_The eagle shall lead thee into strange lands. Never again wilt thou
be separated from Yermah. Withhold from him all knowledge of the birds
until such time as thou shalt find him in great danger._
_Then loosen and follow thy guides._
_Akaza._
The Dorado was so astonished that he held the parchment on his knee and
made no further effort to examine the tissue message for himself.
“Well do I remember how anxious Kerœcia was about this ring. She went
every day to superintend its making.”
Alcyesta’s words aroused Yermah.
Unrolling the tissue, he saw a finely traced map, with a few lines
written on the margin:
_Yermah, Beloved of the Brotherhood_:
_Follow the way marked out before thee._
_When one bird hovers in the air while the other sits on a rock with
cactus flowering at its base, halt thou and receive thy future task
from him who was appointed to aid thee._
_Go willingly. Thou hast no further mission in Tlamco. Fear not._
_I have been before thee—and am with thee even unto the end of time._
_Akaza._
The eagles led them southward by sea for many days after leaving
Monterey Bay, but on coming ashore they traveled inland until they
reached the pueblos of the Colorado.
Here they were evidently expected by the Brotherhood, who reprovisioned
and sent them forward.
“Thou art the forerunners of an exodus which will strip this fair land
of the white race for ages to come. Ice imprisons every vestige of life
to the north, and the seeds of total destruction are already planted in
the Llama city. Whither thou goest, we, too, will follow. Peace be thy
portion!” solemnly spoke the high-priest in adieu.
It would not have been a very difficult journey down the singularly even
plateau stretching beyond the Colorado to far Anahuac, had it not been
for the dread scourge of waters flooding the plains and settling in the
deep cup now known as Tezcuco Lake.
Nature’s tropic prodigality had done much to hide the ugly scars earned
in a life and death struggle between the raging water courses and the
still smoking mountain peaks muttering curses to the clouds.
It looked as if the earth in trembling fright had shaken everything
down, ready for the receding waves to wash into the sea.
Forty long, weary days, the little party pushed ahead.
Cibolo, the gallant, was as resolute and brave as any man among them;
but even the eagles seemed to lose their bearings occasionally, and then
Yermah called aloud to Akaza:
“Make me to know thy wishes. Humbly and obediently will I follow them.”
Instantly, Cibolo’s ears would go forward, and with a start he would shy
at a dim, hazy outline directly in front of him. First it took the form
of Akaza; then, gradually it changed into the beatific countenance of
Kerœcia.
In the beginning only Yermah could discern them, but before the journey
was completed every member of the party saw and recognized them.
“Thou art under Divine guidance,” they said to Yermah, and held him in
higher esteem than ever.
On the last day, the eagles circled in the air, screaming uneasily, and
refusing to go forward.
“We must be near the place,” the wanderers said to each other, in
awe-stricken whispers.
“Dost thou not see the rock and the flowering cactus?”
“One eagle sits and the other circles—”
“O Thou seen and unseen powers! Search our hearts, that thou mayst know
all our gratitude,” cried the Dorado, falling to his knees, and
prostrating himself on the ground, an act which was quickly imitated by
his comrades.
“I am Gautama,” said a voice.
When Yermah looked up, a man old as Akaza, stood making the hierophant
sign of blessing over him.
“Rise and receive from me word from thy beloved teacher.
“Fear me not.
“These hands have guided thy puny baby footsteps, and now thou must lend
thy strength to me. We have some days yet before thou art at rest.”
The survivors were near the ancient site of Tenochtitlan,[24] then a
dreary waste of water, with its first city ingulfed, but to have rebirth
again and again until the present time.
Gautama was accompanied by two of the Brotherhood and some tamanes,
amply provided with food and fresh raiment, which they gave to the
travelers.
“Thou art the last admitted, and art the youngest initiate,” said
Gautama to Yermah, later. “But thine is a special mission. When once in
Cholula, I shall tell thee all. Thou art anxiously awaited.”
The augmented company went into camp for the rest of the day but they
resumed travel shortly after sunrise, the next morning.
The holy city of Cholula[25] did not exist in those days.
There was nothing on the plain but the splendid “Memento for
Generations,” built by the men of Atlantis, whose descendants were
gathered into the hungry maw of the sea.
This massive pile is twice the length of the Pyramid of Cheops, but not
nearly so high. A long circular stairway led to its top, which measured
an acre in its area, and supported a teocalli—the last temple of the
Brotherhood of the White Star which was built in America.
