ld resist, we have come upon you without warning, as he
himself will sometime; therefore you must come, whether you will or not."
"Alas!" said I, "must I die?" "O no," said _Nightmare_; "we will spare
you this time." "But with your favour," said I, "your brother Death
never spared any one yet who was brought within reach of his dart; the
fellow even ventured to fling a fall with the Lord of Life himself,
though it is true he gained very little by his daring." At these words
_Nightmare_ arose full of wrath and departed. "Hey," said _Sleep_, "come
away, and you shall have no cause to repent of your journey." "Well,"
said I, "may there never be night to _saint Sleep_, and may _Nightmare_
never obtain any other place to crouch upon than the top of an awl,
unless you return me to where you found me." Then away he went with me,
over woods and precipices, over oceans and valleys, over castles and
towers, rivers and crags; and where did we descend, but by one of the
gates of the daughters of Belial, on the posterior side of the _city of
Perdition_, and I could there perceive, that the three gates of Perdition
contracted into one on the hinder side, and opened into the same place--a
place foggy, cold, and pestilential, replete with an unwholesome vapour,
and clouds, lowering and terrible. "Pray, sir," said I, "what dungeon of
a place is this?" "_The chambers of Death_," said _Sleep_. I had
scarcely time to enquire, before I heard some people crying, some
screaming, some groaning, some talking deliriously, some uttering
blasphemies in a feeble tone: others in great agony, as if about to give
up the ghost. Here and there one, after a mighty shout would become
silent, and then forthwith I could hear a key revolving in a lock; I
turned at the sound to look for the door, and by dint of long gazing, I
could see tens of thousands of doors, apparently far off though close by
my side notwithstanding. "Please to inform me, master Sleep," said I,
"to what place these doors open?" "They open," he replied, "into the
_land of Oblivion_, a vast country under the rule of my brother Death;
and the great wall here, is the limit of the immense eternity." As I
looked I could see a little death at each door, all with different arms,
and different names, though evidently they were all subjects of the same
king. Notwithstanding which, there was much contention between them
concerning the sick; for the one wished to snatch the sick through h