moment I found it inspire me. I made my plans before I started, how to
steal along under the cover of the blighted brushwood which broke the
line of the valley here and there. I set out only after long thought,
seizing the moment when the vaguely perceived band were scouring in the
other direction intercepting the travellers. Thus, with many pauses, I
got near to the pit’s mouth in safety. But my curiosity was as great as,
almost greater than, my terror. I had kept far from the road, dragging
myself sometimes on hands and feet over broken ground, tearing my
clothes and my flesh upon the thorns; and on that farther side all
seemed so silent and so dark in the shadow cast by some disused
machinery, behind which the glare of the fire from below blazed upon the
other side of the opening, that I could not crawl along in the darkness,
and pass, which would have been the safe way; but with a breathless hot
desire to see and know, dragged myself to the very edge to look down.
Though I was in the shadow, my eyes were nearly put out by the glare on
which I gazed. It was not fire; it was the lurid glow of the gold,
glowing like flame, at which countless miners were working. They were
all about like flies, some on their knees, some bent double as they
stooped over their work, some lying cramped upon shelves and ledges. The
sight was wonderful, and terrible beyond description. The workmen seemed
to consume away with the heat and the glow, even in the few minutes I
gazed. Their eyes shrank into their heads, their faces blackened. I
could see some trying to secrete morsels of the glowing metal, which
burned whatever it touched, and some who were being searched by the
superiors of the mines, and some who were punishing the offenders,
fixing them up against the blazing wall of gold. The fear went out of my
mind, so much absorbed was I in this sight. I gazed, seeing farther and
farther every moment, into crevices and seams of the glowing metal,
always with more and more slaves at work, and the entire pantomime of
labour and theft, and search and punishment, going on and on--the baked
faces dark against the golden glare, the hot eyes taking a yellow
reflection, the monotonous clamour of pick and shovel, and cries and
curses, and all the indistinguishable sound of a multitude of human
creatures. And the floor below, and the low roof which overhung whole
myriads within a few inches of their faces, and the irregular walls all
breached and shelved, were every one the same, a pandemonium of
gold,--gold everywhere. I had loved many foolish things in my life, but
never this: which was perhaps why I gazed and kept my sight, though
there rose out of it a blast of heat which scorched the brain.
While I stooped over, intent on the sight, some one who had come up by
my side to gaze too was caught by the fumes (as I suppose); for suddenly
I was aware of a dark object falling prone into the glowing interior
with a cry and crash which brought back my first wild panic. He fell in
a heap, from which his arms shot forth wildly as he reached the bottom,
and his cry was half anguish yet half desire. I saw him seized by half a
dozen eager watchers, and pitched upon a ledge just under the roof, and
tools thrust into his hands. I held on by an old shaft, trembling,
unable to move. Perhaps I cried too in my horror--for one of the
overseers who stood in the centre of the glare looked up. He had the air
of ordering all that was going on, and stood unaffected by the blaze,
commanding the other wretched officials, who obeyed him like dogs. He
seemed to me, in my terror, like a figure of gold, the image, perhaps,
of wealth or Pluto, or I know not what: for I suppose my brain began to
grow confused, and my hold on the shaft to relax. I had strength enough,
however, for I cared not for the gold, to fling myself back the other
way upon the ground, where I rolled backward, downward, I knew not how,
turning over and over, upon sharp ashes and metallic edges, which tore
my hair and beard,--and for a moment I knew no more.
This fall saved me. I came to myself after a time, and heard the
pressgang searching about. I had sense to lie still among the ashes
thrown up out of the pit, while I heard their voices. Once I gave myself
up for lost. The glitter of a lantern flashed in my eyes, a foot passed,
crashing among the ashes so close to my cheek that the shoe grazed it. I
found the mark after, burned upon my flesh: but I escaped notice by a
miracle. And presently I was able to drag myself up and crawl away. But
how I reached the end of the valley I cannot tell. I pushed my way along
mechanically on the dark side. I had no further desire to see what was
going on in the openings of the mines. I went on, stumbling and stupid,
scarcely capable even of fear, conscious only of wretchedness and
weariness, till at last I felt myself drop across the road within the
gateway of the other town--and lay there, with no thought of anything
but the relief of being at rest.