Nothing could be more sublime and beautiful than the view from the top
of this pyramid. Toward the west stretches the bold barrier of
porphyritic rock which nature has reared around the valley of Mexico,
with huge Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl standing like two colossal
sentinels guarding the entrance to this incomparable region.
The word pyramid means a place of fire, while Palai, or Pele, of the
Hawaiians, is the spirit of the volcano center, or precipice of fire, as
a pyramid was often called. The Arabic word Alcyone means the center, or
cone, the spiritual apex around which the sun and all the sidereal
galaxy are circling.
The two mountains represented the masculine potency and the feminine
passivity of all which is generated in nature giving all things their
proportion. Acting on this principle, the ancient sculptors down to and
including Phidias, fixed the respective heights of man and woman as
twenty and nineteen palms of one-third of a foot each, up to the organs
of casualty and comparison, at the roots of the hair on the forehead.
Comparison with casualty on each side is the psychometric eye—the
Cyclopean third eye, scouted by the would-be wise. Comparison is
feminine; casualty is masculine.
The union of these forms the true vision of the soul, which, developed
to its fullest capacity, gives that mysterious faculty of psychic
perception, comparison and deduction beyond the intellectual
comprehension of ordinary man, and marks the adept.
It was this transcendent power which the Pyramid of Cholula, built to
the east of these two volcanoes, symbolized.
Farther in the same direction, towers Orizaba, correlated to the
macrocosm, of which the Pyramid of Cholula was the microcosm.
Orizaba equals the height of Popocatepetl, signifying that the adept
manifesting energy on the subjective plane is equal _in function_ to the
cosmic mind.
In this capacity the initiate is Quetzalcoatl, who, like Osiris,
Krishna, etc., was black—that is, the unknowable and mysterious in
Deity. This is why Quetzalcoatl is always shown with a black face,
although he was called the Fair God. He belonged to the white race, and
was the Aztec Yermah.
The antediluvians—the men who invented architecture—used the human form,
the pyramid, the pentagram, and the interlaced triangles as a basis of
measure and form.
The pyramid and pentagram denote the cone, or center, of sacred fire;
the interlaced triangles were the balance of spirit and matter; while
the obelisk was intended to show the purified nature of man.
The pillar of fire of Jacob was an obelisk. So were Stonehenge, Ellora,
the Babel towers of Central America, Babylon and Judea, the gigantic
ruins over all Tartary and India, and the totem-pole of the Eskimo—even
the tombstones have the same grand origin.
That the obelisk everywhere outside of Egypt became a sign of the
phallus does not alter its primal significance nor militate against it.
The pyramid was often called the Pillar of the Cosmos because it is the
ideal form of the principle of stability, and cannot be assailed by any
of the four elements.
Its tapering form guards it from destruction by earthquake; nor can it
be overturned; and it is probably the only fireproof structure in the
world.
The immense base and weight render it secure from floods; nor can the
wind get sufficient purchase to do any damage.
Even the insidious encroachments of Time itself are baffled and
outwitted by this cunningly constructed pile. It is, also, a perfect
instrument for estimating the weight of the earth; and, it is an
excellent astronomical observatory.
In its central chamber the temperature never varies.
Does any one believe this is the result of chance?
Will any part of to-day’s civilization survive the same flight of years?
Posterity has no claim on us which individualism—the god of the
age—respects; nor will it require a cataclysm to destroy any of the
works of to-day on any plane.
Science and invention make many discoveries, but our mental flights fall
far short of the ancients in the discernment of the basic principles of
philosophy.
In religion we have lost the meaning of the simplest symbols, and,
apparently, we do not understand where to place the credit for the
principles and precepts we profess to believe and practice.
Gautama led the travelers on by the west, while far away to the east was
seen the conical head of Orizaba, soaring high into the clouds.
Near by was the barren, though beautifully shaped, Malinche Sierras,
casting broad shadows over the plains of Tlaxcala. At their feet lay the
Pyramid of Cholula, reposing in denuded gardens in the once fairest
portion of the plateau of Puebla.
“Thou seest but a remnant of former glory,” said Gautama. “We, too, have
bowed to the chastening rod. Only such as climbed the long flight of
steps to the top of the pillar escaped destruction. Thou, too, art able
to bear witness?”
