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<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Fiction: Non-fiction: This issue was the last to have Farnsworth Wright listed as editor. During his time at Weird Tales<\/em>, according to SFE, \u2018more than anyone else, [he] helped establish the reputations of Robert E. Howard, H. P. Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith, and (rather daringly) used the work of Margaret Brundage.\u2019 1<\/sup> After being at the helm for 177 issues he left from what sounds like a mixture of economic reasons and health problems2<\/sup>\u2014for most of the time he was at the magazine he had suffered badly from Parkinson\u2019s disease. By the middle of 1940 he was dead aged 51, a sad loss to the field.<\/p>\n The fiction in this issue starts with the first of three short stories, The Horror in the Glen<\/em><\/strong> by Clyde Irvine, which is about one\u00a0Scottish clan murdering another, except for one young boy who escapes:<\/p>\n For I am Malcolm Dhu Glas, who is known better just as plain Malcolm Douglas, and the name of me is the way it is said in the tongue we have, the Gaelic, and it means \u201cMalcolm of the Black Water,\u201d for it was beside the dark waters of Loch Dhu itself that I was taken into the country of Boadellen, Queen of the\u00a0Borderland and Ruler of the Underworld, and there held prisoner for seven years by the time of man, but only an hour by the sun-dial that is cut around the pillar in the Court of the Seven Circles. After surviving for some time in the wild he is taken to Queen Boadellen in the Borderland. There he witnesses his murdered kinfolk in purgatory, and he is tempted for seven years with the opportunity to live in luxury, while his kinfolk suffer. After resisting these temptations (spoiler) the Queen returns him to the glen where the murdering McGreggans live and he pretends to be a wealthy visiting Englishman. Just before they set upon him at a\u00a0feast he summons the Queen\u2019s spirits and murders them all.\u00a0There is no real plot complication here, and I\u2019m not sure what the motivation of the Queen of the Borderland is. That said it has some narrative drive if you don\u2019t think too much about what is going on. The Golden Spider<\/em><\/strong> by Seabury Quinn is the first and best of the two novelettes that follow. It\u00a0is an account of Fourchette and her husband, who\u00a0are serfs to the seigneur. One day men from the castle come to her cottage while she is alone and demand a drink of milk. When she protests that the goat is suckling the kid and there is none to spare, they kill the kid, then the goat, and finally rape Fourchette. Needless to say the first two actions are grimly described while the third is implied. The next part of Thomas P. Kelley\u2019s serial, A Million Years in the Future<\/em><\/strong>, is a\u00a0pulp potboiler for the first two thirds or so of this instalment. After escaping Jan and Abel find out the female captive in the spaceship is called Vonna. Then the alarm is raised so\u00a0they wake the pilot and force him to launch the ship, but it materialises they only have enough fuel to reach the forbidden Moon of Madness. \u201cI go, I go,\u201d she spoke hurriedly, for it was evident that in another minute the fast-mounting rage of the little men would hurl them upon her. \u201cI go to tell the Sisters your answer, but remember what happened ages ago when a chief of your tribe sought to defy us. Again we will send the black wolf to the inner world to summon his cloven-footed brethren. Again they will come from the volcano in the great number that will sweep all before them. And tomorrow at sundown I and my sisters will wing from the castle, and lead them\u00a0straight here to devour you all. <\/em> The Wolves of Worra start assembling during the day beside the inactive volcano in the distance, and they end up numbering five thousand or so. Just as Jan and the leader of the dwarves are resigning themselves to being killed Vonna suggests rousing the five hundred Black Raiders on the ship. Jan does this and the men follow him towards the fight and the battle commences. Just as they seem to be getting the upper hand a second wave of wolves appear. Jan is knocked unconscious. The only furniture consisted of the great, throne-like chair that faced me, all black-stone as was the thick pedestal that rose before it, on which glowed and sparkled a golden, crystal-like ball, the size of a man\u2019s head. <\/em> This starts an almost hallucinogenic section where the god Time telepathically communicates to Jan that he and Queen Tara existed before creation and after creating the universe she imprisoned him here so she could rule alone. Time then tells Jan to take his ring to Queen Tara\u2019s quarters and touch it to the Ball of Life she possesses. This will draw her and Time\u2019s Balls of Life together destroying the planet and the moons. The last two pieces of fiction are short stories. Bramwell\u2019s Guardian<\/em><\/strong> by August Derleth, is a rather too straightforward story about a man who finds a Druidic ring on Salisbury Plain. There seems to be a shadowy guardian following the ring, and the man\u00a0subsequently ignores advice to put it back where he found it…. The non-fiction is this issue includes a new \u2018It Happened to Me\u2019 true story column. The first, The Centurion\u2019s Prisoner<\/em><\/strong> by Lindsay Nisbet, is a short Roman piece and reads like an undeveloped story synopsis. Hannes Bok contributes the\u00a0cover and a few of the internal illustrations too. The latter were not as\u00a0good as I expected: a couple are\u00a0quite dark and it is hard to make out what is going on in them.5<\/sup> None of the other artwork grabbed me either. Quite an interesting issue.