Читать книгу The Complete Works of Algernon Blackwood. Novels, Short Stories, Horror Classics, Occult & Supernatural Tales, Plays онлайн

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For, floating upwards across the spaces came a sound of simple, old-time piping—the fluting music of a little reed. It drew near, stopped for a moment as though the player watched them; then, with a plunging swiftness, passed off through starry distance up among the darker mountains. The lost, forsaken Asian valley covered them. Nowhere were they extraneous to it. They slept. And while they slept, they moved across the frontiers of fulfillment.

The moon-blanched Gate of horn and ivory swung open. The consciousness of the Earth possessed them. They passed within.

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"For of old the Sun, our sire,

Came wooing the mother of men,

Earth, that was virginal then,

Vestal fire to his fire.

Silent her bosom and coy,

But the strong god sued and press'd;

And born of their starry nuptial joy

Are all that drink of her breast.

"And the triumph of him that begot,

And the travail of her that bore,

Behold they are evermore

As warp and weft in our lot.

We are children of splendor and flame,