It was like probing an old wound, but Yermah answered bravely:
“The lash found my tender parts, but I am learning to be content.”
“It is to assist thee in this endeavor that I am come. When once thou
art ascended to the teocalli heights, thou mayst not return again until
thou art fully prepared. Thy next labor is to quash doubtful
inspiration. Thou art still leaning on thy earth loves, when thou art
commanded to have but one ideal—”
“I stand face to face with inner consciousness, and hear the still small
voice.”
“He hears the bells, but he does not know where they hang,” commented
the priests of the Brotherhood, smiling at each other.
“Seclusion in rarefied atmosphere, where the whole basin of the earth
has been purified, will give peace beyond thy present capacity for
understanding,” returned Gautama.
“Thy will be done!” responded Yermah.
“Thou art a doer of penance, and must be able to say literally, ‘Thy
will be done!’”
The devotees were nearing the pyramid, when they were met by a
delegation of priests, who crowned them with garlands, and conducted
them up the first flight of steps. On the truncated face of the terrace
was the inscription:
BEFORE THE LIGHT WAS OBSCURED
THIS MEMENTO FOR GENERATIONS
WAS BUILT BY SERPENT KINGS
THEY WERE SCATTERED OVER THE EARTH
TO CARRY TRUTH AND WISDOM
THEY WILL COME AGAIN
TO RECEIVE THE TREASURES
HIDDEN IN THY BOWELS
ALL MEN WILL SPEAK AND HEAR THE
I AM I
The thoughtful band was allowed to rest at this juncture of their
pilgrimage after partaking of some refreshment; but they ascended to the
top of the pile in time to see the sunset.
Next morning, Yermah called his small aggregation of faithful adherents
together, and told them that he had received Akaza’s final commands.
“It imposes upon me seclusion in this spot. There is work for me here,”
he said with an odd smile. “The temple requires a central spire, and I
shall build and cover it with pure gold. Go thou all to the valley, and
make thy life apart from me. I love thee well and need thee sadly, but
even this love must be merged into the universal.”
“What wilt thou have me do?” asked Hanabusa.
“Go thou and build a balsa capable of riding the storm and stress of an
angry sea. In twenty lunations more thou must be prepared to go voyaging
with me.”
“To what task dost thou appoint me?” It was Ben Hu Barabe who spoke.
“Go thou amongst thy fellows and teach them the arts of peace. Show them
how to coax back fertility to the denuded soil, and build up civil
power, until I call thee.”
“Hast thou no thought for me?” asked Ildiko.
“The Brotherhood will guard thee until such time as a new Temple of
Venus shall arise on this fair plain. Seek thou knowledge diligently,
that thou mayst be able to teach the virgins committed to thy care. When
thou art separated from thy beloved Alcyesta, thou wilt be conducted to
a refuge in this teocalli, where other women are waiting to return to
their homes.”
Seeing that she made a brave effort to keep back tears, he added gently:
“Be not downcast. The first days of loneliness will find me near thee.
Shouldst thou need, call, and I shall come straightway.”
To Alcyesta, he said, covering her hand with both his own, and holding
it close to his breast:
“Promise if thine unborn shall be of thy sex, thou wilt name her,
Kerœcia?”
“I promise,” she returned, “and if it should be a son, wilt thou give
him thy name?”
“I shall be to thy son what Akaza was to me, but thou must call him
Gautamozin. In after years, he will understand the significance of this
command.”[26]
CHAPTER THIRTY
YERMAH RETURNS TO THE MOUNTAIN PEAKS OF ATLANTIS
The remnant of the survivors obeyed the will of Yermah, the leader, and
for one year he was a recluse, giving himself up to solitary meditation,
save when Gautama came to converse with him.
In that time Yermah developed rectitude of judgment, correct
appreciation, breadth of view, and an all-roundness of perception,
habitually associated with a well-balanced and perfectly poised mind and
character.
As an initiate, he had marvelous sensibility vibrating to, and stirred
by the faintest touch, yet remaining steadfast in purpose, because he
saw all things in their proper proportion and estimated them at their
real value.
Possessed of discrimination, Yermah perceived the relative permanency of
all that had befallen him. Measuring all by the standard of the Eternal,
he was not swept out of equilibrium by any temporary or illusive
appearance.
