Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the tenth chapter of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.

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Video welcome to Bite at a Time Books, where we read you your favorite classics one byte at a time.

My name is Brie Carlyle and I love to read and wanted to share my passion with listeners like you.

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Be continuing Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.

Chapter Ten I spent the following day roaming through the valley.

I stood beside the sources of the arviron which take their rise in a glacier, that with slow pace as advancing down from the summit of the hills to barricade the valley.

The abrupt sides of vast mountains were before me.

The icy wall of the glacier overhung me.

A few shattered pines were scattered around.

And the solemn silence of this glorious presence chamber of imperial nature was broken only by the brawling waves.

Or the fall of some vast fragment.

The thunder sound of the avalanche.

Or the cracking reverberated along the mountains of the accumulated ice.

Which.

Through the silent working of immutable laws.

Was ever and a non rent and torn as if it had been but a placing in their hands.

These sublime and magnificent scenes afforded me the greatest consolation that I was capable of receiving.

They elevated me from all littleness of feeling, and although they did not remove my grief, they subdued and tranquilized it in some degree.

Also they diverted my mind from the thoughts over which it had brooded for the last month.

I retired to rest at night.

My slumbers, as it were, waited on.

And ministered to by the assemblance of grand shapes which I had contemplated.

During the day they congregated round me the unstained snowy mountaintop, the glittering pinnacle.

The pine woods and the ragged bear.

Ravine, the eagles soaring amidst the clouds, they all gathered round me and bade me be at peace.

Where had they fled?

When the next morning I awoke, all of soul and spiriting fled with sleep, and dark melancholy clouded every thought.

The rain was pouring in torrents, and.

Thick mists hid the summits of the.

Mountains, so that I even saw not the faces of those mighty friends.

Still I would penetrate their misty veil and seek them in their cloudy retrieves.

What were rain and storm to me?

My mule was brought to the door and I resolved to ascend to the summit of Montevert.

I remembered the effect that the view of the tremendous and ever moving glacier had produced upon my mind when I first saw it.

It had then filled me with a sublime ecstasy that gave wings to the soul and allowed it to soar from the obscure world to light and joy.

The sight of the awful and majestic in nature had indeed always the effect of solemnizing my mind and causing me to forget the passing cares of life.

I determined to go without a guide, for I was well acquainted with the path, and the presence of another would destroy the solitary grandeur of the scene.

The ascent is precipitous, but the path is cut into continual and short windings which enable you to surmount the perpendicularity of the mountain.

It is a scene terrifically desolate in a thousand spots.

The traces of the winter avalanche may be perceived where trees lie broken and strewed on the ground, some entirely destroyed, others bent, leaning upon the jutting rocks of the mountain, or transversely upon other trees.

The path, as you ascend higher, is intersected by ravines of snow down which stones continually roll from above.

One of them is particularly dangerous, as the slightest sound, such as even speaking in a loud voice, produces a concussion of air sufficient to draw destruction upon the head of the speaker.

The pines are not tall or luxuriant, but they are somber and add an air of severity to the scene.

I looked on the valley beneath.

Vast mists were rising from the rivers which ran through it and curling in thick reefs around the opposite mountains, whose summits were hid in the uniform clouds, while rain poured from the dark sky and added to the melancholy impression I received from the objects around me.

Alas.

Why does man boast of sensibility superior to those apparent in the brute?

It only renders them more necessary beings.

If our impulses were confined to hunger, thirst and desire, we might be nearly free.

But now we are moved by every wind that blows and a chance word or seen that that word may convey to us, we rest.

A dream has power to poison sleep.

We rise when wandering thought pollutes the day.

We feel conceive or reason, laugh or weep, embrace fond, woe or cast our cares away.

It is the same, for, be it joy or sorrow, the path of its departure still is free.

Mans yesterday may narrow be like his morrow, not may endure, but mutability.

It was nearly noon when I arrived at the top of the ascent.

For some time I sat upon the rock that overlooks the Sea of Ice.

A mist covered both that and the surrounding mountains.

Presently a breeze dissipated the cloud, and I descended upon the glacier.

The surface is very uneven, rising like the waves of a troubled sea, descending low and interspersed by riffs that sink deep.

The field of ice is almost a league in width, but I spent nearly.

2 hours in crossing it.

Opposite mountain is a bare, perpendicular rock.

From the side where I now stood.

Monte Vert was exactly opposite, at the.

Distance of a league, and above it rosemont blank an awful majesty.

I remained in a recess of the rock, gazing on this wonderful and stupendous scene.

The sea, or rather the vast river of ice, wound among its dependent mountains, whose aerial summits hung over its recesses.

Their icy and glittering peaks shone in the sunlight over the clouds.

My heart, which was before sorrowful, now swelled with something like joy.

I exclaimed, wandering spirits, if indeed ye.

Wander and do not rest in your narrow beds, allow me this faint happiness, or take me as your companion, away.

From the joys of life.

As I said this, I suddenly beheld the figure of a man at some distance.

Advancing towards me with superhuman speed, he bounded over the crevices in the ice among which I had walked with caution.

His stature also, as he approached, seemed to exceed that of man.

I was troubled.

A mist came over my eyes, and.

I felt a faintness seized me.

But I was quickly restored by the cold gale of the mountains.

I perceived, as the shape came nearer sight, tremendous and abhorred, that it was the wretch whom I had created.

I trembled with rage and horror, resolving to wait his approach and then close with him in mortal kombat, he approached his countenance bespoke bitter anguish combined with disdain and malignity, while its unearthly ugliness rendered it almost too horrible for human eyes.

But I scarcely observed this rage and hatred, had it first deprived me of utterance, and I recovered only to overwhelm him with words expressive of furious dedestation and contempt.

Devil.

