Frankenstein

My present sit­u­a­tion was one in which all vol­un­tary thought was swal­lowed up and lost. I was hur­ried away by fury; revenge alone endowed me with strength and com­po­sure; it mould­ed my feel­ings and allowed me to be cal­cu­lat­ing and calm at peri­ods when oth­er­wise delir­i­um or death would have been my portion. 

My first res­o­lu­tion was to quit Gene­va for ever; my coun­try, which, when I was hap­py and beloved, was dear to me, now, in my adver­si­ty, became hate­ful. I pro­vid­ed myself with a sum of mon­ey, togeth­er with a few jew­els which had belonged to my moth­er, and departed. 

And now my wan­der­ings began which are to cease but with life. I have tra­versed a vast por­tion of the earth and have endured all the hard­ships which trav­ellers in deserts and bar­barous coun­tries are wont to meet. How I have lived I hard­ly know; many times have I stretched my fail­ing limbs upon the sandy plain and prayed for death. But revenge kept me alive; I dared not die and leave my adver­sary in being. 

When I quit­ted Gene­va my first labour was to gain some clue by which I might trace the steps of my fiendish ene­my. But my plan was unset­tled, and I wan­dered many hours round the con­fines of the town, uncer­tain what path I should pur­sue. As night approached I found myself at the entrance of the ceme­tery where William, Eliz­a­beth, and my father reposed. I entered it and approached the tomb which marked their graves. Every­thing was silent except the leaves of the trees, which were gen­tly agi­tat­ed by the wind; the night was near­ly dark, and the scene would have been solemn and affect­ing even to an unin­ter­est­ed observ­er. The spir­its of the depart­ed seemed to flit around and to cast a shad­ow, which was felt but not seen, around the head of the mourner. 

The deep grief which this scene had at first excit­ed quick­ly gave way to rage and despair. They were dead, and I lived; their mur­der­er also lived, and to destroy him I must drag out my weary exis­tence. I knelt on the grass and kissed the earth and with quiv­er­ing lips exclaimed, “By the sacred earth on which I kneel, by the shades that wan­der near me, by the deep and eter­nal grief that I feel, I swear; and by thee, O Night, and the spir­its that pre­side over thee, to pur­sue the dæmon who caused this mis­ery, until he or I shall per­ish in mor­tal con­flict. For this pur­pose I will pre­serve my life; to exe­cute this dear revenge will I again behold the sun and tread the green herbage of earth, which oth­er­wise should van­ish from my eyes for ever. And I call on you, spir­its of the dead, and on you, wan­der­ing min­is­ters of vengeance, to aid and con­duct me in my work. Let the cursed and hell­ish mon­ster drink deep of agony; let him feel the despair that now tor­ments me.” 

I had begun my adju­ra­tion with solem­ni­ty and an awe which almost assured me that the shades of my mur­dered friends heard and approved my devo­tion, but the furies pos­sessed me as I con­clud­ed, and rage choked my utterance. 

I was answered through the still­ness of night by a loud and fiendish laugh. It rang on my ears long and heav­i­ly; the moun­tains re-echoed it, and I felt as if all hell sur­round­ed me with mock­ery and laugh­ter. Sure­ly in that moment I should have been pos­sessed by fren­zy and have destroyed my mis­er­able exis­tence but that my vow was heard and that I was reserved for vengeance. The laugh­ter died away, when a well-known and abhorred voice, appar­ent­ly close to my ear, addressed me in an audi­ble whis­per, “I am sat­is­fied, mis­er­able wretch! You have deter­mined to live, and I am satisfied.” 

I dart­ed towards the spot from which the sound pro­ceed­ed, but the dev­il elud­ed my grasp. Sud­den­ly the broad disk of the moon arose and shone full upon his ghast­ly and dis­tort­ed shape as he fled with more than mor­tal speed. 

I pur­sued him, and for many months this has been my task. Guid­ed by a slight clue, I fol­lowed the wind­ings of the Rhone, but vain­ly. The blue Mediter­ranean appeared, and by a strange chance, I saw the fiend enter by night and hide him­self in a ves­sel bound for the Black Sea. I took my pas­sage in the same ship, but he escaped, I know not how. 

Amidst the wilds of Tar­tary and Rus­sia, although he still evad­ed me, I have ever fol­lowed in his track. Some­times the peas­ants, scared by this hor­rid appari­tion, informed me of his path; some­times he him­self, who feared that if I lost all trace of him I should despair and die, left some mark to guide me. The snows descend­ed on my head, and I saw the print of his huge step on the white plain. To you first enter­ing on life, to whom care is new and agony unknown, how can you under­stand what I have felt and still feel? Cold, want, and fatigue were the least pains which I was des­tined to endure; I was cursed by some dev­il and car­ried about with me my eter­nal hell; yet still a spir­it of good fol­lowed and direct­ed my steps and when I most mur­mured would sud­den­ly extri­cate me from seem­ing­ly insur­mount­able dif­fi­cul­ties. Some­times, when nature, over­come by hunger, sank under the exhaus­tion, a repast was pre­pared for me in the desert that restored and inspir­it­ed me. The fare was, indeed, coarse, such as the peas­ants of the coun­try ate, but I will not doubt that it was set there by the spir­its that I had invoked to aid me. Often, when all was dry, the heav­ens cloud­less, and I was parched by thirst, a slight cloud would bed­im the sky, shed the few drops that revived me, and vanish. 

I fol­lowed, when I could, the cours­es of the rivers; but the dæmon gen­er­al­ly avoid­ed these, as it was here that the pop­u­la­tion of the coun­try chiefly col­lect­ed. In oth­er places human beings were sel­dom seen, and I gen­er­al­ly sub­sist­ed on the wild ani­mals that crossed my path. I had mon­ey with me and gained the friend­ship of the vil­lagers by dis­trib­ut­ing it; or I brought with me some food that I had killed, which, after tak­ing a small part, I always pre­sent­ed to those who had pro­vid­ed me with fire and uten­sils for cooking. 