Exaggeration, over-coloring, all that savored of unreality or falsehood,
was absolutely foreign to his nature. Yermah, the hierophant, was no
cold abstraction, too self-absorbed to think and to feel deeply—but he
was _strong in the love that gives_, equally joyful though he who
received knew not the source. He never repaid injury or scorn. This
quality showed itself in many ways.
In quick and ready sympathy; in alertness to see; in watchfulness to
note the needs of the hour; in the constant, instinctive attitude of
mind which spontaneously saw and felt every opportunity to give—whether
it were service or sympathy, silence or speech, presence or absence—in
short every attribute of character defining utter selflessness, rounded
and molded the strong individuality of YERMAH, THE DORADO.
When the recluse began to mingle freely with the Brotherhood, he was
quickly made aware of all that was transpiring, not only in the pueblo
of Cholula, but also among outside colonies.
There was never a day when some pilgrim did not climb the zigzag
stairways to see, and to receive advice from him. No attention was paid
to their comings and goings, and it was not thought unusual when a
stranger approached and asked for Yermah.
“Cezardis, why hast thou left Tlamco?” asked Yermah, as he embraced his
visitor.
“I am come to request thee to return. Thou hast many devoted friends
there to mourn thy absence.”
“Is not Setos master of the councilmen?”
“Yes; and he has most grievously taxed and outraged the Azes.”
“I am not surprised,” said Yermah, calmly. “He is by nature fiery and
imperious, combative and bloodthirsty. The restraining influence of
Saturn held him in check for a time, but now it will add malefic
tendencies.”
“Of late, he has been trying to bring about chemical affinities,
investigating secret laws, and dabbling in the knowledge forbidden an
earthy mortal. He overeats, and sends in haste for a shaman and priest
while all Tlamco waits. He will allow no business transacted when he is
sick. Fully half our time is spent in the temples praying for him. We
have no choice, as he is the self-appointed guardian of our morals and
compels attendance.”
Cezardis’s words, looks and actions betrayed his feelings.
“How is it with Imos?”
“He is given unlimited power, because he allowed Setos to espouse
Oahspe, the vestal. This power he uses to advance his own interests.”
“Dost thou say Setos hath another wife? I gave him Rahula.”
“So thou didst. But she bore him no heir; and on this pretext, Setos has
two wives, instead of one; and, he makes it lawful for any man to do the
same.”
“Poor hot-tempered Rahula! How doth she bear the new affliction?”
“She hath obliterated her own individuality until she is an echo whom
Setos values no more than the mats under his feet.”
Yermah sent Cezardis away for rest and refreshment before giving an
answer, when he was again urged to return to Tlamco.
As soon as he was alone Yermah’s mind reverted to its normal condition,
and he was entirely dispassionate in his reply.
“I cannot comply with thy wishes, Cezardis,” he said. “Not that I dread
the conflict inevitable with the overthrow of Setos. I have another and
more difficult battle to fight.”
“I have made oath not to return without thee, and I will not. The whole
country is preparing to follow thee south, and thou art the only one
capable of holding them back.”
“Nothing can stay the exodus. It is the breaking up of old lines. A new
dispensation is beginning, and the present order must pass forever.”
“Wilt thou let me serve thee? I would have come with thee in the
beginning, had I known.”
Cezardis was aware that Yermah could not refuse to accept his offer. It
was an old-time custom for one man to serve another, voluntarily, and
the servant’s was the honored position. To serve sweetly in any capacity
was the aspiration animating this entire dispensation.
The Dorado smiled as he said:
“Thou wilt be the last to make such an offer. The generations following
will reverse our beliefs and practices. Go thou to Ben Hu Barabe, and
tell him to give Hanabusa leave to stock his balsa with food and raiment
for five men. See to it that there is plenty, for thou art of the
company.”
Yermah worked incessantly for several days making a llama of silver, as
an emblem of suffering innocence. Its belly was a golden sunburst, and
it was seated upon the back of an eagle, rescuing a rabbit from the
fangs of a serpent. This represented the unequal conflict between good
and evil; but the serpent being obliged to give up its prey, manifested
the final triumph of goodness.
There were eight altars in the temple; and, at sunset on the last day of
his stay, Yermah placed the llama on the altar facing the east.
Simultaneously with this act, Gautama headed a procession at the base of
the pyramid, which slowly climbed to the top.
The worshipers performed a sacrifice on each of the four terraces, and
did not reach the temple until midnight.
