Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 53 — page 94: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A PRESENT FROM MARS at the small, half-naked boy. ““He’s never troubled about them—only about getting enough to eat. He’s a parasite- host, but that doesn’t worry him because he’s known no other way.” ““There’s some sort of hope in that,’ she said, “‘for the human race.” *“*A queer sort. Demotion.”’ ‘Teach him to write.” *“Who cares about writing?” The bugs of the field came to him and climbed. His personal bugs gave battle. Ten times a day he was a battleground. I KIN RITE I KIN IAM A RITER. ABCDEFGHIJKMWN PTOZ. Almost two centuries passed. The hermit came down from the hills. He was a young man dressed in skins. His flesh was horny; the bugs crawled and recrawled and he felt nothing. Men were few: this was the only village in a hundred square miles. He said: “The name’s Rennes, and I can write. Also I can read.” - 93 The matted, calloused men and the scarecrow women and children stared, and one said: ‘“‘What’s them. things good for?” The hermit stood baffled for a moment, but said, at length: “For telling what dead folks thought.” ““You’re crazy,” they said. .“Listen,’ answered the hermit. ““My old man taught me them things, and his old man taught him, and his old man...’ He flung two bare arms. ““Over there . . .:the city. Who d’ya think built it?” “The Builders,” they told him, like people humoring a child. *“Yeah, the Builders. Know what the Builders hadn’t got that we’ve got?” They grinned and shook their heads, leading him on. “T found it in a writing up in the mountains, a writing by a Builder called Kenn Sigsbee. A writing I could read, because——-”’ he slapped his chest *“‘———I can read.” They went on smiling, but some began to go about their tasks. He called with raised fists: “Don’t nobody want to know . . ?”’. “*You’re crazy,” repeated the few who stayed. But they comiclooks.comn