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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Penguin Island
+
+Author: Anatole France
+
+Release Date: February 25, 2006 [EBook #1930]
+Last Updated: October 5, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PENGUIN ISLAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Aaron Cannon and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+PENGUIN ISLAND
+
+by ANATOLE FRANCE
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+     BOOK I.    THE BEGINNINGS
+     BOOK II.   THE ANCIENT TIMES
+     BOOK III.  THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+     BOOK IV.   MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+     BOOK V.    MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+     BOOK VI.   MODERN TIMES
+     BOOK VII.  MODERN TIMES
+     BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS
+
+
+
+
+I. LIFE OF SAINT MAEL
+
+Mael, a scion of a royal family of Cambria, was sent in his ninth year
+to the Abbey of Yvern so that he might there study both sacred and
+profane learning. At the age of fourteen he renounced his patrimony and
+took a vow to serve the Lord. His time was divided, according to the
+rule, between the singing of hymns, the study of grammar, and the
+meditation of eternal truths.
+
+A celestial perfume soon disclosed the virtues of the monk throughout
+the cloister, and when the blessed Gal, the Abbot of Yvern, departed
+from this world into the next, young Mael succeeded him in the
+government of the monastery. He established therein a school, an
+infirmary, a guest-house, a forge, work-shops of all kinds, and sheds
+for building ships, and he compelled the monks to till the lands in the
+neighbourhood. With his own hands he cultivated the garden of the Abbey,
+he worked in metals, he instructed the novices, and his life was gently
+gliding along like a stream that reflects the heaven and fertilizes the
+fields.
+
+At the close of the day this servant of God was accustomed to seat
+himself on the cliff, in the place that is to-day still called St.
+Mael’s chair. At his feet the rocks bristling with green seaweed and
+tawny wrack seemed like black dragons as they faced the foam of the
+waves with their monstrous breasts. He watched the sun descending into
+the ocean like a red Host whose glorious blood gave a purple tone to the
+clouds and to the summits of the waves. And the holy man saw in this the
+image of the mystery of the Cross, by which the divine blood has clothed
+the earth with a royal purple. In the offing a line of dark blue marked
+the shores of the island of Gad, where St. Bridget, who had been given
+the veil by St. Malo, ruled over a convent of women.
+
+Now Bridget, knowing the merits of the venerable Mael, begged from
+him some work of his hands as a rich present. Mael cast a hand-bell of
+bronze for her and, when it was finished, he blessed it and threw it
+into the sea. And the bell went ringing towards the coast of Gad, where
+St. Bridget, warned by the sound of the bell upon the waves, received it
+piously, and carried it in solemn procession with singing of psalms into
+the chapel of the convent.
+
+Thus the holy Mael advanced from virtue to virtue. He had already passed
+through two-thirds of the way of life, and he hoped peacefully to reach
+his terrestrial end in the midst of his spiritual brethren, when he knew
+by a certain sign that the Divine wisdom had decided otherwise, and
+that the Lord was calling him to less peaceful but not less meritorious
+labours.
+
+
+
+
+II. THE APOSTOLICAL VOCATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+One day as he walked in meditation to the furthest point of a tranquil
+beach, for which rocks jutting out into the sea formed a rugged dam, he
+saw a trough of stone which floated like a boat upon the waters.
+
+It was in a vessel similar to this that St. Guirec, the great St.
+Columba, and so many holy men from Scotland and from Ireland had gone
+forth to evangelize Armorica. More recently still, St. Avoye having come
+from England, ascended the river Auray in a mortar made of rose-coloured
+granite into which children were afterwards placed in order to make
+them strong; St. Vouga passed from Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock whose
+fragments, preserved at Penmarch, will cure of fever such pilgrims as
+place these splinters on their heads. St. Samson entered the Bay of St.
+Michael’s Mount in a granite vessel which will one day be called St.
+Samson’s basin. It is because of these facts that when he saw the stone
+trough the holy Mael understood that the Lord intended him for the
+apostolate of the pagans who still peopled the coast and the Breton
+islands.
+
+He handed his ashen staff to the holy Budoc, thus investing him with
+the government of the monastery. Then, furnished with bread, a barrel
+of fresh water, and the book of the Holy Gospels, he entered the stone
+trough which carried him gently to the island of Hoedic.
+
+This island is perpetually buffeted by the winds. In it some poor
+men fished among the clefts of the rocks and labouriously cultivated
+vegetables in gardens full of sand and pebbles that were sheltered from
+the wind by walls of barren stone and hedges of tamarisk. A beautiful
+fig-tree raised itself in a hollow of the island and thrust forth its
+branches far and wide. The inhabitants of the island used to worship it.
+
+And the holy Mael said to them: “You worship this tree because it is
+beautiful. Therefore you are capable of feeling beauty. Now I come to
+reveal to you the hidden beauty.” And he taught them the Gospel. And
+after having instructed them, he baptized them with salt and water.
+
+The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than they are
+to-day. For since then many have been swallowed up by the sea. St. Mael
+evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he ascended the
+river Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a
+Roman house. A thin column of smoke went up from the roof. The holy man
+crossed the threshold on which there was a mosaic representing a dog
+with its hind legs outstretched and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed
+by an old couple, Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, who lived there
+on the products of their lands. There was a portico round the interior
+court the columns of which were painted red, half their height upwards
+from the base. A fountain made of shells stood against the wall and
+under the portico there rose an altar with a niche in which the master
+of the house had placed some little idols made of baked earth and
+whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged children, others Apollo
+or Mercury, and several were in the form of a naked woman twisting her
+hair. But the holy Mael, observing those figures, discovered among them
+the image of a young mother holding a child upon her knees.
+
+Immediately pointing to that image he said:
+
+“That is the Virgin, the mother of God. The poet Virgil foretold her in
+Sibylline verses before she was born and, in angelical tones he sang Jam
+redit et virgo. Throughout heathendom prophetic figures of her have been
+made, like that which you, O Marcus, have placed upon this altar. And
+without doubt it is she who has protected your modest household. Thus it
+is that those who faithfully observe the natural law prepare themselves
+for the knowledge of revealed truths.”
+
+Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, having been instructed by this
+speech, were converted to the Christian faith. They received baptism
+together with their young freedwoman, Caelia Avitella, who was dearer to
+them than the light of their eyes. All their tenants renounced paganism
+and were baptized on the same day.
+
+Marcus Combabus, Valeria Moerens, and Caelia Avitella led thenceforth
+a life full of merit. They died in the Lord and were admitted into the
+canon of the saints.
+
+For thirty-seven years longer the blessed Mael evangelized the pagans
+of the inner lands. He built two hundred and eighteen chapels and
+seventy-four abbeys.
+
+Now on a certain day in the city of Vannes, when he was preaching the
+Gospel, he learned that the monks of Yvern had in his absence declined
+from the rule of St. Gal. Immediately, with the zeal of a hen who
+gathers her brood, he repaired to his erring children. He was then
+towards the end of his ninety-seventh year; his figure was bent, but his
+arms were still strong, and his speech was poured forth abundantly like
+winter snow in the depths of the valleys.
+
+Abbot Budoc restored the ashen staff to St. Mael and informed him of
+the unhappy state into which the Abbey had fallen. The monks were in
+disagreement as to the date an which the festival of Easter ought to
+be celebrated. Some held for the Roman calendar, others for the Greek
+calendar, and the horrors of a chronological schism distracted the
+monastery.
+
+There also prevailed another cause of disorder. The nuns of the island
+of Gad, sadly fallen from their former virtue, continually came in boats
+to the coast of Yvern. The monks received them in the guesthouse and
+from this there arose scandals which filled pious souls with desolation.
+
+Having finished his faithful report, Abbot Budoc concluded in these
+terms:
+
+“Since the coming of these nuns the innocence and peace of the monks are
+at an end.”
+
+“I readily believe it,” answered the blessed Mael. “For woman is a
+cleverly constructed snare by which we are taken even before we suspect
+the trap. Alas! the delightful attraction of these creatures is exerted
+with even greater force from a distance than when they are close at
+hand. The less they satisfy desire the more they inspire it. This is the
+reason why a poet wrote this verse to one of them:
+
+‘When present I avoid thee, but when away I find thee.’
+
+“Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love have more
+power over hermits and monks than over men who live in the world. All
+through my life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but
+his strongest temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman,
+however beautiful and fragrant she was. They came to me from the image
+of an absent woman. Even now, though full of days and approaching my
+ninety-eighth year, I am often led by the Enemy to sin against chastity,
+at least in thought. At night when I am cold in my bed and my frozen
+old bones rattle together with a dull sound I hear voices reciting the
+second verse of the third Book of the Kings: ‘Wherefore his servants
+said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the king a young virgin:
+and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish him, and let her
+lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat,’ and the devil
+shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to me: ‘I am thy Abishag;
+I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy couch.’
+
+“Believe me,” added the old man, “it is only by the special aid of
+Heaven that a monk can keep his chastity in act and in intention.”
+
+Applying himself immediately to restore innocence and peace to the
+monastery, he corrected the calendar according to the calculations of
+chronology and astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his
+decision; he sent the women who had declined from St. Bridget’s rule
+back to their convent; but far from driving them away brutally, he
+caused them to be led to their boat with singing of psalms and litanies.
+
+“Let us respect in them,” he said, “the daughters of Bridget and the
+betrothed of the Lord. Let us beware lest we imitate the Pharisees who
+affect to despise sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons
+should be abased, and they should be made ashamed of what they have done
+and not of what they are, for they are all creatures of God.”
+
+And the holy man exhorted his monks to obey faithfully the rule of their
+order.
+
+“When it does not yield to the rudder,” said he to them, “the ship
+yields to the rock.”
+
+
+
+
+III. THE TEMPTATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of Yvern
+before he learned that the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic, his
+first catechumens and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to
+paganism, and that they were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of
+wool to the branches of the sacred fig-tree.
+
+The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that soon those
+misguided men might violently destroy the chapel that had been built on
+the shore of their island.
+
+The holy man resolved forthwith to visit his faithless children, so that
+he might lead them back to the faith and prevent them from yielding to
+such sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was
+moored, he turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of
+saws and of hammers, which, thirty years before, he had erected on the
+fringe of that bay for the purpose of building ships.
+
+At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the sheds and,
+under the appearance of a monk called Samsok, he approached the holy man
+and tempted him thus:
+
+“Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins
+unceasingly. Every moment that passes removes them farther from God.
+They are soon going to use violence towards the chapel that you have
+raised with your own venerable hands on the shore of their island. Time
+is pressing. Do you not think that your stone trough would carry you
+more quickly towards them if it were rigged like a boat and furnished
+with a rudder, a mast, and a sail, for then you would be driven by the
+wind? Your arms are still strong and able to steer a small craft.
+It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem in front of your
+apostolic trough. You are much too clear-sighted not to have thought of
+it already.”
+
+“Truly time is pressing,” answered the holy man. “But to do as you say,
+Samson, my son, would it not be to make myself like those men of little
+faith who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts of
+Him who has sent me this stone vessel without rigging or sail?”
+
+This question, the Devil, who is a great theologian, answered by
+another.
+
+“Father, is it praiseworthy to wait, with our arms folded, until help
+comes from on high, and to ask everything from Him who can do all
+things, instead of acting by human prudence and helping ourselves?
+
+“It certainly is not,” answered the holy Mael, “and to neglect to act by
+human prudence is tempting God.”
+
+“Well,” urged the Devil, “is it not prudence in this case to rig the
+vessel?”
+
+“It would be prudence if we could not attain our end in any other way.”
+
+“Is your vessel then so very speedy?”
+
+“It is as speedy as God pleases.”
+
+“What do you know about it? It goes like Abbot Budoc’s mule. It is a
+regular old tub. Are you forbidden to make it speedier?”
+
+“My son, clearness adorns your words, but they are unduly
+over-confident. Remember that this vessel is miraculous.”
+
+“It is, father. A granite trough that floats on the water like a cork
+is a miraculous trough. There is not the slightest doubt about it. What
+conclusion do you draw from that?”
+
+“I am greatly perplexed. Is it right to perfect so miraculous a machine
+by human and natural means?”
+
+“Father, if you lost your right foot and God restored it to you, would
+not that foot be miraculous?”
+
+“Without doubt, my son.”
+
+“Would you put a shoe on it?”
+
+“Assuredly.”
+
+“Well, then, if you believe that one may cover a miraculous foot with a
+natural shoe, you should also believe that we can put natural rigging
+on a miraculous boat. That is clear. Alas! Why must the holiest persons
+have their moments of weakness and despondency? The most illustrious of
+the apostles of Brittany could accomplish works worthy of eternal glory
+. . . But his spirit is tardy and his hand is slothful. Farewell then,
+father! Travel by short and slow stages and when at last you approach
+the coast of Hoedic you will see the smoking ruins of the chapel that
+was built and consecrated by your own hands. The pagans will have burned
+it and with it the deacon you left there. He will be as thoroughly
+roasted as a black pudding.”
+
+“My trouble is extreme,” said the servant of God, drying with his sleeve
+the sweat that gathered upon his brow. “But tell me, Samson, my son,
+would not rigging this stone trough be a difficult piece of work? And if
+we undertook it might we not lose time instead of gaining it?”
+
+“Ah! father,” exclaimed the Devil, “in one turning of the hour-glass the
+thing would be done. We shall find the necessary rigging in this shed
+that you have formerly built here on the coast and in those store-houses
+abundantly stocked through your care. I will myself regulate all the
+ship’s fittings. Before being a monk I was a sailor and a carpenter and
+I have worked at many other trades as well. Let us to work.”
+
+Immediately he drew the holy man into an outhouse filled with all things
+needful for fitting out a boat.
+
+“That for you, father!”
+
+And he placed on his shoulders the sail, the mast, the gaff, and the
+boom.
+
+Then, himself bearing a stem and a rudder with its screw and tiller, and
+seizing a carpenter’s bag full of tools, he ran to the shore, dragging
+the holy man after him by his habit. The latter was bent, sweating, and
+breathless, under the burden of canvas and wood.
+
+
+
+
+IV. ST. MAEL’S NAVIGATION ON THE OCEAN OF ICE
+
+The Devil, having tucked his clothes up to his arm-pits, dragged the
+trough on the sand, and fitted the rigging in less than an hour.
+
+As soon as the holy Mael had embarked, the vessel, with all its sails
+set, cleft through the waters with such speed that the coast was almost
+immediately out of sight. The old man steered to the south so as to
+double the Land’s End, but an irresistible current carried him to the
+south-west. He went along the southern coast of Ireland and turned
+sharply towards the north. In the evening the wind freshened. In vain
+did Mael attempt to furl the sail. The vessel flew distractedly towards
+the fabulous seas.
+
+By the light of the moon the immodest sirens of the North came around
+him with their hempen-coloured hair, raising their white throats and
+their rose-tinted limbs out of the sea; and beating the water into foam
+with their emerald tails, they sang in cadence:
+
+     Whither go’st thou, gentle Mael,
+     In thy trough distracted?
+     All distended is thy sail
+     Like the breast of Juno
+     When from it gushed the Milky Way.
+
+For a moment their harmonious laughter followed him beneath the stars,
+but the vessel fled on, a hundred times more swiftly than the red ship
+of a Viking. And the petrels, surprised in their flight, clung with
+their feet to the hair of the holy man.
+
+Soon a tempest arose full of darkness and groanings, and the trough,
+driven by a furious wind, flew like a sea-mew through the mist and the
+surge.
+
+After a night of three times twenty-four hours the darkness was suddenly
+rent and the holy man discovered on the horizon a shore more dazzling
+than diamond. The coast rapidly grew larger, and soon by the glacial
+light of a torpid and sunken sun, Mael saw, rising above the waves,
+the silent streets of a white city, which, vaster than Thebes with its
+hundred gates, extended as far as the eye could see the ruins of its
+forum built of snow, its palaces of frost, its crystal arches, and its
+iridescent obelisks.
+
+The ocean was covered with floating ice-bergs around which swam men of
+the sea of a wild yet gentle appearance. And Leviathan passed by hurling
+a column of water up to the clouds.
+
+Moreover, on a block of ice which floated at the same rate as the stone
+trough there was seated a white bear holding her little one in her arms,
+and Mael heard her murmuring in a low voice this verse of Virgil, Incipe
+parve puer.
+
+And full of sadness and trouble, the old man wept.
+
+The fresh water had frozen and burst the barrel that contained it. And
+Mael was sucking pieces of ice to quench his thirst, and his food was
+bread dipped in dirty water. His beard and his hair were broken like
+glass. His habit was covered with a layer of ice and cut into him at
+every movement of his limbs. Huge waves rose up and opened their foaming
+jaws at the old man. Twenty times the boat was filled by masses of
+sea. And the ocean swallowed up the book of the Holy Gospels which the
+apostle guarded with extreme care in a purple cover marked with a golden
+cross.
+
+Now on the thirtieth day the sea calmed. And lo! with a frightful
+clamour of sky and waters a mountain of dazzling whiteness advanced
+towards the stone vessel. Mael steered to avoid it, but the tiller broke
+in his hands. To lessen the speed of his progress towards the rock he
+attempted to reef the sails, but when he tried to knot the reef-points
+the wind pulled them away from him and the rope seared his hands. He saw
+three demons with wings of black skin having hooks at their ends, who,
+hanging from the rigging, were puffing with their breath against the
+sails.
+
+Understanding from this sight that the Enemy had governed him in all
+these things, he guarded himself by making the sign of the Cross.
+Immediately a furious gust of wind filled with the noise of sobs and
+howls struck the stone trough, carried off the mast with all the sails,
+and tore away the rudder and the stem.
+
+The trough was drifting on the sea, which had now grown calm. The holy
+man knelt and gave thanks to the Lord who had delivered him from the
+snares of the demon. Then he recognised, sitting on a block of ice, the
+mother bear who had spoken during the storm. She pressed her beloved
+child to her bosom, and in her hand she held a purple book marked with a
+golden cross. Hailing the granite trough, she saluted the holy man with
+these words:
+
+“Pax tibi Mael.”
+
+And she held out the book to him.
+
+The holy man recognised his evangelistary, and, full of astonishment, he
+sang in the tepid air a hymn to the Creator and His creation.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE BAPTISM OF THE PENGUINS
+
+After having drifted for an hour the holy man approached a narrow
+strand, shut in by steep mountains. He went along the coast for a whole
+day and a night, passing around the reef which formed an insuperable
+barrier. He discovered in this way that it was a round island in
+the middle of which rose a mountain crowned with clouds. He joyfully
+breathed the fresh breath of the moist air. Rain fell, and this rain was
+so pleasant that the holy man said to the Lord:
+
+“Lord, this is the island of tears, the island of contrition.”
+
+The strand was deserted. Worn out with fatigue and hunger, he sat down
+on a rock in the hollow of which there lay some yellow eggs, marked with
+black spots, and about as large as those of a swan. But he did not touch
+them, saying:
+
+“Birds are the living praises of God. I should not like a single one of
+these praises to be lacking through me.”
+
+And he munched the lichens which he tore from the crannies of the rocks.
+
+The holy man had gone almost entirely round the island without meeting
+any inhabitants, when he came to a vast amphitheatre formed of black and
+red rocks whose summits became tinged with blue as they rose towards the
+clouds, and they were filled with sonorous cascades.
+
+The reflection from the polar ice had hurt the old man’s eyes, but
+a feeble gleam of light still shone through his swollen eyelids. He
+distinguished animated forms which filled the rocks, in stages, like a
+crowd of men on the tiers of an amphitheatre. And at the same time, his
+ears, deafened by the continual noises of the sea, heard a feeble sound
+of voices. Thinking that what he saw were men living under the natural
+law, and that the Lord had sent him to teach them the Divine law, he
+preached the gospel to them.
+
+Mounted on a lofty stone in the midst of the wild circus:
+
+“Inhabitants of this island,” said he, “although you be of small
+stature, you look less like a band of fishermen and mariners than like
+the senate of a judicious republic. By your gravity, your silence, your
+tranquil deportment, you form on this wild rock an assembly comparable
+to the Conscript Fathers at Rome deliberating in the temple of Victory,
+or rather, to the philosophers of Athens disputing on the benches of the
+Areopagus. Doubtless you possess neither their science nor their genius,
+but perhaps in the sight of God you are their superiors. I believe that
+you are simple and good. As I went round your island I saw no image
+of murder, no sign of carnage, no enemies’ heads or scalps hung from a
+lofty pole or nailed to the doors of your villages. You appear to me
+to have no arts and not to work in metals. But your hearts are pure
+and your hands are innocent, and the truth will easily enter into your
+souls.”
+
+Now what he had taken for men of small stature but of grave bearing were
+penguins whom the spring had gathered together, and who were ranged in
+couples on the natural steps of the rock, erect in the majesty of their
+large white bellies. From moment to moment they moved their winglets
+like arms, and uttered peaceful cries. They did not fear men, for they
+did not know them, and had never received any harm from them; and there
+was in the monk a certain gentleness that reassured the most timid
+animals and that pleased these penguins extremely. With a friendly
+curiosity they turned towards him their little round eyes lengthened in
+front by a white oval spot that gave something odd and human to their
+appearance.
+
+Touched by their attention, the holy man taught them the Gospel.
+
+“Inhabitants of this island, the earthly day that has just risen over
+your rocks is the image of the heavenly day that rises in your souls.
+For I bring you the inner light; I bring you the light and heat of the
+soul. Just as the sun melts the ice of your mountains so Jesus Christ
+will melt the ice of your hearts.”
+
+Thus the old man spoke. As everywhere throughout nature voice calls
+to voice, as all which breathes in the light of day loves alternate
+strains, these penguins answered the old man by the sounds of their
+throats. And their voices were soft, for it was the season of their
+loves.
+
+The holy man, persuaded that they belonged to some idolatrous people and
+that in their own language they gave adherence to the Christian faith,
+invited them to receive baptism.
+
+“I think,” said he to them, “that you bathe often, for all the hollows
+of the rocks are full of pure water, and as I came to your assembly I
+saw several of you plunging into these natural baths. Now purity of body
+is the image of spiritual purity.”
+
+And he taught them the origin, the nature, and the effects of baptism.
+
+“Baptism,” said he to them, “is Adoption, New Birth, Regeneration,
+Illumination.”
+
+And he explained each of these points to them in succession.
+
+Then, having previously blessed the water that fell from the cascades
+and recited the exorcisms, he baptized those whom he had just taught,
+pouring on each of their heads a drop of pure water and pronouncing the
+sacred words.
+
+And thus for three days and three nights he baptized the birds.
+
+
+
+
+VI. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE
+
+When the baptism of the penguins was known in Paradise, it caused
+neither joy nor sorrow, but an extreme surprise. The Lord himself was
+embarrassed. He gathered an assembly of clerics and doctors, and asked
+them whether they regarded the baptism as valid.
+
+“It is void,” said St. Patrick.
+
+“Why is it void?” asked St. Gal, who had evangelized the people of
+Cornwall and had trained the holy Mael for his apostolical labours.
+
+“The sacrament of baptism,” answered St. Patrick, “is void when it is
+given to birds, just as the sacrament of marriage is void when it is
+given to a eunuch.”
+
+But St. Gal replied:
+
+“What relation do you claim to establish between the baptism of a bird
+and the marriage of a eunuch? There is none at all. Marriage is, if I
+may say so, a conditional, a contingent sacrament. The priest blesses an
+event beforehand; it is evident that if the act is not consummated the
+benediction remains without effect. That is obvious. I have known on
+earth, in the town of Antrim, a rich man named Sadoc, who, living in
+concubinage with a woman, caused her to be the mother of nine children.
+In his old age, yielding to my reproofs, he consented to marry her, and
+I blessed their union. Unfortunately Sadoc’s great age prevented him
+from consummating the marriage. A short time afterwards he lost all his
+property, and Germaine (that was the name of the woman), not feeling
+herself able to endure poverty, asked for the annulment of a marriage
+which was no reality. The Pope granted her request, for it was just.
+So much for marriage. But baptism is conferred without restrictions or
+reserves of any kind. There is no doubt about it, what the penguins have
+received is a sacrament.”
+
+Called to give his opinion, Pope St. Damascus expressed himself in these
+terms:
+
+“In order to know if a baptism is valid and will produce its result,
+that is to say, sanctification, it is necessary to consider who gives
+it and not who receives it. In truth, the sanctifying virtue of this
+sacrament results from the exterior act by which it is conferred,
+without the baptized person cooperating in his own sanctification by any
+personal act; if it were otherwise it would not be administered to the
+newly born. And there is no need, in order to baptize, to fulfil any
+special condition; it is not necessary to be in a state of grace; it
+is sufficient to have the intention of doing what the Church does, to
+pronounce the consecrated words and to observe the prescribed forms. Now
+we cannot doubt that the venerable Mael has observed these conditions.
+Therefore the penguins are baptized.”
+
+“Do you think so?” asked St. Guenole. “And what then do you believe that
+baptism really is? Baptism is the process of regeneration by which man
+is born of water and of the spirit, for having entered the water covered
+with crimes, he goes out of it a neophyte, a new creature, abounding in
+the fruits of righteousness; baptism is the seed of immortality; baptism
+is the pledge of the resurrection; baptism is the burying with Christ in
+His death and participation in His departure from the sepulchre. That
+is not a gift to bestow upon birds. Reverend Fathers, let us consider.
+Baptism washes away original sin; now the penguins were not conceived in
+sin. It removes the penalty of sin; now the penguins have not sinned.
+It produces grace and the gift of virtues, uniting Christians to Jesus
+Christ, as the members to the body, and it is obvious to the senses that
+penguins cannot acquire the virtues of confessors, of virgins, and of
+widows, or receive grace and be united to--”
+
+St. Damascus did not allow him to finish.
+
+“That proves,” said he warmly, “that the baptism was useless; it does
+not prove that it was not effective.”
+
+“But by this reasoning,” said St. Guenole, “one might baptize in the
+name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by aspersion or
+immersion, not only a bird or a quadruped, but also an inanimate object,
+a statue, a table, a chair, etc. That animal would be Christian, that
+idol, that table would be Christian! It is absurd!”
+
+St. Augustine began to speak. There was a great silence.
+
+“I am going,” said the ardent bishop of Hippo, “to show you, by an
+example, the power of formulas. It deals, it is true, with a diabolical
+operation. But if it be established that formulas taught by the Devil
+have effect upon unintelligent animals or even on inanimate objects, how
+can we longer doubt that the effect of the sacramental formulas extends
+to the minds of beasts and even to inert matter?
+
+“This is the example. There was during my lifetime in the town of
+Madaura, the birthplace of the philosopher Apuleius, a witch who was
+able to attract men to her chamber by burning a few of their hairs along
+with certain herbs upon her tripod, pronouncing at the same time certain
+words. Now one day when she wished by this means to gain the love of a
+young man, she was deceived by her maid, and instead of the young man’s
+hairs, she burned some hairs pulled from a leather bottle, made out of
+a goatskin that hung in a tavern. During the night the leather bottle,
+full of wine, capered through the town up to the witch’s door. This fact
+is undoubted. And in sacraments as in enchantments it is the form which
+operates. The effect of a divine formula cannot be less in power and
+extent than the effect of an infernal formula.”
+
+Having spoken in this fashion the great St. Augustine sat down amidst
+applause.
+
+One of the blessed, of an advanced age and having a melancholy
+appearance, asked permission to speak. No one knew him. His name was
+Probus, and he was not enrolled in the canon of the saints.
+
+“I beg the company’s pardon,” said he, “I have no halo, and I gained
+eternal blessedness without any eminent distinction. But after what the
+great St. Augustine has just told you I believe it right to impart a
+cruel experience, which I had, relative to the conditions necessary for
+the validity of a sacrament. The bishop of Hippo is indeed right in what
+he said. A sacrament depends on the form; its virtue is in its form;
+its vice is in its form. Listen, confessors and pontiffs, to my woeful
+story. I was a priest in Rome under the rule of the Emperor Gordianus.
+Without desiring to recommend myself to you for any special merit, I may
+say that I exercised my priesthood with piety and zeal. For forty years
+I served the church of St. Modestus-beyond-the-Walls. My habits were
+regular. Every Saturday I went to a tavern-keeper called Barjas, who
+dwelt with his wine-jars under the Porta Capena, and from him I bought
+the wine that I consecrated daily throughout the week. During that long
+space of time I never failed for a single morning to consecrate the holy
+sacrifice of the mass. However, I had no joy, and it was with a heart
+oppressed by sorrow that, on the steps of the altar I used to ask, ‘Why
+art thou so heavy, O my soul, and why art thou so disquieted within
+me?’ The faithful whom I invited to the holy table gave me cause for
+affliction, for having, so to speak, the Host that I administered still
+upon their tongues, they fell again into sin just as if the sacrament
+had been without power or efficacy. At last I reached the end of my
+earthly trials, and failing asleep in the Lord, I awoke in this abode
+of the elect. I learned then from the mouth of the angel who brought me
+here, that Barjas, the tavern-keeper of the Porta Capena, had sold for
+wine a decoction of roots and barks in which there was not a single drop
+of the juice of the grape. I had been unable to transmute this vile
+brew into blood, for it was not wine, and wine alone is changed into the
+blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore all my consecrations were invalid, and
+unknown to us, my faithful and myself had for forty years been deprived
+of the sacrament and were in fact in a state of excommunication. This
+revelation threw me into a stupor which overwhelms me even to-day in
+this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise without ever meeting
+a single one of those Christians whom formerly I admitted to the holy
+table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of the bread of
+angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and they have
+all gone to hell. It gives me some satisfaction to think that Barjas,
+the tavern-keeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic worthy of
+the author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that it
+is sometimes inconvenient that form should prevail over essence in the
+sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy this?”
+
+“No,” answered the Lord. “The remedy would be worse than the disease.
+It would be the ruin of the priesthood if essence prevailed over form in
+the laws of salvation.”
+
+“Alas! Lord,” sighed the humble Probus. “Be persuaded by my humble
+experience; as long as you reduce your sacraments to formulas your
+justice will meet with terrible obstacles.”
+
+“I know that better than you do,” replied the Lord. “I see in a single
+glance both the actual problems which are difficult, and the future
+problems which will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when
+the sun will have turned round the earth two hundred and forty times
+more.
+
+“Sublime language,” exclaimed the angels.
+
+“And worthy of the creator of the world,” answered the pontiffs.
+
+“It is,” resumed the Lord, “a manner of speaking in accordance with
+my old cosmogony and one which I cannot give up without losing my
+immutability. . . .
+
+“After the sun, then, will have turned another two hundred and forty
+times round the earth, there will not be a single cleric left in Rome
+who knows Latin. When they sing their litanies in the churches people
+will invoke Orichel, Roguel, and Totichel, and, as you know, these are
+devils and not angels. Many robbers desiring to make their communions,
+but fearing that before obtaining pardon they would be forced to give up
+the things they had robbed to the Church, will make their confessions
+to travelling priests, who, ignorant of both Italian and Latin, and only
+speaking the patois of their village, will go through cities and towns
+selling the remission of sins for a base price, often for a bottle of
+wine. Probably we shall not be inconvenienced by those absolutions as
+they will want contrition to make them valid, but it may be that their
+baptisms will cause us some embarrassment. The priests will become so
+ignorant that they will baptize children in nomine patria et filia et
+spirita sancta, as Louis de Potter will take a pleasure in relating in
+the third volume of his ‘Philosophical, Political, and Critical History
+of Christianity.’ It will be an arduous question to decide on the
+validity of such baptisms; for even if in my sacred writings I tolerate
+a Greek less elegant than Plato’s and a scarcely Ciceronian Latin, I
+cannot possibly admit a piece of pure patois as a liturgical formula.
+And one shudders when one thinks that millions of new-born babes will be
+baptized by this method. But let us return to our penguins.”
+
+“Your divine words, Lord, have already led us back to them,” said
+St. Gal. “In the signs of religion and the laws of salvation form
+necessarily prevails over essence, and the validity of a sacrament
+solely depends upon its form. The whole question is whether the penguins
+have been baptized with the proper forms. Now there is no doubt about
+the answer.”
+
+The fathers and the doctors agreed, and their perplexity became only the
+more cruel.
+
+“The Christian state,” said St. Cornelius, “is not without serious
+inconveniences for a penguin. In it the birds are obliged to work out
+their own salvation. How can they succeed? The habits of birds are,
+in many points, contrary to the commandments of the Church, and the
+penguins have no reason for changing theirs. I mean that they are not
+intelligent enough to give up their present habits and assume better.”
+
+“They cannot,” said the Lord; “my decrees prevent them.”
+
+“Nevertheless,” resumed St. Cornelius, “in virtue of their baptism their
+actions no longer remain indifferent. Henceforth they will be good or
+bad, susceptible of merit or of demerit.”
+
+“That is precisely the question we have to deal with,” said the Lord.
+
+“I see only one solution,” said St. Augustine. “The penguins will go to
+hell.”
+
+“But they have no soul,” observed St. Irenaeus.
+
+“It is a pity,” sighed Tertullian.
+
+“It is indeed,” resumed St. Gal. “And I admit that my disciple, the holy
+Mael, has, in his blind zeal, created great theological difficulties for
+the Holy Spirit and introduced disorder into the economy of mysteries.”
+
+“He is an old blunderer,” cried St. Adjutor of Alsace, shrugging his
+shoulders.
+
+But the Lord cast a reproachful look on Adjutor.
+
+“Allow me to speak,” said he; “the holy Mael has not intuitive knowledge
+like you, my blessed ones. He does not see me. He is an old man burdened
+by infirmities; he is half deaf and three parts blind. You are
+too severe on him. However, I recognise that the situation is an
+embarrassing one.”
+
+“Luckily it is but a passing disorder,” said St. Irenaeus. “The penguins
+are baptized, but their eggs are not, and the evil will stop with the
+present generation.”
+
+“Do not speak thus, Irenaeus my son,” said the Lord. “There are
+exceptions to the laws that men of science lay down on the earth because
+they are imperfect and have not an exact application to nature. But
+the laws that I establish are perfect and suffer no exception. We must
+decide the fate of the baptized penguins without violating any divine
+law, and in a manner conformable to the decalogue as well as to the
+commandments of my Church.”
+
+“Lord,” said St. Gregory Nazianzen, “give them an immortal soul.”
+
+“Alas! Lord, what would they do with it,” sighed Lactantius. “They
+have not tuneful voices to sing your praises. They would not be able to
+celebrate your mysteries.”
+
+“Without doubt,” said St. Augustine, “they would not observe the divine
+law.”
+
+“They could not,” said the Lord.
+
+“They could not,” continued St. Augustine. “And if, Lord, in your
+wisdom, you pour an immortal soul into them, they will burn eternally
+in hell in virtue of your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent
+order, that this old Welshman has disturbed, be re-established.”
+
+“You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica,” said the Lord,
+“and one that accords with my wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy.
+And, although in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure, the
+more I incline to mildness. This change of character is evident to
+anyone who reads my two Testaments.”
+
+As the discussion continued without much light being thrown upon the
+matter and as the blessed showed a disposition to keep repeating the
+same thing, it was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This
+is what was usually done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had
+confounded fifty very learned doctors. She knew Plato’s philosophy in
+addition to the Holy Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of
+rhetoric.
+
+
+
+
+VII. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE (Continuation and End)
+
+St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a crown of
+emeralds, sapphires, and pearls, and she was clad in a robe of cloth
+of gold. She carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one
+whose fragments had struck her persecutors.
+
+The Lord having invited her to speak, she expressed herself in these
+terms:
+
+“Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me I
+shall not study the habits of animals in general nor those of birds in
+particular. I shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs
+gathered in this assembly that the separation between man and animal is
+not complete since there are monsters who proceed from both. Such are
+chimeras--half nymphs and half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and
+the Capripeds; such are the Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the
+sea. These have a woman’s breast and a fish’s tail. Such also are the
+Centaurs, men down to the waist and the remainder horses. They are a
+noble race of monsters. One of them, as you know, was able, guided
+by the light of reason alone, to direct his steps towards eternal
+blessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom prancing on the
+clouds. Chiron, the Centaur, deserved for his works on the earth
+to share the abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his
+education; and that young hero, when he left the Centaur’s hands, lived
+for two years, dressed as a young girl, among the daughters of King
+Lycomedes. He shared their games and their bed without allowing any
+suspicion to arise that he was not a young virgin like them. Chiron,
+who taught him such good morals, is, with the Emperor Trajan, the only
+righteous man who obtained celestial glory by following the law of
+nature. And yet he was but half human.
+
+“I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternal
+blessedness, it is enough to possess some parts of humanity, always on
+the condition that they are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur,
+could obtain without having been regenerated by baptism, would not the
+penguins deserve too, if they became half penguins and half men? That
+is why, Lord, I entreat you to give old Mael’s penguins a human head
+and breast so that they can praise you worthily. And grant them also an
+immortal soul--but one of small size.”
+
+Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors, and pontiffs
+heard her with a murmur of approbation.
+
+But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and knotty
+arms towards the Most High:
+
+“Do not so, O Lord God,” he cried, “in the name of your holy Paraclete,
+do not so!”
+
+He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook on his chin
+like the empty nose-bag of a hungry horse.
+
+“Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St. Catherine
+has told us nothing new.”
+
+“The imagination groups and compares; it never creates,” replied St.
+Catherine drily.
+
+“They exist already,” continued St. Antony, who would listen to nothing.
+“They are called harpies, and they are the most obscene animals in
+creation. One day as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot
+St. Paul, I placed the table outside my cabin under an old sycamore
+tree. The harpies came and sat in its branches; they deafened us with
+their shrill cries and cast their excrement over all our food. The
+clamour of the monsters prevented me from listening to the teaching of
+the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate birds’ dung with our bread and lettuces.
+Lord, it is impossible to believe that harpies could give thee worthy
+praise.
+
+“Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not only
+women-serpents and women-fishes, but beings still more confusedly formed
+such as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a
+cupboard full of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors
+and windows through which people engaged in their domestic tasks could
+be seen. Eternity would not suffice were I to describe all the monsters
+that assailed me in my solitude, from whales rigged like ships to a
+shower of red insects which changed the water of my fountain into blood.
+But none were as disgusting as the harpies whose offal polluted the
+leaves of my sycamore.”
+
+“Harpies,” observed Lactantius, “are female Monsters with birds’
+bodies. They have a woman’s head and breast. Their forwardness, their
+shamelessness, and their obscenity proceed from their female nature as
+the poet Virgil demonstrated in his ‘Aeneid.’ They share the curse of
+Eve.”
+
+“Let us not speak of the curse of Eve,” said the Lord. “The second Eve
+has redeemed the first.”
+
+Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet was to
+imitate in later years, arose and prayed to the Lord:
+
+“Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony’s. Do not make any more monsters like
+the Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns, whom the Greeks, those collectors of
+fables, loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species
+of monsters have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not
+dispose them to purity of morals.”
+
+The bland Lactantius replied in these terms:
+
+“He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in Paradise, for
+Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Velleius Paterculus, Cornelius
+Nepos, Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and
+Lampridius are deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell
+the torments that are reserved for blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does
+not know heaven as well as he knows the earth, for he does not seem to
+bear in mind that the angels, who proceed from man and bird, are purity
+itself.”
+
+“We are wandering,” said the Eternal. “What have we to do with all those
+centaurs, harpies, and angels? We have to deal with penguins.”
+
+“You have spoken to the point, Lord,” said the chief of the fifty
+doctors, who, during their mortal life had been confounded by the Virgin
+of Alexandria, “and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an
+end to the scandal by which heaven is now stirred, old Mael’s penguins
+should, as St. Catherine who confounded us has proposed, be given half
+of a human body with an eternal soul proportioned to that half.”
+
+At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of private
+conversations and disputes of the doctors. The Greek fathers argued with
+the Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the soul
+that should be given to the penguins.
+
+“Confessors and pontiffs,” exclaimed the Lord, “do not imitate the
+conclaves and synods of the earth. And do not bring into the Church
+Triumphant those violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is
+but too true that in all the councils held under the inspiration of my
+spirit, in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa, fathers have torn the
+beards and scratched the eyes of other fathers. Nevertheless they were
+infallible, for I was with them.”
+
+Order being restored, old Hermas arose and slowly uttered these words:
+
+“I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother, Saphira, to be
+born amidst your people, in the days when the dew of heaven refreshed
+the earth which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you,
+Lord, for having granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles
+of your divine Son. And I will speak in this illustrious assembly
+because you have willed that truth should proceed out of the mouths of
+the humble, and I will say: ‘Change these penguins to men. It is the
+only determination conformable to your justice and your mercy.’”
+
+Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do so. No one
+listened, and all the confessors were tumultuously shaking their palms
+and their crowns.
+
+The Lord, by a gesture of his right hand, appeased the quarrels of his
+elect.
+
+“Let us not deliberate any longer,” said he. “The opinion broached by
+gentle old Hermas is the only one conformable to my eternal designs.
+These birds will be changed into men. I foresee in this several
+disadvantages. Many of those men will commit sins they would not have
+committed as penguins. Truly their fate through this change will be
+far less enviable than if they had been without this baptism and this
+incorporation into the family of Abraham. But my foreknowledge must not
+encroach upon their free will.
+
+“In order not to impair human liberty, I will be ignorant of what I
+know, I will thicken upon my eyes the veils I have pierced, and in my
+blind clearsightedness I will let myself be surprised by what I have
+foreseen.”
+
+And immediately calling the archangel Raphael:
+
+“Go and find the holy Mael,” said he to him; “inform him of his mistake
+and tell him, armed with my Name, to change these penguins into men.”
+
+
+
+
+VIII. METAMORPHOSIS OF THE PENGUINS
+
+The archangel, having gone down into the Island of the Penguins, found
+the holy man asleep in the hollow of a rock surrounded by his new
+disciples. He laid his hand on his shoulder and, having waked him, said
+in a gentle voice:
+
+“Mael, fear not!”
+
+The holy man, dazzled by a vivid light, inebriated by a delicious
+odour, recognised the angel of the Lord, and prostrated himself with his
+forehead on the ground.
+
+The angel continued:
+
+“Mael, know thy error, believing that thou wert baptizing children of
+Adam thou hast baptized birds; and it is, through thee that penguins
+have entered into the Church of God.”
+
+At these words the old man remained stupefied.
+
+And the angel resumed:
+
+“Arise, Mael, arm thyself with the mighty Name of the Lord, and say to
+these birds, ‘Be ye men!’”
+
+And the holy Mael, having wept and prayed, armed himself with the mighty
+Name of the Lord and said to the birds:
+
+“Be ye men!”
+
+Immediately the penguins were transformed. Their foreheads enlarged and
+their heads grew round like the dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome. Their
+oval eyes opened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose clothed the
+two clefts of their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and
+from their mouths went forth speech; their necks grew short and thick;
+their wings became arms and their claws legs; a restless soul dwelt
+within the breast of each of them.
+
+However, there remained with them some traces of their first nature.
+They were inclined to look sideways; they balanced themselves on their
+short thighs; their bodies were covered with fine down.
+
+And Mael gave thanks to the Lord, because he had incorporated these
+penguins into the family of Abraham.
+
+But he grieved at the thought that he would soon leave the island to
+come back no more, and that perhaps when he was far away the faith
+of the penguins would perish for want of care like a young and tender
+plant.
+
+And he formed the idea of transporting their island to the coasts of
+Armorica.
+
+“I know not the designs of eternal Wisdom,” said he to himself. “But if
+God wills that this island be transported, who could prevent it?”
+
+And the holy man made a very fine cord about forty feet long out of the
+flax of his stole. He fastened one end of the cord round a point of rock
+that jutted up through the sand of the shore and, holding the other end
+of the cord in his hand, he entered the stone trough.
+
+The trough glided over the sea and towed Penguin Island behind it; after
+nine days’ sailing it approached the Breton coast, bringing the island
+with it.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES
+
+
+
+
+I. THE FIRST CLOTHES
+
+One day St. Mael was sitting by the seashore on a warm stone that he
+found. He thought it had been warmed by the sun and he gave thanks
+to God for it, not knowing that the Devil had been resting on it. The
+apostle was waiting for the monks of Yvern who had been commissioned to
+bring a freight of skins and fabrics to clothe the inhabitants of the
+island of Alca.
+
+Soon he saw a monk called Magis coming ashore and carrying a chest upon
+his back. This monk enjoyed a great reputation for holiness.
+
+When he had drawn near to the old man he laid the chest on the ground
+and wiping his forehead with the back of his sleeve, he said:
+
+“Well, father, you wish then to clothe these penguins?”
+
+“Nothing is more needful, my son,” said the old man. “Since they have
+been incorporated into the family of Abraham these penguins share the
+curse of Eve, and they know that they are naked, a thing of which they
+were ignorant before. And it is high time to clothe them, for they are
+losing the down that remained on them after their metamorphosis.”
+
+“It is true,” said Magis as he cast his eyes over the coast where
+the penguins were to be seen looking for shrimps, gathering mussels,
+singing, or sleeping, “they are naked. But do you not think, father,
+that it would be better to leave them naked? Why clothe them? When they
+wear clothes and are under the moral law they will assume an immense
+pride, a vile hypocrisy, and an excessive cruelty.”
+
+“Is it possible, my son,” sighed the old man, “that you understand so
+badly the effects of the moral law to which even the heathen submit?”
+
+“The moral law,” answered Magis, “forces men who are beasts to live
+otherwise than beasts, a thine that doubtless puts a constraint upon
+them, but that also flatters and reassures them; and as they are proud,
+cowardly, and covetous of pleasure, they willingly submit to restraints
+that tickle their vanity and on which they found both their present
+security and the hope of their future happiness. That is the principle
+of all morality. . . . But let us not mislead ourselves. My companions
+are unloading their cargo of stuffs and skins on the island. Think,
+father, while there is still time I To clothe the penguins is a very
+serious business. At present when a penguin desires a penguin he knows
+precisely what he desires and his lust is limited by an exact knowledge
+of its object. At this moment two or three couples of penguins are
+making love on the beach. See with what simplicity! No one pays
+any attention and the actors themselves do not seem to be greatly
+preoccupied. But when the female penguins are clothed, the male penguin
+will not form so exact a notion of what it is that attracts him to them.
+His indeterminate desires will fly out into all sorts of dreams and
+illusions; in short, father, he will know love and its mad torments.
+And all the time the female penguins will cast down their eyes and bite
+their lips, and take on airs as if they kept a treasure under their
+clothes! . . . what a pity!
+
+“The evil will be endurable as long as these people remain rude and
+poor; but only wait for a thousand years and you will see, father, with
+what powerful weapons you have endowed the daughters of Alca. If you
+will allow me, I can give you some idea of it beforehand. I have some
+old clothes in this chest. Let us take at hazard one of these female
+penguins to whom the male penguins give such little thought, and let us
+dress her as well as we can.
+
+“Here is one coming towards us. She is neither more beautiful nor
+uglier than the others; she is young. No one looks at her. She strolls
+indolently along the shore, scratching her back and with her finger
+at her nose as she walks. You cannot help seeing, father, that she has
+narrow shoulders, clumsy breasts, a stout figure, and short legs. Her
+reddish knees pucker at every step she takes, and there is, at each of
+her joints, what looks like a little monkey’s head. Her broad and sinewy
+feet cling to the rock with their four crooked toes, while the great
+toes stick up like the heads of two cunning serpents. She begins to
+walk, all her muscles are engaged in the task, and, when we see them
+working, we think of her as a machine intended for walking rather than
+as a machine intended for making love, although visibly she is both,
+and contains within herself several other pieces of machinery, besides.
+Well, venerable apostle, you will see what I am going to make of her.”
+
+With these words the monk, Magis, reached the female penguin in three
+bounds, lifted her up, carried her in his arms with her hair trailing
+behind her, and threw her, overcome with fright, at the feet of the holy
+Mael.
+
+And whilst she wept and begged him to do her no harm, he took a pair of
+sandals out of his chest and commanded her to put them on.
+
+“Her feet,” observed the old man, “will appear smaller when squeezed in
+by the woollen cords. The soles, being two fingers high, will give
+an elegant length to her legs and the weight they bear will seem
+magnified.”
+
+As the penguin tied on her sandals she threw a curious look towards
+the open coffer, and seeing that it was full of jewels and finery, she
+smiled through her tears.
+
+The monk twisted her hair on the back of her head and covered it with
+a chaplet of flowers. He encircled her wrist with golden bracelets
+and making her stand upright, he passed a large linen band beneath her
+breasts, alleging that her bosom would thereby derive a new dignity and
+that her sides would be compressed to the greater glory of her hips.
+
+He fixed this band with pins, taking them one by one out of his mouth.
+
+“You can tighten it still more,” said the penguin.
+
+When he had, with much care and study, enclosed the soft parts of her
+bust in this way, he covered her whole body with a rose-coloured tunic
+which gently followed the lines of her figure.
+
+“Does it hang well?” asked the penguin.
+
+And bending forward with her head on one side and her chin on her
+shoulder, she kept looking attentively at the appearance of her toilet.
+
+Magis asked her if she did not think the dress a little long, but she
+answered with assurance that it was not--she would hold it up.
+
+Immediately, taking the back of her skirt in her left hand, she drew
+it obliquely across her hips, taking care to disclose a glimpse of her
+heels. Then she went away, walking with short steps and swinging her
+hips.
+
+She did not turn her head, but as she passed near a stream she glanced
+out of the corner of her eye at her own reflection.
+
+A male penguin, who met her by chance, stopped in surprise, and
+retracing his steps began to follow her. As she went along the shore,
+others coming back from fishing, went up to her, and after looking at
+her, walked behind her. Those who were lying on the sand got up and
+joined the rest.
+
+Unceasingly, as she advanced, fresh penguins, descending from the paths
+of the mountain, coming out of clefts of the rocks, and emerging from
+the water, added to the size of her retinue.
+
+And all of them, men of ripe age with vigorous shoulders and hairy
+breasts, agile youths, old men shaking the multitudinous wrinkles of
+their rosy, and white-haired skins, or dragging their legs thinner and
+drier than the juniper staff that served them as a third leg, hurried
+on, panting and emitting an acrid odour and hoarse gasps. Yet she went
+on peacefully and seemed to see nothing.
+
+“Father,” cried Magis, “notice how each one advances with his nose
+pointed towards the centre of gravity of that young damsel now that the
+centre is covered by a garment. The sphere inspires the meditations
+of geometers by the number of its properties. When it proceeds from a
+physical and living nature it acquires new qualities, and in order that
+the interest of that figure might be fully revealed to the penguins it
+was necessary that, ceasing to see it distinctly with their eyes, they
+should be led to represent it to themselves in their minds. I myself
+feel at this moment irresistibly attracted towards that penguin. Whether
+it be because her skirt gives more importance to her hips, and that in
+its simple magnificence it invests them with a synthetic and general
+character and allows only the pure idea, the divine principle, of them
+to be seen, whether this be the cause I cannot say, but I feel that if
+I embraced her I would hold in my hands the heaven of human pleasure. It
+is certain that modesty communicates an invincible attraction to women.
+My uneasiness is so great that it would be vain for me to try to conceal
+it.”
+
+He spoke, and, gathering up his habit, he rushed among the crowd of
+penguins, pushing, jostling, trampling, and crushing, until he reached
+the daughter of Alca, whom he seized and suddenly carried in his arms
+into a cave that had been hollowed out by the sea.
+
+Then the penguins felt as if the sun had gone out. And the holy Mael
+knew that the Devil had taken the features of the monk, Magis, in order
+that he might give clothes to the daughter of Alca. He was troubled in
+spirit, and his soul was sad. As with slow steps he went towards his
+hermitage he saw the little penguins of six and seven years of age
+tightening their waists with belts made of sea-weed and walking along
+the shore to see if anybody would follow them.
+
+
+
+
+II. THE FIRST CLOTHES (Continuation and End)
+
+The holy Mael felt a profound sadness that the first clothes put upon
+a daughter of Alca should have betrayed the penguin modesty instead of
+helping it. He persisted, none the less, in his design of giving clothes
+to the inhabitants of the miraculous island. Assembling them on the
+shore, he distributed to them the garments that the monks of Yvern
+had brought. The male penguins received short tunics and breeches, the
+female penguins long robes. But these robes were far from creating the
+effect that the former one had produced. They were not so beautiful,
+their shape was uncouth and without art, and no attention was paid to
+them since every woman bad one. As they prepared the meals and worked
+in the fields they soon had nothing but slovenly bodices and soiled
+petticoats.
+
+The male penguins loaded their unfortunate consorts with work until they
+looked like beasts of burden. They knew nothing of the troubles of the
+heart and the disorders of passion. Their habits were innocent. Incest,
+though frequent, was a sign of rustic simplicity and if drunkenness led
+a youth to commit some such crime he thought nothing more about it the
+day afterwards.
+
+
+
+
+III. SETTING BOUNDS TO THE FIELDS AND THE ORIGIN OF PROPERTY
+
+The island did not preserve the rugged appearance that it had formerly,
+when, in the midst of floating icebergs it sheltered a population of
+birds within its rocky amphitheatre. Its snow-clad peak had sunk
+down into a hill from the summit of which one could see the coasts of
+Armorica eternally covered with mist, and the ocean strewn with sullen
+reefs like monsters half raised out of its depths.
+
+Its coasts were now very extensive and clearly defined and its shape
+reminded one of a mulberry leaf. It was suddenly covered with coarse
+grass, pleasing to the flocks, and with willows, ancient figtrees, and
+mighty oaks. This fact is attested by the Venerable Bede and several
+other authors worthy of credence.
+
+To the north the shore formed a deep bay that in after years became one
+of the most famous ports in the universe. To the east, along a rocky
+coast beaten by a foaming sea, there stretched a deserted and fragrant
+heath. It was the Beach of Shadows, and the inhabitants of the island
+never ventured on it for fear of the serpents that lodged in the hollows
+of the rocks and lest they might encounter the souls of the dead who
+resembled livid flames. To the south, orchards and woods bounded the
+languid Bay of Divers. On this fortunate shore old Mael built a wooden
+church and a monastery. To the west, two streams, the Clange and the
+Surelle, watered the fertile valleys of Dalles and Dombes.
+
+Now one autumn morning, as the blessed Mael was walking in the valley of
+Clange in company with a monk of Yvern called Bulloch, he saw bands of
+fierce-looking men loaded with stones passing along the roads. At the
+same time he heard in all directions cries and complaints mounting up
+from the valley towards the tranquil sky.
+
+And he said to Bulloch:
+
+“I notice with sadness, my son, that since they became men the
+inhabitants of this island act with less wisdom than formerly. When they
+were birds they only quarrelled during the season of their love affairs.
+But now they dispute all the time; they pick quarrels with each other
+in summer as well as in winter. How greatly have they fallen from that
+peaceful majesty which made the assembly of the penguins look like the
+Senate of a wise republic!
+
+“Look towards Surelle, Bulloch, my son. In yonder pleasant valley a
+dozen men penguins are busy knocking each other down with the spades and
+picks that they might employ better in tilling the ground. The women,
+still more cruel than the men, are tearing their opponents’ faces with
+their nails. Alas! Bulloch, my son, why are they murdering each other in
+this way?”
+
+“From a spirit of fellowship, father, and through forethought for
+the future,” answered Bulloch. “For man is essentially provident and
+sociable. Such is his character and it is impossible to imagine it apart
+from a certain appropriation of things. Those penguins whom you see are
+dividing the ground among themselves.”
+
+“Could they not divide it with less violence?” asked the aged man. “As
+they fight they exchange invectives and threats. I do not distinguish
+their words, but they are angry ones, judging from the tone.”
+
+“They are accusing one another of theft and encroachment,” answered
+Bulloch. “That is the general sense of their speech.”
+
+At that moment the holy Mael clasped his hands and sighed deeply.
+
+“Do you see, my son,” he exclaimed, “that madman who with his teeth is
+biting the nose of the adversary he has overthrown and that other one
+who is pounding a woman’s head with a huge stone?”
+
+“I see them,” said Bulloch. “They are creating law; they are founding
+property; they are establishing the principles of civilization, the
+basis of society, and the foundations of the State.”
+
+“How is that?” asked old Mael.
+
+“By setting bounds to their fields. That is the origin of all
+government. Your penguins, O Master, are performing the most august
+of functions. Throughout the ages their work will be consecrated by
+lawyers, and magistrates will confirm it.”
+
+Whilst the monk, Bulloch, was pronouncing these words a big penguin with
+a fair skin and red hair went down into the valley carrying a trunk of a
+tree upon his shoulder. He went up to a little penguin who was watering
+his vegetables in the heat of the sun, and shouted to him:
+
+“Your field is mine!”
+
+And having delivered himself of this stout utterance he brought down
+his club on the head of the little penguin, who fell dead upon the field
+that his own hands had tilled.
+
+At this sight the holy Mael shuddered through his whole body and poured
+forth a flood of tears.
+
+And in a voice stifled by horror and fear he addressed this prayer to
+heaven:
+
+“O Lord, my God, O thou who didst receive young Abel’s sacrifices, thou
+who didst curse Cain, avenge, O Lord, this innocent penguin sacrificed
+upon his own field and make the murderer feel the weight of thy arm.
+Is there a more odious crime, is there a graver offence against thy
+justice, O Lord, than this murder and this robbery?”
+
+“Take care, father,” said Bulloch gently, “that what you call murder and
+robbery may not really be war and conquest, those sacred foundations
+of empires, those sources of all human virtues and all human greatness.
+Reflect, above all, that in blaming the big penguin you are attacking
+property in its origin and in its source. I shall have no trouble
+in showing you how. To till the land is one thing, to possess it is
+another, and these two things must not be confused; as regards ownership
+the right of the first occupier is uncertain and badly founded. The
+right of conquest, on the other hand, rests on more solid foundations.
+It is the only right that receives respect since it is the only one that
+makes itself respected. The sole and proud origin of property is force.
+It is born and preserved by force. In that it is august and yields
+only to a greater force. This is why it is correct to say that he
+who possesses is noble. And that big red man, when he knocked down a
+labourer to get possession of his field, founded at that moment a very
+noble house upon this earth. I congratulate him upon it.”
+
+Having thus spoken, Bulloch approached the big penguin, who was leaning
+upon his club as he stood in the blood-stained furrow:
+
+“Lord Greatauk, dreaded Prince,” said he, bowing to the ground, “I
+come to pay you the homage due to the founder of legitimate power and
+hereditary wealth. The skull of the vile Penguin you have overthrown
+will, buried in your field, attest for ever the sacred rights of your
+posterity over this soil that you have ennobled. Blessed be your suns
+and your sons’ sons! They shall be Greatauks, Dukes of Skull, and they
+shall rule over this island of Alca.”
+
+Then raising his voice and turning towards the holy Mael:
+
+“Bless Greatauk, father, for all power comes from God.”
+
+Mael remained silent and motionless, with his eyes raised towards
+heaven; he felt a painful uncertainty in judging the monk Bulloch’s
+doctrine. It was, however, the doctrine destined to prevail in epochs of
+advanced civilization. Bulloch can be considered as the creator of civil
+law in Penguinia.
+
+
+
+
+IV. THE FIRST ASSEMBLY OF THE ESTATES OF PENGUINIA
+
+“Bulloch, my son,” said old Mael, “we ought to make a census of the
+Penguins and inscribe each of their names in a book.”
+
+“It is a most urgent matter,” answered Bulloch, “there can be no good
+government without it.”
+
+Forthwith, the apostle, with the help of twelve monks, proceeded to make
+a census of the people.
+
+And old Mael then said:
+
+“Now that we keep a register of all the inhabitants, we ought, Bulloch,
+my son, to levy a just tax so as to provide for public expenses and
+the maintenance of the Abbey. Each ought to contribute according to his
+means. For this reason, my son, call together the Elders of Alca, and in
+agreement with them we shall establish the tax.”
+
+The Elders, being called together, assembled to the number of thirty
+under the great sycamore in the courtyard of the wooden monastery.
+They were the first Estates of Penguinia. Three-fourths of them were
+substantial peasants of Surelle and Clange. Greatauk, as the noblest of
+the Penguins, sat upon the highest stone.
+
+The venerable Mael took his place in the midst of his monks and uttered
+these words:
+
+“Children, the Lord when he pleases grants riches to men and he
+takes them away from them. Now I have called you together to levy
+contributions from the people so as to provide for public expenses and
+the maintenance of the monks. I consider that these contributions
+ought to be in proportion to the wealth of each. Therefore he who has a
+hundred oxen will give ten; he who has ten will give one.”
+
+When the holy man had spoken, Morio, a labourer at Anis-on-the-Clange,
+one of the richest of the Penguins, rose up and said:
+
+“O Father Mael, I think it right that each should contribute to the
+public expenses and to the support of the Church, on my part I am ready
+to give up all that I possess in the interest of my brother Penguins,
+and if it were necessary I would even cheerfully part with my shirt. All
+the elders of the people are ready, like me, to sacrifice their goods,
+and no one can doubt their absolute devotion to their country and their
+creed. We have, then, only to consider the public interest and to do
+what it requires. Now, Father, what it requires, what it demands, is not
+to ask much from those who possess much, for then the rich would be less
+rich and the poor still poorer. The poor live on the wealth of the rich
+and that is the reason why that wealth is sacred. Do not touch it, to do
+so would be an uncalled for evil. You will get no great profit by taking
+from the rich, for they are very few in number; on the contrary you will
+strip yourself of all your resources and plunge the country into misery.
+Whereas if you ask a little from each inhabitant without regard to his
+wealth, you will collect enough for the public necessities and you will
+have no need to enquire into each citizen’s resources, a thing that
+would be regarded by all as a most vexatious measure. By taxing all
+equally and easily you will spare the poor, for you Will leave them
+the wealth of the rich. And how could you possibly proportion taxes to
+wealth? Yesterday I had two hundred oxen, to-day I have sixty, to-morrow
+I shall have a hundred. Clunic has three cows, but they are thin; Nicclu
+has only two, but they are fat. Which is the richer, Clunic or Nicclu?
+The signs of opulence are deceitful. What is certain is that everyone
+eats and drinks. Tax people according to what they consume. That would
+be wisdom and it would be justice.”
+
+Thus spoke Morio amid the applause of the Elders.
+
+“I ask that this speech be graven on bronze,” cried the monk, Bulloch.
+“It is spoken for the future; in fifteen hundred years the best of the
+Penguins will not speak otherwise.”
+
+The Elders were still applauding when Greatauk, his hand on the pommel
+of his sword, made this brief declaration:
+
+“Being noble, I shall not contribute; for to contribute is ignoble. It
+is for the rabble to pay.”
+
+After this warning the Elders separated in silence.
+
+As in Rome, a new census was taken every five years; and by this means
+it was observed that the population increased rapidly. Although children
+died in marvellous abundance and plagues and famines came with perfect
+regularity to devastate entire villages, new Penguins, in continually
+greater numbers, contributed by their private misery to the public
+prosperity.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE MARRIAGE OF KRAKEN AND ORBEROSIA
+
+During these times there lived in the island of Alca a Penguin whose arm
+was strong and whose mind was subtle. He was called Kraken, and had his
+dwelling on the Beach of Shadows whither the inhabitants never ventured
+for fear of serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and
+lest they might encounter the souls of Penguins that had died without
+baptism. These, in appearance like livid flames, and uttering doleful
+groans, wandered night and day along the deserted beach. For it was
+generally believed, though without proof, that among the Penguins that
+had been changed into men at the blessed Mael’s prayer, several had
+not received baptism and returned after their death to lament amid the
+tempests. Kraken dwelt on this savage coast in an inaccessible cavern.
+The only way to it was through a natural tunnel a hundred feet long, the
+entrance of which was concealed by a thick wood. One evening as Kraken
+was walking through this deserted plain he happened to meet a young and
+charming woman Penguin. She was the one that the monk Magis had clothed
+with his own hands and thus was the first to have worn the garments
+of chastity. In remembrance of the day when the astonished crowd of
+Penguins had seen her moving gloriously in her robe tinted like the
+dawn, this maiden had received the name of Orberosia.*
+
+     * “Orb, poetically, a globe when speaking of the heavenly
+     bodies. By extension any species of globular body.”--Littre
+
+At the sight of Kraken she uttered a cry of alarm and darted forward to
+escape from him. But the hero seized her by the garments that floated
+behind, her, and addressed her in these words:
+
+“Damsel, tell me thy name, thy family and thy country.”
+
+But Orberosia kept looking at Kraken with alarm.
+
+“Is it you, I see, sir,” she asked him, trembling, “or is it not rather
+your troubled spirit?”
+
+She spoke in this way because the inhabitants of Alca, having no news of
+Kraken since he went to live on the Beach of Shadows, believed that he
+had died and descended among the demons of night.
+
+“Cease to fear, daughter of Alca,” answered Kraken. “He who speaks to
+thee is not a wandering spirit, but a man full of strength and might. I
+shall soon possess great riches.”
+
+And young Orberosia asked:
+
+“How dost thou think of acquiring great riches, O Kraken, since thou art
+a child of Penguins?”
+
+“By my intelligence,” answered Kraken.
+
+“I know,” said Orberosia, “that in the time that thou dwelt among us
+thou wert renowned for thy skill in hunting and fishing. No one equalled
+thee in taking fishes in a net or in piercing with thy arrows the
+swift-flying birds.”
+
+“It was but a vulgar and laborious industry, O maiden. I have found a
+means of gaining much wealth for myself without fatigue. But tell me who
+thou art?”
+
+“I am called Orberosia,” answered the young girl.
+
+“Why art thou so far away from thy dwelling and in the night?”
+
+“Kraken, it was not without the will of Heaven.”
+
+“What meanest thou, Orberosia?”
+
+“That Heaven, O Kraken, placed me in thy path, for what reason I know
+not.”
+
+Kraken beheld her for a long time in silence.
+
+Then he said with gentleness:
+
+“Orberosia, come into my house; it is that of the bravest and most
+ingenious of the sons of the Penguins. If thou art willing to follow me,
+I will make thee my companion.”
+
+Then casting down her eyes, she murmured:
+
+“I will follow thee, master.”
+
+It is thus that the fair Orberosia became the consort of the hero
+Kraken. This marriage was not celebrated with songs and torches because
+Kraken did not consent to show himself to the people of the Penguins;
+but hidden in his cave he planned great designs.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA
+
+“We afterwards went to visit the cabinet of natural history. . . . The
+care-taker showed us a sort of packet bound in straw that he told us
+contained the skeleton of a dragon; a proof, added he, that the dragon
+is not a fabulous animal.”--Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, Paris, 1843.
+Vol. IV., pp. 404, 405
+
+In the meantime the inhabitants of Alca practised the labours of peace.
+Those of the northern coast went in boats to fish or to search for
+shell-fish. The labourers of Dombes cultivated oats, rye, and wheat.
+The rich Penguins of the valley of Dalles reared domestic animals,
+while those of the Bay of Divers cultivated their orchards. Merchants of
+Port-Alca carried on a trade in salt fish with Armorica and the gold
+of the two Britains, which began to be introduced into the island,
+facilitated exchange. The Penguin people were enjoying the fruit of
+their labours in perfect tranquillity when suddenly a sinister rumour
+ran from village to village. It was said everywhere that frightful
+dragon had ravaged two farms in the Bay of Divers.
+
+A few days before, the maiden Orberosia had disappeared. Her absence had
+at first caused no uneasiness because on several occasions she had been
+carried off by violent men who were consumed with love. And thoughtful
+people were not astonished at this, reflecting that the maiden was the
+most beautiful of the Penguins. It was even remarked that she sometimes
+went to meet her ravishers, for none of us can escape his destiny. But
+this time, as she did not return, it was feared that the dragon had
+devoured her. The more so as the inhabitants of the valley of Dalles
+soon knew that the dragon was not a fable told by the women around the
+fountains. For one night the monster devoured out of the village of Anis
+six hens, a sheep, and a young orphan child called little Elo. The next
+morning nothing was to be found either of the animals or of the child.
+
+Immediately the Elders of the village assembled in the public place and
+seated themselves on the stone bench to take counsel concerning what it
+was expedient to do in these terrible circumstances.
+
+Having called all those Penguins who had seen the dragon during the
+disastrous night, they asked them:
+
+“Have you not noticed his form and his behaviour?”
+
+And each answered in his turn:
+
+“He has the claws of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and the tail of a
+serpent.”
+
+“His back bristles with thorny crests.”
+
+“His whole body is covered with yellow scales.”
+
+“His look fascinates and confounds. He vomits flames.”
+
+“He poisons the air with his breath.”
+
+“He has the head of a dragon, the claws of a lion, and the tail of a
+fish.”
+
+And a woman of Anis, who was regarded as intelligent and of sound
+judgment and from whom the dragon had taken three hens, deposed as
+follows:
+
+“He is formed like a man. The proof is that I thought he was my husband,
+and I said to him, ‘Come to bed, you old fool.’”
+
+Others said:
+
+“He is formed like a cloud.”
+
+“He looks like a mountain.”
+
+And a little child came and said:
+
+“I saw the dragon taking off his head in the barn so that he might give
+a kiss to my sister Minnie.”
+
+And the Elders also asked the inhabitants:
+
+“How big is the dragon?”
+
+And it was answered:
+
+“As big as an ox.”
+
+“Like the big merchant ships of the Bretons.”
+
+“He is the height of a man.”
+
+“He is higher than the fig-tree under which you are sitting.”
+
+“He is as large as a dog.”
+
+Questioned finally on his colour, the inhabitants said:
+
+“Red.”
+
+“Green.”
+
+“Blue.”
+
+“Yellow.”
+
+“His head is bright green, his wings are brilliant orange tinged with
+pink, his limbs are silver grey, his hind-quarters and his tail are
+striped with brown and pink bands, his belly bright yellow spotted with
+black.”
+
+“His colour? He has no colour.”
+
+“He is the colour of a dragon.”
+
+After hearing this evidence the Elders remained uncertain as to what
+should be done. Some advised to watch for him, to surprise him and
+overthrow him by a multitude of arrows. Others, thinking it vain to
+oppose so powerful a monster by force, counselled that he should be
+appeased by offerings.
+
+“Pay him tribute,” said one of them who passed for a wise man. “We can
+render him propitious to us by giving him agreeable presents, fruits,
+wine, lambs, a young virgin.”
+
+Others held for poisoning the fountains where he was accustomed to drink
+or for smoking him out of his cavern.
+
+But none of these counsels prevailed. The dispute was lengthy and the
+Elders dispersed without coming to any resolution.
+
+
+
+
+VII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+During all the month dedicated by the Romans to their false god Mars or
+Mavors, the dragon ravaged the farms of Dalles and Dombes. He carried
+off fifty sheep, twelve pigs, and three young boys. Every family was in
+mourning and the island was full of lamentations. In order to remove the
+scourge, the Elders of the unfortunate villages watered by the Clange
+and the Surelle resolved to assemble and together go and ask the help of
+the blessed Mael.
+
+On the fifth day of the month whose name among the Latins signifies
+opening, because it opens the year, they went in procession to the
+wooden monastery that had been built on the southern coast of the
+island. When they were introduced into the cloister they filled it with
+their sobs and groans. Moved by their lamentations, old Mael left the
+room in which he devoted himself to the study of astronomy and the
+meditation of the Scriptures, and went down to them, leaning on his
+pastoral staff. At his approach, the Elders, prostrating themselves,
+held out to him green branches of trees and some of them burnt aromatic
+herbs.
+
+And the holy man, seating himself beside the cloistral fountain under an
+ancient fig-tree, uttered these words:
+
+“O my sons, offspring of the Penguins, why do you weep and groan? Why do
+you hold out those suppliant boughs towards me? Why do you raise towards
+heaven the smoke of those herbs? What calamity do you expect that I can
+avert from your heads? Why do you beseech me? I am ready to give my life
+for you. Only tell your father what it is you hope from him.”
+
+To these questions the chief of the Elders answered:
+
+“O Mael, father of the sons of Alca, I will speak for all. A horrible
+dragon is laying waste our lands, depopulating our cattle-sheds, and
+carrying off the flower of our youth. He has devoured the child Elo and
+seven young boys; he has mangled the maiden Orberosia, the fairest of
+the Penguins with his teeth. There is not a village in which he does not
+emit his poisoned breath and which he has not filled with desolation.
+A prey to this terrible scourge, we come, O Mael, to pray thee, as the
+wisest, to advise us concerning the safety of the inhabitants of this
+island lest the ancient race of Penguins be extinguished.”
+
+“O chief of the Elders of Alca,” replied Mael, “thy words fill me with
+profound grief, and I groan at the thought that this island is the prey
+of a terrible dragon. But such an occurrence is not unique, for we find
+in books several tales of very fierce dragons. The monsters are oftenest
+found in caverns, by the brinks of waters, and, in preference, among
+pagan peoples. Perhaps there are some among you who, although they have
+received holy baptism and been incorporated into the family of Abraham,
+have yet worshipped idols, like the ancient Romans, or hung up images,
+votive tablets, fillets of wool, and garlands of flowers on the branches
+of some sacred tree. Or perhaps some of the women Penguins have danced
+round a magic stone and drunk water from the fountains where the nymphs
+dwell. If it be so, believe, O Penguins, that the Lord has sent this
+dragon to punish all for the crimes of some, and to lead you, O children
+of the Penguins, to exterminate blasphemy, superstition, and impiety
+from amongst you. For this reason I advise, as a remedy against the
+great evil from which you suffer, that you carefully search your
+dwellings for idolatry, and extirpate it from them. I think it would be
+also efficacious to pray and do penance.”
+
+Thus spoke the holy Mael. And the Elders of the Penguin people kissed
+his feet and returned to their villages with renewed hope.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Following the counsel of the holy Mael the inhabitants of Alca
+endeavoured to uproot the superstitions that had sprung up amongst them.
+They took care to prevent the girls from dancing with incantations
+round the fairy tree. Young mothers were sternly forbidden to rub their
+children against the stones that stood upright in the fields so as
+to make them strong. An old man of Dombes who foretold the future by
+shaking grains of barley on a sieve, was thrown into a well.
+
+However, each night the monster still raided the poultry-yards and the
+cattle-sheds. The frightened peasants barricaded themselves in their
+houses. A woman with child who saw the shadow of a dragon on the road
+through a window in the moonlight, was so terrified that she was brought
+to bed before her time.
+
+In those days of trial, the holy Mael meditated unceasingly on the
+nature of dragons and the means of combating them. After six months of
+study and prayer he thought he had found what he sought. One evening as
+he was walking by the sea with a young monk called Samuel, he to him in
+these terms:
+
+“I have studied at length the history and habits of dragons, not to
+satisfy a vain curiosity, but to discover examples to follow in the
+present circumstances. For such, Samuel, my son, is the use of history.
+
+“It is an invariable fact that dragons are extremely vigilant. They
+never sleep, and for this reason we often find them employed in guarding
+treasures. A dragon guarded at Colchis the golden fleece that Jason
+conquered from him. A dragon watched over the golden apples in the
+garden of the Hesperides. He was killed by Hercules and transformed into
+a star by Juno. This fact is related in some books, and if it be true,
+it was done by magic, for the gods of the pagans are in reality demons.
+A dragon prevented barbarous and ignorant men from drinking at the
+fountain of Castalia. We must also remember the dragon of Andromeda,
+which was slain by Perseus. But let us turn from these pagan fables, in
+which error is always mixed with truth. We meet dragons in the histories
+of the glorious archangel Michael, of St. George, St. Philip, St. James
+the Great, St. Patrick, St. Martha, and St. Margaret. And it is in such
+writings, since they are worthy of full credence, that we ought to look
+for comfort and counsel.
+
+“The story of the dragon of Silena affords us particularly precious
+examples. You must know, my son, that on the banks of a vast pool close
+to that town there dwelt a dragon who sometimes approached the walls
+and poisoned with his breath all who dwelt in the suburbs. And that
+they might not be devoured by the monster, the inhabitants of Silena
+delivered up to him one of their number expressed his thought every
+morning. The victim was chosen by lot, and after a hundred others, the
+lot fell upon the king’s daughter.
+
+“Now St. George, who was a military tribune, as he passed through the
+town of Silena, learned that the king’s daughter had just been given to
+the fierce beast. He immediately mounted his horse, and, armed with
+his lance, rushed to encounter the dragon, whom he reached just as the
+monster was about to devour the royal virgin. And when St. George had
+overthrown the dragon, the king’s daughter fastened her girdle round the
+beast’s neck and he followed her like a dog led on a leash.
+
+“That is an example for us of the power of virgins over dragons. The
+history of St. Martha furnishes us with a still more certain proof. Do
+you know the story, Samuel, my son?”
+
+“Yes, father,” answered Samuel.
+
+And the blessed Mael went on:
+
+“There was in a forest on the banks of the Rhone, between Arles and
+Avignon, a dragon half quadruped and half fish, larger than an ox, with
+sharp teeth like horns and huge-wings at his shoulders. He sank the
+boats and devoured their passengers. Now St. Martha, at the entreaty of
+the people, approached this dragon, whom she found devouring a man. She
+put her girdle round his neck and led him easily into the town.
+
+“These two examples lead me to think that we should have recourse to the
+power of some virgin so as to conquer the dragon who scatters terror and
+death through the island of Alca.
+
+“For this reason, Samuel thy son, gird up thy loins and go, I pray thee,
+with two of thy companions, into all the villages of this island, and
+proclaim everywhere that a virgin alone shall be able to deliver the
+island from the monster that devastates it.
+
+“Thou shalt sing psalms and canticles and thou shalt say:
+
+“‘O sons of the Penguins, if there be among you a pure virgin, let her
+arise and go, armed with the sign of the cross, to combat the dragon!’”
+
+Thus the old man spake, and Samuel promised to obey him. The next day he
+girded up his loins and set out with two of his companions to proclaim
+to the inhabitants of Alca that a virgin alone would be able to deliver
+the Penguins from the rage of the dragon.
+
+
+
+
+IX. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia loved her husband, but she did not love him alone. At the
+hour when Venus lightens in the pale sky, whilst Kraken scattered terror
+through the villages, she used to visit in his moving hut, a young
+shepherd of Dalles called Marcel, whose pleasing form was invested with
+inexhaustible vigour. The fair Orberosia shared the shepherd’s aromatic
+couch with delight, but far from making herself known to him, she took
+the name of Bridget, and said that she was the daughter of a gardener in
+the Bay of Divers. When regretfully she left his arms she walked across
+the smoking fields towards the Coast of Shadows, and if she happened to
+meet some belated peasant she immediately spread out her garments like
+great wings and cried:
+
+“Passer by, lower your eyes, that you may not have to say, ‘Alas! alas!
+woe is me, for I have seen the angel of the Lord.’”
+
+The villagers tremblingly knelt with their faces to the round. And
+several of them used to say that angels, whom it would be death to see,
+passed along the roads of the island in the night time.
+
+Kraken did not know of the loves of Orberosia and Marcel, for he was a
+hero, and heroes never discover the secrets of their wives. But though
+he did not know of these loves, he reaped the benefit of them. Every
+night he found his companion more good-humoured and more beautiful,
+exhaling pleasure and perfuming the nuptial bed with a delicious odour
+of fennel and vervain. She loved Kraken with a love that never became
+importunate or anxious, because she did not rest its whole weight on him
+alone.
+
+This lucky infidelity of Orberosia was destined soon to save the hero
+from a great peril and to assure his fortune and his glory for ever.
+For it happened that she saw passing in the twilight a neatherd from
+Belmont, who was goading on his oxen, and she fell more deeply in
+love with him than she had ever been with the shepherd Marcel. He was
+hunch-backed; his shoulders were higher than his ears; his body was
+supported by legs of different lengths; his rolling eyes flashed, from
+beneath his matted hair. From his throat issued a hoarse voice and
+strident laughter; he smelt of the cow-shed. However, to her he was
+beautiful. “A plant,” as Gnatho says, “has been loved by one, a stream
+by another, a beast by a third.”
+
+Now, one day, as she was sighing within the neatherd’s arms in a village
+barn, suddenly the blasts of a trumpet, with sounds and footsteps, fell
+upon her ears; she looked through the window and saw the inhabitants
+collected in the marketplace round a young monk, who, standing upon a
+rock, uttered these words in a distinct voice:
+
+“Inhabitants of Belmont, Abbot Mael, our venerable father, informs you
+through my mouth that neither by strength nor skill in arms shall you
+prevail against the dragon; but the beast shall be overcome by a virgin.
+If, then, there be among you a perfectly pure virgin, let her arise and
+go towards the monster; and when she meets him let her tie her girdle
+round his neck and she shall lead him as easily as if he were a little
+dog.”
+
+And the young monk, replacing his hood upon his head, departed to carry
+the proclamation of the blessed Mael to other villages.
+
+Orberosia sat in the amorous straw, resting her head in her hand and
+supporting her elbow upon her knee, meditating on what she had just
+heard.
+
+Although, so far as Kraken was concerned, she feared the power of
+a virgin much less than the strength of armed men, she did not feel
+reassured by the proclamation of the blessed Mael. A vague but sure
+instinct ruled her mind and warned her that Kraken could not henceforth
+be a dragon with safety.
+
+She said to the neatherd:
+
+“My own heart, what do you think about the dragon?”
+
+The rustic shook his head.
+
+“It is certain that dragons laid waste the earth in ancient times and
+some have been seen as large as mountains. But they come no longer, and
+I believe that what has been taken for a dragon is not one at all, but
+pirates or merchants who have carried off the fair Orberosia and
+the best of the children of Alca in their ships. But if one of those
+brigands attempts to rob me of my oxen, I will either by force or craft
+find a way to prevent him from doing me any harm.”
+
+This remark of the neatherd increased Orberosia’s apprehensions and
+added to her solicitude for the husband whom she loved.
+
+
+
+
+X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+The days passed by and no maiden arose in the island to combat the
+monster. And in the wooden monastery old Mael, seated on a bench in the
+shade of an old fig-tree, accompanied by a pious monk called Regimental,
+kept asking himself anxiously and sadly how it was that there was not in
+Alca a single virgin fit to overthrow the monster.
+
+He sighed and brother Regimental sighed too. At that moment old Mael
+called young Samuel, who happened to pass through the garden, and said
+to him:
+
+“I have meditated anew, my son, on the means of destroying the dragon
+who devours the flower of our youth, our flocks, and our harvests. In
+this respect the story of the dragons of St. Riok and of St. Pol de Leon
+seems to me particularly instructive. The dragon of St. Riok was six
+fathoms long; his head was derived from the cock and the basilisk, his
+body from the ox and the serpent; he ravaged the banks of the Elorn in
+the time of King Bristocus. St. Riok, then aged two years, led him by
+a leash to the sea, in which the monster drowned himself of his own
+accord. St. Pol’s dragon was sixty feet long and not less terrible. The
+blessed apostle of Leon bound him with his stole and allowed a young
+noble of great purity of life to lead him. These examples prove that
+in the eyes of God a chaste young man is as agreeable as a chaste girl.
+Heaven makes no distinction between them. For this reason, my son, if
+you believe what I say, we will both go to the Coast of Shadows; when we
+reach the dragon’s cavern we will call the monster in a loud voice, and
+when he comes forth I will tie my stole round his neck and you will lead
+him to the sea, where he will not fail to drown himself.”
+
+At the old man’s words Samuel cast down his head and did not answer.
+
+“You seem to hesitate, my son,” said Mael.
+
+Brother Regimental, contrary to his custom, spoke without being
+addressed.
+
+“There is at least cause for some hesitation,” said he. “St. Riok was
+only two years old when he overcame the dragon. Who says that nine or
+ten years later he could have done as much? Remember, father, that the
+dragon who is devastating our island has devoured little Elo and four
+or five other young boys. Brother Samuel is not go presumptuous as to
+believe that at nineteen years of age he is more innocent than they were
+at twelve and fourteen.
+
+“Alas!” added the monk, with a groan, “who can boast of being chaste in
+this world, where everything gives the example and model of love, where
+all things in nature, animals, and plants, show us the caresses of love
+and advise us to share them? Animals are eager to unite in their own
+fashion, but the various marriages of quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and
+reptiles are far from equalling in lust the nuptials of the trees. The
+greatest extremes of lewdness that the pagans have imagined in their
+fables are outstripped by the simple flowers of the field, and, if
+you knew the irregularities of lilies and roses you would take those
+chalices of impurity, those vases of scandal, away from your altars.”
+
+“Do not speak in this way, Brother Regimental,” answered old Mael.
+“Since they are subject to the law of nature, animals and plants are
+always innocent. They have no souls to save, whilst man--”
+
+“You are right,” replied Brother Regimental, “it is quite a different
+thing. But do not send young Samuel to the dragon--the dragon might
+devour him. For the last five years Samuel is not in a state to show his
+innocence to monsters. In the year of the comet, the Devil in order to
+seduce him, put in his path a milkmaid, who was lifting up her petticoat
+to cross a ford. Samuel was tempted, but he overcame the temptation.
+The Devil, who never tires, sent him the image of that young girl in
+a dream. The shade did what the reality was unable to accomplish, and
+Samuel yielded. When he awoke be moistened his couch with his tears, but
+alas! repentance did not give him back his innocence.”
+
+As he listened to this story Samuel asked himself how his secret could
+be known, for he was ignorant that the Devil had borrowed the appearance
+of Brother Regimental, so as to trouble the hearts of the monks of Alca.
+
+And old Mael remained deep in thought and kept asking himself in grief:
+
+“Who will deliver us from the dragon’s tooth? Who will preserve us from
+his breath? Who will save us from his look?”
+
+However, the inhabitants of Alca began to take courage. The labourers of
+Dombes and the neatherds of Belmont swore that they themselves would
+be of more avail than a girl against the ferocious beast, and they
+exclaimed as they stroked the muscles on their arms, “Let the dragon
+come!” Many men and women had seen him. They did not agree about his
+form and his figure, but all now united in saying that he was not as
+big as they had thought, and that his height was not much greater than
+a man’s. The defence was organised; towards nightfall watches were
+stationed at the entrances of the villages ready to give the alarm; and
+during the night companies armed with pitchforks and scythes protected
+the paddocks in which the animals were shut up. Indeed, once in the
+village of Anis some plucky labourers surprised him as he was scaling
+Morio’s wall, and, as they had flails, scythes, and pitchforks, they
+fell upon him and pressed him hard. One of them, a very quick and
+courageous man, thought to have run him through with his pitchfork; but
+he slipped in a pool and so let him escape. The others would certainly
+have caught him had they not waited to pick up the rabbits and fowls
+that he dropped in his flight.
+
+Those labourers declared to the Elders of the village that the monster’s
+form and proportions appeased to them human enough except for his head
+and his tail, which were, in truth, terrifying.
+
+
+
+
+XI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+On that day Kraken came back to his cavern sooner than usual. He took
+from his head his sealskin helmet with its two bull’s horns and its
+visor trimmed with terrible hooks. He threw on the table his gloves that
+ended in horrible claws--they were the beaks of sea-birds. He unhooked
+his belt from which hung a long green tail twisted into many folds. Then
+he ordered his page, Elo, to help him off with his boots and, as the
+child did not succeed in doing this very quickly, he gave him a kick
+that sent him to the other end of the grotto.
+
+Without looking at the fair Orberosia, who was spinning, he seated
+himself in front of the fireplace, on which a sheep was roasting, and he
+muttered:
+
+“Ignoble Penguins. . . . There is no worse trade than a dragon’s.”
+
+“What does my master say?” asked the fair Orberosia.
+
+“They fear me no longer,” continued Kraken. “Formerly everyone fled at
+my approach. I carried away hens and rabbits in my bag; I drove sheep
+and pigs, cows, and oxen before me. To-day these clod-hoppers keep a
+good guard; they sit up at night. Just now I was pursued in the
+village of Anis by doughty labourers armed with flails and scythes and
+pitchforks. I had to drop the hens and rabbits, put my tail under my
+arm, and run as fast as I could. Now I ask you, is it seemly for a
+dragon of Cappadocia to run away like a robber with his tail under his
+arm? Further, incommoded as I was by crests, horns, hooks, claws, and
+scales, I barely escaped a brute who ran half an inch of his pitchfork
+into my left thigh.”
+
+As he said this he carefully ran his hand over the insulted part, and,
+after giving himself up for a few moments to bitter meditation:
+
+“What idiots those Penguins are! I am tired of blowing flames in the
+faces of such imbeciles. Orberosia, do you hear me?”
+
+Having thus spoken the hero raised his terrible helmet in his hands and
+gazed at it for a long time in gloomy silence. Then he pronounced these
+rapid words:
+
+“I have made this helmet with my own hands in the shape of a fish’s
+head, covering it with the skin of a seal. To make it more terrible I
+have put on it the horns of a bull and I have given it a boar’s jaws;
+I have hung from it a horse’s tail dyed vermilion. When in the gloomy
+twilight I threw it over my shoulders no inhabitant of this island had
+courage to withstand its sight. Women and children, young men and old
+men fled distracted at its approach, and I carried terror among the
+whole race of Penguins. By what advice does that insolent people lose
+its earlier fears and dare to-day to behold these horrible jaws and to
+attack this terrible crest?”
+
+And throwing his helmet on the rocky soil:
+
+“Perish, deceitful helmet!” cried Kraken. “I swear by all the demons of
+Armor that I will never bear you upon my head again.”
+
+And having uttered this oath he stamped upon his helmet, his gloves, his
+boots, and upon his tail with its twisted folds.
+
+“Kraken,” said the fair Orberosia, “will you allow your servant to
+employ artifice to save your reputation and your goods? Do not despise a
+woman’s help. You need it, for all men are imbeciles.”
+
+“Woman,” asked Kraken, “what are your plans?”
+
+And the fair Orberosia informed her husband that the monks were going
+through the villages teaching the inhabitants the best way of combating
+the dragon; that, according to their instructions, the beast would be
+overcome by a virgin, and that if a maid placed her girdle around the
+dragon’s neck she could lead him as easily as if he were a little dog.
+
+“How do you know that the monks teach this?” asked Kraken.
+
+“My friend,” answered Orberosia, “do not interrupt a serious subject
+by frivolous questions. . . . ‘If, then,’ added the monks, ‘there be in
+Alca a pure virgin, let her arise!’ Now, Kraken, I have determined to
+answer their call. I will go and find the holy Mael and I will say to
+him: ‘I am the virgin destined by Heaven to overthrow the dragon.’”
+
+At these words Kraken exclaimed: “How can you be that pure virgin? And
+why do you want to overthrow me, Orberosia? Have you lost your reason?
+Be sure that I will not allow myself to be conquered by you!”
+
+“Can you not try and understand me before you get angry?” sighed the
+fair Orberosia with deep though gentle contempt.
+
+And she explained the cunning designs that she had formed.
+
+As he listened, the hero remained pensive. And when she ceased speaking:
+
+“Orberosia, your cunning, is deep,” said he, “And if your plans are
+carried out according to your intentions I shall derive great advantages
+from them. But how can you be the virgin destined by heaven?”
+
+“Don’t bother about that,” she replied, “and come to bed.”
+
+The next day in the grease-laden atmosphere of the cavern, Kraken
+plaited a deformed skeleton out of osier rods and covered it with
+bristling, scaly, and filthy skins. To one extremity of the skeleton
+Orberosia sewed the fierce crest and the hideous mask that Kraken used
+to wear in his plundering expeditions, and to the other end she fastened
+the tail with twisted folds which the hero was wont to trail behind him.
+And when the work was finished they showed little Elo and the other five
+children who waited on them how to get inside this machine, how to make
+it walk, how to blow horns and burn tow in it so as to send forth smoke
+and flames through the dragon’s mouth.
+
+
+
+
+XII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia, having clothed herself in a robe made of coarse stuff and
+girt herself with a thick cord, went to the monastery and asked to
+speak to the blessed Mael. And because women were forbidden to enter
+the enclosure of the monastery the old man advanced outside the gates,
+holding his pastoral cross in his right hand and resting his left on the
+shoulder of Brother Samuel, the youngest of his disciples.
+
+He asked:
+
+“Woman, who art thou?”
+
+“I am the maiden Orberosia.”
+
+At this reply Mael raised his trembling arms to heaven.
+
+“Do you speak truth, woman? It is a certain fact that Orberosia was
+devoured by the dragon. And yet I see Orberosia and hear her. Did you
+not, O my daughter, while within the dragon’s bowels arm yourself with
+the sign of the cross and come uninjured out of his throat? That is what
+seems to me the most credible explanation.”
+
+“You are not deceived, father,” answered Orberosia. “That is precisely
+what happened to me. Immediately I came out of the creature’s bowels
+I took refuge in a hermitage on the Coast of Shadows. I lived there
+in solitude, giving myself up to prayer and meditation, and performing
+unheard of austerities, until I learnt by a revelation from heaven that
+a maid alone could overcome the dragon, and that I was that maid.”
+
+“Show me a sign of your mission,” said the old man.
+
+“I myself am the sign,” answered Orberosia.
+
+“I am not ignorant of the power of those who have placed a seal upon
+their flesh,” replied the apostle of the Penguins. “But are you indeed
+such as you say?”
+
+“You will see by the result,” answered Orberosia.
+
+The monk Regimental drew near:
+
+“That will,” said he, “be the best proof. King Solomon has said: ‘Three
+things are hard to understand and a fourth is impossible: they are the
+way of a serpent on the earth, the way of a bird in the air, the way
+of a ship in the sea, and the way of a man with a maid!’ I regard
+such matrons as nothing less than presumptuous who claim to compare
+themselves in these matters with the wisest of kings. Father, if you are
+led by me you will not consult them in regard to the pious Orberosia.
+When they have given their opinion you will not be a bit farther on than
+before. Virginity is not less difficult to prove than to keep. Pliny
+tells us in his history that its signs are either imaginary or very
+uncertain.* One who bears upon her the fourteen signs of corruption may
+yet be pure in the eyes of the angels, and, on the contrary, another who
+has been pronounced pure by the matrons who inspected her may know that
+her good appearance is due to the artifices of a cunning perversity. As
+for the purity of this holy girl here, I would put my hand in the fire
+in witness of it.”
+
+     * We have vainly sought for this phrase in Pliny’s “Natural
+     History.”--Editor.
+
+He spoke thus because he was the Devil. But old Mael did not know it. He
+asked the pious Orberosia:
+
+“My daughter, how, would you proceed to conquer so fierce an animal as
+he who devoured you?”
+
+The virgin answered:
+
+“To-morrow at sunrise, O Mael, you will summon the people together on
+the hill in front of the desolate moor that extends to the Coast of
+Shadows, and you will take care that no man of the Penguins remains less
+than five hundred paces from those rocks so that he may not be poisoned
+by the monster’s breath. And the dragon will come out of the rocks and I
+will put my girdle round his neck and lead him like an obedient dog.”
+
+“Ought you not to be accompanied by a courageous and pious man who will
+kill the dragon?” asked Mael.
+
+“It will be as thou sayest, venerable father. I shall deliver the
+monster to Kraken, who will stay him with his flashing sword. For I tell
+thee that the noble Kraken, who was believed to be dead, will return
+among the Penguins and he shall slay the dragon. And from the creature’s
+belly will come forth the little children whom he has devoured.”
+
+“What you declare to me, O virgin,” cried the apostle, “seems wonderful
+and beyond human power.”
+
+“It is,” answered the virgin Orberosia. “But learn, O Mael, that I have
+had a revelation that as a reward for their deliverance, the Penguin
+people will pay to the knight Kraken an annual tribute of three hundred
+fowls, twelve sheep, two oxen, three pigs, one thousand eight hundred
+bushels of corn, and vegetables according to their season; and that,
+moreover, the children who will come out of the dragon’s belly will be
+given and committed to the said Kraken to serve him and obey him in
+all things. If the Penguin people fail to keep their engagements a new
+dragon will come upon the island more terrible than the first. I have
+spoken.”
+
+
+
+
+XIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation and End)
+
+The people of the Penguins were assembled by Mael and they spent the
+night on the Coast of Shadows within the bounds which the holy man had
+prescribed in order that none among the Penguins should be poisoned by
+the monster’s breath.
+
+The veil of night still covered the earth when, preceded by a hoarse
+bellowing, the dragon showed his indistinct and monstrous form upon
+the rocky coast. He crawled like a serpent and his writhing body seemed
+about fifteen feet long. At his appearance the crowd drew back in
+terror. But soon all eyes were turned towards the Virgin Orberosia,
+who, in the first light of the dawn, clothed in white, advanced over the
+purple heather. With an intrepid though modest gait she walked towards
+the beast, who, uttering awful bellowings, opened his flaming throat. An
+immense cry of terror and pity arose from the midst of the Penguins. But
+the virgin, unloosing her linen girdle, put it round the dragon’s neck
+and led him on the leash like a faithful dog amid the acclamations of
+the spectators.
+
+She had walked over a long stretch of the heath when Kraken appeared
+armed with a flashing sword. The people, who believed him dead, uttered
+cries of joy and surprise. The hero rushed towards the beast, turned
+him over on his back, and with his sword cut open his belly, from whence
+came forth in their shirts, with curling hair and folded hands, little
+Elo and the five other children whom the monster had devoured.
+
+Immediately they threw themselves on their knees before the virgin
+Orberosia, who took them in her arms and whispered into their ears:
+
+“You will go through the villages saying: ‘We are the poor little
+children who were devoured by the dragon, and we came out of his belly
+in our shirts.’ The inhabitants will give you abundance of all that you
+can desire. But if you say anything else you will get nothing but cuffs
+and whippings. Go!”
+
+Several Penguins, seeing the dragon disembowelled, rushed forward to cut
+him to pieces, some from a feeling of rage and vengeance, others to get
+the magic stone called dragonite, that is engendered in his head. The
+mothers of the children who had come back to life ran to embrace their
+little ones. But the holy Mael kept them back, saying that none of them
+were holy enough to approach a dragon without dying.
+
+And soon little Elo, and the five other children came towards the people
+and said:
+
+“We are the poor little children who were devoured by the dragon and we
+came out of his belly in our shirts.”
+
+And all who heard them kissed them and said:
+
+“Blessed children, we will give you abundance of all that you can
+desire.”
+
+And the crowd of people dispersed, full of joy, singing hymns and
+canticles.
+
+To commemorate this day on which Providence delivered the people from
+a cruel scourge, processions were established in which the effigy of a
+chained dragon was led about.
+
+Kraken levied the tribute and became the richest and most powerful of
+the Penguins. As a sign of his victory and so as to inspire a salutary
+terror, he wore a dragon’s crest upon his head and he had a habit of
+saying to the people:
+
+“Now that the monster is dead I am the dragon.”
+
+For many years Orberosia bestowed her favours upon neatherds and
+shepherds, whom she thought equal to the gods. But when she was no
+longer beautiful she consecrated herself to the Lord.
+
+At her death she became the object of public veneration, and was
+admitted into the calendar of the saints and adopted as the patron saint
+of Penguinia.
+
+Kraken left a son, who, like his father, wore a dragon’s crest, and
+he was for this reason surnamed Draco. He was the founder of the first
+royal dynasty of the Penguins.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+
+
+
+
+I. BRIAN THE GOOD AND QUEEN GLAMORGAN
+
+The kings of Alca were descended from Draco, the son of Kraken, and they
+wore on their heads a terrible dragon’s crest, as a sacred badge whose
+appearance alone inspired the people with veneration, terror, and love.
+They were perpetually in conflict either with their own vassals and
+subjects or with the princes of the adjoining islands and continents.
+
+The most ancient of these kings has left but a name. We do not even know
+how to pronounce or write it. The first of the Draconides whose history
+is known was Brian the Good, renowned for his skill and courage in war
+and in the chase.
+
+He was a Christian and loved learning. He also favoured men who had
+vowed themselves to the monastic life. In the hall of his palace where,
+under the sooty rafters, there hung the heads, pelts, and horns of
+wild beasts, he held feasts to which all the harpers of Alca and of
+the neighbouring islands were invited, and he himself used to join in
+singing the praises of the heroes. He was just and magnanimous, but
+inflamed by so ardent a love of glory that he could not restrain himself
+from putting to death those who had sung better than himself.
+
+The monks of Yvern having been driven out by the pagans who ravaged
+Brittany, King Brian summoned them into his kingdom and built a wooden
+monastery for them near his palace. Every day he went with Queen
+Glamorgan, his wife, into the monastery chapel and was present at the
+religious ceremonies and joined in the hymns.
+
+Now among these monks there was a brother called Oddoul, who, while
+still in the flower of his youth, had adorned himself with knowledge and
+virtue. The devil entertained a great grudge against him, and attempted
+several times to lead him into temptation. He took several shapes and
+appeared to him in turn as a war-horse, a young maiden, and a cup of
+mead. Then he rattled two dice in a dicebox and said to him:
+
+“Will you play with me for the kingdoms of, the world against one of the
+hairs of your head?”
+
+But the man of the Lord, armed with the sign of the Cross, repulsed the
+enemy. Perceiving that he could not seduce him, the devil thought of an
+artful plan to ruin him. One summer night he approached the queen, who
+slept upon her couch, showed her an image of the young monk whom she
+saw every day in the wooden monastery, and upon this image he placed
+a spell. Forthwith, like a subtle poison, love flowed into Glamorgan’s
+veins, and she burned with an ardent desire to do as she listed with
+Oddoul. She found unceasing pretexts to have him near her. Several times
+she asked him to teach reading and singing to her children.
+
+“I entrust them to you,” said she to him. “And will follow the lessons
+you will give them so that I myself may learn also. You will teach both
+mother and sons at the same time.”
+
+But the young monk kept making excuses. At times he would say that he
+was not a learned enough teacher, and on other occasions that his
+state forbade him all intercourse with women. This refusal inflamed
+Glamorgan’s passion. One day as she lay pining upon her couch, her
+malady having become intolerable, she summoned Oddoul to her chamber.
+He came in obedience to her orders, but remained with his eyes cast
+down towards the threshold of the door. With impatience and grief she
+resented his not looking at her.
+
+“See,” said she to him, “I have no more strength, a shadow is on my
+eyes. My body is both burning and freezing.”
+
+And as he kept silence and made no movement, she called him in a voice
+of entreaty:
+
+“Come to me, come!”
+
+With outstretched arms to which passion gave more length, she
+endeavoured to seize him and draw him towards her.
+
+But he fled away, reproaching her for her wantonness.
+
+Then, incensed with rage and fearing that Oddoul might divulge the shame
+into which she had fallen, she determined to ruin him so that he might
+not ruin her.
+
+In a voice of lamentation that resounded throughout all the palace she
+called for help, as if, in truth, she were in some great danger. Her
+servants rushed up and saw the young monk fleeing and the queen pulling
+back the sheets upon her couch. They all cried out together. And when
+King Brian, attracted by the noise, entered the chamber, Glamorgan,
+showing him her dishevelled hair, her eyes flooded with tears, and her
+bosom that in the fury of her love she had torn with her nails, said:
+
+“My lord and husband, behold the traces of the insults I have undergone.
+Driven by an infamous desire Oddoul has approached me and attempted to
+do me violence.”
+
+When he heard these complaints and saw the blood, the king, transported
+with fury, ordered his guards to seize the young monk and burn him alive
+before the palace under the queen’s eyes.
+
+Being told of the affair, the Abbot of Yvern went to the king and said
+to him:
+
+“King Brian, know by this example the difference between a Christian
+woman and a pagan. Roman Lucretia was the most virtuous of idolatrous
+princesses, yet she had not the strength to defend herself against the
+attacks of an effeminate youth, and, ashamed of her weakness, she gave
+way to despair, whilst Glamorgan has successfully withstood the assaults
+of a criminal filled with rage, and possessed by the most terrible of
+demons.” Meanwhile Oddoul, in the prison of the palace, was waiting for
+the moment when he should be burned alive. But God did not suffer an
+innocent to perish. He sent to him an angel, who, taking the form of one
+of the queen’s servants called Gudrune, took him out of his prison and
+led him into the very room where the woman whose appearance he had taken
+dwelt.
+
+And the angel said to young Oddoul:
+
+“I love thee because thou art daring.”
+
+And young Oddoul, believing that it was Gudrune herself, answered with
+downcast looks:
+
+“It is by the grace of the Lord that I have resisted the violence of the
+queen and braved the anger of that powerful woman.”
+
+And the angel asked:
+
+“What? Hast thou not done what the queen accuses thee of?”
+
+“In truth no, I have not done it,” answered Oddoul, his hand on his
+heart.
+
+“Thou hast not done it?”
+
+“No, I have not done it. The very thought of such an action fills me
+with horror.”
+
+“Then,” cried the angel, “what art thou doing here, thou impotent
+creature?” *
+
+     * The Penguin chronicler who relates the fact employs the
+     expression, Species inductilis. I have endeavoured to
+     translate it literally.
+
+
+And she opened the door to facilitate the young man’s escape. Oddoul
+felt himself pushed violently out. Scarcely had he gone down into the
+street than a chamber-pot was poured over his head; and he thought:
+
+“Mysterious are thy designs, O Lord, and thy ways past finding out.”
+
+
+
+
+II. DRACO THE GREAT (Translation of the Relics of St. Orberosia)
+
+The direct posterity of Brian the Good was extinguished about the year
+900 in the person of Collic of the Short Nose. A cousin of that prince,
+Bosco the Magnanimous, succeeded him, and took care, in order to assure
+himself of the throne, to put to death all his relations. There issued
+from him a long line of powerful kings.
+
+One of them, Draco the Great, attained great renown as a man of war. He
+was defeated more frequently than the others. It is by this constancy
+in defeat that great captains are recognized. In twenty years he burned
+down more than a hundred thousand hamlets, market towns, unwalled
+towns, villages, walled towns, cities, and universities. He set fire
+impartially to his enemies’ territory and to his own domains. And he
+used to explain his conduct by saying:
+
+“War without fire is like tripe without mustard: it is an insipid
+thing.”
+
+His justice was rigorous. When the peasants whom he made prisoners were
+unable to raise the money for their ransoms he had them hanged from a
+tree, and if any unhappy woman came to plead for her destitute husband
+he dragged her by the hair at his horse’s tail. He lived like a soldier
+without effeminacy. It is satisfactory to relate that his manner of
+life was pure. Not only did he not allow his kingdom to decline from its
+hereditary glory, but, even in his reverses he valiantly supported the
+honour of the Penguin people.
+
+Draco the Great caused the relics of St. Orberosia to be transferred to
+Alca.
+
+The body of the blessed saint had been buried in a grotto on the Coast
+of Shadows at the end of a scented heath. The first pilgrims who went
+to visit it were the boys and girls from the neighbouring villages. They
+used to go there in the evening, by preference in couples, as if their
+pious desires naturally sought satisfaction in darkness and solitude.
+They worshipped the saint with a fervent and discreet worship whose
+mystery they seemed jealously to guard, for they did not like to publish
+too openly the experiences they felt. But they were heard to murmur one
+to another words of love, delight, and rapture with which they mingled
+the name of Orberosia. Some would sigh that there they forgot the world;
+others would say that they came out of the grotto in peace and calm; the
+young girls among them used to recall to each other the joy with which
+they had been filled in it.
+
+Such were the marvels that the virgin of Alca performed in the morning
+of her glorious eternity; they had the sweetness and indefiniteness
+of the dawn. Soon the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume
+throughout the land; it was a ground of joy and edification for pious
+souls, and corrupt men endeavoured, though in vain, by falsehood and
+calumny, to divert the faithful from the springs of grace that flowed
+from the saint’s tomb. The Church took measures so that these graces
+should not remain reserved for a few children, but should be diffused
+throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up their quarters in the
+grotto, they built a monastery, a chapel, and a hostelry on the coast,
+and pilgrims began to flock thither.