My life, as it passed thus, was indeed hate­ful to me, and it was dur­ing sleep alone that I could taste joy. O blessed sleep! Often, when most mis­er­able, I sank to repose, and my dreams lulled me even to rap­ture. The spir­its that guard­ed me had pro­vid­ed these moments, or rather hours, of hap­pi­ness that I might retain strength to ful­fil my pil­grim­age. Deprived of this respite, I should have sunk under my hard­ships. Dur­ing the day I was sus­tained and inspir­it­ed by the hope of night, for in sleep I saw my friends, my wife, and my beloved coun­try; again I saw the benev­o­lent coun­te­nance of my father, heard the sil­ver tones of my Elizabeth’s voice, and beheld Cler­val enjoy­ing health and youth. Often, when wea­ried by a toil­some march, I per­suad­ed myself that I was dream­ing until night should come and that I should then enjoy real­i­ty in the arms of my dear­est friends. What ago­nis­ing fond­ness did I feel for them! How did I cling to their dear forms, as some­times they haunt­ed even my wak­ing hours, and per­suade myself that they still lived! At such moments vengeance, that burned with­in me, died in my heart, and I pur­sued my path towards the destruc­tion of the dæmon more as a task enjoined by heav­en, as the mechan­i­cal impulse of some pow­er of which I was uncon­scious, than as the ardent desire of my soul. 

What his feel­ings were whom I pur­sued I can­not know. Some­times, indeed, he left marks in writ­ing on the barks of the trees or cut in stone that guid­ed me and insti­gat­ed my fury. “My reign is not yet over”—these words were leg­i­ble in one of these inscriptions—“you live, and my pow­er is com­plete. Fol­low me; I seek the ever­last­ing ices of the north, where you will feel the mis­ery of cold and frost, to which I am impas­sive. You will find near this place, if you fol­low not too tardi­ly, a dead hare; eat and be refreshed. Come on, my ene­my; we have yet to wres­tle for our lives, but many hard and mis­er­able hours must you endure until that peri­od shall arrive.” 

Scoff­ing dev­il! Again do I vow vengeance; again do I devote thee, mis­er­able fiend, to tor­ture and death. Nev­er will I give up my search until he or I per­ish; and then with what ecsta­sy shall I join my Eliz­a­beth and my depart­ed friends, who even now pre­pare for me the reward of my tedious toil and hor­ri­ble pilgrimage! 

As I still pur­sued my jour­ney to the north­ward, the snows thick­ened and the cold increased in a degree almost too severe to sup­port. The peas­ants were shut up in their hov­els, and only a few of the most hardy ven­tured forth to seize the ani­mals whom star­va­tion had forced from their hid­ing-places to seek for prey. The rivers were cov­ered with ice, and no fish could be pro­cured; and thus I was cut off from my chief arti­cle of maintenance. 

The tri­umph of my ene­my increased with the dif­fi­cul­ty of my labours. One inscrip­tion that he left was in these words: “Pre­pare! Your toils only begin; wrap your­self in furs and pro­vide food, for we shall soon enter upon a jour­ney where your suf­fer­ings will sat­is­fy my ever­last­ing hatred.” 

My courage and per­se­ver­ance were invig­o­rat­ed by these scoff­ing words; I resolved not to fail in my pur­pose, and call­ing on Heav­en to sup­port me, I con­tin­ued with unabat­ed fer­vour to tra­verse immense deserts, until the ocean appeared at a dis­tance and formed the utmost bound­ary of the hori­zon. Oh! How unlike it was to the blue sea­sons of the south! Cov­ered with ice, it was only to be dis­tin­guished from land by its supe­ri­or wild­ness and rugged­ness. The Greeks wept for joy when they beheld the Mediter­ranean from the hills of Asia, and hailed with rap­ture the bound­ary of their toils. I did not weep, but I knelt down and with a full heart thanked my guid­ing spir­it for con­duct­ing me in safe­ty to the place where I hoped, notwith­stand­ing my adversary’s gibe, to meet and grap­ple with him. 

Some weeks before this peri­od I had pro­cured a sledge and dogs and thus tra­versed the snows with incon­ceiv­able speed. I know not whether the fiend pos­sessed the same advan­tages, but I found that, as before I had dai­ly lost ground in the pur­suit, I now gained on him, so much so that when I first saw the ocean he was but one day’s jour­ney in advance, and I hoped to inter­cept him before he should reach the beach. With new courage, there­fore, I pressed on, and in two days arrived at a wretched ham­let on the seashore. I inquired of the inhab­i­tants con­cern­ing the fiend and gained accu­rate infor­ma­tion. A gigan­tic mon­ster, they said, had arrived the night before, armed with a gun and many pis­tols, putting to flight the inhab­i­tants of a soli­tary cot­tage through fear of his ter­rif­ic appear­ance. He had car­ried off their store of win­ter food, and plac­ing it in a sledge, to draw which he had seized on a numer­ous drove of trained dogs, he had har­nessed them, and the same night, to the joy of the hor­ror-struck vil­lagers, had pur­sued his jour­ney across the sea in a direc­tion that led to no land; and they con­jec­tured that he must speed­i­ly be destroyed by the break­ing of the ice or frozen by the eter­nal frosts. 

On hear­ing this infor­ma­tion I suf­fered a tem­po­rary access of despair. He had escaped me, and I must com­mence a destruc­tive and almost end­less jour­ney across the moun­tain­ous ices of the ocean, amidst cold that few of the inhab­i­tants could long endure and which I, the native of a genial and sun­ny cli­mate, could not hope to sur­vive. Yet at the idea that the fiend should live and be tri­umphant, my rage and vengeance returned, and like a mighty tide, over­whelmed every oth­er feel­ing. After a slight repose, dur­ing which the spir­its of the dead hov­ered round and insti­gat­ed me to toil and revenge, I pre­pared for my journey. 

