During the winter of 1927-28 officials of the Federal government made a
strange and secretDefinition: something that should remain hidden from others (especially information
that is not to be passed on); information known only to a special group; something
that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; not open or public; kept private
or not revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims or methods; not openly made
known; communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to elude detection; hidden from
general view or use; (of information) given in confidence or in secret; indulging
only covertly; having an import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to the
intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next to highest level of official
classification for documents
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
14 investigation of certain conditions in the ancientDefinition: a very old person; a
person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the
historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 Massachusetts seaport of Innsmouth .
The public first learned of it in February, when a vast series of raids and arrests
occurred, followed by the deliberate burning and dynamiting--under suitable
precautions--of an enormous number of crumbling, worm-eaten, and supposedly empty houses
along the abandoned waterfront. Uninquiring soulsDefinition: the immaterial part of a person; the
actuating cause of an individual life; a human being; deep feeling or emotion; the
human embodiment of something; a secular form of gospel that was a major Black
musical genre in the 1960s and 1970s
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 5 let this occurrence pass as one of the major clashes in a spasmodicDefinition: affected
by involuntary jerky muscular contractions; resembling a spasm; occurring in spells
and often abruptly
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 war on
liquorDefinition: an
alcoholic beverage that is distilled rather than fermented; a liquid substance that
is a solution (or emulsion or suspension) used or obtained in an industrial process;
the liquid in which vegetables or meat have be cooked
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3.
Keener news-followers, however, wondered at the prodigiousDefinition: so great in size or
force or extent as to elicit awe; of momentous or ominous significance; far beyond
what is usual in magnitude or degree
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
3 number of arrests, the abnormallyDefinition: in an abnormal manner
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1. slarge force of men used in making
them, and the secrecy surrounding the disposal of the prisoners. No trials, or even
definite charges were reported; nor were any of the captives seen thereafter in the
regular gaols of the nation. There were vague statements about disease and concentration
camps, and later about dispersal in various naval and military prisons, but nothing
positive ever developed. Innsmouth itself was left almost depopulated, and it is even
now only beginning to show signs of a sluggishly revived existence.
Complaints from many liberal organizations were met with long
confidential discussions, and representatives were taken on trips to certain camps and
prisons. As a result, these societies became surprisingly passive and reticentDefinition:
temperamentally disinclined to talk; cool and formal in manner; reluctant to draw
attention to yourself
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3.
Newspaper men were harder to manage, but seemed largely to cooperate with the government
in the end. Only one paper--a tabloid always discounted because of its wild
policy--mentioned the deep diving submarine that discharged torpedoes downward in the
marine abyssDefinition: a
bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or chasm
or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 just beyond Devil Reef. That item, gathered
by chance in a haunt of sailors, seemed indeed rather far-fetched; since the low, black
reef lay a full mile and a half out from Innsmouth Harbour .
People around the country and in the nearby towns muttered a great deal
among themselves, but said very little to the outer world. They had talked about dying
and half-desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a
cause, a country or an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or
army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth for nearly a century, and nothing new could be
wilder or more hideous than what they had whisperedDefinition: speak softly; in a low voice; spoken
in soft hushed tones without vibrations of the vocal cords
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 and hinted at years before. Many things had
taught them secretivenessDefinition: characterized by a lack of openness (especially about one's actions or
purposes); the trait of keeping things secret
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2, and there was no need to exert pressure on them. Besides, they
really knew little; for wide salt marshes, desolateDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; reduce in population; cause extensive destruction or ruin
utterly; providing no shelter or sustenance; crushed by grief
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 and unpeopled, kept neighbors off from
Innsmouth on the landward side.
But at last I am going to defy the ban on speech about this thing.
Results, I am certain, are so thorough that no public harm save a shock of repulsionDefinition: the
force by which bodies repel one another; intense aversion; the act of repulsing or
repelling an attack; a successful defensive stand
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 could ever accrue from a hinting of what was found by
those horrifiedDefinition:
fill with apprehension or alarm; cause to be unpleasantly surprised; stricken with
horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 men at Innsmouth.
Besides, what was found might possibly have more than one explanation. I do not know
just how much of the whole tale has been told even to me, and I have many reasons for
not wishing to probe deeper. For my contact with this affair has been closer than that
of any other layman, and I have carried away impressions which are yet to drive me to
drastic measures.
It was I who fled frantically out of Innsmouth in the early morning
hours of July 16, 1927, and whose frightenedDefinition: cause fear in; drive out by
frightening; made afraid; thrown into a state of intense fear or desperation
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 appeals for government inquiry
and action brought on the whole reported episode. I was willing enough to stay mute
while the affair was fresh and uncertain; but now that it is an old story, with public
interest and curiosity gone, I have an odd craving to whisperDefinition: speaking softly without
vibration of the vocal cords; a light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or
leaves blowing in the wind; speak softly; in a low voice
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 about those few frightfulDefinition: provoking horror;
extreme in degree or extent or amount or impact; extremely distressing
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 hours in that ill-rumored and evillyDefinition: in a
wicked evil manner
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1-shadowedDefinition: follow,
usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by
comparison; filled with shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
4 seaport of death and blasphemousDefinition: grossly irreverent toward what is
held to be sacred; characterized by profanity or cursing
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 2
abyssDefinition: a
bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or chasm
or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2. The mere telling helps me to restore
confidence in my own faculties; to reassure myself that I was not the first to succumb
to a contagious nightmareDefinition: a situation resembling a terrifying dream; a terrifying or deeply
upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
hallucination. It helps me, too, in making up my mind regarding a certain terrible step
which lies ahead of me.
I never heard of Innsmouth till the day before I saw it for the first
and--so far--last time. I was celebrating my coming of age by a tour of New
England--sightseeing, antiquarianDefinition: an expert or collector of antiquities; of or relating to
persons who study or deal in antiques or antiquities; of or relating to antiques or
antiquities
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3, and genealogicalDefinition:
of or relating to genealogy
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets:
1--and had planned to go directly from ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived
in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the historical period
before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 Newburyport to Arkham, whence my mother's family was
derived. I had no car, but was travelling by train, trolley and motor-coach, always
seeking the cheapest possible route. In Newburyport they told me that the steam train
was the thing to take to Arkham; and it was only at the station ticket-office, when I
demurredDefinition: take
exception to; enter a demurrer
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
2 at the high fare, that I learned about Innsmouth. The stout, shrewd-faced
agent, whose speech shewed him to be no local man, seemed sympathetic toward my efforts
at economy, and made a suggestion that none of my other informants had offered.
"You could take that old bus, I suppose," he said with a certain hesitation, "but it ain't thought much of hereabouts. It goes through Innsmouth--you may have heard about that--and so the people don't like it. Run by an Innsmouth fellow--Joe Sargent--but never gets any custom from here, or Arkham either, I guess. Wonder it keeps running at all. I s'pose it's cheap enough, but I never see mor'n two or three people in it--nobody but those Innsmouth folk. Leaves the square--front of Hammond's Drug Store--at 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. unless they've changed lately. Looks like a terrible rattletrap--I've never been on it."
That was the first I ever heard of shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's
knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled with
shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth. Any
reference to a town not shown on common maps or listed in recent guidebooks would have
interested me, and the agent's odd manner of allusion roused something like real
curiosity. A town able to inspire such dislike in it its neighbors, I thought, must be
at least rather unusual, and worthy of a tourist's attention. If it came before Arkham I
would stop off there and so I asked the agent to tell me something about it. He was very
deliberate, and spoke with an air of feeling slightly superior to what he said.
" Innsmouth? Well, it's a queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual
man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous,
disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or
expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 kind of a town down at the mouth of the Manuxet. Used to
be almost a city--quite a port before the War of 1812--but all gone to pieces in the
last hundred years or so. No railroad now--B. and M. never went through, and the branch
line from Rowley was given up years ago.
"More empty houses than there are people, I guess, and no business to speak of except fishing and lobstering. Everybody trades mostly either here or in Arkham or Ipswich. Once they had quite a few mills, but nothing's left now except one gold refinery running on the leanest kind of part time.
"That refinery, though, used to be a big thing, and old man Marsh, who
owns it, must be richer'n Croesus. QueerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or
prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or
difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or
arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
old duck, though, and sticks mighty close in his home. He's supposed to have developed
some skin disease or deformity late in life that makes him keep out of sight. Grandson
of Captain Obed Marsh, who founded the business. His mother seems to've been some kind
of foreigner--they say a South Sea islander--so everybody raised Cain when he married an
Ipswich girl fifty years ago. They always do that about Innsmouth people, and folks here
and hereabouts always try to cover up any Innsmouth blood they have in 'em. But Marsh's
children and grandchildren look just like anyone else far's I can see. I've had 'em
pointed out to me here--though, come to think of it, the elder children don't seem to be
around lately. Never saw the old man.
"And why is everybody so down on Innsmouth? Well, young fellow, you
mustn't take too much stock in what people here say. They're hard to get started, but
once they do get started they never let up. They've been telling things about
Innsmouth--whisperingDefinition: a light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in the
wind; speaking softly without vibration of the vocal cords; speak softly; in a low
voice; making a low continuous indistinct sound
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 4'em, mostly--for the last hundred years, I guess, and I gather
they're more scared than anything else. Some of the stories would make you laugh--about
old Captain Marsh driving bargains with the devilDefinition: (Judeo-Christian and Islamic religions)
chief spirit of evil and adversary of God; tempter of mankind; master of Hell; an
evil supernatural being; a word used in exclamations of confusion; a rowdy or
mischievous person (usually a young man); a cruel wicked and inhuman person; cause
annoyance in; disturb, especially by minor irritations; coat or stuff with a spicy
paste
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 7 and bringing impsDefinition: (folklore)
fairies that are somewhat mischievous; one who is playfully mischievous
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 out of hellDefinition: any place of pain and
turmoil; ; a cause of difficulty and suffering; (Christianity) the abode of Satan and
the forces of evil; where sinners suffer eternal punishment; (religion) the world of
the dead; violent and excited activity; noisy and unrestrained mischief
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6 to live in Innsmouth, or about some
kind of devilDefinition: (Judeo-Christian and Islamic religions) chief spirit of evil and
adversary of God; tempter of mankind; master of Hell; an evil supernatural being; a
word used in exclamations of confusion; a rowdy or mischievous person (usually a
young man); a cruel wicked and inhuman person; cause annoyance in; disturb,
especially by minor irritations; coat or stuff with a spicy paste
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 7-worship and awful sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or
surrendering something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform
etc.; personnel that are sacrificed (e.g., surrendered or lost in order to gain an
objective); a loss entailed by giving up or selling something at less than its value;
the act of killing (an animal or person) in order to propitiate a deity; (baseball)
an out that advances the base runners; endure the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a
loss; make a sacrifice of; in religious rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 9 in some place near the wharves that people stumbled on
around 1845 or thereabouts--but I come from Panton, Vermont, and that kind of story
don't go down with me.
"You ought to hear, though, what some of the old-timers tell about the
black reef off the coast--Devil Reef, they call it. It's well above water a good part of
the time, and never much below it, but at that you could hardly call it an island. The
story is that there's a whole legion of devilsDefinition: (Judeo-Christian and Islamic religions)
chief spirit of evil and adversary of God; tempter of mankind; master of Hell; an
evil supernatural being; a word used in exclamations of confusion; a rowdy or
mischievous person (usually a young man); a cruel wicked and inhuman person; cause
annoyance in; disturb, especially by minor irritations; coat or stuff with a spicy
paste
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 7 seen sometimes on
that reef--sprawled about, or darting in and out of some kind of caves near the top.
It's a rugged, uneven thing, a good bit over a mile out, and toward the end of shipping
days sailors used to make big detours just to avoid it.
"That is, sailors that didn't hail from Innsmouth. One of the things
they had against old Captain Marsh was that he was supposed to land on it sometimes at
night when the tide was right. Maybe he did, for I dare say the rock formation was
interesting, and it's just barely possible he was looking for pirate loot and maybe
finding it; but there was talk of his dealing with demonsDefinition: an evil supernatural
being; a cruel wicked and inhuman person; someone extremely diligent or
skillful
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 3 there. Fact is,
I guess on the whole it was really the Captain that gave the bad reputation to the reef.
"That was before the big epidemic of 1846, when over half the folks in Innsmouth was carried off. They never did quite figure out what the trouble was, but it was probably some foreign kind of disease brought from China or somewhere by the shipping. It surely was bad enough--there was riots over it, and all sorts of ghastly doings that I don't believe ever got outside of town--and it left the place in awful shape. Never came back--there can't be more'n 300 or 400 people living there now.
"But the real thing behind the way folks feel is simply race
prejudice--and I don't say I'm blaming those that hold it. I hate those Innsmouth folks
myself, and I wouldn't care to go to their town. I s'pose you know--though I can see
you're a Westerner by your talk--what a lot our New England ships used to have to do
with queerDefinition:
offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans,
or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or
deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 ports in Africa, Asia, the South
Seas, and everywhere else, and what queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual
man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous,
disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or
expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 kinds of people they sometimes brought back with 'em.
You've probably heard about the Salem man that came home with a Chinese wife, and maybe
you know there's still a bunch of Fiji Islanders somewhere around Cape Cod.
"Well, there must be something like that back of the Innsmouth people.
The place always was badly cut off from the rest of the country by marshes and creeks
and we can't be sure about the ins and outs of the matter; but it's pretty clear that
old Captain Marsh must have brought home some odd specimens when he had all three of his
ships in commission back in the twenties and thirties. There certainly is a strange kind
of streak in the Innsmouth folks today--I don't know how to explain it but it sort of
makes you crawl. You'll notice a little in Sargent if you take his bus. Some of 'em have
queerDefinition:
offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans,
or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or
deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 narrow heads with flat noses and
bulgy, stary eyes that never seem to shut, and their skin ain't quite right. Rough and
scabby, and the sides of the necks are all shriveled or creased up. Get bald, too, very
young. The older fellows look the worst--fact is, I don't believe I've ever seen a very
old chap of that kind. Guess they must die of looking in the glass! Animals hate
'em--they used to have lots of horse trouble before the autos came in.
"Nobody around here or in Arkham or Ipswich will have anything to do
with 'em, and they act kind of offish themselves when they come to town or when anyone
tries to fish on their grounds. QueerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or
prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or
difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or
arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
how fish are always thick off Innsmouth Harbour when there ain't any anywhere else
around--but just try to fish there yourself and see how the folks chase you off! Those
people used to come here on the railroad--walking and taking the train at Rowley after
the branch was dropped--but now they use that bus.
"Yes, there's a hotel in Innsmouth--called the Gilman House--but I
don't believe it can amount to much. I wouldn't advise you to try it. Better stay over
here and take the ten o'clock bus tomorrow morning; then you can get an evening bus
there for Arkham at eight o'clock. There was a factory inspector who stopped at the
Gilman a couple of years ago and he had a lot of unpleasant hints about the place. Seems
they get a queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the
efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult
position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing
homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 crowd
there, for this fellow heard voices in other rooms--though most of 'em was empty--that
gave him the shivers. It was foreign talk he thought, but he said the bad thing about it
was the kind of voice that sometimes spoke. It sounded so unnatural--slopping like, he
said--that he didn't dare undress and go to sleep. Just waited up and lit out the first
thing in the morning. The talk went on most all night.
"This fellow--Casey, his name was--had a lot to say about how the
Innsmouth folk watched him and seemed kind of on guard. He found the Marsh refinery a
queerDefinition:
offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans,
or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or
deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 place--it's in an old mill on the
lower falls of the Manuxet. What he said tallied up with what I'd heard. Books in bad
shape, and no clear account of any kind of dealings. You know it's always been a kind of
mysteryDefinition:
something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; a story about a crime
(usually murder) presented as a novel or play or movie
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 where the Marshes get the gold they refine. They've never
seemed to do much buying in that line, but years ago they shipped out an enormous lot of
ingots.
"Used to be talk of a queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual
man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous,
disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or
expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 foreign kind of jewelry that the sailors and refinery men
sometimes sold on the sly, or that was seen once or twice on some of the Marsh
women-folks. People allowed maybe old Captain Obed traded for it in some heathenDefinition: a
person who does not acknowledge your god; not acknowledging the God of Christianity
and Judaism and Islam
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2
port, especially since he always ordered stacks of glass beads and trinkets such as
seafaring men used to get for native trade. Others thought and still think he'd found an
old pirate cache out on Devil Reef. But here's a funny thing. The old Captain's been
dead these sixty years, and there's ain't been a good-sized ship out of the place since
the Civil War; but just the same the Marshes still keep on buying a few of those native
trade things--mostly glass and rubber gewgaws, they tell me. Maybe the Innsmouth folks
like 'em to look at themselves--Gawd knows they've gotten to be about as bad as South
Sea cannibals and Guinea savages.
"That plague of ' 46 must have taken off the best blood in the place.
Anyway, they're a doubtful lot now, and the Marshes and other rich folks are as bad as
any. As I told you, there probably ain't more'n 400 people in the whole town in spite of
all the streets they say there are. I guess they're what they call 'white trash' down
South--lawless and sly, and full of secretDefinition: something that should remain hidden from
others (especially information that is not to be passed on); information known only
to a special group; something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; not
open or public; kept private or not revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims
or methods; not openly made known; communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to
elude detection; hidden from general view or use; (of information) given in
confidence or in secret; indulging only covertly; having an import not apparent to
the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next
to highest level of official classification for documents
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 14 things. They get a lot of fish and lobsters
and do exporting by truck. QueerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or
prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or
difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or
arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
how the fish swarm right there and nowhere else.
"Nobody can ever keep track of these people, and state school
officials and census men have a devilDefinition: (Judeo-Christian and Islamic religions) chief spirit of evil
and adversary of God; tempter of mankind; master of Hell; an evil supernatural being;
a word used in exclamations of confusion; a rowdy or mischievous person (usually a
young man); a cruel wicked and inhuman person; cause annoyance in; disturb,
especially by minor irritations; coat or stuff with a spicy paste
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 7 of a time. You can bet that prying
strangers ain't welcome around Innsmouth. I've heard personally of more'n one business
or government man that's disappeared there, and there's loose talk of one who went crazy
and is out at Danvers now. They must have fixed up some awful scare for that fellow.
"That's why I wouldn't go at night if I was you. I've never been there and have no wish to go, but I guess a daytime trip couldn't hurt you--even though the people hereabouts will advise you not to make it. If you're just sightseeing, and looking for old-time stuff, Innsmouth ought to be quite a place for you."
And so I spent part of that evening at the Newburyport Public Library
looking up data about Innsmouth. When I had tried to question the natives in the shops,
the lunchroom, the garages, and the fire station, I had found them even harder to get
started than the ticket agent had predicted; and realized that I could not spare the
time to overcome their first instinctive reticenceDefinition: the trait of being uncommunicative;
not volunteering anything more than necessary
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1. They had a kind of obscure suspiciousness, as if there were
something amiss with anyone too much interested in Innsmouth. At the Y. M. C. A., where
I was stopping, the clerk merely discouraged my going to such a dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1, decadent place; and the people
at the library shewed much the same attitude. Clearly, in the eyes of the educated,
Innsmouth was merely an exaggerated case of civic degenerationDefinition: the process of
declining from a higher to a lower level of effective power or vitality or essential
quality; the state of being degenerate in mental or moral qualities; passing from a
more complex to a simpler biological form
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 3.
The Essex County histories on the library shelves had very little to
say, except that the town was founded in 1643, noted for shipbuilding before the
Revolution, a seat of great marine prosperity in the early 19th century, and later a
minor factory center using the Manuxet as power. The epidemic and riots of 1846 were
very sparselyDefinition: in
a sparse manner
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 treated, as
if they formed a discredit to the county.
References to decline were few, though the significance of the later
record was unmistakable. After the Civil War all industrial life was confined to the
Marsh Refining Company, and the marketing of gold ingots formed the only remaining bit
of major commerce aside from the eternal fishing. That fishing paid less and less as the
price of the commodity fell and large-scale corporations offered competition, but there
was never a dearthDefinition: an acute insufficiency; an insufficient quantity or number
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 of fish around Innsmouth Harbour.
Foreigners seldom settled there, and there was some discreetly veiledDefinition: to obscure, or conceal
with or as if with a veil; make undecipherable or imperceptible by obscuring or
concealing; having or as if having a veil or concealing cover; muted or unclear
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 4 evidence that a number of
Poles and Portuguese who had tried it had been scattered in a peculiarly drastic
fashion.
Most interesting of all was a glancing reference to the strange jewelry
vaguely associated with Innsmouth. It had evidently impressed the whole countryside more
than a little, for mention was made of specimens in the museum of Miskatonic University
at Arkham, and in the display room of the Newburyport Historical Society. The
fragmentary descriptions of these things were bald and prosaic, but they hinted to me an
undercurrent of persistent strangeness. Something about them seemed so odd and
provocative that I could not put them out of my mind, and despite the relative lateness
of the hour I resolved to see the local sample--said to be a large, queerlyDefinition: in a strange manner; in a
questionably unusual manner
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
2-proportioned thing evidently meant for a tiara--if it could possibly be
arranged.
The librarian gave me a note of introduction to the curator of the
Society, a Miss Anna Tilton, who lived nearby, and after a brief explanation that ancientDefinition: a very old
person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially
of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 gentlewoman was kind enough to
pilot me into the closed building, since the hour was not outrageously late. The
collection was a notable one indeed, but in my present mood I had eyes for nothing but
the bizarreDefinition:
conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 object which glistened in a corner cupboard under the
electric lights.
It took no excessive sensitiveness to beauty to make me literally gasp
at the strange, unearthlyDefinition: concerned with or affecting the spirit or soul; suggesting the operation
of supernatural influences
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2
splendour of the alienDefinition: a person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe
allegiance to your country; anyone who does not belong in the environment in which
they are found; a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere;
transfer property or ownership; arouse hostility or indifference in where there had
formerly been love, affection, or friendliness; not contained in or deriving from the
essential nature of something; being or from or characteristic of another place or
part of the world
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 7,
opulentDefinition: rich
and superior in quality
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1
phantasyDefinition:
something many people believe that is false; fiction with a large amount of
imagination in it; imagination unrestricted by reality
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 that rested there on a purple velvet cushion. Even now I
can hardly describe what I saw, though it was clearly enough a sort of tiara, as the
description had said. It was tall in front, and with a very large and curiously
irregular periphery, as if designed for a head of almost freakishly ellipticalDefinition: rounded like an egg;
characterized by extreme economy of expression or omission of superfluous
elements
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 outline. The
material seemed to be predominantly gold, though a weird lighter lustrousness hinted at
some strange alloy with an equally beautiful and scarcely identifiable metal. Its
condition was almost perfect, and one could have spent hours in studying the striking
and puzzlingly untraditional designs--some simply geometricalDefinition: of or relating to or
determined by geometry; characterized by simple geometric forms in design and
decoration
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2, and some
plainly marine--chased or moulded in high relief on its surface with a craftsmanship of
incredible skill and grace.
