that throwing thy body into the cold embraces of the water thou wert
convinced that thy children, the twins Romulus and Remus, were at that
moment drinking the warm milk of the she-wolf, and that in time to come
they would raise up the first rampart of the future Eternal City. If in
the moment of thy death thou hadst no doubt of this, thou wert perhaps
the happiest of all the people in that pitiful half-destroyed Rome
towards which were already moving from the Alps the hordes of the wild
Lombards.
ELULI, SON OF ELULI
A STORY OF THE ANCIENT PHŒNICIANS
I
The young scholar Dutrail, whose works on the head ornaments of the
Carthaginians had already attracted attention, and Bouverie, his former
tutor, now his friend, a corresponding-member of the Academy of
Inscriptions, were working at some excavations on the western coast of
Africa, in the French Congo, south of Myamba. It was a small expedition,
fitted out by private means, and originally consisting of eight members.
Most of them, however, had been unable to endure the deadly climate, and
on one pretext or another had gone away. There remained only Dutrail,
whose youthful enthusiasm conquered all difficulties, and the old
Bouverie, who having all his life dreamed of taking part in important
excavations where his special knowledge was concerned, had in his old
age--thanks to the patronage of his young friend--obtained his desire.
The excavations were extremely interesting; no one had supposed the
Phœnician colony to have spread itself so far south on the West Coast
of Africa, extending even beyond the Equator. Every day’s work enriched
science and opened up new perspectives as to the position of Phœnicia
and her commercial relations in the ninth century B.C.
The work was, however, extremely arduous. No European had remained with
Dutrail and Bouverie except their servant Victor; all the workmen were
negroes of the place. True, it had been decided that in place of those
who had left other archæologists should come and bring with them not
only some French workmen and a new store of necessary instruments, guns,
and food supplies, but also the letters, books, and newspapers of which
Dutrail and Bouverie had long been deprived. But day followed day, and
the wished-for steamer did not appear. Their stores were decreasing,
they were obliged to hunt for their food, and Dutrail was especially
anxious about the exhaustion of their supply of cartridges; the natives
were already sullen and insubordinate, and in the event of a riot among
them their lack of arms might be dangerous. Besides this, the Frenchmen
suffered greatly from the climate and from the intolerable heat, which
was so great that in the daytime it was impossible to touch a stone
without burning the hand. And now at last the bold archæologists seemed
likely to be overcome by the malevolent local fever which had attacked
several of the company before their departure.
Dutrail triumphed over everything. Day after day he subsisted on the
flesh of seabirds tasting strongly of fish, and drank the warmish water
from a neighbouring spring; he kept the mutinous crowd of negro-workmen
in check and himself worked with them, and yet still found time at night
to write his diary and to keep a detailed account of all the
archæological treasures they had obtained. In the tiny hut which they
had built under the shelter of a cliff he had already put in order a
whole museum of wonderful things which had lain almost three centuries
in the earth and now being restored to the world would soon bring about
a revolution in Phœnician lore. Bouverie, on the contrary, though
desiring with all his soul to remain with his young friend, was
manifestly becoming weaker. It was more difficult for an old man to
struggle against misfortunes and deprivation. Often, as he worked, his
spade or his gun would simply drop from his hands and he himself would
fall unconscious to the ground. Added to this he had begun to have
attacks of the local fever. Dutrail tried to cure him with quinine and
the other medicines which were in their travelling medicine-chest, but
the old man’s strength was utterly giving way; his cheeks had fallen in,
his eyes burned with an unhealthy glitter, and at night-time he was
tortured by paroxysms of dry coughing, shivering fits, fever and
delirium.
Dutrail had long ago made up his mind to compel his friend to return to
Europe as soon as the steamer should come, but for a long while he had
been afraid to speak about the matter. He felt that the old man would
certainly refuse--would prefer, as a scholar, to die at his post, the
more so as lately he had often spoken of death. To Dutrail’s
astonishment, however, Bouverie himself began to speak of leaving,
saying it was evident that they must part, and although it was bitter
for him to abandon the work he had begun, his illness compelled him to
go, so that he might die in his native land. In the depths of his soul
Dutrail was almost offended by these last remarks of the old man, who
could prefer his superstitious desire--to be in his native land at the
moment of his death--before the high interest of scientific research,
but explaining this by Bouverie’s illness he at length applauded his
friend’s resolution, and said all that might be expected from him under
the circumstances--that the fever was not so dangerous, that it would
pass with the change of climate, that they would still do much work
together, and so forth.
