down blazing over the plains of Thold; there were no clouds, only the
chill blue sky and the imminence of stars; and the surface of the
sleeping Earth began to harden against the cold of the night. Presently
from their lairs arose, and shook themselves and went stealthily forth,
those of Earth’s children to whom it is the law to prowl abroad as soon
as the dusk has fallen. And they went pattering softly over the plain,
and their eyes shone in the dark, and crossed and recrossed one another
in their courses. Suddenly there became manifest in the midst of the
plain that fearful portent of the presence of Man—a little flickering
fire. And the children of Earth who prowl abroad by night looked
sideways at it and snarled and edged away; all but the wolves, who came
a little nearer, for it was winter and the wolves were hungry, and they
had come in thousands from the mountains, and they said in their hearts,
“We are strong.” Around the fire a little tribe was encamped. They, too,
had come from the mountains, and from lands beyond them, but it was in
the mountains that the wolves first winded them; they picked up bones at
first that the tribe had dropped, but they were closer now and on all
sides. It was Loz who had lit the fire. He had killed a small furry
beast, hurling his stone axe at it, and had gathered a quantity of
reddish brown stones, and had laid them in a long row, and placed bits
of the small beast all along it; then he lit a fire on each side, and
the stones heated, and the bits began to cook. It was at this time that
the tribe noticed that the wolves who had followed them so far were no
longer content with the scraps of deserted encampments. A line of yellow
eyes surrounded them, and when it moved it was to come nearer. So the
men of the tribe hastily tore up brushwood, and felled a small tree with
their flint axes, and heaped it all over the fire that Loz had made, and
for a while the great heap hid the flame, and the wolves came trotting
in and sat down again on their haunches much closer than before; and the
fierce and valiant dogs that belonged to the tribe believed that their
end was about to come while fighting, as they had long since prophesied
it would. Then the flame caught the lofty stack of brushwood, and rushed
out of it, and ran up the side of it, and stood up haughtily far over
the top, and the wolves seeing this terrible ally of Man revelling there
in his strength, and knowing nothing of his frequent treachery to his
masters, went slowly away as though they had other purposes. And for the
rest of that night the dogs of the encampment cried out to them and
besought them to come back. But the tribe lay down all round the fire
under thick furs and slept. And a great wind arose and blew into the
roaring heart of the fire till it was red no longer, but all pallid with
heat. With the dawn the tribe awoke.
Loz might have known that after such a mighty conflagration nothing
could remain of his small furry beast, but there was hunger in him and
little reason as he searched among the ashes. What he found there amazed
him beyond measure; there was no meat, there was not even his row of
reddish brown stones, but something longer than a man’s leg and narrower
than his hand, was lying there like a great flattened snake. When Loz
looked at its thin edges and saw that it ran to a point, he picked up
stones to chip it and make it sharp. It was the instinct of Loz to
sharpen things. When he found that it could not be chipped his
wonderment increased. It was many hours before he discovered that he
could sharpen the edges by rubbing them with a stone; but at last the
point was sharp, and all one side of it except near the end, where Loz
held it in his hand. And Loz lifted it and brandished it, and the Stone
Age was over. That afternoon in the little encampment, just as the tribe
moved on, the Stone Age passed away, which, for perhaps thirty or forty
thousand years, had slowly lifted Man from among the beasts and left him
with his supremacy beyond all hope of reconquest.
It was not for many days that any other man tried to make for himself an
iron sword by cooking the same kind of small furry beast that Loz had
tried to cook. It was not for many years that any thought to lay the
meat along stones as Loz had done; and when they did, being no longer on
the plains of Thold, they used flints or chalk. It was not for many
generations that another piece of iron ore was melted and the secret
slowly guessed. Nevertheless one of Earth’s many veils was torn aside by
Loz to give us ultimately the steel sword and the plough, machinery and
factories; let us not blame Loz if we think that he did wrong, for he
did all in ignorance. The tribe moved on until it came to water, and
there it settled down under a hill, and they built their huts there.