When I came to myself, it seemed to me that there was a change in the
atmosphere and the light. It was less lurid, paler, gray, more like
twilight than the stormy afternoon of the other city. A certain dead
serenity was in the sky--a black paleness, whiteness, everything faint
in it. This town was walled, but the gates stood open, and I saw no
defences of troops or other guardians. I found myself lying across the
threshold, but pushed to one side, so that the carriages which went and
came should not be stopped or I injured by their passage. It seemed to
me that there was some thoughtfulness and kindness in this action, and
my heart sprang up in a reaction of hope. I looked back as if upon a
nightmare on the dreadful city which I had left, on its tumults and
noise, the wild racket of the streets, the wounded wretches who sought
refuge in the corners, the strife and misery that were abroad, and,
climax of all, the horrible entertainment which had been going on in the
square, the unhappy being strapped upon the table. How, I said to
myself, could such things be? Was it a dream? was it a nightmare? was it
something presented to me in a vision--a strong delusion to make me
think that the old fables which had been told concerning the end of
mortal life were true? When I looked back it appeared like an allegory,
so that I might have seen it in a dream; and still more like an allegory
were the gold-mines in the valley, and the myriads who laboured there.
Was it all true? or only a reflection from the old life, mingling with
the strange novelties which would most likely elude understanding, on
the entrance into this new? I sat within the shelter of the gateway, on
my awakening, and thought over all this. My heart was quite
calm--almost, in the revulsion from the terrors I had been through,
happy. I persuaded myself that I was but now beginning; that there had
been no reality in these latter experiences, only a curious succession
of nightmares, such as might so well be supposed to follow a wonderful
transformation like that which must take place between our mortal life
and--the world to come. The world to come! I paused and thought of it
all, until the heart began to beat loud in my breast. What was this,
where I lay? Another world; a world which was not happiness, not bliss?
Oh no--perhaps there was no world of bliss save in dreams. This, on the
other hand, I said to myself, was not misery: for was not I seated here,
with a certain tremulousness about me, it was true, after all the
experiences which, supposing them even to have been but dreams, I had
come through,--a tremulousness very comprehensible, and not at all
without hope?
I will not say that I believed even what I tried to think. Something in
me lay like a dark shadow in the midst of all my theories; but yet I
succeeded to a great degree in convincing myself that the hope in me was
real, and that I was but now beginning--beginning, with at least a
possibility that all might be well. In this half conviction, and after
all the troubles that were over (even though they might only have been
imaginary troubles), I felt a certain sweetness in resting there,
within the gateway, with my back against it. I was unwilling to get up
again, and bring myself in contact with reality. I felt that there was
pleasure in being left alone. Carriages rolled past me occasionally, and
now and then some people on foot; but they did not kick me out of the
way or interfere with my repose.
Presently as I sat trying to persuade myself to rise and pursue my way,
two men came up to me in a sort of uniform. I recognised with another
distinct sensation of pleasure that here were people who had authority,
representatives of some kind of government. They came up to me and bade
me come with them in tones which were peremptory enough; but what of
that?--better the most peremptory supervision than the lawlessness from
which I had come. They raised me from the ground with a touch, for I
could not resist them, and led me quickly along the street, into which
that gateway gave access, which was a handsome street with tall houses
on either side. Groups of people were moving about along the pavement,
talking now and then with considerable animation; but when my companions
were seen, there was an immediate moderation of tone, a sort of respect
which looked like fear. There was no brawling nor tumult of any kind in
the street. The only incident that occurred was this: when we had gone
some way, I saw a lame man dragging himself along with difficulty on the
other side of the street. My conductors had no sooner perceived him than
they gave each other a look and darted across, conveying me with them,
by a sweep of magnetic influence, I thought, that prevented me from
staying behind. He made an attempt with his crutches to get out of the
way, hurrying on--and I will allow that this attempt of his seemed to me
very grotesque, so that I could scarcely help laughing: the other
lookers-on in the street laughed too, though some put on an aspect of
disgust. ‘Look, the tortoise!’ some one said; ‘does he think he can go
quicker than the orderlies?’ My companions came up to the man while this
commentary was going on, and seized him by each arm. ‘Where were you
going? Where have you come from? How dare you make an exhibition of
yourself?’ they cried. They took the crutches from him as they spoke and
threw them away, and dragged him on until we reached a great grated door
which one of them opened with a key, while the other held the offender,
for he seemed an offender, roughly up by one shoulder causing him great
pain. When the door was opened, I saw a number of people within, who
seemed to crowd to the door as if seeking to get out. But this was not
at all what was intended. My second companion dragged the lame man
forward, and pushed him in with so much violence that I could see him
fall forward on his face on the floor. Then the other locked the door,
and we proceeded on our way. It was not till some time later that I
understood why.