<\/p>\n Fiction: The Horror in the Glen \u2022 short story by Clyde Irvine \u2665\u2665 Train for Flushing \u2022 short story by Malcolm Jameson \u2665\u2665\u2665 The Song of the Slaves \u2022 short story by Manly Wade Wellman \u2665\u2665 The Golden Spider \u2022 novelette by Seabury Quinn \u2665\u2665\u2665 Slaves of the Gray Mold \u2022 novelette by Thorp McClusky […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weird-tales"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pcj7-ml","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1385"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1401,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385\/revisions\/1401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThe Horror in the Glen<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Clyde Irvine \u2665\u2665
\nTrain for Flushing<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Malcolm Jameson \u2665\u2665\u2665
\nThe Song of the Slaves<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Manly Wade Wellman \u2665\u2665
\nThe Golden Spider<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 novelette by Seabury Quinn \u2665\u2665\u2665
\nSlaves of the Gray Mold<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 novelette by Thorp McClusky
\nA Million Years in the Future<\/em><\/strong> (Part 2 of 4) \u2022 serial by Thomas P. Kelley \u2665\u2665
\nBramwell\u2019s Guardian<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by August Derleth \u2665
\nThe Specter of Virginia<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Clive Leonard \u2665<\/p>\n
\nCover<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 Hannes Bok
\nInterior artwork<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 Hannes Bok, Harry Ferman, Andrew Brosnatch, Margaret Brundage
\nThe Dweller<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 reprint poem by H. P. Lovecraft
\n\u201cBroken is the Golden Bowl\u201d<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 poetry artwork by Virgil Finlay
\nThe Centurion\u2019s Prisoner<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 essay by Lindsay Nisbet
\nThe Eyrie<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 reader\u2019s letters
\nComing Next Issue <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n
\nFirst you must know that I was born in Benallerton. I had the \u201csecond sight,\u201d for I was the seventh son of a seventh son and the height of me was six feet and the half of it, and I weighed one-third the meat on\u00a0a stallion\u2019s bones.<\/em> p.8<\/p>\n
\nThe Scottish details seem accurate, but \u2018Clyde Irvine\u2019 sounds like pseudonym created from a map of the Glasgow area: the writer\u2019s only other publications, according to ISFDB,3<\/sup> were a dozen or so tales in Jungle Stories<\/em>.
\nThe second short story is Train for Flushing<\/em><\/strong>, quite a good fantasy by Malcolm Jameson. This is an intriguing variant of the \u2018Flying Dutchman\u2019 myth that has an elderly man and woman trapped on a subway coach with an insane Dutchman. After the latter separates the coach from the rest of the train they travel all around the network and frequently pass through the other trains on the tracks.
\nAfter a decade of this the man, who is writing an account of what is happening to them, realises he is growing younger…. Later, they end up above ground and see troops mobilising for the Cuban War and then, later still, end up on a stagecoach and hear of Custer\u2019s death. This is presented partially in the form of a journal found by police and given to a psychiatric clinic.
\nNext is The Song of the Slaves<\/em><\/strong> by Manly Wade Wellman. This gets off to quite a good if grim start with its tale of Gender, a slave owner, who has hired a ship and men to go to Africa to capture his own slaves. On the way back to the ship the slaves sing about killing Gender, regardless of how much he attempts to beat them into silence. Once on board he leaves them shackled as a punishment, and they are subsequently pursued by a British naval vessel. If the slaves are still on board by the time the British catch up it will go very badly for Gender and the captain….
\nThe second part of the story is a bit too much by the numbers but there is quite a good final scene.<\/p>\n
\nFourchette subsequently makes a pact with the devil and the rest of the story details her and her husband\u2019s rise in the world. Until, that is, the seigneur\u2019s wife decides to settle a few scores by imprisoning her to make her confess to witchcraft. The ending wasn\u2019t what I was expecting, and although I thought it worked after a fashion I am not sure everyone will think the same.