The longer I looked, the more the thing fascinated me; and in this
fascination there was a curiously disturbing element hardly to be classified or
accounted for. At first I decided that it was the queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual
man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous,
disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or
expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
other-worldly
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 quality of the art which made me
uneasy. All other art objects I had ever seen either belonged to some known racial or
national stream, or else were consciously modernistic defiances of every recognized
stream. This tiara was neither. It clearly belonged to some settled technique of
infinite maturity and perfection, yet that technique was utterly remote from
any--Eastern or Western, ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times;
belonging to times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of
the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
4 or modern--which I had ever heard of or seen exemplified. It was as if the
workmanship were that of another planetDefinition: (astronomy) any of the nine large
celestial bodies in the solar system that revolve around the sun and shine by
reflected light; Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and
Pluto in order of their proximity to the sun; viewed from the constellation Hercules,
all the planets rotate around the sun in a counterclockwise direction; a person who
follows or serves another; any celestial body (other than comets or satellites) that
revolves around a star
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3.
However, I soon saw that my uneasiness had a second and perhaps equally
potent source residing in the pictorial and mathematical suggestion of the strange
designs. The patterns all hinted of remote secretsDefinition: something that should remain hidden
from others (especially information that is not to be passed on); information known
only to a special group; something that baffles understanding and cannot be
explained
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and unimaginable
abyssDefinition: a
bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or
chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2esDefinition: a bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable)
cavity or chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends
for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 in time and space, and
the monotonously aquatic nature of the reliefs became almost sinisterDefinition: threatening or
foreshadowing evil or tragic developments; stemming from evil characteristics or
forces; wicked or dishonorable; on or starting from the wearer's left
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3. Among these reliefs were fabulous
monsters of abhorrentDefinition: offensive to the mind
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
1
grotesquenessDefinition:
ludicrous or incongruous unnaturalness or distortion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 and malignityDefinition: wishing evil to others; quality of
being disposed to evil; intense ill will
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2--half ichthyic
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 and half batrachianDefinition: any
of various tailless stout-bodied amphibians with long hind limbs for leaping;
semiaquatic and terrestrial species; relating to frogs and toads
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2 in suggestion--which one could not
dissociate from a certain haunting and uncomfortable sense of pseudom
Word Type: other
Number
Of Synsets: 0 emory, as if they called up some image from deep cells and
tissues whose retentive functions are wholly primal and awesomely ancestral. At times I
fancied that every contour of these blasphemousDefinition: grossly irreverent toward what is
held to be sacred; characterized by profanity or cursing
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 fish-frogs was over-flowing with the
ultimate quintessence of unknown and inhumanDefinition: without compunction or human feeling;
belonging to or resembling something nonhuman
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2
evilDefinition: morally
objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good
is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6.
However, I soon saw that my uneasiness had a second and perhaps equally
potent source residing in the pictorial and mathematicalDefinition: of or pertaining to or of the
nature of mathematics; relating to or having ability to think in or work with
numbers; beyond question; statistically possible though highly improbable;
characterized by the exactness or precision of mathematics
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 5 suggestion of the strange designs. The
patterns all hinted of remote secretsDefinition: something that should remain hidden from others (especially
information that is not to be passed on); information known only to a special group;
something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and unimaginable abyssesDefinition: a bottomless gulf or pit;
any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or chasm or void extending below
(often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2 in time and space, and the monotonously aquatic nature of the
reliefs became almost sinisterDefinition: threatening or foreshadowing evil or tragic developments;
stemming from evil characteristics or forces; wicked or dishonorable; on or starting
from the wearer's left
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3.
Among these reliefs were fabulous monsters of abhorrentDefinition: offensive to the mind
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1
grotesquenessDefinition:
ludicrous or incongruous unnaturalness or distortion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 and malignityDefinition: wishing evil to others; quality of
being disposed to evil; intense ill will
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2--half ichthyic
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 and half batrachianDefinition: any
of various tailless stout-bodied amphibians with long hind limbs for leaping;
semiaquatic and terrestrial species; relating to frogs and toads
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2 in suggestion--which one could not
dissociate from a certain haunting and uncomfortable sense of pseudom
Word Type: other
Number
Of Synsets: 0 emory, as if they called up some image from deep cells and
tissues whose retentive functions are wholly primal and awesomely ancestral. At times I
fancied that every contour of these blasphemousDefinition: grossly irreverent toward what is
held to be sacred; characterized by profanity or cursing
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 fish-frogs was over-flowing with the
ultimate quintessence of unknown and inhumanDefinition: without compunction or human feeling;
belonging to or resembling something nonhuman
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2
evilDefinition: morally
objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good
is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6.
In odd contrast to the tiara's aspect was its brief and prosy history as related by Miss Tilton. It had been pawned for a ridiculous sum at a shop in State Street in 1873, by a drunken Innsmouth man shortly afterward killed in a brawl. The Society had acquired it directly from the pawnbroker, at once giving it a display worthy of its quality. It was labeled as of probable East-Indian or Indochinese provenance, though the attribution was frankly tentative.
Miss Tilton, comparing all possible hypothesesDefinition: a proposal intended to
explain certain facts or observations; a tentative insight into the natural world; a
concept that is not yet verified but that if true would explain certain facts or
phenomena; a message expressing an opinion based on incomplete evidence
Word
Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3 regarding its origin and its
presence in New England, was inclined to believe that it formed part of some exoticDefinition: being or
from or characteristic of another place or part of the world; strikingly strange or
unusual
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 pirate hoard
discovered by old Captain Obed Marsh. This view was surely not weakened by the insistent
offers of purchase at a high price which the Marshes began to make as soon as they knew
of its presence, and which they repeated to this day despite the Society's unvarying
determination not to sell.
As the good lady shewed me out of the building she made it clear that
the pirate theory of the Marsh fortune was a popular one among the intelligent people of
the region. Her own attitude toward shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's
knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled with
shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth--which she
never seen--was one of disgust at a community slipping far down the cultural scale, and
she assured me that the rumours of devil-worshipDefinition: the acts or rites of worshiping
devils
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1 were partly
justified by a peculiar secretDefinition: something that should remain hidden from others (especially
information that is not to be passed on); information known only to a special group;
something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; not open or public;
kept private or not revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims or methods; not
openly made known; communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to elude detection;
hidden from general view or use; (of information) given in confidence or in secret;
indulging only covertly; having an import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to
the intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next to highest level of
official classification for documents
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 14
cultDefinition:
followers of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices; an interest
followed with exaggerated zeal; followers of an unorthodox, extremist, or false
religion or sect who often live outside of conventional society under the direction
of a charismatic leader; a religion or sect that is generally considered to be
unorthodox, extremist, or false; a system of religious beliefs and rituals
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 5 which had gained force there and
engulfed all the orthodox churches.
It was called, she said, "The Esoteric Order of Dagon," and was
undoubtedly a debased, quasi-pagan
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 0 thing
imported from the East a century before, at a time when the Innsmouth fisheries seemed
to be going barrenDefinition: an uninhabited wilderness that is worthless for cultivation; providing
no shelter or sustenance; not bearing offspring; completely wanting or lacking
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4. Its persistence among a simple
people was quite natural in view of the sudden and permanent return of abundantly fine
fishing, and it soon came to be the greatest influence in the town, replacing
Freemasonry altogether and taking up headquarters in the old Masonic Hall on New Church
Green.
All this, to the piousDefinition: having or showing or expressing reverence
for a deity
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1 Miss Tilton,
formed an excellent reason for shunning the ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived
in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the historical period
before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 town of decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming
inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon
of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous
disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing
radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin;
undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
8 and desolation; but to me it was merely a fresh incentive. To my
architectural and historical anticipations was now added an acute anthropologicalDefinition: of or concerned with the science of anthropology
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 zeal, and I could scarcely sleep in my
small room at the " Y " as the night wore away.
Shortly before ten the next morning I stood with one small valise in
front of Hammond's Drug Store in old Market Square waiting for the Innsmouth bus. As the
hour for its arrival drew near I noticed a general drift of the loungers to other places
up the street, or to the Ideal Lunch across the square. Evidently the ticket-agent had
not exaggerated the dislike which local People bore toward Innsmouth and its denizens.
In a few moments a small motor-coach of extreme decrepitudeDefinition: a state of deterioration due to old
age or long use
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 and dirty
grey colour rattled down State Street, made a turn, and drew up at the curb beside me. I
felt immediately that it was the right one; a guess which the half-illegible sign on the
windshield--Arkham-Innsmouth-Newburyport--soon verified.
There were only three passengers--dark, unkempt men of sullen visageDefinition: the human
face (`kisser' and `smiler' and `mug' are informal terms for `face' and `phiz' is
British); the appearance conveyed by a person's face
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 and somewhat youthful cast--and when the vehicle stopped
they clumsily shambledDefinition: walk by dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1 out and began walking up State Street in a silent, almost furtive
fashion. The driver also alighted, and I watched him as he went into the drug store to
make some purchase. This, I reflected, must be the Joe Sargent mentioned by the
ticket-agent; and even before I noticed any details there spread over me a wave of
spontaneous aversionDefinition: a feeling of intense dislike; the act of turning yourself (or your gaze)
away
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 which could be neither
checked nor explained. It suddenly struck me as very natural that the local people
should not wish to ride on a bus owned and driven by this man, or to visit any oftener
than possible the habitat of such a man and his kinsfolk.
When the driver came out of the store I looked at him more carefully
and tried to determine the source of my evilDefinition: morally objectionable behavior; that which
causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good is oft interred with their bones"-
Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in principle or practice; morally bad
or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6 impression. He was a thin,
stoop-shouldered man not much under six feet tall, dressed in shabby blue civilian
clothes and wearing a frayed golf cap. His age was perhaps thirty-five, but the odd,
deep creases in the sides of his neck made him seem older when one did not study his
dull, expressionless face. He had a narrow head, bulging, watery-blue eyes that seemed
never to wink, a flat nose, a receding forehead and chin, and singularly undeveloped
ears. His long thick lip and coarse-pored, greyish cheeks seemed almost beardless except
for some sparseDefinition:
not dense
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 yellow hairs that
straggled and curled in irregular patches; and in places the surface seemed queerlyDefinition: in a
strange manner; in a questionably unusual manner
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 2 irregular, as if peeling from some cutaneousDefinition: relating to or existing
on or affecting the skin
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets:
1 disease. His hands were large and heavily veined, and had a very unusual
greyish-blue tinge. The fingers were strikingly short in proportion to the rest of the
structure, and seemed to have a tendency to curl closely into the huge palm. As he
walked toward the bus I observed his peculiarly shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion
without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 gait and saw that his feet were inordinately immense. The
more I studied them the more I wondered how he could buy any shoes to fit them.
A certain greasiness about the fellow increased my dislike. He was
evidently given to working or lounging around the fish docks, and carried with him much
of their characteristic smell. Just what foreign blood was in him I could not even
guess. His oddities certainly did not look Asiatic, Polynesian, Levantine or negroid,
yet I could see why the people found him alienDefinition: a person who comes from a foreign
country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your country; anyone who does not
belong in the environment in which they are found; a form of life assumed to exist
outside the Earth or its atmosphere; transfer property or ownership; arouse hostility
or indifference in where there had formerly been love, affection, or friendliness;
not contained in or deriving from the essential nature of something; being or from or
characteristic of another place or part of the world
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 7. I myself would have thought of biologicalDefinition:
pertaining to biology or to life and living things; of parents and children; related
by blood
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2
degenerationDefinition: the process of declining from a higher to a lower level of effective
power or vitality or essential quality; the state of being degenerate in mental or
moral qualities; passing from a more complex to a simpler biological form
Word
Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3 rather than alienageDefinition: the
quality of being alien
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1.
I was sorry when I saw there would be no other passengers on the bus. Somehow I did not like the idea of riding alone with this driver. But as leaving time obviously approached I conquered my qualms and followed the man aboard, extending him a dollar bill and murmuring the single word " Innsmouth." He looked curiously at me for a second as he returned forty cents change without speaking. I took a seat far behind him, but on the same side of the bus, since I wished to watch the shore during the journey.
At length the decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by hard use; lacking bodily or muscular
strength or vitality
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
vehicle stared with a jerk, and rattled noisily past the old brick buildings of State
Street amidst a cloud of vapour from the exhaust. Glancing at the people on the
sidewalks, I thought I detected in them a curious wish to avoid looking at the bus--or
at least a wish to avoid seeming to look at it. Then we turned to the left into High
Street, where the going was smoother; flying by stately old mansions of the early
republic and still older colonial farmhouses, passing the Lower Green and Parker River,
and finally emerging into a long, monotonous stretch of open shore country.
The day was warm and sunny, but the landscape of sand and sedge-grass,
and stunted shrubbery became more and desolateDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; reduce in population; cause extensive destruction or ruin
utterly; providing no shelter or sustenance; crushed by grief
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 as we proceeded. Out the window I could see
the blue water and the sandy line of Plum Island, and we presently drew very near the
beach as our narrow road veered off from the main highway to Rowley and Ipswich. There
were no visible houses, and I could tell by the state of the road that traffic was very
light hereabouts. The weather-worn telephone poles carried only two wires. Now and then
we crossed crude wooden bridges over tidal creeks that wound far inland and promoted the
general isolation of the region.
Once in a while I noticed dead stumps and crumbling foundation-walls
above the drifting sand, and recalled the old tradition quoted in one of the histories I
had read, that this was once a fertile and thickly-settled countryside. The change, it
was said, came simultaneously with the Innsmouth epidemic of l846, and was thought by
simple folk to have a dark connection with hidden forces of evilDefinition: morally objectionable
behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good is oft
interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6. Actually, it was caused by the unwise cutting of woodlands near the shore,
which robbed the soil of the best protection and opened the way for waves of wind-blown
sand.
At last we lost sight of Plum Island and saw the vast expanse of the
open Atlantic on our left. Our narrow course began to climb steeply, and I felt a
singular sense of disquiet in looking at the lonely crest ahead where the rutted
road-way met the sky. It was as if the bus were about to keep on in its ascent, leaving
the sane earth altogether and merging with the unknown arcanaDefinition: information known only to
a special group
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 of upper
air and crypticalDefinition: of an obscure nature; having a secret or hidden meaning
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 sky. The smell of the sea took on ominousDefinition:
threatening or foreshadowing evil or tragic developments; presaging ill fortune
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 implications, and the silent
driver's bent, rigid back and narrow head became more and more hateful. As I looked at
him I saw that the back of his head was almost as hairless as his face, having only a
few straggling yellow strands upon a grey scabrous surface.
Then we reached the crest and beheld the outspread valley beyond, where
the Manuxet joins the sea just north of the long line of cliffs that culminate in
Kingsport Head and veer off toward Cape Ann. On the far misty horizon I could just make
out the dizzy profile of the Head, topped by the queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual
man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous,
disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or
expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
ancientDefinition: a very
old person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past
especially of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very
old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 house of which so many
legendsDefinition: a
story about mythical or supernatural beings or events; brief description accompanying
an illustration
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 are told;
but for the moment all my attention was captured by the nearer panorama just below me. I
had, I realized, come face to face with rumour-shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's
knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled with
shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth.
It was a town of wide extent and dense construction, yet one with a
portentous dearthDefinition: an acute insufficiency; an insufficient quantity or number
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 of visible life. From the tangle of
chimney-pots scarcely a wisp of smoke came, and the three tall steeples loomed stark and
unpainted against the seaward horizon. One of them was crumbling down at the top, and in
that and another there were only black gaping holes where clock-dials should have been.
The vast huddle of sagging gambrelDefinition: a gable roof with two slopes on each side and the lower
slope being steeper
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 roofs
and peaked gables conveyed with offensive clearness the idea of wormy decayDefinition: the process
of gradually becoming inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current;
the organic phenomenon of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of
decaying; the spontaneous disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the
emission of ionizing radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall
into decay or ruin; undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 8, and as we approached along the now descending road I
could see that many roofs had wholly caved in. There were some large square Georgian
houses, too, with hipped roofs, cupolas, and railed "widow's walks." These were mostly
well back from the water, and one or two seemed to be in moderately sound condition.
Stretching inland from among them I saw the rusted, grass-grown line of the abandoned
railway, with leaning telegraph-poles now devoid of wires, and the half-obscured lines
of the old carriage roads to Rowley and Ipswich.
The decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming inferior; a gradual decrease; as of
stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon of rotting; an inferior state
resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous disintegration of a
radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing radiation; lose a stored
charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or
decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 8 was worst
close to the waterfront, though in its very midst I could spy the white belfry of a
fairly well preserved brick structure which looked like a small factory. The harbour,
long clogged with sand, was enclosed by an ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived
in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the historical period
before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 stone breakwater; on which I could begin to discern the
minute forms of a few seated fishermen, and at whose end were what looked like the
foundations of a bygoneDefinition: past events to be put aside; well in the past; former
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 2 lighthouse. A sandy tongue had formed inside
this barrier and upon it I saw a few decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by hard use;
lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 2 cabins, moored dories, and scattered lobster-pots. The only deep
water seemed to be where the river poured out past the belfried structure and turned
southward to join the ocean at the breakwater's end.
Here and there the ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and
destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that
results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation;
destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 of wharves jutted out from the shore to end in
indeterminate rottennessDefinition: in a state of progressive putrefaction; the quality of rotting and
becoming putrid
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2, those
farthest south seeming the most decayedDefinition: lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into
decay or ruin; undergo decay or decomposition; damaged by decay; hence unsound and
useless
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4. And far out at
sea, despite a high tide, I glimpsed a long, black line scarcely rising above the water
yet carrying a suggestion of odd latent malignancyDefinition: (medicine) a malignant state;
progressive and resistant to treatment and tending to cause death; quality of being
disposed to evil; intense ill will
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
2. This, I knew, must be Devil Reef. As I looked, a subtle, curious sense of
beckoning seemed superadded
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 to the grim repulsionDefinition: the
force by which bodies repel one another; intense aversion; the act of repulsing or
repelling an attack; a successful defensive stand
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3; and oddly enough, I found this overtone more disturbing
than the primary impression.
We met no one on the road, but presently began to pass desertedDefinition: leave
someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or
an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind;
forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
4 farms in varying stages of ruinDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and
destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that
results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation;
destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12. Then I noticed a few inhabited houses with rags stuffed
in the broken windows and shells and dead fish lying about the littered yards. Once or
twice I saw listless-looking people working in barrenDefinition: an uninhabited wilderness that is
worthless for cultivation; providing no shelter or sustenance; not bearing offspring;
completely wanting or lacking
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
4 gardens or digging clams on the fishy-smelling beach below, and groups of
dirty, simian-visagedDefinition: having a face or visage as specified
Word Type: other
Number
Of Synsets: 1 children playing around weed-grown doorsteps. Somehow these
people seemed more disquieting than the dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 buildings, for almost every one had certain
peculiaritiesDefinition:
an odd or unusual characteristic; a distinguishing trait; something unusual --
perhaps worthy of collecting
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3
of face and motions which I instinctively disliked without being able to define or
comprehend them. For a second I thought this typical physique suggested some picture I
had seen, perhaps in a book, under circumstances of particular horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear;
something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense aversion
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 or melancholyDefinition: a feeling of thoughtful sadness; a
constitutional tendency to be gloomy and depressed; a humor that was once believed to
be secreted by the kidneys or spleen and to cause sadness and melancholy;
characterized by or causing or expressing sadness; grave or even gloomy in
character
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5; but this pseudo-recollection
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 passed very quickly.
As the bus reached a lower level I began to catch the steady note of a
waterfall through the unnaturalDefinition: not in accordance with or determined by nature; contrary to
nature; not normal; not typical or usual or regular or conforming to a norm; speaking
or behaving in an artificial way to make an impression
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 stillness, The leaning, unpainted houses grew thicker,
lined both sides of the road, and displayed more urban tendencies than did those we were
leaving behind, The panorama ahead had contracted to a street scene, and in spots I
could see where a cobblestone pavement and stretches of brick sidewalk had formerly
existed. All the houses were apparently desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4, and there were
occasional gaps where tumbledown chimneys and cellar walls told of buildings that had
collapsed. Pervading everything was the most nauseous fishy odour imaginable.
Soon cross streets and junctions began to appear; those on the left
leading to shoreward realms of unpaved squalor and decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming
inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon
of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous
disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing
radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin;
undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
8, while those on the right shewed vistas of departed grandeurDefinition: the quality of being
magnificent or splendid or grand; the quality of elevation of mind and exaltation of
character or ideals or conduct
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
2. So far I had seen no people in the town, but there now came signs of a
sparseDefinition: not
dense
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 habitation--curtained
windows here and there, and an occasional battered motorcar at the curb. Pavement and
sidewalks were increasingly well-defined, and though most of the houses were quite
old--wood and brick structures of the early 19th century--they were obviously kept fit
for habitation. As an amateur antiquarianDefinition: an expert or collector of
antiquities; of or relating to persons who study or deal in antiques or antiquities;
of or relating to antiques or antiquities
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 3 I almost lost my olfactoryDefinition: of or relating to olfaction
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 disgust and my feeling of
menaceDefinition:
something that is a source of danger; a threat or the act of threatening; pose a
threat to; present a danger to; express a threat either by an utterance or a gesture;
act in a threatening manner
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
and repulsionDefinition:
the force by which bodies repel one another; intense aversion; the act of repulsing
or repelling an attack; a successful defensive stand
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 amidst this rich, unaltered survival from the past.