Two days later Bouverie astonished his friend still further. On that day
the excavators had come upon a new and rich tomb. Dutrail was in ecstasy
over such a discovery and he could neither speak nor think of anything
else. But in the evening Bouverie called his former pupil to his side in
his half of the little hut and begged him to witness his will.
“I’m much to blame,” said Bouverie, “not to have made my will before,
but I’ve never had the time. All my life I’ve been entirely taken up
with science, and I have never had time to think about my own affairs.
But my health is getting so much worse that perhaps I shall never get
away from here, so I must formulate my last desires. We are only three
Europeans here, but you and Victor are enough to witness my will.”
So as not to agitate the old man, Dutrail agreed. The will was quite an
ordinary one. Bouverie left the little money he had to dispose of to a
niece, for he was unmarried and had no other relatives. He left small
sums to his old servant, to the owner of the house in which he had lived
for forty years, and to various other people. His collection of
Phœnician and Carthaginian antiquities, gathered together during his
long lifetime, the old man bequeathed to the Louvre, and some separate
small things--to his friends, Dutrail among the number.
Coming at length to the last clause, Bouverie said, in an agitated
manner:
“This, strictly speaking, ought not to be included in the will. It is
simply--my request to you personally, Dutrail. But listen to it all the
same.”
The request was that after his death Bouverie wanted his body to be sent
to France and buried in his native town by the side of his mother. As he
read this last clause of the will the old man could not restrain his
tears. In a breaking voice he began to implore that whatever might
happen his request should be fulfilled.
By a great effort Dutrail controlled his anger and answered as gently
and tenderly as he could.
“Devil take it, dear friend! You see, I’m quite sure you’re not so ill
as you think. If I agreed to witness your will, I did so for one reason,
to please you, and for another, because it is never superfluous to put
one’s affairs in order. But as I am strongly convinced that you will get
better and will laugh at your present anxiety about yourself, I will
permit myself to make some objections.”
With the greatest caution Dutrail pointed out to Bouverie that his
request could hardly be fulfilled; there were no means at hand for
embalming the body and no coffin which could be hermetically sealed. And
he asked whether it were worse to be after death under African palms
side by side with the dead of the great past than in some small
provincial French cemetery. The only thing it was possible to promise in
any case, under such circumstances, was that his body should be buried
here in Africa at first and afterwards taken to France, though this
would be difficult, troublesome, and, above all, useless.
“That’s what I was afraid of!” cried the old man despairingly. “I was
afraid that you would say just that. But I beg of you, I conjure you, to
fulfil my request, whatever it may cost you, even though ... even though
you may have to give up the excavations for a time.”
Bouverie entreated, begged, wept. And at last, in order to pacify the
old man, Dutrail was obliged to consent, to give his word of honour and
even his oath. The will was signed.
II
Next day, even before the sun had risen, their labours were resumed.
They began to excavate the magnificent tomb which they had come across
the evening before. It was evident that the Phœnician settlement
would show itself much more significant than they had at first supposed.
At least, the tomb they had discovered had clearly belonged to a rich
and powerful family, several generations of which had not only spent
their whole lives under the inhospitable skies of equatorial Africa, but
had also prepared here for themselves an eternal resting-place. The
sepulchre was built of massive blocks of stone and ornamented with
bas-reliefs. Dutrail untiringly directed the workmen and often took a
pick or a spade himself.
After great difficulty they succeeded in discovering the entrance to the
tomb--an enormous iron door that in spite of the twenty-eight centuries
which had elapsed since it was closed had to be carefully broken to
pieces. Having succeeded at last in forcing an entrance and letting
fresh air flow into the recesses of the tomb Dutrail and Bouverie went
in themselves, carrying torches in their hands. The picture which
presented itself to their gaze was enough to send an archæologist out of
his mind with delight. The tomb was apparently absolutely untouched. In
the midst of it a stone coffin was raised upon a stone platform in the
shape of a fantastic monster, and around this were many articles for
household use, some fine specimens of crescent-shaped lamps, implements
of war, images of gods, and other articles whose significance it would
have been difficult to define at once.
