"Arthur H. Landis - Camelot 01 - A World Called Camelot" - читать интересную книгу автора (Landis Arthur H)

A WORLD CALLED CAMELOT

COPYRIGHT ┬й, 1976, BY ARTHUR H. LANDIS All Rights Reserved.

e-book ver. 1.0
An earlier and somewhat different version of this novel was published as a serial under the title Let There Be
Magick with the by-line of "James R. Keaveny," and is copyright, 1969, by Camelot Publishing Company.

"There are two fundamental principles of magic. The first is that like produces like and effect resembles cause. The
second is that things that have once been in contact ever afterward act on each other. Number One is the law of
similarity, Number Two is the law of contagion. Practices based upon the law of similarity may be termed Homeopathic
magic: those on the law of contagion, Contagious magic."* Both derive, in the final analysis, from a false conception
of natural law. The primitive magician, however, never examines the assumptions upon which his performance is
basedтАФnever reflects upon the abstract principles involved. With him, as with the vast majority of sentient life, logic
is implicit, not explicit; he knows magic only as a practical thing. And to him it is always an art, never a science. The
very idea of science is quite alien to his thinking.

*Sir James Frazer, The New Golden Bough (Anno: circa 2000) Introduction, p. 35.

The road was a simple, well-traveled cart path, undulating gracefully through the forested hills and deep
valleys that led to the distant river. Birds sang in the afternoon sunlight, their voices blending with the
sound of bees and insects, completing a picture of summer quietude in a countryside that seemed both
wild and virgin.

It was something like Vermont-land, I mused, thinking of Earth and the Foundation Center. Or better yet,
England-Isle. They were both like this. I shifted my weight from one heel to the other while I crouched
lower on the flat rock of the promontory that overlooked the road some hundred yards below. Yes, they
were like this: England-Isle naturally so, and Vermont-land deliberately, artificially. In fact, I recalled,
there were great keeps and castles of runic and eld taste all over Vermont-land today, and they were
owned by the most obviously "opportuned" people. I sighed inwardly.

But, hey! Wouldn't those same yokels be purple with envy at the wondrous rockpile which I estimated to
be but a short twenty miles distant? My eyelids focused purple contact lenses to six magnitudes while I
admired the crenelated ramparts, great turrets dour aeries, and brave pennons fluttering against a
background of mountain crag and heavy, blue-black forest. Then I took a deep breath and returned
regretfully to the cleft in the hill through which the road came.

Just as the sun was sinking on the far horizon of late afternoon, so clouds were beginning to appear now,
especially in the direction of the forested hills and the castle.

Anyone looking in my direction from the road below would see a somewhat tall, rangy-looking Earth
male (disguised), sporting a heavily tanned face and an air of smug complaisance. I was dressedтАФfrom
the point of view of my adopted milieuтАФloudly and romantically. I wore green ski pants tucked into soft
leather boots with golden spurs to show that I was a full heggleтАФor knight; a heavy green shirt opened
to the waist in the purported style of the country, and a green jacket and green cap with a contrasting
bright red feather. Over my left shoulder and around my waist, respectively, was a six-foot bow with a
quiver of arrows, a broadsword, a dagger, and a leather pouch. It had been suggested aboard the
Deneb-3 a few short hours ago that I could easily be from the mythical Sherwood Forest, or from
fabulous Gabtsville on Procyon-4. Kriloy and Ragan, the Adjusters, and Foundation crewmates of the
starship Deneb-3, had most enviously concurred. But just as the forest ensemble that elicited envy was