But I was not to reach my destination without one very strong
impression of poignantlyDefinition: in a poignant or touching manner
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1 disagreeable quality. The bus had come to a sort of open concourse
or radial point with churches on two sides and the bedraggled remains of a circular
green in the centre, and I was looking at a large pillared hall on the right-hand
junction ahead. The structure's once white paint was now gray and peeling and the black
and gold sign on the pediment was so faded that I could only with difficulty make out
the words " Esoteric Order of Dagon. " This, then was the former Masonic Hall now given
over to a degraded cultDefinition: followers of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices; an
interest followed with exaggerated zeal; followers of an unorthodox, extremist, or
false religion or sect who often live outside of conventional society under the
direction of a charismatic leader; a religion or sect that is generally considered to
be unorthodox, extremist, or false; a system of religious beliefs and rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 5. As I strained to decipher
this inscription my notice was distracted by the raucousDefinition: unpleasantly loud and harsh; disturbing
the public peace; loud and rough
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
2 tones of a cracked bell across the street, and I quickly turned to look out
the window on my side of the coach.
The sound came from a squat stone church of manifestlyDefinition: unmistakably (`plain'
is often used informally for `plainly')
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1 later date than most of the houses, built in a clumsy Gothic
fashion and having a disproportionatelyDefinition: out of proportion; to a disproportionate degree
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 high basement with shuttered windows.
Though the hands of its clock were missing on the side I glimpsed, I knew that those
hoarse strokes were tolling the hour of eleven. Then suddenly all thoughts of time were
blotted out by an onrushing image of sharp intensity and unaccountable horrorDefinition: intense and
profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense
aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 which had seized
me before I knew what it really was. The door of the church basement was open, revealing
a rectangle of blackness inside. And as I looked, a certain object crossed or seemed to
cross that dark rectangle; burning into my brain a momentary conception of nightmareDefinition: a
situation resembling a terrifying dream; a terrifying or deeply upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 which was all the more maddeningDefinition: cause to
go crazy; cause to lose one's mind; drive up the wall; go on someone's nerves; make
mad; extremely annoying or displeasing
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 4 because analysisDefinition: an investigation of the component
parts of a whole and their relations in making up the whole; the abstract separation
of a whole into its constituent parts in order to study the parts and their
relations; a form of literary criticism in which the structure of a piece of writing
is analyzed; the use of closed-class words instead of inflections: e.g., `the father
of the bride' instead of `the bride's father'; a branch of mathematics involving
calculus and the theory of limits; sequences and series and integration and
differentiation; a set of techniques for exploring underlying motives and a method of
treating various mental disorders; based on the theories of Sigmund Freud
Word
Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 6 could not shew a single nightmarishDefinition:
extremely alarming
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 quality
in it.
It was a living object--the first except the driver that I had seen
since entering the compact part of the town--and had I been in a steadier mood I would
have found nothing whatever of terrorDefinition: an overwhelming feeling of fear and anxiety; a person who
inspires fear or dread; a very troublesome child; the use of extreme fear in order to
coerce people (especially for political reasons)
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 4 in it. Clearly, as I realised a moment later, it was the pastor;
clad in some peculiar vestments doubtless introduced since the Order of Dagon had
modified the ritual of the local churches. The thing which had probably caught my first
subconscious glance and supplied the touch of bizarreDefinition: conspicuously or grossly unconventional
or unusual
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1
horrorDefinition: intense
and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense
aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 was the tall tiara
he wore; an almost exact duplicate of the one Miss Tilton had shown me the previous
evening. This, acting on my imagination, had supplied namelessly sinisterDefinition: threatening or
foreshadowing evil or tragic developments; stemming from evil characteristics or
forces; wicked or dishonorable; on or starting from the wearer's left
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 qualities to the indeterminate face
and robed, shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by
dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 form
beneath it. There was not, I soon decided, any reason why I should have felt that
shuddering touch of evilDefinition: morally objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or
misfortune; the good is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of
being morally wrong in principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature
of vice; having or exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6
pseudo-memory
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0. Was it not natural that a local mysteryDefinition: something
that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; a story about a crime (usually
murder) presented as a novel or play or movie
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2
cultDefinition:
followers of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices; an interest
followed with exaggerated zeal; followers of an unorthodox, extremist, or false
religion or sect who often live outside of conventional society under the direction
of a charismatic leader; a religion or sect that is generally considered to be
unorthodox, extremist, or false; a system of religious beliefs and rituals
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 5 should adopt among its regimentals
an unique type of head-dress made familiar to the community in some strange way--perhaps
as treasure-trove?
A very thin sprinkling of repellent-looking youngish people now became
visible on the sidewalks--lone individuals, and silent knots of two or three. The lower
floors of the crumbling houses sometimes harboured small shops with dingyDefinition: thickly covered with
ingrained dirt or soot; (of color) discolored by impurities; not bright and clear;
causing dejection
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 signs, and
I noticed a parked truck or two as we rattled along. The sound of waterfalls became more
and more distinct, and presently I saw a fairly deep river-gorge ahead, spanned by a
wide, iron-railed highway bridge beyond which a large square opened out. As we clanked
over the bridge I looked out on both sides and observed some factory buildings on the
edge of the grassy bluff or part way down. The water far below was very abundant, and I
could see two vigorous sets of falls upstream on my right and at least one downstream on
my left. From this point the noise was quite deafening. Then we rolled into the large
semicircular square across the river and drew up on the right-hand side in front of a
tall, cupolaDefinition: a
vertical cylindrical furnace for melting iron for casting; a roof in the form of a
dome
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 crowned building with
remnants of yellow paint and with a half-effaced sign proclaiming it to be the Gilman
House.
I was glad to get out of that bus, and at once proceeded to check my
valise in the shabbyDefinition: showing signs of wear and tear; mean and unworthy and despicable
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 hotel lobby. There was only one
person in sight--an elderly man without what I had come to call the " Innsmouth
look"--and I decided not to ask him any of the questions which bothered me; remembering
that odd things had been noticed in this hotel. Instead, I strolled out on the square,
from which the bus had already gone, and studied the scene minutely and appraisingly.
One side of the cobblestoned open space was the straight line of the
river; the other was a semicircle of slant-roofed brick buildings of about the 1800
period, from which several streets radiated away to the southeast, south, and southwest.
Lamps were depressingly few and small--all low-powered incandescents
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 0--and I was glad that my plans called for departure before
dark, even though I knew the moon would be bright. The buildings were all in fair
condition, and included perhaps a dozen shops in current operation; of which one was a
grocery of the First National chain, others a dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 restaurant, a drug store, and a wholesale
fish-dealer's office, and still another, at the eastward extremity of the square near
the river an office of the town's only industry--the Marsh Refining Company. There were
perhaps ten people visible, and four or five automobiles and motor trucks stood
scattered about. I did not need to be told that this was the civic centre of Innsmouth.
Eastward I could catch blue glimpses of the harbour, against which rose the decayingDefinition: lose a
stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or
decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 remains of
three once beautiful Georgian steeples. And toward the shore on the opposite bank of the
river I saw the white belfry surmounting what I took to be the Marsh refinery.
For some reason or other I chose to make my first inquiries at the chain grocery, whose personnel was not likely to be native to Innsmouth. I found a solitary boy of about seventeen in charge, and was pleased to note the brightness and affability which promised cheerful information. He seemed exceptionally eager to talk, and I soon gathered that he did not like the place, its fishy smell, or its furtive people. A word with any outsider was a relief to him. He hailed from Arkham, boarded with a family who came from Ipswich, and went back whenever he got a moment off. His family did not like him to work in Innsmouth, but the chain had transferred him there and he did not wish to give up his job.
There was, he said, no public library or chamber of commerce in
Innsmouth, but I could probably find my way about. The street I had come down was
Federal. West of that were the fine old residence streets--Broad, Washington, Lafayette,
and Adams--and east of it were the shoreward slums. It was in these slums--along Main
Street--that I would find the old Georgian churches, but they were all long abandoned.
It would be well not to make oneself too conspicuousDefinition: obvious to the eye or mind; without
any attempt at concealment; completely obvious
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2 in such neighbourhoods--especially north of the river since the
people were sullen and hostile. Some strangers had even disappeared.
Certain spots were almost forbiddenDefinition: command against; keep from happening
or arising; make impossible; excluded from use or mention
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 territory, as he had learned at considerable
cost. One must not, for example, linger much around the Marsh refinery, or around any of
the still used churches, or around the pillared Order of Dagon Hall at New Church Green.
Those churches were very odd--all violently disavowedDefinition: refuse to acknowledge; disclaim
knowledge of; responsibility for, or association with
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 by their respective denominations elsewhere, and
apparently using the queerestDefinition: beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual
or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
2 kind of ceremonialsDefinition: a formal event performed on a special occasion
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1 and clericalDefinition: of or relating to
clerks; of or relating to the clergy; appropriate for or engaged in office work
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 3
vestmentsDefinition:
gown (especially ceremonial garments) worn by the clergy
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 1. Their creedsDefinition: any system of principles
or beliefs; the written body of teachings of a religious group that are generally
accepted by that group
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2
were heterodoxDefinition: characterized by departure from accepted beliefs or standards
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1 and mysteriousDefinition: of an obscure nature;
having an import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond
ordinary understanding
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2,
involving hints of certain marvelous transformations leading to bodily immoralityDefinition: the
quality of not being in accord with standards of right or good conduct; morally
objectionable behavior
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2--of
a sort--on this earth. The youth's own pastor--Dr. Wallace of Asbury M. E. Churchins ins
Arkham--had gravely urged him not to join any church in Innsmouth.
As for the Innsmouth people--the youth hardly knew what to make of
them. They were as furtive and seldom seen as animals that live in burrows, and one
could hardly imagine how they passed the time apart from their desultoryDefinition: marked by lack of
definite plan or regularity or purpose; jumping from one thing to another
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 fishing. Perhaps--judging from the
quantities of bootleg liquorDefinition: an alcoholic beverage that is distilled rather than fermented; a liquid
substance that is a solution (or emulsion or suspension) used or obtained in an
industrial process; the liquid in which vegetables or meat have be cooked
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 they consumed--they lay for most of the
daylight hours in an alcoholic stupor. They seemed sullenly banded together in some sort
of fellowshipDefinition: an
association of people who share common beliefs or activities; the state of being with
someone; money granted (by a university or foundation or other agency) for advanced
study or research
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 and
understanding--despising the world as if they had access to other and preferable spheres
of entityDefinition: that
which is perceived or known or inferred to have its own distinct existence (living or
nonliving)
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1. Their
appearance--especially those staring, unwinking eyes which one never saw shut--was
certainly shocking enough; and their voices were disgusting. It was awful to hear them
chantingDefinition:
the act of singing in a monotonous tone; recite with musical intonation; recite as a
chant or a psalm; utter monotonously and repetitively and rhythmically
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 3 in their churches at night, and
especially during their main festivals or revivalsDefinition: bringing again into activity and
prominence; an evangelistic meeting intended to reawaken interest in religion
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2, which fell twice a year on April
30th and October 31st.
They were very fond of the water, and swam a great deal in both river
and harbour. Swimming races out to Devil Reef were very common, and everyone in sight
seemed well able to share in this arduousDefinition: characterized by effort to the point of exhaustion;
especially physical effort; taxing to the utmost; testing powers of endurance;
difficult to accomplish; demanding considerable mental effort and skill
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 sport. When one came to think of it, it
was generally only rather young people who were seen about in public, and of these the
oldest were apt to be the most tainted-looking. When exceptions did occur, they were
mostly persons with no trace of aberrancyDefinition: a state or condition markedly different from the norm
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1, like the old clerk at the hotel.
One wondered what became of the bulk of the older folk, and whether the " Innsmouth
look" were not a strange and insidiousDefinition: beguiling but harmful; intended to entrap; working or
spreading in a hidden and usually injurious way
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 3 disease-phenomenon which increased its hold as years advanced.
Only a very rare affliction, of course, could bring about such vast and
radical anatomicalDefinition: an expression that relates to anatomy; of or relating to the structure
of the body; of or relating to the branch of morphology that studies the structure of
organisms
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3 changes in a
single individual after maturity--changes invoking osseousDefinition: composed of or containing
bone
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 factors as basic
as the shape of the skull--but then, even this aspect was no more baffling and
unheard-of than the visible features of the malady as a whole. It would be hard, the
youth implied, to form any real conclusions regarding such a matter; since one never
came to know the natives personally no matter how long one might live in Innsmouth.
The youth was certain that many specimens even worse than the worst
visible ones were kept locked indoors in some places. People sometimes heard the queerestDefinition: beyond or
deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 kind of sounds. The tottering
waterfront hovels north of the river were reputedly connected by hidden tunnels, being
thus a veritable warren of unseen abnormalitiesDefinition: an abnormal physical condition
resulting from defective genes or developmental deficiencies; retardation sufficient
to fall outside the normal range of intelligence; marked strangeness as a consequence
of being abnormal; behavior that breaches the rule or etiquette or custom or
morality
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 4. What kind of
foreign blood--if any--these beings had, it was impossible to tell. They sometimes kept
certain especially repulsiveDefinition: offensive to the mind; possessing the ability to repel; so
extremely ugly as to be terrifying
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3 characters out of sight when government and others from the outside world
came to town.
It would be of no use, my informant said, to ask the natives anything
about the place. The only one who would talk was a very aged but normal looking man who
lived at the poorhouse on the north rim of the town and spent his time walking about or
lounging around the fire station. This hoary character, Zadok Allen, was 96 years old
and somewhat touched in the head, besides being the town drunkard. He was a strange,
furtiveDefinition:
marked by quiet and caution and secrecy; taking pains to avoid being observed; secret
and sly or sordid
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2
creatureDefinition: a
living organism characterized by voluntary movement; a human being; `wight' is an
archaic term; a person who is controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant
or dishonest tasks for someone else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
3 who constantly looked over his shoulder as if afraid of something, and when
sober could not be persuaded to talk at all with strangers. He was, however, unable to
resist any offer of his favorite poison; and once drunk would furnish the most
astonishing fragments of whisperedDefinition: speak softly; in a low voice; spoken in soft hushed tones
without vibrations of the vocal cords
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2 reminiscence.
After all, though, little useful data could be gained from him; since
his stories were all insane, incomplete hints of impossible marvels and horrorsDefinition: intense
and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense
aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 which could have
no source save in his own disordered fancy. Nobody ever believed him, but the natives
did not like him to drink and talk with strangers; and it was not always safe to be seen
questioning him. It was probably from him that some of the wildest popular whispersDefinition: speaking
softly without vibration of the vocal cords; a light noise, like the noise of silk
clothing or leaves blowing in the wind; speak softly; in a low voice
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and delusions were derived.
Several non-native residents had reported monstrous glimpses from time to time, but between old Zadok's tales and the malformed inhabitants it was no wonder such illusions were current. None of the non-natives ever stayed out late at night, there being a widespread impression that it was not wise to do so. Besides, the streets were loathsomely dark.
As for business--the abundance of fish was certainly almost uncannyDefinition: suggesting
the operation of supernatural influences; surpassing the ordinary or normal
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2, but the natives were taking less
and less advantage of it. Moreover, prices were falling and competition was growing. Of
course the town's real business was the refinery, whose commercial office was on the
square only a few doors east of where we stood. Old Man Marsh was never seen, but
sometimes went to the works in a closed, curtained car.
There were all sorts of rumors about how Marsh had come to look. He had
once been a great dandy; and people said he still wore the frock-coated finery of the
Edwardian age curiously adapted to certain deformities. His son had formerly conducted
the office in the square, but latterly they had been keeping out of sight a good deal
and leaving the brunt of affairs to the younger generation. The sons and their sisters
had come to look very queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the
efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult
position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing
homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5,
especially the elder ones; and it was said that their health was failing.
One of the Marsh daughters was a repellent, reptilian-looking woman who
wore an excess of weird jewellery clearly of the same exoticDefinition: being or from or
characteristic of another place or part of the world; strikingly strange or
unusual
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 tradition as that
to which the strange tiara belonged. My informant had noticed it many times, and had
heard it spoken of as coming from some secretDefinition: something that should remain hidden from
others (especially information that is not to be passed on); information known only
to a special group; something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; not
open or public; kept private or not revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims
or methods; not openly made known; communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to
elude detection; hidden from general view or use; (of information) given in
confidence or in secret; indulging only covertly; having an import not apparent to
the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next
to highest level of official classification for documents
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 14 hoard, either of pirates or of demonsDefinition: an evil
supernatural being; a cruel wicked and inhuman person; someone extremely diligent or
skillful
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 3. The clergymenDefinition: a
member of the clergy and a spiritual leader of the Christian Church
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 1--or priestsDefinition: a clergyman in Christian
churches who has the authority to perform or administer various religious rites; one
of the Holy Orders; a person who performs religious duties and ceremonies in a
non-Christian religion
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2,
or whatever they were called nowadays--also wore this kind of ornament as a headdress;
but one seldom caught glimpses of them. Other specimens the youth had not seen, though
many were rumoured to exist around Innsmouth.
The Marshes, together with the other three gently bred families of the town--the Waites, the Gilmans, and the Eliots--were all very retiring. They lived in immense houses along Washington Street, and several were reputed to harbour in concealment certain living kinsfolk whose personal aspect forbade public view, and whose deaths had been reported and recorded.
Warning me that many of the street signs were down, the youth drew for
my benefit a rough but ample and painstaking sketch map of the town's salientDefinition: (military)
the part of the line of battle that projects closest to the enemy; having a quality
that thrusts itself into attention; (of angles) pointing outward at an angle of less
than 180 degrees; represented as leaping (rampant but leaning forward)
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 features. After a moment's study I felt
sure that it would be of great help, and pocketed it with profuse thanks. Disliking the
dinginess of the single restaurant I had seen, I bought a fair supply of cheese crackers
and ginger wafers to serve as a lunch later on. My program, I decided, would be to
thread the principal streets, talk with any non-natives I might encounter, and catch the
eight o'clock coach for Arkham. The town, I could see, formed a significant and
exaggerated example of communal decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming inferior; a gradual
decrease; as of stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon of rotting; an
inferior state resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous disintegration
of a radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing radiation; lose a
stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or
decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 8; but being no
sociologistDefinition: a social scientist who studies the institutions and development of human
society
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 I would limit
my serious observations to the field of architecture.
Thus I began my systematic though half-bewildered tour of Innsmouth's
narrow, shadowDefinition:
shade within clear boundaries; an unilluminated area; something existing in
perception only; a premonition of something adverse; an indication that something has
been present; refuge from danger or observation; a dominating and pervasive presence;
a spy employed to follow someone and report their movements; an inseparable
companion; follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make
appear small by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
12-blighted ways. Crossing the bridge and turning toward the roar of the lower
falls, I passed close to the Marsh refinery, which seemed to be oddly free from the
noise of industry. The building stood on the steep river bluff near a bridge and an open
confluence of streets which I took to be the earliest civic center, displaced after the
Revolution by the present Town Square.
Re-crossing the gorge on the Main Street bridge, I struck a region of
utter desertion which somehow made me shudder. Collapsing huddles of gambrel roofs
formed a jagged and fantastic skyline, above which rose the ghoulish, decapitatedDefinition: cut the
head of; having had the head cut off
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
2 steeple of an ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times;
belonging to times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of
the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
4 church. Some houses along Main Street were tenanted, but most were tightly
boarded up. Down unpaved side streets I saw the black, gaping windows of desertedDefinition: leave
someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or
an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind;
forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
4 hovels, many of which leaned at perilous and incredible angles through the
sinking of part of the foundations. Those windows stared so spectrally
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 0 that it took courage to turn eastward toward the
waterfront. Certainly, the terror of a desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 house swells in
geometricalDefinition: of or relating to or determined by geometry; characterized by simple
geometric forms in design and decoration
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 2 rather than arithmeticalDefinition: relating to or involving
arithmetic
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 progression
as houses multiply to form a city of stark desolation. The sight of such endless avenues
of fishy-eyed vacancy and death, and the thought of such linked infinities of black,
brooding compartments given over to cob-webs and memories and the conqueror worm, start
up vestigialDefinition: not fully developed in mature animals
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 fears and aversionsDefinition: a feeling of intense dislike; the act
of turning yourself (or your gaze) away
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2 that not even the stoutest philosophy can disperse.
Fish Street was as desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 as Main, though
it differed in having many brick and stone warehouses still in excellent shape. Water
Street was almost its duplicate, save that there were great seaward gaps where wharves
had been. Not a living thing did I see except for the scattered fishermen on the distant
break-water, and not a sound did I hear save the lapping of the harbour tides and the
roar of the falls in the Manuxet. The town was getting more and more on my nerves, and I
looked behind me furtively as I picked my way back over the tottering Water Street
bridge. The Fish Street bridge, according to the sketch, was in ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of
devastation and destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated;
an event that results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or
reputation; destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined;
destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to
bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12.
North of the river there were traces of squalid life--active
fish-packing houses in Water Street, smoking chimneys and patched roofs here and there,
occasional sounds from indeterminate sources, and infrequent shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow
dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's feet
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 forms in the dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 streets and unpaved lanes--but I
seemed to find this even more oppressive than the southerly desertion. For one thing,
the people were more hideous and abnormalDefinition: not normal; not typical or usual or
regular or conforming to a norm; departing from the normal in e.g. intelligence and
development; much greater than the normal
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 3 sthan those near the centre of the town; so that I was several
times evillyDefinition:
in a wicked evil manner
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 1
reminded of something utterly fantastic which I could not quite place. Undoubtedly the
alienDefinition: a
person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does not owe allegiance to your
country; anyone who does not belong in the environment in which they are found; a
form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere; transfer property
or ownership; arouse hostility or indifference in where there had formerly been love,
affection, or friendliness; not contained in or deriving from the essential nature of
something; being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the
world
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 7 strain in the
Innsmouth folk was stronger here than farther inland--unless, indeed, the " Innsmouth
look" were a disease rather than a blood stain, in which case this district might be
held to harbour the more advanced cases.
One detail that annoyed me was the distribution of the few faint sounds I heard. They ought naturally to have come wholly from the visibly inhabited houses, yet in reality were often strongest inside the most rigidly boarded-up facades. There were creakings, scurryings, and hoarse doubtful noises; and I thought uncomfortably about the hidden tunnels suggested by the grocery boy. Suddenly I found myself wondering what the voices of those denizens would be like. I had heard no speech so far in this quarter, and was unaccountably anxious not to do so.
