THE VIZIER OF THE TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER
BY
FRANK R. STOCKTON
1899
PREFATORY NOTE
The story told in this book is based upon legendary history, and the
statements on which it is founded appear in the chronicles of Abou-djafar
Mohammed Tabari. This historian was the first Mussulman to write a general
history of the world. He was born in the year 244 of the Hejira
(838-839 A.D.), and passed a great part of his life in Bagdad, where he
studied and taught theology and jurisprudence. His chronicles embrace the
history of the world, according to his lights, from the creation to the
year 302 of the Hejira.
In these chronicles Tabari relates some of the startling experiences of
El Khoudr, or El Kroudhr, then Vizier of that great monarch, the
Two-Horned Alexander, and these experiences furnish the motive for
those subsequent adventures which are now related in this book.
Some writers have confounded the Two-Horned Alexander with Alexander the
Great, but this is an inexcusable error. References in ancient histories
to the Two-Horned Alexander describe him as a great and powerful
potentate, and place him in the time of Abraham. Mr. S. Baring-Gould, in
his "Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets," states that, after a careful
examination, he has come to the conclusion that some of the most generally
known legends which have come down to us through the ages are based on
incidents which occurred in the reign of this monarch.
The hero of this story now deems it safe to speak out plainly without
fear of evil consequences to himself, and his confidence in our high
civilization is a compliment to the age.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
I lent large sums to the noble knights
"Don't you do it"
His wife was a slender lady
"Time of Abraham!" I exclaimed
Moses asked embarrassing questions
An encounter with Charles Lamb
I cut that picture from its frame
When we left Cordova
I had been a broker in Pompeii
Solomon and the Jinns
"Go tell the queen"
She gave me her hand, and I shook it heartily
Asking all sorts of questions
And roughly told me
She turned her head
"How like!"
I proceeded to dig a hole
"Why are you not in the army?"
Nebuchadnezzar and the gardener
Petrarch and Laura
The crouching African fixed her eyes
upon him
THE VIZIER OF THE
TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER
I
I was on a French steamer bound from Havre to New York, when I had a
peculiar experience in the way of a shipwreck. On a dark and foggy
night, when we were about three days out, our vessel collided with
a derelict--a great, heavy, helpless mass, as dull and colorless
as the darkness in which she was enveloped. We struck her almost
head on, and her stump of a bowsprit was driven into our port bow
with such tremendous violence that a great hole--nobody knew of what
dimensions--was made in our vessel.
The collision occurred about two hours before daylight, and the frightened
passengers who crowded the upper deck were soon informed by the officers
that it would be necessary to take to the boats, for the vessel was
rapidly settling by the head.
Now, of course, all was hurry and confusion. The captain endeavored
to assure his passengers that there were boats enough to carry every
soul on board, and that there was time enough for them to embark
quietly and in order. But as the French people did not understand him
when he spoke in English, and as the Americans did not readily comprehend
what he said in French, his exhortations were of little avail. With such
of their possessions as they could carry, the people crowded into the
boats as soon as they were ready, and sometimes before they were ready;
and while there was not exactly a panic on board, each man seemed to be
inspired with the idea that his safety, and that of his family, if he had
one, depended upon precipitate individual action.
I was a young man, traveling alone, and while I was as anxious as any
one to be saved from the sinking vessel, I was not a coward, and I
could not thrust myself into a boat when there were women and children
behind me who had not yet been provided with places. There were men
who did this, and several times I felt inclined to knock one of the
poltroons overboard. The deck was well lighted, the steamer was settling
slowly, and there was no excuse for the dastardly proceedings which were
going on about me.
It was not long, however, before almost all of the passengers were
safely embarked, and I was preparing to get into a boat which was
nearly filled with the officers and crew, when I was touched on the
shoulder, and turning, I saw a gentleman whose acquaintance I had
made soon after the steamer had left Havre. His name was Crowder.
He was a middle-aged man, a New-Yorker, intelligent and of a social
disposition, and I had found him a very pleasant companion. To my
amazement, I perceived that he was smoking a cigar.
"If I were you," said he, "I would not go in that boat. It is horribly
crowded, and the captain and second officer have yet to find places
in it."
"That's all the more reason," said I, "why we should hurry. I am
not going to push myself ahead of women and children, but I've just
as much right to be saved as the captain has, and if there are any
vacant places, let us get them as soon as possible."
Crowder now put his hand on my shoulder as if to restrain me. "Safety!"
said he. "You needn't trouble yourself about safety. You are just as safe
where you are as you could possibly be in one of those boats. If they are
not picked up soon,--and they may float about for days,--their sufferings
and discomforts will be very great. There is a shameful want of
accommodation in the way of boats."
"But, my dear sir," said I, "I can't stop here to talk about that.
They are calling for the captain now."
"Oh, he's in no hurry," said my companion. "He's collecting his papers,
I suppose, and he knows his vessel will not sink under him while he is
doing it. I'm not going in that boat; I haven't the least idea of such
a thing. It will be odiously crowded, and I assure you, sir, that if the
sea should be rough that boat will be dangerous. Even now she is
overloaded."
