14:26
  Speaker 1: Wells