Pausing only long enough to look at two fine but ruinousDefinition: extremely harmful;
bringing physical or financial ruin; causing injury or blight; especially affecting
with sudden violence or plague or ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2 old churches at Main and Church Streets, I hastened out of that
vile waterfront slum. My next logical goal was New Church Green, but somehow or other I
could not bear to repass the church in whose basement I had glimpsed the inexplicably
frighteningDefinition:
the act of inspiring with fear; cause fear in; drive out by frightening; causing fear
or dread or terror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 form of
that strangely diademmed
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 0
priestDefinition: a
clergyman in Christian churches who has the authority to perform or administer
various religious rites; one of the Holy Orders; a person who performs religious
duties and ceremonies in a non-Christian religion
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 or pastorDefinition: a person authorized to conduct religious
worship; only the rose-colored starlings; in some classifications considered a
separate genus
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2. Besides,
the grocery youth had told me that churches, as well as the Order of Dagon Hall, were
not advisable neighbourhoods for strangers.
Accordingly I kept north along Main to Martin, then turning inland,
crossing Federal Street safely north of the Green, and entering the decayedDefinition: lose a stored charge,
magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or decomposition;
damaged by decay; hence unsound and useless
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 4 patrician neighbourhood of northern Broad, Washington, Lafayette,
and Adams Streets. Though these stately old avenues were ill-surfaced and unkempt, their
elm-shaded dignity had not entirely departed. Mansion after mansion claimed my gaze,
most of them decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by hard use; lacking bodily or muscular strength or
vitality
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 and boarded up
amidst neglected grounds, but one or two in each street shewing signs of occupancy. In
Washington Street there was a row of four or five in excellent repair and with
finely-tended lawns and gardens. The most sumptuous of these--with wide terraced
parterres extending back the whole way to Lafayette Street--I took to be the home of Old
Man Marsh, the afflicted refinery owner.
In all these streets no living thing was visible, and I wondered at the
complete absence of cats and dogs from Innsmouth. Another thing which puzzled and
disturbed me, even in some of the best-preserved mansions, was the tightly shuttered
condition of many third-story and attic windows. Furtiveness and secretDefinition: something that should
remain hidden from others (especially information that is not to be passed on);
information known only to a special group; something that baffles understanding and
cannot be explained; not open or public; kept private or not revealed; conducted with
or marked by hidden aims or methods; not openly made known; communicated covertly;
not expressed; designed to elude detection; hidden from general view or use; (of
information) given in confidence or in secret; indulging only covertly; having an
import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond ordinary
understanding; the next to highest level of official classification for
documents
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 14iveness seemed
universal in this hushed city of alienageDefinition: the quality of being alien
Word
Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 and death, and I could not escape
the sensation of being watched from ambush on every hand by sly, staring eyes that never
shut.
I shivered as the cracked stroke of three sounded from a belfry on my
left. Too well did I recall the squat church from which those notes came. Following
Washington Street toward the river, I now faced a new zone of former industry and
commerce; noting the ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined
building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction;
failure that results in a loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by
causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably;
destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of
virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12
of a factory ahead, and seeing others, with the traces of an old railway station and
covered railway bridge beyond, up the gorge on my right.
The uncertain bridge now before me was posted with a warning sign, but
I took the risk and crossed again to the south bank where traces of life reappeared.
Furtive, shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by
dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2
creaturesDefinition: a
living organism characterized by voluntary movement; a human being; `wight' is an
archaic term; a person who is controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant
or dishonest tasks for someone else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
3 stared crypticallyDefinition: in a cryptic manner
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 1 in my direction, and more normal faces eyed me coldly and
curiously. Innsmouth was rapidly becoming intolerable, and I turned down Paine Street
toward the Square in the hope of getting some vehicle to take me to Arkham before the
still-distant starting-time of that sinister bus.
It was then that I saw the tumbledown fire station on my left, and
noticed the red faced, bushy-bearded, watery eyed old man in nondescript rags who sat on
a bench in front of it talking with a pair of unkempt but not abnormalDefinition: not normal; not typical
or usual or regular or conforming to a norm; departing from the normal in e.g.
intelligence and development; much greater than the normal
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3 slooking firemen. This, of course, must
be Zadok Allen, the half-crazed, liquorish
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
0
nonagenarianDefinition: someone whose age is in the nineties; being from 90 to 99 years
old
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2 whose tales of old
Innsmouth and its shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an unilluminated area; something existing
in perception only; a premonition of something adverse; an indication that something
has been present; refuge from danger or observation; a dominating and pervasive
presence; a spy employed to follow someone and report their movements; an inseparable
companion; follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make
appear small by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12
were so hideous and incredible.
It must have been some imp of the perverse--or some sardonic pull from
dark, hidden sources--which made me change my plans as I did. I had long before resolved
to limit my observations to architecture alone, and I was even then hurrying toward the
Square in an effort to get quick transportation out of this festering city of death and
decayDefinition: the
process of gradually becoming inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or
current; the organic phenomenon of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the
process of decaying; the spontaneous disintegration of a radioactive substance along
with the emission of ionizing radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or
current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 8; but the sight of old Zadok Allen set up new
currents in my mind and made me slacken my pace uncertainly.
I had been assured that the old man could do nothing but hint at wild,
disjointed, and incredible legendsDefinition: a story about mythical or supernatural beings or events;
brief description accompanying an illustration
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2, and I had been warned that the natives made it unsafe to be seen
talking with him; yet the thought of this aged witness to the town's decayDefinition: the process
of gradually becoming inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current;
the organic phenomenon of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of
decaying; the spontaneous disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the
emission of ionizing radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall
into decay or ruin; undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 8, with memories going back to the early days of ships and
factories, was a lure that no amount of reason could make me resist. After all, the
strangest and maddest of mythsDefinition: a traditional story accepted as history; serves to explain
the world view of a people
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
1 are often merely symbols or allegories based upon truth--and old Zadok must
have seen everything which went on around Innsmouth for the last ninety years. Curiosity
flared up beyond sense and caution, and in my youthful egotism I fancied I might be able
to sift a nucleus of real history from the confused, extravagant outpouring I would
probably extract with the aid of raw whiskey.
I knew that I could not accost him then and there, for the firemen
would surely notice and object. Instead, I reflected, I would prepare by getting some
bootleg liquorDefinition:
an alcoholic beverage that is distilled rather than fermented; a liquid substance
that is a solution (or emulsion or suspension) used or obtained in an industrial
process; the liquid in which vegetables or meat have be cooked
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 3 at a place where the grocery boy had told me
it was plentiful. Then I would loaf near the fire station in apparent casualness, and
fall in with old Zadok after he had started on one of his frequent rambles. The youth
had said that he was very restless, seldom sitting around the station for more than an
hour or two at a time.
A quart bottle of whiskey was easily, though not cheaply, obtained in the rear of a dingy variety-store just off the Square in Eliot Street. The dirty-looking fellow who waited on me had a touch of the staring " Innsmouth look", but was quite civil in his way; being perhaps used to the custom of such convivial strangers--truckmen, gold-buyers, and the like--as were occasionally in town.
Reentering the Square I saw that luck was with me; for--shuffling out
of Paine Street around the corner of the Gilman House--I glimpsed nothing less than the
tall, lean, tattered form of old Zadok Allen himself. In accordance with my plan, I
attracted his attention by brandishing my newly-purchased bottle: and soon realised that
he had begun to shuffle wistfully after me as I turned into Waite Street on my way to
the most desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a
cause, a country or an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or
army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 region I could think of.
I was steering my course by the map the grocery boy had prepared, and was aiming for the wholly abandoned stretch of southern waterfront which I had previously visited. The only people in sight there had been the fishermen on the distant breakwater; and by going a few squares south I could get beyond the range of these, finding a pair of seats on some abandoned wharf and being free to question old Zadok unobserved for an indefinite time. Before I reached Main Street I could hear a faint and wheezy "Hey, Mister!" behind me and I presently allowed the old man to catch up and take copious pulls from the quart bottle.
I began putting out feelers as we walked amidst the omnipresent
desolation and crazily tilted ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a
ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that results in
destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation; destruction
achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage
irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive
of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
12, but found that the aged tongue did not loosen as quickly as I had
expected. At length I saw a grass-grown opening toward the sea between crumbling brick
walls, with the weedy length of an earth-and-masonry wharf projecting beyond. Piles of
moss-covered stones near the water promised tolerable seats, and the scene was sheltered
from all possible view by a ruinedDefinition: destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to
fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin;
destroyed physically or morally; doomed to extinction; brought to ruin
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 9 warehouse on the north. Here, I
thought was the ideal place for a long secretDefinition: something that should remain hidden from
others (especially information that is not to be passed on); information known only
to a special group; something that baffles understanding and cannot be explained; not
open or public; kept private or not revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims
or methods; not openly made known; communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to
elude detection; hidden from general view or use; (of information) given in
confidence or in secret; indulging only covertly; having an import not apparent to
the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next
to highest level of official classification for documents
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 14
colloquyDefinition: a
conversation especially a formal one; formal conversation
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 2; so I guided my companion down the lane and
picked out spots to sit in among the mossy stones. The air of death and desertion was
ghoulishDefinition:
suggesting the horror of death and decay
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 1, and the smell of fish almost insufferable; but I was resolved to
let nothing deter me.
About four hours remained for conversation if I were to catch the eight
o'clock coach for Arkham, and I began to dole out more liquorDefinition: an alcoholic beverage that
is distilled rather than fermented; a liquid substance that is a solution (or
emulsion or suspension) used or obtained in an industrial process; the liquid in
which vegetables or meat have be cooked
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 3 to the ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times;
belonging to times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of
the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
4
tipplerDefinition: someone
who drinks liquor repeatedly in small quantities
Word Type: other
Number
Of Synsets: 1; meanwhile eating my own frugal lunch. In my donations I was
careful not to overshoot the mark, for I did not wish Zadok's vinousDefinition: of or relating to
wine
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 garrulousness to pass
into a stupor. After an hour his furtive taciturnity shewedDefinition: establish the validity of something, as
by an example, explanation or experiment
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1 signs of disappearing, but much to my disappointment he still
sidetracked my questions about Innsmouth and its shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an
unilluminated area; something existing in perception only; a premonition of something
adverse; an indication that something has been present; refuge from danger or
observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a spy employed to follow someone
and report their movements; an inseparable companion; follow, usually without the
person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12-haunted past. He would babble of
current topics, revealing a wide acquaintance with newspapers and a great tendency to
philosophise in a sententiousDefinition: abounding in or given to pompous or aphoristic moralizing;
concise and full of meaning
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2
village fashion.
Toward the end of the second hour I feared my quart of whiskey would
not be enough to produce results, and was wondering whether I had better leave old Zadok
and go back for more. Just then, however, chance made the opening which my questions had
been unable to make; and the wheezingDefinition: breathe with difficulty; relating to breathing with a
whistling sound
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2
ancientDefinition: a very
old person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past
especially of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very
old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4's rambling took a turn
that caused me to lean forward and listen alertly. My back was toward the fishy-smelling
sea, but he was facing it and something or other had caused his wandering gaze to light
on the low, distant line of Devil Reef, then showing plainly and almost fascinatingly
above the waves. The sight seemed to displease him, for he began a series of weak curses
which ended in a confidential whisperDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of the vocal cords; a
light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in the wind; speak
softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and
a knowing leerDefinition: a
facial expression of contempt or scorn; the upper lip curls; a suggestive or sneering
look or grin; look suggestively or obliquely; look or gaze with a sly, immodest, or
malign expression
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3. He bent
toward me, took hold of my coat lapel, and hissed out some hints that could not be
mistaken,
"Thar's whar it all begun--that cursed place of all wickedness whar the
deep water starts. Gate o' hellDefinition: any place of pain and turmoil; ; a cause of difficulty and
suffering; (Christianity) the abode of Satan and the forces of evil; where sinners
suffer eternal punishment; (religion) the world of the dead; violent and excited
activity; noisy and unrestrained mischief
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 6--sheer drop daown to a bottom no saoundin'-line kin tech. Ol' Cap'n
Obed done it--him that faound aout more'n was good fer him in the Saouth Sea islands.
"Everybody was in a bad way them days. Trade fallin' off, mills losin' business--even the new ones--an' the best of our menfolks kilt aprivateerin' in the War of 1812 or lost with the Elizy brig an' the Ranger scow--both on 'em Gilman venters. Obed Marsh he had three ships afloat--brigantine Columby, brig Hefty, an' barque Sumatry Queen. He was the only one as kep' on with the East-Injy an' Pacific trade, though Esdras Martin's barkentine Malay Bride made a venter as late as twenty-eight.
"Never was nobody like Cap'n Obed--old limb o' Satan! Heh, heh! I kin
mind him a-tellin' abaout furren parts, an' callin' all the folks stupid for goin' to
Christian meetin' an' bearin' their burdens meek an' lowly. Says they'd orter git better
godsDefinition: the
supernatural being conceived as the perfect and omnipotent and omniscient originator
and ruler of the universe; the object of worship in monotheistic religions; any
supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part of the world or some aspect of
life or who is the personification of a force; a man of such superior qualities that
he seems like a deity to other people; a material effigy that is worshipped
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 4 like some o' the folks in the
Injies--gods as ud bring 'em good fishin' in return for their sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or
surrendering something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform
etc.; personnel that are sacrificed (e.g., surrendered or lost in order to gain an
objective); a loss entailed by giving up or selling something at less than its value;
the act of killing (an animal or person) in order to propitiate a deity; (baseball)
an out that advances the base runners; endure the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a
loss; make a sacrifice of; in religious rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 9, an' ud reely answer folks's prayers.
"Matt Eliot, his fust mate, talked a lot too, only he was again'
folks's doin' any heathenDefinition: a person who does not acknowledge your god; not
acknowledging the God of Christianity and Judaism and Islam
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 things. Told abaout an island east of
Othaheite whar they was a lot o' stone ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and
destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that
results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation;
destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 older'n anybody knew anything abaout, kind o' like them
on Ponape, in the Carolines, but with carven's of faces that looked like the big statues
on Easter Island. Thar was a little volcanic island near thar, too, whar they was other
ruinsDefinition: an
irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined building; the process of
becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction; failure that results in a
loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by causing something to be
wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail;
reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 with diff'rent carvin'--ruinsDefinition: an
irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined building; the process of
becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction; failure that results in a
loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by causing something to be
wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail;
reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 all wore away like they'd ben
under the sea onct, an' with picters of awful monsters all over 'em.
"Wal, Sir, Matt he says the natives araound thar had all the fish they
cud ketch, an' sported bracelets an' armlets an' head rigs made aout o' a queerDefinition: offensive
term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires)
of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating
from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 kind o' gold an' covered with picters
o' monsters jest like the ones carved over the ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and
destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that
results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation;
destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 on the little island--sorter fish-like frogs or froglike
fishes that was drawed in all kinds o' positions likes they was human bein's. Nobody cud
get aout o' them whar they got all the stuff, an' all the other natives wondered haow
they managed to find fish in plenty even when the very next island had lean pickin's.
Matt he got to wonderon' too an' so did Cap'n Obed. Obed he notices, besides, that lots
of the hn'some young folks ud drop aout o' sight fer good from year to year, an' that
they wan't many old folks around. Also, he thinks some of the folks looked durned queerDefinition: offensive
term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires)
of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating
from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 even for Kanakys.
"It took Obed to git the truth aout o' them heathenDefinition: a person who does not
acknowledge your god; not acknowledging the God of Christianity and Judaism and
Islam
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2. I dun't know haow
he done it, but he begun by tradin' fer the gold-like things they wore. Ast 'em whar
they come from, an' ef they cud git more, an' finally wormed the story aout o' the old
chief--Walakea, they called him. Nobody but Obed ud ever a believed the old yeller
devil, but the Cap'n cud read folks like they was books. Heh, heh! Nobody never believes
me naow when I tell 'em, an' I dun't s'pose you will, young feller--though come to look
at ye, ye hev kind o' got them sharp-readin' eyes like Obed had."
The old man's whisperDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of the vocal cords; a
light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in the wind; speak
softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 grew
fainter, and I found myself shuddering at the terrible and sincere portentousness of his
intonation, even though I knew his tale could be nothing but drunken phantasy.
"Wal, Sir, Obed he larnt that they's things on this arth as most folks
never heerd about--an' wouldn't believe ef they did hear. It seems these Kanakys was
sacrificin'
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 0 heaps o' their young men an'
maidens to some kind o' god-things
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 0 that lived
under the sea, an' gittin' all kinds o' favour in return. They met the things on the
little islet with the queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the
efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult
position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing
homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
ruinsDefinition: an
irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined building; the process of
becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction; failure that results in a
loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by causing something to be
wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail;
reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12, an' it seems them awful picters
o' frog-fish monsters was supposed to be picters o' these things. Mebbe they was the
kind o' crittersDefinition:
a regional term for `creature' (especially for domestic animals)
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 1 as got all the mermaid stories an' sech
started.
"They had all kinds a' cities on the sea-bottom, an' this island was heaved up from thar. Seem they was some of the things alive in the stone buildin's when the island come up sudden to the surface, That's how the Kanakys got wind they was daown thar. Made sign-talk as soon as they got over bein' skeert, an' pieced up a bargain afore long.
"Them things liked human sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or surrendering
something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform etc.; personnel
that are sacrificed (e.g., surrendered or lost in order to gain an objective); a loss
entailed by giving up or selling something at less than its value; the act of killing
(an animal or person) in order to propitiate a deity; (baseball) an out that advances
the base runners; endure the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a loss; make a
sacrifice of; in religious rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 9. Had had 'em ages afore, but lost track o' the upper world after a
time. What they done to the victims it ain't fer me to say, an' I guess Obed wa'n't none
too sharp abaout askin'. But it was all right with the heathenDefinition: a person who does not
acknowledge your god; not acknowledging the God of Christianity and Judaism and
Islam
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2s, because they'd
ben havin' a hard time an' was desp'rate abaout everything. They give a sarten number o'
young folks to the sea-things twice every year--May-Eve an' Hallawe'en--reg'lar as cud
be. Also give some a' the carved knick-knacks they made. What the things agreed to give
in return was plenty a' fish--they druv 'em in from all over the sea--an' a few
gold-like things naow an' then.
"Wal, as I says, the natives met the things on the little volcanic
islet--goin' thar in canoes with the sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or surrendering
something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform etc.; personnel
that are sacrificed (e.g., surrendered or lost in order to gain an objective); a loss
entailed by giving up or selling something at less than its value; the act of killing
(an animal or person) in order to propitiate a deity; (baseball) an out that advances
the base runners; endure the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a loss; make a
sacrifice of; in religious rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 9 et cet'ry, and bringin' back any of the gold-like jools as was
comin' to 'em. At fust the things didn't never go onto the main island, but arter a time
they come to want to. Seems they hankered arter mixin' with the folks, an' havin' j'int
ceremonies on the big days--May-Eve an' Hallowe'en. Ye see, they was able to live both
in ant aout o' water--what they call amphibians, I guess. The Kanakys told 'em as haow
folks from the other islands might wanta wipe 'an out if they got wind o' their bein'
thar, but they says they dun't keer much, because they cud wipe aout the hull brood o'
humans ef they was willin' to bother--that is, any as didn't be, sarten signs sech as
was used onct by the lost Old Ones, whoever they was. But not wantin' to bother, they'd
lay low when anybody visited the island.
"When it come to matin' with them toad-lookin' fishes, the Kanakys kind o' balked, but finally they larnt something as put a new face on the matter. Seems that human folks has got a kind a' relation to sech water-beasts--that everything alive come aout o' the water onct an' only needs a little change to go back agin. Them things told the Kanakys that ef they mixed bloods there'd be children as ud look human at fust, but later turn more'n more like the things, till finally they'd take to the water an' jine the main lot o' things daown har. An' this is the important part, young feller--them as turned into fish things an' went into the water wouldn't never die. Them things never died excep' they was kilt violent.
"Wal, Sir, it seems by the time Obed knowed them islanders they was all full o' fish blood from them deep-water things. When they got old an' begun to shew it, they was kep' hid until they felt like takin' to the water an' quittin' the place. Some was more teched than others, an' some never did change quite enough to take to the water; but mosily they turned out jest the way them things said. Them as was born more like the things changed arly, but them as was nearly human sometimes stayed on the island till they was past seventy, though they'd usually go daown under for trial trips afore that. Folks as had took to the water gen'rally come back a good deal to visit, so's a man ud often be a'talkin' to his own five-times-great-grandfather who'd left the dry land a couple o' hundred years or so afore.
"Everybody got aout o' the idee o' dyin'--excep' in canoe wars with the
other islanders, or as sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or surrendering something as a penalty for
a mistake or fault or failure to perform etc.; personnel that are sacrificed (e.g.,
surrendered or lost in order to gain an objective); a loss entailed by giving up or
selling something at less than its value; the act of killing (an animal or person) in
order to propitiate a deity; (baseball) an out that advances the base runners; endure
the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a loss; make a sacrifice of; in religious
rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 9 to the sea-gods
daown below, or from snakebite or plague or sharp gallopin' ailments or somethin' afore
they cud take to the water--but simply looked forrad to a kind o' change that wa'n't a
bit horribleDefinition:
provoking horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 arter a
while. They thought what they'd got was well wuth all they'd had to give up--an' I guess
Obed kind o' come to think the same hisself when he'd chewed over old Walakea's story a
bit. Walakea, though, was one of the few as hadn't got none of the fish blood--bein' of
a royal line that intermarried with royal lines on other islands.
"Walakea he shewed Obed a lot o' rites an' incantations as had to do with the sea things, an' let him see some o' the folks in the village as had changed a lot from human shape. Somehaow or other, though, he never would let him see one of the reg'lar things from right aout o' the water. In the end he give him a funny kind o' thingumajig made aout o' lead or something, that he said ud bring up the fish things from any place in the water whar they might be a nest o' 'em. The idee was to drop it daown with the right kind o' prayers an' sech. Walakea allowed as the things was scattered all over the world, so's anybody that looked abaout cud find a nest an' bring 'em up ef they was wanted.
"Matt he didn't like this business at all, an' wanted Obed shud keep away from the island; but the Cap'n was sharp fer gain, an' faound he cud get them gold-like things so cheap it ud pay him to make a specialty of them. Things went on that way for years an' Obed got enough o' that gold-like stuff to make him start the refinery in Waite's old run-daown fullin' mill. He didn't dass sell the pieces like they was, for folks ud be all the time askin' questions. All the same his crews ud get a piece an' dispose of it naow and then, even though they was swore to keep quiet; an' he let his women-folks wear some o' the pieces as was more human-like than most.
