“That is a known, though rarely obtained, effect of Cannabis indica ,” observed the doctor. “And it provoked laughter again, did it?”

“Only the muttering of the cupboard-bookcase made me laugh. It was so like a great animal trying to get itself noticed, and made me think of a performing bear⁠—which is full of a kind of pathetic humour, you know. But this mingling of the senses produced no confusion in my brain. On the contrary, I was unusually clearheaded and experienced an intensification of consciousness, and felt marvellously alive and keen-minded.

“Moreover, when I took up a pencil in obedience to an impulse to sketch⁠—a talent not normally mine⁠—I found that I could draw nothing but heads, nothing, in fact, but one head⁠—always the same⁠—the head of a dark-skinned woman, with huge and terrible features and a very drooping left eye; and so well drawn, too, that I was amazed, as you may imagine⁠—”

“And the expression of the face⁠—?”