They found Yermah in the great, dark structure, intently watching the
constellation of the Pleiades. As Alcyone approached the zenith he
sprang forward with a glad cry, and vigorously swinging a copper hammer,
made the sparks fly from a granite rock.
The venerable Gautama held the cotton, and carefully nursed the sparks
into a blaze. As the light streamed up toward the heavens, shouts of joy
and triumph burst forth—for once more the children of men received a
direct ray from the spiritual sun.
Carriers with torches lighted at the blazing beacon ran in every
direction, carrying the cheering element to every part of the country.
Long before sunrise it was brightening the altars and hearthstones
everywhere.
Yermah sent up orisons from the eastern altar, and then took an
affectionate farewell of the priests in attendance, but before beginning
to descend he gazed long at the matchless scenery below.
Soft spring verdure lay everywhere, and he drew courage and inspiration
from the fact that the lower forms of creation neither sulked nor held
back because the elements had been remorselessly cruel to them.
Wherever there was enough soil to support plantlife, flowers and grasses
put forth, and all nature was making a brave effort to swing back into
harmony.
Gautama walked with him, and so did an unseen host led by Akaza and
Kerœcia.
The Dorado wore all the insignia of his office. He had a cloth-of-gold
robe, and a pale violet mantle. On his head was a high cap of the same
color crested with jewels. There were jeweled sandals on his feet, and
he carried a caduceus of silver running through a circle, which was a
gold serpent with its tail in its mouth.
At the foot of the pyramid Yermah found Alcyesta and her infant son
waiting for his blessing. Beside her was Ildiko, in the white robes of a
high-priestess, surrounded by the few vestals possible to the depleted
numbers.
Ben Hu Barabe, Hanabusa and Cezardis were ready to accompany him.
Taking a handful of salt and holding the baby up to the sun with the
left hand, Yermah spake:
“By right of initiation, I name thee Gautamozin, and by the power of
adeptship endow thee with Brotherhood inheritance. Thou shalt have a
long line; but the last of thy name shall be as I am, a sacrifice to
another order of being.”
As Yermah ceased speaking, he sprinkled salt over the child’s face, and
at this juncture a tamane approached leading Cibolo. With his disengaged
arm Yermah drew the horse’s head down until its nose touched the baby’s
soft cheek, and when Cibolo had tasted a morsel of the salt his master
laid his face close to the horse’s jaw, and said softly:
“Thou wilt be a good and faithful friend to Gautamozin, as thou hast
been to me? Thine shalt be a name to conjure with—as thy love and
obedience hath been worthy of example. Farewell, my comrade! Thy days
shall be as the sunny hours.”
From his breast Yermah drew the locket containing Kerœcia’s ring. Taking
Alcyesta’s hand, he silently slipped it on her finger, while unchecked
tears coursed down her cheeks.
Turning to Ildiko, he handed her the locket. Facing them all, he said:
“Be of good cheer! A long era of peace and prosperity is for thee and
thine. Thou art saved from the floods for a divine purpose. Let this
knowledge be thy secret refuge, lest thou be tempted to depart from the
way.”
At the water’s edge he embraced and blessed each one.
“Grieve not for me. In the fullness of time I shall come again.”
The young men went out on flower-laden rafts with him, and cast gold and
emeralds into the sea in his honor.
The stone of promise signified renewal after the cataclysm, and Yermah
was El Dorado,—“_He of the golden heart_.”
The men on the raft strained their vision to catch a last glimpse of the
balsa, as it was known that he was going away for purification, and they
believed implicitly that he would come again.
It was not long before the people on shore began the weary watch for his
return, which makes Cortez’s conquest of later days so pathetic and
pitiful.
The heart aches with the memory of the treachery and cruelty of the
Conquistadors at Cholula, after its inhabitants had sent Cortez a helmet
filled with gold nuggets, because they saw with surprise that he whom
they mistook for their Fair God, valued this metal.
The gold, itself, thrown up in the days of the earth agony, lay
untouched for centuries, but every precept of the “golden one”[27] was
cherished as priceless gifts over all the Americas.
The tribes had different local versions of him, where they built
pyramids and teocallis in his honor, sculptured his sayings in enduring
granite, repeated his exploits in poetry and song, until finally his
name and fame excited the cupidity of the European adventurers who
sought the Golden Fleece in crusades and voyages of discovery.
