And lo! from among those sable draperies where the
sounds of the song departed, there came forth a dark and undefined
shadow- a shadow such as the moon, when low in heaven, might fashion
from the figure of a man: but it was the shadow neither of man nor
of God, nor of any familiar thing. And quivering awhile among the
draperies of the room, it at length rested in full view upon the
surface of the door of brass. But the shadow was vague, and
formless, and indefinite, and was the shadow neither of man nor of
God- neither God of Greece, nor God of Chaldaea, nor any Egyptian God.
And the shadow rested upon the brazen doorway, and under the arch of
the entablature of the door, and moved not, nor spoke any word, but
there became stationary and remained. And the door whereupon the
shadow rested was, if I remember aright, over against the feet of
the young Zoilus enshrouded. But we, the seven there assembled, having
seen the shadow as it came out from among the draperies, dared not
steadily behold it, but cast down our eyes, and gazed continually into
the depths of the mirror of ebony. And at length I, Oinos, speaking
some low words, demanded of the shadow its dwelling and its
appellation. And the shadow answered, "I am SHADOW, and my dwelling is
near to the Catacombs of Ptolemais, and hard by those dim plains of
Helusion which border upon the foul Charonian canal.
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