I was rowing on the Thames not many days after my return from the Yann
and drifting eastwards with the fall of the tide away from Westminster
Bridge, near which I had hired my boat. All kinds of things were on
the water with me--sticks drifting, and huge boats--and I was
watching, so absorbed the traffic of that great river that I did not
notice I had come to the City until I looked up and saw that part of
the Embankment that is nearest to Go-by Street. And then I suddenly
wondered what befell Singanee, for there was a stillness about his
ivory palace when I passed it by, which made me think that he had not
then returned. And though I had seen him go forth with his terrific
spear, and mighty elephant-hunter though he was, yet his was a fearful
quest for I knew that it was none other than to avenge Perdóndaris by
slaying that monster with the single tusk who had overthrown it
suddenly in a day. So I tied up my boat as soon as I came to some
steps, and landed and left the Embankment, and about the third street
I came to I began to look for the opening of Go-by Street; it is very
narrow, you hardly notice it at first, but there it was, and soon I
was in the old man's shop. But a young man leaned over the counter.
He had no information to give me about the old man--he was sufficient
in himself. As to the little old door in the back of the shop, "We
know nothing about that, sir." So I had to talk to him and humour
him. He had for sale on the counter an instrument for picking up a
lump of sugar in a new way. He was pleased when I looked at it and he
began to praise it. I asked him what was the use of it, and he said
that it was of no use but that it had only been invented a week ago
and was quite new and was made of real silver and was being very much
bought. But all the while I was straying towards the back of the
shop. When I enquired about the idols there he said that they were
some of the season's novelties and were a choice selection of mascots;
and while I made a pretence of selecting one I suddenly saw the
wonderful old door. I was through it at once and the young
shop-keeper after me. No one was more surprised than he when he saw
the street of grass and the purple flowers on it; he ran across in his
frock-coat on to the opposite pavement and only just stopped in time,
for the world ended there. Looking downward over the pavement's edge
he saw, instead of accustomed kitchen-windows, white clouds and a
wide, blue sky. I led him to the old back door of the shop, looking
pale and in need of air, and pushed him lightly and he went limply
through, for I thought the air was better for him on the side of the
street that he knew. As soon as the door was shut on that astonished
man I turned to the right and went along the street till I saw the
gardens and the cottages, and a little red patch moving in a garden,
which I knew to be the old witch wearing her shawl.
"Come for a change of illusion again?" she said.
"I have come from London," I said. "And I want to see Singanee. I
want to go to his ivory palace over the elfin mountains where the
amethyst precipice is."
"Nothing like changing your illusions," she said, "or you grow tired.
London's a fine place but one wants to see the elfin mountains
sometimes."
"Then you know London?" I said.
"Of course I do," she said. "I can dream as well as you. You are not
the only person that can imagine London." Men were toiling dreadfully
in her garden; it was in the heat of the day and they were digging
with spades; she suddenly turned from me to beat one of them over the
back with a long black stick that she carried. "Even my poets go to
London sometimes," she said to me.
"Why did you beat that man?" I said.
"To make him work," she answered.
"But he is tired," I said.
"Of course he is," said she.
And I looked and saw that the earth was difficult and dry and that
every spadeful that the tired men lifted was full of pearls; but some
men sat quite still and watched the butterflies that flitted about the
garden and the old witch did not beat them with her stick. And when I
asked her who the diggers were she said, "These are my poets, they are
digging for pearls." And when I asked her what so many pearls were
for she said to me: "To feed the pigs of course."
"But do the pigs like pearls?" I said to her.
"Of course they don't," she said. And I would have pressed the matter
further but the old black cat had come out of the cottage and was
looking at me whimsically and saying nothing so that I knew I was
asking silly questions. And I asked instead why some of the poets
were idle and were watching butterflies without being beaten. And she
said: "The butterflies know where the pearls are hidden and they are
waiting for one to alight above the buried treasure. They cannot dig
until they know where to dig." And all of a sudden a faun came out of
a rhododendron forest and began to dance upon a disk of bronze in
which a fountain was set; and the sound of his two hooves dancing on
the bronze was beautiful as bells.
