TSOU - The Tree on the Hill
vonj...@hotmail.com
(with Special Guest Star Daniel Harms)
"The Tree on the Hill"
Sources: _The Horror in the Museum_, Arkham; _The Loved Dead_, Carroll and
Graf.
Synopsis: The narrator is hiking through the hills when he comes upon a
curious tree standing on its own. He notices some odd effects, takes a few
pictures of it, and then falls asleep. In his dreams, he sees a strange
temple with a great darkness within. When he shows a friend his pictures,
the friend becomes agitated, pointing out a passage from the Chronicles of
Nath which tells of a great evil which overtook a prehistoric land. His
friend goes back to the tree and sends the thing back, but exhausts himself
and tells the narrator to destroy the evidence without looking at it. He
does so - save for one last sketch.
Comments: I wasn't too impressed with this piece. It might have been better
if Rimel had taken the time to flesh things out more. I found the role of
Constantine unnecessary and annoying; instead of having the narrator
investigate and find out things for himself, we have a subsidiary character
who knows exactly what he's doing, and confines the most crucial part of the
action off-screen. (HPL often does this successfully, but the reason behind
the exclusion does not seem to be to incite horror, but to keep us from it.)
Duane W. Rimel was a young correspondent of Lovecraft's who lived in
Washington. He wrote a few other pieces, including "Dreams from Yith" and
"Music of the Stars", which are of passable quality. According to Joshi,
Lovecraft's role in this story was probably limited to rewriting the last
section and the quote from the Chronicles of Nath. The piece was apparently
polished up later by Rimel (based on the date of 1938 given within) and
published in a magazine called Polaria (most likely a fan production) in 1940.
I attempted to find the tale's geographical location with mixed results. The
Salmon River is indeed a real river in west-central Idaho, and the mention of
the Nez Perce clinches the association. However, the towns of Hampden and
Croydon are nowhere to be found. Based on the statement that Hampden is
northwest of the river, and Joshi's assertion that Rimel was a Washingtonian,
I would tentatively place Hampden near Lewiston. Going even further out on
my limb, I might place Croydon at Spokane, the biggest town in the region and
one certainly capable of supporting a large university. This is sheer
speculation, however.
For Mythos fans, this story introduced the book The Chronicle of Nath by
Rudolf Yergler, which connects up with the rest of the Mythos through Rimel's
"The Music of the Stars". Aside from that, no references to it have appeared,
though Lumley's reference to "The Spheres of Nath" in "In the Vaults Beneath"
might be linked to this piece.
Once again, chat time to be announced by Steven Kaye. Next week's piece is
"The Battle that Ended the Century", a rare one you can find in _Miscellaneous
Writings_ and _Something about Cats_. If you don't have either of them, you
can go ahead and get started on "The Shadow out of Time". Happy Halloween
to one and all!
Yrs.,
Daniel Harms
http://members.tripod.com/~danharms/
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