+
+As if strengthened by a longer sojourn in heaven, the blessed Orberosia
+now performed still greater miracles for those who came to lay their
+offerings on her tomb. She gave hopes to women who had been hitherto
+barren, she sent dreams to reassure jealous old men concerning the
+fidelity of the young wives whom they had suspected without cause, and
+she protected the country from plagues, murrains, famines, tempests, and
+dragons of Cappadocia.
+
+But during the troubles that desolated the kingdom in the time of King
+Collic and his successors, the tomb of St. Orberosia was plundered of
+its wealth, the monastery burned down, and the monks dispersed. The
+road that had been so long trodden by devout pilgrims was overgrown with
+furze and heather, and the blue thistles of the sands. For a hundred
+years the miraculous tomb had been visited by none save vipers,
+weasels, and bats, when, one day the saint appeared to a peasant of the
+neighbourhood, Momordic by name.
+
+“I am the virgin Orberosia,” said she to him; “I have chosen thee to
+restore my sanctuary. Warn the inhabitants of the country that if they
+allow my memory to be blotted out, and leave my tomb without honour and
+wealth, a new dragon will come and devastate Penguinia.”
+
+Learned churchmen held an inquiry concerning this apparition, and
+pronounced it genuine, and not diabolical but truly heavenly, and in
+later years it was remarked that in France, in like circumstances, St.
+Foy and St. Catherine had acted in the same way and made use of similar
+language.
+
+The monastery was restored and pilgrims flocked to it anew. The virgin
+Orberosia worked greater and greater miracles. She cured divers hurtful
+maladies, particularly club-foot, dropsy, paralysis, and St. Guy’s
+disease. The monks who kept the tomb were enjoying an enviable opulence,
+when the saint, appearing to King Draco the Great, ordered him to
+recognise her as the heavenly patron of the kingdom and to transfer her
+precious remains to the cathedral of Alca.
+
+In consequence, the odoriferous relics of that virgin were carried with
+great pomp to the metropolitan church and placed in the middle of the
+choir in a shrine made of gold and enamel and ornamented with precious
+stones.
+
+The chapter kept a record of the miracles wrought by the blessed
+Orberosia.
+
+Draco the Great, who had never ceased to defend and exalt the Christian
+faith, died fulfilled with the most pious sentiments and bequeathed his
+great possessions to the Church.
+
+
+
+
+III. QUEEN CRUCHA
+
+Terrible disorders followed the death of Draco the Great. That prince’s
+successors have often been accused of weakness, and it is true that none
+of them followed, even from afar, the example of their valiant ancestor.
+
+His son, Chum, who was lame, failed to increase the territory of the
+Penguins. Bolo, the son of Chum, was assassinated by the palace guards
+at the age of nine, just as he was ascending the throne. His brother
+Gun succeeded him. He was only seven years old and allowed himself to be
+governed by his mother, Queen Crucha.
+
+Crucha was beautiful, learned, and intelligent; but she was unable to
+curb her own passions.
+
+These are the terms in which the venerable Talpa expresses himself in
+his chronicle regarding that illustrious queen:
+
+“In beauty of face and symmetry of figure Queen Crucha yields neither
+to Semiramis of Babylon nor to Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons; nor to
+Salome, the daughter of Herodias. But she offers in her person certain
+singularities that will appear beautiful or uncomely according to the
+contradictory opinions of men and the varying judgments of the world.
+She has on her forehead two small horns which she conceals in the
+abundant folds of her golden hair; one of her eyes is blue and one is
+black; her neck is bent towards the left side; and, like Alexander
+of Macedon, she has six fingers on her right hand, and a stain like a
+little monkey’s head upon her skin.
+
+“Her gait is majestic and her manner affable. She is magnificent in her
+expenses, but she is not always able to rule desire by reason.
+
+“One day, having noticed in the palace stables, a young groom of great
+beauty, she immediately fell violently in love with him, and entrusted
+to him the command of her armies. What one must praise unreservedly
+in this great queen is the abundance of gifts that she makes to the
+churches, monasteries, and chapels in her kingdom, and especially to
+the holy house of Beargarden, where, by the grace of the Lord, I made my
+profession in my fourteenth year. She has founded masses for the repose
+of her soul in such great numbers that every priest in the Penguin
+Church is, so to speak, transformed into a taper lighted in the sight of
+heaven to draw down the divine mercy upon the august Crucha.”
+
+From these lines and from some others with which have enriched my text
+the reader can judge of the historical and literary value of the “Gesta
+Penguinorum.” Unhappily, that chronicle suddenly comes suddenly to an
+end at third year of Draco the Simple, the successor of Gun the Weak.
+Having reached that point of my history, I deplore the loss of an
+agreeable and trustworthy guide.
+
+During the two centuries that followed, the Penguins remained plunged
+in blood-stained disorder. All the arts perished. In the midst of the
+general ignorance, the monks in the shadow of their cloister devoted
+themselves to study, and copied the Holy Scriptures with indefatigable
+zeal. As parchment was scarce, they scraped the writing off old
+manuscripts in order to transcribe upon them the divine word. Thus
+throughout the breadth of Penguinia Bibles blossomed forth like roses on
+a bush.
+
+A monk of the order of St. Benedict, Ermold the Penguin, had himself
+alone defaced four thousand Greek and Latin manuscripts so as to copy
+out the Gospel of St. John four thousand times. Thus the masterpieces of
+ancient poetry and eloquence were destroyed in great numbers. Historians
+are unanimous in recognising that the Penguin convents were the refuge
+of learning during the Middle Ages.
+
+Unending wars between the Penguins and the Porpoises filled the close
+of this period. It is extremely difficult to know the truth concerning
+these wars, not because accounts are wanting, but because there are so
+many of them. The Porpoise Chronicles contradict the Penguin Chronicles
+at every point. And, moreover, the Penguins contradict each other as
+well as the Porpoises. I have discovered two chronicles that are in
+agreement, but one has copied from the other. A single fact is certain,
+namely, that massacres, rapes, conflagrations, and plunder succeeded one
+another without interruption.
+
+Under the unhappy prince Bosco IX. the kingdom was at the verge of
+ruin. On the news that the Porpoise fleet, composed of six hundred great
+ships, was in sight of Alca, the bishop ordered a solemn procession. The
+cathedral chapter, the elected magistrates, the members of Parliament,
+and the clerics of the University entered the Cathedral and, taking up
+St. Orberosia’s shrine, led it in procession through the town, followed
+by the entire people singing hymns. The holy patron of Penguinia was not
+invoked in vain. Nevertheless, the Porpoises besieged the town both by
+land and sea, took it by assault, and for three days and three nights
+killed, plundered, violated, and burned, with all the indifference that
+habit produces.
+
+Our astonishment cannot be too great at the fact that, during those iron
+ages, the faith was preserved intact among the Penguins. The splendour
+of the truth in those times illumined all souls that had not been
+corrupted by sophisms. This is the explanation of the unity of belief.
+A constant practice of the Church doubtless contributed also to
+maintain this happy communion of the faithful--every Penguin who thought
+differently from the others was immediately burned at the stake.
+
+
+
+
+IV. LETTERS: JOHANNES TALPA
+
+During the minority of King Gun, Johannes Talpa, in the monastery of
+Beargarden, where at the age of fourteen he had made his profession
+and from which he never departed for a single day throughout his life,
+composed his celebrated Latin chronicle in twelve books called “De
+Gestis Penguinorum.”
+
+The monastery of Beargarden lifts its high walls on the summit of an
+inaccessible peak. One sees around it only the blue tops of mountains,
+divided by the clouds.
+
+When he began to write his “Gesta Penguinorum,” Johannes Talpa was
+already old. The good monk has taken care to tell us this in his book:
+“My head has long since lost,” he says, “its adornment of fair hair,
+and my scalp resembles those convex mirrors of metal which the Penguin
+ladies consult with so much care and zeal. My stature, naturally small,
+has with years become diminished and bent. My white beard gives warmth
+to my breast.”
+
+With a charming simplicity, Talpa informs us of certain circumstances in
+his life and some features in his character. “Descended,” he tells us,
+“from a noble family, and destined from childhood for the ecclesiastical
+state, I was taught grammar and music. I learnt to read under the
+guidance of a master who was called Amicus, and who would have been
+better named Inimicus. As I did not easily attain to a knowledge of
+my letters, he beat me violently with rods so that I can say that he
+printed the alphabet in strokes upon my back.”
+
+In another passage Talpa confesses his natural inclination towards
+pleasure. These are his expressive words: “In my youth the ardour of
+my senses was such that in the shadow of the woods I experienced a
+sensation of boiling in a pot rather than of breathing the fresh air. I
+fled from women, but in vain, for every object recalled them to me.”
+
+While he was writing his chronicle, a terrible war, at once foreign and
+domestic, laid waste the Penguin land. The soldiers of Crucha came to
+defend the monastery of Beargarden against the Penguin barbarians and
+established themselves strongly within its walls. In order to render it
+impregnable they pierced loop-holes through the walls and they took the
+lead off the church roof to make balls for their slings. At night they
+lighted huge fires in the courts and cloisters and on them they roasted
+whole oxen which they spitted upon the ancient pine-trees of the
+mountain. Sitting around the flames, amid smoke filled with a mingled
+odour of resin and fat, they broached huge casks of wine and beer. Their
+songs, their blasphemies, and the noise of their quarrels drowned the
+sound of the morning bells.
+
+At last the Porpoises, having crossed the defiles, laid siege to the
+monastery. They were warriors from the North, clad in copper armour.
+They fastened ladders a hundred and fifty fathoms long to the sides of
+the cliffs and sometimes in the darkness and storm these broke beneath
+the weight of men and arms, and bunches of the besiegers were hurled
+into the ravines and precipices. A prolonged wail would be heard going
+down into the darkness, and the assault would begin again. The Penguins
+poured streams of burning wax upon their assailants, which made them
+blaze like torches. Sixty times the enraged Porpoises attempted to scale
+the monastery and sixty times they were repulsed.
+
+For six months they had closely invested the monastery, when, on the day
+of the Epiphany, a shepherd of the valley showed them a hidden path
+by which they climbed the mountain, penetrated into the vaults of the
+abbey, ran through the cloisters, the kitchens, the church, the chapter
+halls, the library, the laundry, the cells, the refectories, and the
+dormitories, and burned the buildings, killing and violating without
+distinction of age or sex. The Penguins, awakened unexpectedly, ran to
+arms, but in the darkness and alarm they struck at one another, whilst
+the Porpoises with blows of their axes disputed the sacred vessels, the
+censers, the candlesticks, dalmatics, reliquaries, golden crosses, and
+precious stones.
+
+The air was filled with an acrid odour of burnt flesh. Groans and
+death-cries arose in the midst of the flames, and on the edges of the
+crumbling roofs monks ran in thousands like ants, and fell into the
+valley. Yet Johannes Talpa kept on writing his Chronicle. The soldiers
+of Crucha retreated speedily and filled up all the issues from the
+monastery with pieces of rock so as to shut up the Porpoises in the
+burning buildings. And to crush the enemy beneath the ruin they employed
+the trunks of old oaks as battering-rams. The burning timbers fell in
+with a noise like thunder and the lofty arches of the naves crumbled
+beneath the shock of these giant trees when moved by six hundred men
+together. Soon there was left nothing of the rich and extensive abbey
+but the cell of Johannes Talpa, which, by a marvellous chance, hung from
+the ruin of a smoking gable. The old chronicler still kept writing.
+
+This admirable intensity of thought may seem excessive in the case of
+an annalist who applies himself to relate the events of his own time.
+However abstracted and detached we may be from surrounding things,
+we nevertheless resent their influence. I have consulted the original
+manuscript of Johannes Talpa in the National Library, where it is
+preserved (Monumenta Peng., K. L6., 12390 four). It is a parchment
+manuscript of 628 leaves. The writing is extremely confused, the letters
+instead of being in a straight line, stray in all directions and are
+mingled together in great disorder, or, more correctly speaking, in
+absolute confusion. They are so badly formed that for the most part it
+is impossible not merely to say what they are, but even to distinguish
+them from the splashes of ink with which they are plentifully
+interspersed. Those inestimable pages bear witness in this way to the
+troubles amid which they were written. To read them is difficult. On the
+other hand, the monk of Beargarden’s style shows no trace of emotion.
+The tone of the “Gesta Penguinorum” never departs from simplicity.
+The narration is rapid and of a conciseness that sometimes approaches
+dryness. The reflections are rare and, as a rule, judicious.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE ARTS: THE PRIMITIVES OF PENGUIN PAINTING
+
+The Penguin critics vie with one another in affirming that Penguin
+art has from its origin been distinguished by a powerful and pleasing
+originality, and that we may look elsewhere in vain for the qualities of
+grace and reason that characterise its earliest works. But the Porpoises
+claim that their artists were undoubtedly the instructors and masters of
+the Penguins. It is difficult to form an opinion on the matter, because
+the Penguins, before they began to admire their primitive painters,
+destroyed all their works.
+
+We cannot be too sorry for this loss. For my own part I feel it cruelly,
+for I venerate the Penguin antiquities and I adore the primitives.
+They are delightful. I do not say the are all alike, for that would be
+untrue, but they have common characters that are found in all schools--I
+mean formulas from which they never depart--and there is besides
+something finished in their work, for what they know they know well.
+Luckily we can form a notion of the Penguin primitives from the Italian,
+Flemish, and Dutch primitives, and from the French primitives, who are
+superior to all the rest; as M. Gruyer tells us they are more logical,
+logic being a peculiarly French quality. Even if this is denied it must
+at least be admitted that to France belongs the credit of having kept
+primitives when the other nations knew them no longer. The Exhibition
+of French Primitives at the Pavilion Marsan in 1904 contained several
+little panels contemporary with the later Valois kings and with Henry
+IV.
+
+I have made many journeys to see the pictures of the brothers Van Eyck,
+of Memling, of Roger van der Weyden, of the painter of the death of
+Mary, of Ambrogio Lorenzetti, and of the old Umbrian masters. It was,
+however, neither Bruges, nor Cologne, nor Sienna, nor Perugia, that
+completed my initiation; it was in the little town of Arezzo that I
+became a conscious adept in primitive painting. That was ten years
+ago or even longer. At that period of indigence and simplicity, the
+municipal museums, though usually kept shut, were always opened to
+foreigners. One evening an old woman with a candle showed me, for half a
+lira, the sordid museum of Arezzo, and in it I discovered a painting
+by Margaritone, a “St. Francis,” the pious sadness of which moved me to
+tears. I was deeply touched, and Margaritone, of Arezzo became from that
+day my dearest primitive.
+
+I picture to myself the Penguin primitives in conformity with the works
+of that master. It will not therefore be thought superfluous if in this
+place I consider his works with some attention, if not in detail,
+at least under their more general and, if I dare say so, most
+representative aspect.
+
+We possess five or six pictures signed with his hand. His masterpiece,
+preserved in the National Gallery of London, represents the Virgin
+seated on a throne and holding the infant Jesus in her arms. What
+strikes one first when one looks at this figure is the proportion. The
+body from the neck to the feet is only twice as long as the head,
+so that it appears extremely short and podgy. This work is not less
+remarkable for its painting than for its drawing. The great Margaritone
+had but a limited number of colours in his possession, and he used
+them in all their purity without ever modifying the tones. From this it
+follows that his colouring has more vivacity than harmony. The cheeks
+of the Virgin and those of the Child are of a bright vermilion which the
+old master, from a naive preference for clear definitions, has placed on
+each face in two circumferences as exact as if they had been traced out
+by a pair of compasses.
+
+A learned critic of the eighteenth century, the Abbe Lanzi, has treated
+Margaritone’s works with profound disdain. “They are,” he says, “merely
+crude daubs. In those unfortunate times people could neither draw nor
+paint.” Such was the common opinion of the connoisseurs of the days of
+powdered wigs. But the great Margaritone and his contemporaries were
+soon to be avenged for this cruel contempt. There was born in the
+nineteenth century, in the biblical villages and reformed cottages of
+pious England, a multitude of little Samuels and little St. Johns, with
+hair curling like lambs, who, about 1840, and 1850, became spectacled
+professors and founded the cult of the primitives.
+
+That eminent theorist of Pre-Raphaelitism, Sir James Tuckett, does not
+shrink from placing the Madonna of the National Gallery on a level with
+the masterpieces of Christian art. “By giving to the Virgin’s head,”
+ says Sir James Tuckett, “a third of the total height of the figure,
+the old master attracts the spectator’s attention and keeps it directed
+towards the more sublime parts of the human figure, and in particular
+the eyes, which we ordinarily describe as the spiritual organs. In this
+picture, colouring and design conspire to produce an ideal and mystical
+impression. The vermilion of the cheeks does not recall the natural
+appearance of the skin; it rather seems as if the old master has applied
+the roses of Paradise to the faces of the Mother and the Child.”
+
+We see, in such a criticism as this, a shining reflection, so to speak,
+of the work which it exalts; yet MacSilly, the seraphic aesthete of
+Edinburgh, has expressed in a still more moving and penetrating fashion
+the impression produced upon his mind by the sight of this primitive
+painting. “The Madonna of Margaritone,” says the revered MacSilly,
+“attains the transcendent end of art. It inspires its beholders with
+feelings of innocence and purity; it makes them like little children.
+And so true is this, that at the age of sixty-six, after having had the
+joy of contemplating it closely for three hours, I felt myself suddenly
+transformed into a little child. While my cab was taking me through
+Trafalgar Square I kept laughing and prattling and shaking my
+spectacle-case as if it were a rattle. And when the maid in my
+boarding-house had served my meal I kept pouring spoonfuls of soup into
+my ear with all the artlessness of childhood.”
+
+“It is by such results,” adds MacSilly, “that the excellence of a work
+of art is proved.”
+
+Margaritone, according to Vasari, died at the age of seventy-seven,
+“regretting that he had lived to see a new form of art arising and the
+new artists crowned with fame.”
+
+These lines, which I translate literally, have inspired Sir James
+Tuckett with what are perhaps the finest pages in his work. They form
+part of his “Breviary for Aesthetes”; all the Pre-Raphaelites know them
+by heart. I place them here as the most precious ornament of this book.
+You will agree that nothing more sublime has been written since the days
+of the Hebrew prophets.
+
+MARGARITONE’S VISION
+
+Margaritone, full of years and labours, went one day to visit the studio
+of a young painter who had lately settled in the town. He noticed in
+the studio a freshly painted Madonna, which, although severe and rigid,
+nevertheless, by a certain exactness in the proportions and a devilish
+mingling of light and shade, assumed an appearance of relief and life.
+At this sight the artless and sublime worker of Arezzo perceived with
+horror what the future of painting would be. With his brow clasped in
+his hands he exclaimed:
+
+“What things of shame does not this figure show forth! I discern in it
+the end of that Christian art which paints the soul and inspires the
+beholder with an ardent desire for heaven. Future painters will not
+restrain themselves as does this one to portraying on the side of a wall
+or on a wooden panel the cursed matter of which our bodies are formed;
+they will celebrate and glorify it. They will clothe their figures with
+dangerous appearances of flesh, and these figures will seem like real
+persons. Their bodies will be seen; their forms will appear through
+their clothing. St. Magdalen will have a bosom. St. Martha a belly, St.
+Barbara hips, St. Agnes buttocks; St. Sebastian will unveil his youthful
+beauty, and St. George will display beneath his armour the muscular
+wealth of a robust virility; apostles, confessors, doctors, and God
+the Father himself will appear as ordinary beings like you and me; the
+angels will affect an equivocal, ambiguous, mysterious beauty which
+will trouble hearts. What desire for heaven will these representations
+impart? None; but from them you will learn to take pleasure in the
+forms of terrestrial life. Where will painters stop in their indiscreet
+inquiries? They will stop nowhere. They will go so far as to show men
+and women naked like the idols of the Romans. There will be a sacred art
+and a profane art, and the sacred art will not be less profane than the
+other.”
+
+“Get ye behind me, demons,” exclaimed the old master. For in prophetic
+vision he saw the righteous and the saints assuming the appearance of
+melancholy athletes. He saw Apollos playing the lute on a flowery hill,
+in the midst of the Muses wearing light tunics. He saw Venuses lying
+under shady myrtles and the Danae exposing their charming sides to the
+golden rain. He saw pictures of Jesus under the pillar’s of the temple
+amidst patricians, fair ladies, musicians, pages, negroes, dogs, and
+parrots. He saw in an inextricable confusion of human limbs, outspread
+wings, and flying draperies, crowds of tumultuous Nativities, opulent
+Holy Families, emphatic Crucifixions. He saw St. Catherines, St.
+Barbaras, St. Agneses humiliating patricians by the sumptuousness of
+their velvets, their brocades, and their pearls, and by the splendour of
+their breasts. He saw Auroras scattering roses, and a multitude of naked
+Dianas and Nymphs surprised on the banks of retired streams. And the
+great Margaritone died, strangled by so horrible a presentiment of the
+Renaissance and the Bolognese School.
+
+
+
+
+VI. MARBODIUS
+
+We possess a precious monument of the Penguin literature of the
+fifteenth century. It is a narrative of a journey to hell undertaken
+by the monk Marbodius, of the order of St. Benedict, who professed
+a fervent admiration for the poet Virgil. This narrative, written in
+fairly good Latin, has been published by M. du Clos des Limes. It is
+here translated for the first time. I believe that I am doing a service
+to my fellow-countrymen in making them acquainted with these pages,
+though doubtless they are far from forming a unique example of this
+class of mediaeval Latin literature. Among the fictions that may be
+compared with them we may mention “The Voyage of St. Brendan,”
+ “The Vision of Albericus,” and “St. Patrick’s Purgatory,” imaginary
+descriptions, like Dante Alighieri’s “Divine Comedy,” of the supposed
+abode of the dead. The narrative of Marbodius is one of the latest works
+dealing with this theme, but it is not the least singular.
+
+THE DESCENT OF MARBODIUS INTO HELL
+
+In the fourteen hundred and fifty-third year of the incarnation of the
+Son of God, a few days before the enemies of the Cross entered the
+city of Helena and the great Constantine, it was given to me, Brother
+Marbodius, an unworthy monk, to see and to hear what none had hitherto
+seen or heard. I have composed a faithful narrative of those things so
+that their memory may not perish with me, for man’s time is short.
+
+On the first day of May in the aforesaid year, at the hour of vespers, I
+was seated in the Abbey of Corrigan on a stone in the cloisters and, as
+my custom was, I read the verses of the poet whom I love best of all,
+Virgil, who has sung of the labours: of the field, of shepherds, and
+of heroes. Evening was hanging its purple folds from the arches of the
+cloisters and in a voice of emotion I was murmuring the verses which
+describe how Dido, the Phoenician queen, wanders with her ever-bleeding
+wound beneath the myrtles of hell. At that moment Brother Hilary
+happened to pass by, followed by Brother Jacinth, the porter.
+
+Brought up in the barbarous ages before the resurrection of the Muses,
+Brother Hilary has not been initiated into the wisdom of the ancients;
+nevertheless, the poetry of the Mantuan has, like a subtle torch, shed
+some gleams of light into his understanding.
+
+“Brother Marbodius,” he asked me, “do those verses that you utter
+with swelling breast and sparkling eyes--do they belong to that great
+‘Aeneid’ from which morning or evening your glances are never withheld?”
+
+I answered that I was reading in Virgil how the son of Anchises
+perceived Dido like a moon behind the foliage.*
+
+     * The text runs
+
+     . . .qualem primo qui syrgere mense
+     Aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam.
+
+Brother Marbodius, by a strange misunderstanding, substitutes an
+entirely different image for the one created by the poet.
+
+
+“Brother Marbodius,” he replied, “I am certain that on all occasions
+Virgil gives expression to wise maxims and profound thoughts. But the
+songs that he modulates on his Syracusan flute hold such a lofty meaning
+and such exalted doctrine that I am continually puzzled by them.”
+
+“Take care, father,” cried Brother Jacinth, in an agitated voice.
+“Virgil was a magician who wrought marvels by the help of demons. It is
+thus he pierced through a mountain near Naples and fashioned a bronze
+horse that had power to heal all the diseases of horses. He was a
+necromancer, and there is still shown, in a certain town in Italy, the
+mirror in which he made the dead appear. And yet a woman deceived this
+great sorcerer. A Neapolitan courtesan invited him to hoist himself up
+to her window in the basket that was used to bring the provisions, and
+she left him all night suspended between two storeys.”
+
+Brother Hilary did not appear to hear these observations.
+
+“Virgil is a prophet,” he replied, “and a prophet who leaves far behind
+him the sibyls with their sacred verses as well as the daughter of King
+Priam, and that great diviner of future things, Plato of Athens. You
+will find in the fourth of his Syracusan cantos the birth of our Lord
+foretold in a lancune that seems of heaven rather than of earth.* In the
+time of my early studies, when I read for the first time JAM REDIT ET
+VIRGO, I felt myself bathed in an infinite delight, but I immediately
+experienced intense grief at the thought that, for ever deprived of the
+presence of God, the author of this prophetic verse, the noblest that
+has come from human lips, was pining among the heathen in eternal
+darkness. This cruel thought did not leave me. It pursued me even in
+my studies, my prayers, my meditations, and my ascetic labours. Thinkin
+that Virgil was deprived of the sight of God and that possibly he might
+even be suffering the fate of the reprobate in hell, I could neither
+enjoy peace nor rest, and I went so far as to exclaim several times a
+day with my arms outstretched to heaven:
+
+“‘Reveal to me, O Lord, the lot thou hast assigned to him who sang on
+earth as the angels sing in heaven!’
+
+     *Three centuries before the epoch in which our Marbodius
+     lived the words--
+
+     ‘Maro, vates gentilium
+     Da Christo testimonium.’
+
+     Were sung in the churches on Christmas Day.
+
+
+“After some years my anguish ceased when I read in an old book that
+the great apostle St. Paul, who called the Gentiles into the Church of
+Christ, went to Naples and sanctified with his tears the tomb of the
+prince of poets.* This was some ground for believing that Virgil, like
+the Emperor Trajan, was admitted to Paradise because even in error he
+had a presentiment of the truth. We are not compelled to believe it, but
+I can easily persuade myself that it is true.”
+
+     *Ad maronis mausoleum
+     Ductus, fudit super eum
+     Piae rorem lacrymae.
+     Quem te, intuit, reddidissem,
+     Si te vivum invenissem
+     Poetarum maxime!
+
+Having thus spoken, old Hilary wished me the peace of a holy night and
+went away with Brother Jacinth.
+
+I resumed the delightful study of my poet. Book in hand, I meditated
+upon the way in which those whom Love destroys with its cruel malady
+wander through the secret paths in the depth of the myrtle forest, and,
+as I meditated, the quivering reflections of the stars came and mingled
+with those of the leafless eglantines in the waters of the cloister
+fountain. Suddenly the lights and the perfumes and the stillness of the
+sky were overwhelmed, a fierce Northwind charged with storm and darkness
+burst roaring upon me. It lifted me up and carried me like a wisp of
+straw over fields, cities, rivers, and mountains, and through the midst
+of thunder-clouds, during a long night composed of a whole series of
+nights and days. And when, after this prolonged and cruel rage, the
+hurricane was at last stilled, I found myself far from my native land at
+the bottom of a valley bordered by cypress trees. Then a woman of wild
+beauty, trailing long garments behind her, approached me. She placed
+her left hand on my shoulder, and, pointing her right arm to an oak with
+thick foliage:
+
+“Look!” said she to me.
+
+Immediately I recognised the Sibyl who guards the sacred wood of
+Avernus, and I discerned the fair Proserpine’s beautiful golden twig
+amongst the tufted boughs of the tree to which her finger pointed.
+
+“O prophetic Virgin,” I exclaimed, “thou hast comprehended my desire and
+thou hast satisfied it in this way. Thou hast revealed to me the tree
+that bears the shining twig without which none can enter alive into the
+dwelling-place of the dead. And in truth, eagerly did I long to converse
+with the shade of Virgil.”
+
+Having said this, I snatched the golden branch from its ancient trunk
+and I advanced without fear into the smoking gulf that leads to the
+miry banks of the Styx, upon which the shades are tossed about like dead
+leaves. At sight of the branch dedicated to Proserpine, Charon took
+me in his bark, which groaned beneath my weight, and I alighted on the
+shores of the dead, and was greeted by the mute baying of the threefold
+Cerberus. I pretended to throw the shade of a stone at him, and the vain
+monster fled into his cave. There, amidst the rushes, wandered the souls
+of those children whose eyes had but opened and shut to the kindly light
+of day, and there in a gloomy cavern Minos judges men. I penetrated
+into the myrtle wood in which the victims of love wander languishing,
+Phaedra, Procris, the sad Eriphyle, Evadne, Pasiphae, Laodamia, and
+Cenis, and the Phoenician Dido. Then I went through the dusty plains
+reserved for famous warriors. Beyond them open two ways. That to the
+left leads to Tartarus, the abode of the wicked. I took that to the
+right, which leads to Elysium and to the dwellings of Dis. Having hung
+the sacred branch at the goddess’s door, I reached pleasant fields
+flooded with purple light. The shades of philosophers and poets hold
+grave converse there. The Graces and the Muses formed sprightly choirs
+upon the grass. Old Homer sang, accompanying himself upon his rustic
+lyre. His eyes were closed, but divine images shone upon his lips. I saw
+Solon, Democritus, and Pythagoras watching the games of the young men in
+the meadow, and, through the foliage of an ancient laurel, I perceived
+also Hesiod, Orpheus, the melancholy Euripides, and the masculine
+Sappho. I passed and recognised, as they sat on the bank of a fresh
+rivulet, the poet Horace, Varius, Gallus, and Lycoris. A little
+apart, leaning against the trunk of a dark holm-oak, Virgil was gazing
+pensively at the grove. Of lofty stature, though spare, he still
+preserved that swarthy complexion, that rustic air, that negligent
+bearing, and unpolished appearance which during his lifetime concealed
+his genius. I saluted him piously and remained for a long time without
+speech.
+
+At last when my halting voice could proceed out of my throat:
+
+“O thou, so dear to the Ausonian Muses, thou honour of the Latin name,
+Virgil,” cried I, “it is through thee I have known what beauty is, it
+is through thee I have known what the tables of the gods and the beds
+of the goddesses are like. Suffer the praises of the humblest of thy
+adorers.”
+
+“Arise, stranger,” answered the divine poet. “I perceive that thou art
+a living being among the shades, and that thy body treads down the grass
+in this eternal evening. Thou art not the first man who has descended
+before his death into these dwellings, although all intercourse between
+us and the living is difficult. But cease from praise; I do not like
+eulogies and the confused sounds of glory have always offended my ears.
+That is why I fled from Rome, where I was known to the idle and curious,
+and laboured in the solitude of my beloved Parthenope. And then I am not
+so convinced that the men of thy generation understand my verses that
+should be gratified by thy praises. Who art thou?”
+
+“I am called Marbodius of the Kingdom of Alca. I made my profession in
+the Abbey of Corrigan. I read thy poems by day and I read them by night.
+It is thee whom I have come to see in Hell; I was impatient to know what
+thy fate was. On earth the learned often dispute about it. Some hold
+it probable that, having lived under the power of demons, thou art now
+burning in inextinguishable flames; others, more cautious, pronounce
+no opinion, believing that all which is said concerning the dead is
+uncertain and full of lies; several, though not in truth the ablest,
+maintain that, because thou didst elevate the tone of the Sicilian Muses
+and foretell that a new progeny would descend from heaven, thou wert
+admitted, like the Emperor Trajan, to enjoy eternal blessedness in the
+Christian heaven.”
+
+“Thou seest that such is not the case,” answered the shade, smiling.
+
+“I meet thee in truth, O Virgil, among the heroes and sages in those
+Elysian Fields which thou thyself hast described. Thus, contrary to what
+several on earth believe, no one has come to seek thee on the part of
+Him who reigns on high?”
+
+After a rather long silence:
+
+“I will conceal nought from thee. He sent for me; one of his messengers,
+a simple man, came to say that I was expected, and that, although I
+had not been initiated into their mysteries, in consideration of my
+prophetic verses, a place had been reserved for me among those of the
+new sect. But I refused to accept that invitation; I had no desire
+to change my lace. I did so not because I share the admiration of the
+Greeks for the Elysian fields, or because I taste here those joys
+which caused Proserpine to lose the remembrance of her mother. I never
+believed much myself in what I say about these things in the ‘Aeneid.’
+I was instructed by philosophers and men of science and I had a correct
+foreboding of the truth. Life in hell is extremely attenuated; we feel
+neither pleasure nor pain; we are as if we were not. The dead have
+no existence here except such as the living lend them. Nevertheless I
+prefer to remain here.”
+
+“But what reason didst thou give, O Virgil, for so strange a refusal?”
+
+“I gave excellent ones. I said to the messenger of the god that I did
+not deserve the honour he brought me, and that a meaning had been given
+to my verses which they did not bear. In truth I have not in my fourth
+Eclogue betrayed the faith of my ancestors. Some ignorant Jews alone
+have interpreted in favour of a barbarian god a verse which celebrates
+the return of the golden age predicted by the Sibylline oracles. I
+excused myself then on the ground that I could not occupy a place which
+was destined for me in error and to which I recognised that I had no
+right. Then I alleged my disposition and my tastes, which do not accord
+with the customs of the new heavens.
+
+“‘I am not unsociable,’ said I to this man. ‘I have shown in life a
+complaisant and easy disposition, although the extreme simplicity of my
+habits caused me to be suspected of avarice. I kept nothing for myself
+alone. My library was open to all and I have conformed my conduct to
+that fine saying of Euripides, “all ought to be common among friends.”
+ Those praises that seemed obtrusive when I myself received them became
+agreeable to me when addressed to Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I
+am rustic and uncultivated. I take pleasure in the society of animals;
+I was so zealous in observing them and took so much care of them that I
+was regarded, not altogether wrongly, as a good veterinary surgeon. I am
+told that the people of thy sect claim an immortal soul for themselves,
+but refuse one to the animals. That is a piece of nonsense that makes
+me doubt their judgment. Perhaps I love the flocks and the shepherds a
+little too much. That would not seem right amongst you. There is a maxim
+to which I endeavour to conform my actions, “Nothing too much.” More
+even than my feeble health my philosophy teaches me to use things with
+measure. I am sober; a lettuce and some olives with a drop of Falernian
+wine form all my meals. I have, indeed, to some extent gone with strange
+women, but I have not delayed over long in taverns to watch the young
+Syrians dance to the sound of the crotalum.* But if I have restrained
+my desires it was for my own satisfaction and for the sake of good
+discipline. To fear pleasure and to fly from joy appears to me the worst
+insult that one can offer to nature. I am assured that during their
+lives certain of the elect of thy god abstained from food and avoided
+women through love of asceticism, and voluntarily exposed themselves to
+useless sufferings. I should be afraid of meeting those, criminals whose
+frenzy horrifies me. A poet must not be asked to attach himself too
+strictly to any scientific or moral doctrine. Moreover, I am a Roman,
+and the Romans, unlike the Greeks, are unable to pursue profound
+speculations in a subtle manner. If they adopt a philosophy it is above
+all in order to derive some practical advantages from it. Siro, who
+enjoyed great renown among us, taught me the system of Epicurus and thus
+freed me from vain terrors and turned me aside from the cruelties to
+which religion persuades ignorant men. I have embraced the views of
+Pythagoras concerning the souls of men and animals, both of which are of
+divine essence; this invites us to look upon ourselves without pride
+and without shame. I have learnt from the Alexandrines how the earth, at
+first soft and without form, hardened in proportion as Nereus withdrew
+himself from it to dig his humid dwellings; I have learned how things
+were formed insensibly; in what manner the rains, falling from the
+burdened clouds, nourished the silent forests, and by what progress a
+few animals at last began to wander over the nameless mountains. I could
+not accustom myself to your cosmogony either, for it seems to me
+fitter for a camel-driver on the Syrian sands than for a disciple of
+Aristarchus of Samos. And what would become of me in the abode of your
+beatitude if I did not find there my friends, my ancestors, my masters,
+and my gods, and if it is not given to me to see Rhea’s noble son, or
+Venus, mother of Aeneas, with her winning smile, or Pan, or the young
+Dryads, or the Sylvans, or old Silenus, with his face stained by Aegle’s
+purple mulberries.’ These are the reasons which I begged that simple man
+to plead before the successor of Jupiter.”
+
+     * This phrase seems to indicate that, if one is to believe
+     Macrobius, the “Copa” is by Virgil.
+
+“And since then, O great shade, thou hast received no other messages?”
+
+“I have received none.”
+
+“To console themselves for thy absence, O Virgil, they have three poets,
+Commodianus, Prudentius, and Fortunatus, who were all three born in
+those dark plays when neither prosody nor grammar were known. But tell
+me, O Mantuan, hast thou never received other intelligence of the God
+whose company thou didst so deliberately refuse?”
+
+“Never that I remember.”
+
+“Hast thou not told me that I am not the first who descended alive into
+these abodes and presented himself before thee?”
+
+
+“Thou dost remind me of it. A century and a half ago, or so it seems
+to me (it is difficult to reckon days and years amid the shades),
+my profound peace was intruded upon by a strange visitor. As I was
+wandering beneath the gloomy foliage that borders the Styx, I saw
+rising before me a human form more opaque and darker than that of the
+inhabitants of these shores. I recognised a living person. He was
+of high stature, thin, with an aquiline nose, sharp chin, and hollow
+cheeks. His dark eyes shot forth fire; a red hood girt with a crown of
+laurels bound his lean brows. His bones pierced through the tight
+brown cloak that descended to his heels. He saluted me with deference,
+tempered by a sort of fierce pride, and addressed me in a speech more
+obscure and incorrect than that of those Gauls with whom the divine
+Julius filled both his legions and the Curia. At last I understood that
+he had been born near Fiesole, in an ancient Etruscan colony that Sulla
+had founded on the banks of the Arno, and which had prospered; that
+he had obtained municipal honours, but that he had thrown himself
+vehemently into the sanguinary quarrels which arose between the senate,
+the knights, and the people, that he had been defeated and banished, and
+now he wandered in exile throughout the world. He described Italy to me
+as distracted by more wars and discords than in the time of my youth,
+and as sighing anew for a second Augustus. I pitied his misfortune,
+remembering what I myself had formerly endured.
+
+“An audacious spirit unceasingly disquieted him, and his mind harboured
+great thoughts, but alas! his rudeness and ignorance displayed the
+triumph of barbarism. He knew neither poetry, nor science, nor even
+the tongue of the Greeks, and he was ignorant, too, of the ancient
+traditions concerning the origin of the world and the nature of the
+gods. He bravely repeated fables which in my time would have brought
+smiles to the little children who were not yet old enough to pay for
+admission at the baths. The vulgar easily believe in monsters. The
+Etruscans especially peopled hell with demons, hideous as a sick man’s
+dreams. That they have not abandoned their childish imaginings after
+so many centuries is explained by the continuation and progress of
+ignorance and misery, but that one of their magistrates whose mind is
+raised above the common level should share these popular illusions and
+should be frightened by the hideous demons that the inhabitants of that
+country painted on the walls of their tombs in the time of Porsena--that
+is something which might sadden even a sage. My Etruscan visitor
+repeated verses to me which he had composed in a new dialect, called
+by him the vulgar tongue, the sense of which I could not understand.
+My ears were more surprised than charmed as I heard him repeat the same
+sound three or four times at regular intervals in his efforts to mark
+the rhythm. That artifice did not seem ingenious to me; but it is not
+for the dead to judge of novelties.
+
+“But I do not reproach this colonist of Sulla, born in an unhappy time,
+for making inharmonious verses or for being, if it be possible, as bad a
+poet as Bavius or Maevius. I have grievances against him which touch
+me more closely. The thing is monstrous and scarcely credible, but when
+this man returned to earth he disseminated the most odious lies about
+me. He affirmed in several passages of his barbarous poems that I had
+served him as a guide in the modern Tartarus, a place I know nothing of.
+He insolently proclaimed that I had spoken of the gods of Rome as false
+and lying gods, and that I held as the true God the present successor of
+Jupiter. Friend, when thou art restored to the kindly light of day and
+beholdest again thy native land, contradict those abominable falsehoods.
+Say to thy people that the singer of the pious Aeneas has never
+worshipped the god of the Jews. I am assured that his power is declining
+and that his approaching fall is manifested by undoubted indications.
+This news would give me some pleasure if one could rejoice in these
+abodes where we feel neither fears nor desires.”
+
+He spoke, and with a gesture of farewell he went away. I beheld his.
+shade gliding over the asphodels without bending their stalks. I saw
+that it became fainter and vaguer as it receded farther from me, and
+it vanished before it reached the wood of evergreen laurels. Then I
+understood the meaning of the words, “The dead have no life, but that
+which the living lend them,” and I walked slowly through the pale meadow
+to the gate of horn.
+
+I affirm that all in this writing is true.*
+
+     * There is in Marbodius’s narrative a passage very worthy of
+     notice, viz., that in which the monk of Corrigan describes
+     Dante Alighieri such as we picture him to ourselves to-day.
+     The miniatures in a very old manuscript of the “Divine
+     Comedy,” the “Codex Venetianus,” represent the poet as a
+     little fat man clad in a short tunic, the skirts of which
+     fall above his knees. As for Virgil, he still wears the
+     philosophical beard, in the wood-engravings of the sixteenth
+     century.
+
+One would not have thought either that Marbodius, or even Virgil, could
+have known the Etruscan tombs of Chiusi and Corneto, where, in fact,
+there are horrible and burlesque devils closely resembling those of
+Orcagna. Nevertheless, the authenticity of the “Descent of Marbodius
+into Hell” is indisputable. M. du Clos des Lunes has firmly established
+it. To doubt it would be to doubt palaeography itself.
+
+
+
+
+VII. SIGNS IN THE MOON
+
+At that time, whilst Penguinia was still plunged in ignorance and
+barbarism, Giles Bird-catcher, a Franciscan monk, known by his writings
+under the name Aegidius Aucupis, devoted himself with indefatigable
+zeal to the study of letters and the sciences. He gave his nights to
+mathematics and music, which he called the two adorable sisters,
+the harmonious daughters of Number and Imagination. He was versed in
+medicine and astrology. He was suspected of practising magic, and it
+seemed true that he wrought metamorphoses and discovered hidden things.
+
+The monks of his convent, finding in his cell Greek books which they
+could not read, imagined them to be conjuring-books, and denounced their
+too learned brother as a wizard. Aegidius Aucupis fled, and reached the
+island of Ireland, where he lived for thirty studious years. He went
+from monastery to monastery, searching for and copying the Greek and
+Latin manuscripts which they contained. He also studied physics and
+alchemy. He acquired a universal knowledge and discovered notable
+secrets concerning animals, plants, and stones. He was found one day in
+the company of a very beautiful woman who sang to her own accompaniment
+on the lute, and who was afterwards discovered to be a machine which he
+had himself constructed.
+
+He often crossed the Irish Sea to go into the land of Wales and to visit
+the libraries of the monasteries there. During one of these crossings,
+as he remained during the night on the bridge of the ship, he saw
+beneath the waters two sturgeons swimming side by side. He had very
+good hearing and he knew the language of fishes. Now he heard one of the
+sturgeons say to the other:
+
+“The man in the moon, whom we have often seen carrying fagots on his
+shoulders, has fallen into the sea.”
+
+And the other sturgeon said in its turn:
+
+“And in the silver disc there will be seen the image of two lovers
+kissing each other on the mouth.”
+
+Some years later, having returned to his native country, Aegidius
+Aucupis found that ancient learning had been restored. Manners had
+softened. Men no longer pursued the nymphs of the fountains, of the
+woods, and of the mountains with their insults. They placed images of
+the Muses and of the modest Graces in their gardens, and they rendered
+her former honours to the Goddess with ambrosial lips, the joy of men
+and gods. They were becoming reconciled to nature. They trampled vain
+terrors beneath their feet and raised their eyes to heaven without
+fearing, as they formerly did, to read signs of anger and threats of
+damnation in the skies.
+
+At this spectacle Aegidius Aucupis remembered what the two sturgeons of
+the sea of Erin had foretold.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+
+
+
+
+I. MOTHER ROUQUIN
+
+Aegidius Aucupis, the Erasmus of the Penguins, was not mistaken; his age
+was an age of free inquiry. But that great man mistook the elegances
+of the humanists for softness of manners, and he did not foresee
+the effects that the awaking of intelligence would have amongst
+the Penguins. It brought about the religious Reformation; Catholics
+massacred Protestants and Protestants massacred Catholics. Such were
+the first results of liberty of thought. The Catholics prevailed in
+Penguinia. But the spirit of inquiry had penetrated among them without
+their knowing it. They joined reason to faith, and claimed that religion
+had been divested of the superstitious practices that dishonoured it,
+just as in later days the booths that the cobblers, hucksters, and
+dealers in old clothes had built against the walls of the cathedrals
+were cleared away. The word, legend, which at first indicated what the
+faithful ought to read, soon suggested the idea of pious fables and
+childish tales.
+
+The saints had to suffer from this state of mind. An obscure canon
+called Princeteau, a very austere and crabbed man, designated so great a
+number of them as not worthy of having their days observed, that he was
+surnamed the exposer of the saints. He did not think, for instance,
+that if St. Margaret’s prayer were applied as a poultice to a woman in
+travail that the pains of childbirth would be softened.
+
+Even the venerable patron saint of Penguinia did not escape his rigid
+criticism. This is what he says of her in his “Antiquities of Alca”:
+
+“Nothing is more uncertain than the history, or even the existence, of
+St. Orberosia. An ancient anonymous annalist, a monk of Dombes, relates
+that a woman called Orberosia was possessed by the devil in a cavern
+where, even down to his own days, the little boys and girls of the
+village used to play at a sort of game representing the devil and
+the fair Orberosia. He adds that this woman became the concubine of a
+horrible dragon, who ravaged the country. Such a statement is hardly
+credible, but the history of Orberosia, as it has since been related,
+seems hardly more worthy of belief. The life of that saint by the Abbot
+Simplicissimus is three hundred years later than the pretended events
+which it relates and that author shows himself excessively credulous and
+devoid of all critical faculty.”
+
+Suspicion attacked even the supernatural origin of the Penguins. The
+historian Ovidius Capito went so far as to deny the miracle of their
+transformation. He thus begins his “Annals of Penguinia”:
+
+“A dense obscurity envelopes this history, and it would be no
+exaggeration to say that it is a tissue of puerile fables and popular
+tales. The Penguins claim that they are descended from birds who were
+baptized by St. Mael and whom God changed into men at the intercession
+of that glorious apostle. They hold that, situated at first in the
+frozen ocean, their island, floating like Delos, was brought to anchor
+in these heaven-favoured seas, of which it is to-day the queen. I
+conclude that this myth is a reminiscence of the ancient migrations of
+the Penguins.”
+
+In the following century, which was that of the philosophers, scepticism
+became still more acute. No further evidence of it is needed than the
+following celebrated passage from the “Moral Essay”:
+
+“Arriving we know not from whence (for indeed their origins are not very
+clear), and successively invaded and conquered by four or five peoples
+from the north, south, east, and west, miscegenated, interbred,
+amalgamated, and commingled, the Penguins boast of the purity of their
+race, and with justice, for they have become a pure race. This mixture
+of all mankind, red, black, yellow, and white, round-headed and
+long-headed, as formed in the course of ages a fairly homogeneous human
+family, and one which is recognisable by certain features due to a
+community of life and customs.
+
+“This idea that they belong to the best race in the world, and that
+they are its finest family, inspires them with noble pride, indomitable
+courage, and a hatred for the human race.
+
+“The life of a people is but a succession of miseries, crimes, and
+follies. This is true of the Penguin nation, as of all other nations.
+Save for this exception its history is admirable from beginning to end.”
+
+The two classic ages of the Penguins are too well-known for me to lay
+stress upon them. But what has not been sufficiently noticed is the way
+in which the rationalist theologians such as Canon Princeteau called
+into existence the unbelievers of the succeeding age. The former
+employed their reason to destroy what did not seem to them, essential
+to their religion; they only left untouched the most rigid article of
+faith. Their intellectual successors, being taught by them how to
+make use of science and reason, employed them against whatever beliefs
+remained. Thus rational theology engendered natural philosophy.
+
+That is why (if I may turn from the Penguins of former days to the
+Sovereign Pontiff, who, to-day governs the universal Church) we cannot
+admire too greatly the wisdom of Pope Pius X. in condemning the study
+of exegesis as contrary to revealed truth, fatal to sound theological
+doctrine, and deadly to the faith. Those clerics who maintain the rights
+of science in opposition to him are pernicious doctors and pestilent
+teachers, and the faithful who approve of them are lacking in either
+mental or moral ballast.
+
+At the end of the age of philosophers, the ancient kingdom of Penguinia
+was utterly destroyed, the king put to death, the privileges of the
+nobles abolished, and a Republic proclaimed in the midst of public
+misfortunes and while a terrible war was raging. The assembly which
+then governed Penguinia ordered all the metal articles contained in the
+churches to be melted down. The patriots even desecrated the tombs of
+the kings. It is said that when the tomb of Draco the Great was opened,
+that king presented an appearance as black as ebony and so majestic
+that those who profaned his corpse fled in terror. According to other
+accounts, these churlish men insulted him by putting a pipe in his mouth
+and derisively offering him a glass of wine.
+
+On the seventeenth day of the month of Mayflowers, the shrine of
+St. Orberosia, which had for five hundred years been exposed to the
+veneration of the faithful in the Church of St. Mael, was transported
+into the town-hall and submitted to the examination of a jury of experts
+appointed by the municipality. It was made of gilded copper in shape
+like the nave of a church, entirely covered with enamels and decorated
+with precious stones, which latter were perceived to be false. The
+chapter in its foresight had removed the rubies, sapphires, emeralds,
+and great balls of rock-crystal, and had substituted pieces of glass in
+their place. It contained only a little dust and a piece of old linen,
+which were thrown into a great fire that had been lighted on the Place
+de Greve to burn the relics of the saints. The people danced around it
+singing patriotic songs.
+
+From the threshold of their booth, which leant against the town-hall,
+a man called Rouquin and his wife were watching this group of madmen.
+Rouquin clipped dogs and gelded cats; he also frequented the inns. His
+wife was a ragpicker and a bawd, but she had plenty of shrewdness.
+
+“You see, Rouquin,” said she to her man, “they are committing a
+sacrilege. They will repent of it.”
+
+“You know nothing about it, wife,” answered Rouquin; “they, have become
+philosophers, and when one is once a philosopher he is a philosopher for
+ever.”
+
+“I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret what they
+are doing to-day. They ill-treat the saints because they have not helped
+them enough, but for all that the quails won’t fall ready cooked into
+their mouths. They will soon find themselves as badly off as before, and
+when they have put out their tongues for enough they will become pious
+again. Sooner than people think the day will come when Penguinia will
+again begin to honour her blessed patron. Rouquin, it would be a good
+thing, in readiness for that day, if we kept a handful of ashes and some
+rags and bones in an old pot in our lodgings. We will say that they are
+the relics of St. Orberosia and that we have saved them from the flames
+at the peril of our lives. I am greatly mistaken if we don’t get honour
+and profit out of them. That good action might be worth a place from the
+Cure to sell tapers and hire chairs in the chapel of St. Orberosia.”
+
+On that same day Mother Rouquin took home with her a little ashes and
+some bones, and put them in an old jam-pot in her cupboard.
+
+
+
+
+II. TRINCO
+
+The sovereign Nation had taken possession of the lands of the nobility
+and clergy to sell them at a low price to the middle classes and
+the peasants. The middle classes and the peasants thought that the
+revolution was a good thing for acquiring lands and a bad one for
+retaining them.
+
+The legislators of the Republic made terrible laws for the defence of
+property, and decreed death to anyone who should propose a division of
+wealth. But that did not avail the Republic. The peasants who had become
+proprietors bethought themselves that though it had made them rich,
+the Republic had nevertheless caused a disturbance to wealth, and they
+desired a system more respectful of private property and more capable of
+assuring the permanence of the new institutions.
+
+They had not long to wait. The Republic, like Agrippina, bore her
+destroyer in her bosom.
+
+Having great wars to carry on, it created military forces, and these
+were destined both to save it and to destroy it. Its legislators thought
+they could restrain their generals by the fear of punishment, but if
+they sometimes cut off the heads of unlucky soldiers they could not do
+the same to the fortunate soldiers who obtained over it the advantages
+of having saved its existence.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory the renovated Penguins delivered themselves
+up to a dragon, more terrible than that of their fables, who, like
+a stork amongst frogs, devoured them for fourteen years with his
+insatiable beak.
+
+Half a century after the reign of the new dragon a young Maharajah
+of Malay, called Djambi, desirous, like the Scythian Anacharsis,
+of instructing himself by travel, visited Penguinia and wrote an
+interesting account of his travels. I transcribe the first page of his
+account:
+
+ACCOUNT OF THE TRAVELS OF YOUNG DJAMBI IN PENGUINIA
+
+After a voyage of ninety days I landed at the vast and deserted port of
+the Penguins and travelled over untilled fields to their ruined capital.
+Surrounded by ramparts and full of barracks and arsenals it had a
+martial though desolate appearance. Feeble and crippled men wandered
+proudly through the streets, wearing old uniforms and carrying rusty
+weapons.
+
+“What do you want?” I was rudely asked at the gate of the city by a
+soldier whose moustaches pointed to the skies.
+
+“Sir,” I answered, “I come as an inquirer to visit this island.”
+
+“It is not an island,” replied the soldier.
+
+“What!” I exclaimed, “Penguin Island is not an island?”
+
+“No, sir, it is an insula. It was formerly called an island, but for a
+century it has been decreed that it shall bear the name of insula. It is
+the only insula in the whole universe. Have you a passport?”
+
+“Here it is.”
+
+“Go and get it signed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.”
+
+A lame guide who conducted me came to a pause in a vast square.
+
+“The insula,” said he, “has given birth, as you know, to Trinco, the
+greatest genius of the universe, whose statue you see before you. That
+obelisk standing to your right commemorates Trinco’s birth; the column
+that rises to your left has Trinco crowned with a diadem upon its
+summit. You see here the triumphal arch dedicated to the glory of Trinco
+and his family.”
+
+“What extraordinary feat has Trinco performed?” I asked.
+
+“War.”
+
+“That is nothing extraordinary. We Malayans make war constantly.”
+
+“That may be, but Trinco is the greatest warrior of all countries and
+all times. There never existed a greater conqueror than he. As you
+anchored in our port you saw to the east a volcanic island called
+Ampelophoria, shaped like a cone, and of small size, but renowned for
+its wines. And to the west a larger island which raises to the sky a
+long range of sharp teeth; for this reason it is called the Dog’s Jaws.
+It is rich in copper mines. We possessed both before Trinco’s reign
+and they were the boundaries of our empire. Trinco extended the Penguin
+dominion over the Archipelago of the Turquoises and the Green Continent,
+subdued the gloomy Porpoises, and planted his flag amid the icebergs
+of the Pole and on the burning sands of the African deserts. He raised
+troops in all the countries he conquered, and when his armies marched
+past in the wake of our own light infantry, our island grenadiers, our
+hussars, our dragoons, our artillery, and our engineers there were to be
+seen yellow soldiers looking in their blue armour like crayfish standing
+on their tails; red men with parrots’ plumes, tattooed with solar and
+Phallic emblems, and with quivers of poisoned arrows resounding on
+their backs; naked blacks armed only with their teeth and nails; pygmies
+riding on cranes; gorillas carrying trunks of trees and led by an old
+ape who wore upon his hairy breast the cross of the Legion of Honour.
+And all those troops, led to Trinco’s banner by the most ardent
+patriotism, flew on from victory to victory, and in thirty years of war
+Trinco conquered half the known world.”
+
+“What!” cried I, “you possess half of the world.”
+
+“Trinco conquered it for us, and Trinco lost it to us. As great in his
+defeats as in his victories he surrendered all that he had conquered.
+He even allowed those two islands we possessed before his time,
+Ampelophoria and the Dog’s Jaws, to be taken from us. He left Penguinia
+impoverished and depopulated. The flower of the insula perished in his
+wars. At the time of his fall there were left in our country none but
+the hunchbacks and cripples from whom we are descended. But he gave us
+glory.”
+
+“He made you pay dearly for it!”
+
+“Glory never costs too much,” replied my guide.
+
+
+
+
+III. THE JOURNEY OF DOCTOR OBNUBILE
+
+After a succession of amazing vicissitudes, the memory of which is in
+great part lost by the wrongs of time and the bad style of historians,
+the Penguins established the government of the Penguins by themselves.
+They elected a diet or assembly, and invested it with the privilege of
+naming the Head of the State. The latter, chosen from among the simple
+Penguins, wore no formidable monster’s crest upon his head and exercised
+no absolute authority over the people. He was himself subject to the
+laws of the nation. He was not given the title of king, and no ordinal
+number followed his name. He bore such names as Paturle, Janvion,
+Traffaldin, Coquenhot, and Bredouille. These magistrates did not make
+war. They were not suited for that.
+
+The new state received the name of Public Thing or Republic. Its
+partisans were called republicanists or republicans. They were also
+named Thingmongers and sometimes Scamps, but this latter name was taken
+in ill part.
+
+The Penguin democracy did not itself govern. It obeyed a financial
+oligarchy which formed opinion by means of the newspapers, and held
+in its hands the representatives, the ministers, and the president.
+It controlled the finances of the republic, and directed the foreign
+affairs of the country as if it were possessed of sovereign power.
+
+Empires and kingdoms in those days kept up enormous fleets. Penguinia,
+compelled to do as they did, sank under the pressure of her armaments.
+Everybody deplored or pretended to deplore so grievous a necessity.
+However, the rich, and those engaged in business or affairs, submitted
+to it with a good heart through a spirit of patriotism, and because they
+counted on the soldiers and sailors to defend their goods at home and
+to acquire markets and territories abroad. The great manufacturers
+encouraged the making of cannons and ships through a zeal for the
+national defence and in order to obtain orders. Among the citizens of
+middle rank and of the liberal professions some resigned themselves to
+this state of affairs without complaining, believing that it would last
+for ever; others waited impatiently for its end and thought they might
+be able to lead the powers to a simultaneous disarmament.
+
+The illustrious Professor Obnubile belonged to this latter class.
+
+“War,” said he, “is a barbarity to which the progress of civilization
+will put an end. The great democracies are pacific and will soon impose
+their will upon the aristocrats.”
+
+Professor Obnubile, who had for sixty years led a solitary and retired
+life in his laboratory, whither external noises did not penetrate,
+resolved to observe the spirit of the peoples for himself. He began
+his studies with the greatest of all democracies and set sail for New
+Atlantis.
+
+After a voyage of fifteen days his steamer entered, during the night,
+the harbour of Titanport, where thousands of ships were anchored. An
+iron bridge thrown across the water and shining with lights, stretched
+between two piers so far apart that Professor Obnubile imagined he was
+sailing on the seas of Saturn and that he saw the marvellous ring which
+girds the planet of the Old Man. And this immense conduit bore upon it
+more than a quarter of the wealth of the world. The learned Penguin,
+having disembarked, was waited on by automatons in a hotel forty-eight
+stories high. Then he took the great railway that led to Gigantopolis,
+the capital of New Atlantis. In the train there were restaurants,
+gaming-rooms, athletic arenas, telegraphic, commercial, and financial
+offices, a Protestant Church, and the printing-office of a great
+newspaper, which latter the doctor was unable to read, as he did not
+know the language of the New Atlantans. The train passed along the banks
+of great rivers, through manufacturing cities which concealed the sky
+with the smoke from their chimneys, towns black in the day, towns red at
+night, full of noise by day and full of noise also by night.
+
+“Here,” thought the doctor, “is a people far too much engaged in
+industry and trade to make war. I am already certain that the New
+Atlantans pursue a policy of peace. For it is an axiom admitted by all
+economists that peace without and peace within are necessary for the
+progress of commerce and industry.”
+
+As he surveyed Gigantopolis, he was confirmed in this opinion. People
+went through the streets so swiftly propelled by hurry that they knocked
+down all who were in their way. Obnubile was thrown down several times,
+but soon succeeded in learning how to demean himself better; after an
+hour’s walking he himself knocked down an Atlantan.
+
+Having reached a great square he saw the portico of a palace in the
+Classic style, whose Corinthian columns reared their capitals of
+arborescent acanthus seventy metres above the stylobate.
+
+As he stood with his head thrown back admiring the building, a man of
+modest appearance approached him and said in Penguin:
+
+“I see by your dress that you are from Penguinia. I know your language;
+I am a sworn interpreter. This is the Parliament palace. At the present
+moment the representatives of the States are in deliberation. Would you
+like to be present at the sitting?”
+
+The doctor was brought into the hall and cast his looks upon the crowd
+of legislators who were sitting on cane chairs with their feet upon
+their desks.
+
+The president arose and, in the midst of general inattention, muttered
+rather than spoke the following formulas which the interpreter
+immediately translated to the doctor.
+
+“The war for the opening of the Mongol markets being ended to the
+satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid before
+the finance committee . . . .”
+
+“Is there any opposition? . . .”
+
+“The proposal is carried.”
+
+“The war for the opening of the markets of Third-Zealand being ended
+to the satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid
+before the finance committee. . . .”
+
+“Is there any opposition? . . .”
+
+“The proposal is carried.”
+
+“Have I heard aright?” asked Professor Obnubile. “What? you an
+industrial people and engaged in all these wars!”
+
+“Certainly,” answered the interpreter, “these are industrial wars.
+Peoples who have neither commerce nor industry are not obliged to make
+war, but a business people is forced to adopt a policy of conquest. The
+number of wars necessarily increases with our productive activity. As
+soon as one of our industries fails to find a market for its products
+a war is necessary to open new outlets. It is in this way we have had
+a coal war, a copper war, and a cotton war. In Third-Zealand we have
+killed two-thirds of the inhabitants in order to compel the remainder to
+buy our umbrellas and braces.”
+
+At that moment a fat man who was sitting in the middle of the assembly
+ascended the tribune.
+
+“I claim,” said he, “a war against the Emerald Republic, which
+insolently contends with our pigs for the hegemony of hams and sauces in
+all the markets of the universe.”
+
+“Who is that legislator?” asked Doctor Obnubile.
+
+“He is a pig merchant.”
+
+“Is there any opposition?” said the President. “I put the proposition to
+the vote.”
+
+The war against the Emerald Republic was voted with uplifted hands by a
+very large majority.
+
+“What?” said Obnubile to the interpreter; “you have voted a war with
+that rapidity and that indifference!”
+
+“Oh! it is an unimportant war which will hardly cost eight million
+dollars.”
+
+“And men . . .”
+
+“The men are included in the eight million dollars.”
+
+Then Doctor Obnubile bent his head in bitter reflection.
+
+“Since wealth and civilization admit of as many causes of wars as
+poverty and barbarism, since the folly and wickedness of men are
+incurable, there remains but one good action to be done. The wise man
+will collect enough dynamite to blow up this planet. When its fragments
+fly through space an imperceptible amelioration will be accomplished
+in the universe and a satisfaction will be given to the universal
+conscience. Moreover, this universal conscience does not exist.”
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+
+
+
+
+I. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Every system of government produces people who are dissatisfied. The
+Republic or Public Thing produced them at first from among the nobles
+who had been despoiled of their ancient privileges. These looked with
+regret and hope to Prince Crucho, the last of the Draconides, a prince
+adorned both with the grace of youth and the melancholy of exile.
+It also produced them from among the smaller traders, who, owing to
+profound economic causes, no longer gained a livelihood. They believed
+that this was the fault of the republic which they had at first adored
+and from which each day they were now becoming more detached. The
+financiers, both Christians and Jews, became by their insolence and
+their cupidity the scourge of the country, which they plundered and
+degraded, as well as the scandal of a government which they never
+troubled either to destroy or preserve, so confident were they that they
+could operate without hindrance under all governments. Nevertheless,
+their sympathies inclined to absolute power as the best protection
+against the socialists, their puny but ardent adversaries. And just
+as they imitated the habits of the aristocrats, so they imitated their
+political and religious sentiments. Their women, in particular, loved
+the Prince and had dreams of appearing one day at his Court.
+
+However, the Republic retained some partisans and defenders. If it was
+not in a position to believe in the fidelity of its own officials it
+could at least still count on the devotion of the manual labourers,
+although it had never relieved their misery. These came forth in crowds
+from their quarries and their factories to defend it, and marched in
+long processions, gloomy, emaciated, and sinister. They would have died
+for it because it had given them hope.
+
+Now, under the Presidency of Theodore Formose, there lived in a
+peaceable suburb of Alca a monk called Agaric, who kept a school and
+assisted in arranging marriages. In his school he taught fencing and
+riding to the sons of old families, illustrious by their birth, but now
+as destitute of wealth as of privilege. And as soon as they were old
+enough he married them to the daughters of the opulent and despised
+caste of financiers.
+
+Tall, thin, and dark, Agaric used to walk in deep thought, with
+his breviary in his hand and his brow loaded with care, through the
+corridors of the school and the alleys of the garden. His care was not
+limited to inculcating in his pupils abstruse doctrines and mechanical
+precepts and to endowing them afterwards with legitimate and rich
+wives. He entertained political designs and pursued the realisation of
+a gigantic plan. His thought of thoughts and labour of labours was
+to overthrow the Republic. He was not moved to this by any personal
+interest. He believed that a democratic state was opposed to the holy
+society to which body and soul he belonged. And all the other monks, his
+brethren, thought the same. The Republic was perpetually at strife with
+the congregation of monks and the assembly of the faithful. True,
+to plot the death of the new government was a difficult and perilous
+enterprise. Still, Agaric was in a position to carry on a formidable
+conspiracy. At that epoch, when the clergy guided the superior classes
+of the Penguins, this monk exercised a tremendous influence over the
+aristocracy of Alca.
+
+All the young men whom he had brought up waited only for a favourable
+moment to march against the popular power. The sons of the ancient
+families did not practise the arts or engage in business. They were
+almost all soldiers and served the Republic. They served it, but
+they did not love it; they regretted the dragon’s crest. And the fair
+Jewesses shared in these regrets in order that they might be taken for
+Christians.
+
+One July as he was walking in a suburban street which ended in some
+dusty fields, Agaric heard groans coming from a moss-grown well that had
+been abandoned by the gardeners. And almost immediately he was told by
+a cobbler of the neighbourhood that a ragged man who had shouted out
+“Hurrah for the Republic!” had been thrown into the well by some cavalry
+officers who were passing, and had sunk up to his ears in the mud.
+Agaric was quite ready to see a general significance in this particular
+fact. He inferred a great fermentation in the whole aristocratic and
+military caste, and concluded that it was the moment to act.
+
+The next day he went to the end of the Wood of Conils to visit the
+good Father Cornemuse. He found the monk in his laboratory pouring a
+golden-coloured liquor into a still. He was a short, fat, little man,
+with vermilion-tinted cheeks and an elaborately polished bald head. His
+eyes had ruby-coloured pupils like a guinea-pig’s. He graciously saluted
+his visitor and offered him a glass of the St. Orberosian liqueur, which
+he manufactured, and from the sale of which he gained immense wealth.
+
+Agaric made a gesture of refusal. Then, standing on his long feet and
+pressing his melancholy hat against his stomach, he remained silent.
+
+“Take a seat,” said Cornemuse to him.
+
+Agaric sat down on a rickety stool, but continued mute.
+
+Then the monk of Conils inquired:
+
+“Tell me some news of your young pupils. Have the dear children sound
+views?”
+
+“I am very satisfied with them,” answered the teacher. “It is everything
+to be nurtured in sound principles. It is necessary to have sound views
+before having any views at all, for afterwards it is too late. . . .
+Yes, I have great grounds for comfort. But we live in a sad age.”
+
+“Alas!” sighed Cornemuse.
+
+“We are passing through evil days. . . .”
+
+“Times of trial.”
+
+“Yet, Cornemuse, the mind of the public is not so entirely corrupted as
+it seems.”
+
+“Perhaps you are right.”
+
+“The people are tired of a government that ruins them and does nothing
+for them. Every day fresh scandals spring up. The Republic is sunk in
+shame. It is ruined.”
+
+“May God grant it!”
+
+“Cornemuse, what do you think of Prince Crucho?”
+
+“He is an amiable young man and, I dare say, a worthy scion of an august
+stock. I pity him for having to endure the pains of exile at so early an
+age. Spring has no flowers for the exile, and autumn no fruits. Prince
+Crucho has sound views; he respects the clergy; he practises our
+religion; besides, he consumes a good deal of my little products.”
+
+“Cornemuse, in many homes, both rich and poor, his return is hoped for.
+Believe me, he will come back.”
+
+“May I live to throw my mantle beneath his feet!” sighed Cornemuse.
+
+Seeing that he held these sentiments, Agaric depicted to him the state
+of people’s minds such as he himself imagined them. He showed him the
+nobles and the rich exasperated against the popular government; the army
+refusing to endure fresh insults; the officials willing to betray their
+chiefs; the people discontented, riot ready to burst forth, and the
+enemies of the monks, the agents of the constituted authority, thrown
+into the wells of Alca. He concluded that it was the moment to strike a
+great blow.
+
+“We can,” he cried, “save the Penguin people, we can deliver it from
+its tyrants, deliver it from itself, restore the Dragon’s crest,
+re-establish the ancient State, the good State, for the honour of the
+faith and the exaltation of the Church. We can do this if we will. We
+possess great wealth and we exert secret influences; by our evangelistic
+and outspoken journals we communicate with all the ecclesiastics
+in towns and county alike, and we inspire them with our own eager
+enthusiasm and our own burning faith. They will kindle their penitents
+and their congregations. I can dispose of the chiefs of the army; I have
+an understanding with the men of the people. Unknown to them I sway
+the minds of umbrella sellers, publicans, shopmen, gutter merchants,
+newspaper boys, women of the streets, and police agents. We have more
+people on our side than we need. What are we waiting for? Let us act!”
+
+“What do you think of doing?” asked Cornemuse.
+
+“Of forming a vast conspiracy and overthrowing the Republic, of
+re-establishing Crucho on the throne of the Draconides.”
+
+Cornemuse moistened his lips with his tongue several times. Then he said
+with unction:
+
+“Certainly the restoration of the Draconides is desirable; it is
+eminently desirable; and for my part, desire it with all my heart. As
+for the Republic, you know what I think of it. . . . But would it not te
+better to abandon it to its fate and let it die of the vices of its own
+constitution? Doubtless, Agaric, what you propose is noble and generous.
+It would be a fine thing to save this great and unhappy country, to
+re-establish it in its ancient splendour. But reflect on it, we
+are Christians before we are Penguins. And we must take heed not to
+compromise religion in political enterprises.”
+
+Agaric replied eagerly:
+
+“Fear nothing. We shall hold all the threads of the plot, but we
+ourselves shall remain in the background. We shall not be seen.”
+
+“Like flies in milk,” murmured the monk of Conils.
+
+And turning his keen ruby-coloured eyes towards his brother monk:
+
+“Take care. Perhaps the Republic is stronger than it seems. Possibly,
+too, by dragging it out of the nerveless inertia in which it now rests
+we may only consolidate its forces. Its malice is great; if we attack
+it, it will defend itself. It makes bad laws which hardly affect us;
+if it is frightened it will make terrible ones against us. Let us not
+lightly engage in an adventure in which we may get fleeced. You think
+the opportunity a good one. I don’t, and I am going to tell you why. The
+present government is not yet known by everybody, that is to say, it is
+known by nobody. It proclaims that it is the Public Thing, the common
+thing. The populace believes it and remains democratic and Republican.
+But patience! This same people will one day demand that the public thing
+be the people’s thing. I need not tell you how insolent, unregulated,
+and contrary to Scriptural polity such claims seem to me. But the people
+will make them, and enforce them, and then there will be an end of the
+present government. The moment cannot now be far distant; and it is then
+that we ought to act in the interests of our august body. Let us wait.
+What hurries us? Our existence is not in peril. It has not been
+rendered absolutely intolerable to us. The Republic fails in respect and
+submission to us; it does not give the priests the honours it owes them.
+But it lets us live. And such is the excellence of our position that
+with us to live is to prosper. The Republic is hostile to us, but women
+revere us. President Formose does not assist at the celebration of our
+mysteries, but I have seen his wife and daughters at my feet. They
+buy my phials by the gross. I have no better clients even among the
+aristocracy. Let us say what there is to be said for it. There is no
+country in the world as good for priests and monks as Penguinia. In what
+other country would you find our virgin wax, our virile incense, our
+rosaries, our scapulars, our holy water, and our St. Orberosian liqueur
+sold in such great quantities? What other people would, like the
+Penguins, give a hundred golden crowns for a wave of our hands, a sound
+from our mouths, a movement of our lips? For my part, I gain a thousand
+times more, in this pleasant, faithful, and docile Penguinia, by
+extracting the essence from a bundle of thyme, than I could make
+by tiring my lungs with preaching the remission of sins in the most
+populous states of Europe and America. Honestly, would Penguinia be
+better off if a police officer came to take me away from here and put me
+on a steamboat bound for the Islands of Night?”
+
+Having thus spoken, the monk of Conils got up and led his guest into
+a huge shed where hundreds of orphans clothed in blue were packing
+bottles, nailing up cases, and gumming tickets. The ear was deafened
+by the noise of hammers mingled with the dull rumbling of bales being
+placed upon the rails.
+
+“It is from here that consignments are forwarded,” said Cornemuse.
+“I have obtained from the government a railway through the Wood and
+a station at my door. Every three days I fill a truck with my own
+products. You see that the Republic has not killed all beliefs.”
+
+Agaric made a last effort to engage the wise distiller in his
+enterprise. He pointed him to a prompt, certain, dazzling success.
+
+“Don’t you wish to share in it?” he added. “Don’t you wish to bring back
+your king from exile?”
+
+“Exile is pleasant to men of good will,” answered the monk of Conils.
+“If you are guided by me, my dear Brother Agaric, you will give up your
+project for the present. For my own part I have no illusions. Whether or
+not I belong to your party, if you lose, I shall have to pay like you.”
+
+Father Agaric took leave of his friend and went back satisfied to his
+school. “Cornemuse,” thought he, “not being able to prevent the plot,
+would like to make it succeed and he will give money.” Agaric was not
+deceived. Such, indeed, was the solidarity among priests and monks that
+the acts of a single one bound them all. That was at once both their
+strength and their weakness.
+
+
+
+
+II. PRINCE CRUCHO
+
+Agaric resolved to proceed without delay to Prince Crucho, who honoured
+him with his familiarity. In the dusk of the evening he went out of his
+school by the side door, disguised as a cattle merchant and took passage
+on board the St. Mael.
+
+The next day he landed in Porpoisea, for it was at Chitterlings Castle
+on this hospitable soil that Crucho ate the bitter bread of exile.
+
+Agaric met the Prince on the road driving in a motor-car with two young
+ladies at the rate of a hundred miles an hour. When the monk saw him he
+shook his red umbrella and the prince stopped his car.
+
+“Is it you, Agaric? Get in! There are already three of us, but we can
+make room for you. You can take one of these young ladies on your knee.”
+
+The pious Agaric got in.
+
+“What news, worthy father?” asked the young prince.
+
+“Great news,” answered Agaric. “Can I speak?”
+
+“You can. I have nothing secret from these two ladies.”
+
+“Sire, Penguinia claims you. You will not be deaf to her call.”
+
+Agaric described the state of feeling and outlined a vast plot.
+
+“On my first signal,” said he, “all your partisans will rise at once.
+With cross in hand and habits girded up, your venerable clergy will lead
+the armed crowd into Formose’s palace. We shall carry terror and death
+among your enemies. For a reward of our efforts we only ask of you,
+Sire, that you will not render them useless. We entreat you to come and
+seat yourself on the throne that we shall prepare.”
+
+The prince returned a simple answer:
+
+“I shall enter Alca on a green horse.”
+
+Agaric declared that he accepted this manly response. Although, contrary
+to his custom, he had a lady on his knee, he adjured the young prince,
+with a sublime loftiness of soul, to be faithful to his royal duties.
+
+“Sire,” he cried, with tears in his eyes, “you will live to remember
+the day on which you have been restored from exile, given back to your
+people, reestablished on the throne of your ancestors by the hands of
+your monks, and crowned by them with the august crest of the Dragon.
+King Crucho, may you equal the glory of your ancestor Draco the Great!”
+
+The young prince threw himself with emotion on his restorer and
+attempted to embrace him, but he was prevented from reaching him by
+the girth of the two ladies, so tightly packed were they all in that
+historic carriage.
+
+“Worthy father,” said he, “I would like all Penguinia to witness this
+embrace.”
+
+“It would be a cheering spectacle,” said Agaric.
+
+In the mean time the motor-car rushed like a tornado through hamlets
+and villages, crushing hens, geese, turkeys, ducks, guinea-fowls, cats,
+dogs, pigs, children, labourers, and women beneath its insatiable tyres.
+And the pious Agaric turned over his great designs in his mind. His
+voice, coming from behind one of the ladies, expressed this thought:
+
+“We must have money, a great deal of money.”
+
+“That is your business,” answered the prince.
+
+But already the park gates were opening to the formidable motor-car.
+
+The dinner was sumptuous. They toasted the Dragon’s crest. Everybody
+knows that a closed goblet is a sign of sovereignty; so Prince
+Crucho and Princess Gudrune, his wife, drank out of goblets that were
+covered-over like ciboriums. The prince had his filled several times
+with the wines of Penguinia, both white and red.
+
+Crucho had received a truly princely education, and he excelled in
+motoring, but was not ignorant of history either. He was said to be well
+versed in the antiquities and famous deeds of his family; and, indeed,
+he gave a notable proof of his knowledge in this respect. As they were
+speaking of the various remarkable peculiarities that had been noticed
+in famous women.
+
+“It is perfectly true,” said he, “that Queen Crucha, whose name I bear,
+had the mark of a little monkey’s head upon her body.”
+
+During the evening Agaric had a decisive interview with three of the
+prince’s oldest councillors. It was decided to ask for funds from
+Crucho’s father-in-law, as he was anxious to have a king for son-in-law,
+from several Jewish ladies, who were impatient to become ennobled, and,
+finally, from the Prince Regent of the Porpoises, who had promised his
+aid to the Draconides, thinking that by Crucho’s restoration he would
+weaken the Penguins, the hereditary enemies of his people. The three
+old councillors divided among themselves the three chief offices of the
+Court, those of Chamberlain, Seneschal, and High Steward, and authorised
+the monk to distribute the other places to the prince’s best advantage.
+
+“Devotion has to be rewarded,” said the three old councillors.
+
+“And treachery also,” said Agaric.
+
+“It is but too true,” replied one of them, the Marquis of Sevenwounds,
+who had experience of revolutions.
+
+There was dancing, and after the ball Princess Gudrune tore up her green
+robe to make cockades. With her own hands she sewed a piece of it on the
+monk’s breast, upon which he shed tears of sensibility and gratitude.
+
+M. de Plume, the prince’s equerry, set out the same evening to look for
+a green horse.
+
+
+
+
+III. THE CABAL
+
+After his return to the capital of Penguinia, the Reverend Father
+Agaric disclosed his projects to Prince Adelestan des Boscenos, of whose
+Draconian sentiments he was well aware.
+
+The prince belonged to the highest nobility. The Torticol des Boscenos
+went back to Brian the Good, and under the Draconides had held the
+highest offices in the kingdom. In 1179, Philip Torticol, High Admiral
+of Penguinia, a brave, faithful, and generous, but vindictive man,
+delivered over the port of La Crique and the Penguin fleet to the
+enemies of the kingdom, because he suspected that Queen Crucha, whose
+lover he was, had been unfaithful to him and loved a stable-boy. It was
+that great queen who gave to the Boscenos the silver warming-pan which
+they bear in their arms. As for their motto, it only goes back to the
+sixteenth century. The story of its origin is as follows: One gala
+night, as he mingled with the crowd of courtiers who were watching the
+fire-works in the king’s garden, Duke John des Boscenos approached the
+Duchess of Skull and put his hand under the petticoat of that lady, who
+made no complaint at the gesture. The king, happening to pass, surprised
+them and contented himself with saying, “And thus I find you.” These
+four words became the motto of the Boscenos.
+
+Prince Adelestan had not degenerated from his ancestors. He preserved an
+unalterable fidelity for the race of the Draconides and desired nothing
+so much as the restoration of Prince Crucho, an event which was in his
+eyes to be the fore-runner of the restoration of his own fortune. He
+therefore readily entered into the Reverend Father Agaric’s plans. He
+joined himself at once to the monk’s projects, and hastened to put him
+into communication with the most loyal Royalists of his acquaintance,
+Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd. They
+met together one night in the Duke of Ampoule’s country house, six miles
+eastward of Alca, to consider ways and means.
+
+M. de La Trumelle was in favour of legal action.
+
+“We ought to keep within the law,” said he in substance. “We are for
+order. It is by an untiring propaganda that we shall best pursue the
+realisation of our hopes. We must change the feeling of the country. Our
+cause will conquer because it is just.”
+
+The Prince des Boscenos expressed a contrary opinion. He thought that,
+in order to triumph, just causes need force quite as much and even more
+than unjust causes require it.
+
+“In the present situation,” said he tranquilly, “three methods of action
+present themselves: to hire the butcher boys, to corrupt the ministers,
+and to kidnap President Formose.”
+
+“It would be a mistake to kidnap Formose,” objected M. de La Trumelle.
+“The President is on our side.”
+
+The attitude and sentiments of the President of the Republic are
+explained by the fact that one Dracophil proposed to seize Formose
+while another Dracophil regarded him as a friend. Formose showed himself
+favourable to the Royalists, whose habits he admired and imitated. If
+he smiled at the mention of the Dragon’s crest it was at the thought
+of putting it on his own head. He was envious of sovereign power, not
+because he felt himself capable of exercising it, but because he loved
+to appear so. According to the expression of a Penguin chronicler, “he
+was a goose.”
+
+Prince des Boscenos maintained his proposal to march against Formose’s
+palace and the House of Parliament.
+
+Count Clena was even still more energetic.
+
+“Let us begin,” said he, “by slaughtering, disembowelling, and braining
+the Republicans and all partisans of the government. Afterwards we shall
+see what more need be done.”
+
+M. de La Trumelle was a moderate, and moderates are always moderately
+opposed to violence. He recognised that Count Clena’s policy was
+inspired by a noble feeling and that it was high-minded, but he timidly
+objected that perhaps it was not conformable to principle, and that it
+presented certain dangers. At last he consented to discuss it.
+
+“I propose,” added he, “to draw up an appeal to the people. Let us show
+who we are. For my own part I can assure you that I shall not hide my
+flag in my pocket.”
+
+M. Bigourd began to speak.
+
+“Gentlemen, the Penguins are dissatisfied with the new order because it
+exists, and it is natural for men to complain of their condition. But at
+the same time the Penguins are afraid to change their government because
+new things alarm them. They have not known the Dragon’s crest and,
+although they sometimes say that they regret it, we must not believe
+them. It is easy to see that they speak in this way either without
+thought or because they are in an ill-temper. Let us not have any
+illusions about their feelings towards ourselves. They do not like us.
+They hate the aristocracy both from a base envy and from a generous love
+of equality. And these two united feelings are very strong in a people.
+Public opinion is not against us, because it knows nothing about us. But
+when it knows what we want it will not follow us. If we let it be seen
+that we wish to destroy democratic government and restore the Dragon’s
+crest, who will be our partisans? Only the butcher-boys and the little
+shopkeepers of Alca. And could we even count on them to the end?
+They are dissatisfied, but at the bottom of their hearts they are
+Republicans. They are more anxious to sell their cursed wares than to
+see Crucho again. If we act openly we shall only cause alarm.
+
+“To make people sympathise with us and follow us we must make them
+believe that we want, not to overthrow the Republic, but, on the
+contrary, to restore it, to cleanse, to purify, to embellish, to adorn,
+to beautify, and to ornament it, to render it, in a word, glorious and
+attractive. Therefore, we ought not to act openly ourselves. It is known
+that we are not favourable to the present order. We must have recourse
+to a friend of the Republic, and, if we are to do what is best, to a
+defender of this government. We have plenty to choose from. It would
+be well to prefer the most popular and, if I dare say so, the most
+republican of them. We shall win him over to us by flattery, by
+presents, and above all by promises. Promises cost less than presents,
+and are worth more. No one gives as much as he who gives hopes. It is
+not necessary for the man we choose to be of brilliant intellect. I
+would even prefer him to be of no great ability. Stupid people show an
+inimitable grace in roguery. Be guided by me, gentlemen, and overthrow
+the Republic by the agency of a Republican. Let us be prudent. But
+prudence does not exclude energy. If you need me you will find me at
+your disposal.”
+
+This speech made a great impression upon those who heard it. The mind
+of the pious Agaric was particularly impressed. But each of them was
+anxious to appoint himself to a position of honour and profit. A secret
+government was organised of which all those present were elected active
+members. The Duke of Ampoule, who was the great financier of the
+party, was chosen treasurer and charged with organising funds for the
+propaganda.
+
+The meeting was on the point of coming to an end when a rough voice was
+heard singing an old air:
+
+     Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+     On en va faire des andouilles
+     Des saucisses et du jambon
+     Pour le reveillon des pauv’ bougres.
+
+It had, for two hundred years, been a well-known song in the slums of
+Alca. Prince Boscenos did not like to hear it. He went down into the
+street, and, perceiving that the singer was a workman who was placing
+some slates on the roof of a church, he politely asked him to sing
+something else.
+
+“I will sing what I like,” answered the man.
+
+“My friend, to please me. . . .”
+
+“I don’t want to please you.”
+
+Prince Boscenos was as a rule good-tempered, but he was easily angered
+and a man of great strength.
+
+“Fellow, come down or I will go up to you,” cried he, in a terrible
+voice.
+
+As the workman, astride on his coping, showed no sign of budging, the
+prince climbed quickly up the staircase of the tower and attacked the
+singer. He gave him a blow that broke his jaw-bone and sent him rolling
+into a water-spout. At that moment seven or eight carpenters, who were
+working on the rafters, heard their companion’s cry and looked through
+the window. Seeing the prince on the coping they climbed along a ladder
+that was leaning on the slates and reached him just as he was slipping
+into the tower. They sent him, head foremost, down the one hundred and
+thirty-seven steps of the spiral staircase.
+
+
+
+
+IV. VISCOUNTESS OLIVE
+
+The Penguins had the finest army in the world. So had the Porpoises. And
+it was the same with the other nations of Europe. The smallest amount of
+thought will prevent any surprise at this. For all armies are the finest
+in the world. The second finest army, if one could exist, would be in
+a notoriously inferior position; it would be certain to be beaten. It
+ought to be disbanded at once. Therefore, all armies are the finest in
+the world. In France the illustrious Colonel Marchand understood
+this when, before the passage of the Yalou, being questioned by some
+journalists about the Russo-Japanese war, he did not hesitate to
+describe the Russian army as the finest in the world, and also the
+Japanese. And it should be noticed that even after suffering the most
+terrible reverses an army does not fall from its position of being
+the finest in the world. For if nations ascribe their victories to the
+ability of their generals and the courage of their soldiers, they always
+attribute their defeats to an inexplicable fatality. On the other hand,
+navies are classed according to the number of their ships. There is a
+first, a second, a third, and so on. So that there exists no doubt as to
+the result of naval wars.
+
+The Penguins had the finest army and the second navy in the world.
+This navy was commanded by the famous Chatillon, who bore the title
+of Emiralbahr, and by abbreviation Emiral. It is the same word which,
+unfortunately in a corrupt form, is used to-day among several European
+nations to designate the highest grade in the naval service. But as
+there was but one Emiral among the Penguins, a singular prestige, if I
+dare say so, was attached to that rank.
+
+The Emiral did not belong to the nobility. A child of the people, he was
+loved by the people. They were flattered to see a man who sprang from
+their own ranks holding a position of honour. Chatillon was good-looking
+and fortune favoured him. He was not over-addicted to thought. No event
+ever disturbed his serene outlook.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric, surrendering to M. Bigourd’s reasons and
+recognising that the existing government could only be destroyed by one
+of its defenders, cast his eyes upon Emiral Chatillon. He asked a large
+sum of money from his friend, the Reverend Father Cornemuse, which the
+latter handed him with a sigh. And with this sum he hired six hundred
+butcher boys of Alca to run behind Chatillon’s horse and shout, “Hurrah
+for the Emiral!” Henceforth Chatillon could not take a single step
+without being cheered.
+
+Viscountess Olive asked him for a private interview. He received her at
+the Admiralty* in a room decorated with anchors, shells, and grenades.
+
+     * Or better, Emiralty.
+
+She was discreetly dressed in greyish blue. A hat trimmed with roses
+covered her pretty, fair hair, Behind her veil her eyes shone like
+sapphires. Although she came of Jewish origin there was no more
+fashionable woman in the whole nobility. She was tall and well shaped;
+her form was that of the year, her figure that of the season.
+
+“Emiral,” said she, in a delightful voice, “I cannot conceal my emotion
+from you. . . . It is very natural . . . before a hero.”
+
+“You are too kind. But tell me, Viscountess, what brings me the honour
+of your visit.”
+
+“For a long time I have been anxious to see you, to speak to you. . . .
+So I very willingly undertook to convey a message to you.”
+
+“Please take a seat.”
+
+“How still it is here.”
+
+“Yes, it is quiet enough.”
+
+“You can hear the birds singing.”
+
+“Sit down, then, dear lady.”
+
+And he drew up an arm-chair for her.
+
+She took a seat with her back to the light.
+
+“Emiral, I came to bring you a very important message, a message. . .”
+
+“Explain.”
+
+“Emiral, have you ever seen Prince Crucho?”
+
+“Never.”
+
+She sighed.
+
+“It is a great pity. He would be so delighted to see you! He esteems and
+appreciates you. He has your portrait on his desk beside his mother’s.
+What a pity it is he is not better known! He is a charming prince and so
+grateful for what is done for him! He will be a great king. For he will
+be king without doubt. He will come back and sooner than people think.
+. . . What I have to tell you, the message with which I am entrusted,
+refers precisely to. . .”
+
+The Emiral stood up.
+
+“Not a word more, dear lady. I have the esteem, the confidence of the
+Republic. I will not betray it. And why should I betray it? I am loaded
+honours and dignities.”
+
+“Allow me to tell you, my dear Emiral, that your honours and dignities
+are far from equalling what you deserve. If your services were
+properly rewarded, you would be Emiralissimo and Generalissimo,
+Commander-in-chief of the troops both on land and sea. The Republic is
+very ungrateful to you.”
+
+“All governments are more or less ungrateful.”
+
+“Yes, but the Republicans are jealous of you. That class of person
+is always afraid of his superiors. They cannot endure the Services.
+Everything that has to do with the navy and the army is odious to them.
+They are afraid of you.”
+
+“That is possible.”
+
+“They are wretches; they are ruining the country. Don’t you wish to save
+Penguinia?
+
+“In what way?”
+
+“By sweeping away all the rascals of the Republic, all the Republicans.”
+
+“What a proposal to make to me, dear lady!”
+
+“It is what will certainly be done, if not by you, then by some one
+else. The Generalissimo, to mention him alone, is ready to throw all
+the ministers, deputies, and senators into the sea, and to recall Prince
+Crucho.”
+
+“Oh, the rascal, the scoundrel,” exclaimed the Emiral.
+
+“Do to him what he would do to you. The prince will know how to
+recognise your services, He will give you the Constable’s sword and a
+magnificent grant. I am commissioned, in the mean time, to hand you a
+pledge of his royal friendship.”
+
+As she said these words she drew a green cockade from her bosom.
+
+“What is that?” asked the Emiral.
+
+“It is his colours which Crucho sends you.”
+
+“Be good enough to take them back.”
+
+“So that they may be offered to the Generalissimo who will accept them!
+. . . No, Emiral, let me place them on your glorious breast.”
+
+Chatillon gently repelled the lady. But for some minutes he thought her
+extremely pretty, and he felt this impression still more when two bare
+arms and the rosy palms of two delicate hands touched him lightly. He
+yielded almost immediately. Olive was slow in fastening the ribbon. Then
+when it was done she made a low courtesy and saluted Chatillon with the
+title of Constable.
+
+“I have been ambitious like my comrades,” answered the sailor, “I don’t
+hide it, and perhaps I am so still; but u on my word of honour, when I
+look at you, the only, desire I feel is for a cottage and a heart.”
+
+She turned upon him the charming sapphire glances that flashed from
+under her eyelids.
+
+“That is to be had also . . . what are you doing, Emiral?”
+
+“I am looking for the heart.”
+
+When she left the Admiralty, the Viscountess went immediately to the
+Reverend Father Agaric to give an account of her visit.
+
+“You must go to him again, dear lady,” said that austere monk.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE PRINCE DES BOSCENOS
+
+Morning and evening the newspapers that had been bought by the
+Dracophils proclaimed Chatillon’s praises and hurled shame and
+opprobrium upon the Ministers of the Republic. Chatillon’s portrait was
+sold through the streets of Alca. Those young descendants of Remus who
+carry plaster figures on their heads, offered busts of Chatillon for
+sale upon the bridges.
+
+Every evening Chatillon rode upon his white horse round the Queen’s
+Meadow, a place frequented by the people of fashion. The Dracophils
+posted along the Emiral’s route a crowd of needy Penguins who kept
+shouting: “It is Chatillon we want.” The middle classes of Alca
+conceived a profound admiration for the Emiral. Shopwomen murmured:
+“He is good-looking.” Women of fashion slackened the speed of their
+motor-cars and kissed hands to him as they passed, amidst the hurrahs of
+an enthusiastic populace.
+
+One day, as he went into a tobacco shop, two Penguins who were putting
+letters in the box recognized Chatillon and cried at the top of their
+voices: “Hurrah for the Emiral! Down with the Republicans.” All those
+who were passing stopped in front of the shop. Chatillon lighted his
+cigar before the eyes of a dense crowd of frenzied citizens who waved
+their hats and cheered. The crowd kept increasing, and the whole
+town, singing and marching behind its hero, went back with him to the
+Admiralty.
+
+The Emiral had an old comrade in arms, Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, who had
+served with great distinction, a man as true as gold and as loyal as his
+sword. Vulcanmould plumed himself on his thoroughgoing independence and
+he went among the partisans of Crucho and the Minister of the Republic
+telling both parties what he thought of them. M. Bigourd maliciously
+declared that he told each party what the other party thought of it.
+In truth he had on several occasions been guilty of regrettable
+indiscretions, which were overlooked as being the freedoms of a soldier
+who knew nothing of intrigue. Every morning he went to see Chatillon,
+whom he treated with the cordial roughness of a brother in arms.
+
+“Well, old buffer, so you are popular,” said he to him. “Your phiz is
+sold on the heads of pipes and on liqueur bottles and every drunkard in
+Alca spits out your name as he rolls in the gutter. . . . Chatillon, the
+hero of the Penguins! Chatillon, defender of the Penguin glory! . . .
+Who would have said it? Who would have thought it?”
+
+And he laughed with his harsh laugh. Then changing his tone: “But,
+joking aside, are you not a bit surprised at what is happening to you?”
+
+“No, indeed,” answered Chatillon.
+
+And out went the honest Vulcanmould, banging the door behind him.
+
+In the mean time Chatillon had taken a little flat at number 18
+Johannes-Talpa Street, so that he might receive Viscountess Olive. They
+met there every day. He was desperately in love with her. During his
+martial and neptunian life he had loved crowds of women, red, black,
+yellow, and white, and some of them had been very beautiful. But before
+he met the Viscountess he did not know what a woman really was. When the
+Viscountess Olive called him her darling, her dear darling, he felt in
+heaven and it seemed to him that the stars shone in her hair.
+
+She would come a little late, and, as she put her bag on the table, she
+would ask pensively:
+
+“Let me sit on your knee.”
+
+And then she would talk of subjects suggested by the pious Agaric,
+interrupting the conversation with sighs and kisses. She would ask him
+to dismiss such and such an officer, to give a command to another,
+to send the squadron here or there. And at the right moment she would
+exclaim:
+
+“How young you are, my dear!”
+
+And he did whatever she wished, for he was simple, he was anxious to
+wear the Constable’s sword, and to receive a large grant; he did not
+dislike playing a double part, he had a vague idea of saving Penguinia,
+and he was in love.
+
+This delightful woman induced him to remove the troops that were at La
+Cirque, the port where Crucho was to land. By this means it was made
+certain that there would be no obstacle to prevent the prince from
+entering Penguinia.
+
+The pious Agaric organised public meetings so as to keep up the
+agitation. The Dracophils held one or two every day in some of the
+thirty-six districts of Alca, and preferably in the poorer quarters.
+They desired to win over the poor, for they are the most numerous.
+On the fourth of May a particularly fine meeting was held in an old
+cattle-market, situated in the centre of a populous suburb filled with
+housewives sitting on the doorsteps and children playing in the gutters.
+There were present about two thousand people, in the opinion of
+the Republicans, and six thousand according to the reckoning of the
+Dracophils. In the audience was to be seen the flower of Penguin
+society, including Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Count Clena, M. de
+La Trumelle, M. Bigourd, and several rich Jewish ladies.
+
+The Generalissimo of the national army had come in uniform. He was
+cheered.
+
+The committee had been carefully formed. A man of the people, a workman,
+but a man of sound principles, M. Rauchin, the secretary of the yellow
+syndicate, was asked to preside, supported by Count Clena and M.
+Michaud, a butcher.
+
+The government which Penguinia had freely given itself was called by
+such names as cesspool and drain in several eloquent speeches. But
+President Formose was spared and no mention was made of Crucho or the
+priests.
+
+The meeting was not unanimous. A defender of the modern State and of the
+Republic, a manual labourer, stood up.
+
+“Gentlemen,” said M. Rauchin, the chairman, “we have told you that this
+meeting would not be unanimous. We are not like our opponents, we are
+honest men. I allow our opponent to speak. Heaven knows what you are
+going to hear. Gentlemen, I beg of you to restrain as long as you can
+the expression of your contempt, your disgust, and your indignation.”
+
+“Gentlemen,” said the opponent. . . .
+
+Immediately he was knocked down, trampled beneath the feet of the
+indignant crowd, and his unrecognisable remains thrown out of the hall.
+
+The tumult was still resounding when Count Clena ascended the tribune.
+Cheers took the place of groans and when silence was restored the orator
+uttered these words:
+
+“Comrades, we are going to see whether you have blood in your veins.
+What we have got to do is to slaughter, disembowel, and brain all the
+Republicans.”
+
+This speech let loose such a thunder of applause that the old shed
+rocked with it, and a cloud of acrid and thick dust fell from its filthy
+walls and worm-eaten beams and enveloped the audience.
+
+A resolution was carried vilifying the government and acclaiming
+Chatillon. And the audience departed singing the hymn of the liberator:
+“It is Chatillon we want.”
+
+The only way out of the old market was through a muddy alley shut in by
+omnibus stables and coal sheds. There was no moon and a cold drizzle was
+coming down. The police, who were assembled in great numbers, blocked
+the alley and compelled the Dracophils to disperse in little groups.
+These were the instructions they had received from their chief, who was
+anxious to check the enthusiasm of the excited crowd.
+
+The Dracophils who were detained in the alley kept marking time and
+singing, “It is Chatillon we want.” Soon, becoming impatient of the
+delay, the cause of which they did not know, they began to push those in
+front of them. This movement, propagated along the alley, threw those in
+front against the broad chests of the police. The latter had no hatred
+for the Dracophils. In the bottom of their hearts they liked Chatillon.
+But it is natural to resist aggression and strong men are inclined to
+make use of their strength. For these reasons the police kicked the
+Dracophils with their hob-nailed boots. As a result there were sudden
+rushes backwards and forwards. Threats and cries mingled with the songs.
+
+“Murder! Murder! . . . It is Chatillon we want! Murder! Murder!”
+
+And in the gloomy alley the more prudent kept saying, “Don’t push.”
+ Among these latter, in the darkness, his lofty figure rising above the
+moving crowd, his broad shoulders and robust body noticeable among
+the trampled limbs and crushed sides of the rest, stood the Prince
+des Boscenos, calm, immovable, and placid. Serenely and indulgently he
+waited. In the mean time, as the exit was opened at regular intervals
+between the ranks of the police, the pressure of elbows against the
+chests of those around the prince diminished and people began to breathe
+again.
+
+“You see we shall soon be able to go out,” said that kindly giant, with
+a pleasant smile. “Time and patience . . .”
+
+He took a cigar from his case, raised it to his lips and struck a match.
+Suddenly, in the light of the match, he saw Princess Anne, his wife,
+clasped in Count Clena’s arms. At this sight he rushed towards them,
+striking both them and those around with his cane. He was disarmed,
+though not without difficulty, but he could not be separated from his
+opponent. And whilst the fainting princess was lifted from arm to arm
+to her carriage over the excited and curious crowd, the two men still
+fought furiously. Prince des Boscenos lost his hat, his eye-glass,
+his cigar, his necktie, and his portfolio full of private letters and
+political correspondence; he even lost the miraculous medals that he
+had received from the good Father Cornemuse. But he gave his opponent
+so terrible a kick in the stomach that the unfortunate Count was knocked
+through an iron grating and went, head foremost, through a glass door
+and into a coal-shed.
+
+Attracted by the struggle and the cries of those around, the police
+rushed towards the prince, who furiously resisted them. He stretched
+three of them gasping at his feet and put seven others to flight,
+with, respectively, a broken jaw, a split lip, a nose pouring blood, a
+fractured skull, a torn ear, a dislocated collar-bone, and broken ribs.
+He fell, however, and was dragged bleeding and disfigured, with his
+clothes in rags, to the nearest police-station, where, jumping about and
+bellowing, he spent the night.
+
+At daybreak groups of demonstrators went about the town singing, “It is
+Chatillon we want,” and breaking the windows of the houses in which the
+Ministers of the Republic lived.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE EMIRAL’S FALL
+
+That night marked the culmination of the Dracophil movement. The
+Royalists had no longer any doubt of its triumph. Their chiefs sent
+congratulations to Prince Crucho by wireless telegraphy. Their ladies
+embroidered scarves and slippers for him. M. de Plume had found the
+green horse.
+
+The pious Agaric shared the common hope. But he still worked to
+win partisans for the Pretender. They ought, he said, to lay their
+foundations upon the bed-rock.
+
+With this design he had an interview with three Trade Union workmen.
+
+In these times the artisans no longer lived, as in the days of the
+Draconides, under the government of corporations. They were free, but
+they had no assured pay. After having remained isolated from each other
+for a long time, without help and without support, they had formed
+themselves into unions. The coffers of the unions were empty, as it was
+not the habit of the unionists to pay their subscriptions. There were
+unions numbering thirty thousand members, others with a thousand,
+five hundred, two hundred, and so forth. Several numbered two or three
+members only, or even a few less. But as the lists of adherents were
+not published, it was not easy to distinguish the great unions from the
+small ones.
+
+After some dark and indirect steps the pious Agaric was put into
+communication in a room in the Moulin de la Galette, with comrades
+Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille, the secretaries of three unions of which
+the first numbered fourteen members, the second twenty-four, and the
+third only one. Agaric showed extreme cleverness at this interview.
+
+“Gentlemen,” said he, “you and I have not, in most respects, the same
+political and social views, but there are points in which we may come
+to an understanding. We have a common enemy. The government exploits you
+and despises us. Help us to overthrow it; we will supply you with
+the means so far as we are able, and you can in addition count on our
+gratitude.”
+
+“Fork out the tin,” said Dagobert.
+
+The Reverend Father placed on the table a bag which the distiller of
+Conils had given him with tears in his eyes.
+
+“Done!” said the three companions.
+
+Thus was the solemn compact sealed.
+
+As soon as the monk had departed, carrying with him the joy of having
+won over the masses to his cause, Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille
+whistled to their wives, Amelia, Queenie, and Matilda, who were waiting
+in the street for the signal, and all six holding each other’s hands,
+danced around the bag, singing:
+
+     J’ai du bon pognon,
+     Tu n’l’auras pas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+And they ordered a salad-bowl full of warm wine.
+
+In the evening all six went through the street from stall to stall
+singing their new song. The song became popular, for the detectives
+reported that every day showed an increase of the number of workpeople
+who sang through the slums:
+
+     J’ai du bon pognon;
+     Tu n’l’auras pas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+The Dracophil agitation made no progress in the provinces. The pious
+Agaric sought to find the cause of this, but was unable to discover it
+until old Cornemuse revealed it to him.
+
+“I have proofs,” sighed the monk of Conils, “that the Duke of Ampoule,
+the treasurer of the Dracophils, has brought property in Porpoisia with
+the funds that he received for the propaganda.”
+
+The party wanted money. Prince des Boscenos had lost his portfolio in a
+brawl and he was reduced to painful expedients which were repugnant to
+his impetuous character. The Viscountess Olive was expensive. Cornemuse
+advised that the monthly allowance of that lady should be diminished.
+
+“She is very useful to us,” objected the pious Agaric.
+
+“Undoubtedly,” answered Cornemuse, “but she does us an injury by ruining
+us.”
+
+A schism divided the Dracophils. Misunderstandings reigned in their
+councils. Some wished that in accordance with the policy of M. Bigourd
+and the pious Agaric, they should carry on the design of reforming the
+Republic. Others, wearied by their long constraint, had resolved to
+proclaim the Dragon’s crest and swore to conquer beneath that sign.
+
+The latter urged the advantage of a clear situation and the
+impossibility of making a pretence much longer, and in truth, the public
+began to see whither the agitation was tending and that the Emiral’s
+partisans wanted to destroy the very foundations of the Republic.
+
+A report was spread that the prince was to land at La Cirque and make
+his entry into Alca on a green horse.
+
+These rumours excited the fanatical monks, delighted the poor nobles,
+satisfied the rich Jewish ladies, and put hope in the hearts of the
+small traders. But very few of them were inclined to purchase these
+benefits at the price of a social catastrophe and the overthrow of the
+public credit; and there were fewer still who would have risked their
+money, their peace, their liberty, or a single hour from their pleasures
+in the business. On the other hand, the workmen held themselves ready,
+as ever, to give a day’s work to the Republic, and a strong resistance
+was being formed in the suburbs.
+
+“The people are with us,” the pious Agaric used to say.
+
+However, men, women, and children, when leaving their factories, used to
+shout with one voice:
+
+     A bas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+As for the government, it showed the weakness, indecision, flabbiness,
+and heedlessness common to all governments, and from which none has ever
+departed without falling into arbitrariness and violence. In three words
+it knew nothing, wanted nothing, and would do nothing. Formose, shut in
+his presidential palace, remained blind, dumb, deaf, huge, invisible,
+wrapped up in his pride as in an eider-down.
+
+Count Olive advised the Dracophils to make a last appeal for funds and
+to attempt a great stroke while Alca was still in a ferment.
+
+An executive committee, which he himself had chosen, decided to kidnap
+the members of the Chamber of Deputies, and considered ways and means.
+
+The affair was fixed for the twenty-eighth of July. On that day the sun
+rose radiantly over the city. In front of the legislative palace women
+passed to market with their baskets; hawkers cried their peaches, pears,
+and grapes; cab horses with their noses in their bags munched their
+hay. Nobody expected anything, not because the secret had been kept
+but because it met with nothing but unbelievers. Nobody believed in a
+revolution, and from this fact we may conclude that nobody desired one.