I looked at the man in amazement. He had spoken earnestly, but he was as
calm as if we were standing on a sidewalk, and he endeavoring to dissuade
me from boarding an overcrowded street-car. Before I could say anything
he spoke again:
"I am going to remain on this ship. She is a hundred times safer than any
of those boats. I have had a great deal of experience in regard to vessels
and ocean navigation, and it will be a long time before this vessel sinks,
if she ever sinks of her own accord. She's just as likely to float as that
derelict we ran into. The steam is nearly out of her boilers by this time,
and nothing is likely to happen to her. I wish you would stay with me.
Here we will be safe, with plenty of room, and plenty to eat and drink.
When it is daylight we will hoist a flag of distress, which will be much
more likely to be seen than anything that can flutter from those little
boats. If you have noticed, sir, the inclination of this deck is not
greater now than it was half an hour ago. That proves that our bow has
settled down about as far as it is going. I think it likely that the water
has entered only a few of the forward compartments."
The man spoke so confidently that his words made an impression upon me.
I knew that it very often happens that a wreck floats for a long time,
and the boat from which the men were now frantically shouting for the
captain would certainly be dangerously crowded.
"Stay with me," said Mr. Crowder, "and I assure you, with as much reason
as any man can assure any other man of anything in this world, that you
will be perfectly safe. This steamer is not going to sink."
There were rapid footsteps, and I saw the captain and his second officer
approaching.
"Step back here," said Mr. Crowder, pulling me by the coat. "Don't let
them see us. They may drag us on board that confounded boat. Keep quiet,
sir, and let them get off. They think they are the last on board."
Involuntarily I obeyed him, and we stood in the shadow of the great
funnel. The captain had reached the rail.
"Is every one in the boats?" he shouted, in French and in English. "Is
every one in the boats? I am going to leave the vessel."
I made a start as if to rush toward him, but Crowder held me by the arm.
"Don't you do it," he whispered very earnestly. "I have the greatest
possible desire to save you. Stay where you are, and you will be all
right. That overloaded boat may capsize in half an hour."
[Illustration: "'DON'T YOU DO IT.'"]
I could not help it; I believed him. My own judgment seemed suddenly to
rise up and ask me why I should leave the solid deck of the steamer for
that perilous little boat.
I need say but little more in regard to this shipwreck. When the fog
lifted, about ten o'clock in the morning, we could see no signs of any
of the boats. A mile or so away lay the dull black line of the derelict,
as if she were some savage beast who had bitten and torn us, and was
now sullenly waiting to see us die of the wound. We hoisted a flag,
union down, and then we went below to get some breakfast. Mr. Crowder
knew all about the ship, and where to find everything. He told me he
had made so many voyages that he felt almost as much at home on sea
as on land. We made ourselves comfortable all day, and at night we went
to our rooms, and I slept fairly well, although there was a very
disagreeable slant to my berth. The next day, early in the afternoon,
our signal of distress was seen by a tramp steamer on her way to
New York, and we were taken off.
We cruised about for many hours in the direction the boats had probably
taken, and the next day we picked up two of them in a sorry condition,
the occupants having suffered many hardships and privations. We never
had news of the captain's boat, but the others were rescued by a
sailing-vessel going eastward.
Before we reached New York, Mr. Crowder had made me promise that I
would spend a few days with him at his home in that city. His family
was small, he told me,--a wife, and a daughter about six,--and he wanted
me to know them. Naturally we had become great friends. Very likely the
man had saved my life, and he had done it without any act of heroism or
daring, but simply by impressing me with the fact that his judgment was
better than mine. I am apt to object to people of superior judgment, but
Mr. Crowder was an exception to the ordinary superior person. From the
way he talked it was plain that he 'had much experience of various sorts,
and that he had greatly advantaged thereby; but he gave himself no airs on
this account, and there was nothing patronizing about him. If I were able
to tell him anything he did not know,--and I frequently was,--he was very
glad to hear it.
Moreover, Mr. Crowder was a very good man to look at. He was certainly
over fifty, and his closely trimmed hair was white, but he had a fresh
and florid complexion. He was tall and well made, fashionably dressed,
and had an erect and somewhat military carriage. He was fond of talking,
and seemed fond of me, and these points in his disposition attracted
me very much.
My relatives were few, they lived in the West, and I never had had a
friend whose company was so agreeable to me as that of Mr. Crowder.
Mr. Crowder's residence was a handsome house in the upper part of the
city. His wife was a slender lady, scarcely half his age, with a sweet
and interesting face, and was attired plainly but tastefully. In general
appearance she seemed to be the opposite of her husband in every way. She
had suffered a week of anxiety, and was so rejoiced at having her husband
again that when I met her, some hours after Crowder had reached the house,
her glorified face seemed like that of an angel. But there was nothing
demonstrative about her. Even in her great joy she was as quiet as a dove,
and I was not surprised when her husband afterward told me that she was a
Quaker.
