_Atterley goes to the great monthly fair--Its various exhibitions;
difficulties--Preparations to leave the Moon--Curiosities procured by
Atterley--Regress to the Earth._
The philosopher, not waiting to enjoy the triumph of victory, abruptly
took his leave, and we, refreshed and delighted with our walk, returned
home. Our landlord informed us that we had arrived in good time to
attend the great fair, or market, which regularly takes place a little
before the sun sinks below the horizon. Having taken a short repast,
while the Brahmin called on one of his acquaintance, I sallied forth
into the street, and soon found myself in the bustling throng, who were
hastening to this great resort of the busy, the idle, the knavish, and
the gay; some in pursuit of gain, and some of pleasure; whilst others
again, without any settled purpose, were carried along by the vague
desire of meeting with somewhat to relieve them from the pain
of idleness.
The fair was held in a large square piece of ground in one of the
suburbs, set apart for that purpose; and on each of its four sides a
long low building, or rather roof, supported on massy white columns,
extended about six hundred yards in length, and was thirty yards wide.
Immediately within this arcade were arranged the finer kinds of
merchandise, fabrics of cotton or silk, and articles of jewelry,
cutlery, porcelain, and glass. On the outside were provisions of every
kind, vegetable and animal, flesh, fish, and fowl, as well as the
coarser manufactures. At no great distance from this hollow square,
(which was used exclusively for buying and selling,) might be seen an
infinite variety of persons, collected in groupes, all engaged in some
occupation or amusement, according to their several tastes and humours.
Here a party of young men were jumping, or wrestling, or shooting at a
mark with cross-bows. There, girls and boys were dancing to the sound of
a pipe, or still smaller children were playing at marbles, or amusing
themselves with the toys they had just purchased. Not far from these, a
quack from one scaffold was descanting on the virtues of his medicines,
whilst a preacher from another was holding forth to the graver part of
the crowd, the joys and terrors of another life; and yet farther on, a
motley groupe were listening to a blind beggar, who was singing to the
music of a sort of rude guitar. Here and there curtains, hanging from a
slight frame of wood-work, veiled a small square from the eyes of all,
except those who paid a nail for admittance. Some of these curtained
boxes contained jugglers--some tumblers--some libidinous pictures--and
others again, strange birds, beasts, and other animals. I observed that
none of the exhibitions were as much frequented as these booths; and I
was told that the corporation of the city derived from them a
considerable revenue. Amidst such an infinite variety of objects, my
attention was so distracted that it could not settle down upon any one,
and I strolled about without object or design.
When I had become more familiar with this mixed multitude of sights and
sounds, I endeavoured to take a closer survey of some of the objects
composing the medley. The first thing which attracted my particular
notice, was a profusion of oaths and imprecations, which proceeded from
one of the curtained booths. I paid the admittance money to a
well-dressed man, of smooth, easy manners, and entered. I found there
several parties paired off, and engaged at different games; but, like
the rest of the bystanders, I felt myself most strongly attracted
towards the two who were betting highest. One of these was an elderly
man, of a tall stature, in a plain dress; the other was a short man, in
very costly apparel, and some years younger. For a long time the scales
of victory seemed balanced between them; but at length the tall man, who
had great self-possession, and who played with consummate skill, won the
game: soon after which he rose up, and making a graceful, respectful bow
to the rest of the company, he retired. Not being able to catch his eye,
so intent was he on his game, I felt some curiosity to know whether he
was a Glonglim; but could not ascertain the fact, as some of whom the
Brahmin inquired, said that he was, while others maintained that he was
not. His adversary, however, evidently belonged to that class, and, when
flushed with hope, reminded me of the feather-hunter. At first he
endeavoured, by forced smiles, to conceal his rage and disappointment.
He then bit his lips with vexation, and challenged one of the bystanders
to play for a smaller stake. Fortune seemed about to smile on him on
this occasion; but one of the company, who appeared to be very much
respected by the rest, detected the little man in some false play, and
publicly exposing him, broke up the game. I understood afterwards, that
before the fair was over, the gamester avenged himself for this injury
in the other's blood: that he then returned to the fair, secretly
entered another gambling booth, where he betted so rashly, that he soon
lost not only his patrimonial estate, which was large, but his acquired
wealth, which was much larger. Having lost all his property, and even
his clothes, he then staked and lost his liberty, and even his teeth,
which were very good; and he will thus be compelled to live on soups for
the rest of his life.
I saw several other matches played, in which great sums were betted,
great skill was exhibited, and occasionally much unfairness practised.
There was one man in the crowd, whose extraordinary good fortune I could
not but admire. He went about from table to table, sometimes betting
high and sometimes low, but was generally successful, until he had won
as much as he could fairly carry; after which he went out, and amused
himself at a puppet-show, and the stall of a cake-woman, with whom he
had formerly quarrelled, but who now, when she learnt his success, was
obsequiously civil to him. I did not see that he manifested superior
skill, but still he was successful; and in his last great stake with a
young, but not inexpert player, he won the game, though the chances were
three to two against him. "Surely," thought I, "fortune rules the
destinies of man in the moon as well as on the earth."
On looking now at my watch, I found that I had been longer a witness of
these trials of skill and fortune, than I had been aware; and on leaving
the booth, perceived that the sun had sunk behind the western mountains,
and that the earth began to beam with her nocturnal splendour. Those who
had come from a distance, were already hurrying back with their carts;
and here and there light cars, of various forms and colours, and drawn
by dogs, were conveying those away whose object had been amusement. Some
were snatching a hasty meal; and a few, by their quiet air, seemed as if
they meant to continue on the spot as long as the regulations permit,
after sunset, which is about twenty of our hours. I found the Brahmin at
home when I returned, and I felt as much pleased to see him, as if we
had not seen each other for many months.