+About two o’clock the deputies began to pass, few and unnoticed, through
+the side-door of the palace. At three o’clock a few groups of badly
+dressed men had formed. At half past three black masses coming from the
+adjacent streets spread over Revolution Square. This vast expanse was
+soon covered by an ocean of soft hats, and the crowd of demonstrators,
+continually increased by sight-seers, having crossed the bridge, struck
+its dark wave against the walls of the legislative enclosure. Cries,
+murmurs, and songs went up to the impassive sky. “It is Chatillon we
+want!” “Down with the Deputies!” “Down with the Republicans!” “Death
+to the Republicans!” The devoted band of Dracophils, led by Prince des
+Boscenos, struck up the august canticle:
+
+     Vive Crucho,
+     Vaillant et sage,
+     Plein de courage
+     Des le berceau!
+
+Behind the wall silence alone replied.
+
+This silence and the absence of guards encouraged and at the same time
+frightened the crowd. Suddenly a formidable voice cried out:
+
+“Attack!”
+
+And Prince des Boscenos was seen raising his gigantic form to the top
+of the wall, which was covered with barbs and iron spikes. Behind him
+rushed his companions, and the people followed. Some hammered against
+the wall to make holes in it; others endeavoured to tear down the spikes
+and to pull out the barbs. These defences had given way in places and
+some of the invaders had stripped the wall and were sitting astride on
+the top. Prince des Boscenos was waving an immense green flag. Suddenly
+the crowd wavered and from it came a long cry of terror. The police
+and the Republican carabineers issuing out of all the entrances of the
+palace formed themselves into a column beneath the wall and in a moment
+it was cleared of its besiegers. After a long moment of suspense the
+noise of arms was heard, and the police charged the crowd with fixed
+bayonets. An instant afterwards and on the deserted square strewn with
+hats and walking-sticks there reigned a sinister silence. Twice again
+the Dracophils attempted to form, twice they were repulsed. The rising
+was conquered. But Prince des Boscenos, standing on the wall of the
+hostile palace, his flag in his hand, still repelled the attack of a
+whole brigade. He knocked down all who approached him. At last he, too,
+was thrown down, and fell on an iron spike, to which he remained hooked,
+still clasping the standard of the Draconides.
+
+On the following day the Ministers of the Republic and the Members of
+Parliament determined to take energetic measures. In vain, this time,
+did President Formose attempt to evade his responsibilities. The
+government discussed the question of depriving Chatillon of his rank and
+dignities and of indicting him before the High Court as a conspirator,
+an enemy of the public good, a traitor, etc.
+
+At this news the Emiral’s old companions in arms, who the very evening
+before had beset him with their adulations, made no effort to conceal
+their joy. But Chatillon remained popular with the middle classes of
+Alca and one still heard the hymn of the liberator sounding in the
+streets, “It is Chatillon we want.”
+
+The Ministers were embarrassed. They intended to indict Chatillon before
+the High Court. But they knew nothing; they remained in that total
+ignorance reserved for those who govern men. They were incapable of
+advancing any grave charges against Chatillon. They could supply
+the prosecution with nothing but the ridiculous lies of their spies.
+Chatillon’s share in the plot and his relations with Prince Crucho
+remained the secret of the thirty thousand Dracophils. The Ministers
+and the Deputies had suspicions and even certainties, but they had no
+proofs. The Public Prosecutor said to the Minister of justice: “Very
+little is needed for a political prosecution! but I have nothing at all
+and that is not enough.” The affair made no progress. The enemies of the
+Republic were triumphant.
+
+On the eighteenth of September the news ran in Alca that Chatillon had
+taken flight. Everywhere there was surprise and astonishment. People
+doubted, for they could not understand.
+
+This is what had happened: One day as the brave Under-Emiral Vulcanmould
+happened, as if by chance, to go into the office of M. Barbotan, the
+Minister of Foreign Affairs, he remarked with his usual frankness:
+
+“M. Barbotan, your colleagues do not seem to me to be up to much; it is
+evident that they have never commanded a ship. That fool Chatillon gives
+them a deuced bad fit of the shivers.”
+
+The Minister, in sign of denial, waved his paper-knife in the air above
+his desk.
+
+“Don’t deny it,” answered Vulcanmould. “You don’t know how to get rid of
+Chatillon. You do not dare to indict him before the High Court because
+you are not sure of being able to bring forward a strong enough charge.
+Bigourd will defend him, and Bigourd is a clever advocate. . . . You are
+right, M. Barbotan, you are right. It would be a dangerous trial.”
+
+“Ah! my friend,” said the Minister, in a careless tone, “if you knew
+how satisfied we are. . . . I receive the most reassuring news from
+my prefects. The good sense of the Penguins will do justice to the
+intrigues of this mutinous soldier. Can you suppose for a moment that
+a great people, an intelligent, laborious people, devoted to liberal
+institutions which. . .”
+
+Vulcanmould interrupted with a great sigh:
+
+“Ah! If I had time to do it I would relieve you of your difficulty. I
+would juggle away my Chatillon like a nutmeg out of a thimble. I would
+fillip him off to Porpoisia.”
+
+The Minister paid close attention.
+
+“It would not take long,” continued the sailor. “I would rid you in a
+trice of the creature. . . . But just now I have other fish to fry. . . .
+I am in a bad hole. I must find a pretty big sum. But, deuce take it,
+honour before everything.”
+
+The Minister and the Under-Emiral looked at each other for a moment in
+silence. Then Barbotan said with authority:
+
+“Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, get rid of this seditious soldier. You will
+render a great service to Penguinia, and the Minister of Home Affairs
+will see that your gambling debts are paid.”
+
+The same evening Vulcanmould called on Chatillon and looked at him for
+some time with an expression of grief and mystery.
+
+“My do you look like that?” asked the Emiral in an uneasy tone.
+
+Vulcanmould said to him sadly:
+
+“Old brother in arms, all is discovered. For the past half-hour the
+government knows everything.”
+
+At these words Chatillon sank down overwhelmed.
+
+Vulcanmould continued:
+
+“You may be arrested any moment. I advise you to make off.”
+
+And drawing out his watch:
+
+“Not a minute to lose.”
+
+“Have I time to call on the Viscountess Olive?”
+
+“It would be mad,” said Vulcanmould, handing him a passport and a pair
+of blue spectacles, and telling him to have courage.
+
+“I will,” said Chatillon.
+
+“Good-bye! old chum.”
+
+“Good-bye and thanks! You have saved my life.”
+
+“That is the least I could do.”
+
+A quarter of an hour later the brave Emiral had left the city of Alca.
+
+He embarked at night on an old cutter at La Cirque and set sail
+for Porpoisia. But eight miles from the coast he was captured by a
+despatch-boat which was sailing without lights and which was under, the
+flag of the Queen of the Black Islands. That Queen had for a long time
+nourished a fatal passion for Chatillon.
+
+
+
+
+VII. CONCLUSION
+
+Nunc est bibendum. Delivered from its fears and pleased at having
+escaped from so great a danger, the government resolved to celebrate
+the anniversary of the Penguin regeneration and the establishment of the
+Republic by holding a general holiday.
+
+President Formose, the Ministers, and the members of the Chamber and of
+the Senate were present at the ceremony.
+
+The Generalissimo of the Penguin army was present in uniform. He was
+cheered.
+
+Preceded by the black flag of misery and the red flag of revolt,
+deputations of workmen walked in the procession, their aspect one of
+grim protection.
+
+President, Ministers, Deputies, officials, heads of the magistracy and
+of the army, each, in their own names and in the name of the sovereign
+people, renewed the ancient oath to live in freedom or to die. It was
+an alternative upon which they were resolutely determined. But they
+preferred to live in freedom. There were games, speeches, and songs.
+
+After the departure of the representatives of the State the crowd of
+citizens separated slowly and peaceably, shouting out, “Hurrah for the
+Republic!” “Hurrah for liberty!” “Down with the shaven pates!”
+
+The newspapers mentioned only one regrettable incident that happened on
+that wonderful day. Prince des Boscenos was quietly smoking a cigar
+in the Queen’s Meadow when the State procession passed by. The prince
+approached the Minister’s carriage and said in a loud voice: “Death to
+the Republicans!” He was immediately apprehended by the police, to whom
+he offered a most desperate resistance. He knocked them down in crowds,
+but he was conquered by numbers, and, bruised, scratched, swollen, and
+unrecognisable even to the eyes of his wife, he was dragged through the
+joyous streets into an obscure prison.
+
+The magistrates carried on the case against Chatillon in a peculiar
+style. Letters were found at the Admiralty which revealed the complicity
+of the Reverend Father Agaric in the plot. Immediately public opinion
+was inflamed against the monks, and Parliament voted, one after the
+other, a dozen laws which restrained, diminished, limited, prescribed,
+suppressed, determined, and curtailed, their rights, immunities,
+exemptions, privileges, and benefits, and created many invalidating
+disqualifications against them.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric steadfastly endured the rigour of the laws
+which struck himself personally, as well as the terrible fall of the
+Emiral of which he was the chief cause. Far from yielding to evil
+fortune, he regarded it as but a bird of passage. He was planning new
+political designs more audacious than the first.
+
+When his projects were sufficiently ripe he went one day to the Wood of
+Conils. A thrush sang in a tree and a little hedgehog crossed the
+stony path in front of him with awkward steps. Agaric walked with great
+strides, muttering fragments of sentences to himself.
+
+When he reached the door of the laboratory in which, for so many
+years, the pious manufacturer bad distilled the golden liqueur of St.
+Orberosia, he found the place deserted and the door shut. Having walked
+around the building he saw in the backyard the venerable Cornemuse, who,
+with his habit pinned up, was climbing a ladder that leant against the
+wall.
+
+“Is that you, my dear friend?” said he to him. “What are you doing
+there?”
+
+“You can see for yourself,” answered the monk of Conils in a feeble
+voice, turning a sorrowful look Upon Agaric. “I am going into my house.”
+
+The red pupils of his eyes no longer imitated the triumph and brilliance
+of the ruby, they flashed mournful and troubled glances. His countenance
+had lost its happy fulness. His shining head was no longer pleasant
+to the sight; perspiration and inflamed blotches bad altered its
+inestimable perfection.
+
+“I don’t understand,” said Agaric.
+
+“It is easy enough to understand. You see the consequences of your plot.
+Although a multitude of laws are directed against me I have managed to
+elude the greater number of them. Some, however, have struck me. These
+vindictive men have closed my laboratories and my shops, and confiscated
+my bottles, my stills, and my retorts. They have put seals on my doors
+and now I am compelled to go in through the window. I am barely able to
+extract in secret and from time to time the juice of a few plants and
+that with an apparatus which the humblest labourer would despise.”
+
+“You suffer from the persecution,” said Agaric. “It strikes us all.”
+
+The monk of Conils passed his hand over his afflicted brow:
+
+“I told you so, Brother Agaric; I told you that your enterprise would
+turn against ourselves.”
+
+“Our defeat is only momentary,” replied Agaric eagerly. “It is due to
+purely accidental causes; it results from mere contingencies. Chatillon
+was a fool; he has drowned himself in his own ineptitude. Listen to
+me, Brother Cornemuse. We have not a moment to lose. We must free the
+Penguin people, we must deliver them from their tyrants, save them from
+themselves, restore the Dragon’s crest, reestablish the ancient State,
+the good State, for the honour of religion and the exaltation of the
+Catholic faith. Chatillon was a bad instrument; he broke in our hands.
+Let us take a better instrument to replace him. I have the man who will
+destroy this impious democracy. He is a civil official; his name is
+Gomoru. The Penguins worship him, He has already betrayed his party for
+a plate of rice. There’s the man we want!”
+
+At the beginning of this speech the monk of Conils had climbed into his
+window and pulled up the ladder.
+
+“I foresee,” answered he, with his nose through the sash, “that you will
+not stop until you have us all expelled from this pleasant, agreeable,
+and sweet land of Penguinia. Good night; God keep you!”
+
+Agaric, standing before the wall, entreated his dearest brother to
+listen to him for a moment:
+
+“Understand your own interest better, Cornemuse! Penguinia is ours. What
+do we need to conquer it? just one effort more . . . one more little
+sacrifice of money and . . .”
+
+But without listening further, the monk of Conils drew in his head and
+closed his window.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES.
+
+THE AFFAIR OF THE EIGHTY THOUSAND TRUSSES OF HAY
+
+O Father Zeus, only save thou the sons of the Acheans from the darkness,
+and make clear sky and vouchsafe sight to our eyes, and then, so it be
+but light, slay us, since such is thy good pleasure. (Iliad, xvii. 645
+et seq.)
+
+
+
+
+I. GENERAL GREATAUK, DUKE OF SKULL
+
+A short time after the flight of the Emiral, a middle-class Jew called
+Pyrot, desirous of associating with the aristocracy and wishing to serve
+his country, entered the Penguin army. The Minister of War, who at the
+time was Greatauk, Duke of Skull, could not endure him. He blamed him
+for his zeal, his hooked nose, his vanity, his fondness for study, his
+thick lips, and his exemplary conduct. Every time the author of any
+misdeed was looked for, Greatauk used to say:
+
+“It must be Pyrot!”
+
+One morning General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, informed Greatauk
+of a serious matter. Eighty thousand trusses of hay intended for the
+cavalry had disappeared and not a trace of them was to be found.
+
+Greatauk exclaimed at once:
+
+“It must be Pyrot who has stolen them!”
+
+He remained in thought for some time and said: “The more I think of
+it the more I am convinced that Pyrot has stolen those eighty thousand
+trusses of hay. And I know it by this: he stole them in order that he
+might sell them to our bitter enemies the Porpoises. What an infamous
+piece of treachery!
+
+“There is no doubt about it,” answered Panther; “it only remains to
+prove it.”
+
+The same day, as he passed by a cavalry barracks, Prince des Boscenos
+heard the troopers as they were sweeping out the yard, singing:
+
+     Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+     On en va faire des andouilles,
+     Des saucisses et du jambon
+     Pour le riveillon des pauy’ bougres.
+
+It seemed to him contrary to all discipline that soldiers should sing
+this domestic and revolutionary refrain which on days of riot had been
+uttered by the lips of jeering workmen. On this occasion he deplored the
+moral degeneration of the army, and thought with a bitter smile that his
+old comrade Greatauk, the head of this degenerate army, basely exposed
+him to the malice of an unpatriotic government. And he promised himself
+that he would make an improvement before long.
+
+“That scoundrel Greatauk,” said he to himself, “will, not remain long a
+Minister.”
+
+Prince des Boscenos was the most irreconcilable of the opponents of
+modern democracy, free thought, and the government which the Penguins had
+voluntarily given themselves. He had a vigorous and undisguised hatred
+for the Jews, and he worked in public and in private, night and day, for
+the restoration of the line of the Draconides. His ardent royalism was
+still further excited by the thought of his private affairs, which were
+in a bad way and were hourly growing worse. He had no hope of seeing an
+end to his pecuniary embarrassments until the heir of Draco the Great
+entered the city of Alca.
+
+When he returned to his house, the prince took out of his safe a bundle
+of old letters consisting of a private correspondence of the most secret
+nature, which he had obtained from a treacherous secretary. They proved
+that his old comrade Greatauk, the Duke of Skull, had been guilty of
+jobbery regarding the military stores and had received a present of no
+great value from a manufacturer called Maloury. The very smallness of
+this present deprived the Minister who had accepted it of all excuse.
+
+The prince re-read the letters with a bitter satisfaction, put them
+carefully back into his safe, and dashed to the Minister of War. He was
+a man of resolute character. On being told that the Minister could see
+no one he knocked down the ushers, swept aside the orderlies, trampled
+under foot the civil and military clerks, burst through the doors, and
+entered the room of the astonished Greatauk.
+
+“I will not say much,” said he to him, “but I will speak to the point.
+You are a confounded cad. I have asked you to put a flea in the ear of
+General Mouchin, the tool of those Republicans, and you would not do it.
+I have asked you to give a command to General des Clapiers, who works
+for the Dracophils, and who has obliged me personally, and you would not
+do it. I have asked you to dismiss General Tandem, the commander of Port
+Alca, who robbed me of fifty louis at cards, and who had me handcuffed
+when I was brought before the High Court as Emiral Chatillon’s
+accomplice. You would not do it. I asked you for the hay and bran
+stores. You would not give them. I asked you to send me on a secret
+mission to Porpoisia. You refused. And not satisfied with these repeated
+refusals you have designated me to your Government colleagues as a
+dangerous person, who ought to be watched, and it is owing to you that
+I have been shadowed by the police. You old traitor! I ask nothing more
+from you and I have but one word to say to you: Clear out; you have
+bothered us too long. Besides, we will force the vile Republic to
+replace you by one of our own party. You know that I am a man of my
+word. If in twenty-four hours you have not handed in your resignation I
+will publish the Maloury dossier in the newspapers.”
+
+But Greatauk calmly and serenely replied:
+
+“Be quiet, you fool. I am just having a Jew transported. I am handing
+over Pyrot to justice as guilty of having stolen eighty thousand trusses
+of hay.”
+
+Prince Boscenos, whose anger vanished like a dream, smiled.
+
+“Is that true?”
+
+“You will see.”
+
+“My congratulations, Greatauk. But as one always needs to take
+precautions with you I shall immediately publish the good news. People
+will read this evening about Pyrot’s arrest in every newspaper in
+Alca . . . .”
+
+And he went away muttering:
+
+“That Pyrot! I suspected he would come to a bad end.”
+
+A moment later General Panther appeared before Greatauk.
+
+“Sir,” said he, “I have just examined the business of the eighty
+thousand trusses of hay. There is no evidence against Pyrot.”
+
+“Let it be found,” answered Greatauk. “Justice requires it. Have Pyrot
+arrested at once.”
+
+
+
+
+II. PYROT
+
+All Penguinia heard with horror of Pyrot’s crime; at the same time
+there was a sort of satisfaction that this embezzlement combined with
+treachery and even bordering on sacrilege, had been committed by a Jew.
+In order to understand this feeling it is necessary to be acquainted
+with the state of public opinion regarding the Jews both great and
+small. As we have had occasion to say in this history, the universally
+detested and all powerful financial caste was composed of Christians and
+of Jews. The Jews who formed part of it and on whom the people poured
+all their hatred were the upper-class Jews. They possessed immense
+riches and, it was said, held more than a fifth part of the total
+property of Penguinia. Outside this formidable caste there was a
+multitude of Jews of a mediocre condition, who were not more loved than
+the others and who were feared much less. In every ordered State, wealth
+is a sacred thing: in democracies it is the only sacred thing. Now
+the Penguin State was democratic. Three or four financial companies
+exercised a more extensive, and above all, more effective and continuous
+power, than that of the Ministers of the Republic. The latter were
+puppets whom the companies ruled in secret, whom they compelled by
+intimidation or corruption to favour themselves at the expense of the
+State, and whom they ruined by calumnies in the press if they remained
+honest. In spite of the secrecy of the Exchequer, enough appeared to
+make the country indignant, but the middle-class Penguins had, from the
+greatest to the least of them, been brought up to hold money in great
+reverence, and as they all had property, either much or little, they
+were strongly impressed with the solidarity of capital and understood
+that a small fortune is not safe unless a big one is protected. For
+these reasons they conceived a religious respect for the Jews’ millions,
+and self-interest being stronger with them than aversion, they were as
+much afraid as they were of death to touch a single hair of one of the
+rich Jews whom they detested. Towards the poorer Jews they felt less
+ceremonious and when they saw any of them down they trampled on them.
+That is why the entire nation learnt with thorough satisfaction that the
+traitor was a Jew. They could take vengeance on all Israel in his person
+without any fear of compromising the public credit.
+
+That Pyrot had stolen the eighty thousand trusses of hay nobody
+hesitated for a moment to believe. No one doubted because the general
+ignorance in which everybody was concerning the affair did not allow of
+doubt, for doubt is a thing that demands motives. People do not doubt
+without reasons in the same way that people believe without reasons. The
+thing was not doubted because it was repeated everywhere and, with the
+public, to repeat is to prove. It was not doubted because people wished
+to believe Pyrot guilty and one believes what one wishes to believe.
+Finally, it was not doubted because the faculty of doubt is rare amongst
+men; very few minds carry in them its germs and these are not developed
+without cultivation. Doubt is singular, exquisite, philosophic, immoral,
+transcendent, monstrous, full of malignity, injurious to persons and
+to property, contrary to the good order of governments, and to the
+prosperity of empires, fatal to humanity, destructive of the gods, held
+in horror by heaven and earth. The mass of the Penguins were ignorant
+of doubt: it believed in Pyrot’s guilt and this conviction immediately
+became one of its chief national beliefs and an essential truth in its
+patriotic creed.
+
+Pyrot was tried secretly and condemned.
+
+General Panther immediately went to the Minister of War to tell him the
+result.
+
+“Luckily,” said he, “the judges were certain, for they had no proofs.”
+
+“Proofs,” muttered Greatauk, “Proofs, what do they prove? There is only
+one certain, irrefragable proof--the confession of the guilty person.
+Has Pyrot confessed?”
+
+“No, General.”
+
+“He will confess, he ought to. Panther, we must induce him; tell him it
+is to his interest. Promise him that, if he confesses, he will obtain
+favours, a reduction of his sentence, full pardon; promise him that if
+he confesses his innocence will be admitted, that he will be decorated.
+Appeal to his good feelings. Let him confess from patriotism, for the
+flag, for the sake of order, from respect for the hierarchy, at the
+special command of the Minister of War militarily. . . . But tell me,
+Panther, has he not confessed already? There are tacit confessions;
+silence is a confession.”
+
+“But, General, he is not silent; he keeps on squealing like a pig that
+he is innocent.”
+
+“Panther, the confessions of a guilty man sometimes result from the
+vehemence of his denials. To deny desperately is to confess. Pyrot has
+confessed; we must have witnesses of his confessions, justice requires
+them.”
+
+There was in Western Penguinia a seaport called La Cirque, formed of
+three small bays and formerly greatly frequented by ships, but now
+solitary and deserted. Gloomy lagoons stretched along its low coasts
+exhaling a pestilent odour, while fever hovered over its sleepy waters.
+Here, on the borders of the sea, there was built a high square tower,
+like the old Campanile at Venice, from the side of which, close to the
+summit hung an open cage which was fastened by a chain to a transverse
+beam. In the times of the Draconides the Inquisitors of Alca used to
+put heretical clergy into this cage. It had been empty for three hundred
+years, but now Pirot was imprisoned in it under the guard of sixty
+warders, who lived in the tower and did not lose sight of him night or
+day, spying on him for confessions that they might afterwards report
+to the Minister of War. For Greatauk, careful and prudent, desired
+confessions and still further confessions. Greatauk, who was looked
+upon as a fool, was in reality a man of great ability and full of rare
+foresight.
+
+In the mean time Pyrot, burnt by the sun, eaten by mosquitoes, soaked
+in the rain, hail and snow, frozen by the cold, tossed about terribly by
+the wind, beset by the sinister croaking of the ravens that perched upon
+his cage, kept writing down his innocence on pieces torn off his shirt
+with a tooth-pick dipped in blood. These rags were lost in the sea or
+fell into the hands of the gaolers. But Pyrot’s protests moved nobody
+because his confessions had been published.
+
+
+
+
+III. COUNT DE MAUBEC DE LA DENTDULYNX
+
+The morals of the Jews were not always pure; in most cases they were
+averse from none of the vices of Christian civilization, but they
+retained from the Patriarchal age a recognition of family, ties and
+an attachment to the interests of the tribe. Pyrot’s brothers,
+half-brothers, uncles, great-uncles, first, second, and third cousins,
+nephews and great-nephews, relations by blood and relations by marriage,
+and all who were related to him to the number of about seven hundred,
+were at first overwhelmed by the blow that had struck their relative,
+and they shut themselves up in their houses, covering themselves with
+ashes and blessing the hand that had chastised them. For forty days they
+kept a strict fast. Then they bathed themselves and resolved to search,
+without rest, at the cost of any toil and at the risk of eve danger,
+for the demonstration of an innocence which they did not doubt. And how
+could they have doubted? Pyrot’s innocence had been revealed to them in
+the same way that his guilt had been revealed to Christian Penguinia’s;
+for these things, being hidden, assume a mystic character and take on
+the authority of religious truths. The seven hundred Pyrotists set to
+work with as much zeal as prudence, and made the most thorough inquiries
+in secret. They were everywhere; they were seen nowhere. One would have
+said that, like the pilot of Ulysses, they wandered freely over the
+earth. They penetrated into the War Office and approached, under
+different disguises, the judges, the registrars, and the witnesses of
+the affair. Then Greatauk’s cleverness was seen. The witnesses knew
+nothing; the judges and registrars knew nothing. Emissaries reached
+even Pyrot and anxiously questioned him in his cage amid the prolonged
+moanings of the sea and the hoarse croaks of the ravens. It was in vain;
+the prisoner knew nothing. The seven hundred Pyrotists could not subvert
+the proofs of the accusation because they could not know what they were,
+and they could not know what they were because there were none. Pyrot’s
+guilt was indefeasible through its very nullity. And it was with a
+legitimate pride that Greatauk, expressing himself as a true artist,
+said one day to General Panther: “This case is a master-piece: it is
+made out of nothing.” The seven hundred Pyrotists despaired of ever
+clearing up this dark business, when suddenly they discovered, from
+a stolen letter, that the eighty thousand trusses of hay had never
+existed, that a most distinguished nobleman, Count de Maubec, had
+sold them to the State, that he had received the price but had never
+delivered them. Indeed seeing that he was descended from the richest
+landed proprietors of ancient Penguinia, the heir of the Maubecs of
+Dentdulynx, once the possessors of four duchies, sixty counties, and six
+hundred and twelve marquisates, baronies, and viscounties, he did not
+possess as much land as he could cover with his hand, and would not have
+been able to cut a single day’s mowing of forage off his own domains. As
+to his getting a single rush from a land-owner or a merchant, that would
+have been quite impossible, for everybody except the Ministers of State
+and the Government officials knew that it would be easier to get blood
+from a stone than a farthing from a Maubec.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists made a minute inquiry concerning the Count
+Maubec de la Dentdulynx’s financial resources, and they proved that that
+nobleman was chiefly supported by a house in which some generous ladies
+were ready to furnish all comers with the most lavish hospitality.
+They publicly proclaimed that he was guilty of the theft of the eighty
+thousand trusses of straw for which an innocent man had been condemned
+and was now imprisoned in the cage.
+
+Maubec belonged to an illustrious family which was allied to the
+Draconides. There is nothing that a democracy esteems more highly than
+noble birth. Maubec had also served in the Penguin army, and since the
+Penguins were all soldiers, they loved their army to idolatry. Maubec,
+on the field of battle, had received the Cross, which is a sign of
+honour among the Penguins and which they valued even more highly than
+the embraces of their wives. All Penguinia declared for Maubec, and the
+voice of the people which began to assume a threatening tone, demanded
+severe punishments for the seven hundred calumniating Pyrotists.
+
+Maubec was a nobleman; he challenged the seven hundred Pyrotists to
+combat with either sword, sabre, pistols, carabines, or sticks.
+
+“Vile dogs,” he wrote to them in a famous letter, “you have crucified
+my God and you want my life too; I warn you that I will not be such a
+duffer as He was and that I will cut off your fourteen hundred ears.
+Accept my boot on your seven hundred behinds.”
+
+The Chief of the Government at the time was a peasant called Robin
+Mielleux, a man pleasant to the rich and powerful, but hard towards the
+poor, a man of small courage and ignorant of his own interests. In a
+public declaration he guaranteed Maubec’s innocence and honour, and
+presented the seven hundred Pyrotists: to the criminal courts where they
+were condemned, as libellers, to imprisonment, to enormous fines, and to
+all the damages that were claimed by their innocent victim.
+
+It seemed as if Pyrot was destined to remain for ever shut in the cage
+on which the ravens perched. But all the Penguins being anxious to know
+and prove that this Jew was guilty, all the proofs brought forward were
+found not to be good, while some of them were also contradictory. The
+officers of the Staff showed zeal but lacked prudence. Whilst Greatauk
+kept an admirable silence, General Panther made inexhaustible speeches
+and every morning demonstrated in the newspapers that the condemned man
+was guilty. He would have done better, perhaps, if he had said nothing.
+The guilt was evident and what is evident cannot be demonstrated. So
+much reasoning disturbed people’s minds; their faith, though still
+alive, became less serene. The more proofs one gives a crowd the more
+they ask for.
+
+Nevertheless the danger of proving too much would not have been great if
+there had not been in Penguinia, as there are, indeed, everywhere, minds
+framed for free inquiry, capable of studying a difficult question, and
+inclined to philosophic doubt. They were few; they were not all inclined
+to speak, and the public was by no means inclined to listen to them.
+Still, they did not always meet with deaf ears. The great Jews, all the
+Israelite millionaires of Alca, when spoken to of Pyrot, said: “We do
+not know the man”; but they thought of saving him. They preserved the
+prudence to which their wealth inclined them and wished that others
+would be less timid. Their wish was to be gratified.
+
+
+
+
+IV. COLOMBAN
+
+Some weeks after the conviction of the seven hundred Pyrotists, a
+little, gruff, hairy, short-sighted man left his house one morning
+with a paste-pot, a ladder, and a bundle of posters and went about the
+streets pasting placards to the walls on which might be read in large
+letters: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty. He was not a bill-poster;
+his name was Colomban, and as the author of sixty volumes on Penguin
+sociology he was numbered among the most laborious and respected writers
+in Alca. Having given sufficient thought to the matter and no longer
+doubting Pyrot’s innocence, he proclaimed it in the manner which he
+thought would be most sensational. He met with no hindrance while
+posting his bills in the quiet streets, but when he came to the populous
+quarters, every time he mounted his ladder, inquisitive people crowded
+round him and, dumbfounded with surprise and indignation, threw at
+him threatening looks which he received with the calm that comes from
+courage and short-sightedness. Whilst caretakers and tradespeople tore
+down the bills he had posted, he kept on zealously placarding, carrying
+his tools and followed by little boys who, with their baskets under
+their arms or their satchels on their backs, were in no hurry to reach
+school. To the mute indignation against him, protests and murmurs were
+now added. But Colomban did not condescend to see or hear anything.
+As, at the entrance to the Rue St. Orberosia, he was posting one of his
+squares of paper bearing the words: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty,
+the riotous crowd showed signs of the most violent anger. They called
+after him, “Traitor, thief, rascal, scoundrel.” A woman opened a window
+and emptied a vase full of filth over his head, a cabby sent his hat
+flying from one end of the street to the other by a blow of his
+whip amid the cheers of the crowd who now felt themselves avenged. A
+butcher’s boy knocked Colomban with his paste-pot, his brush, and his
+posters, from the top of his ladder into the gutter, and the proud
+Penguins then felt the greatness of their country. Colomban stood up,
+covered with filth, lame, and with his elbow injured, but tranquil and
+resolute.
+
+“Low brutes,” he muttered, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+Then he went down on all-fours in the gutter to look for his glasses
+which he had lost in his fall. It was then seen that his coat was split
+from the collar to the tails and that his trousers were in rags. The
+rancour of the crowd grew stronger.
+
+On the other side of the street stretched the big St. Orberosian Stores.
+The patriots seized whatever they could lay their hands on from the shop
+front, and hurled at Colomban oranges, lemons, pots of jam, pieces of
+chocolate, bottles of liqueurs, boxes of sardines, pots of foie gras,
+hams, fowls, flasks of oil, and bags of haricots. Covered with the
+debris of the food, bruised, tattered, lame, and blind, he took to
+flight, followed by the shop-boys, bakers, loafers, citizens, and
+hooligans whose number increased each moment and who kept shouting:
+“Duck him! Death to the traitor! Duck him!” This torrent of vulgar
+humanity swept along the streets and rushed into the Rue St. Mael.
+The police did their duty. From all the adjacent streets constables
+proceeded and, holding their scabbards with their left hands, they
+went at full speed in front of the pursuers. They were on the point of
+grabbing Colomban in their huge hands when he suddenly escaped them by
+falling through an open man-hole to the bottom of a sewer.
+
+He spent the night there in the darkness, sitting close by the dirty
+water amidst the fat and slimy rats. He thought of his task, and his
+swelling heart filled with courage and pity. And when the dawn threw
+a pale ray of light into the air-hole he got up and said, speaking to
+himself:
+
+“I see that the fight will be a stiff one.”
+
+Forthwith he composed a memorandum in which he clearly showed that
+Pyrot could not have stolen from the Ministry of War the eighty thousand
+trusses of hay which it had never received, for the reason that Maubec
+had never delivered them, though he had received the money. Colomban
+caused this statement to be distributed in the streets of Alca. The
+people refused to read it and tore it up in anger. The shop-keepers
+shook their fists at the distributers, who made off, chased by angry
+women armed with brooms. Feelings grew warm and the ferment lasted the
+whole day. In the evening bands of wild and ragged men went about
+the streets yelling: “Death to Colomban!” The patriots snatched whole
+bundles of the memorandum from the newsboys and burned them in the
+public squares, dancing wildly round these bon-fires with girls whose
+petticoats were tied up to their waists.
+
+Some of the more enthusiastic among them went and broke the windows of
+the house in which Colomban had lived in perfect tranquillity during his
+forty years of work.
+
+Parliament was roused and asked the Chief of the Government what
+measures he proposed to take in order to repel the odious attacks
+made by Colomban upon the honour of the National Arm and the safety
+of Penguinia. Robin Mielleux denounced Colomban’s impious audacity and
+proclaimed amid the cheers of the legislators that the man would be
+summoned before the Courts to answer for his infamous libel.
+
+The Minister of War was called to the tribune and appeared in it
+transfigured. He had no longer the air, as in former days, of one of the
+sacred geese of the Penguin citadels. Now, bristling, with outstretched
+neck and hooked beak, he seemed the symbolical vulture fastened to the
+livers of his country’s enemies.
+
+In the august silence of the assembly he pronounced these words only:
+
+“I swear that Pyrot is a rascal.”
+
+This speech of Greatauk was reported all over Penguinia and satisfied
+the public conscience.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Colomban bore with meekness and surprise the weight of the general
+reprobation. He could not go out without being stoned, so he did not
+go out. He remained in his study with a superb obstinacy, writing new
+memoranda in favour of the encaged innocent. In the mean time among
+the few readers that he found, some, about a dozen, were struck by his
+reasons and began to doubt Pyrot’s guilt. They broached the subject to
+their friends and endeavoured to spread the light that had arisen in
+their minds. One of them was a friend of Robin Mielleux and confided to
+him his perplexities, with the result that he was no longer received by
+that Minister. Another demanded explanations in an open letter to the
+Minister of War. A third published a terrible pamphlet. The latter,
+whose name was Kerdanic, was a formidable controversialist. The public
+was unmoved. It was said that these defenders of the traitor had been
+bribed by the rich Jews; they were stigmatized by the name of Pyrotists
+and the patriots swore to exterminate them. There were only a thousand
+or twelve hundred Pyrotists in the whole vast Republic, but it was
+believed that they were everywhere. People were afraid of finding
+them in the promenades, at meetings, at receptions, in fashionable
+drawing-rooms, at the dinner-table, even in the conjugal couch. One half
+of the population was suspected by the other half. The discord set all
+Alca on fire.
+
+In the mean time Father Agaric, who managed his big school for young
+nobles, followed events with anxious attention. The misfortunes of the
+Penguin Church had not disheartened him. He remained faithful to Prince
+Crucho and preserved the hope of restoring the heir of the Draconides
+to the Penguin throne. It appeared to him that the events that were
+happening or about to happen in the country, the state of mind of
+which they were at once the effect and the cause, and the troubles that
+necessarily resulted from them might--if they were directed, guided, and
+led by the profound wisdom of a monk--overthrow the Republic and incline
+the Penguins to restore Prince Crucho, from whose piety the faithful
+hoped for so much solace. Wearing his huge black hat, the brims of which
+looked like the wings of Night, he walked through the Wood of Conils
+towards the factory where his venerable friend, Father Cornemuse,
+distilled the hygienic St. Orberosian liqueur, The good monk’s industry,
+so cruelly affected in the time of Emiral Chatillon, was being restored
+from its ruins. One heard goods trains rumbling through the Wood and one
+saw in the sheds hundreds of orphans clothed in blue, packing bottles
+and nailing up cases.
+
+Agaric found the venerable Cornemuse standing before his stoves and
+surrounded by his retorts. The shining pupils of the old man’s eyes had
+again become as rubies, his skull shone with its former elaborate and
+careful polish.
+
+Agaric first congratulated the pious distiller on the restored activity
+of his laboratories and workshops.
+
+“Business is recovering. I thank God for it,” answered the old man of
+Conils. “Alas! it had fallen into a bad state, Brother Agaric. You raw
+the desolation of this establishment. I need say no more.”
+
+Agaric turned away his head.
+
+“The St. Orberosian liqueur,” continued Cornemuse, “is making fresh
+conquests. But none the less my industry remains uncertain and
+precarious. The laws of ruin and desolation that struck it have not been
+abrogated, they have only been suspended.”
+
+And the monk of Conils lifted his ruby eyes to heaven.
+
+Agaric put his hand on his shoulder.
+
+“What a sight, Cornemuse, does unhappy Penguinia present to us!
+Everywhere disobedience, independence, liberty! We seethe proud, the
+haughty, the men of revolt rising up. After having braved the Divine
+laws they now rear themselves against human laws, so true is it that in
+order to be a good citizen a man must be a good Christian. Colomban
+is trying to imitate Satan. Numerous criminals are following his fatal
+example. They want, in their rage, to put aside all checks, to throw off
+all yokes, to free themselves from the most sacred bonds, to escape from
+the most salutary restraints. They strike their country to make it obey
+them. But they will be overcome by the weight of public animadversion,
+vituperation, indignation, fury, execration, and abomination. That is
+the abyss to which they have been led by atheism, free thought, and the
+monstrous claim to judge for themselves and to form their own opinions.”
+
+“Doubtless, doubtless,” replied Father Cornemuse, shaking his head, “but
+I confess that the care of distilling these simples has prevented me
+from following public affairs. I only know that people are talking a
+great deal about a man called Pyrot. Some maintain that he is guilty,
+others affirm that he is innocent, but I do not clearly understand the
+motives that drive both parties to mix themselves up in a business that
+concerns neither of them.”
+
+The pious Agaric asked eagerly:
+
+“You do not doubt Pyrot’s guilt?”
+
+“I cannot doubt it, dear Agaric,” answered the monk of Conils. “That
+would be contrary to the laws of my country which we ought to respect as
+long as they are not opposed to the Divine laws. Pyrot is guilty, for
+he has been convicted. As to saying more for or against his guilt, that
+would be to erect my own authority against that of the judges, a thing
+which I will take good care not to do. Besides, it is useless, for Pyrot
+has been convicted. If he has not been convicted because he is guilty,
+he is guilty because he has been convicted; it comes to the same thing.
+I believe in his guilt as every good citizen ought to believe in it; and
+I will believe in it as long as the established jurisdiction will order
+me to believe in it, for it is not for a private person but for a
+judge to proclaim the innocence of a convicted person. Human justice
+is venerable even in the errors inherent in its fallible and limited
+nature. These errors are never irreparable; if the judges do not repair
+them on earth, God will repair them in Heaven. Besides I have great
+confidence in general Greatauk, who, though he certainly does not look
+it, seems to me to be an abler man than all those who are attacking
+him.”
+
+“Dearest Cornemuse,” cried the pious Agaric, “the Pyrot affair, if
+pushed to the point whither we can lead it by the help of God and the
+necessary funds, will produce the greatest benefits. It will lay bare
+the vices of this Anti-Christian Republic and will incline the Penguins
+to restore the throne of the Draconides and the prerogatives of the
+Church. But to do that it is necessary for the people to see the clergy
+in the front rank of its defenders. Let us march against the enemies of
+the army, against those who insult our heroes, and everybody will follow
+us.”
+
+“Everybody will be too many,” murmured the monk of Conils, shaking his
+head. “I see that the Penguins want to quarrel. If we mix ourselves up
+in their quarrel they will become reconciled at our expense and we shall
+have to pay the cost of the war. That is why, if you are guided by me,
+dear Agaric, you will not engage the Church in this adventure.”
+
+“You know my energy; you know my prudence. I will compromise nothing.
+. . . Dear Cornemuse, I only want from you the funds necessary for us to
+begin the campaign.”
+
+For a long time Cornemuse refused to bear the expenses of what he
+thought was a fatal enterprise. Agaric was in turn pathetic and
+terrible. At last, yielding to his prayers and threats, Cornemuse, with
+banging head and swinging arms, went to the austere cell that concealed
+his evangelical poverty. In the whitewashed wall under a branch of
+blessed box, there was fixed a safe. He opened it, and with a sigh took
+out a bundle of bills which, with hesitating hands, he gave to the pious
+Agaric.
+
+“Do not doubt it, dear Cornemuse,” said the latter, thrusting the papers
+into the pocket of his overcoat, “this Pyrot affair has been sent us by
+God for the glory and exaltation of the Church of Penguinia.”
+
+“I pray that you may be right!” sighed the monk of Conils.
+
+And, left alone in his laboratory, he gazed, through his exquisite eyes,
+with an ineffable sadness at his stoves and his retorts.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE SEVEN HUNDRED PYROTISTS
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists inspired the public with an increasing
+aversion. Every day two or three of them were beaten to death in the
+streets. One of them was publicly whipped, another thrown into the
+river, a third tarred and feathered and led through a laughing crowd, a
+fourth had his nose cut off by a captain of dragoons. They did not dare
+to show themselves at their clubs, at tennis, or at the races; they
+put on a disguise when they went to the Stock Exchange. In these
+circumstances the Prince des Boscenos thought it urgent to curb their
+audacity and repress their insolence. For this purpose he joined with
+Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd in
+founding a great anti-Pyrotist association to which citizens in hundreds
+of thousands, soldiers in companies, regiments, brigades, divisions, and
+army corps, towns, districts, and provinces, all gave their adhesion.
+
+About this time the Minister of War happening to visit one day his Chief
+of Staff, saw with surprise that the large room where General Panther
+worked, which was formerly quite bare, had now along each wall from
+floor to ceiling in sets of deep pigeon-holes, triple and quadruple rows
+of paper bundles of every as form and colour. These sudden and monstrous
+records had in a few days reached the dimensions of a pile of archives
+such as it takes centuries to accumulate.
+
+“What is this?” asked the astonished minister.
+
+“Proofs against Pyrot,” answered General Panther with patriotic
+satisfaction. “We had not got them when we convicted him, but we have
+plenty of them now.”
+
+The door was open, and Greatauk saw coming up the stair-case a long file
+of porters who were unloading heavy bales of papers in the hall, and he
+saw the lift slowly rising heavily loaded with paper packets.
+
+“What are those others?” said he.
+
+“They are fresh proofs against Pyrot that are now reaching us,” said
+Panther. “I have asked for them in every county of Penguinia, in every
+Staff Office and in every Court in Europe. I have ordered them in every
+town in America and in Australia, and in every factory in Africa, and I
+am expecting bales of them from Bremen and a ship-load from Melbourne.”
+ And Panther turned towards the Minister of War the tranquil and radiant
+look of a hero. However, Greatauk, his eye-glass in his eye, was looking
+at the formidable pile of papers with less satisfaction than uneasiness.
+
+“Very good,” said he, “very good! but I am afraid that this Pyrot
+business may lose its beautiful simplicity. It was limpid; like a
+rock-crystal its value lay in its transparency. You could have searched
+it in vain with a magnifying-glass for a straw, a bend, a blot, for the
+least fault. When it left my hands it was as pure as the light. Indeed
+it was the light. I give you a pearl and you make a mountain out of it.
+To tell you the truth I am afraid that by wishing to do too well you
+have done less well. Proofs! of course it is good to have proofs, but
+perhaps it is better to have none at all. I have already told you,
+Panther, there is only one irrefutable proof, the confession of the
+guilty person (or if the innocent what matter!). The Pyrot affair, as
+I arranged it, left no room for criticism; there was no spot where it
+could be touched. It defied assault. It was invulnerable because it was
+invisible. Now it gives an enormous handle for discussion. I advise
+you, Panther, to use your paper packets with great reserve. I should
+be particularly grateful if you would be more sparing of your
+communications to journalists. You speak well, but you say too much.
+Tell me, Panther, are there any forged documents among these?”
+
+“There are some adapted ones.”
+
+“That is what I meant. There are some adapted ones. So much the better.
+As proofs, forged documents, in general, are better than genuine ones,
+first of all because they have been expressly made to suit the needs
+of the case, to order and measure, and therefore they are fitting and
+exact. They are also preferable because they carry the mind into an
+ideal world and turn it aside from the reality which, alas! in this
+world is never without some alloy. . . . Nevertheless, I think I should
+have preferred, Panther, that we had no proofs at all.”
+
+The first act of the Anti-Pyrotist Association was to ask the Government
+immediately to summon the seven hundred Pyrotists and their accomplices
+before the High Court of Justice as guilty of high treason. Prince des
+Boscenos was charged to speak on behalf of the Association and presented
+himself before the Council which had assembled to hear him. He expressed
+a hope that the vigilance and firmness of the Government would rise to
+the height of the occasion. He shook hands with each of the ministers
+and as he passed General Greatauk he whispered in his ear:
+
+“Behave properly, you ruffian, or I will publish the Maloury dossier!”
+
+Some days later by a unanimous vote of both Houses, on a motion proposed
+by the Government, the Anti-Pyrotist Association was granted a charter
+recognising it as beneficial to the public interest.
+
+The Association immediately sent a deputation to Chitterlings Castle in
+Porpoisia, where Crucho was eating the bitter bread of exile, to assure
+the prince of the love and devotion of the Anti-Pyrotist members.
+
+However, the Pyrotists grew in numbers, and now counted ten thousand.
+They had their regular cafes on the boulevards. The patriots had theirs
+also, richer and bigger, and every evening glasses of beer, saucers,
+match-stands, jugs, chairs, and tables were hurled from one to the
+other. Mirrors were smashed to bits, and the police ended the struggles
+by impartially trampling the combatants of both parties under their
+hob-nailed shoes.
+
+On one of these glorious nights, as Prince des Boscenos was leaving
+a fashionable cafe in the company of some patriots, M. de La Trumelle
+pointed out to him a little, bearded man with glasses, hatless, and
+having only one sleeve to his coat, who was painfully dragging himself
+along the rubbish-strewn pavement.
+
+“Look!” said he, “there is Colomban!”
+
+The prince had gentleness as well as strength; he was exceedingly mild;
+but at the name of Colomban his blood boiled. He rushed at the little
+spectacled man, and knocked him down with one blow of his fist on the
+nose.
+
+M. de La Trumelle then perceived that, misled by an undeserved
+resemblance, he had mistaken for Colomban, M. Bazile, a retired lawyer,
+the secretary of the Anti-pyrotist Association, and an ardent and
+generous patriot. Prince des Boscenos was one of those antique souls who
+never bend. However, he knew how to recognise his faults.
+
+“M. Bazile,” said he, raising his hat, “if I have touched your face with
+my hand you will excuse me and you will understand me, you will approve
+of me, nay, you will compliment me, you will congratulate me and
+felicitate me, when you know the cause of that act. I took you for
+Colomban.”
+
+M. Bazile, wiping his bleeding nostrils with his handkerchief and
+displaying an elbow laid bare by the absence of his sleeve:
+
+“No, sir,” answered he drily, “I shall not felicitate you, I shall not
+congratulate you, I shall not compliment you, for your action was, at
+the very least, superfluous; it was, I will even say, supererogatory.
+Already this evening I have been three times mistaken for Colomban and
+received a sufficient amount of the treatment he deserves. The patriots
+have knocked in my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion
+that that was enough.”
+
+Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists appeared,
+and misled in their turn by that insidious resemblance, they believed
+that the patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des
+Boscenos and his companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and
+left them for dead. Then seizing Bazile they carried him in triumph, and
+in spite of his protests, along the boulevards, amid cries of: “Hurrah
+for Colomban! Hurrah for Pyrot!” At last the police, who had been sent
+after them, attacked and defeated them and dragged them ignominiously to
+the station, where Bazile, under the name of Colomban, was trampled on
+by an innumerable quantity of thick, hob-nailed shoes.
+
+
+
+
+VII. BIDAULT-COQUILLE AND MANIFLORE, THE SOCIALISTS
+
+Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine
+Bidault-Coquille, poorest and happiest of astronomers, installed in
+an old steam-engine of the time of the Draconides, was observing the
+heavens through a bad telescope, and photographing the paths of the
+meteors upon some damaged photographic plates. His genius corrected the
+errors of his instruments and his love of science triumphed over the
+worthlessness of his apparatus. With an inextinguishable ardour he
+observed aerolites, meteors, and fire-balls, and all the glowing ruins
+and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial atmosphere with
+prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he received the
+indifference of the public, the ingratitude of the State and the blame
+of the learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew
+not what occurred upon the surface of the earth. He never read the
+newspapers, and when he walked through the town his mind was occupied
+with the November asteroids, and more than once he found himself at the
+bottom of a pond in one of the public parks or beneath the wheels of a
+motor omnibus.
+
+Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and others. This
+was shown by his cold politeness as well as by a very thin black frock
+coat and a tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once
+emaciated and sublime. He took his meals in a little restaurant from
+which all customers less intellectual than himself had fled, and
+thenceforth his napkin bound by its wooden ring rested alone in the
+abandoned rack.
+
+In this cook-shop his eyes fell one evening upon Colomban’s memorandum
+in favour of Pyrot. He read it as he was cracking some bad nuts and
+suddenly, exalted with astonishment, admiration, horror, and pity, he
+forgot all about falling meteors and shooting stars and saw nothing but
+the innocent man hanging in his cage exposed to the winds of heaven and
+the ravens perching upon it.
+
+That image did not leave him. For a week he had been obsessed by the
+innocent convict, when, as he was leaving his cook-shop, he saw a crowd
+of citizens entering a public-house in which a public meeting was going
+on. He went in. The meeting was disorderly; they were yelling, abusing
+one another and knocking one another down in the smoke-laden hall. The
+Pyrotists and the Anti-Pyrotists spoke in turn and were alternately
+cheered and hissed at. An obscure and confused enthusiasm moved the
+audience. With the audacity of a timid and retired man Bidault-Coquille
+leaped upon the platform and spoke for three-quarters of an hour. He
+spoke very quickly, without order, but with vehemence, and with all the
+conviction of a mathematical mystic. He was cheered. When he got down
+from the platform a big woman of uncertain age, dressed in red, and
+wearing an immense hat trimmed with heroic feathers, throwing herself
+into his arms, embraced him, and said to him:
+
+“You are splendid!”
+
+He thought in his simplicity that there was some truth in the statement.
+
+She declared to him that henceforth she would live but for Pyrot’s
+defence and Colomban’s glory. He thought her sublime and beautiful. She
+was Maniflore, a poor old courtesan, now forgotten and discarded, who
+had suddenly become a vehement politician.
+
+She never left him. They spent glorious hours together in doss-houses
+and in lodgings beautified by their love, in newspaper offices, in
+meeting-halls and in lecture-halls. As he was an idealist, he persisted
+in thinking her beautiful, although she gave him abundant opportunity of
+seeing that she had preserved no charm of any kind. From her past beauty
+she only retained a confidence in her capacity for pleasing and a lofty
+assurance in demanding homage. Still, it must be admitted that this
+Pyrot affair, so fruitful in prodigies, invested Maniflore with a sort
+of civic majesty, and transformed her, at public meetings, into an
+august symbol of justice and truth.
+
+Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore did not kindle the least spark of irony
+or amusement in a single Anti-Pyrotist, a single defender of Greatauk,
+or a single supporter of the army. The gods, in their anger, had refused
+to those men the precious gift of humour. They gravely accused the
+courtesan and the astronomer of being spies, of treachery, and of
+plotting against their country. Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore grew
+visibly greater beneath insult, abuse, and calumny.
+
+For long months Penguinia had been divided into two camps and, though at
+first sight it may appear strange, hitherto the socialists had taken
+no part in the contest. Their groups comprised almost all the manual
+workers in the country, necessarily scattered, confused, broken up, and
+divided, but formidable. The Pyrot affair threw the group leaders into a
+singular embarrassment. They did not wish to place themselves either on
+the side of the financiers or on the side of the army. They regarded
+the Jews, both great and small, as their uncompromising opponents. Their
+principles were not at stake, nor were their interests concerned in the
+affair. Still the greater number felt how difficult it was growing for
+them to remain aloof from struggles in which all Penguinia was engaged.
+
+Their leaders called a sitting of their federation at the Rue de la
+Queue-du-diable-St. Mael, to take into consideration the conduct they
+ought to adopt in the present circumstances and in future eventualities.
+
+Comrade Phoenix was the first to speak.
+
+“A crime,” said he, “the most odious and cowardly of crimes, a judicial
+crime, has been committed. Military judges, coerced or misled by their
+superior officers, have condemned an innocent man to an infamous and
+cruel punishment. Let us not say that the victim is not one of our own
+party, that he belongs to a caste which was, and always will be, our
+enemy. Our party is the party of social justice; it can look upon no
+iniquity with indifference.
+
+“It would be a shame for us if we left it to Kerdanic, a radical,
+to Colomban, a member of the middle classes, and to a few moderate
+Republicans, alone to proceed against the crimes of the army. If
+the victim is not one of us, his executioners are our brothers’
+executioners, and before Greatauk struck down this soldier he shot our
+comrades who were on strike.
+
+“Comrades, by an intellectual, moral and material effort you must rescue
+Pyrot from his torment, and in performing this generous act you are
+not turning aside from the liberating and revolutionary task you have
+undertaken, for Pyrot his become the symbol of the oppressed and of all
+the social iniquities that now exist; by destroying one you make all the
+others tremble.”
+
+When Phoenix ended, comrade Sapor spoke in these terms:
+
+“You are advised to abandon your task in order to do something with
+which you have no concern. Why throw yourselves into a conflict
+where, on whatever side you turn, you will find none but your natural,
+uncompromising, even necessary opponents? Are the financiers to be less
+hated by us than the army? What inept and criminal generosity is it that
+hurries you to save those seven hundred Pyrotists whom you will always
+find confronting you in the social war?
+
+“It is proposed that you act the part of the police for your enemies,
+and that you are to re-establish for them the order which their own
+crimes have disturbed. Magnanimity pushed to this degree changes its
+name.
+
+“Comrades, there is a point at which infamy becomes fatal to a society.
+Penguin society is being strangled by its infamy, and you are requested
+to save it, to give it air that it can breathe. This is simply turning
+you into ridicule.
+
+“Leave is to smother itself and let us gaze at its last convulsions with
+joyful contempt, only regretting that it has so entirely corrupted the
+soil on which it has been built that we shall find nothing but poisoned
+mud on which to lay the foundations of a new society.”
+
+When Sapor had ended his speech comrade Lapersonne pronounced these few
+words:
+
+“Phoenix calls us to Pyrot’s help for the reason that Pyrot is innocent.
+It seems to me that that is a very bad reason. If Pyrot is innocent he
+has behaved like a good soldier and has always conscientiously worked
+at his trade, which principally consists in shooting the people. That is
+not a motive to make the people brave all dangers in his defence. When
+it is demonstrated to me that Pyrot is guilty and that he stole the army
+hay, I shall be on his side.”
+
+Comrade Larrivee afterwards spoke.
+
+“I am not of my friend, Phoenix’s opinion but I am not with my friend
+Sapor either. I do not believe that the party is bound to embrace a
+cause as soon as we are told that that cause is just. That, I am afraid,
+is a grievous abuse of words and a dangerous equivocation. For social
+justice is not revolutionary justice. They are both in perpetual
+antagonism: to serve the one is to oppose the other. As for me, my
+choice is made. I am for revolutionary justice as against social
+justice. Still, in the present case I am against abstention. I say that
+when a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we should be fools not
+to profit by it.
+
+“How? We are given an opportunity of striking terrible, perhaps
+fatal, blows against militarism. And am I to fold my arms? I tell you,
+comrades, I am not a fakir, I have never been a fakir, and if there are
+fakirs here let them not count on me. To sit in meditation is a policy
+without results and one which I shall never adopt.
+
+“A party like ours ought to be continually asserting itself. It ought to
+prove its existence by continual action. We will intervene in the Pyrot
+affair but we will intervene in it in a revolutionary manner; we
+will adopt violent action. . . . Perhaps you think that violence is
+old-fashioned and superannuated, to be scrapped along with diligences,
+hand-presses and aerial telegraphy. You are mistaken. To-day as
+yesterday nothing is obtained except by violence; it is the one
+efficient instrument. The only thing necessary is to know how to use it.
+You ask what will our action be? I will tell you: it will be to stir up
+the governing classes against one another, to put the army in conflict
+with the capitalists, the government with the magistracy, the nobility
+and clergy with the Jews, and if possible to drive them all to destroy
+one another. To do this would be to carry on an agitation which would
+weaken government in the same way that fever wears out the sick.
+
+“The Pyrot affair, little as we know how to turn it to advantage,
+will put forward by ten years the growth of the Social party and the
+emancipation of the proletariat, by disarmament, the general strike, and
+revolution.”
+
+The leaders of the party having each expressed a different opinion, the
+discussion was continued, not without vivacity. The orators, as always
+happens in such a case, reproduced the arguments they had already
+brought forward, though with less order and moderation than before. The
+dispute was prolonged and none changed his opinion. These opinions, in
+the final analysis, were reduced to two: that of Sapor and Lapersonne
+who advised abstention, and that of Phoenix and Larrivee, who wanted
+intervention. Even these two contrary opinions were united in a common
+hatred of the heads of the army and of their justice, and in a common
+belief in Pyrot’s innocence. So that public opinion was hardly mistaken
+in regarding all the Socialist leaders as pernicious Anti-Pyrotists.
+
+As for the vast masses in whose name they spoke and whom they
+represented as far as speech can express the impossible--as for the
+proletarians whose thought is difficult to know and who do not know it
+themselves, it seemed that the Pyrot affair did not interest them. It
+was too literary for them, it was in too classical a style, and had an
+upper-middle-class and high-finance tone about it that did not please
+them much.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. THE COLOMBAN TRIAL
+
+When the Colomban trial began, the Pyrotists were not many more than
+thirty thousand, but they were every where and might be found even among
+the priests and millionaires. What injured them most was the sympathy of
+the rich Jews. On the other hand they derived valuable advantages from
+their feeble number. In the first place there were among them fewer
+fools than among their opponents, who were over-burdened with them.
+Comprising but a feeble minority, they co-operated easily, acted
+with harmony, and had no temptation to divide and thus counteract one
+another’s efforts. Each of them felt the necessity of doing the best
+possible and was the more careful of his conduct as he found himself
+more in the public eye. Finally, they had every reason to hope that they
+would gain fresh adherents, while their opponents, having had everybody
+with them at the beginning, could only decrease.
+
+Summoned before the judges at a public sitting, Colomban immediately
+perceived that his judges were not anxious to discover the truth. As
+soon as he opened his mouth the President ordered him to be silent in
+the superior interests of the State. For the same reason, which is the
+supreme reason, the witnesses for the defence were not heard. General
+Panther, the Chief of the Staff, appeared in the witness-box, in full
+uniform and decorated with all his orders. He deposed as follows:
+
+“The infamous Colomban states that we have no proofs against Pyrot. He
+lies; we have them. I have in my archives seven hundred and thirty-two
+square yards of them which at five hundred pounds each make three
+hundred and sixty-six thousand pounds.”
+
+That superior officer afterwards gave, with elegance and ease, a summary
+of those proofs.
+
+“They are of all colours and all shades,” said he in substance, “they
+are of every form--pot, crown, sovereign, grape, dove-cot, grand eagle,
+etc. The smallest is less than the hundredth part of a square inch, the
+largest measures seventy yards long by ninety yards broad.”
+
+At this revelation the audience shuddered with horror.
+
+Greatauk came to give evidence in his turn. Simpler, and perhaps
+greater, he wore a grey tunic and held his hands joined behind his back.
+
+“I leave,” said he calmly and in a slightly raised voice, “I leave to M.
+Colomban the responsibility for an act that has brought our country
+to the brink of ruin. The Pyrot affair is secret; it ought to remain
+secret. If it were divulged the cruelest ills, wars, pillages,
+depredations, fires, massacres, and epidemics would immediately burst
+upon Penguinia. I should consider myself guilty of high treason if I
+uttered another word.”
+
+Some persons known for their political experience, among others M.
+Bigourd, considered the evidence of the Minister of War as abler and of
+greater weight than that of his Chief of Staff.
+
+The evidence of Colonel de Boisjoli made a great impression.
+
+“One evening at the Ministry of War,” said that officer, “the attache of
+a neighbouring Power told me that while visiting his sovereign’s stables
+he had once admired some soft and fragrant hay, of a pretty green
+colour, the finest hay he had ever seen! ‘Where did it come from?’ I
+asked him. He did not answer, but there seemed to me no doubt about its
+origin. It was the hay Pyrot had stolen. Those qualities of verdure,
+softness, and aroma, are those of our national hay. The forage of the
+neighbouring Power is grey and brittle; it sounds under the fork and
+smells of dust. One can draw one own conclusions.”
+
+Lieutenant-Colonel Hastaing said in the witness-box, amid hisses, that
+he did not believe Pyrot guilty. He was immediately seized by the police
+and thrown into the bottom of a dungeon where, amid vipers, toads, and
+broken glass, he remained insensible both to promises and threats.
+
+The usher called:
+
+“Count Pierre Maubec de la Dentdulynx.”
+
+There was deep silence, and a stately but ill-dressed nobleman, whose
+moustaches pointed to the skies and whose dark eyes shot forth flashing
+glances, was seen advancing toward the witness-box.
+
+He approached Colomban and casting upon him a look of ineffable disdain:
+
+“My evidence,” said he, “here it is: you excrement!”
+
+At these words the entire hall burst into enthusiastic applause and
+jumped up, moved by one of those transports that stir men’s hearts and
+rouse them to extraordinary actions. Without another word Count Maubec
+de la Dentdulynx withdrew.
+
+All those present left the Court and formed a procession behind him.
+Prostrate at his feet, Princess des Boscenos held his legs in a close
+embrace, but he went on, stern and impassive, beneath a shower of
+handkerchiefs and flowers. Viscountess Olive, clinging to his neck,
+could not be removed, and the calm hero bore her along with him,
+floating on his breast like a light scarf.
+
+When the court resumed its sitting, which it had been compelled to
+suspend, the President called the experts.
+
+Vermillard, the famous expert in handwriting, gave the results of his
+researches.
+
+“Having carefully studied,” said he, “the papers found in Pyrot’s house,
+in particular his account book and his laundry books, I noticed that,
+though apparently not out of the common, they formed an impenetrable
+cryptogram, the key to which, however, I discovered. The traitor’s
+infamy is to be seen in every line. In this system of writing the
+words ‘Three glasses of beer and twenty francs for Adele’ mean ‘I have
+delivered thirty thousand trusses of hay to a neighbouring Power! From
+these documents I have even been able to establish the composition of
+the hay delivered by this officer. The words waistcoat, drawers, pocket
+handkerchief, collars, drink, tobacco, cigars, mean clover, meadowgrass,
+lucern, burnet, oats, rye-grass, vernal-grass, and common cat’s tail
+grass. And these are precisely the constituents of the hay furnished
+by Count Maubec to the Penguin cavalry. In this way Pyrot mentioned
+his crimes in a language that he believed would always remain
+indecipherable. One is confounded by so much astuteness and so great a
+want of conscience.”
+
+Colomban, pronounced guilty without any extenuating circumstances,
+was condemned to the severest penalty. The judges immediately signed a
+warrant consuming him to solitary confinement.
+
+In the Place du Palais on the sides of a river whose banks had during
+the course of twelve centuries seen so great a history, fifty thousand
+persons were tumultuously awaiting the result of the trial. Here were
+the heads of the Anti-Pyrotist Association, among whom might be seen
+Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, Viscount Olive, and M. de La Trumelle;
+here crowded the Reverend Father Agaric and the teachers of St. Mael
+College with their pupils; here the monk Douillard and General Caraguel,
+embracing each other, formed a sublime group. The market women and
+laundry women with spits, shovels, tongs, beetles, and kettles full of
+water might be seen running across the Pont-Vieux. On the steps in front
+of the bronze gates were assembled all the defenders of Pyrot in Alca,
+professors, publicists, workmen, some conservatives, others Radicals or
+Revolutionaries, and by their negligent dress and fierce aspect could
+be recognised comrades Phoenix, Larrivee, Lapersonne, Dagobert, and
+Varambille. Squeezed in his funereal frock-coat and wearing his hat of
+ceremony, Bidault-Coquille invoked the sentimental mathematics on
+behalf of Colomban and Colonel Hastaing. Maniflore shone smiling and
+resplendent on the topmost step, anxious, like Leaena, to deserve
+a glorious monument, or to be given, like Epicharis, the praises of
+history.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists disguised as lemonade sellers,
+utter-merchants, collectors of odds and ends, or anti-Pyrotists,
+wandered round the vast building.
+
+When Colomban appeared, so great an uproar burst forth that, struck by
+the commotion of air and water, birds fell from the trees and fishes
+floated on the surface of the stream.
+
+On all sides there were yells:
+
+“Duck Colomban, duck him, duck him!”
+
+There were some cries of “Justice and truth!” and a voice was even heard
+shouting:
+
+“Down with the Army!”
+
+This was the signal for a terrible struggle. The combatants fell in
+thousands, and their bodies formed howling and moving mounds on top of
+which fresh champions gripped each other by the throats. Women, eager,
+pale, and dishevelled, with clenched teeth and frantic nails, rushed
+on the man, in transports that, in the brilliant light of the public
+square, gave to their faces expressions unsurpassed even in the shade
+of curtains and in the hollows of pillows. They were going to seize
+Colomban, to bite him, to strangle, dismember and rend him, when
+Maniflore, tall and dignified in her red tunic, stood forth, serene
+and terrible, confronting these furies who recoiled from before her in
+terror. Colomban seemed to be saved; his partisans succeeded in clearing
+a passage for him through the Place du Palais and in putting him into a
+cab stationed at the corner of the Pont-Vieux. The horse was already in
+full trot when Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, and M. de La Trumelle
+knocked the driver off his seat. Then, making the animal back and
+pushing the spokes of the wheels, they ran the vehicle on to the parapet
+of the bridge, whence they overturned it into the river amid the cheers
+of the delirious crowd. With a resounding splash a jet of water rose
+upwards, and then nothing but a slight eddy was to be seen on the
+surface of the stream.
+
+Almost immediately comrades Dagobert and Varambille, with the help of
+the seven hundred disguised Pyrotists, sent Prince des Boscenos head
+foremost into a river-laundry in which he was lamentably swallowed up.
+
+Serene night descended over the Place du Palais and shed silence and
+peace upon the frightful ruins with which it was strewed. In the mean
+time, Colomban, three thousand yards down the stream, cowering beside
+a lame old horse on a bridge, was meditating on the ignorance and
+injustice of crowds.
+
+“The business,” said he to himself, “is even more troublesome than I
+believed. I foresee fresh difficulties.”
+
+He got up and approached the unhappy animal.
+
+“What have you, poor friend, done to them?” said he. “It is on my
+account they have used you so cruelly.”
+
+He embraced the unfortunate beast and kissed the white star on his
+forehead. Then he took him by the bridle and led him, both of them
+limping, trough the sleeping city to his house, where sleep soon allowed
+them to forget mankind.
+
+
+
+
+IX. FATHER DOUILLARD
+
+In their infinite gentleness and at the suggestion of the common father
+of the faithful, the bishops, canons, vicars, curates, abbots, and
+friars of Penguinia resolved to hold a solemn service in the cathedral
+of Alca, and to pray that Divine mercy would deign to put an end to the
+troubles that distracted one of the noblest countries in Christendom,
+and grant to repentant Penguinia pardon for its crimes against God and
+the ministers of religion.
+
+The ceremony took place on the fifteenth of June. General Caraguel,
+surrounded by his staff, occupied the churchwarden’s pew. The
+congregation was numerous and brilliant. According to M. Bigourd’s
+expression it was both crowded and select. In the front rank was to be
+seen M. de la Bertheoseille, Chamberlain to his Highness Prince Crucho.
+Near the pulpit, which was to be ascended by the Reverend Father
+Douillard, of the Order of St. Francis, were gathered, in an attitude of
+attention with their hands crossed upon their wands of office, the great
+dignitaries of the Anti-Pyrotist association, Viscount Olive, M. de
+La Trumelle, Count Clena, the Duke d’Ampoule, and Prince des Boscenos.
+Father Agaric was in the apse with the teachers and pupils of St. Mael
+College. The right-hand transept and aisle were reserved for officers
+and soldiers in uniform, this side being thought the more honourable,
+since the Lord leaned his head to the right when he died on the
+Cross. The ladies of the aristocracy, and among them Countess Clena,
+Viscountess Olive, and Princess des Boscenos, occupied reserved seats.
+In the immense building and in the square outside were gathered twenty
+thousand clergy of all sorts, as well as thirty thousand of the laity.
+
+After the expiatory and propitiatory ceremony the Reverend Father
+Douillard ascended the pulpit. The sermon had at first been entrusted to
+the Reverend Father Agaric, but, in spite of his merits, he was thought
+unequal to the occasion in zeal and doctrine, and the eloquent Capuchin
+friar, who for six months had gone through the barracks preaching
+against the enemies of God and authority, had been chosen in his place.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, taking as his text, “He hath put down the
+mighty from their seat,” established that all temporal power has God as
+its principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when it
+turns aside from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from
+the end to which He has directed it.
+
+Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he drew a
+terrible picture of the evils that the country’s rulers had been unable
+either to prevent or to foresee.
+
+“The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my brethren,”
+ said he, “is only too well known to you. He is a monster whose destiny
+is providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from the
+Greek word, pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this
+etymology that a Jew was to set ablaze the country that had welcomed
+him.”
+
+He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the Church,
+and crying in its agony:
+
+“O woe! O glory! Those who have crucified my God are crucifying me!”
+
+At these words a prolonged shudder passed through the assembly.
+
+The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he described
+the proud and crime-stained Colomban, plunged into the stream, all
+the waters of which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the
+humiliations and all the perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the
+President of the Republic and his Prime Minister with them.
+
+“That Minister,” said he, “having been guilty of degrading cowardice
+in not exterminating the seven hundred Pyrotists with their allies and
+defenders, as Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered
+himself unworthy of exercising the power that God delegated to him,
+and every good citizen ought henceforth to insult his contemptible
+government. Heaven will look favourably on those who despise him.
+‘He hath put down the mighty from their seat.’ God will depose these
+pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their place strong men who
+will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you officers,
+non-commissioned officers, and soldiers who listen to me, I tell you
+General of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey
+God’s orders, if in His name you do not depose those now in authority,
+if you do not establish a religious and strong government in Penguinia,
+God will none the less destroy what He has condemned, He will none the
+less save His people. He will save them, but, if you are wanting, He
+will do so by means of a humble artisan or a simple corporal. Hasten!
+The hour will soon be past.”
+
+Excited by this ardent exhortation, the sixty thousand people present
+rose up trembling and shouting: “To arms! To arms! Death to the
+Pyrotists! Hurrah for Crucho!” and all of them, monks, women, soldiers,
+noblemen, citizens, and loafers, who were gathered beneath the
+superhuman arm uplifted in the pulpit, struck up the hymn, “Let us save
+Penguinia!” They rushed impetuously from the basilica and marched along
+the quays to the Chamber of Deputies.
+
+Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting his arms to
+heaven, murmured in broken accents:
+
+“Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well whither this
+will lead us.”
+
+The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace was
+repulsed. Vigorously charged by the police and Alcan guards, the
+assailants were already fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists,
+running from the slums and led by comrades Phoenix, Dagobert,
+Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw themselves upon them and completed
+their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and d’Ampoule were taken to the
+police station. Prince des Boscenos, after a valiant struggle, fell upon
+the bloody pavement with a fractured skull.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an innumerable
+crowd of paper-sellers and gutter-merchants, ran through the boulevards
+all night, carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the mirrors of
+the cafes and the glasses of the street lamps amid cries of “Down with
+Crucho! Hurrah for the Social Revolution!” The Anti-Pyrotists in their
+turn upset the newspaper kiosks and tore down the hoardings.
+
+These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and they
+were fit causes for grief to the municipal authorities, who desired to
+preserve the good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder
+for a man of heart was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from
+fear of blows, kept at an equal distance from the two camps, and who,
+although they allowed their selfishness and cowardice to be visible,
+claimed admiration for the generosity of their sentiments and the
+nobility of their souls. They rubbed their eyes with onions, gaped like
+whitings, blew violently into their handkerchiefs, and, bringing their
+voices out of the depths of their stomachs, groaned forth: “O Penguins,
+cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend your mother’s bosom!”
+ As if men could live in society without disputes and without quarrels,
+and as if civil discords were not the necessary conditions of national
+life and progress. They showed themselves hypocritical cowards by
+proposing a compromise between the just and the unjust, offending
+the just in his rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these
+creatures, the rich and powerful Machimel, a champion coward, rose upon
+the town like a colossus of grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at
+his feet and his sighs capsized the boats of the fishermen.
+
+During these stormy nights Bidault-Coquille at the top of his old
+steam-engine, under the serene sky, boasted in his heart, while the
+shooting stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He
+was fighting for justice. He loved and was loved with a sublime passion.
+Insult and calumny raised him to the clouds. A caricature of him in
+company with those of Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be
+seen in the newspaper kiosks. The Anti-Pyrotists proclaimed that he
+had received fifty thousand francs from the big Jewish financiers.
+The reporters of the militarist sheets held interviews regarding his
+scientific knowledge with official scholars, who declared he had no
+knowledge of the stars, disputed his most solid observations, denied
+his most certain discoveries, and condemned his most ingenious and most
+fruitful hypotheses. He exulted under these flattering blows of hatred
+and envy.
+
+He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of lights,
+without giving a thought to all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias,
+vain dreams, spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a
+great city contains.
+
+“It is in this enormous city,” said he to himself, “that the just and
+the unjust are joining battle.”
+
+And substituting a simple and magnificent poetry for the multiple and
+vulgar reality, he represented to himself the Pyrot affair as a struggle
+between good and bad angels. He awaited the eternal triumph of the
+Sons of Light and congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day
+confounding the Children of Night.
+
+
+
+
+X. MR. JUSTICE CHAUSSEPIED
+
+Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the bands of
+Friar Douillard and the partisans of Prince Crucho, the Republicans at
+last opened their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair.
+The deputies who had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the
+patriotic crowds became, not indeed more courageous, but altered their
+cowardice and blamed Robin Mielleux for disorders which their own
+compliance had encouraged, and the instigators of which they had several
+times slavishly congratulated. They reproached him for having imperilled
+the Republic by a weakness which was really theirs and a timidity
+which they themselves had imposed upon him. Some of them began to doubt
+whether it was not to their interest to believe in Pyrot’s innocence
+rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward they felt a bitter anguish
+at the thought that the unhappy man might have been wrongly convicted
+and that in his aerial cage he might be expiating another man’s crimes.
+“I cannot sleep on account of it!” was what several members of Minister
+Guillaumette’s majority used to say. But these were ambitious to replace
+their chief.
+
+These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the President of
+the Republic put in Robin Mielleux’s place, a patriarchal Republican
+with a flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the
+Penguins, understood nothing about the affair, but thought that too many
+monks were mixed up in it.
+
+General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his final
+advice to Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.
+
+“I go and you remain,” said he, as he shook hands with him. “The Pyrot
+affair is my daughter; I confide her to you, she is worthy of your love
+and your care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves
+the shade, is leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her
+modesty with gentleness. Too many indiscreet looks have already profaned
+her charms. . . . Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You
+have many, perhaps too many, in your possession. I see that there will
+be many tiresome interventions and much dangerous curiosity. If I were
+in your place I would tear up all those documents. Believe me, the best
+of proofs is none at all. That is the only one which nobody discusses.”
+
+Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this advice. The
+future was only too thoroughly to justify Greatauk’s perspicacity. La
+Trinite demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche,
+his Minister of War, refused them in the superior interests of the
+national defence, telling him that the documents under General Panther’s
+care formed the hugest mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied
+the case as well as he could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of
+the matter, suspected it of irregularity. Conformably to his rights
+and prerogatives he then ordered a fresh trial to be held. Immediately,
+Peniche, his Minister of War, accused him of insulting the army and
+betraying the country and flung his portfolio at his head. He was
+replaced by a second, who did the same. To him succeeded a third, who
+imitated these examples, and those after him to the number of seventy
+acted like their predecessors, until the venerable La Trinite groaned
+beneath the weight of bellicose portfolios. The seventy-first Minister
+of War, van Julep, retained office. Not that he was in disagreement with
+so many and such noble colleagues, but he had been commissioned by them
+generously to betray his Prime Minister, to cover him with shame and
+opprobrium, and to convert the new trial to the glory of Greatauk, the
+satisfaction of the Anti-Pyrotists, the profit of the monks, and the
+restoration of Prince Crucho.
+
+General van Julep, though endowed with high military virtues, was not
+intelligent enough to employ the subtle conduct and exquisite methods of
+Greatauk. He thought, like General Panther, that tangible proofs against
+Pyrot were necessary, that they could never ave too many of them, that
+they could never have even enough. He expressed these’ sentiments to his
+Chief of Staff, who was only too inclined to agree with them.
+
+“Panther,” said he, “we are at the moment when we need abundant and
+superabundant proofs.”
+
+“You have said enough, General,” answered Panther, “I will complete my
+piles of documents.”
+
+Six months later the proofs against Pyrot filled two storeys of the
+Ministry of War. The ceiling fell in beneath the weight of the bundles,
+and the avalanche of falling documents crushed two head clerks, fourteen
+second clerks, and sixty copying clerks, who were at work upon the
+ground floor arranging a change in the fashion of the cavalry gaiters.
+The walls of the huge edifice had to be propped. Passers-by saw
+with amazement enormous beams and monstrous stanchions which reared
+themselves obliquely against the noble front of the building, now
+tottering and disjointed, and blocked up the streets, stopped the
+carriages, and presented to the motor-omnibuses an obstacle against
+which they dashed with their loads of passengers.
+
+The judges who had condemned Pyrot were not, properly speaking, judges
+but soldiers. The judges who had condemned Colomban were real judges,
+but of inferior rank, wearing seedy black clothes like church vergers,
+unlucky wretches of judges, miserable judgelings. Above them were the
+superior judges who wore ermine robes over their black gowns. These,
+renowned for their knowledge and doctrine, formed a court whose terrible
+name expressed power. It was called the Court of Appeal (Cassation) so
+as to make it clear that it was the hammer suspended over the judgments
+and decrees of all other jurisdictions.
+
+One of these superior red Judges of the Supreme Court, called
+Chaussepied, led a modest and tranquil life in a suburb of Alca. His
+soul was pure, his heart honest, his spirit just. When he had finished
+studying his documents he used to play the violin and cultivate
+hyacinths. Every Sunday he dined with his neighbours the Mesdemoiselles
+Helbivore. His old age was cheerful and robust and his friends often
+praised the amenity of his character.
+
+For some months, however, he had been irritable and touchy, and when he
+opened a newspaper his broad and ruddy face would become covered with
+dolorous wrinkles and darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the cause
+of it. Justice Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could
+have committed so black a crime as to hand over eighty thousand trusses
+of military hay to a neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could still
+less conceive how a scoundrel should have found official defenders in
+Penguinia. The thought that there existed in his country a Pyrot,
+a Colonel Hastaing, a Colomban, a Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his
+hyacinths, his violin, his heaven, and his earth, all nature, and even
+his dinner with the Mesdemoiselles Helbivore!
+
+In the mean time the Pyrot case, having been presented to the Supreme
+Court by the Keeper of Seals, it fell to Chaussepied to examine it and
+cover its defects, in case any existed. Although as upright and honest
+as a man can be, and trained by long habit to exercise his magistracy
+without fear or favour, he expected to find in the documents he
+submitted to him proofs of certain guilt and obvious criminality. After
+lengthened difficulties and repeated refusals on the part of General
+Julep, Justice Chaussepied was allowed to examine the documents.
+Numbered and initialed they ran to the number of fourteen millions six
+hundred and twenty-six thousand three hundred and twelve. As he studied
+them the judge was at first surprised, then astonished, then stupefied,
+amazed, and, if I dare say so, flabbergasted. He found among the
+documents prospectuses of new fancy shops, newspapers, fashion-plates,
+paper bags, old business letters, exercise books, brown paper, green
+paper for rubbing parquet floors, playing cards, diagrams, six thousand
+copies of the “Key to Dreams,” but not a single document in which any
+mention was made of Pyrot.
+
+
+
+
+XI. CONCLUSION
+
+The appeal was allowed, and Pyrot was brought down from his cage. But
+the Anti-Pyrotists did not regard themselves as beaten. The military
+judges re-tried Pyrot. Greatauk, in this second affair, surpassed
+himself. He obtained a second conviction; he obtained it by declaring
+that the proofs communicated to the Supreme Court were worth nothing,
+and that great care had been taken to keep back the good ones, since
+they ought to remain secret. In the opinion of connoisseurs he had never
+shown so much address. On leaving the court, as he passed through the
+vestibule with a tranquil step, and his hands behind his back, amidst a
+crowd of sight-seers, a woman dressed in red and with her face covered
+by a black veil rushed at him, brandishing a kitchen knife.
+
+“Die, scoundrel!” she cried. It was Maniflore. Before those present
+could understand what was happening, the general seized her by the
+wrist, and with apparent gentleness, squeezed it so forcibly that the
+knife fell from her aching hand.
+
+Then he picked it up and handed it to Maniflore.
+
+“Madam,” said he with a bow, “you have dropped a household utensil.”
+
+He could not prevent the heroine from being taken to the police-station;
+but he had her immediately released and afterwards he employed all his
+influence to stop the prosecution.
+
+The second conviction of Pyrot was Greatauk’s last victory.
+
+Justice Chaussepied, who had formerly liked soldiers so much, and
+esteemed their justice so highly, being now enraged with the
+military judges, quashed their judgments as a monkey cracks nuts.
+He rehabilitated Pyrot a second time; he would, if necessary, have
+rehabilitated him five hundred times.
+
+Furious at having been cowards and at having allowed themselves to be
+deceived and made game of, the Republicans turned against the monks
+and clergy. The deputies passed laws of expulsion, separation, and
+spoliation against them. What Father Cornemuse had foreseen took place.
+That good monk was driven from the Wood of Conils. Treasury officers
+confiscated his retorts and his stills, and the liquidators divided
+amongst them his bottles of St. Oberosian liqueur. The pious distiller
+lost the annual income of three million five hundred thousand francs
+that his products procured for him. Father Agaric went into exile,
+abandoning his school into the hands of laymen, who soon allowed it to
+fall into decay. Separated from its foster-mother, the State, the Church
+of Penguinia withered like a plucked flower.
+
+The victorious defenders of the innocent man now abused each other and
+overwhelmed each other reciprocally with insults and calumnies. The
+vehement Kerdanic hurled himself upon Phoenix as if ready to devour
+him. The wealthy Jews and the seven hundred Pyrotists turned away with
+disdain from the socialist comrades whose aid they had humbly implored
+in the past.
+
+“We know you no longer,” said they. “To the devil with you and your
+social justice. Social justice is the defence of property.”
+
+Having been elected a Deputy and chosen to be the leader of the new
+majority, comrade Larrivee was appointed by the Chamber and public
+opinion to the Premiership. He showed himself an energetic defender
+of the military tribunals that had condemned Pyrot. When his former
+socialist comrades claimed a little more justice and liberty for the
+employes of the State as well as for manual workers, he opposed their
+proposals in an eloquent speech.
+
+“Liberty,” said he, “is not licence. Between order and disorder my
+choice is made: revolution is impotence. Progress has no more formidable
+enemy than violence. Gentlemen, those who, as I am, are anxious for
+reform, ought to apply themselves before everything else to cure this
+agitation which enfeebles government just as fever exhausts those who
+are ill. It is time to reassure honest people.”
+
+This speech was received with applause. The government of the Republic
+remained in subjection to the great financial companies, the army was
+exclusively devoted to the defence of capital, while the fleet was
+designed solely to procure fresh orders for the mine-owners. Since the
+rich refused to pay their just share of the taxes, the poor, as in the
+past, paid for them.
+
+In the mean time from the height of his old steamline, beneath the
+crowded stars of night, Bidault-Coquille gazed sadly at the sleeping
+city. Maniflore had left him. Consumed with a desire for fresh devotions
+and fresh sacrifices, she had gone in company with a young Bulgarian
+to bear justice and vengeance to Sofia. He did not regret her, having
+perceived after the Affair, that she was less beautiful in form and in
+thought than he had at first imagined. His impressions had been modified
+in the same direction concerning many other forms and many other
+thoughts. And what was cruelest of all to him, he regarded himself as
+not so great, not so splendid, as he had believed.
+
+And he reflected:
+
+“You considered yourself sublime when you had but candour and good-will.
+Of what were you proud, Bidault-Coquille? Of having been one of the
+first to know that Pyrot was innocent and Greatauk a scoundrel. But
+three-fourths of those who defended Greatauk against the attacks of the
+seven hundred Pyrotists knew that better than you. Of what then did you
+show yourself so proud? Of having dared to say what you thought? That
+is civic courage, and, like military courage, it is a mere result of
+imprudence. You have been imprudent. So far so good, but that is
+no reason for praising yourself beyond measure. Your imprudence was
+trifling; it exposed you to trifling perils; you did not risk your head
+by it. The Penguins have lost that cruel and sanguinary pride which
+formerly gave a tragic grandeur to their revolutions; it is the fatal
+result of the weakening of beliefs and character. Ought one to look
+upon oneself as a superior spirit for having shown a little more
+clear-sightedness than the vulgar? I am very much afraid, on the
+contrary, Bidault-Coquille, that you have given proof of a gross
+misunderstanding of the conditions of the moral and intellectual
+development of a people. You imagined that social injustices were
+threaded together like pearls and that it would be enough to pull off
+one in order to unfasten the whole necklace. That is a very ingenuous
+conception. You flattered yourself that at one stroke you were
+establishing justice in your own country and in the universe. You were
+a brave man, an honest idealist, though without much experimental
+philosophy. But go home to your own heart and you will recognise that
+you had in you a spice of malice and that our ingenuousness was not
+without cunning. You believed you were performing a fine moral action.
+You said to yourself: ‘Here am I, just and courageous once for all.
+I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the praise of
+historians.’ And now that you have lost your illusions, now that you
+know how hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the task must ever be
+begun afresh, you are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but
+go back to them with modesty, Bidault-Coquille!”
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES
+
+
+MADAME CERES
+
+“Only extreme things are tolerable.” Count Robert de Montesquiou.
+
+
+
+
+
+I. MADAME CLARENCE’S DRAWING-ROOM
+
+Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the Republic,
+loved to entertain. Every Thursday she collected together some friends
+of modest condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who
+went to see her, very different in age and rank, were all without
+money, and had all suffered much. There was a duchess who looked like
+a fortune-teller and a fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. Madame
+Clarence was pretty enough to maintain some old liaisons, but not to
+form new ones, and she generally inspired a quiet esteem. She had a very
+pretty daughter, who, since she had no dower, caused some alarm among
+the male guests; for the Penguins were as much afraid of portionless
+girls as they were of the devil himself. Eveline Clarence, noticing
+their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them their tea
+with an air of disdain. Moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties
+and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her discreet and
+retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those
+who took part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she
+would not understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might
+listen to everything.
+
+One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence’s drawing-room, the
+conversation turned upon love. The ladies spoke of it with pride,
+delicacy, and mystery, the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone
+took an interest in the conversation, for each one was interested in
+what he or she said. A great deal of wit flowed; brilliant apostrophes
+were launched forth and keen repartees were returned. But when Professor
+Haddi began to speak he overwhelmed everybody.
+
+“It is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on everything
+else,” said he, “they rest upon anterior habits whose very memory has
+been effaced. In morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds
+for existing, the most useless obligations, the cruelest and most
+injurious restraints, are because of their profound antiquity and the
+mystery of their origin, the least disputed and the least disputable as
+well as the most respected, and they are those that cannot be violated
+without incurring the most severe blame. All morality relative to the
+relations of the sexes is founded on this principle: that a woman once
+obtained belongs to the man, that she is his property like his horse or
+his weapons. And this having ceased to be true, absurdities result from
+it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a woman to a man, with
+clauses restricting the right of ownership introduced as a consequence
+of the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.
+
+“The obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her virginity
+to her husband comes from the times when girls were married immediately
+they were of a marriageable age. It is ridiculous that a girl who
+marries at twenty-five or thirty should be subject to that obligation.
+You will, perhaps, say that it is a present with which her husband, if
+she gets one at last, will be gratified; but every moment we see men
+wooing married women and showing themselves perfectly satisfied to take
+them as they find them.
+
+“Still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined in
+religious morality by the old belief that God, the most powerful of
+warriors, is polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself,
+and that men can only take those whom he has left. This belief, although
+traces of it exist in several metaphors of mysticism, is abandoned
+to-day, by most civilised peoples. However, it still dominates the
+education of girls not only among our believers, but even among our
+free-thinkers, who, as a rule, think freely for the reason that they do
+not think at all.
+
+“Discretion means ability to separate and discern. We say that a girl is
+discreet when she knows nothing at all. We cultivate her ignorance. In
+spite of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot
+conceal from them their own nature and their own sensations. But they
+know badly, they know in a wrong way. That is all we obtain by our
+careful education. . . .”
+
+“Sir,” suddenly said Joseph Boutourle, the High Treasurer of Alca,
+“believe me, there are innocent girls, perfectly innocent girls, and it
+is a great pity. I have known three. They married, and the result was
+tragical.”
+
+“I have noticed,” Professor Haddock went on, “that Europeans in general
+and Penguins in particular occupy themselves, after sport and motoring,
+with nothing so much as with love. It is giving a great deal of
+importance to a matter that has very little weight.”
+
+“Then, Professor,” exclaimed Madame Cremeur in a choking voice, “when
+a woman has completely surrendered herself to you, you think it is a
+matter of no importance?”
+
+“No, Madame; it can have its importance,” answered Professor Haddock,
+“but it is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she
+offers us a delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions.
+And then, do we not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather
+than gives herself. Look at the pretty Madame Pensee. . . .”
+
+“She is my mother,” said a tall, fair young man.
+
+“Sir, I have the greatest respect for her,” replied Professor Haddock;
+“do not be afraid that I intend to say anything in the least offensive
+about her. But allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of
+sons about their mothers are not to be relied on. They do not bear
+enough in mind that a mother is a mother only because she loved, and
+that she can still love. That, however, is the case, and it would be
+deplorable were it otherwise. I have noticed, on the contrary, that
+daughters do not deceive themselves about their mothers’ faculty for
+loving or about the use they make of it; they are rivals; they have
+their eyes upon them.”
+
+The insupportable Professor spoke a great deal longer, adding
+indecorum to awkwardness, and impertinence to incivility, accumulating
+incongruities, despising what is respectable, respecting what is
+despicable; but no one listened to him further.
+
+During this time in a room that was simple without grace, a room sad
+for the want of love, a room which, like all young girls’ rooms, had
+something of the cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, Eveline
+Clarence turned over the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of
+charities in order to obtain from them some acquaintance with society.
+Being convinced that her mother, shut up in her own intellectual but
+poor world, could neither bring her out or push her into prominence, she
+decided that she herself would seek the best means of winning a husband.
+At once calm and obstinate, without dreams or illusions, and regarding
+marriage as but a ticket of admission or a passport, she kept before
+her mind a clear notion of the hazards, difficulties, and chances of her
+enterprise. She had the art of pleasing and a coldness of temperament
+that enabled her to turn it to its fullest advantage. Her weakness lay
+in the fact that she was dazzled by anything that had an aristocratic
+air.
+
+When she was alone with her mother she said:
+
+“Mamma, we will go to-morrow to Father Douillard’s retreat.”
+
+
+
+
+II. THE CHARITY OF ST. ORBEROSIA
+
+Every Friday evening at nine o’clock the choicest of Alcan society
+assembled in the aristocratic church of St. Mael for the Reverend Father
+Douillard’s retreat. Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Viscount and
+Viscountess Olive, M. and Madame Bigourd, Monsieur and Madame de La
+Trumelle were never absent. The flower of the aristocracy might be seen
+there, and fair Jewish baronesses also adorned it by their presence, for
+the Jewish baronesses of Alca were Christians.
+
+This retreat, like all religious retreats, had for its object to procure
+for those living in the world opportunities for recollection so that
+they might think of their eternal salvation. It was also intended to
+draw down upon so man noble and illustrious families the benediction
+of L. Orberosia, who loves the Penguins. The Reverend Father Douillard
+strove for the completion of his task with a truly apostolical zeal. He
+hoped to restore the prerogatives of St. Orberosia as the patron saint
+of Penguinia and to dedicate to her a monumental church on one of the
+hills that dominate the city. His efforts had been crowned with great
+success, and for the accomplishing of this national enterprise he had
+already united more than a hundred thousand adherents and collected more
+than twenty millions of francs.
+
+It was in the choir of St. Mael’s that St. Orberosia’s new shrine,
+shining with gold, sparkling with precious stones, and surrounded by
+tapers and flowers, had been erected.
+
+The following account may be read in the “History of the Miracles of the
+Patron Saint of Alca” by the Abbe Plantain:
+
+“The ancient shrine had been melted down during the Terror and the
+precious relics of the saint thrown into a fire that had been lit on the
+Place de Greve; but a poor woman of great piety, named Rouquin, went by
+night at the peril of her life to gather up the calcined bones and the
+ashes of the blessed saint. She preserved them in a jam-pot, and when
+religion was again restored, brought them to the venerable Cure of
+St. Maels. The woman ended her days piously as a vendor of tapers and
+custodian of seats in the saint’s chapel.”
+
+It is certain that in the time of Father Douillard, although faith was
+declining, the cult of St. Orberosia, which for three hundred years had
+fallen under the criticism of Canon Princeteau and the silence of the
+Doctors of the Church, recovered, and was surrounded with more pomp,
+more splendour, and more fervour than ever. The theologians did not
+now subtract a single iota from the legend. They held as certainly
+established all the facts related by Abbot Simplicissimus, and in
+particular declared, on the testimony of that monk, that the devil,
+assuming a monk’s form had carried off the saint to a cave and had there
+striven with her until she overcame him. Neither places nor dates caused
+them any embarrassment. They paid no heed to exegesis and took good
+care not to grant as much to science as Canon Princeteau had formerly
+conceded. They knew too well whither that would lead.
+
+The church shone with lights and flowers. An operatic tenor sang the
+famous canticle of St. Orberosia:
+
+     Virgin of Paradise
+     Come, come in the dusky night
+     And on us shed
+     Thy beams of light.
+
+Mademoiselle Clarence sat beside her mother and in front of Viscount
+Clena. She remained kneeling during a considerable time, for the
+attitude of prayer is natural to discreet virgins and it shows off their
+figures.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. He was a powerful
+orator and could, at once melt, surprise, and rouse his hearers. Women
+complained only that he fulminated against vice with excessive harshness
+and in crude terms that made them blush. But they liked him none the
+less for it.
+
+He treated in his sermon of the seventh trial of St. Orberosia, who was
+tempted by the dragon which she went forth to combat. But she did not
+yield, and she disarmed the monster. The orator demonstrated without
+difficulty that we, also, by the aid of St. Orberosia, and strong in the
+virtue which she inspires, can in our turn overthrow the dragons that
+dart upon us and are waiting to devour us, the dragon of doubt, the
+dragon of impiety, the dragon of forgetfulness of religious duties.
+He proved that the charity of St. Orberosia was a work of social
+regeneration, and he concluded by an ardent appeal to the faithful “to
+become instruments of the Divine mercy, eager upholders and supporters
+of the charity of St. Orberosia, and to furnish it with all the means
+which it required to take its flight and bear its salutary fruits.” *
+
+     * Cf. J. Ernest Charles in the “Censeur,” May-August, 1907,
+     p. 562, col. 2.
+
+After the ceremony, the Reverend Father Douillard remained in
+the sacristy at the disposal of those of the faithful who desired
+information concerning the charity, or who wished to bring their
+contributions. Mademoiselle Clarence wished to speak to Father
+Douillard, so did Viscount Clena. The crowd was large, and a queue was
+formed. By chance Viscount Clena and Mademoiselle Clarence were side by
+side and possibly they were squeezed a little closely to each other
+by the crowd. Eveline had noticed this fashionable young man, who was
+almost as well known as his father in the world of sport. Clena had
+noticed her, and, as he thought her pretty, he bowed to her, then
+apologised and pretended to believe that he had been introduced to the
+ladies, but could not remember where. They pretended to believe it also.
+
+He presented himself the following week at Madame Clarence’s, thinking
+that her house was a bit fast--a thing not likely to displease him--and
+when he saw Eveline again he felt he had not been mistaken and that she
+was an extremely pretty girl.
+
+Viscount Clena had the finest motor-car in Europe. For three months he
+drove the Clarences every day over hills and plains, through woods and
+valleys; they visited famous sites and went over celebrated castles. He
+said to Eveline all that could be said and did all that could be done
+to overcome her resistance. She did not conceal from him that she
+loved him, that she would always love him, and love no one but him. She
+remained grave and trembling by his side. To his devouring passion she
+opposed the invincible defence of a virtue conscious of its danger. At
+the end of three months, after having gone uphill and down hill,
+turned sharp corners, and negotiated level crossings, and experienced
+innumerable break-downs, he knew her as well as he knew the fly-wheel of
+his car, but not much better. He employed surprises, adventures,
+sudden stoppages in the depths of forests and before hotels, but he had
+advanced no farther. He said to himself that it was absurd; then, taking
+her again in his car he set off at fifty miles an hour quite prepared to
+upset her in a ditch or to smash himself and her against a tree.
+
+One day, having come to take her on some excursion, he found her more
+charming than ever, and more provoking. He darted upon her as a storm
+falls upon the reeds that border a lake. She bent with adorable weakness
+beneath the breath of the storm, and twenty times was almost carried
+away by its strength, but twenty times she arose, supple and, bowing to
+the wind. After all these shocks one would have said that a light breeze
+had barely touched her charming stem; she smiled as if ready to be
+plucked by a bold hand. Then her unhappy aggressor, desperate, enraged,
+and three parts mad, fled so as not to kill her, mistook the door, went
+into the bedroom of Madame Clarence, whom he found putting on her hat in
+front of a wardrobe, seized her, flung her on the bed, and possessed her
+before she knew what had happened.
+
+The same day Eveline, who had been making inquiries, learned that
+Viscount Clena had nothing but debts, lived on money given him by an
+elderly lady, and promoted the sale of the latest models of a motor-car
+manufacturer. They separated with common accord and Eveline began again
+disdainfully to serve tea to her mother’s guests.
+
+
+
+
+III. HIPPOLYTE CERES
+
+In Madame Clarence’s drawing-room the conversation turned upon love, and
+many charming things were said about it.
+
+“Love is a sacrifice,” sighed Madame Cremeur.
+
+“I agree with you,” replied M. Boutourle with animation.
+
+But Professor Haddock soon displayed his fastidious insolence.
+
+“It seems to me,” said he, “that the Penguin ladies have made a great
+fuss since, through St. Mael’s agency, they became viviparous. But there
+is nothing to be particularly proud of in that, for it is a state they
+share in common with cows and pigs, and even with orange and lemon
+trees, for the seeds of these plants germinate in the pericarp.”
+
+“The self-importance which the Penguin ladies give themselves does not
+go so far back as that,” answered M. Boutourle. “It dates from the day
+when the holy apostle gave them clothes. But this self-importance was
+long kept in restraint, and displayed itself fully only with increased
+luxury of dress and in a small section of society. For go only two
+leagues from Alca into the country at harvest time, and you will see
+whether women are over-precise or self-important.”
+
+On that day M. Hippolyte Ceres paid his first call. He was a Deputy of
+Alca, and one of the youngest members of the House. His father was
+said to have kept a dram shop, but he himself was a lawyer of robust
+physique, a good though prolix speaker, with a self-important air and a
+reputation for ability.
+
+“M. Ceres,” said the mistress of the house, “your constituency is one of
+the finest in Alca.”
+
+“And there are fresh improvements made in it every day, Madame.”
+
+“Unfortunately, it is impossible to take a stroll through it any
+longer,” said M. Boutourle.
+
+“Why?” asked M. Ceres.
+
+“On account of the motors, of course.”
+
+“Do not give them a bad name,” answered the Deputy. “They are our great
+national industry.”
+
+“I know. The Penguins of to-day make me think of the ancient Egyptians.
+According to Clement of Alexandria, Taine tells us--though he misquotes
+the text--the Egyptians worshipped the crocodiles that devoured them.
+The Penguins to-day worship the motors that crush them. Without a doubt
+the future belongs to the metal beast. We are no more likely to go back
+to cabs than we are to go back to the diligence. And the long martyrdom
+of the horse will come to an end. The motor, which the frenzied cupidity
+of manufacturers hurls like a juggernaut’s car upon the bewildered
+people and of which the idle and fashionable make a foolish though fatal
+elegance, will soon begin to perform its true function, and putting its
+strength at the service of the entire people, will behave like a docile,
+toiling monster. But in order that the motor may cease to be injurious
+and become beneficent we must build roads suited to its speed, roads
+which it cannot tear up with its ferocious tyres, and from which it will
+send no clouds of poisonous dust into human lungs. We ought not to allow
+slower vehicles or mere animals to go upon those roads, and we should
+establish garages upon them and foot-bridges over them, and so create
+order and harmony among the means of communication of the future. That
+is the wish of every good citizen.”
+
+Madame Clarence led the conversation back to the improvements in M.
+Ceres’ constituency. M. Ceres showed his enthusiasm for demolitions,
+tunnelings, constructions, reconstructions, and all other fruitful
+operations.
+
+“We build to-day in an admirable style,” said he; “everywhere majestic
+avenues are being reared. Was ever anything as fine as our arcaded
+bridges and our domed hotels!”
+
+“You are forgetting that big palace surmounted an immense melon-shaped
+dome,” grumbled by M. Daniset, an old art amateur, in a voice of
+restrained rage. “I am amazed at the degree of ugliness which a modern
+city can attain. Alca is becoming Americanised. Everywhere we are
+destroying all that is free, unexpected, measured, restrained, human,
+or traditional among the things that are left us. Everywhere we are
+destroying that charming object, a piece of an old wall that bears up
+the branches of a tree. Everywhere we are suppressing some fragment
+of light and air, some fragment of nature, some fragment of the
+associations that still remain with us, some fragment of our fathers,
+some fragment of ourselves. And we are putting up frightful, enormous,
+infamous houses, surmounted in Viennese style by ridiculous domes, or
+fashioned after the models of the ‘new art’ without mouldings, or
+having profiles with sinister corbels and burlesque pinnacles, and such
+monsters as these shamelessly peer over the surrounding buildings. We
+see bulbous protuberances stuck on the fronts of buildings and we are
+told they are ‘new art’ motives. I have seen the ‘new art’ in other
+countries, but it is not so ugly as with us; it has fancy and it has
+simplicity. It is only in our own country that by a sad privilege we may
+behold the newest and most diverse styles of architectural ugliness. Not
+an enviable privilege!”
+
+“Are you not afraid,” asked M. Ceres severely, “are you not afraid that
+these bitter criticisms tend to keep out of our capital the foreigners
+who flow into it from all arts of the world and who leave millions
+behind them?”
+
+“You may set your mind at rest about that,” answered M. Daniset.
+“Foreigners do not come to admire our buildings; they come to see our
+courtesans, our dressmakers, and our dancing saloons.”
+
+“We have one bad habit,” sighed M. Ceres, “it is that we calumniate
+ourselves.”
+
+Madame Clarence as an accomplished hostess thought it was time to return
+to the subject of love and asked M. Jumel his opinion of M. Leon Blum’s
+recent book in which the author complained. . . .
+
+“. . . That an irrational custom,” went on Professor Haddock, “prevents
+respectable young ladies from making love, a thing they would enjoy
+doing, whilst mercenary girls do it too much and without getting any
+enjoyment out of it. It is indeed deplorable. But M. Leon Blum need
+not fret too much. If the evil exists, as he says it does, in our
+middle-class society, I can assure him that everywhere else he would see
+a consoling spectacle. Among the people, the mass of the people through
+town and country, girls do not deny themselves that pleasure.”
+
+“It is depravity!” said Madame Cremeur.
+
+And she praised the innocence of young girls in terms full of modesty
+and grace. It was charming to hear her.
+
+Professor Haddock’s views on the same subject were, on the contrary,
+painful to listen to.
+
+“Respectable young girls,” said he, “are guarded and watched over.
+Besides, men do not, as a rule, pursue them much, either through
+probity, or from a fear of grave responsibilities, or because the
+seduction of a young girl would not be to their credit. Even then we do
+not know what really takes place, for the reason that what is hidden is
+not seen. This is a condition necessary to the existence of all society.
+The scruples of respectable young girls could be more easily overcome
+than those of married women if the same pressure were brought to bear on
+them, and for this there are two reasons: they have more illusions, and
+their curiosity has not been satisfied. Women, for the most part, have
+been so disappointed by their husbands that they have not courage
+enough to begin again with somebody else. I myself have been met by this
+obstacle several times in my attempts at seduction.”
+
+At the moment when Professor Haddock ended his unpleasant remarks,
+Mademoiselle Eveline Clarence entered the drawing-room and listlessly
+handed about tea with that expression of boredom which gave an oriental
+charm to her beauty.
+
+“For my part,” said Hippolyte Ceres, looking at her, “I declare myself
+the young ladies’ champion.”
+
+“He must be a fool,” thought the girl.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, who had never set foot outside of his political world
+of electors and elected, thought Madame Clarence’s drawing-room most
+select, its mistress exquisite, and her daughter amazingly beautiful.
+His visits became frequent and he paid court to both of them. Madame
+Clarence, who now liked attention, thought him agreeable. Eveline showed
+no friendliness towards him, and treated him with a hauteur and disdain
+that he took for aristocratic behaviour and fashionable manners, and
+he thought all the more of her on that account. This busy man taxed his
+ingenuity to please them, and he sometimes succeeded. He got them
+cards for fashionable functions and boxes at the Opera. He furnished
+Mademoiselle Clarence with several opportunities of appearing to great
+advantage and in particular at a garden party which, although given by
+a Minister, was regarded as really fashionable, and gained its first
+success in society circles for the Republic.
+
+At that party Eveline had been much noticed and had attracted the
+special attention of a young diplomat called Roger Lambilly who,
+imagining that she belonged to a rather fast set, invited her to his
+bachelor’s flat. She thought him handsome and believed him rich, and she
+accepted. A little moved, almost disquieted, she very nearly became the
+victim of her daring, and only avoided defeat by an offensive measure
+audaciously carried out. This was the most foolish escapade in her
+unmarried life.
+
+Being now on friendly terms with Ministers and with the President,
+Eveline continued to wear her aristocratic and pious affectations,
+and these won for her the sympathy of the chief personages in the
+anti-clerical and democratic Republic. M. Hippolyte Ceres, seeing that
+she was succeeding and doing him credit, liked her still more. He even
+went so far as to fall madly in love with her.
+
+Henceforth, in spite of everything, she began to observe him with
+interest, being curious to see if his passion would increase. He
+appeared to her without elegance or grace, and not well bred, but
+active, clear-sighted, full of resource, and not too great a bore. She
+still made fun of him, but he had now won her interest.