[Illustration: "HIS WIFE WAS A SLENDER LADY."]
I was entertained very handsomely by the Crowders. I spent several days
with them, and although they were so happy to see each other, they made
it very plain that they were also happy to have me with them, he because
he liked me, she because he liked me.
On the day before my intended departure, Mr. Crowder and I were smoking,
after dinner, in his study. He had been speaking of people and things that
he had seen in various parts of the world, but after a time he became a
little abstracted, and allowed me to do most of the talking.
"You must excuse me," he said suddenly, when I had repeated a question;
"you must not think me willingly inattentive, but I was considering
something important--very important. Ever since you have been here,
--almost ever since I have known you, I might say,--the desire has been
growing upon me to tell you something known to no living being but
myself."
This offer did not altogether please me; I had grown very fond of Crowder,
but the confidences of friends are often very embarrassing. At this moment
the study door was gently opened, and Mrs. Crowder came in.
"No," said she, addressing her husband with a smile; "thee need not let
thy conscience trouble thee. I have not come to say anything about
gentlemen being too long over their smoking. I only want to say that
Mrs. Norris and two other ladies have just called, and I am going down
to see them. They are a committee, and will not care for the society of
gentlemen. I am sorry to lose any of your company, Mr. Randolph,
especially as you insist that this is to be your last evening with us;
but I do not think you would care anything about our ward organizations."
"Now, isn't that a wife to have!" exclaimed my host, as we resumed our
cigars. "She thinks of everybody's happiness, and even wishes us to feel
free to take another cigar if we desire it, although in her heart she
disapproves of smoking."
We settled ourselves again to talk, and as there really could be no
objection to my listening to Crowder's confidences, I made none.
"What I have to tell you," he said presently, "concerns my life,
present, past, and future. Pretty comprehensive, isn't it? I have long
been looking for some one to whom I should be so drawn by bonds of
sympathy that I should wish to tell him my story. Now, I feel that
I am so drawn to you. The reason for this, in some degree at least, is
because you believe in me. You are not weak, and it is my opinion that
on important occasions you are very apt to judge for yourself, and not
to care very much for the opinions of other people; and yet, on a most
important occasion, you allowed me to judge for you. You are not only
able to rely on yourself, but you know when it is right to rely on
others. I believe you to be possessed of a fine and healthy sense of
appreciation."
I laughed, and begged him not to bestow too many compliments upon me,
for I was not used to them.
"I am not thinking of complimenting you," he said. "I am simply telling
you what I think of you in order that you may understand why I tell you
my story. I must first assure you, however, that I do not wish to place
any embarrassing responsibility upon you by taking you into my confidence.
All that I say to you, you may say to others when the time comes; but
first I must tell the tale to you."
He sat up straight in his chair, and put down his cigar. "I will begin,"
he said, "by stating that I am the Vizier of the Two-horned Alexander."
I sat up even straighter than my companion, and gazed steadfastly at him.
"No," said he, "I am not crazy. I expected you to think that, and am
entirely prepared for your look of amazement and incipient horror. I will
ask you, however, to set aside for a time the dictates of your own sense,
and hear what I have to say. Then you can take the whole matter into
consideration, and draw your own conclusions." He now leaned back in his
chair, and went on with his story: "It would be more correct, perhaps,
for me to say that I was the Vizier of the Two-horned Alexander, for
that great personage died long ago. Now, I don't believe you ever heard
anything about the Two-horned Alexander."
I had recovered sufficiently from my surprise to assure him that he
was right.
My host nodded. "I thought so," said he; "very few people do know anything
about that powerful potentate. He lived in the time of Abraham. He was a
man of considerable culture, even of travel, and of an adventurous
disposition. I entered into the service of his court when I was a very
young man, and gradually I rose in position until I became his chief
officer, or vizier."
[Illustration: "'TIME OF ABRAHAM!' I EXCLAIMED."]
I sprang from my chair. "Time of Abraham!" I exclaimed. "This is simply--"
"No; it is not," he interrupted, and speaking in perfect good humor.
"I beg you will sit down and listen to me. What I have to say to you is
not nearly so wonderful as the nature and power of electricity."
I obeyed; he had touched me on a tender spot, for I am an electrician,
and can appreciate the wonderful.
"There has been a great deal of discussion," he continued, "in regard to
the peculiar title given to Alexander, but the appellation 'two-horned'
has frequently been used in ancient times. You know Michelangelo gave
two horns to Moses; but he misunderstood the tradition he had heard, and
furnished the prophet with real horns. Alexander wore his hair arranged
over his forehead in the shape of two protruding horns. This was simply
a symbol of high authority; as the bull is monarch of the herd, so was
he monarch among men. He was the first to use this symbol, although it
was imitated afterward by various Eastern potentates.
"As I have said, Alexander was a man of enterprise, and it had come to his
knowledge that there existed somewhere a certain spring the waters of
which would confer immortality upon any descendant of Shem who should
drink of them, and he started out to find this spring. I traveled with
him for more than a year. It was on this journey that he visited Abraham
when the latter was building the great edifice which the Mohammedans claim
as their holy temple, the Kaaba.