I exchanged my land-sledge for one fash­ioned for the inequal­i­ties of the Frozen Ocean, and pur­chas­ing a plen­ti­ful stock of pro­vi­sions, I depart­ed from land. 

I can­not guess how many days have passed since then, but I have endured mis­ery which noth­ing but the eter­nal sen­ti­ment of a just ret­ri­bu­tion burn­ing with­in my heart could have enabled me to sup­port. Immense and rugged moun­tains of ice often barred up my pas­sage, and I often heard the thun­der of the ground sea, which threat­ened my destruc­tion. But again the frost came and made the paths of the sea secure. 

By the quan­ti­ty of pro­vi­sion which I had con­sumed, I should guess that I had passed three weeks in this jour­ney; and the con­tin­u­al pro­trac­tion of hope, return­ing back upon the heart, often wrung bit­ter drops of despon­den­cy and grief from my eyes. Despair had indeed almost secured her prey, and I should soon have sunk beneath this mis­ery. Once, after the poor ani­mals that con­veyed me had with incred­i­ble toil gained the sum­mit of a slop­ing ice moun­tain, and one, sink­ing under his fatigue, died, I viewed the expanse before me with anguish, when sud­den­ly my eye caught a dark speck upon the dusky plain. I strained my sight to dis­cov­er what it could be and uttered a wild cry of ecsta­sy when I dis­tin­guished a sledge and the dis­tort­ed pro­por­tions of a well-known form with­in. Oh! With what a burn­ing gush did hope revis­it my heart! Warm tears filled my eyes, which I hasti­ly wiped away, that they might not inter­cept the view I had of the dæmon; but still my sight was dimmed by the burn­ing drops, until, giv­ing way to the emo­tions that oppressed me, I wept aloud. 

But this was not the time for delay; I dis­en­cum­bered the dogs of their dead com­pan­ion, gave them a plen­ti­ful por­tion of food, and after an hour’s rest, which was absolute­ly nec­es­sary, and yet which was bit­ter­ly irk­some to me, I con­tin­ued my route. The sledge was still vis­i­ble, nor did I again lose sight of it except at the moments when for a short time some ice-rock con­cealed it with its inter­ven­ing crags. I indeed per­cep­ti­bly gained on it, and when, after near­ly two days’ jour­ney, I beheld my ene­my at no more than a mile dis­tant, my heart bound­ed with­in me. 

But now, when I appeared almost with­in grasp of my foe, my hopes were sud­den­ly extin­guished, and I lost all trace of him more utter­ly than I had ever done before. A ground sea was heard; the thun­der of its progress, as the waters rolled and swelled beneath me, became every moment more omi­nous and ter­rif­ic. I pressed on, but in vain. The wind arose; the sea roared; and, as with the mighty shock of an earth­quake, it split and cracked with a tremen­dous and over­whelm­ing sound. The work was soon fin­ished; in a few min­utes a tumul­tuous sea rolled between me and my ene­my, and I was left drift­ing on a scat­tered piece of ice that was con­tin­u­al­ly less­en­ing and thus prepar­ing for me a hideous death. 

In this man­ner many appalling hours passed; sev­er­al of my dogs died, and I myself was about to sink under the accu­mu­la­tion of dis­tress when I saw your ves­sel rid­ing at anchor and hold­ing forth to me hopes of suc­cour and life. I had no con­cep­tion that ves­sels ever came so far north and was astound­ed at the sight. I quick­ly destroyed part of my sledge to con­struct oars, and by these means was enabled, with infi­nite fatigue, to move my ice raft in the direc­tion of your ship. I had deter­mined, if you were going south­wards, still to trust myself to the mer­cy of the seas rather than aban­don my pur­pose. I hoped to induce you to grant me a boat with which I could pur­sue my ene­my. But your direc­tion was north­wards. You took me on board when my vigour was exhaust­ed, and I should soon have sunk under my mul­ti­plied hard­ships into a death which I still dread, for my task is unfulfilled. 

Oh! When will my guid­ing spir­it, in con­duct­ing me to the dæmon, allow me the rest I so much desire; or must I die, and he yet live? If I do, swear to me, Wal­ton, that he shall not escape, that you will seek him and sat­is­fy my vengeance in his death. And do I dare to ask of you to under­take my pil­grim­age, to endure the hard­ships that I have under­gone? No; I am not so self­ish. Yet, when I am dead, if he should appear, if the min­is­ters of vengeance should con­duct him to you, swear that he shall not live—swear that he shall not tri­umph over my accu­mu­lat­ed woes and sur­vive to add to the list of his dark crimes. He is elo­quent and per­sua­sive, and once his words had even pow­er over my heart; but trust him not. His soul is as hell­ish as his form, full of treach­ery and fiend-like mal­ice. Hear him not; call on the names of William, Jus­tine, Cler­val, Eliz­a­beth, my father, and of the wretched Vic­tor, and thrust your sword into his heart. I will hov­er near and direct the steel aright. 

Wal­ton, in con­tin­u­a­tion.

August 26th, 17—. 

You have read this strange and ter­rif­ic sto­ry, Mar­garet; and do you not feel your blood con­geal with hor­ror, like that which even now cur­dles mine? Some­times, seized with sud­den agony, he could not con­tin­ue his tale; at oth­ers, his voice bro­ken, yet pierc­ing, uttered with dif­fi­cul­ty the words so replete with anguish. His fine and love­ly eyes were now light­ed up with indig­na­tion, now sub­dued to down­cast sor­row and quenched in infi­nite wretched­ness. Some­times he com­mand­ed his coun­te­nance and tones and relat­ed the most hor­ri­ble inci­dents with a tran­quil voice, sup­press­ing every mark of agi­ta­tion; then, like a vol­cano burst­ing forth, his face would sud­den­ly change to an expres­sion of the wildest rage as he shrieked out impre­ca­tions on his persecutor. 