+
+One day she wished to test him. It was during the elections, when
+members of Parliament were, as the phrase runs, requesting a renewal of
+their mandates. He had an opponent, who, though not dangerous at first
+and not much of an orator, was rich and was reported to be gaining votes
+every day. Hippolyte Ceres, banishing both dull security and foolish
+alarm from his mind, redoubled his care. His chief method of action
+was by public meetings at which he spoke vehemently against the rival
+candidate. His committee held huge meetings on Saturday evenings and
+at three o’clock on Sunday afternoons. One Sunday, as he called on
+the Clarences, he found Eveline alone in the drawing-room. He had been
+chatting for about twenty or twenty-five minutes, when, taking out his
+watch, he saw that it was a quarter to three. The young girl showed
+herself amiable, engaging, attractive, and full of promises. Ceres was
+fascinated, but he stood up to go.
+
+“Stay a little longer,” said she in a pressing and agreeable voice which
+made him promptly sit down again.
+
+She was full of interest, of abandon, curiosity, and weakness. He
+blushed, turned pale, and again got up.
+
+Then, in order to keep him still longer, she looked at him out of two
+grey and melting eyes, and though her bosom was heaving, she did not say
+another word. He fell at her feet in distraction, but once more looking
+at his watch, he jumped up with a terrible oath.
+
+“D--! a quarter to four! I must be off.”
+
+And immediately he rushed down the stairs.
+
+From that time onwards she had a certain amount of esteem for him.
+
+
+
+
+IV. A POLITICIAN’S MARRIAGE
+
+She was not quite in love with him, but she wished him to be in love
+with her. She was, moreover, very reserved with him, and that not solely
+from any want of inclination to be otherwise, since in affairs of
+love some things are due to indifference, to inattention, to woman’s
+instinct, to traditional custom and feeling, to a desire to try one’s
+power, and to satisfaction at seeing its results. The reason of her
+prudence was that she knew him to be very much infatuated and capable
+of taking advantage of any familiarities she allowed as well as of
+reproaching her coarsely afterwards if she discontinued them.
+
+As he was a professed anti-clerical and free-thinker, she thought it
+a good plan to affect an appearance of piety in his presence and to
+be seen with prayer-books bound in red morocco, such as Queen Marie
+Leczinska’s or the Dauphiness Marie Josephine’s “The Last Two Weeks of
+Lent.” She lost no opportunity, either, of showing him the subscriptions
+that she collected for the endowment of the national cult of St.
+Orberosia. Eveline did not act in this way because she wished to tease
+him. Nor did it spring from a young girl’s archness, or a spirit of
+constraint, or even from snobbishness, though there was more than
+a suspicion of this latter in her behaviour. It was but her way of
+asserting herself, of stamping herself with a definite character, of
+increasing her value. To rouse the Deputy’s courage she wrapped herself
+up in religion, just as Brunhild surrounded herself with flames so as to
+attract Sigurd. Her audacity was successful. He thought her still more
+beautiful thus. Clericalism was in his eyes a sign of good form.
+
+Ceres was re-elected by an enormous majority and returned to a House
+which showed itself more inclined to the Left, more advanced, and, as it
+seemed, more eager for reform than its predecessor. Perceiving at once
+that so much zeal was but intended to hide a fear of change, and a
+sincere desire to do nothing, he determined to adopt a policy that would
+satisfy these aspirations. At the beginning of the session he made a
+great speech, cleverly thought out and well arranged, dealing with the
+idea that all reform ought to be put off for a long time. He showed
+himself heated, even fervid; holding the principle that an orator should
+recommend moderation with extreme vehemence. He was applauded by the
+entire assembly. The Clarences listened to him from the President’s
+box and Eveline trembled in spite of herself at the solemn sound of
+the applause. On the same bench the fair Madame Pensee shivered at the
+intonations of his virile voice.
+
+As soon as he descended from the tribune, Ceres, even while the audience
+were still clapping, went without a moment’s delay to salute the
+Clarences in their box. Eveline saw in him the beauty of success, and as
+he leaned towards the ladies, wiping his neck with his handkerchief
+and receiving their congratulations with an air of modesty though not
+without a tinge of self-conceit, the young girl glanced towards Madame
+Pensee and saw her, palpitating and breathless, drinking in the hero’s
+applause with her head thrown backwards. It seemed as if she were on the
+point of fainting. Eveline immediately smiled tenderly on M. Ceres.
+
+The Alcan deputy’s speech had a great vogue. In political “spheres”
+ it was regarded as extremely able. “We have at last heard an honest
+pronouncement,” said the chief Moderate journal. “It is a regular
+programme!” they said in the House. It was agreed that he was a man of
+immense talent.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres had now established himself as leader of the radicals,
+socialists, and anti-clericals, and they appointed him President of
+their group, which was then the most considerable in the House. He thus
+found himself marked out for office in the next ministerial combination.
+
+After a long hesitation Eveline Clarence accepted the idea of marrying
+M. Hippolyte Ceres. The great man was a little common for her taste.
+Nothing had yet proved that he would one day reach the point where
+politics bring in large sums of money. But she was entering her
+twenty-seventh year and knew enough of life to see that she must not be
+too fastidious or show herself too difficult to please.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was celebrated; Hippolyte Ceres was happy. He was no
+longer recognisable; the elegance of his clothes and deportment had
+increased tremendously. He wore an undue number of white gloves. Now
+that he was too much of a society man, Eveline began to doubt if it was
+not worse than being too little of one. Madame Clarence regarded the
+engagement with favour. She was reassured concerning her daughter’s
+future and pleased to have flowers given her every Thursday for her
+drawing-room.
+
+The celebration of the marriage raised some difficulties. Eveline was
+pious and wished to receive the benediction of the Church. Hippolyte
+Ceres, tolerant but a free-thinker, wanted only a civil marriage. There
+were many discussions and even some violent scenes upon the subject.
+The last took place in the young girl’s room at the moment when the
+invitations were being written. Eveline declared that if she did not go
+to church she would not believe herself married. She spoke of breaking
+off the engagement, and of going abroad with her mother, or of retiring
+into a convent. Then she became tender, weak, suppliant. She sighed,
+and everything in her virginal chamber sighed in chorus, the holy-water
+font, the palm-branch above her white bed, the books of devotion on
+their little shelves, and the blue and white statuette of St.
+Orberosia chaining the dragon of Cappadocia, that stood upon the marble
+mantelpiece. Hippolyte Ceres was moved, softened, melted.
+
+Beautiful in her grief, her eyes shining with tears, her wrists girt
+by a rosary of lapis lazuli and, so to speak, chained by her faith,
+she suddenly flung herself at Hippolyte’s feet, and dishevelled, almost
+dying, she embraced his knees.
+
+He nearly yielded.
+
+“A religious marriage,” he muttered, “a marriage in church, I could
+make my constituents stand that, but my committee would not swallow the
+matter so easily. . . . Still I’ll explain it to them . . . toleration,
+social necessities . . . . They all send their daughters to Sunday
+school . . . . But as for office, my dear I am afraid we are going to
+drown all hope of that in your holy water.”
+
+At these words she stood up grave, generous, resigned, conquered also in
+her turn.
+
+“My dear, I insist no longer.”
+
+“Then we won’t have a religious marriage. It will be better, much better
+not.”
+
+“Very well, but be guided by me. I am going to try and arrange
+everything both to your satisfaction and mine.”
+
+She sought the Reverend Father Douillard and explained the situation. He
+showed himself even more accommodating and yielding than she had hoped.
+
+“Your husband is an intelligent man, a man of order and reason; he will
+come over to us. You will sanctify him. It is not in vain that God has
+granted him the blessing of a Christian wife. The Church needs no pomp
+and ceremonial display for her benedictions. Now that she is persecuted,
+the shadow of the crypts and the recesses of the catacombs are in better
+accord with her festivals. Mademoiselle, when you have performed the
+civil formalities come here to my private chapel in costume with M.
+Ceres. I will marry you, a observe the most absolute discretion. I will
+obtain the necessary dispensations from the Archbishop as well as all
+facilities regarding the banns, confession-tickets, etc.”
+
+Hippolyte, although he thought the combination a little dangerous,
+agreed to it, a good deal flattered, at bottom.
+
+“I will go in a short coat,” he said.
+
+He went in a frock coat with white gloves and varnished shoes, and he
+genuflected.
+
+“Politeness demands. . . .”
+
+
+
+
+V. THE VISIRE CABINET
+
+The Ceres household was established with modest decency in a pretty flat
+situated in a new building. Ceres loved his wife in a calm and tranquil
+fashion. He was often kept late from home by the Commission on the
+Budget and he worked more than three nights a week at a report on the
+postal finances of which he hoped to make a masterpiece. Eveline thought
+she could twist him round her finger, and this did not displease him.
+The bad side of their situation was that they had not much money; in
+truth they had very little. The servants of the Republic do not grow
+rich in her service as easily as people think. Since the sovereign is no
+longer there to distribute favours, each of them takes what he can, and
+his depredations, limited by the depredations of all the others, are
+reduced to modest proportions. Hence that austerity of morals that is
+noticed in democratic leaders. They can only grow rich during periods
+of great business activity and then they find themselves exposed to the
+envy of their less favoured colleagues. Hippolyte Ceres had for a
+long time foreseen such a period. He was one of those who had made
+preparations for its arrival. Whilst waiting for it he endured his
+poverty with dignity, and Eveline shared that poverty without suffering
+as much as one might have thought. She was in close intimacy with the
+Reverend Father Douillard and frequented the chapel of St. Orberosia,
+where she met with serious society and people in a position to render
+her useful services. She knew how to choose among them and gave her
+confidence to none but those who deserved it. She had gained experience
+since her motor excursions with Viscount Clena, and above all she had
+now acquired the value of a married woman.
+
+The deputy was at first uneasy about these pious practices, which were
+ridiculed by the demagogic newspapers, but he was soon reassured, for
+he saw all around him democratic leaders joyfully becoming reconciled to
+the aristocracy and the Church.
+
+They found that they had reached one of those periods (which often
+recur) when advance had been carried a little too far. Hippolyte Ceres
+gave a moderate support to this view. His policy was not a policy of
+persecution but a policy of tolerance. He had laid its foundations in
+his splendid speech on the preparations for reform. The Prime Minister
+was looked upon as too advanced. He proposed schemes which were admitted
+to be dangerous to capital, and the great financial companies were
+opposed to him. Of course it followed that the papers of all views
+supported the companies. Seeing the danger increasing, the Cabinet
+abandoned its schemes, its programme, and its opinions, but it was too
+late. A new administration was already ready. An insidious question by
+Paul Visire which was immediately made the subject of a resolution, and
+a fine speech by Hippolyte Ceres, overthrew the Cabinet.
+
+The President of the Republic entrusted the formation of a new Cabinet
+to this same Paul Visire, who, though still very young, had been a
+Minister twice. He was a charming man, spending much of his time in the
+green-rooms of theatres, very artistic, a great society man, of amazing
+ability and industry. Paul Visire formed a temporary ministry intended
+to reassure public feeling which had taken alarm, and Hippolyte Ceres
+was invited to hold office in it.
+
+The new ministry, belonging to all the groups in the majority,
+represented the most diverse and contrary opinions, but they were all
+moderate and convinced conservatives.* The Minister of Foreign Affairs
+was retained from the former cabinet. He was a little dark man called
+Crombile, who worked fourteen hours a day with the conviction that
+he dealt with tremendous questions. He refused to see even his own
+diplomatic agents, and was terribly uneasy, though he did not disturb
+anybody else, for the want of foresight of peoples is infinite and that
+of governments is just as great.
+
+     * As this ministry exercised considerable influence upon the
+     destinies of the country and of the world, we think it well
+     to give its composition: Minister of the Interior and Prime
+     Minister, Paul Visire; Minister of Justice, Pierre Bouc;
+     Foreign Affairs, Victor Crombile; Finance, Terrasson;
+     Education, Labillette; Commerce, Posts and Telegraphs,
+     Hippolyte Ceres; Agriculture, Aulac; Public Works,
+     Lapersonne; War, General Debonnaire; Admiralty, Admiral
+     Vivier des Murenes.
+
+The office of Public Works was given to a Socialist, Fortune Lapersonne.
+It was then a political custom and one of the most solemn, most severe,
+most rigorous, and if I may dare say so, the most terrible and cruel
+of all political customs, to include a member of the Socialist party
+in each ministry intended to oppose Socialism, so that the enemies of
+wealth and property should suffer the shame of being attacked by one of
+their own party, and so that they could not unite against these forces
+without turning to some one who might possibly attack themselves in the
+future. Nothing but a profound ignorance of the human heart would permit
+the belief that it was difficult to find a Socialist to occupy these
+functions. Citizen Fortune Lapersonne entered the Visire cabinet of
+his own free will and without any constraint; and he found those who
+approved of his action even among his former friends, so great was the
+fascination that power exercised over the Penguins!
+
+General Debonnaire went to the War Office. He was looked upon as one
+of the ablest generals in the army, but he was ruled by a woman, the
+Baroness Bildermann, who, though she had reached the age of intrigue,
+was still beautiful. She was in the pay of a neighbouring and hostile
+Power.
+
+The new Minister of Marine, the worthy Admiral Vivier des Murenes, was
+generally regarded as an excellent seaman. He displayed a piety that
+would have seemed excessive in an anti-clerical minister, if the
+Republic had not recognised that religion was of great maritime utility.
+Acting on the instruction of his spiritual director, the Reverend Father
+Douillard, the worthy Admiral had dedicated his fleet to St. Orberosia
+and directed canticles in honour of the Alcan Virgin to be composed by
+Christian bards. These replaced the national hymn in the music played by
+the navy.
+
+Prime Minister Visire declared himself to be distinctly anticlerical
+but ready to respect all creeds; he asserted that he was a sober-minded
+reformer. Paul Visire and his colleagues desired reforms, and it was in
+order not to compromise reform that they proposed none; for they were
+true politicians and knew that reforms are compromised the moment they
+are proposed. The government was well received, respectable people were
+reassured, and the funds rose.
+
+The administration announced that four new ironclads would be put
+into commission, that prosecutions would be undertaken against the
+Socialists, and it formally declared its intention to have nothing to do
+with any inquisitorial income-tax. The choice of Terrasson as Minister
+of Finance was warmly approved by the press. Terrasson, an old minister
+famous for his financial operations, gave warrant to all the hopes of
+the financiers and shadowed forth a period of great business activity.
+Soon those three udders of modern nations, monopolies, bill discounting,
+and fraudulent speculation, were swollen with the milk of wealth.
+Already whispers were heard of distant enterprises, and of planting
+colonies, and the boldest put forward in the newspapers the project of a
+military and financial protectorate over Nigritia.
+
+Without having yet shown what he was capable of, Hippolyte Ceres was
+considered a man of weight. Business people thought highly of him.
+He was congratulated on all sides for having broken with the
+extreme sections, the dangerous men, and for having realised the
+responsibilities of government.
+
+Madame Ceres shone alone amid the Ministers’ wives. Crombile withered
+away in bachelordom. Paul Visire had married money in the person of
+Mademoiselle Blampignon, an accomplished, estimable, and simple lady who
+was always ill, and whose feeble health compelled her to stay with her
+mother in the depths of a remote province. The other Ministers’ wives
+were not born to charm the sight, and people smiled when they read
+that Madame Labillette had appeared at the Presidency Ball wearing a
+headdress of birds of paradise. Madame Vivier des Murenes, a woman of
+good family, was stout rather than tall, had a face like a beef-steak
+and the voice of a newspaper-seller. Madame Debonnaire, tall, dry,
+and florid, was devoted to young officers. She ruined herself by her
+escapades and crimes and only regained consideration by dint of ugliness
+and insolence.
+
+Madame Ceres was the charm of the Ministry and its tide to
+consideration. Young, beautiful, and irreproachable, she charmed alike
+society and the masses by her combination of elegant costumes and
+pleasant smiles.
+
+Her receptions were thronged by the great Jewish financiers. She gave
+the most fashionable garden parties in the Republic. The newspapers
+described her dresses and the milliners did not ask her to pay for them.
+She went to Mass; she protected the chapel of St. Orberosia from the
+ill-will of the people; and she aroused in aristocratic hearts the hope
+of a fresh Concordat.
+
+With her golden hair, grey eyes, and supple and slight though rounded
+figure, she was indeed pretty. She enjoyed an excellent reputation and
+she was so adroit, and calm, so much mistress of herself, that she would
+have preserved it intact even if she had been discovered in the very act
+of ruining it.
+
+The session ended with a victory for the cabinet which, amid the
+almost unanimous applause of the House, defeated a proposal for an
+inquisitorial tax, and with a triumph for Madame Ceres who gave parties
+in honour of three kings who were at the moment passing through Alca.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE SOFA OF THE FAVOURITE
+
+The Prime Minister invited Monsieur and Madame Ceres to spend a couple
+of weeks of the holidays in a little villa that he had taken in the
+mountains, and in which he lived alone. The deplorable health of Madame
+Paul Visire did not allow her to accompany her husband, and she remained
+with her relatives in one of the southern provinces.
+
+The villa had belonged to the mistress of one of the last Kings of Alca:
+the drawing-room retained its old furniture, and in it was still to be
+found the Sofa of the Favourite. The country was charming; a pretty blue
+stream, the Aiselle, flowed at the foot of the hill that dominated the
+villa. Hippolyte Ceres loved fishing; when engaged at this monotonous
+occupation he often formed his best Parliamentary combinations, and
+his happiest oratorical inspirations. Trout swarmed in the Aiselle; he
+fished it from morning till evening in a boat that the Prime Minister
+readily placed at is disposal.
+
+In the mean time, Eveline and Paul Visire sometimes took a turn together
+in the garden, or had a little chat in the drawing-room. Eveline,
+although she recognised the attraction that Visire had for women, had
+hitherto displayed towards him only an intermittent and superficial
+coquetry, without any deep intentions or settled design. He was a
+connoisseur and saw that she was pretty. The House and the Opera had
+deprived him of all leisure, but, in a little villa, the grey eyes
+and rounded figure of Eveline took on a value in his eyes. One day as
+Hippolyte Ceres was fishing in the Aiselle, he made her sit beside him
+on the Sofa of the Favourite. Long rays of gold struck Eveline like
+arrows from a hidden Cupid through the chinks of the curtains which
+protected her from the heat and glare of a brilliant day. Beneath her
+white muslin dress her rounded yet slender form was outlined in its
+grace and youth. Her skin was cool and fresh, and had the fragrance of
+freshly mown hay. Paul Visire behaved as the occasion warranted, and for
+her part, she was opposed neither to the games of chance or of society.
+She believed it would be nothing or a trifle; she was mistaken.
+
+“There was,” says the famous German ballad, “on the sunny side of the
+town square, beside a wall whereon the creeper grew, a pretty little
+letter-box, as blue as the corn-flowers, smiling and tranquil.
+
+“All day long there came to it, in their heavy shoes, small
+shop-keepers, rich farmers, citizens, the tax-collector and the
+policeman, and they put into it their business letters, their invoices,
+their summonses their notices to pay taxes, the judges’ returns, and
+orders for the recruits to assemble. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+“With joy, or in anxiety, there advanced towards it workmen and farm
+servants, maids and nursemaids, accountants, clerks, and women carrying
+their little children in their arms; they put into it notifications of
+births, marriages, and deaths, letters between engaged couples, between
+husbands and wives, from mothers to their sons, and from sons to their
+mothers. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+“At twilight, young lads and young girls slipped furtively to it, and
+put in love-letters, some moistened with tears that blotted the ink,
+others with a little circle to show the place to kiss, all of them very
+long. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+“Rich merchants came themselves through excess of carefulness at the
+hour of daybreak, and put into it registered letters, and letters with
+five red seals, full of bank notes or cheques on the great financial
+establishments of the Empire. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+“But one day, Gaspar, whom it had never seen, and whom it did not know
+from Adam, came to put in a letter, of which nothing is known but that
+it was folded like a little hat. Immediately the pretty letter-box fell
+into a swoon. Henceforth it remains no longer in its place; it runs
+through streets, fields, and woods, girdled with ivy, and crowned with
+roses. It keeps running up hill and down dale; the country policeman
+surprises it sometimes, amidst the corn, in Gaspar’s arms kissing him
+upon the mouth.”
+
+Paul Visire had recovered all his customary nonchalance. Eveline
+remained stretched on the Divan of the Favourite in an attitude of
+delicious astonishment.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, an excellent moral theologian, and a man
+who in the decadence of the Church has preserved his principles, was
+very right to teach, in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers,
+that while a woman commits a great sin by giving herself for money, she
+commits a much greater one by giving herself for nothing. For, in the
+first case she acts to support her life, and that is sometimes not
+merely excusable but pardonable, and even worthy of the Divine Grace,
+for God forbids suicide, and is unwilling that his creatures should
+destroy themselves. Besides, in giving herself in order to live, she
+remains humble, and derives no pleasure from it a thing which diminishes
+the sin. But a woman who gives herself for nothing sins with pleasure
+and exults in her fault. The pride and delight with which she burdens
+her crime increase its load of moral guilt.
+
+Madame Hippolyte Ceres’ example shows the profundity of these moral
+truths. She perceived that she had senses. A second was enough to bring
+about this discovery, to change her soul, to alter her whole life. To
+have learned to know herself was at first a delight. The {greek here}
+of the ancient philosophy is not a precept the moral fulfilment of which
+procures any pleasure, since one enjoys little satisfaction from knowing
+one’s soul. It is not the same with the flesh, for in it sources of
+pleasure may be revealed to us. Eveline immediately felt an obligation
+to her revealer equal to the benefit she had received, and she imagined
+that he who had discovered these heavenly depths was the sole possessor
+of the key to them. Was this an error, and might she not be able to
+find others who also had the golden key? It is difficult to decide; and
+Professor Haddock, when the facts were divulged (which happened without
+much delay as we shall see), treated the matter from an experimental
+point of view, in a scientific review, and concluded that the chances
+Madame C-- would have of finding the exact equivalent of M. V-- were
+in the proportion of 305 to 975008. This is as much as to say that she
+would never find it. Doubtless her instinct told her the same, for she
+attached herself distractedly to him.
+
+I have related these facts with all the circumstances which seemed to me
+worthy of attracting the attention of meditative and philosophic minds.
+The Sofa of the Favourite is worthy of the majesty of history; on
+it were decided the destinies of a great people; nay, on it was
+accomplished an act whose renown was to extend over the neighbouring
+nations both friendly and hostile, and even over all humanity. Too often
+events of this nature escape the superficial minds and shallow spirits
+who inconsiderately assume the task of writing history. Thus the secret
+springs of events remain hidden from us. The fall of Empires and the
+transmission of dominions astonish us and remain incomprehensible to us,
+because we have not discovered the imperceptible point, or touched the
+secret spring which when put in movement has destroyed and overthrown
+everything. The author of this great history knows better than
+anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do himself this
+justice--that he has always kept the moderation, the seriousness, the
+austerity, which an account of affairs of State demands, and that he has
+never departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of human
+actions.
+
+
+
+
+VII. THE FIRST CONSEQUENCES
+
+When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never experienced
+anything similar, he did not believe her. He had had a good deal to do
+with women and knew that they readily say these things to men in order
+to make them more in love with them. Thus his experience, as sometimes
+happens, made him disregard the truth. Incredulous, but gratified all
+the same, he soon felt love and something more for her. This state at
+first seemed favourable to his intellectual faculties. Visire delivered
+in the chief town of his constituency a speech full of grace, brilliant
+and happy, which was considered to be a masterpiece.
+
+The re-opening of Parliament was serene. A few isolated jealousies, a
+few timid ambitions raised their heads in the House, and that was all. A
+smile from the Prime Minister was enough to dissipate these shadows.
+She and he saw each other twice a day, and wrote to each other in the
+interval. He was accustomed to intimate relationships, was adroit, and
+knew how to dissimulate; but Eveline displayed a foolish imprudence: she
+made herself conspicuous with him in drawing-rooms, at the theatre, in
+the House, and at the Embassies; she wore her love upon her face, upon
+her whole person, in her moist glances, in the languishing smile of her
+lips, in the heaving of her breast, in all her heightened, agitated,
+and distracted beauty. Soon the entire country knew of their intimacy.
+Foreign Courts were informed of it. The President of the Republic and
+Eveline’s husband alone remained in ignorance. The President became
+acquainted with it in the country, through a misplaced police report
+which found its way, it is not known how, into his portmanteau.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, without being either very subtle, or very
+perspicacious, noticed that there was something different in his home.
+Eveline, who quite lately had interested herself in his affairs, and
+shown, if not tenderness, at least affection, towards him, displayed
+henceforth nothing but indifference and repulsion. She had always had
+periods of absence, and made prolonged visits to the Charity of St.
+Orberosia; now, she went out in the morning, remained out all day, and
+sat down to dinner at nine o’clock in the evening with the face of a
+somnambulist. Her husband thought it absurd; however, he might perhaps
+have never known the reason for this; a profound ignorance of women, a
+crass confidence in his own merit, and in his own fortune, might perhaps
+have always hidden the truth from him, if the two lovers had not, so to
+speak, compelled him to discover it.
+
+When Paul Visire went to Eveline’s house and found her alone, they
+used to say, as they embraced each other; “Not here! not here!” and
+immediately they affected an extreme reserve. That was their invariable
+rule. Now, one day, Paul Visire went to the house of his colleague
+Ceres, with whom he had an engagement. It was Eveline who received him,
+the Minister of Commerce being delayed by a commission.
+
+“Not here!” said the lovers, smiling.
+
+They said it, mouth to mouth, embracing, and clasping each other. They
+were still saying it, when Hippolyte Ceres entered the drawing-room.
+
+Paul Visire did not lose his presence of mind. He declared to Madame
+Ceres that he would give up his attempt to take the dust out of her
+eye. By this attitude he did not deceive the husband, but he was able to
+leave the room with some dignity.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was thunderstruck. Eveline’s conduct appeared
+incomprehensible to him; he asked her what reasons she had for it.
+
+“Why? why?” he kept repeating continually, “why?”
+
+She denied everything, not to convince him, for he had seen them, but
+from expediency and good taste, and to avoid painful explanations.
+Hippolyte Ceres suffered all the tortures of jealousy. He admitted it
+to himself, he kept saying inwardly, “I am a strong man; I am clad in
+armour; but the wound is underneath, it is in my heart,” and turning
+towards his wife, who looked beautiful in her guilt, he would say:
+
+“It ought not to have been with him.”
+
+He was right--Eveline ought not to have loved in government circles.
+
+He suffered so much that he took up his revolver, exclaiming: “I will go
+and kill him!” But he remembered that a Minister of Commerce cannot kill
+his own Prime Minister, and he put his revolver back into his drawer.
+
+The weeks passed without calming his sufferings. Each morning he buckled
+his strong man’s armour over his wound and sought in work and fame the
+peace that fled from him. Every Sunday he inaugurated busts, statues,
+fountains, artesian wells, hospitals, dispensaries, railways, canals,
+public markets, drainage systems, triumphal arches, and slaughter
+houses, and delivered moving speeches on each of these occasions.
+His fervid activity devoured whole piles of documents; he changed the
+colours of the postage stamps fourteen times in one week. Nevertheless,
+he gave vent to outbursts of grief and rage that drove him insane; for
+whole days his reason abandoned him. If he had been in the employment of
+a private administration this would have been noticed immediately, but
+it is much more difficult to discover insanity or frenzy in the conduct
+of affairs of State. At that moment the government employees were
+forming themselves into associations and federations amid a ferment
+that was giving alarm both to the Parliament and to public feeling. The
+postmen were especially prominent in their enthusiasm for trade unions.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres informed them in a circular that their action was
+strictly legal. The following day he sent out a second circular
+forbidding all associations of government employees as illegal. He
+dismissed one hundred and eighty postmen, reinstated them, reprimanded
+them--and awarded them gratuities. At Cabinet councils he was always
+on the point of bursting forth. The presence of the Head of the State
+scarcely restrained him within the limits of the decencies, and as
+he did not dare to attack his rival he consoled himself by heaping
+invectives upon General Debonnaire, the respected Minister of War.
+The General did not hear them, for he was deaf and occupied himself in
+composing verses for the Baroness Bildermann. Hippolyte Ceres offered
+an indistinct opposition to everything the Prime Minister proposed. In
+a word, he was a madman. One faculty alone escaped the ruin of his
+intellect: he retained his Parliamentary sense, his consciousness of
+the temper of majorities, his thorough knowledge of groups, and his
+certainty of the direction in which affairs were moving.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. FURTHER CONSEQUENCES
+
+The session ended calmly, and the Ministry saw no dangerous signs
+upon the benches where the majority sat. It was visible, however, from
+certain articles in the Moderate journals, that the demands of the
+Jewish and Christian financiers were increasing daily, that the
+patriotism of the banks required a civilizing expedition to Nigritia,
+and that the steel trusts, eager in the defence of our coasts and
+colonies, were crying out for armoured cruisers and still more armoured
+cruisers. Rumours of war began to be heard. Such rumours sprang up every
+year as regularly as the trade winds; serious people paid no heed
+to them and the government usually let them die away from their own
+weakness unless they grew stronger and spread. For in that case the
+country would be alarmed. The financiers only wanted colonial wars and
+the people did not want any wars at all. It loved to see its government
+proud and even insolent, but at the least suspicion that a European war
+was brewing, its violent emotion would quickly have reached the House.
+Paul Visire was not uneasy. The European situation was in his view
+completely reassuring. He was only irritated by the maniacal silence of
+his Minister of Foreign Affairs. That gnome went to the Cabinet meetings
+with a portfolio bigger than himself stuffed full of papers, said
+nothing, refused to answer all questions, even those asked him by the
+respected President of the Republic, and, exhausted by his obstinate
+labours, took a few moments’ sleep in his arm-chair in which nothing
+but the top of his little black head was to be seen above the green
+tablecloth.
+
+In the mean time Hippolyte Ceres became a strong man again. In company
+with his colleague Lapersonne he formed numerous intimacies with ladies
+of the theatre. They were both to be seen at night entering fashionable
+restaurants in the company of ladies whom they over-topped by their
+lofty stature and their new hats, and they were soon reckoned amongst
+the most sympathetic frequenters of the boulevards. Fortune Lapersonne
+had his own wound beneath his armour, His wife, a young milliner whom he
+carried off from a marquis, had gone to live with a chauffeur. He loved
+her still, and could not console himself for her loss, so that very
+often in the private room of a restaurant, in the midst of a group of
+girls who laughed and ate crayfish, the two ministers exchanged a look
+full of their common sorrow and wiped away an unbidden tear.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, although wounded to the heart, did not allow himself to
+be beaten. He swore that he would be avenged.
+
+Madame Paul Visire, whose deplorable health forced her to live with her
+relatives in a distant province, received an anonymous letter specifying
+that M. Paul Visire, who had not a half-penny when he married her, was
+spending her dowry on a married woman, E-- C--, that he gave this
+woman thirty-thousand-franc motor-cars, and pearl necklaces costing
+twenty-five thousand francs, and that he was going straight to dishonour
+and ruin. Madame Paul Visire read the letter, fell into hysterics, and
+handed it to her father.
+
+“I am going to box your husband’s ears,” said M. Blampignon; “he is a
+blackguard who will land you both in the workhouse unless we look out.
+He may be Prime Minister, but he won’t frighten me.”
+
+When he stepped off the train M. Blampignon presented himself at the
+Ministry of the Interior, and was immediately received. He entered the
+Prime Minister’s room in a fury.
+
+“I have something to say to you, sir!” And he waved the anonymous
+letter.
+
+Paul Visire welcomed him smiling.
+
+“You are welcome, my dear father. I was going to write to you. . . .
+Yes, to tell you of your nomination to the rank of officer of the Legion
+of Honour. I signed the patent this morning.”
+
+M. Blampignon thanked his son-in-law warmly and threw the anonymous
+letter into the fire.
+
+He returned to his provincial house and found his daughter fretting and
+agitated.
+
+“Well! I saw your husband. He is a delightful fellow. But then, you
+don’t understand how to deal with him.”
+
+About this time Hippolyte Ceres learned through a little scandalous
+newspaper (it is always through the newspapers that ministers are
+informed of the affairs of State) that the Prime Minister dined every
+evening with Mademoiselle Lysiane of the Folies Dramatiques, whose charm
+seemed to have made a great impression on him. Thenceforth Ceres took
+a gloomy joy in watching his wife. She came in every evening to dine or
+dress with an air of agreeable fatigue and the serenity that comes from
+enjoyment.
+
+Thinking that she knew nothing, he sent her anonymous communications.
+She read them at the table before him and remained still listless and
+smiling.
+
+He then persuaded himself that she gave no heed to these vague reports,
+and that in order to disturb her it would be necessary to enable her to
+verify her lover’s infidelity and treason for herself. There were at the
+Ministry a number of trustworthy agents charged with secret inquiries
+regarding the national defence. They were then employed in watching the
+spies of a neighbouring and hostile Power who had succeeded in entering
+the Postal and Telegraphic service. M. Ceres ordered them to suspend
+their work for the present and to inquire where, when, and how, the
+Minister of the Interior saw Mademoiselle Lysiane. The agents performed
+their missions faithfully and told the minister that they had several
+times seen the Prime Minister with a woman, but that she was not
+Mademoiselle Lysiane. Hippolyte Ceres asked them nothing further. He was
+right; the loves of Paul Visire and Lysiane were but an alibi invented
+by Paul Visire himself, with Eveline’s approval, for his fame was rather
+inconvenient to her, and she sighed for secrecy and mystery.
+
+They were not shadowed by the agents of the Ministry of Commerce alone.
+They were also followed by those of the Prefect of Police, and even by
+those of the Minister of the Interior, who disputed with each other
+the honour of protecting their chief. Then there were the emissaries
+of several royalist, imperialist, and clerical organisations, those of
+eight or ten blackmailers, several amateur detectives, a multitude of
+reporters, and a crowd of photographers, who all made their appearance
+wherever these two took refuge in their perambulating love affairs,
+at big hotels, small hotels, town houses, country houses, private
+apartments, villas, museums, palaces, hovels. They kept watch in the
+streets, from neighbouring houses, trees, walls, stair-cases, landings,
+roofs, adjoining rooms, and even chimneys. The Minister and his friend
+saw with alarm all round their bed room, gimlets boring through doors
+and shutters, and drills making holes in the walls. A photograph of
+Madame Ceres in night attire buttoning her boots was the utmost that had
+been obtained.
+
+Paul Visire grew impatient and irritable, and often lost his good humour
+and agreeableness. He came to the cabinet meetings in a rage and he,
+too, poured invectives upon General Debonnaire--a brave man under fire
+but a lax disciplinarian--and launched his sarcasms at against the
+venerable admiral Vivier des Murenes whose ships went to the bottom
+without any apparent reason.
+
+Fortune Lapersonne listened open-eyed, and grumbled scoffingly between
+his teeth:
+
+“He is not satisfied with robbing Hippolyte Ceres of his wife, but he
+must go and rob him of his catchwords too.”
+
+These storms were made known by the indiscretion of some ministers and
+by the complaints of the two old warriors, who declared their intention
+of flinging their portfolios at the beggar’s head, but who did nothing
+of the sort. These outbursts, far from injuring the lucky Prime
+Minister, had an excellent effect on Parliament and public opinion,
+who looked on them as signs of a keen solicitude for the welfare of the
+national army and navy. The Prime Minister was the recipient of general
+approbation.
+
+To the congratulations of the various groups and of notable personages,
+he replied with simple firmness: “Those are my principles!” and he had
+seven or eight Socialists put in prison.
+
+The session ended, and Paul Visire, very exhausted, went to take the
+waters. Hippolyte Ceres refused to leave his Ministry, where the trade
+union of telephone girls was in tumultuous agitation. He opposed it with
+an unheard of violence, for he had now become a woman-hater. On Sundays
+he went into the suburbs to fish along with his colleague Lapersonne,
+wearing the tall hat that never left him since he had become a Minister.
+And both of them, forgetting the fish, complained of the inconstancy of
+women and mingled their griefs.
+
+Hippolyte still loved Eveline and he still suffered. However, hope
+had slipped into his heart. She was now separated from her lover, and,
+thinking to win her back, he directed all his efforts to that end.
+He put forth all his skill, showed himself sincere, adaptable,
+affectionate, devoted, even discreet; his heart taught him the
+delicacies of feeling. He said charming and touching things to the
+faithless one, and, to soften her, he told her all that he had suffered.
+
+Crossing the band of his trousers upon his stomach.
+
+“See,” said he, “how thin I have got.”
+
+He promised her everything he thought could gratify a woman, country
+parties, hats, jewels.
+
+Sometimes he thought she would take pity on him.
+
+She no longer displayed an insolently happy countenance. Being separated
+from Paul, her sadness had an air of gentleness. But the moment he made
+a gesture to recover her she turned away fiercely and gloomily, girt
+with her fault as if with a golden girdle.
+
+He did not give up, making himself humble, suppliant, lamentable.
+
+One day he went to Lapersonne and said to him with tears in his eyes:
+
+“Will you speak to her?”
+
+Lapersonne excused himself, thinking that his intervention would be
+useless, but he gave some advice to his friend.
+
+“Make her think that you don’t care about her, that you love another,
+and she will come back to you.”
+
+Hippolyte, adopting this method, inserted in the newspapers that he was
+always to be found in the company of Mademoiselle Guinaud of the Opera.
+He came home late or did not come home at all, assumed in Eveline’s
+presence an appearance of inward joy impossible to restrain, took out of
+his pocket, at dinner, a letter on scented paper which he pretended to
+read with delight, and his lips seemed as in a dream to kiss invisible
+lips. Nothing happened. Eveline did not even notice the change.
+Insensible to all around her, she only came out of her lethargy to ask
+for some louis from her husband, and if he did not give them she threw
+him a look of contempt, ready to upbraid him with the shame which she
+poured upon him in the sight of the whole world. Since she had loved
+she spent a great deal on dress. She needed money, and she had only her
+husband to secure it for her; she was so far faithful to him.
+
+He lost patience, became furious, and threatened her with his revolver.
+He said one day before her to Madame Clarence:
+
+“I congratulate you, Madame; you have brought up your daughter to be a
+wanton hussy.”
+
+“Take me away, Mamma,” exclaimed Eveline. “I will get a divorce!”
+
+He loved her more ardently than ever. In his jealous rage, suspecting
+her, not without probability, of sending and receiving letters, he swore
+that he would intercept them, re-established a censorship over the post,
+threw private correspondence into confusion, delayed stock-exchange
+quotations, prevented assignations, brought about bankruptcies, thwarted
+passions, and caused suicides. The independent press gave utterance to
+the complaints of the public and indignantly supported them. To justify
+these arbitrary measures, the ministerial journals spoke darkly of plots
+and public dangers, and promoted a belief in a monarchical conspiracy.
+The less well-informed sheets gave more precise information, told of
+the seizure of fifty thousand guns, and the landing of Prince Crucho.
+Feeling grew throughout the country, and the republican organs called
+for the immediate meeting of Parliament. Paul Visire returned to
+Paris, summoned his colleagues, held an important Cabinet Council, and
+proclaimed through his agencies that a plot had been actually formed
+against the national representation, but that the Prime Minister held
+the threads of it in his hand, and that a judicial inquiry was about to
+be opened.
+
+He immediately ordered the arrest of thirty Socialists, and whilst
+the entire country was acclaiming him as its saviour, baffling the
+watchfulness of his six hundred detectives, he secretly took Eveline to
+a little house near the Northern railway station, where they remained
+until night. After their departure, the maid of their hotel, as she
+was putting their room in order, saw seven little crosses traced by a
+hairpin on the wall at the head of the bed.
+
+That is all that Hippolyte Ceres obtained as a reward of his efforts.
+
+
+
+
+IX. THE FINAL CONSEQUENCES
+
+Jealousy is a virtue of democracies which preserves them from tyrants.
+Deputies began to envy the Prime Minister his golden key. For a year his
+domination over the beauteous Madame Ceres had been known to the whole
+universe. The provinces, whither news and fashions only arrive after a
+complete revolution of the earth round the sun, were at last informed of
+the illegitimate loves of the Cabinet. The provinces preserve an austere
+morality; women are more virtuous there than they are in the capital.
+
+Various reasons have been alleged for this: Education, example,
+simplicity of life. Professor Haddock asserts that this virtue of
+provincial ladies is solely due to the fact that the heels of their
+shoes are low. “A woman,” said he, in a learned article in the
+“Anthropological Review”, “a woman attracts a civilized man in
+proportion as her feet make an angle with the ground. If this angle is
+as much as thirty-five degrees, the attraction becomes acute. For the
+position of the feet upon the ground determines the whole carriage of
+the body, and it results that provincial women, since they wear low
+heels, are not very attractive, and preserve their virtue with ease.”
+ These conclusions were not generally accepted. It was objected that
+under the influence of English and American fashions, low heels had been
+introduced generally without producing the results attributed to them
+by the learned Professor; moreover, it was said that the difference he
+pretended to establish between the morals of the metropolis and those
+of the provinces is perhaps illusory, and that if it exists, it is
+apparently due to the fact that great cities offer more advantages and
+facilities for love than small towns provide. However that may be, the
+provinces began to murmur against the Prime Minister, and to raise a
+scandal. This was not yet a danger, but there was a possibility that it
+might become one.
+
+For the moment the peril was nowhere and yet everywhere. The majority
+remained solid; but the leaders became stiff and exacting. Perhaps
+Hippolyte Ceres would never have intentionally sacrificed his interests
+to his vengeance. But thinking that he could henceforth, without
+compromising his own fortune, secretly damage that of Paul Visire, he
+devoted himself to the skilful and careful preparation of difficulties
+and perils for the Head of the Government. Though far from equalling his
+rival in talent, knowledge, and authority, he greatly surpassed him in
+his skill as a lobbyist. The most acute parliamentarians attributed
+the recent misfortunes of the majority to his refusal to vote. At
+committees, by a calculated imprudence, he favoured motions which
+he knew the Prime Minister could not accept. One day his intentional
+awkwardness provoked a sudden and violent conflict between the Minister
+of the Interior, and his departmental Treasurer. Then Ceres became
+frightened and went no further. It would have been dangerous for him to
+overthrow the ministry too soon. His ingenious hatred found an issue by
+circuitous paths. Paul Visire had a poor cousin of easy morals who bore
+his name. Ceres, remembering this lady, Celine Visire, brought her
+into prominence, arranged that she should become intimate with several
+foreigners, and procured her engagements in the music-halls. One summer
+night, on a stage in the Champs Elysees before a tumultuous crowd, she
+performed risky dances to the sounds of wild music which was audible
+in the gardens where the President of the Republic was entertaining
+Royalty. The name of Visire, associated with these scandals, covered the
+walls of the town, filled the newspapers, was repeated in the cafes and
+at balls, and blazed forth in letters of fire upon the boulevards.
+
+Nobody regarded the Prime Minister as responsible for the scandal of
+his relatives, but a bad idea of his family came into existence, and the
+influence of the statesman was diminished.
+
+Almost immediately he was made to feel this in a pretty sharp fashion.
+One day in the House, on a simple question, Labillette, the Minister of
+Religion and Public Worship, who was suffering from an attack of liver,
+and beginning to be exasperated by the intentions and intrigues of
+the clergy, threatened to close the Chapel of St. Orberosia, and spoke
+without respect of the National Virgin. The entire Right rose up in
+indignation; the Left appeared to give but a half-hearted support to
+the rash Minister. The leaders of the majority did not care to attack a
+popular cult which brought thirty millions a year into the country.
+The most moderate of the supporters of the Right, M. Bigourd, made
+the question the subject of a resolution and endangered the Cabinet.
+Luckily, Fortune Lapersonne, the Minister of Public Works, always
+conscious of the obligations of power, was able in the Prime Minister’s
+absence to repair the awkwardness and indecorum of his colleague, the
+Minister of Public Worship. He ascended the tribune and bore witness
+to the respect in which the Government held the heavenly Patron of
+the country, the consoler of so many ills which science admitted its
+powerlessness to relieve.
+
+When Paul Visire, snatched at last from Eveline’s arms, appeared in the
+House, the administration was saved; but the Prime Minister saw himself
+compelled to grant important concessions to the upper classes. He
+proposed in Parliament that six armoured cruisers should be laid down,
+and thus won the sympathies of the Steel Trust; he gave new assurances
+that the income tax would not be imposed, and he had eighteen Socialists
+arrested.
+
+He was soon to find himself opposed by more formidable obstacles. The
+Chancellor of the neighbouring Empire in an ingenious and profound
+speech upon the foreign relations of his sovereign, made a sly allusion
+to the intrigues that inspired the policy of a great country. This
+reference, which was receive with smiles by the Imperial Parliament,
+was certain to irritate a punctilious republic. It aroused the national
+susceptibility, which directed its wrath against its amorous
+Minister. The Deputies seized upon a frivolous pretext to show their
+dissatisfaction. A ridiculous incident, the fact that the wife of a
+subprefect had danced at the Moulin Rouge, forced the minister to face
+a vote of censure, and he was within a few votes of being defeated.
+According to general opinion, Paul Visire had never been so weak, so
+vacillating, or so spiritless, as on that occasion.
+
+He understood that he could only keep himself in office by a great
+political stroke, and he decided on the expedition to Nigritia. This
+measure was demanded by the great financial and industrial corporations
+and was one which would bring concessions of immense forests to the
+capitalists, a loan of eight millions to the banking companies, as well
+as promotions and decorations to the naval and military officers. A
+pretext presented itself; some insult needed to be avenged, or some
+debt to be collected. Six battleships, fourteen cruisers, and eighteen
+transports sailed up the mouth of the river Hippopotamus. Six hundred
+canoes vainly opposed the landing of the troops. Admiral Vivier des
+Murenes’ cannons produced an appalling effect upon the blacks, who
+replied to them with flights of arrows, but in spite of their fanatical
+courage they were entirely defeated. Popular enthusiasm was kindled by
+the newspapers which the financiers subsidised, and burst into a blaze.
+Some Socialists alone protested against this barbarous, doubtful, and
+dangerous enterprise. They were at once arrested.
+
+At that moment when the Minister, supported by wealth, and now beloved
+by the poor, seemed unconquerable, the light of hate showed Hippolyte
+Ceres alone the danger, and looking with a gloomy joy at his rival, he
+muttered between his teeth, “He is wrecked, the brigand!”
+
+Whilst the country intoxicated itself with glory, the neighbouring
+Empire protested against the occupation of Nigritia by a European
+power, and these protests following one another at shorter and
+shorter intervals became more and more vehement. The newspapers of the
+interested Republic concealed all causes for uneasiness; but Hippolyte
+Ceres heard the growing menace, and determined at last to risk
+everything, even the fate of the ministry, in order to ruin his enemy.
+He got men whom he could trust to write and insert articles in several
+of the official journals, which, seeming to express Paul Visire’s
+precise views, attributed warlike intentions to the Head of the
+Government.
+
+These articles roused a terrible echo abroad, and they alarmed the
+public opinion of a nation which, while fond of soldiers, was not fond
+of war. Questioned in the House on the foreign policy of his government,
+Paul Visire made a re-assuring statement, and promised to maintain a
+face compatible with the dignity of a great nation. His Minister of
+Foreign Affairs, Crombile, read a declaration which was absolutely
+unintelligible, for the reason that it was couched in diplomatic
+language. The Minister obtained a large majority.
+
+But the rumours of war did not cease, and in order to avoid a new and
+dangerous motion, the Prime Minister distributed eighty thousand acres
+of forests in Nigritia among the Deputies, and had fourteen Socialists
+arrested. Hippolyte Ceres went gloomily about the lobbies, confiding to
+the Deputies of his group that he was endeavouring to induce the Cabinet
+to adopt a pacific policy, and that he still hoped to succeed. Day by
+day the sinister rumours grew in volume, and penetrating amongst the
+public, spread uneasiness and disquiet. Paul Visire himself began to
+take alarm. What disturbed him most were the silence and absence of the
+Minister of Foreign Affairs. Crombile no longer came to the meetings of
+the Cabinet. Rising at five o’clock in the morning, he worked eighteen
+hours at his desk, and at last fell exhausted into his waste-paper
+basket, from whence the registrars removed him, together with the
+papers which they were going to sell to the military attaches of the
+neighbouring Empire.
+
+General Debonnaire believed that a campaign was imminent, and prepared
+for it. Far from fearing war, he prayed for it, and confided his
+generous hopes to Baroness Bildermann, who informed the neighbouring
+nation, which, acting on her information, proceeded to a rapid
+mobilization.
+
+The Minister of Finance unintentionally precipitated events. At the
+moment, he was speculating for a fall, and in order to bring about
+a panic on the Stock Exchange, he spread the rumour that war was now
+inevitable. The neighbouring Empire, deceived by this action, and
+expecting to see its territory invaded, mobilized its troops in all
+haste. The terrified Chamber overthrew the Visire ministry by an
+enormous majority (814 votes to 7, with 28 abstentions). It was too
+late. The very day of this fall the neighbouring and hostile nation
+recalled its ambassador and flung eight millions of men into Madame
+Ceres’ country. War became universal, and the whole world was drowned in
+a torrent of blood.
+
+
+THE ZENITH OF PENGUIN CIVILIZATION
+
+Half a century after the events we have just related, Madame Ceres died
+surrounded with respect and veneration, in the eighty-ninth year of her
+age. She had long been the widow of a statesman whose name she bore with
+dignity. Her modest and quiet funeral was followed by the orphans of the
+parish and the sisters of the Sacred Compassion.
+
+The deceased left all her property to the Charity of St. Orberosia.
+
+“Alas!” sighed M. Monnoyer, a canon of St. Mael, as he received the
+pious legacy, “it was high time for a generous benefactor to come to
+the relief of our necessities. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant
+are turning away from us. And when we try to lead back these misguided
+souls, neither threats nor promises, neither gentleness nor violence,
+nor anything else is now successful. The Penguin clergy pine in
+desolation; our country priests, reduced to following the humblest of
+trades, are shoeless, and compelled to live upon such scraps as they
+can pick up. In our ruined churches the rain of heaven falls upon the
+faithful, and during the holy offices they can hear the noise of stones
+falling from the arches. The tower of the cathedral is tottering and
+will soon fall. St. Orberosia is forgotten by the Penguins, her devotion
+abandoned, and her sanctuary deserted. On her shrine, bereft of its gold
+and precious stones, the spider silently weaves her web.”
+
+Hearing these lamentations, Pierre Mille, who at the age of ninety-eight
+years had lost nothing of his intellectual and moral power, asked, the
+canon if he did not think that St. Orberosia would one day rise out of
+this wrongful oblivion.
+
+“I hardly dare to hope so,” sighed M. Monnoyer.
+
+“It is a pity!” answered Pierre Mille. “Orberosia is a charming figure
+and her legend is a beautiful one. I discovered the other day by the
+merest chance, one of her most delightful miracles, the miracle of Jean
+Violle. Would you like to hear it, M. Monnoyer?”
+
+“I should be very pleased, M. Mille.”
+
+“Here it is, then, just as I found it in a fifteenth-century manuscript
+
+“Cecile, the wife of Nicolas Gaubert, a jeweller on the Pont-au-Change,
+after having led an honest and chaste life for many years, and being
+now past her prime, became infatuated with Jean Violle, the Countess de
+Maubec’s page, who lived at the Hotel du Paon on the Place de Greve. He
+was not yet eighteen years old, and his face and figure were attractive.
+Not being able to conquer her passion, Cecile resolved to satisfy it.
+She attracted the page to her house, loaded him with caresses, supplied
+him with sweetmeats and finally did as she wished with him.
+
+“Now one day, as they were together in the jeweller’s bed, Master
+Nicholas came home sooner than he was expected. He found the bolt drawn,
+and heard his wife on the other side of the door exclaiming, ‘My heart!
+my angel! my love!’ Then suspecting that she was shut up with a gallant,
+he struck great blows upon the door and began to shout ‘Slut! hussy!
+wanton! open so that I may cut off your nose and ears!’ In this peril,
+the jeweller’s wife besought St. Orberosia, and vowed her a large candle
+if she helped her and the little page, who was dying of fear beside the
+bed, out of their difficulty.
+
+“The saint heard the prayer. She immediately changed Jean Violle into
+a girl. Seeing this, Cecile was completely reassured, and began to call
+out to her husband: ‘Oh! you brutal villain, you jealous wretch! Speak
+gently if you want the door to be opened.’ And scolding in this way, she
+ran to the wardrobe and took out of it an old hood, a pair of stays,
+and a long grey petticoat, in which she hastily wrapped the transformed
+page. Then when this was done, ‘Catherine, dear Catherine,’ said she,
+loudly, ‘open the door for your uncle; he is more fool than knave, and
+won’t do you any harm.’ The boy who had become a girl, obeyed. Master
+Nicholas entered the room and found in it a young maid whom he did not
+know, and his wife in bed. ‘Big booby,’ said the latter to him, ‘don’t
+stand gaping at what you see, just as I had come to bed because had
+a stomach ache, I received a visit from Catherine, the daughter of my
+sister Jeanne de Palaiseau, with whom we quarrelled fifteen years ago.
+Kiss your niece. She is well worth the trouble.’ The jeweller gave
+Violle a hug, and from that moment wanted nothing so much as to be alone
+with her a moment, so that he might embrace her as much as he liked. For
+this reason he led her without any delay down to the kitchen, under the
+pretext of giving her some walnuts and wine, and he was no sooner there
+with her than he began to caress her very affectionately. He would not
+have stopped at that if St. Orberosia had not inspired his good wife
+with the idea of seeing what he was about. She found him with the
+pretended niece sitting on his knee. She called him a debauched
+creature, boxed his ears, and forced him to beg her pardon. The next day
+Violle resumed his previous form.”
+
+Having heard this story the venerable Canon Monnoyer thanked Pierre
+Mille for having told it, and, taking up his pen, began to write out
+a list of horses that would win at the next race meeting. For he was a
+book-maker’s clerk.
+
+In the mean time Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who produced the
+things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not produce them
+had more than enough. “But these,” as a member of the Institute said,
+“are necessary economic fatalities.” The great Penguin people had no
+longer either traditions, intellectual culture, or arts. The progress
+of civilisation manifested itself among them by murderous industry,
+infamous speculation, and hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as
+did all the great cities of the time, a cosmopolitan and financial
+character. An immense and regular ugliness reigned within it. The
+country enjoyed perfect tranquillity. It had reached its zenith.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+THE ENDLESS HISTORY
+
+
+Alca is becoming Americanised.--M. Daniset.
+
+And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the
+inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.--Genesis
+xix. 25
+
+{greek here} (Herodotus, Histories, VII cii.)
+
+Poverty hast ever been familiar to Greece, but virtue has been acquired,
+having been accomplished by wisdom and firm laws.--Henry Cary’s
+Translation.
+
+You have not seen angels then.--Liber Terribilis.
+
+     Bqfttfusftpvtuse jufbmmbb b up sjufef
+     tspjtfucftfnqfsfvstbqsftbnpjsqsp
+     dmbnfuspjtghjttdmjcfsufnbgsbodftftutpbnjtfbeftdpnqb
+     hojtgjobo--difsftr--vjejtqpteoueftsjdifttftevqbzt fuqbsmfn
+     Pzfoevofqsf ttfbdifuffejsjhfboumpqjojno Voufnpjoxfsiejrvf
+
+We are now beginning to study a chemistry which will deal with effects
+produced by bodies containing a quantity of concentrated energy the like
+of which we have not yet had at our disposal.--Sir William Ramsay.
+
+
+S. I
+
+The houses were never high enough to satisfy them; they kept on making
+them still higher and built them of thirty or forty storeys: with
+offices, shops, banks, societies one above another; they dug cellars and
+tunnels ever deeper downwards.
+
+Fifteen millions of men laboured in a giant town by the light of beacons
+which shed forth their glare both day and night. No light of heaven
+pierced through the smoke of the factories with which the town was girt,
+but sometimes the red disk of a rayless sun might be seen riding in the
+black firmament through which iron bridges ploughed their way, and from
+which there descended a continual shower of soot and cinders. It was
+the most industrial of all the cities in the world and the richest.
+Its organisation seemed perfect. None of the ancient aristocratic or
+democratic forms remained; everything was subordinated to the interests
+of the trusts. This environment gave rise to what anthropologists called
+the multi-millionaire type. The men of this type were at once energetic
+and frail, capable of great activity in forming mental combinations
+and of prolonged labour in offices, but men whose nervous irritability
+suffered from hereditary troubles which increased as time went on.
+
+Like all true aristocrats, like the patricians of republican Rome or the
+squires of old England, these powerful men affected a great severity
+in their habits and customs. They were the ascetics of wealth. At the
+meetings of the trusts an observer would have noticed their smooth and
+puffy faces, their lantern cheeks, their sunken eyes and wrinkled brows.
+With bodies more withered, complexions yellower, lips drier, and eyes
+filled with a more burning fanaticism than those of the old Spanish
+monks, these multimillionaires gave themselves up with inextinguishable
+ardour to the austerities of banking and industry. Several, denying
+themselves all happiness, all pleasure, and all rest, spent their
+miserable lives in rooms without light or air, furnished only with
+electrical apparatus, living on eggs and milk, and sleeping on camp
+beds. By doing nothing except pressing nickel buttons with their
+fingers, these mystics heaped up riches of which they never even saw the
+signs, and acquired the vain possibility of gratifying desires that they
+never experienced.
+
+The worship of wealth had its martyrs. One of these multi-millionaires,
+the famous Samuel Box, preferred to die rather than surrender the
+smallest atom of his property. One of his workmen, the victim of an
+accident while at work, being refused any indemnity by his employer,
+obtained a verdict in the courts, but repelled by innumerable obstacles
+of procedure, he fell into the direst poverty. Being thus reduced to
+despair, he succeeded by dint of cunning and audacity in confronting his
+employer with a loaded revolver in his hand, and threatened to blow
+out his brains if he did not give him some assistance. Samuel Box gave
+nothing, and let himself be killed for the sake of principle.
+
+Examples that come from high quarters are followed. Those who possessed
+some small capital (and they were necessarily the greater number),
+affected the ideas and habits of the multi-millionaires, in order
+that they might be classed among them. All passions which injured the
+increase or the preservation of wealth, were regarded as dishonourable;
+neither indolence, nor idleness, nor the taste for disinterested study,
+nor love of the arts, nor, above all, extravagance, was ever forgiven;
+pity was condemned as a dangerous weakness. Whilst every inclination
+to licentiousness excited public reprobation, the violent and brutal
+satisfaction of an appetite was, on the contrary, excused; violence, in
+truth, was regarded as less injurious to morality, since it manifested
+a form of social energy. The State was firmly based on two great public
+virtues: respect for the rich and contempt for the poor. Feeble spirits
+who were still moved by human suffering had no other resource than to
+take refuge in a hypocrisy which it was impossible to blame, since
+it contributed to the maintenance of order and the solidity of
+institutions.
+
+Thus, among the rich, all were devoted to their social order, or seemed
+to be so; all gave good examples, if all did not follow them. Some felt
+the gravity of their position cruelly; but they endured it either from
+pride or from duty. Some attempted, in secret and by subterfuge, to
+escape from it for a moment. One of these, Edward Martin, the President,
+of the Steel Trust, sometimes dressed himself as a poor man, went: forth
+to beg his bread, and allowed himself to be jostled by the passers-by.
+One day, as he asked alms on a bridge, he engaged in a quarrel with a
+real beggar, and filled with a fury of envy, he strangled him.
+
+As they devoted their whole intelligence to business, they sought
+no intellectual pleasures. The theatre, which had formerly been very
+flourishing among them, was now reduced to pantomimes and comic dances.
+Even the pieces in which women acted were given up; the taste for pretty
+forms and brilliant toilettes had been lost; the somersaults of clowns
+and the music of negroes were preferred above them, and what roused
+enthusiasm was the sight of women upon the stage whose necks were
+bedizened with diamonds, or processions carrying golden bars in triumph.
+Ladies of wealth were as much compelled as the men to lead a respectable
+life. According to a tendency common to all civilizations, public
+feeling set them up as symbols; they were, by their austere
+magnificence, to represent both the splendour of wealth and its
+intangible. The old habits of gallantry had been reformed, Tut
+fashionable lovers were now secretly replaced by muscular labourers
+or stray grooms. Nevertheless, scandals were rare, a foreign journey
+concealed nearly all of them, and the Princesses of the Trusts remained
+objects of universal esteem.
+
+The rich formed only a small minority, but their collaborators, who
+composed the entire people, had been completely won over or completely
+subjugated by them. They formed two classes, the agents of commerce or
+banking, and workers in the factories. The former contributed an immense
+amount of work and received large salaries. Some of them succeeded in
+founding establishments of their own; for in the constant increase of
+the public wealth the more intelligent and audacious could hope for
+anything. Doubtless it would have been possible to find a certain
+number of discontented and rebellious persons among the immense crowd of
+engineers and accountants, but this powerful society had imprinted its
+firm discipline even on the minds of its opponents. The very anarchists
+were laborious and regular.
+
+As for the workmen who toiled in the factories that surrounded the
+town, their decadence, both physical and moral, was terrible; they were
+examples of the type of poverty as it is set forth by anthropology.
+Although the development among them of certain muscles, due to the
+particular nature of their work, might give a false idea of their
+strength, they presented sure signs of morbid debility. Of low stature,
+with small heads and narrow chests, they were further distinguished from
+the comfortable classes by a multitude of physiological anomalies, and,
+in particular, by a common want of symmetry between the head and the
+limbs. And they were destined to a gradual and continuous degeneration,
+for the State made soldiers of the more robust among them, and the
+health of these did not long withstand the brothels and the drink-shops
+that sprang up around their barracks. The proletarians became more
+and more feeble in mind. The continued weakening of their intellectual
+faculties was not entirely due to their manner of life; it resulted also
+from a methodical selection carried out by the employers. The latter,
+fearing that workmen of too great ability might be inclined to put
+forward legitimate demands, took care to eliminate them by every
+possible means, and preferred to engage ignorant and stupid labourers,
+who were incapable of defending their rights, but were yet intelligent
+enough to perform their toil, which highly perfected machines rendered
+extremely simple. Thus the proletarians were unable to do anything to
+improve their lot. With difficulty did they succeed by means of strikes
+in maintaining the rate of their wages. Even this means began to fail
+them. The alternations of production inherent in the capitalist system
+caused such cessations of work that, in several branches of industry, as
+soon as a strike was declared, the accumulation of products allowed
+the employers to dispense with the strikers. In a word, these miserable
+employees were plunged in a gloomy apathy that nothing enlightened and
+nothing exasperated. They were necessary instruments for the social
+order and well adapted to their purpose.
+
+Upon the whole, this social order seemed the most firmly established
+that had yet been seen, at least amon kind, for that of bees and ants is
+incomparably more stable. Nothing could foreshadow the ruin of a system
+founded on what is strongest in human nature, pride and cupidity.
+However, keen observers discovered several grounds for uneasiness. The
+most certain, although the least apparent, were of an economic order,
+and consisted in the continually increasing amount of over-production,
+which entailed long and cruel interruptions of labour, though these
+were, it is true, utilized by the manufacturers as a means of breaking
+the power of the workmen, by facing them with the prospect of a
+lock-out. A more obvious peril resulted from the physiological state of
+almost the entire population. “The health of the poor is what it must
+be,” said the experts in hygiene, “but that of the rich leaves much to
+be desired.” It was not difficult to find the causes of this. The supply
+of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the city, and men
+breathed in an artificial air. The food trusts, by means of the most
+daring chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk, fruit,
+and vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and brain
+troubles. The multi-millionaires were bald at the age of eighteen; some
+showed from time to time a dangerous weakness of mind. Over-strung and
+enfeebled, they gave enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a
+common thing for some bath-attendant or other trumpery who turned healer
+or prophet, to make a rapid fortune by the practice of medicine or
+theology. The number of lunatics increased continually; suicides
+multiplied in the world of wealth, and many of them were accompanied
+by atrocious and extraordinary circumstances, which bore witness to an
+unheard o perversion of intelligence and sensibility.
+
+Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average minds.
+Terrible accidents, henceforth periodical and regular, entered
+into people’s calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in
+statistical tables. Every day, machines burst into fragments, houses
+fell down, trains laden with merchandise fell on to the streets,
+demolishing entire buildings and crushing hundreds of passers-by.
+Through the ground, honey-combed with tunnels, two or three storeys of
+work-shops would often crash, engulfing all those who worked in them.
+
+S. 2
+
+In the southwestern district of the city, on an eminence which had
+preserved its ancient name of Fort Saint-Michel, there stretched a
+square where some old trees still spread their exhausted arms above the
+greensward. Landscape gardeners had constructed a cascade, grottos, a
+torrent, a lake, and an island, on its northern slope. From this side
+one could see the whole town with its streets, its boulevards, its
+squares, the multitude of its roofs and domes, its air-passages, and its
+crowds of men, covered with a veil of silence, and seemingly enchanted
+by the distance. This square was the healthiest place in the capital;
+here no smoke obscured the sky, and children were brought here to play.
+In summer some employees from the neighbouring offices and laboratories
+used to resort to it for a moment after their luncheons, but they did
+not disturb its solitude and peace.
+
+It was owing to this custom that, one day in June, about mid-day, a
+telegraph clerk, Caroline Meslier, came and sat down on a bench at the
+end of a terrace. In order to refresh her eyes by the sight of a little
+green, she turned her back to the town. Dark, with brown eyes, robust
+and placid, Caroline appeared to be from twenty-five to twenty-eight
+years of age. Almost immediately, a clerk in the Electricity Trust,
+George Clair, took his place beside her. Fair, thin, and supple, he had
+features of a feminine delicacy; he was scarcely older than she, and
+looked still younger. As they met almost every day in this place,
+a comradeship had sprung up between them, and they enjoyed chatting
+together. But their conversation had never been tender, affectionate, or
+even intimate. Caroline, although it had happened to her in the past to
+repent of her confidence, might perhaps have been less reserved had
+not George Clair always shown himself extremely restrained in his
+expressions and behaviour. He always gave a purely intellectual
+character to the conversation, keeping it within the realm of general
+ideas, and, moreover, expressing himself on all subjects with the
+greatest freedom. He spoke frequently of the organization of society,
+and the conditions of labour.
+
+“Wealth,” said he, “is one of the means of living happily; but people
+have made it the sole end of existence.”
+
+And this state of things seemed monstrous to both of them.
+
+They returned continually to various scientific subjects with which they
+were both familiar.
+
+On that day they discussed the evolution of chemistry.
+
+“From the moment,” said Clair, “that radium was seen to be transformed
+into helium, people ceased to affirm the immutability of simple bodies;
+in this way all those old laws about simple relations and about the
+indestructibility of matter were abolished.”
+
+“However,” said she, “chemical laws exist.”
+
+For, being a woman, she had need of belief.
+
+He resumed carelessly:
+
+“Now that we can procure radium in sufficient quantities, science
+possesses incomparable means of analysis; even at present we get
+glimpses, within what are called simple bodies, of extremely diversified
+complex ones, and we discover energies in matter which seem to increase
+even by reason of its tenuity.”
+
+As they talked, they threw bits of bread to the birds, and some children
+played around them.
+
+Passing from one subject to another:
+
+“This hill, in the quaternary epoch,” said Clair, “was inhabited by wild
+horses. Last year, as they were tunnelling for the water mains, they
+found a layer of the bones of primeval horses.”
+
+She was anxious to know whether, at that distant epoch, man had yet
+appeared.
+
+He told her that man used to hunt the primeval horse long before he
+tried to domesticate him.
+
+“Man,” he added, “was at first a hunter, then he became a shepherd,
+a cultivator, a manufacturer . . . and these diverse civilizations
+succeeded each other at intervals of time that the mind cannot
+conceive.”
+
+He took out his watch.
+
+Caroline asked if it was already time to go back to the office.
+
+He said it was not, that it was scarcely half-past twelve.
+
+A little girl was making mud pies at the foot of their bench; a little
+boy of seven or eight years was playing in front of them. Whilst his
+mother was sewing on an adjoining bench, he played all alone at being a
+run-away horse, and with that power of illusion, of which children are
+capable, he imagined that he was at the same time the horse, and those
+who ran after him, and those who fled in terror before him. He kept
+struggling with himself and shouting: “Stop him, Hi! Hi! This is an
+awful horse, he has got the bit between his teeth.”
+
+Caroline asked the question:
+
+“Do you think that men were happy formerly?”
+
+Her companion answered:
+
+“They suffered less when they were younger. They acted like that little
+boy: they played; they played at arts, at virtues, at vices, at heroism,
+at beliefs, at pleasures; they had illusions which entertained them;
+they made a noise; they amused themselves. But now. . . .”
+
+He interrupted himself, and looked again at his watch.
+
+The child, who was running, struck his foot against the little girl’s
+pail, and fell his full length on the gravel. He remained a moment
+stretched out motionless, then raised himself up on the palms of his
+hands. His forehead puckered, his mouth opened, and he burst into tears.
+His mother ran up, but Caroline had lifted him from the ground and was
+wiping his eyes and mouth with her handkerchief.
+
+The child kept on sobbing and Clair took him in his arms.
+
+“Come, don’t cry, my little man! I am going to tell you a story.
+
+“A fisherman once threw his net into the sea and drew out a little,
+sealed, copper pot, which he opened with his knife. Smoke came out
+of it, and as it mounted up to the clouds the smoke grew thicker and
+thicker and became a giant who gave such a terrible yawn that the whole
+world was blown to dust.”
+
+Clair stopped himself, gave a dry laugh, and handed the child back to
+his mother. Then he took out his watch again, and kneeling on the bench
+with his elbows resting on its back he gazed at the town. As far as
+the eye could reach, the multitude of houses stood out in their tiny
+immensity.
+
+Caroline turned her eyes in the same direction.
+
+“What splendid weather it is!” said she. “The sun’s rays change the
+smoke on the horizon into gold. The worst thing about civilization is
+that it deprives one of the light of day.”
+
+We did not answer; his looks remained fixed on a place in the town.
+
+After some seconds of silence they saw about half a mile away, in the
+richer district on the other side of the river, a sort of tragic fog
+rearing itself upwards. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard even
+where they were sitting, and an immense tree of smoke mounted towards
+the pure sky. Little by little the air was filled with an imperceptible
+murmur caused by the shouts of thousands of men. Cries burst forth quite
+close to the square.
+
+“What has been blown up?”
+
+The bewilderment was great, for although accidents were common, such
+a violent explosion as this one had never been seen, and everybody
+perceived that something terribly strange had happened.
+
+Attempts were made to locate the place of the accident; districts,
+streets, different buildings, clubs, theatres, and shops were mentioned.
+Information gradually became more precise and at last the truth was
+known.
+
+“The Steel Trust has just been blown up.”
+
+Clair put his watch back into his pocket.
+
+Caroline looked at him closely and her eyes filled with astonishment.
+
+At last she whispered in his ear:
+
+“Did you know it? Were you expecting it? Was it you . . . ?”
+
+He answered very calmly:
+
+“That town ought to be destroyed.”
+
+She replied in a gentle and thoughtful tone:
+
+“I think so too.”
+
+And both of them returned quietly to their work.
+
+
+S. 3
+
+From that day onward, anarchist attempts followed one another every week
+without interruption. The victims were numerous, and almost all of them
+belonged to the poorer classes. These crimes roused public resentment.
+It was among domestic servants, hotel-keepers, and the employees of such
+small shops as the Trusts still allowed to exist, that indignation
+burst forth most vehemently. In popular districts women might be heard
+demanding unusual punishments for the dynamitards. (They were called
+by this old name, although it was hardly appropriate to them, since, to
+these unknown chemists, dynamite was an innocent material only fit to
+destroy ant-hills, and they considered it mere child’s play to explode
+nitro-glycerine with a cartridge made of fulminate of mercury.) Business
+ceased suddenly, and those who were least rich were the first to feel
+the effects. They spoke of doing justice themselves to the anarchists.
+In the mean time the factory workers remained hostile or indifferent
+to violent action. They were threatened, as a result of the decline of
+business, with a likelihood of losing their work, or even a lock-out
+in all the factories. The Federation of Trade Unions proposed a general
+strike as the most powerful means of influencing the employers, and the
+best aid that could be given to the revolutionists, but all the trades
+with the exception of the gliders refused to cease work.
+
+The police made numerous arrests. Troops summoned from all parts of the
+National Federation protected the offices of the Trusts, the houses of
+the multi-millionaires, the public halls, the banks, and the big shops.
+A fortnight passed without a single explosion, and it was concluded that
+the dynamitards, in all probability but a handful of persons, perhaps
+even Still fewer, had all been killed or captured, or that they were in
+hiding, or had taken flight. Confidence returned; it returned at first
+among the poorer classes. Two or three hundred thousand soldiers, who
+bad been lodged in the most closely populated districts, stimulated
+trade, and people began to cry out: “Hurrah for the army!”
+
+The rich, who had not been so quick to take alarm, were reassured more
+slowly. But at the Stock Exchange a group of “bulls” spread optimistic
+rumours and by a powerful effort put a brake upon the fall in prices.
+Business improved. Newspapers with big circulations supported the
+movement. With patriotic eloquence they depicted capital as laughing in
+its impregnable position at the assaults of a few dastardly criminals,
+and public wealth maintaining its serene ascendency in spite of the vain
+threats made against it. They were sincere in their attitude, though at
+the same time they found it benefited them. Outrages were forgotten or
+their occurrence denied. On Sundays, at the race-meetings, the stands
+were adorned by women covered with pearls and diamonds. It was observed
+with joy that the capitalists had not suffered. Cheers were given for
+the multi-millionaires in the saddling rooms.
+
+On the following day the Southern Railway Station, the Petroleum Trust,
+and the huge church built at the expense of Thomas Morcellet were all
+blown up. Thirty houses were in flames, and the beginning of a fire
+was discovered at the docks. The firemen showed amazing intrepidity and
+zeal. They managed their tall fire-escapes with automatic precision,
+and climbed as high as thirty storeys to rescue the luckless inhabitants
+from the flames. The soldiers performed their duties with spirit, and
+were given a double ration of coffee. But these fresh casualties started
+a panic. Millions of people, who wanted to take their money with them
+and leave the town at once, crowded the great banking houses. These
+establishments, after paying out money for three days, closed their
+doors amid mutterings of a riot. A crowd of fugitives, laden with their
+baggage, besieged the railway stations and took the town by storm. Many
+who were anxious to lay in a stock of provisions and take refuge in
+the cellars, attacked the grocery stores, although they were guarded by
+soldiers with fixed bayonets. The public authorities displayed energy.
+Numerous arrests were made and thousands of warrants issued against
+suspected persons.
+
+During the three weeks that followed no outrage was committed. There was
+a rumour that bombs had been found in the Opera House, in the cellars of
+the Town Hall, and beside one of the Pillars of the Stock Exchange. But
+it was soon known that these were boxes of sweets that had been put in
+those places by practical jokers or lunatics. One of the accused, when
+questioned by a magistrate, declared that he was the chief author of
+the explosions, and said that all his accomplices had lost their
+lives. These confessions were published by the newspapers and helped
+to reassure public opinion. It was only towards the close of the
+examination that the magistrates saw they had to deal with a pretender
+who was in no way connected with any of the crimes.
+
+The experts chosen by the courts discovered nothing that enabled them to
+determine the engine employed in the work of destruction. According to
+their conjectures the new explosive emanated from a gas which radium
+evolves, and it was supposed that electric waves, produced by a special
+type of oscillator, were propagated through space and thus caused the
+explosion. But even the ablest chemist could say nothing precise or
+certain. At last two policemen, who were passing in front of the Hotel
+Meyer, found on the pavement, close to a ventilator, an egg made of
+white metal and provided with a capsule at each end. They picked it
+up carefully, and, on the orders of their chief, carried it to the
+municipal laboratory. Scarcely had the experts assembled to examine it,
+than the egg burst and blew up the amphitheatre and the dome. All the
+experts perished, and with them Collin, the General of Artillery, and
+the famous Professor Tigre.
+
+The capitalist society did not allow itself to be daunted by this fresh
+disaster. The great banks re-opened their doors, declaring that
+they would meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money
+guaranteed by the State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange,
+in spite of the complete cessation of business, decided not to suspend
+their sittings.
+
+In the mean time the magisterial investigation into the case of those
+who had been first accused had come to an end. Perhaps the evidence
+brought against them might have appeared insufficient under other
+circumstances, but the zeal both of the magistrates and the public made
+up for this insufficiency. On the eve of the day fixed for the trial the
+Courts of justice were blown up and eight hundred people were killed,
+the greater number of them being judges and lawyers. A furious crowd
+broke into the prison and lynched the prisoners. The troops sent to
+restore order were received with showers of stones and revolver shots;
+several soldiers being dragged from their horses and trampled underfoot.
+The soldiers fired on the mob and many persons were killed. At last the
+public authorities succeeded in establishing tranquillity. Next day the
+Bank was blown up.
+
+From that time onwards unheard-of things took place. The factory
+workers, who had refused to strike, rushed in crowds into the town and
+set fire to the houses. Entire regiments, led by their officers, joined
+the workmen, went with them through the town singing revolutionary
+hymns, and took barrels of petroleum from the docks with which to feed
+the fires. Explosions were continual. One morning a monstrous tree of
+smoke, like the ghost of a huge palm tree half a mile in height, rose
+above the giant Telegraph Hall which suddenly fell into a complete ruin.
+
+Whilst half the town was in flames, the other half pursued its
+accustomed life. In the mornings, milk pails could be heard jingling
+in the dairy carts. In a deserted avenue some old navvy might be seen
+seated against a wall slowly eating hunks of bread with perhaps a little
+meat. Almost all the presidents of the trusts remained at their posts.
+Some of them performed their duty with heroic simplicity. Raphael
+Box, the son of a martyred multi-millionaire, was blown up as he was
+presiding at the general meeting of the Sugar Trust. He was given a
+magnificent funeral and the procession on its way to the cemetery had
+to climb six times over piles of ruins or cross upon planks over the
+uprooted roads.
+
+The ordinary helpers of the rich, the clerks, employees, brokers, and
+agents, preserved an unshaken fidelity. The surviving clerks of the Bank
+that had been blown up, made their way along the ruined streets through
+the midst of smoking houses to hand in their bills of exchange, and
+several were swallowed up in the flames while endeavouring to present
+their receipts.
+
+Nevertheless, any illusion concerning the state of affairs was
+impossible. The enemy was master of the town. Instead of silence the
+noise of explosions was now continuous and produced an insurmountable
+feeling of horror. The lighting apparatus having been destroyed, the
+city was plunged in darkness all through the night, and appalling crimes
+were committed. The populous districts alone, having suffered the least,
+still preserved measures of protection. The were paraded by patrols of
+volunteers who shot the robbers, and at every street corner one stumbled
+over a body lying in a pool of blood, the hands bound behind the back, a
+handkerchief over the face, and a placard pinned upon the breast.
+
+It became impossible to clear away the ruins or to bury the dead. Soon
+the stench from the corpses became intolerable. Epidemics raged and
+caused innumerable deaths, while they also rendered the survivors feeble
+and listless. Famine carried off almost all who were left. A hundred
+and one days after the first outrage, whilst six army corps with field
+artillery and siege artillery were marching, at night, into the poorest
+quarter of the city, Caroline and Clair, holding each other’s hands,
+were watching from the roof a lofty house, the only one still left
+standing, but now surrounded by smoke and flame, joyous songs ascended
+from the street, where the crowd was dancing in delirium.
+
+“To-morrow it will be ended,” said the man, “and it will be better.”
+
+The young woman, her hair loosened and her face shining with the
+reflection of the flames, gazed with a pious joy at the circle of fire
+that was growing closer around them.
+
+“It will be better,” said she also.
+
+And throwing herself into the destroyer’s arms she pressed a passionate
+kiss upon his lips.
+
+S. 4
+
+The other towns of the federation also suffered from disturbances and
+outbreaks, and then order was restored. Reforms were introduced into
+institutions and great changes took place in habits and customs, but the
+country never recovered the loss of its capital, and never regained its
+former prosperity. Commerce and industry dwindled away, and civilization
+abandoned those countries which for so long it bad preferred to all
+others. They became insalubrious and sterile; the territory that had
+supported so many millions of men became nothing more than a desert. On
+the hill of Fort St. Michel wild horses cropped the coarse grass.
+
+Days flowed by like water from the fountains, and the centuries passed
+like drops falling from the ends of stalactites. Hunters came to chase
+the bears upon the hills that covered the forgotten city; shepherds led
+their flocks upon them; labourers turned up the soil with their ploughs;
+gardeners cultivated their lettuces and grafted their pear trees. They
+were not rich, and they had no arts. The walls of their cabins were
+covered with old vines and roses, A goat-skin clothed their tanned
+limbs, while their wives dressed themselves with the wool that they
+themselves had spun. The goat-herds moulded little figures of men and
+animals out of clay, or sang songs about the young girl who follows her
+lover through woods or among the browsing goats while the pine trees
+whisper together and the water utters its murmuring sound. The master of
+the house grew angry with the beetles who devoured his figs; he planned
+snares to protect his fowls from the velvet-tailed fox, and he poured
+out wine for his neighbours saying:
+
+“Drink! The flies have not spoilt my vintage; the vines were dry before
+they came.”
+
+Then in the course of ages the wealth of the villages and the corn
+that filled the fields were pillaged by barbarian invaders. The country
+changed its masters several times. The conquerors built castles upon the
+hills; cultivation increased; mills, forges, tanneries, and looms were
+established; roads were opened through the woods and over the marshes;
+the river was covered with boats. The hamlets became large villages and
+joining together formed a town which protected itself by deep trenches
+and lofty walls. Later, becoming the capital of a great State, it found
+itself straitened within its now useless ramparts and it converted them
+into grass-covered walks.
+
+It grew very rich and large beyond measure. The houses were never high
+enough to satisfy the people; they kept on making them still higher
+and built them of thirty or forty storeys, with offices, shops, banks,
+societies one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper
+downwards. Fifteen millions of men laboured in the giant town.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
+
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diff --git a/old/1930.txt b/old/1930.txt
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Penguin Island
+
+Author: Anatole France
+
+Release Date: February 25, 2006 [EBook #1930]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PENGUIN ISLAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Aaron Cannon and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+PENGUIN ISLAND
+
+by ANATOLE FRANCE
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+     BOOK I.    THE BEGINNINGS
+     BOOK II.   THE ANCIENT TIMES
+     BOOK III.  THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+     BOOK IV.   MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+     BOOK V.    MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+     BOOK VI.   MODERN TIMES
+     BOOK VII.  MODERN TIMES
+     BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS
+
+
+
+
+I. LIFE OF SAINT MAEL
+
+Mael, a scion of a royal family of Cambria, was sent in his ninth year
+to the Abbey of Yvern so that he might there study both sacred and
+profane learning. At the age of fourteen he renounced his patrimony and
+took a vow to serve the Lord. His time was divided, according to the
+rule, between the singing of hymns, the study of grammar, and the
+meditation of eternal truths.
+
+A celestial perfume soon disclosed the virtues of the monk throughout
+the cloister, and when the blessed Gal, the Abbot of Yvern, departed
+from this world into the next, young Mael succeeded him in the
+government of the monastery. He established therein a school, an
+infirmary, a guest-house, a forge, work-shops of all kinds, and sheds
+for building ships, and he compelled the monks to till the lands in the
+neighbourhood. With his own hands he cultivated the garden of the Abbey,
+he worked in metals, he instructed the novices, and his life was gently
+gliding along like a stream that reflects the heaven and fertilizes the
+fields.
+
+At the close of the day this servant of God was accustomed to seat
+himself on the cliff, in the place that is to-day still called St.
+Mael's chair. At his feet the rocks bristling with green seaweed and
+tawny wrack seemed like black dragons as they faced the foam of the
+waves with their monstrous breasts. He watched the sun descending into
+the ocean like a red Host whose glorious blood gave a purple tone to the
+clouds and to the summits of the waves. And the holy man saw in this the
+image of the mystery of the Cross, by which the divine blood has clothed
+the earth with a royal purple. In the offing a line of dark blue marked
+the shores of the island of Gad, where St. Bridget, who had been given
+the veil by St. Malo, ruled over a convent of women.
+
+Now Bridget, knowing the merits of the venerable Mael, begged from
+him some work of his hands as a rich present. Mael cast a hand-bell of
+bronze for her and, when it was finished, he blessed it and threw it
+into the sea. And the bell went ringing towards the coast of Gad, where
+St. Bridget, warned by the sound of the bell upon the waves, received it
+piously, and carried it in solemn procession with singing of psalms into
+the chapel of the convent.
+
+Thus the holy Mael advanced from virtue to virtue. He had already passed
+through two-thirds of the way of life, and he hoped peacefully to reach
+his terrestrial end in the midst of his spiritual brethren, when he knew
+by a certain sign that the Divine wisdom had decided otherwise, and
+that the Lord was calling him to less peaceful but not less meritorious
+labours.
+
+
+
+
+II. THE APOSTOLICAL VOCATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+One day as he walked in meditation to the furthest point of a tranquil
+beach, for which rocks jutting out into the sea formed a rugged dam, he
+saw a trough of stone which floated like a boat upon the waters.
+
+It was in a vessel similar to this that St. Guirec, the great St.
+Columba, and so many holy men from Scotland and from Ireland had gone
+forth to evangelize Armorica. More recently still, St. Avoye having come
+from England, ascended the river Auray in a mortar made of rose-coloured
+granite into which children were afterwards placed in order to make
+them strong; St. Vouga passed from Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock whose
+fragments, preserved at Penmarch, will cure of fever such pilgrims as
+place these splinters on their heads. St. Samson entered the Bay of St.
+Michael's Mount in a granite vessel which will one day be called St.
+Samson's basin. It is because of these facts that when he saw the stone
+trough the holy Mael understood that the Lord intended him for the
+apostolate of the pagans who still peopled the coast and the Breton
+islands.
+
+He handed his ashen staff to the holy Budoc, thus investing him with
+the government of the monastery. Then, furnished with bread, a barrel
+of fresh water, and the book of the Holy Gospels, he entered the stone
+trough which carried him gently to the island of Hoedic.
+
+This island is perpetually buffeted by the winds. In it some poor
+men fished among the clefts of the rocks and labouriously cultivated
+vegetables in gardens full of sand and pebbles that were sheltered from
+the wind by walls of barren stone and hedges of tamarisk. A beautiful
+fig-tree raised itself in a hollow of the island and thrust forth its
+branches far and wide. The inhabitants of the island used to worship it.
+
+And the holy Mael said to them: "You worship this tree because it is
+beautiful. Therefore you are capable of feeling beauty. Now I come to
+reveal to you the hidden beauty." And he taught them the Gospel. And
+after having instructed them, he baptized them with salt and water.
+
+The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than they are
+to-day. For since then many have been swallowed up by the sea. St. Mael
+evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he ascended the
+river Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a
+Roman house. A thin column of smoke went up from the roof. The holy man
+crossed the threshold on which there was a mosaic representing a dog
+with its hind legs outstretched and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed
+by an old couple, Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, who lived there
+on the products of their lands. There was a portico round the interior
+court the columns of which were painted red, half their height upwards
+from the base. A fountain made of shells stood against the wall and
+under the portico there rose an altar with a niche in which the master
+of the house had placed some little idols made of baked earth and
+whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged children, others Apollo
+or Mercury, and several were in the form of a naked woman twisting her
+hair. But the holy Mael, observing those figures, discovered among them
+the image of a young mother holding a child upon her knees.
+
+Immediately pointing to that image he said:
+
+"That is the Virgin, the mother of God. The poet Virgil foretold her in
+Sibylline verses before she was born and, in angelical tones he sang Jam
+redit et virgo. Throughout heathendom prophetic figures of her have been
+made, like that which you, O Marcus, have placed upon this altar. And
+without doubt it is she who has protected your modest household. Thus it
+is that those who faithfully observe the natural law prepare themselves
+for the knowledge of revealed truths."
+
+Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, having been instructed by this
+speech, were converted to the Christian faith. They received baptism
+together with their young freedwoman, Caelia Avitella, who was dearer to
+them than the light of their eyes. All their tenants renounced paganism
+and were baptized on the same day.
+
+Marcus Combabus, Valeria Moerens, and Caelia Avitella led thenceforth
+a life full of merit. They died in the Lord and were admitted into the
+canon of the saints.
+
+For thirty-seven years longer the blessed Mael evangelized the pagans
+of the inner lands. He built two hundred and eighteen chapels and
+seventy-four abbeys.
+
+Now on a certain day in the city of Vannes, when he was preaching the
+Gospel, he learned that the monks of Yvern had in his absence declined
+from the rule of St. Gal. Immediately, with the zeal of a hen who
+gathers her brood, he repaired to his erring children. He was then
+towards the end of his ninety-seventh year; his figure was bent, but his
+arms were still strong, and his speech was poured forth abundantly like
+winter snow in the depths of the valleys.
+
+Abbot Budoc restored the ashen staff to St. Mael and informed him of
+the unhappy state into which the Abbey had fallen. The monks were in
+disagreement as to the date an which the festival of Easter ought to
+be celebrated. Some held for the Roman calendar, others for the Greek
+calendar, and the horrors of a chronological schism distracted the
+monastery.
+
+There also prevailed another cause of disorder. The nuns of the island
+of Gad, sadly fallen from their former virtue, continually came in boats
+to the coast of Yvern. The monks received them in the guesthouse and
+from this there arose scandals which filled pious souls with desolation.
+
+Having finished his faithful report, Abbot Budoc concluded in these
+terms:
+
+"Since the coming of these nuns the innocence and peace of the monks are
+at an end."
+
+"I readily believe it," answered the blessed Mael. "For woman is a
+cleverly constructed snare by which we are taken even before we suspect
+the trap. Alas! the delightful attraction of these creatures is exerted
+with even greater force from a distance than when they are close at
+hand. The less they satisfy desire the more they inspire it. This is the
+reason why a poet wrote this verse to one of them:
+
+'When present I avoid thee, but when away I find thee.'
+
+"Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love have more
+power over hermits and monks than over men who live in the world. All
+through my life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but
+his strongest temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman,
+however beautiful and fragrant she was. They came to me from the image
+of an absent woman. Even now, though full of days and approaching my
+ninety-eighth year, I am often led by the Enemy to sin against chastity,
+at least in thought. At night when I am cold in my bed and my frozen
+old bones rattle together with a dull sound I hear voices reciting the
+second verse of the third Book of the Kings: 'Wherefore his servants
+said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the king a young virgin:
+and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish him, and let her
+lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat,' and the devil
+shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to me: 'I am thy Abishag;
+I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy couch.'
+
+"Believe me," added the old man, "it is only by the special aid of
+Heaven that a monk can keep his chastity in act and in intention."
+
+Applying himself immediately to restore innocence and peace to the
+monastery, he corrected the calendar according to the calculations of
+chronology and astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his
+decision; he sent the women who had declined from St. Bridget's rule
+back to their convent; but far from driving them away brutally, he
+caused them to be led to their boat with singing of psalms and litanies.
+
+"Let us respect in them," he said, "the daughters of Bridget and the
+betrothed of the Lord. Let us beware lest we imitate the Pharisees who
+affect to despise sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons
+should be abased, and they should be made ashamed of what they have done
+and not of what they are, for they are all creatures of God."
+
+And the holy man exhorted his monks to obey faithfully the rule of their
+order.
+
+"When it does not yield to the rudder," said he to them, "the ship
+yields to the rock."
+
+
+
+
+III. THE TEMPTATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of Yvern
+before he learned that the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic, his
+first catechumens and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to
+paganism, and that they were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of
+wool to the branches of the sacred fig-tree.
+
+The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that soon those
+misguided men might violently destroy the chapel that had been built on
+the shore of their island.
+
+The holy man resolved forthwith to visit his faithless children, so that
+he might lead them back to the faith and prevent them from yielding to
+such sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was
+moored, he turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of
+saws and of hammers, which, thirty years before, he had erected on the
+fringe of that bay for the purpose of building ships.
+
+At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the sheds and,
+under the appearance of a monk called Samsok, he approached the holy man
+and tempted him thus:
+
+"Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins
+unceasingly. Every moment that passes removes them farther from God.
+They are soon going to use violence towards the chapel that you have
+raised with your own venerable hands on the shore of their island. Time
+is pressing. Do you not think that your stone trough would carry you
+more quickly towards them if it were rigged like a boat and furnished
+with a rudder, a mast, and a sail, for then you would be driven by the
+wind? Your arms are still strong and able to steer a small craft.
+It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem in front of your
+apostolic trough. You are much too clear-sighted not to have thought of
+it already."
+
+"Truly time is pressing," answered the holy man. "But to do as you say,
+Samson, my son, would it not be to make myself like those men of little
+faith who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts of
+Him who has sent me this stone vessel without rigging or sail?"
+
+This question, the Devil, who is a great theologian, answered by
+another.
+
+"Father, is it praiseworthy to wait, with our arms folded, until help
+comes from on high, and to ask everything from Him who can do all
+things, instead of acting by human prudence and helping ourselves?
+
+"It certainly is not," answered the holy Mael, "and to neglect to act by
+human prudence is tempting God."
+
+"Well," urged the Devil, "is it not prudence in this case to rig the
+vessel?"
+
+"It would be prudence if we could not attain our end in any other way."
+
+"Is your vessel then so very speedy?"
+
+"It is as speedy as God pleases."
+
+"What do you know about it? It goes like Abbot Budoc's mule. It is a
+regular old tub. Are you forbidden to make it speedier?"
+
+"My son, clearness adorns your words, but they are unduly
+over-confident. Remember that this vessel is miraculous."
+
+"It is, father. A granite trough that floats on the water like a cork
+is a miraculous trough. There is not the slightest doubt about it. What
+conclusion do you draw from that?"
+
+"I am greatly perplexed. Is it right to perfect so miraculous a machine
+by human and natural means?"
+
+"Father, if you lost your right foot and God restored it to you, would
+not that foot be miraculous?"
+
+"Without doubt, my son."
+
+"Would you put a shoe on it?"
+
+"Assuredly."
+
+"Well, then, if you believe that one may cover a miraculous foot with a
+natural shoe, you should also believe that we can put natural rigging
+on a miraculous boat. That is clear. Alas! Why must the holiest persons
+have their moments of weakness and despondency? The most illustrious of
+the apostles of Brittany could accomplish works worthy of eternal glory
+. . . But his spirit is tardy and his hand is slothful. Farewell then,
+father! Travel by short and slow stages and when at last you approach
+the coast of Hoedic you will see the smoking ruins of the chapel that
+was built and consecrated by your own hands. The pagans will have burned
+it and with it the deacon you left there. He will be as thoroughly
+roasted as a black pudding."
+
+"My trouble is extreme," said the servant of God, drying with his sleeve
+the sweat that gathered upon his brow. "But tell me, Samson, my son,
+would not rigging this stone trough be a difficult piece of work? And if
+we undertook it might we not lose time instead of gaining it?"
+
+"Ah! father," exclaimed the Devil, "in one turning of the hour-glass the
+thing would be done. We shall find the necessary rigging in this shed
+that you have formerly built here on the coast and in those store-houses
+abundantly stocked through your care. I will myself regulate all the
+ship's fittings. Before being a monk I was a sailor and a carpenter and
+I have worked at many other trades as well. Let us to work."
+
+Immediately he drew the holy man into an outhouse filled with all things
+needful for fitting out a boat.
+
+"That for you, father!"
+
+And he placed on his shoulders the sail, the mast, the gaff, and the
+boom.
+
+Then, himself bearing a stem and a rudder with its screw and tiller, and
+seizing a carpenter's bag full of tools, he ran to the shore, dragging
+the holy man after him by his habit. The latter was bent, sweating, and
+breathless, under the burden of canvas and wood.
+
+
+
+
+IV. ST. MAEL'S NAVIGATION ON THE OCEAN OF ICE
+
+The Devil, having tucked his clothes up to his arm-pits, dragged the
+trough on the sand, and fitted the rigging in less than an hour.
+
+As soon as the holy Mael had embarked, the vessel, with all its sails
+set, cleft through the waters with such speed that the coast was almost
+immediately out of sight. The old man steered to the south so as to
+double the Land's End, but an irresistible current carried him to the
+south-west. He went along the southern coast of Ireland and turned
+sharply towards the north. In the evening the wind freshened. In vain
+did Mael attempt to furl the sail. The vessel flew distractedly towards
+the fabulous seas.
+
+By the light of the moon the immodest sirens of the North came around
+him with their hempen-coloured hair, raising their white throats and
+their rose-tinted limbs out of the sea; and beating the water into foam
+with their emerald tails, they sang in cadence:
+
+     Whither go'st thou, gentle Mael,
+     In thy trough distracted?
+     All distended is thy sail
+     Like the breast of Juno
+     When from it gushed the Milky Way.
+
+For a moment their harmonious laughter followed him beneath the stars,
+but the vessel fled on, a hundred times more swiftly than the red ship
+of a Viking. And the petrels, surprised in their flight, clung with
+their feet to the hair of the holy man.
+
+Soon a tempest arose full of darkness and groanings, and the trough,
+driven by a furious wind, flew like a sea-mew through the mist and the
+surge.
+
+After a night of three times twenty-four hours the darkness was suddenly
+rent and the holy man discovered on the horizon a shore more dazzling
+than diamond. The coast rapidly grew larger, and soon by the glacial
+light of a torpid and sunken sun, Mael saw, rising above the waves,
+the silent streets of a white city, which, vaster than Thebes with its
+hundred gates, extended as far as the eye could see the ruins of its
+forum built of snow, its palaces of frost, its crystal arches, and its
+iridescent obelisks.
+
+The ocean was covered with floating ice-bergs around which swam men of
+the sea of a wild yet gentle appearance. And Leviathan passed by hurling
+a column of water up to the clouds.
+
+Moreover, on a block of ice which floated at the same rate as the stone
+trough there was seated a white bear holding her little one in her arms,
+and Mael heard her murmuring in a low voice this verse of Virgil, Incipe
+parve puer.
+
+And full of sadness and trouble, the old man wept.
+
+The fresh water had frozen and burst the barrel that contained it. And
+Mael was sucking pieces of ice to quench his thirst, and his food was
+bread dipped in dirty water. His beard and his hair were broken like
+glass. His habit was covered with a layer of ice and cut into him at
+every movement of his limbs. Huge waves rose up and opened their foaming
+jaws at the old man. Twenty times the boat was filled by masses of
+sea. And the ocean swallowed up the book of the Holy Gospels which the
+apostle guarded with extreme care in a purple cover marked with a golden
+cross.
+
+Now on the thirtieth day the sea calmed. And lo! with a frightful
+clamour of sky and waters a mountain of dazzling whiteness advanced
+towards the stone vessel. Mael steered to avoid it, but the tiller broke
+in his hands. To lessen the speed of his progress towards the rock he
+attempted to reef the sails, but when he tried to knot the reef-points
+the wind pulled them away from him and the rope seared his hands. He saw
+three demons with wings of black skin having hooks at their ends, who,
+hanging from the rigging, were puffing with their breath against the
+sails.
+
+Understanding from this sight that the Enemy had governed him in all
+these things, he guarded himself by making the sign of the Cross.
+Immediately a furious gust of wind filled with the noise of sobs and
+howls struck the stone trough, carried off the mast with all the sails,
+and tore away the rudder and the stem.
+
+The trough was drifting on the sea, which had now grown calm. The holy
+man knelt and gave thanks to the Lord who had delivered him from the
+snares of the demon. Then he recognised, sitting on a block of ice, the
+mother bear who had spoken during the storm. She pressed her beloved
+child to her bosom, and in her hand she held a purple book marked with a
+golden cross. Hailing the granite trough, she saluted the holy man with
+these words:
+
+"Pax tibi Mael."
+
+And she held out the book to him.
+
+The holy man recognised his evangelistary, and, full of astonishment, he
+sang in the tepid air a hymn to the Creator and His creation.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE BAPTISM OF THE PENGUINS
+
+After having drifted for an hour the holy man approached a narrow
+strand, shut in by steep mountains. He went along the coast for a whole
+day and a night, passing around the reef which formed an insuperable
+barrier. He discovered in this way that it was a round island in
+the middle of which rose a mountain crowned with clouds. He joyfully
+breathed the fresh breath of the moist air. Rain fell, and this rain was
+so pleasant that the holy man said to the Lord:
+
+"Lord, this is the island of tears, the island of contrition."
+
+The strand was deserted. Worn out with fatigue and hunger, he sat down
+on a rock in the hollow of which there lay some yellow eggs, marked with
+black spots, and about as large as those of a swan. But he did not touch
+them, saying:
+
+"Birds are the living praises of God. I should not like a single one of
+these praises to be lacking through me."
+
+And he munched the lichens which he tore from the crannies of the rocks.
+
+The holy man had gone almost entirely round the island without meeting
+any inhabitants, when he came to a vast amphitheatre formed of black and
+red rocks whose summits became tinged with blue as they rose towards the
+clouds, and they were filled with sonorous cascades.
+
+The reflection from the polar ice had hurt the old man's eyes, but
+a feeble gleam of light still shone through his swollen eyelids. He
+distinguished animated forms which filled the rocks, in stages, like a
+crowd of men on the tiers of an amphitheatre. And at the same time, his
+ears, deafened by the continual noises of the sea, heard a feeble sound
+of voices. Thinking that what he saw were men living under the natural
+law, and that the Lord had sent him to teach them the Divine law, he
+preached the gospel to them.
+
+Mounted on a lofty stone in the midst of the wild circus:
+
+"Inhabitants of this island," said he, "although you be of small
+stature, you look less like a band of fishermen and mariners than like
+the senate of a judicious republic. By your gravity, your silence, your
+tranquil deportment, you form on this wild rock an assembly comparable
+to the Conscript Fathers at Rome deliberating in the temple of Victory,
+or rather, to the philosophers of Athens disputing on the benches of the
+Areopagus. Doubtless you possess neither their science nor their genius,
+but perhaps in the sight of God you are their superiors. I believe that
+you are simple and good. As I went round your island I saw no image
+of murder, no sign of carnage, no enemies' heads or scalps hung from a
+lofty pole or nailed to the doors of your villages. You appear to me
+to have no arts and not to work in metals. But your hearts are pure
+and your hands are innocent, and the truth will easily enter into your
+souls."
+
+Now what he had taken for men of small stature but of grave bearing were
+penguins whom the spring had gathered together, and who were ranged in
+couples on the natural steps of the rock, erect in the majesty of their
+large white bellies. From moment to moment they moved their winglets
+like arms, and uttered peaceful cries. They did not fear men, for they
+did not know them, and had never received any harm from them; and there
+was in the monk a certain gentleness that reassured the most timid
+animals and that pleased these penguins extremely. With a friendly
+curiosity they turned towards him their little round eyes lengthened in
+front by a white oval spot that gave something odd and human to their
+appearance.
+
+Touched by their attention, the holy man taught them the Gospel.
+
+"Inhabitants of this island, the earthly day that has just risen over
+your rocks is the image of the heavenly day that rises in your souls.
+For I bring you the inner light; I bring you the light and heat of the
+soul. Just as the sun melts the ice of your mountains so Jesus Christ
+will melt the ice of your hearts."
+
+Thus the old man spoke. As everywhere throughout nature voice calls
+to voice, as all which breathes in the light of day loves alternate
+strains, these penguins answered the old man by the sounds of their
+throats. And their voices were soft, for it was the season of their
+loves.
+
+The holy man, persuaded that they belonged to some idolatrous people and
+that in their own language they gave adherence to the Christian faith,
+invited them to receive baptism.
+
+"I think," said he to them, "that you bathe often, for all the hollows
+of the rocks are full of pure water, and as I came to your assembly I
+saw several of you plunging into these natural baths. Now purity of body
+is the image of spiritual purity."
+
+And he taught them the origin, the nature, and the effects of baptism.
+
+"Baptism," said he to them, "is Adoption, New Birth, Regeneration,
+Illumination."
+
+And he explained each of these points to them in succession.
+
+Then, having previously blessed the water that fell from the cascades
+and recited the exorcisms, he baptized those whom he had just taught,
+pouring on each of their heads a drop of pure water and pronouncing the
+sacred words.
+
+And thus for three days and three nights he baptized the birds.
+
+
+
+
+VI. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE
+
+When the baptism of the penguins was known in Paradise, it caused
+neither joy nor sorrow, but an extreme surprise. The Lord himself was
+embarrassed. He gathered an assembly of clerics and doctors, and asked
+them whether they regarded the baptism as valid.
+
+"It is void," said St. Patrick.
+
+"Why is it void?" asked St. Gal, who had evangelized the people of
+Cornwall and had trained the holy Mael for his apostolical labours.
+
+"The sacrament of baptism," answered St. Patrick, "is void when it is
+given to birds, just as the sacrament of marriage is void when it is
+given to a eunuch."
+
+But St. Gal replied:
+
+"What relation do you claim to establish between the baptism of a bird
+and the marriage of a eunuch? There is none at all. Marriage is, if I
+may say so, a conditional, a contingent sacrament. The priest blesses an
+event beforehand; it is evident that if the act is not consummated the
+benediction remains without effect. That is obvious. I have known on
+earth, in the town of Antrim, a rich man named Sadoc, who, living in
+concubinage with a woman, caused her to be the mother of nine children.
+In his old age, yielding to my reproofs, he consented to marry her, and
+I blessed their union. Unfortunately Sadoc's great age prevented him
+from consummating the marriage. A short time afterwards he lost all his
+property, and Germaine (that was the name of the woman), not feeling
+herself able to endure poverty, asked for the annulment of a marriage
+which was no reality. The Pope granted her request, for it was just.
+So much for marriage. But baptism is conferred without restrictions or
+reserves of any kind. There is no doubt about it, what the penguins have
+received is a sacrament."
+
+Called to give his opinion, Pope St. Damascus expressed himself in these
+terms:
+
+"In order to know if a baptism is valid and will produce its result,
+that is to say, sanctification, it is necessary to consider who gives
+it and not who receives it. In truth, the sanctifying virtue of this
+sacrament results from the exterior act by which it is conferred,
+without the baptized person cooperating in his own sanctification by any
+personal act; if it were otherwise it would not be administered to the
+newly born. And there is no need, in order to baptize, to fulfil any
+special condition; it is not necessary to be in a state of grace; it
+is sufficient to have the intention of doing what the Church does, to
+pronounce the consecrated words and to observe the prescribed forms. Now
+we cannot doubt that the venerable Mael has observed these conditions.
+Therefore the penguins are baptized."
+
+"Do you think so?" asked St. Guenole. "And what then do you believe that
+baptism really is? Baptism is the process of regeneration by which man
+is born of water and of the spirit, for having entered the water covered
+with crimes, he goes out of it a neophyte, a new creature, abounding in
+the fruits of righteousness; baptism is the seed of immortality; baptism
+is the pledge of the resurrection; baptism is the burying with Christ in
+His death and participation in His departure from the sepulchre. That
+is not a gift to bestow upon birds. Reverend Fathers, let us consider.
+Baptism washes away original sin; now the penguins were not conceived in
+sin. It removes the penalty of sin; now the penguins have not sinned.
+It produces grace and the gift of virtues, uniting Christians to Jesus
+Christ, as the members to the body, and it is obvious to the senses that
+penguins cannot acquire the virtues of confessors, of virgins, and of
+widows, or receive grace and be united to--"
+
+St. Damascus did not allow him to finish.
