No human being was in sight, neither
did any human dwelling show signs of habitation. He wished he had gone
round by the road and through the length of the village. He registered a
vow against short cuts--save in broad daylight--for his present
surroundings inspired him with the liveliest distrust. They were to him
positively nightmarish. He suffered the nastiest little fears of what
might follow him, what might, even now, peer and lurk. Heretofore he had
considered the earth as so much dead matter, to be usefully and
profitably exploited by all-dominant man--specially by men of his own
creed and race. But now the power of the earth laid hands on him. She
lived, and mankind dwindled to the proportions of parasitic insects, at
most irritating some small portions of her skin, her vast indifferent
surface. Such ideas had never occurred to him before. He resented
them--essayed to put them from him as trenching on blasphemy.
Starting on again, angry alike with himself for entertaining, and with
the unknown for engendering, such subversive notions, his pace
unconsciously quickened to a run.
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