BOOK OF THE DAMNED 215 



Our own expression: 



That he saw a luminous object near the moon: that that part of 

 the moon became illuminated, and the object was lost to view; but 

 that then its shadow underneath was seen. 



Serviss explains, of course. Otherwise he'd not be Prof. Serviss. 

 It's a little contest in relative approximations to realness. Prof. 

 Serviss thinks that what Schroeter saw was the "round" shadow of 

 a mountain in the region that had become lighted. He assumes 

 that Schroeter never looked again to see whether the shadow could 

 be attributed to a mountain. That's the crux: conceivably a moun- 

 tain could cast a round and that means detached shadow, in the 

 lighted part of the moon. Prof. Serviss could, of course, explain 

 why he disregards the light in the first place maybe it had always 

 been there "in the first place." If he couldn't explain, he'd still be 

 an amateur. 



We have another datum. I think it is more extraordinary 

 than 



Vast thing, black and poised, like a crow, over the moon. 



But only because it's more circumstantial, and because it has cor- 

 roboration, do I think it more extraordinary than 



Vast poised thing, black as a crow, over the moon. 



Mr. H. C. Russell, who was usually as orthodox as anybody, I 

 suppose at least, he wrote "F. R. A. S." after his name tells in 

 the Observatory, 2-374, one of the wickedest, or most preposterous, 

 stories that we have so far exhumed: 



That he and another astronomer, G. D. Hirst, were in the Blue 

 Mountains, near Sydney, N. S. W., and Mr. Hirst was looking at 

 the moon 



He saw on the moon what Russell calls "one of those remarkable 

 facts, which being seen should be recorded, although no explanation 

 can at present be offered." 



That may be so. It is very rarely done. Our own expression upon 

 evolution by successive dominants and their correlates is against it. 

 On the other hand, we express that every era records a few observa- 

 tions out of harmony with it, but adumbratory or preparatory to 

 the spirit of eras still to come. It's very rarely done. Lashed by 

 the phantom-scourge of a now passing era, the world of astron- 

 omers is in a state of terrorism, though of a highly attenuated, 

 modernized, devitalized kind. Let an astronomer see something that 

 is not of the conventional, celestial sights, or something that it is 

 "improper" to see his very dignity is in danger. Some one of the 