Very soon they had to fight with another tribe, a tribe that was
stronger than them; but the sword of Loz was terrible and his tribe slew
their foes. You might make one blow at Loz, but then would come one
thrust from that iron sword, and there was no way of surviving it. No
one could fight with Loz. And he became the ruler of the tribe in the
place of Iz, who hitherto had ruled it with his sharp axe, as his father
had before him.
Now Loz begat Lo, and in his old age gave his sword to him, and Lo ruled
the tribe with it. And Lo called the name of the sword Death, because it
was so swift and terrible.
And Iz begat Ird, who was of no account. And Ird hated Lo because he was
of no account by reason of the iron sword of Lo.
One night Ird stole down to the hut of Lo, carrying his sharp axe, and
he went very softly, but Lo’s dog, Warner, heard him coming, and he
growled softly by his master’s door. When Ird came to the hut he heard
Lo talking gently to his sword. And Lo was saying, “Lie still, Death.
Rest, rest, old sword,” and then, “What, again, Death? Be still. Be
still.”
And then again: “What, art thou hungry, Death? Or thirsty, poor old
sword? Soon, Death, soon. Be still only a little.”
But Ird fled, for he did not like the gentle tone of Lo as he spoke to
his sword.
And Lo begat Lod. And when Lo died Lod took the iron sword and ruled the
tribe.
And Ird begat Ith, who was of no account, like his father.
Now when Lod had smitten a man or killed a terrible beast, Ith would go
away for a while into the forest rather than hear the praises that would
be given to Lod.
And once, as Ith sat in the forest waiting for the day to pass, he
suddenly thought he saw a tree trunk looking at him as with a face. And
Ith was afraid, for trees should not look at men. But soon Ith saw that
it was only a tree and not a man, though it was like a man. Ith used to
speak to this tree, and tell it about Lod, for he dared not speak to any
one else about him. And Ith found comfort in talking about Lod.
One day Ith went with his stone axe into the forest, and stayed there
many days.
He came back by night, and the next morning when the tribe awoke they
saw something that was like a man and yet was not a man. And it sat on
the hill with its elbows pointing outwards and was quite still. And Ith
was crouching before it, and hurriedly placing before it fruits and
flesh, and then leaping away from it and looking frightened. Presently
all the tribe came out to see, but dared not come quite close because of
the fear that they saw on the face of Ith. And Ith went to his hut, and
came back again with a hunting spear-head and valuable small stone
knives, and reached out and laid them before the thing that was like a
man, and then sprang away from it.
And some of the tribe questioned Ith about the still thing that was like
a man, and Ith said, “This is Ged.” They then asked, “Who is Ged?” and
Ith said, “Ged sends the crops and the rain; and the sun and the moon
are Ged’s.”
Then the tribe went back to their huts, but later in the day some came
again, and they said to Ith, “Ged is only as we are, having hands and
feet.” And Ith pointed to the right hand of Ged, which was not as his
left, but was shaped like the paw of a beast, and Ith said, “By this ye
may know that he is not as any man.”
Then they said, “He is indeed Ged.” But Lod said, “He speaketh not, nor
doth he eat,” and Ith answered, “The thunder is his voice and the famine
is his eating.”
After this the tribe copied Ith, and brought little gifts of meat to
Ged; and Ith cooked them before him that Ged might smell the cooking.
One day a great thunder-storm came trampling up from the distance and
raged among the hills, and the tribe all hid away from it in their huts.
And Ith appeared among the huts looking unafraid. And Ith said little,
but the tribe thought that he had expected the terrible storm because
the meat that they had laid before Ged had been tough meat, and not the
best parts of the beasts they slew.
And Ged grew to have more honour among the tribe than Lod. And Lod was
vexed.
One night Lod arose when all were asleep, and quieted his dog, and took
his iron sword and went away to the hill. And he came on Ged in the
starlight, sitting still, with his elbows pointing outwards, and his
beast’s paw, and the mark of the fire on the ground where his food had
been cooked.