+
+"That proves," said he warmly, "that the baptism was useless; it does
+not prove that it was not effective."
+
+"But by this reasoning," said St. Guenole, "one might baptize in the
+name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by aspersion or
+immersion, not only a bird or a quadruped, but also an inanimate object,
+a statue, a table, a chair, etc. That animal would be Christian, that
+idol, that table would be Christian! It is absurd!"
+
+St. Augustine began to speak. There was a great silence.
+
+"I am going," said the ardent bishop of Hippo, "to show you, by an
+example, the power of formulas. It deals, it is true, with a diabolical
+operation. But if it be established that formulas taught by the Devil
+have effect upon unintelligent animals or even on inanimate objects, how
+can we longer doubt that the effect of the sacramental formulas extends
+to the minds of beasts and even to inert matter?
+
+"This is the example. There was during my lifetime in the town of
+Madaura, the birthplace of the philosopher Apuleius, a witch who was
+able to attract men to her chamber by burning a few of their hairs along
+with certain herbs upon her tripod, pronouncing at the same time certain
+words. Now one day when she wished by this means to gain the love of a
+young man, she was deceived by her maid, and instead of the young man's
+hairs, she burned some hairs pulled from a leather bottle, made out of
+a goatskin that hung in a tavern. During the night the leather bottle,
+full of wine, capered through the town up to the witch's door. This fact
+is undoubted. And in sacraments as in enchantments it is the form which
+operates. The effect of a divine formula cannot be less in power and
+extent than the effect of an infernal formula."
+
+Having spoken in this fashion the great St. Augustine sat down amidst
+applause.
+
+One of the blessed, of an advanced age and having a melancholy
+appearance, asked permission to speak. No one knew him. His name was
+Probus, and he was not enrolled in the canon of the saints.
+
+"I beg the company's pardon," said he, "I have no halo, and I gained
+eternal blessedness without any eminent distinction. But after what the
+great St. Augustine has just told you I believe it right to impart a
+cruel experience, which I had, relative to the conditions necessary for
+the validity of a sacrament. The bishop of Hippo is indeed right in what
+he said. A sacrament depends on the form; its virtue is in its form;
+its vice is in its form. Listen, confessors and pontiffs, to my woeful
+story. I was a priest in Rome under the rule of the Emperor Gordianus.
+Without desiring to recommend myself to you for any special merit, I may
+say that I exercised my priesthood with piety and zeal. For forty years
+I served the church of St. Modestus-beyond-the-Walls. My habits were
+regular. Every Saturday I went to a tavern-keeper called Barjas, who
+dwelt with his wine-jars under the Porta Capena, and from him I bought
+the wine that I consecrated daily throughout the week. During that long
+space of time I never failed for a single morning to consecrate the holy
+sacrifice of the mass. However, I had no joy, and it was with a heart
+oppressed by sorrow that, on the steps of the altar I used to ask, 'Why
+art thou so heavy, O my soul, and why art thou so disquieted within
+me?' The faithful whom I invited to the holy table gave me cause for
+affliction, for having, so to speak, the Host that I administered still
+upon their tongues, they fell again into sin just as if the sacrament
+had been without power or efficacy. At last I reached the end of my
+earthly trials, and failing asleep in the Lord, I awoke in this abode
+of the elect. I learned then from the mouth of the angel who brought me
+here, that Barjas, the tavern-keeper of the Porta Capena, had sold for
+wine a decoction of roots and barks in which there was not a single drop
+of the juice of the grape. I had been unable to transmute this vile
+brew into blood, for it was not wine, and wine alone is changed into the
+blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore all my consecrations were invalid, and
+unknown to us, my faithful and myself had for forty years been deprived
+of the sacrament and were in fact in a state of excommunication. This
+revelation threw me into a stupor which overwhelms me even to-day in
+this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise without ever meeting
+a single one of those Christians whom formerly I admitted to the holy
+table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of the bread of
+angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and they have
+all gone to hell. It gives me some satisfaction to think that Barjas,
+the tavern-keeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic worthy of
+the author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that it
+is sometimes inconvenient that form should prevail over essence in the
+sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy this?"
+
+"No," answered the Lord. "The remedy would be worse than the disease.
+It would be the ruin of the priesthood if essence prevailed over form in
+the laws of salvation."
+
+"Alas! Lord," sighed the humble Probus. "Be persuaded by my humble
+experience; as long as you reduce your sacraments to formulas your
+justice will meet with terrible obstacles."
+
+"I know that better than you do," replied the Lord. "I see in a single
+glance both the actual problems which are difficult, and the future
+problems which will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when
+the sun will have turned round the earth two hundred and forty times
+more.
+
+"Sublime language," exclaimed the angels.
+
+"And worthy of the creator of the world," answered the pontiffs.
+
+"It is," resumed the Lord, "a manner of speaking in accordance with
+my old cosmogony and one which I cannot give up without losing my
+immutability. . . .
+
+"After the sun, then, will have turned another two hundred and forty
+times round the earth, there will not be a single cleric left in Rome
+who knows Latin. When they sing their litanies in the churches people
+will invoke Orichel, Roguel, and Totichel, and, as you know, these are
+devils and not angels. Many robbers desiring to make their communions,
+but fearing that before obtaining pardon they would be forced to give up
+the things they had robbed to the Church, will make their confessions
+to travelling priests, who, ignorant of both Italian and Latin, and only
+speaking the patois of their village, will go through cities and towns
+selling the remission of sins for a base price, often for a bottle of
+wine. Probably we shall not be inconvenienced by those absolutions as
+they will want contrition to make them valid, but it may be that their
+baptisms will cause us some embarrassment. The priests will become so
+ignorant that they will baptize children in nomine patria et filia et
+spirita sancta, as Louis de Potter will take a pleasure in relating in
+the third volume of his 'Philosophical, Political, and Critical History
+of Christianity.' It will be an arduous question to decide on the
+validity of such baptisms; for even if in my sacred writings I tolerate
+a Greek less elegant than Plato's and a scarcely Ciceronian Latin, I
+cannot possibly admit a piece of pure patois as a liturgical formula.
+And one shudders when one thinks that millions of new-born babes will be
+baptized by this method. But let us return to our penguins."
+
+"Your divine words, Lord, have already led us back to them," said
+St. Gal. "In the signs of religion and the laws of salvation form
+necessarily prevails over essence, and the validity of a sacrament
+solely depends upon its form. The whole question is whether the penguins
+have been baptized with the proper forms. Now there is no doubt about
+the answer."
+
+The fathers and the doctors agreed, and their perplexity became only the
+more cruel.
+
+"The Christian state," said St. Cornelius, "is not without serious
+inconveniences for a penguin. In it the birds are obliged to work out
+their own salvation. How can they succeed? The habits of birds are,
+in many points, contrary to the commandments of the Church, and the
+penguins have no reason for changing theirs. I mean that they are not
+intelligent enough to give up their present habits and assume better."
+
+"They cannot," said the Lord; "my decrees prevent them."
+
+"Nevertheless," resumed St. Cornelius, "in virtue of their baptism their
+actions no longer remain indifferent. Henceforth they will be good or
+bad, susceptible of merit or of demerit."
+
+"That is precisely the question we have to deal with," said the Lord.
+
+"I see only one solution," said St. Augustine. "The penguins will go to
+hell."
+
+"But they have no soul," observed St. Irenaeus.
+
+"It is a pity," sighed Tertullian.
+
+"It is indeed," resumed St. Gal. "And I admit that my disciple, the holy
+Mael, has, in his blind zeal, created great theological difficulties for
+the Holy Spirit and introduced disorder into the economy of mysteries."
+
+"He is an old blunderer," cried St. Adjutor of Alsace, shrugging his
+shoulders.
+
+But the Lord cast a reproachful look on Adjutor.
+
+"Allow me to speak," said he; "the holy Mael has not intuitive knowledge
+like you, my blessed ones. He does not see me. He is an old man burdened
+by infirmities; he is half deaf and three parts blind. You are
+too severe on him. However, I recognise that the situation is an
+embarrassing one."
+
+"Luckily it is but a passing disorder," said St. Irenaeus. "The penguins
+are baptized, but their eggs are not, and the evil will stop with the
+present generation."
+
+"Do not speak thus, Irenaeus my son," said the Lord. "There are
+exceptions to the laws that men of science lay down on the earth because
+they are imperfect and have not an exact application to nature. But
+the laws that I establish are perfect and suffer no exception. We must
+decide the fate of the baptized penguins without violating any divine
+law, and in a manner conformable to the decalogue as well as to the
+commandments of my Church."
+
+"Lord," said St. Gregory Nazianzen, "give them an immortal soul."
+
+"Alas! Lord, what would they do with it," sighed Lactantius. "They
+have not tuneful voices to sing your praises. They would not be able to
+celebrate your mysteries."
+
+"Without doubt," said St. Augustine, "they would not observe the divine
+law."
+
+"They could not," said the Lord.
+
+"They could not," continued St. Augustine. "And if, Lord, in your
+wisdom, you pour an immortal soul into them, they will burn eternally
+in hell in virtue of your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent
+order, that this old Welshman has disturbed, be re-established."
+
+"You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica," said the Lord,
+"and one that accords with my wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy.
+And, although in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure, the
+more I incline to mildness. This change of character is evident to
+anyone who reads my two Testaments."
+
+As the discussion continued without much light being thrown upon the
+matter and as the blessed showed a disposition to keep repeating the
+same thing, it was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This
+is what was usually done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had
+confounded fifty very learned doctors. She knew Plato's philosophy in
+addition to the Holy Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of
+rhetoric.
+
+
+
+
+VII. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE (Continuation and End)
+
+St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a crown of
+emeralds, sapphires, and pearls, and she was clad in a robe of cloth
+of gold. She carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one
+whose fragments had struck her persecutors.
+
+The Lord having invited her to speak, she expressed herself in these
+terms:
+
+"Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me I
+shall not study the habits of animals in general nor those of birds in
+particular. I shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs
+gathered in this assembly that the separation between man and animal is
+not complete since there are monsters who proceed from both. Such are
+chimeras--half nymphs and half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and
+the Capripeds; such are the Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the
+sea. These have a woman's breast and a fish's tail. Such also are the
+Centaurs, men down to the waist and the remainder horses. They are a
+noble race of monsters. One of them, as you know, was able, guided
+by the light of reason alone, to direct his steps towards eternal
+blessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom prancing on the
+clouds. Chiron, the Centaur, deserved for his works on the earth
+to share the abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his
+education; and that young hero, when he left the Centaur's hands, lived
+for two years, dressed as a young girl, among the daughters of King
+Lycomedes. He shared their games and their bed without allowing any
+suspicion to arise that he was not a young virgin like them. Chiron,
+who taught him such good morals, is, with the Emperor Trajan, the only
+righteous man who obtained celestial glory by following the law of
+nature. And yet he was but half human.
+
+"I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternal
+blessedness, it is enough to possess some parts of humanity, always on
+the condition that they are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur,
+could obtain without having been regenerated by baptism, would not the
+penguins deserve too, if they became half penguins and half men? That
+is why, Lord, I entreat you to give old Mael's penguins a human head
+and breast so that they can praise you worthily. And grant them also an
+immortal soul--but one of small size."
+
+Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors, and pontiffs
+heard her with a murmur of approbation.
+
+But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and knotty
+arms towards the Most High:
+
+"Do not so, O Lord God," he cried, "in the name of your holy Paraclete,
+do not so!"
+
+He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook on his chin
+like the empty nose-bag of a hungry horse.
+
+"Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St. Catherine
+has told us nothing new."
+
+"The imagination groups and compares; it never creates," replied St.
+Catherine drily.
+
+"They exist already," continued St. Antony, who would listen to nothing.
+"They are called harpies, and they are the most obscene animals in
+creation. One day as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot
+St. Paul, I placed the table outside my cabin under an old sycamore
+tree. The harpies came and sat in its branches; they deafened us with
+their shrill cries and cast their excrement over all our food. The
+clamour of the monsters prevented me from listening to the teaching of
+the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate birds' dung with our bread and lettuces.
+Lord, it is impossible to believe that harpies could give thee worthy
+praise.
+
+"Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not only
+women-serpents and women-fishes, but beings still more confusedly formed
+such as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a
+cupboard full of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors
+and windows through which people engaged in their domestic tasks could
+be seen. Eternity would not suffice were I to describe all the monsters
+that assailed me in my solitude, from whales rigged like ships to a
+shower of red insects which changed the water of my fountain into blood.
+But none were as disgusting as the harpies whose offal polluted the
+leaves of my sycamore."
+
+"Harpies," observed Lactantius, "are female Monsters with birds'
+bodies. They have a woman's head and breast. Their forwardness, their
+shamelessness, and their obscenity proceed from their female nature as
+the poet Virgil demonstrated in his 'Aeneid.' They share the curse of
+Eve."
+
+"Let us not speak of the curse of Eve," said the Lord. "The second Eve
+has redeemed the first."
+
+Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet was to
+imitate in later years, arose and prayed to the Lord:
+
+"Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony's. Do not make any more monsters like
+the Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns, whom the Greeks, those collectors of
+fables, loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species
+of monsters have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not
+dispose them to purity of morals."
+
+The bland Lactantius replied in these terms:
+
+"He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in Paradise, for
+Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Velleius Paterculus, Cornelius
+Nepos, Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and
+Lampridius are deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell
+the torments that are reserved for blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does
+not know heaven as well as he knows the earth, for he does not seem to
+bear in mind that the angels, who proceed from man and bird, are purity
+itself."
+
+"We are wandering," said the Eternal. "What have we to do with all those
+centaurs, harpies, and angels? We have to deal with penguins."
+
+"You have spoken to the point, Lord," said the chief of the fifty
+doctors, who, during their mortal life had been confounded by the Virgin
+of Alexandria, "and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an
+end to the scandal by which heaven is now stirred, old Mael's penguins
+should, as St. Catherine who confounded us has proposed, be given half
+of a human body with an eternal soul proportioned to that half."
+
+At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of private
+conversations and disputes of the doctors. The Greek fathers argued with
+the Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the soul
+that should be given to the penguins.
+
+"Confessors and pontiffs," exclaimed the Lord, "do not imitate the
+conclaves and synods of the earth. And do not bring into the Church
+Triumphant those violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is
+but too true that in all the councils held under the inspiration of my
+spirit, in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa, fathers have torn the
+beards and scratched the eyes of other fathers. Nevertheless they were
+infallible, for I was with them."
+
+Order being restored, old Hermas arose and slowly uttered these words:
+
+"I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother, Saphira, to be
+born amidst your people, in the days when the dew of heaven refreshed
+the earth which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you,
+Lord, for having granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles
+of your divine Son. And I will speak in this illustrious assembly
+because you have willed that truth should proceed out of the mouths of
+the humble, and I will say: 'Change these penguins to men. It is the
+only determination conformable to your justice and your mercy.'"
+
+Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do so. No one
+listened, and all the confessors were tumultuously shaking their palms
+and their crowns.
+
+The Lord, by a gesture of his right hand, appeased the quarrels of his
+elect.
+
+"Let us not deliberate any longer," said he. "The opinion broached by
+gentle old Hermas is the only one conformable to my eternal designs.
+These birds will be changed into men. I foresee in this several
+disadvantages. Many of those men will commit sins they would not have
+committed as penguins. Truly their fate through this change will be
+far less enviable than if they had been without this baptism and this
+incorporation into the family of Abraham. But my foreknowledge must not
+encroach upon their free will.
+
+"In order not to impair human liberty, I will be ignorant of what I
+know, I will thicken upon my eyes the veils I have pierced, and in my
+blind clearsightedness I will let myself be surprised by what I have
+foreseen."
+
+And immediately calling the archangel Raphael:
+
+"Go and find the holy Mael," said he to him; "inform him of his mistake
+and tell him, armed with my Name, to change these penguins into men."
+
+
+
+
+VIII. METAMORPHOSIS OF THE PENGUINS
+
+The archangel, having gone down into the Island of the Penguins, found
+the holy man asleep in the hollow of a rock surrounded by his new
+disciples. He laid his hand on his shoulder and, having waked him, said
+in a gentle voice:
+
+"Mael, fear not!"
+
+The holy man, dazzled by a vivid light, inebriated by a delicious
+odour, recognised the angel of the Lord, and prostrated himself with his
+forehead on the ground.
+
+The angel continued:
+
+"Mael, know thy error, believing that thou wert baptizing children of
+Adam thou hast baptized birds; and it is, through thee that penguins
+have entered into the Church of God."
+
+At these words the old man remained stupefied.
+
+And the angel resumed:
+
+"Arise, Mael, arm thyself with the mighty Name of the Lord, and say to
+these birds, 'Be ye men!'"
+
+And the holy Mael, having wept and prayed, armed himself with the mighty
+Name of the Lord and said to the birds:
+
+"Be ye men!"
+
+Immediately the penguins were transformed. Their foreheads enlarged and
+their heads grew round like the dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome. Their
+oval eyes opened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose clothed the
+two clefts of their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and
+from their mouths went forth speech; their necks grew short and thick;
+their wings became arms and their claws legs; a restless soul dwelt
+within the breast of each of them.
+
+However, there remained with them some traces of their first nature.
+They were inclined to look sideways; they balanced themselves on their
+short thighs; their bodies were covered with fine down.
+
+And Mael gave thanks to the Lord, because he had incorporated these
+penguins into the family of Abraham.
+
+But he grieved at the thought that he would soon leave the island to
+come back no more, and that perhaps when he was far away the faith
+of the penguins would perish for want of care like a young and tender
+plant.
+
+And he formed the idea of transporting their island to the coasts of
+Armorica.
+
+"I know not the designs of eternal Wisdom," said he to himself. "But if
+God wills that this island be transported, who could prevent it?"
+
+And the holy man made a very fine cord about forty feet long out of the
+flax of his stole. He fastened one end of the cord round a point of rock
+that jutted up through the sand of the shore and, holding the other end
+of the cord in his hand, he entered the stone trough.
+
+The trough glided over the sea and towed Penguin Island behind it; after
+nine days' sailing it approached the Breton coast, bringing the island
+with it.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES
+
+
+
+
+I. THE FIRST CLOTHES
+
+One day St. Mael was sitting by the seashore on a warm stone that he
+found. He thought it had been warmed by the sun and he gave thanks
+to God for it, not knowing that the Devil had been resting on it. The
+apostle was waiting for the monks of Yvern who had been commissioned to
+bring a freight of skins and fabrics to clothe the inhabitants of the
+island of Alca.
+
+Soon he saw a monk called Magis coming ashore and carrying a chest upon
+his back. This monk enjoyed a great reputation for holiness.
+
+When he had drawn near to the old man he laid the chest on the ground
+and wiping his forehead with the back of his sleeve, he said:
+
+"Well, father, you wish then to clothe these penguins?"
+
+"Nothing is more needful, my son," said the old man. "Since they have
+been incorporated into the family of Abraham these penguins share the
+curse of Eve, and they know that they are naked, a thing of which they
+were ignorant before. And it is high time to clothe them, for they are
+losing the down that remained on them after their metamorphosis."
+
+"It is true," said Magis as he cast his eyes over the coast where
+the penguins were to be seen looking for shrimps, gathering mussels,
+singing, or sleeping, "they are naked. But do you not think, father,
+that it would be better to leave them naked? Why clothe them? When they
+wear clothes and are under the moral law they will assume an immense
+pride, a vile hypocrisy, and an excessive cruelty."
+
+"Is it possible, my son," sighed the old man, "that you understand so
+badly the effects of the moral law to which even the heathen submit?"
+
+"The moral law," answered Magis, "forces men who are beasts to live
+otherwise than beasts, a thine that doubtless puts a constraint upon
+them, but that also flatters and reassures them; and as they are proud,
+cowardly, and covetous of pleasure, they willingly submit to restraints
+that tickle their vanity and on which they found both their present
+security and the hope of their future happiness. That is the principle
+of all morality. . . . But let us not mislead ourselves. My companions
+are unloading their cargo of stuffs and skins on the island. Think,
+father, while there is still time I To clothe the penguins is a very
+serious business. At present when a penguin desires a penguin he knows
+precisely what he desires and his lust is limited by an exact knowledge
+of its object. At this moment two or three couples of penguins are
+making love on the beach. See with what simplicity! No one pays
+any attention and the actors themselves do not seem to be greatly
+preoccupied. But when the female penguins are clothed, the male penguin
+will not form so exact a notion of what it is that attracts him to them.
+His indeterminate desires will fly out into all sorts of dreams and
+illusions; in short, father, he will know love and its mad torments.
+And all the time the female penguins will cast down their eyes and bite
+their lips, and take on airs as if they kept a treasure under their
+clothes! . . . what a pity!
+
+"The evil will be endurable as long as these people remain rude and
+poor; but only wait for a thousand years and you will see, father, with
+what powerful weapons you have endowed the daughters of Alca. If you
+will allow me, I can give you some idea of it beforehand. I have some
+old clothes in this chest. Let us take at hazard one of these female
+penguins to whom the male penguins give such little thought, and let us
+dress her as well as we can.
+
+"Here is one coming towards us. She is neither more beautiful nor
+uglier than the others; she is young. No one looks at her. She strolls
+indolently along the shore, scratching her back and with her finger
+at her nose as she walks. You cannot help seeing, father, that she has
+narrow shoulders, clumsy breasts, a stout figure, and short legs. Her
+reddish knees pucker at every step she takes, and there is, at each of
+her joints, what looks like a little monkey's head. Her broad and sinewy
+feet cling to the rock with their four crooked toes, while the great
+toes stick up like the heads of two cunning serpents. She begins to
+walk, all her muscles are engaged in the task, and, when we see them
+working, we think of her as a machine intended for walking rather than
+as a machine intended for making love, although visibly she is both,
+and contains within herself several other pieces of machinery, besides.
+Well, venerable apostle, you will see what I am going to make of her."
+
+With these words the monk, Magis, reached the female penguin in three
+bounds, lifted her up, carried her in his arms with her hair trailing
+behind her, and threw her, overcome with fright, at the feet of the holy
+Mael.
+
+And whilst she wept and begged him to do her no harm, he took a pair of
+sandals out of his chest and commanded her to put them on.
+
+"Her feet," observed the old man, "will appear smaller when squeezed in
+by the woollen cords. The soles, being two fingers high, will give
+an elegant length to her legs and the weight they bear will seem
+magnified."
+
+As the penguin tied on her sandals she threw a curious look towards
+the open coffer, and seeing that it was full of jewels and finery, she
+smiled through her tears.
+
+The monk twisted her hair on the back of her head and covered it with
+a chaplet of flowers. He encircled her wrist with golden bracelets
+and making her stand upright, he passed a large linen band beneath her
+breasts, alleging that her bosom would thereby derive a new dignity and
+that her sides would be compressed to the greater glory of her hips.
+
+He fixed this band with pins, taking them one by one out of his mouth.
+
+"You can tighten it still more," said the penguin.
+
+When he had, with much care and study, enclosed the soft parts of her
+bust in this way, he covered her whole body with a rose-coloured tunic
+which gently followed the lines of her figure.
+
+"Does it hang well?" asked the penguin.
+
+And bending forward with her head on one side and her chin on her
+shoulder, she kept looking attentively at the appearance of her toilet.
+
+Magis asked her if she did not think the dress a little long, but she
+answered with assurance that it was not--she would hold it up.
+
+Immediately, taking the back of her skirt in her left hand, she drew
+it obliquely across her hips, taking care to disclose a glimpse of her
+heels. Then she went away, walking with short steps and swinging her
+hips.
+
+She did not turn her head, but as she passed near a stream she glanced
+out of the corner of her eye at her own reflection.
+
+A male penguin, who met her by chance, stopped in surprise, and
+retracing his steps began to follow her. As she went along the shore,
+others coming back from fishing, went up to her, and after looking at
+her, walked behind her. Those who were lying on the sand got up and
+joined the rest.
+
+Unceasingly, as she advanced, fresh penguins, descending from the paths
+of the mountain, coming out of clefts of the rocks, and emerging from
+the water, added to the size of her retinue.
+
+And all of them, men of ripe age with vigorous shoulders and hairy
+breasts, agile youths, old men shaking the multitudinous wrinkles of
+their rosy, and white-haired skins, or dragging their legs thinner and
+drier than the juniper staff that served them as a third leg, hurried
+on, panting and emitting an acrid odour and hoarse gasps. Yet she went
+on peacefully and seemed to see nothing.
+
+"Father," cried Magis, "notice how each one advances with his nose
+pointed towards the centre of gravity of that young damsel now that the
+centre is covered by a garment. The sphere inspires the meditations
+of geometers by the number of its properties. When it proceeds from a
+physical and living nature it acquires new qualities, and in order that
+the interest of that figure might be fully revealed to the penguins it
+was necessary that, ceasing to see it distinctly with their eyes, they
+should be led to represent it to themselves in their minds. I myself
+feel at this moment irresistibly attracted towards that penguin. Whether
+it be because her skirt gives more importance to her hips, and that in
+its simple magnificence it invests them with a synthetic and general
+character and allows only the pure idea, the divine principle, of them
+to be seen, whether this be the cause I cannot say, but I feel that if
+I embraced her I would hold in my hands the heaven of human pleasure. It
+is certain that modesty communicates an invincible attraction to women.
+My uneasiness is so great that it would be vain for me to try to conceal
+it."
+
+He spoke, and, gathering up his habit, he rushed among the crowd of
+penguins, pushing, jostling, trampling, and crushing, until he reached
+the daughter of Alca, whom he seized and suddenly carried in his arms
+into a cave that had been hollowed out by the sea.
+
+Then the penguins felt as if the sun had gone out. And the holy Mael
+knew that the Devil had taken the features of the monk, Magis, in order
+that he might give clothes to the daughter of Alca. He was troubled in
+spirit, and his soul was sad. As with slow steps he went towards his
+hermitage he saw the little penguins of six and seven years of age
+tightening their waists with belts made of sea-weed and walking along
+the shore to see if anybody would follow them.
+
+
+
+
+II. THE FIRST CLOTHES (Continuation and End)
+
+The holy Mael felt a profound sadness that the first clothes put upon
+a daughter of Alca should have betrayed the penguin modesty instead of
+helping it. He persisted, none the less, in his design of giving clothes
+to the inhabitants of the miraculous island. Assembling them on the
+shore, he distributed to them the garments that the monks of Yvern
+had brought. The male penguins received short tunics and breeches, the
+female penguins long robes. But these robes were far from creating the
+effect that the former one had produced. They were not so beautiful,
+their shape was uncouth and without art, and no attention was paid to
+them since every woman bad one. As they prepared the meals and worked
+in the fields they soon had nothing but slovenly bodices and soiled
+petticoats.
+
+The male penguins loaded their unfortunate consorts with work until they
+looked like beasts of burden. They knew nothing of the troubles of the
+heart and the disorders of passion. Their habits were innocent. Incest,
+though frequent, was a sign of rustic simplicity and if drunkenness led
+a youth to commit some such crime he thought nothing more about it the
+day afterwards.
+
+
+
+
+III. SETTING BOUNDS TO THE FIELDS AND THE ORIGIN OF PROPERTY
+
+The island did not preserve the rugged appearance that it had formerly,
+when, in the midst of floating icebergs it sheltered a population of
+birds within its rocky amphitheatre. Its snow-clad peak had sunk
+down into a hill from the summit of which one could see the coasts of
+Armorica eternally covered with mist, and the ocean strewn with sullen
+reefs like monsters half raised out of its depths.
+
+Its coasts were now very extensive and clearly defined and its shape
+reminded one of a mulberry leaf. It was suddenly covered with coarse
+grass, pleasing to the flocks, and with willows, ancient figtrees, and
+mighty oaks. This fact is attested by the Venerable Bede and several
+other authors worthy of credence.
+
+To the north the shore formed a deep bay that in after years became one
+of the most famous ports in the universe. To the east, along a rocky
+coast beaten by a foaming sea, there stretched a deserted and fragrant
+heath. It was the Beach of Shadows, and the inhabitants of the island
+never ventured on it for fear of the serpents that lodged in the hollows
+of the rocks and lest they might encounter the souls of the dead who
+resembled livid flames. To the south, orchards and woods bounded the
+languid Bay of Divers. On this fortunate shore old Mael built a wooden
+church and a monastery. To the west, two streams, the Clange and the
+Surelle, watered the fertile valleys of Dalles and Dombes.
+
+Now one autumn morning, as the blessed Mael was walking in the valley of
+Clange in company with a monk of Yvern called Bulloch, he saw bands of
+fierce-looking men loaded with stones passing along the roads. At the
+same time he heard in all directions cries and complaints mounting up
+from the valley towards the tranquil sky.
+
+And he said to Bulloch:
+
+"I notice with sadness, my son, that since they became men the
+inhabitants of this island act with less wisdom than formerly. When they
+were birds they only quarrelled during the season of their love affairs.
+But now they dispute all the time; they pick quarrels with each other
+in summer as well as in winter. How greatly have they fallen from that
+peaceful majesty which made the assembly of the penguins look like the
+Senate of a wise republic!
+
+"Look towards Surelle, Bulloch, my son. In yonder pleasant valley a
+dozen men penguins are busy knocking each other down with the spades and
+picks that they might employ better in tilling the ground. The women,
+still more cruel than the men, are tearing their opponents' faces with
+their nails. Alas! Bulloch, my son, why are they murdering each other in
+this way?"
+
+"From a spirit of fellowship, father, and through forethought for
+the future," answered Bulloch. "For man is essentially provident and
+sociable. Such is his character and it is impossible to imagine it apart
+from a certain appropriation of things. Those penguins whom you see are
+dividing the ground among themselves."
+
+"Could they not divide it with less violence?" asked the aged man. "As
+they fight they exchange invectives and threats. I do not distinguish
+their words, but they are angry ones, judging from the tone."
+
+"They are accusing one another of theft and encroachment," answered
+Bulloch. "That is the general sense of their speech."
+
+At that moment the holy Mael clasped his hands and sighed deeply.
+
+"Do you see, my son," he exclaimed, "that madman who with his teeth is
+biting the nose of the adversary he has overthrown and that other one
+who is pounding a woman's head with a huge stone?"
+
+"I see them," said Bulloch. "They are creating law; they are founding
+property; they are establishing the principles of civilization, the
+basis of society, and the foundations of the State."
+
+"How is that?" asked old Mael.
+
+"By setting bounds to their fields. That is the origin of all
+government. Your penguins, O Master, are performing the most august
+of functions. Throughout the ages their work will be consecrated by
+lawyers, and magistrates will confirm it."
+
+Whilst the monk, Bulloch, was pronouncing these words a big penguin with
+a fair skin and red hair went down into the valley carrying a trunk of a
+tree upon his shoulder. He went up to a little penguin who was watering
+his vegetables in the heat of the sun, and shouted to him:
+
+"Your field is mine!"
+
+And having delivered himself of this stout utterance he brought down
+his club on the head of the little penguin, who fell dead upon the field
+that his own hands had tilled.
+
+At this sight the holy Mael shuddered through his whole body and poured
+forth a flood of tears.
+
+And in a voice stifled by horror and fear he addressed this prayer to
+heaven:
+
+"O Lord, my God, O thou who didst receive young Abel's sacrifices, thou
+who didst curse Cain, avenge, O Lord, this innocent penguin sacrificed
+upon his own field and make the murderer feel the weight of thy arm.
+Is there a more odious crime, is there a graver offence against thy
+justice, O Lord, than this murder and this robbery?"
+
+"Take care, father," said Bulloch gently, "that what you call murder and
+robbery may not really be war and conquest, those sacred foundations
+of empires, those sources of all human virtues and all human greatness.
+Reflect, above all, that in blaming the big penguin you are attacking
+property in its origin and in its source. I shall have no trouble
+in showing you how. To till the land is one thing, to possess it is
+another, and these two things must not be confused; as regards ownership
+the right of the first occupier is uncertain and badly founded. The
+right of conquest, on the other hand, rests on more solid foundations.
+It is the only right that receives respect since it is the only one that
+makes itself respected. The sole and proud origin of property is force.
+It is born and preserved by force. In that it is august and yields
+only to a greater force. This is why it is correct to say that he
+who possesses is noble. And that big red man, when he knocked down a
+labourer to get possession of his field, founded at that moment a very
+noble house upon this earth. I congratulate him upon it."
+
+Having thus spoken, Bulloch approached the big penguin, who was leaning
+upon his club as he stood in the blood-stained furrow:
+
+"Lord Greatauk, dreaded Prince," said he, bowing to the ground, "I
+come to pay you the homage due to the founder of legitimate power and
+hereditary wealth. The skull of the vile Penguin you have overthrown
+will, buried in your field, attest for ever the sacred rights of your
+posterity over this soil that you have ennobled. Blessed be your suns
+and your sons' sons! They shall be Greatauks, Dukes of Skull, and they
+shall rule over this island of Alca."
+
+Then raising his voice and turning towards the holy Mael:
+
+"Bless Greatauk, father, for all power comes from God."
+
+Mael remained silent and motionless, with his eyes raised towards
+heaven; he felt a painful uncertainty in judging the monk Bulloch's
+doctrine. It was, however, the doctrine destined to prevail in epochs of
+advanced civilization. Bulloch can be considered as the creator of civil
+law in Penguinia.
+
+
+
+
+IV. THE FIRST ASSEMBLY OF THE ESTATES OF PENGUINIA
+
+"Bulloch, my son," said old Mael, "we ought to make a census of the
+Penguins and inscribe each of their names in a book."
+
+"It is a most urgent matter," answered Bulloch, "there can be no good
+government without it."
+
+Forthwith, the apostle, with the help of twelve monks, proceeded to make
+a census of the people.
+
+And old Mael then said:
+
+"Now that we keep a register of all the inhabitants, we ought, Bulloch,
+my son, to levy a just tax so as to provide for public expenses and
+the maintenance of the Abbey. Each ought to contribute according to his
+means. For this reason, my son, call together the Elders of Alca, and in
+agreement with them we shall establish the tax."
+
+The Elders, being called together, assembled to the number of thirty
+under the great sycamore in the courtyard of the wooden monastery.
+They were the first Estates of Penguinia. Three-fourths of them were
+substantial peasants of Surelle and Clange. Greatauk, as the noblest of
+the Penguins, sat upon the highest stone.
+
+The venerable Mael took his place in the midst of his monks and uttered
+these words:
+
+"Children, the Lord when he pleases grants riches to men and he
+takes them away from them. Now I have called you together to levy
+contributions from the people so as to provide for public expenses and
+the maintenance of the monks. I consider that these contributions
+ought to be in proportion to the wealth of each. Therefore he who has a
+hundred oxen will give ten; he who has ten will give one."
+
+When the holy man had spoken, Morio, a labourer at Anis-on-the-Clange,
+one of the richest of the Penguins, rose up and said:
+
+"O Father Mael, I think it right that each should contribute to the
+public expenses and to the support of the Church, on my part I am ready
+to give up all that I possess in the interest of my brother Penguins,
+and if it were necessary I would even cheerfully part with my shirt. All
+the elders of the people are ready, like me, to sacrifice their goods,
+and no one can doubt their absolute devotion to their country and their
+creed. We have, then, only to consider the public interest and to do
+what it requires. Now, Father, what it requires, what it demands, is not
+to ask much from those who possess much, for then the rich would be less
+rich and the poor still poorer. The poor live on the wealth of the rich
+and that is the reason why that wealth is sacred. Do not touch it, to do
+so would be an uncalled for evil. You will get no great profit by taking
+from the rich, for they are very few in number; on the contrary you will
+strip yourself of all your resources and plunge the country into misery.
+Whereas if you ask a little from each inhabitant without regard to his
+wealth, you will collect enough for the public necessities and you will
+have no need to enquire into each citizen's resources, a thing that
+would be regarded by all as a most vexatious measure. By taxing all
+equally and easily you will spare the poor, for you Will leave them
+the wealth of the rich. And how could you possibly proportion taxes to
+wealth? Yesterday I had two hundred oxen, to-day I have sixty, to-morrow
+I shall have a hundred. Clunic has three cows, but they are thin; Nicclu
+has only two, but they are fat. Which is the richer, Clunic or Nicclu?
+The signs of opulence are deceitful. What is certain is that everyone
+eats and drinks. Tax people according to what they consume. That would
+be wisdom and it would be justice."
+
+Thus spoke Morio amid the applause of the Elders.
+
+"I ask that this speech be graven on bronze," cried the monk, Bulloch.
+"It is spoken for the future; in fifteen hundred years the best of the
+Penguins will not speak otherwise."
+
+The Elders were still applauding when Greatauk, his hand on the pommel
+of his sword, made this brief declaration:
+
+"Being noble, I shall not contribute; for to contribute is ignoble. It
+is for the rabble to pay."
+
+After this warning the Elders separated in silence.
+
+As in Rome, a new census was taken every five years; and by this means
+it was observed that the population increased rapidly. Although children
+died in marvellous abundance and plagues and famines came with perfect
+regularity to devastate entire villages, new Penguins, in continually
+greater numbers, contributed by their private misery to the public
+prosperity.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE MARRIAGE OF KRAKEN AND ORBEROSIA
+
+During these times there lived in the island of Alca a Penguin whose arm
+was strong and whose mind was subtle. He was called Kraken, and had his
+dwelling on the Beach of Shadows whither the inhabitants never ventured
+for fear of serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and
+lest they might encounter the souls of Penguins that had died without
+baptism. These, in appearance like livid flames, and uttering doleful
+groans, wandered night and day along the deserted beach. For it was
+generally believed, though without proof, that among the Penguins that
+had been changed into men at the blessed Mael's prayer, several had
+not received baptism and returned after their death to lament amid the
+tempests. Kraken dwelt on this savage coast in an inaccessible cavern.
+The only way to it was through a natural tunnel a hundred feet long, the
+entrance of which was concealed by a thick wood. One evening as Kraken
+was walking through this deserted plain he happened to meet a young and
+charming woman Penguin. She was the one that the monk Magis had clothed
+with his own hands and thus was the first to have worn the garments
+of chastity. In remembrance of the day when the astonished crowd of
+Penguins had seen her moving gloriously in her robe tinted like the
+dawn, this maiden had received the name of Orberosia.*
+
+     * "Orb, poetically, a globe when speaking of the heavenly
+     bodies. By extension any species of globular body."--Littre
+
+At the sight of Kraken she uttered a cry of alarm and darted forward to
+escape from him. But the hero seized her by the garments that floated
+behind, her, and addressed her in these words:
+
+"Damsel, tell me thy name, thy family and thy country."
+
+But Orberosia kept looking at Kraken with alarm.
+
+"Is it you, I see, sir," she asked him, trembling, "or is it not rather
+your troubled spirit?"
+
+She spoke in this way because the inhabitants of Alca, having no news of
+Kraken since he went to live on the Beach of Shadows, believed that he
+had died and descended among the demons of night.
+
+"Cease to fear, daughter of Alca," answered Kraken. "He who speaks to
+thee is not a wandering spirit, but a man full of strength and might. I
+shall soon possess great riches."
+
+And young Orberosia asked:
+
+"How dost thou think of acquiring great riches, O Kraken, since thou art
+a child of Penguins?"
+
+"By my intelligence," answered Kraken.
+
+"I know," said Orberosia, "that in the time that thou dwelt among us
+thou wert renowned for thy skill in hunting and fishing. No one equalled
+thee in taking fishes in a net or in piercing with thy arrows the
+swift-flying birds."
+
+"It was but a vulgar and laborious industry, O maiden. I have found a
+means of gaining much wealth for myself without fatigue. But tell me who
+thou art?"
+
+"I am called Orberosia," answered the young girl.
+
+"Why art thou so far away from thy dwelling and in the night?"
+
+"Kraken, it was not without the will of Heaven."
+
+"What meanest thou, Orberosia?"
+
+"That Heaven, O Kraken, placed me in thy path, for what reason I know
+not."
+
+Kraken beheld her for a long time in silence.
+
+Then he said with gentleness:
+
+"Orberosia, come into my house; it is that of the bravest and most
+ingenious of the sons of the Penguins. If thou art willing to follow me,
+I will make thee my companion."
+
+Then casting down her eyes, she murmured:
+
+"I will follow thee, master."
+
+It is thus that the fair Orberosia became the consort of the hero
+Kraken. This marriage was not celebrated with songs and torches because
+Kraken did not consent to show himself to the people of the Penguins;
+but hidden in his cave he planned great designs.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA
+
+"We afterwards went to visit the cabinet of natural history. . . . The
+care-taker showed us a sort of packet bound in straw that he told us
+contained the skeleton of a dragon; a proof, added he, that the dragon
+is not a fabulous animal."--Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, Paris, 1843.
+Vol. IV., pp. 404, 405
+
+In the meantime the inhabitants of Alca practised the labours of peace.
+Those of the northern coast went in boats to fish or to search for
+shell-fish. The labourers of Dombes cultivated oats, rye, and wheat.
+The rich Penguins of the valley of Dalles reared domestic animals,
+while those of the Bay of Divers cultivated their orchards. Merchants of
+Port-Alca carried on a trade in salt fish with Armorica and the gold
+of the two Britains, which began to be introduced into the island,
+facilitated exchange. The Penguin people were enjoying the fruit of
+their labours in perfect tranquillity when suddenly a sinister rumour
+ran from village to village. It was said everywhere that frightful
+dragon had ravaged two farms in the Bay of Divers.
+
+A few days before, the maiden Orberosia had disappeared. Her absence had
+at first caused no uneasiness because on several occasions she had been
+carried off by violent men who were consumed with love. And thoughtful
+people were not astonished at this, reflecting that the maiden was the
+most beautiful of the Penguins. It was even remarked that she sometimes
+went to meet her ravishers, for none of us can escape his destiny. But
+this time, as she did not return, it was feared that the dragon had
+devoured her. The more so as the inhabitants of the valley of Dalles
+soon knew that the dragon was not a fable told by the women around the
+fountains. For one night the monster devoured out of the village of Anis
+six hens, a sheep, and a young orphan child called little Elo. The next
+morning nothing was to be found either of the animals or of the child.
+
+Immediately the Elders of the village assembled in the public place and
+seated themselves on the stone bench to take counsel concerning what it
+was expedient to do in these terrible circumstances.
+
+Having called all those Penguins who had seen the dragon during the
+disastrous night, they asked them:
+
+"Have you not noticed his form and his behaviour?"
+
+And each answered in his turn:
+
+"He has the claws of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and the tail of a
+serpent."
+
+"His back bristles with thorny crests."
+
+"His whole body is covered with yellow scales."
+
+"His look fascinates and confounds. He vomits flames."
+
+"He poisons the air with his breath."
+
+"He has the head of a dragon, the claws of a lion, and the tail of a
+fish."
+
+And a woman of Anis, who was regarded as intelligent and of sound
+judgment and from whom the dragon had taken three hens, deposed as
+follows:
+
+"He is formed like a man. The proof is that I thought he was my husband,
+and I said to him, 'Come to bed, you old fool.'"
+
+Others said:
+
+"He is formed like a cloud."
+
+"He looks like a mountain."
+
+And a little child came and said:
+
+"I saw the dragon taking off his head in the barn so that he might give
+a kiss to my sister Minnie."
+
+And the Elders also asked the inhabitants:
+
+"How big is the dragon?"
+
+And it was answered:
+
+"As big as an ox."
+
+"Like the big merchant ships of the Bretons."
+
+"He is the height of a man."
+
+"He is higher than the fig-tree under which you are sitting."
+
+"He is as large as a dog."
+
+Questioned finally on his colour, the inhabitants said:
+
+"Red."
+
+"Green."
+
+"Blue."
+
+"Yellow."
+
+"His head is bright green, his wings are brilliant orange tinged with
+pink, his limbs are silver grey, his hind-quarters and his tail are
+striped with brown and pink bands, his belly bright yellow spotted with
+black."
+
+"His colour? He has no colour."
+
+"He is the colour of a dragon."
+
+After hearing this evidence the Elders remained uncertain as to what
+should be done. Some advised to watch for him, to surprise him and
+overthrow him by a multitude of arrows. Others, thinking it vain to
+oppose so powerful a monster by force, counselled that he should be
+appeased by offerings.
+
+"Pay him tribute," said one of them who passed for a wise man. "We can
+render him propitious to us by giving him agreeable presents, fruits,
+wine, lambs, a young virgin."
+
+Others held for poisoning the fountains where he was accustomed to drink
+or for smoking him out of his cavern.
+
+But none of these counsels prevailed. The dispute was lengthy and the
+Elders dispersed without coming to any resolution.
+
+
+
+
+VII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+During all the month dedicated by the Romans to their false god Mars or
+Mavors, the dragon ravaged the farms of Dalles and Dombes. He carried
+off fifty sheep, twelve pigs, and three young boys. Every family was in
+mourning and the island was full of lamentations. In order to remove the
+scourge, the Elders of the unfortunate villages watered by the Clange
+and the Surelle resolved to assemble and together go and ask the help of
+the blessed Mael.
+
+On the fifth day of the month whose name among the Latins signifies
+opening, because it opens the year, they went in procession to the
+wooden monastery that had been built on the southern coast of the
+island. When they were introduced into the cloister they filled it with
+their sobs and groans. Moved by their lamentations, old Mael left the
+room in which he devoted himself to the study of astronomy and the
+meditation of the Scriptures, and went down to them, leaning on his
+pastoral staff. At his approach, the Elders, prostrating themselves,
+held out to him green branches of trees and some of them burnt aromatic
+herbs.
+
+And the holy man, seating himself beside the cloistral fountain under an
+ancient fig-tree, uttered these words:
+
+"O my sons, offspring of the Penguins, why do you weep and groan? Why do
+you hold out those suppliant boughs towards me? Why do you raise towards
+heaven the smoke of those herbs? What calamity do you expect that I can
+avert from your heads? Why do you beseech me? I am ready to give my life
+for you. Only tell your father what it is you hope from him."
+
+To these questions the chief of the Elders answered:
+
+"O Mael, father of the sons of Alca, I will speak for all. A horrible
+dragon is laying waste our lands, depopulating our cattle-sheds, and
+carrying off the flower of our youth. He has devoured the child Elo and
+seven young boys; he has mangled the maiden Orberosia, the fairest of
+the Penguins with his teeth. There is not a village in which he does not
+emit his poisoned breath and which he has not filled with desolation.
+A prey to this terrible scourge, we come, O Mael, to pray thee, as the
+wisest, to advise us concerning the safety of the inhabitants of this
+island lest the ancient race of Penguins be extinguished."
+
+"O chief of the Elders of Alca," replied Mael, "thy words fill me with
+profound grief, and I groan at the thought that this island is the prey
+of a terrible dragon. But such an occurrence is not unique, for we find
+in books several tales of very fierce dragons. The monsters are oftenest
+found in caverns, by the brinks of waters, and, in preference, among
+pagan peoples. Perhaps there are some among you who, although they have
+received holy baptism and been incorporated into the family of Abraham,
+have yet worshipped idols, like the ancient Romans, or hung up images,
+votive tablets, fillets of wool, and garlands of flowers on the branches
+of some sacred tree. Or perhaps some of the women Penguins have danced
+round a magic stone and drunk water from the fountains where the nymphs
+dwell. If it be so, believe, O Penguins, that the Lord has sent this
+dragon to punish all for the crimes of some, and to lead you, O children
+of the Penguins, to exterminate blasphemy, superstition, and impiety
+from amongst you. For this reason I advise, as a remedy against the
+great evil from which you suffer, that you carefully search your
+dwellings for idolatry, and extirpate it from them. I think it would be
+also efficacious to pray and do penance."
+
+Thus spoke the holy Mael. And the Elders of the Penguin people kissed
+his feet and returned to their villages with renewed hope.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Following the counsel of the holy Mael the inhabitants of Alca
+endeavoured to uproot the superstitions that had sprung up amongst them.
+They took care to prevent the girls from dancing with incantations
+round the fairy tree. Young mothers were sternly forbidden to rub their
+children against the stones that stood upright in the fields so as
+to make them strong. An old man of Dombes who foretold the future by
+shaking grains of barley on a sieve, was thrown into a well.
+
+However, each night the monster still raided the poultry-yards and the
+cattle-sheds. The frightened peasants barricaded themselves in their
+houses. A woman with child who saw the shadow of a dragon on the road
+through a window in the moonlight, was so terrified that she was brought
+to bed before her time.
+
+In those days of trial, the holy Mael meditated unceasingly on the
+nature of dragons and the means of combating them. After six months of
+study and prayer he thought he had found what he sought. One evening as
+he was walking by the sea with a young monk called Samuel, he to him in
+these terms:
+
+"I have studied at length the history and habits of dragons, not to
+satisfy a vain curiosity, but to discover examples to follow in the
+present circumstances. For such, Samuel, my son, is the use of history.
+
+"It is an invariable fact that dragons are extremely vigilant. They
+never sleep, and for this reason we often find them employed in guarding
+treasures. A dragon guarded at Colchis the golden fleece that Jason
+conquered from him. A dragon watched over the golden apples in the
+garden of the Hesperides. He was killed by Hercules and transformed into
+a star by Juno. This fact is related in some books, and if it be true,
+it was done by magic, for the gods of the pagans are in reality demons.
+A dragon prevented barbarous and ignorant men from drinking at the
+fountain of Castalia. We must also remember the dragon of Andromeda,
+which was slain by Perseus. But let us turn from these pagan fables, in
+which error is always mixed with truth. We meet dragons in the histories
+of the glorious archangel Michael, of St. George, St. Philip, St. James
+the Great, St. Patrick, St. Martha, and St. Margaret. And it is in such
+writings, since they are worthy of full credence, that we ought to look
+for comfort and counsel.
+
+"The story of the dragon of Silena affords us particularly precious
+examples. You must know, my son, that on the banks of a vast pool close
+to that town there dwelt a dragon who sometimes approached the walls
+and poisoned with his breath all who dwelt in the suburbs. And that
+they might not be devoured by the monster, the inhabitants of Silena
+delivered up to him one of their number expressed his thought every
+morning. The victim was chosen by lot, and after a hundred others, the
+lot fell upon the king's daughter.
+
+"Now St. George, who was a military tribune, as he passed through the
+town of Silena, learned that the king's daughter had just been given to
+the fierce beast. He immediately mounted his horse, and, armed with
+his lance, rushed to encounter the dragon, whom he reached just as the
+monster was about to devour the royal virgin. And when St. George had
+overthrown the dragon, the king's daughter fastened her girdle round the
+beast's neck and he followed her like a dog led on a leash.
+
+"That is an example for us of the power of virgins over dragons. The
+history of St. Martha furnishes us with a still more certain proof. Do
+you know the story, Samuel, my son?"
+
+"Yes, father," answered Samuel.
+
+And the blessed Mael went on:
+
+"There was in a forest on the banks of the Rhone, between Arles and
+Avignon, a dragon half quadruped and half fish, larger than an ox, with
+sharp teeth like horns and huge-wings at his shoulders. He sank the
+boats and devoured their passengers. Now St. Martha, at the entreaty of
+the people, approached this dragon, whom she found devouring a man. She
+put her girdle round his neck and led him easily into the town.
+
+"These two examples lead me to think that we should have recourse to the
+power of some virgin so as to conquer the dragon who scatters terror and
+death through the island of Alca.
+
+"For this reason, Samuel thy son, gird up thy loins and go, I pray thee,
+with two of thy companions, into all the villages of this island, and
+proclaim everywhere that a virgin alone shall be able to deliver the
+island from the monster that devastates it.
+
+"Thou shalt sing psalms and canticles and thou shalt say:
+
+"'O sons of the Penguins, if there be among you a pure virgin, let her
+arise and go, armed with the sign of the cross, to combat the dragon!'"
+
+Thus the old man spake, and Samuel promised to obey him. The next day he
+girded up his loins and set out with two of his companions to proclaim
+to the inhabitants of Alca that a virgin alone would be able to deliver
+the Penguins from the rage of the dragon.
+
+
+
+
+IX. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia loved her husband, but she did not love him alone. At the
+hour when Venus lightens in the pale sky, whilst Kraken scattered terror
+through the villages, she used to visit in his moving hut, a young
+shepherd of Dalles called Marcel, whose pleasing form was invested with
+inexhaustible vigour. The fair Orberosia shared the shepherd's aromatic
+couch with delight, but far from making herself known to him, she took
+the name of Bridget, and said that she was the daughter of a gardener in
+the Bay of Divers. When regretfully she left his arms she walked across
+the smoking fields towards the Coast of Shadows, and if she happened to
+meet some belated peasant she immediately spread out her garments like
+great wings and cried:
+
+"Passer by, lower your eyes, that you may not have to say, 'Alas! alas!
+woe is me, for I have seen the angel of the Lord.'"
+
+The villagers tremblingly knelt with their faces to the round. And
+several of them used to say that angels, whom it would be death to see,
+passed along the roads of the island in the night time.
+
+Kraken did not know of the loves of Orberosia and Marcel, for he was a
+hero, and heroes never discover the secrets of their wives. But though
+he did not know of these loves, he reaped the benefit of them. Every
+night he found his companion more good-humoured and more beautiful,
+exhaling pleasure and perfuming the nuptial bed with a delicious odour
+of fennel and vervain. She loved Kraken with a love that never became
+importunate or anxious, because she did not rest its whole weight on him
+alone.
+
+This lucky infidelity of Orberosia was destined soon to save the hero
+from a great peril and to assure his fortune and his glory for ever.
+For it happened that she saw passing in the twilight a neatherd from
+Belmont, who was goading on his oxen, and she fell more deeply in
+love with him than she had ever been with the shepherd Marcel. He was
+hunch-backed; his shoulders were higher than his ears; his body was
+supported by legs of different lengths; his rolling eyes flashed, from
+beneath his matted hair. From his throat issued a hoarse voice and
+strident laughter; he smelt of the cow-shed. However, to her he was
+beautiful. "A plant," as Gnatho says, "has been loved by one, a stream
+by another, a beast by a third."
+
+Now, one day, as she was sighing within the neatherd's arms in a village
+barn, suddenly the blasts of a trumpet, with sounds and footsteps, fell
+upon her ears; she looked through the window and saw the inhabitants
+collected in the marketplace round a young monk, who, standing upon a
+rock, uttered these words in a distinct voice:
+
+"Inhabitants of Belmont, Abbot Mael, our venerable father, informs you
+through my mouth that neither by strength nor skill in arms shall you
+prevail against the dragon; but the beast shall be overcome by a virgin.
+If, then, there be among you a perfectly pure virgin, let her arise and
+go towards the monster; and when she meets him let her tie her girdle
+round his neck and she shall lead him as easily as if he were a little
+dog."
+
+And the young monk, replacing his hood upon his head, departed to carry
+the proclamation of the blessed Mael to other villages.
+
+Orberosia sat in the amorous straw, resting her head in her hand and
+supporting her elbow upon her knee, meditating on what she had just
+heard.
+
+Although, so far as Kraken was concerned, she feared the power of
+a virgin much less than the strength of armed men, she did not feel
+reassured by the proclamation of the blessed Mael. A vague but sure
+instinct ruled her mind and warned her that Kraken could not henceforth
+be a dragon with safety.
+
+She said to the neatherd:
+
+"My own heart, what do you think about the dragon?"
+
+The rustic shook his head.
+
+"It is certain that dragons laid waste the earth in ancient times and
+some have been seen as large as mountains. But they come no longer, and
+I believe that what has been taken for a dragon is not one at all, but
+pirates or merchants who have carried off the fair Orberosia and
+the best of the children of Alca in their ships. But if one of those
+brigands attempts to rob me of my oxen, I will either by force or craft
+find a way to prevent him from doing me any harm."
+
+This remark of the neatherd increased Orberosia's apprehensions and
+added to her solicitude for the husband whom she loved.
+
+
+
+
+X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+The days passed by and no maiden arose in the island to combat the
+monster. And in the wooden monastery old Mael, seated on a bench in the
+shade of an old fig-tree, accompanied by a pious monk called Regimental,
+kept asking himself anxiously and sadly how it was that there was not in
+Alca a single virgin fit to overthrow the monster.
+
+He sighed and brother Regimental sighed too. At that moment old Mael
+called young Samuel, who happened to pass through the garden, and said
+to him:
+
+"I have meditated anew, my son, on the means of destroying the dragon
+who devours the flower of our youth, our flocks, and our harvests. In
+this respect the story of the dragons of St. Riok and of St. Pol de Leon
+seems to me particularly instructive. The dragon of St. Riok was six
+fathoms long; his head was derived from the cock and the basilisk, his
+body from the ox and the serpent; he ravaged the banks of the Elorn in
+the time of King Bristocus. St. Riok, then aged two years, led him by
+a leash to the sea, in which the monster drowned himself of his own
+accord. St. Pol's dragon was sixty feet long and not less terrible. The
+blessed apostle of Leon bound him with his stole and allowed a young
+noble of great purity of life to lead him. These examples prove that
+in the eyes of God a chaste young man is as agreeable as a chaste girl.
+Heaven makes no distinction between them. For this reason, my son, if
+you believe what I say, we will both go to the Coast of Shadows; when we
+reach the dragon's cavern we will call the monster in a loud voice, and
+when he comes forth I will tie my stole round his neck and you will lead
+him to the sea, where he will not fail to drown himself."
+
+At the old man's words Samuel cast down his head and did not answer.
+
+"You seem to hesitate, my son," said Mael.
+
+Brother Regimental, contrary to his custom, spoke without being
+addressed.
+
+"There is at least cause for some hesitation," said he. "St. Riok was
+only two years old when he overcame the dragon. Who says that nine or
+ten years later he could have done as much? Remember, father, that the
+dragon who is devastating our island has devoured little Elo and four
+or five other young boys. Brother Samuel is not go presumptuous as to
+believe that at nineteen years of age he is more innocent than they were
+at twelve and fourteen.
+
+"Alas!" added the monk, with a groan, "who can boast of being chaste in
+this world, where everything gives the example and model of love, where
+all things in nature, animals, and plants, show us the caresses of love
+and advise us to share them? Animals are eager to unite in their own
+fashion, but the various marriages of quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and
+reptiles are far from equalling in lust the nuptials of the trees. The
+greatest extremes of lewdness that the pagans have imagined in their
+fables are outstripped by the simple flowers of the field, and, if
+you knew the irregularities of lilies and roses you would take those
+chalices of impurity, those vases of scandal, away from your altars."
+
+"Do not speak in this way, Brother Regimental," answered old Mael.
+"Since they are subject to the law of nature, animals and plants are
+always innocent. They have no souls to save, whilst man--"
+
+"You are right," replied Brother Regimental, "it is quite a different
+thing. But do not send young Samuel to the dragon--the dragon might
+devour him. For the last five years Samuel is not in a state to show his
+innocence to monsters. In the year of the comet, the Devil in order to
+seduce him, put in his path a milkmaid, who was lifting up her petticoat
+to cross a ford. Samuel was tempted, but he overcame the temptation.
+The Devil, who never tires, sent him the image of that young girl in
+a dream. The shade did what the reality was unable to accomplish, and
+Samuel yielded. When he awoke be moistened his couch with his tears, but
+alas! repentance did not give him back his innocence."
+
+As he listened to this story Samuel asked himself how his secret could
+be known, for he was ignorant that the Devil had borrowed the appearance
+of Brother Regimental, so as to trouble the hearts of the monks of Alca.
+
+And old Mael remained deep in thought and kept asking himself in grief:
+
+"Who will deliver us from the dragon's tooth? Who will preserve us from
+his breath? Who will save us from his look?"
+
+However, the inhabitants of Alca began to take courage. The labourers of
+Dombes and the neatherds of Belmont swore that they themselves would
+be of more avail than a girl against the ferocious beast, and they
+exclaimed as they stroked the muscles on their arms, "Let the dragon
+come!" Many men and women had seen him. They did not agree about his
+form and his figure, but all now united in saying that he was not as
+big as they had thought, and that his height was not much greater than
+a man's. The defence was organised; towards nightfall watches were
+stationed at the entrances of the villages ready to give the alarm; and
+during the night companies armed with pitchforks and scythes protected
+the paddocks in which the animals were shut up. Indeed, once in the
+village of Anis some plucky labourers surprised him as he was scaling
+Morio's wall, and, as they had flails, scythes, and pitchforks, they
+fell upon him and pressed him hard. One of them, a very quick and
+courageous man, thought to have run him through with his pitchfork; but
+he slipped in a pool and so let him escape. The others would certainly
+have caught him had they not waited to pick up the rabbits and fowls
+that he dropped in his flight.
+
+Those labourers declared to the Elders of the village that the monster's
+form and proportions appeased to them human enough except for his head
+and his tail, which were, in truth, terrifying.
+
+
+
+
+XI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+On that day Kraken came back to his cavern sooner than usual. He took
+from his head his sealskin helmet with its two bull's horns and its
+visor trimmed with terrible hooks. He threw on the table his gloves that
+ended in horrible claws--they were the beaks of sea-birds. He unhooked
+his belt from which hung a long green tail twisted into many folds. Then
+he ordered his page, Elo, to help him off with his boots and, as the
+child did not succeed in doing this very quickly, he gave him a kick
+that sent him to the other end of the grotto.
+
+Without looking at the fair Orberosia, who was spinning, he seated
+himself in front of the fireplace, on which a sheep was roasting, and he
+muttered:
+
+"Ignoble Penguins. . . . There is no worse trade than a dragon's."
+
+"What does my master say?" asked the fair Orberosia.
+
+"They fear me no longer," continued Kraken. "Formerly everyone fled at
+my approach. I carried away hens and rabbits in my bag; I drove sheep
+and pigs, cows, and oxen before me. To-day these clod-hoppers keep a
+good guard; they sit up at night. Just now I was pursued in the
+village of Anis by doughty labourers armed with flails and scythes and
+pitchforks. I had to drop the hens and rabbits, put my tail under my
+arm, and run as fast as I could. Now I ask you, is it seemly for a
+dragon of Cappadocia to run away like a robber with his tail under his
+arm? Further, incommoded as I was by crests, horns, hooks, claws, and
+scales, I barely escaped a brute who ran half an inch of his pitchfork
+into my left thigh."
+
+As he said this he carefully ran his hand over the insulted part, and,
+after giving himself up for a few moments to bitter meditation:
+
+"What idiots those Penguins are! I am tired of blowing flames in the
+faces of such imbeciles. Orberosia, do you hear me?"
+
+Having thus spoken the hero raised his terrible helmet in his hands and
+gazed at it for a long time in gloomy silence. Then he pronounced these
+rapid words:
+
+"I have made this helmet with my own hands in the shape of a fish's
+head, covering it with the skin of a seal. To make it more terrible I
+have put on it the horns of a bull and I have given it a boar's jaws;
+I have hung from it a horse's tail dyed vermilion. When in the gloomy
+twilight I threw it over my shoulders no inhabitant of this island had
+courage to withstand its sight. Women and children, young men and old
+men fled distracted at its approach, and I carried terror among the
+whole race of Penguins. By what advice does that insolent people lose
+its earlier fears and dare to-day to behold these horrible jaws and to
+attack this terrible crest?"
+
+And throwing his helmet on the rocky soil:
+
+"Perish, deceitful helmet!" cried Kraken. "I swear by all the demons of
+Armor that I will never bear you upon my head again."
+
+And having uttered this oath he stamped upon his helmet, his gloves, his
+boots, and upon his tail with its twisted folds.
+
+"Kraken," said the fair Orberosia, "will you allow your servant to
+employ artifice to save your reputation and your goods? Do not despise a
+woman's help. You need it, for all men are imbeciles."
+
+"Woman," asked Kraken, "what are your plans?"
+
+And the fair Orberosia informed her husband that the monks were going
+through the villages teaching the inhabitants the best way of combating
+the dragon; that, according to their instructions, the beast would be
+overcome by a virgin, and that if a maid placed her girdle around the
+dragon's neck she could lead him as easily as if he were a little dog.
+
+"How do you know that the monks teach this?" asked Kraken.
+
+"My friend," answered Orberosia, "do not interrupt a serious subject
+by frivolous questions. . . . 'If, then,' added the monks, 'there be in
+Alca a pure virgin, let her arise!' Now, Kraken, I have determined to
+answer their call. I will go and find the holy Mael and I will say to
+him: 'I am the virgin destined by Heaven to overthrow the dragon.'"
+
+At these words Kraken exclaimed: "How can you be that pure virgin? And
+why do you want to overthrow me, Orberosia? Have you lost your reason?
+Be sure that I will not allow myself to be conquered by you!"
+
+"Can you not try and understand me before you get angry?" sighed the
+fair Orberosia with deep though gentle contempt.
+
+And she explained the cunning designs that she had formed.
+
+As he listened, the hero remained pensive. And when she ceased speaking:
+
+"Orberosia, your cunning, is deep," said he, "And if your plans are
+carried out according to your intentions I shall derive great advantages
+from them. But how can you be the virgin destined by heaven?"
+
+"Don't bother about that," she replied, "and come to bed."
+
+The next day in the grease-laden atmosphere of the cavern, Kraken
+plaited a deformed skeleton out of osier rods and covered it with
+bristling, scaly, and filthy skins. To one extremity of the skeleton
+Orberosia sewed the fierce crest and the hideous mask that Kraken used
+to wear in his plundering expeditions, and to the other end she fastened
+the tail with twisted folds which the hero was wont to trail behind him.
+And when the work was finished they showed little Elo and the other five
+children who waited on them how to get inside this machine, how to make
+it walk, how to blow horns and burn tow in it so as to send forth smoke
+and flames through the dragon's mouth.
+
+
+
+
+XII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia, having clothed herself in a robe made of coarse stuff and
+girt herself with a thick cord, went to the monastery and asked to
+speak to the blessed Mael. And because women were forbidden to enter
+the enclosure of the monastery the old man advanced outside the gates,
+holding his pastoral cross in his right hand and resting his left on the
+shoulder of Brother Samuel, the youngest of his disciples.
+
+He asked:
+
+"Woman, who art thou?"
+
+"I am the maiden Orberosia."
+
+At this reply Mael raised his trembling arms to heaven.
+
+"Do you speak truth, woman? It is a certain fact that Orberosia was
+devoured by the dragon. And yet I see Orberosia and hear her. Did you
+not, O my daughter, while within the dragon's bowels arm yourself with
+the sign of the cross and come uninjured out of his throat? That is what
+seems to me the most credible explanation."
+
+"You are not deceived, father," answered Orberosia. "That is precisely
+what happened to me. Immediately I came out of the creature's bowels
+I took refuge in a hermitage on the Coast of Shadows. I lived there
+in solitude, giving myself up to prayer and meditation, and performing
+unheard of austerities, until I learnt by a revelation from heaven that
+a maid alone could overcome the dragon, and that I was that maid."
+
+"Show me a sign of your mission," said the old man.
+
+"I myself am the sign," answered Orberosia.
+
+"I am not ignorant of the power of those who have placed a seal upon
+their flesh," replied the apostle of the Penguins. "But are you indeed
+such as you say?"
+
+"You will see by the result," answered Orberosia.
+
+The monk Regimental drew near:
+
+"That will," said he, "be the best proof. King Solomon has said: 'Three
+things are hard to understand and a fourth is impossible: they are the
+way of a serpent on the earth, the way of a bird in the air, the way
+of a ship in the sea, and the way of a man with a maid!' I regard
+such matrons as nothing less than presumptuous who claim to compare
+themselves in these matters with the wisest of kings. Father, if you are
+led by me you will not consult them in regard to the pious Orberosia.
+When they have given their opinion you will not be a bit farther on than
+before. Virginity is not less difficult to prove than to keep. Pliny
+tells us in his history that its signs are either imaginary or very
+uncertain.* One who bears upon her the fourteen signs of corruption may
+yet be pure in the eyes of the angels, and, on the contrary, another who
+has been pronounced pure by the matrons who inspected her may know that
+her good appearance is due to the artifices of a cunning perversity. As
+for the purity of this holy girl here, I would put my hand in the fire
+in witness of it."
+
+     * We have vainly sought for this phrase in Pliny's "Natural
+     History."--Editor.
+
+He spoke thus because he was the Devil. But old Mael did not know it. He
+asked the pious Orberosia:
+
+"My daughter, how, would you proceed to conquer so fierce an animal as
+he who devoured you?"
+
+The virgin answered:
+
+"To-morrow at sunrise, O Mael, you will summon the people together on
+the hill in front of the desolate moor that extends to the Coast of
+Shadows, and you will take care that no man of the Penguins remains less
+than five hundred paces from those rocks so that he may not be poisoned
+by the monster's breath. And the dragon will come out of the rocks and I
+will put my girdle round his neck and lead him like an obedient dog."
+
+"Ought you not to be accompanied by a courageous and pious man who will
+kill the dragon?" asked Mael.
+
+"It will be as thou sayest, venerable father. I shall deliver the
+monster to Kraken, who will stay him with his flashing sword. For I tell
+thee that the noble Kraken, who was believed to be dead, will return
+among the Penguins and he shall slay the dragon. And from the creature's
+belly will come forth the little children whom he has devoured."
+
+"What you declare to me, O virgin," cried the apostle, "seems wonderful
+and beyond human power."
+
+"It is," answered the virgin Orberosia. "But learn, O Mael, that I have
+had a revelation that as a reward for their deliverance, the Penguin
+people will pay to the knight Kraken an annual tribute of three hundred
+fowls, twelve sheep, two oxen, three pigs, one thousand eight hundred
+bushels of corn, and vegetables according to their season; and that,
+moreover, the children who will come out of the dragon's belly will be
+given and committed to the said Kraken to serve him and obey him in
+all things. If the Penguin people fail to keep their engagements a new
+dragon will come upon the island more terrible than the first. I have
+spoken."
+
+
+
+
+XIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation and End)
+
+The people of the Penguins were assembled by Mael and they spent the
+night on the Coast of Shadows within the bounds which the holy man had
+prescribed in order that none among the Penguins should be poisoned by
+the monster's breath.
+
+The veil of night still covered the earth when, preceded by a hoarse
+bellowing, the dragon showed his indistinct and monstrous form upon
+the rocky coast. He crawled like a serpent and his writhing body seemed
+about fifteen feet long. At his appearance the crowd drew back in
+terror. But soon all eyes were turned towards the Virgin Orberosia,
+who, in the first light of the dawn, clothed in white, advanced over the
+purple heather. With an intrepid though modest gait she walked towards
+the beast, who, uttering awful bellowings, opened his flaming throat. An
+immense cry of terror and pity arose from the midst of the Penguins. But
+the virgin, unloosing her linen girdle, put it round the dragon's neck
+and led him on the leash like a faithful dog amid the acclamations of
+the spectators.
+
+She had walked over a long stretch of the heath when Kraken appeared
+armed with a flashing sword. The people, who believed him dead, uttered
+cries of joy and surprise. The hero rushed towards the beast, turned
+him over on his back, and with his sword cut open his belly, from whence
+came forth in their shirts, with curling hair and folded hands, little
+Elo and the five other children whom the monster had devoured.
+
+Immediately they threw themselves on their knees before the virgin
+Orberosia, who took them in her arms and whispered into their ears:
+
+"You will go through the villages saying: 'We are the poor little
+children who were devoured by the dragon, and we came out of his belly
+in our shirts.' The inhabitants will give you abundance of all that you
+can desire. But if you say anything else you will get nothing but cuffs
+and whippings. Go!"
+
+Several Penguins, seeing the dragon disembowelled, rushed forward to cut
+him to pieces, some from a feeling of rage and vengeance, others to get
+the magic stone called dragonite, that is engendered in his head. The
+mothers of the children who had come back to life ran to embrace their
+little ones. But the holy Mael kept them back, saying that none of them
+were holy enough to approach a dragon without dying.
+
+And soon little Elo, and the five other children came towards the people
+and said:
+
+"We are the poor little children who were devoured by the dragon and we
+came out of his belly in our shirts."
+
+And all who heard them kissed them and said:
+
+"Blessed children, we will give you abundance of all that you can
+desire."
+
+And the crowd of people dispersed, full of joy, singing hymns and
+canticles.
+
+To commemorate this day on which Providence delivered the people from
+a cruel scourge, processions were established in which the effigy of a
+chained dragon was led about.
+
+Kraken levied the tribute and became the richest and most powerful of
+the Penguins. As a sign of his victory and so as to inspire a salutary
+terror, he wore a dragon's crest upon his head and he had a habit of
+saying to the people:
+
+"Now that the monster is dead I am the dragon."
+
+For many years Orberosia bestowed her favours upon neatherds and
+shepherds, whom she thought equal to the gods. But when she was no
+longer beautiful she consecrated herself to the Lord.
+
+At her death she became the object of public veneration, and was
+admitted into the calendar of the saints and adopted as the patron saint
+of Penguinia.
+
+Kraken left a son, who, like his father, wore a dragon's crest, and
+he was for this reason surnamed Draco. He was the founder of the first
+royal dynasty of the Penguins.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+
+
+
+
+I. BRIAN THE GOOD AND QUEEN GLAMORGAN
+
+The kings of Alca were descended from Draco, the son of Kraken, and they
+wore on their heads a terrible dragon's crest, as a sacred badge whose
+appearance alone inspired the people with veneration, terror, and love.
+They were perpetually in conflict either with their own vassals and
+subjects or with the princes of the adjoining islands and continents.
+
+The most ancient of these kings has left but a name. We do not even know
+how to pronounce or write it. The first of the Draconides whose history
+is known was Brian the Good, renowned for his skill and courage in war
+and in the chase.
+
+He was a Christian and loved learning. He also favoured men who had
+vowed themselves to the monastic life. In the hall of his palace where,
+under the sooty rafters, there hung the heads, pelts, and horns of
+wild beasts, he held feasts to which all the harpers of Alca and of
+the neighbouring islands were invited, and he himself used to join in
+singing the praises of the heroes. He was just and magnanimous, but
+inflamed by so ardent a love of glory that he could not restrain himself
+from putting to death those who had sung better than himself.
+
+The monks of Yvern having been driven out by the pagans who ravaged
+Brittany, King Brian summoned them into his kingdom and built a wooden
+monastery for them near his palace. Every day he went with Queen
+Glamorgan, his wife, into the monastery chapel and was present at the
+religious ceremonies and joined in the hymns.
+
+Now among these monks there was a brother called Oddoul, who, while
+still in the flower of his youth, had adorned himself with knowledge and
+virtue. The devil entertained a great grudge against him, and attempted
+several times to lead him into temptation. He took several shapes and
+appeared to him in turn as a war-horse, a young maiden, and a cup of
+mead. Then he rattled two dice in a dicebox and said to him:
+
+"Will you play with me for the kingdoms of, the world against one of the
+hairs of your head?"
+
+But the man of the Lord, armed with the sign of the Cross, repulsed the
+enemy. Perceiving that he could not seduce him, the devil thought of an
+artful plan to ruin him. One summer night he approached the queen, who
+slept upon her couch, showed her an image of the young monk whom she
+saw every day in the wooden monastery, and upon this image he placed
+a spell. Forthwith, like a subtle poison, love flowed into Glamorgan's
+veins, and she burned with an ardent desire to do as she listed with
+Oddoul. She found unceasing pretexts to have him near her. Several times
+she asked him to teach reading and singing to her children.
+
+"I entrust them to you," said she to him. "And will follow the lessons
+you will give them so that I myself may learn also. You will teach both
+mother and sons at the same time."
+
+But the young monk kept making excuses. At times he would say that he
+was not a learned enough teacher, and on other occasions that his
+state forbade him all intercourse with women. This refusal inflamed
+Glamorgan's passion. One day as she lay pining upon her couch, her
+malady having become intolerable, she summoned Oddoul to her chamber.
+He came in obedience to her orders, but remained with his eyes cast
+down towards the threshold of the door. With impatience and grief she
+resented his not looking at her.
+
+"See," said she to him, "I have no more strength, a shadow is on my
+eyes. My body is both burning and freezing."
+
+And as he kept silence and made no movement, she called him in a voice
+of entreaty:
+
+"Come to me, come!"
+
+With outstretched arms to which passion gave more length, she
+endeavoured to seize him and draw him towards her.
+
+But he fled away, reproaching her for her wantonness.
+
+Then, incensed with rage and fearing that Oddoul might divulge the shame
+into which she had fallen, she determined to ruin him so that he might
+not ruin her.
+
+In a voice of lamentation that resounded throughout all the palace she
+called for help, as if, in truth, she were in some great danger. Her
+servants rushed up and saw the young monk fleeing and the queen pulling
+back the sheets upon her couch. They all cried out together. And when
+King Brian, attracted by the noise, entered the chamber, Glamorgan,
+showing him her dishevelled hair, her eyes flooded with tears, and her
+bosom that in the fury of her love she had torn with her nails, said:
+
+"My lord and husband, behold the traces of the insults I have undergone.
+Driven by an infamous desire Oddoul has approached me and attempted to
+do me violence."
+
+When he heard these complaints and saw the blood, the king, transported
+with fury, ordered his guards to seize the young monk and burn him alive
+before the palace under the queen's eyes.
+
+Being told of the affair, the Abbot of Yvern went to the king and said
+to him:
+
+"King Brian, know by this example the difference between a Christian
+woman and a pagan. Roman Lucretia was the most virtuous of idolatrous
+princesses, yet she had not the strength to defend herself against the
+attacks of an effeminate youth, and, ashamed of her weakness, she gave
+way to despair, whilst Glamorgan has successfully withstood the assaults
+of a criminal filled with rage, and possessed by the most terrible of
+demons." Meanwhile Oddoul, in the prison of the palace, was waiting for
+the moment when he should be burned alive. But God did not suffer an
+innocent to perish. He sent to him an angel, who, taking the form of one
+of the queen's servants called Gudrune, took him out of his prison and
+led him into the very room where the woman whose appearance he had taken
+dwelt.
+
+And the angel said to young Oddoul:
+
+"I love thee because thou art daring."
+
+And young Oddoul, believing that it was Gudrune herself, answered with
+downcast looks:
+
+"It is by the grace of the Lord that I have resisted the violence of the
+queen and braved the anger of that powerful woman."
+
+And the angel asked:
+
+"What? Hast thou not done what the queen accuses thee of?"
+
+"In truth no, I have not done it," answered Oddoul, his hand on his
+heart.
+
+"Thou hast not done it?"
+
+"No, I have not done it. The very thought of such an action fills me
+with horror."
+
+"Then," cried the angel, "what art thou doing here, thou impotent
+creature?" *
+
+     * The Penguin chronicler who relates the fact employs the
+     expression, Species inductilis. I have endeavoured to
+     translate it literally.
+
+
+And she opened the door to facilitate the young man's escape. Oddoul
+felt himself pushed violently out. Scarcely had he gone down into the
+street than a chamber-pot was poured over his head; and he thought:
+
+"Mysterious are thy designs, O Lord, and thy ways past finding out."
+
+
+
+
+II. DRACO THE GREAT (Translation of the Relics of St. Orberosia)
+
+The direct posterity of Brian the Good was extinguished about the year
+900 in the person of Collic of the Short Nose. A cousin of that prince,
+Bosco the Magnanimous, succeeded him, and took care, in order to assure
+himself of the throne, to put to death all his relations. There issued
+from him a long line of powerful kings.
+
+One of them, Draco the Great, attained great renown as a man of war. He
+was defeated more frequently than the others. It is by this constancy
+in defeat that great captains are recognized. In twenty years he burned
+down more than a hundred thousand hamlets, market towns, unwalled
+towns, villages, walled towns, cities, and universities. He set fire
+impartially to his enemies' territory and to his own domains. And he
+used to explain his conduct by saying:
+
+"War without fire is like tripe without mustard: it is an insipid
+thing."
+
+His justice was rigorous. When the peasants whom he made prisoners were
+unable to raise the money for their ransoms he had them hanged from a
+tree, and if any unhappy woman came to plead for her destitute husband
+he dragged her by the hair at his horse's tail. He lived like a soldier
+without effeminacy. It is satisfactory to relate that his manner of
+life was pure. Not only did he not allow his kingdom to decline from its
+hereditary glory, but, even in his reverses he valiantly supported the
+honour of the Penguin people.
+
+Draco the Great caused the relics of St. Orberosia to be transferred to
+Alca.
+
+The body of the blessed saint had been buried in a grotto on the Coast
+of Shadows at the end of a scented heath. The first pilgrims who went
+to visit it were the boys and girls from the neighbouring villages. They
+used to go there in the evening, by preference in couples, as if their
+pious desires naturally sought satisfaction in darkness and solitude.
+They worshipped the saint with a fervent and discreet worship whose
+mystery they seemed jealously to guard, for they did not like to publish
+too openly the experiences they felt. But they were heard to murmur one
+to another words of love, delight, and rapture with which they mingled
+the name of Orberosia. Some would sigh that there they forgot the world;
+others would say that they came out of the grotto in peace and calm; the
+young girls among them used to recall to each other the joy with which
+they had been filled in it.
+
+Such were the marvels that the virgin of Alca performed in the morning
+of her glorious eternity; they had the sweetness and indefiniteness
+of the dawn. Soon the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume
+throughout the land; it was a ground of joy and edification for pious
+souls, and corrupt men endeavoured, though in vain, by falsehood and
+calumny, to divert the faithful from the springs of grace that flowed
+from the saint's tomb. The Church took measures so that these graces
+should not remain reserved for a few children, but should be diffused
+throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up their quarters in the
+grotto, they built a monastery, a chapel, and a hostelry on the coast,
+and pilgrims began to flock thither.
+
+As if strengthened by a longer sojourn in heaven, the blessed Orberosia
+now performed still greater miracles for those who came to lay their
+offerings on her tomb. She gave hopes to women who had been hitherto
+barren, she sent dreams to reassure jealous old men concerning the
+fidelity of the young wives whom they had suspected without cause, and
+she protected the country from plagues, murrains, famines, tempests, and
+dragons of Cappadocia.
+
+But during the troubles that desolated the kingdom in the time of King
+Collic and his successors, the tomb of St. Orberosia was plundered of
+its wealth, the monastery burned down, and the monks dispersed. The
+road that had been so long trodden by devout pilgrims was overgrown with
+furze and heather, and the blue thistles of the sands. For a hundred
+years the miraculous tomb had been visited by none save vipers,
+weasels, and bats, when, one day the saint appeared to a peasant of the
+neighbourhood, Momordic by name.
+
+"I am the virgin Orberosia," said she to him; "I have chosen thee to
+restore my sanctuary. Warn the inhabitants of the country that if they
+allow my memory to be blotted out, and leave my tomb without honour and
+wealth, a new dragon will come and devastate Penguinia."
+
+Learned churchmen held an inquiry concerning this apparition, and
+pronounced it genuine, and not diabolical but truly heavenly, and in
+later years it was remarked that in France, in like circumstances, St.
+Foy and St. Catherine had acted in the same way and made use of similar
+language.
+
+The monastery was restored and pilgrims flocked to it anew. The virgin
+Orberosia worked greater and greater miracles. She cured divers hurtful
+maladies, particularly club-foot, dropsy, paralysis, and St. Guy's
+disease. The monks who kept the tomb were enjoying an enviable opulence,
+when the saint, appearing to King Draco the Great, ordered him to
+recognise her as the heavenly patron of the kingdom and to transfer her
+precious remains to the cathedral of Alca.
+
+In consequence, the odoriferous relics of that virgin were carried with
+great pomp to the metropolitan church and placed in the middle of the
+choir in a shrine made of gold and enamel and ornamented with precious
+stones.
+
+The chapter kept a record of the miracles wrought by the blessed
+Orberosia.
+
+Draco the Great, who had never ceased to defend and exalt the Christian
+faith, died fulfilled with the most pious sentiments and bequeathed his
+great possessions to the Church.
+
+
+
+
+III. QUEEN CRUCHA
+
+Terrible disorders followed the death of Draco the Great. That prince's
+successors have often been accused of weakness, and it is true that none
+of them followed, even from afar, the example of their valiant ancestor.
+
+His son, Chum, who was lame, failed to increase the territory of the
+Penguins. Bolo, the son of Chum, was assassinated by the palace guards
+at the age of nine, just as he was ascending the throne. His brother
+Gun succeeded him. He was only seven years old and allowed himself to be
+governed by his mother, Queen Crucha.
+
+Crucha was beautiful, learned, and intelligent; but she was unable to
+curb her own passions.
+
+These are the terms in which the venerable Talpa expresses himself in
+his chronicle regarding that illustrious queen:
+
+"In beauty of face and symmetry of figure Queen Crucha yields neither
+to Semiramis of Babylon nor to Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons; nor to
+Salome, the daughter of Herodias. But she offers in her person certain
+singularities that will appear beautiful or uncomely according to the
+contradictory opinions of men and the varying judgments of the world.
+She has on her forehead two small horns which she conceals in the
+abundant folds of her golden hair; one of her eyes is blue and one is
+black; her neck is bent towards the left side; and, like Alexander
+of Macedon, she has six fingers on her right hand, and a stain like a
+little monkey's head upon her skin.
+
+"Her gait is majestic and her manner affable. She is magnificent in her
+expenses, but she is not always able to rule desire by reason.
+
+"One day, having noticed in the palace stables, a young groom of great
+beauty, she immediately fell violently in love with him, and entrusted
+to him the command of her armies. What one must praise unreservedly
+in this great queen is the abundance of gifts that she makes to the
+churches, monasteries, and chapels in her kingdom, and especially to
+the holy house of Beargarden, where, by the grace of the Lord, I made my
+profession in my fourteenth year. She has founded masses for the repose
+of her soul in such great numbers that every priest in the Penguin
+Church is, so to speak, transformed into a taper lighted in the sight of
+heaven to draw down the divine mercy upon the august Crucha."
+
+From these lines and from some others with which have enriched my text
+the reader can judge of the historical and literary value of the "Gesta
+Penguinorum." Unhappily, that chronicle suddenly comes suddenly to an
+end at third year of Draco the Simple, the successor of Gun the Weak.
+Having reached that point of my history, I deplore the loss of an
+agreeable and trustworthy guide.
+
+During the two centuries that followed, the Penguins remained plunged
+in blood-stained disorder. All the arts perished. In the midst of the
+general ignorance, the monks in the shadow of their cloister devoted
+themselves to study, and copied the Holy Scriptures with indefatigable
+zeal. As parchment was scarce, they scraped the writing off old
+manuscripts in order to transcribe upon them the divine word. Thus
+throughout the breadth of Penguinia Bibles blossomed forth like roses on
+a bush.
+
+A monk of the order of St. Benedict, Ermold the Penguin, had himself
+alone defaced four thousand Greek and Latin manuscripts so as to copy
+out the Gospel of St. John four thousand times. Thus the masterpieces of
+ancient poetry and eloquence were destroyed in great numbers. Historians
+are unanimous in recognising that the Penguin convents were the refuge
+of learning during the Middle Ages.
+
+Unending wars between the Penguins and the Porpoises filled the close
+of this period. It is extremely difficult to know the truth concerning
+these wars, not because accounts are wanting, but because there are so
+many of them. The Porpoise Chronicles contradict the Penguin Chronicles
+at every point. And, moreover, the Penguins contradict each other as
+well as the Porpoises. I have discovered two chronicles that are in
+agreement, but one has copied from the other. A single fact is certain,
+namely, that massacres, rapes, conflagrations, and plunder succeeded one
+another without interruption.
+
+Under the unhappy prince Bosco IX. the kingdom was at the verge of
+ruin. On the news that the Porpoise fleet, composed of six hundred great
+ships, was in sight of Alca, the bishop ordered a solemn procession. The
+cathedral chapter, the elected magistrates, the members of Parliament,
+and the clerics of the University entered the Cathedral and, taking up
+St. Orberosia's shrine, led it in procession through the town, followed
+by the entire people singing hymns. The holy patron of Penguinia was not
+invoked in vain. Nevertheless, the Porpoises besieged the town both by
+land and sea, took it by assault, and for three days and three nights
+killed, plundered, violated, and burned, with all the indifference that
+habit produces.
+
+Our astonishment cannot be too great at the fact that, during those iron
+ages, the faith was preserved intact among the Penguins. The splendour
+of the truth in those times illumined all souls that had not been
+corrupted by sophisms. This is the explanation of the unity of belief.
+A constant practice of the Church doubtless contributed also to
+maintain this happy communion of the faithful--every Penguin who thought
+differently from the others was immediately burned at the stake.
+
+
+
+
+IV. LETTERS: JOHANNES TALPA
+
+During the minority of King Gun, Johannes Talpa, in the monastery of
+Beargarden, where at the age of fourteen he had made his profession
+and from which he never departed for a single day throughout his life,
+composed his celebrated Latin chronicle in twelve books called "De
+Gestis Penguinorum."
+
+The monastery of Beargarden lifts its high walls on the summit of an
+inaccessible peak. One sees around it only the blue tops of mountains,
+divided by the clouds.
+
+When he began to write his "Gesta Penguinorum," Johannes Talpa was
+already old. The good monk has taken care to tell us this in his book:
+"My head has long since lost," he says, "its adornment of fair hair,
+and my scalp resembles those convex mirrors of metal which the Penguin
+ladies consult with so much care and zeal. My stature, naturally small,
+has with years become diminished and bent. My white beard gives warmth
+to my breast."
+
+With a charming simplicity, Talpa informs us of certain circumstances in
+his life and some features in his character. "Descended," he tells us,
+"from a noble family, and destined from childhood for the ecclesiastical
+state, I was taught grammar and music. I learnt to read under the
+guidance of a master who was called Amicus, and who would have been
+better named Inimicus. As I did not easily attain to a knowledge of
+my letters, he beat me violently with rods so that I can say that he
+printed the alphabet in strokes upon my back."
+
+In another passage Talpa confesses his natural inclination towards
+pleasure. These are his expressive words: "In my youth the ardour of
+my senses was such that in the shadow of the woods I experienced a
+sensation of boiling in a pot rather than of breathing the fresh air. I
+fled from women, but in vain, for every object recalled them to me."
+
+While he was writing his chronicle, a terrible war, at once foreign and
+domestic, laid waste the Penguin land. The soldiers of Crucha came to
+defend the monastery of Beargarden against the Penguin barbarians and
+established themselves strongly within its walls. In order to render it
+impregnable they pierced loop-holes through the walls and they took the
+lead off the church roof to make balls for their slings. At night they
+lighted huge fires in the courts and cloisters and on them they roasted
+whole oxen which they spitted upon the ancient pine-trees of the
+mountain. Sitting around the flames, amid smoke filled with a mingled
+odour of resin and fat, they broached huge casks of wine and beer. Their
+songs, their blasphemies, and the noise of their quarrels drowned the
+sound of the morning bells.
+
+At last the Porpoises, having crossed the defiles, laid siege to the
+monastery. They were warriors from the North, clad in copper armour.
+They fastened ladders a hundred and fifty fathoms long to the sides of
+the cliffs and sometimes in the darkness and storm these broke beneath
+the weight of men and arms, and bunches of the besiegers were hurled
+into the ravines and precipices. A prolonged wail would be heard going
+down into the darkness, and the assault would begin again. The Penguins
+poured streams of burning wax upon their assailants, which made them
+blaze like torches. Sixty times the enraged Porpoises attempted to scale
+the monastery and sixty times they were repulsed.
+
+For six months they had closely invested the monastery, when, on the day
+of the Epiphany, a shepherd of the valley showed them a hidden path
+by which they climbed the mountain, penetrated into the vaults of the
+abbey, ran through the cloisters, the kitchens, the church, the chapter
+halls, the library, the laundry, the cells, the refectories, and the
+dormitories, and burned the buildings, killing and violating without
+distinction of age or sex. The Penguins, awakened unexpectedly, ran to
+arms, but in the darkness and alarm they struck at one another, whilst
+the Porpoises with blows of their axes disputed the sacred vessels, the
+censers, the candlesticks, dalmatics, reliquaries, golden crosses, and
+precious stones.
+
+The air was filled with an acrid odour of burnt flesh. Groans and
+death-cries arose in the midst of the flames, and on the edges of the
+crumbling roofs monks ran in thousands like ants, and fell into the
+valley. Yet Johannes Talpa kept on writing his Chronicle. The soldiers
+of Crucha retreated speedily and filled up all the issues from the
+monastery with pieces of rock so as to shut up the Porpoises in the
+burning buildings. And to crush the enemy beneath the ruin they employed
+the trunks of old oaks as battering-rams. The burning timbers fell in
+with a noise like thunder and the lofty arches of the naves crumbled
+beneath the shock of these giant trees when moved by six hundred men
+together. Soon there was left nothing of the rich and extensive abbey
+but the cell of Johannes Talpa, which, by a marvellous chance, hung from
+the ruin of a smoking gable. The old chronicler still kept writing.
+
+This admirable intensity of thought may seem excessive in the case of
+an annalist who applies himself to relate the events of his own time.
+However abstracted and detached we may be from surrounding things,
+we nevertheless resent their influence. I have consulted the original
+manuscript of Johannes Talpa in the National Library, where it is
+preserved (Monumenta Peng., K. L6., 12390 four). It is a parchment
+manuscript of 628 leaves. The writing is extremely confused, the letters
+instead of being in a straight line, stray in all directions and are
+mingled together in great disorder, or, more correctly speaking, in
+absolute confusion. They are so badly formed that for the most part it
+is impossible not merely to say what they are, but even to distinguish
+them from the splashes of ink with which they are plentifully
+interspersed. Those inestimable pages bear witness in this way to the
+troubles amid which they were written. To read them is difficult. On the
+other hand, the monk of Beargarden's style shows no trace of emotion.
+The tone of the "Gesta Penguinorum" never departs from simplicity.
+The narration is rapid and of a conciseness that sometimes approaches
+dryness. The reflections are rare and, as a rule, judicious.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE ARTS: THE PRIMITIVES OF PENGUIN PAINTING
+
+The Penguin critics vie with one another in affirming that Penguin
+art has from its origin been distinguished by a powerful and pleasing
+originality, and that we may look elsewhere in vain for the qualities of
+grace and reason that characterise its earliest works. But the Porpoises
+claim that their artists were undoubtedly the instructors and masters of
+the Penguins. It is difficult to form an opinion on the matter, because
+the Penguins, before they began to admire their primitive painters,
+destroyed all their works.
+
+We cannot be too sorry for this loss. For my own part I feel it cruelly,
+for I venerate the Penguin antiquities and I adore the primitives.
+They are delightful. I do not say the are all alike, for that would be
+untrue, but they have common characters that are found in all schools--I
+mean formulas from which they never depart--and there is besides
+something finished in their work, for what they know they know well.
+Luckily we can form a notion of the Penguin primitives from the Italian,
+Flemish, and Dutch primitives, and from the French primitives, who are
+superior to all the rest; as M. Gruyer tells us they are more logical,
+logic being a peculiarly French quality. Even if this is denied it must
+at least be admitted that to France belongs the credit of having kept
+primitives when the other nations knew them no longer. The Exhibition
+of French Primitives at the Pavilion Marsan in 1904 contained several
+little panels contemporary with the later Valois kings and with Henry
+IV.
+
+I have made many journeys to see the pictures of the brothers Van Eyck,
+of Memling, of Roger van der Weyden, of the painter of the death of
+Mary, of Ambrogio Lorenzetti, and of the old Umbrian masters. It was,
+however, neither Bruges, nor Cologne, nor Sienna, nor Perugia, that
+completed my initiation; it was in the little town of Arezzo that I
+became a conscious adept in primitive painting. That was ten years
+ago or even longer. At that period of indigence and simplicity, the
+municipal museums, though usually kept shut, were always opened to
+foreigners. One evening an old woman with a candle showed me, for half a
+lira, the sordid museum of Arezzo, and in it I discovered a painting
+by Margaritone, a "St. Francis," the pious sadness of which moved me to
+tears. I was deeply touched, and Margaritone, of Arezzo became from that
+day my dearest primitive.
+
+I picture to myself the Penguin primitives in conformity with the works
+of that master. It will not therefore be thought superfluous if in this
+place I consider his works with some attention, if not in detail,
+at least under their more general and, if I dare say so, most
+representative aspect.
+
+We possess five or six pictures signed with his hand. His masterpiece,
+preserved in the National Gallery of London, represents the Virgin
+seated on a throne and holding the infant Jesus in her arms. What
+strikes one first when one looks at this figure is the proportion. The
+body from the neck to the feet is only twice as long as the head,
+so that it appears extremely short and podgy. This work is not less
+remarkable for its painting than for its drawing. The great Margaritone
+had but a limited number of colours in his possession, and he used
+them in all their purity without ever modifying the tones. From this it
+follows that his colouring has more vivacity than harmony. The cheeks
+of the Virgin and those of the Child are of a bright vermilion which the
+old master, from a naive preference for clear definitions, has placed on
+each face in two circumferences as exact as if they had been traced out
+by a pair of compasses.
+
+A learned critic of the eighteenth century, the Abbe Lanzi, has treated
+Margaritone's works with profound disdain. "They are," he says, "merely
+crude daubs. In those unfortunate times people could neither draw nor
+paint." Such was the common opinion of the connoisseurs of the days of
+powdered wigs. But the great Margaritone and his contemporaries were
+soon to be avenged for this cruel contempt. There was born in the
+nineteenth century, in the biblical villages and reformed cottages of
+pious England, a multitude of little Samuels and little St. Johns, with
+hair curling like lambs, who, about 1840, and 1850, became spectacled
+professors and founded the cult of the primitives.
+
+That eminent theorist of Pre-Raphaelitism, Sir James Tuckett, does not
+shrink from placing the Madonna of the National Gallery on a level with
+the masterpieces of Christian art. "By giving to the Virgin's head,"
+says Sir James Tuckett, "a third of the total height of the figure,
+the old master attracts the spectator's attention and keeps it directed
+towards the more sublime parts of the human figure, and in particular
+the eyes, which we ordinarily describe as the spiritual organs. In this
+picture, colouring and design conspire to produce an ideal and mystical
+impression. The vermilion of the cheeks does not recall the natural
+appearance of the skin; it rather seems as if the old master has applied
+the roses of Paradise to the faces of the Mother and the Child."
+
+We see, in such a criticism as this, a shining reflection, so to speak,
+of the work which it exalts; yet MacSilly, the seraphic aesthete of
+Edinburgh, has expressed in a still more moving and penetrating fashion
+the impression produced upon his mind by the sight of this primitive
+painting. "The Madonna of Margaritone," says the revered MacSilly,
+"attains the transcendent end of art. It inspires its beholders with
+feelings of innocence and purity; it makes them like little children.
+And so true is this, that at the age of sixty-six, after having had the
+joy of contemplating it closely for three hours, I felt myself suddenly
+transformed into a little child. While my cab was taking me through
+Trafalgar Square I kept laughing and prattling and shaking my
+spectacle-case as if it were a rattle. And when the maid in my
+boarding-house had served my meal I kept pouring spoonfuls of soup into
+my ear with all the artlessness of childhood."
+
+"It is by such results," adds MacSilly, "that the excellence of a work
+of art is proved."
+
+Margaritone, according to Vasari, died at the age of seventy-seven,
+"regretting that he had lived to see a new form of art arising and the
+new artists crowned with fame."
+
+These lines, which I translate literally, have inspired Sir James
+Tuckett with what are perhaps the finest pages in his work. They form
+part of his "Breviary for Aesthetes"; all the Pre-Raphaelites know them
+by heart. I place them here as the most precious ornament of this book.
+You will agree that nothing more sublime has been written since the days
+of the Hebrew prophets.
+
+MARGARITONE'S VISION
+
+Margaritone, full of years and labours, went one day to visit the studio
+of a young painter who had lately settled in the town. He noticed in
+the studio a freshly painted Madonna, which, although severe and rigid,
+nevertheless, by a certain exactness in the proportions and a devilish
+mingling of light and shade, assumed an appearance of relief and life.
+At this sight the artless and sublime worker of Arezzo perceived with
+horror what the future of painting would be. With his brow clasped in
+his hands he exclaimed:
+
+"What things of shame does not this figure show forth! I discern in it
+the end of that Christian art which paints the soul and inspires the
+beholder with an ardent desire for heaven. Future painters will not
+restrain themselves as does this one to portraying on the side of a wall
+or on a wooden panel the cursed matter of which our bodies are formed;
+they will celebrate and glorify it. They will clothe their figures with
+dangerous appearances of flesh, and these figures will seem like real
+persons. Their bodies will be seen; their forms will appear through
+their clothing. St. Magdalen will have a bosom. St. Martha a belly, St.
+Barbara hips, St. Agnes buttocks; St. Sebastian will unveil his youthful
+beauty, and St. George will display beneath his armour the muscular
+wealth of a robust virility; apostles, confessors, doctors, and God
+the Father himself will appear as ordinary beings like you and me; the
+angels will affect an equivocal, ambiguous, mysterious beauty which
+will trouble hearts. What desire for heaven will these representations
+impart? None; but from them you will learn to take pleasure in the
+forms of terrestrial life. Where will painters stop in their indiscreet
+inquiries? They will stop nowhere. They will go so far as to show men
+and women naked like the idols of the Romans. There will be a sacred art
+and a profane art, and the sacred art will not be less profane than the
+other."
+
+"Get ye behind me, demons," exclaimed the old master. For in prophetic
+vision he saw the righteous and the saints assuming the appearance of
+melancholy athletes. He saw Apollos playing the lute on a flowery hill,
+in the midst of the Muses wearing light tunics. He saw Venuses lying
+under shady myrtles and the Danae exposing their charming sides to the
+golden rain. He saw pictures of Jesus under the pillar's of the temple
+amidst patricians, fair ladies, musicians, pages, negroes, dogs, and
+parrots. He saw in an inextricable confusion of human limbs, outspread
+wings, and flying draperies, crowds of tumultuous Nativities, opulent
+Holy Families, emphatic Crucifixions. He saw St. Catherines, St.
+Barbaras, St. Agneses humiliating patricians by the sumptuousness of
+their velvets, their brocades, and their pearls, and by the splendour of
+their breasts. He saw Auroras scattering roses, and a multitude of naked
+Dianas and Nymphs surprised on the banks of retired streams. And the
+great Margaritone died, strangled by so horrible a presentiment of the
+Renaissance and the Bolognese School.
+
+
+
+
+VI. MARBODIUS
+
+We possess a precious monument of the Penguin literature of the
+fifteenth century. It is a narrative of a journey to hell undertaken
+by the monk Marbodius, of the order of St. Benedict, who professed
+a fervent admiration for the poet Virgil. This narrative, written in
+fairly good Latin, has been published by M. du Clos des Limes. It is
+here translated for the first time. I believe that I am doing a service
+to my fellow-countrymen in making them acquainted with these pages,
+though doubtless they are far from forming a unique example of this
+class of mediaeval Latin literature. Among the fictions that may be
+compared with them we may mention "The Voyage of St. Brendan,"
+"The Vision of Albericus," and "St. Patrick's Purgatory," imaginary
+descriptions, like Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy," of the supposed
+abode of the dead. The narrative of Marbodius is one of the latest works
+dealing with this theme, but it is not the least singular.
+
+THE DESCENT OF MARBODIUS INTO HELL
+
+In the fourteen hundred and fifty-third year of the incarnation of the
+Son of God, a few days before the enemies of the Cross entered the
+city of Helena and the great Constantine, it was given to me, Brother
+Marbodius, an unworthy monk, to see and to hear what none had hitherto
+seen or heard. I have composed a faithful narrative of those things so
+that their memory may not perish with me, for man's time is short.
+
+On the first day of May in the aforesaid year, at the hour of vespers, I
+was seated in the Abbey of Corrigan on a stone in the cloisters and, as
+my custom was, I read the verses of the poet whom I love best of all,
+Virgil, who has sung of the labours: of the field, of shepherds, and
+of heroes. Evening was hanging its purple folds from the arches of the
+cloisters and in a voice of emotion I was murmuring the verses which
+describe how Dido, the Phoenician queen, wanders with her ever-bleeding
+wound beneath the myrtles of hell. At that moment Brother Hilary
+happened to pass by, followed by Brother Jacinth, the porter.
+
+Brought up in the barbarous ages before the resurrection of the Muses,
+Brother Hilary has not been initiated into the wisdom of the ancients;
+nevertheless, the poetry of the Mantuan has, like a subtle torch, shed
+some gleams of light into his understanding.
+
+"Brother Marbodius," he asked me, "do those verses that you utter
+with swelling breast and sparkling eyes--do they belong to that great
+'Aeneid' from which morning or evening your glances are never withheld?"
+
+I answered that I was reading in Virgil how the son of Anchises
+perceived Dido like a moon behind the foliage.*
+
+     * The text runs
+
+     . . .qualem primo qui syrgere mense
+     Aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam.
+
+Brother Marbodius, by a strange misunderstanding, substitutes an
+entirely different image for the one created by the poet.
+
+
+"Brother Marbodius," he replied, "I am certain that on all occasions
+Virgil gives expression to wise maxims and profound thoughts. But the
+songs that he modulates on his Syracusan flute hold such a lofty meaning
+and such exalted doctrine that I am continually puzzled by them."
+
+"Take care, father," cried Brother Jacinth, in an agitated voice.
+"Virgil was a magician who wrought marvels by the help of demons. It is
+thus he pierced through a mountain near Naples and fashioned a bronze
+horse that had power to heal all the diseases of horses. He was a
+necromancer, and there is still shown, in a certain town in Italy, the
+mirror in which he made the dead appear. And yet a woman deceived this
+great sorcerer. A Neapolitan courtesan invited him to hoist himself up
+to her window in the basket that was used to bring the provisions, and
+she left him all night suspended between two storeys."
+
+Brother Hilary did not appear to hear these observations.
+
+"Virgil is a prophet," he replied, "and a prophet who leaves far behind
+him the sibyls with their sacred verses as well as the daughter of King
+Priam, and that great diviner of future things, Plato of Athens. You
+will find in the fourth of his Syracusan cantos the birth of our Lord
+foretold in a lancune that seems of heaven rather than of earth.* In the
+time of my early studies, when I read for the first time JAM REDIT ET
+VIRGO, I felt myself bathed in an infinite delight, but I immediately
+experienced intense grief at the thought that, for ever deprived of the
+presence of God, the author of this prophetic verse, the noblest that
+has come from human lips, was pining among the heathen in eternal
+darkness. This cruel thought did not leave me. It pursued me even in
+my studies, my prayers, my meditations, and my ascetic labours. Thinkin
+that Virgil was deprived of the sight of God and that possibly he might
+even be suffering the fate of the reprobate in hell, I could neither
+enjoy peace nor rest, and I went so far as to exclaim several times a
+day with my arms outstretched to heaven:
+
+"'Reveal to me, O Lord, the lot thou hast assigned to him who sang on
+earth as the angels sing in heaven!'
+
+     *Three centuries before the epoch in which our Marbodius
+     lived the words--
+
+     'Maro, vates gentilium
+     Da Christo testimonium.'
+
+     Were sung in the churches on Christmas Day.
+
+
+"After some years my anguish ceased when I read in an old book that
+the great apostle St. Paul, who called the Gentiles into the Church of
+Christ, went to Naples and sanctified with his tears the tomb of the
+prince of poets.* This was some ground for believing that Virgil, like
+the Emperor Trajan, was admitted to Paradise because even in error he
+had a presentiment of the truth. We are not compelled to believe it, but
+I can easily persuade myself that it is true."
+
+     *Ad maronis mausoleum
+     Ductus, fudit super eum
+     Piae rorem lacrymae.
+     Quem te, intuit, reddidissem,
+     Si te vivum invenissem
+     Poetarum maxime!
+
+Having thus spoken, old Hilary wished me the peace of a holy night and
+went away with Brother Jacinth.