But the most striking fact was that the inner walls of the tomb were
almost entirely covered with paintings and inscriptions. With the inrush
of the fresh air, the colours of the paintings, as is always the case,
swiftly began to fade, but the inscriptions, which were written in some
sort of black composition and even cut out to some depth in the stone,
seemed as if wrought but yesterday. This especially enraptured Dutrail,
for until then he had come across very few Phœnician inscriptions. He
already had visions of unearthing here entirely new historical data,
information, for example, about the connection of the Phœnicians with
Atlantis, of which Shleeman’s nephew had read in a Phœnician
inscription on a vase found in Syria.
In spite of the scorching heat, Dutrail busied himself in transferring
all the things they had found to the museum, and he did not stop until
the last crescent-shaped lamp had been placed in the wished-for spot.
Then, carefully closing up the entrance to the tomb, the young scholar
lay down to rest; but no sooner had the heat abated a little than he was
again at work. He occupied himself in copying and deciphering the
inscriptions, a work which with all his splendid knowledge of the
language was extremely complicated. When evening came he had succeeded
in copying only an insignificant number of the inscriptions and in
approximately deciphering still fewer.
That night, sitting in their little hut, by the dim light of a lamp,
Dutrail shared his discoveries with Bouverie and begged his help in the
interpretation of various difficult expressions. One series of
inscriptions was clearly a simple genealogy leading up through ten or
twelve generations. But one contained an adjuration against violators of
the peace of the tomb. Dutrail interpreted it approximately thus:
“In the name of Astarte who has been down into hell may there be peace
for me, Eluli, son of Eluli, buried here. May I lie here for a thousand
years and for eternity. Nearest and dearest, fellow-countrymen and
strangers, friends and foes, I adjure: ‘Touch not my ashes, nor my gold,
nor the things belonging to me. If people persuade thee, give no ear to
them. And thou, bold man, reading these words which no human eye should
ever see, cursed be thou upon the earth and under the earth where is
neither eating nor drinking. Mayest thou never receive a place of rest
with Rephaim, never be buried in a tomb, never have a son nor any issue.
May the sun not warm thee, may wood never bear thee up upon water, may
there not depart from thee for one hour the demon of torture, formless,
pitiless, whose strength never becomes less.’”
The inscription was continued further, but the end was unintelligible.
Bouverie listened to the translation in profound silence and did not
wish to take any share in deciphering the rest. Pleading illness, he
went off to his own half of the hut behind a wooden partition. But
Dutrail sat on for a long while over his notes, consulting books they
had brought with them, thinking over every expression and striving to
understand every shade of meaning in the inscription.
III
Late that night, when Dutrail was already sleeping the sound sleep of a
wearied man, he was suddenly awakened by Bouverie. The old man had
lighted a candle, and by its light he seemed still paler than usual. His
hair was in disorder, his whole appearance indicated an extreme degree
of terror.
“What is the matter, Bouverie?” asked Dutrail. “You’re ill?”
Though it was difficult to struggle against his desire to sleep, Dutrail
made an effort to awake, remembering the serious illness of his old
friend. But Bouverie did not answer the question; he asked, in a broken
voice:
“Did you see him too?”
“Whom could I see?” objected Dutrail. “I’m so tired at the end of the
day that I sleep without dreaming.”
“This was not a dream,” said Bouverie sadly, “and I saw him go from me
towards you.”
“Whom?”
“The Phœnician whose tomb we dug out.”
“Your mind’s wandering, dear Bouverie,” said Dutrail. “You have fever:
I’ll prepare a dose of quinine for you.”
“I’m not wandering,” objected the old man obstinately. “I saw this man
quite clearly. He was shaven and beardless, with a wrinkled face, and he
was dressed as a soldier. He stood by my bed and looked threateningly at
me, and said....”
“Wait a moment,” interrupted Dutrail, trying to bring the old man to
reason--“in what language did he speak to you?”