And Lod stood there for a while in great fear, trying to keep to his
purpose. Suddenly he stepped up close to Ged and lifted his iron sword,
and Ged neither hit nor shrank. Then the thought came into Lod’s mind,
“Ged does not hit. What will Ged do instead?”
And Lod lowered his sword and struck not, and his imagination began to
work on that, “What will Ged do instead?”
And the more Lod thought, the worse was his fear of Ged.
And Lod ran away and left him.
Lod still ruled the tribe in battle or in the hunt, but the chiefest
spoils of battle were given to Ged, and the beasts that they slew were
Ged’s; and all questions that concerned war or peace, and questions of
law and disputes, were always brought to him, and Ith gave the answers
after speaking to Ged by night.
At last Ith said, the day after an eclipse, that the gifts which they
brought to Ged were not enough, that some far greater sacrifice was
needed, that Ged was very angry even now, and not to be appeased by any
ordinary sacrifice.
And Ith said that to save the tribe from the anger of Ged he would speak
to Ged that night, and ask him what new sacrifice he needed.
Deep in his heart Lod shuddered, for his instinct told him that Ged
wanted Lod’s only son, who should hold the iron sword when Lod was gone.
No one would dare touch Lod because of the iron sword, but his instinct
said in his slow mind again and again, “Ged loves Ith. Ith has said so.
Ith hates the sword-holders.”
“Ith hates the sword-holders. Ged loves Ith.”
Evening fell and the night came when Ith should speak with Ged, and Lod
became ever surer of the doom of his race.
He lay down but could not sleep.
Midnight had barely come when Lod arose and went with his iron sword
again to the hill.
And there sat Ged. Had Ith been to him yet? Ith whom Ged loved, who
hated the sword-holders.
And Lod looked long at the old sword of iron that had come to his
grandfather on the plains of Thold.
Good-bye, old sword! And Lod laid it on the knees of Ged, then went
away.
And when Ith came, a little before dawn, the sacrifice was found
acceptable unto Ged.
_The Idle City_
There was once a city which was an idle city, wherein men told vain
tales.
And it was that city’s custom to tax all men that would enter in, the
toll of some idle story in the gate.
So all men paid to the watchers in the gate the toll of an idle story,
and passed into the city unhindered and unhurt. And in a certain hour of
the night when the king of that city arose and went pacing swiftly up
and down the chamber of his sleeping, and called upon the name of the
dead queen, then would the watchers fasten up the gate and go into that
chamber to the king, and, sitting on the floor, would tell him all the
tales that they had gathered. And listening to them some calmer mood
would come upon the king, and listening still he would lie down again
and at last fall asleep, and all the watchers silently would arise and
steal away from the chamber.
A while ago wandering, I came to the gate of that city. And even as I
came a man stood up to pay his toll to the watchers. They were seated
cross-legged on the ground between him and the gate, and each one held a
spear. Near him two other travellers sat on the warm sand waiting. And
the man said:
Now the city of Nombros forsook the worship of the gods and turned
towards God. So the gods threw their cloaks over their faces and strode
away from the city, and going into the haze among the hills passed
through the trunks of the olive groves into the sunset. But when they
had already left the earth, they turned and looked through the gleaming
folds of the twilight for the last time at their city; and they looked
half in anger and half in regret, then turned and went away for ever.
But they sent back a Death, who bore a scythe, saying to it: “Slay half
in the city that forsook us, but half of them spare alive that they may
yet remember their old forsaken gods.”
But God sent a destroying angel to show that He was God, saying unto
him: “Go down and show the strength of mine arm unto that city and slay
half of the dwellers therein, yet spare a half of them that they may
know that I am God.”
And at once the destroying angel put his hand to his sword, and the
sword came out of the scabbard with a deep breath, like to the breath
that a broad woodman takes before his first blow at some giant oak.