"It was more than a month after we had parted from Abraham that I, being
in advance of the rest of the company, noticed a little pool in the shade
of a rock, and being very warm and thirsty, I got down on my hands and
knees, and putting my face to the water, drank of it. I drank heartily,
and when I raised my head, I saw, to my amazement, that there was not a
drop of water left in the spring. Now it so happened that when Alexander
came to this spot, he stopped, and having regarded the little hollow under
the rock, together with its surroundings, he dismounted and stood by it.
He called me, and said: 'According to all the descriptions I have read,
this might have been the spring of immortality for which I have been
searching; but it cannot be such now, for there is no water in it.' Then
he stooped down and looked carefully at the hollow. 'There has been water
here,' said he, 'and that not long ago, for the ground is wet.'
"A horrible suspicion now seized upon me. Could I have drained the
contents of the spring of inestimable value? Could I, without knowing it,
have deprived my king of the great prize for which he had searched so
long, with such labor and pains? Of course I was certain of nothing, but
I bowed before Alexander, and told him that I had found an insignificant
little puddle at the place, that I had tasted it and found it was nothing
but common water, and in quantity so small that it scarcely sufficed to
quench my thirst. If he would consent to camp in the shade, and wait a few
hours, water would trickle again into the little basin, and fill it, and
he could see for himself that this could not be the spring of which he was
in search.
"We waited at that place for the rest of the day and the whole of the
night, and the next morning the little basin was empty and entirely dry.
Alexander did not reproach me; he was accustomed to rule all men, even
himself, and he forbade himself to think that I had interfered with the
great object of his search. But he sent me home to his capital city, and
continued his journey without me. 'Such a thirsty man must not travel
with me,' he said. 'If we should really come to the immortal spring,
he would be sure to drink it all.'
"Nine years afterward Alexander returned to his palace, and when
I presented myself before him he regarded me steadfastly. I knew why he
was looking at me, and I trembled. At length he spoke: 'Thou art not one
day older than when I dismissed thee from my company. It was indeed the
fountain of immortality which thou didst discover, and of which thou didst
drink every drop. I have searched over the whole habitable world, and
there is no other. Thou, too, art an aristocrat; thou, too, art of the
family of Shem. It was for this reason that I placed thee near me, that
I gave thee great power; and now thou hast destroyed all my hopes, my
aspirations. Thou hast put an end to my ambitions. I had believed that
I should rule the world, and rule it forever.' His face grew black; his
voice was terrible. 'Retire!' he said. 'I will attend to thy future.'
"I retired, but my furious sovereign never saw me again. I was fifty-three
years old when I drank the water in the little pool under the rock, and
I was well aware that at the time of my sovereign's return I felt no older
and looked no older. But still I hoped that this was merely the result of
my general good health, and that when Alexander came back he would inform
me that he had discovered the veritable spring of immortality; so
I retained my high office, and waited. But I had made my plans for escape
in case my hope should not be realized. In two minutes from the time
I left his presence I had begun my flight, and there were no horses in
all his dominions which could equal the speed of mine.
"Now began a long, long period of danger and terror, of concealment and
deprivation. I fled into other lands, and these were conquered in order
that I might be found. But at last Alexander died, and his son died, and
the sons of his son died, and the whole story was forgotten or
disbelieved, and I was no longer in danger of living forever as an example
of the ingenious cruelty of an exasperated monarch.
"I do not intend to recount my life and adventures since that time; in
fact, I shall scarcely touch upon them. You can see for yourself that that
would be impossible. One might as well attempt to read a history of the
world in a single evening. I merely want to say enough to make you
understand the situation.
"A hundred years after I had fled from Alexander I was still fifty-three
years old, and knew that that would be my age forever. I stayed so long
in the place where I first established myself that people began to look
upon me with suspicion. Seeing me grow no older, they thought I was a
wizard, and I was obliged to seek a new habitation. Ever since, my fate
has been the necessity of moving from place to place. I would go
somewhere as a man beginning to show signs of age, and I would remain as
long as a man could reasonably be supposed to live without becoming truly
old and decrepit. Sometimes I remained in a place far longer than my
prudence should have permitted, and many were the perils I escaped on
account of this rashness; but I have gradually learned wisdom."
The man spoke so quietly and calmly, and made his statements in such
a matter-of-fact way, that I listened to him with the same fascinated
attention I had given to the theory of telegraphy without wires, when it
was first propounded to me. In fact, I had been so influenced by his own
conviction of the truth of what he said that I had been on the point of
asking him if Abraham had really had anything to do with the building
of the Islam temple, but had been checked by the thought of the utter
absurdity of supposing that this man sitting in front of me could possibly
know anything about it. But now I spoke. I did not want him to suppose
that I believed anything he said, nor did I really intend to humor him in
his insane retrospections; but what he had said suggested to me the very
apropos remark that one might suppose he had been giving a new version of
the story of the Wandering Jew.