His tale is con­nect­ed and told with an appear­ance of the sim­plest truth, yet I own to you that the let­ters of Felix and Safie, which he showed me, and the appari­tion of the mon­ster seen from our ship, brought to me a greater con­vic­tion of the truth of his nar­ra­tive than his assev­er­a­tions, how­ev­er earnest and con­nect­ed. Such a mon­ster has, then, real­ly exis­tence! I can­not doubt it, yet I am lost in sur­prise and admi­ra­tion. Some­times I endeav­oured to gain from Franken­stein the par­tic­u­lars of his creature’s for­ma­tion, but on this point he was impenetrable. 

“Are you mad, my friend?” said he. “Or whith­er does your sense­less curios­i­ty lead you? Would you also cre­ate for your­self and the world a demo­ni­a­cal ene­my? Peace, peace! Learn my mis­eries and do not seek to increase your own.” 

Franken­stein dis­cov­ered that I made notes con­cern­ing his his­to­ry; he asked to see them and then him­self cor­rect­ed and aug­ment­ed them in many places, but prin­ci­pal­ly in giv­ing the life and spir­it to the con­ver­sa­tions he held with his ene­my. “Since you have pre­served my nar­ra­tion,” said he, “I would not that a muti­lat­ed one should go down to posterity.” 

Thus has a week passed away, while I have lis­tened to the strangest tale that ever imag­i­na­tion formed. My thoughts and every feel­ing of my soul have been drunk up by the inter­est for my guest which this tale and his own ele­vat­ed and gen­tle man­ners have cre­at­ed. I wish to soothe him, yet can I coun­sel one so infi­nite­ly mis­er­able, so des­ti­tute of every hope of con­so­la­tion, to live? Oh, no! The only joy that he can now know will be when he com­pos­es his shat­tered spir­it to peace and death. Yet he enjoys one com­fort, the off­spring of soli­tude and delir­i­um; he believes that when in dreams he holds con­verse with his friends and derives from that com­mu­nion con­so­la­tion for his mis­eries or excite­ments to his vengeance, that they are not the cre­ations of his fan­cy, but the beings them­selves who vis­it him from the regions of a remote world. This faith gives a solem­ni­ty to his rever­ies that ren­der them to me almost as impos­ing and inter­est­ing as truth. 

Our con­ver­sa­tions are not always con­fined to his own his­to­ry and mis­for­tunes. On every point of gen­er­al lit­er­a­ture he dis­plays unbound­ed knowl­edge and a quick and pierc­ing appre­hen­sion. His elo­quence is forcible and touch­ing; nor can I hear him, when he relates a pathet­ic inci­dent or endeav­ours to move the pas­sions of pity or love, with­out tears. What a glo­ri­ous crea­ture must he have been in the days of his pros­per­i­ty, when he is thus noble and god­like in ruin! He seems to feel his own worth and the great­ness of his fall. 

“When younger,” said he, “I believed myself des­tined for some great enter­prise. My feel­ings are pro­found, but I pos­sessed a cool­ness of judg­ment that fit­ted me for illus­tri­ous achieve­ments. This sen­ti­ment of the worth of my nature sup­port­ed me when oth­ers would have been oppressed, for I deemed it crim­i­nal to throw away in use­less grief those tal­ents that might be use­ful to my fel­low crea­tures. When I reflect­ed on the work I had com­plet­ed, no less a one than the cre­ation of a sen­si­tive and ratio­nal ani­mal, I could not rank myself with the herd of com­mon pro­jec­tors. But this thought, which sup­port­ed me in the com­mence­ment of my career, now serves only to plunge me low­er in the dust. All my spec­u­la­tions and hopes are as noth­ing, and like the archangel who aspired to omnipo­tence, I am chained in an eter­nal hell. My imag­i­na­tion was vivid, yet my pow­ers of analy­sis and appli­ca­tion were intense; by the union of these qual­i­ties I con­ceived the idea and exe­cut­ed the cre­ation of a man. Even now I can­not rec­ol­lect with­out pas­sion my rever­ies while the work was incom­plete. I trod heav­en in my thoughts, now exult­ing in my pow­ers, now burn­ing with the idea of their effects. From my infan­cy I was imbued with high hopes and a lofty ambi­tion; but how am I sunk! Oh! My friend, if you had known me as I once was, you would not recog­nise me in this state of degra­da­tion. Despon­den­cy rarely vis­it­ed my heart; a high des­tiny seemed to bear me on, until I fell, nev­er, nev­er again to rise.” 

Must I then lose this admirable being? I have longed for a friend; I have sought one who would sym­pa­thise with and love me. Behold, on these desert seas I have found such a one, but I fear I have gained him only to know his val­ue and lose him. I would rec­on­cile him to life, but he repuls­es the idea. 

“I thank you, Wal­ton,” he said, “for your kind inten­tions towards so mis­er­able a wretch; but when you speak of new ties and fresh affec­tions, think you that any can replace those who are gone? Can any man be to me as Cler­val was, or any woman anoth­er Eliz­a­beth? Even where the affec­tions are not strong­ly moved by any supe­ri­or excel­lence, the com­pan­ions of our child­hood always pos­sess a cer­tain pow­er over our minds which hard­ly any lat­er friend can obtain. They know our infan­tine dis­po­si­tions, which, how­ev­er they may be after­wards mod­i­fied, are nev­er erad­i­cat­ed; and they can judge of our actions with more cer­tain con­clu­sions as to the integri­ty of our motives. A sis­ter or a broth­er can nev­er, unless indeed such symp­toms have been shown ear­ly, sus­pect the oth­er of fraud or false deal­ing, when anoth­er friend, how­ev­er strong­ly he may be attached, may, in spite of him­self, be con­tem­plat­ed with sus­pi­cion. But I enjoyed friends, dear not only through habit and asso­ci­a­tion, but from their own mer­its; and wher­ev­er I am, the sooth­ing voice of my Eliz­a­beth and the con­ver­sa­tion of Cler­val will be ever whis­pered in my ear. They are dead, and but one feel­ing in such a soli­tude can per­suade me to pre­serve my life. If I were engaged in any high under­tak­ing or design, fraught with exten­sive util­i­ty to my fel­low crea­tures, then could I live to ful­fil it. But such is not my des­tiny; I must pur­sue and destroy the being to whom I gave exis­tence; then my lot on earth will be ful­filled and I may die.” 