Thereat the angel pointed his arms downwards, and bending his head
between them, fell forward from Heaven’s edge, and the spring of his
ankles shot him downwards with his wings furled behind him. So he went
slanting earthward through the evening with his sword stretched out
before him, and he was like a javelin that some hunter hath hurled that
returneth again to the earth: but just before he touched it he lifted
his head and spread his wings with the under feathers forward, and
alighted by the bank of the broad Flavro that divides the city of
Nombros. And down the bank of the Flavro he fluttered low, like to a
hawk over a new-cut cornfield when the little creatures of the corn are
shelterless, and at the same time down the other bank the Death from the
gods went mowing.
At once they saw each other, and the angel glared at the Death, and the
Death leered back at him, and the flames in the eyes of the angel
illumined with a red glare the mist that lay in the hollows of the
sockets of the Death. Suddenly they fell on one another, sword to
scythe. And the angel captured the temples of the gods, and set up over
them the sign of God, and the Death captured the temples of God, and led
into them the ceremonies and sacrifices of the gods; and all the while
the centuries slipped quietly by going down the Flavro seawards.
And now some worship God in the temple of the gods, and others worship
the gods in the temple of God, and still the angel hath not returned
again to the rejoicing choirs, and still the Death hath not gone back to
die with the dead gods; but all through Nombros they fight up and down,
and still on each side of the Flavro the city lives.
[Illustration: THE SILENCE OF GED]
And the watchers in the gate said, “Enter in.”
Then another traveller rose up, and said:
“Solemnly between Huhenwāzi and Nitcrāna the huge grey clouds came
floating. And those great mountains, heavenly Huhenwāzi, and Nitcrāna,
the king of peaks, greeted them, calling them brothers. And the clouds
were glad of their greeting for they meet with companions seldom in the
lonely heights of the sky.
“But the vapours of evening said unto the earth-mist, ‘What are those
shapes that dare to move above us and to go where Nitcrāna is and
Huhenwāzi?’
“And the earth-mist said in answer unto the vapours of evening, ‘It is
only an earth-mist that has become mad and has left the warm and
comfortable earth, and has in his madness thought that his place is with
Huhenwāzi and Nitcrāna.’
“‘Once,’ said the vapours of evening, ‘there were clouds, but this was
many and many a day ago, as our forefathers have said. Perhaps the mad
one thinks he is the clouds.’
“Then spake the earth-worms from the warm deeps of the mud, saying ‘O,
earth-mist, thou art indeed the clouds, and there are no clouds but
thou. And as for Huhenwāzi and Nitcrāna, I cannot see them, and
therefore they are not high, and there are no mountains in the world but
those that I cast up every morning out of the deeps of the mud.’
“And the earth-mist and the vapours of evening were glad at the voice of
the earth-worms, and looking earthward believed what they had said.
“And indeed it is better to be as the earth-mist, and to keep close to
the warm mud at night, and to hear the earth-worm’s comfortable speech,
and not to be a wanderer in the cheerless heights, but to leave the
mountains alone with their desolate snow, to draw what comfort they can
from their vast aspect over all the cities of men, and from the whispers
that they hear at evening of unknown distant Gods.”
And the watchers in the gate said, “Enter in.”
Then a man stood up who came out of the west, and told a western tale.
He said:
“There is a road in Rome that runs through an ancient temple that once
the gods had loved; it runs along the top of a great wall, and the floor
of the temple lies far down beneath it, of marble, pink and white.
“Upon the temple floor I counted to the number of thirteen hungry cats.
“Sometimes,” they said among themselves, “It was the gods that lived
here, sometimes it was men, and now it’s cats. So let us enjoy the sun
on the hot marble before another people comes.
“For it was at that hour of a warm afternoon when my fancy is able to
hear the silent voices.
“And the fearful leanness of all those thirteen cats moved me to go into
a neighbouring fish shop, and there to buy a quantity of fishes. Then I
returned and threw them all over the railing at the top of the great
wall, and they fell for thirty feet, and hit the sacred marble with a
smack.
“Now, in any other town but Rome, or in the minds of any other cats, the
sight of fishes falling out of heaven had surely excited wonder. They
rose slowly, and all stretched themselves, then they came leisurely
towards the fishes. ‘It is only a miracle,’ they said in their hearts.”
