MY DESPAIR UPON FINDING THE PIPE OF THE FUNNEL TOO SMALL FOR MY
BODY.—A RAY OF HOPE BREAKS IN UPON ME.—FULL ACCOUNT OF HOW I
SUCCEEDED IN ENTERING THE PIPE OF THE FUNNEL.—MY PASSAGE THROUGH
IT.—BULGER’S TIMELY AID.—THE MARBLE HIGHWAY AND SOME CURIOUS
THINGS CONCERNING THE ENTRANCE TO THE WORLD WITHIN A WORLD.
The rocky sides of Polyphemus’ Funnel were apparently as well polished
as those of any tin funnel that I had ever seen hanging in the kitchen
of Castle Trump, so making fast my tackle and taking Bulger in my arms,
away we went sliding down the side with the line passed under my arm for
safety’s sake.
It was nearly a hundred feet to the bottom, for I had measured off the
full length of my line before I had come to the apex of this gigantic
cone, and not caring to tumble headlong down its pipe, I proceeded to
light a taper and look about me.
Ah, dear friends, I can feel that shudder now, so terrible was it, and
what wonder, too, for a glance at the pipe of the funnel told me that it
was too small to let my body pass through. The agonizing thought flashed
through my mind that I had committed a terrible error—that I had
mistaken some vast pit for the Giants’ Well, that I had thrown Bulger’s
and my own life away in mad and unreasoning haste, that I should never
reach the wonderful World within a World, that there in that thick gloom
must we lay our bodies and bones.
Or, thought I, may not the learned Master of Masters, Don Fum, have made
an error himself in holding out the idea that the pipe of Polyphemus’
Funnel was large enough to admit the passage of a man’s body?
In my almost frenzy I advanced to the mouth of the pipe, and, lowering
myself into it, let my body sink as far as it would.
It caught at the shoulders, and after a careful examination I was forced
to reach the brain-racking conclusion that my faithful Bulger and I had
travelled our last mile together.
There was nothing for us to do but to lie down and die.
Lie down and die? Never! I had noticed in making the descent into the
Giants’ Well that its side had much the appearance of being walled
around by blocks of stone. With Bulger strapped to my back I would
slowly climb up from shelf to shelf until my strength failed me, and
then I would wait until I thought old Yuliana had come back to gather
herbs, and possibly I might make her hear me.
In my despair I sighed and clutched my own arms, and as I did so one of
my hands came into contact with something cold and slippery having the
feel of tallow. Taking a pinch of the substance between my thumb and
finger, I rubbed it thoughtfully for a moment, and then a ray of hope
broke through the awful gloom that enshrouded me so pitilessly. It was
black lead—there could be no doubt of it. It had made its way through a
crack or crevice in Polyphemus’ Funnel, and I had rubbed it off in
sliding down the side. With this greasy material to rub on the inside of
the pipe to the funnel, and also to besmear myself with, mayhap I might
yet slip through into the World within a World!
At any rate, I determined to make the trial, even if I left some of my
skin on the flinty rock.
In order to collect my thoughts thoroughly, and that I might proceed
step by step in that systematic order so characteristic of all my
wonderful exploits, I sat down, and putting my arm around dear Bulger’s
neck and drawing him up against me, I communed with myself for a good
half-hour.
[Illustration: BEFORE HER MAJESTY GALAXA, QUEEN OF THE MIKKAMENKIES.]
Then all was in readiness for action; and to prove to you, dear friends,
how careful Bulger was not to interrupt my train of thought, I have to
report to you that although a small animal of the rat family came out
from a crevice in the rock while I sat there thinking, as I could see by
the light of my tiny wax taper, and had the temerity first to sniff at
Bulger’s tail and then to give it a playful nip, yet the sagacious
animal never budged a hair’s breadth.
“Mind hath ordered, now let hands obey!” I exclaimed, as I sprang up and
began stripping off my outer garments. This done, I clambered up on the
side of the funnel, and began to collect a supply of the black lead,
which I deposited near the opening of the pipe. The next thing to do was
to get Bulger through the pipe ahead of me. To this end I tied him up in
my clothing, bag fashion, and began to lower away.
After paying out sixty-five or seventy feet of the line, he struck
bottom, and by his loud barking gave me to understand that it was all
right, that I might make the descent myself. Upon hearing his voice, I
gave the line a few sharp tugs. He was not slow to comprehend my
meaning, and in a moment or so had not only scrambled out of the bag
himself, but pulled my clothing loose, so that I might draw the line up
again.
My next step was to contrive a way to weight myself when the moment
arrived to begin the descent, for I felt sure that I never should be
able to arrange it so as to slip through the pipe unless something was
pulling at my heels.
Cutting off about ten feet of the rope, I made fast one end of the piece
to a long piece of rock, weighing about a hundred pounds. This I laid
near the mouth of the pipe ready for use. But now came the most
difficult thing of all—it was to draw my shoulders in on my breast and
lash them securely in that position, by which plan I expected to reduce
my width by at least two good inches.
These two inches thus gained, or, rather, lost, might be the means by
which I would be able to slip through the pipe of Polyphemus’ Funnel and
reach the vast underground passage leading to the World within a World.