+
+I resumed the delightful study of my poet. Book in hand, I meditated
+upon the way in which those whom Love destroys with its cruel malady
+wander through the secret paths in the depth of the myrtle forest, and,
+as I meditated, the quivering reflections of the stars came and mingled
+with those of the leafless eglantines in the waters of the cloister
+fountain. Suddenly the lights and the perfumes and the stillness of the
+sky were overwhelmed, a fierce Northwind charged with storm and darkness
+burst roaring upon me. It lifted me up and carried me like a wisp of
+straw over fields, cities, rivers, and mountains, and through the midst
+of thunder-clouds, during a long night composed of a whole series of
+nights and days. And when, after this prolonged and cruel rage, the
+hurricane was at last stilled, I found myself far from my native land at
+the bottom of a valley bordered by cypress trees. Then a woman of wild
+beauty, trailing long garments behind her, approached me. She placed
+her left hand on my shoulder, and, pointing her right arm to an oak with
+thick foliage:
+
+"Look!" said she to me.
+
+Immediately I recognised the Sibyl who guards the sacred wood of
+Avernus, and I discerned the fair Proserpine's beautiful golden twig
+amongst the tufted boughs of the tree to which her finger pointed.
+
+"O prophetic Virgin," I exclaimed, "thou hast comprehended my desire and
+thou hast satisfied it in this way. Thou hast revealed to me the tree
+that bears the shining twig without which none can enter alive into the
+dwelling-place of the dead. And in truth, eagerly did I long to converse
+with the shade of Virgil."
+
+Having said this, I snatched the golden branch from its ancient trunk
+and I advanced without fear into the smoking gulf that leads to the
+miry banks of the Styx, upon which the shades are tossed about like dead
+leaves. At sight of the branch dedicated to Proserpine, Charon took
+me in his bark, which groaned beneath my weight, and I alighted on the
+shores of the dead, and was greeted by the mute baying of the threefold
+Cerberus. I pretended to throw the shade of a stone at him, and the vain
+monster fled into his cave. There, amidst the rushes, wandered the souls
+of those children whose eyes had but opened and shut to the kindly light
+of day, and there in a gloomy cavern Minos judges men. I penetrated
+into the myrtle wood in which the victims of love wander languishing,
+Phaedra, Procris, the sad Eriphyle, Evadne, Pasiphae, Laodamia, and
+Cenis, and the Phoenician Dido. Then I went through the dusty plains
+reserved for famous warriors. Beyond them open two ways. That to the
+left leads to Tartarus, the abode of the wicked. I took that to the
+right, which leads to Elysium and to the dwellings of Dis. Having hung
+the sacred branch at the goddess's door, I reached pleasant fields
+flooded with purple light. The shades of philosophers and poets hold
+grave converse there. The Graces and the Muses formed sprightly choirs
+upon the grass. Old Homer sang, accompanying himself upon his rustic
+lyre. His eyes were closed, but divine images shone upon his lips. I saw
+Solon, Democritus, and Pythagoras watching the games of the young men in
+the meadow, and, through the foliage of an ancient laurel, I perceived
+also Hesiod, Orpheus, the melancholy Euripides, and the masculine
+Sappho. I passed and recognised, as they sat on the bank of a fresh
+rivulet, the poet Horace, Varius, Gallus, and Lycoris. A little
+apart, leaning against the trunk of a dark holm-oak, Virgil was gazing
+pensively at the grove. Of lofty stature, though spare, he still
+preserved that swarthy complexion, that rustic air, that negligent
+bearing, and unpolished appearance which during his lifetime concealed
+his genius. I saluted him piously and remained for a long time without
+speech.
+
+At last when my halting voice could proceed out of my throat:
+
+"O thou, so dear to the Ausonian Muses, thou honour of the Latin name,
+Virgil," cried I, "it is through thee I have known what beauty is, it
+is through thee I have known what the tables of the gods and the beds
+of the goddesses are like. Suffer the praises of the humblest of thy
+adorers."
+
+"Arise, stranger," answered the divine poet. "I perceive that thou art
+a living being among the shades, and that thy body treads down the grass
+in this eternal evening. Thou art not the first man who has descended
+before his death into these dwellings, although all intercourse between
+us and the living is difficult. But cease from praise; I do not like
+eulogies and the confused sounds of glory have always offended my ears.
+That is why I fled from Rome, where I was known to the idle and curious,
+and laboured in the solitude of my beloved Parthenope. And then I am not
+so convinced that the men of thy generation understand my verses that
+should be gratified by thy praises. Who art thou?"
+
+"I am called Marbodius of the Kingdom of Alca. I made my profession in
+the Abbey of Corrigan. I read thy poems by day and I read them by night.
+It is thee whom I have come to see in Hell; I was impatient to know what
+thy fate was. On earth the learned often dispute about it. Some hold
+it probable that, having lived under the power of demons, thou art now
+burning in inextinguishable flames; others, more cautious, pronounce
+no opinion, believing that all which is said concerning the dead is
+uncertain and full of lies; several, though not in truth the ablest,
+maintain that, because thou didst elevate the tone of the Sicilian Muses
+and foretell that a new progeny would descend from heaven, thou wert
+admitted, like the Emperor Trajan, to enjoy eternal blessedness in the
+Christian heaven."
+
+"Thou seest that such is not the case," answered the shade, smiling.
+
+"I meet thee in truth, O Virgil, among the heroes and sages in those
+Elysian Fields which thou thyself hast described. Thus, contrary to what
+several on earth believe, no one has come to seek thee on the part of
+Him who reigns on high?"
+
+After a rather long silence:
+
+"I will conceal nought from thee. He sent for me; one of his messengers,
+a simple man, came to say that I was expected, and that, although I
+had not been initiated into their mysteries, in consideration of my
+prophetic verses, a place had been reserved for me among those of the
+new sect. But I refused to accept that invitation; I had no desire
+to change my lace. I did so not because I share the admiration of the
+Greeks for the Elysian fields, or because I taste here those joys
+which caused Proserpine to lose the remembrance of her mother. I never
+believed much myself in what I say about these things in the 'Aeneid.'
+I was instructed by philosophers and men of science and I had a correct
+foreboding of the truth. Life in hell is extremely attenuated; we feel
+neither pleasure nor pain; we are as if we were not. The dead have
+no existence here except such as the living lend them. Nevertheless I
+prefer to remain here."
+
+"But what reason didst thou give, O Virgil, for so strange a refusal?"
+
+"I gave excellent ones. I said to the messenger of the god that I did
+not deserve the honour he brought me, and that a meaning had been given
+to my verses which they did not bear. In truth I have not in my fourth
+Eclogue betrayed the faith of my ancestors. Some ignorant Jews alone
+have interpreted in favour of a barbarian god a verse which celebrates
+the return of the golden age predicted by the Sibylline oracles. I
+excused myself then on the ground that I could not occupy a place which
+was destined for me in error and to which I recognised that I had no
+right. Then I alleged my disposition and my tastes, which do not accord
+with the customs of the new heavens.
+
+"'I am not unsociable,' said I to this man. 'I have shown in life a
+complaisant and easy disposition, although the extreme simplicity of my
+habits caused me to be suspected of avarice. I kept nothing for myself
+alone. My library was open to all and I have conformed my conduct to
+that fine saying of Euripides, "all ought to be common among friends."
+Those praises that seemed obtrusive when I myself received them became
+agreeable to me when addressed to Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I
+am rustic and uncultivated. I take pleasure in the society of animals;
+I was so zealous in observing them and took so much care of them that I
+was regarded, not altogether wrongly, as a good veterinary surgeon. I am
+told that the people of thy sect claim an immortal soul for themselves,
+but refuse one to the animals. That is a piece of nonsense that makes
+me doubt their judgment. Perhaps I love the flocks and the shepherds a
+little too much. That would not seem right amongst you. There is a maxim
+to which I endeavour to conform my actions, "Nothing too much." More
+even than my feeble health my philosophy teaches me to use things with
+measure. I am sober; a lettuce and some olives with a drop of Falernian
+wine form all my meals. I have, indeed, to some extent gone with strange
+women, but I have not delayed over long in taverns to watch the young
+Syrians dance to the sound of the crotalum.* But if I have restrained
+my desires it was for my own satisfaction and for the sake of good
+discipline. To fear pleasure and to fly from joy appears to me the worst
+insult that one can offer to nature. I am assured that during their
+lives certain of the elect of thy god abstained from food and avoided
+women through love of asceticism, and voluntarily exposed themselves to
+useless sufferings. I should be afraid of meeting those, criminals whose
+frenzy horrifies me. A poet must not be asked to attach himself too
+strictly to any scientific or moral doctrine. Moreover, I am a Roman,
+and the Romans, unlike the Greeks, are unable to pursue profound
+speculations in a subtle manner. If they adopt a philosophy it is above
+all in order to derive some practical advantages from it. Siro, who
+enjoyed great renown among us, taught me the system of Epicurus and thus
+freed me from vain terrors and turned me aside from the cruelties to
+which religion persuades ignorant men. I have embraced the views of
+Pythagoras concerning the souls of men and animals, both of which are of
+divine essence; this invites us to look upon ourselves without pride
+and without shame. I have learnt from the Alexandrines how the earth, at
+first soft and without form, hardened in proportion as Nereus withdrew
+himself from it to dig his humid dwellings; I have learned how things
+were formed insensibly; in what manner the rains, falling from the
+burdened clouds, nourished the silent forests, and by what progress a
+few animals at last began to wander over the nameless mountains. I could
+not accustom myself to your cosmogony either, for it seems to me
+fitter for a camel-driver on the Syrian sands than for a disciple of
+Aristarchus of Samos. And what would become of me in the abode of your
+beatitude if I did not find there my friends, my ancestors, my masters,
+and my gods, and if it is not given to me to see Rhea's noble son, or
+Venus, mother of Aeneas, with her winning smile, or Pan, or the young
+Dryads, or the Sylvans, or old Silenus, with his face stained by Aegle's
+purple mulberries.' These are the reasons which I begged that simple man
+to plead before the successor of Jupiter."
+
+     * This phrase seems to indicate that, if one is to believe
+     Macrobius, the "Copa" is by Virgil.
+
+"And since then, O great shade, thou hast received no other messages?"
+
+"I have received none."
+
+"To console themselves for thy absence, O Virgil, they have three poets,
+Commodianus, Prudentius, and Fortunatus, who were all three born in
+those dark plays when neither prosody nor grammar were known. But tell
+me, O Mantuan, hast thou never received other intelligence of the God
+whose company thou didst so deliberately refuse?"
+
+"Never that I remember."
+
+"Hast thou not told me that I am not the first who descended alive into
+these abodes and presented himself before thee?"
+
+
+"Thou dost remind me of it. A century and a half ago, or so it seems
+to me (it is difficult to reckon days and years amid the shades),
+my profound peace was intruded upon by a strange visitor. As I was
+wandering beneath the gloomy foliage that borders the Styx, I saw
+rising before me a human form more opaque and darker than that of the
+inhabitants of these shores. I recognised a living person. He was
+of high stature, thin, with an aquiline nose, sharp chin, and hollow
+cheeks. His dark eyes shot forth fire; a red hood girt with a crown of
+laurels bound his lean brows. His bones pierced through the tight
+brown cloak that descended to his heels. He saluted me with deference,
+tempered by a sort of fierce pride, and addressed me in a speech more
+obscure and incorrect than that of those Gauls with whom the divine
+Julius filled both his legions and the Curia. At last I understood that
+he had been born near Fiesole, in an ancient Etruscan colony that Sulla
+had founded on the banks of the Arno, and which had prospered; that
+he had obtained municipal honours, but that he had thrown himself
+vehemently into the sanguinary quarrels which arose between the senate,
+the knights, and the people, that he had been defeated and banished, and
+now he wandered in exile throughout the world. He described Italy to me
+as distracted by more wars and discords than in the time of my youth,
+and as sighing anew for a second Augustus. I pitied his misfortune,
+remembering what I myself had formerly endured.
+
+"An audacious spirit unceasingly disquieted him, and his mind harboured
+great thoughts, but alas! his rudeness and ignorance displayed the
+triumph of barbarism. He knew neither poetry, nor science, nor even
+the tongue of the Greeks, and he was ignorant, too, of the ancient
+traditions concerning the origin of the world and the nature of the
+gods. He bravely repeated fables which in my time would have brought
+smiles to the little children who were not yet old enough to pay for
+admission at the baths. The vulgar easily believe in monsters. The
+Etruscans especially peopled hell with demons, hideous as a sick man's
+dreams. That they have not abandoned their childish imaginings after
+so many centuries is explained by the continuation and progress of
+ignorance and misery, but that one of their magistrates whose mind is
+raised above the common level should share these popular illusions and
+should be frightened by the hideous demons that the inhabitants of that
+country painted on the walls of their tombs in the time of Porsena--that
+is something which might sadden even a sage. My Etruscan visitor
+repeated verses to me which he had composed in a new dialect, called
+by him the vulgar tongue, the sense of which I could not understand.
+My ears were more surprised than charmed as I heard him repeat the same
+sound three or four times at regular intervals in his efforts to mark
+the rhythm. That artifice did not seem ingenious to me; but it is not
+for the dead to judge of novelties.
+
+"But I do not reproach this colonist of Sulla, born in an unhappy time,
+for making inharmonious verses or for being, if it be possible, as bad a
+poet as Bavius or Maevius. I have grievances against him which touch
+me more closely. The thing is monstrous and scarcely credible, but when
+this man returned to earth he disseminated the most odious lies about
+me. He affirmed in several passages of his barbarous poems that I had
+served him as a guide in the modern Tartarus, a place I know nothing of.
+He insolently proclaimed that I had spoken of the gods of Rome as false
+and lying gods, and that I held as the true God the present successor of
+Jupiter. Friend, when thou art restored to the kindly light of day and
+beholdest again thy native land, contradict those abominable falsehoods.
+Say to thy people that the singer of the pious Aeneas has never
+worshipped the god of the Jews. I am assured that his power is declining
+and that his approaching fall is manifested by undoubted indications.
+This news would give me some pleasure if one could rejoice in these
+abodes where we feel neither fears nor desires."
+
+He spoke, and with a gesture of farewell he went away. I beheld his.
+shade gliding over the asphodels without bending their stalks. I saw
+that it became fainter and vaguer as it receded farther from me, and
+it vanished before it reached the wood of evergreen laurels. Then I
+understood the meaning of the words, "The dead have no life, but that
+which the living lend them," and I walked slowly through the pale meadow
+to the gate of horn.
+
+I affirm that all in this writing is true.*
+
+     * There is in Marbodius's narrative a passage very worthy of
+     notice, viz., that in which the monk of Corrigan describes
+     Dante Alighieri such as we picture him to ourselves to-day.
+     The miniatures in a very old manuscript of the "Divine
+     Comedy," the "Codex Venetianus," represent the poet as a
+     little fat man clad in a short tunic, the skirts of which
+     fall above his knees. As for Virgil, he still wears the
+     philosophical beard, in the wood-engravings of the sixteenth
+     century.
+
+One would not have thought either that Marbodius, or even Virgil, could
+have known the Etruscan tombs of Chiusi and Corneto, where, in fact,
+there are horrible and burlesque devils closely resembling those of
+Orcagna. Nevertheless, the authenticity of the "Descent of Marbodius
+into Hell" is indisputable. M. du Clos des Lunes has firmly established
+it. To doubt it would be to doubt palaeography itself.
+
+
+
+
+VII. SIGNS IN THE MOON
+
+At that time, whilst Penguinia was still plunged in ignorance and
+barbarism, Giles Bird-catcher, a Franciscan monk, known by his writings
+under the name Aegidius Aucupis, devoted himself with indefatigable
+zeal to the study of letters and the sciences. He gave his nights to
+mathematics and music, which he called the two adorable sisters,
+the harmonious daughters of Number and Imagination. He was versed in
+medicine and astrology. He was suspected of practising magic, and it
+seemed true that he wrought metamorphoses and discovered hidden things.
+
+The monks of his convent, finding in his cell Greek books which they
+could not read, imagined them to be conjuring-books, and denounced their
+too learned brother as a wizard. Aegidius Aucupis fled, and reached the
+island of Ireland, where he lived for thirty studious years. He went
+from monastery to monastery, searching for and copying the Greek and
+Latin manuscripts which they contained. He also studied physics and
+alchemy. He acquired a universal knowledge and discovered notable
+secrets concerning animals, plants, and stones. He was found one day in
+the company of a very beautiful woman who sang to her own accompaniment
+on the lute, and who was afterwards discovered to be a machine which he
+had himself constructed.
+
+He often crossed the Irish Sea to go into the land of Wales and to visit
+the libraries of the monasteries there. During one of these crossings,
+as he remained during the night on the bridge of the ship, he saw
+beneath the waters two sturgeons swimming side by side. He had very
+good hearing and he knew the language of fishes. Now he heard one of the
+sturgeons say to the other:
+
+"The man in the moon, whom we have often seen carrying fagots on his
+shoulders, has fallen into the sea."
+
+And the other sturgeon said in its turn:
+
+"And in the silver disc there will be seen the image of two lovers
+kissing each other on the mouth."
+
+Some years later, having returned to his native country, Aegidius
+Aucupis found that ancient learning had been restored. Manners had
+softened. Men no longer pursued the nymphs of the fountains, of the
+woods, and of the mountains with their insults. They placed images of
+the Muses and of the modest Graces in their gardens, and they rendered
+her former honours to the Goddess with ambrosial lips, the joy of men
+and gods. They were becoming reconciled to nature. They trampled vain
+terrors beneath their feet and raised their eyes to heaven without
+fearing, as they formerly did, to read signs of anger and threats of
+damnation in the skies.
+
+At this spectacle Aegidius Aucupis remembered what the two sturgeons of
+the sea of Erin had foretold.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+
+
+
+
+I. MOTHER ROUQUIN
+
+Aegidius Aucupis, the Erasmus of the Penguins, was not mistaken; his age
+was an age of free inquiry. But that great man mistook the elegances
+of the humanists for softness of manners, and he did not foresee
+the effects that the awaking of intelligence would have amongst
+the Penguins. It brought about the religious Reformation; Catholics
+massacred Protestants and Protestants massacred Catholics. Such were
+the first results of liberty of thought. The Catholics prevailed in
+Penguinia. But the spirit of inquiry had penetrated among them without
+their knowing it. They joined reason to faith, and claimed that religion
+had been divested of the superstitious practices that dishonoured it,
+just as in later days the booths that the cobblers, hucksters, and
+dealers in old clothes had built against the walls of the cathedrals
+were cleared away. The word, legend, which at first indicated what the
+faithful ought to read, soon suggested the idea of pious fables and
+childish tales.
+
+The saints had to suffer from this state of mind. An obscure canon
+called Princeteau, a very austere and crabbed man, designated so great a
+number of them as not worthy of having their days observed, that he was
+surnamed the exposer of the saints. He did not think, for instance,
+that if St. Margaret's prayer were applied as a poultice to a woman in
+travail that the pains of childbirth would be softened.
+
+Even the venerable patron saint of Penguinia did not escape his rigid
+criticism. This is what he says of her in his "Antiquities of Alca":
+
+"Nothing is more uncertain than the history, or even the existence, of
+St. Orberosia. An ancient anonymous annalist, a monk of Dombes, relates
+that a woman called Orberosia was possessed by the devil in a cavern
+where, even down to his own days, the little boys and girls of the
+village used to play at a sort of game representing the devil and
+the fair Orberosia. He adds that this woman became the concubine of a
+horrible dragon, who ravaged the country. Such a statement is hardly
+credible, but the history of Orberosia, as it has since been related,
+seems hardly more worthy of belief. The life of that saint by the Abbot
+Simplicissimus is three hundred years later than the pretended events
+which it relates and that author shows himself excessively credulous and
+devoid of all critical faculty."
+
+Suspicion attacked even the supernatural origin of the Penguins. The
+historian Ovidius Capito went so far as to deny the miracle of their
+transformation. He thus begins his "Annals of Penguinia":
+
+"A dense obscurity envelopes this history, and it would be no
+exaggeration to say that it is a tissue of puerile fables and popular
+tales. The Penguins claim that they are descended from birds who were
+baptized by St. Mael and whom God changed into men at the intercession
+of that glorious apostle. They hold that, situated at first in the
+frozen ocean, their island, floating like Delos, was brought to anchor
+in these heaven-favoured seas, of which it is to-day the queen. I
+conclude that this myth is a reminiscence of the ancient migrations of
+the Penguins."
+
+In the following century, which was that of the philosophers, scepticism
+became still more acute. No further evidence of it is needed than the
+following celebrated passage from the "Moral Essay":
+
+"Arriving we know not from whence (for indeed their origins are not very
+clear), and successively invaded and conquered by four or five peoples
+from the north, south, east, and west, miscegenated, interbred,
+amalgamated, and commingled, the Penguins boast of the purity of their
+race, and with justice, for they have become a pure race. This mixture
+of all mankind, red, black, yellow, and white, round-headed and
+long-headed, as formed in the course of ages a fairly homogeneous human
+family, and one which is recognisable by certain features due to a
+community of life and customs.
+
+"This idea that they belong to the best race in the world, and that
+they are its finest family, inspires them with noble pride, indomitable
+courage, and a hatred for the human race.
+
+"The life of a people is but a succession of miseries, crimes, and
+follies. This is true of the Penguin nation, as of all other nations.
+Save for this exception its history is admirable from beginning to end."
+
+The two classic ages of the Penguins are too well-known for me to lay
+stress upon them. But what has not been sufficiently noticed is the way
+in which the rationalist theologians such as Canon Princeteau called
+into existence the unbelievers of the succeeding age. The former
+employed their reason to destroy what did not seem to them, essential
+to their religion; they only left untouched the most rigid article of
+faith. Their intellectual successors, being taught by them how to
+make use of science and reason, employed them against whatever beliefs
+remained. Thus rational theology engendered natural philosophy.
+
+That is why (if I may turn from the Penguins of former days to the
+Sovereign Pontiff, who, to-day governs the universal Church) we cannot
+admire too greatly the wisdom of Pope Pius X. in condemning the study
+of exegesis as contrary to revealed truth, fatal to sound theological
+doctrine, and deadly to the faith. Those clerics who maintain the rights
+of science in opposition to him are pernicious doctors and pestilent
+teachers, and the faithful who approve of them are lacking in either
+mental or moral ballast.
+
+At the end of the age of philosophers, the ancient kingdom of Penguinia
+was utterly destroyed, the king put to death, the privileges of the
+nobles abolished, and a Republic proclaimed in the midst of public
+misfortunes and while a terrible war was raging. The assembly which
+then governed Penguinia ordered all the metal articles contained in the
+churches to be melted down. The patriots even desecrated the tombs of
+the kings. It is said that when the tomb of Draco the Great was opened,
+that king presented an appearance as black as ebony and so majestic
+that those who profaned his corpse fled in terror. According to other
+accounts, these churlish men insulted him by putting a pipe in his mouth
+and derisively offering him a glass of wine.
+
+On the seventeenth day of the month of Mayflowers, the shrine of
+St. Orberosia, which had for five hundred years been exposed to the
+veneration of the faithful in the Church of St. Mael, was transported
+into the town-hall and submitted to the examination of a jury of experts
+appointed by the municipality. It was made of gilded copper in shape
+like the nave of a church, entirely covered with enamels and decorated
+with precious stones, which latter were perceived to be false. The
+chapter in its foresight had removed the rubies, sapphires, emeralds,
+and great balls of rock-crystal, and had substituted pieces of glass in
+their place. It contained only a little dust and a piece of old linen,
+which were thrown into a great fire that had been lighted on the Place
+de Greve to burn the relics of the saints. The people danced around it
+singing patriotic songs.
+
+From the threshold of their booth, which leant against the town-hall,
+a man called Rouquin and his wife were watching this group of madmen.
+Rouquin clipped dogs and gelded cats; he also frequented the inns. His
+wife was a ragpicker and a bawd, but she had plenty of shrewdness.
+
+"You see, Rouquin," said she to her man, "they are committing a
+sacrilege. They will repent of it."
+
+"You know nothing about it, wife," answered Rouquin; "they, have become
+philosophers, and when one is once a philosopher he is a philosopher for
+ever."
+
+"I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret what they
+are doing to-day. They ill-treat the saints because they have not helped
+them enough, but for all that the quails won't fall ready cooked into
+their mouths. They will soon find themselves as badly off as before, and
+when they have put out their tongues for enough they will become pious
+again. Sooner than people think the day will come when Penguinia will
+again begin to honour her blessed patron. Rouquin, it would be a good
+thing, in readiness for that day, if we kept a handful of ashes and some
+rags and bones in an old pot in our lodgings. We will say that they are
+the relics of St. Orberosia and that we have saved them from the flames
+at the peril of our lives. I am greatly mistaken if we don't get honour
+and profit out of them. That good action might be worth a place from the
+Cure to sell tapers and hire chairs in the chapel of St. Orberosia."
+
+On that same day Mother Rouquin took home with her a little ashes and
+some bones, and put them in an old jam-pot in her cupboard.
+
+
+
+
+II. TRINCO
+
+The sovereign Nation had taken possession of the lands of the nobility
+and clergy to sell them at a low price to the middle classes and
+the peasants. The middle classes and the peasants thought that the
+revolution was a good thing for acquiring lands and a bad one for
+retaining them.
+
+The legislators of the Republic made terrible laws for the defence of
+property, and decreed death to anyone who should propose a division of
+wealth. But that did not avail the Republic. The peasants who had become
+proprietors bethought themselves that though it had made them rich,
+the Republic had nevertheless caused a disturbance to wealth, and they
+desired a system more respectful of private property and more capable of
+assuring the permanence of the new institutions.
+
+They had not long to wait. The Republic, like Agrippina, bore her
+destroyer in her bosom.
+
+Having great wars to carry on, it created military forces, and these
+were destined both to save it and to destroy it. Its legislators thought
+they could restrain their generals by the fear of punishment, but if
+they sometimes cut off the heads of unlucky soldiers they could not do
+the same to the fortunate soldiers who obtained over it the advantages
+of having saved its existence.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory the renovated Penguins delivered themselves
+up to a dragon, more terrible than that of their fables, who, like
+a stork amongst frogs, devoured them for fourteen years with his
+insatiable beak.
+
+Half a century after the reign of the new dragon a young Maharajah
+of Malay, called Djambi, desirous, like the Scythian Anacharsis,
+of instructing himself by travel, visited Penguinia and wrote an
+interesting account of his travels. I transcribe the first page of his
+account:
+
+ACCOUNT OF THE TRAVELS OF YOUNG DJAMBI IN PENGUINIA
+
+After a voyage of ninety days I landed at the vast and deserted port of
+the Penguins and travelled over untilled fields to their ruined capital.
+Surrounded by ramparts and full of barracks and arsenals it had a
+martial though desolate appearance. Feeble and crippled men wandered
+proudly through the streets, wearing old uniforms and carrying rusty
+weapons.
+
+"What do you want?" I was rudely asked at the gate of the city by a
+soldier whose moustaches pointed to the skies.
+
+"Sir," I answered, "I come as an inquirer to visit this island."
+
+"It is not an island," replied the soldier.
+
+"What!" I exclaimed, "Penguin Island is not an island?"
+
+"No, sir, it is an insula. It was formerly called an island, but for a
+century it has been decreed that it shall bear the name of insula. It is
+the only insula in the whole universe. Have you a passport?"
+
+"Here it is."
+
+"Go and get it signed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
+
+A lame guide who conducted me came to a pause in a vast square.
+
+"The insula," said he, "has given birth, as you know, to Trinco, the
+greatest genius of the universe, whose statue you see before you. That
+obelisk standing to your right commemorates Trinco's birth; the column
+that rises to your left has Trinco crowned with a diadem upon its
+summit. You see here the triumphal arch dedicated to the glory of Trinco
+and his family."
+
+"What extraordinary feat has Trinco performed?" I asked.
+
+"War."
+
+"That is nothing extraordinary. We Malayans make war constantly."
+
+"That may be, but Trinco is the greatest warrior of all countries and
+all times. There never existed a greater conqueror than he. As you
+anchored in our port you saw to the east a volcanic island called
+Ampelophoria, shaped like a cone, and of small size, but renowned for
+its wines. And to the west a larger island which raises to the sky a
+long range of sharp teeth; for this reason it is called the Dog's Jaws.
+It is rich in copper mines. We possessed both before Trinco's reign
+and they were the boundaries of our empire. Trinco extended the Penguin
+dominion over the Archipelago of the Turquoises and the Green Continent,
+subdued the gloomy Porpoises, and planted his flag amid the icebergs
+of the Pole and on the burning sands of the African deserts. He raised
+troops in all the countries he conquered, and when his armies marched
+past in the wake of our own light infantry, our island grenadiers, our
+hussars, our dragoons, our artillery, and our engineers there were to be
+seen yellow soldiers looking in their blue armour like crayfish standing
+on their tails; red men with parrots' plumes, tattooed with solar and
+Phallic emblems, and with quivers of poisoned arrows resounding on
+their backs; naked blacks armed only with their teeth and nails; pygmies
+riding on cranes; gorillas carrying trunks of trees and led by an old
+ape who wore upon his hairy breast the cross of the Legion of Honour.
+And all those troops, led to Trinco's banner by the most ardent
+patriotism, flew on from victory to victory, and in thirty years of war
+Trinco conquered half the known world."
+
+"What!" cried I, "you possess half of the world."
+
+"Trinco conquered it for us, and Trinco lost it to us. As great in his
+defeats as in his victories he surrendered all that he had conquered.
+He even allowed those two islands we possessed before his time,
+Ampelophoria and the Dog's Jaws, to be taken from us. He left Penguinia
+impoverished and depopulated. The flower of the insula perished in his
+wars. At the time of his fall there were left in our country none but
+the hunchbacks and cripples from whom we are descended. But he gave us
+glory."
+
+"He made you pay dearly for it!"
+
+"Glory never costs too much," replied my guide.
+
+
+
+
+III. THE JOURNEY OF DOCTOR OBNUBILE
+
+After a succession of amazing vicissitudes, the memory of which is in
+great part lost by the wrongs of time and the bad style of historians,
+the Penguins established the government of the Penguins by themselves.
+They elected a diet or assembly, and invested it with the privilege of
+naming the Head of the State. The latter, chosen from among the simple
+Penguins, wore no formidable monster's crest upon his head and exercised
+no absolute authority over the people. He was himself subject to the
+laws of the nation. He was not given the title of king, and no ordinal
+number followed his name. He bore such names as Paturle, Janvion,
+Traffaldin, Coquenhot, and Bredouille. These magistrates did not make
+war. They were not suited for that.
+
+The new state received the name of Public Thing or Republic. Its
+partisans were called republicanists or republicans. They were also
+named Thingmongers and sometimes Scamps, but this latter name was taken
+in ill part.
+
+The Penguin democracy did not itself govern. It obeyed a financial
+oligarchy which formed opinion by means of the newspapers, and held
+in its hands the representatives, the ministers, and the president.
+It controlled the finances of the republic, and directed the foreign
+affairs of the country as if it were possessed of sovereign power.
+
+Empires and kingdoms in those days kept up enormous fleets. Penguinia,
+compelled to do as they did, sank under the pressure of her armaments.
+Everybody deplored or pretended to deplore so grievous a necessity.
+However, the rich, and those engaged in business or affairs, submitted
+to it with a good heart through a spirit of patriotism, and because they
+counted on the soldiers and sailors to defend their goods at home and
+to acquire markets and territories abroad. The great manufacturers
+encouraged the making of cannons and ships through a zeal for the
+national defence and in order to obtain orders. Among the citizens of
+middle rank and of the liberal professions some resigned themselves to
+this state of affairs without complaining, believing that it would last
+for ever; others waited impatiently for its end and thought they might
+be able to lead the powers to a simultaneous disarmament.
+
+The illustrious Professor Obnubile belonged to this latter class.
+
+"War," said he, "is a barbarity to which the progress of civilization
+will put an end. The great democracies are pacific and will soon impose
+their will upon the aristocrats."
+
+Professor Obnubile, who had for sixty years led a solitary and retired
+life in his laboratory, whither external noises did not penetrate,
+resolved to observe the spirit of the peoples for himself. He began
+his studies with the greatest of all democracies and set sail for New
+Atlantis.
+
+After a voyage of fifteen days his steamer entered, during the night,
+the harbour of Titanport, where thousands of ships were anchored. An
+iron bridge thrown across the water and shining with lights, stretched
+between two piers so far apart that Professor Obnubile imagined he was
+sailing on the seas of Saturn and that he saw the marvellous ring which
+girds the planet of the Old Man. And this immense conduit bore upon it
+more than a quarter of the wealth of the world. The learned Penguin,
+having disembarked, was waited on by automatons in a hotel forty-eight
+stories high. Then he took the great railway that led to Gigantopolis,
+the capital of New Atlantis. In the train there were restaurants,
+gaming-rooms, athletic arenas, telegraphic, commercial, and financial
+offices, a Protestant Church, and the printing-office of a great
+newspaper, which latter the doctor was unable to read, as he did not
+know the language of the New Atlantans. The train passed along the banks
+of great rivers, through manufacturing cities which concealed the sky
+with the smoke from their chimneys, towns black in the day, towns red at
+night, full of noise by day and full of noise also by night.
+
+"Here," thought the doctor, "is a people far too much engaged in
+industry and trade to make war. I am already certain that the New
+Atlantans pursue a policy of peace. For it is an axiom admitted by all
+economists that peace without and peace within are necessary for the
+progress of commerce and industry."
+
+As he surveyed Gigantopolis, he was confirmed in this opinion. People
+went through the streets so swiftly propelled by hurry that they knocked
+down all who were in their way. Obnubile was thrown down several times,
+but soon succeeded in learning how to demean himself better; after an
+hour's walking he himself knocked down an Atlantan.
+
+Having reached a great square he saw the portico of a palace in the
+Classic style, whose Corinthian columns reared their capitals of
+arborescent acanthus seventy metres above the stylobate.
+
+As he stood with his head thrown back admiring the building, a man of
+modest appearance approached him and said in Penguin:
+
+"I see by your dress that you are from Penguinia. I know your language;
+I am a sworn interpreter. This is the Parliament palace. At the present
+moment the representatives of the States are in deliberation. Would you
+like to be present at the sitting?"
+
+The doctor was brought into the hall and cast his looks upon the crowd
+of legislators who were sitting on cane chairs with their feet upon
+their desks.
+
+The president arose and, in the midst of general inattention, muttered
+rather than spoke the following formulas which the interpreter
+immediately translated to the doctor.
+
+"The war for the opening of the Mongol markets being ended to the
+satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid before
+the finance committee . . . ."
+
+"Is there any opposition? . . ."
+
+"The proposal is carried."
+
+"The war for the opening of the markets of Third-Zealand being ended
+to the satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid
+before the finance committee. . . ."
+
+"Is there any opposition? . . ."
+
+"The proposal is carried."
+
+"Have I heard aright?" asked Professor Obnubile. "What? you an
+industrial people and engaged in all these wars!"
+
+"Certainly," answered the interpreter, "these are industrial wars.
+Peoples who have neither commerce nor industry are not obliged to make
+war, but a business people is forced to adopt a policy of conquest. The
+number of wars necessarily increases with our productive activity. As
+soon as one of our industries fails to find a market for its products
+a war is necessary to open new outlets. It is in this way we have had
+a coal war, a copper war, and a cotton war. In Third-Zealand we have
+killed two-thirds of the inhabitants in order to compel the remainder to
+buy our umbrellas and braces."
+
+At that moment a fat man who was sitting in the middle of the assembly
+ascended the tribune.
+
+"I claim," said he, "a war against the Emerald Republic, which
+insolently contends with our pigs for the hegemony of hams and sauces in
+all the markets of the universe."
+
+"Who is that legislator?" asked Doctor Obnubile.
+
+"He is a pig merchant."
+
+"Is there any opposition?" said the President. "I put the proposition to
+the vote."
+
+The war against the Emerald Republic was voted with uplifted hands by a
+very large majority.
+
+"What?" said Obnubile to the interpreter; "you have voted a war with
+that rapidity and that indifference!"
+
+"Oh! it is an unimportant war which will hardly cost eight million
+dollars."
+
+"And men . . ."
+
+"The men are included in the eight million dollars."
+
+Then Doctor Obnubile bent his head in bitter reflection.
+
+"Since wealth and civilization admit of as many causes of wars as
+poverty and barbarism, since the folly and wickedness of men are
+incurable, there remains but one good action to be done. The wise man
+will collect enough dynamite to blow up this planet. When its fragments
+fly through space an imperceptible amelioration will be accomplished
+in the universe and a satisfaction will be given to the universal
+conscience. Moreover, this universal conscience does not exist."
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+
+
+
+
+I. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Every system of government produces people who are dissatisfied. The
+Republic or Public Thing produced them at first from among the nobles
+who had been despoiled of their ancient privileges. These looked with
+regret and hope to Prince Crucho, the last of the Draconides, a prince
+adorned both with the grace of youth and the melancholy of exile.
+It also produced them from among the smaller traders, who, owing to
+profound economic causes, no longer gained a livelihood. They believed
+that this was the fault of the republic which they had at first adored
+and from which each day they were now becoming more detached. The
+financiers, both Christians and Jews, became by their insolence and
+their cupidity the scourge of the country, which they plundered and
+degraded, as well as the scandal of a government which they never
+troubled either to destroy or preserve, so confident were they that they
+could operate without hindrance under all governments. Nevertheless,
+their sympathies inclined to absolute power as the best protection
+against the socialists, their puny but ardent adversaries. And just
+as they imitated the habits of the aristocrats, so they imitated their
+political and religious sentiments. Their women, in particular, loved
+the Prince and had dreams of appearing one day at his Court.
+
+However, the Republic retained some partisans and defenders. If it was
+not in a position to believe in the fidelity of its own officials it
+could at least still count on the devotion of the manual labourers,
+although it had never relieved their misery. These came forth in crowds
+from their quarries and their factories to defend it, and marched in
+long processions, gloomy, emaciated, and sinister. They would have died
+for it because it had given them hope.
+
+Now, under the Presidency of Theodore Formose, there lived in a
+peaceable suburb of Alca a monk called Agaric, who kept a school and
+assisted in arranging marriages. In his school he taught fencing and
+riding to the sons of old families, illustrious by their birth, but now
+as destitute of wealth as of privilege. And as soon as they were old
+enough he married them to the daughters of the opulent and despised
+caste of financiers.
+
+Tall, thin, and dark, Agaric used to walk in deep thought, with
+his breviary in his hand and his brow loaded with care, through the
+corridors of the school and the alleys of the garden. His care was not
+limited to inculcating in his pupils abstruse doctrines and mechanical
+precepts and to endowing them afterwards with legitimate and rich
+wives. He entertained political designs and pursued the realisation of
+a gigantic plan. His thought of thoughts and labour of labours was
+to overthrow the Republic. He was not moved to this by any personal
+interest. He believed that a democratic state was opposed to the holy
+society to which body and soul he belonged. And all the other monks, his
+brethren, thought the same. The Republic was perpetually at strife with
+the congregation of monks and the assembly of the faithful. True,
+to plot the death of the new government was a difficult and perilous
+enterprise. Still, Agaric was in a position to carry on a formidable
+conspiracy. At that epoch, when the clergy guided the superior classes
+of the Penguins, this monk exercised a tremendous influence over the
+aristocracy of Alca.
+
+All the young men whom he had brought up waited only for a favourable
+moment to march against the popular power. The sons of the ancient
+families did not practise the arts or engage in business. They were
+almost all soldiers and served the Republic. They served it, but
+they did not love it; they regretted the dragon's crest. And the fair
+Jewesses shared in these regrets in order that they might be taken for
+Christians.
+
+One July as he was walking in a suburban street which ended in some
+dusty fields, Agaric heard groans coming from a moss-grown well that had
+been abandoned by the gardeners. And almost immediately he was told by
+a cobbler of the neighbourhood that a ragged man who had shouted out
+"Hurrah for the Republic!" had been thrown into the well by some cavalry
+officers who were passing, and had sunk up to his ears in the mud.
+Agaric was quite ready to see a general significance in this particular
+fact. He inferred a great fermentation in the whole aristocratic and
+military caste, and concluded that it was the moment to act.
+
+The next day he went to the end of the Wood of Conils to visit the
+good Father Cornemuse. He found the monk in his laboratory pouring a
+golden-coloured liquor into a still. He was a short, fat, little man,
+with vermilion-tinted cheeks and an elaborately polished bald head. His
+eyes had ruby-coloured pupils like a guinea-pig's. He graciously saluted
+his visitor and offered him a glass of the St. Orberosian liqueur, which
+he manufactured, and from the sale of which he gained immense wealth.
+
+Agaric made a gesture of refusal. Then, standing on his long feet and
+pressing his melancholy hat against his stomach, he remained silent.
+
+"Take a seat," said Cornemuse to him.
+
+Agaric sat down on a rickety stool, but continued mute.
+
+Then the monk of Conils inquired:
+
+"Tell me some news of your young pupils. Have the dear children sound
+views?"
+
+"I am very satisfied with them," answered the teacher. "It is everything
+to be nurtured in sound principles. It is necessary to have sound views
+before having any views at all, for afterwards it is too late. . . .
+Yes, I have great grounds for comfort. But we live in a sad age."
+
+"Alas!" sighed Cornemuse.
+
+"We are passing through evil days. . . ."
+
+"Times of trial."
+
+"Yet, Cornemuse, the mind of the public is not so entirely corrupted as
+it seems."
+
+"Perhaps you are right."
+
+"The people are tired of a government that ruins them and does nothing
+for them. Every day fresh scandals spring up. The Republic is sunk in
+shame. It is ruined."
+
+"May God grant it!"
+
+"Cornemuse, what do you think of Prince Crucho?"
+
+"He is an amiable young man and, I dare say, a worthy scion of an august
+stock. I pity him for having to endure the pains of exile at so early an
+age. Spring has no flowers for the exile, and autumn no fruits. Prince
+Crucho has sound views; he respects the clergy; he practises our
+religion; besides, he consumes a good deal of my little products."
+
+"Cornemuse, in many homes, both rich and poor, his return is hoped for.
+Believe me, he will come back."
+
+"May I live to throw my mantle beneath his feet!" sighed Cornemuse.
+
+Seeing that he held these sentiments, Agaric depicted to him the state
+of people's minds such as he himself imagined them. He showed him the
+nobles and the rich exasperated against the popular government; the army
+refusing to endure fresh insults; the officials willing to betray their
+chiefs; the people discontented, riot ready to burst forth, and the
+enemies of the monks, the agents of the constituted authority, thrown
+into the wells of Alca. He concluded that it was the moment to strike a
+great blow.
+
+"We can," he cried, "save the Penguin people, we can deliver it from
+its tyrants, deliver it from itself, restore the Dragon's crest,
+re-establish the ancient State, the good State, for the honour of the
+faith and the exaltation of the Church. We can do this if we will. We
+possess great wealth and we exert secret influences; by our evangelistic
+and outspoken journals we communicate with all the ecclesiastics
+in towns and county alike, and we inspire them with our own eager
+enthusiasm and our own burning faith. They will kindle their penitents
+and their congregations. I can dispose of the chiefs of the army; I have
+an understanding with the men of the people. Unknown to them I sway
+the minds of umbrella sellers, publicans, shopmen, gutter merchants,
+newspaper boys, women of the streets, and police agents. We have more
+people on our side than we need. What are we waiting for? Let us act!"
+
+"What do you think of doing?" asked Cornemuse.
+
+"Of forming a vast conspiracy and overthrowing the Republic, of
+re-establishing Crucho on the throne of the Draconides."
+
+Cornemuse moistened his lips with his tongue several times. Then he said
+with unction:
+
+"Certainly the restoration of the Draconides is desirable; it is
+eminently desirable; and for my part, desire it with all my heart. As
+for the Republic, you know what I think of it. . . . But would it not te
+better to abandon it to its fate and let it die of the vices of its own
+constitution? Doubtless, Agaric, what you propose is noble and generous.
+It would be a fine thing to save this great and unhappy country, to
+re-establish it in its ancient splendour. But reflect on it, we
+are Christians before we are Penguins. And we must take heed not to
+compromise religion in political enterprises."
+
+Agaric replied eagerly:
+
+"Fear nothing. We shall hold all the threads of the plot, but we
+ourselves shall remain in the background. We shall not be seen."
+
+"Like flies in milk," murmured the monk of Conils.
+
+And turning his keen ruby-coloured eyes towards his brother monk:
+
+"Take care. Perhaps the Republic is stronger than it seems. Possibly,
+too, by dragging it out of the nerveless inertia in which it now rests
+we may only consolidate its forces. Its malice is great; if we attack
+it, it will defend itself. It makes bad laws which hardly affect us;
+if it is frightened it will make terrible ones against us. Let us not
+lightly engage in an adventure in which we may get fleeced. You think
+the opportunity a good one. I don't, and I am going to tell you why. The
+present government is not yet known by everybody, that is to say, it is
+known by nobody. It proclaims that it is the Public Thing, the common
+thing. The populace believes it and remains democratic and Republican.
+But patience! This same people will one day demand that the public thing
+be the people's thing. I need not tell you how insolent, unregulated,
+and contrary to Scriptural polity such claims seem to me. But the people
+will make them, and enforce them, and then there will be an end of the
+present government. The moment cannot now be far distant; and it is then
+that we ought to act in the interests of our august body. Let us wait.
+What hurries us? Our existence is not in peril. It has not been
+rendered absolutely intolerable to us. The Republic fails in respect and
+submission to us; it does not give the priests the honours it owes them.
+But it lets us live. And such is the excellence of our position that
+with us to live is to prosper. The Republic is hostile to us, but women
+revere us. President Formose does not assist at the celebration of our
+mysteries, but I have seen his wife and daughters at my feet. They
+buy my phials by the gross. I have no better clients even among the
+aristocracy. Let us say what there is to be said for it. There is no
+country in the world as good for priests and monks as Penguinia. In what
+other country would you find our virgin wax, our virile incense, our
+rosaries, our scapulars, our holy water, and our St. Orberosian liqueur
+sold in such great quantities? What other people would, like the
+Penguins, give a hundred golden crowns for a wave of our hands, a sound
+from our mouths, a movement of our lips? For my part, I gain a thousand
+times more, in this pleasant, faithful, and docile Penguinia, by
+extracting the essence from a bundle of thyme, than I could make
+by tiring my lungs with preaching the remission of sins in the most
+populous states of Europe and America. Honestly, would Penguinia be
+better off if a police officer came to take me away from here and put me
+on a steamboat bound for the Islands of Night?"
+
+Having thus spoken, the monk of Conils got up and led his guest into
+a huge shed where hundreds of orphans clothed in blue were packing
+bottles, nailing up cases, and gumming tickets. The ear was deafened
+by the noise of hammers mingled with the dull rumbling of bales being
+placed upon the rails.
+
+"It is from here that consignments are forwarded," said Cornemuse.
+"I have obtained from the government a railway through the Wood and
+a station at my door. Every three days I fill a truck with my own
+products. You see that the Republic has not killed all beliefs."
+
+Agaric made a last effort to engage the wise distiller in his
+enterprise. He pointed him to a prompt, certain, dazzling success.
+
+"Don't you wish to share in it?" he added. "Don't you wish to bring back
+your king from exile?"
+
+"Exile is pleasant to men of good will," answered the monk of Conils.
+"If you are guided by me, my dear Brother Agaric, you will give up your
+project for the present. For my own part I have no illusions. Whether or
+not I belong to your party, if you lose, I shall have to pay like you."
+
+Father Agaric took leave of his friend and went back satisfied to his
+school. "Cornemuse," thought he, "not being able to prevent the plot,
+would like to make it succeed and he will give money." Agaric was not
+deceived. Such, indeed, was the solidarity among priests and monks that
+the acts of a single one bound them all. That was at once both their
+strength and their weakness.
+
+
+
+
+II. PRINCE CRUCHO
+
+Agaric resolved to proceed without delay to Prince Crucho, who honoured
+him with his familiarity. In the dusk of the evening he went out of his
+school by the side door, disguised as a cattle merchant and took passage
+on board the St. Mael.
+
+The next day he landed in Porpoisea, for it was at Chitterlings Castle
+on this hospitable soil that Crucho ate the bitter bread of exile.
+
+Agaric met the Prince on the road driving in a motor-car with two young
+ladies at the rate of a hundred miles an hour. When the monk saw him he
+shook his red umbrella and the prince stopped his car.
+
+"Is it you, Agaric? Get in! There are already three of us, but we can
+make room for you. You can take one of these young ladies on your knee."
+
+The pious Agaric got in.
+
+"What news, worthy father?" asked the young prince.
+
+"Great news," answered Agaric. "Can I speak?"
+
+"You can. I have nothing secret from these two ladies."
+
+"Sire, Penguinia claims you. You will not be deaf to her call."
+
+Agaric described the state of feeling and outlined a vast plot.
+
+"On my first signal," said he, "all your partisans will rise at once.
+With cross in hand and habits girded up, your venerable clergy will lead
+the armed crowd into Formose's palace. We shall carry terror and death
+among your enemies. For a reward of our efforts we only ask of you,
+Sire, that you will not render them useless. We entreat you to come and
+seat yourself on the throne that we shall prepare."
+
+The prince returned a simple answer:
+
+"I shall enter Alca on a green horse."
+
+Agaric declared that he accepted this manly response. Although, contrary
+to his custom, he had a lady on his knee, he adjured the young prince,
+with a sublime loftiness of soul, to be faithful to his royal duties.
+
+"Sire," he cried, with tears in his eyes, "you will live to remember
+the day on which you have been restored from exile, given back to your
+people, reestablished on the throne of your ancestors by the hands of
+your monks, and crowned by them with the august crest of the Dragon.
+King Crucho, may you equal the glory of your ancestor Draco the Great!"
+
+The young prince threw himself with emotion on his restorer and
+attempted to embrace him, but he was prevented from reaching him by
+the girth of the two ladies, so tightly packed were they all in that
+historic carriage.
+
+"Worthy father," said he, "I would like all Penguinia to witness this
+embrace."
+
+"It would be a cheering spectacle," said Agaric.
+
+In the mean time the motor-car rushed like a tornado through hamlets
+and villages, crushing hens, geese, turkeys, ducks, guinea-fowls, cats,
+dogs, pigs, children, labourers, and women beneath its insatiable tyres.
+And the pious Agaric turned over his great designs in his mind. His
+voice, coming from behind one of the ladies, expressed this thought:
+
+"We must have money, a great deal of money."
+
+"That is your business," answered the prince.
+
+But already the park gates were opening to the formidable motor-car.
+
+The dinner was sumptuous. They toasted the Dragon's crest. Everybody
+knows that a closed goblet is a sign of sovereignty; so Prince
+Crucho and Princess Gudrune, his wife, drank out of goblets that were
+covered-over like ciboriums. The prince had his filled several times
+with the wines of Penguinia, both white and red.
+
+Crucho had received a truly princely education, and he excelled in
+motoring, but was not ignorant of history either. He was said to be well
+versed in the antiquities and famous deeds of his family; and, indeed,
+he gave a notable proof of his knowledge in this respect. As they were
+speaking of the various remarkable peculiarities that had been noticed
+in famous women.
+
+"It is perfectly true," said he, "that Queen Crucha, whose name I bear,
+had the mark of a little monkey's head upon her body."
+
+During the evening Agaric had a decisive interview with three of the
+prince's oldest councillors. It was decided to ask for funds from
+Crucho's father-in-law, as he was anxious to have a king for son-in-law,
+from several Jewish ladies, who were impatient to become ennobled, and,
+finally, from the Prince Regent of the Porpoises, who had promised his
+aid to the Draconides, thinking that by Crucho's restoration he would
+weaken the Penguins, the hereditary enemies of his people. The three
+old councillors divided among themselves the three chief offices of the
+Court, those of Chamberlain, Seneschal, and High Steward, and authorised
+the monk to distribute the other places to the prince's best advantage.
+
+"Devotion has to be rewarded," said the three old councillors.
+
+"And treachery also," said Agaric.
+
+"It is but too true," replied one of them, the Marquis of Sevenwounds,
+who had experience of revolutions.
+
+There was dancing, and after the ball Princess Gudrune tore up her green
+robe to make cockades. With her own hands she sewed a piece of it on the
+monk's breast, upon which he shed tears of sensibility and gratitude.
+
+M. de Plume, the prince's equerry, set out the same evening to look for
+a green horse.
+
+
+
+
+III. THE CABAL
+
+After his return to the capital of Penguinia, the Reverend Father
+Agaric disclosed his projects to Prince Adelestan des Boscenos, of whose
+Draconian sentiments he was well aware.
+
+The prince belonged to the highest nobility. The Torticol des Boscenos
+went back to Brian the Good, and under the Draconides had held the
+highest offices in the kingdom. In 1179, Philip Torticol, High Admiral
+of Penguinia, a brave, faithful, and generous, but vindictive man,
+delivered over the port of La Crique and the Penguin fleet to the
+enemies of the kingdom, because he suspected that Queen Crucha, whose
+lover he was, had been unfaithful to him and loved a stable-boy. It was
+that great queen who gave to the Boscenos the silver warming-pan which
+they bear in their arms. As for their motto, it only goes back to the
+sixteenth century. The story of its origin is as follows: One gala
+night, as he mingled with the crowd of courtiers who were watching the
+fire-works in the king's garden, Duke John des Boscenos approached the
+Duchess of Skull and put his hand under the petticoat of that lady, who
+made no complaint at the gesture. The king, happening to pass, surprised
+them and contented himself with saying, "And thus I find you." These
+four words became the motto of the Boscenos.
+
+Prince Adelestan had not degenerated from his ancestors. He preserved an
+unalterable fidelity for the race of the Draconides and desired nothing
+so much as the restoration of Prince Crucho, an event which was in his
+eyes to be the fore-runner of the restoration of his own fortune. He
+therefore readily entered into the Reverend Father Agaric's plans. He
+joined himself at once to the monk's projects, and hastened to put him
+into communication with the most loyal Royalists of his acquaintance,
+Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd. They
+met together one night in the Duke of Ampoule's country house, six miles
+eastward of Alca, to consider ways and means.
+
+M. de La Trumelle was in favour of legal action.
+
+"We ought to keep within the law," said he in substance. "We are for
+order. It is by an untiring propaganda that we shall best pursue the
+realisation of our hopes. We must change the feeling of the country. Our
+cause will conquer because it is just."
+
+The Prince des Boscenos expressed a contrary opinion. He thought that,
+in order to triumph, just causes need force quite as much and even more
+than unjust causes require it.
+
+"In the present situation," said he tranquilly, "three methods of action
+present themselves: to hire the butcher boys, to corrupt the ministers,
+and to kidnap President Formose."
+
+"It would be a mistake to kidnap Formose," objected M. de La Trumelle.
+"The President is on our side."
+
+The attitude and sentiments of the President of the Republic are
+explained by the fact that one Dracophil proposed to seize Formose
+while another Dracophil regarded him as a friend. Formose showed himself
+favourable to the Royalists, whose habits he admired and imitated. If
+he smiled at the mention of the Dragon's crest it was at the thought
+of putting it on his own head. He was envious of sovereign power, not
+because he felt himself capable of exercising it, but because he loved
+to appear so. According to the expression of a Penguin chronicler, "he
+was a goose."
+
+Prince des Boscenos maintained his proposal to march against Formose's
+palace and the House of Parliament.
+
+Count Clena was even still more energetic.
+
+"Let us begin," said he, "by slaughtering, disembowelling, and braining
+the Republicans and all partisans of the government. Afterwards we shall
+see what more need be done."
+
+M. de La Trumelle was a moderate, and moderates are always moderately
+opposed to violence. He recognised that Count Clena's policy was
+inspired by a noble feeling and that it was high-minded, but he timidly
+objected that perhaps it was not conformable to principle, and that it
+presented certain dangers. At last he consented to discuss it.
+
+"I propose," added he, "to draw up an appeal to the people. Let us show
+who we are. For my own part I can assure you that I shall not hide my
+flag in my pocket."
+
+M. Bigourd began to speak.
+
+"Gentlemen, the Penguins are dissatisfied with the new order because it
+exists, and it is natural for men to complain of their condition. But at
+the same time the Penguins are afraid to change their government because
+new things alarm them. They have not known the Dragon's crest and,
+although they sometimes say that they regret it, we must not believe
+them. It is easy to see that they speak in this way either without
+thought or because they are in an ill-temper. Let us not have any
+illusions about their feelings towards ourselves. They do not like us.
+They hate the aristocracy both from a base envy and from a generous love
+of equality. And these two united feelings are very strong in a people.
+Public opinion is not against us, because it knows nothing about us. But
+when it knows what we want it will not follow us. If we let it be seen
+that we wish to destroy democratic government and restore the Dragon's
+crest, who will be our partisans? Only the butcher-boys and the little
+shopkeepers of Alca. And could we even count on them to the end?
+They are dissatisfied, but at the bottom of their hearts they are
+Republicans. They are more anxious to sell their cursed wares than to
+see Crucho again. If we act openly we shall only cause alarm.
+
+"To make people sympathise with us and follow us we must make them
+believe that we want, not to overthrow the Republic, but, on the
+contrary, to restore it, to cleanse, to purify, to embellish, to adorn,
+to beautify, and to ornament it, to render it, in a word, glorious and
+attractive. Therefore, we ought not to act openly ourselves. It is known
+that we are not favourable to the present order. We must have recourse
+to a friend of the Republic, and, if we are to do what is best, to a
+defender of this government. We have plenty to choose from. It would
+be well to prefer the most popular and, if I dare say so, the most
+republican of them. We shall win him over to us by flattery, by
+presents, and above all by promises. Promises cost less than presents,
+and are worth more. No one gives as much as he who gives hopes. It is
+not necessary for the man we choose to be of brilliant intellect. I
+would even prefer him to be of no great ability. Stupid people show an
+inimitable grace in roguery. Be guided by me, gentlemen, and overthrow
+the Republic by the agency of a Republican. Let us be prudent. But
+prudence does not exclude energy. If you need me you will find me at
+your disposal."
+
+This speech made a great impression upon those who heard it. The mind
+of the pious Agaric was particularly impressed. But each of them was
+anxious to appoint himself to a position of honour and profit. A secret
+government was organised of which all those present were elected active
+members. The Duke of Ampoule, who was the great financier of the
+party, was chosen treasurer and charged with organising funds for the
+propaganda.
+
+The meeting was on the point of coming to an end when a rough voice was
+heard singing an old air:
+
+     Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+     On en va faire des andouilles
+     Des saucisses et du jambon
+     Pour le reveillon des pauv' bougres.
+
+It had, for two hundred years, been a well-known song in the slums of
+Alca. Prince Boscenos did not like to hear it. He went down into the
+street, and, perceiving that the singer was a workman who was placing
+some slates on the roof of a church, he politely asked him to sing
+something else.
+
+"I will sing what I like," answered the man.
+
+"My friend, to please me. . . ."
+
+"I don't want to please you."
+
+Prince Boscenos was as a rule good-tempered, but he was easily angered
+and a man of great strength.
+
+"Fellow, come down or I will go up to you," cried he, in a terrible
+voice.
+
+As the workman, astride on his coping, showed no sign of budging, the
+prince climbed quickly up the staircase of the tower and attacked the
+singer. He gave him a blow that broke his jaw-bone and sent him rolling
+into a water-spout. At that moment seven or eight carpenters, who were
+working on the rafters, heard their companion's cry and looked through
+the window. Seeing the prince on the coping they climbed along a ladder
+that was leaning on the slates and reached him just as he was slipping
+into the tower. They sent him, head foremost, down the one hundred and
+thirty-seven steps of the spiral staircase.
+
+
+
+
+IV. VISCOUNTESS OLIVE
+
+The Penguins had the finest army in the world. So had the Porpoises. And
+it was the same with the other nations of Europe. The smallest amount of
+thought will prevent any surprise at this. For all armies are the finest
+in the world. The second finest army, if one could exist, would be in
+a notoriously inferior position; it would be certain to be beaten. It
+ought to be disbanded at once. Therefore, all armies are the finest in
+the world. In France the illustrious Colonel Marchand understood
+this when, before the passage of the Yalou, being questioned by some
+journalists about the Russo-Japanese war, he did not hesitate to
+describe the Russian army as the finest in the world, and also the
+Japanese. And it should be noticed that even after suffering the most
+terrible reverses an army does not fall from its position of being
+the finest in the world. For if nations ascribe their victories to the
+ability of their generals and the courage of their soldiers, they always
+attribute their defeats to an inexplicable fatality. On the other hand,
+navies are classed according to the number of their ships. There is a
+first, a second, a third, and so on. So that there exists no doubt as to
+the result of naval wars.
+
+The Penguins had the finest army and the second navy in the world.
+This navy was commanded by the famous Chatillon, who bore the title
+of Emiralbahr, and by abbreviation Emiral. It is the same word which,
+unfortunately in a corrupt form, is used to-day among several European
+nations to designate the highest grade in the naval service. But as
+there was but one Emiral among the Penguins, a singular prestige, if I
+dare say so, was attached to that rank.
+
+The Emiral did not belong to the nobility. A child of the people, he was
+loved by the people. They were flattered to see a man who sprang from
+their own ranks holding a position of honour. Chatillon was good-looking
+and fortune favoured him. He was not over-addicted to thought. No event
+ever disturbed his serene outlook.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric, surrendering to M. Bigourd's reasons and
+recognising that the existing government could only be destroyed by one
+of its defenders, cast his eyes upon Emiral Chatillon. He asked a large
+sum of money from his friend, the Reverend Father Cornemuse, which the
+latter handed him with a sigh. And with this sum he hired six hundred
+butcher boys of Alca to run behind Chatillon's horse and shout, "Hurrah
+for the Emiral!" Henceforth Chatillon could not take a single step
+without being cheered.
+
+Viscountess Olive asked him for a private interview. He received her at
+the Admiralty* in a room decorated with anchors, shells, and grenades.
+
+     * Or better, Emiralty.
+
+She was discreetly dressed in greyish blue. A hat trimmed with roses
+covered her pretty, fair hair, Behind her veil her eyes shone like
+sapphires. Although she came of Jewish origin there was no more
+fashionable woman in the whole nobility. She was tall and well shaped;
+her form was that of the year, her figure that of the season.
+
+"Emiral," said she, in a delightful voice, "I cannot conceal my emotion
+from you. . . . It is very natural . . . before a hero."
+
+"You are too kind. But tell me, Viscountess, what brings me the honour
+of your visit."
+
+"For a long time I have been anxious to see you, to speak to you. . . .
+So I very willingly undertook to convey a message to you."
+
+"Please take a seat."
+
+"How still it is here."
+
+"Yes, it is quiet enough."
+
+"You can hear the birds singing."
+
+"Sit down, then, dear lady."
+
+And he drew up an arm-chair for her.
+
+She took a seat with her back to the light.
+
+"Emiral, I came to bring you a very important message, a message. . ."
+
+"Explain."
+
+"Emiral, have you ever seen Prince Crucho?"
+
+"Never."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"It is a great pity. He would be so delighted to see you! He esteems and
+appreciates you. He has your portrait on his desk beside his mother's.
+What a pity it is he is not better known! He is a charming prince and so
+grateful for what is done for him! He will be a great king. For he will
+be king without doubt. He will come back and sooner than people think.
+. . . What I have to tell you, the message with which I am entrusted,
+refers precisely to. . ."
+
+The Emiral stood up.
+
+"Not a word more, dear lady. I have the esteem, the confidence of the
+Republic. I will not betray it. And why should I betray it? I am loaded
+honours and dignities."
+
+"Allow me to tell you, my dear Emiral, that your honours and dignities
+are far from equalling what you deserve. If your services were
+properly rewarded, you would be Emiralissimo and Generalissimo,
+Commander-in-chief of the troops both on land and sea. The Republic is
+very ungrateful to you."
+
+"All governments are more or less ungrateful."
+
+"Yes, but the Republicans are jealous of you. That class of person
+is always afraid of his superiors. They cannot endure the Services.
+Everything that has to do with the navy and the army is odious to them.
+They are afraid of you."
+
+"That is possible."
+
+"They are wretches; they are ruining the country. Don't you wish to save
+Penguinia?
+
+"In what way?"
+
+"By sweeping away all the rascals of the Republic, all the Republicans."
+
+"What a proposal to make to me, dear lady!"
+
+"It is what will certainly be done, if not by you, then by some one
+else. The Generalissimo, to mention him alone, is ready to throw all
+the ministers, deputies, and senators into the sea, and to recall Prince
+Crucho."
+
+"Oh, the rascal, the scoundrel," exclaimed the Emiral.
+
+"Do to him what he would do to you. The prince will know how to
+recognise your services, He will give you the Constable's sword and a
+magnificent grant. I am commissioned, in the mean time, to hand you a
+pledge of his royal friendship."
+
+As she said these words she drew a green cockade from her bosom.
+
+"What is that?" asked the Emiral.
+
+"It is his colours which Crucho sends you."
+
+"Be good enough to take them back."
+
+"So that they may be offered to the Generalissimo who will accept them!
+. . . No, Emiral, let me place them on your glorious breast."
+
+Chatillon gently repelled the lady. But for some minutes he thought her
+extremely pretty, and he felt this impression still more when two bare
+arms and the rosy palms of two delicate hands touched him lightly. He
+yielded almost immediately. Olive was slow in fastening the ribbon. Then
+when it was done she made a low courtesy and saluted Chatillon with the
+title of Constable.
+
+"I have been ambitious like my comrades," answered the sailor, "I don't
+hide it, and perhaps I am so still; but u on my word of honour, when I
+look at you, the only, desire I feel is for a cottage and a heart."
+
+She turned upon him the charming sapphire glances that flashed from
+under her eyelids.
+
+"That is to be had also . . . what are you doing, Emiral?"
+
+"I am looking for the heart."
+
+When she left the Admiralty, the Viscountess went immediately to the
+Reverend Father Agaric to give an account of her visit.
+
+"You must go to him again, dear lady," said that austere monk.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE PRINCE DES BOSCENOS
+
+Morning and evening the newspapers that had been bought by the
+Dracophils proclaimed Chatillon's praises and hurled shame and
+opprobrium upon the Ministers of the Republic. Chatillon's portrait was
+sold through the streets of Alca. Those young descendants of Remus who
+carry plaster figures on their heads, offered busts of Chatillon for
+sale upon the bridges.
+
+Every evening Chatillon rode upon his white horse round the Queen's
+Meadow, a place frequented by the people of fashion. The Dracophils
+posted along the Emiral's route a crowd of needy Penguins who kept
+shouting: "It is Chatillon we want." The middle classes of Alca
+conceived a profound admiration for the Emiral. Shopwomen murmured:
+"He is good-looking." Women of fashion slackened the speed of their
+motor-cars and kissed hands to him as they passed, amidst the hurrahs of
+an enthusiastic populace.
+
+One day, as he went into a tobacco shop, two Penguins who were putting
+letters in the box recognized Chatillon and cried at the top of their
+voices: "Hurrah for the Emiral! Down with the Republicans." All those
+who were passing stopped in front of the shop. Chatillon lighted his
+cigar before the eyes of a dense crowd of frenzied citizens who waved
+their hats and cheered. The crowd kept increasing, and the whole
+town, singing and marching behind its hero, went back with him to the
+Admiralty.
+
+The Emiral had an old comrade in arms, Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, who had
+served with great distinction, a man as true as gold and as loyal as his
+sword. Vulcanmould plumed himself on his thoroughgoing independence and
+he went among the partisans of Crucho and the Minister of the Republic
+telling both parties what he thought of them. M. Bigourd maliciously
+declared that he told each party what the other party thought of it.
+In truth he had on several occasions been guilty of regrettable
+indiscretions, which were overlooked as being the freedoms of a soldier
+who knew nothing of intrigue. Every morning he went to see Chatillon,
+whom he treated with the cordial roughness of a brother in arms.
+
+"Well, old buffer, so you are popular," said he to him. "Your phiz is
+sold on the heads of pipes and on liqueur bottles and every drunkard in
+Alca spits out your name as he rolls in the gutter. . . . Chatillon, the
+hero of the Penguins! Chatillon, defender of the Penguin glory! . . .
+Who would have said it? Who would have thought it?"
+
+And he laughed with his harsh laugh. Then changing his tone: "But,
+joking aside, are you not a bit surprised at what is happening to you?"
+
+"No, indeed," answered Chatillon.
+
+And out went the honest Vulcanmould, banging the door behind him.
+
+In the mean time Chatillon had taken a little flat at number 18
+Johannes-Talpa Street, so that he might receive Viscountess Olive. They
+met there every day. He was desperately in love with her. During his
+martial and neptunian life he had loved crowds of women, red, black,
+yellow, and white, and some of them had been very beautiful. But before
+he met the Viscountess he did not know what a woman really was. When the
+Viscountess Olive called him her darling, her dear darling, he felt in
+heaven and it seemed to him that the stars shone in her hair.
+
+She would come a little late, and, as she put her bag on the table, she
+would ask pensively:
+
+"Let me sit on your knee."
+
+And then she would talk of subjects suggested by the pious Agaric,
+interrupting the conversation with sighs and kisses. She would ask him
+to dismiss such and such an officer, to give a command to another,
+to send the squadron here or there. And at the right moment she would
+exclaim:
+
+"How young you are, my dear!"
+
+And he did whatever she wished, for he was simple, he was anxious to
+wear the Constable's sword, and to receive a large grant; he did not
+dislike playing a double part, he had a vague idea of saving Penguinia,
+and he was in love.
+
+This delightful woman induced him to remove the troops that were at La
+Cirque, the port where Crucho was to land. By this means it was made
+certain that there would be no obstacle to prevent the prince from
+entering Penguinia.
+
+The pious Agaric organised public meetings so as to keep up the
+agitation. The Dracophils held one or two every day in some of the
+thirty-six districts of Alca, and preferably in the poorer quarters.
+They desired to win over the poor, for they are the most numerous.
+On the fourth of May a particularly fine meeting was held in an old
+cattle-market, situated in the centre of a populous suburb filled with
+housewives sitting on the doorsteps and children playing in the gutters.
+There were present about two thousand people, in the opinion of
+the Republicans, and six thousand according to the reckoning of the
+Dracophils. In the audience was to be seen the flower of Penguin
+society, including Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Count Clena, M. de
+La Trumelle, M. Bigourd, and several rich Jewish ladies.
+
+The Generalissimo of the national army had come in uniform. He was
+cheered.
+
+The committee had been carefully formed. A man of the people, a workman,
+but a man of sound principles, M. Rauchin, the secretary of the yellow
+syndicate, was asked to preside, supported by Count Clena and M.
+Michaud, a butcher.
+
+The government which Penguinia had freely given itself was called by
+such names as cesspool and drain in several eloquent speeches. But
+President Formose was spared and no mention was made of Crucho or the
+priests.
+
+The meeting was not unanimous. A defender of the modern State and of the
+Republic, a manual labourer, stood up.
+
+"Gentlemen," said M. Rauchin, the chairman, "we have told you that this
+meeting would not be unanimous. We are not like our opponents, we are
+honest men. I allow our opponent to speak. Heaven knows what you are
+going to hear. Gentlemen, I beg of you to restrain as long as you can
+the expression of your contempt, your disgust, and your indignation."
+
+"Gentlemen," said the opponent. . . .
+
+Immediately he was knocked down, trampled beneath the feet of the
+indignant crowd, and his unrecognisable remains thrown out of the hall.
+
+The tumult was still resounding when Count Clena ascended the tribune.
+Cheers took the place of groans and when silence was restored the orator
+uttered these words:
+
+"Comrades, we are going to see whether you have blood in your veins.
+What we have got to do is to slaughter, disembowel, and brain all the
+Republicans."
+
+This speech let loose such a thunder of applause that the old shed
+rocked with it, and a cloud of acrid and thick dust fell from its filthy
+walls and worm-eaten beams and enveloped the audience.
+
+A resolution was carried vilifying the government and acclaiming
+Chatillon. And the audience departed singing the hymn of the liberator:
+"It is Chatillon we want."
+
+The only way out of the old market was through a muddy alley shut in by
+omnibus stables and coal sheds. There was no moon and a cold drizzle was
+coming down. The police, who were assembled in great numbers, blocked
+the alley and compelled the Dracophils to disperse in little groups.
+These were the instructions they had received from their chief, who was
+anxious to check the enthusiasm of the excited crowd.
+
+The Dracophils who were detained in the alley kept marking time and
+singing, "It is Chatillon we want." Soon, becoming impatient of the
+delay, the cause of which they did not know, they began to push those in
+front of them. This movement, propagated along the alley, threw those in
+front against the broad chests of the police. The latter had no hatred
+for the Dracophils. In the bottom of their hearts they liked Chatillon.
+But it is natural to resist aggression and strong men are inclined to
+make use of their strength. For these reasons the police kicked the
+Dracophils with their hob-nailed boots. As a result there were sudden
+rushes backwards and forwards. Threats and cries mingled with the songs.
+
+"Murder! Murder! . . . It is Chatillon we want! Murder! Murder!"
+
+And in the gloomy alley the more prudent kept saying, "Don't push."
+Among these latter, in the darkness, his lofty figure rising above the
+moving crowd, his broad shoulders and robust body noticeable among
+the trampled limbs and crushed sides of the rest, stood the Prince
+des Boscenos, calm, immovable, and placid. Serenely and indulgently he
+waited. In the mean time, as the exit was opened at regular intervals
+between the ranks of the police, the pressure of elbows against the
+chests of those around the prince diminished and people began to breathe
+again.
+
+"You see we shall soon be able to go out," said that kindly giant, with
+a pleasant smile. "Time and patience . . ."
+
+He took a cigar from his case, raised it to his lips and struck a match.
+Suddenly, in the light of the match, he saw Princess Anne, his wife,
+clasped in Count Clena's arms. At this sight he rushed towards them,
+striking both them and those around with his cane. He was disarmed,
+though not without difficulty, but he could not be separated from his
+opponent. And whilst the fainting princess was lifted from arm to arm
+to her carriage over the excited and curious crowd, the two men still
+fought furiously. Prince des Boscenos lost his hat, his eye-glass,
+his cigar, his necktie, and his portfolio full of private letters and
+political correspondence; he even lost the miraculous medals that he
+had received from the good Father Cornemuse. But he gave his opponent
+so terrible a kick in the stomach that the unfortunate Count was knocked
+through an iron grating and went, head foremost, through a glass door
+and into a coal-shed.
+
+Attracted by the struggle and the cries of those around, the police
+rushed towards the prince, who furiously resisted them. He stretched
+three of them gasping at his feet and put seven others to flight,
+with, respectively, a broken jaw, a split lip, a nose pouring blood, a
+fractured skull, a torn ear, a dislocated collar-bone, and broken ribs.
+He fell, however, and was dragged bleeding and disfigured, with his
+clothes in rags, to the nearest police-station, where, jumping about and
+bellowing, he spent the night.
+
+At daybreak groups of demonstrators went about the town singing, "It is
+Chatillon we want," and breaking the windows of the houses in which the
+Ministers of the Republic lived.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE EMIRAL'S FALL
+
+That night marked the culmination of the Dracophil movement. The
+Royalists had no longer any doubt of its triumph. Their chiefs sent
+congratulations to Prince Crucho by wireless telegraphy. Their ladies
+embroidered scarves and slippers for him. M. de Plume had found the
+green horse.
+
+The pious Agaric shared the common hope. But he still worked to
+win partisans for the Pretender. They ought, he said, to lay their
+foundations upon the bed-rock.
+
+With this design he had an interview with three Trade Union workmen.
+
+In these times the artisans no longer lived, as in the days of the
+Draconides, under the government of corporations. They were free, but
+they had no assured pay. After having remained isolated from each other
+for a long time, without help and without support, they had formed
+themselves into unions. The coffers of the unions were empty, as it was
+not the habit of the unionists to pay their subscriptions. There were
+unions numbering thirty thousand members, others with a thousand,
+five hundred, two hundred, and so forth. Several numbered two or three
+members only, or even a few less. But as the lists of adherents were
+not published, it was not easy to distinguish the great unions from the
+small ones.
+
+After some dark and indirect steps the pious Agaric was put into
+communication in a room in the Moulin de la Galette, with comrades
+Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille, the secretaries of three unions of which
+the first numbered fourteen members, the second twenty-four, and the
+third only one. Agaric showed extreme cleverness at this interview.
+
+"Gentlemen," said he, "you and I have not, in most respects, the same
+political and social views, but there are points in which we may come
+to an understanding. We have a common enemy. The government exploits you
+and despises us. Help us to overthrow it; we will supply you with
+the means so far as we are able, and you can in addition count on our
+gratitude."
+
+"Fork out the tin," said Dagobert.
+
+The Reverend Father placed on the table a bag which the distiller of
+Conils had given him with tears in his eyes.
+
+"Done!" said the three companions.
+
+Thus was the solemn compact sealed.
+
+As soon as the monk had departed, carrying with him the joy of having
+won over the masses to his cause, Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille
+whistled to their wives, Amelia, Queenie, and Matilda, who were waiting
+in the street for the signal, and all six holding each other's hands,
+danced around the bag, singing:
+
+     J'ai du bon pognon,
+     Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+And they ordered a salad-bowl full of warm wine.
+
+In the evening all six went through the street from stall to stall
+singing their new song. The song became popular, for the detectives
+reported that every day showed an increase of the number of workpeople
+who sang through the slums:
+
+     J'ai du bon pognon;
+     Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+The Dracophil agitation made no progress in the provinces. The pious
+Agaric sought to find the cause of this, but was unable to discover it
+until old Cornemuse revealed it to him.
+
+"I have proofs," sighed the monk of Conils, "that the Duke of Ampoule,
+the treasurer of the Dracophils, has brought property in Porpoisia with
+the funds that he received for the propaganda."
+
+The party wanted money. Prince des Boscenos had lost his portfolio in a
+brawl and he was reduced to painful expedients which were repugnant to
+his impetuous character. The Viscountess Olive was expensive. Cornemuse
+advised that the monthly allowance of that lady should be diminished.
+
+"She is very useful to us," objected the pious Agaric.
+
+"Undoubtedly," answered Cornemuse, "but she does us an injury by ruining
+us."
+
+A schism divided the Dracophils. Misunderstandings reigned in their
+councils. Some wished that in accordance with the policy of M. Bigourd
+and the pious Agaric, they should carry on the design of reforming the
+Republic. Others, wearied by their long constraint, had resolved to
+proclaim the Dragon's crest and swore to conquer beneath that sign.
+
+The latter urged the advantage of a clear situation and the
+impossibility of making a pretence much longer, and in truth, the public
+began to see whither the agitation was tending and that the Emiral's
+partisans wanted to destroy the very foundations of the Republic.
+
+A report was spread that the prince was to land at La Cirque and make
+his entry into Alca on a green horse.
+
+These rumours excited the fanatical monks, delighted the poor nobles,
+satisfied the rich Jewish ladies, and put hope in the hearts of the
+small traders. But very few of them were inclined to purchase these
+benefits at the price of a social catastrophe and the overthrow of the
+public credit; and there were fewer still who would have risked their
+money, their peace, their liberty, or a single hour from their pleasures
+in the business. On the other hand, the workmen held themselves ready,
+as ever, to give a day's work to the Republic, and a strong resistance
+was being formed in the suburbs.
+
+"The people are with us," the pious Agaric used to say.
+
+However, men, women, and children, when leaving their factories, used to
+shout with one voice:
+
+     A bas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+As for the government, it showed the weakness, indecision, flabbiness,
+and heedlessness common to all governments, and from which none has ever
+departed without falling into arbitrariness and violence. In three words
+it knew nothing, wanted nothing, and would do nothing. Formose, shut in
+his presidential palace, remained blind, dumb, deaf, huge, invisible,
+wrapped up in his pride as in an eider-down.
+
+Count Olive advised the Dracophils to make a last appeal for funds and
+to attempt a great stroke while Alca was still in a ferment.
+
+An executive committee, which he himself had chosen, decided to kidnap
+the members of the Chamber of Deputies, and considered ways and means.
+
+The affair was fixed for the twenty-eighth of July. On that day the sun
+rose radiantly over the city. In front of the legislative palace women
+passed to market with their baskets; hawkers cried their peaches, pears,
+and grapes; cab horses with their noses in their bags munched their
+hay. Nobody expected anything, not because the secret had been kept
+but because it met with nothing but unbelievers. Nobody believed in a
+revolution, and from this fact we may conclude that nobody desired one.
+About two o'clock the deputies began to pass, few and unnoticed, through
+the side-door of the palace. At three o'clock a few groups of badly
+dressed men had formed. At half past three black masses coming from the
+adjacent streets spread over Revolution Square. This vast expanse was
+soon covered by an ocean of soft hats, and the crowd of demonstrators,
+continually increased by sight-seers, having crossed the bridge, struck
+its dark wave against the walls of the legislative enclosure. Cries,
+murmurs, and songs went up to the impassive sky. "It is Chatillon we
+want!" "Down with the Deputies!" "Down with the Republicans!" "Death
+to the Republicans!" The devoted band of Dracophils, led by Prince des
+Boscenos, struck up the august canticle:
+
+     Vive Crucho,
+     Vaillant et sage,
+     Plein de courage
+     Des le berceau!
+
+Behind the wall silence alone replied.
+
+This silence and the absence of guards encouraged and at the same time
+frightened the crowd. Suddenly a formidable voice cried out:
+
+"Attack!"
+
+And Prince des Boscenos was seen raising his gigantic form to the top
+of the wall, which was covered with barbs and iron spikes. Behind him
+rushed his companions, and the people followed. Some hammered against
+the wall to make holes in it; others endeavoured to tear down the spikes
+and to pull out the barbs. These defences had given way in places and
+some of the invaders had stripped the wall and were sitting astride on
+the top. Prince des Boscenos was waving an immense green flag. Suddenly
+the crowd wavered and from it came a long cry of terror. The police
+and the Republican carabineers issuing out of all the entrances of the
+palace formed themselves into a column beneath the wall and in a moment
+it was cleared of its besiegers. After a long moment of suspense the
+noise of arms was heard, and the police charged the crowd with fixed
+bayonets. An instant afterwards and on the deserted square strewn with
+hats and walking-sticks there reigned a sinister silence. Twice again
+the Dracophils attempted to form, twice they were repulsed. The rising
+was conquered. But Prince des Boscenos, standing on the wall of the
+hostile palace, his flag in his hand, still repelled the attack of a
+whole brigade. He knocked down all who approached him. At last he, too,
+was thrown down, and fell on an iron spike, to which he remained hooked,
+still clasping the standard of the Draconides.
+
+On the following day the Ministers of the Republic and the Members of
+Parliament determined to take energetic measures. In vain, this time,
+did President Formose attempt to evade his responsibilities. The
+government discussed the question of depriving Chatillon of his rank and
+dignities and of indicting him before the High Court as a conspirator,
+an enemy of the public good, a traitor, etc.
+
+At this news the Emiral's old companions in arms, who the very evening
+before had beset him with their adulations, made no effort to conceal
+their joy. But Chatillon remained popular with the middle classes of
+Alca and one still heard the hymn of the liberator sounding in the
+streets, "It is Chatillon we want."
+
+The Ministers were embarrassed. They intended to indict Chatillon before
+the High Court. But they knew nothing; they remained in that total
+ignorance reserved for those who govern men. They were incapable of
+advancing any grave charges against Chatillon. They could supply
+the prosecution with nothing but the ridiculous lies of their spies.
+Chatillon's share in the plot and his relations with Prince Crucho
+remained the secret of the thirty thousand Dracophils. The Ministers
+and the Deputies had suspicions and even certainties, but they had no
+proofs. The Public Prosecutor said to the Minister of justice: "Very
+little is needed for a political prosecution! but I have nothing at all
+and that is not enough." The affair made no progress. The enemies of the
+Republic were triumphant.
+
+On the eighteenth of September the news ran in Alca that Chatillon had
+taken flight. Everywhere there was surprise and astonishment. People
+doubted, for they could not understand.
+
+This is what had happened: One day as the brave Under-Emiral Vulcanmould
+happened, as if by chance, to go into the office of M. Barbotan, the
+Minister of Foreign Affairs, he remarked with his usual frankness:
+
+"M. Barbotan, your colleagues do not seem to me to be up to much; it is
+evident that they have never commanded a ship. That fool Chatillon gives
+them a deuced bad fit of the shivers."
+
+The Minister, in sign of denial, waved his paper-knife in the air above
+his desk.
+
+"Don't deny it," answered Vulcanmould. "You don't know how to get rid of
+Chatillon. You do not dare to indict him before the High Court because
+you are not sure of being able to bring forward a strong enough charge.
+Bigourd will defend him, and Bigourd is a clever advocate. . . . You are
+right, M. Barbotan, you are right. It would be a dangerous trial."
+
+"Ah! my friend," said the Minister, in a careless tone, "if you knew
+how satisfied we are. . . . I receive the most reassuring news from
+my prefects. The good sense of the Penguins will do justice to the
+intrigues of this mutinous soldier. Can you suppose for a moment that
+a great people, an intelligent, laborious people, devoted to liberal
+institutions which. . ."
+
+Vulcanmould interrupted with a great sigh:
+
+"Ah! If I had time to do it I would relieve you of your difficulty. I
+would juggle away my Chatillon like a nutmeg out of a thimble. I would
+fillip him off to Porpoisia."
+
+The Minister paid close attention.
+
+"It would not take long," continued the sailor. "I would rid you in a
+trice of the creature. . . . But just now I have other fish to fry. . . .
+I am in a bad hole. I must find a pretty big sum. But, deuce take it,
+honour before everything."
+
+The Minister and the Under-Emiral looked at each other for a moment in
+silence. Then Barbotan said with authority:
+
+"Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, get rid of this seditious soldier. You will
+render a great service to Penguinia, and the Minister of Home Affairs
+will see that your gambling debts are paid."
+
+The same evening Vulcanmould called on Chatillon and looked at him for
+some time with an expression of grief and mystery.
+
+"My do you look like that?" asked the Emiral in an uneasy tone.
+
+Vulcanmould said to him sadly:
+
+"Old brother in arms, all is discovered. For the past half-hour the
+government knows everything."
+
+At these words Chatillon sank down overwhelmed.
+
+Vulcanmould continued:
+
+"You may be arrested any moment. I advise you to make off."
+
+And drawing out his watch:
+
+"Not a minute to lose."
+
+"Have I time to call on the Viscountess Olive?"
+
+"It would be mad," said Vulcanmould, handing him a passport and a pair
+of blue spectacles, and telling him to have courage.
+
+"I will," said Chatillon.
+
+"Good-bye! old chum."
+
+"Good-bye and thanks! You have saved my life."
+
+"That is the least I could do."
+
+A quarter of an hour later the brave Emiral had left the city of Alca.
+
+He embarked at night on an old cutter at La Cirque and set sail
+for Porpoisia. But eight miles from the coast he was captured by a
+despatch-boat which was sailing without lights and which was under, the
+flag of the Queen of the Black Islands. That Queen had for a long time
+nourished a fatal passion for Chatillon.
+
+
+
+
+VII. CONCLUSION
+
+Nunc est bibendum. Delivered from its fears and pleased at having
+escaped from so great a danger, the government resolved to celebrate
+the anniversary of the Penguin regeneration and the establishment of the
+Republic by holding a general holiday.
+
+President Formose, the Ministers, and the members of the Chamber and of
+the Senate were present at the ceremony.
+
+The Generalissimo of the Penguin army was present in uniform. He was
+cheered.
+
+Preceded by the black flag of misery and the red flag of revolt,
+deputations of workmen walked in the procession, their aspect one of
+grim protection.
+
+President, Ministers, Deputies, officials, heads of the magistracy and
+of the army, each, in their own names and in the name of the sovereign
+people, renewed the ancient oath to live in freedom or to die. It was
+an alternative upon which they were resolutely determined. But they
+preferred to live in freedom. There were games, speeches, and songs.
+
+After the departure of the representatives of the State the crowd of
+citizens separated slowly and peaceably, shouting out, "Hurrah for the
+Republic!" "Hurrah for liberty!" "Down with the shaven pates!"
+
+The newspapers mentioned only one regrettable incident that happened on
+that wonderful day. Prince des Boscenos was quietly smoking a cigar
+in the Queen's Meadow when the State procession passed by. The prince
+approached the Minister's carriage and said in a loud voice: "Death to
+the Republicans!" He was immediately apprehended by the police, to whom
+he offered a most desperate resistance. He knocked them down in crowds,
+but he was conquered by numbers, and, bruised, scratched, swollen, and
+unrecognisable even to the eyes of his wife, he was dragged through the
+joyous streets into an obscure prison.
+
+The magistrates carried on the case against Chatillon in a peculiar
+style. Letters were found at the Admiralty which revealed the complicity
+of the Reverend Father Agaric in the plot. Immediately public opinion
+was inflamed against the monks, and Parliament voted, one after the
+other, a dozen laws which restrained, diminished, limited, prescribed,
+suppressed, determined, and curtailed, their rights, immunities,
+exemptions, privileges, and benefits, and created many invalidating
+disqualifications against them.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric steadfastly endured the rigour of the laws
+which struck himself personally, as well as the terrible fall of the
+Emiral of which he was the chief cause. Far from yielding to evil
+fortune, he regarded it as but a bird of passage. He was planning new
+political designs more audacious than the first.
+
+When his projects were sufficiently ripe he went one day to the Wood of
+Conils. A thrush sang in a tree and a little hedgehog crossed the
+stony path in front of him with awkward steps. Agaric walked with great
+strides, muttering fragments of sentences to himself.
+
+When he reached the door of the laboratory in which, for so many
+years, the pious manufacturer bad distilled the golden liqueur of St.
+Orberosia, he found the place deserted and the door shut. Having walked
+around the building he saw in the backyard the venerable Cornemuse, who,
+with his habit pinned up, was climbing a ladder that leant against the
+wall.
+
+"Is that you, my dear friend?" said he to him. "What are you doing
+there?"
+
+"You can see for yourself," answered the monk of Conils in a feeble
+voice, turning a sorrowful look Upon Agaric. "I am going into my house."
+
+The red pupils of his eyes no longer imitated the triumph and brilliance
+of the ruby, they flashed mournful and troubled glances. His countenance
+had lost its happy fulness. His shining head was no longer pleasant
+to the sight; perspiration and inflamed blotches bad altered its
+inestimable perfection.
+
+"I don't understand," said Agaric.
+
+"It is easy enough to understand. You see the consequences of your plot.
+Although a multitude of laws are directed against me I have managed to
+elude the greater number of them. Some, however, have struck me. These
+vindictive men have closed my laboratories and my shops, and confiscated
+my bottles, my stills, and my retorts. They have put seals on my doors
+and now I am compelled to go in through the window. I am barely able to
+extract in secret and from time to time the juice of a few plants and
+that with an apparatus which the humblest labourer would despise."
+
+"You suffer from the persecution," said Agaric. "It strikes us all."
+
+The monk of Conils passed his hand over his afflicted brow:
+
+"I told you so, Brother Agaric; I told you that your enterprise would
+turn against ourselves."
+
+"Our defeat is only momentary," replied Agaric eagerly. "It is due to
+purely accidental causes; it results from mere contingencies. Chatillon
+was a fool; he has drowned himself in his own ineptitude. Listen to
+me, Brother Cornemuse. We have not a moment to lose. We must free the
+Penguin people, we must deliver them from their tyrants, save them from
+themselves, restore the Dragon's crest, reestablish the ancient State,
+the good State, for the honour of religion and the exaltation of the
+Catholic faith. Chatillon was a bad instrument; he broke in our hands.
+Let us take a better instrument to replace him. I have the man who will
+destroy this impious democracy. He is a civil official; his name is
+Gomoru. The Penguins worship him, He has already betrayed his party for
+a plate of rice. There's the man we want!"
+
+At the beginning of this speech the monk of Conils had climbed into his
+window and pulled up the ladder.
+
+"I foresee," answered he, with his nose through the sash, "that you will
+not stop until you have us all expelled from this pleasant, agreeable,
+and sweet land of Penguinia. Good night; God keep you!"
+
+Agaric, standing before the wall, entreated his dearest brother to
+listen to him for a moment:
+
+"Understand your own interest better, Cornemuse! Penguinia is ours. What
+do we need to conquer it? just one effort more . . . one more little
+sacrifice of money and . . ."
+
+But without listening further, the monk of Conils drew in his head and
+closed his window.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES.
+
+THE AFFAIR OF THE EIGHTY THOUSAND TRUSSES OF HAY
+
+O Father Zeus, only save thou the sons of the Acheans from the darkness,
+and make clear sky and vouchsafe sight to our eyes, and then, so it be
+but light, slay us, since such is thy good pleasure. (Iliad, xvii. 645
+et seq.)
+
+
+
+
+I. GENERAL GREATAUK, DUKE OF SKULL
+
+A short time after the flight of the Emiral, a middle-class Jew called
+Pyrot, desirous of associating with the aristocracy and wishing to serve
+his country, entered the Penguin army. The Minister of War, who at the
+time was Greatauk, Duke of Skull, could not endure him. He blamed him
+for his zeal, his hooked nose, his vanity, his fondness for study, his
+thick lips, and his exemplary conduct. Every time the author of any
+misdeed was looked for, Greatauk used to say:
+
+"It must be Pyrot!"
+
+One morning General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, informed Greatauk
+of a serious matter. Eighty thousand trusses of hay intended for the
+cavalry had disappeared and not a trace of them was to be found.
+
+Greatauk exclaimed at once:
+
+"It must be Pyrot who has stolen them!"
+
+He remained in thought for some time and said: "The more I think of
+it the more I am convinced that Pyrot has stolen those eighty thousand
+trusses of hay. And I know it by this: he stole them in order that he
+might sell them to our bitter enemies the Porpoises. What an infamous
+piece of treachery!
+
+"There is no doubt about it," answered Panther; "it only remains to
+prove it."
+
+The same day, as he passed by a cavalry barracks, Prince des Boscenos
+heard the troopers as they were sweeping out the yard, singing:
+
+     Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+     On en va faire des andouilles,
+     Des saucisses et du jambon
+     Pour le riveillon des pauy' bougres.
+
+It seemed to him contrary to all discipline that soldiers should sing
+this domestic and revolutionary refrain which on days of riot had been
+uttered by the lips of jeering workmen. On this occasion he deplored the
+moral degeneration of the army, and thought with a bitter smile that his
+old comrade Greatauk, the head of this degenerate army, basely exposed
+him to the malice of an unpatriotic government. And he promised himself
+that he would make an improvement before long.
+
+"That scoundrel Greatauk," said he to himself, "will, not remain long a
+Minister."
+
+Prince des Boscenos was the most irreconcilable of the opponents of
+modern democracy, free thought, and the government which the Penguins had
+voluntarily given themselves. He had a vigorous and undisguised hatred
+for the Jews, and he worked in public and in private, night and day, for
+the restoration of the line of the Draconides. His ardent royalism was
+still further excited by the thought of his private affairs, which were
+in a bad way and were hourly growing worse. He had no hope of seeing an
+end to his pecuniary embarrassments until the heir of Draco the Great
+entered the city of Alca.
+
+When he returned to his house, the prince took out of his safe a bundle
+of old letters consisting of a private correspondence of the most secret
+nature, which he had obtained from a treacherous secretary. They proved
+that his old comrade Greatauk, the Duke of Skull, had been guilty of
+jobbery regarding the military stores and had received a present of no
+great value from a manufacturer called Maloury. The very smallness of
+this present deprived the Minister who had accepted it of all excuse.
+
+The prince re-read the letters with a bitter satisfaction, put them
+carefully back into his safe, and dashed to the Minister of War. He was
+a man of resolute character. On being told that the Minister could see
+no one he knocked down the ushers, swept aside the orderlies, trampled
+under foot the civil and military clerks, burst through the doors, and
+entered the room of the astonished Greatauk.
+
+"I will not say much," said he to him, "but I will speak to the point.
+You are a confounded cad. I have asked you to put a flea in the ear of
+General Mouchin, the tool of those Republicans, and you would not do it.
+I have asked you to give a command to General des Clapiers, who works
+for the Dracophils, and who has obliged me personally, and you would not
+do it. I have asked you to dismiss General Tandem, the commander of Port
+Alca, who robbed me of fifty louis at cards, and who had me handcuffed
+when I was brought before the High Court as Emiral Chatillon's
+accomplice. You would not do it. I asked you for the hay and bran
+stores. You would not give them. I asked you to send me on a secret
+mission to Porpoisia. You refused. And not satisfied with these repeated
+refusals you have designated me to your Government colleagues as a
+dangerous person, who ought to be watched, and it is owing to you that
+I have been shadowed by the police. You old traitor! I ask nothing more
+from you and I have but one word to say to you: Clear out; you have
+bothered us too long. Besides, we will force the vile Republic to
+replace you by one of our own party. You know that I am a man of my
+word. If in twenty-four hours you have not handed in your resignation I
+will publish the Maloury dossier in the newspapers."
+
+But Greatauk calmly and serenely replied:
+
+"Be quiet, you fool. I am just having a Jew transported. I am handing
+over Pyrot to justice as guilty of having stolen eighty thousand trusses
+of hay."
+
+Prince Boscenos, whose anger vanished like a dream, smiled.
+
+"Is that true?"
+
+"You will see."
+
+"My congratulations, Greatauk. But as one always needs to take
+precautions with you I shall immediately publish the good news. People
+will read this evening about Pyrot's arrest in every newspaper in
+Alca . . . ."
+
+And he went away muttering:
+
+"That Pyrot! I suspected he would come to a bad end."
+
+A moment later General Panther appeared before Greatauk.
+
+"Sir," said he, "I have just examined the business of the eighty
+thousand trusses of hay. There is no evidence against Pyrot."
+
+"Let it be found," answered Greatauk. "Justice requires it. Have Pyrot
+arrested at once."
+
+
+
+
+II. PYROT
+
+All Penguinia heard with horror of Pyrot's crime; at the same time
+there was a sort of satisfaction that this embezzlement combined with
+treachery and even bordering on sacrilege, had been committed by a Jew.
+In order to understand this feeling it is necessary to be acquainted
+with the state of public opinion regarding the Jews both great and
+small. As we have had occasion to say in this history, the universally
+detested and all powerful financial caste was composed of Christians and
+of Jews. The Jews who formed part of it and on whom the people poured
+all their hatred were the upper-class Jews. They possessed immense
+riches and, it was said, held more than a fifth part of the total
+property of Penguinia. Outside this formidable caste there was a
+multitude of Jews of a mediocre condition, who were not more loved than
+the others and who were feared much less. In every ordered State, wealth
+is a sacred thing: in democracies it is the only sacred thing. Now
+the Penguin State was democratic. Three or four financial companies
+exercised a more extensive, and above all, more effective and continuous
+power, than that of the Ministers of the Republic. The latter were
+puppets whom the companies ruled in secret, whom they compelled by
+intimidation or corruption to favour themselves at the expense of the
+State, and whom they ruined by calumnies in the press if they remained
+honest. In spite of the secrecy of the Exchequer, enough appeared to
+make the country indignant, but the middle-class Penguins had, from the
+greatest to the least of them, been brought up to hold money in great
+reverence, and as they all had property, either much or little, they
+were strongly impressed with the solidarity of capital and understood
+that a small fortune is not safe unless a big one is protected. For
+these reasons they conceived a religious respect for the Jews' millions,
+and self-interest being stronger with them than aversion, they were as
+much afraid as they were of death to touch a single hair of one of the
+rich Jews whom they detested. Towards the poorer Jews they felt less
+ceremonious and when they saw any of them down they trampled on them.
+That is why the entire nation learnt with thorough satisfaction that the
+traitor was a Jew. They could take vengeance on all Israel in his person
+without any fear of compromising the public credit.
+
+That Pyrot had stolen the eighty thousand trusses of hay nobody
+hesitated for a moment to believe. No one doubted because the general
+ignorance in which everybody was concerning the affair did not allow of
+doubt, for doubt is a thing that demands motives. People do not doubt
+without reasons in the same way that people believe without reasons. The
+thing was not doubted because it was repeated everywhere and, with the
+public, to repeat is to prove. It was not doubted because people wished
+to believe Pyrot guilty and one believes what one wishes to believe.
+Finally, it was not doubted because the faculty of doubt is rare amongst
+men; very few minds carry in them its germs and these are not developed
+without cultivation. Doubt is singular, exquisite, philosophic, immoral,
+transcendent, monstrous, full of malignity, injurious to persons and
+to property, contrary to the good order of governments, and to the
+prosperity of empires, fatal to humanity, destructive of the gods, held
+in horror by heaven and earth. The mass of the Penguins were ignorant
+of doubt: it believed in Pyrot's guilt and this conviction immediately
+became one of its chief national beliefs and an essential truth in its
+patriotic creed.
+
+Pyrot was tried secretly and condemned.
+
+General Panther immediately went to the Minister of War to tell him the
+result.
+
+"Luckily," said he, "the judges were certain, for they had no proofs."
+
+"Proofs," muttered Greatauk, "Proofs, what do they prove? There is only
+one certain, irrefragable proof--the confession of the guilty person.
+Has Pyrot confessed?"
+
+"No, General."
+
+"He will confess, he ought to. Panther, we must induce him; tell him it
+is to his interest. Promise him that, if he confesses, he will obtain
+favours, a reduction of his sentence, full pardon; promise him that if
+he confesses his innocence will be admitted, that he will be decorated.
+Appeal to his good feelings. Let him confess from patriotism, for the
+flag, for the sake of order, from respect for the hierarchy, at the
+special command of the Minister of War militarily. . . . But tell me,
+Panther, has he not confessed already? There are tacit confessions;
+silence is a confession."
+
+"But, General, he is not silent; he keeps on squealing like a pig that
+he is innocent."
+
+"Panther, the confessions of a guilty man sometimes result from the
+vehemence of his denials. To deny desperately is to confess. Pyrot has
+confessed; we must have witnesses of his confessions, justice requires
+them."
+
+There was in Western Penguinia a seaport called La Cirque, formed of
+three small bays and formerly greatly frequented by ships, but now
+solitary and deserted. Gloomy lagoons stretched along its low coasts
+exhaling a pestilent odour, while fever hovered over its sleepy waters.
+Here, on the borders of the sea, there was built a high square tower,
+like the old Campanile at Venice, from the side of which, close to the
+summit hung an open cage which was fastened by a chain to a transverse
+beam. In the times of the Draconides the Inquisitors of Alca used to
+put heretical clergy into this cage. It had been empty for three hundred
+years, but now Pirot was imprisoned in it under the guard of sixty
+warders, who lived in the tower and did not lose sight of him night or
+day, spying on him for confessions that they might afterwards report
+to the Minister of War. For Greatauk, careful and prudent, desired
+confessions and still further confessions. Greatauk, who was looked
+upon as a fool, was in reality a man of great ability and full of rare
+foresight.
+
+In the mean time Pyrot, burnt by the sun, eaten by mosquitoes, soaked
+in the rain, hail and snow, frozen by the cold, tossed about terribly by
+the wind, beset by the sinister croaking of the ravens that perched upon
+his cage, kept writing down his innocence on pieces torn off his shirt
+with a tooth-pick dipped in blood. These rags were lost in the sea or
+fell into the hands of the gaolers. But Pyrot's protests moved nobody
+because his confessions had been published.
+
+
+
+
+III. COUNT DE MAUBEC DE LA DENTDULYNX
+
+The morals of the Jews were not always pure; in most cases they were
+averse from none of the vices of Christian civilization, but they
+retained from the Patriarchal age a recognition of family, ties and
+an attachment to the interests of the tribe. Pyrot's brothers,
+half-brothers, uncles, great-uncles, first, second, and third cousins,
+nephews and great-nephews, relations by blood and relations by marriage,
+and all who were related to him to the number of about seven hundred,
+were at first overwhelmed by the blow that had struck their relative,
+and they shut themselves up in their houses, covering themselves with
+ashes and blessing the hand that had chastised them. For forty days they
+kept a strict fast. Then they bathed themselves and resolved to search,
+without rest, at the cost of any toil and at the risk of eve danger,
+for the demonstration of an innocence which they did not doubt. And how
+could they have doubted? Pyrot's innocence had been revealed to them in
+the same way that his guilt had been revealed to Christian Penguinia's;
+for these things, being hidden, assume a mystic character and take on
+the authority of religious truths. The seven hundred Pyrotists set to
+work with as much zeal as prudence, and made the most thorough inquiries
+in secret. They were everywhere; they were seen nowhere. One would have
+said that, like the pilot of Ulysses, they wandered freely over the
+earth. They penetrated into the War Office and approached, under
+different disguises, the judges, the registrars, and the witnesses of
+the affair. Then Greatauk's cleverness was seen. The witnesses knew
+nothing; the judges and registrars knew nothing. Emissaries reached
+even Pyrot and anxiously questioned him in his cage amid the prolonged
+moanings of the sea and the hoarse croaks of the ravens. It was in vain;
+the prisoner knew nothing. The seven hundred Pyrotists could not subvert
+the proofs of the accusation because they could not know what they were,
+and they could not know what they were because there were none. Pyrot's
+guilt was indefeasible through its very nullity. And it was with a
+legitimate pride that Greatauk, expressing himself as a true artist,
+said one day to General Panther: "This case is a master-piece: it is
+made out of nothing." The seven hundred Pyrotists despaired of ever
+clearing up this dark business, when suddenly they discovered, from
+a stolen letter, that the eighty thousand trusses of hay had never
+existed, that a most distinguished nobleman, Count de Maubec, had
+sold them to the State, that he had received the price but had never
+delivered them. Indeed seeing that he was descended from the richest
+landed proprietors of ancient Penguinia, the heir of the Maubecs of
+Dentdulynx, once the possessors of four duchies, sixty counties, and six
+hundred and twelve marquisates, baronies, and viscounties, he did not
+possess as much land as he could cover with his hand, and would not have
+been able to cut a single day's mowing of forage off his own domains. As
+to his getting a single rush from a land-owner or a merchant, that would
+have been quite impossible, for everybody except the Ministers of State
+and the Government officials knew that it would be easier to get blood
+from a stone than a farthing from a Maubec.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists made a minute inquiry concerning the Count
+Maubec de la Dentdulynx's financial resources, and they proved that that
+nobleman was chiefly supported by a house in which some generous ladies
+were ready to furnish all comers with the most lavish hospitality.
+They publicly proclaimed that he was guilty of the theft of the eighty
+thousand trusses of straw for which an innocent man had been condemned
+and was now imprisoned in the cage.
+
+Maubec belonged to an illustrious family which was allied to the
+Draconides. There is nothing that a democracy esteems more highly than
+noble birth. Maubec had also served in the Penguin army, and since the
+Penguins were all soldiers, they loved their army to idolatry. Maubec,
+on the field of battle, had received the Cross, which is a sign of
+honour among the Penguins and which they valued even more highly than
+the embraces of their wives. All Penguinia declared for Maubec, and the
+voice of the people which began to assume a threatening tone, demanded
+severe punishments for the seven hundred calumniating Pyrotists.
+
+Maubec was a nobleman; he challenged the seven hundred Pyrotists to
+combat with either sword, sabre, pistols, carabines, or sticks.
+
+"Vile dogs," he wrote to them in a famous letter, "you have crucified
+my God and you want my life too; I warn you that I will not be such a
+duffer as He was and that I will cut off your fourteen hundred ears.
+Accept my boot on your seven hundred behinds."