My beloved Sister, 

Sep­tem­ber 2d. 

I write to you, encom­passed by per­il and igno­rant whether I am ever doomed to see again dear Eng­land and the dear­er friends that inhab­it it. I am sur­round­ed by moun­tains of ice which admit of no escape and threat­en every moment to crush my ves­sel. The brave fel­lows whom I have per­suad­ed to be my com­pan­ions look towards me for aid, but I have none to bestow. There is some­thing ter­ri­bly appalling in our sit­u­a­tion, yet my courage and hopes do not desert me. Yet it is ter­ri­ble to reflect that the lives of all these men are endan­gered through me. If we are lost, my mad schemes are the cause. 

And what, Mar­garet, will be the state of your mind? You will not hear of my destruc­tion, and you will anx­ious­ly await my return. Years will pass, and you will have vis­it­ings of despair and yet be tor­tured by hope. Oh! My beloved sis­ter, the sick­en­ing fail­ing of your heart-felt expec­ta­tions is, in prospect, more ter­ri­ble to me than my own death. But you have a hus­band and love­ly chil­dren; you may be hap­py. Heav­en bless you and make you so! 

My unfor­tu­nate guest regards me with the ten­der­est com­pas­sion. He endeav­ours to fill me with hope and talks as if life were a pos­ses­sion which he val­ued. He reminds me how often the same acci­dents have hap­pened to oth­er nav­i­ga­tors who have attempt­ed this sea, and in spite of myself, he fills me with cheer­ful auguries. Even the sailors feel the pow­er of his elo­quence; when he speaks, they no longer despair; he rous­es their ener­gies, and while they hear his voice they believe these vast moun­tains of ice are mole-hills which will van­ish before the res­o­lu­tions of man. These feel­ings are tran­si­to­ry; each day of expec­ta­tion delayed fills them with fear, and I almost dread a mutiny caused by this despair. 

Sep­tem­ber 5th. 

A scene has just passed of such uncom­mon inter­est that, although it is high­ly prob­a­ble that these papers may nev­er reach you, yet I can­not for­bear record­ing it. 

We are still sur­round­ed by moun­tains of ice, still in immi­nent dan­ger of being crushed in their con­flict. The cold is exces­sive, and many of my unfor­tu­nate com­rades have already found a grave amidst this scene of des­o­la­tion. Franken­stein has dai­ly declined in health; a fever­ish fire still glim­mers in his eyes, but he is exhaust­ed, and when sud­den­ly roused to any exer­tion, he speed­i­ly sinks again into appar­ent lifelessness. 

I men­tioned in my last let­ter the fears I enter­tained of a mutiny. This morn­ing, as I sat watch­ing the wan coun­te­nance of my friend—his eyes half closed and his limbs hang­ing listlessly—I was roused by half a dozen of the sailors, who demand­ed admis­sion into the cab­in. They entered, and their leader addressed me. He told me that he and his com­pan­ions had been cho­sen by the oth­er sailors to come in dep­u­ta­tion to me to make me a req­ui­si­tion which, in jus­tice, I could not refuse. We were immured in ice and should prob­a­bly nev­er escape, but they feared that if, as was pos­si­ble, the ice should dis­si­pate and a free pas­sage be opened, I should be rash enough to con­tin­ue my voy­age and lead them into fresh dan­gers, after they might hap­pi­ly have sur­mount­ed this. They insist­ed, there­fore, that I should engage with a solemn promise that if the ves­sel should be freed I would instant­ly direct my course southwards. 

This speech trou­bled me. I had not despaired, nor had I yet con­ceived the idea of return­ing if set free. Yet could I, in jus­tice, or even in pos­si­bil­i­ty, refuse this demand? I hes­i­tat­ed before I answered, when Franken­stein, who had at first been silent, and indeed appeared hard­ly to have force enough to attend, now roused him­self; his eyes sparkled, and his cheeks flushed with momen­tary vigour. Turn­ing towards the men, he said, 

“What do you mean? What do you demand of your cap­tain? Are you, then, so eas­i­ly turned from your design? Did you not call this a glo­ri­ous expe­di­tion? “And where­fore was it glo­ri­ous? Not because the way was smooth and placid as a south­ern sea, but because it was full of dan­gers and ter­ror, because at every new inci­dent your for­ti­tude was to be called forth and your courage exhib­it­ed, because dan­ger and death sur­round­ed it, and these you were to brave and over­come. For this was it a glo­ri­ous, for this was it an hon­ourable under­tak­ing. You were here­after to be hailed as the bene­fac­tors of your species, your names adored as belong­ing to brave men who encoun­tered death for hon­our and the ben­e­fit of mankind. And now, behold, with the first imag­i­na­tion of dan­ger, or, if you will, the first mighty and ter­rif­ic tri­al of your courage, you shrink away and are con­tent to be hand­ed down as men who had not strength enough to endure cold and per­il; and so, poor souls, they were chilly and returned to their warm fire­sides. Why, that requires not this prepa­ra­tion; ye need not have come thus far and dragged your cap­tain to the shame of a defeat mere­ly to prove your­selves cow­ards. Oh! Be men, or be more than men. Be steady to your pur­pos­es and firm as a rock. This ice is not made of such stuff as your hearts may be; it is muta­ble and can­not with­stand you if you say that it shall not. Do not return to your fam­i­lies with the stig­ma of dis­grace marked on your brows. Return as heroes who have fought and con­quered and who know not what it is to turn their backs on the foe.” 