The American version of the Argonauts’ expedition for the golden apples,
under Columbus, began in violence and ended in crime.
But the search for the fabled El Dorado did not end here.
Like a veritable will-o’-the-wisp, it led some into the fever-infested
swamps of the Orinoco, in South America,[28] and finally induced
Coronado to push northward into Kansas, after he had nearly perished in
the desert sands of the Colorado. He pounced down upon the Zuni pueblo,
and tried hard to persuade himself that he had found the land of
Quivira, though he vainly tried to locate the seven cities of Cibolo.
The magic words “El Dorado” attracted another bond of gold-seekers, who
have made the name and the country their very own.
In their wake are the forerunners of the men and women who will make
California[29] a great center of occult knowledge—the alchemical gold,
corresponding to her mineral wealth.
* * * * *
“The land! The land! O my beloved country! How art thou humbled by
misfortune! I know not thy desolate bosom!” cried Yermah, springing
ashore upon the island of Teneriffe, the mountain peak of Poseidon’s
kingdom, his lost Atlantis.
“I kiss thy blackened and charred face! Thou mother of the white race!
Thou source of all learning! Grant that thy dependencies may not forget
and deny thee!”
Gautama, too, had prostrated himself, while a stifled, smothered feeling
kept him silent. For a time, Yermah forgot that the three bronzed men
who stood looking at the shepherds gathered about the shore were not
Atlantians.
It seemed doubtful what kind of a reception they were to receive, until
Yermah called to the natives in their own tongue.
“Our Dorado! Come to us out of the sea!” they shouted almost beside
themselves with joy.
“O thou blessed one! Dost thou see the scourge laid upon us?
“Thy father, Poseidon, and all thy countrymen, save us, poor Guanches,
are perished. Evil days have fallen on Majorata. Dost thou not see the
new mountain choking and filling her wide-open mouth? Tell us how thou
art come.”
“Thy servant brother, Hanabusa, skilled in sailcraft, is my deliverer.”
“The sun and stars lent countenance to our venture,” said he, “save when
obscured by a passing shadow. Then the corposant ran in balls and
spirals from sheet to sheet, and we could not fail.”
“I am of the Monbas,” said Ben Hu Barabe, “far to the west, and I am
brother to thee in sorrow. The destructive power of the Divine took all
my people.”
“And I am of the Mazamas,” said Cezardis, coming forward. “My country
lies under sheets of ice mountains high, and no living thing is there.”
“Misfortune is known in the land of Mexi, whence I come,” said Gautama.
“Flood and fire hidden in the earth made us tremble for days lest we all
should perish.”
“The Azes, too—” Hanabusa was not allowed to finish his sentence.
“Thou art of our blood!” exclaimed the Guanches, in a breath.
“Never again shalt thou depart from us. Thou wert with the Dorado?”
“From the beginning,” he answered.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
FINAL PEACE IS MADE WITH COSMIC LAW
These Guanches were splendid specimens of manhood, the remote
forefathers of the warriors who, five hundred years ago, held their
European conquerors at bay for more than a hundred years—never more than
a handful of men at any time.
First the fierce and ruthless Normans, then the Portuguese, and lastly
the Spanish, laid a destroying hand on the brave Guanches. Now, there is
but little more than their goats left of the surviving Atlantians. These
goats are of a Vandyke brown, with long twisted horns, venerable beards,
and hair lengthening almost to a lion’s mane.
Teneriffe was the Island of the Blessed of the Hindus, the Elysian
Fields of the Greeks, and the Tlapallapan of the Aztecs.
The Greeks had their Hermes; the Norsemen, Ymer; the Egyptians, Kema;
all words correlated to, and having the same significance as Yermah,[30]
which means the Divine Germ incarnate.
As El Dorado, his love nature was typified, but he transmuted passion,
and became a god among men. He was Votan to the Quiches; to the Mayas,
he was Kukulcan; and to the Peruvians he was Manco-capac—all types of
the same character, and emanations from the same civilizing source.
The next morning the Guanches made a part of the company which gave
escort to Yermah, as he essayed climbing the still smoking peak. After
they had passed the line of vegetation there was naught to be seen save
a sea of red rocks, and thirsty yellow pumice.
The scorching sun and blue, unvaried sky condemned everything far and
near to barrenness and desolation forever.