At this he sat up very straight, on the extreme edge of his chair; his
eyes sparkled.
"You must excuse me," he said, "but for twenty seconds I am going to be
angry. I can't help it. It isn't your fault, but that remark always
enrages me. I expect it, of course, but it makes my blood boil, all the
same."
"Then you have told your story before?" I said.
"Yes," he answered. "I have told it to certain persons to whom I thought
it should be known. Some of these have believed it, some have not; but,
believers or disbelievers, all have died and disappeared. Their opinions
are nothing to me. You are now the only living being who knows my story."
I was going to ask a question here, but he did not give me a chance.
He was very much moved.
"I hate that Wandering Jew," said he, "or, I should say, I despise the
thin film of a tradition from which he was constructed. There never was
a Wandering Jew. There could not have been; it is impossible to conceive
of a human being sent forth to wander in wretchedness forever. Moreover,
suppose there had been such a man, what a poor, modern creature he would
be compared with me! Even now he would be less than two thousand years
old. You must excuse my perturbation, but I am sure that during the whole
of the Christian era I have never told my story to any one who did not, in
some way or other, make an absurd or irritating reference to the Wandering
Jew. I have often thought, and I have no doubt I am right, that the
ancient story of my adventures as Kroudhr, the Vizier of the Two-horned
Alexander, combined with what I have related, in one century or another,
of my subsequent experiences, has given rise to the tradition of that
very unpleasant Jew of whom Eugène Sue and many others have made good
use. It is very natural that there should be legends about people who in
some way or other are enabled to live forever. If Ponce De Leon and his
companions had mysteriously disappeared when in search of the Fountain
of Youth, there would be stories now about rejuvenated Spaniards wandering
about the earth, and who would always continue to wander. But the Fountain
of Youth is not a desirable water-supply, and a young person who should
find such a pool would do well to wait until he had arrived at maturity
before entering upon an existence of indefinite continuance.
"But I must go on with my story. At one time I made for myself a home, and
remained in it for many, many years without making any change. I became a
sort of hermit, and lived in a rocky cave. I allowed my hair and beard to
grow, so that people really thought I was getting older and older; at last
I acquired the reputation of a prophet, and was held in veneration by a
great many religious people. Of course I could not prophesy, but as I had
such a vast deal of experience I was able to predicate intelligently
something about the future from my knowledge of the past. I became famed
as a wonderful seer, and there were a great many curious stories told
about me.
"Among my visitors at that time was Moses. He had heard of me, and came to
see what manner of man I was. We became very well acquainted. He was a man
anxious to obtain information, and he asked me questions which embarrassed
me very much; but I do not know that he suspected I had lived beyond the
ordinary span of life. There are a good many traditions about this visit
of Moses, some of which are extant at the present day; but these, of
course, are the result of what might be called cumulative imagination.
Many of them are of Moslem origin, and the great Arabian historian Tabari
has related some of them.
[Illustration: "MOSES ASKED EMBARRASSING QUESTIONS."]
"I learned a great deal while I lived in this cave, both from scholars and
from nature; but at last new generations arose who did not honor or even
respect me, and by some I was looked upon as a fraudulent successor to the
old prophet of whom their ancestors had told them, and so I thought it
prudent to leave."
My interest in this man's extraordinary tissue of retrospection was
increasing, and I felt that I must not doubt nor deny; to do so would
be to break the spell, to close the book.
"Did it not sometimes fill you with horror to think that you must live
forever?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered, "that has happened to me; but such feelings have long,
long passed away. If you could have lived as I have, and had seen the
world change from what it was when I was young to what it is now, you
would understand how a man of my disposition, a man of my overpowering
love of knowledge, love of discovery, love of improvement, love of
progress of all kinds, would love to live. In fact, if I were now to be
told that at the end of five thousand years I must expire and cease, it
would fill me with gloom. Having seen so much, I expect more than most men
are capable of comprehending. And I shall see it all--see the centuries
unfold, behold the wonderful things of the future arise! The very thought
of it fills me with inexpressible joy."
For a few moments he remained silent. I could understand the state of his
mind, no matter how those mental conditions had been brought about.
"But you must not suppose," he continued, "that this earthly immortality
is without its pains, its fears, I may say its horrors. It is precisely
on account of all these that I am now talking to you. The knowledge that
my life is always safe, no matter in what peril I may be, does not relieve
me from anxiety and apprehension of evil. It would be a curse to live if
I were not in sound physical condition; it would be a curse to live as a
slave; it would be a curse to live in a dungeon. I have known vicissitudes
and hardships of every kind, but I have been fortunate enough to preserve
myself whole and unscathed, in spite of the dangers I have incurred.
"I often think from what a terrible fate I saved my master, Alexander
of the two horns. If he had found the fountain he might have enjoyed his
power and dominion for a few generations. Then he would have been thrown
down, cast out, and even if he had escaped miseries which I cannot bear
to mention, he never could have regained his high throne. He would have
been condemned to live forever in a station for which he was not fitted.