"Tea-bell," said the witch; and all the poets threw down their spades
and followed her into the house, and I followed them; but the witch
and all of us followed the black cat, who arched his back and lifted
his tail and walked along the garden-path of blue enamelled tiles and
through the black-thatched porch and the open, oaken door and into a
little room where tea was ready. And in the garden the flowers began
to sing and the fountain tinkled on the disk of bronze. And I learned
that the fountain came from an otherwise unknown sea, and sometimes it
threw gilded fragments up from the wrecks of unheard-of galleons,
foundered in storms of some sea that was nowhere in the world; or
battered to bits in wars waged with we know not whom. Some said that
it was salt because of the sea and others that it was salt with
mariners' tears. And some of the poets took large flowers out of
vases and threw their petals all about the room, and others talked two
at a time and other sang. "Why they are only children after all," I
said.
"Only children!" repeated the old witch who was pouring out cowslip
wine.
_"Only_ children," said the old black cat. And every one laughed at
me.
"I sincerely apologize," I said. "I did not mean to say it. I did
not intend to insult any one."
"Why he knows nothing at all," said the old black cat. And everybody
laughed till the poets were put to bed.
And then I took one look at the fields we know, and turned to the
other window that looks on the elfin mountains. And the evening
looked like a sapphire. And I saw my way though the fields were
growing dim, and when I found it I went downstairs and through the
witch's parlour, and out of doors and came that night to the palace of
Singanee.
Lights glittered through every crystal slab--and all were
uncurtained--in the palace of ivory. The sounds were those of a
triumphant dance. Very haunting indeed was the booming of a bassoon,
and like the dangerous advance of some galloping beast were the blows
wielded by a powerful man on the huge, sonourous drum. It seemed to
me as I listened that the contest of Singanee with the more than
elephantine destroyer of Perdóndaris had already been set to music.
And as I walked in the dark along the amethyst precipice I suddenly
saw across it a curved white bridge. It was one ivory tusk. And I
knew it for the triumph of Singanee. I knew at once that this curved
mass of ivory that had been dragged by ropes to bridge the abyss was
the twin of the ivory gate that once Perdóndaris had, and had itself
been the destruction of that once famous city--towers and walls and
people. Already men had begun to hollow it and to carve human figures
life-size along its sides. I walked across it; and half way across,
at the bottom of the curve, I met a few of the carvers fast asleep. On
the opposite cliff by the palace lay the thickest end of the tusk and
I came down a ladder which leaned against the tusk for they had not
yet carved steps.
Outside the ivory palace it was as I had supposed and the sentry at
the gate slept heavily; and though I asked of him permission to enter
the palace he only muttered a blessing on Singanee and fell asleep
again. It was evident that he had been drinking bak. Inside the ivory
hall I met with servitors who told me that any stranger was welcome
there that night, because they extolled the triumph of Singanee. And
they offered me bak to drink to commemorate the splendour but I did
not know its power nor whether a little or much prevailed over a man
so I said that I was under an oath to a god to drink nothing
beautiful; and they asked me if he could not be appeased by a prayer,
and I said, "In nowise," and went towards the dance; and they
commiserated me and abused that god bitterly, thinking to please me
thereby, and then they fell to drinking bak to the glory of Singanee.
Outside the curtains that hung before the dance there stood a
chamberlain and when I told him that though a stranger there, yet I
was well known to Mung and Sish and Kib, the gods of Pegana, whose
signs I made, he bade me ample welcome. Therefore I questioned him
about my clothes asking if they were not unsuitable to so august an
occasion and he swore by the spear that had slain the destroyer of
Perdóndaris that Singanee would think it a shameful thing that any
stranger not unknown to the gods should enter the dancing hall
unsuitably clad; and therefore he led me to another room and took
silken robes out of an old sea-chest of black and seamy oak with green
copper hasps that were set with a few pale sapphires, and requested me
to choose a suitable robe. And I chose a bright green robe, with an
under-robe of light blue which was seen here and there, and a light
blue sword-belt. I also wore a cloak that was dark purple with two
thin strips of dark-blue along the border and a row of large dark
sapphires sewn along the purple between them; it hung down from my
shoulders behind me. Nor would the chamberlain of Singanee let me
take any less than this, for he said that not even a stranger, on that
night, could be allowed to stand in the way of his master's
munificence which he was pleased to exercise in honour of his victory.
