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The Masque of the Red Death
The Masque of the Red Death
Edgar
Allan Poe
THE "Red Death" had long devastated the country.
No pestilence[1] had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar
and its seal -- the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains,
and sudden dizziness, and then profuse[2] bleeding at the pores, with dissolution[3]. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the
face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him
out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole
seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents of half an
hour.
But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless[4] and sagacious[5]. When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to
his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights
and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of
his castellated abbeys. This was an extensive and magnificent structure, the
creation of the prince's own eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty
wall girdled it in. This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers[6], having entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and
welded the bolts. They resolved to leave means neither of ingress or egress[7] to the sudden impulses of despair or of frenzy from within.
The abbey was amply provisioned. With such precautions the courtiers might bid
defiance to contagion. The external world could take care of itself. In the
meantime it was folly to grieve, or to think. The prince had provided all the
appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were improvisatori,
there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. All these and security were within. Without
was the "Red Death."
It was toward the close of the fifth or sixth month of his seclusion,
and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad, that the Prince Prospero
entertained his thousand friends at a masked ball of the most unusual
magnificence.
It was a voluptuous[8] scene, that masquerade. But first
let me tell of the rooms in which it was held. There were seven -- an imperial
suite. In many palaces, however, such suites form a long and straight vista,
while the folding doors slide back nearly to the walls on either hand, so that
the view of the whole extent is scarcely impeded[9]. Here the case was very different; as might have been
expected from the duke's love of the bizarre. The apartments were so
irregularly disposed[10] that the vision embraced but little more than one at a
time. There was a sharp turn at every twenty or thirty yards, and at each turn
a novel effect. To the right and left, in the middle of each wall, a tall and
narrow Gothic window looked out upon a closed corridor which pursued the
windings of the suite. These windows were of stained glass whose color varied in
accordance with the prevailing hue[11] of the decorations of the chamber into which it opened.
That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue -- and vividly
blue were its windows. The second chamber was purple in its ornaments and tapestries[12], and here the panes were purple. The third was green
throughout, and so were the casements[13]. The fourth was furnished and lighted with orange -- the
fifth with white -- the sixth with violet. The seventh apartment was closely
shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the
walls, falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. But
in this chamber only, the color of the windows failed to correspond with the
decorations. The panes here were scarlet -- a deep blood color. Now in no one
of the seven apartments was there any lamp or candelabrum, amid the profusion
of golden ornaments that lay scattered to and fro or depended from the roof.
There was no light of any kind emanating from lamp or candle within the suite
of chambers. But in the corridors that followed the suite, there stood,
opposite to each window, a heavy tripod, bearing a brazier[14] of fire that protected its rays through the tinted glass
and so glaringly illumined the room. And thus were produced a multitude of gaudy[15] and fantastic appearances. But in the western or black
chamber the effect of the fire-light that streamed upon the dark hangings
through the blood-tinted panes, was ghastly in the extreme, and produced so
wild a look upon the countenances[16] of those who entered, that there were few of the company
bold enough to set foot within its precincts at all.
It was in this apartment, also, that there stood against the
western wall, a gigantic clock of ebony[17]. Its pendulum swung to and fro with a dull, heavy,
monotonous clang; and when the minute-hand made the circuit of the face, and
the hour was to be stricken, there came from the brazen lungs of the clock a
sound which was clear and loud and deep and exceedingly musical, but of so
peculiar a note and emphasis that, at each lapse of an hour, the musicians of
the orchestra were constrained to pause, momentarily, in their performance, to hearken[18] to the sound; and thus the waltzers[19] perforce ceased their evolutions; and there was a brief disconcert[20] of the whole gay company; and, while the chimes of the
clock yet rang, it was observed that the giddiest grew pale, and the more aged
and sedate passed their hands over their brows as if in confused reverie or
meditation. But when the echoes had fully ceased, a light laughter at once
pervaded the assembly; the musicians looked at each other and smiled as if at
their own nervousness and folly, and made whispering vows, each to the other,
that the next chiming of the clock should produce in them no similar emotion;
and then, after the lapse of sixty minutes, (which embrace three thousand and
six hundred seconds of the Time that flies,) there came yet another chiming of
the clock, and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and meditation
as before.
