This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1848 edition. Excerpt: . To the dimensions vast of upper worlds; Down mid the Ocean with my form they sped, And held me there for seeming ages long, To gasp for breath, yet scarcely then to breathe; There, on through endless labyrinths they rushed, Where caves terrific glowered upon my soul, And fierce sea-monsters glared and growled in spite; Till, rising thence, they left the seas domain, And dragged me up the loftiest mountain-steeps, There to endure perennial Winters cold, Mid deepest beds of everlasting snows Swift thence they bore me when it seemed that Time Had swept his nameless cycles oer those heights, Far to the sun-burnt desert, through its sands To wade for centuries oppressed with thirst, With no green spot upon the arid wild, Where springs and shades, whose life-renewing power Might quench my lip, or cool my sun-charred feet, Or re"st my fevered frame one moments length." Then through the surface of the earth I seemed Far downwards to be drawn with power unspent, Through stubborn soils and still resisting rocks, That tore my vitals and my frame apart, Till in earths centre they were all reformed, And cast into a crucible, neath which Unending fires blazed fiercely round and round.

Here rolled a mighty sea of molten gold, Into whose currents ghastly giants hurled Huge masses of the precious ore to melt, That as they fell amid the seething tide, Sent myriad sparks, with glow and heat intense, Shooting like stars that course the paths of Heaven. Mid this metallic sea I then seemed plunged, And made to writhe in anguish undefined; By fiends down driven to unmeasured depths, Burning I sank to struggle there in vain; Then after countless years, from that deep Hell Swiftly transported to the Arctic zone--Oh horrors nameless of that dread.