As soon as I was attired we went to the dancing hall and the first
thing that I saw in that tall, scintillant chamber was the huge form
of Singanee standing among the dancers and the heads of the men no
higher than his waist. Bare were the huge arms that had held the
spear that had avenged Perdóndaris. The chamberlain led me to him and
I bowed, and said that I gave thanks to the gods to whom he looked for
protection; and he said that he had heard my gods well spoken of by
those accustomed to pray but this he said only of courtesy, for he
knew not whom they were.
Singanee was simply dressed and only wore on his head a plain gold
band to keep his hair from falling over his forehead, the ends of the
gold were tied in the back with a bow of purple silk. But all his
queens wore crowns of great magnificence, though whether they were
crowned as the queens of Singanee or whether queens were attracted
there from the thrones of distant lands by the wonder of him and the
splendour I did not know.
All there wore silken robes of brilliant colours and the feet of all
were bare and very shapely for the custom of boots was unknown in
those regions. And when they saw that my big toes were deformed in
the manner of Europeans, turning inwards towards the others instead of
being straight, one or two asked sympathetically if an accident had
befallen me. And rather than tell them truly that deforming out big
toes was our custom and our pleasure I told them that I was under the
curse of a malignant god at whose feet I had neglected to offer
berries in infancy. And to some extent I justified myself, for
Convention is a god though his ways are evil; and had I told them the
truth I would not have been understood. They gave me a lady to dance
with who was of marvellous beauty, she told me that her name was
Saranoora, a princess from the North, who had been sent as tribute to
the palace of Singanee. And partly she danced as Europeans dance and
partly as the fairies of the waste who lure, as legend has it, lost
travellers to their doom. And if I could get thirty heathen men out of
fantastic lands, with their long black hair and little elfin eyes and
instruments of music even unknown to Nebuchadnezzar the King; and if I
could make them play those tunes that I heard in the ivory palace on
some lawn, gentle reader, at evening near your house then you would
understand the beauty of Saranoora and the blaze of light and colour
in that stupendous hall and the lithesome movement of those mysterious
queens that danced round Singanee. Then gentle reader you would be
gentle no more but the thoughts that run like leopards over the far
free lands would come leaping into your head even were it London, yes,
even in London: you would rise up then and beat your hands on the wall
with its pretty pattern of flowers, in the hope that the bricks might
break and reveal the way to that palace of ivory by the amethyst gulf
where the golden dragons are. For there have been men who have burned
prisons down that the prisoners might escape, and even such
incendiaries those dark musicians are who dangerously burn down custom
that the pining thoughts may go free. Let your elders have no fear,
have no fear. I will not play those tunes in any streets we know. I
will not bring those strange musicians here, I will only whisper the
way to the Lands of Dream, and only a few frail feet shall find the
way, and I shall dream alone of the beauty of Saranoora and sometimes
sigh. We danced on and on at the will of the thirty musicians, but
when the stars were paling and the wind that knew the dawn was
ruffling up the edge of the skirts of night, then Saranoora the
princess of the North led me out into a garden. Dark groves of trees
were there which filled the night with perfume and guarded night's
mysteries from the arising dawn. There floated over us, wandering in
that garden, the triumphant melody of those dark musicians, whose
origin was unguessed even by those that dwelt there and knew the Lands
of Dream. For only a moment once sang the tolulu-bird, for the
festival of that night had scared him and he was silent. For only a
moment once we heard him singing in some far grove because the
musicians rested and our bare feet made no sound; for a moment we
heard that bird of which once our nightingale dreamed and handed on
the tradition to his children. And Saranoora told me that they have
named the bird the Sister of Song; but for the musicians, who
presently played again, she said they had no name, for no one knew who
they were or from what country. Then some one sang quite near us in
the darkness to an instrument of strings telling of Singanee and his
battle against the monster. And soon we saw him sitting on the ground
and singing to the night of that spear-thrust that had found the
thumping heart of the destroyer of Perdóndaris; and we stopped awhile
and asked him who had seen so memorable a struggle and he answered
none but Singanee and he whose tusk had scattered Perdóndaris, and now
the last was dead. And when we asked him if Singanee had told him of
the struggle he said that that proud hunter would say no word about it
and that therefore his mighty deed was given to the poets and become
their trust forever, and he struck again his instrument of strings and
sang on.
