I stood as if paralyzed under his awful eyes. Oh! thought I, can two orbs picture such infinite depth of remorse; such absence of tenderness; such barrenness of sympathy, far beyond the most care-worn look of earth? Then, pervading all these lineaments of despair were the positive characteristics of his nature—malice, envy, and hatred. These lent their repulsive fires to his eye, already overcharged with insidious gleamings. I suddenly thought of my ten thousand, and my fears subsided.
“It were better for you to remain a stranger to the greater depth and go no farther,” were the words that finally came from Blackana’s scarcely moving lips.
“Fulfill your mission, Blackana! I fear not the deepest depth when I am thus equipped.”
“Where is your sword and where is your armor?” he tauntingly asked.
“My steel is hid until I find a foe worthy of its mettle.”
Blackana quivered and resumed his task. He told me that above us, deep in the bowels of these mountains, were the more refined legislative halls of Satan; while below us, at varying and terrible depths, lay scattered many a brooding station where the lowest laws of Hell are hatched.
“Let us go downward,” I said, and scarcely had the words escaped my lips ere Blackana had ushered me into an elevator, holding me as we dropped down and down with increasing velocity, while a cold chill was freezing my heart, and my body playing the part of an aspen leaf.
Never before had I been touched by so dreadful a hand, but I thought again of the ten thousand, and that lent warmth to my heart and calmness to my nerves. “To what great depth are we falling?” I soon ventured to ask, as I perceived that we were dashing downward at terrific speed.
“We fall to no great depth; we go only a thousand furlongs to reach the first grand level, not stopping at these lesser places of which you get a glimpse in passing.”
“A thousand furlongs,” I repeated, “down into the earth! Who ever heard of such a descent before?” But I still thought of my ten thousand, even though I could not conceive how they could follow me in such places.