Climbing higher, there was no solid rock, no soft earth—nothing but
black stones, piled one upon the other so loosely that under the
crenellated edge of the sky-line were frequent glimpses of daylight.
It was not necessary for the Guanches to explain that a marvelous
bombardment of the heavens had but recently taken place. The wrenching
and heaving, when the crater of eruption was active, had cracked the
cooling and hardening surface repeatedly, sending masses of cinders and
stones rattling down only to be caught and piled one over another
fathoms deep.
The granular lava had crystals of white felspar mixed in it, liked
chopped straw, which were formed into spherical shells, veined, curved
and frothy. Under the varying effects of pressure, the still pasty mass
was rolling, falling and crystallizing in grotesque cascades.
In some places the trade-winds had hardened them into wild, dreamlike
faces, while some were pictures of contending beasts. Yermah could hear
them grinding and crushing in low snarls and growls as they rolled
heavily downward.
Many times these writhing and twisting forms threatened to remain
forever suspended in mid-air.
The Dorado imagined that he recognized some of the effigies, and was
made dizzy and seasick by their ceaseless progression in a community of
pain.
How inexpressibly varied were the colors, bathed in the brilliant light
of a vertical tropical sun, undimmed by impurities of the lower
atmosphere!
The tired and thirsty party halted at the Guajara Springs near the
spectral Lunar Rocks of the Cañadas, standing like white teeth newly
cast from a granite mouth opened wide enough to admit a tongue of lava
thousands of feet higher in air.
These grayish white spikes line the “Road of the Guanche Kings” where
the crater of elevation sticks out its ragged and torn lips, eternal
witnesses to one of nature’s most stupendous debauches.
Yermah groaned in spirit as he looked across the dreary waste, and he
mourned unfeignedly for his lost people. It seemed to need this grand,
harmonious outburst of unseen forces to give voice to the wild and
passionate utterances seeking vent in his heart. Nature speaks to each
soul alone, and no mortal may interfere with the communion.
In taking a tender farewell of his comrades, Yermah appointed the life
work of each loyal heart; nor had he the least doubt of their faithful
obedience.
“Go thou to Egypt, Gautama, and tell them the task is finished.”
“Mayst thou be eternally at one with the Divine.”
“And thou, Cezardis, journey on beyond Egypt, until thou art come to
Lassa. Find Kadmon, and tell him all is well.”
“And thou, Yermah, wilt thou come with me?” asked Ben Hu Barabe.
“No. Thou must teach Gautamozin in my stead. He will learn from the
Brotherhood. Farewell, beloved! I shall return, but not now.”
“Thou art come to thine own, Hanabusa,” he continued. “Stay thou here
with the despoiled.”
He kissed each one on brow and cheeks, murmuring affectionate words of
encouragement and farewell.
“Go now to the sea level. I am come to the end of my journey, and would
fain be alone.”
It was difficult for him to persuade the Guanches to leave him.
“Thou wilt see me again,” he promised; “but at another time.”
The shepherds turned again and again, kissing their hands to him as long
as he was in sight.
Weary and exhausted, Yermah slept soundly until the first streak of dawn
appeared in the lowest place on the horizon, while the long glade of
zodiacal light shot up amongst the stars of Orion and Taurus.
Yermah knew how to interpret this heavenly sign. Gradually a reddish hue
appeared, and as soon as the lonely watcher comprehended its meaning the
zodiacal light faded, and golden yellow gradually overcame and drove out
the red tinge, grown to vermilion.
The cold region of gray at its upper limit blushed a rosy pink as the
first point of the solar disk leaped from behind a horizon of ocean and
clouds.[31]
The Dorado performed ablutions with marked care, dressed himself in
fresh, white linen, and before the sun was an hour old was picking his
way to the higher regions.
Finally, a bright spot of fire appeared in the malpais, then a
lengthening red and smoking line, widening and growing deeper as it
flowed down the mountain side.
Nothing but the extreme high altitude made the heat bearable.
Occasionally a fresh tongue of fire shot up from the fountain head, and
the whole mass of fluid lava and scoria felt the impulse. Alternate
cascades of fire and dross thundered precipitately against the lower
slopes.
The tense and elastic vapors in their struggles for freedom here made
one collective heave to gain the light of day, as the Island of Atlantis
slowly settled down on the bed of the ocean, and the crater of eruption
came up like a huge lava bubble.
During this process the cold atmosphere did effective work on the
outside.
