- end_line
- 665
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:47:56.335Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 602
- text
- I sat stock still for a time, thoroughly to master, if possible, my
first discomposure. Then rising, I looked pretty steadily at the table;
went up to it pretty steadily; took hold of it pretty steadily; but let
it go pretty quickly; then paced up and down, stopping every moment
or two, with ear pricked to listen. Meantime, within me, the contest
between panic and philosophy remained not wholly decided.
Tick! tick! tick!
With appalling distinctness the ticking now rose on the night.
My pulse fluttered--my heart beat. I hardly know what might not have
followed, had not Democritus just then come to the rescue. For shame,
said I to myself, what is the use of so fine an example of philosophy,
if it cannot be followed? Straightway I resolved to imitate it, even to
the old sage's occupation and attitude.
Resuming my chair and paper, with back presented to the table, I
remained thus for a time, as if buried in study, when, the ticking
still continuing, I drawled out, in as indifferent and dryly jocose a
way as I could; "Come, come, Tick, my boy, fun enough for to-night."
Tick! tick! tick!
There seemed a sort of jeering defiance in the ticking now. It seemed
to exult over the poor affected part I was playing. But much as the
taunt stung me, it only stung me into persistence. I resolved not to
abate one whit in my mode of address.
"Come, come, you make more and more noise, Tick, my boy; too much of a
joke--time to have done."
No sooner said than the ticking ceased. Never was responsive obedience
more exact. For the life of me, I could not help turning round upon the
table, as one would upon some reasonable being, when--could I believe
my senses? I saw something moving, or wriggling, or squirming upon the
slab of the table. It shone like a glow-worm. Unconsciously, I grasped
the poker that stood at hand. But bethinking me how absurd to attack a
glow-worm with a poker, I put it down. How long I sat spellbound and
staring there, with my body presented one way and my face another, I
cannot say; but at length I rose, and, buttoning my coat up and down,
made a sudden intrepid forced march full upon the table. And there,
near the centre of the slab, as I live, I saw an irregular little
hole, or, rather, short nibbled sort of crack, from which (like a
butterfly escaping its chrysalis) the sparkling object, whatever it
might be, was struggling. Its motion was the motion of life. I stood
becharmed. Are there, indeed, spirits, thought I; and is this one?
No; I must be dreaming. I turned my glance off to the red fire on the
hearth, then back to the pale lustre on the table. What I saw was no
optical illusion, but a real marvel. The tremor was increasing, when,
once again, Democritus befriended me. Supernatural coruscation as it
appeared, I strove to look at the strange object in a purely scientific
way. Thus viewed, it appeared some new sort of small shining beetle or
bug, and, I thought, not without something of a hum to it, too.
I still watched it, and with still increasing self-possession.
Sparkling and wriggling, it still continued its throes. In another
moment it was just on the point of escaping its prison. A thought
struck me. Running for a tumbler, I clapped it over the insect just in
time to secure it.
After watching it a while longer under the tumbler, I left all as it
was, and, tolerably composed, retired.
- title
- Chunk 9