He trembled with his head hung low.

with little sleep and much reading his brains got so dry that he lost his wits.

Maybe all the strings inside him broke.

Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.

At night, when he lay down to sleep, he felt that his brain was resonating with the heartbeat of the planet.

As he caught his footing, his head fell back, and the Milky Way flowed down inside him with a roar.

Sound as a burrow'd marmot he slept
On the straw where he'd tumbled fully-dressed that night.

And thus, from too little sleep and too much reading, his brain dried up and he completely lost his judgment.

His brain convulsed,
his mind split open.
Vertigo, hysteria, lurchings
and launchings came over him,
he staggered and flapped desperately,
he was revolted by the thought of known places
and dreamed strange migrations.

He unzipped his pants and his brains fell out.

"and when he awoke it was as if he had awakened in hell. It WAS hell — "the hell of conscious failure,

He was in a terrible state- that of consciousness.

He whispered steadily along in this pearly place, but though his steps were steady, a tension had seized him. It was a quivering, high-note vibration rather than a trembling. His flesh did not shake: inside his tightened skin he hummed, making no sound — a silent scream.

Then he shrieked. In his hand the wooden shaft suddenly writhed. Its rigid outline became pliant, melting in his grasp. He tried to throw it from him, but it was too late. He held a living serpent in his naked hand, and already it had coiled about his wrist and its wicked wedge-shaped head darted at his muscular arm. He screamed again and his eyes became distended, his features purple. He went to his knees shaken by an awful convulsion, and then lay still.