Before the Beginning of Years

(Chapters Four, Five, and Six — except Four — have proved too pianissimo to print.)

The Universe slept, and shiny dreams confused it; its purity clouded over like Chalcedony. It was an absinthe dream —

Yea! let me fall off the water wagon; let me hie me to the Old Absinthe House, and pledge mine host in a bumper of green poison! —

for behold! in that clear diamond without flaw there gathered nebulae like a great mist of light.

And there was some perception of distinction, and thereby came hurt.

Close up, please, camera!

Now, Miss Eissiz, register despair!

Thank you. Now close up in the scene! Right.

In one nebula there was an insignificant body who is, (let me whisper, Helen) in one way the hero of Our Story. Closer up, there; ten yards’ title, Helios. Closer up again — so here we are back to earth after all, ready to begin a new chapter of what, please the pigs, shall not be the Life and Adventures of Sir Roger Bloxam.

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