As the shades of night approached, my anxiety to return to my native
planet increased, and I urged my friend to lose no time in preparing for
our departure. We were soon afterwards informed that a man high in
office, and renowned for his political sagacity, proposed to detain us,
on the ground that when such voyages as ours were shown to be
practicable, the inhabitants of the earth, who were so much more
numerous than those of the moon, might invade the latter with a large
army, for the purposes of rapine and conquest. We farther learnt that
this opinion, which was at first cautiously circulated in the higher
circles, had become more generally known, and was producing a strong
sensation among the people.
The Brahmin immediately presented himself before the council of state,
to remove the impression. He pointed out to them the insurmountable
obstacles to such an invasion, physical and moral. He urged to them that
the nations of the earth felt so much jealousy and ill-will towards one
another, that they never cordially co-operated in any enterprise for
their common interest or glory; and that if any one nation were to send
an army into the moon, such a scheme of ambition would afford at once a
temptation and pretext for its neighbours to invade it. That his country
had not the ability, and mine had not the inclination, to attack the
liberties of any other: so far from that, he informed them, on my
authority, that we were in the habit of sending teachers abroad, to
instruct other nations in the duties of religion, morals, and humanity.
He entered into some calculations, to show that the project was also
impracticable on account of its expense; and, lastly, insisted that if
all other difficulties were removed, we should find it impossible to
convince the people of the earth that we had really been to the moon. I
have since found that the Brahmin was more right in his last argument,
than I then believed possible.
I am not able to say what effect these representations of the Brahmin
would have produced, if they had not been taken up and enforced by the
political rival of him who had first opposed our departure; but by his
powerful aid they finally triumphed, and we obtained a formal permission
to leave the moon whenever, we thought proper.
As we meant to return in the same machine in which we came, we were not
long in preparing for our voyage. We proposed to set out about the
middle of the night; and we passed the chief part of the interval in
making visits of ceremony, and in calling on those who had shown us
civility. I endeavoured also, to collect such articles as I thought
would be most curious and rare in my own country, and most likely to
produce conviction with those who might be disposed to question the fact
of my voyage. I was obliged, however, to limit myself to such things as
were neither bulky nor weighty, the Brahmin thinking that after we had
taken in our instruments and the necessary provisions, we could not
safely take more than twenty or thirty pounds in addition.
Some of my lunar curiosities, which I thought would be most new and
interesting to my countrymen, have proved to be very familiar to our men
of science. This has been most remarkably the case with my mineral
specimens. Of the leaves and flowers of above seventy plants, which I
brought, more than forty are found on the earth, and several of these
grow in my native State. With the insects I have been more successful;
but some of these, as well as of the plants, I am assured, are found on
the coasts of the Pacific, or in the islands of that ocean; which fact,
by the way, gives a farther support to the Brahmin's hypothesis.
Besides the productions of nature that I have mentioned, I procured some
specimens of their cloth, a few light toys, a lady's turban decorated
with cantharides, a pair of slippers with heavy metallic soles, which
are used there for walking in a strong wind, and by the dancing girls to
prevent their jumping too high. As this metal, which gravitates to the
moon, is repelled from the earth, these slippers assist the wearer here
in springing from the ground as much as they impeded it in the moon, and
therefore I have lent them to Madame ----, of the New-York Theatre, who
is thus enabled to astonish and delight the spectators with her
wonderful lightness and agility.
But there is nothing that I have brought which I prize so highly as a
few of their manuscripts. The Lunarians write as we do, from left to
right; but when their words consist of more than one syllable, all the
subsequent syllables are put over the first, so that what we call _long
words_, they call _high_ ones: which mode of writing makes them more
striking to the eye. This peculiarity has, perhaps, had some effect in
giving their writers a magniloquence of style, something like that which
so laudably characterises our Fourth of July Orations and Funeral
Panegyrics: that composition being thought the finest in which the words
stand highest. Another advantage of this mode of writing is, that they
can crowd more in a small page, so that a long discourse, if it is also
very eloquent, may be compressed in a single page. I have left some of
the manuscripts with the publisher of this work, for the gratification
of the public curiosity.
Having taken either respectful or affectionate leave of all, and got
every thing in readiness, on the 20th day of August, 1825, about
midnight we again entered our copper balloon, if I may so speak, and
rose from the moon with the same velocity as we had formerly ascended
from the earth. Though I experienced somewhat of my former sensations,
when I again found myself off the solid ground, yet I soon regained my
self-possession; and, animated with the hope of seeing my children and
country, with the past success of our voyage, and (I will not disguise
it,) with the distinction which I expected it would procure me from my
countrymen, I was in excellent spirits. The Brahmin exhibited the same
mild equanimity as ever.
As the course of our ascent was now less inclined from the vertical line
than before, in proportion as the motion of the moon on its axis, is
slower than that of the earth, we for some hours could see the former,
only by the light reflected from our planet; and although the objects on
the moon's surface were less distinct, they appeared yet more beautiful
in my eyes than they had done in the glare of day. The difference,
however, may be in part attributed to my being now in a better frame of
mind for enjoying the scene. As our distance increased, the face of the
moon became of a lighter and more uniform tint, until at length it
looked like one vast lake of melted silver, with here and there small
pieces of greyish dross floating on it. After contemplating this lovely
and magnificent spectacle for about an hour, I turned to the Brahmin,
and reminded him of his former promise to give me the history of his
early life. He replied, "as you have seen all that you can see of the
moon, and the objects of the earth are yet too indistinct to excite much
interest, I am not likely to have a more suitable occasion;" and after a
short pause, he began in the way that the reader may see in the
next chapter.