I exclaimed, do you dare approach me?

And do not you fear the fierce.

Vengeance of my arm wreaked on your miserable head?

Be gone, vile insect.

Or rather stay, that I may trample you to dust.

And, oh, that I could with the extinction of your miserable existence, restore those victims whom you have so diabolically murdered.

I expected this reception, said the demon.

All men hate the wretched.

How, then must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things?

Yet you, my creator, detest and spurn me, thy creature, to whom thou art bound by ties, only dissolable by the.

Annihilation of one of us.

You purpose to kill me.

How dare you sport thus with life?

Do your duty towards me, and I.

Will do mine towards you and the rest of mankind.

If you will comply with my conditions, I will leave them and you at peace.

But if you refuse, I will glut the maw of death until it be satiated with the blood of your remaining friends.

Abhorred monster.

Fiend that thou art.

The tortures of h*** are too mild of vengeance for thy crimes.

Wretched devil.

You approach me with your creation.

Come on, then I may extinguish the spark which I so negligently bestowed.

My rage was without bounds.

I sprang on him, impelled by all.

The feelings which can arm one being.

Against the existence of another.

He easily eluded me and said, be calm.

I entreat you to hear me before you give vent to your hatred on my devoted head.

Have I not suffered enough that you seek to increase my misery?

Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it.

Remember, thou hast made me more powerful than thyself.

My high is superior to thine, my joints more supple.

But I will not be tempted to set myself in opposition to thee.

I am thy creature, and I will be even mild and docile to my natural lord and king, if thou wilt also perform thy part, the witch thou owest me, o Frankenstein, be not equitable to every other and tremble upon me alone, to whom thy justice and even thy clemency and affection is most due.

Remember that I am thy creature.

I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel whom thou driveest from joy for no misdeed.

Everywhere I see bliss from which I alone am irrevocably excluded.

I was benevolent, and good misery made me a fiend.

Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous.

Be gone.

I will not hear you.

There can be no community between you and me.

We are enemies.

Be gone, or let us try our strength in a fight in which one must fall.

How can I move thee?

Will no entreaties cause thee to turn a favorable eye upon thy creature who implores thy goodness and compassion?

Believe me, Frankenstein, I was benevolent.

My soul glowed with love and humanity.

But am I not alone?

Miserably alone?

You, my creator, abhor me.

What hope can I gather from your fellow creatures who owe me nothing?

They spurn and hate me.

The desert mountains and dreary glaciers are my refuge.

I've wandered here many days.

The caves of ice, which I only do not fear, are a dwelling to me, and the only one which man does not grudge.

These bleak skies I hail for they are kinder to me than your fellow beings.

If the multitude of mankind knew of my existence, they would do as you do and arm themselves for my destruction.

Shall I not then hate them who abhor me.

I will keep no terms with my enemies.

I am miserable and they shall share my wretchedness.

Yet it is in your power to recompense me and deliver them from an evil which it only remains for you to make so great that not only you and your family, but thousands of others shall be swallowed up in the whirlwinds of its rage.

Let your compassion be moved and do not disdain me.

Listen to my tale.

When you have heard that.

Abandon or commiserate me as you shall judge that I deserve.

But hear me.

The guilty are allowed by human laws, bloody as they are, to speak in their own defense before they are condemned.

Listen to me, Frankenstein.

You accuse me of murder and yet you would with a satisfied conscience destroy your own creature.

Oh, praise the eternal justice of man.

Yet I ask you not to spare me.

Listen to me.

And then, if you can and if you will, destroy the work of your hands.

Why do you call to my remembrance?

I rejoined circumstances of which I shudder to reflect that I have been the.

Miserable origin and author.

Cursed be the day a poured devil in which you first saw light.

Cursed.

Although I cursed myself.

Be the hands that formed you.

You have made me wretched beyond expression.

You have left me no power to consider whether I am just to you or not.

Be gone.

Relieve me from the side of your detested form.

Thus I relieve thee, my creator, he.

Said, and placed his hated hands before my eyes which I flung from me with violence.

Thus I take from thee, sight which you abhor.

Still thou canst to listen to me and grant me thy compassion by the virtues that I once possessed.

I demand this from you.

Hear my tale.

It is long and strange and the temperature of this place is not fitting to your fine sensations.

Come to the hut upon the mountain.

The sun is yet high in the heavens.

Before it descends to hide itself behind your snowy precipices and illuminate another world.

You will have heard my story and can decide on you it rests whether I quit forever the neighborhood of man and lead a harmless life, or become the scourge of your fellow creatures and the author of your own speedy ruin.

As he said this, he led the way across the ice.

I followed.

My heart was full and I did not answer him, but I proceeded.

I weighed the various arguments that he.

Had used and determined at least to.

Listen to his tale.

I was partly urged by curiosity and compassion, confirmed my resolution.

I had hitherto supposed him to be.

The murder of my brother, and I eagerly sought a confirmation or denial of this opinion.

For the first time, also, I felt what the duties of a creator towards his creature were and that I ought to render him happy before I complained of his wickedness.

These motives urged me to comply with his demand.

We crossed the ice, therefore, and ascended the opposite rock.

The air was cold, and the rain.

Again began to descend.

We entered the hut, the fiend with an air of exultation I with a heavy heart and depressed spirits, but I consented to listen.

And seating myself by the fire which.

My odious companion had lighted, he thus began his tale.

Thank you for joining Bite atotime Books today while we read a bite of.

One of your favorite classics.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of Frankenstein.

Don't forget to tag us on your social media posts at Bite at a.

Time Books, and we hope to be.

Able to feature you in this Saturday segment.

Check out the show notes or our website, Bite at a Time Books, for the links for our show.

Take a look and let's see what we can find, chapter by chapter, one by take your word forward line by line, one.