"Well, come abaout thutty-eight--when I was seven year' old--Obed he
faound the island people all wiped aout between v'yages. Seems the other islanders had
got wind o' what was goin' on, and had took matters into their own hands. S'pose they
must a had, after all, them old magic signs as the sea things says was the only things
they was afeard of. No tellin' what any o' them Kanakys will chance to git a holt of
when the sea-bottom throws up some island with ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and
destruction; a ruined building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that
results in destruction; failure that results in a loss of position or reputation;
destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 older'n the deluge. Pious cusses, these was--they didn't
leave nothin' standin' on either the main island or the little volcanic islet excep'
what parts of the ruinsDefinition: an irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined
building; the process of becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction;
failure that results in a loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by
causing something to be wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably;
destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of
virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12
was too big to knock daown. In some places they was little stones strewed abaout--like
charms--with somethin' on 'em like what ye call a swastika naowadays. Prob'ly them was
the Old Ones' signs. Folks all wiped aout no trace o' no gold-like things an' none the
nearby Kanakys ud breathe a word abaout the matter. Wouldn't even admit they'd ever ben
any people on that island.
"That naturally hit Obed pretty hard, seein' as his normal trade was doin' very poor. It hit the whole of Innsmouth, too, because in seafarint days what profited the master of a ship gen'lly profited the crew proportionate. Most of the folks araound the taown took the hard times kind o' sheep-like an' resigned, but they was in bad shape because the fishin' was peterin' aout an' the mills wan't doin' none too well.
"Then's the time Obed he begun a-cursin' at the folks fer bein' dull
sheep an' prayin' to a Christian heaven as didn't help 'em none. He told 'em he'd knowed
o' folks as prayed to godsDefinition: the supernatural being conceived as the perfect and
omnipotent and omniscient originator and ruler of the universe; the object of worship
in monotheistic religions; any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part
of the world or some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force; a man
of such superior qualities that he seems like a deity to other people; a material
effigy that is worshipped
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
4 that give somethin' ye reely need, an' says ef a good bunch o' men ud stand
by him, he cud mebbe get a holt o' sarten paowers as ud bring plenty o' fish an' quite a
bit of gold. O' course them as sarved on the Sumatry Queen, an' seed the island knowed
what he meant, an' wa'n't none too anxious to get clost to sea-things like they'd heard
tell on, but them as didn't know what 'twas all abaout got kind o' swayed by what Obed
had to say, and begun to ast him what he cud do to sit 'em on the way to the faith as ud
bring 'em results."
Here the old man faltered, mumbled, and lapsed into a moody and
apprehensive silence; glancing nervously over his shoulder and then turning back to
stare fascinatedly at the distant black reef. When I spoke to him he did not answer, so
I knew I would have to let him finish the bottle. The insane yarn I was hearing
interested me profoundly, for I fancied there was contained within it a sort of crude
allegory based upon the strangeness of Innsmouth and elaborated by an imagination at
once creative and full of scraps of exoticDefinition: being or from or characteristic of
another place or part of the world; strikingly strange or unusual
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
legendDefinition: a story
about mythical or supernatural beings or events; brief description accompanying an
illustration
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2. Not for a
moment did I believe that the tale had any really substantial foundation; but none the
less the account held a hint of genuine terror if only because it brought in references
to strange jewels clearly akin to the malign tiara I had seen at Newburyport. Perhaps
the ornaments had, after all, come from some strange island; and possibly the wild
stories were lies of the bygoneDefinition: past events to be put aside; well in the past; former
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 Obed himself rather than of this
antique toper.
I handed Zadok the bottle, and he drained it to the last drop. It was
curious how he could stand so much whiskey, for not even a trace of thickness had come
into his high, wheezy voice. He licked the nose of the bottle and slipped it into his
pocket, then beginning to nod and whisperDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of
the vocal cords; a light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in
the wind; speak softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 3 softly to himself. I bent close to catch any articulate words he
might utter, and thought I saw a sardonic smile behind the stained bushy whiskers.
Yes--he was really forming words, and I could grasp a fair proportion of them.
"Poor Matt--Matt he allus was agin it--tried to line up the folks on
his side, an' had long talks with the preachers--no use--they run the Congregational
parson aout o' taown, an' the Methodist feller quit--never did see Resolved Babcock, the
Baptist parson, agin--Wrath o' Jehovy--I was a mightly little critterDefinition: a regional term for
`creature' (especially for domestic animals)
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1, but I heerd what I heerd an, seen what I seen--Dagon an'
Ashtoreth--Belial an' Beelzebub--Golden Caff an' the idolsDefinition: a material effigy that is
worshipped; someone who is adored blindly and excessively; an ideal instance; a
perfect embodiment of a concept
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
3 o' Canaan an' the Philistines--Babylonish abominations--Mene, mene, tekel,
upharsin--."
He stopped again, and from the look in his watery blue eyes I feared he was close to a stupor after all. But when I gently shook his shoulder he turned on me with astonishing alertness and snapped out some more obscure phrases.
"Dun't believe me, hey? Hey, heh, heh--then jest tell me, young feller,
why Cap'n Obed an' twenty odd other folks used to row aout to Devil Reef in the dead o'
night an' chant things so laoud ye cud hear 'em all over taown when the wind was right?
Tell me that, hey? An' tell me why Obed was allus droppin' heavy things daown into the
deep water t'other side o' the reef whar the bottom shoots daown like a cliff lower'n ye
kin saound? Tell me what he done with that funny-shaped lead thingumajig as Walakea give
him? Hey, boy? An' what did they all haowl on May-Eve, an, agin the next Hallowe'en? An'
why'd the new church parsons--fellers as used to be sailors--wear them queerDefinition: offensive
term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires)
of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or deviating
from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 robes an' cover their-selves with them
gold-like things Obed brung? Hey?"
The watery blue eyes were almost savage and maniacal now, and the dirty
white beard bristled electrically. Old Zadok probably saw me shrink back, for he began
to cackle evillyDefinition: in a wicked evil manner
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 1.
"Heh, heh, heh, heh! Beginnin' to see, hey? Mebbe ye'd like to a ben me in them days, when I seed things at night aout to sea from the cupalo top o' my haouse. Oh, I kin tell ye' little pitchers hev big ears, an' I wa'n't missin' nothin' o' what was gossiped abaout Cap'n Obed an' the folks aout to the reef! Heh, heh, heh! Haow abaout the night I took my pa's ship's glass up to the cupalo an' seed the reef a-bristlin' thick with shapes that dove off quick soon's the moon riz?
"Obed an' the folks was in a dory, but them shapes dove off the far side into the deep water an' never come up...
"Haow'd ye like to be a little shaver alone up in a cupola a-watchin' shapes as wa'n't human shapes?...Heh?...Heh, heh, heh ..."
The old man was getting hysterical, and I began to shiver with a nameless alarm. He laid a gnarled claw on my shoulder, and it seemed to me that its shaking was not altogether that of mirth.
"S'pose one night ye seed somethin' heavy heaved offen Obed's dory beyond the reef' and then learned next day a young feller was missin' from home. Hey! Did anybody ever see hide or hair o' Hiram Gilman agin. Did they? An' Nick Pierce, an' Luelly Waite, an' Adoniram Saouthwick, an' Henry Garrison. Hey? Heh, heh, heh, heh...Shapes talkin' sign language with their hands...them as had reel hands ...
"Wal, Sir, that was the time Obed begun to git on his feet agin. Folks see his three darters a-wearin' gold-like things as nobody'd never see on 'em afore, an' smoke stared comin' aout o' the refin'ry chimbly. Other folks was prosp'rin, too--fish begun to swarm into the harbour fit to kill an' heaven knows what sized cargoes we begun to ship out to Newb'ryport, Arkham, an' Boston. 'Twas then Obed got the ol' branch railrud put through. Some Kingsport fishermen heerd abaout the ketch an' come up in sloops, but they was all lost. Nobody never see 'em agin. An' jest then our folk organised the Esoteric Order 0' Dagon, an' bought Masonic Hall offen Calvary Commandery for it...heh, heh, heh! Matt Eliot was a Mason an' agin the sellin', but he dropped aout o' sight jest then.
"Remember, I ain't sayin' Obed was set on hevin' things jest like they was on that Kanaky isle. I dun't think he aimed at fust to do no mixin', nor raise no younguns to take to the water an' turn into fishes with eternal life. He wanted them gold things, an' was willin' to pay heavy, an' I guess the others was satisfied fer a while ...
"Come in' forty-six the taown done some lookin' an' thinkin' fer
itself. Too many folks missin'--too much wild preachin' at meetin' of a Sunday--too much
talk abaout that reef. I guess I done a bit by tellin' Selectman Mowry what I see from
the cupalo. They was a party one night as follered Obed's craowd aout to the reef, an' I
heerd shots betwixt the dories. Nex' day Obed and thutty-two others was in gaol, with
everybody a-wonderin' jest what was afoot and jest what charge agin 'em cud he got to
holt. GodDefinition:
the supernatural being conceived as the perfect and omnipotent and omniscient
originator and ruler of the universe; the object of worship in monotheistic
religions; any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part of the world or
some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force; a man of such superior
qualities that he seems like a deity to other people; a material effigy that is
worshipped
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 4, ef anybody'd
look'd ahead...a couple o' weeks later, when nothin' had ben throwed into the sea fer
thet long..."
Zadok was shewing sings of frightDefinition: an emotion experienced in anticipation
of some specific pain or danger (usually accompanied by a desire to flee or fight);
cause fear in
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 and
exhaustion, and I let him keep silence for a while, though glancing apprehensively at my
watch. The tide had turned and was coming in now, and the sound of the waves seemed to
arouse him. I was glad of that tide, for at high water the fishy smell might not be so
bad. Again I strained to catch his whispersDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of
the vocal cords; a light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in
the wind; speak softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 3.
"That awful night...I seed 'em. I was up in the cupalo...hordes of 'em...swarms of 'em...all over the reef an' swimmin' up the harbour into the Manuxet...God, what happened in the streets of Innsmouth that night...they rattled our door, but pa wouldn't open...then he clumb aout the kitchen winder with his musket to find Selecman Mowry an' see what he cud do...Maounds o' the dead an' the dyin'...shots and screams...shaoutin' in Ol Squar an' Taown Squar an' New Church Green--gaol throwed open...--proclamation...treason...called it the plague when folks come in an' faoud haff our people missin'...nobody left but them as ud jine in with Obed an' them things or else keep quiet...never heard o' my pa no more..."
The old man was panting and perspiring profusely. His grip on my shoulder tightened.
"Everything cleaned up in the mornin'--but they was traces...Obed he kinder takes charge an' says things is goin' to be changed... others'll worship with us at meetin'-time, an' sarten haouses hez got to entertin guests...they wanted to mix like they done with the Kanakys, an' he for one didn't feel baound to stop 'em. Far gone, was Obed...jest like a crazy man on the subjeck. He says they brung us fish an' treasure, an' shud hev what they hankered after..."
"Nothin' was to be diff'runt on the aoutside; only we was to keep shy o' strangers ef we knowed what was good fer us.
"We all hed to take the Oath o' Dagon, an' later on they was secon' an'
third oaths that some o' us took. Them as ud help special, ud git special rewards--gold
an' sech--No use balkin', fer they was millions of 'em daown thar. They'd ruther not
start risin' an' wipin' aout human-kind, but ef they was gave away an' forced to, they
cud do a lot toward jest that. We didn't hev them old charms to cut 'em off like folks
in the Saouth Sea did, an' them Kanakys wudn't never give away their secretDefinition: something
that should remain hidden from others (especially information that is not to be
passed on); information known only to a special group; something that baffles
understanding and cannot be explained; not open or public; kept private or not
revealed; conducted with or marked by hidden aims or methods; not openly made known;
communicated covertly; not expressed; designed to elude detection; hidden from
general view or use; (of information) given in confidence or in secret; indulging
only covertly; having an import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to the
intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding; the next to highest level of official
classification for documents
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
14 s.
"Yield up enough sacrificesDefinition: the act of losing or surrendering
something as a penalty for a mistake or fault or failure to perform etc.; personnel
that are sacrificed (e.g., surrendered or lost in order to gain an objective); a loss
entailed by giving up or selling something at less than its value; the act of killing
(an animal or person) in order to propitiate a deity; (baseball) an out that advances
the base runners; endure the loss of; kill or destroy; sell at a loss; make a
sacrifice of; in religious rituals
Word Type: religious
Number Of
Synsets: 9 an' savage knick-knacks an' harbourage in the taown when they
wanted it, an' they'd let well enough alone. Wudn't bother no strangers as might bear
tales aoutside--that is, withaout they got pryin'. All in the band of the
faithful--Order 0' Dagon--an' the children shud never die, but go back to the Mother
Hydra an' Father Dagon what we all come from onct...Ia! Ia! Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui
mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah-nagl fhtaga--"
Old Zadok was fast lapsing into stark raving, and I held my breath.
Poor old soul--to what pitiful depths of hallucination had his liquorDefinition: an alcoholic beverage that
is distilled rather than fermented; a liquid substance that is a solution (or
emulsion or suspension) used or obtained in an industrial process; the liquid in
which vegetables or meat have be cooked
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 3, plus his hatred of the decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming
inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon
of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous
disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing
radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin;
undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
8, alienageDefinition: the quality of being alien
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 1, and disease around him, brought that fertile, imaginative brain?
He began to moan now, and tears were coursing down his channelled checks into the depths
of his beard.
"God, what I seen senct I was fifteen year' old--Mene, mene, tekel,
upharsin!--the folks as was missin', and them as kilt theirselves--them as told things
ins Arkham or Ipswich or sech places was all called crazy, like you're callin' me right
naow--but GodDefinition: the supernatural being conceived as the perfect and omnipotent and
omniscient originator and ruler of the universe; the object of worship in
monotheistic religions; any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part of
the world or some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force; a man of
such superior qualities that he seems like a deity to other people; a material effigy
that is worshipped
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 4, what
I seen--They'd a kilt me long ago fer' what I know, only I'd took the fust an' secon'
Oaths o' Dago offen Obed, so was pertected unlessen a jury of 'em proved I told things
knowin' an' delib'rit...but I wudn't take the third Oath--I'd a died ruther'n take
that--
"It got wuss araound Civil War time, when children born senct 'forty-six begun to grow up--some 'em, that is. I was afeared--never did no pryin' arter that awful night, an' never see one o'--them--clost to in all my life. That is, never no full-blooded one. I went to the war, an' ef I'd a had any guts or sense I'd a never come back, but settled away from here. But folks wrote me things wa'n't so bad. That, I s'pose, was because gov'munt draft men was in taown arter 'sixty-three. Arter the war it was jest as bad agin. People begun to fall off--mills an' shops shet daown--shippin' stopped an' the harbour choked up--railrud give up--but they...they never stopped swimmin' in an' aout o' the river from that cursed reef o' Satan--an' more an' more attic winders got a-boarded up, an' more an' more noises was heerd in haouses as wa'n't s'posed to hev nobody in 'em...
"Folks aoutside hev their stories abaout us--s'pose you've heerd a
plenty on 'em, seein' what questions ye ast--stories abaout things they've seed naow an'
then, an' abaout that queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the
efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult
position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing
homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 joolry
as still comes in from somewhars an' ain't quite all melted up--but nothin' never gits
def'nite. Nobody'll believe nothin'. They call them gold-like things pirate loot, an'
allaow the Innsmouth folks hez furren blood or is dis-tempered or somethin'. Beside,
them that lives here shoo off as many strangers as they kin, an' encourage the rest not
to git very cur'ous, specially raound night time. BeastsDefinition: a living organism characterized by
voluntary movement; a cruelly rapacious person
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2 balk at the crittersDefinition: a regional term for `creature' (especially for domestic
animals)
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1--hosses wuss'n
mules--but when they got autos that was all right.
"In 'forty-six Cap'n Obed took a second wife that nobody in the taown never see--some says he didn't want to, but was made to by them as he'd called in--had three children by her--two as disappeared young, but one gal as looked like anybody else an' was eddicated in Europe. Obed finally got her married off by a trick to ans Arkham feller as didn't suspect nothin'. But nobody aoutside'll hav nothin' to do with Innsmouth folks naow. Barnabas Marsh that runs the refin'ry now is Obed's grandson by his fust wife--son of Onesiphorus, his eldest son, but his mother was another o' them as wa'n't never seen aoutdoors.
"Right naow Barnabas is abaout changed. Can't shet his eyes no more, an' is all aout o' shape. They say he still wears clothes, but he'll take to the water soon. Mebbe he's tried it already--they do sometimes go daown for little spells afore they go daown for good. Ain't ben seed abaout in public fer nigh on ten year'. Dun't know haow his poor wife kin feel--she come from Ipiwich, an' they nigh lynched Barnabas when he courted her fifty odd year' ago. Obed he died in 'seventy-eight an' all the next gen'ration is gone naow--the fust wife's children dead, and the rest...God knows..."
The sound of the incoming tide was now very insistent, and little by little it seemed to change the old man's mood from maudlin tearfulness to watchful fear. He would pause now and then to renew those nervous glances over his shoulder or out toward the reef, and despite the wild absurdity of his tale, I could not help beginning to share his apprehensiveness. Zadok now grew shriller, seemed to be trying to whip up his courage with louder speech.
"Hey, yew, why dun't ye say somethin'? Haow'd ye like to be livin' in a taown like this, with everything a-rottin' an' dyin', an' boarded-up monsters crawlin' an' bleatin' an' barkin' an' hoppin' araoun' black cellars an' attics every way ye turn? Hey? Haow'd ye like to hear the haowlin' night arter night from the churches an' Order o' Dagon Hall, an' know what's doin' part o' the haowlin'? Haow'd ye like to hear what comes from that awful reef every May-Eve an' Hallowmass? Hey? Think the old man's crazy, eh? Wal, Sir, let me tell ye that ain't the wust!"
Zadok was really screaming now, and the mad frenzy of his voice disturbed me more than I care to own.
"Curse ye, dun't set thar a'starin' at me with them eyes--I tell Obed
Marsh he's in hellDefinition: any place of pain and turmoil; ; a cause of difficulty and suffering;
(Christianity) the abode of Satan and the forces of evil; where sinners suffer
eternal punishment; (religion) the world of the dead; violent and excited activity;
noisy and unrestrained mischief
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6, an, hez got to stay thar! Heh, heh...in hellDefinition: any place of pain and
turmoil; ; a cause of difficulty and suffering; (Christianity) the abode of Satan and
the forces of evil; where sinners suffer eternal punishment; (religion) the world of
the dead; violent and excited activity; noisy and unrestrained mischief
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6, I says! Can't git me--I hain't
done nothin' nor told nobody nothin'--
"Oh, you, young feller? Wal, even ef I hain't told nobody nothin' yet, I'm a'goin' to naow! Yew jest set still an' listen to me, boy--this is what I ain't never told nobody...I says I didn't get to do pryin' arter that night--but I faound things about jest the same!"
"Yew want to know what the reel horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something
that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense aversion
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 is, hey? Wal, it's this--it ain't what them
fish devils hez done, but what they're a-goin' to do! They're a-bringin' things up aout
o' whar they come from into the taown--been doin' it fer years, an' slackenin' up
lately. Them haouses north o' the river be-twixt Water an' Main Streets is full of
'em--them devils an' what they brung--an' when they git ready...I say, when they
git...ever hear tell of a shoggoth?
"Hey, d'ye hear me? I tell ye I know what them things be--I seen 'em one night when...eh-ahhh-ah! e'yahhh..."
The hideous suddenness and inhumanDefinition: without compunction or human feeling;
belonging to or resembling something nonhuman
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2
frightfulnessDefinition:
the quality of being frightful
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
1 of the old man's shriek almost made me faint. His eyes, looking past me
toward the malodorous sea, were positively starting from his head; while his face was a
mask of fear worthy of Greek tragedy. His bony claw dug monstrously into my shoulder,
and he made no motion as I turned my head to look at whatever he had glimpsed.
There was nothing that I could see. Only the incoming tide, with
perhaps one set of ripples more local than the long-flung line of breakers. But now
Zadok was shaking me, and I turned back to watch the melting of that fear-frozen face
into a chaos of twitching eyelids and mumbling gums. Presently his voice came
back--albeit as a trembling whisperDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of the vocal cords; a
light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in the wind; speak
softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3.
"Git aout o' here! Get aout o' here! They seen us--git aout fer your life! Dun't wait fer nothin'--they know naow--Run fer it--quick--aout o' this taown--"
Another heavy wave dashed against the loosing masonry of the bygoneDefinition: past events
to be put aside; well in the past; former
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2 wharf, and changed the mad ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived
in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the historical period
before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4's whisperDefinition: speaking softly without vibration of the vocal cords; a
light noise, like the noise of silk clothing or leaves blowing in the wind; speak
softly; in a low voice
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 to
another inhumanDefinition: without compunction or human feeling; belonging to or resembling
something nonhuman
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 2 and
blood-curdling scream. "E-yaahhhh!...Yheaaaaaa!..."
Before I could recover my scattered wits he had relaxed his clutch on
my shoulder and dashed wildly inland toward the street, reeling northward around the
ruinedDefinition:
destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to
bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin; destroyed
physically or morally; doomed to extinction; brought to ruin
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 9 warehouse wall.
I glanced back at the sea, but there was nothing there. And when I reached Water Street and looked along it toward the north there was no remaining trace of Zadok Allen.
I can hardly describe the mood in which I was left by this harrowing
episode--an episode at once mad and pitiful, grotesqueDefinition: art characterized by an incongruous
mixture of parts of humans and animals interwoven with plants; distorted and
unnatural in shape or size; abnormal and hideous; ludicrously odd
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and terrifying. The grocery boy had prepared
me for it, yet the reality left me none the less bewildered and disturbed. Puerile
though the story was, old Zadok's insane earnestness and horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear;
something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense aversion
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 had communicated to me a mounting
unrest which joined with my earlier sense of loathing for the town and its blight of
intangible shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an unilluminated area; something existing
in perception only; a premonition of something adverse; an indication that something
has been present; refuge from danger or observation; a dominating and pervasive
presence; a spy employed to follow someone and report their movements; an inseparable
companion; follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make
appear small by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
12.