+
+The Chief of the Government at the time was a peasant called Robin
+Mielleux, a man pleasant to the rich and powerful, but hard towards the
+poor, a man of small courage and ignorant of his own interests. In a
+public declaration he guaranteed Maubec's innocence and honour, and
+presented the seven hundred Pyrotists: to the criminal courts where they
+were condemned, as libellers, to imprisonment, to enormous fines, and to
+all the damages that were claimed by their innocent victim.
+
+It seemed as if Pyrot was destined to remain for ever shut in the cage
+on which the ravens perched. But all the Penguins being anxious to know
+and prove that this Jew was guilty, all the proofs brought forward were
+found not to be good, while some of them were also contradictory. The
+officers of the Staff showed zeal but lacked prudence. Whilst Greatauk
+kept an admirable silence, General Panther made inexhaustible speeches
+and every morning demonstrated in the newspapers that the condemned man
+was guilty. He would have done better, perhaps, if he had said nothing.
+The guilt was evident and what is evident cannot be demonstrated. So
+much reasoning disturbed people's minds; their faith, though still
+alive, became less serene. The more proofs one gives a crowd the more
+they ask for.
+
+Nevertheless the danger of proving too much would not have been great if
+there had not been in Penguinia, as there are, indeed, everywhere, minds
+framed for free inquiry, capable of studying a difficult question, and
+inclined to philosophic doubt. They were few; they were not all inclined
+to speak, and the public was by no means inclined to listen to them.
+Still, they did not always meet with deaf ears. The great Jews, all the
+Israelite millionaires of Alca, when spoken to of Pyrot, said: "We do
+not know the man"; but they thought of saving him. They preserved the
+prudence to which their wealth inclined them and wished that others
+would be less timid. Their wish was to be gratified.
+
+
+
+
+IV. COLOMBAN
+
+Some weeks after the conviction of the seven hundred Pyrotists, a
+little, gruff, hairy, short-sighted man left his house one morning
+with a paste-pot, a ladder, and a bundle of posters and went about the
+streets pasting placards to the walls on which might be read in large
+letters: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty. He was not a bill-poster;
+his name was Colomban, and as the author of sixty volumes on Penguin
+sociology he was numbered among the most laborious and respected writers
+in Alca. Having given sufficient thought to the matter and no longer
+doubting Pyrot's innocence, he proclaimed it in the manner which he
+thought would be most sensational. He met with no hindrance while
+posting his bills in the quiet streets, but when he came to the populous
+quarters, every time he mounted his ladder, inquisitive people crowded
+round him and, dumbfounded with surprise and indignation, threw at
+him threatening looks which he received with the calm that comes from
+courage and short-sightedness. Whilst caretakers and tradespeople tore
+down the bills he had posted, he kept on zealously placarding, carrying
+his tools and followed by little boys who, with their baskets under
+their arms or their satchels on their backs, were in no hurry to reach
+school. To the mute indignation against him, protests and murmurs were
+now added. But Colomban did not condescend to see or hear anything.
+As, at the entrance to the Rue St. Orberosia, he was posting one of his
+squares of paper bearing the words: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty,
+the riotous crowd showed signs of the most violent anger. They called
+after him, "Traitor, thief, rascal, scoundrel." A woman opened a window
+and emptied a vase full of filth over his head, a cabby sent his hat
+flying from one end of the street to the other by a blow of his
+whip amid the cheers of the crowd who now felt themselves avenged. A
+butcher's boy knocked Colomban with his paste-pot, his brush, and his
+posters, from the top of his ladder into the gutter, and the proud
+Penguins then felt the greatness of their country. Colomban stood up,
+covered with filth, lame, and with his elbow injured, but tranquil and
+resolute.
+
+"Low brutes," he muttered, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+Then he went down on all-fours in the gutter to look for his glasses
+which he had lost in his fall. It was then seen that his coat was split
+from the collar to the tails and that his trousers were in rags. The
+rancour of the crowd grew stronger.
+
+On the other side of the street stretched the big St. Orberosian Stores.
+The patriots seized whatever they could lay their hands on from the shop
+front, and hurled at Colomban oranges, lemons, pots of jam, pieces of
+chocolate, bottles of liqueurs, boxes of sardines, pots of foie gras,
+hams, fowls, flasks of oil, and bags of haricots. Covered with the
+debris of the food, bruised, tattered, lame, and blind, he took to
+flight, followed by the shop-boys, bakers, loafers, citizens, and
+hooligans whose number increased each moment and who kept shouting:
+"Duck him! Death to the traitor! Duck him!" This torrent of vulgar
+humanity swept along the streets and rushed into the Rue St. Mael.
+The police did their duty. From all the adjacent streets constables
+proceeded and, holding their scabbards with their left hands, they
+went at full speed in front of the pursuers. They were on the point of
+grabbing Colomban in their huge hands when he suddenly escaped them by
+falling through an open man-hole to the bottom of a sewer.
+
+He spent the night there in the darkness, sitting close by the dirty
+water amidst the fat and slimy rats. He thought of his task, and his
+swelling heart filled with courage and pity. And when the dawn threw
+a pale ray of light into the air-hole he got up and said, speaking to
+himself:
+
+"I see that the fight will be a stiff one."
+
+Forthwith he composed a memorandum in which he clearly showed that
+Pyrot could not have stolen from the Ministry of War the eighty thousand
+trusses of hay which it had never received, for the reason that Maubec
+had never delivered them, though he had received the money. Colomban
+caused this statement to be distributed in the streets of Alca. The
+people refused to read it and tore it up in anger. The shop-keepers
+shook their fists at the distributers, who made off, chased by angry
+women armed with brooms. Feelings grew warm and the ferment lasted the
+whole day. In the evening bands of wild and ragged men went about
+the streets yelling: "Death to Colomban!" The patriots snatched whole
+bundles of the memorandum from the newsboys and burned them in the
+public squares, dancing wildly round these bon-fires with girls whose
+petticoats were tied up to their waists.
+
+Some of the more enthusiastic among them went and broke the windows of
+the house in which Colomban had lived in perfect tranquillity during his
+forty years of work.
+
+Parliament was roused and asked the Chief of the Government what
+measures he proposed to take in order to repel the odious attacks
+made by Colomban upon the honour of the National Arm and the safety
+of Penguinia. Robin Mielleux denounced Colomban's impious audacity and
+proclaimed amid the cheers of the legislators that the man would be
+summoned before the Courts to answer for his infamous libel.
+
+The Minister of War was called to the tribune and appeared in it
+transfigured. He had no longer the air, as in former days, of one of the
+sacred geese of the Penguin citadels. Now, bristling, with outstretched
+neck and hooked beak, he seemed the symbolical vulture fastened to the
+livers of his country's enemies.
+
+In the august silence of the assembly he pronounced these words only:
+
+"I swear that Pyrot is a rascal."
+
+This speech of Greatauk was reported all over Penguinia and satisfied
+the public conscience.
+
+
+
+
+V. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Colomban bore with meekness and surprise the weight of the general
+reprobation. He could not go out without being stoned, so he did not
+go out. He remained in his study with a superb obstinacy, writing new
+memoranda in favour of the encaged innocent. In the mean time among
+the few readers that he found, some, about a dozen, were struck by his
+reasons and began to doubt Pyrot's guilt. They broached the subject to
+their friends and endeavoured to spread the light that had arisen in
+their minds. One of them was a friend of Robin Mielleux and confided to
+him his perplexities, with the result that he was no longer received by
+that Minister. Another demanded explanations in an open letter to the
+Minister of War. A third published a terrible pamphlet. The latter,
+whose name was Kerdanic, was a formidable controversialist. The public
+was unmoved. It was said that these defenders of the traitor had been
+bribed by the rich Jews; they were stigmatized by the name of Pyrotists
+and the patriots swore to exterminate them. There were only a thousand
+or twelve hundred Pyrotists in the whole vast Republic, but it was
+believed that they were everywhere. People were afraid of finding
+them in the promenades, at meetings, at receptions, in fashionable
+drawing-rooms, at the dinner-table, even in the conjugal couch. One half
+of the population was suspected by the other half. The discord set all
+Alca on fire.
+
+In the mean time Father Agaric, who managed his big school for young
+nobles, followed events with anxious attention. The misfortunes of the
+Penguin Church had not disheartened him. He remained faithful to Prince
+Crucho and preserved the hope of restoring the heir of the Draconides
+to the Penguin throne. It appeared to him that the events that were
+happening or about to happen in the country, the state of mind of
+which they were at once the effect and the cause, and the troubles that
+necessarily resulted from them might--if they were directed, guided, and
+led by the profound wisdom of a monk--overthrow the Republic and incline
+the Penguins to restore Prince Crucho, from whose piety the faithful
+hoped for so much solace. Wearing his huge black hat, the brims of which
+looked like the wings of Night, he walked through the Wood of Conils
+towards the factory where his venerable friend, Father Cornemuse,
+distilled the hygienic St. Orberosian liqueur, The good monk's industry,
+so cruelly affected in the time of Emiral Chatillon, was being restored
+from its ruins. One heard goods trains rumbling through the Wood and one
+saw in the sheds hundreds of orphans clothed in blue, packing bottles
+and nailing up cases.
+
+Agaric found the venerable Cornemuse standing before his stoves and
+surrounded by his retorts. The shining pupils of the old man's eyes had
+again become as rubies, his skull shone with its former elaborate and
+careful polish.
+
+Agaric first congratulated the pious distiller on the restored activity
+of his laboratories and workshops.
+
+"Business is recovering. I thank God for it," answered the old man of
+Conils. "Alas! it had fallen into a bad state, Brother Agaric. You raw
+the desolation of this establishment. I need say no more."
+
+Agaric turned away his head.
+
+"The St. Orberosian liqueur," continued Cornemuse, "is making fresh
+conquests. But none the less my industry remains uncertain and
+precarious. The laws of ruin and desolation that struck it have not been
+abrogated, they have only been suspended."
+
+And the monk of Conils lifted his ruby eyes to heaven.
+
+Agaric put his hand on his shoulder.
+
+"What a sight, Cornemuse, does unhappy Penguinia present to us!
+Everywhere disobedience, independence, liberty! We seethe proud, the
+haughty, the men of revolt rising up. After having braved the Divine
+laws they now rear themselves against human laws, so true is it that in
+order to be a good citizen a man must be a good Christian. Colomban
+is trying to imitate Satan. Numerous criminals are following his fatal
+example. They want, in their rage, to put aside all checks, to throw off
+all yokes, to free themselves from the most sacred bonds, to escape from
+the most salutary restraints. They strike their country to make it obey
+them. But they will be overcome by the weight of public animadversion,
+vituperation, indignation, fury, execration, and abomination. That is
+the abyss to which they have been led by atheism, free thought, and the
+monstrous claim to judge for themselves and to form their own opinions."
+
+"Doubtless, doubtless," replied Father Cornemuse, shaking his head, "but
+I confess that the care of distilling these simples has prevented me
+from following public affairs. I only know that people are talking a
+great deal about a man called Pyrot. Some maintain that he is guilty,
+others affirm that he is innocent, but I do not clearly understand the
+motives that drive both parties to mix themselves up in a business that
+concerns neither of them."
+
+The pious Agaric asked eagerly:
+
+"You do not doubt Pyrot's guilt?"
+
+"I cannot doubt it, dear Agaric," answered the monk of Conils. "That
+would be contrary to the laws of my country which we ought to respect as
+long as they are not opposed to the Divine laws. Pyrot is guilty, for
+he has been convicted. As to saying more for or against his guilt, that
+would be to erect my own authority against that of the judges, a thing
+which I will take good care not to do. Besides, it is useless, for Pyrot
+has been convicted. If he has not been convicted because he is guilty,
+he is guilty because he has been convicted; it comes to the same thing.
+I believe in his guilt as every good citizen ought to believe in it; and
+I will believe in it as long as the established jurisdiction will order
+me to believe in it, for it is not for a private person but for a
+judge to proclaim the innocence of a convicted person. Human justice
+is venerable even in the errors inherent in its fallible and limited
+nature. These errors are never irreparable; if the judges do not repair
+them on earth, God will repair them in Heaven. Besides I have great
+confidence in general Greatauk, who, though he certainly does not look
+it, seems to me to be an abler man than all those who are attacking
+him."
+
+"Dearest Cornemuse," cried the pious Agaric, "the Pyrot affair, if
+pushed to the point whither we can lead it by the help of God and the
+necessary funds, will produce the greatest benefits. It will lay bare
+the vices of this Anti-Christian Republic and will incline the Penguins
+to restore the throne of the Draconides and the prerogatives of the
+Church. But to do that it is necessary for the people to see the clergy
+in the front rank of its defenders. Let us march against the enemies of
+the army, against those who insult our heroes, and everybody will follow
+us."
+
+"Everybody will be too many," murmured the monk of Conils, shaking his
+head. "I see that the Penguins want to quarrel. If we mix ourselves up
+in their quarrel they will become reconciled at our expense and we shall
+have to pay the cost of the war. That is why, if you are guided by me,
+dear Agaric, you will not engage the Church in this adventure."
+
+"You know my energy; you know my prudence. I will compromise nothing.
+. . . Dear Cornemuse, I only want from you the funds necessary for us to
+begin the campaign."
+
+For a long time Cornemuse refused to bear the expenses of what he
+thought was a fatal enterprise. Agaric was in turn pathetic and
+terrible. At last, yielding to his prayers and threats, Cornemuse, with
+banging head and swinging arms, went to the austere cell that concealed
+his evangelical poverty. In the whitewashed wall under a branch of
+blessed box, there was fixed a safe. He opened it, and with a sigh took
+out a bundle of bills which, with hesitating hands, he gave to the pious
+Agaric.
+
+"Do not doubt it, dear Cornemuse," said the latter, thrusting the papers
+into the pocket of his overcoat, "this Pyrot affair has been sent us by
+God for the glory and exaltation of the Church of Penguinia."
+
+"I pray that you may be right!" sighed the monk of Conils.
+
+And, left alone in his laboratory, he gazed, through his exquisite eyes,
+with an ineffable sadness at his stoves and his retorts.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE SEVEN HUNDRED PYROTISTS
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists inspired the public with an increasing
+aversion. Every day two or three of them were beaten to death in the
+streets. One of them was publicly whipped, another thrown into the
+river, a third tarred and feathered and led through a laughing crowd, a
+fourth had his nose cut off by a captain of dragoons. They did not dare
+to show themselves at their clubs, at tennis, or at the races; they
+put on a disguise when they went to the Stock Exchange. In these
+circumstances the Prince des Boscenos thought it urgent to curb their
+audacity and repress their insolence. For this purpose he joined with
+Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd in
+founding a great anti-Pyrotist association to which citizens in hundreds
+of thousands, soldiers in companies, regiments, brigades, divisions, and
+army corps, towns, districts, and provinces, all gave their adhesion.
+
+About this time the Minister of War happening to visit one day his Chief
+of Staff, saw with surprise that the large room where General Panther
+worked, which was formerly quite bare, had now along each wall from
+floor to ceiling in sets of deep pigeon-holes, triple and quadruple rows
+of paper bundles of every as form and colour. These sudden and monstrous
+records had in a few days reached the dimensions of a pile of archives
+such as it takes centuries to accumulate.
+
+"What is this?" asked the astonished minister.
+
+"Proofs against Pyrot," answered General Panther with patriotic
+satisfaction. "We had not got them when we convicted him, but we have
+plenty of them now."
+
+The door was open, and Greatauk saw coming up the stair-case a long file
+of porters who were unloading heavy bales of papers in the hall, and he
+saw the lift slowly rising heavily loaded with paper packets.
+
+"What are those others?" said he.
+
+"They are fresh proofs against Pyrot that are now reaching us," said
+Panther. "I have asked for them in every county of Penguinia, in every
+Staff Office and in every Court in Europe. I have ordered them in every
+town in America and in Australia, and in every factory in Africa, and I
+am expecting bales of them from Bremen and a ship-load from Melbourne."
+And Panther turned towards the Minister of War the tranquil and radiant
+look of a hero. However, Greatauk, his eye-glass in his eye, was looking
+at the formidable pile of papers with less satisfaction than uneasiness.
+
+"Very good," said he, "very good! but I am afraid that this Pyrot
+business may lose its beautiful simplicity. It was limpid; like a
+rock-crystal its value lay in its transparency. You could have searched
+it in vain with a magnifying-glass for a straw, a bend, a blot, for the
+least fault. When it left my hands it was as pure as the light. Indeed
+it was the light. I give you a pearl and you make a mountain out of it.
+To tell you the truth I am afraid that by wishing to do too well you
+have done less well. Proofs! of course it is good to have proofs, but
+perhaps it is better to have none at all. I have already told you,
+Panther, there is only one irrefutable proof, the confession of the
+guilty person (or if the innocent what matter!). The Pyrot affair, as
+I arranged it, left no room for criticism; there was no spot where it
+could be touched. It defied assault. It was invulnerable because it was
+invisible. Now it gives an enormous handle for discussion. I advise
+you, Panther, to use your paper packets with great reserve. I should
+be particularly grateful if you would be more sparing of your
+communications to journalists. You speak well, but you say too much.
+Tell me, Panther, are there any forged documents among these?"
+
+"There are some adapted ones."
+
+"That is what I meant. There are some adapted ones. So much the better.
+As proofs, forged documents, in general, are better than genuine ones,
+first of all because they have been expressly made to suit the needs
+of the case, to order and measure, and therefore they are fitting and
+exact. They are also preferable because they carry the mind into an
+ideal world and turn it aside from the reality which, alas! in this
+world is never without some alloy. . . . Nevertheless, I think I should
+have preferred, Panther, that we had no proofs at all."
+
+The first act of the Anti-Pyrotist Association was to ask the Government
+immediately to summon the seven hundred Pyrotists and their accomplices
+before the High Court of Justice as guilty of high treason. Prince des
+Boscenos was charged to speak on behalf of the Association and presented
+himself before the Council which had assembled to hear him. He expressed
+a hope that the vigilance and firmness of the Government would rise to
+the height of the occasion. He shook hands with each of the ministers
+and as he passed General Greatauk he whispered in his ear:
+
+"Behave properly, you ruffian, or I will publish the Maloury dossier!"
+
+Some days later by a unanimous vote of both Houses, on a motion proposed
+by the Government, the Anti-Pyrotist Association was granted a charter
+recognising it as beneficial to the public interest.
+
+The Association immediately sent a deputation to Chitterlings Castle in
+Porpoisia, where Crucho was eating the bitter bread of exile, to assure
+the prince of the love and devotion of the Anti-Pyrotist members.
+
+However, the Pyrotists grew in numbers, and now counted ten thousand.
+They had their regular cafes on the boulevards. The patriots had theirs
+also, richer and bigger, and every evening glasses of beer, saucers,
+match-stands, jugs, chairs, and tables were hurled from one to the
+other. Mirrors were smashed to bits, and the police ended the struggles
+by impartially trampling the combatants of both parties under their
+hob-nailed shoes.
+
+On one of these glorious nights, as Prince des Boscenos was leaving
+a fashionable cafe in the company of some patriots, M. de La Trumelle
+pointed out to him a little, bearded man with glasses, hatless, and
+having only one sleeve to his coat, who was painfully dragging himself
+along the rubbish-strewn pavement.
+
+"Look!" said he, "there is Colomban!"
+
+The prince had gentleness as well as strength; he was exceedingly mild;
+but at the name of Colomban his blood boiled. He rushed at the little
+spectacled man, and knocked him down with one blow of his fist on the
+nose.
+
+M. de La Trumelle then perceived that, misled by an undeserved
+resemblance, he had mistaken for Colomban, M. Bazile, a retired lawyer,
+the secretary of the Anti-pyrotist Association, and an ardent and
+generous patriot. Prince des Boscenos was one of those antique souls who
+never bend. However, he knew how to recognise his faults.
+
+"M. Bazile," said he, raising his hat, "if I have touched your face with
+my hand you will excuse me and you will understand me, you will approve
+of me, nay, you will compliment me, you will congratulate me and
+felicitate me, when you know the cause of that act. I took you for
+Colomban."
+
+M. Bazile, wiping his bleeding nostrils with his handkerchief and
+displaying an elbow laid bare by the absence of his sleeve:
+
+"No, sir," answered he drily, "I shall not felicitate you, I shall not
+congratulate you, I shall not compliment you, for your action was, at
+the very least, superfluous; it was, I will even say, supererogatory.
+Already this evening I have been three times mistaken for Colomban and
+received a sufficient amount of the treatment he deserves. The patriots
+have knocked in my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion
+that that was enough."
+
+Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists appeared,
+and misled in their turn by that insidious resemblance, they believed
+that the patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des
+Boscenos and his companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and
+left them for dead. Then seizing Bazile they carried him in triumph, and
+in spite of his protests, along the boulevards, amid cries of: "Hurrah
+for Colomban! Hurrah for Pyrot!" At last the police, who had been sent
+after them, attacked and defeated them and dragged them ignominiously to
+the station, where Bazile, under the name of Colomban, was trampled on
+by an innumerable quantity of thick, hob-nailed shoes.
+
+
+
+
+VII. BIDAULT-COQUILLE AND MANIFLORE, THE SOCIALISTS
+
+Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine
+Bidault-Coquille, poorest and happiest of astronomers, installed in
+an old steam-engine of the time of the Draconides, was observing the
+heavens through a bad telescope, and photographing the paths of the
+meteors upon some damaged photographic plates. His genius corrected the
+errors of his instruments and his love of science triumphed over the
+worthlessness of his apparatus. With an inextinguishable ardour he
+observed aerolites, meteors, and fire-balls, and all the glowing ruins
+and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial atmosphere with
+prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he received the
+indifference of the public, the ingratitude of the State and the blame
+of the learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew
+not what occurred upon the surface of the earth. He never read the
+newspapers, and when he walked through the town his mind was occupied
+with the November asteroids, and more than once he found himself at the
+bottom of a pond in one of the public parks or beneath the wheels of a
+motor omnibus.
+
+Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and others. This
+was shown by his cold politeness as well as by a very thin black frock
+coat and a tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once
+emaciated and sublime. He took his meals in a little restaurant from
+which all customers less intellectual than himself had fled, and
+thenceforth his napkin bound by its wooden ring rested alone in the
+abandoned rack.
+
+In this cook-shop his eyes fell one evening upon Colomban's memorandum
+in favour of Pyrot. He read it as he was cracking some bad nuts and
+suddenly, exalted with astonishment, admiration, horror, and pity, he
+forgot all about falling meteors and shooting stars and saw nothing but
+the innocent man hanging in his cage exposed to the winds of heaven and
+the ravens perching upon it.
+
+That image did not leave him. For a week he had been obsessed by the
+innocent convict, when, as he was leaving his cook-shop, he saw a crowd
+of citizens entering a public-house in which a public meeting was going
+on. He went in. The meeting was disorderly; they were yelling, abusing
+one another and knocking one another down in the smoke-laden hall. The
+Pyrotists and the Anti-Pyrotists spoke in turn and were alternately
+cheered and hissed at. An obscure and confused enthusiasm moved the
+audience. With the audacity of a timid and retired man Bidault-Coquille
+leaped upon the platform and spoke for three-quarters of an hour. He
+spoke very quickly, without order, but with vehemence, and with all the
+conviction of a mathematical mystic. He was cheered. When he got down
+from the platform a big woman of uncertain age, dressed in red, and
+wearing an immense hat trimmed with heroic feathers, throwing herself
+into his arms, embraced him, and said to him:
+
+"You are splendid!"
+
+He thought in his simplicity that there was some truth in the statement.
+
+She declared to him that henceforth she would live but for Pyrot's
+defence and Colomban's glory. He thought her sublime and beautiful. She
+was Maniflore, a poor old courtesan, now forgotten and discarded, who
+had suddenly become a vehement politician.
+
+She never left him. They spent glorious hours together in doss-houses
+and in lodgings beautified by their love, in newspaper offices, in
+meeting-halls and in lecture-halls. As he was an idealist, he persisted
+in thinking her beautiful, although she gave him abundant opportunity of
+seeing that she had preserved no charm of any kind. From her past beauty
+she only retained a confidence in her capacity for pleasing and a lofty
+assurance in demanding homage. Still, it must be admitted that this
+Pyrot affair, so fruitful in prodigies, invested Maniflore with a sort
+of civic majesty, and transformed her, at public meetings, into an
+august symbol of justice and truth.
+
+Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore did not kindle the least spark of irony
+or amusement in a single Anti-Pyrotist, a single defender of Greatauk,
+or a single supporter of the army. The gods, in their anger, had refused
+to those men the precious gift of humour. They gravely accused the
+courtesan and the astronomer of being spies, of treachery, and of
+plotting against their country. Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore grew
+visibly greater beneath insult, abuse, and calumny.
+
+For long months Penguinia had been divided into two camps and, though at
+first sight it may appear strange, hitherto the socialists had taken
+no part in the contest. Their groups comprised almost all the manual
+workers in the country, necessarily scattered, confused, broken up, and
+divided, but formidable. The Pyrot affair threw the group leaders into a
+singular embarrassment. They did not wish to place themselves either on
+the side of the financiers or on the side of the army. They regarded
+the Jews, both great and small, as their uncompromising opponents. Their
+principles were not at stake, nor were their interests concerned in the
+affair. Still the greater number felt how difficult it was growing for
+them to remain aloof from struggles in which all Penguinia was engaged.
+
+Their leaders called a sitting of their federation at the Rue de la
+Queue-du-diable-St. Mael, to take into consideration the conduct they
+ought to adopt in the present circumstances and in future eventualities.
+
+Comrade Phoenix was the first to speak.
+
+"A crime," said he, "the most odious and cowardly of crimes, a judicial
+crime, has been committed. Military judges, coerced or misled by their
+superior officers, have condemned an innocent man to an infamous and
+cruel punishment. Let us not say that the victim is not one of our own
+party, that he belongs to a caste which was, and always will be, our
+enemy. Our party is the party of social justice; it can look upon no
+iniquity with indifference.
+
+"It would be a shame for us if we left it to Kerdanic, a radical,
+to Colomban, a member of the middle classes, and to a few moderate
+Republicans, alone to proceed against the crimes of the army. If
+the victim is not one of us, his executioners are our brothers'
+executioners, and before Greatauk struck down this soldier he shot our
+comrades who were on strike.
+
+"Comrades, by an intellectual, moral and material effort you must rescue
+Pyrot from his torment, and in performing this generous act you are
+not turning aside from the liberating and revolutionary task you have
+undertaken, for Pyrot his become the symbol of the oppressed and of all
+the social iniquities that now exist; by destroying one you make all the
+others tremble."
+
+When Phoenix ended, comrade Sapor spoke in these terms:
+
+"You are advised to abandon your task in order to do something with
+which you have no concern. Why throw yourselves into a conflict
+where, on whatever side you turn, you will find none but your natural,
+uncompromising, even necessary opponents? Are the financiers to be less
+hated by us than the army? What inept and criminal generosity is it that
+hurries you to save those seven hundred Pyrotists whom you will always
+find confronting you in the social war?
+
+"It is proposed that you act the part of the police for your enemies,
+and that you are to re-establish for them the order which their own
+crimes have disturbed. Magnanimity pushed to this degree changes its
+name.
+
+"Comrades, there is a point at which infamy becomes fatal to a society.
+Penguin society is being strangled by its infamy, and you are requested
+to save it, to give it air that it can breathe. This is simply turning
+you into ridicule.
+
+"Leave is to smother itself and let us gaze at its last convulsions with
+joyful contempt, only regretting that it has so entirely corrupted the
+soil on which it has been built that we shall find nothing but poisoned
+mud on which to lay the foundations of a new society."
+
+When Sapor had ended his speech comrade Lapersonne pronounced these few
+words:
+
+"Phoenix calls us to Pyrot's help for the reason that Pyrot is innocent.
+It seems to me that that is a very bad reason. If Pyrot is innocent he
+has behaved like a good soldier and has always conscientiously worked
+at his trade, which principally consists in shooting the people. That is
+not a motive to make the people brave all dangers in his defence. When
+it is demonstrated to me that Pyrot is guilty and that he stole the army
+hay, I shall be on his side."
+
+Comrade Larrivee afterwards spoke.
+
+"I am not of my friend, Phoenix's opinion but I am not with my friend
+Sapor either. I do not believe that the party is bound to embrace a
+cause as soon as we are told that that cause is just. That, I am afraid,
+is a grievous abuse of words and a dangerous equivocation. For social
+justice is not revolutionary justice. They are both in perpetual
+antagonism: to serve the one is to oppose the other. As for me, my
+choice is made. I am for revolutionary justice as against social
+justice. Still, in the present case I am against abstention. I say that
+when a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we should be fools not
+to profit by it.
+
+"How? We are given an opportunity of striking terrible, perhaps
+fatal, blows against militarism. And am I to fold my arms? I tell you,
+comrades, I am not a fakir, I have never been a fakir, and if there are
+fakirs here let them not count on me. To sit in meditation is a policy
+without results and one which I shall never adopt.
+
+"A party like ours ought to be continually asserting itself. It ought to
+prove its existence by continual action. We will intervene in the Pyrot
+affair but we will intervene in it in a revolutionary manner; we
+will adopt violent action. . . . Perhaps you think that violence is
+old-fashioned and superannuated, to be scrapped along with diligences,
+hand-presses and aerial telegraphy. You are mistaken. To-day as
+yesterday nothing is obtained except by violence; it is the one
+efficient instrument. The only thing necessary is to know how to use it.
+You ask what will our action be? I will tell you: it will be to stir up
+the governing classes against one another, to put the army in conflict
+with the capitalists, the government with the magistracy, the nobility
+and clergy with the Jews, and if possible to drive them all to destroy
+one another. To do this would be to carry on an agitation which would
+weaken government in the same way that fever wears out the sick.
+
+"The Pyrot affair, little as we know how to turn it to advantage,
+will put forward by ten years the growth of the Social party and the
+emancipation of the proletariat, by disarmament, the general strike, and
+revolution."
+
+The leaders of the party having each expressed a different opinion, the
+discussion was continued, not without vivacity. The orators, as always
+happens in such a case, reproduced the arguments they had already
+brought forward, though with less order and moderation than before. The
+dispute was prolonged and none changed his opinion. These opinions, in
+the final analysis, were reduced to two: that of Sapor and Lapersonne
+who advised abstention, and that of Phoenix and Larrivee, who wanted
+intervention. Even these two contrary opinions were united in a common
+hatred of the heads of the army and of their justice, and in a common
+belief in Pyrot's innocence. So that public opinion was hardly mistaken
+in regarding all the Socialist leaders as pernicious Anti-Pyrotists.
+
+As for the vast masses in whose name they spoke and whom they
+represented as far as speech can express the impossible--as for the
+proletarians whose thought is difficult to know and who do not know it
+themselves, it seemed that the Pyrot affair did not interest them. It
+was too literary for them, it was in too classical a style, and had an
+upper-middle-class and high-finance tone about it that did not please
+them much.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. THE COLOMBAN TRIAL
+
+When the Colomban trial began, the Pyrotists were not many more than
+thirty thousand, but they were every where and might be found even among
+the priests and millionaires. What injured them most was the sympathy of
+the rich Jews. On the other hand they derived valuable advantages from
+their feeble number. In the first place there were among them fewer
+fools than among their opponents, who were over-burdened with them.
+Comprising but a feeble minority, they co-operated easily, acted
+with harmony, and had no temptation to divide and thus counteract one
+another's efforts. Each of them felt the necessity of doing the best
+possible and was the more careful of his conduct as he found himself
+more in the public eye. Finally, they had every reason to hope that they
+would gain fresh adherents, while their opponents, having had everybody
+with them at the beginning, could only decrease.
+
+Summoned before the judges at a public sitting, Colomban immediately
+perceived that his judges were not anxious to discover the truth. As
+soon as he opened his mouth the President ordered him to be silent in
+the superior interests of the State. For the same reason, which is the
+supreme reason, the witnesses for the defence were not heard. General
+Panther, the Chief of the Staff, appeared in the witness-box, in full
+uniform and decorated with all his orders. He deposed as follows:
+
+"The infamous Colomban states that we have no proofs against Pyrot. He
+lies; we have them. I have in my archives seven hundred and thirty-two
+square yards of them which at five hundred pounds each make three
+hundred and sixty-six thousand pounds."
+
+That superior officer afterwards gave, with elegance and ease, a summary
+of those proofs.
+
+"They are of all colours and all shades," said he in substance, "they
+are of every form--pot, crown, sovereign, grape, dove-cot, grand eagle,
+etc. The smallest is less than the hundredth part of a square inch, the
+largest measures seventy yards long by ninety yards broad."
+
+At this revelation the audience shuddered with horror.
+
+Greatauk came to give evidence in his turn. Simpler, and perhaps
+greater, he wore a grey tunic and held his hands joined behind his back.
+
+"I leave," said he calmly and in a slightly raised voice, "I leave to M.
+Colomban the responsibility for an act that has brought our country
+to the brink of ruin. The Pyrot affair is secret; it ought to remain
+secret. If it were divulged the cruelest ills, wars, pillages,
+depredations, fires, massacres, and epidemics would immediately burst
+upon Penguinia. I should consider myself guilty of high treason if I
+uttered another word."
+
+Some persons known for their political experience, among others M.
+Bigourd, considered the evidence of the Minister of War as abler and of
+greater weight than that of his Chief of Staff.
+
+The evidence of Colonel de Boisjoli made a great impression.
+
+"One evening at the Ministry of War," said that officer, "the attache of
+a neighbouring Power told me that while visiting his sovereign's stables
+he had once admired some soft and fragrant hay, of a pretty green
+colour, the finest hay he had ever seen! 'Where did it come from?' I
+asked him. He did not answer, but there seemed to me no doubt about its
+origin. It was the hay Pyrot had stolen. Those qualities of verdure,
+softness, and aroma, are those of our national hay. The forage of the
+neighbouring Power is grey and brittle; it sounds under the fork and
+smells of dust. One can draw one own conclusions."
+
+Lieutenant-Colonel Hastaing said in the witness-box, amid hisses, that
+he did not believe Pyrot guilty. He was immediately seized by the police
+and thrown into the bottom of a dungeon where, amid vipers, toads, and
+broken glass, he remained insensible both to promises and threats.
+
+The usher called:
+
+"Count Pierre Maubec de la Dentdulynx."
+
+There was deep silence, and a stately but ill-dressed nobleman, whose
+moustaches pointed to the skies and whose dark eyes shot forth flashing
+glances, was seen advancing toward the witness-box.
+
+He approached Colomban and casting upon him a look of ineffable disdain:
+
+"My evidence," said he, "here it is: you excrement!"
+
+At these words the entire hall burst into enthusiastic applause and
+jumped up, moved by one of those transports that stir men's hearts and
+rouse them to extraordinary actions. Without another word Count Maubec
+de la Dentdulynx withdrew.
+
+All those present left the Court and formed a procession behind him.
+Prostrate at his feet, Princess des Boscenos held his legs in a close
+embrace, but he went on, stern and impassive, beneath a shower of
+handkerchiefs and flowers. Viscountess Olive, clinging to his neck,
+could not be removed, and the calm hero bore her along with him,
+floating on his breast like a light scarf.
+
+When the court resumed its sitting, which it had been compelled to
+suspend, the President called the experts.
+
+Vermillard, the famous expert in handwriting, gave the results of his
+researches.
+
+"Having carefully studied," said he, "the papers found in Pyrot's house,
+in particular his account book and his laundry books, I noticed that,
+though apparently not out of the common, they formed an impenetrable
+cryptogram, the key to which, however, I discovered. The traitor's
+infamy is to be seen in every line. In this system of writing the
+words 'Three glasses of beer and twenty francs for Adele' mean 'I have
+delivered thirty thousand trusses of hay to a neighbouring Power! From
+these documents I have even been able to establish the composition of
+the hay delivered by this officer. The words waistcoat, drawers, pocket
+handkerchief, collars, drink, tobacco, cigars, mean clover, meadowgrass,
+lucern, burnet, oats, rye-grass, vernal-grass, and common cat's tail
+grass. And these are precisely the constituents of the hay furnished
+by Count Maubec to the Penguin cavalry. In this way Pyrot mentioned
+his crimes in a language that he believed would always remain
+indecipherable. One is confounded by so much astuteness and so great a
+want of conscience."
+
+Colomban, pronounced guilty without any extenuating circumstances,
+was condemned to the severest penalty. The judges immediately signed a
+warrant consuming him to solitary confinement.
+
+In the Place du Palais on the sides of a river whose banks had during
+the course of twelve centuries seen so great a history, fifty thousand
+persons were tumultuously awaiting the result of the trial. Here were
+the heads of the Anti-Pyrotist Association, among whom might be seen
+Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, Viscount Olive, and M. de La Trumelle;
+here crowded the Reverend Father Agaric and the teachers of St. Mael
+College with their pupils; here the monk Douillard and General Caraguel,
+embracing each other, formed a sublime group. The market women and
+laundry women with spits, shovels, tongs, beetles, and kettles full of
+water might be seen running across the Pont-Vieux. On the steps in front
+of the bronze gates were assembled all the defenders of Pyrot in Alca,
+professors, publicists, workmen, some conservatives, others Radicals or
+Revolutionaries, and by their negligent dress and fierce aspect could
+be recognised comrades Phoenix, Larrivee, Lapersonne, Dagobert, and
+Varambille. Squeezed in his funereal frock-coat and wearing his hat of
+ceremony, Bidault-Coquille invoked the sentimental mathematics on
+behalf of Colomban and Colonel Hastaing. Maniflore shone smiling and
+resplendent on the topmost step, anxious, like Leaena, to deserve
+a glorious monument, or to be given, like Epicharis, the praises of
+history.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists disguised as lemonade sellers,
+utter-merchants, collectors of odds and ends, or anti-Pyrotists,
+wandered round the vast building.
+
+When Colomban appeared, so great an uproar burst forth that, struck by
+the commotion of air and water, birds fell from the trees and fishes
+floated on the surface of the stream.
+
+On all sides there were yells:
+
+"Duck Colomban, duck him, duck him!"
+
+There were some cries of "Justice and truth!" and a voice was even heard
+shouting:
+
+"Down with the Army!"
+
+This was the signal for a terrible struggle. The combatants fell in
+thousands, and their bodies formed howling and moving mounds on top of
+which fresh champions gripped each other by the throats. Women, eager,
+pale, and dishevelled, with clenched teeth and frantic nails, rushed
+on the man, in transports that, in the brilliant light of the public
+square, gave to their faces expressions unsurpassed even in the shade
+of curtains and in the hollows of pillows. They were going to seize
+Colomban, to bite him, to strangle, dismember and rend him, when
+Maniflore, tall and dignified in her red tunic, stood forth, serene
+and terrible, confronting these furies who recoiled from before her in
+terror. Colomban seemed to be saved; his partisans succeeded in clearing
+a passage for him through the Place du Palais and in putting him into a
+cab stationed at the corner of the Pont-Vieux. The horse was already in
+full trot when Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, and M. de La Trumelle
+knocked the driver off his seat. Then, making the animal back and
+pushing the spokes of the wheels, they ran the vehicle on to the parapet
+of the bridge, whence they overturned it into the river amid the cheers
+of the delirious crowd. With a resounding splash a jet of water rose
+upwards, and then nothing but a slight eddy was to be seen on the
+surface of the stream.
+
+Almost immediately comrades Dagobert and Varambille, with the help of
+the seven hundred disguised Pyrotists, sent Prince des Boscenos head
+foremost into a river-laundry in which he was lamentably swallowed up.
+
+Serene night descended over the Place du Palais and shed silence and
+peace upon the frightful ruins with which it was strewed. In the mean
+time, Colomban, three thousand yards down the stream, cowering beside
+a lame old horse on a bridge, was meditating on the ignorance and
+injustice of crowds.
+
+"The business," said he to himself, "is even more troublesome than I
+believed. I foresee fresh difficulties."
+
+He got up and approached the unhappy animal.
+
+"What have you, poor friend, done to them?" said he. "It is on my
+account they have used you so cruelly."
+
+He embraced the unfortunate beast and kissed the white star on his
+forehead. Then he took him by the bridle and led him, both of them
+limping, trough the sleeping city to his house, where sleep soon allowed
+them to forget mankind.
+
+
+
+
+IX. FATHER DOUILLARD
+
+In their infinite gentleness and at the suggestion of the common father
+of the faithful, the bishops, canons, vicars, curates, abbots, and
+friars of Penguinia resolved to hold a solemn service in the cathedral
+of Alca, and to pray that Divine mercy would deign to put an end to the
+troubles that distracted one of the noblest countries in Christendom,
+and grant to repentant Penguinia pardon for its crimes against God and
+the ministers of religion.
+
+The ceremony took place on the fifteenth of June. General Caraguel,
+surrounded by his staff, occupied the churchwarden's pew. The
+congregation was numerous and brilliant. According to M. Bigourd's
+expression it was both crowded and select. In the front rank was to be
+seen M. de la Bertheoseille, Chamberlain to his Highness Prince Crucho.
+Near the pulpit, which was to be ascended by the Reverend Father
+Douillard, of the Order of St. Francis, were gathered, in an attitude of
+attention with their hands crossed upon their wands of office, the great
+dignitaries of the Anti-Pyrotist association, Viscount Olive, M. de
+La Trumelle, Count Clena, the Duke d'Ampoule, and Prince des Boscenos.
+Father Agaric was in the apse with the teachers and pupils of St. Mael
+College. The right-hand transept and aisle were reserved for officers
+and soldiers in uniform, this side being thought the more honourable,
+since the Lord leaned his head to the right when he died on the
+Cross. The ladies of the aristocracy, and among them Countess Clena,
+Viscountess Olive, and Princess des Boscenos, occupied reserved seats.
+In the immense building and in the square outside were gathered twenty
+thousand clergy of all sorts, as well as thirty thousand of the laity.
+
+After the expiatory and propitiatory ceremony the Reverend Father
+Douillard ascended the pulpit. The sermon had at first been entrusted to
+the Reverend Father Agaric, but, in spite of his merits, he was thought
+unequal to the occasion in zeal and doctrine, and the eloquent Capuchin
+friar, who for six months had gone through the barracks preaching
+against the enemies of God and authority, had been chosen in his place.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, taking as his text, "He hath put down the
+mighty from their seat," established that all temporal power has God as
+its principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when it
+turns aside from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from
+the end to which He has directed it.
+
+Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he drew a
+terrible picture of the evils that the country's rulers had been unable
+either to prevent or to foresee.
+
+"The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my brethren,"
+said he, "is only too well known to you. He is a monster whose destiny
+is providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from the
+Greek word, pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this
+etymology that a Jew was to set ablaze the country that had welcomed
+him."
+
+He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the Church,
+and crying in its agony:
+
+"O woe! O glory! Those who have crucified my God are crucifying me!"
+
+At these words a prolonged shudder passed through the assembly.
+
+The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he described
+the proud and crime-stained Colomban, plunged into the stream, all
+the waters of which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the
+humiliations and all the perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the
+President of the Republic and his Prime Minister with them.
+
+"That Minister," said he, "having been guilty of degrading cowardice
+in not exterminating the seven hundred Pyrotists with their allies and
+defenders, as Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered
+himself unworthy of exercising the power that God delegated to him,
+and every good citizen ought henceforth to insult his contemptible
+government. Heaven will look favourably on those who despise him.
+'He hath put down the mighty from their seat.' God will depose these
+pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their place strong men who
+will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you officers,
+non-commissioned officers, and soldiers who listen to me, I tell you
+General of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey
+God's orders, if in His name you do not depose those now in authority,
+if you do not establish a religious and strong government in Penguinia,
+God will none the less destroy what He has condemned, He will none the
+less save His people. He will save them, but, if you are wanting, He
+will do so by means of a humble artisan or a simple corporal. Hasten!
+The hour will soon be past."
+
+Excited by this ardent exhortation, the sixty thousand people present
+rose up trembling and shouting: "To arms! To arms! Death to the
+Pyrotists! Hurrah for Crucho!" and all of them, monks, women, soldiers,
+noblemen, citizens, and loafers, who were gathered beneath the
+superhuman arm uplifted in the pulpit, struck up the hymn, "Let us save
+Penguinia!" They rushed impetuously from the basilica and marched along
+the quays to the Chamber of Deputies.
+
+Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting his arms to
+heaven, murmured in broken accents:
+
+"Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well whither this
+will lead us."
+
+The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace was
+repulsed. Vigorously charged by the police and Alcan guards, the
+assailants were already fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists,
+running from the slums and led by comrades Phoenix, Dagobert,
+Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw themselves upon them and completed
+their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and d'Ampoule were taken to the
+police station. Prince des Boscenos, after a valiant struggle, fell upon
+the bloody pavement with a fractured skull.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an innumerable
+crowd of paper-sellers and gutter-merchants, ran through the boulevards
+all night, carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the mirrors of
+the cafes and the glasses of the street lamps amid cries of "Down with
+Crucho! Hurrah for the Social Revolution!" The Anti-Pyrotists in their
+turn upset the newspaper kiosks and tore down the hoardings.
+
+These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and they
+were fit causes for grief to the municipal authorities, who desired to
+preserve the good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder
+for a man of heart was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from
+fear of blows, kept at an equal distance from the two camps, and who,
+although they allowed their selfishness and cowardice to be visible,
+claimed admiration for the generosity of their sentiments and the
+nobility of their souls. They rubbed their eyes with onions, gaped like
+whitings, blew violently into their handkerchiefs, and, bringing their
+voices out of the depths of their stomachs, groaned forth: "O Penguins,
+cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend your mother's bosom!"
+As if men could live in society without disputes and without quarrels,
+and as if civil discords were not the necessary conditions of national
+life and progress. They showed themselves hypocritical cowards by
+proposing a compromise between the just and the unjust, offending
+the just in his rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these
+creatures, the rich and powerful Machimel, a champion coward, rose upon
+the town like a colossus of grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at
+his feet and his sighs capsized the boats of the fishermen.
+
+During these stormy nights Bidault-Coquille at the top of his old
+steam-engine, under the serene sky, boasted in his heart, while the
+shooting stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He
+was fighting for justice. He loved and was loved with a sublime passion.
+Insult and calumny raised him to the clouds. A caricature of him in
+company with those of Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be
+seen in the newspaper kiosks. The Anti-Pyrotists proclaimed that he
+had received fifty thousand francs from the big Jewish financiers.
+The reporters of the militarist sheets held interviews regarding his
+scientific knowledge with official scholars, who declared he had no
+knowledge of the stars, disputed his most solid observations, denied
+his most certain discoveries, and condemned his most ingenious and most
+fruitful hypotheses. He exulted under these flattering blows of hatred
+and envy.
+
+He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of lights,
+without giving a thought to all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias,
+vain dreams, spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a
+great city contains.
+
+"It is in this enormous city," said he to himself, "that the just and
+the unjust are joining battle."
+
+And substituting a simple and magnificent poetry for the multiple and
+vulgar reality, he represented to himself the Pyrot affair as a struggle
+between good and bad angels. He awaited the eternal triumph of the
+Sons of Light and congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day
+confounding the Children of Night.
+
+
+
+
+X. MR. JUSTICE CHAUSSEPIED
+
+Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the bands of
+Friar Douillard and the partisans of Prince Crucho, the Republicans at
+last opened their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair.
+The deputies who had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the
+patriotic crowds became, not indeed more courageous, but altered their
+cowardice and blamed Robin Mielleux for disorders which their own
+compliance had encouraged, and the instigators of which they had several
+times slavishly congratulated. They reproached him for having imperilled
+the Republic by a weakness which was really theirs and a timidity
+which they themselves had imposed upon him. Some of them began to doubt
+whether it was not to their interest to believe in Pyrot's innocence
+rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward they felt a bitter anguish
+at the thought that the unhappy man might have been wrongly convicted
+and that in his aerial cage he might be expiating another man's crimes.
+"I cannot sleep on account of it!" was what several members of Minister
+Guillaumette's majority used to say. But these were ambitious to replace
+their chief.
+
+These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the President of
+the Republic put in Robin Mielleux's place, a patriarchal Republican
+with a flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the
+Penguins, understood nothing about the affair, but thought that too many
+monks were mixed up in it.
+
+General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his final
+advice to Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.
+
+"I go and you remain," said he, as he shook hands with him. "The Pyrot
+affair is my daughter; I confide her to you, she is worthy of your love
+and your care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves
+the shade, is leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her
+modesty with gentleness. Too many indiscreet looks have already profaned
+her charms. . . . Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You
+have many, perhaps too many, in your possession. I see that there will
+be many tiresome interventions and much dangerous curiosity. If I were
+in your place I would tear up all those documents. Believe me, the best
+of proofs is none at all. That is the only one which nobody discusses."
+
+Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this advice. The
+future was only too thoroughly to justify Greatauk's perspicacity. La
+Trinite demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche,
+his Minister of War, refused them in the superior interests of the
+national defence, telling him that the documents under General Panther's
+care formed the hugest mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied
+the case as well as he could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of
+the matter, suspected it of irregularity. Conformably to his rights
+and prerogatives he then ordered a fresh trial to be held. Immediately,
+Peniche, his Minister of War, accused him of insulting the army and
+betraying the country and flung his portfolio at his head. He was
+replaced by a second, who did the same. To him succeeded a third, who
+imitated these examples, and those after him to the number of seventy
+acted like their predecessors, until the venerable La Trinite groaned
+beneath the weight of bellicose portfolios. The seventy-first Minister
+of War, van Julep, retained office. Not that he was in disagreement with
+so many and such noble colleagues, but he had been commissioned by them
+generously to betray his Prime Minister, to cover him with shame and
+opprobrium, and to convert the new trial to the glory of Greatauk, the
+satisfaction of the Anti-Pyrotists, the profit of the monks, and the
+restoration of Prince Crucho.
+
+General van Julep, though endowed with high military virtues, was not
+intelligent enough to employ the subtle conduct and exquisite methods of
+Greatauk. He thought, like General Panther, that tangible proofs against
+Pyrot were necessary, that they could never ave too many of them, that
+they could never have even enough. He expressed these' sentiments to his
+Chief of Staff, who was only too inclined to agree with them.
+
+"Panther," said he, "we are at the moment when we need abundant and
+superabundant proofs."
+
+"You have said enough, General," answered Panther, "I will complete my
+piles of documents."
+
+Six months later the proofs against Pyrot filled two storeys of the
+Ministry of War. The ceiling fell in beneath the weight of the bundles,
+and the avalanche of falling documents crushed two head clerks, fourteen
+second clerks, and sixty copying clerks, who were at work upon the
+ground floor arranging a change in the fashion of the cavalry gaiters.
+The walls of the huge edifice had to be propped. Passers-by saw
+with amazement enormous beams and monstrous stanchions which reared
+themselves obliquely against the noble front of the building, now
+tottering and disjointed, and blocked up the streets, stopped the
+carriages, and presented to the motor-omnibuses an obstacle against
+which they dashed with their loads of passengers.
+
+The judges who had condemned Pyrot were not, properly speaking, judges
+but soldiers. The judges who had condemned Colomban were real judges,
+but of inferior rank, wearing seedy black clothes like church vergers,
+unlucky wretches of judges, miserable judgelings. Above them were the
+superior judges who wore ermine robes over their black gowns. These,
+renowned for their knowledge and doctrine, formed a court whose terrible
+name expressed power. It was called the Court of Appeal (Cassation) so
+as to make it clear that it was the hammer suspended over the judgments
+and decrees of all other jurisdictions.
+
+One of these superior red Judges of the Supreme Court, called
+Chaussepied, led a modest and tranquil life in a suburb of Alca. His
+soul was pure, his heart honest, his spirit just. When he had finished
+studying his documents he used to play the violin and cultivate
+hyacinths. Every Sunday he dined with his neighbours the Mesdemoiselles
+Helbivore. His old age was cheerful and robust and his friends often
+praised the amenity of his character.
+
+For some months, however, he had been irritable and touchy, and when he
+opened a newspaper his broad and ruddy face would become covered with
+dolorous wrinkles and darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the cause
+of it. Justice Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could
+have committed so black a crime as to hand over eighty thousand trusses
+of military hay to a neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could still
+less conceive how a scoundrel should have found official defenders in
+Penguinia. The thought that there existed in his country a Pyrot,
+a Colonel Hastaing, a Colomban, a Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his
+hyacinths, his violin, his heaven, and his earth, all nature, and even
+his dinner with the Mesdemoiselles Helbivore!
+
+In the mean time the Pyrot case, having been presented to the Supreme
+Court by the Keeper of Seals, it fell to Chaussepied to examine it and
+cover its defects, in case any existed. Although as upright and honest
+as a man can be, and trained by long habit to exercise his magistracy
+without fear or favour, he expected to find in the documents he
+submitted to him proofs of certain guilt and obvious criminality. After
+lengthened difficulties and repeated refusals on the part of General
+Julep, Justice Chaussepied was allowed to examine the documents.
+Numbered and initialed they ran to the number of fourteen millions six
+hundred and twenty-six thousand three hundred and twelve. As he studied
+them the judge was at first surprised, then astonished, then stupefied,
+amazed, and, if I dare say so, flabbergasted. He found among the
+documents prospectuses of new fancy shops, newspapers, fashion-plates,
+paper bags, old business letters, exercise books, brown paper, green
+paper for rubbing parquet floors, playing cards, diagrams, six thousand
+copies of the "Key to Dreams," but not a single document in which any
+mention was made of Pyrot.
+
+
+
+
+XI. CONCLUSION
+
+The appeal was allowed, and Pyrot was brought down from his cage. But
+the Anti-Pyrotists did not regard themselves as beaten. The military
+judges re-tried Pyrot. Greatauk, in this second affair, surpassed
+himself. He obtained a second conviction; he obtained it by declaring
+that the proofs communicated to the Supreme Court were worth nothing,
+and that great care had been taken to keep back the good ones, since
+they ought to remain secret. In the opinion of connoisseurs he had never
+shown so much address. On leaving the court, as he passed through the
+vestibule with a tranquil step, and his hands behind his back, amidst a
+crowd of sight-seers, a woman dressed in red and with her face covered
+by a black veil rushed at him, brandishing a kitchen knife.
+
+"Die, scoundrel!" she cried. It was Maniflore. Before those present
+could understand what was happening, the general seized her by the
+wrist, and with apparent gentleness, squeezed it so forcibly that the
+knife fell from her aching hand.
+
+Then he picked it up and handed it to Maniflore.
+
+"Madam," said he with a bow, "you have dropped a household utensil."
+
+He could not prevent the heroine from being taken to the police-station;
+but he had her immediately released and afterwards he employed all his
+influence to stop the prosecution.
+
+The second conviction of Pyrot was Greatauk's last victory.
+
+Justice Chaussepied, who had formerly liked soldiers so much, and
+esteemed their justice so highly, being now enraged with the
+military judges, quashed their judgments as a monkey cracks nuts.
+He rehabilitated Pyrot a second time; he would, if necessary, have
+rehabilitated him five hundred times.
+
+Furious at having been cowards and at having allowed themselves to be
+deceived and made game of, the Republicans turned against the monks
+and clergy. The deputies passed laws of expulsion, separation, and
+spoliation against them. What Father Cornemuse had foreseen took place.
+That good monk was driven from the Wood of Conils. Treasury officers
+confiscated his retorts and his stills, and the liquidators divided
+amongst them his bottles of St. Oberosian liqueur. The pious distiller
+lost the annual income of three million five hundred thousand francs
+that his products procured for him. Father Agaric went into exile,
+abandoning his school into the hands of laymen, who soon allowed it to
+fall into decay. Separated from its foster-mother, the State, the Church
+of Penguinia withered like a plucked flower.
+
+The victorious defenders of the innocent man now abused each other and
+overwhelmed each other reciprocally with insults and calumnies. The
+vehement Kerdanic hurled himself upon Phoenix as if ready to devour
+him. The wealthy Jews and the seven hundred Pyrotists turned away with
+disdain from the socialist comrades whose aid they had humbly implored
+in the past.
+
+"We know you no longer," said they. "To the devil with you and your
+social justice. Social justice is the defence of property."
+
+Having been elected a Deputy and chosen to be the leader of the new
+majority, comrade Larrivee was appointed by the Chamber and public
+opinion to the Premiership. He showed himself an energetic defender
+of the military tribunals that had condemned Pyrot. When his former
+socialist comrades claimed a little more justice and liberty for the
+employes of the State as well as for manual workers, he opposed their
+proposals in an eloquent speech.
+
+"Liberty," said he, "is not licence. Between order and disorder my
+choice is made: revolution is impotence. Progress has no more formidable
+enemy than violence. Gentlemen, those who, as I am, are anxious for
+reform, ought to apply themselves before everything else to cure this
+agitation which enfeebles government just as fever exhausts those who
+are ill. It is time to reassure honest people."
+
+This speech was received with applause. The government of the Republic
+remained in subjection to the great financial companies, the army was
+exclusively devoted to the defence of capital, while the fleet was
+designed solely to procure fresh orders for the mine-owners. Since the
+rich refused to pay their just share of the taxes, the poor, as in the
+past, paid for them.
+
+In the mean time from the height of his old steamline, beneath the
+crowded stars of night, Bidault-Coquille gazed sadly at the sleeping
+city. Maniflore had left him. Consumed with a desire for fresh devotions
+and fresh sacrifices, she had gone in company with a young Bulgarian
+to bear justice and vengeance to Sofia. He did not regret her, having
+perceived after the Affair, that she was less beautiful in form and in
+thought than he had at first imagined. His impressions had been modified
+in the same direction concerning many other forms and many other
+thoughts. And what was cruelest of all to him, he regarded himself as
+not so great, not so splendid, as he had believed.
+
+And he reflected:
+
+"You considered yourself sublime when you had but candour and good-will.
+Of what were you proud, Bidault-Coquille? Of having been one of the
+first to know that Pyrot was innocent and Greatauk a scoundrel. But
+three-fourths of those who defended Greatauk against the attacks of the
+seven hundred Pyrotists knew that better than you. Of what then did you
+show yourself so proud? Of having dared to say what you thought? That
+is civic courage, and, like military courage, it is a mere result of
+imprudence. You have been imprudent. So far so good, but that is
+no reason for praising yourself beyond measure. Your imprudence was
+trifling; it exposed you to trifling perils; you did not risk your head
+by it. The Penguins have lost that cruel and sanguinary pride which
+formerly gave a tragic grandeur to their revolutions; it is the fatal
+result of the weakening of beliefs and character. Ought one to look
+upon oneself as a superior spirit for having shown a little more
+clear-sightedness than the vulgar? I am very much afraid, on the
+contrary, Bidault-Coquille, that you have given proof of a gross
+misunderstanding of the conditions of the moral and intellectual
+development of a people. You imagined that social injustices were
+threaded together like pearls and that it would be enough to pull off
+one in order to unfasten the whole necklace. That is a very ingenuous
+conception. You flattered yourself that at one stroke you were
+establishing justice in your own country and in the universe. You were
+a brave man, an honest idealist, though without much experimental
+philosophy. But go home to your own heart and you will recognise that
+you had in you a spice of malice and that our ingenuousness was not
+without cunning. You believed you were performing a fine moral action.
+You said to yourself: 'Here am I, just and courageous once for all.
+I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the praise of
+historians.' And now that you have lost your illusions, now that you
+know how hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the task must ever be
+begun afresh, you are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but
+go back to them with modesty, Bidault-Coquille!"
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES
+
+
+MADAME CERES
+
+"Only extreme things are tolerable." Count Robert de Montesquiou.
+
+
+
+
+
+I. MADAME CLARENCE'S DRAWING-ROOM
+
+Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the Republic,
+loved to entertain. Every Thursday she collected together some friends
+of modest condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who
+went to see her, very different in age and rank, were all without
+money, and had all suffered much. There was a duchess who looked like
+a fortune-teller and a fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. Madame
+Clarence was pretty enough to maintain some old liaisons, but not to
+form new ones, and she generally inspired a quiet esteem. She had a very
+pretty daughter, who, since she had no dower, caused some alarm among
+the male guests; for the Penguins were as much afraid of portionless
+girls as they were of the devil himself. Eveline Clarence, noticing
+their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them their tea
+with an air of disdain. Moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties
+and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her discreet and
+retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those
+who took part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she
+would not understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might
+listen to everything.
+
+One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence's drawing-room, the
+conversation turned upon love. The ladies spoke of it with pride,
+delicacy, and mystery, the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone
+took an interest in the conversation, for each one was interested in
+what he or she said. A great deal of wit flowed; brilliant apostrophes
+were launched forth and keen repartees were returned. But when Professor
+Haddi began to speak he overwhelmed everybody.
+
+"It is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on everything
+else," said he, "they rest upon anterior habits whose very memory has
+been effaced. In morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds
+for existing, the most useless obligations, the cruelest and most
+injurious restraints, are because of their profound antiquity and the
+mystery of their origin, the least disputed and the least disputable as
+well as the most respected, and they are those that cannot be violated
+without incurring the most severe blame. All morality relative to the
+relations of the sexes is founded on this principle: that a woman once
+obtained belongs to the man, that she is his property like his horse or
+his weapons. And this having ceased to be true, absurdities result from
+it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a woman to a man, with
+clauses restricting the right of ownership introduced as a consequence
+of the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.
+
+"The obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her virginity
+to her husband comes from the times when girls were married immediately
+they were of a marriageable age. It is ridiculous that a girl who
+marries at twenty-five or thirty should be subject to that obligation.
+You will, perhaps, say that it is a present with which her husband, if
+she gets one at last, will be gratified; but every moment we see men
+wooing married women and showing themselves perfectly satisfied to take
+them as they find them.
+
+"Still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined in
+religious morality by the old belief that God, the most powerful of
+warriors, is polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself,
+and that men can only take those whom he has left. This belief, although
+traces of it exist in several metaphors of mysticism, is abandoned
+to-day, by most civilised peoples. However, it still dominates the
+education of girls not only among our believers, but even among our
+free-thinkers, who, as a rule, think freely for the reason that they do
+not think at all.
+
+"Discretion means ability to separate and discern. We say that a girl is
+discreet when she knows nothing at all. We cultivate her ignorance. In
+spite of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot
+conceal from them their own nature and their own sensations. But they
+know badly, they know in a wrong way. That is all we obtain by our
+careful education. . . ."
+
+"Sir," suddenly said Joseph Boutourle, the High Treasurer of Alca,
+"believe me, there are innocent girls, perfectly innocent girls, and it
+is a great pity. I have known three. They married, and the result was
+tragical."
+
+"I have noticed," Professor Haddock went on, "that Europeans in general
+and Penguins in particular occupy themselves, after sport and motoring,
+with nothing so much as with love. It is giving a great deal of
+importance to a matter that has very little weight."
+
+"Then, Professor," exclaimed Madame Cremeur in a choking voice, "when
+a woman has completely surrendered herself to you, you think it is a
+matter of no importance?"
+
+"No, Madame; it can have its importance," answered Professor Haddock,
+"but it is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she
+offers us a delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions.
+And then, do we not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather
+than gives herself. Look at the pretty Madame Pensee. . . ."
+
+"She is my mother," said a tall, fair young man.
+
+"Sir, I have the greatest respect for her," replied Professor Haddock;
+"do not be afraid that I intend to say anything in the least offensive
+about her. But allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of
+sons about their mothers are not to be relied on. They do not bear
+enough in mind that a mother is a mother only because she loved, and
+that she can still love. That, however, is the case, and it would be
+deplorable were it otherwise. I have noticed, on the contrary, that
+daughters do not deceive themselves about their mothers' faculty for
+loving or about the use they make of it; they are rivals; they have
+their eyes upon them."
+
+The insupportable Professor spoke a great deal longer, adding
+indecorum to awkwardness, and impertinence to incivility, accumulating
+incongruities, despising what is respectable, respecting what is
+despicable; but no one listened to him further.
+
+During this time in a room that was simple without grace, a room sad
+for the want of love, a room which, like all young girls' rooms, had
+something of the cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, Eveline
+Clarence turned over the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of
+charities in order to obtain from them some acquaintance with society.
+Being convinced that her mother, shut up in her own intellectual but
+poor world, could neither bring her out or push her into prominence, she
+decided that she herself would seek the best means of winning a husband.
+At once calm and obstinate, without dreams or illusions, and regarding
+marriage as but a ticket of admission or a passport, she kept before
+her mind a clear notion of the hazards, difficulties, and chances of her
+enterprise. She had the art of pleasing and a coldness of temperament
+that enabled her to turn it to its fullest advantage. Her weakness lay
+in the fact that she was dazzled by anything that had an aristocratic
+air.
+
+When she was alone with her mother she said:
+
+"Mamma, we will go to-morrow to Father Douillard's retreat."
+
+
+
+
+II. THE CHARITY OF ST. ORBEROSIA
+
+Every Friday evening at nine o'clock the choicest of Alcan society
+assembled in the aristocratic church of St. Mael for the Reverend Father
+Douillard's retreat. Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Viscount and
+Viscountess Olive, M. and Madame Bigourd, Monsieur and Madame de La
+Trumelle were never absent. The flower of the aristocracy might be seen
+there, and fair Jewish baronesses also adorned it by their presence, for
+the Jewish baronesses of Alca were Christians.
+
+This retreat, like all religious retreats, had for its object to procure
+for those living in the world opportunities for recollection so that
+they might think of their eternal salvation. It was also intended to
+draw down upon so man noble and illustrious families the benediction
+of L. Orberosia, who loves the Penguins. The Reverend Father Douillard
+strove for the completion of his task with a truly apostolical zeal. He
+hoped to restore the prerogatives of St. Orberosia as the patron saint
+of Penguinia and to dedicate to her a monumental church on one of the
+hills that dominate the city. His efforts had been crowned with great
+success, and for the accomplishing of this national enterprise he had
+already united more than a hundred thousand adherents and collected more
+than twenty millions of francs.
+
+It was in the choir of St. Mael's that St. Orberosia's new shrine,
+shining with gold, sparkling with precious stones, and surrounded by
+tapers and flowers, had been erected.
+
+The following account may be read in the "History of the Miracles of the
+Patron Saint of Alca" by the Abbe Plantain:
+
+"The ancient shrine had been melted down during the Terror and the
+precious relics of the saint thrown into a fire that had been lit on the
+Place de Greve; but a poor woman of great piety, named Rouquin, went by
+night at the peril of her life to gather up the calcined bones and the
+ashes of the blessed saint. She preserved them in a jam-pot, and when
+religion was again restored, brought them to the venerable Cure of
+St. Maels. The woman ended her days piously as a vendor of tapers and
+custodian of seats in the saint's chapel."
+
+It is certain that in the time of Father Douillard, although faith was
+declining, the cult of St. Orberosia, which for three hundred years had
+fallen under the criticism of Canon Princeteau and the silence of the
+Doctors of the Church, recovered, and was surrounded with more pomp,
+more splendour, and more fervour than ever. The theologians did not
+now subtract a single iota from the legend. They held as certainly
+established all the facts related by Abbot Simplicissimus, and in
+particular declared, on the testimony of that monk, that the devil,
+assuming a monk's form had carried off the saint to a cave and had there
+striven with her until she overcame him. Neither places nor dates caused
+them any embarrassment. They paid no heed to exegesis and took good
+care not to grant as much to science as Canon Princeteau had formerly
+conceded. They knew too well whither that would lead.
+
+The church shone with lights and flowers. An operatic tenor sang the
+famous canticle of St. Orberosia:
+
+     Virgin of Paradise
+     Come, come in the dusky night
+     And on us shed
+     Thy beams of light.
+
+Mademoiselle Clarence sat beside her mother and in front of Viscount
+Clena. She remained kneeling during a considerable time, for the
+attitude of prayer is natural to discreet virgins and it shows off their
+figures.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. He was a powerful
+orator and could, at once melt, surprise, and rouse his hearers. Women
+complained only that he fulminated against vice with excessive harshness
+and in crude terms that made them blush. But they liked him none the
+less for it.
+
+He treated in his sermon of the seventh trial of St. Orberosia, who was
+tempted by the dragon which she went forth to combat. But she did not
+yield, and she disarmed the monster. The orator demonstrated without
+difficulty that we, also, by the aid of St. Orberosia, and strong in the
+virtue which she inspires, can in our turn overthrow the dragons that
+dart upon us and are waiting to devour us, the dragon of doubt, the
+dragon of impiety, the dragon of forgetfulness of religious duties.
+He proved that the charity of St. Orberosia was a work of social
+regeneration, and he concluded by an ardent appeal to the faithful "to
+become instruments of the Divine mercy, eager upholders and supporters
+of the charity of St. Orberosia, and to furnish it with all the means
+which it required to take its flight and bear its salutary fruits." *
+
+     * Cf. J. Ernest Charles in the "Censeur," May-August, 1907,
+     p. 562, col. 2.
+
+After the ceremony, the Reverend Father Douillard remained in
+the sacristy at the disposal of those of the faithful who desired
+information concerning the charity, or who wished to bring their
+contributions. Mademoiselle Clarence wished to speak to Father
+Douillard, so did Viscount Clena. The crowd was large, and a queue was
+formed. By chance Viscount Clena and Mademoiselle Clarence were side by
+side and possibly they were squeezed a little closely to each other
+by the crowd. Eveline had noticed this fashionable young man, who was
+almost as well known as his father in the world of sport. Clena had
+noticed her, and, as he thought her pretty, he bowed to her, then
+apologised and pretended to believe that he had been introduced to the
+ladies, but could not remember where. They pretended to believe it also.
+
+He presented himself the following week at Madame Clarence's, thinking
+that her house was a bit fast--a thing not likely to displease him--and
+when he saw Eveline again he felt he had not been mistaken and that she
+was an extremely pretty girl.
+
+Viscount Clena had the finest motor-car in Europe. For three months he
+drove the Clarences every day over hills and plains, through woods and
+valleys; they visited famous sites and went over celebrated castles. He
+said to Eveline all that could be said and did all that could be done
+to overcome her resistance. She did not conceal from him that she
+loved him, that she would always love him, and love no one but him. She
+remained grave and trembling by his side. To his devouring passion she
+opposed the invincible defence of a virtue conscious of its danger. At
+the end of three months, after having gone uphill and down hill,
+turned sharp corners, and negotiated level crossings, and experienced
+innumerable break-downs, he knew her as well as he knew the fly-wheel of
+his car, but not much better. He employed surprises, adventures,
+sudden stoppages in the depths of forests and before hotels, but he had
+advanced no farther. He said to himself that it was absurd; then, taking
+her again in his car he set off at fifty miles an hour quite prepared to
+upset her in a ditch or to smash himself and her against a tree.
+
+One day, having come to take her on some excursion, he found her more
+charming than ever, and more provoking. He darted upon her as a storm
+falls upon the reeds that border a lake. She bent with adorable weakness
+beneath the breath of the storm, and twenty times was almost carried
+away by its strength, but twenty times she arose, supple and, bowing to
+the wind. After all these shocks one would have said that a light breeze
+had barely touched her charming stem; she smiled as if ready to be
+plucked by a bold hand. Then her unhappy aggressor, desperate, enraged,
+and three parts mad, fled so as not to kill her, mistook the door, went
+into the bedroom of Madame Clarence, whom he found putting on her hat in
+front of a wardrobe, seized her, flung her on the bed, and possessed her
+before she knew what had happened.
+
+The same day Eveline, who had been making inquiries, learned that
+Viscount Clena had nothing but debts, lived on money given him by an
+elderly lady, and promoted the sale of the latest models of a motor-car
+manufacturer. They separated with common accord and Eveline began again
+disdainfully to serve tea to her mother's guests.
+
+
+
+
+III. HIPPOLYTE CERES
+
+In Madame Clarence's drawing-room the conversation turned upon love, and
+many charming things were said about it.
+
+"Love is a sacrifice," sighed Madame Cremeur.
+
+"I agree with you," replied M. Boutourle with animation.
+
+But Professor Haddock soon displayed his fastidious insolence.
+
+"It seems to me," said he, "that the Penguin ladies have made a great
+fuss since, through St. Mael's agency, they became viviparous. But there
+is nothing to be particularly proud of in that, for it is a state they
+share in common with cows and pigs, and even with orange and lemon
+trees, for the seeds of these plants germinate in the pericarp."
+
+"The self-importance which the Penguin ladies give themselves does not
+go so far back as that," answered M. Boutourle. "It dates from the day
+when the holy apostle gave them clothes. But this self-importance was
+long kept in restraint, and displayed itself fully only with increased
+luxury of dress and in a small section of society. For go only two
+leagues from Alca into the country at harvest time, and you will see
+whether women are over-precise or self-important."
+
+On that day M. Hippolyte Ceres paid his first call. He was a Deputy of
+Alca, and one of the youngest members of the House. His father was
+said to have kept a dram shop, but he himself was a lawyer of robust
+physique, a good though prolix speaker, with a self-important air and a
+reputation for ability.
+
+"M. Ceres," said the mistress of the house, "your constituency is one of
+the finest in Alca."
+
+"And there are fresh improvements made in it every day, Madame."
+
+"Unfortunately, it is impossible to take a stroll through it any
+longer," said M. Boutourle.
+
+"Why?" asked M. Ceres.
+
+"On account of the motors, of course."
+
+"Do not give them a bad name," answered the Deputy. "They are our great
+national industry."
+
+"I know. The Penguins of to-day make me think of the ancient Egyptians.
+According to Clement of Alexandria, Taine tells us--though he misquotes
+the text--the Egyptians worshipped the crocodiles that devoured them.
+The Penguins to-day worship the motors that crush them. Without a doubt
+the future belongs to the metal beast. We are no more likely to go back
+to cabs than we are to go back to the diligence. And the long martyrdom
+of the horse will come to an end. The motor, which the frenzied cupidity
+of manufacturers hurls like a juggernaut's car upon the bewildered
+people and of which the idle and fashionable make a foolish though fatal
+elegance, will soon begin to perform its true function, and putting its
+strength at the service of the entire people, will behave like a docile,
+toiling monster. But in order that the motor may cease to be injurious
+and become beneficent we must build roads suited to its speed, roads
+which it cannot tear up with its ferocious tyres, and from which it will
+send no clouds of poisonous dust into human lungs. We ought not to allow
+slower vehicles or mere animals to go upon those roads, and we should
+establish garages upon them and foot-bridges over them, and so create
+order and harmony among the means of communication of the future. That
+is the wish of every good citizen."
+
+Madame Clarence led the conversation back to the improvements in M.
+Ceres' constituency. M. Ceres showed his enthusiasm for demolitions,
+tunnelings, constructions, reconstructions, and all other fruitful
+operations.
+
+"We build to-day in an admirable style," said he; "everywhere majestic
+avenues are being reared. Was ever anything as fine as our arcaded
+bridges and our domed hotels!"
+
+"You are forgetting that big palace surmounted an immense melon-shaped
+dome," grumbled by M. Daniset, an old art amateur, in a voice of
+restrained rage. "I am amazed at the degree of ugliness which a modern
+city can attain. Alca is becoming Americanised. Everywhere we are
+destroying all that is free, unexpected, measured, restrained, human,
+or traditional among the things that are left us. Everywhere we are
+destroying that charming object, a piece of an old wall that bears up
+the branches of a tree. Everywhere we are suppressing some fragment
+of light and air, some fragment of nature, some fragment of the
+associations that still remain with us, some fragment of our fathers,
+some fragment of ourselves. And we are putting up frightful, enormous,
+infamous houses, surmounted in Viennese style by ridiculous domes, or
+fashioned after the models of the 'new art' without mouldings, or
+having profiles with sinister corbels and burlesque pinnacles, and such
+monsters as these shamelessly peer over the surrounding buildings. We
+see bulbous protuberances stuck on the fronts of buildings and we are
+told they are 'new art' motives. I have seen the 'new art' in other
+countries, but it is not so ugly as with us; it has fancy and it has
+simplicity. It is only in our own country that by a sad privilege we may
+behold the newest and most diverse styles of architectural ugliness. Not
+an enviable privilege!"
+
+"Are you not afraid," asked M. Ceres severely, "are you not afraid that
+these bitter criticisms tend to keep out of our capital the foreigners
+who flow into it from all arts of the world and who leave millions
+behind them?"
+
+"You may set your mind at rest about that," answered M. Daniset.
+"Foreigners do not come to admire our buildings; they come to see our
+courtesans, our dressmakers, and our dancing saloons."
+
+"We have one bad habit," sighed M. Ceres, "it is that we calumniate
+ourselves."
+
+Madame Clarence as an accomplished hostess thought it was time to return
+to the subject of love and asked M. Jumel his opinion of M. Leon Blum's
+recent book in which the author complained. . . .
+
+". . . That an irrational custom," went on Professor Haddock, "prevents
+respectable young ladies from making love, a thing they would enjoy
+doing, whilst mercenary girls do it too much and without getting any
+enjoyment out of it. It is indeed deplorable. But M. Leon Blum need
+not fret too much. If the evil exists, as he says it does, in our
+middle-class society, I can assure him that everywhere else he would see
+a consoling spectacle. Among the people, the mass of the people through
+town and country, girls do not deny themselves that pleasure."
+
+"It is depravity!" said Madame Cremeur.
+
+And she praised the innocence of young girls in terms full of modesty
+and grace. It was charming to hear her.
+
+Professor Haddock's views on the same subject were, on the contrary,
+painful to listen to.
+
+"Respectable young girls," said he, "are guarded and watched over.
+Besides, men do not, as a rule, pursue them much, either through
+probity, or from a fear of grave responsibilities, or because the
+seduction of a young girl would not be to their credit. Even then we do
+not know what really takes place, for the reason that what is hidden is
+not seen. This is a condition necessary to the existence of all society.
+The scruples of respectable young girls could be more easily overcome
+than those of married women if the same pressure were brought to bear on
+them, and for this there are two reasons: they have more illusions, and
+their curiosity has not been satisfied. Women, for the most part, have
+been so disappointed by their husbands that they have not courage
+enough to begin again with somebody else. I myself have been met by this
+obstacle several times in my attempts at seduction."
+
+At the moment when Professor Haddock ended his unpleasant remarks,
+Mademoiselle Eveline Clarence entered the drawing-room and listlessly
+handed about tea with that expression of boredom which gave an oriental
+charm to her beauty.
+
+"For my part," said Hippolyte Ceres, looking at her, "I declare myself
+the young ladies' champion."
+
+"He must be a fool," thought the girl.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, who had never set foot outside of his political world
+of electors and elected, thought Madame Clarence's drawing-room most
+select, its mistress exquisite, and her daughter amazingly beautiful.
+His visits became frequent and he paid court to both of them. Madame
+Clarence, who now liked attention, thought him agreeable. Eveline showed
+no friendliness towards him, and treated him with a hauteur and disdain
+that he took for aristocratic behaviour and fashionable manners, and
+he thought all the more of her on that account. This busy man taxed his
+ingenuity to please them, and he sometimes succeeded. He got them
+cards for fashionable functions and boxes at the Opera. He furnished
+Mademoiselle Clarence with several opportunities of appearing to great
+advantage and in particular at a garden party which, although given by
+a Minister, was regarded as really fashionable, and gained its first
+success in society circles for the Republic.
+
+At that party Eveline had been much noticed and had attracted the
+special attention of a young diplomat called Roger Lambilly who,
+imagining that she belonged to a rather fast set, invited her to his
+bachelor's flat. She thought him handsome and believed him rich, and she
+accepted. A little moved, almost disquieted, she very nearly became the
+victim of her daring, and only avoided defeat by an offensive measure
+audaciously carried out. This was the most foolish escapade in her
+unmarried life.
+
+Being now on friendly terms with Ministers and with the President,
+Eveline continued to wear her aristocratic and pious affectations,
+and these won for her the sympathy of the chief personages in the
+anti-clerical and democratic Republic. M. Hippolyte Ceres, seeing that
+she was succeeding and doing him credit, liked her still more. He even
+went so far as to fall madly in love with her.
+
+Henceforth, in spite of everything, she began to observe him with
+interest, being curious to see if his passion would increase. He
+appeared to her without elegance or grace, and not well bred, but
+active, clear-sighted, full of resource, and not too great a bore. She
+still made fun of him, but he had now won her interest.
+
+One day she wished to test him. It was during the elections, when
+members of Parliament were, as the phrase runs, requesting a renewal of
+their mandates. He had an opponent, who, though not dangerous at first
+and not much of an orator, was rich and was reported to be gaining votes
+every day. Hippolyte Ceres, banishing both dull security and foolish
+alarm from his mind, redoubled his care. His chief method of action
+was by public meetings at which he spoke vehemently against the rival
+candidate. His committee held huge meetings on Saturday evenings and
+at three o'clock on Sunday afternoons. One Sunday, as he called on
+the Clarences, he found Eveline alone in the drawing-room. He had been
+chatting for about twenty or twenty-five minutes, when, taking out his
+watch, he saw that it was a quarter to three. The young girl showed
+herself amiable, engaging, attractive, and full of promises. Ceres was
+fascinated, but he stood up to go.
+
+"Stay a little longer," said she in a pressing and agreeable voice which
+made him promptly sit down again.
+
+She was full of interest, of abandon, curiosity, and weakness. He
+blushed, turned pale, and again got up.
+
+Then, in order to keep him still longer, she looked at him out of two
+grey and melting eyes, and though her bosom was heaving, she did not say
+another word. He fell at her feet in distraction, but once more looking
+at his watch, he jumped up with a terrible oath.
+
+"D--! a quarter to four! I must be off."
+
+And immediately he rushed down the stairs.
+
+From that time onwards she had a certain amount of esteem for him.
+
+
+
+
+IV. A POLITICIAN'S MARRIAGE
+
+She was not quite in love with him, but she wished him to be in love
+with her. She was, moreover, very reserved with him, and that not solely
+from any want of inclination to be otherwise, since in affairs of
+love some things are due to indifference, to inattention, to woman's
+instinct, to traditional custom and feeling, to a desire to try one's
+power, and to satisfaction at seeing its results. The reason of her
+prudence was that she knew him to be very much infatuated and capable
+of taking advantage of any familiarities she allowed as well as of
+reproaching her coarsely afterwards if she discontinued them.
+
+As he was a professed anti-clerical and free-thinker, she thought it
+a good plan to affect an appearance of piety in his presence and to
+be seen with prayer-books bound in red morocco, such as Queen Marie
+Leczinska's or the Dauphiness Marie Josephine's "The Last Two Weeks of
+Lent." She lost no opportunity, either, of showing him the subscriptions
+that she collected for the endowment of the national cult of St.
+Orberosia. Eveline did not act in this way because she wished to tease
+him. Nor did it spring from a young girl's archness, or a spirit of
+constraint, or even from snobbishness, though there was more than
+a suspicion of this latter in her behaviour. It was but her way of
+asserting herself, of stamping herself with a definite character, of
+increasing her value. To rouse the Deputy's courage she wrapped herself
+up in religion, just as Brunhild surrounded herself with flames so as to
+attract Sigurd. Her audacity was successful. He thought her still more
+beautiful thus. Clericalism was in his eyes a sign of good form.
+
+Ceres was re-elected by an enormous majority and returned to a House
+which showed itself more inclined to the Left, more advanced, and, as it
+seemed, more eager for reform than its predecessor. Perceiving at once
+that so much zeal was but intended to hide a fear of change, and a
+sincere desire to do nothing, he determined to adopt a policy that would
+satisfy these aspirations. At the beginning of the session he made a
+great speech, cleverly thought out and well arranged, dealing with the
+idea that all reform ought to be put off for a long time. He showed
+himself heated, even fervid; holding the principle that an orator should
+recommend moderation with extreme vehemence. He was applauded by the
+entire assembly. The Clarences listened to him from the President's
+box and Eveline trembled in spite of herself at the solemn sound of
+the applause. On the same bench the fair Madame Pensee shivered at the
+intonations of his virile voice.
+
+As soon as he descended from the tribune, Ceres, even while the audience
+were still clapping, went without a moment's delay to salute the
+Clarences in their box. Eveline saw in him the beauty of success, and as
+he leaned towards the ladies, wiping his neck with his handkerchief
+and receiving their congratulations with an air of modesty though not
+without a tinge of self-conceit, the young girl glanced towards Madame
+Pensee and saw her, palpitating and breathless, drinking in the hero's
+applause with her head thrown backwards. It seemed as if she were on the
+point of fainting. Eveline immediately smiled tenderly on M. Ceres.
+
+The Alcan deputy's speech had a great vogue. In political "spheres"
+it was regarded as extremely able. "We have at last heard an honest
+pronouncement," said the chief Moderate journal. "It is a regular
+programme!" they said in the House. It was agreed that he was a man of
+immense talent.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres had now established himself as leader of the radicals,
+socialists, and anti-clericals, and they appointed him President of
+their group, which was then the most considerable in the House. He thus
+found himself marked out for office in the next ministerial combination.
+
+After a long hesitation Eveline Clarence accepted the idea of marrying
+M. Hippolyte Ceres. The great man was a little common for her taste.
+Nothing had yet proved that he would one day reach the point where
+politics bring in large sums of money. But she was entering her
+twenty-seventh year and knew enough of life to see that she must not be
+too fastidious or show herself too difficult to please.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was celebrated; Hippolyte Ceres was happy. He was no
+longer recognisable; the elegance of his clothes and deportment had
+increased tremendously. He wore an undue number of white gloves. Now
+that he was too much of a society man, Eveline began to doubt if it was
+not worse than being too little of one. Madame Clarence regarded the
+engagement with favour. She was reassured concerning her daughter's
+future and pleased to have flowers given her every Thursday for her
+drawing-room.
+
+The celebration of the marriage raised some difficulties. Eveline was
+pious and wished to receive the benediction of the Church. Hippolyte
+Ceres, tolerant but a free-thinker, wanted only a civil marriage. There
+were many discussions and even some violent scenes upon the subject.
+The last took place in the young girl's room at the moment when the
+invitations were being written. Eveline declared that if she did not go
+to church she would not believe herself married. She spoke of breaking
+off the engagement, and of going abroad with her mother, or of retiring
+into a convent. Then she became tender, weak, suppliant. She sighed,
+and everything in her virginal chamber sighed in chorus, the holy-water
+font, the palm-branch above her white bed, the books of devotion on
+their little shelves, and the blue and white statuette of St.
+Orberosia chaining the dragon of Cappadocia, that stood upon the marble
+mantelpiece. Hippolyte Ceres was moved, softened, melted.
+
+Beautiful in her grief, her eyes shining with tears, her wrists girt
+by a rosary of lapis lazuli and, so to speak, chained by her faith,
+she suddenly flung herself at Hippolyte's feet, and dishevelled, almost
+dying, she embraced his knees.
+
+He nearly yielded.
+
+"A religious marriage," he muttered, "a marriage in church, I could
+make my constituents stand that, but my committee would not swallow the
+matter so easily. . . . Still I'll explain it to them . . . toleration,
+social necessities . . . . They all send their daughters to Sunday
+school . . . . But as for office, my dear I am afraid we are going to
+drown all hope of that in your holy water."
+
+At these words she stood up grave, generous, resigned, conquered also in
+her turn.
+
+"My dear, I insist no longer."
+
+"Then we won't have a religious marriage. It will be better, much better
+not."
+
+"Very well, but be guided by me. I am going to try and arrange
+everything both to your satisfaction and mine."
+
+She sought the Reverend Father Douillard and explained the situation. He
+showed himself even more accommodating and yielding than she had hoped.
+
+"Your husband is an intelligent man, a man of order and reason; he will
+come over to us. You will sanctify him. It is not in vain that God has
+granted him the blessing of a Christian wife. The Church needs no pomp
+and ceremonial display for her benedictions. Now that she is persecuted,
+the shadow of the crypts and the recesses of the catacombs are in better
+accord with her festivals. Mademoiselle, when you have performed the
+civil formalities come here to my private chapel in costume with M.
+Ceres. I will marry you, a observe the most absolute discretion. I will
+obtain the necessary dispensations from the Archbishop as well as all
+facilities regarding the banns, confession-tickets, etc."
+
+Hippolyte, although he thought the combination a little dangerous,
+agreed to it, a good deal flattered, at bottom.
+
+"I will go in a short coat," he said.
+
+He went in a frock coat with white gloves and varnished shoes, and he
+genuflected.
+
+"Politeness demands. . . ."
+
+
+
+
+V. THE VISIRE CABINET
+
+The Ceres household was established with modest decency in a pretty flat
+situated in a new building. Ceres loved his wife in a calm and tranquil
+fashion. He was often kept late from home by the Commission on the
+Budget and he worked more than three nights a week at a report on the
+postal finances of which he hoped to make a masterpiece. Eveline thought
+she could twist him round her finger, and this did not displease him.
+The bad side of their situation was that they had not much money; in
+truth they had very little. The servants of the Republic do not grow
+rich in her service as easily as people think. Since the sovereign is no
+longer there to distribute favours, each of them takes what he can, and
+his depredations, limited by the depredations of all the others, are
+reduced to modest proportions. Hence that austerity of morals that is
+noticed in democratic leaders. They can only grow rich during periods
+of great business activity and then they find themselves exposed to the
+envy of their less favoured colleagues. Hippolyte Ceres had for a
+long time foreseen such a period. He was one of those who had made
+preparations for its arrival. Whilst waiting for it he endured his
+poverty with dignity, and Eveline shared that poverty without suffering
+as much as one might have thought. She was in close intimacy with the
+Reverend Father Douillard and frequented the chapel of St. Orberosia,
+where she met with serious society and people in a position to render
+her useful services. She knew how to choose among them and gave her
+confidence to none but those who deserved it. She had gained experience
+since her motor excursions with Viscount Clena, and above all she had
+now acquired the value of a married woman.
+
+The deputy was at first uneasy about these pious practices, which were
+ridiculed by the demagogic newspapers, but he was soon reassured, for
+he saw all around him democratic leaders joyfully becoming reconciled to
+the aristocracy and the Church.
+
+They found that they had reached one of those periods (which often
+recur) when advance had been carried a little too far. Hippolyte Ceres
+gave a moderate support to this view. His policy was not a policy of
+persecution but a policy of tolerance. He had laid its foundations in
+his splendid speech on the preparations for reform. The Prime Minister
+was looked upon as too advanced. He proposed schemes which were admitted
+to be dangerous to capital, and the great financial companies were
+opposed to him. Of course it followed that the papers of all views
+supported the companies. Seeing the danger increasing, the Cabinet
+abandoned its schemes, its programme, and its opinions, but it was too
+late. A new administration was already ready. An insidious question by
+Paul Visire which was immediately made the subject of a resolution, and
+a fine speech by Hippolyte Ceres, overthrew the Cabinet.
+
+The President of the Republic entrusted the formation of a new Cabinet
+to this same Paul Visire, who, though still very young, had been a
+Minister twice. He was a charming man, spending much of his time in the
+green-rooms of theatres, very artistic, a great society man, of amazing
+ability and industry. Paul Visire formed a temporary ministry intended
+to reassure public feeling which had taken alarm, and Hippolyte Ceres
+was invited to hold office in it.
+
+The new ministry, belonging to all the groups in the majority,
+represented the most diverse and contrary opinions, but they were all
+moderate and convinced conservatives.* The Minister of Foreign Affairs
+was retained from the former cabinet. He was a little dark man called
+Crombile, who worked fourteen hours a day with the conviction that
+he dealt with tremendous questions. He refused to see even his own
+diplomatic agents, and was terribly uneasy, though he did not disturb
+anybody else, for the want of foresight of peoples is infinite and that
+of governments is just as great.
+
+     * As this ministry exercised considerable influence upon the
+     destinies of the country and of the world, we think it well
+     to give its composition: Minister of the Interior and Prime
+     Minister, Paul Visire; Minister of Justice, Pierre Bouc;
+     Foreign Affairs, Victor Crombile; Finance, Terrasson;
+     Education, Labillette; Commerce, Posts and Telegraphs,
+     Hippolyte Ceres; Agriculture, Aulac; Public Works,
+     Lapersonne; War, General Debonnaire; Admiralty, Admiral
+     Vivier des Murenes.
+
+The office of Public Works was given to a Socialist, Fortune Lapersonne.
+It was then a political custom and one of the most solemn, most severe,
+most rigorous, and if I may dare say so, the most terrible and cruel
+of all political customs, to include a member of the Socialist party
+in each ministry intended to oppose Socialism, so that the enemies of
+wealth and property should suffer the shame of being attacked by one of
+their own party, and so that they could not unite against these forces
+without turning to some one who might possibly attack themselves in the
+future. Nothing but a profound ignorance of the human heart would permit
+the belief that it was difficult to find a Socialist to occupy these
+functions. Citizen Fortune Lapersonne entered the Visire cabinet of
+his own free will and without any constraint; and he found those who
+approved of his action even among his former friends, so great was the
+fascination that power exercised over the Penguins!
+
+General Debonnaire went to the War Office. He was looked upon as one
+of the ablest generals in the army, but he was ruled by a woman, the
+Baroness Bildermann, who, though she had reached the age of intrigue,
+was still beautiful. She was in the pay of a neighbouring and hostile
+Power.
+
+The new Minister of Marine, the worthy Admiral Vivier des Murenes, was
+generally regarded as an excellent seaman. He displayed a piety that
+would have seemed excessive in an anti-clerical minister, if the
+Republic had not recognised that religion was of great maritime utility.
+Acting on the instruction of his spiritual director, the Reverend Father
+Douillard, the worthy Admiral had dedicated his fleet to St. Orberosia
+and directed canticles in honour of the Alcan Virgin to be composed by
+Christian bards. These replaced the national hymn in the music played by
+the navy.
+
+Prime Minister Visire declared himself to be distinctly anticlerical
+but ready to respect all creeds; he asserted that he was a sober-minded
+reformer. Paul Visire and his colleagues desired reforms, and it was in
+order not to compromise reform that they proposed none; for they were
+true politicians and knew that reforms are compromised the moment they
+are proposed. The government was well received, respectable people were
+reassured, and the funds rose.
+
+The administration announced that four new ironclads would be put
+into commission, that prosecutions would be undertaken against the
+Socialists, and it formally declared its intention to have nothing to do
+with any inquisitorial income-tax. The choice of Terrasson as Minister
+of Finance was warmly approved by the press. Terrasson, an old minister
+famous for his financial operations, gave warrant to all the hopes of
+the financiers and shadowed forth a period of great business activity.
+Soon those three udders of modern nations, monopolies, bill discounting,
+and fraudulent speculation, were swollen with the milk of wealth.
+Already whispers were heard of distant enterprises, and of planting
+colonies, and the boldest put forward in the newspapers the project of a
+military and financial protectorate over Nigritia.
+
+Without having yet shown what he was capable of, Hippolyte Ceres was
+considered a man of weight. Business people thought highly of him.
+He was congratulated on all sides for having broken with the
+extreme sections, the dangerous men, and for having realised the
+responsibilities of government.
+
+Madame Ceres shone alone amid the Ministers' wives. Crombile withered
+away in bachelordom. Paul Visire had married money in the person of
+Mademoiselle Blampignon, an accomplished, estimable, and simple lady who
+was always ill, and whose feeble health compelled her to stay with her
+mother in the depths of a remote province. The other Ministers' wives
+were not born to charm the sight, and people smiled when they read
+that Madame Labillette had appeared at the Presidency Ball wearing a
+headdress of birds of paradise. Madame Vivier des Murenes, a woman of
+good family, was stout rather than tall, had a face like a beef-steak
+and the voice of a newspaper-seller. Madame Debonnaire, tall, dry,
+and florid, was devoted to young officers. She ruined herself by her
+escapades and crimes and only regained consideration by dint of ugliness
+and insolence.
+
+Madame Ceres was the charm of the Ministry and its tide to
+consideration. Young, beautiful, and irreproachable, she charmed alike
+society and the masses by her combination of elegant costumes and
+pleasant smiles.
+
+Her receptions were thronged by the great Jewish financiers. She gave
+the most fashionable garden parties in the Republic. The newspapers
+described her dresses and the milliners did not ask her to pay for them.
+She went to Mass; she protected the chapel of St. Orberosia from the
+ill-will of the people; and she aroused in aristocratic hearts the hope
+of a fresh Concordat.
+
+With her golden hair, grey eyes, and supple and slight though rounded
+figure, she was indeed pretty. She enjoyed an excellent reputation and
+she was so adroit, and calm, so much mistress of herself, that she would
+have preserved it intact even if she had been discovered in the very act
+of ruining it.
+
+The session ended with a victory for the cabinet which, amid the
+almost unanimous applause of the House, defeated a proposal for an
+inquisitorial tax, and with a triumph for Madame Ceres who gave parties
+in honour of three kings who were at the moment passing through Alca.
+
+
+
+
+VI. THE SOFA OF THE FAVOURITE
+
+The Prime Minister invited Monsieur and Madame Ceres to spend a couple
+of weeks of the holidays in a little villa that he had taken in the
+mountains, and in which he lived alone. The deplorable health of Madame
+Paul Visire did not allow her to accompany her husband, and she remained
+with her relatives in one of the southern provinces.
+
+The villa had belonged to the mistress of one of the last Kings of Alca:
+the drawing-room retained its old furniture, and in it was still to be
+found the Sofa of the Favourite. The country was charming; a pretty blue
+stream, the Aiselle, flowed at the foot of the hill that dominated the
+villa. Hippolyte Ceres loved fishing; when engaged at this monotonous
+occupation he often formed his best Parliamentary combinations, and
+his happiest oratorical inspirations. Trout swarmed in the Aiselle; he
+fished it from morning till evening in a boat that the Prime Minister
+readily placed at is disposal.
+
+In the mean time, Eveline and Paul Visire sometimes took a turn together
+in the garden, or had a little chat in the drawing-room. Eveline,
+although she recognised the attraction that Visire had for women, had
+hitherto displayed towards him only an intermittent and superficial
+coquetry, without any deep intentions or settled design. He was a
+connoisseur and saw that she was pretty. The House and the Opera had
+deprived him of all leisure, but, in a little villa, the grey eyes
+and rounded figure of Eveline took on a value in his eyes. One day as
+Hippolyte Ceres was fishing in the Aiselle, he made her sit beside him
+on the Sofa of the Favourite. Long rays of gold struck Eveline like
+arrows from a hidden Cupid through the chinks of the curtains which
+protected her from the heat and glare of a brilliant day. Beneath her
+white muslin dress her rounded yet slender form was outlined in its
+grace and youth. Her skin was cool and fresh, and had the fragrance of
+freshly mown hay. Paul Visire behaved as the occasion warranted, and for
+her part, she was opposed neither to the games of chance or of society.
+She believed it would be nothing or a trifle; she was mistaken.
+
+"There was," says the famous German ballad, "on the sunny side of the
+town square, beside a wall whereon the creeper grew, a pretty little
+letter-box, as blue as the corn-flowers, smiling and tranquil.
+
+"All day long there came to it, in their heavy shoes, small
+shop-keepers, rich farmers, citizens, the tax-collector and the
+policeman, and they put into it their business letters, their invoices,
+their summonses their notices to pay taxes, the judges' returns, and
+orders for the recruits to assemble. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"With joy, or in anxiety, there advanced towards it workmen and farm
+servants, maids and nursemaids, accountants, clerks, and women carrying
+their little children in their arms; they put into it notifications of
+births, marriages, and deaths, letters between engaged couples, between
+husbands and wives, from mothers to their sons, and from sons to their
+mothers. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"At twilight, young lads and young girls slipped furtively to it, and
+put in love-letters, some moistened with tears that blotted the ink,
+others with a little circle to show the place to kiss, all of them very
+long. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"Rich merchants came themselves through excess of carefulness at the
+hour of daybreak, and put into it registered letters, and letters with
+five red seals, full of bank notes or cheques on the great financial
+establishments of the Empire. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"But one day, Gaspar, whom it had never seen, and whom it did not know
+from Adam, came to put in a letter, of which nothing is known but that
+it was folded like a little hat. Immediately the pretty letter-box fell
+into a swoon. Henceforth it remains no longer in its place; it runs
+through streets, fields, and woods, girdled with ivy, and crowned with
+roses. It keeps running up hill and down dale; the country policeman
+surprises it sometimes, amidst the corn, in Gaspar's arms kissing him
+upon the mouth."
+
+Paul Visire had recovered all his customary nonchalance. Eveline
+remained stretched on the Divan of the Favourite in an attitude of
+delicious astonishment.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, an excellent moral theologian, and a man
+who in the decadence of the Church has preserved his principles, was
+very right to teach, in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers,
+that while a woman commits a great sin by giving herself for money, she
+commits a much greater one by giving herself for nothing. For, in the
+first case she acts to support her life, and that is sometimes not
+merely excusable but pardonable, and even worthy of the Divine Grace,
+for God forbids suicide, and is unwilling that his creatures should
+destroy themselves. Besides, in giving herself in order to live, she
+remains humble, and derives no pleasure from it a thing which diminishes
+the sin. But a woman who gives herself for nothing sins with pleasure
+and exults in her fault. The pride and delight with which she burdens
+her crime increase its load of moral guilt.
+
+Madame Hippolyte Ceres' example shows the profundity of these moral
+truths. She perceived that she had senses. A second was enough to bring
+about this discovery, to change her soul, to alter her whole life. To
+have learned to know herself was at first a delight. The {greek here}
+of the ancient philosophy is not a precept the moral fulfilment of which
+procures any pleasure, since one enjoys little satisfaction from knowing
+one's soul. It is not the same with the flesh, for in it sources of
+pleasure may be revealed to us. Eveline immediately felt an obligation
+to her revealer equal to the benefit she had received, and she imagined
+that he who had discovered these heavenly depths was the sole possessor
+of the key to them. Was this an error, and might she not be able to
+find others who also had the golden key? It is difficult to decide; and
+Professor Haddock, when the facts were divulged (which happened without
+much delay as we shall see), treated the matter from an experimental
+point of view, in a scientific review, and concluded that the chances
+Madame C-- would have of finding the exact equivalent of M. V-- were
+in the proportion of 305 to 975008. This is as much as to say that she
+would never find it. Doubtless her instinct told her the same, for she
+attached herself distractedly to him.
+
+I have related these facts with all the circumstances which seemed to me
+worthy of attracting the attention of meditative and philosophic minds.
+The Sofa of the Favourite is worthy of the majesty of history; on
+it were decided the destinies of a great people; nay, on it was
+accomplished an act whose renown was to extend over the neighbouring
+nations both friendly and hostile, and even over all humanity. Too often
+events of this nature escape the superficial minds and shallow spirits
+who inconsiderately assume the task of writing history. Thus the secret
+springs of events remain hidden from us. The fall of Empires and the
+transmission of dominions astonish us and remain incomprehensible to us,
+because we have not discovered the imperceptible point, or touched the
+secret spring which when put in movement has destroyed and overthrown
+everything. The author of this great history knows better than
+anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do himself this
+justice--that he has always kept the moderation, the seriousness, the
+austerity, which an account of affairs of State demands, and that he has
+never departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of human
+actions.
+
+
+
+
+VII. THE FIRST CONSEQUENCES
+
+When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never experienced
+anything similar, he did not believe her. He had had a good deal to do
+with women and knew that they readily say these things to men in order
+to make them more in love with them. Thus his experience, as sometimes
+happens, made him disregard the truth. Incredulous, but gratified all
+the same, he soon felt love and something more for her. This state at
+first seemed favourable to his intellectual faculties. Visire delivered
+in the chief town of his constituency a speech full of grace, brilliant
+and happy, which was considered to be a masterpiece.
+
+The re-opening of Parliament was serene. A few isolated jealousies, a
+few timid ambitions raised their heads in the House, and that was all. A
+smile from the Prime Minister was enough to dissipate these shadows.
+She and he saw each other twice a day, and wrote to each other in the
+interval. He was accustomed to intimate relationships, was adroit, and
+knew how to dissimulate; but Eveline displayed a foolish imprudence: she
+made herself conspicuous with him in drawing-rooms, at the theatre, in
+the House, and at the Embassies; she wore her love upon her face, upon
+her whole person, in her moist glances, in the languishing smile of her
+lips, in the heaving of her breast, in all her heightened, agitated,
+and distracted beauty. Soon the entire country knew of their intimacy.
+Foreign Courts were informed of it. The President of the Republic and
+Eveline's husband alone remained in ignorance. The President became
+acquainted with it in the country, through a misplaced police report
+which found its way, it is not known how, into his portmanteau.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, without being either very subtle, or very
+perspicacious, noticed that there was something different in his home.
+Eveline, who quite lately had interested herself in his affairs, and
+shown, if not tenderness, at least affection, towards him, displayed
+henceforth nothing but indifference and repulsion. She had always had
+periods of absence, and made prolonged visits to the Charity of St.
+Orberosia; now, she went out in the morning, remained out all day, and
+sat down to dinner at nine o'clock in the evening with the face of a
+somnambulist. Her husband thought it absurd; however, he might perhaps
+have never known the reason for this; a profound ignorance of women, a
+crass confidence in his own merit, and in his own fortune, might perhaps
+have always hidden the truth from him, if the two lovers had not, so to
+speak, compelled him to discover it.
+
+When Paul Visire went to Eveline's house and found her alone, they
+used to say, as they embraced each other; "Not here! not here!" and
+immediately they affected an extreme reserve. That was their invariable
+rule. Now, one day, Paul Visire went to the house of his colleague
+Ceres, with whom he had an engagement. It was Eveline who received him,
+the Minister of Commerce being delayed by a commission.
+
+"Not here!" said the lovers, smiling.
+
+They said it, mouth to mouth, embracing, and clasping each other. They
+were still saying it, when Hippolyte Ceres entered the drawing-room.
+
+Paul Visire did not lose his presence of mind. He declared to Madame
+Ceres that he would give up his attempt to take the dust out of her
+eye. By this attitude he did not deceive the husband, but he was able to
+leave the room with some dignity.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was thunderstruck. Eveline's conduct appeared
+incomprehensible to him; he asked her what reasons she had for it.
+
+"Why? why?" he kept repeating continually, "why?"
+
+She denied everything, not to convince him, for he had seen them, but
+from expediency and good taste, and to avoid painful explanations.
+Hippolyte Ceres suffered all the tortures of jealousy. He admitted it
+to himself, he kept saying inwardly, "I am a strong man; I am clad in
+armour; but the wound is underneath, it is in my heart," and turning
+towards his wife, who looked beautiful in her guilt, he would say:
+
+"It ought not to have been with him."
+
+He was right--Eveline ought not to have loved in government circles.
+
+He suffered so much that he took up his revolver, exclaiming: "I will go
+and kill him!" But he remembered that a Minister of Commerce cannot kill
+his own Prime Minister, and he put his revolver back into his drawer.
+
+The weeks passed without calming his sufferings. Each morning he buckled
+his strong man's armour over his wound and sought in work and fame the
+peace that fled from him. Every Sunday he inaugurated busts, statues,
+fountains, artesian wells, hospitals, dispensaries, railways, canals,
+public markets, drainage systems, triumphal arches, and slaughter
+houses, and delivered moving speeches on each of these occasions.
+His fervid activity devoured whole piles of documents; he changed the
+colours of the postage stamps fourteen times in one week. Nevertheless,
+he gave vent to outbursts of grief and rage that drove him insane; for
+whole days his reason abandoned him. If he had been in the employment of
+a private administration this would have been noticed immediately, but
+it is much more difficult to discover insanity or frenzy in the conduct
+of affairs of State. At that moment the government employees were
+forming themselves into associations and federations amid a ferment
+that was giving alarm both to the Parliament and to public feeling. The
+postmen were especially prominent in their enthusiasm for trade unions.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres informed them in a circular that their action was
+strictly legal. The following day he sent out a second circular
+forbidding all associations of government employees as illegal. He
+dismissed one hundred and eighty postmen, reinstated them, reprimanded
+them--and awarded them gratuities. At Cabinet councils he was always
+on the point of bursting forth. The presence of the Head of the State
+scarcely restrained him within the limits of the decencies, and as
+he did not dare to attack his rival he consoled himself by heaping
+invectives upon General Debonnaire, the respected Minister of War.