When the strings of pearls that hung down from her neck began to gleam
all over Saranoora I knew that dawn was near and that that memorable
night was all but gone. And at last we left the garden and came to
the abyss to see the sunrise shine on the amethyst cliff. And at first
it lit up the beauty of Saranoora and then it topped the world and
blazed upon those cliffs of amethyst until it dazzled our eyes, and we
turned from it and saw the workman going out along the tusk to hollow
it and to carve a balustrade of fair professional figures. And those
who had drunken bak began to awake and to open their dazzled eyes at
the amethyst precipice and to rub them and turn them away. And now
those wonderful kingdoms of song that the dark musicians established
all night by magical chords dropped back again to the sway of that
ancient silence who ruled before the gods, and the musicians wrapped
their cloaks about them and covered up their marvellous instruments
and stole away to the plains; and no one dared ask them whither they
went or why they dwelt there, or what god they served. And the dance
stopped and all the queens departed. And then the female slave came
out again by a door and emptied her basket of sapphires down the abyss
as I saw her do before. Beautiful Saranoora said that those great
queens would never wear their sapphires more than once and that every
day at noon a merchant from the mountains sold new ones for that
evening. Yet I suspected that something more than extravagance lay at
the back of that seemingly wasteful act of tossing sapphires into an
abyss, for there were in the depths of it those two dragons of gold of
whom nothing seemed to be known. And I thought, and I think so still,
that Singanee, terrific though he was in war with the elephants, from
whose tusks he had built his palace, well knew and even feared those
dragons in the abyss, and perhaps valued those priceless jewels less
than he valued his queens, and that he to whom so many lands paid
beautiful tribute out of their dread of his spear, himself paid
tribute to the golden dragons. Whether those dragons had wings I could
not see; nor, if they had, could I tell if they could bear that weight
of solid gold from the abyss; nor by what paths they could crawl from
it did I know. And I know not what use to a golden dragon should
sapphires be or a queen. Only it seemed strange to me that so much
wealth of jewels should be thrown by command of a man who had nothing
to fear--to fall flashing and changing their colours at dawn into an
abyss.
I do not know how long we lingered there watching the sunrise on those
miles of amethyst. And it is strange that that great and famous
wonder did not move me more than it did, but my mind was dazzled by
the fame of it and my eyes were actually dazzled by the blaze, and as
often happens I thought more of little things and remember watching
the daylight in the solitary sapphire that Saranoora had and that she
wore upon her finger in a ring. Then, the dawn wind being all about
her, she said that she was cold and turned back into the ivory palace.