"It is very different with me. My nature allows me to adapt myself to
various conditions, and my habits of prudence prevent me from seeking
to occupy any position which may be dangerous to me by making me
conspicuous, and from which I could not easily retire when I believe
the time has come to do so. I have been almost everything; I have even
been a soldier. But I have never taken up arms except when obliged to do
so, and I have known as little of war as possible. No weapon or missile
could kill me, but I have a great regard for my arms and legs. I have
been a ruler of men, but I have trembled in my high estate, for I feared
the populace. They could do everything except take my life. Therefore
I made it a point to abdicate when the skies were clear. In such cases
I set out on journeys from which I never returned.
"I have also lived the life of the lowly; I have drawn water, and I have
hewn wood. By the way, that reminds me of a little incident which may
interest you. I was employed in the East India House at the time Charles
Lamb was a clerk there. It was not long after he had begun to contribute
his Elia essays to the 'London Magazine.' I had read some of them, and
was interested in the man. I met him several times in the corridors or
on the stairways, and one day I was going up-stairs, carrying a hod of
coals, as he was coming down. Looking up at him, I made a misstep, and
came near dropping a portion of my burden. 'My good man,' said he, with
a queer smile, 'if you would learn to carry your coals as well as you
carry your age you would do well.' I don't remember what I said in
reply; but I know I thought if Charles Lamb could be made aware of my
real age he would abandon his Elia work and devote himself to me."
"It is a pity you did not tell him," I suggested.
"No," replied my host. "He might have been interested, but he could not
have appreciated the situation, even if I had told him everything. He
would not really have known my age, for he would not have believed me.
I might have found myself in a lunatic asylum. I never saw Lamb again,
and very soon after that meeting I came to America."
[Illustration: AN ENCOUNTER WITH CHARLES LAMB.]
II
"There are two points about your story that I do not comprehend," said
I (and as I spoke I could not help the thought that in reality I did not
comprehend any of it). "In the first place, I don't see how you could
live for a generation or two in one place and then go off to an entirely
new locality. I should think there were not enough inhabited spots in
the world to accommodate you in such extensive changes."
Mr. Crowder smiled. "I don't wonder you ask that question," he said; "but
in fact it was not always necessary for me to seek new places. There are
towns in which I have taken up my residence many times. But as I arrived
each time as a stranger from afar, and as these sojourns were separated
by many years, there was no one to suppose me to be a person who had
lived in that place a century or two before."
"Then you never had your portrait painted," I remarked.
"Oh, yes, I have," he replied. "Toward the close of the thirteenth century
I was living in Florence, being at that time married to a lady of wealthy
family, and she insisted upon my having my portrait painted by Cimabue,
who, as you know, was the master of Giotto. After my wife's death
I departed from Florence, leaving behind me the impression that I intended
soon to return; and I would have been glad to take the portrait with me,
but I had no opportunity. It was in 1503 that I went back to Florence, and
as soon as I could I visited the stately mansion where I had once lived,
and there in the gallery still hung the portrait. This was an
unsatisfactory discovery, for I might wish at some future time to settle
again in Florence, and I had hoped that the portrait had faded, or that it
had been destroyed; but Cimabue painted too well, and his work was then
held in high value, without regard to his subject. Finding myself
entirely alone in the gallery, I cut that picture from its frame.
I concealed it under my cloak, and when I reached my lodging I utterly
destroyed it. I did not feel that I was committing any crime in doing
this; I had ordered and paid for the painting, and I felt that I had a
right to do what I pleased with it."
"I don't see how you can help having your picture taken in these days,"
I said; "even if you refuse to go to a photographer's, you can't escape
the kodak people. You have a striking presence."
"Oh, I can't get away from photographers," he answered. "I have had a
number of pictures taken, at the request of my wife and other people.
It is impossible to avoid it, and that is one of the reasons why I am
now telling you my story. What is the other point about which you
wished to ask me?"
"I cannot comprehend," I answered, "how you should ever have found
yourself poor and obliged to work. I should say that a man who had lived
so long would have accumulated, in one way or another, immense wealth,
inexhaustible treasures."
[Illustration: "'I CUT THAT PICTURE FROM ITS FRAME.'"]
"Oh, yes," said he, with a smile; "Monte Cristo, and all that sort of
thing. Your notion is a perfectly natural one, but I assure you, Mr.
Randolph, that it is founded upon a mistake. Over and over and over again
I have amassed wealth; but I have not been able to retain it permanently,
and often I have suffered for the very necessaries of life. I have been
hungry, knowing that I could never starve. The explanation of this state
of things is simple enough: I would trade; I would speculate; I would
marry an heiress; I would become rich; for many years I would enjoy my
possessions. Then the time would come when people said: 'Who owns these
houses?' 'To whom belongs this money in the banks?' 'These properties were
purchased in our great-grandfathers' times; the accounts in the banks were
opened long before our oldest citizens were born. Who is it who is making
out leases and drawing checks?' I have employed all sorts of subterfuges
in order to retain my property, but I have always found that to prove my
continued identity I should have to acknowledge my immortality; and in
that case, of course, I should have been adjudged a lunatic, and
everything would have been taken from me. So I generally managed, before
the time arrived when it was actually necessary for me to do so, to turn
my property, as far as possible, into money, and establish myself in some
other place as a stranger. But there were times when I was obliged to
hurry from my home and take nothing with me. Then I knew misery.
