True! Nervous - very nervous, dreadfully nervous I had been and am. But why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses - not destroyed, not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell. How then am I mad? Hearken, and observe how healthily, how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells -
Of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells
Bells, bells, bells -
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!
And then there stole into my fancy, like a rich musical note, the thought of what sweet rest there must be in the grave. The thought came gently and stealthily, and it seemed long before it attained full appreciation; but just as my spirit came at length properly to feel and entertain it, the figures of the judges vanished, as if magically, from before me; the tall candles sank into nothingness; their flames went out utterly; the blackness of darkness supervened; all sensations appeared swallowed up in a mad rushing descent as of the soul into Hades. Then all was silence, and stillness, and night.
The bells -
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs on burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of 'Never - nevermore.'"
It was hope that prompted the nerve to quiver, the frame to shrink. It was hope, the hope that triumphs on the rack - that whispers to the death-condemned even in a dungeon...
Hear the loud alarum bells -
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now - now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating:
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! - Prophet still if (moon - bird) or devil! -
Whether tempter sent or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted
On this home by horror haunted, - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there...is there...balm...? - tell me - tell me, I implore!"
After this I call to mind flatness and dampness; and then all is madness - the madness of a memory which busies itself among forbidden things. Very suddenly there came back to my soul motion and sound - the tumultuous motion of my heart, and in my ears the sound of its beating.
It was a low, dull, quick sound, much such a sound as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I gasped for breath - I talked more quickly, more vehemently - but the noise steadily increased. I paced the floor to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury - but the noise steadily increased. I felt that I must scream or die! And now, again - hark! Louder! Louder! Louder! Louder!
Hear the tolling of the bells -
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn though their melody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people - ah, the people -
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone -
They are neither man nor woman -
They are neither brute nor human -
They are ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming
At the same time, my forehead seemed bathed in a clammy vapor, and the peculiar smell of decayed fungus arose to my nostrils.
The entire surface of this metallic enclosure was rudely daubed in all the hideous and repulsive devices to which the charnel superstition of the monks has given rise. The figures of fiends in aspects of menace, with skeleton forms, and other more really fearful images, overspread and disfigured the walls.
It's nether extremity was formed of a crescent of glittering steel, about a foot in length from horn to horn; the horns upward, and the under edge evidently as keen as that of a razor. Like a razor, also, it seemed massive and heavy, tapering from the edge into a solid and broad structure above. It was appended to a weighty rod of brass, and the whole hissed as it swung through the air. I could no longer doubt the doom prepared for me by monkish ingenuity in torture.
Having failed to fall, it was no part of the demon plan to hurl me into the abyss; thus, there being no alternative, a different and a milder destruction awaited me. Milder!
Down - steadily down it crept. I took a frenzied pleasure in contrasting its downward with its lateral velocity. To the right, to the left, far and wide - with the shriek of a damned spirit! Toward my heart, it crept, with the stealthy pace of the tiger! I alternately laughed and howled, as he one or the other idea grew predominant. Down, certainly, relentlessly down!
I grew frantically mad, and struggled to force myself upward against the sweep of the fearful scimitar. And then I fell suddenly calm, and lay smiling at the glittering death, as a child at some rare bauble.
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls rolls,
Rolls
A paean from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of runic rhyme,
To the paean of the bells -
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells,
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells,
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells -
Bells, bells, bells -
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells -
Of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells
Bells, bells, bells -
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!
And then there stole into my fancy, like a rich musical note, the thought of what sweet rest there must be in the grave. The thought came gently and stealthily, and it seemed long before it attained full appreciation; but just as my spirit came at length properly to feel and entertain it, the figures of the judges vanished, as if magically, from before me; the tall candles sank into nothingness; their flames went out utterly; the blackness of darkness supervened; all sensations appeared swallowed up in a mad rushing descent as of the soul into Hades. Then all was silence, and stillness, and night.
The bells -
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs on burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of 'Never - nevermore.'"
It was hope that prompted the nerve to quiver, the frame to shrink. It was hope, the hope that triumphs on the rack - that whispers to the death-condemned even in a dungeon...
Hear the loud alarum bells -
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now - now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating:
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! - Prophet still if (moon - bird) or devil! -
Whether tempter sent or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted
On this home by horror haunted, - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there...is there...balm...? - tell me - tell me, I implore!"
After this I call to mind flatness and dampness; and then all is madness - the madness of a memory which busies itself among forbidden things. Very suddenly there came back to my soul motion and sound - the tumultuous motion of my heart, and in my ears the sound of its beating.
It was a low, dull, quick sound, much such a sound as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I gasped for breath - I talked more quickly, more vehemently - but the noise steadily increased. I paced the floor to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury - but the noise steadily increased. I felt that I must scream or die! And now, again - hark! Louder! Louder! Louder! Louder!
Hear the tolling of the bells -
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn though their melody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people - ah, the people -
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone -
They are neither man nor woman -
They are neither brute nor human -
They are ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming
At the same time, my forehead seemed bathed in a clammy vapor, and the peculiar smell of decayed fungus arose to my nostrils.
The entire surface of this metallic enclosure was rudely daubed in all the hideous and repulsive devices to which the charnel superstition of the monks has given rise. The figures of fiends in aspects of menace, with skeleton forms, and other more really fearful images, overspread and disfigured the walls.
It's nether extremity was formed of a crescent of glittering steel, about a foot in length from horn to horn; the horns upward, and the under edge evidently as keen as that of a razor. Like a razor, also, it seemed massive and heavy, tapering from the edge into a solid and broad structure above. It was appended to a weighty rod of brass, and the whole hissed as it swung through the air. I could no longer doubt the doom prepared for me by monkish ingenuity in torture.
Having failed to fall, it was no part of the demon plan to hurl me into the abyss; thus, there being no alternative, a different and a milder destruction awaited me. Milder!
Down - steadily down it crept. I took a frenzied pleasure in contrasting its downward with its lateral velocity. To the right, to the left, far and wide - with the shriek of a damned spirit! Toward my heart, it crept, with the stealthy pace of the tiger! I alternately laughed and howled, as he one or the other idea grew predominant. Down, certainly, relentlessly down!
I grew frantically mad, and struggled to force myself upward against the sweep of the fearful scimitar. And then I fell suddenly calm, and lay smiling at the glittering death, as a child at some rare bauble.
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls rolls,
Rolls
A paean from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of runic rhyme,
To the paean of the bells -
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells,
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells,
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells -
Bells, bells, bells -
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!