And I feared that we might never meet again, for time moves
differently over the Lands of Dream than over the fields we know; like
ocean-currents going different ways and bearing drifting ships. And
at the doorway of the ivory palace I turned to say farewell and yet I
found no words that were suitable to say. And often now when I stand
in other lands I stop and think of many things to have said; yet all I
said was "Perhaps we shall meet again." And she said that it was
likely that we should often meet for that this was a little thing for
the gods to permit not knowing that the gods of the Lands of Dream
have little power upon the fields we know. Then she went in through
the doorway. And having exchanged for my own clothes again the raiment
that the chamberlain had given me I turned from the hospitality of
mighty Singanee and set my face towards the fields we know. I crossed
that enormous tusk that had been the end of Perdóndaris and met the
artists carving it as I went; and some by way of greeting as I passed
extolled Singanee, and in answer I gave honour to his name. Daylight
had not yet penetrated wholly to the bottom of the abyss but the
darkness was giving place to a purple haze and I could faintly see one
golden dragon there. Then looking once towards the ivory palace, and
seeing no one at the windows, I turned sorrowfully away, and going by
the way that I knew passed through the gap in the mountains and down
their slopes till I came again in sight of the witch's cottage. And
as I went to the upper window to look for the fields we know, the
witch spoke to me; but I was cross, as one newly waked from sleep, and
I would not answer her. Then the cat questioned me as to whom I had
met, and I answered him that in the fields we know cats kept their
place and did not speak to man. And then I came downstairs and walked
straight out of the door, heading for Go-by Street. "You are going
the wrong way," the witch called through the window; and indeed I had
no sooner gone back to the ivory palace again, but I had no right to
trespass any further on the hospitality of Singanee and one cannot
stay always in the Lands of Dream, and what knowledge had that old
witch of the call of the fields we know or the little though many
snares that bind our feet therein? So I paid no heed to her, but kept
on, and came to Go-by Street. I saw the house with the green door
some way up the street but thinking that the near end of the street
was closer to the Embankment where I had left my boat I tried the
first door I came to, a cottage thatched like the rest, with little
golden spires along the roof-ridge, and strange birds sitting there
and preening marvellous feathers. The door opened, and to my surprise
I found myself in what seemed like a shepherd's cottage; a man who was
sitting on a log of wood in a little low dark room said something to
me in an alien language. I muttered something and hurried through to
the street. The house was thatched in front as well as behind. There
were not golden spires in front, no marvellous birds; but there was no
pavement. There was a row of houses, byres, and barns but no other
sign of a town. Far off I saw one or two little villages. Yet there
was the river--and no doubt the Thames, for it was the width of the
Thames and had the curves of it, if you can imagine the Thames in that
particular spot without a city around it, without any bridges, and the
Embankment fallen in. I saw that there had happened to me permanently
and in the light of day some such thing as happens to a man, but to a
child more often, when he awakes before morning in some strange room
and sees a high, grey window where the door ought to be and unfamiliar
objects in wrong places and though knowing where he is yet knows not
how it can be that the place should look like that.
A flock of sheep came by me presently looking the same as ever, but
the man who led them had a wild, strange look. I spoke to him and he
did not understand me. Then I went down to the river to see if my
boat was there and at the very spot where I had left it, in the mud
(for the tide was low) I saw a half-buried piece of blackened wood
that might have been part of a boat, but I could not tell. I began to
feel that I had missed the world. It would be a strange thing to
travel from far away to see London and not be able to find it among
all the roads that lead there, but I seemed to have travelled in Time
and to have missed it among the centuries. And when as I wandered
over the grassy hills I came on a wattled shrine that was thatched
with straw and saw a lion in it more worn with time than even the
Sphinx at Gizeh and when I knew it for one of the four in Trafalgar
Square then I saw that I was stranded far away in the future with many
centuries of treacherous years between me and anything that I had
known. And then I sat on the grass by the worn paws of the lion to
think out what to do. And I decided to go back through Go-by Street
and, since there was nothing left to keep me any more to the fields we
know, to offer myself as a servant in the palace of Singanee, and to
see again the face of Saranoora and those famous, wonderful,
amethystine dawns upon the abyss where the golden dragons play. And I
stayed no longer to look for remains of the ruins of London; for there
is little pleasure in seeing wonderful things if there is no one at
all to hear of them and to wonder. So I returned at once to Go-by
Street, the little row of huts, and saw no other record that London
had been except that one stone lion. I went to the right house this
time. It was very much altered and more like one of those huts that
one sees on Salisbury plain than a shop in the city of London, but I
found it by counting the houses in the street for it was still a row
of houses though pavement and city were gone. And it was still a shop.
