terra-nova

'' the great war was then at its very beginning ... it was in one of the most open and least frequented parts of the broad pacific that the packet of which i was supercargo fell a victem to the german sea raider ... five days after we were taken i managed to escape alone in a small boat ...

'' when i fanally found myself adrift and free, i had but little idea of my surroundings ... i drifted aimlessly beneath the scorching sun; waiting either for some passing ship, or to be cast on the shores of some habitable land ...

'' the change happened whilst i slept. its details i shall never know for my slumber, though troubled and dream infested, was continuous. when at last i awaked, it was to discover myself half sucked into a slimy expanse of hellish black mire which extended about me in monotonous undulations as far as i could see, and in which my boat lay grounded some distance away ...

'' as i crawled into the stranded boat i realised that ... through some unprecedented volcanic upheaval a portion of the ocean floor must have been thrown to the surface ... so great was the extent of the new land which had risen beneath me that i could not detect the faintest noise of the surging of the ocean, strain my ears as i might. i remember little. i believe i sang a great deal and laughed oddly when i was unable to sing ...

'' when i came out of the shadow i was in a san francisco hospital; ... of any land upheaval in the pacific, my rescuers knew nothing; ... nor did i deem it necessary to insist upon a thing which i knew they could not believe ... often i ask myself if it could not all have been a pure phantasm--a mere freak of fever as i lay sun-stricken and raving in the open boat after my escape from the german man-of-war. '' h.p.lovecraft, dagon.

i: new islands at the energy collective, via dailygrail