“In Phœnician. I don’t know if perhaps at another time I should have
understood the Phœnician language, but at that moment I understood
every word.”
“What did the apparition say to you?”
“He said to me: ‘I--am Eluli, son of Eluli, he whose peaceful repose
you, strangers, have disturbed, not dreading my curse. Therefore I will
have vengeance on thee, and what has befallen me shall come upon thee.
Thy ashes shall not rest in thy native land, but shall be the prey of
the hyena and jackal. I will torment thee both sleeping and waking, all
thy life and after thy life, and until the end of time.’ When he had
said this he went towards you, and I thought you would see him too.”
Dutrail felt convinced that his friend’s state was the result of
illness, easily explained by the heat, by his continuous thinking about
death, and by the agitation consequent on their remarkable discovery.
Wishing to bring the old man into a reasonable frame of mind, Dutrail
did not remind him that apparitions were a delusion of sight, but he
tried to make clear all the implausibility of the vision.
“We did not excavate the tomb,” said he, “to insult the ashes lying
there, or to profit by the things collected there; we had a
disinterested scientific object. Eluli, son of Eluli, has no reason for
being angered with us. Science resurrects the past, and we, in raising
up Phœnician antiquities, have also raised up this Eluli. The old
Phœnician ought rather to be grateful to us for calling him from
oblivion. If it hadn’t been for us, who in our day would have known that
a thousand years before Christ there once lived in Africa a certain
Eluli, son of Eluli?”
Dutrail talked to the old man as to a sick child. At first Bouverie
would not listen to any arguments and he demanded what was clearly
impossible--that all the things should be taken back to the tomb at
once, and the tomb itself buried anew. Little by little, however, he
began to give way, and agreed to postpone the decision of the matter
until the morning. Then Dutrail lifted the old man in his arms and laid
him on his bed, covering him with quilts as he began to shiver, and sat
down by his bedside until the sick man fell into a restless and
disturbed sleep. “What havoc illness plays with even the clearest mind!”
he thought sadly.
IV
On the morrow, logic and the obviousness of Dutrail’s arguments gained
the day. Bouverie agreed that his vision had been the result of a
feverish delirium. He also agreed that it would be a crime against
science and against humanity to fill up the excavations of the tomb. The
work went on with the former enthusiasm. And in the tomb of Eluli and in
others near it they found even more precious historical things. The
friends only awaited the arrival of the steamer with the necessary tools
and some European workmen to begin excavating the town.
But Bouverie’s health did not improve. The fever did not leave him; he
often cried aloud at night and leapt from his bed in unreasoning terror.
Once the old man confessed that he had seen the Phœnician Eluli once
again. Dutrail thought it good to laugh at him, and after this the old
man spoke no more of his visions. But, all the same, he seemed to fade
daily, and he even began to manifest signs of mental disturbance: he was
afraid of the darkness and of the night, he did not wish to go into the
museum, and presently he absolutely abandoned the excavations. Dutrail
shook his head and waited impatiently for the steamer, hoping that a
sea-voyage and his return to France might do the old man good.
But in vain did the two friends await the steamer. When at length it
arrived, in the place where the members of the expedition had
established their little settlement nothing was found but a heap of
ashes and charred wood. It was evident that the negro-workmen had
mutinied, killed the Europeans and stolen their property and carried off
all the things which had been arranged in the museum. The great
discovery of Dutrail and Bouverie, which they had dreamed would enrich
Phœnician lore, was lost to mankind.
IN THE TOWER
A RECORDED DREAM
There is no doubt that I dreamed all this, dreamed it last night. True,
I never thought that a dream could be so circumstantial and so
consecutive. But none of the events of this dream have any connection
with what I am experiencing now or with anything that I can remember.
Yet how otherwise can a dream be differentiated from reality except in
this way--that it is divorced from the continuous chain of events which
occur in our waking hours?
I dreamed of a knight’s castle, somewhere on the shore of the sea.
Beyond it there was a field and a stunted yet ancient forest of pines.
In front of it there stretched an expanse of grey northern billows. The
castle had been roughly built with stone of a terrible thickness, and
from the side it looked like a wild and fantastic cliff. Its deep,
irregularly placed windows were like the nests of monstrous birds.