And the watchers in the gate said, “Enter in.”
Proudly and slowly, as they spoke, drew up to them a camel, whose rider
sought for entrance to the city. His face shone with the sunset by which
for long he had steered for the city’s gate. Of him they demanded toll.
Whereat he spoke to his camel, and the camel roared and kneeled, and the
man descended from him. And the man unwrapped from many silks a box of
divers metals wrought by the Japanese, and on the lid of it were figures
of men who gazed from some shore at an isle of the Inland Sea. This he
showed to the watchers, and when they had seen it, said, “It has seemed
to me that these speak to each other thus:
“Behold now Oojni, the dear one of the sea, the little mother sea that
hath no storms. She goeth out from Oojni singing a song, and she
returneth singing over her sands. Little is Oojni in the lap of the sea,
and scarce to be perceived by wondering ships. White sails have never
wafted her legends afar, they are told not by bearded wanderers of the
sea. Her fireside tales are known not to the North, the dragons of China
have not heard of them, nor those that ride on elephants through Ind.
“Men tell the tales and the smoke ariseth upwards; the smoke departeth
and the tales are told.
“Oojni is not a name among the nations, she is not known of where the
merchants meet, she is not spoken of by alien lips.
“Indeed, but Oojni is little among the isles, yet is she loved by those
that know her coasts and her inland places hidden from the sea.
“Without glory, without fame, and without wealth, Oojni is greatly loved
by a little people, and by a few; yet not by few, for all her dead still
love her, and oft by night come whispering through her woods. Who could
forget Oojni even among the dead?
“For here in Oojni, wot you, are homes of men, and gardens, and golden
temples of the gods, and sacred places inshore from the sea, and many
murmurous woods. And there is a path that winds over the hills to go
into mysterious holy lands where dance by night the spirits of the
woods, or sing unseen in the sunlight; and no one goes into these holy
lands, for who that love Oojni would rob her of her mysteries, and the
curious aliens come not. Indeed, but we love Oojni though she is so
little; she is the little mother of our race, and the kindly nurse of
all seafaring birds.
“And behold, even now caressing her, the gentle fingers of the mother
sea, whose dreams are afar with that old wanderer Ocean.
“And yet let us forget not Fuzi-Yama, for he stands manifest over clouds
and sea, misty below, and vague and indistinct, but clear above for all
the isles to watch. The ships make all their journeys in his sight, the
nights and the days go by him like a wind, the summers and winters under
him flicker and fade, the lives of men pass quietly here and hence, and
Fuzi-Yama watches there—and knows.”
And the watchers in the gate said “Enter in.”
And I, too, would have told them a tale, very wonderful and very true;
one that I had told in many cities, which as yet had no believers. But
now the sun had set, and the brief twilight gone, and ghostly silences
were rising from far and darkening hills. A stillness hung over that
city’s gate. And the great silence of the solemn night was more
acceptable to the watchers in the gate than any sound of man. Therefore
they beckoned to us, and motioned with their hands that we should pass
untaxed into the city. And softly we went up over the sand, and between
the high rock pillars of the gate, and a deep stillness settled among
the watchers, and the stars over them twinkled undisturbed.
For how short a while man speaks, and withal how vainly. And for how
long he is silent. Only the other day I met a king in Thebes, who had
been silent already for four thousand years.
_The Hashish Man_
I was at dinner in London the other day. The ladies had gone upstairs,
and no one sat on my right; on my left there was a man I did not know,
but he knew my name somehow apparently, for he turned to me after a
while, and said, “I read a story of yours about Bethmoora in a review.”
Of course I remembered the tale. It was about a beautiful Oriental city
that was suddenly deserted in a day—nobody quite knew why. I said, “Oh,
yes,” and slowly searched in my mind for some more fitting
acknowledgement of the compliment that his memory had paid me.
I was greatly astonished when he said, “You were wrong about the gnousar
sickness; it was not that at all.”
