"Bridgeport?" said I, pointing.
"Camelot," said he.
My stranger had been showing signs of sleepiness. He caught
himself nodding, now, and smiled one of those pathetic, obsolete
smiles of his, and said:
"I find I can't go on; but come with me, I've got it all written
out, and you can read it if you like."
In his chamber, he said: "First, I kept a journal; then by and by,
after years, I took the journal and turned it into a book. How
long ago that was!"
He handed me his manuscript, and pointed out the place where
I should begin:
"Begin here--I've already told you what goes before." He was
steeped in drowsiness by this time. As I went out at his door
I heard him murmur sleepily: "Give you good den, fair sir."
I sat down by my fire and examined my treasure. The first part
of it--the great bulk of it--was parchment, and yellow with age.
I scanned a leaf particularly and saw that it was a palimpsest.
Under the old dim writing of the Yankee historian appeared traces
of a penmanship which was older and dimmer still--Latin words
and sentences: fragments from old monkish legends, evidently.
I turned to the place indicated by my stranger and began to read
--as follows:
THE TALE OF THE LOST LAND
CHAPTER I
CAMELOT
"Camelot--Camelot," said I to myself. "I don't seem to remember
hearing of it before.
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