rums of the Doomed

ome time ago Baron Von Lodge was the head of a small country near Switzerland known as Lilliland.

One of the Lilliland cemeteries that no one wanted their loved ones to be buried in had a frightening reputation and people would refer to strange noises coming from inside the cemetery as being the drums of the doomed. Periodically, around midnight, people would hear the strange drumming sounds.

Finally, the Baron and Professor Hamblin, his chief advisor, decided to have an expert come in and investigate the strange noises. The drum sounds were making the people afraid of the cemetery and the Baron wanted to alleviate their fears.

The expert investigated the names and situations of all the people buried in the cemetery. There was nothing out of the ordinary about the people buried there except for one group of six mountain climbers that froze to death atop one of the Alpine Mountains. But it was listed as merely an ordinary mountain climbing incident without mentioning anything sinister or evil.

The expert looked around the ground that the cemetery was built over. He did find a glacier fault under the grounds of the cemetery, not exactly under it, but very close. The glacier fault could be responsible for the sound of the drums. It could be caused by the fault moving a bit from time to time.

The expert called in a colleague on glacier fault movement. It did not take him long to discover that the sound of the drums of the doomed was in reality the sound of Mother Nature rubbing two masses of earth together.

The two experts were asked by the Baron and the Professor to meet with the leaders of Lilliland to explain the origin of the drum sounds. The explanation appeared to satisfy the people who were then no longer afraid of the strange sounds.

The Professor concluded that many of the strange sounds in nature can be investigated carefully and explained as a natural phenomenon. Attributing the sounds to evil spirits was quickly forgotten after the truth was known.

After all, at one time the sound of thunder and lightening were attributed to the gods not liking what people were doing. That notion has long since been put to rest along with some other natural phenomenon.