The mass was hidebound with hardening stone; but the violence of the
heated gases made a grievous rent in the wrinkled coating, thus causing
the mountain to shake as with the ague.
Finally, the internal pressure being too great, the massive shell was
shattered into a thousand pieces. Not once, but many times, has this
battle between heated gases and cold air taken place in the years since
then, as the extinct craters amply testify, before the pent-up, unruly
spirits of the mountain finally escaped.
Prior to reaching his destination, Yermah discovered a lava figure
resembling Kerœcia, kneeling with her hands joined in prayer, and
appearing to have a heavy mantle thrown over her shoulders.
This effigy is still one of the many fantastic shapes pointing the way
to the Ice Cavern—that wondrous sepulcher of the Dorado.
It was not then an ice-cold spring banked with snow, in the midst of
desolation, but was a vent where three conical mouths of the volcano
flared open from different quarters, and hardened there in a dome-shaped
elevation.
Lying to the south is a particularly large mass of scoria turned upside
down, which has been used from time immemorial by the Guanches as a
place to pack and make up their parcels of cavern snow before venturing
to carry it under a vertical sun, thirty miles to the capital below.
It was nightfall when Yermah reached this spot, where he found the
pentagram mentioned in Akaza’s will.
Nature had made it for him of whitish felspar on the western side of the
scoria table. Certain that he had been guided aright, he sat down to
await the appearance of Venus in the eastern horizon.
Astronomers call it lateral refraction when a star oscillates and makes
images in the heated atmosphere; but to Yermah it had a different
significance. He first saw Venus seven degrees high, apparently
motionless. The planet oscillated up and down, then horizontally,
outlining a Maltese cross—the primordial sign of matter.[32]
Finally, it rose perpendicularly, descended sideways at an angle, and
returned to the spot whence it started, completing a triangle—the
universal emblem of spirit.
While Yermah sat on the rock lost in reverie, the sub-conscious man made
its final peace with cosmic law. His entire life passed before him in
successive events when he knew that here was the end; but with this
realization he leaned confidently upon the Divine.
Under the impulse of utter helplessness, he arose and kissed his hand
reverently to the evening star—a practice taught him in the nursery.
As a child it was his first act of adoration before his tongue learned
to fashion appropriate speech or his mind to comprehend veneration. In
this supreme moment, he turned back to that time insistently.
Finally, he knelt—and lifting up his arms as if to embrace a heavenly
ray, Yermah kissed the air as if it were the raiment of God. Turning his
face up to the sky, he closed his eyes in silent prayer.
Rising, he approached the mouth of the crater which faces north. He
could hear the angry, hissing roar of the subterranean fires, and the
scorching flames licked out at him as he fed them his belongings one by
one.
But a short time previous, Yermah had passed his thirty-third birthday,
and, as he now stood ready for self-immolation, he was in the prime and
glory of vigorous manhood.
He had the illumined face of a saint, and was uplifted by that spirit
which sustained martyrs in the after years. Even his fair young body
seemed to be spiritualized.
“O Thou Ineffable One! Thou Spirit of Fire! Take that which is thine!
Lap thy purifying tongue about me, and leave no dross!”
The desolation about him was the veritable home of black despair. Of
what use was it to cry out to the deadly calm of the rarefied air,
amidst the crushing, strangling and appalling stillness?
Coming nearer, Yermah looked down into the white heat of the
pink-throated cavern.
“O Thou Sacred Fire! Thy kiss was welcome to her sweet lips. Feast Thou
on mine!”
With the fervor of an enthusiast he rushed forward to fling himself
headlong into the yawning chasm, but a dazzling effulgence obscured the
way, and a voice from the land of shadows said:
“Yermah, son of light, no further sacrifice is required of thee!”
It was the gentle, unseen hand of Akaza which halted the action * * *
then a Higher Power suffered Yermah’s lifeless body to be at rest.
“Kerœcia, beloved, receive thy twin spirit!” he cried, in passing.
In the transcendent radiance of the Presence enveloping all, the twain
appeared—transfigured and glorified.
Being thus reunited, Kerœcia realized for the first time that she was
out of the body.
* * * * *
Yermah was neither Krishna, nor the Christ, but the Ideal Man of all
time, and of all people.
He was LOVE, the eternal mystery; that love which Madame de Staël has
said confounds all notion of time, effaces all memory of a beginning and
all fear of an end.