A very different shop to the one I knew, but things were for sale
there--shepherd's crooks, food, and rude axes. And a man with long
hair was there who was clad in skins. I did not speak to him for I did
not know his language. He said to me something that sounded like
"Everkike." It conveyed no meaning to me; but when he looked towards
one of his buns, light suddenly dawned in my mind, and I knew that
England was even England still and that still she was not conquered,
and that though they had tired of London they still held to their
land; for the words that the man had said were, "Av er kike," and then
I knew that that very language that was carried to distant lands by
the old, triumphant cockney was spoken still in his birthplace and
that neither his politics nor his enemies had destroyed him after all
these thousand years. I had always disliked the Cockney dialect--and
with the arrogance of the Irishman who hears from rich and poor the
English of the splendour of Elizabeth; and yet when I heard those
words my eyes felt sore as with impending tears--it should be
remembered how far away I was. I think I was silent for a little
while. Suddenly I saw that the man who kept the shop was asleep.
That habit was strangely like the ways of a man who if he were then
alive would be (if I could judge from the time-worn look of the lion)
over a thousand years old. But then how old was I? It is perfectly
clear that Time moves over the Lands of Dream swifter or slower than
over the fields we know. For the dead, and the long dead, live again
in our dreams; and a dreamer passes through the events of days in a
single moment of the Town-Hall's clock. Yet logic did not aid me and
my mind was puzzled. While the old man slept--and strangely like in
face he was to the old man who had shown me first the little, old
backdoor--I went to the far end of his wattled shop. There was a door
of a sort on leather hinges. I pushed it open and there I was again
under the notice-board at the back of the shop, at least the back of
Go-by Street had not changed. Fantastic and remote though this grass
street was with its purple flowers and the golden spires, and the
world ending at its opposite pavement, yet I breathed more happily to
see something again that I had seen before. I thought I had lost
forever the world I knew, and now that I was at the back of Go-by
Street again I felt the loss less than when I was standing where
familiar things ought to be; and I turned my mind to what was left me
in the vast Lands of Dream and thought of Saranoora. And when I saw
the cottages again I felt less lonely even at the thought of the cat
though he generally laughed at the things I said. And the first thing
that I saw when I saw the witch was that I had lost the world and was
going back for the rest of my days to the palace of Singanee. And the
first thing that she said was: "Why! You've been through the wrong
door," quite kindly for she saw how unhappy I looked. And I said,
"Yes, but it's all the same street. The whole street's altered and
London's gone and the people I used to know and the houses I used to
rest in, and everything; and I'm tired."
"What did you want to go through the wrong door for?" she said.
"O, that made no difference," I said.
"O, didn't it?" she said in a contradictory way.
"Well I wanted to get to the near end of the street so as to find my
boat quickly by the Embankment. And now my boat, and the Embankment
and--and----."
"Some people are always in such a hurry," said the old black cat. And
I felt too unhappy to be angry and I said nothing more.
And the old witch said, "Now which way do you want to go?" and she was
talking rather like a nurse to a small child. And I said, "I have
nowhere to go."
And she said, "Would you rather go home or go to the ivory palace of
Singanee." And I said, "I've got a headache, and I don't want to go
anywhere, and I'm tired of the Lands of Dream."
"Then suppose you try going in through the right door," she said.
"That's no good," I said. "Everyone's dead and gone, and they're
selling buns there."
"What do you know about Time?" she said.
"Nothing," answered the old, black cat, though nobody spoke to him.
"Run along," said the old witch.
So I turned and trudged away to Go-by Street again. I was very tired.
"What does he know about anything?" said the old black cat behind me.
I knew what he was going to say next. He waited a moment and then
said, "Nothing." When I looked over my shoulder he was strutting back
to the cottage. And when I got to Go-by Street I listlessly opened
the door through which I had just now come. I saw no use in doing it,
I just did wearily as I was told. And the moment I got inside I saw
it was just the same as of old, and the sleepy old man was there who
sold idols. And I bought a vulgar thing that I did not want, for the
sheer joy of seeing accustomed things. And when I turned from Go-by
Street which was just the same as ever, the first thing that I saw was
a taximeter running into a hansom cab. And I took off my hat and
cheered. And I went to the Embankment and there was my boat, and the
stately river full of dirty, accustomed things. And I rowed back and
bought a penny paper, (I had been away it seemed for one day) and I
read it from cover to cover--patent remedies for incurable illnesses
and all--and I determined to walk, as soon as I was rested, in all the
streets that I knew and to call on all the people that I had ever met,
and to be content for long with the fields we know.