Page:Erewhon-1872-003.djvu/24

exceeded all conceivable limits of the hideous. His mouth extended almost from ear to ear, his teeth grinning horribly; his eyes glared, though they remained quite fixed, and his forehead was contracted with a most malevolent scowl.

I am afraid that my description will have conveyed only the ridiculous side of his appearance; but the ridiculous and the sublime are near, and the grotesque fiendishness of Chowbok’s face approached this last, if it did not reach it. I tried to be amused, but I felt a sort of creeping at the roots of my hair and over my whole body, as I looked and wondered what he could be possibly intending to signify. He continued thus for about a minute, sitting bolt upright, as stiff as a stone, and making this fearful face. Then there came from his lips a low moaning like the wind rising and falling, by infinitely small gradations, till it became almost a shriek, from which it descended and died away; after that, he jumped down from the bale, and held up the extended fingers of both his hands, as one who should say “ten,” though I did not then understand him.

For myself I was open-mouthed with astonishment. Chowbok rolled the bales rapidly into their place, and stood before me shuddering as in great fear; horror was written upon his face—this time quite involuntarily—as though the natural panic of one who had committed an awful crime against unknown and superhuman agencies. He nodded his head and gibbered, and pointed repeatedly to the mountains. He would not touch the grog, but, after a few seconds, he made a run through the wool-shed door into the moonlight; nor did he reappear till next day at dinner-time, when