Within the castle were high gloomy chambers with sounding passages
between them.
As I now call to mind the furniture of the rooms, the dress of the
people about me, and other trifling details, I clearly understand to
what period my dream had taken me back. It was the life of the Middle
Ages, dreadful, austere, still half-savage, still full of impulses not
yet under control. But in the dream I had not at first this
understanding of the time but only a dull feeling that I myself was
foreign to that life into which I was plunged. I felt confusedly that I
was some kind of new-comer into that world.
At times this feeling was more intense. Something would suddenly begin
to torture my memory, like a name which one wants to remember and
cannot. When I was shooting birds with a cross-bow I would long for
another and more effective weapon. The knights, encased in their armour
of iron, accustomed to murder, seeking only for plunder, appeared to me
to be degenerates, and I foresaw the possibility of a different and more
refined existence. As I argued with the monks on scholastic questions, I
had a foretaste of some other kind of learning, deeper, fuller, freer.
But when I made an effort to bring something into my memory, my
consciousness was bedimmed anew.
I lived in the castle as a prisoner, or, more truly, as an hostage. A
special tower was allotted to me. I was treated with respect, but was
kept under guard. I had no definite occupation of any kind, and the lack
of employment was burdensome to me. But there was one thing which
brought happiness and ecstasy into my life: I was in love.
The governor of the castle was named Hugo von Rizen. He was a giant with
a voice of thunder and the strength of a bear. He was a widower. But he
had one daughter, Matilda, tall, graceful, bright-eyed. She was like St.
Catherine as the Italians paint her, and I loved her passionately and
tenderly. As Matilda took charge of all the housekeeping in the castle,
we used to meet several times a day, and every meeting would fill my
soul with blessing.
For a long while I could not make up my mind to tell Matilda of my love,
though of course my eyes betrayed my secret. I uttered the fateful words
quite unexpectedly, as it were, one morning at the close of winter. We
met on the narrow staircase leading to the watch-tower. And though it
had often happened that we had been alone together--in the snow-covered
garden, and in the dim hall, under the marvellous light of the moon, for
some reason or other it was specially at this moment that I felt I could
not be silent. I pressed myself close up against the wall, stretched out
my hands and said, “Matilda, I love you.” Matilda did not blench, she
simply bent her head and answered softly, “I love you too, you are my
chosen one.” Then she ran quickly up the stairs and I stood there,
against the wall, still holding out my hands.
In the most consecutive of dreams there is always some break in the
action. I can remember nothing of what happened in the days immediately
following my confession of love. I remember only that I was walking with
Matilda on the shore, though everything showed that some weeks must have
elapsed. The air was already filled with the odours of spring, but the
snow still lay on the ground. The waves, with thunderous noise, were
rolling in with white crests on to the stony beach.
It was evening, and the sun was sinking into the sea, like a magic bird
of fire, setting the edges of the clouds aflame. We walked along side by
side.
Matilda was wearing a coat lined with ermine, and the ends of her white
scarf floated in the wind. We dreamed of the future, the happy future,
forgetting that we were children of different races, and that between us
lay an abyss of national enmity.
It was difficult for us to talk, because I did not know Matilda’s
language very well, and she was quite ignorant of mine, but we
understood much, even without words. And even now my heart trembles as I
remember this walk along the shore within sight of the gloomy castle, in
the rays of the setting sun. I was experiencing and living through true
happiness, whether awake or in a dream--what difference does it make?
It must have been on the following morning that I was told Hugo wished
to speak to me. I was taken into his presence. He was seated on a high
bench covered with elk-furs. A monk was reading a letter to him. Hugo
was glowering and angry. When he saw me, he said sternly:
“Aha! Do you know what your countrymen are doing? Was it such a little
thing for us to defeat you at Isborsk. We set fire to Pskov, and you
besought us to have mercy. Now you’re asking help from Alexander, who
glories in the appellation of Nevsky. But we are not like the Swedes!
Sit down and write to your people of our might, so that they may be
brought to reason. And if you refuse, then you and all the other
hostages will pay cruelly for your refusal.”