Putting a noose around my chest, just below my collar bone, I drew my
shoulders in as tight as I could bear, and changed the slip knot into a
hard one; then having made the other end of the line fast to the side of
the funnel, I proceeded to wind myself up as the housewives often do a
big sausage to keep it from bursting. This done, I set about rolling in
the black lead until I was thoroughly smeared with it.
There was now but one thing more to do before dropping myself into the
pipe, and that was to make fast the weight to my feet. It was no easy
task, wound up as I was, with my arms lashed down against my body, but
by the use of slip knots I finally accomplished the feat, and sitting
down put my legs into the pipe and drew a long breath, for I felt as if
I was skewered up in a straight jacket.
Bending down, I called out to Bulger. He answered with a yelp of joy
that brought fresh vigor to my heart. Now was come the supreme moment
which was to witness success or failure. Failure! Oh, what a dread word
is that! and yet how often must human lips pronounce it, and in so doing
breathe out the sigh in which it ends! Quickly lowering the weight, I
wriggled off the edge of the opening, and straightened myself out as I
slipped into the pipe.
Had I stopped it like a cork, or was I moving? Yes, down, down, gently,
slowly, noiselessly, I went slipping through the pipe to Polyphemus’
Funnel. What did I care how that weight caused the line to cut into my
ankles? I was moving, I was drawing nearer and nearer to Bulger, whose
joyous bark I could hear now and then, nearer to the inner gates of the
World within a World!
But woe is me! I suddenly stop, and in spite of all my efforts to start
again by twisting, turning, and shaking my body, it refused to sink
another inch, and there I stick.
“Oh, Bulger, Bulger,” I moan, “faithful friend, if thou couldst but
reach me, one tug from thee might save thy little master!”
In a sort of a wild and desperate way I now began to feel about me as
well as I could with my hands wedged in so close to my sides, but in a
moment or so I had discovered the cause of my coming to such a sudden
standstill.
I had struck a portion of the pipe that had a thread to it, like that
which encircles a bolt of iron and makes a screw of it, and the thought
came to me that if I could only succeed in giving a revolving motion to
my body, I would with every turn twist myself farther down toward the
end of the pipe.
I could feel that my knuckles and finger tips were being bruised and
lacerated by this arduous work, but what cared I for the keen pain that
darted from hands to wrists, and wrists to elbows! It was like twisting
a screw slowly through a long nut, only the thread in this case was on
the nut and the grooves in the screw, and that screw was my poor bruised
little body!
All of a sudden, by the swinging of the weight, I could tell that it had
passed out at the lower end of the pipe. It was pulling cruelly hard on
my tender ankles, but I could twist myself no more; my strength was
gone. I was at the point of swooning when I heard Bulger utter a loud
yelp, and the next instant there was such a strong tug at my ankles that
I sent forth a groan, but that tug saved me! It was Bulger who had
leaped into the air, and catching the rope in his teeth had dragged his
little master out of the pipe of Polyphemus’ Funnel!
We all fell into the same heap, Bulger, I, and the weight, fully ten
feet, and very serious might have been the consequences for me had my
fall not been broken by my striking on the pile of my clothing placed
directly under the opening; and, dear friends, if you talked until the
crack o’ doom you could not make me believe that my four-footed brother
hadn’t placed those clothes there to catch me.
They weren’t thrown higgledy-piggledy into a heap either, but were laid
one upon the other, the heaviest at the bottom.
Having unwound myself and lighted one of my wax tapers, I made haste to
cast away the undergarment with its coating of black lead and resume my
clothing; then stooping down, I made an examination of the floor. It was
composed of huge blocks of marble of various colors, polished almost as
smooth as if the hand of man had wrought the work; and then I knew that
I was on Nature’s Marble Highway leading to the cities of the under
world which Don Fum had mentioned in his book, and I remembered, too,
that he had spoken of Nature’s Mighty Mosaics, huge fantastic figures on
the walls of these lofty corridors, made up of various colored blocks
and fragments laid one upon the other as if with design, and not by the
wild, tempestuous whims of upbursting forces thousands of years ago,
when the earth was in its mad and wayward youth. After a rest of several
hours, during which I nursed my torn hands and bruised fingers, Bulger
and I were up and off again along this broad and glorious Marble
Highway. Strange to say, it was not the inky darkness of the ordinary
cavern which filled these magnificent chambers, through which the Marble
Highway went winding in stately and massive grandeur; far from it. The
gloom was tempered by a faint glow that met us on the way ever and anon,
like a ray of twilight gone astray. Anyway, Bulger, I noticed, could see
perfectly well; so tying a bit of twine to his collar, I sent him on
ahead, convinced that I could have no surer guide.
At times our path would be lighted up for an instant by the bursting-out
of a little tongue of flame either on the sides or from the roof of the
gallery. I was puzzled for quite a while to tell what it proceeded from;
but at last I caught sight of the source, or rather the maker, of this
welcome illumination. It proceeded from a lizard-like animal, which, by
suddenly uncoiling its tail, had the power to emit this extremely bright
flash of phosphorescent light, and in so doing he made a sharp crack,
for all the world like the noise of an electric spark. Bulger was
delighted with this performance; and on one occasion, not being able to
control his feeling, he uttered a sharp bark, whereupon apparently ten
thousand of these little torch-bearers snapped their tails at me at the
same instant, and filled the vast place with a flash of light of almost
lightning-like intensity.
Bulger was so frightened by the result of his applause that he took good
care to keep quiet after this.