Later I might sift the tale and extract some nucleus of historic
allegory; just now I wished to put it out of my head. The hour grown perilously late--my
watch said 7:15, and the Arkham bus left Town Square at eight--so I tried to give my
thoughts as neutral and practical a cast as possible, meanwhile walking rapidly through
the desertedDefinition:
leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a
country or an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or army;
leave behind; forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 4 streets of gaping roofs and leaning houses toward the hotel
where I had checked my valise and would find my bus.
Though the golden light of late afternoon gave the ancientDefinition: a very old person; a
person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the
historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 roofs and decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by
hard use; lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 chimneys an air of mysticDefinition: someone who believes in
the existence of realities beyond human comprehension; having an import not apparent
to the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond ordinary understanding;
relating to or resembling mysticism; relating to or characteristic of mysticism
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 loveliness and peace, I could not
help glancing over my shoulder now and then. I would surely be very glad to get out of
malodorous and fear-shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a
shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled with shade
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth, and wished there were some other
vehicle than the bus driven by that sinister-looking fellow Sargent. Yet I did not hurry
too precipitately, for there were architectural details worth viewing at every silent
corner; and I could easily, I calculated, cover the necessary distance in a half-hour.
Studying the grocery youth's map and seeking a route I had not
traversed before, I chose Marsh Street instead of State for my approach to Town Square.
Near the corner of Fall Street I began to see scattered groups of furtive whisperersDefinition: one who
speaks in a whisper
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1, and
when I finally reached the Square I saw that almost all the loiterers were congregated
around the door of the Gilman House. It seemed as if many bulging, watery, unwinking
eyes looked oddly at me as I claimed my valise in the lobby, and I hoped that none of
these unpleasant creaturesDefinition: a living organism characterized by voluntary movement; a human being;
`wight' is an archaic term; a person who is controlled by others and is used to
perform unpleasant or dishonest tasks for someone else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 would be my fellow-passengers on the coach.
The bus, rather early, rattled in with three passengers somewhat before
eight, and an evilDefinition: morally objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or
misfortune; the good is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of
being morally wrong in principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature
of vice; having or exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6-looking fellow on the sidewalk muttered a few
indistinguishable words to the driver. Sargent threw out a mail-bag and a roll of
newspapers, and entered the hotel; while the passengers--the same men whom I had seen
arriving in Newburyport that morning--shambledDefinition: walk by dragging one's feet
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 to the sidewalk and exchanged some
faint guttural words with a loafer in a language I could have sworn was not English. I
boarded the empty coach and took the seat I had taken before, but was hardly settled
before Sargent re-appeared and began mumbling in a throaty voice of peculiar repulsivenessDefinition: the
quality of being disgusting to the senses or emotions
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1.
I was, it appeared, in very bad luck. There had been something wrong
with the engine, despite the excellent time made from Newburyport, and the bus could not
complete the journey to Arkham. No, it could not possibly be repaired that night, nor
was there any other way of getting transportation out of Innsmouth either to Arkham or
elsewhere. Sargent was sorry, but I would have to stop over at the Gilman. Probably the
clerk would make the price easy for me, but there was nothing else to do. Almost dazed
by this sudden obstacle, and violently dreading the fall of night in this decayingDefinition: lose a
stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or
decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and
half-unlighted town, I left the bus and reentered the hotel lobby; where the sullen
queerDefinition:
offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the efforts, plans,
or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult position; beyond or
deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5-looking night clerk told me I
could have Room 428 on next the top floor--large, but without running water--for a
dollar.
Despite what I had heard of this hotel in Newburyport, I signed the
register, paid my dollar, let the clerk take my valise, and followed that sour, solitary
attendant up three creaking flights of stairs past dusty corridors which seemed wholly
devoid of life. My room was a dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 1 rear one with two windows and bare, cheap furnishings, overlooked a
dingy court-yard otherwise hemmed in by low, desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 brick blocks,
and commanded a view of decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by hard use; lacking bodily or muscular
strength or vitality
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
westward-stretching roofs with a marshy countryside beyond. At the end of the corridor
was a bathroom--a discouraging relique with ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived
in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the historical period
before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 marble bowl, tin tub, faint electric light, and musty
wooded paneling around all the plumbing fixtures.
It being still daylight, I descended to the Square and looked around
for a dinner of some sort; noticing as I did so the strange glances I received from the
unwholesome loafers. Since the grocery was closed, I was forced to patronise the
restaurant I had shunned before; a stooped, narrow-headed man with staring, unwinking
eyes, and a flat-nosed wench with unbelievably thick, clumsy hands being in attendance.
The service was all of the counter type, and it relieved me to find that much was
evidently served from cans and packages. A bowl of vegetable soup with crackers was
enough for me, and I soon headed back for my cheerless room at the Gilman; getting a
evening paper and a fly-specked magazine from the evilDefinition: morally objectionable behavior; that which
causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good is oft interred with their bones"-
Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in principle or practice; morally bad
or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 6-visagedDefinition: having a face or visage
as specified
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 clerk at the
rickety stand beside his desk.
As twilight deepened I turned on the one feeble electric bulb over the
cheap, iron-framed bed, and tried as best I could to continue the reading I had begun. I
felt it advisable to keep my mind wholesomely occupied, for it would not do to brood
over the abnormalitiesDefinition: an abnormal physical condition resulting from defective genes or
developmental deficiencies; retardation sufficient to fall outside the normal range
of intelligence; marked strangeness as a consequence of being abnormal; behavior that
breaches the rule or etiquette or custom or morality
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 4 of this ancientDefinition: a very old person; a
person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially of the
historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4, blight-shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without
the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled
with shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 town while I was
still within its borders. The insane yarn I had heard from the aged drunkard did not
promise very pleasant dreams, and I felt I must keep the image of his wild, watery eyes
as far as possible from my imagination.
Also, I must not dwell on what that factory inspector had told the
Newburyport ticket-agent about the Gilman House and the voices of its nocturnal
tenants--not on that, nor on the face beneath the tiara in the black church doorway; the
face for whose horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something
horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
my conscious mind could not account. It would perhaps have been easier to keep my
thoughts from disturbing topics had the room not been so gruesomely musty. As it was,
the lethal mustiness blended hideously with the town's general fishy odour and
persistently focussed one's fancy on death and decayDefinition: the process of gradually becoming
inferior; a gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current; the organic phenomenon
of rotting; an inferior state resulting from the process of decaying; the spontaneous
disintegration of a radioactive substance along with the emission of ionizing
radiation; lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin;
undergo decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
8.
Another thing that disturbed me was the absence of a bolt on the door
of my room. One had been there, as marks clearly shewed, but there were signs of recent
removal. No doubt it had been out of order, like so many other things in this decrepitDefinition: worn and
broken down by hard use; lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 edifice. In my nervousness I looked
around and discovered a bolt on the clothes press which seemed to be of the same size,
judging from the marks, as the one formerly on the door. To gain a partial relief from
the general tension I busied myself by transferring this hardware to the vacant place
with the aid of a handy three-in-one device including a screwdriver which I kept on my
key-ring. The bolt fitted perfectly, and I was somewhat relieved when I knew that I
could shoot it firmly upon retiring. Not that I had any real apprehension of its need,
but that any symbol of security was welcome in an environment of this kind. There were
adequate bolts on the two lateral doors to connecting rooms, and these I proceeded to
fasten.
I did not undress, but decided to read till I was sleepy and then lie
down with only my coat, collar, and shoes off. Taking a pocket flash light from my
valise, I placed it in my trousers, so that I could read my watch if I woke up later in
the dark. Drowsiness, however, did not come; and when I stopped to analyseDefinition:
consider in detail and subject to an analysis in order to discover essential features
or meaning; break down into components or essential features; make a mathematical,
chemical, or grammatical analysis of; break down into components or essential
features; subject to psychoanalytic treatment
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 4 my thoughts I found to my disquiet that I was really
unconsciously listening for something--listening for something which I dreaded but could
not name. That inspector's story must have worked on my imagination more deeply than I
had suspected. Again I tried to read, but found that I made no progress.
After a time I seemed to hear the stairs and corridors creak at
intervals as if with footsteps, and wondered if the other rooms were beginning to fill
up. There were no voices, however, and it struck me that there was something subtly
furtive about the creaking. I did not like it, and debated whether I had better try to
sleep at all. This town had some queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or
prevent (the efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or
difficult position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or
arousing homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5
people, and there had undoubtedly been several disappearances. Was this one of those
inns where travelers were slain for their money? Surely I had no look of excessive
prosperity. Or were the towns folk really so resentful about curious visitors? Had my
obvious sightseeing, with its frequent map-consultations, aroused unfavorable notice. It
occurred to me that I must be in a highly nervous state to let a few random creakings
set me off speculating in this fashion--but I regretted none the less that I was
unarmed.
At length, feeling a fatigue which had nothing of drowsiness in it, I
bolted the newly outfitted hall door, turned off the light, and threw myself down on the
hard, uneven bed--coat, collar, shoes, and all. In the darkness every faint noise of the
night seemed magnified, and a flood of doubly unpleasant thoughts swept over me. I was
sorry I had put out the light, yet was too tired to rise and turn it on again. Then,
after a long, dreary interval, and prefaced by a fresh creaking of stairs and corridor,
there came that soft, damnably unmistakable sound which seemed like a malign fulfillment
of all my apprehensions. Without the least shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an
unilluminated area; something existing in perception only; a premonition of something
adverse; an indication that something has been present; refuge from danger or
observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a spy employed to follow someone
and report their movements; an inseparable companion; follow, usually without the
person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 of a doubt, the lock of my door was
being tried--cautiously, furtively, tentatively--with a key.
My sensations upon recognising this sign of actual peril were perhaps less rather than more tumultuous because of my previous vague fears. I had been, albeit without definite reason, instinctively on my guard--and that was to my advantage in the new and real crisis, whatever it might turn out to be. Nevertheless the change in the menace from vague premonition to immediate reality was a profound shock, and fell upon me with the force of a genuine blow. It never once occurred to me that the fumbling might be a mere mistake. Malign purpose was all I could think of, and I kept deathly quiet, awaiting the would-be intruder's next move.
After a time the cautious rattling ceased, and I heard the room to the north entered with a pass-key. Then the lock of the connecting door to my room was softly tried. The bolt held, of course, and I heard the floor creak as the prowler left the room. After a moment there came another soft rattling, and I knew that the room to the south of me was being entered. Again a furtive trying of a bolted connecting door, and again a receding creaking. This time the creaking went along the hall and down the stairs, so I knew that the prowler had realised the bolted condition of my doors and was giving up his attempt for a greater or lesser time, as the future would shew.
The readiness with which I fell into a plan of action proves that I must have been subconsciously fearing some menace and considering possible avenues of escape for hours. From the first I felt that the unseen fumbler meant a danger not to be met or dealt with, but only to be fled from as precipitately as possible. The one thing to do was to get out of that hotel alive as quickly as I could, and through some channel other than the front stairs and lobby.
Rising softly and throwing my flashlight on the switch, I sought to
light the bulb over my bed in order to choose and pocket some belongings for a swift,
valiseless flight. Nothing, however, happened; and I saw that the power had been cut
off. Clearly, some crypticDefinition: of an obscure nature; having a secret or hidden meaning; having a
puzzling terseness
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3, evilDefinition: morally
objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good
is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6 movement was afoot on a large scale--just what, I could not say. As I stood
pondering with my hand on the now useless switch I heard a muffled creaking on the floor
below, and thought I could barely distinguish voices in conversation. A moment later I
felt less sure that the deeper sounds were voices, since the apparent hoarse barkings
and loose-syllabled croakings bore so little resemblance to recognized human speech.
Then I thought with renewed force of what the factory inspector had heard in the night
in this mouldering and pestilential building.
Having filled my pockets with the flashlight's aid, I put on my hat and
tiptoed to the windows to consider chances of descent. Despite the state's safety
regulations there was no fire escape on this side of the hotel, and I saw that my
windows commanded only a sheer three story drop to the cobbled courtyard. On the right
and left, however, some ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times;
belonging to times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of
the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
4 brick business blocks abutted on the hotel; their slant roofs coming up to a
reasonable jumping distance from my fourth-story level. To reach either of these lines
of buildings I would have to be in a room two from my own--in one case on the north and
in the other case on the south--and my mind instantly set to work what chances I had of
making the transfer.
I could not, I decided, risk an emergence into the corridor; where my footsteps would surely be heard, and where the difficulties of entering the desired room would be insuperable. My progress, if it was to be made at all, would have to be through the less solidly-built connecting doors of the rooms; the locks and bolts of which I would have to force violently, using my shoulder as a battering-ram whenever they were set against me. This, I thought, would be possible owing to the rickety nature of the house and its fixtures; but I realised I could not do it noiselessly. I would have to count on sheer speed, and the chance of getting to a window before any hostile forces became coordinated enough to open the right door toward me with a pass-key. My own outer door I reinforced by pushing the bureau against it--little by little, in order to make a minimum of sound.
I perceived that my chances were very slender, and was fully prepared
for any calamity. Even getting to another roof would not solve the problem for there
would then remain the task of reaching the ground and escaping from the town. One thing
in my favour was the desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the
lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to join the opposing
cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 and ruinousDefinition: extremely harmful;
bringing physical or financial ruin; causing injury or blight; especially affecting
with sudden violence or plague or ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2 state of the abutting building and the number of skylights gaping
blackly open in each row.
Gathering from the grocery boy's map that the best route out of town was southward, I glanced first at the connecting door on the south side of the room. It was designed to open in my direction, hence I saw--after drawing the bolt and finding other fastening in place--it was not a favorable one for forcing. Accordingly abandoning it as a route, I cautiously moved the bedstead against it to hamper any attack which might be made on it later from the next room. The door on the north was hung to open away from me, and this--though a test proved it to be locked or bolted from the other side--I knew must be my route. If I could gain the roofs of the buildings in Paine Street and descend successfully to the ground level, I might perhaps dart through the courtyard and the adjacent or opposite building to Washington or Bates--or else emerge in Paine and edge around southward into Washington. In any case, I would aim to strike Washington somehow and get quickly out of the Town Square region. My preference would be to avoid Paine, since the fire station there might be open all night.
As I thought of these things I looked out over the squalid sea of decayingDefinition: lose a
stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo decay or
decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 roofs below
me, now brightened by the beams of a moon not much past full. On the right the black
gash of the river-gorge clove the panorama; abandoned factories and railway station
clinging barnacle-like to its sides. Beyond it the rusted railway and the Rowley road
led off through a flat marshy terrain dotted with islets of higher and dryer scrub-grown
land. On the left the creek-threaded country-side was nearer, the narrow road to Ipswich
gleaming white in the moonlight. I could not see from my side of the hotel the southward
route toward Arkham which I had determined to take.
I was irresolutely speculating on when I had better attack the northward door, and on how I could least audibly manage it, when I noticed that the vague noises underfoot had given place to a fresh and heavier creaking of the stairs. A wavering flicker of light shewed through my transom, and the boards of the corridor began to groan with a ponderous load. Muffled sounds of possible vocal origin approached, and at length a firm knock came at my outer door.
For a moment I simply held my breath and waited. Eternities seemed to elapse, and the nauseous fishy odour of my environment seemed to mount suddenly and spectacularly. Then the knocking was repeated--continuously, and with growing insistence. I knew that the time for action had come, and forthwith drew the bolt of the northward connecting door, bracing myself for the task of battering it open. The knocking waxed louder, and I hoped that its volume would cover the sound of my efforts. At last beginning my attempt, I lunged again and again at the thin paneling with my left shoulder, heedless of shock or pain. The door resisted even more than I expected, but I did not give in. And all the while the clamour at the outer door increased.
Finally the connecting door gave, but with such a crash that I knew
those outside must have heard. Instantly the outside knocking became a violent
battering, while keys sounded ominouslyDefinition: in an ominous manner
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 1 in the hall doors of the rooms on both sides of me. Rushing through
the newly opened connexion, I succeeded in bolting the northerly hall door before the
lock could be turned; but even as I did so I heard the hall door of the third room--the
one from whose window I had hoped to reach the roof below--being tried with a pass-key.
For an instant I felt absolute despair, since my trapping in a chamber
with no window egress seemed complete. A wave of almost abnormalDefinition: not normal; not typical
or usual or regular or conforming to a norm; departing from the normal in e.g.
intelligence and development; much greater than the normal
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3
horrorDefinition: intense
and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense
aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 swept over me, and
invested with a terrible but unexplainable singularity the flashlight-glimpsed dust
prints made by the intruder who had lately tried my door from this room. Then, with a
dazed automatism which persisted despite hopelessness, I made for the next connecting
door and performed the blind motion of pushing at it in an effort to get through
and--granting that fastenings might be as providentially intact as in this second
room--bolt the hall door beyond before the lock could be turned from outside.
Sheer fortunate chance gave me my reprieve--for the connecting door before me was not only unlocked but actually ajar. In a second I was though, and had my right knee and shoulder against a hall door which was visibly opening inward. My pressure took the opener off guard, for the thing shut as I pushed, so that I could slip the well-conditioned bolt as I had done with the other door. As I gained this respite I heard the battering at the two other doors abate, while a confused clatter came from the connecting door I had shielded with the bedstead. Evidently the bulk of my assailants had entered the southerly room and were massing in a lateral attack. But at the same moment a pass-key sounded in the next door to the north, and I knew that a nearer peril was at hand.
The northward connecting door was wide open, but there was no time to
think about checking the already turning lock in the hall. All I could do was to shut
and bolt the open connecting door, as well as its mate on the opposite side--pushing a
bedstead against the one and a bureau against the other, and moving a washstand in front
of the hall door. I must, I saw, trust to such makeshift barriers to shield me till I
could get out the window and on the roof of the Paine Street block. But even in this
acute moment my chief horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike;
something horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3 was something apart from the immediate weakness of my defenses. I was
shuddering because not one of my pursuers, despite some hideous panting, grunting, and
subdued barkings at odd intervals, was uttering an unmuffled or intelligible vocal
sound.
As I moved the furniture and rushed toward the windows I heard a frightfulDefinition:
provoking horror; extreme in degree or extent or amount or impact; extremely
distressing
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 scurrying along
the corridor toward the room north of me, and perceived that the southward battering had
ceased. Plainly, most of my opponents were about to concentrate against the feeble
connecting door which they knew must open directly on me. Outside, the moon played on
the ridgepole of the block below, and I saw that the jump would be desperately hazardous
because of the steep surface on which I must land.
Surveying the conditions, I chose the more southerly of the two windows
as my avenue of escape; planning to land on the inner slope of the roof and make for the
nearest sky-light. Once inside one of the decrepitDefinition: worn and broken down by hard use;
lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 2 brick structures I would have to reckon with pursuit; but I
hoped to descend and dodge in and out of yawning doorways along the shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without
the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled
with shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 courtyard,
eventually getting to Washington Street and slipping out of town toward the south.
The clatter at the northerly connecting door was now terrific, and I
saw that the weak panelling was beginning to splinter. Obviously, the besiegers had
brought some ponderous object into play as a battering-ram. The bedstead, however, still
held firm; so that I had at least a faint chance of making good my escape. As I opened
the window I noticed that it was flanked by heavy velour draperies suspended from a pole
by brass rings, and also that there was a large projecting catch for the shutters on the
exterior. Seeing a possible means of avoiding the dangerous jump, I yanked at the
hangings and brought them down, pole and all; then quickly hooking two of the rings in
the shutter catch and flinging the drapery outside. The heavy folds reached fully to the
abutting roof, and I saw that the rings and catch would be likely to bear my weight. So,
climbing out of the window and down the improvised rope ladder, I left behind me forever
the morbid and horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something
horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3-infested fabric of the Gilman House.
I landed safely on the loose slates of the steep roof, and succeeded in
gaining the gaping black skylight without a slip. Glancing up at the window I had left,
I observed it was still dark, though far across the crumbling chimneys to the north I
could see lights ominouslyDefinition: in an ominous manner
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
1 blazing in the Order of Dagon Hall, the Baptist church, and the
Congregational church which I recalled so shiveringly. There had seemed to be no one in
the courtyard below, and I hoped there would be a chance to get away before the
spreading of a general alarm. Flashing my pocket lamp into the skylight, I saw that
there were no steps down. The distance was slight, however, so I clambered over the
brink and dropped; striking a dusty floor littered with crumbling boxes and barrels.
The place was ghoulish-looking, but I was past minding such impressions
and made at once for the staircase revealed by my flashlight--after a hasty glance at my
watch, which shewed the hour to be 2 a.m. The steps creaked, but seemed tolerably sound;
and I raced down past a barnlike second storey to the ground floor. The desolation was
complete, and only echoes answered my footfalls. At length I reached the lower hall at
the end of which I saw a faint luminous rectangle marking the ruinedDefinition: destroy completely; damage
irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive
of virginity; fall into ruin; destroyed physically or morally; doomed to extinction;
brought to ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 9 Paine
Street doorway. Heading the other way, I found the back door also open; and darted out
and down five stone steps to the grass-grown cobblestones of the courtyard.
The moonbeams did not reach down here, but I could just see my way about without using the flashlight. Some of the windows on the Gilman House side were faintly glowing, and I thought I heard confused sounds within. Walking softly over to the Washington Street side I perceived several open doorways, and chose the nearest as my route out. The hallway inside was black, and when I reached the opposite end I saw that the street door was wedged immovably shut. Resolved to try another building, I groped my way back toward the courtyard, but stopped short when close to the doorway.
For out of an opened door in the Gilman House a large crowd of doubtful
shapes was pouring--lanterns bobbing in the darkness, and horribleDefinition: provoking horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 croaking voices exchanging low
cries in what was certainly not English. The figures moved uncertainly, and I realized
to my relief that they did not know where I had gone; but for all that they sent a
shiver of horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something
horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
through my frame. Their features were indistinguishable, but their crouching, shamblingDefinition: walking
with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's
feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 gait was abominably
repellent. And worst of all, I perceived that one figure was strangely robed, and
unmistakably surmounted by a tall tiara of a design altogether too familiar. As the
figures spread throughout the courtyard, I felt my fears increase. Suppose I could find
no egress from this building on the street side? The fishy odour was detestable, and I
wondered I could stand it without fainting. Again groping toward the street, I opened a
door off the hall and came upon an empty room with closely shuttered but sashless
windows. Fumbling in the rays of my flashlight, I found I could open the shutters; and
in another moment had climbed outside and was fully closing the aperture in its original
manner.