I said, “Why! Have you been there?”
And he said, “Yes; I do it with hashish. I know Bethmoora well.” And he
took out of his pocket a small box full of some black stuff that looked
like tar, but had a stranger smell. He warned me not to touch it with my
finger, as the stain remained for days. “I got it from a gipsy,” he
said. “He had a lot of it, as it had killed his father.” But I
interrupted him, for I wanted to know for certain what it was that had
made desolate that beautiful city, Bethmoora, and why they fled from it
swiftly in a day. “Was it because of the Desert’s curse?” I asked. And
he said, “Partly it was the fury of the Desert and partly the advice of
the Emperor Thuba Mleen, for that fearful beast is in some way connected
with the Desert on his mother’s side.” And he told me this strange
story: “You remember the sailor with the black scar, who was there on
the day that you described when the messengers came on mules to the gate
of Bethmoora, and all the people fled. I met this man in a tavern,
drinking rum, and he told me all about the flight from Bethmoora, but
knew no more than you did what the message was, or who had sent it.
However, he said he would see Bethmoora once more whenever he touched
again at an eastern port, even if he had to face the Devil. He often
said that he would face the Devil to find out the mystery of that
message that emptied Bethmoora in a day. And in the end he had to face
Thuba Mleen, whose weak ferocity he had not imagined. For one day the
sailor told me he had found a ship, and I met him no more after that in
the tavern drinking rum. It was about that time that I got the hashish
from the gipsy, who had a quantity that he did not want. It takes one
literally out of oneself. It is like wings. You swoop over distant
countries and into other worlds. Once I found out the secret of the
universe. I have forgotten what it was, but I know that the Creator does
not take Creation seriously, for I remember that He sat in Space with
all His work in front of Him and laughed. I have seen incredible things
in fearful worlds. As it is your imagination that takes you there, so it
is only by your imagination that you can get back. Once out in æther I
met a battered, prowling spirit, that had belonged to a man whom drugs
had killed a hundred years ago; and he led me to regions that I had
never imagined; and we parted in anger beyond the Pleiades, and I could
not imagine my way back. And I met a huge grey shape that was the Spirit
of some great people, perhaps of a whole star, and I besought It to show
me my way home, and It halted beside me like a sudden wind and pointed,
and, speaking quite softly, asked me if I discerned a certain tiny
light, and I saw a far star faintly, and then It said to me, ‘That is
the Solar System,’ and strode tremendously on. And somehow I imagined my
way back, and only just in time, for my body was already stiffening in a
chair in my room; and the fire had gone out and everything was cold, and
I had to move each finger one by one, and there were pins and needles in
them, and dreadful pains in the nails, which began to thaw; and at last
I could move one arm, and reached a bell, and for a long time no one
came, because every one was in bed. But at last a man appeared, and they
got a doctor; and _he_ said that it was hashish poisoning, but it would
have been all right if I hadn’t met that battered, prowling spirit.
“I could tell you astounding things that I have seen, but you want to
know who sent that message to Bethmoora. Well, it was Thuba Mleen. And
this is how I know. I often went to the city after that day that you
wrote of (I used to take hashish of an evening in my flat), and I always
found it uninhabited. Sand had poured into it from the desert, and the
streets were yellow and smooth, and through open, swinging doors the
sand had drifted.
“One evening I had put the guard in front of the fire, and settled into
a chair and eaten my hashish, and the first thing that I saw when I came
to Bethmoora was the sailor with the black scar, strolling down the
street, and making footprints in the yellow sand. And now I knew that I
should see what secret power it was that kept Bethmoora uninhabited.
“I saw that there was anger in the Desert, for there were storm clouds
heaving along the skyline, and I heard a muttering amongst the sand.
“The sailor strolled on down the street, looking into the empty houses
as he went; sometimes he shouted and sometimes he sang, and sometimes he
wrote his name on a marble wall. Then he sat down on a step and ate his
dinner. After a while he grew tired of the city, and came back up the
street. As he reached the gate of green copper three men on camels
appeared.