A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder James De Mille

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thought that it was to be so short-lived. It was enough at that moment
that we saw one another--enough that we were in one another's arms;
and so we mingled our tears, and shared one common rapture. And sweet
it was--sweet beyond all expression--the sweetest moment in all my
life; for it had come in the midst of the drear desolation of my heart
and the black despair. It was like a flash of lightning in the intense
darkness, short and sudden indeed, yet still intense while it lasted,
and in an instant filling all with its glow.
"I did this," murmured Almah, "to see you and to save you."
"Save me!" I repeated.
"Yes," said she. "I have seen Layelah. She told me that there is this
chance and this one only to save you. I determined to try it. I cannot
bear to think of you at the sacrifice--and for love of me meeting your
death--for I would die to save you, Atam-or."
I pressed her closer in my arms.
"Oh, Almah," said I, "I would die to save you! and if this ceremony
will save you I will go through with it, and accept my fate whatever
it may be."
We were now interrupted.
The women--the hags of horror--the shriek-like ones, as I may call
them, or the fiend-like, the female fiends, the foul ones--they were
all around us; and one there was who looked so exactly like the
nightmare hag of the outer sea that I felt sure she must be the same,
who by some strange chance had come here. Such, indeed, is quite
likely, for there may have been a pass over the mountains to the land
of the Kosekin; and those savage cannibals may all have been honored
Kosekin exiles, dwelling in poverty, want, woe, and darkness, all of
which may have been allotted to them as a reward for eminent virtues.
And so here she was, the nightmare hag, and I saw that she recognized
me.
A circle was now formed around us, and the light stood in the middle.
The nightmare hag also stood within the circle on the other side of
the light opposite us. The beams of the lamp flickered through the