I was now in Washington Street, and for the moment saw no living thing
nor any light save that of the moon. From several directions in the distance, however, I
could hear the sound of hoarse voices, of footsteps, and of a curious kind of pattering
which did not sound quite like footsteps. Plainly I had no time to lose. The points of
the compass were clear to me, and I was glad that all the street lights were turned off,
as is often the custom on strongly moonlit nights in prosperous rural regions. Some of
the sounds came from the south, yet I retained my design of escaping in that direction.
There would, I knew, be plenty of desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 doorways to
shelter me in case I met any person or group who looked like pursuers.
I walked rapidly, softly, and close to the ruinedDefinition: destroy completely; damage
irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive
of virginity; fall into ruin; destroyed physically or morally; doomed to extinction;
brought to ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 9 houses.
While hatless and dishevelled after my arduous climb, I did not look especially
noticeable; and stood a good chance of passing unheeded if forced to encounter any
casual wayfarer.
At Bates Street I drew into a yawning vestibule while two shamblingDefinition: walking
with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's
feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 figures crossed in
front of me, but was soon on my way again and approaching the open space where Eliot
Street obliquely crosses Washington at the intersection of South. Though I had never
seen this space, it had looked dangerous to me on the grocery youth's map; since the
moonlight would have free play there. There was no use trying to evade it, for any
alternative course would involve detours of possibly disastrous visibility and delaying
effect. The only thing to do was to cross it boldly and openly; imitating the typical
shambleDefinition:
walking with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's
feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 of the Innsmouth folk
as best I could, and trusting that no one--or at least no pursuer of mine--would be
there.
Just how fully the pursuit was organised--and indeed, just what its purpose might be--I could form no idea. There seemed to be unusual activity in the town, but I judged that the news of my escape from the Gilman had not yet spread. I would, of course, soon have to shift from Washington to some other southward street; for that party from the hotel would doubtless be after me. I must have left dust prints in that last old building, revealing how I had gained the street.
The open space was, as I had expected, strongly moonlit; and I saw the remains of a parklike, iron-railed green in its center. Fortunately no one was about though a curious sort of buzz or roar seemed to be increasing in the direction of Town Square. South Street was very wide, leading directly down a slight declivity to the waterfront and commanding a long view out to sea; and I hoped that no one would be glancing up it from afar as I crossed in the bright moonlight.
My progress was unimpeded, and no fresh sound arose to hint that I had
been spied. Glancing about me, I involuntarily let my pace slacken for a second to take
in the sight of the sea, gorgeous in the burning moonlight at the street's end. Far out
beyond the breakwater was the dim, dark line of Devil Reef, and as I glimpsed it I could
not help thinking of all the hideous legendsDefinition: a story about mythical or supernatural
beings or events; brief description accompanying an illustration
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 2 I had heard in the last twenty-four
hours--legends which portrayed this ragged rock as a veritable gateway to realms of
unfathomed horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something
horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
and inconceivable abnormalityDefinition: an abnormal physical condition resulting from defective
genes or developmental deficiencies; retardation sufficient to fall outside the
normal range of intelligence; marked strangeness as a consequence of being abnormal;
behavior that breaches the rule or etiquette or custom or morality
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 4.
Then, without warning, I saw the intermittent flashes of light on the
distant reef. They were definite and unmistakable, and awaked in my mind a blind horrorDefinition: intense and
profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense
aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 beyond all
rational proportion. My muscles tightened for panic flight, held in only by a certain
unconscious caution and half-hypnotic fascination. And to make matters worse, there now
flashed forth from the lofty cupola of the Gilman House, which loomed up to the
northeast behind me, a series of analogousDefinition: similar or equivalent in some
respects though otherwise dissimilar; corresponding in function but not in
evolutionary origin
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 though
differently spaced gleams which could be nothing less than an answering signal.
Controlling my muscles, and realising afresh--how plainly visible I
was, I resumed my brisker and feignedly shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion
without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 pace; though keeping my eyes on that hellishDefinition: very
unpleasant; extremely evil or cruel; expressive of cruelty or befitting hell
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 and ominousDefinition: threatening or
foreshadowing evil or tragic developments; presaging ill fortune
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 reef as long as the opening of South Street
gave me a seaward view. What the whole proceeding meant, I could not imagine; unless it
involved some strange rite connected with Devil Reef, or unless some party had landed
from a ship on that sinister rock. I now bent to the left around the ruinousDefinition: extremely
harmful; bringing physical or financial ruin; causing injury or blight; especially
affecting with sudden violence or plague or ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 2 green; still gazing toward the ocean as it blazed in the spectralDefinition: of or
relating to a spectrum; resembling or characteristic of a phantom
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 summer moonlight, and watching the crypticalDefinition: of an
obscure nature; having a secret or hidden meaning
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 flashing of those nameless, unexplainable beacons.
It was then that the most horribleDefinition: provoking horror
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 impression of all was borne in upon me--the
impression which destroyed my last vestige of self-control and sent me running
frantically southward past the yawning black doorways and fishily staring windows of
that desertedDefinition:
leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a
country or an army), often in order to join the opposing cause, country, or army;
leave behind; forsaken by owner or inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 4
nightmareDefinition: a
situation resembling a terrifying dream; a terrifying or deeply upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 street. For at a closer glance I
saw that the moonlit waters between the reef and the shore were far from empty. They
were alive with a teeming horde of shapes swimming inward toward the town; and even at
my vast distance and in my single moment of perception I could tell that the bobbing
heads and flailing arms were alienDefinition: a person who comes from a foreign country; someone who does
not owe allegiance to your country; anyone who does not belong in the environment in
which they are found; a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its
atmosphere; transfer property or ownership; arouse hostility or indifference in where
there had formerly been love, affection, or friendliness; not contained in or
deriving from the essential nature of something; being or from or characteristic of
another place or part of the world
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 7 and aberrant in a way scarcely to be expressed or consciously
formulated.
My frantic running ceased before I had covered a block, for at my left I began to hear something like the hue and cry of organised pursuit. There were footsteps and guttural sounds, and a rattling motor wheezed south along Federal Street. In a second all my plans were utterly changed--for if the southward highway were blocked ahead of me, I must clearly find another egress from Innsmouth. I paused and drew into a gaping doorway, reflecting how lucky I was to have left the moonlit open space before these pursuers came down the parallel street.
A second reflection was less comforting. Since the pursuit was down another street, it was plain that the party was not following me directly. It had not seen me, but was simply obeying a general plan of cutting off my escape. This, however, implied that all roads leading out of Innsmouth were similarly patrolled; for the people could not have known what route I intended to take. If this were so, I would have to make my retreat across country away from any road; but how could I do that in view of the marshy and creek-riddled nature of all the surrounding region? For a moment my brain reeled--both from sheer hopelessness and from a rapid increase in the omnipresent fishy odour.
Then I thought of the abandoned railway to Rowley, whose solid line of ballasted, weed-grown earth still stretched off to the northwest from the crumbling station on the edge at the river-gorge. There was just a chance that the townsfolk would not think of that; since its briar-choked desertion made it half-impassable, and the unlikeliest of all avenues for a fugitive to choose. I had seen it clearly from my hotel window and knew about how it lay. Most of its earlier length was uncomfortably visible from the Rowley road, and from high places in the town itself; but one could perhaps crawl inconspicuously through the undergrowth. At any rate, it would form my only chance of deliverance, and there was nothing to do but try it.
Drawing inside the hall of my desertedDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on
you; leave in the lurch; desert (a cause, a country or an army), often in order to
join the opposing cause, country, or army; leave behind; forsaken by owner or
inhabitants
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 shelter, I once
more consulted the grocery boy's map with the aid of the flashlight. The immediate
problem was how to reach the ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times;
belonging to times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of
the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
4 railway; and I now saw that the safest course was ahead to Babson Street;
then west to Lafayette--there edging around but not crossing an open space homologous to
the one I had traversed--and subsequently back northward and westward in a zigzagging
line through Lafayette, Bates, Adam, and Bank streets--the latter skirting the river
gorge--to the abandoned and dilapidated station I had seen from my window. My reason for
going ahead to Babson was that I wished neither to recross the earlier open space nor to
begin my westward course along a cross street as broad as South.
Starting once more, I crossed the street to the right-hand side in order to edge around into Babson as inconspicuously as possible. Noises still continued in Federal Street, and as I glanced behind me I thought I saw a gleam of light near the building through which I had escaped. Anxious to leave Washington Street, I broke into a quiet dogtrot, trusting to luck not to encounter any observing eye. Next the corner of Babson Street I saw to my alarm that one of the houses was still inhabited, as attested by curtains at the window; but there were no lights within, and I passed it without disaster.
In Babson Street, which crossed Federal and might thus reveal me to the
searchers, I clung as closely as possible to the sagging, uneven buildings; twice
pausing in a doorway as the noises behind me momentarily increased. The open space ahead
shone wide and desolateDefinition: leave someone who needs or counts on you; leave in the lurch; reduce in
population; cause extensive destruction or ruin utterly; providing no shelter or
sustenance; crushed by grief
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
5 under the moon, but my route would not force me to cross it. During my
second pause I began to detect a fresh distribution of vague sounds; and upon looking
cautiously out from cover beheld a motor car darting across the open space, bound
outward along Eliot Street, which there intersects both Babson and Lafayette.
As I watched--choked by a sudden rise in the fishy odour after a short
abatement--I saw a band of uncouth, crouching shapes loping and shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow
dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's feet
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 in the same direction; and knew that
this must be the party guarding the Ipswich road, since that highway forms an extension
of Eliot Street. Two of the figures I glimpsed were in voluminous robes, and one wore a
peaked diadem which glistened whitely in the moonlight. The gait of this figure was so
odd that it sent a chill through me--for it seemed to me the creatureDefinition: a living organism
characterized by voluntary movement; a human being; `wight' is an archaic term; a
person who is controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant or dishonest
tasks for someone else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 was
almost hopping.
When the last of the band was out of sight I resumed my progress;
darting around the corner into Lafayette Street, and crossing Eliot very hurriedly lest
stragglers of the party be still advancing along that thoroughfare. I did hear some
croaking and clattering sounds far off toward Town Square, but accomplished the passage
without disaster. My greatest dread was in re-crossing broad and moonlit South
Street--with its seaward view--and I had to nerve myself for the ordeal. Someone might
easily be looking, and possible Eliot Street stragglers could not fail to glimpse me
from either of two points. At the last moment I decided I had better slacken my trot and
make the crossing as before in the shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion
without lifting your feet; walk by dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 gait of an average Innsmouth native.
When the view of the water again opened out--this time on my right--I
was half-determined not to look at it at all. I could not however, resist; but cast a
sidelong glance as I carefully and imitatively shambledDefinition: walk by dragging one's feet
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 toward the protecting shadowsDefinition: shade
within clear boundaries; an unilluminated area; something existing in perception
only; a premonition of something adverse; an indication that something has been
present; refuge from danger or observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a
spy employed to follow someone and report their movements; an inseparable companion;
follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small
by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 ahead. There
was no ship visible, as I had half-expected there would be. Instead, the first thing
which caught my eye was a small rowboat pulling in toward the abandoned wharves and
laden with some bulky, tarpaulin-covered object. Its rowers, though distantly and
indistinctly seen, were of an especially repellent aspect. Several swimmers were still
discernible; while on the far black reef I could see a faint, steady glow unlike the
winking beacon visible before, and of a curious colour which I could not precisely
identify. Above the slant roofs ahead and to the right there loomed the tall cupola of
the Gilman House, but it was completely dark. The fishy odour, dispelled for a moment by
some merciful breeze, now closed in again with maddening intensity.
I had not quite crossed the street when I heard a muttering band
advancing along Washington from the north. As they reached the broad open space where I
had had my first disquieting glimpse of the moonlit water I could see them plainly only
a block away--and was horrifiedDefinition: fill with apprehension or alarm; cause to be unpleasantly
surprised; stricken with horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
2 by the bestialDefinition: resembling a beast; showing lack of human sensibility
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 1
abnormalityDefinition:
an abnormal physical condition resulting from defective genes or developmental
deficiencies; retardation sufficient to fall outside the normal range of
intelligence; marked strangeness as a consequence of being abnormal; behavior that
breaches the rule or etiquette or custom or morality
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 4 of their faces and the doglike
sub-humanness of their crouching gait. One man moved in a positively simianDefinition: an ape
or monkey; relating to or resembling an ape
Word Type: scientific
Number
Of Synsets: 2 way, with long arms frequently touching the ground; while
another figure--robed and tiaraed--seemed to progress in an almost hopping fashion. I
judged this party to be the one I had seen in the Gilman's courtyard--the one,
therefore, most closely on my trail. As some of the figures turned to look in my
direction I was transfixed with frightDefinition: an emotion experienced in anticipation of some specific pain
or danger (usually accompanied by a desire to flee or fight); cause fear in
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2, yet managed to preserve the
casual, shamblingDefinition: walking with a slow dragging motion without lifting your feet; walk by
dragging one's feet
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 gait I
had assumed. To this day I do not know whether they saw me or not. If they did, my
stratagem must have deceived them, for they passed on across the moonlit space without
varying their course--meanwhile croaking and jabbering in some hateful guttural patois I
could not identify.
Once more in shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an unilluminated area;
something existing in perception only; a premonition of something adverse; an
indication that something has been present; refuge from danger or observation; a
dominating and pervasive presence; a spy employed to follow someone and report their
movements; an inseparable companion; follow, usually without the person's knowledge;
cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12, I resumed my former dog-trot past the leaning and decrepitDefinition: worn and
broken down by hard use; lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 houses that stared blankly into the
night. Having crossed to the western sidewalk I rounded the nearest corner into Bates
Street where I kept close to the buildings on the southern side. I passed two houses
shewing signs of habitation, one of which had faint lights in upper rooms, yet met with
no obstacle. As I turned into Adams Street I felt measurably safer, but received a shook
when a man reeled out of a black doorway directly in front of me. He proved, however,
too hopelessly drunk to be a menace; so that I reached the dismalDefinition: causing dejection
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1
ruinsDefinition: an
irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction; a ruined building; the process of
becoming dilapidated; an event that results in destruction; failure that results in a
loss of position or reputation; destruction achieved by causing something to be
wrecked or ruined; destroy completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail;
reduce to bankruptcy; reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 of the Bank Street warehouses in
safety.
No one was stirring in that dead street beside the river-gorge, and the
roar of the waterfalls quite drowned my foot steps. It was a long dog-trot to the ruinedDefinition: destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin; destroyed physically or
morally; doomed to extinction; brought to ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 9 station, and the great brick warehouse walls around me seemed
somehow more terrifying than the fronts of private houses. At last I saw the ancientDefinition: a very old
person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially
of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 arcaded station--or what was left
of it--and made directly for the tracks that started from its farther end.
The rails were rusty but mainly intact, and not more than half the ties
had rottedDefinition:
break down; become physically weaker; damaged by decay; hence unsound and
useless
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 away. Walking or
running on such a surface was very difficult; but I did my best, and on the whole made
very fair time. For some distance the line kept on along the gorge's brink, but at
length I reached the long covered bridge where it crossed the chasm at a dizzying
height. The condition of this bridge would determine my next step. If humanly possible,
I would use it; if not, I would have to risk more street wandering and take the nearest
intact highway bridge.
The vast, barnlike length of the old bridge gleamed spectrally
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 0 in the moonlight, and I saw that the ties
were safe for at least a few feet within. Entering, I began to use my flashlight, and
was almost knocked down by the cloud of bats that flapped past me. About half-way across
there was a perilous gap in the ties which I feared for a moment would halt me; but in
the end I risked a desperate jump which fortunately succeeded.
I was glad to see the moonlight again when I emerged from that macabre
tunnel. The old tracks crossed River Street at grade, and at once veered off into a
region increasingly rural and with less and less of Innsmouth's abhorrentDefinition: offensive to the
mind
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 fishy odour. Here the
dense growth of weeds and briers hindered me and cruelly tore at my clothes, but I was
none the less glad that they were there to give me concealment in case of peril. I knew
that much of my route must be visible from the Rowley road.
The marshy region began very abruptly, with the single track on a low, grassy embankment where the weedy growth was somewhat thinner. Then came a sort of island of higher ground, where the line passed through a shallow open cut choked with bushes and brambles. I was very glad of this partial shelter, since at this point the Rowley road was uncomfortably near according to my window view. At the end of the cut it would cross the track and swerve off to a safer distance; but meanwhile I must be exceedingly careful. I was by this time thankfully certain that the railway itself was not patrolled.
Just before entering the cut I glanced behind me, but saw no pursuer.
The ancientDefinition: a
very old person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past
especially of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very
old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4 spires and roofs of
decayingDefinition:
lose a stored charge, magnetic flux, or current; fall into decay or ruin; undergo
decay or decomposition
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
Innsmouth gleamed lovely and ethereal in the magic yellow moonlight, and I thought of
how they must have looked in the old days before the shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an
unilluminated area; something existing in perception only; a premonition of something
adverse; an indication that something has been present; refuge from danger or
observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a spy employed to follow someone
and report their movements; an inseparable companion; follow, usually without the
person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 fell. Then, as my gaze circled inland
from the town, something less tranquil arrested my notice and held me immobile for a
second.
What I saw--or fancied I saw--was a disturbing suggestion of undulant
motion far to the south; a suggestion which made me conclude that a very large horde
must be pouring out of the city along the level Ipswich road. The distance was great and
I could distinguish nothing in detail; but I did not at all like the look of that moving
column. It undulated too much, and glistened too brightly in the rays of the now
westering moon. There was a suggestion of sound, too, though the wind was blowing the
other way--a suggestion of bestialDefinition: resembling a beast; showing lack of human sensibility
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 scraping and bellowing even worse
than the muttering of the parties I had lately overheard.
All sorts of unpleasant conjectures crossed my mind. I thought of those very extreme Innsmouth types said to be hidden in crumbling, centuried warrens near the waterfront; I thought, too, of those nameless swimmers I had seen. Counting the parties so far glimpsed, as well as those presumably covering other roads, the number of my pursuers must be strangely large for a town as depopulated as Innsmouth.
Whence could come the dense personnel of such a column as I now beheld?
Did those ancientDefinition: a very old person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to
times long past especially of the historical period before the fall of the Western
Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4,
unplumbedDefinition:
situated at or extending to great depth; too deep to have been sounded or
plumbed
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1
warrensDefinition: United
States writer and poet (1905-1989); United States jurist who served as chief justice
of the United States Supreme Court (1891-1974); a series of connected underground
tunnels occupied by rabbits; an overcrowded residential area; a colony of
rabbits
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 5
teemDefinition: be teeming,
be abuzz; move in large numbers
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
2 with a twisted, uncatalogued, and unsuspected life? Or had some unseen ship
indeed landed a legion of unknown outsiders on that hellishDefinition: very unpleasant;
extremely evil or cruel; expressive of cruelty or befitting hell
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 reef? Who were they? Why were they here?
And if such a column of them was scouring the Ipswich road, would the patrols on the
other roads be likewise augmented?
I had entered the brush-grown cut and was struggling along at a very slow pace when that damnable fishy odour again waxed dominant. Had the wind suddenly changed eastward, so that it blew in from the sea and over the town? It must have, I concluded, since I now began to hear shocking guttural murmurs from that hitherto silent direction. There was another sound, too--a kind of wholesale, colossal flopping or pattering which somehow called up images of the most detestable sort. It made me think illogically of that unpleasantly undulating column on the far-off Ipswich road.
And then both stench and sounds grew stronger, so that I paused
shivering and grateful for the cut's protection. It was here, I recalled, that the
Rowley road drew so close to the old railway before crossing westward and diverging.
Something was coming along that road, and I must lie low till its passage and vanishment
in the distance. Thank heaven these creaturesDefinition: a living organism characterized by
voluntary movement; a human being; `wight' is an archaic term; a person who is
controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant or dishonest tasks for someone
else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 employed no dogs for
tracking--though perhaps that would have been impossible amidst the omnipresent regional
odour. Crouched in the bushes of that sandy cleft I felt reasonably safe, even though I
knew the searchers would have to cross the track in front of me not much more than a
hundred yards away. I would be able to see them, but they could not, except by a malign
miracle, see me.
All at once I began dreading to look at them as they passed. I saw the close moonlit space where they would surge by, and had curious thoughts about the irredeemable pollution of that space. They would perhaps be the worst of all Innsmouth types--something one would not care to remember.
The stench waxed overpowering, and the noises swelled to a bestialDefinition: resembling
a beast; showing lack of human sensibility
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1
babelDefinition:
(Genesis 11:1-11) a tower built by Noah's descendants (probably in Babylon) who
intended it to reach up to heaven; God foiled them by confusing their language so
they could no longer understand one another; a confusion of voices and other
sounds
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2 of croaking,
baying and barking without the least suggestion of human speech. Were these indeed the
voices of my pursuers? Did they have dogs after all? So far I had seen none of the lower
animals in Innsmouth. That flopping or pattering was monstrous--I could not look upon
the degenerateDefinition: a
person whose behavior deviates from what is acceptable especially in sexual behavior;
grow worse; unrestrained by convention or morality
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3
creaturesDefinition: a
living organism characterized by voluntary movement; a human being; `wight' is an
archaic term; a person who is controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant
or dishonest tasks for someone else
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets:
3 responsible for it. I would keep my eyes shut till the sound receded toward
the west. The horde was very close now--air foul with their hoarse snarlings, and the
ground almost shaking with their alien-rhythmed
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 0 footfalls. My breath nearly ceased to come, and I put every ounce
of will-power into the task of holding my eyelids down.
I am not even yet willing to say whether what followed was a hideous
actuality or only a nightmareDefinition: a situation resembling a terrifying dream; a terrifying or
deeply upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
hallucination. The later action of the government, after my frantic appeals, would tend
to confirm it as a monstrous truth; but could not an hallucination have been repeated
under the quasi-hypnotic
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 0 spell of
that ancientDefinition: a
very old person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past
especially of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very
old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4, haunted, and shadowedDefinition: follow,
usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by
comparison; filled with shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
4 town? Such places have strange properties, and the legacy of insane legendDefinition: a story
about mythical or supernatural beings or events; brief description accompanying an
illustration
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 might well have
acted on more than one human imagination amidst those dead, stench-cursed streets and
huddles of rottingDefinition: (biology) the process of decay caused by bacterial or fungal action;
break down; become physically weaker
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3 roofs and crumbling steeples. Is it not possible that the germ of an actual
contagious madness lurks in the depths of that shadowDefinition: shade within clear boundaries; an
unilluminated area; something existing in perception only; a premonition of something
adverse; an indication that something has been present; refuge from danger or
observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a spy employed to follow someone
and report their movements; an inseparable companion; follow, usually without the
person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small by comparison
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 over Innsmouth? Who can be sure of
reality after hearing things like the tale of old Zadok Allen? The government men never
found poor Zadok, and have no conjectures to make as to what became of him. Where does
madness leave off and reality begin? Is it possible that even my latest fear is sheer
delusion?
