"I ran up the river," said the Hollander, "to have a game of bowls with
the Englishman and his crew, nearly all of them countrymen of mine;
and, by-the-way, Hudson always insists that it was I who brought the
storm with me that gave poor Rip Van Winkle the rheumatism as he slept
off his intoxication on the hillside under the pines. He was a good
fellow, Rip, and a very good judge of schnapps, too."
Seeing him smile with the pleasant memories of past companionship, I
marvelled when the sorrowful expression swiftly covered his face again
as a mask.
"But why talk of those who are dead and gone and are happy?" he asked
in his deep voice. "Soon there will be no one left, perhaps, but
Ahasuerus and Vanderdecken--the Wandering Jew and the Flying Dutchman."
He sighed bitterly, and then he gave a short, hard laugh.
"There's no use talking about these things, is there?" he cried. "In an
hour or two, if the wind holds, I can show you the house in which
Ahasuerus has established his museum, the only solace of his lonely
life. He has the most extraordinary gathering of curiosities the world
has ever seen--truly a virtuoso's collection. An American reporter came
on a voyage with me fifty or sixty years ago, and I took him over
there. His name was Hawthorne. He interviewed the Jew, and wrote up the
collection in the American papers, so I've been told."
"I remember reading the interview," I said, "and it was indeed a most
remarkable collection."
"It's all the more curious now for the odds and ends I've been able to
pick up here and there for my old friend," Vanderdecken declared; "I
got him the horn of Hernani, the harpoon with which Long Tom Coffin
pinned the British officer to the mast, the long rifle of Natty Bumppo,
the letter A in scarlet cloth embroidered in gold by Hester Prynne, the
banner with the strange device 'Excelsior,' the gold bug which was once
used as a plummet, Maud Muller's rake, and the jack-knives of Hosea
Biglow and Sam Lawson."
"You must have seen extraordinary things yourself," I ventured to
suggest.
"No man has seen stranger," he answered, promptly. "No man has ever
been witness to more marvellous deeds than I--not even Ahasuerus, I
verily believe, for he has only the land, and I have the boundless sea.
I survey mankind from China to Peru. I have heard the horns of elfland
blowing, and I could tell you the song the sirens sang. I have dropped
anchor at the No Man's Land, and off Lyonesse, and in Xanadu, where
Alph the sacred river ran. I have sailed from the still-vexed
Bermoothes to the New Atlantis, of which there is no mention even until
the year 1629."
"In which year there was published an account of it written in the
Latin tongue, but by an Englishman," I said, desirous to reveal my
acquirements.
"I have seen every strange coast," continued the Flying Dutchman. "The
Island of Bells and Robinson Crusoe's Island and the Kingdoms of
Brobdingnag and Lilliput. But it is not for me to vaunt myself for my
voyages. And of a truth there are men I should like to have met and
talked with whom I have yet failed to see. Especially is there one
Ulysses, a sailor-man of antiquity who called himself Outis, whence I
have sometimes suspected that he came from the town of Weissnichtwo."
Just to discover what Vanderdecken would say, I inquired innocently
whether this was the same person as one Captain Nemo of whose submarine
exploits I had read.
"Captain Nemo?" the Flying Dutchman repeated scornfully. "I never heard
of him. Are you sure there is such a fellow?"
I tried to turn the conversation by asking if he had ever met another
ancient mariner named Charon.
"Oh, yes," was his answer. "Charon keeps the ferry across the Styx to
the Elysian Fields, past the sunless marsh of Acheron. Yes--I've met
him more than once. I met him only last month, and he was very proud of
his new electric launch with its storage battery."
When I expressed my surprise at this, he asked me if I did not know
that the underworld was now lighted by electricity, and that Pluto had
put in all the modern improvements. Before I had time to answer, he
rose from his seat and slapped me on the shoulder.
"Come up with me!--if you want to behold things for yourself," he
cried. "So far, it seems to me, you have never seen the sights!"
I followed him on deck. The sun was now two hours high, and I could
just make out a faint line of land on the horizon.
"That rugged coast is Bohemia, which is really a desert country by the
sea, although ignorant and bigoted pedants have dared to deny it," and
the scorn of my companion as he said this was wonderful to see. "Its
borders touch Alsatia, of which the chief town is a city of refuge. Not
far inland, but a little to the south, is the beautiful Forest of
Arden, where men and maids dwell together in amity, and where clowns
wander, making love to shepherdesses. Some of these same pestilent
pedants have pretended to believe that this forest of Arden was
situated in France, which is absurd, as there are no serpents and no
lions in France, while we have the best of evidence as to the existence
of both in Arden--you know that, don't you?"
I admitted that a green and gilded snake and a lioness with udders all
drawn dry were known to have been seen there both on the same day. I
ventured to suggest further that possibly this Forest of Arden was the
Wandering Wood where Una met her lion.
"Of course," was the curt response; "everybody knows that Arden is a
most beautiful region; even the toads there have precious jewels in
their heads. And if you range the forest freely you may chance to find
also the White Doe of Rylstone and the goat with the gilded horns that
told fortunes in Paris long ago by tapping with his hoof on a
tambourine."
"These, then, are the Happy Hunting-Grounds?" I suggested with a light
laugh.
"Who would chase a tame goat?" he retorted with ill-concealed contempt
for my ill-advised remark.
I thought it best to keep silence; and after a minute or two he resumed
the conversation, like one who is glad of a good listener.
"In the outskirts of the Forest of Arden," he began again, "stands
the Abbey of Thelema--the only abbey which is bounded by no wall
and in which there is no clock at all nor any dial. And what need is
there of knowing the time when one has for companions only comely and
well-conditioned men and fair women of sweet disposition? And the motto
of the Abbey of Thelema is _Fais ce que voudra_--Do what you will; and
many of those who dwell in the Forest of Arden will tell you that they
have taken this also for their device, and that if you live under the
greenwood tree you may spend your life--as you like it."
I acknowledged that this claim was probably well founded, since I
recalled a song of the foresters in which they declared themselves
without an enemy but winter and rough weather.
"Yes," he went on, "they are fond of singing in the Forest of Arden,
and they sing good songs. And so they do in the fair land beyond where
I have never been, and which I can never hope to go to see for myself,
if all that they report be true--and yet what would I not give to see
it and to die there."
And as he said this sadly, his voice sank into a sigh.
"And where does the road through the forest lead, that you so much wish
to set forth upon it?" I asked.
"That's the way to Arcady," he said--"to Arcady where all the leaves
are merry. I may not go there, though I long for it. Those who attain
to its borders never come back again--and why should they leave it? Yet
there are tales told, and I have heard that this Arcady is the
veritable El Dorado, and that in it is the true Fountain of Youth,
gushing forth unfailingly for the refreshment of all who may reach it.
But no one may find the entrance who cannot see it by the light that
never was on land or sea."
"It must be a favored region," I remarked.
"Of a truth it is," he answered; "and on the way there is the orchard
where grow the golden apples of Hesperides, and the dragon is dead now
that used to guard them, and so any one may help himself to the
beautiful fruit. And by the side of the orchard flows the river Lethe,
of which it is not well for man to drink, though many men would taste
it gladly." And again he sighed.