"It was during the period of one of my greatest depressions that I met
with a monk who was afterward St. Bruno, and I joined the Carthusian
monastery which he founded in Calabria. In the midst of their asceticism,
their seclusion, and their silence I hoped that I might be asked no
questions, and need tell no lies; I hoped that I might be allowed to live
as long as I pleased without disturbance; but I found no such immunity.
When Bruno died, and his successor had followed him into the grave, it was
proposed that I should be the next prior; but this would not have suited
me at all. I had employed all my time in engrossing books, but the duties
of a prior were not for me, so I escaped, and went out into the world
again."
As I sat and listened to Mr. Crowder, his story seemed equally wonderful
to me, whether it were a plain statement of facts or the relation of an
insane dream. It was not a wild tale, uttered in the enthusiastic
excitement of a disordered mind; but it was a series of reminiscences,
told quietly and calmly, here a little, there a little, without
chronological order, each one touched upon as it happened to suggest
itself. From wondering I found myself every now and then believing: but
whenever I realized the folly in which I was indulging myself, I shook
off my credulity and endeavored to listen with interest, but without
judgment, for in this way only could I most thoroughly enjoy the
strange narrative; but my lapses into unconscious belief were frequent.
"You have spoken of marriage," said I. "Have you had many wives?"
My host leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling. "That is a
subject," he said, "of which I think as little as I can, and yet I must
speak to you of it. It is right that I should do so. I have been married
so often that I can scarcely count the wives I have had. Beautiful women,
good women, some of them women to whom I would have given immortality had
I been able; but they died, and died, and died. And here is one of the
great drawbacks of living forever.
"Yet it was not always the death of my wives which saddened me the most;
it was their power of growing old. I would marry a young woman, beautiful,
charming. You need not be surprised that I was able to do this, for in all
ages woman has been in the habit of disregarding the years of man, and
I have always had a youthful spirit; I think it is Daudet who says that
the most dangerous lover is the man of fifty-three. I would live happily
with a wife; she would gradually grow to be the same age as myself; and
then she would become older and older, and I did not. As I have said,
there were women to whom I would have given immortality if I could; but
I will add that there have been times when I would have given up my own
immortality to be able to pass gently into old age with a beloved wife.
"You will want to know if I have had descendants. They exist by the
thousand; but if you ask me where they are, I must tell you that I do
not know. I now have but one child, a little girl who is asleep
up-stairs. I have gathered around me families of sons and daughters;
they have grown up, married, and my grandchildren have sat upon my knees.
Sometimes, at long intervals, I have known great-grandchildren. But when
my sons and daughters have grown gray and gone to their graves, I have
withdrawn myself from the younger people,--some of whom were not
acquainted with me, others even had never heard of me,--and then by the
next generation the old ancestor, if remembered at all, was connected
only with the distant past. And so family after family have melted into
the great mass of human beings, and are as completely lost as though they
were water thrown into the sea.
"I have always been fond of beautiful women, and as you have met Mrs.
Crowder, you know that my disposition has not changed. Sarah, the wife
of Abraham, was considered a woman of great beauty in her day, and the
fame of her charms continues; but I assure you that if she lived now her
attractions would not have given her husband so much trouble. I saw a
good deal of Sarah when I visited Abraham with my master Alexander, and
I have seen many more beautiful women since that time. Hagar was a fine
woman, but she was too dark, and her face had an anxious expression which
interfered with her beauty."
"Was Hagar really the wife of Abraham," I asked, "as the Mussulmans say,
and was Ishmael considered his heir?"
"When I saw them," my host continued, "the two women seemed as friendly
as sisters, and Isaac was not yet born. At that time it was considered,
of course, that Ishmael was Abraham's heir. Certainly he was a much finer
man than Isaac, with whom I became acquainted a long time afterward. There
were some very beautiful women at the court of Solomon. One of these was
Balkis, the famous Queen of Sheba."
"Did you ever meet Cleopatra?" I interrupted.
"I never saw her," was the answer, "but, from what I have heard, I do
not think I should have cared for her if I had seen her asleep. What might
have happened had I seen her awake is quite another matter. I have noticed
that women grow more beautiful as the world grows older, and men grow
taller and better developed. You would consider me, I think, a man of
average size; but I tell you that in my early life I was exceptionally
tall, and I have no doubt it was my stature and presence to which
I largely owed my preferment at the court of Alexander. I was living in
Spain toward the close of the tenth century, when I married the daughter
of an Arabian physician, who was a wonderfully beautiful woman. She was
not dark, like the ordinary Moorish women. In feature and form she
surpassed any creation of the Greek sculptors, and I have been in many of
their workshops, and have seen their models. This lady lived longer than
any other wife I had. She lived so long, in fact, that when we left
Cordova we both thought it well that she should pass as my mother. She was
one of the few wives to whom I told my story. It did not shock her, for
she believed her father to be a miracle-worker, and she had faith in many
strange things. Her great desire was to live as long as I should, and
I think she believed that this might happen. She died at the age of one
hundred and fifteen, and was lively and animated to the very last.
