Page:Richard Marsh--The joss, a reversion.djvu/257

Rh large crowds. Though I could not guess in which direction it might be. Columns rose on every hand. I had a notion that they were of varied colours; covered with painted carvings. But whether they were of wood, stone, or metal I could not say. Their number added an extra touch of bewilderment. One gazed through serried lines and lines of columns which seemed to bridge the gathering shadows with the outer darkness which was beyond.

Until our guide moved more towards the centre of the building, with us at her heels, I did not understand where the light which illumined the place came from. It proceeded from what I suppose was the altar. The high altar. A queer one it was. And imposing to boot. Anyhow, seen in that half light, with us coming on it unprepared, and not expecting anything of the kind, it was imposing, and something more. I don’t mind owning that I had a queer feeling about my back. Just as if someone had squeezed an unexpected drop of water out of a sponge, and it was going trickling down my spine.

There was some fascinating representations of what one could only trust were not common objects of the seashore. These were of all sizes. Some several times as large as life, and, one fervently hoped, a hundred times less natural. They stood for originals which, so far as my knowledge of physiology goes, are to be found neither in the sea, or under it; on the earth, or over it; or anywhere adjacent. The powers be thanked! They were monsters; just that, and would have been excellent items in a raving madman’s ideal freak museum. Anywhere else they were out of place. There was one sweet creature which particularly struck my fancy. It was some fourteen or fifteen feet high, and was about all mouth. Its mouth was pretty wide open. It would have made nothing of swallowing a Jonah. And was fitted with a set of teeth which were just the thing to scrunch his bones.