Avon Fantasy Reader No. 8 — page 100: what you’re looking at

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

96 H. P. LOWECR Aw it must be—and today after thousands of years it rests untarriished and in- violate in the endless night and silence of an ocean chasin. [ can not reckon the number of hours I spent in gazing at the sunken city with its buildings, arches, statues, and bridges, and the colossal temple with its beauty and mystery. Though I knew that death was near, my curiosity was consuming, and I threw the searchlight’s beam about in eager quest. The shaft of light permitted me to learn many details, but refused to show _ anything within the gaping door of the rock-hewn temple; and after a time I turned off the current, conscious of the need of conserving power. The fays were now perceptibly dimmer than they had been during the weeks of drifting. And as if sharpened by the coming of deprivation of light, my desire to explore the watery secrets grew. I, a German, should be the first to tread those eon-forgotten.ways! : , I produced and examined a deep-sea diving-suit of jointed metal, and ex- perimented with the portable light and air regenerator. Though I should have trouble in managing the double hatches alone, I believed I could over. come all obstacles with my scientific skill and actually walk about the dead city 1N person. | On August 16 I effected an exit from the U-29, and laboriously made my way through the ruined and mud-choked streets to the ancient river. I found no skeletons or other human remains, but gleaned a wealth of archeological lore from sculptures and coins. Of this I can not now speak save to utter my awe at a culture in the full noon of glory when cave-dwellers roamed Europe and the Nile flowed unwatched to the sea. Others, guided by this manuscript if it shall ever be found, must unfold the mysteries at which I can only hint. I returned to’ the boat as my electric batteries grew feeble, resolved to explore the rock temple on the following day. On the 17th, as my impulse to search out the mystery of the temple waxed still more insistent, a great disappointment befell me: for I found that the materials needed to replenish the portable light had perished in the mutiny of those pigs in July. My rage was unbounded, yet my German sense forbade me to venture unprepared into an utterly black interior which might prove the lair of some indescribable marine monster or a labyrinth of passages from whose windings I could never extricate myself. All I could do was to turn on the waning searchlight of the U-29, and with its aid walk up the temple steps and study the exterior carvings. The shaft of light entered the door at an upward angle, and I peered in to see if I could glimpse anything, ~ — but all in vain. Not even the roof was visible; and though I took a step or two inside after testing the floor with a staff, I dared not go farther. More- over, for the first time in my life I experienced the emotion of dread. I began to realize how some of poor Klenze’s moods had arisen, for as the temple drew me more and more, I feared its aqueous abysses with a blind and mount- Comicbooks:com (2)