He spoke this with a voice so mod­u­lat­ed to the dif­fer­ent feel­ings expressed in his speech, with an eye so full of lofty design and hero­ism, that can you won­der that these men were moved? They looked at one anoth­er and were unable to reply. I spoke; I told them to retire and con­sid­er of what had been said, that I would not lead them far­ther north if they stren­u­ous­ly desired the con­trary, but that I hoped that, with reflec­tion, their courage would return. 

They retired and I turned towards my friend, but he was sunk in lan­guor and almost deprived of life. 

How all this will ter­mi­nate, I know not, but I had rather die than return shame­ful­ly, my pur­pose unful­filled. Yet I fear such will be my fate; the men, unsup­port­ed by ideas of glo­ry and hon­our, can nev­er will­ing­ly con­tin­ue to endure their present hardships. 

Sep­tem­ber 7th. 

The die is cast; I have con­sent­ed to return if we are not destroyed. Thus are my hopes blast­ed by cow­ardice and inde­ci­sion; I come back igno­rant and dis­ap­point­ed. It requires more phi­los­o­phy than I pos­sess to bear this injus­tice with patience. 

Sep­tem­ber 12th. 

It is past; I am return­ing to Eng­land. I have lost my hopes of util­i­ty and glo­ry; I have lost my friend. But I will endeav­our to detail these bit­ter cir­cum­stances to you, my dear sis­ter; and while I am waft­ed towards Eng­land and towards you, I will not despond. 

Sep­tem­ber 9th, the ice began to move, and roar­ings like thun­der were heard at a dis­tance as the islands split and cracked in every direc­tion. We were in the most immi­nent per­il, but as we could only remain pas­sive, my chief atten­tion was occu­pied by my unfor­tu­nate guest whose ill­ness increased in such a degree that he was entire­ly con­fined to his bed. The ice cracked behind us and was dri­ven with force towards the north; a breeze sprang from the west, and on the 11th the pas­sage towards the south became per­fect­ly free. When the sailors saw this and that their return to their native coun­try was appar­ent­ly assured, a shout of tumul­tuous joy broke from them, loud and long-con­tin­ued. Franken­stein, who was doz­ing, awoke and asked the cause of the tumult. “They shout,” I said, “because they will soon return to England.” 

“Do you, then, real­ly return?” 

“Alas! Yes; I can­not with­stand their demands. I can­not lead them unwill­ing­ly to dan­ger, and I must return.” 

“Do so, if you will; but I will not. You may give up your pur­pose, but mine is assigned to me by Heav­en, and I dare not. I am weak, but sure­ly the spir­its who assist my vengeance will endow me with suf­fi­cient strength.” Say­ing this, he endeav­oured to spring from the bed, but the exer­tion was too great for him; he fell back and fainted. 

It was long before he was restored, and I often thought that life was entire­ly extinct. At length he opened his eyes; he breathed with dif­fi­cul­ty and was unable to speak. The sur­geon gave him a com­pos­ing draught and ordered us to leave him undis­turbed. In the mean­time he told me that my friend had cer­tain­ly not many hours to live. 

His sen­tence was pro­nounced, and I could only grieve and be patient. I sat by his bed, watch­ing him; his eyes were closed, and I thought he slept; but present­ly he called to me in a fee­ble voice, and bid­ding me come near, said, “Alas! The strength I relied on is gone; I feel that I shall soon die, and he, my ene­my and per­se­cu­tor, may still be in being. Think not, Wal­ton, that in the last moments of my exis­tence I feel that burn­ing hatred and ardent desire of revenge I once expressed; but I feel myself jus­ti­fied in desir­ing the death of my adver­sary. Dur­ing these last days I have been occu­pied in exam­in­ing my past con­duct; nor do I find it blam­able. In a fit of enthu­si­as­tic mad­ness I cre­at­ed a ratio­nal crea­ture and was bound towards him to assure, as far as was in my pow­er, his hap­pi­ness and well-being. This was my duty, but there was anoth­er still para­mount to that. My duties towards the beings of my own species had greater claims to my atten­tion because they includ­ed a greater pro­por­tion of hap­pi­ness or mis­ery. Urged by this view, I refused, and I did right in refus­ing, to cre­ate a com­pan­ion for the first crea­ture. He showed unpar­al­leled malig­ni­ty and self­ish­ness in evil; he destroyed my friends; he devot­ed to destruc­tion beings who pos­sessed exquis­ite sen­sa­tions, hap­pi­ness, and wis­dom; nor do I know where this thirst for vengeance may end. Mis­er­able him­self that he may ren­der no oth­er wretched, he ought to die. The task of his destruc­tion was mine, but I have failed. When actu­at­ed by self­ish and vicious motives, I asked you to under­take my unfin­ished work, and I renew this request now, when I am only induced by rea­son and virtue. 

“Yet I can­not ask you to renounce your coun­try and friends to ful­fil this task; and now that you are return­ing to Eng­land, you will have lit­tle chance of meet­ing with him. But the con­sid­er­a­tion of these points, and the well bal­anc­ing of what you may esteem your duties, I leave to you; my judg­ment and ideas are already dis­turbed by the near approach of death. I dare not ask you to do what I think right, for I may still be mis­led by passion. 

“That he should live to be an instru­ment of mis­chief dis­turbs me; in oth­er respects, this hour, when I momen­tar­i­ly expect my release, is the only hap­py one which I have enjoyed for sev­er­al years. The forms of the beloved dead flit before me, and I has­ten to their arms. Farewell, Wal­ton! Seek hap­pi­ness in tran­quil­li­ty and avoid ambi­tion, even if it be only the appar­ent­ly inno­cent one of dis­tin­guish­ing your­self in sci­ence and dis­cov­er­ies. Yet why do I say this? I have myself been blast­ed in these hopes, yet anoth­er may succeed.” 