In the meantime I was hurried on, meeting a great many people who took
no notice of me, to a central building in the middle of the town, where
I was brought before an official attended by clerks, with great books
spread out before him. Here I was questioned as to my name and my
antecedents, and the time of my arrival, then dismissed with a nod to
one of my conductors. He led me back again down the street, took me into
one of the tall great houses, opened the door of a room which was
numbered, and left me there without a word. I cannot convey to any one
the bewildered consternation with which I felt myself deposited here;
and as the steps of my conductor died away in the long corridor, I sat
down, and looking myself in the face, as it were, tried to make out what
it was that had happened to me. The room was small and bare. There was
but one thing hung upon the undecorated walls, and that was a long list
of printed regulations which I had not the courage for the moment to
look at. The light was indifferent, though the room was high up, and the
street from the window looked far away below. I cannot tell how long I
sat there thinking, and yet it could scarcely be called thought. I asked
myself over and over again, Where am I? is it a prison? am I shut in, to
leave this enclosure no more? what am I to do? how is the time to pass?
I shut my eyes for a moment and tried to realise all that had happened
to me; but nothing save a whirl through my head of disconnected thoughts
seemed possible, and some force was upon me to open my eyes again, to
see the blank room, the dull light, the vacancy round me in which there
was nothing to interest the mind, nothing to please the eye, a blank
wherever I turned. Presently there came upon me a burning regret for
everything I had left, for the noisy town with all its tumults and
cruelties, for the dark valley with all its dangers. Everything seemed
bearable, almost agreeable, in comparison with this. I seemed to have
been brought here to make acquaintance once more with myself, to learn
over again what manner of man I was. Needless knowledge, acquaintance
unnecessary, unhappy! for what was there in me to make me to myself a
good companion? Never, I knew, could I separate myself from that eternal
consciousness; but it was cruelty to force the contemplation upon me.
All blank, blank, around me, a prison! And was this to last for ever?
I do not know how long I sat, rapt in this gloomy vision; but at last it
occurred to me to rise and try the door, which to my astonishment was
open. I went out with a throb of new hope. After all, it might not be
necessary to come back; there might be other expedients: I might fall
among friends. I turned down the long echoing stairs, on which I met
various people, who took no notice of me, and in whom I felt no
interest save a desire to avoid them, and at last reached the street. To
be out of doors in the air was something, though there was no wind, but
a motionless still atmosphere which nothing disturbed. The streets,
indeed, were full of movement, but not of life--though this seems a
paradox. The passengers passed on their way in long regulated
lines--those who went towards the gates keeping rigorously to one side
of the pavement, those who came, to the other. They talked to each other
here and there; but whenever two men in uniform, such as those who had
been my conductors, appeared, silence ensued, and the wayfarers shrank
even from the looks of these persons in authority. I walked all about
the spacious town. Everywhere there were tall houses, everywhere streams
of people coming and going, but no one spoke to me, or remarked me at
all. I was as lonely as if I had been in a wilderness. I was indeed in a
wilderness of men, who were as though they did not see me, passing
without even a look of human fellowship; each absorbed in his own
concerns. I walked and walked till my limbs trembled under me, from one
end to another of the great streets, up and down, and round and round.
But no one said, How are you? Whence come you? What are you doing? At
length in despair I turned again to the blank and miserable room, which
had looked to me like a cell in a prison. I had wilfully made no note of
its situation, trying to avoid rather than to find it, but my steps were
drawn thither against my will. I found myself retracing my steps,
mounting the long stairs, passing the same people, who streamed along
with no recognition of me, as I desired nothing to do with them; and at
last found myself within the same four blank walls as before.
