"_They_ opened!--horribly they opened!--and that thing sprang,--sprang from the bed at me, and fastened upon me,--moaning, and gnawing, and rending! Oh! with what madness of terror did I strive against it! But the eyes of it, and the moans of it, and the touch of it, sickened; and all my being seemed about to burst asunder in frenzy of loathing, when--I knew not how--
I found in my hand an axe. And I struck with the axe;--I clove, I crushed, I brayed the Moaner,--until there lay before me only a shapeless, hideous, reeking mass,--the abominable ruin of Myself....
"--_Baku kuraë! Baku kuraë! Baku kuraë!_ Devour, O Baku! devour the dream!" "Nay!" made answer the Baku. "I never eat lucky dreams. That is a very lucky dream,--a most fortunate dream.... The axe--yes! the Axe of the Excellent Law, by which the monster of Self is utterly destroyed!... The best kind of a dream! My friend, _I_ believe in the teaching of the Buddha."
And the Baku went out of the window. I looked after him;--and I beheld him fleeing over the miles of moonlit roofs,--passing, from house-top to house-top, with amazing soundless leaps,--like a great cat....
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Kott?, by Lafcadio Hearn