His voice became fainter as he spoke, and at length, exhaust­ed by his effort, he sank into silence. About half an hour after­wards he attempt­ed again to speak but was unable; he pressed my hand fee­bly, and his eyes closed for ever, while the irra­di­a­tion of a gen­tle smile passed away from his lips. 

Mar­garet, what com­ment can I make on the untime­ly extinc­tion of this glo­ri­ous spir­it? What can I say that will enable you to under­stand the depth of my sor­row? All that I should express would be inad­e­quate and fee­ble. My tears flow; my mind is over­shad­owed by a cloud of dis­ap­point­ment. But I jour­ney towards Eng­land, and I may there find consolation. 

I am inter­rupt­ed. What do these sounds por­tend? It is mid­night; the breeze blows fair­ly, and the watch on deck scarce­ly stir. Again there is a sound as of a human voice, but hoars­er; it comes from the cab­in where the remains of Franken­stein still lie. I must arise and exam­ine. Good night, my sister. 

Great God! what a scene has just tak­en place! I am yet dizzy with the remem­brance of it. I hard­ly know whether I shall have the pow­er to detail it; yet the tale which I have record­ed would be incom­plete with­out this final and won­der­ful catastrophe. 

I entered the cab­in where lay the remains of my ill-fat­ed and admirable friend. Over him hung a form which I can­not find words to describe—gigantic in stature, yet uncouth and dis­tort­ed in its pro­por­tions. As he hung over the cof­fin, his face was con­cealed by long locks of ragged hair; but one vast hand was extend­ed, in colour and appar­ent tex­ture like that of a mum­my. When he heard the sound of my approach, he ceased to utter excla­ma­tions of grief and hor­ror and sprung towards the win­dow. Nev­er did I behold a vision so hor­ri­ble as his face, of such loath­some yet appalling hideous­ness. I shut my eyes invol­un­tar­i­ly and endeav­oured to rec­ol­lect what were my duties with regard to this destroy­er. I called on him to stay. 

He paused, look­ing on me with won­der, and again turn­ing towards the life­less form of his cre­ator, he seemed to for­get my pres­ence, and every fea­ture and ges­ture seemed insti­gat­ed by the wildest rage of some uncon­trol­lable passion. 

“That is also my vic­tim!” he exclaimed. “In his mur­der my crimes are con­sum­mat­ed; the mis­er­able series of my being is wound to its close! Oh, Franken­stein! Gen­er­ous and self-devot­ed being! What does it avail that I now ask thee to par­don me? I, who irre­triev­ably destroyed thee by destroy­ing all thou lovedst. Alas! He is cold, he can­not answer me.” 

His voice seemed suf­fo­cat­ed, and my first impuls­es, which had sug­gest­ed to me the duty of obey­ing the dying request of my friend in destroy­ing his ene­my, were now sus­pend­ed by a mix­ture of curios­i­ty and com­pas­sion. I approached this tremen­dous being; I dared not again raise my eyes to his face, there was some­thing so scar­ing and unearth­ly in his ugli­ness. I attempt­ed to speak, but the words died away on my lips. The mon­ster con­tin­ued to utter wild and inco­her­ent self-reproach­es. At length I gath­ered res­o­lu­tion to address him in a pause of the tem­pest of his passion. 

“Your repen­tance,” I said, “is now super­flu­ous. If you had lis­tened to the voice of con­science and heed­ed the stings of remorse before you had urged your dia­bol­i­cal vengeance to this extrem­i­ty, Franken­stein would yet have lived.” 

“And do you dream?” said the dæmon. “Do you think that I was then dead to agony and remorse? He,” he con­tin­ued, point­ing to the corpse, “he suf­fered not in the con­sum­ma­tion of the deed. Oh! Not the ten-thou­sandth por­tion of the anguish that was mine dur­ing the lin­ger­ing detail of its exe­cu­tion. A fright­ful self­ish­ness hur­ried me on, while my heart was poi­soned with remorse. Think you that the groans of Cler­val were music to my ears? My heart was fash­ioned to be sus­cep­ti­ble of love and sym­pa­thy, and when wrenched by mis­ery to vice and hatred, it did not endure the vio­lence of the change with­out tor­ture such as you can­not even imagine. 

“After the mur­der of Cler­val I returned to Switzer­land, heart-bro­ken and over­come. I pitied Franken­stein; my pity amount­ed to hor­ror; I abhorred myself. But when I dis­cov­ered that he, the author at once of my exis­tence and of its unspeak­able tor­ments, dared to hope for hap­pi­ness, that while he accu­mu­lat­ed wretched­ness and despair upon me he sought his own enjoy­ment in feel­ings and pas­sions from the indul­gence of which I was for ever barred, then impo­tent envy and bit­ter indig­na­tion filled me with an insa­tiable thirst for vengeance. I rec­ol­lect­ed my threat and resolved that it should be accom­plished. I knew that I was prepar­ing for myself a dead­ly tor­ture, but I was the slave, not the mas­ter, of an impulse which I detest­ed yet could not dis­obey. Yet when she died! Nay, then I was not mis­er­able. I had cast off all feel­ing, sub­dued all anguish, to riot in the excess of my despair. Evil thence­forth became my good. Urged thus far, I had no choice but to adapt my nature to an ele­ment which I had will­ing­ly cho­sen. The com­ple­tion of my demo­ni­a­cal design became an insa­tiable pas­sion. And now it is end­ed; there is my last victim!” 

I was at first touched by the expres­sions of his mis­ery; yet, when I called to mind what Franken­stein had said of his pow­ers of elo­quence and per­sua­sion, and when I again cast my eyes on the life­less form of my friend, indig­na­tion was rekin­dled with­in me. “Wretch!” I said. “It is well that you come here to whine over the des­o­la­tion that you have made. You throw a torch into a pile of build­ings, and when they are con­sumed, you sit among the ruins and lament the fall. Hyp­o­crit­i­cal fiend! If he whom you mourn still lived, still would he be the object, again would he become the prey, of your accursed vengeance. It is not pity that you feel; you lament only because the vic­tim of your malig­ni­ty is with­drawn from your power.” 