But, in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent
revel. The tastes of the duke were peculiar. He had a fine eye for colors and
effects. He disregarded the decora of mere fashion.
His plans were bold and fiery, and his conceptions glowed with barbaric lustre. There are some who would have thought him mad. His
followers felt that he was not. It was necessary to hear and see and touch him
to be sure that he was not.
He had directed, in great part, the moveable embellishments
of the seven chambers, upon occasion of this great fete[21]; and it was his own guiding taste which had given character
to the masqueraders. Be sure they were grotesque. There were much glare and
glitter and piquancy[22] and phantasm[23] -- much of what has been since seen in "Hernani." There were arabesque figures with unsuited
limbs and appointments. There were delirious fancies such as the madman
fashions. There was much of the beautiful, much of the wanton, much of the
bizarre, something of the terrible, and not a little of that which might have
excited disgust. To and fro in the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a
multitude of dreams. And these -- the dreams -- writhed[24]
in and about, taking hue from the rooms, and causing the wild music of the
orchestra to seem as the echo of their steps. And, anon, there strikes
the ebony clock which stands in the hall of the velvet. And then, for a moment,
all is still, and all is silent save the voice of the clock. The dreams are
stiff-frozen as they stand. But the echoes of the chime die away -- they have
endured but an instant -- and a light, half-subdued laughter floats after them
as they depart. And now again the music swells, and the dreams live, and writhe
to and fro more merrily than ever, taking hue from the many-tinted windows
through which stream the rays from the tripods. But to the chamber which lies
most westwardly of the seven, there are now none of
the maskers who venture; for the night is waning away; and there flows a
ruddier light through the blood-colored panes; and the blackness of the sable[25] drapery appalls; and to him whose foot falls upon the sable
carpet, there comes from the near clock of ebony a muffled peal more solemnly emphatic[26] than any which reaches their ears who indulge in the more
remote gaieties of the other apartments.
But these other apartments were densely crowded, and in them
beat feverishly the heart of life. And the revel[27] went whirlingly on, until at
length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the clock. And then the
music ceased, as I have told; and the evolutions of the waltzers
were quieted; and there was an uneasy cessation[28] of all things as before. But now there were twelve strokes
to be sounded by the bell of the clock; and thus it happened, perhaps, that
more of thought crept, with more of time, into the meditations of the
thoughtful among those who reveled. And thus, too, it happened, perhaps, that
before the last echoes of the last chime had utterly sunk into silence, there
were many individuals in the crowd who had found leisure to become aware of the
presence of a masked figure which had arrested the attention of no single
individual before. And the rumor of this new presence having spread itself
whisperingly around, there arose at length from the whole company a buzz, or
murmur, expressive of disapprobation[29] and surprise -- then, finally, of terror, of horror, and of
disgust.
In an assembly of phantasms such as I have painted, it may
well be supposed that no ordinary appearance could have excited such sensation.
In truth the masquerade license of the night was nearly unlimited; but the
figure in question had out-Heroded Herod[30], and gone beyond the bounds of even the prince's indefinite
decorum. There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be
touched without emotion. Even with the utterly lost, to whom life and death are
equally jests[31],
there are matters of which no jest can be made. The whole company, indeed,
seemed now deeply to feel that in the costume and bearing of the stranger
neither wit nor propriety existed. The figure was
tall and gaunt[32], and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments[33] of the grave. The mask which concealed the visage[34] was made so nearly to resemble the countenance[35] of a stiffened corpse that the closest scrutiny must have
had difficulty in detecting the cheat. And yet all this might have been
endured, if not approved, by the mad revelers around. But the mummer[36] had gone so far as to assume the type of the Red Death. His
vesture[37] was dabbled in blood -- and his broad brow, with all the
features of the face, was besprinkled with the scarlet horror.
When the eyes of Prince Prospero fell upon this spectral
image (which with a slow and solemn movement, as if more fully to sustain its
role, stalked to and fro among the waltzers) he was
seen to be convulsed, in the first moment with a strong shudder either of
terror or distaste; but, in the next, his brow reddened with rage.