\nUnfortunately, the second novelette, Slaves of the Gray Mold<\/em><\/strong> by Thorp McClusky,4<\/sup> is the poorest story in the issue. It is a potboiler about an alien mould that can take over humans and then hypnotically control others. After a number of standard pulp scenes, a police lieutenant spotting possible financial irregularities, a down-and-out winning big at the races, a marital engagement being broken off, etc., it slowly wends its way (spoiler) to an ending with sub-Lovecraftian aliens coming through a portal.<\/p>\n
\nWhen they land there they discover it seems to be made of ancient black rock. They hear drums coming towards them.\u2026 A certain amount of filler later they have fought off a flying serpent and discovered and befriended dwarf men who live in an extensive underground cave. They are told that a nearby altar is used by vampire woman who live in a\u00a0distant castle\u2014and who will be coming for one his people tonight.
\nAbout this point the story starts becoming a bit more interesting and strange. Having been in a sword and spaceship story our hero is now convincing a race of subterranean dwarves to fight the vampire women! When one of them arrives that night, Jan tells her to leave. There are some ill-natured exchanges before she realises it would be wise to depart:<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThen we will see if this man can save you!\u201d she cried. \u201cThen we will see if the defiance he now flaunts can protect the tribe of Shebak from the dripping maws and rending teeth of the cruel Wolves of Worra!\u201d<\/em>
\nAnd with a wild scream that ended in a high, terrible laugh, the Vampire-Woman leaped into the air, and flapped dismally away into the night.<\/em> p.96<\/p>\n
\nWhen Jan wakes he surmises he is in the castle of the vampire women. They return as night is ending and are about to kill him when dawn breaks. They quickly retreat to their tomb below. Jan frees himself, follows them down, and dispatches them.
\nThe dwarf leader has previously told Jan that the Vampire Woman were there to protect the Black Tower, which contains the great god Time and the secret that can destroy Tara, the Queen of the Raiders. Jan starts a perilous climb up the outside of the tower and, after nearly plummeting to his death, makes it to the room at the top:<\/p>\n
\nBut what had at once caught my eye was the huge, statue-like figure which sat so majestically upon that age-old throne\u2014a figure apparently carved from the black rock of the mighty seat itself, as also\u00a0seemed the flowing robes that adorned his massive seven-foot frame, and the two large hands that held a weighty scepter in his lap. The great beard of that aged monarch, whitened by the snow of centuries and reaching to an amazing length, had grown around and around the throne upon which he sat, lost in deep revery, and buried in dreams.<\/em> p.106<\/p>\n
\nAt this point, Tara senses their conversation and blocks any further communication. Jan escapes the tower by climbing down Time\u2019s long\u00a0beard in some weird kind of anti-Rapunzel scene.
\nIn conclusion, this part of the serial\u00a0starts out as\u00a0a not particularly good pulp potboiler before it\u00a0gets into some entertaining vampire silliness, finally climaxing with transcendent\u00a0last scenes. It also highlights the inadequacies of a star rating system given I didn\u2019t think this part\u00a0particularly good overall but found it occasionally fascinating. I\u2019ll be interested to see what the next instalment holds.<\/p>\n
\nThe Specter of Virginia<\/em><\/strong> by Clive Leonard tells of two military men called Graham who meet in the American War of Independence. One of them is a Scotsman paroled to a member of Washington\u2019s forces. The tale recounted by one to the other is about a haunted and bloody skean dhu that is a family heirloom. Not so much a story but a supernatural occurrence that is relatively undeveloped.<\/p>\n
\nThis issue\u2019s The Eyrie<\/em><\/strong> has letters by Ray Bradbury (praising Hannes Bok\u2019s work) and Robert A. Lowndes amongst others. There is talk about the Weird Tales<\/em> club and one letter about an LA meeting in particular (from a pseudonymous Forrest J. Ackerman), more comment about Seabury Quinn\u2019s work (praise for Uncanonized<\/em> this time), and comment about various other stories.<\/p>\n\n
\nI was also\u00a0told that E. Hoffman Price states in his\u00a0Book of the Dead<\/em>, \u2018he was dismissed because of physical disabilities\u2018. Nice.<\/li>\n![\"WT194003x600art1\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sfmagazines.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/WT194003x600art1.jpg?resize=400%2C600&ssl=1\")
\nBut this one is\u00a0better:
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