“Oh, it is not thus—not thus,” inter­rupt­ed the being. “Yet such must be the impres­sion con­veyed to you by what appears to be the pur­port of my actions. Yet I seek not a fel­low feel­ing in my mis­ery. No sym­pa­thy may I ever find. When I first sought it, it was the love of virtue, the feel­ings of hap­pi­ness and affec­tion with which my whole being over­flowed, that I wished to be par­tic­i­pat­ed. But now that virtue has become to me a shad­ow, and that hap­pi­ness and affec­tion are turned into bit­ter and loathing despair, in what should I seek for sym­pa­thy? I am con­tent to suf­fer alone while my suf­fer­ings shall endure; when I die, I am well sat­is­fied that abhor­rence and oppro­bri­um should load my mem­o­ry. Once my fan­cy was soothed with dreams of virtue, of fame, and of enjoy­ment. Once I false­ly hoped to meet with beings who, par­don­ing my out­ward form, would love me for the excel­lent qual­i­ties which I was capa­ble of unfold­ing. I was nour­ished with high thoughts of hon­our and devo­tion. But now crime has degrad­ed me beneath the mean­est ani­mal. No guilt, no mis­chief, no malig­ni­ty, no mis­ery, can be found com­pa­ra­ble to mine. When I run over the fright­ful cat­a­logue of my sins, I can­not believe that I am the same crea­ture whose thoughts were once filled with sub­lime and tran­scen­dent visions of the beau­ty and the majesty of good­ness. But it is even so; the fall­en angel becomes a malig­nant dev­il. Yet even that ene­my of God and man had friends and asso­ciates in his des­o­la­tion; I am alone. 

“You, who call Franken­stein your friend, seem to have a knowl­edge of my crimes and his mis­for­tunes. But in the detail which he gave you of them he could not sum up the hours and months of mis­ery which I endured wast­ing in impo­tent pas­sions. For while I destroyed his hopes, I did not sat­is­fy my own desires. They were for ever ardent and crav­ing; still I desired love and fel­low­ship, and I was still spurned. Was there no injus­tice in this? Am I to be thought the only crim­i­nal, when all humankind sinned against me? Why do you not hate Felix, who drove his friend from his door with con­tu­me­ly? Why do you not exe­crate the rus­tic who sought to destroy the sav­iour of his child? Nay, these are vir­tu­ous and immac­u­late beings! I, the mis­er­able and the aban­doned, am an abor­tion, to be spurned at, and kicked, and tram­pled on. Even now my blood boils at the rec­ol­lec­tion of this injustice. 

“But it is true that I am a wretch. I have mur­dered the love­ly and the help­less; I have stran­gled the inno­cent as they slept and grasped to death his throat who nev­er injured me or any oth­er liv­ing thing. I have devot­ed my cre­ator, the select spec­i­men of all that is wor­thy of love and admi­ra­tion among men, to mis­ery; I have pur­sued him even to that irre­me­di­a­ble ruin. There he lies, white and cold in death. You hate me, but your abhor­rence can­not equal that with which I regard myself. I look on the hands which exe­cut­ed the deed; I think on the heart in which the imag­i­na­tion of it was con­ceived and long for the moment when these hands will meet my eyes, when that imag­i­na­tion will haunt my thoughts no more. 

“Fear not that I shall be the instru­ment of future mis­chief. My work is near­ly com­plete. Nei­ther yours nor any man’s death is need­ed to con­sum­mate the series of my being and accom­plish that which must be done, but it requires my own. Do not think that I shall be slow to per­form this sac­ri­fice. I shall quit your ves­sel on the ice raft which brought me thith­er and shall seek the most north­ern extrem­i­ty of the globe; I shall col­lect my funer­al pile and con­sume to ash­es this mis­er­able frame, that its remains may afford no light to any curi­ous and unhal­lowed wretch who would cre­ate such anoth­er as I have been. I shall die. I shall no longer feel the ago­nies which now con­sume me or be the prey of feel­ings unsat­is­fied, yet unquenched. He is dead who called me into being; and when I shall be no more, the very remem­brance of us both will speed­i­ly van­ish. I shall no longer see the sun or stars or feel the winds play on my cheeks. Light, feel­ing, and sense will pass away; and in this con­di­tion must I find my hap­pi­ness. Some years ago, when the images which this world affords first opened upon me, when I felt the cheer­ing warmth of sum­mer and heard the rustling of the leaves and the war­bling of the birds, and these were all to me, I should have wept to die; now it is my only con­so­la­tion. Pol­lut­ed by crimes and torn by the bit­ter­est remorse, where can I find rest but in death? 

“Farewell! I leave you, and in you the last of humankind whom these eyes will ever behold. Farewell, Franken­stein! If thou wert yet alive and yet cher­ished a desire of revenge against me, it would be bet­ter sati­at­ed in my life than in my destruc­tion. But it was not so; thou didst seek my extinc­tion, that I might not cause greater wretched­ness; and if yet, in some mode unknown to me, thou hadst not ceased to think and feel, thou wouldst not desire against me a vengeance greater than that which I feel. Blast­ed as thou wert, my agony was still supe­ri­or to thine, for the bit­ter sting of remorse will not cease to ran­kle in my wounds until death shall close them for ever. 

“But soon,” he cried with sad and solemn enthu­si­asm, “I shall die, and what I now feel be no longer felt. Soon these burn­ing mis­eries will be extinct. I shall ascend my funer­al pile tri­umphant­ly and exult in the agony of the tor­tur­ing flames. The light of that con­fla­gra­tion will fade away; my ash­es will be swept into the sea by the winds. My spir­it will sleep in peace, or if it thinks, it will not sure­ly think thus. Farewell.” 

He sprang from the cab­in-win­dow as he said this, upon the ice raft which lay close to the ves­sel. He was soon borne away by the waves and lost in dark­ness and distance.