My first American wife was a fine woman, too. She was a French creole, and
died fifteen years ago. We had no children."
[Illustration: "'WHEN WE LEFT CORDOVA.'"]
"It strikes me," I said suddenly, "that you must understand a great many
languages--you speak so much of living with people of different nations."
"It would be impossible," he answered, "unless I were void of ordinary
intelligence, to live as long as I have, and not become a general
linguist. Of course I had to learn the languages of the countries
I visited, and as I was always a student, it delighted me to do so. In
fact, I not only studied, but I wrote. When the Alexandrian library was
destroyed, fourteen of my books were burned. When I was in Italy with my
first American wife, I visited the museum at Naples, and in the room
where the experts were unrolling the papyri found in Pompeii, I looked
over the shoulder of one of them, and, to my amazement, found that one of
the rolls was an account-book of my own. I had been a broker in Pompeii,
and these were the records of moneys I had loaned, on interest, to various
merchants and tradespeople. I was always fond of dealing in money, and at
present I am a broker in Wall street. During the first crusades I was a
banker in Genoa, and lent large sums to the noble knights who were setting
forth for Jerusalem."
[Illustration: "'I HAD BEEN A BROKER IN POMPEII.'"]
[Illustration: "'I LENT LARGE SUMS TO THE NOBLE KNIGHTS.'"]
"Was much of it repaid?" I asked.
"Most of it. The loans were almost always secured by good property. As
I look back upon the vast panorama of my life," my host continued, after
a pause, "I most pleasantly recall my various intimacies with learned
men, and my own studies and researches; but in the great company of men
of knowledge whom I have known, there was not one in whom I was so much
interested as in King Solomon. I visited his court because I greatly
wished to know a man who knew so much. It was not difficult to obtain
access to him, for I came as a stranger from Ethiopia, to the east of
Ethiopia, to the east of the Red Sea, and the king was always anxious
to see intelligent people from foreign parts. I was able to tell him a
good deal which he did not know, and he became fond of my society.
"I found Solomon a very well-informed man. He had not read and studied
books as much as I had, and he had not had my advantages of direct
intercourse with learned men; but he was a most earnest and indefatigable
student of nature. I believe he knew more about natural history than any
human being then living, or who had preceded him. Whenever it was
possible for him to do so, he studied animal nature from the living
model, and all the beasts, birds, and fishes which it was possible for
him to obtain alive were quartered in the grounds of his palace. In a
certain way he was an animal-tamer. You may well imagine that this great
king's wonderful possessions, as well as the man himself, were the source
of continual delight to me.
"The time-honored story of Solomon's carpet on which he mounted and was
wafted away to any place, with his retinue, had a good deal of foundation
in fact; for Solomon was an exceedingly ingenious man, and not only
constructed parachutes by which people could safely descend from great
heights, but he made some attempts in the direction of ballooning.
I have seen small bags of thin silk, covered with a fine varnish made of
gum to render them air-tight, which, being inflated with hot air and
properly ballasted, rose high above the earth, and were wafted out of
sight by the wind. Many people supposed that in the course of time
Solomon would be able to travel through the air, and from this idea was
derived the tradition that he really did so.
"Another of the interesting legends regarding King Solomon concerned his
dominion over the Jinns. These people, of whom so much has been written
and handed down by word of mouth, and who were supposed by subsequent
generations to be a race of servile demons, were, in reality, savage
natives of surrounding countries, who were forced by the king to work on
his great buildings and other enterprises, and who occupied very much the
position of the coolies of the present day. But that story of the dead
Solomon and the Jinns who were at work on the temple gives a good idea of
one of the most important characteristics of this great ruler. He was a
man who gave personal attention to all his affairs, and was in the habit
of overseeing the laborers on his public works. Do you remember the story
to which I refer?"
I was obliged to say that I did not think I had ever heard it.
"The story runs thus," said my host: "The Jinns were at work building
the temple, and Solomon, according to his custom, overlooked them daily.
At the time when the temple was nearly completed Solomon felt that his
strength was passing from him, and that he would not have much longer to
live. This greatly troubled him, for he knew that when the Jinns should
find that his watchful eye would be no more upon them, they would rebel
and refuse to work, and the temple would not be finished during his
reign. Therefore, as the story runs, he came, one day, into the temple,
and hoped that he might be enabled to remain there until the great
edifice should be finished. He stood leaning on his staff, and the Jinns,
when they beheld their master, continued to work, and work, and work. When
night came Solomon still remained standing in his accustomed place, and
the Jinns worked on, afraid to cease their toil for a moment.
[Illustration: SOLOMON AND THE JINNS.]