Soon after I returned I became conscious of measured steps passing the
door, and of an eye upon me. I can say no more than this. From what
point it was that I was inspected I cannot tell; but that I was
inspected, closely scrutinised by some one, and that not only
externally, but by a cold observation that went through and through me,
I knew and felt beyond any possibility of mistake. This recurred from
time to time, horribly, at uncertain moments, so that I never felt
myself secure from it. I knew when the watcher was coming by tremors and
shiverings through all my being: and no sensation so unsupportable has
it ever been mine to bear. How much that is to say, no one can tell who
has not gone through those regions of darkness, and learned what is in
all their abysses. I tried at first to hide, to fling myself on the
floor, to cover my face, to burrow in a dark corner. Useless attempts!
The eyes that looked in upon me had powers beyond my powers. I felt
sometimes conscious of the derisive smile with which my miserable
subterfuges were regarded. They were all in vain.
And what was still more strange was that I had not energy to think of
attempting any escape. My steps, though watched, were not restrained in
any way, so far as I was aware. The gates of the city stood open on all
sides, free to those who went as well as to those who came; but I did
not think of flight. Of flight! Whence should I go from myself? Though
that horrible inspection was from the eyes of some unseen being, it was
in some mysterious way connected with my own thinking and reflections,
so that the thought came ever more and more strongly upon me, that from
myself I could never escape. And that reflection took all energy, all
impulse from me. I might have gone away when I pleased, beyond reach of
the authority which regulated everything,--how one should walk, where
one should live,--but never from my own consciousness. On the other side
of the town lay a great plain, traversed by roads on every side. There
was no reason why I should not continue my journey there. But I did
not. I had no wish nor any power in me to go away.
In one of my long, dreary, companionless walks, unshared by any human
fellowship, I saw at last a face which I remembered; it was that of the
cynical spectator who had spoken to me in the noisy street in the midst
of my early experiences. He gave a glance round him to see that there
were no officials in sight, then left the file in which he was walking,
and joined me. ‘Ah!’ he said, ‘you are here already,’ with the same
derisive smile with which he had before regarded me. I hated the man and
his sneer, yet that he should speak to me was something, almost a
pleasure.
‘Yes,’ said I, ‘I am here.’ Then, after a pause, in which I did not know
what to say--‘It is quiet here,’ I said.
‘Quiet enough. Do you like it better for that? To do whatever you please
with no one to interfere; or to do nothing you please, but as you are
forced to do it,--which do you think is best?’
I felt myself instinctively glance round, as he had done, to make sure
that no one was in sight. Then I answered, faltering, ‘I have always
held that law and order were necessary things; and the lawlessness of
that--that place--I don’t know its name--if there is such a place,’ I
cried, ‘I thought it was a dream.’
He laughed in his mocking way. ‘Perhaps it is all a dream--who knows?’
he said.
‘Sir,’ said I, ‘you have been longer here than I----’
‘Oh,’ cried he, with a laugh that was dry and jarred upon the air almost
like a shriek, ‘since before your forefathers were born!’ It seemed to
me that he spoke like one who, out of bitterness and despite, made every
darkness blacker still. A kind of madman in his way; for what was this
claim of age?--a piece of bravado, no doubt, like the rest.
‘That is strange,’ I said, assenting, as when there is such a
hallucination it is best to do. ‘You can tell me, then, whence all this
authority comes, and why we are obliged to obey.’
He looked at me as if he were thinking in his mind how to hurt me most.
Then, with that dry laugh, ‘We make trial of all things in this world,’
he said, ‘to see if perhaps we can find something we shall
like--discipline here, freedom in the other place. When you have gone
all the round like me, then, perhaps, you will be able to choose.’
‘Have you chosen?’ I asked.
He only answered with a laugh. ‘Come,’ he said, ‘there is amusement to
be had too, and that of the most elevated kind. We make researches here
into the moral nature of man. Will you come? But you must take the
risk,’ he added, with a smile which afterwards I understood.
We went on together after this till we reached the centre of the place,
in which stood an immense building with a dome, which dominated the
city, and into a great hall in the centre of that, where a crowd of
people were assembled. The sound of human speech, which murmured all
around, brought new life to my heart. And as I gazed at a curious
apparatus erected on a platform, several people spoke to me.
‘We have again,’ said one, ‘the old subject to-day.’
‘Is it something about the constitution of the place?’ I asked, in the
bewilderment of my mind.
My neighbours looked at me with alarm, glancing behind them to see what
officials might be near.