But I must try to tell what I thought I saw that night under the
mocking yellow moon--saw surging and hopping down the Rowley road in plain sight in
front of me as I crouched among the wild brambles of that desolateDefinition: leave someone who needs
or counts on you; leave in the lurch; reduce in population; cause extensive
destruction or ruin utterly; providing no shelter or sustenance; crushed by
grief
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 railway cut. Of
course my resolution to keep my eyes shut had failed. It was foredoomed to failure--for
who could crouch blindly while a legion of croaking, baying entities of unknown source
flopped noisomely past, scarcely more than a hundred yards away?
I thought I was prepared for the worst, and I really ought to have been prepared considering what I had seen before.
My other pursuers had been accursedly abnormalDefinition: not normal; not typical
or usual or regular or conforming to a norm; departing from the normal in e.g.
intelligence and development; much greater than the normal
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3--so should I not have been ready to face
a strengthening of the abnormalDefinition: not normal; not typical or usual or regular or conforming to
a norm; departing from the normal in e.g. intelligence and development; much greater
than the normal
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3
selement; to look upon forms in which there was no mixture of the normal at all? I did
not open my eyes until the raucous clamour came loudly from a point obviously straight
ahead. Then I knew that a long section of them must be plainly in sight where the sides
of the cut flattened out and the road crossed the track--and I could no longer keep
myself from sampling whatever horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike;
something horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3 that leering yellow moon might have to shew.
It was the end, for whatever remains to me of life on the surface of
this earth, of every vestige of mental peace and confidence in the integrity of nature
and of the human mind. Nothing that I could have imagined--nothing, even, that I could
have gathered had I credited old Zadok's crazy tale in the most literal way--would be in
any way comparable to the demoniacDefinition: someone who acts as if possessed by a demon; frenzied as if
possessed by a demon
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2,
blasphemousDefinition: grossly irreverent toward what is held to be sacred; characterized by
profanity or cursing
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2
reality that I saw--or believe I saw. I have tried to hint what it was in order to
postpone the horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something
horrible; intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
of writing it down baldly. Can it be possible that this planet has actually spawned such
things; that human eyes have truly seen, as objective flesh, what man has hitherto known
only in febrile phantasy and tenuous legendDefinition: a story about mythical or supernatural
beings or events; brief description accompanying an illustration
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 2?
And yet I saw them in a limitless stream--flopping, hopping, croaking,
bleating--urging inhumanly
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 through the spectralDefinition: of or
relating to a spectrum; resembling or characteristic of a phantom
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 moonlight in a grotesqueDefinition: art characterized by an
incongruous mixture of parts of humans and animals interwoven with plants; distorted
and unnatural in shape or size; abnormal and hideous; ludicrously odd
Word
Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3, malignantDefinition: dangerous to health;
characterized by progressive and uncontrolled growth (especially of a tumor)
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1
sarabandDefinition: music
composed for dancing the saraband; a stately court dance of the 17th and 18th
centuries; in slow time
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 of
fantastic nightmareDefinition: a situation resembling a terrifying dream; a terrifying or deeply
upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2. And some
of them had tall tiaras of that nameless whitish-gold metal...and some were strangely
robed...and one, who led the way, was clad in a ghoulishly humped black coat and striped
trousers, and had a man's felt hat perched on the shapeless thing that answered for a
head.
I think their predominant colour was a greyish-green, though they had
white bellies. They were mostly shiny and slippery, but the ridges of their backs were
scaly. Their forms vaguely suggested the anthropoid, while their heads were the heads of
fish, with prodigiousDefinition: so great in size or force or extent as to elicit awe; of momentous or
ominous significance; far beyond what is usual in magnitude or degree
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 3 bulging eyes that never closed. At the
sides of their necks were palpitating gills, and their long paws were webbed. They
hopped irregularly, sometimes on two legs and sometimes on four. I was somehow glad that
they had no more than four limbs. Their croaking, baying voices, clearly used for
articulate speech, held all the dark shades of expression which their staring faces
lacked.
But for all of their monstrousness they were not unfamiliar to me. I
knew too well what they must be--for was not the memory of the evilDefinition: morally objectionable
behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good is oft
interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6
tiaraDefinition: a jeweled
headdress worn by women on formal occasions
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 1 at Newburyport still fresh? They were the blasphemousDefinition: grossly irreverent
toward what is held to be sacred; characterized by profanity or cursing
Word
Type: religious
Number Of Synsets: 2
fish-frogs
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 0 of the nameless design--living and horribleDefinition: provoking
horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1--and as I saw them I
knew also of what that humped, tiaraed priest in the black church basement had
fearsomely reminded me. Their number was past guessing. It seemed to me that there were
limitless swarms of them and certainly my momentary glimpse could have shewn only the
least fraction. In another instant everything was blotted out by a merciful fit of
fainting; the first I had ever had.
It was a gentle daylight rain that awaked me front my stupor in the
brush-grown railway cut, and when I staggered out to the roadway ahead I saw no trace of
any prints in the fresh mud. The fishy odour, too, was gone, Innsmouth's ruinedDefinition: destroy
completely; damage irreparably; destroy or cause to fail; reduce to bankruptcy;
reduce to ruins; deprive of virginity; fall into ruin; destroyed physically or
morally; doomed to extinction; brought to ruin
Word Type: gothic
Number
Of Synsets: 9 roofs and toppling steeples loomed up greyly toward the
southeast, but not a living creatureDefinition: a living organism characterized by voluntary movement; a
human being; `wight' is an archaic term; a person who is controlled by others and is
used to perform unpleasant or dishonest tasks for someone else
Word Type:
other
Number Of Synsets: 3 did I spy in all the desolateDefinition: leave someone who needs
or counts on you; leave in the lurch; reduce in population; cause extensive
destruction or ruin utterly; providing no shelter or sustenance; crushed by
grief
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5 salt marshes around.
My watch was still going, and told me that the hour was past noon.
The reality of what I had been through was highly uncertain in my mind,
but I felt that something hideous lay in the background. I must get away from evilDefinition: morally
objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune; the good
is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare; the quality of being morally wrong in
principle or practice; morally bad or wrong; having the nature of vice; having or
exerting a malignant influence
Word Type: religious
Number Of Synsets:
6-shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make
appear small by comparison; filled with shade
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 4 Innsmouth--and accordingly I began to test my cramped, wearied
powers of locomotion. Despite weakness hunger, horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something
that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense aversion
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3, and bewilderment I found myself after a
time able to walk; so started slowly along the muddy road to Rowley. Before evening I
was in village, getting a meal and providing myself with presentable clothes. I caught
the night train to Arkham, and the next day talked long and earnestly with government
officials there; a process I later repeated in Boston. With the main result of these
colloquies the public is now familiar--and I wish, for normality's sake, there were
nothing more to tell. Perhaps it is madness that is overtaking me--yet perhaps a greater
horrorDefinition:
intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible;
intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3--or a
greater marvel--is reaching out.
As may well be imagined, I gave up most of the foreplanned features of
the rest of my tour--the scenic, architectural, and antiquarianDefinition: an expert or
collector of antiquities; of or relating to persons who study or deal in antiques or
antiquities; of or relating to antiques or antiquities
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3 diversions on which I had counted so
heavily. Nor did I dare look for that piece of strange jewelry said to be in the
Miskatonic University Museum. I did, however, improve my stay in Arkham by collecting
some genealogical notes I had long wished to possess; very rough and hasty data, it is
true, but capable of good use later on when I might have time to collate and codify
them. The curator of the historical society there--Mr. B. Lapham Peabody--was very
courteous about assisting me, and expressed unusual interest when I told him I was a
grandson of Eliza Orne of Arkham, who was born in 1867 and had married James Williamson
of Ohio at the age of seventeen.
It seemed that a maternal uncle of mine had been there many years before on a quest much like my own; and that my grandmother's family was a topic of some local curiosity. There had, Mr. Peabody said, been considerable discussion about the marriage of her father, Benjamin Orne, just after the Civil War; since the ancestry of the bride was peculiarly puzzling. That bride was understood to have been an orphaned Marsh of New Hampshire--a cousin of the Essex County Marshes--but her education had been in France and she knew very little of her family. A guardian had deposited funds in a Boston bank to maintain her and her French governess; but that guardian's name was unfamiliar to Arkham people, and in time he dropped out of sight, so that the governess assumed the role by court appointment. The Frenchwoman--now long dead--was very taciturn, and there were those who said she could have told more than she did.
But the most baffling thing was the inability of anyone to place the recorded parents of the young woman--Enoch and Lydia (Meserve) Marsh--among the known families of New Hampshire. Possibly, many suggested, she was the natural daughter of some Marsh of prominence--she certainly had the true Marsh eyes. Most of the puzzling was done after her early death, which took place at the birth of my grandmother--her only child. Having formed some disagreeable impressions connected with the name of Marsh, I did not welcome the news that it belonged on my own ancestral tree; nor was I pleased by Mr. Peabody's suggestion that I had the true Marsh eyes myself. However, I was grateful for data which I knew would prove valuable; and took copious notes and lists of book references regarding the well-documented Orne family.
I went directly home to Toledo from Boston, and later spent a month at
Maumee recuperating from my ordeal. In September I entered Oberlin for my final year,
and from then till the next June was busy with studies and other wholesome
activities--reminded of the bygoneDefinition: past events to be put aside; well in the past; former
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 2 terror only by occasional official
visits from government men in connexion with the campaign which my pleas and evidence
had started. Around the middle of July--just a year after the Innsmouth experience--I
spent a week with my late mother's family in Cleveland; checking some of my new
genealogical data with the various notes, traditions, and bits of heirloom material in
existence there, and seeing what kind of a connected chart I could construct.
I did not exactly relish this task, for the atmosphere of the Williamson home had always depressed me. There was a strain of morbidity there, and my mother had never encouraged my visiting her parents as a child, although she always welcomed her father when he came to Toledo. My Arkham-born grandmother had seemed strange and almost terrifying to me, and I do not think I grieved when she disappeared. I was eight years old then, and it was said that she had wandered off in grief after the suicide of my Uncle Douglas, her eldest son. He had shot himself after a trip to New England--the same trip, no doubt, which had caused him to be recalled at the Arkham Historical Society.
This uncle had resembled her, and I had never liked him either. Something about the staring, unwinking expression of both of them had given me a vague, unaccountable uneasiness. My mother and Uncle Walter had not looked like that. They were like their father, though poor little cousin Lawrence--Walter's son--had been almost perfect duplicate of his grandmother before his condition took him to the permanent seclusion of a sanitarium at Canton. I had not seen him in four years, but my uncle once implied that his state, both mental and physical, was very bad. This worry had probably been a major cause of his mother's death two years before.
My grandfather and his widowed son Walter now comprised the Cleveland household, but the memory of older times hung thickly over it. I still disliked the place, and tried to get my researches done as quickly as possible. Williamson records and traditions were supplied in abundance by my grandfather; though for Orne material I had to depend on my uncle Walter, who put at my disposal the contents of all his files, including notes, letters, cuttings, heirlooms, photographs, and miniatures.
It was in going over the letters and pictures on the Orne side that I
began to acquire a kind of terror of my own ancestry. As I have said, my grandmother and
Uncle Douglas had always disturbed me. Now, years after their passing, I gazed at their
pictured faces with a measurably heightened feeling of repulsionDefinition: the force by which
bodies repel one another; intense aversion; the act of repulsing or repelling an
attack; a successful defensive stand
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3 and alienationDefinition: the feeling of being alienated from other people; separation
resulting from hostility; (law) the voluntary and absolute transfer of title and
possession of real property from one person to another; the action of alienating; the
action of causing to become unfriendly
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 4. I could not at first understand the change, but gradually a horribleDefinition: provoking
horror
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 sort of comparison
began to obtrude itself on my unconscious mind despite the steady refusal of my
consciousness to admit even the least suspicion of it. It was clear that the typical
expression of these faces now suggested something it had not suggested before--something
which would bring stark panic if too openly thought of.
But the worst shock came when my uncle shewed me the Orne jewellery in
a downtown safe deposit vault. Some of the items were delicate and inspiring enough, but
there was one box of strange old pieces descended from my mysteriousDefinition: of an obscure nature;
having an import not apparent to the senses nor obvious to the intelligence; beyond
ordinary understanding
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2
great-grandmother which my uncle was almost reluctant to produce. They were, he said, of
very grotesqueDefinition:
art characterized by an incongruous mixture of parts of humans and animals interwoven
with plants; distorted and unnatural in shape or size; abnormal and hideous;
ludicrously odd
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 and almost
repulsiveDefinition:
offensive to the mind; possessing the ability to repel; so extremely ugly as to be
terrifying
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 design, and had
never to his knowledge been publicly worn; though my grandmother used to enjoy looking
at them. Vague legendsDefinition: a story about mythical or supernatural beings or events; brief
description accompanying an illustration
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 2 of bad luck clustered around them, and my great-grandmother's
French governess had said they ought not to be worn in New England, though it would be
quite safe to wear them in Europe.
As my uncle began slowly and grudgingly to unwrap the things he urged
me not to be shocked by the strangeness and frequent hideousness of the designs. Artists
and archaeologists who had seen them pronounced their workmanship superlatively and
exotically
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 0 exquisite, though no one seemed able to
define their exact material or assign them to any specific art tradition. There were two
armlets, a tiara, and a kind of pectoral; the latter having in high relief certain
figures of almost unbearable extravagance.
During this description I had kept a tight rein on my emotions, but my face must have betrayed my mounting fears. My uncle looked concerned, and paused in his unwrapping to study my countenance. I motioned to him to continue, which he did with renewed signs of reluctance. He seemed to expect some demonstration when the first piece--the tiara--became visible, but I doubt if he expected quite what actually happened. I did not expect it, either, for I thought I was thoroughly forewarned regarding what the jewellery would turn out to be. What I did was to faint silently away, just as I had done in that brier-choked railway cut a year before.
From that day on my life has been a nightmareDefinition: a situation resembling a terrifying
dream; a terrifying or deeply upsetting dream
Word Type: gothic
Number Of
Synsets: 2 of brooding and apprehension nor do I know how much is hideous
truth and how much madness. My great-grandmother had been a Marsh of unknown source
whose husband lived in Arkham--and did not old Zadok say that the daughter of Obed Marsh
by a monstrous mother was married to an Arkham man through trick? What was it the ancientDefinition: a very old
person; a person who lived in ancient times; belonging to times long past especially
of the historical period before the fall of the Western Roman Empire; very old
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 4
toperDefinition: a person
who drinks alcoholic beverages (especially to excess)
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 had muttered about the line of my eyes to Captain Obed's?
In Arkham, too, the curator had told me I had the true Marsh eyes. Was Obed Marsh my own
great-great-grandfather? Who--or what--then, was my great-great-grandmother? But perhaps
this was all madness. Those whitish-gold ornaments might easily have been bought from
some Innsmouth sailor by the father of my great-grandmother, whoever he was. And that
look in the staring-eyed faces of my grandmother and self-slain uncle might be sheer
fancy on my part--sheer fancy, bolstered up by the Innsmouth shadowDefinition: shade within clear
boundaries; an unilluminated area; something existing in perception only; a
premonition of something adverse; an indication that something has been present;
refuge from danger or observation; a dominating and pervasive presence; a spy
employed to follow someone and report their movements; an inseparable companion;
follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a shadow over; make appear small
by comparison
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 12 which had so
darkly coloured my imagination. But why had my uncle killed himself after an ancestral
quest in New England?
For more than two years I fought off these reflections with partial
success. My father secured me a place in an insurance office, and I buried myself in
routine as deeply as possible. In the winter of 1930-31, however, the dreams began. They
were very sparseDefinition:
not dense
Word Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 and insidious at
first, but increased in frequency and vividness as the weeks went by. Great watery
spaces opened out before me, and I seemed to wander through titanic sunken porticosDefinition: a porch or
entrance to a building consisting of a covered and often columned area
Word
Type: other
Number Of Synsets: 1 and labyrinths of weedy cyclopeanDefinition: of
or relating to or resembling the Cyclops
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 1 walls with grotesqueDefinition: art characterized by an incongruous
mixture of parts of humans and animals interwoven with plants; distorted and
unnatural in shape or size; abnormal and hideous; ludicrously odd
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 fishes as my companions. Then the other
shapes began to appear, filling me with nameless horrorDefinition: intense and profound fear; something
that inspires dislike; something horrible; intense aversion
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 the moment I awoke. But during the dreams
they did not horrifyDefinition: fill with apprehension or alarm; cause to be unpleasantly
surprised
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 1 me at all--I was
one with them; wearing their unhumanDefinition: divested of human qualities or attributes
Word Type:
scientific
Number Of Synsets: 1 trappings, treading their aqueous ways,
and praying monstrously at their evilDefinition: morally objectionable behavior; that which causes harm or
destruction or misfortune; the good is oft interred with their bones"- Shakespeare;
the quality of being morally wrong in principle or practice; morally bad or wrong;
having the nature of vice; having or exerting a malignant influence
Word Type:
religious
Number Of Synsets: 6 sea-bottom temples.
There was much more than I could remember, but even what I did remember
each morning would be enough to stamp me as a madman or a genius if ever I dared write
it down. Some frightfulDefinition: provoking horror; extreme in degree or extent or amount or impact;
extremely distressing
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3
influence, I felt, was seeking gradually to drag me out of the sane world of wholesome
life into unnamable
abyssDefinition: a
bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or
chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2esDefinition: a bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable)
cavity or chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends
for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 of blackness and
alienage; and the process told heavily on me. My health and appearance grew steadily
worse, till finally I was forced to give up my position and adopt the static, secluded
life of an invalid. Some odd nervous affliction had me in its grip, and I found myself
at times almost unable to shut my eyes.
It was then that I began to study the mirror with mounting alarm. The
slow ravages of disease are not pleasant to watch, but in my case there was something
subtler and more puzzling in the background. My father seemed to notice it, too, for he
began looking at me curiously and almost affrightedly
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 0. What was taking place in me? Could it be that I was coming to
resemble my grandmother and uncle Douglas?
One night I had a frightfulDefinition: provoking horror; extreme in degree
or extent or amount or impact; extremely distressing
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 dream in which I met my grandmother under the sea. She
lived in a phosphorescent palace of many terraces, with gardens of strange leprous
corals and grotesqueDefinition: art characterized by an incongruous mixture of parts of humans and
animals interwoven with plants; distorted and unnatural in shape or size; abnormal
and hideous; ludicrously odd
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets:
3
brachiateDefinition:
swing from one hold to the next; having widely spreading paired branches; having arms
or armlike appendages
Word Type: scientific
Number Of Synsets: 3
efflorescencesDefinition:
the period of greatest prosperity or productivity; any red eruption of the skin; the
time and process of budding and unfolding of blossoms; a powdery deposit on a
surface
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4, and welcomed me
with a warmth that may have been sardonic. She had changed--as those who take to the
water change--and told me she had never died. Instead, she had gone to a spot her dead
son had learned about, and had leaped to a realm whose wonders-- destined for him as
well--he had spurned with a smoking pistol. This was to be my realm, too--I could not
escape it. I would never die, but would live with those who had lived since before man
ever walked the earth.
I met also that which had been her grandmother. For eighty thousand years Pth'thya-l'yi had lived in Y'ha-nthlei, and thither she had gone back after Obed Marsh was dead. Y'ha-nthlei was not destroyed when the upper-earth men shot death into the sea. It was hurt, but not destroyed. The Deep Ones could never be destroyed, even though the palaeogean magic of the forgotten Old Ones might sometimes check them. For the present they would rest; but some day, if they remembered, they would rise again for the tribute Great Cthulhu craved. It would be a city greater than Innsmouth next time. They had planned to spread, and had brought up that which would help them, but now they must wait once more. For bringing the upper-earth men's death I must do a penance, but that would not be heavy. This was the dream in which I saw a shoggoth for the first time, and the sight set me awake in a frenzy of screaming. That morning the mirror definitely told me I had acquired the Innsmouth look.
So far I have not shot myself as my uncle Douglas did. I bought an
automatic and almost took the step, but certain dreams deterred me. The tense extremes
of horrorDefinition:
intense and profound fear; something that inspires dislike; something horrible;
intense aversion
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 3 are
lessening, and I feel queerDefinition: offensive term for an openly homosexual man; hinder or prevent (the
efforts, plans, or desires) of; put in a dangerous, disadvantageous, or difficult
position; beyond or deviating from the usual or expected; homosexual or arousing
homosexual desires
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 5ly drawn
toward the unknown sea-deeps instead of fearing them. I hear and do strange things in
sleep, and awake with a kind of exaltation instead of terror. I do not believe I need to
wait for the full change as most have waited. If I did, my father would probably shut me
up in a sanitarium as my poor little cousin is shut up. Stupendous and unheard-of
splendors await me below, and I shall seek them soon. Ia-R'lyehl Cihuiha flgagnl id Ia!
No, I shall not shoot myself--I cannot be made to shoot myself!
I shall plan my cousin's escape from that Canton mad-house, and
together we shall go to marvel-shadowedDefinition: follow, usually without the person's knowledge; cast a
shadow over; make appear small by comparison; filled with shade
Word Type:
gothic
Number Of Synsets: 4 Innsmouth. We shall swim out to that
brooding reef in the sea and dive down through black
abyssDefinition: a
bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable) cavity or
chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2esDefinition: a bottomless gulf or pit; any unfathomable (or apparently unfathomable)
cavity or chasm or void extending below (often used figuratively); make amends
for
Word Type: gothic
Number Of Synsets: 2 to CyclopeanDefinition: of
or relating to or resembling the Cyclops
Word Type: scientific
Number Of
Synsets: 1 and many-columned Y'ha-nthlei
Word Type: other
Number Of
Synsets: 0, and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and
glory for ever.