Re-reading this pre-Lovecraft Renaissance classic of its kind. :)
“An old religious tract. Pastor Newgate Phillips, I think. Read it as a boy. How does it go again?”
He tried to remember. He licked his lips. He did remember.
” ‘For some, autumn comes early, stays late through life where
October follows September and November touches October and then instead
of December and Christ’s birth, there is no Bethlehem Star, no
rejoicing, but September comes again and old October and so on down the
years, with no winter, spring, or revivifying summer. For these beings,
fall is the ever normal season, the only weather, there be no choice
beyond. Where do they come from? The dust. Where do they go? The grave.
Does blood stir in their veins? No: the night wind. What ticks in their
head? The worm. What speaks from their mouth? The toad. What sees from
their eye? The snake. What hears with their ear? The abyss between the
stars. They sift the human storm for souls, eat flesh of reason, fill
tombs with sinners. They frenzy forth. In gusts they beetle-scurry,
creep, thread, filter, motions, make all moons sullen, and surely cloud
all clear-run waters. The spider-web hears them, trembles — breaks.
Such
are the autumn people. Beware of them.’ ”