‘The constitution of the place is the result of the sense of the
inhabitants that order must be preserved,’ said the one who had spoken
to me first. ‘The lawless can find refuge in other places. Here we have
chosen to have supervision, nuisances removed, and order kept. That is
enough. The constitution is not under discussion.’
‘But man is,’ said a second speaker. ‘Let us keep to that in which we
can mend nothing. Sir, you may have to contribute your quota to our
enlightenment. We are investigating the rise of thought. You are a
stranger; you may be able to help us.’
‘I am no philosopher,’ I said, with a panic which I could not explain to
myself.
‘That does not matter. You are a fresh subject.’ The speaker made a
slight movement with his hand, and I turned round to escape in wild,
sudden fright, though I had no conception what could be done to me. But
the crowd had pressed close round me, hemming me in on every side. I was
so wildly alarmed that I struggled among them, pushing backwards with
all my force, and clearing a space round me with my arms. But my efforts
were vain. Two of the officers suddenly appeared out of the crowd, and
seizing me by the arms, forced me forward. The throng dispersed before
them on either side, and I was half dragged, half lifted up upon the
platform, where stood the strange apparatus which I had contemplated
with a dull wonder when I came into the hall. My wonder did not last
long. I felt myself fixed in it, standing supported in that position by
bands and springs, so that no effort of mine was necessary to hold
myself up, and none possible to release myself. I was caught by every
joint, sustained, supported, exposed to the gaze of what seemed a world
of upturned faces: among which I saw, with a sneer upon it, keeping a
little behind the crowd, the face of the man who had led me here. Above
my head was a strong light, more brilliant than anything I had ever
seen, and which blazed upon my brain till the hair seemed to singe and
the skin shrink. I hope I may never feel such a sensation again. The
pitiless light went into me like a knife; but even my cries were stopped
by the framework in which I was bound. I could breathe and suffer, but
that was all.
Then some one got up on the platform above me and began to speak. He
said, so far as I could comprehend in the anguish and torture in which
I was held, that the origin of thought was the question he was
investigating, but that in every previous subject the confusion of ideas
had bewildered them, and the rapidity with which one followed another.
‘The present example has been found to exhibit great persistency of
idea,’ he said. ‘We hope that by his means some clearer theory may be
arrived at.’ Then he pulled over me a great movable lens as of a
microscope, which concentrated the insupportable light. The wild,
hopeless passion that raged within my soul had no outlet in the
immovable apparatus that held me. I was let down among the crowd, and
exhibited to them, every secret movement of my being, by some awful
process which I have never fathomed. A burning fire was in my brain,
flame seemed to run along all my nerves, speechless, horrible,
incommunicable fury raged in my soul. But I was like a child--nay, like
an image of wood or wax in the pitiless hands that held me. What was
the cut of a surgeon’s knife to this? And I had thought _that_ cruel!
And I was powerless, and could do nothing--to blast, to destroy, to burn
with this same horrible flame the fiends that surrounded me, as I
desired to do.
Suddenly, in the raging fever of my thoughts, there surged up the
recollection of that word which had paralysed all around, and myself
with them. The thought that I must share the anguish did not restrain me
from my revenge. With a tremendous effort I got my voice, though the
instrument pressed upon my lips. I know not what I articulated save
‘God,’ whether it was a curse or a blessing. I had been swung out into
the middle of the hall, and hung amid the crowd, exposed to all their
observations, when I succeeded in gaining utterance. My God! my God!
Another moment and I had forgotten them and all my fury in the tortures
that arose within myself. What, then, was the light that racked my
brain? Once more my life from its beginning to its end rose up before
me--each scene like a spectre, like the harpies of the old fables
rending me with tooth and claw. Once more I saw what might have been,
the noble things I might have done, the happiness I had lost, the
turnings of the fated road which I might have taken,--everything that
was once so possible, so possible, so easy! but now possible no more. My
anguish was immeasurable; I turned and wrenched myself, in the strength
of pain, out of the machinery that held me, and fell down, down among
all the curses that were being hurled at me--among the horrible and
miserable crowd. I had brought upon them the evil which I shared, and
they fell upon me with a fury which was like that which had prompted
myself a few minutes before. But they could do nothing to me so
tremendous as the vengeance I had taken upon them. I was too miserable
to feel the blows that rained upon me, but presently I suppose I lost
consciousness altogether, being almost torn to pieces by the multitude.