"Who dares?" he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers
who stood near him -- "who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery?
Seize him and unmask him -- that we may know whom we
have to hang at sunrise, from the battlements!"
It was in the eastern or blue chamber in which stood the
Prince Prospero as he uttered these words. They rang throughout the seven rooms
loudly and clearly -- for the prince was a bold and robust man, and the music
had become hushed at the waving of his hand.
It was in the blue room where stood the prince, with a group
of pale courtiers by his side. At first, as he spoke, there was a slight
rushing movement of this group in the direction of the intruder, who at the
moment was also near at hand, and now, with deliberate and stately step, made
closer approach to the speaker. But from a certain nameless awe with which the
mad assumptions of the mummer had inspired the whole party, there were found
none who put forth hand to seize him; so that, unimpeded[38], he passed within a yard of the prince's person; and, while
the vast assembly, as if with one impulse, shrank from the centres
of the rooms to the walls, he made his way uninterruptedly, but with the same
solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from the first, through
the blue chamber to the purple -- through the purple to the green -- through
the green to the orange -- through this again to the white -- and even thence
to the violet, ere a decided
movement had been made to arrest him. It was then, however, that the Prince
Prospero, maddening with rage and the shame of his own momentary cowardice,
rushed hurriedly through the six chambers, while none followed him on account
of a deadly terror that had seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and
had approached, in rapid impetuosity[39], to within three or four feet of the retreating figure,
when the latter, having attained the extremity of the velvet apartment, turned
suddenly and confronted his pursuer. There was a sharp cry -- and the dagger
dropped gleaming upon the sable carpet, upon which, instantly afterwards, fell prostrate[40] in death the Prince Prospero. Then, summoning the wild
courage of despair, a throng of the revelers at once threw themselves into the
black apartment, and, seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and
motionless within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror
at finding the grave-cerements[41] and corpse-like mask which they handled with so violent a
rudeness, untenanted[42] by any tangible[43] form.
And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He
had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revelers in the
blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of
his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the
gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red
Death held illimitable dominion over all.
Copyright thiesmeyer.net 2014
[1] Pestilence n. sickness or
disease
[2] Profuse adj. plentiful or
abundant
[3] Dissolution n. decay or
disintegration
[4] Dauntless adj. fearless or
bold
[5] Sagacious adj. wise
[6] Courtier n. a member of the
court
[7] Ingress/egress n.
entrance/exit
[8] Voluptuous adj. luxurious
[9] Impede v. to obstruct or block
[10] Disposed v. arranged
[11] Hue n. color
[12] Tapestry n. piece of heavy,
decorated fabric...hung from walls as decoration
[13] Casement n. window
[14] Brazier n. a stand with a pan
for holding coals (used for heat/light)
[15] Gaudy adj. extravagantly
bright or showy (to the point of being tasteless)
[16] Countenance n. face
[17] Ebony adj. black
[18] Hearken v. to listen
[19] Waltzers
n. dancers (doing the waltz: a Ύ time dance)
[20] Disconcert n. state of being
disturbed or unsettled
[21] Fete n. party
[22] Piquancy n. quality of being
stimulating or exciting
[23] Phantasm n. an illusion or
apparition
[24] Writhe v. to twist or squirm
[25] Sable adj. dark colored
[26] Emphatic adj. forceful
[27] Revel n. party or festive
event
[28] Cessation n. a stopping or
halt
[29] Disapprobation n. disfavor or
disapproval
[30] Herod Roman king known for
madness, violence, & insatiable ambition
[31] Jest n. joke
[32] Gaunt adj. thin or skinny
[33] Habiliments n. clothing
[34] Visage n. face
[35] Countenance n. facial
expression
[36] Mummer n. a masked actor or
pantomime
[37] Vesture n. clothing/dress
[38] Unimpeded adj.
unhindered/unable to be stopped
[39] Impetuosity n.
rashness/impulsiveness/hotheadedness
[40] Prostrate adj. flat or
horizontal
[41] Cerements n. waxed cloth for
wrapping a corpse
[42] Untenanted v.
unoccupied/vacant/empty
[43] Tangible adj.
solid/concrete/physical