For some time after this occurrence I failed to regard the subject of
demons and allied Forces in any but a spirit of complete no
enthusiasm, but more recently my interest and research have been
enlarged by the zeal and supernatural conversation of a liberal-minded
person who sought my prosaic society with indefatigable persistence.
When we had progressed to such a length that the one might speak of
affairs without the other at once interposing that he himself had also
unfortunately come out quite destitute of money, this stranger, who
revealed to me that his name was Glidder, but that in the company of a
certain chosen few he was known intimately as the Keeper of the
Salograma, approached me confidentially, and inquired whether we of
our Central Kingdom were in the habit of receiving manifestations from
the spirits of those who had Passed Beyond.
At the unassumed ingenuousness of this remark I suffered my
impassiveness to relax, as I replied with well-established pride that
although a country which neglected its ancestors might doubtless be
able to produce more of the ordinary or graveyard spectres, we were
unapproachable for the diverse forms and malignant enmity of our
apparitions. Of invisible beings alone, I continued tolerantly, we had
the distinction of being harassed by upwards of seven hundred
clearly-defined varieties, while the commoner inflictions of demons,
shades, visions, warlocks, phantoms, sprites, imps, phenomena, ghosts,
and reflections passed almost without comment; and touching our
admitted national speciality of dragons, the honour of supremacy had
never been questioned.
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