bout her, and to make her to seem unreal
to my gaze; for the vapour did be in constant movement, and to give a
seeming of shifting to and fro of all that did be in it.

And behold! as I did stare, with my dreadful pain, there did be sudden a
strange hoarse noise from the nearer Millions. And lo! in an instant
there came a mighty Shout out of all that Country; and the shout did be
made again, and did grow into a mighty hoarse roaring from the Millions,
so that all that great Country did be filled with the monstrous sound.
And, in verity, I to have seen the thing, likewise; but to have set it
to the madness of longing of my heart and to that desperate and dreadful
pain which did make me to be crazed and lost from all sane thinking.

And the thing that I did see, had been that the Maid did seem to move,
there upon the Last Road, where she did lie; but indeed, this to have
appeared only to be the stirring of the luminous vapour of the
Earth-Current, which did seem to make things shift, as I have told.

And lo! I now to see truly that the Maid did move where she was laid
afar off upon the Road; and I now to know, and to believe that she did
indeed live. And my life came into me with a bounding; yet did my heart
seem to be a moment stilled in my breast. And the Master Monstruwacan to
have signed already that the Roadway be stopt, and brought backward; but
I to be now upon the Last Road, and did run as a madman, shouting vainly
upon the name of Mine Own. And I to learn afterward that there to have
been a dreadful peril that all the near Millions to rush toward the Last
Road, and so, mayhap, to have caused the death of many, and to have
been like to have crusht Mine Own. But this danger to have been eased,
because that the Watch Master did act very prompt, and set the great
regiments of his men to keep back the Millions, and did send a signal
abroad over all the Country, that there to be calmness, for that the
Maid should be succoured. And alway, whilst this to be, I did run
staggering most strangely upward of the Last Road; and surely that great
roof did ring and boom with the constant and mighty shoutings of the
Millions.

And there did run others also along the Road, to my back; but I to have
been the first, and to make a good speed, though I did stagger and rock
so strange upon my feet; and the Road alway to be moving backward under
me; and so I to be come wonderful soon unto where the Maid did be. And
she to be upon her