“They are evidently bent on keeping me here, and I confess I shall have some difficulty in tearing myself away.”
The toad continued to lead the way. At the sixtieth stair it paused before a door, which opened, although there was nobody to be seen: the toad again moved on, and Mitaine continued to follow it. She found herself in a vast gallery lighted only by the moon. Refreshed by the cool air which blew on her face, and by the glimpse of the open country which she caught through a window, she felt as if she had just emerged from the tomb. On her left hand was a blank wall; before her opened, one after another, a series of huge folding doors; on her right was a large array of columns and arches that flung their gloomy shadows on the floor and side of the chamber. Before her was the toad going on without stopping; gleaming with phosphorescent light, and leaving behind it, as if crawled along, a slimy and shining track. As Mitaine passed by the first column, it crumbled in pieces, and she beheld, standing upright on the pedestal, a corpse wrapped in its winding-sheet, and holding in its hand a lighted torch. It stepped down from its place, and, waiting until she passed, took up its position on her left. The second column sank in its turn, a second corpse descended and placed itself on her right hand, also bearing a torch. The same thing took place throughout the whole length of the gallery; but the attention of our young page was distracted by the spectacle she beheld on passing the first door. She saw an immense hole, the mere sight of which made her giddy; at one moment excessively bright, at the next equally gloomy, it seemed as if lighted by some gigantic forge, whose flame alternately blazed up and died at every successive blast of the bellows. This intermittent glare was insupportable, and for some minutes Mitaine was almost blinded. She heard groans, and, at length, contrived to distinguish thousands of unhappy wretches with their hands tied behind their backs, and their limbs fractured, suspended by their wrists from the roof. Her heart full of pity and rage, she was about to rush to their aid, when she perceived that the hall was without a floor; a gulf, at the bottom of which a torrent was roaring, yawned beneath the feet of the victims. She turned aside her head, wiped away a tear, and hastened onwards. Every door before which she passed afforded her a view of new tortures, and her impotence to relieve these agonies so infuriated her, that, not knowing how to vent her rage, she rushed, sword in hand, upon the melancholy procession that surrounded her; but she encountered nothing but empty air. The corpses, taking no heed, pursued their way without hurrying, without delaying. Then the anger of Mitaine knew no bounds. She rushed on recklessly in search of an enemy. The toad took to flight; the dead, observing their distance, seemed to glide, not walk over the floor. At the end of the gallery a door opened, on grating hinges, and closed again as soon as Mitaine had crossed the threshold. The darkness was impenetrable. She was compelled to halt. The dull flame of the torches flickered up and faded in the gloom without giving out any light. The corpses ranged themselves in an immense circle round the toad; the toad gave a bound at least ten feet high, and Mitaine observed that it increased in size.
[Original Size] -- [Medium-Size]
As it swelled out, the hall became filled with light. Then the beast began to assume airs and graces, to attitudinise, and to ogle; and lastly, to finish these vagaries, it set about its toilet, and commenced scratching itself, emitting, at every touch of its foot, showers of venom and sparks.
