Inside this circle, as well as at regular intervals outside it,
were curious-looking designs, also traced in the same black, smoking
substance. These, too, seemed to emit a feeble light of their own.
"My first impression on entering the room had been that it was full
of--_people_, I was going to say; but that hardly expresses my meaning.
_Beings_, they certainly were, but it was borne in upon me beyond the
possibility of doubt, that they were not human beings. That I had caught
a momentary glimpse of living, intelligent entities I can never doubt,
but I am equally convinced, though I cannot prove it, that these
entities were from some other scheme of evolution altogether, and had
nothing to do with the ordinary human life, either incarnate or
discarnate.
"But, whatever they were, the visible appearance of them was exceedingly
fleeting. I no longer saw anything, though I still felt convinced of
their immediate presence. They were, moreover, of the same order of life
as the visitant in my bedroom of a few nights before, and their
proximity to my atmosphere in numbers, instead of singly as before,
conveyed to my mind something that was quite terrible and overwhelming.
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