"The Moon Bog"

 by H.P. Lovecraft  

originally published Weird Tales, June 1926

Denys Barry, a friend to our Unnamed Narrator, has made some scratch in Americay and returned to the Old Sod to rebuild his family's old castle, thus pleasing the locals by creating jobs and taking care of an eyesore.  But after awhile something scares `em off, and Denys has to bring in servants and workers from other parts.  He writes his old buddy UN and asks him to come visit, being as he's lonely out there in that not-so-crumbling-anymore Irish castle.

UN arrives to be told by the locals that the land has become accursed.  He finds on the property a bog, and an islet therein, where sits "a strange olden ruin" that "glistens spectrally".  

It seems Denys lost the workers when he decided to drain the bog, seeing it as nothing but wasted land.  But the locals believed a spirit lived in the ruin, and: "There were tales of dancing lights in the dark of the moon, and of chill winds when the night was warm; of wraiths in white hovering over the waters, and of an imagined city of stone deep down below the swampy surface. But foremost among the weird fancies, and alone in its absolute unanimity, was that of the curse awaiting him who should dare to touch or drain the vast reddish morass."

Denys laughed off their concerns, which isn't the sort of thing that will endear you to folks, let's face it. 

UN thinks it's all pretty silly, too.  Until he's awakened in the night by weird piping, and observes wispy, glowing figures dancing around the ruin in the moonlight, and a great glow coming from the ruin.  And the hired workers are joining in.

Not sure if it was a dream or what, UN is filled with dread the next day, increasing as he watches Denys prepare to drain the bog.  

That night he falls asleep and is awakened by a repeat of the previous night's supernatural partying, and something in their rites is bringing doom upon the nearby town.  UN does what anyone would do in such a situation - start praying to Graeco-Roman deities!! Next thing you know icy winds are howling in the windows, and he can hear Denys screaming.  He loses his shit and runs through the castle and outside and is eventually found wandering in the town.  

He recalls seeing, as he ran, that the formerly-devoid-of-life bog was now full of big frogs, "which piped shrilly and incessantly in tones strangely out of keeping with their size" (whatever that's supposed to mean).  A particularly big and ugly frog glances up, and UN follows its gaze to see what appears to be a shadowy figure, resembling Denys, writhing in terror or agony as it is drawn up towards the moon. "And now I shudder when I hear the frogs piping in swamps, or see the moon in lonely places."

This story is fun and long on atmosphere, but slight in content, and Lovecraft's worst stylistic excesses hurt it - I'm kind of a smart guy, but I had to re-read several lines to be clear what it was he was trying to say was going on.  Not to mention some pure silliness (yeah, I know when I'm scared shitless praying to Artemis is the first thing that comes to mind!).  Nonetheless, and story with big frogs as harbingers of doom, bogs, and moonlit faerie dances can't be all bad.