+The General did not hear them, for he was deaf and occupied himself in
+composing verses for the Baroness Bildermann. Hippolyte Ceres offered
+an indistinct opposition to everything the Prime Minister proposed. In
+a word, he was a madman. One faculty alone escaped the ruin of his
+intellect: he retained his Parliamentary sense, his consciousness of
+the temper of majorities, his thorough knowledge of groups, and his
+certainty of the direction in which affairs were moving.
+
+
+
+
+VIII. FURTHER CONSEQUENCES
+
+The session ended calmly, and the Ministry saw no dangerous signs
+upon the benches where the majority sat. It was visible, however, from
+certain articles in the Moderate journals, that the demands of the
+Jewish and Christian financiers were increasing daily, that the
+patriotism of the banks required a civilizing expedition to Nigritia,
+and that the steel trusts, eager in the defence of our coasts and
+colonies, were crying out for armoured cruisers and still more armoured
+cruisers. Rumours of war began to be heard. Such rumours sprang up every
+year as regularly as the trade winds; serious people paid no heed
+to them and the government usually let them die away from their own
+weakness unless they grew stronger and spread. For in that case the
+country would be alarmed. The financiers only wanted colonial wars and
+the people did not want any wars at all. It loved to see its government
+proud and even insolent, but at the least suspicion that a European war
+was brewing, its violent emotion would quickly have reached the House.
+Paul Visire was not uneasy. The European situation was in his view
+completely reassuring. He was only irritated by the maniacal silence of
+his Minister of Foreign Affairs. That gnome went to the Cabinet meetings
+with a portfolio bigger than himself stuffed full of papers, said
+nothing, refused to answer all questions, even those asked him by the
+respected President of the Republic, and, exhausted by his obstinate
+labours, took a few moments' sleep in his arm-chair in which nothing
+but the top of his little black head was to be seen above the green
+tablecloth.
+
+In the mean time Hippolyte Ceres became a strong man again. In company
+with his colleague Lapersonne he formed numerous intimacies with ladies
+of the theatre. They were both to be seen at night entering fashionable
+restaurants in the company of ladies whom they over-topped by their
+lofty stature and their new hats, and they were soon reckoned amongst
+the most sympathetic frequenters of the boulevards. Fortune Lapersonne
+had his own wound beneath his armour, His wife, a young milliner whom he
+carried off from a marquis, had gone to live with a chauffeur. He loved
+her still, and could not console himself for her loss, so that very
+often in the private room of a restaurant, in the midst of a group of
+girls who laughed and ate crayfish, the two ministers exchanged a look
+full of their common sorrow and wiped away an unbidden tear.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, although wounded to the heart, did not allow himself to
+be beaten. He swore that he would be avenged.
+
+Madame Paul Visire, whose deplorable health forced her to live with her
+relatives in a distant province, received an anonymous letter specifying
+that M. Paul Visire, who had not a half-penny when he married her, was
+spending her dowry on a married woman, E-- C--, that he gave this
+woman thirty-thousand-franc motor-cars, and pearl necklaces costing
+twenty-five thousand francs, and that he was going straight to dishonour
+and ruin. Madame Paul Visire read the letter, fell into hysterics, and
+handed it to her father.
+
+"I am going to box your husband's ears," said M. Blampignon; "he is a
+blackguard who will land you both in the workhouse unless we look out.
+He may be Prime Minister, but he won't frighten me."
+
+When he stepped off the train M. Blampignon presented himself at the
+Ministry of the Interior, and was immediately received. He entered the
+Prime Minister's room in a fury.
+
+"I have something to say to you, sir!" And he waved the anonymous
+letter.
+
+Paul Visire welcomed him smiling.
+
+"You are welcome, my dear father. I was going to write to you. . . .
+Yes, to tell you of your nomination to the rank of officer of the Legion
+of Honour. I signed the patent this morning."
+
+M. Blampignon thanked his son-in-law warmly and threw the anonymous
+letter into the fire.
+
+He returned to his provincial house and found his daughter fretting and
+agitated.
+
+"Well! I saw your husband. He is a delightful fellow. But then, you
+don't understand how to deal with him."
+
+About this time Hippolyte Ceres learned through a little scandalous
+newspaper (it is always through the newspapers that ministers are
+informed of the affairs of State) that the Prime Minister dined every
+evening with Mademoiselle Lysiane of the Folies Dramatiques, whose charm
+seemed to have made a great impression on him. Thenceforth Ceres took
+a gloomy joy in watching his wife. She came in every evening to dine or
+dress with an air of agreeable fatigue and the serenity that comes from
+enjoyment.
+
+Thinking that she knew nothing, he sent her anonymous communications.
+She read them at the table before him and remained still listless and
+smiling.
+
+He then persuaded himself that she gave no heed to these vague reports,
+and that in order to disturb her it would be necessary to enable her to
+verify her lover's infidelity and treason for herself. There were at the
+Ministry a number of trustworthy agents charged with secret inquiries
+regarding the national defence. They were then employed in watching the
+spies of a neighbouring and hostile Power who had succeeded in entering
+the Postal and Telegraphic service. M. Ceres ordered them to suspend
+their work for the present and to inquire where, when, and how, the
+Minister of the Interior saw Mademoiselle Lysiane. The agents performed
+their missions faithfully and told the minister that they had several
+times seen the Prime Minister with a woman, but that she was not
+Mademoiselle Lysiane. Hippolyte Ceres asked them nothing further. He was
+right; the loves of Paul Visire and Lysiane were but an alibi invented
+by Paul Visire himself, with Eveline's approval, for his fame was rather
+inconvenient to her, and she sighed for secrecy and mystery.
+
+They were not shadowed by the agents of the Ministry of Commerce alone.
+They were also followed by those of the Prefect of Police, and even by
+those of the Minister of the Interior, who disputed with each other
+the honour of protecting their chief. Then there were the emissaries
+of several royalist, imperialist, and clerical organisations, those of
+eight or ten blackmailers, several amateur detectives, a multitude of
+reporters, and a crowd of photographers, who all made their appearance
+wherever these two took refuge in their perambulating love affairs,
+at big hotels, small hotels, town houses, country houses, private
+apartments, villas, museums, palaces, hovels. They kept watch in the
+streets, from neighbouring houses, trees, walls, stair-cases, landings,
+roofs, adjoining rooms, and even chimneys. The Minister and his friend
+saw with alarm all round their bed room, gimlets boring through doors
+and shutters, and drills making holes in the walls. A photograph of
+Madame Ceres in night attire buttoning her boots was the utmost that had
+been obtained.
+
+Paul Visire grew impatient and irritable, and often lost his good humour
+and agreeableness. He came to the cabinet meetings in a rage and he,
+too, poured invectives upon General Debonnaire--a brave man under fire
+but a lax disciplinarian--and launched his sarcasms at against the
+venerable admiral Vivier des Murenes whose ships went to the bottom
+without any apparent reason.
+
+Fortune Lapersonne listened open-eyed, and grumbled scoffingly between
+his teeth:
+
+"He is not satisfied with robbing Hippolyte Ceres of his wife, but he
+must go and rob him of his catchwords too."
+
+These storms were made known by the indiscretion of some ministers and
+by the complaints of the two old warriors, who declared their intention
+of flinging their portfolios at the beggar's head, but who did nothing
+of the sort. These outbursts, far from injuring the lucky Prime
+Minister, had an excellent effect on Parliament and public opinion,
+who looked on them as signs of a keen solicitude for the welfare of the
+national army and navy. The Prime Minister was the recipient of general
+approbation.
+
+To the congratulations of the various groups and of notable personages,
+he replied with simple firmness: "Those are my principles!" and he had
+seven or eight Socialists put in prison.
+
+The session ended, and Paul Visire, very exhausted, went to take the
+waters. Hippolyte Ceres refused to leave his Ministry, where the trade
+union of telephone girls was in tumultuous agitation. He opposed it with
+an unheard of violence, for he had now become a woman-hater. On Sundays
+he went into the suburbs to fish along with his colleague Lapersonne,
+wearing the tall hat that never left him since he had become a Minister.
+And both of them, forgetting the fish, complained of the inconstancy of
+women and mingled their griefs.
+
+Hippolyte still loved Eveline and he still suffered. However, hope
+had slipped into his heart. She was now separated from her lover, and,
+thinking to win her back, he directed all his efforts to that end.
+He put forth all his skill, showed himself sincere, adaptable,
+affectionate, devoted, even discreet; his heart taught him the
+delicacies of feeling. He said charming and touching things to the
+faithless one, and, to soften her, he told her all that he had suffered.
+
+Crossing the band of his trousers upon his stomach.
+
+"See," said he, "how thin I have got."
+
+He promised her everything he thought could gratify a woman, country
+parties, hats, jewels.
+
+Sometimes he thought she would take pity on him.
+
+She no longer displayed an insolently happy countenance. Being separated
+from Paul, her sadness had an air of gentleness. But the moment he made
+a gesture to recover her she turned away fiercely and gloomily, girt
+with her fault as if with a golden girdle.
+
+He did not give up, making himself humble, suppliant, lamentable.
+
+One day he went to Lapersonne and said to him with tears in his eyes:
+
+"Will you speak to her?"
+
+Lapersonne excused himself, thinking that his intervention would be
+useless, but he gave some advice to his friend.
+
+"Make her think that you don't care about her, that you love another,
+and she will come back to you."
+
+Hippolyte, adopting this method, inserted in the newspapers that he was
+always to be found in the company of Mademoiselle Guinaud of the Opera.
+He came home late or did not come home at all, assumed in Eveline's
+presence an appearance of inward joy impossible to restrain, took out of
+his pocket, at dinner, a letter on scented paper which he pretended to
+read with delight, and his lips seemed as in a dream to kiss invisible
+lips. Nothing happened. Eveline did not even notice the change.
+Insensible to all around her, she only came out of her lethargy to ask
+for some louis from her husband, and if he did not give them she threw
+him a look of contempt, ready to upbraid him with the shame which she
+poured upon him in the sight of the whole world. Since she had loved
+she spent a great deal on dress. She needed money, and she had only her
+husband to secure it for her; she was so far faithful to him.
+
+He lost patience, became furious, and threatened her with his revolver.
+He said one day before her to Madame Clarence:
+
+"I congratulate you, Madame; you have brought up your daughter to be a
+wanton hussy."
+
+"Take me away, Mamma," exclaimed Eveline. "I will get a divorce!"
+
+He loved her more ardently than ever. In his jealous rage, suspecting
+her, not without probability, of sending and receiving letters, he swore
+that he would intercept them, re-established a censorship over the post,
+threw private correspondence into confusion, delayed stock-exchange
+quotations, prevented assignations, brought about bankruptcies, thwarted
+passions, and caused suicides. The independent press gave utterance to
+the complaints of the public and indignantly supported them. To justify
+these arbitrary measures, the ministerial journals spoke darkly of plots
+and public dangers, and promoted a belief in a monarchical conspiracy.
+The less well-informed sheets gave more precise information, told of
+the seizure of fifty thousand guns, and the landing of Prince Crucho.
+Feeling grew throughout the country, and the republican organs called
+for the immediate meeting of Parliament. Paul Visire returned to
+Paris, summoned his colleagues, held an important Cabinet Council, and
+proclaimed through his agencies that a plot had been actually formed
+against the national representation, but that the Prime Minister held
+the threads of it in his hand, and that a judicial inquiry was about to
+be opened.
+
+He immediately ordered the arrest of thirty Socialists, and whilst
+the entire country was acclaiming him as its saviour, baffling the
+watchfulness of his six hundred detectives, he secretly took Eveline to
+a little house near the Northern railway station, where they remained
+until night. After their departure, the maid of their hotel, as she
+was putting their room in order, saw seven little crosses traced by a
+hairpin on the wall at the head of the bed.
+
+That is all that Hippolyte Ceres obtained as a reward of his efforts.
+
+
+
+
+IX. THE FINAL CONSEQUENCES
+
+Jealousy is a virtue of democracies which preserves them from tyrants.
+Deputies began to envy the Prime Minister his golden key. For a year his
+domination over the beauteous Madame Ceres had been known to the whole
+universe. The provinces, whither news and fashions only arrive after a
+complete revolution of the earth round the sun, were at last informed of
+the illegitimate loves of the Cabinet. The provinces preserve an austere
+morality; women are more virtuous there than they are in the capital.
+
+Various reasons have been alleged for this: Education, example,
+simplicity of life. Professor Haddock asserts that this virtue of
+provincial ladies is solely due to the fact that the heels of their
+shoes are low. "A woman," said he, in a learned article in the
+"Anthropological Review", "a woman attracts a civilized man in
+proportion as her feet make an angle with the ground. If this angle is
+as much as thirty-five degrees, the attraction becomes acute. For the
+position of the feet upon the ground determines the whole carriage of
+the body, and it results that provincial women, since they wear low
+heels, are not very attractive, and preserve their virtue with ease."
+These conclusions were not generally accepted. It was objected that
+under the influence of English and American fashions, low heels had been
+introduced generally without producing the results attributed to them
+by the learned Professor; moreover, it was said that the difference he
+pretended to establish between the morals of the metropolis and those
+of the provinces is perhaps illusory, and that if it exists, it is
+apparently due to the fact that great cities offer more advantages and
+facilities for love than small towns provide. However that may be, the
+provinces began to murmur against the Prime Minister, and to raise a
+scandal. This was not yet a danger, but there was a possibility that it
+might become one.
+
+For the moment the peril was nowhere and yet everywhere. The majority
+remained solid; but the leaders became stiff and exacting. Perhaps
+Hippolyte Ceres would never have intentionally sacrificed his interests
+to his vengeance. But thinking that he could henceforth, without
+compromising his own fortune, secretly damage that of Paul Visire, he
+devoted himself to the skilful and careful preparation of difficulties
+and perils for the Head of the Government. Though far from equalling his
+rival in talent, knowledge, and authority, he greatly surpassed him in
+his skill as a lobbyist. The most acute parliamentarians attributed
+the recent misfortunes of the majority to his refusal to vote. At
+committees, by a calculated imprudence, he favoured motions which
+he knew the Prime Minister could not accept. One day his intentional
+awkwardness provoked a sudden and violent conflict between the Minister
+of the Interior, and his departmental Treasurer. Then Ceres became
+frightened and went no further. It would have been dangerous for him to
+overthrow the ministry too soon. His ingenious hatred found an issue by
+circuitous paths. Paul Visire had a poor cousin of easy morals who bore
+his name. Ceres, remembering this lady, Celine Visire, brought her
+into prominence, arranged that she should become intimate with several
+foreigners, and procured her engagements in the music-halls. One summer
+night, on a stage in the Champs Elysees before a tumultuous crowd, she
+performed risky dances to the sounds of wild music which was audible
+in the gardens where the President of the Republic was entertaining
+Royalty. The name of Visire, associated with these scandals, covered the
+walls of the town, filled the newspapers, was repeated in the cafes and
+at balls, and blazed forth in letters of fire upon the boulevards.
+
+Nobody regarded the Prime Minister as responsible for the scandal of
+his relatives, but a bad idea of his family came into existence, and the
+influence of the statesman was diminished.
+
+Almost immediately he was made to feel this in a pretty sharp fashion.
+One day in the House, on a simple question, Labillette, the Minister of
+Religion and Public Worship, who was suffering from an attack of liver,
+and beginning to be exasperated by the intentions and intrigues of
+the clergy, threatened to close the Chapel of St. Orberosia, and spoke
+without respect of the National Virgin. The entire Right rose up in
+indignation; the Left appeared to give but a half-hearted support to
+the rash Minister. The leaders of the majority did not care to attack a
+popular cult which brought thirty millions a year into the country.
+The most moderate of the supporters of the Right, M. Bigourd, made
+the question the subject of a resolution and endangered the Cabinet.
+Luckily, Fortune Lapersonne, the Minister of Public Works, always
+conscious of the obligations of power, was able in the Prime Minister's
+absence to repair the awkwardness and indecorum of his colleague, the
+Minister of Public Worship. He ascended the tribune and bore witness
+to the respect in which the Government held the heavenly Patron of
+the country, the consoler of so many ills which science admitted its
+powerlessness to relieve.
+
+When Paul Visire, snatched at last from Eveline's arms, appeared in the
+House, the administration was saved; but the Prime Minister saw himself
+compelled to grant important concessions to the upper classes. He
+proposed in Parliament that six armoured cruisers should be laid down,
+and thus won the sympathies of the Steel Trust; he gave new assurances
+that the income tax would not be imposed, and he had eighteen Socialists
+arrested.
+
+He was soon to find himself opposed by more formidable obstacles. The
+Chancellor of the neighbouring Empire in an ingenious and profound
+speech upon the foreign relations of his sovereign, made a sly allusion
+to the intrigues that inspired the policy of a great country. This
+reference, which was receive with smiles by the Imperial Parliament,
+was certain to irritate a punctilious republic. It aroused the national
+susceptibility, which directed its wrath against its amorous
+Minister. The Deputies seized upon a frivolous pretext to show their
+dissatisfaction. A ridiculous incident, the fact that the wife of a
+subprefect had danced at the Moulin Rouge, forced the minister to face
+a vote of censure, and he was within a few votes of being defeated.
+According to general opinion, Paul Visire had never been so weak, so
+vacillating, or so spiritless, as on that occasion.
+
+He understood that he could only keep himself in office by a great
+political stroke, and he decided on the expedition to Nigritia. This
+measure was demanded by the great financial and industrial corporations
+and was one which would bring concessions of immense forests to the
+capitalists, a loan of eight millions to the banking companies, as well
+as promotions and decorations to the naval and military officers. A
+pretext presented itself; some insult needed to be avenged, or some
+debt to be collected. Six battleships, fourteen cruisers, and eighteen
+transports sailed up the mouth of the river Hippopotamus. Six hundred
+canoes vainly opposed the landing of the troops. Admiral Vivier des
+Murenes' cannons produced an appalling effect upon the blacks, who
+replied to them with flights of arrows, but in spite of their fanatical
+courage they were entirely defeated. Popular enthusiasm was kindled by
+the newspapers which the financiers subsidised, and burst into a blaze.
+Some Socialists alone protested against this barbarous, doubtful, and
+dangerous enterprise. They were at once arrested.
+
+At that moment when the Minister, supported by wealth, and now beloved
+by the poor, seemed unconquerable, the light of hate showed Hippolyte
+Ceres alone the danger, and looking with a gloomy joy at his rival, he
+muttered between his teeth, "He is wrecked, the brigand!"
+
+Whilst the country intoxicated itself with glory, the neighbouring
+Empire protested against the occupation of Nigritia by a European
+power, and these protests following one another at shorter and
+shorter intervals became more and more vehement. The newspapers of the
+interested Republic concealed all causes for uneasiness; but Hippolyte
+Ceres heard the growing menace, and determined at last to risk
+everything, even the fate of the ministry, in order to ruin his enemy.
+He got men whom he could trust to write and insert articles in several
+of the official journals, which, seeming to express Paul Visire's
+precise views, attributed warlike intentions to the Head of the
+Government.
+
+These articles roused a terrible echo abroad, and they alarmed the
+public opinion of a nation which, while fond of soldiers, was not fond
+of war. Questioned in the House on the foreign policy of his government,
+Paul Visire made a re-assuring statement, and promised to maintain a
+face compatible with the dignity of a great nation. His Minister of
+Foreign Affairs, Crombile, read a declaration which was absolutely
+unintelligible, for the reason that it was couched in diplomatic
+language. The Minister obtained a large majority.
+
+But the rumours of war did not cease, and in order to avoid a new and
+dangerous motion, the Prime Minister distributed eighty thousand acres
+of forests in Nigritia among the Deputies, and had fourteen Socialists
+arrested. Hippolyte Ceres went gloomily about the lobbies, confiding to
+the Deputies of his group that he was endeavouring to induce the Cabinet
+to adopt a pacific policy, and that he still hoped to succeed. Day by
+day the sinister rumours grew in volume, and penetrating amongst the
+public, spread uneasiness and disquiet. Paul Visire himself began to
+take alarm. What disturbed him most were the silence and absence of the
+Minister of Foreign Affairs. Crombile no longer came to the meetings of
+the Cabinet. Rising at five o'clock in the morning, he worked eighteen
+hours at his desk, and at last fell exhausted into his waste-paper
+basket, from whence the registrars removed him, together with the
+papers which they were going to sell to the military attaches of the
+neighbouring Empire.
+
+General Debonnaire believed that a campaign was imminent, and prepared
+for it. Far from fearing war, he prayed for it, and confided his
+generous hopes to Baroness Bildermann, who informed the neighbouring
+nation, which, acting on her information, proceeded to a rapid
+mobilization.
+
+The Minister of Finance unintentionally precipitated events. At the
+moment, he was speculating for a fall, and in order to bring about
+a panic on the Stock Exchange, he spread the rumour that war was now
+inevitable. The neighbouring Empire, deceived by this action, and
+expecting to see its territory invaded, mobilized its troops in all
+haste. The terrified Chamber overthrew the Visire ministry by an
+enormous majority (814 votes to 7, with 28 abstentions). It was too
+late. The very day of this fall the neighbouring and hostile nation
+recalled its ambassador and flung eight millions of men into Madame
+Ceres' country. War became universal, and the whole world was drowned in
+a torrent of blood.
+
+
+THE ZENITH OF PENGUIN CIVILIZATION
+
+Half a century after the events we have just related, Madame Ceres died
+surrounded with respect and veneration, in the eighty-ninth year of her
+age. She had long been the widow of a statesman whose name she bore with
+dignity. Her modest and quiet funeral was followed by the orphans of the
+parish and the sisters of the Sacred Compassion.
+
+The deceased left all her property to the Charity of St. Orberosia.
+
+"Alas!" sighed M. Monnoyer, a canon of St. Mael, as he received the
+pious legacy, "it was high time for a generous benefactor to come to
+the relief of our necessities. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant
+are turning away from us. And when we try to lead back these misguided
+souls, neither threats nor promises, neither gentleness nor violence,
+nor anything else is now successful. The Penguin clergy pine in
+desolation; our country priests, reduced to following the humblest of
+trades, are shoeless, and compelled to live upon such scraps as they
+can pick up. In our ruined churches the rain of heaven falls upon the
+faithful, and during the holy offices they can hear the noise of stones
+falling from the arches. The tower of the cathedral is tottering and
+will soon fall. St. Orberosia is forgotten by the Penguins, her devotion
+abandoned, and her sanctuary deserted. On her shrine, bereft of its gold
+and precious stones, the spider silently weaves her web."
+
+Hearing these lamentations, Pierre Mille, who at the age of ninety-eight
+years had lost nothing of his intellectual and moral power, asked, the
+canon if he did not think that St. Orberosia would one day rise out of
+this wrongful oblivion.
+
+"I hardly dare to hope so," sighed M. Monnoyer.
+
+"It is a pity!" answered Pierre Mille. "Orberosia is a charming figure
+and her legend is a beautiful one. I discovered the other day by the
+merest chance, one of her most delightful miracles, the miracle of Jean
+Violle. Would you like to hear it, M. Monnoyer?"
+
+"I should be very pleased, M. Mille."
+
+"Here it is, then, just as I found it in a fifteenth-century manuscript
+
+"Cecile, the wife of Nicolas Gaubert, a jeweller on the Pont-au-Change,
+after having led an honest and chaste life for many years, and being
+now past her prime, became infatuated with Jean Violle, the Countess de
+Maubec's page, who lived at the Hotel du Paon on the Place de Greve. He
+was not yet eighteen years old, and his face and figure were attractive.
+Not being able to conquer her passion, Cecile resolved to satisfy it.
+She attracted the page to her house, loaded him with caresses, supplied
+him with sweetmeats and finally did as she wished with him.
+
+"Now one day, as they were together in the jeweller's bed, Master
+Nicholas came home sooner than he was expected. He found the bolt drawn,
+and heard his wife on the other side of the door exclaiming, 'My heart!
+my angel! my love!' Then suspecting that she was shut up with a gallant,
+he struck great blows upon the door and began to shout 'Slut! hussy!
+wanton! open so that I may cut off your nose and ears!' In this peril,
+the jeweller's wife besought St. Orberosia, and vowed her a large candle
+if she helped her and the little page, who was dying of fear beside the
+bed, out of their difficulty.
+
+"The saint heard the prayer. She immediately changed Jean Violle into
+a girl. Seeing this, Cecile was completely reassured, and began to call
+out to her husband: 'Oh! you brutal villain, you jealous wretch! Speak
+gently if you want the door to be opened.' And scolding in this way, she
+ran to the wardrobe and took out of it an old hood, a pair of stays,
+and a long grey petticoat, in which she hastily wrapped the transformed
+page. Then when this was done, 'Catherine, dear Catherine,' said she,
+loudly, 'open the door for your uncle; he is more fool than knave, and
+won't do you any harm.' The boy who had become a girl, obeyed. Master
+Nicholas entered the room and found in it a young maid whom he did not
+know, and his wife in bed. 'Big booby,' said the latter to him, 'don't
+stand gaping at what you see, just as I had come to bed because had
+a stomach ache, I received a visit from Catherine, the daughter of my
+sister Jeanne de Palaiseau, with whom we quarrelled fifteen years ago.
+Kiss your niece. She is well worth the trouble.' The jeweller gave
+Violle a hug, and from that moment wanted nothing so much as to be alone
+with her a moment, so that he might embrace her as much as he liked. For
+this reason he led her without any delay down to the kitchen, under the
+pretext of giving her some walnuts and wine, and he was no sooner there
+with her than he began to caress her very affectionately. He would not
+have stopped at that if St. Orberosia had not inspired his good wife
+with the idea of seeing what he was about. She found him with the
+pretended niece sitting on his knee. She called him a debauched
+creature, boxed his ears, and forced him to beg her pardon. The next day
+Violle resumed his previous form."
+
+Having heard this story the venerable Canon Monnoyer thanked Pierre
+Mille for having told it, and, taking up his pen, began to write out
+a list of horses that would win at the next race meeting. For he was a
+book-maker's clerk.
+
+In the mean time Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who produced the
+things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not produce them
+had more than enough. "But these," as a member of the Institute said,
+"are necessary economic fatalities." The great Penguin people had no
+longer either traditions, intellectual culture, or arts. The progress
+of civilisation manifested itself among them by murderous industry,
+infamous speculation, and hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as
+did all the great cities of the time, a cosmopolitan and financial
+character. An immense and regular ugliness reigned within it. The
+country enjoyed perfect tranquillity. It had reached its zenith.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+THE ENDLESS HISTORY
+
+
+Alca is becoming Americanised.--M. Daniset.
+
+And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the
+inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.--Genesis
+xix. 25
+
+{greek here} (Herodotus, Histories, VII cii.)
+
+Poverty hast ever been familiar to Greece, but virtue has been acquired,
+having been accomplished by wisdom and firm laws.--Henry Cary's
+Translation.
+
+You have not seen angels then.--Liber Terribilis.
+
+     Bqfttfusftpvtuse jufbmmbb b up sjufef
+     tspjtfucftfnqfsfvstbqsftbnpjsqsp
+     dmbnfuspjtghjttdmjcfsufnbgsbodftftutpbnjtfbeftdpnqb
+     hojtgjobo--difsftr--vjejtqpteoueftsjdifttftevqbzt fuqbsmfn
+     Pzfoevofqsf ttfbdifuffejsjhfboumpqjojno Voufnpjoxfsiejrvf
+
+We are now beginning to study a chemistry which will deal with effects
+produced by bodies containing a quantity of concentrated energy the like
+of which we have not yet had at our disposal.--Sir William Ramsay.
+
+
+S. I
+
+The houses were never high enough to satisfy them; they kept on making
+them still higher and built them of thirty or forty storeys: with
+offices, shops, banks, societies one above another; they dug cellars and
+tunnels ever deeper downwards.
+
+Fifteen millions of men laboured in a giant town by the light of beacons
+which shed forth their glare both day and night. No light of heaven
+pierced through the smoke of the factories with which the town was girt,
+but sometimes the red disk of a rayless sun might be seen riding in the
+black firmament through which iron bridges ploughed their way, and from
+which there descended a continual shower of soot and cinders. It was
+the most industrial of all the cities in the world and the richest.
+Its organisation seemed perfect. None of the ancient aristocratic or
+democratic forms remained; everything was subordinated to the interests
+of the trusts. This environment gave rise to what anthropologists called
+the multi-millionaire type. The men of this type were at once energetic
+and frail, capable of great activity in forming mental combinations
+and of prolonged labour in offices, but men whose nervous irritability
+suffered from hereditary troubles which increased as time went on.
+
+Like all true aristocrats, like the patricians of republican Rome or the
+squires of old England, these powerful men affected a great severity
+in their habits and customs. They were the ascetics of wealth. At the
+meetings of the trusts an observer would have noticed their smooth and
+puffy faces, their lantern cheeks, their sunken eyes and wrinkled brows.
+With bodies more withered, complexions yellower, lips drier, and eyes
+filled with a more burning fanaticism than those of the old Spanish
+monks, these multimillionaires gave themselves up with inextinguishable
+ardour to the austerities of banking and industry. Several, denying
+themselves all happiness, all pleasure, and all rest, spent their
+miserable lives in rooms without light or air, furnished only with
+electrical apparatus, living on eggs and milk, and sleeping on camp
+beds. By doing nothing except pressing nickel buttons with their
+fingers, these mystics heaped up riches of which they never even saw the
+signs, and acquired the vain possibility of gratifying desires that they
+never experienced.
+
+The worship of wealth had its martyrs. One of these multi-millionaires,
+the famous Samuel Box, preferred to die rather than surrender the
+smallest atom of his property. One of his workmen, the victim of an
+accident while at work, being refused any indemnity by his employer,
+obtained a verdict in the courts, but repelled by innumerable obstacles
+of procedure, he fell into the direst poverty. Being thus reduced to
+despair, he succeeded by dint of cunning and audacity in confronting his
+employer with a loaded revolver in his hand, and threatened to blow
+out his brains if he did not give him some assistance. Samuel Box gave
+nothing, and let himself be killed for the sake of principle.
+
+Examples that come from high quarters are followed. Those who possessed
+some small capital (and they were necessarily the greater number),
+affected the ideas and habits of the multi-millionaires, in order
+that they might be classed among them. All passions which injured the
+increase or the preservation of wealth, were regarded as dishonourable;
+neither indolence, nor idleness, nor the taste for disinterested study,
+nor love of the arts, nor, above all, extravagance, was ever forgiven;
+pity was condemned as a dangerous weakness. Whilst every inclination
+to licentiousness excited public reprobation, the violent and brutal
+satisfaction of an appetite was, on the contrary, excused; violence, in
+truth, was regarded as less injurious to morality, since it manifested
+a form of social energy. The State was firmly based on two great public
+virtues: respect for the rich and contempt for the poor. Feeble spirits
+who were still moved by human suffering had no other resource than to
+take refuge in a hypocrisy which it was impossible to blame, since
+it contributed to the maintenance of order and the solidity of
+institutions.
+
+Thus, among the rich, all were devoted to their social order, or seemed
+to be so; all gave good examples, if all did not follow them. Some felt
+the gravity of their position cruelly; but they endured it either from
+pride or from duty. Some attempted, in secret and by subterfuge, to
+escape from it for a moment. One of these, Edward Martin, the President,
+of the Steel Trust, sometimes dressed himself as a poor man, went: forth
+to beg his bread, and allowed himself to be jostled by the passers-by.
+One day, as he asked alms on a bridge, he engaged in a quarrel with a
+real beggar, and filled with a fury of envy, he strangled him.
+
+As they devoted their whole intelligence to business, they sought
+no intellectual pleasures. The theatre, which had formerly been very
+flourishing among them, was now reduced to pantomimes and comic dances.
+Even the pieces in which women acted were given up; the taste for pretty
+forms and brilliant toilettes had been lost; the somersaults of clowns
+and the music of negroes were preferred above them, and what roused
+enthusiasm was the sight of women upon the stage whose necks were
+bedizened with diamonds, or processions carrying golden bars in triumph.
+Ladies of wealth were as much compelled as the men to lead a respectable
+life. According to a tendency common to all civilizations, public
+feeling set them up as symbols; they were, by their austere
+magnificence, to represent both the splendour of wealth and its
+intangible. The old habits of gallantry had been reformed, Tut
+fashionable lovers were now secretly replaced by muscular labourers
+or stray grooms. Nevertheless, scandals were rare, a foreign journey
+concealed nearly all of them, and the Princesses of the Trusts remained
+objects of universal esteem.
+
+The rich formed only a small minority, but their collaborators, who
+composed the entire people, had been completely won over or completely
+subjugated by them. They formed two classes, the agents of commerce or
+banking, and workers in the factories. The former contributed an immense
+amount of work and received large salaries. Some of them succeeded in
+founding establishments of their own; for in the constant increase of
+the public wealth the more intelligent and audacious could hope for
+anything. Doubtless it would have been possible to find a certain
+number of discontented and rebellious persons among the immense crowd of
+engineers and accountants, but this powerful society had imprinted its
+firm discipline even on the minds of its opponents. The very anarchists
+were laborious and regular.
+
+As for the workmen who toiled in the factories that surrounded the
+town, their decadence, both physical and moral, was terrible; they were
+examples of the type of poverty as it is set forth by anthropology.
+Although the development among them of certain muscles, due to the
+particular nature of their work, might give a false idea of their
+strength, they presented sure signs of morbid debility. Of low stature,
+with small heads and narrow chests, they were further distinguished from
+the comfortable classes by a multitude of physiological anomalies, and,
+in particular, by a common want of symmetry between the head and the
+limbs. And they were destined to a gradual and continuous degeneration,
+for the State made soldiers of the more robust among them, and the
+health of these did not long withstand the brothels and the drink-shops
+that sprang up around their barracks. The proletarians became more
+and more feeble in mind. The continued weakening of their intellectual
+faculties was not entirely due to their manner of life; it resulted also
+from a methodical selection carried out by the employers. The latter,
+fearing that workmen of too great ability might be inclined to put
+forward legitimate demands, took care to eliminate them by every
+possible means, and preferred to engage ignorant and stupid labourers,
+who were incapable of defending their rights, but were yet intelligent
+enough to perform their toil, which highly perfected machines rendered
+extremely simple. Thus the proletarians were unable to do anything to
+improve their lot. With difficulty did they succeed by means of strikes
+in maintaining the rate of their wages. Even this means began to fail
+them. The alternations of production inherent in the capitalist system
+caused such cessations of work that, in several branches of industry, as
+soon as a strike was declared, the accumulation of products allowed
+the employers to dispense with the strikers. In a word, these miserable
+employees were plunged in a gloomy apathy that nothing enlightened and
+nothing exasperated. They were necessary instruments for the social
+order and well adapted to their purpose.
+
+Upon the whole, this social order seemed the most firmly established
+that had yet been seen, at least amon kind, for that of bees and ants is
+incomparably more stable. Nothing could foreshadow the ruin of a system
+founded on what is strongest in human nature, pride and cupidity.
+However, keen observers discovered several grounds for uneasiness. The
+most certain, although the least apparent, were of an economic order,
+and consisted in the continually increasing amount of over-production,
+which entailed long and cruel interruptions of labour, though these
+were, it is true, utilized by the manufacturers as a means of breaking
+the power of the workmen, by facing them with the prospect of a
+lock-out. A more obvious peril resulted from the physiological state of
+almost the entire population. "The health of the poor is what it must
+be," said the experts in hygiene, "but that of the rich leaves much to
+be desired." It was not difficult to find the causes of this. The supply
+of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the city, and men
+breathed in an artificial air. The food trusts, by means of the most
+daring chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk, fruit,
+and vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and brain
+troubles. The multi-millionaires were bald at the age of eighteen; some
+showed from time to time a dangerous weakness of mind. Over-strung and
+enfeebled, they gave enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a
+common thing for some bath-attendant or other trumpery who turned healer
+or prophet, to make a rapid fortune by the practice of medicine or
+theology. The number of lunatics increased continually; suicides
+multiplied in the world of wealth, and many of them were accompanied
+by atrocious and extraordinary circumstances, which bore witness to an
+unheard o perversion of intelligence and sensibility.
+
+Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average minds.
+Terrible accidents, henceforth periodical and regular, entered
+into people's calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in
+statistical tables. Every day, machines burst into fragments, houses
+fell down, trains laden with merchandise fell on to the streets,
+demolishing entire buildings and crushing hundreds of passers-by.
+Through the ground, honey-combed with tunnels, two or three storeys of
+work-shops would often crash, engulfing all those who worked in them.
+
+S. 2
+
+In the southwestern district of the city, on an eminence which had
+preserved its ancient name of Fort Saint-Michel, there stretched a
+square where some old trees still spread their exhausted arms above the
+greensward. Landscape gardeners had constructed a cascade, grottos, a
+torrent, a lake, and an island, on its northern slope. From this side
+one could see the whole town with its streets, its boulevards, its
+squares, the multitude of its roofs and domes, its air-passages, and its
+crowds of men, covered with a veil of silence, and seemingly enchanted
+by the distance. This square was the healthiest place in the capital;
+here no smoke obscured the sky, and children were brought here to play.
+In summer some employees from the neighbouring offices and laboratories
+used to resort to it for a moment after their luncheons, but they did
+not disturb its solitude and peace.
+
+It was owing to this custom that, one day in June, about mid-day, a
+telegraph clerk, Caroline Meslier, came and sat down on a bench at the
+end of a terrace. In order to refresh her eyes by the sight of a little
+green, she turned her back to the town. Dark, with brown eyes, robust
+and placid, Caroline appeared to be from twenty-five to twenty-eight
+years of age. Almost immediately, a clerk in the Electricity Trust,
+George Clair, took his place beside her. Fair, thin, and supple, he had
+features of a feminine delicacy; he was scarcely older than she, and
+looked still younger. As they met almost every day in this place,
+a comradeship had sprung up between them, and they enjoyed chatting
+together. But their conversation had never been tender, affectionate, or
+even intimate. Caroline, although it had happened to her in the past to
+repent of her confidence, might perhaps have been less reserved had
+not George Clair always shown himself extremely restrained in his
+expressions and behaviour. He always gave a purely intellectual
+character to the conversation, keeping it within the realm of general
+ideas, and, moreover, expressing himself on all subjects with the
+greatest freedom. He spoke frequently of the organization of society,
+and the conditions of labour.
+
+"Wealth," said he, "is one of the means of living happily; but people
+have made it the sole end of existence."
+
+And this state of things seemed monstrous to both of them.
+
+They returned continually to various scientific subjects with which they
+were both familiar.
+
+On that day they discussed the evolution of chemistry.
+
+"From the moment," said Clair, "that radium was seen to be transformed
+into helium, people ceased to affirm the immutability of simple bodies;
+in this way all those old laws about simple relations and about the
+indestructibility of matter were abolished."
+
+"However," said she, "chemical laws exist."
+
+For, being a woman, she had need of belief.
+
+He resumed carelessly:
+
+"Now that we can procure radium in sufficient quantities, science
+possesses incomparable means of analysis; even at present we get
+glimpses, within what are called simple bodies, of extremely diversified
+complex ones, and we discover energies in matter which seem to increase
+even by reason of its tenuity."
+
+As they talked, they threw bits of bread to the birds, and some children
+played around them.
+
+Passing from one subject to another:
+
+"This hill, in the quaternary epoch," said Clair, "was inhabited by wild
+horses. Last year, as they were tunnelling for the water mains, they
+found a layer of the bones of primeval horses."
+
+She was anxious to know whether, at that distant epoch, man had yet
+appeared.
+
+He told her that man used to hunt the primeval horse long before he
+tried to domesticate him.
+
+"Man," he added, "was at first a hunter, then he became a shepherd,
+a cultivator, a manufacturer . . . and these diverse civilizations
+succeeded each other at intervals of time that the mind cannot
+conceive."
+
+He took out his watch.
+
+Caroline asked if it was already time to go back to the office.
+
+He said it was not, that it was scarcely half-past twelve.
+
+A little girl was making mud pies at the foot of their bench; a little
+boy of seven or eight years was playing in front of them. Whilst his
+mother was sewing on an adjoining bench, he played all alone at being a
+run-away horse, and with that power of illusion, of which children are
+capable, he imagined that he was at the same time the horse, and those
+who ran after him, and those who fled in terror before him. He kept
+struggling with himself and shouting: "Stop him, Hi! Hi! This is an
+awful horse, he has got the bit between his teeth."
+
+Caroline asked the question:
+
+"Do you think that men were happy formerly?"
+
+Her companion answered:
+
+"They suffered less when they were younger. They acted like that little
+boy: they played; they played at arts, at virtues, at vices, at heroism,
+at beliefs, at pleasures; they had illusions which entertained them;
+they made a noise; they amused themselves. But now. . . ."
+
+He interrupted himself, and looked again at his watch.
+
+The child, who was running, struck his foot against the little girl's
+pail, and fell his full length on the gravel. He remained a moment
+stretched out motionless, then raised himself up on the palms of his
+hands. His forehead puckered, his mouth opened, and he burst into tears.
+His mother ran up, but Caroline had lifted him from the ground and was
+wiping his eyes and mouth with her handkerchief.
+
+The child kept on sobbing and Clair took him in his arms.
+
+"Come, don't cry, my little man! I am going to tell you a story.
+
+"A fisherman once threw his net into the sea and drew out a little,
+sealed, copper pot, which he opened with his knife. Smoke came out
+of it, and as it mounted up to the clouds the smoke grew thicker and
+thicker and became a giant who gave such a terrible yawn that the whole
+world was blown to dust."
+
+Clair stopped himself, gave a dry laugh, and handed the child back to
+his mother. Then he took out his watch again, and kneeling on the bench
+with his elbows resting on its back he gazed at the town. As far as
+the eye could reach, the multitude of houses stood out in their tiny
+immensity.
+
+Caroline turned her eyes in the same direction.
+
+"What splendid weather it is!" said she. "The sun's rays change the
+smoke on the horizon into gold. The worst thing about civilization is
+that it deprives one of the light of day."
+
+We did not answer; his looks remained fixed on a place in the town.
+
+After some seconds of silence they saw about half a mile away, in the
+richer district on the other side of the river, a sort of tragic fog
+rearing itself upwards. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard even
+where they were sitting, and an immense tree of smoke mounted towards
+the pure sky. Little by little the air was filled with an imperceptible
+murmur caused by the shouts of thousands of men. Cries burst forth quite
+close to the square.
+
+"What has been blown up?"
+
+The bewilderment was great, for although accidents were common, such
+a violent explosion as this one had never been seen, and everybody
+perceived that something terribly strange had happened.
+
+Attempts were made to locate the place of the accident; districts,
+streets, different buildings, clubs, theatres, and shops were mentioned.
+Information gradually became more precise and at last the truth was
+known.
+
+"The Steel Trust has just been blown up."
+
+Clair put his watch back into his pocket.
+
+Caroline looked at him closely and her eyes filled with astonishment.
+
+At last she whispered in his ear:
+
+"Did you know it? Were you expecting it? Was it you . . . ?"
+
+He answered very calmly:
+
+"That town ought to be destroyed."
+
+She replied in a gentle and thoughtful tone:
+
+"I think so too."
+
+And both of them returned quietly to their work.
+
+
+S. 3
+
+From that day onward, anarchist attempts followed one another every week
+without interruption. The victims were numerous, and almost all of them
+belonged to the poorer classes. These crimes roused public resentment.
+It was among domestic servants, hotel-keepers, and the employees of such
+small shops as the Trusts still allowed to exist, that indignation
+burst forth most vehemently. In popular districts women might be heard
+demanding unusual punishments for the dynamitards. (They were called
+by this old name, although it was hardly appropriate to them, since, to
+these unknown chemists, dynamite was an innocent material only fit to
+destroy ant-hills, and they considered it mere child's play to explode
+nitro-glycerine with a cartridge made of fulminate of mercury.) Business
+ceased suddenly, and those who were least rich were the first to feel
+the effects. They spoke of doing justice themselves to the anarchists.
+In the mean time the factory workers remained hostile or indifferent
+to violent action. They were threatened, as a result of the decline of
+business, with a likelihood of losing their work, or even a lock-out
+in all the factories. The Federation of Trade Unions proposed a general
+strike as the most powerful means of influencing the employers, and the
+best aid that could be given to the revolutionists, but all the trades
+with the exception of the gliders refused to cease work.
+
+The police made numerous arrests. Troops summoned from all parts of the
+National Federation protected the offices of the Trusts, the houses of
+the multi-millionaires, the public halls, the banks, and the big shops.
+A fortnight passed without a single explosion, and it was concluded that
+the dynamitards, in all probability but a handful of persons, perhaps
+even Still fewer, had all been killed or captured, or that they were in
+hiding, or had taken flight. Confidence returned; it returned at first
+among the poorer classes. Two or three hundred thousand soldiers, who
+bad been lodged in the most closely populated districts, stimulated
+trade, and people began to cry out: "Hurrah for the army!"
+
+The rich, who had not been so quick to take alarm, were reassured more
+slowly. But at the Stock Exchange a group of "bulls" spread optimistic
+rumours and by a powerful effort put a brake upon the fall in prices.
+Business improved. Newspapers with big circulations supported the
+movement. With patriotic eloquence they depicted capital as laughing in
+its impregnable position at the assaults of a few dastardly criminals,
+and public wealth maintaining its serene ascendency in spite of the vain
+threats made against it. They were sincere in their attitude, though at
+the same time they found it benefited them. Outrages were forgotten or
+their occurrence denied. On Sundays, at the race-meetings, the stands
+were adorned by women covered with pearls and diamonds. It was observed
+with joy that the capitalists had not suffered. Cheers were given for
+the multi-millionaires in the saddling rooms.
+
+On the following day the Southern Railway Station, the Petroleum Trust,
+and the huge church built at the expense of Thomas Morcellet were all
+blown up. Thirty houses were in flames, and the beginning of a fire
+was discovered at the docks. The firemen showed amazing intrepidity and
+zeal. They managed their tall fire-escapes with automatic precision,
+and climbed as high as thirty storeys to rescue the luckless inhabitants
+from the flames. The soldiers performed their duties with spirit, and
+were given a double ration of coffee. But these fresh casualties started
+a panic. Millions of people, who wanted to take their money with them
+and leave the town at once, crowded the great banking houses. These
+establishments, after paying out money for three days, closed their
+doors amid mutterings of a riot. A crowd of fugitives, laden with their
+baggage, besieged the railway stations and took the town by storm. Many
+who were anxious to lay in a stock of provisions and take refuge in
+the cellars, attacked the grocery stores, although they were guarded by
+soldiers with fixed bayonets. The public authorities displayed energy.
+Numerous arrests were made and thousands of warrants issued against
+suspected persons.
+
+During the three weeks that followed no outrage was committed. There was
+a rumour that bombs had been found in the Opera House, in the cellars of
+the Town Hall, and beside one of the Pillars of the Stock Exchange. But
+it was soon known that these were boxes of sweets that had been put in
+those places by practical jokers or lunatics. One of the accused, when
+questioned by a magistrate, declared that he was the chief author of
+the explosions, and said that all his accomplices had lost their
+lives. These confessions were published by the newspapers and helped
+to reassure public opinion. It was only towards the close of the
+examination that the magistrates saw they had to deal with a pretender
+who was in no way connected with any of the crimes.
+
+The experts chosen by the courts discovered nothing that enabled them to
+determine the engine employed in the work of destruction. According to
+their conjectures the new explosive emanated from a gas which radium
+evolves, and it was supposed that electric waves, produced by a special
+type of oscillator, were propagated through space and thus caused the
+explosion. But even the ablest chemist could say nothing precise or
+certain. At last two policemen, who were passing in front of the Hotel
+Meyer, found on the pavement, close to a ventilator, an egg made of
+white metal and provided with a capsule at each end. They picked it
+up carefully, and, on the orders of their chief, carried it to the
+municipal laboratory. Scarcely had the experts assembled to examine it,
+than the egg burst and blew up the amphitheatre and the dome. All the
+experts perished, and with them Collin, the General of Artillery, and
+the famous Professor Tigre.
+
+The capitalist society did not allow itself to be daunted by this fresh
+disaster. The great banks re-opened their doors, declaring that
+they would meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money
+guaranteed by the State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange,
+in spite of the complete cessation of business, decided not to suspend
+their sittings.
+
+In the mean time the magisterial investigation into the case of those
+who had been first accused had come to an end. Perhaps the evidence
+brought against them might have appeared insufficient under other
+circumstances, but the zeal both of the magistrates and the public made
+up for this insufficiency. On the eve of the day fixed for the trial the
+Courts of justice were blown up and eight hundred people were killed,
+the greater number of them being judges and lawyers. A furious crowd
+broke into the prison and lynched the prisoners. The troops sent to
+restore order were received with showers of stones and revolver shots;
+several soldiers being dragged from their horses and trampled underfoot.
+The soldiers fired on the mob and many persons were killed. At last the
+public authorities succeeded in establishing tranquillity. Next day the
+Bank was blown up.
+
+From that time onwards unheard-of things took place. The factory
+workers, who had refused to strike, rushed in crowds into the town and
+set fire to the houses. Entire regiments, led by their officers, joined
+the workmen, went with them through the town singing revolutionary
+hymns, and took barrels of petroleum from the docks with which to feed
+the fires. Explosions were continual. One morning a monstrous tree of
+smoke, like the ghost of a huge palm tree half a mile in height, rose
+above the giant Telegraph Hall which suddenly fell into a complete ruin.
+
+Whilst half the town was in flames, the other half pursued its
+accustomed life. In the mornings, milk pails could be heard jingling
+in the dairy carts. In a deserted avenue some old navvy might be seen
+seated against a wall slowly eating hunks of bread with perhaps a little
+meat. Almost all the presidents of the trusts remained at their posts.
+Some of them performed their duty with heroic simplicity. Raphael
+Box, the son of a martyred multi-millionaire, was blown up as he was
+presiding at the general meeting of the Sugar Trust. He was given a
+magnificent funeral and the procession on its way to the cemetery had
+to climb six times over piles of ruins or cross upon planks over the
+uprooted roads.
+
+The ordinary helpers of the rich, the clerks, employees, brokers, and
+agents, preserved an unshaken fidelity. The surviving clerks of the Bank
+that had been blown up, made their way along the ruined streets through
+the midst of smoking houses to hand in their bills of exchange, and
+several were swallowed up in the flames while endeavouring to present
+their receipts.
+
+Nevertheless, any illusion concerning the state of affairs was
+impossible. The enemy was master of the town. Instead of silence the
+noise of explosions was now continuous and produced an insurmountable
+feeling of horror. The lighting apparatus having been destroyed, the
+city was plunged in darkness all through the night, and appalling crimes
+were committed. The populous districts alone, having suffered the least,
+still preserved measures of protection. The were paraded by patrols of
+volunteers who shot the robbers, and at every street corner one stumbled
+over a body lying in a pool of blood, the hands bound behind the back, a
+handkerchief over the face, and a placard pinned upon the breast.
+
+It became impossible to clear away the ruins or to bury the dead. Soon
+the stench from the corpses became intolerable. Epidemics raged and
+caused innumerable deaths, while they also rendered the survivors feeble
+and listless. Famine carried off almost all who were left. A hundred
+and one days after the first outrage, whilst six army corps with field
+artillery and siege artillery were marching, at night, into the poorest
+quarter of the city, Caroline and Clair, holding each other's hands,
+were watching from the roof a lofty house, the only one still left
+standing, but now surrounded by smoke and flame, joyous songs ascended
+from the street, where the crowd was dancing in delirium.
+
+"To-morrow it will be ended," said the man, "and it will be better."
+
+The young woman, her hair loosened and her face shining with the
+reflection of the flames, gazed with a pious joy at the circle of fire
+that was growing closer around them.
+
+"It will be better," said she also.
+
+And throwing herself into the destroyer's arms she pressed a passionate
+kiss upon his lips.
+
+S. 4
+
+The other towns of the federation also suffered from disturbances and
+outbreaks, and then order was restored. Reforms were introduced into
+institutions and great changes took place in habits and customs, but the
+country never recovered the loss of its capital, and never regained its
+former prosperity. Commerce and industry dwindled away, and civilization
+abandoned those countries which for so long it bad preferred to all
+others. They became insalubrious and sterile; the territory that had
+supported so many millions of men became nothing more than a desert. On
+the hill of Fort St. Michel wild horses cropped the coarse grass.
+
+Days flowed by like water from the fountains, and the centuries passed
+like drops falling from the ends of stalactites. Hunters came to chase
+the bears upon the hills that covered the forgotten city; shepherds led
+their flocks upon them; labourers turned up the soil with their ploughs;
+gardeners cultivated their lettuces and grafted their pear trees. They
+were not rich, and they had no arts. The walls of their cabins were
+covered with old vines and roses, A goat-skin clothed their tanned
+limbs, while their wives dressed themselves with the wool that they
+themselves had spun. The goat-herds moulded little figures of men and
+animals out of clay, or sang songs about the young girl who follows her
+lover through woods or among the browsing goats while the pine trees
+whisper together and the water utters its murmuring sound. The master of
+the house grew angry with the beetles who devoured his figs; he planned
+snares to protect his fowls from the velvet-tailed fox, and he poured
+out wine for his neighbours saying:
+
+"Drink! The flies have not spoilt my vintage; the vines were dry before
+they came."
+
+Then in the course of ages the wealth of the villages and the corn
+that filled the fields were pillaged by barbarian invaders. The country
+changed its masters several times. The conquerors built castles upon the
+hills; cultivation increased; mills, forges, tanneries, and looms were
+established; roads were opened through the woods and over the marshes;
+the river was covered with boats. The hamlets became large villages and
+joining together formed a town which protected itself by deep trenches
+and lofty walls. Later, becoming the capital of a great State, it found
+itself straitened within its now useless ramparts and it converted them
+into grass-covered walks.
+
+It grew very rich and large beyond measure. The houses were never high
+enough to satisfy the people; they kept on making them still higher
+and built them of thirty or forty storeys, with offices, shops, banks,
+societies one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper
+downwards. Fifteen millions of men laboured in the giant town.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
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+Scanned by Aaron Cannon of Paradise, California
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+
+
+
+
+PENGUIN ISLAND
+
+by ANATOLE FRANCE 
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS
+BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES
+BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES
+BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES
+BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS
+
+I. LIFE OF SAINT MAEL
+
+Mael, a scion of a royal family of Cambria, was sent in his ninth year to the
+Abbey of Yvern so that he might there study both sacred and profane learning.
+At the age of fourteen he renounced his patrimony and took a vow to serve the
+Lord. His time was divided, according to the rule, between the singing of
+hymns, the study of grammar, and the meditation of eternal truths.
+
+A celestial perfume soon disclosed the virtues of the monk throughout the
+cloister, and when the blessed Gal, the Abbot of Yvern, departed from this
+world into the next, young Mael succeeded him in the government of the
+monastery. He established therein a school, an infirmary, a guest-house, a
+forge, work-shops of all kinds, and sheds for building ships, and he compelled
+the monks to till the lands in the neighbourhood. With his own hands he
+cultivated the garden of the Abbey, he worked in metals, he instructed the
+novices, and his life was gently gliding along like a stream that reflects the
+heaven and fertilizes the fields.
+
+At the close of the day this servant of God was accustomed to seat himself on
+the cliff, in the place that is to-day still called St. Mael's chair. At his
+feet the rocks bristling with green seaweed and tawny wrack seemed like black
+dragons as they faced the foam of the waves with their monstrous breasts. He
+watched the sun descending into the ocean like a red Host whose glorious blood
+gave a purple tone to the clouds and to the summits of the waves. And the holy
+man saw in this the image of the mystery of the Cross, by which the divine
+blood has clothed the earth with a royal purple. In the offing a line of dark
+blue marked the shores of the island of Gad, where St. Bridget, who had been
+given the veil by St. Malo, ruled over a convent of women.
+
+Now Bridget, knowing the merits of the venerable Mael, begged from him some
+work of his hands as a rich present. Mael cast a hand-bell of bronze for her
+and, when it was finished, he blessed it and threw it into the sea. And the
+bell went ringing towards the coast of Gad, where St. Bridget, warned by the
+sound of the bell upon the waves, received it piously, and carried it in
+solemn procession with singing of psalms into the chapel of the convent.
+
+Thus the holy Mael advanced from virtue to virtue. He had already passed
+through two-thirds of the way of life, and he hoped peacefully to reach his
+terrestrial end in the midst of his spiritual brethren, when he knew by a
+certain sign that the Divine wisdom had decided otherwise, and that the Lord
+was calling him to less peaceful but not less meritorious labours.
+
+
+
+II. THE APOSTOLICAL VOCATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+One day as he walked in meditation to the furthest point of a tranquil beach,
+for which rocks jutting out into the sea formed a rugged dam, he saw a trough
+of stone which floated like a boat upon the waters.
+
+It was in a vessel similar to this that St. Guirec, the great St. Columba, and
+so many holy men from Scotland and from Ireland had gone forth to evangelize
+Armorica. More recently still, St. Avoye having come from England, ascended
+the river Auray in a mortar made of rose-coloured granite into which children
+were afterwards placed in order to make them strong; St. Vouga passed from
+Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock whose fragments, preserved at Penmarch, will
+cure of fever such pilgrims as place these splinters on their heads. St.
+Samson entered the Bay of St. Michael's Mount in a granite vessel which will
+one day be called St. Samson's basin. It is because of these facts that when
+he saw the stone trough the holy Mael understood that the Lord intended him
+for the apostolate of the pagans who still peopled the coast and the Breton
+islands.
+
+He handed his ashen staff to the holy Budoc, thus investing him with the
+government of the monastery. Then, furnished with bread, a barrel of fresh
+water, and the book of the Holy Gospels, he entered the stone trough which
+carried him gently to the island of Hoedic.
+
+This island is perpetually buffeted by the winds. In it some poor men fished
+among the clefts of the rocks and labouriously cultivated vegetables in
+gardens full of sand and pebbles that were sheltered from the wind by walls of
+barren stone and hedges of tamarisk. A beautiful fig-tree raised itself in a
+hollow of the island and thrust forth its branches far and wide. The
+inhabitants of the island used to worship it.
+
+And the holy Mael said to them: "You worship this tree because it is
+beautiful. Therefore you are capable of feeling beauty. Now I come to reveal
+to you the hidden beauty." And he taught them the Gospel. And after having
+instructed them, he baptized them with salt and water.
+
+The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than they are
+to-day. For since then many have been swallowed up by the sea. St. Mael
+evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he ascended the river
+Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a Roman house. A
+thin column of smoke went up from the roof. The holy man crossed the threshold
+on which there was a mosaic representing a dog with its hind legs outstretched
+and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed by an old couple, Marcus Combabus and
+Valeria Moerens, who lived there on the products of their lands. There was a
+portico round the interior court the columns of which were painted red, half
+their height upwards from the base. A fountain made of shells stood against
+the wall and under the portico there rose an altar with a niche in which the
+master of the house had placed some little idols made of baked earth and
+whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged children, others Apollo or
+Mercury, and several were in the form of a naked woman twisting her hair. But
+the holy Mael, observing those figures, discovered among them the image of a
+young mother holding a child upon her knees.
+
+Immediately pointing to that image he said:
+
+"That is the Virgin, the mother of God. The poet Virgil foretold her in
+Sibylline verses before she was born and, in angelical tones he sang Jam redit
+et virgo. Throughout heathendom prophetic figures of her have been made, like
+that which you, O Marcus, have placed upon this altar. And without doubt it is
+she who has protected your modest household. Thus it is that those who
+faithfully observe the natural law prepare themselves for the knowledge of
+revealed truths."
+
+Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, having been instructed by this speech,
+were converted to the Christian faith. They received baptism together with
+their young freedwoman, Caelia Avitella, who was dearer to them than the light
+of their eyes. All their tenants renounced paganism and were baptized on the
+same day.
+
+Marcus Combabus, Valeria Moerens, and Caelia Avitella led thenceforth a life
+full of merit. They died in the Lord and were admitted into the canon of the
+saints.
+
+For thirty-seven years longer the blessed Mael evangelized the pagans of the
+inner lands. He built two hundred and eighteen chapels and seventy-four
+abbeys.
+
+Now on a certain day in the city of Vannes, when he was preaching the Gospel,
+he learned that the monks of Yvern had in his absence declined from the rule
+of St. Gal. Immediately, with the zeal of a hen who gathers her brood, he
+repaired to his erring children. He was then towards the end of his
+ninety-seventh year; his figure was bent, but his arms were still strong, and
+his speech was poured forth abundantly like winter snow in the depths of the
+valleys.
+
+Abbot Budoc restored the ashen staff to St. Mael and informed him of the
+unhappy state into which the Abbey had fallen. The monks were in disagreement
+as to the date an which the festival of Easter ought to be celebrated. Some
+held for the Roman calendar, others for the Greek calendar, and the horrors of
+a chronological schism distracted the monastery.
+
+There also prevailed another cause of disorder. The nuns of the island of Gad,
+sadly fallen from their former virtue, continually came in boats to the coast
+of Yvern. The monks received them in the guesthouse and from this there arose
+scandals which filled pious souls with desolation.
+
+Having finished his faithful report, Abbot Budoc concluded in these terms:
+
+"Since the coming of these nuns the innocence and peace of the monks are at an
+end."
+
+"I readily believe it," answered the blessed Mael. "For woman is a cleverly
+constructed snare by which we are taken even before we suspect the trap. Alas!
+the delightful attraction of these creatures is exerted with even greater
+force from a distance than when they are close at hand. The less they satisfy
+desire the more they inspire it. This is the reason why a poet wrote this
+verse to one of them:
+
+When present I avoid thee, but when away I find thee.
+
+Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love have more power
+over hermits and monks than over men who live in the world. All through my
+life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but his strongest
+temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman, however beautiful and
+fragrant she was. They came to me from the image of an absent woman. Even now,
+though full of days and approaching my ninety-eighth year, I am often led by
+the Enemy to sin against chastity, at least in thought. At night when I am
+cold in my bed and my frozen old bones rattle together with a dull sound I
+hear voices reciting the second verse of the third Book of the Kings:
+'Wherefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the
+king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish
+him, and let her lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat,' and
+the devil shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to me: 'I am thy
+Abishag; I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy couch.'
+
+"Believe me," added the old man, "it is only by the special aid of Heaven that
+a monk can keep his chastity in act and in intention."
+
+Applying himself immediately to restore innocence and peace to the monastery,
+he corrected the calendar according to the calculations of chronology and
+astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his decision; he sent the
+women who had declined from St. Bridget's rule back to their convent; but far
+from driving them away brutally, he caused them to be led to their boat with
+singing of psalms and litanies.
+
+"Let us respect in them," he said, "the daughters of Bridget and the betrothed
+of the Lord. Let us beware lest we imitate the Pharisees who affect to despise
+sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons should be abased, and
+they should be made ashamed of what they have done and not of what they are,
+for they are all creatures of God."
+
+And the holy man exhorted his monks to obey faithfully the rule of their
+order.
+
+"When it does not yield to the rudder," said he to them, "the ship yields to
+the rock."
+
+
+
+III. THE TEMPTATION OF SAINT MAEL
+
+The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of Yvern before he
+learned that the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic, his first catechumens
+and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to paganism, and that they
+were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of wool to the branches of the
+sacred fig-tree.
+
+The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that soon those
+misguided men might violently destroy the chapel that had been built on the
+shore of their island.
+
+The holy man resolved forthwith to visit his faithless children, so that he
+might lead them back to the faith and prevent them from yielding to such
+sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was moored, he
+turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of saws and of
+hammers, which, thirty years before, he had erected on the fringe of that bay
+for the purpose of building ships.
+
+At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the sheds and, under
+the appearance of a monk called Samsok, he approached the holy man and tempted
+him thus:
+
+"Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins unceasingly.
+Every moment that passes removes them farther from God. They are soon going to
+use violence towards the chapel that you have raised with your own venerable
+hands on the shore of their island. Time is pressing. Do you not think that
+your stone trough would carry you more quickly towards them if it were rigged
+like a boat and furnished with a rudder, a mast, and a sail, for then you
+would be driven by the wind? Your arms are still strong and able to steer a
+small craft. It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem in front of
+your apostolic trough. You are much too clear-sighted not to have thought of
+it already."
+
+"Truly time is pressing," answered the holy man. "But to do as you say,
+Samson, my son, would it not be to make myself like those men of little faith
+who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts of Him who has
+sent me this stone vessel without rigging or sail?"
+
+This question, the Devil, who is a great theologian, answered by another.
+
+"Father, is it praiseworthy to wait, with our arms folded, until help comes
+from on high, and to ask everything from Him who can do all things, instead of
+acting by human prudence and helping ourselves?
+
+"It certainly is not," answered the holy Mael, "and to neglect to act by human
+prudence is tempting God."
+
+"Well," urged the Devil, "is it not prudence in this case to rig the vessel?"
+
+"It would be prudence if we could not attain our end in any other way."
+
+"Is your vessel then so very speedy?"
+
+"It is as speedy as God pleases."
+
+"What do you know about it? It goes like Abbot Budoc's mule. It is a regular
+old tub. Are you forbidden to make it speedier?"
+
+"My son, clearness adorns your words, but they are unduly over-confident.
+Remember that this vessel is miraculous."
+
+"It is, father. A granite trough that floats on the water like a cork is a
+miraculous trough. There is not the slightest doubt about it. What conclusion
+do you draw from that?"
+
+"I am greatly perplexed. Is it right to perfect so miraculous a machine by
+human and natural means?"
+
+"Father, if you lost your right foot and God restored it to you, would not
+that foot be miraculous?"
+
+"Without doubt, my son."
+
+"Would you put a shoe on it?"
+
+"Assuredly."
+
+"Well, then, if you believe that one may cover a miraculous foot with a
+natural shoe, you should also believe that we can put natural rigging on a
+miraculous boat. That is clear. Alas! Why must the holiest persons have their
+moments of weakness and despondency? The most illustrious of the apostles of
+Brittany could accomplish works worthy of eternal glory . . . But his spirit
+is tardy and his hand is slothful. Farewell then, father! Travel by short and
+slow stages and when at last you approach the coast of Hoedic you will see the
+smoking ruins of the chapel that was built and consecrated by your own hands.
+The pagans will have burned it and with it the deacon you left there. He will
+be as thoroughly roasted as a black pudding."
+
+"My trouble is extreme," said the servant of God, drying with his sleeve the
+sweat that gathered upon his brow. "But tell me, Samson, my son, would not
+rigging this stone trough be a difficult piece of work? And if we undertook it
+might we not lose time instead of gaining it?"
+
+"Ah! father," exclaimed the Devil, "in one turning of the hour-glass the thing
+would be done. We shall find the necessary rigging in this shed that you have
+formerly built here on the coast and in those store-houses abundantly stocked
+through your care. I will myself regulate all the ship's fittings. Before
+being a monk I was a sailor and a carpenter and I have worked at many other
+trades as well. Let us to work."
+
+Immediately he drew the holy man into an outhouse filled with all things
+needful for fitting out a boat.
+
+"That for you, father!"
+
+And he placed on his shoulders the sail, the mast, the gaff, and the boom.
+
+Then, himself bearing a stem and a rudder with its screw and tiller, and
+seizing a carpenter's bag full of tools, he ran to the shore, dragging the
+holy man after him by his habit. The latter was bent, sweating, and
+breathless, under the burden of canvas and wood.
+
+
+
+IV. ST. MAEL'S NAVIGATION ON THE OCEAN OF ICE
+
+The Devil, having tucked his clothes up to his arm-pits, dragged the trough on
+the sand, and fitted the rigging in less than an hour.
+
+As soon as the holy Mael had embarked, the vessel, with all its sails set,
+cleft through the waters with such speed that the coast was almost immediately
+out of sight. The old man steered to the south so as to double the Land's End,
+but an irresistible current carried him to the south-west. He went along the
+southern coast of Ireland and turned sharply towards the north. In the evening
+the wind freshened. In vain did Mael attempt to furl the sail. The vessel flew
+distractedly towards the fabulous seas.
+
+By the light of the moon the immodest sirens of the North came around him with
+their hempen-coloured hair, raising their white throats and their rose-tinted
+limbs out of the sea; and beating the water into foam with their emerald
+tails, they sang in cadence:
+
+    Whither go'st thou, gentle Mael,
+    In thy trough distracted?
+    All distended is thy sail 
+    Like the breast of Juno
+    When from it gushed the Milky Way.
+
+For a moment their harmonious laughter followed him beneath the stars, but the
+vessel fled on, a hundred times more swiftly than the red ship of a Viking.
+And the petrels, surprised in their flight, clung with their feet to the hair
+of the holy man.
+
+Soon a tempest arose full of darkness and groanings, and the trough, driven by
+a furious wind, flew like a sea-mew through the mist and the surge.
+
+After a night of three times twenty-four hours the darkness was suddenly rent
+and the holy man discovered on the horizon a shore more dazzling than diamond.
+The coast rapidly grew larger, and soon by the glacial light of a torpid and
+sunken sun, Mael saw, rising above the waves, the silent streets of a white
+city, which, vaster than Thebes with its hundred gates, extended as far as the
+eye could see the ruins of its forum built of snow, its palaces of frost, its
+crystal arches, and its iridescent obelisks.
+
+The ocean was covered with floating ice-bergs around which swam men of the sea
+of a wild yet gentle appearance. And Leviathan passed by hurling a column of
+water up to the clouds.
+
+Moreover, on a block of ice which floated at the same rate as the stone trough
+there was seated a white bear holding her little one in her arms, and Mael
+heard her murmuring in a low voice this verse of Virgil, Incipe parve puer.
+
+And full of sadness and trouble, the old man wept.
+
+The fresh water had frozen and burst the barrel that contained it. And Mael
+was sucking pieces of ice to quench his thirst, and his food was bread dipped
+in dirty water. His beard and his hair were broken like glass. His habit was
+covered with a layer of ice and cut into him at every movement of his limbs.
+Huge waves rose up and opened their foaming jaws at the old man. Twenty times
+the boat was filled by masses of sea. And the ocean swallowed up the book of
+the Holy Gospels which the apostle guarded with extreme care in a purple cover
+marked with a golden cross.
+
+Now on the thirtieth day the sea calmed. And lo! with a frightful clamour of
+sky and waters a mountain of dazzling whiteness advanced towards the stone
+vessel. Mael steered to avoid it, but the tiller broke in his hands. To lessen
+the speed of his progress towards the rock he attempted to reef the sails, but
+when he tried to knot the reef-points the wind pulled them away from him and
+the rope seared his hands. He saw three demons with wings of black skin having
+hooks at their ends, who, hanging from the rigging, were puffing with their
+breath against the sails.
+
+Understanding from this sight that the Enemy had governed him in all these
+things, he guarded himself by making the sign of the Cross. Immediately a
+furious gust of wind filled with the noise of sobs and howls struck the stone
+trough, carried off the mast with all the sails, and tore away the rudder and
+the stem.
+
+The trough was drifting on the sea, which had now grown calm. The holy man
+knelt and gave thanks to the Lord who had delivered him from the snares of the
+demon. Then he recognised, sitting on a block of ice, the mother bear who had
+spoken during the storm. She pressed her beloved child to her bosom, and in
+her hand she held a purple book marked with a golden cross. Hailing the
+granite trough, she saluted the holy man with these words:
+
+    "Pax tibi Mael"
+
+And she held out the book to him.
+
+The holy man recognised his evangelistary, and, full of astonishment, he sang
+in the tepid air a hymn to the Creator and His creation.
+
+
+
+V. THE BAPTISM OF THE PENGUINS
+
+After having drifted for an hour the holy man approached a narrow strand, shut
+in by steep mountains. He went along the coast for a whole day and a night,
+passing around the reef which formed an insuperable barrier. He discovered in
+this way that it was a round island in the middle of which rose a mountain
+crowned with clouds. He joyfully breathed the fresh breath of the moist air.
+Rain fell, and this rain was so pleasant that the holy man said to the Lord:
+
+"Lord, this is the island of tears, the island of contrition."
+
+The strand was deserted. Worn out with fatigue and hunger, he sat down on a
+rock in the hollow of which there lay some yellow eggs, marked with black
+spots, and about as large as those of a swan. But he did not touch them,
+saying:
+
+"Birds are the living praises of God. I should not like a single one of these
+praises to be lacking through me."
+
+And he munched the lichens which he tore from the crannies of the rocks.
+
+The holy man had gone almost entirely round the island without meeting any
+inhabitants, when he came to a vast amphitheatre formed of black and red rocks
+whose summits became tinged with blue as they rose towards the clouds, and
+they were filled with sonorous cascades.
+
+The reflection from the polar ice had hurt the old man's eyes, but a feeble
+gleam of light still shone through his swollen eyelids. He distinguished
+animated forms which filled the rocks, in stages, like a crowd of men on the
+tiers of an amphitheatre. And at the same time, his ears, deafened by the
+continual noises of the sea, heard a feeble sound of voices. Thinking that
+what he saw were men living under the natural law, and that the Lord had sent
+him to teach them the Divine law, he preached the gospel to them.
+
+Mounted on a lofty stone in the midst of the wild circus:
+
+"Inhabitants of this island," said he, "although you be of small stature, you
+look less like a band of fishermen and mariners than like the senate of a
+judicious republic. By your gravity, your silence, your tranquil deportment,
+you form on this wild rock an assembly comparable to the Conscript Fathers at
+Rome deliberating in the temple of Victory, or rather, to the philosophers of
+Athens disputing on the benches of the Areopagus. Doubtless you possess
+neither their science nor their genius, but perhaps in the sight of God you
+are their superiors. I believe that you are simple and good. As I went round
+your island I saw no image of murder, no sign of carnage, no enemies' heads or
+scalps hung from a lofty pole or nailed to the doors of your villages. You
+appear to me to have no arts and not to work in metals. But your hearts are
+pure and your hands are innocent, and the truth will easily enter into your
+souls."
+
+Now what he had taken for men of small stature but of grave bearing were
+penguins whom the spring had gathered together, and who were ranged in couples
+on the natural steps of the rock, erect in the majesty of their large white
+bellies. From moment to moment they moved their winglets like arms, and
+uttered peaceful cries. They did not fear men, for they did not know them, and
+had never received any harm from them; and there was in the monk a certain
+gentleness that reassured the most timid animals and that pleased these
+penguins extremely. With a friendly curiosity they turned towards him their
+little round eyes lengthened in front by a white oval spot that gave something
+odd and human to their appearance.
+
+Touched by their attention, the holy man taught them the Gospel.
+
+"Inhabitants of this island, the earthly day that has just risen over your
+rocks is the image of the heavenly day that rises in your souls. For I bring
+you the inner light; I bring you the light and heat of the soul. Just as the
+sun melts the ice of your mountains so Jesus Christ will melt the ice of your
+hearts."
+
+Thus the old man spoke. As everywhere throughout nature voice calls to voice,
+as all which breathes in the light of day loves alternate strains, these
+penguins answered the old man by the sounds of their throats. And their voices
+were soft, for it was the season of their loves.
+
+The holy man, persuaded that they belonged to some idolatrous people and that
+in their own language they gave adherence to the Christian faith, invited them
+to receive baptism.
+
+"I think," said he to them, "that you bathe often, for all the hollows of the
+rocks are full of pure water, and as I came to your assembly I saw several of
+you plunging into these natural baths. Now purity of body is the image of
+spiritual purity."
+
+And he taught them the origin, the nature, and the effects of baptism.
+
+"Baptism," said he to them, "is Adoption, New Birth, Regeneration,
+Illumination."
+
+And he explained each of these points to them in succession.
+
+Then, having previously blessed the water that fell from the cascades and
+recited the exorcisms, he baptized those whom he had just taught, pouring on
+each of their heads a drop of pure water and pronouncing the sacred words.
+
+And thus for three days and three nights he baptized the birds.
+
+
+
+VI. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE
+
+When the baptism of the penguins was known in Paradise, it caused neither joy
+nor sorrow, but an extreme surprise. The Lord himself was embarrassed. He
+gathered an assembly of clerics and doctors, and asked them whether they
+regarded the baptism as valid.
+
+"It is void," said St. Patrick.
+
+"Why is it void?" asked St. Gal, who had evangelized the people of Cornwall
+and had trained the holy Mael for his apostolical labours.
+
+"The sacrament of baptism," answered St. Patrick, "is void when it is given to
+birds, just as the sacrament of marriage is void when it is given to a
+eunuch."
+
+But St. Gal replied:
+
+"What relation do you claim to establish between the baptism of a bird and the
+marriage of a eunuch? There is none at all. Marriage is, if I may say so, a
+conditional, a contingent sacrament. The priest blesses an event beforehand;
+it is evident that if the act is not consummated the benediction remains
+without effect. That is obvious. I have known on earth, in the town of Antrim,
+a rich man named Sadoc, who, living in concubinage with a woman, caused her to
+be the mother of nine children. In his old age, yielding to my reproofs, he
+consented to marry her, and I blessed their union. Unfortunately Sadoc's great
+age prevented him from consummating the marriage. A short time afterwards he
+lost all his property, and Germaine (that was the name of the woman), not
+feeling herself able to endure poverty, asked for the annulment of a marriage
+which was no reality. The Pope granted her request, for it was just. So much
+for marriage. But baptism is conferred without restrictions or reserves of any
+kind. There is no doubt about it, what the penguins have received is a
+sacrament."
+
+Called to give his opinion, Pope St. Damascus expressed himself in these
+terms:
+
+"In order to know if a baptism is valid and will produce its result, that is
+to say, sanctification, it is necessary to consider who gives it and not who
+receives it. In truth, the sanctifying virtue of this sacrament results from
+the exterior act by which it is conferred, without the baptized person
+cooperating in his own sanctification by any personal act; if it were
+otherwise it would not be administered to the newly born. And there is no
+need, in order to baptize, to fulfil any special condition; it is not
+necessary to be in a state of grace; it is sufficient to have the intention of
+doing what the Church does, to pronounce the consecrated words and to observe
+the prescribed forms. Now we cannot doubt that the venerable Mael has observed
+these conditions. Therefore the penguins are baptized."
+
+"Do you think so?" asked St. Guenole. "And what then do you believe that
+baptism really is? Baptism is the process of regeneration by which man is born
+of water and of the spirit, for having entered the water covered with crimes,
+he goes out of it a neophyte, a new creature, abounding in the fruits of
+righteousness; baptism is the seed of immortality; baptism is the pledge of
+the resurrection; baptism is the burying with Christ in His death and
+participation in His departure from the sepulchre. That is not a gift to
+bestow upon birds. Reverend Fathers, let us consider. Baptism washes away
+original sin; now the penguins were not conceived in sin. It removes the
+penalty of sin; now the penguins have not sinned. It produces grace and the
+gift of virtues, uniting Christians to Jesus Christ, as the members to the
+body, and it is obvious to the senses that penguins cannot acquire the virtues
+of confessors, of virgins, and of widows, or receive grace and be united to--"
+
+St. Damascus did not allow him to finish.
+
+"That proves," said he warmly, "that the baptism was useless; it does not
+prove that it was not effective."
+
+"But by this reasoning," said St. Guenole, "one might baptize in the name of
+the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by aspersion or immersion, not
+only a bird or a quadruped, but also an inanimate object, a statue, a table, a
+chair, etc. That animal would be Christian, that idol, that table would be
+Christian! It is absurd!"
+
+St. Augustine began to speak. There was a great silence.
+
+"I am going," said the ardent bishop of Hippo, "to show you, by an example,
+the power of formulas. It deals, it is true, with a diabolical operation. But
+if it be established that formulas taught by the Devil have effect upon
+unintelligent animals or even on inanimate objects, how can we longer doubt
+that the effect of the sacramental formulas extends to the minds of beasts and
+even to inert matter?
+
+"This is the example. There was during my lifetime in the town of Madaura, the
+birthplace of the philosopher Apuleius, a witch who was able to attract men to
+her chamber by burning a few of their hairs along with certain herbs upon her
+tripod, pronouncing at the same time certain words. Now one day when she
+wished by this means to gain the, love of a young man, she was deceived by her
+maid, and instead of the young man's hairs, she burned some hairs pulled from
+a leather bottle, made out of a goatskin that hung in a tavern. During the
+night the leather bottle, full of wine, capered through the town up to the
+witch's door. This fact is undoubted. And in sacraments as in enchantments it
+is the form which operates. The effect of a divine formula cannot be less in
+power and extent than the effect of an infernal formula."
+
+Having spoken in this fashion the great St. Augustine sat down amidst
+applause.
+
+One of the blessed, of an advanced age and having a melancholy appearance,
+asked permission to speak. No one knew him. His name was Probus, and he was
+not enrolled in the canon of the saints.
+
+"I beg the company's pardon," said he, "I have no halo, and I gained eternal
+blessedness without any eminent distinction. But after what the great St.
+Augustine has just told you I believe it right to impart a cruel experience,
+which I had, relative to the conditions necessary for the validity of a
+sacrament. The bishop of Hippo is indeed right in what he said. A sacrament
+depends on the form; its virtue is in its form; its vice is in its form.
+Listen, confessors and pontiffs, to my woeful story. I was a priest in Rome
+under the rule of the Emperor Gordianus. Without desiring to recommend myself
+to you for any special merit, I may say that I exercised my priesthood with
+piety and zeal. For forty years I served the church of St.
+Modestus-beyond-the-Walls. My habits were regular. Every Saturday I went to a
+tavern-keeper called Barjas, who dwelt with his wine-jars under the Porta
+Capena, and from him I bought the wine that I consecrated daily throughout the
+week. During that.long space of time I never failed for a single morning to
+consecrate the holy sacrifice of the mass. However, I had no joy, and it was
+with a heart oppressed by sorrow that, on the steps of the altar I used to
+ask, 'Why art thou so heavy, O my soul, and why art thou so disquieted within
+me?' The faithful whom I invited to the holy table gave me cause for
+affliction, for having, so to speak, the Host that I administered still upon
+their tongues, they fell again into sin just as if the sacrament had been
+without power or efficacy. At last I reached the end of my earthly trials, and
+failing asleep in the Lord, I awoke in this abode of the elect. I learned then
+from the mouth of the angel who brought me here, that Barjas, the
+tavern-keeper of the Porta Capena, had sold for wine a decoction of roots and
+barks in which there was not a single drop of the juice of the grape. I had
+been unable to transmute this vile brew into blood, for it was not wine, and
+wine alone is changed into the blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore all my
+consecrations were invalid, and unknown to us, my faithful and myself had for
+forty years been deprived of the sacrament and were in fact in a state of
+excommunication. This revelation threw me into a stupor which overwhelms me
+even to-day in this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise without ever
+meeting a single one of those Christians whom formerly I admitted to the holy
+table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of the bread of
+angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and they have all
+gone to hell. It gives me some satisfaction to think that Barjas, the
+tavern-keeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic worthy of the
+author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that it is
+sometimes inconvenient that form should prevail over essence in the
+sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy this?"
+
+"No," answered the Lord. "The remedy would be worse than the disease. It would
+be the ruin of the priesthood if essence prevailed over form in the laws of
+salvation."
+
+"Alas! Lord," sighed the humble Probus. "Be persuaded by my humble experience;
+as long as you reduce your sacraments to formulas your justice will meet with
+terrible obstacles."
+
+"I know that better than you do," replied the Lord. "I see in a single glance
+both the actual problems which are difficult, and the future problems which
+will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when the sun will have
+turned round the earth two hundred and forty times more.
+
+"Sublime language," exclaimed the angels.
+
+"And worthy of the creator of the world," answered the pontiffs.
+
+"It is," resumed the Lord, "a manner of speaking in accordance with my old
+cosmogony and one which I cannot give up without losing my immutability. . . .
+
+"After the sun, then, will have turned another two hundred and forty times
+round the earth, there will not be a single cleric left in Rome who knows
+Latin. When they sing their litanies in the churches people will invoke
+Orichel, Roguel, and Totichel, and, as you know, these are devils and not
+angels. Many robbers desiring to make their communions, but fearing that
+before obtaining pardon they would be forced to give up the things they had
+robbed to the Church, will make their confessions to travelling priests,who,
+ignorant of both Italian and Latin, and only speaking the patois of their
+village, will go through cities and towns selling the remission of sins for a
+base price, often for a bottle of wine. Probably we shall not be
+inconvenienced by those absolutions as they will want contrition to make them
+valid, but it may be that their baptisms will cause us some embarrassment. The
+priests will become so ignorant that they will baptize children in nomine
+patria et filia et spirita sancta, as Louis de Potter will take a pleasure in
+relating in the third volume of his 'Philosophical, Political, and Critical
+History of Christianity.' It will be an arduous question to decide on the
+validity of such baptisms; for even if in my sacred writings I tolerate a
+Greek less elegant than Plato's and a scarcely Ciceronian Latin, I cannot
+possibly admit a piece of pure patois as a liturgical formula. And one
+shudders when one thinks that millions of new-born babes will be baptized by
+this method. But let us return to our penguins."
+
+"Your divine words, Lord, have already led us back to them," said St. Gal. "In
+the signs of religion and the laws of salvation form necessarily prevails over
+essence, and the validity of a sacrament solely depends upon its form. The
+whole question is whether the penguins have been baptized with the proper
+forms. Now there is no doubt about the answer."
+
+The fathers and the doctors agreed, and their perplexity became only the more
+cruel.
+
+"The Christian state," said St. Cornelius, "is not without serious
+inconveniences for a penguin. In it the birds are obliged to work out their
+own salvation. How can they succeed? The habits of birds are, in many points,
+contrary to the commandments of the Church, and the penguins have no reason
+for changing theirs. I mean that they are not intelligent enough to give up
+their present habits and assume better."
+
+"They cannot," said the Lord; "my decrees prevent them."
+
+"Nevertheless," resumed St. Cornelius, "in virtue of their baptism their
+actions no longer remain indifferent. Henceforth they will be good or bad,
+susceptible of merit or of demerit."
+
+"That is precisely the question we have to deal with," said the Lord.
+
+"I see only one solution," said St. Augustine. "The penguins will go to hell."
+
+"But they have no soul," observed St. Irenaeus.
+
+"It is a pity"" sighed Tertullian. 
+
+"It is indeed," resumed St. Gal. "And I admit that my disciple, the holy Mael,
+has, in his blind zeal, created great theological difficulties for the Holy
+Spirit and introduced disorder into the economy of mysteries."
+
+"He is an old blunderer," cried St. Adjutor of Alsace, shrugging his
+shoulders.
+
+But the Lord cast a reproachful look on Adjutor.
+
+"Allow me to speak," said he; "the holy Mael has not intuitive knowledge like
+you, my blessed ones. He does not see me. He is an old man burdened by
+infirmities; he is half deaf and three parts blind. You are too severe on him.
+However, I recognise that the situation is an embarrassing one."
+
+"Luckily it is but a passing disorder," said St. Irenaeus. "The penguins are
+baptized, but their eggs are not, and the evil will stop with the present
+generation."
+
+"Do not speak thus, Irenaeus my son," said the Lord. "There are exceptions to
+the laws that men of science lay down on the earth because they are imperfect
+and have not an exact application to nature. But the laws that I establish are
+perfect and suffer no exception. We must decide the fate of the baptized
+penguins without violating any divine law, and in a manner conformable to the
+decalogue as well as to the commandments of my Church."
+
+"Lord," said St. Gregory Nazianzen, "give them an immortal soul."
+
+"Alas! Lord, what would they do with it," sighed Lactantius. "They have not
+tuneful voices to sing your praises. They would not be able to celebrate your
+mysteries."
+
+"Without doubt," said St. Augustine, "they would not observe the divine law."
+
+"They could not," said the Lord.
+
+"They could not," continued St. Augustine. "And if, Lord, in your wisdom, you
+pour an immortal soul into them, they will burn eternally in hell in virtue of
+your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent order, that this old
+Welshman has disturbed, be re-established."
+
+"You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica," said the Lord, "and one
+that accords with my wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy. And, although
+in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure, the more I incline to
+mildness. This change of character is evident to anyone who reads my two
+Testaments."
+
+As the discussion continued without much light being thrown upon the matter
+and as the blessed showed a disposition to keep repeating the same thing, it
+was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This is what was usually
+done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had confounded fifty very
+learned doctors. She knew Plato's philosophy in addition to the Holy
+Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of rhetoric.
+
+
+
+VII. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE (Continuation and End)
+
+St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a crown of emeralds,
+sapphires, and pearls, and she was clad in a robe of cloth of gold. She
+carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one whose fragments had
+struck her persecutors.
+
+The Lord having invited her to speak, she expressed herself in these terms:
+
+"Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me I shall not
+study the habits of animals in general nor those of birds in particular. I
+shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs gathered in this
+assembly that the separation between man and animal is not complete since
+there are monsters who proceed from both. Such are chimeras--half nymphs and
+half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and the Capripeds; such are the
+Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the sea. These have a woman's breast and a
+fish's tail. Such also are the Centaurs, men down to the waist and the
+remainder horses. They are a noble race of monsters. One of them, as you know,
+was able, guided by the light of reason alone, to direct his steps towards
+eternal blessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom prancing on the
+clouds. Chiron, the Centaur, deserved for his works on the earth to share the
+abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his education; and that
+young hero, when he left the Centaur's hands, lived for two years, dressed as
+a young girl, among the daughters of King Lycomedes. He shared their games and
+their bed without allowing any suspicion to arise that he was not a young
+virgin like them. Chiron, who taught him such good morals, is, with the
+Emperor Trajan, the only righteous man who obtained celestial glory by
+following the law of nature. And yet he was but half human.
+
+"I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternal blessedness, it
+is enough to possess some parts of humanity, always on the condition that they
+are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur, could obtain without having been
+regenerated by baptism, would not the penguins deserve too, if they became
+half penguins and half men? That is why, Lord, I entreat you to give old
+Mael's penguins a human head and breast so that they can praise you worthily.
+And grant them also an immortal soul--but one of small size."
+
+Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors, and pontiffs heard
+her with a murmur of approbation.
+
+But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and knotty arms
+towards the Most High:
+
+"Do not so, O Lord God," he cried, "in the name of your holy Paraclete, do not
+so!"
+
+He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook on his chin like
+the empty nose-bag of a hungry horse.
+
+"Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St. Catherine has told
+us nothing new."
+
+"The imagination groups and compares; it never creates," replied St. Catherine
+drily.
+
+"They exist already," continued St. Antony, who would listen to nothing. "They
+are called harpies, and they are the most obscene animals in creation. One day
+as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot St. Paul, I placed the
+table outside my cabin under an old sycamore tree. The harpies came and sat in
+its branches; they deafened us with their shrill cries and cast their
+excrement over all our food. The clamour of the monsters prevented me from
+listening to the teaching of the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate birds' dung with
+our bread and lettuces. Lord, it is impossible to believe that harpies could
+give thee worthy praise.
+
+"Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not only
+women-serpents and women-fishes, but beings still more confusedly formed such
+as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a cupboard full
+of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors and windows through
+which people engaged in their domestic tasks could be seen. Eternity would not
+suffice were I to describe all the monsters that assailed me in my solitude,
+from whales rigged like ships to a shower of red insects which changed the
+water of my fountain into blood. But none were as disgusting as the harpies
+whose offal polluted the leaves of my sycamore."
+
+"Harpies," observed Lactantius, "are female Monsters with birds' bodies. They
+have a woman's head and breast. Their forwardness, their shamelessness, and
+their obscenity proceed from their female nature as the poet Virgil
+demonstrated in his 'Aeneid.' They share the curse of Eve."
+
+"Let us not speak of the curse of Eve," said the Lord. "The second Eve has
+redeemed the first."
+
+Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet was to imitate in
+later years, arose and prayed to the Lord:
+
+"Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony's. Do not make any more monsters like the
+Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns, whom the Greeks, those collectors of fables,
+loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species of monsters
+have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not dispose them to
+purity of morals."
+
+The bland Lactantius replied in these terms:
+
+"He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in Paradise, for
+Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Velleius Paterculus, Cornelius Nepos,
+Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and Lampridius are
+deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell the torments that
+are reserved for blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does not know heaven as well as
+he knows the earth, for he does not seem to bear in mind that the angels, who
+proceed from man and bird, are purity itself."
+
+"We are wandering," said the Eternal. "What have we to do with all those
+centaurs, harpies, and angels? We have to deal with penguins."
+
+"You have spoken to the point, Lord," said the chief of the fifty doctors,
+who, during their mortal life had been confounded by the Virgin of Alexandria,
+"and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an end to the scandal by
+which heaven is now stirred, old Mael's penguins should, as St. Catherine who
+confounded us has proposed, be given half of a human body with an eternal soul
+proportioned to that half."
+
+At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of private
+conversations and disputes of the doctors. The Greek fathers argued with the
+Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the soul that
+should be given to the penguins.
+
+"Confessors and pontiffs," exclaimed the Lord, "do not imitate the conclaves
+and synods of the earth. And do not bring into the Church Triumphant those
+violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is but too true that in all
+the councils held under the inspiration of my spirit, in Europe, in Asia, and
+in Africa, fathers have torn the beards and scratched the eyes of other
+fathers. Nevertheless they were infallible, for I was with them."
+
+Order being restored, old Hermas arose and slowly uttered these words:
+
+"I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother, Saphira, to be born
+amidst your people, in the days when the dew of heaven refreshed the earth
+which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you, Lord, for having
+granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles of your divine Son. And
+I will speak in this illustrious assembly because you have willed that truth
+should proceed out of the mouths of the humble, and I will say: 'Change these
+penguins to men. It is the only determination conformable to your justice and
+your mercy.'"
+
+Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do so. No one
+listened, and all the confessors were tumultuously shaking their palms and
+their crowns.
+
+The Lord, by a gesture of his right hand, appeased the quarrels of his elect.
+
+"Let us not deliberate any longer," said he. "The opinion broached by gentle
+old Hermas is the only one conformable to my eternal designs. These birds will
+be changed into men. I foresee in this several disadvantages. Many of those
+men will commit sins they would not have committed as penguins. Truly their
+fate through this change will be far less enviable than if they had been
+without this baptism and this incorporation into the family of Abraham. But my
+foreknowledge must not encroach upon their free will.
+
+"In order not to impair human liberty, I will be ignorant of what I know, I
+will thicken upon my eyes the veils I have pierced, and in my blind
+clearsightedness I will let myself be surprised by what I have foreseen."
+
+And immediately calling the archangel Raphael:
+
+"Go and find the holy Mael," said he to him; "inform him of his mistake and
+tell him, armed with my Name, to change these penguins into men."
+
+
+
+VII. METAMORPHOSIS OF THE PENGUINS
+
+The archangel, having gone down into the Island of the Penguins, found the
+holy man asleep in the hollow of a rock surrounded by his new disciples. He
+laid his hand on his shoulder and, having waked him, said in a gentle voice:
+
+"Mael, fear not!"
+
+The holy man, dazzled by a vivid light, inebriated by a delicious odour,
+recognised the angel of the Lord, and prostrated himself with his forehead on
+the ground.
+
+The angel continued:
+
+"Mael, know thy error, believing that thou wert baptizing children of Adam
+thou hast baptized birds; and it is, through thee that penguins have entered
+into the Church of God."
+
+At these words the old man remained stupefied.
+
+And the angel resumed:
+
+"Arise, Mael, arm thyself with the mighty Name of the Lord, and say to these
+birds, 'Be ye men!'"
+
+And the holy Mael, having wept and prayed, armed himself with the mighty Name
+of the Lord and said to the birds:
+
+"Be ye men!"
+
+Immediately the penguins were transformed. Their foreheads enlarged and their
+heads grew round like the dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome. Their oval eyes
+opened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose clothed the two clefts of
+their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and from their mouths
+went forth speech; their necks grew short and thick; their wings became arms
+and their claws legs; a restless soul dwelt within the breast of each of them.
+
+However, there remained with them some traces of their first nature. They were
+inclined to look sideways; they balanced themselves on their short thighs;
+their bodies were covered with fine down.
+
+And Mael gave thanks to the Lord, because he had incorporated these penguins
+into the family of Abraham.
+
+But he grieved at the thought that he would soon leave the island to come back
+no more, and that perhaps when he was far away the faith of the penguins would
+perish for want of care like a young and tender plant.
+
+And he formed the idea of transporting their island to the coasts of Armorica.
+
+"I know not the designs of eternal Wisdom," said he to himself. "But if God
+wills that this island be transported, who could prevent it?"
+
+And the holy man made a very fine cord about forty feet long out of the flax
+of his stole. He fastened one end of the cord round a point of rock that
+jutted up through the sand of the shore and, holding the other end of the cord
+in his hand, he entered the stone trough.
+
+The trough glided over the sea and towed Penguin Island behind it; after nine
+days' sailing it approached the Breton coast, bringing the island with it.
+
+
+
+BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES
+
+I. THE FIRST CLOTHES
+
+One day St. Mael was sitting by the seashore on a warm stone that he found. He
+thought it had been warmed by the sun and he gave thanks to God for it, not
+knowing that the Devil had been resting on it. The apostle was waiting for the
+monks of Yvern who had been commissioned to bring a freight of skins and
+fabrics to clothe the inhabitants of the island of Alca.
+
+Soon he saw a monk called Magis coming ashore and carrying a chest upon his
+back. This monk enjoyed a great reputation for holiness.
+
+When he had drawn near to the old man he laid the chest on the ground and
+wiping his forehead with the back of his sleeve, he said:
+
+"Well, father, you wish then to clothe these penguins?"
+
+"Nothing is more needful, my son," said the old man. "Since they have been
+incorporated into the family of Abraham these penguins share the curse of Eve,
+and they know that they are naked, a thing of which they were ignorant before.
+And it is high time to clothe them, for they are losing the down that remained
+on them after their metamorphosis."
+
+"It is true," said Magis as he cast his eyes over the coast where the penguins
+were to be seen looking for shrimps, gathering mussels, singing, or sleeping,
+"they are naked. But do you not think, father, that it would be better to
+leave them naked? Why clothe them? When they wear clothes and are under the
+moral law they will assume an immense pride, a vile hypocrisy, and an
+excessive cruelty."
+
+"Is it possible, my son," sighed the old man, "that you understand so badly
+the effects of the moral law to which even the heathen submit?"
+
+"The moral law," answered Magis, "forces men who are beasts to live otherwise
+than beasts, a thine that doubtless puts a constraint upon them, but that also
+flatters and reassures them; and as they are proud, cowardly, and covetous of
+pleasure, they willingly submit to restraints that tickle their vanity and on
+which they found both their present security and the hope of their future
+happiness. That is the principle of all morality. . . . But let us not mislead
+ourselves. My companions are unloading their cargo of stuffs and skins on the
+island. Think, father, while there is still time I To clothe the penguins is a
+very serious business. At present when a penguin desires a penguin he knows
+precisely what he desires and his lust is limited by an exact knowledge of its
+object. At this moment two or three couples of penguins are making love on the
+beach. See with what simplicity! No one pays any attention and the actors
+themselves do not seem to be greatly preoccupied. But when the female penguins
+are clothed, the male penguin will not form so exact a notion of what it is
+that attracts him to them. His indeterminate desires will fly out into all
+sorts of dreams and illusions; in short, father, he will know love and its mad
+torments. And all the time the female penguins will cast down their eyes and
+bite their lips, and take on airs as if they kept a treasure under their
+clothes! . . . what a pity!
+
+"The evil will be endurable as long as these people remain rude and poor; but
+only wait for a thousand years and you will see, father, with what powerful
+weapons you have endowed the daughters of Alca. If you will allow me, I can
+give you some idea of it beforehand. I have some old clothes in this chest.
+Let us take at hazard one of these female penguins to whom the male penguins
+give such little thought, and let us dress her as well as we can.
+
+"Here is one coming towards us. She is neither more beautiful nor uglier than
+the others; she is young. No one looks at her. She strolls indolently along
+the shore, scratching her back and with her finger at her nose as she walks.
+You cannot help seeing, father, that she has narrow shoulders, clumsy breasts,
+a stout figure, and short legs. Her reddish knees pucker at every step she
+takes, and there is, at each of her joints, what looks like a little monkey's
+head. Her broad and sinewy feet cling to the rock with their four crooked
+toes, while the great toes stick up like the heads of two cunning serpents.
+She begins to walk, all her muscles are engaged in the task, and, when we see
+them working, we think of her as a machine intended for walking rather than as
+a machine intended for making love, although visibly she is both, and contains
+within herself several other pieces of machinery, besides. Well, venerable
+apostle, you will see what I am going to make of her."
+
+With these words the monk, Magis, reached the female penguin in three bounds,
+lifted her up, carried her in his arms with her hair trailing behind her, and
+threw her, overcome with fright, at the feet of the holy Mael.
+
+And whilst she wept and begged him to do her no harm, he took a pair of
+sandals out of his chest and commanded her to put them on.
+
+"Her feet," observed the old man, "will appear smaller when squeezed in by the
+woollen cords. The soles, being two fingers high, will give an elegant length
+to her legs and the weight they bear will seem magnified."
+
+As the penguin tied on her sandals she threw a curious look towards the open
+coffer, and seeing that it was full of jewels and finery, she smiled through
+her tears.
+
+The monk twisted her hair on the back of her head and covered it with a
+chaplet of flowers. He encircled her wrist with golden bracelets and making
+her stand upright, he passed a large linen band beneath her breasts, alleging
+that her bosom would thereby derive a new dignity and that her sides would be
+compressed to the greater glory of her hips.
+
+He fixed this band with pins, taking them one by one out of his mouth.
+
+"You can tighten it still more," said the penguin.
+
+When he had, with much care and study, enclosed the soft parts of her bust in
+this way, he covered her whole body with a rose-coloured tunic which gently
+followed the lines of her figure.
+
+"Does it hang well?" asked the penguin.
+
+And bending forward with her head on one side and her chin on her shoulder,
+she kept looking attentively at the appearance of her toilet.
+
+Magis asked her if she did not think the dress a little long, but she answered
+with assurance that it was not--she would hold it up.
+
+Immediately, taking the back of her skirt in her left hand, she drew it
+obliquely across her hips, taking care to disclose a glimpse of her heels.
+Then she went away, walking with short steps and swinging her hips.
+
+She did not turn her head, but as she passed near a stream she glanced out of
+the corner of her eye at her own reflection.
+
+A male penguin, who met her by chance, stopped in surprise, and retracing his
+steps began to follow her. As she went along the shore, others coming back
+from fishing, went up to her, and after looking at her, walked behind her.
+Those who were lying on the sand got up and joined the rest.
+
+Unceasingly, as she advanced, fresh penguins, descending from the paths of the
+mountain, coming out of clefts of the rocks, and emerging from the water,
+added to the size of her retinue.
+
+And all of them, men of ripe age with vigorous shoulders and hairy breasts,
+agile youths, old men shaking the multitudinous wrinkles of their rosy, and
+white-haired skins, or dragging their legs thinner and drier than the juniper
+staff that served them as a third leg, hurried on, panting and emitting an
+acrid odour and hoarse gasps. Yet she went on peacefully and seemed to see
+nothing.
+
+"Father," cried Magis, "notice how each one advances with his nose pointed
+towards the centre of gravity of that young damsel now that the centre is
+covered by a garment. The sphere inspires the meditations of geometers by the
+number of its properties. When it proceeds from a physical and living nature
+it acquires new qualities, and in order that the interest of that figure might
+be fully revealed to the penguins it was necessary that, ceasing to see it
+distinctly with their eyes, they should be led to represent it to themselves
+in their minds. I myself feel at this moment irresistibly attracted towards
+that penguin. Whether it be because her skirt gives more importance to her
+hips, and that in its simple magnificence it invests them with a synthetic and
+general character and allows only the pure idea, the divine principle, of them
+to be seen, whether this be the cause I cannot say, but I feel that if I
+embraced her I would hold in my hands the heaven of human pleasure. It is
+certain that modesty communicates an invincible attraction to women. My
+uneasiness is so great that it would be vain for me to try to conceal it."
+
+He spoke, and, gathering up his habit, he rushed among the crowd of penguins,
+pushing, jostling, trampling, and crushing, until he reached the daughter of
+Alca, whom he seized and suddenly carried in his arms into a cave that had
+been hollowed out by the sea.
+
+Then the penguins felt as if the sun had gone out. And the holy Mael knew that
+the Devil had taken the features of the monk, Magis, in order that he might
+give clothes to the daughter of Alca. He was troubled in spirit, and his soul
+was sad. As with slow steps he went towards his hermitage he saw the little
+penguins of six and seven years of age tightening their waists with belts made
+of sea-weed and walking along the shore to see if anybody would follow them.
+
+
+
+II. THE FIRST CLOTHES (Continuation and End)
+
+The holy Mael felt a profound sadness that the first clothes put upon a
+daughter of Alca should have betrayed the penguin modesty instead of helping
+it. He persisted, none the less, in his design of giving clothes to the
+inhabitants of the miraculous island. Assembling them on the shore, he
+distributed to them the garments that the monks of Yvern had brought. The male
+penguins received short tunics and breeches, the female penguins long robes.
+But these robes were far from creating the effect that the former one had
+produced. They were not so beautiful, their shape was uncouth and without art,
+and no attention was paid to them since every woman bad one. As they prepared
+the meals and worked in the fields they soon had nothing but slovenly bodices
+and soiled petticoats.
+
+The male penguins loaded their unfortunate consorts with work until they
+looked like beasts of burden. They knew nothing of the troubles of the heart
+and the disorders of passion. Their habits were innocent. Incest, though
+frequent, was a sign of rustic simplicity and if drunkenness led a youth to
+commit some such crime he thought nothing more about it the day afterwards.
+
+
+
+III. SETTING BOUNDS TO THE FIELDS AND THE ORIGIN OF PROPERTY
+
+The island did not preserve the rugged appearance that it had formerly, when,
+in the midst of floating icebergs it sheltered a population of birds within
+its rocky amphitheatre. Its snow-clad peak had sunk down into a hill from the
+summit of which one could see the coasts of Armorica eternally covered with
+mist, and the ocean strewn with sullen reefs like monsters half raised out of
+its depths.
+
+Its coasts were now very extensive and clearly defined and its shape reminded
+one of a mulberry leaf. It was suddenly covered with coarse grass, pleasing to
+the flocks, and with willows, ancient figtrees, and mighty oaks. This fact is
+attested by the Venerable Bede and several other authors worthy of credence.
+
+To the north the shore formed a deep bay that in after years became one of the
+most famous ports in the universe. To the east, along a rocky coast beaten by
+a foaming sea, there stretched a deserted and fragrant heath. It was the Beach
+of Shadows, and the inhabitants of the island never ventured on it for fear of
+the serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest they might
+encounter the souls of the dead who resembled livid flames. To the south,
+orchards and woods bounded the languid Bay of Divers. On this fortunate shore
+old Mael built a wooden church and a monastery. To the west, two streams, the
+Clange and the Surelle, watered the fertile valleys of Dalles and Dombes.
+
+Now one autumn morning, as the blessed Mael was walking in the valley of
+Clange in company with a monk of Yvern called Bulloch, he saw bands of
+fierce-looking men loaded with stones passing along the roads. At the same
+time he heard in all directions cries and complaints mounting up from the
+valley towards the tranquil sky.
+
+And he said to Bulloch:
+
+"I notice with sadness, my son, that since they became men the inhabitants of
+this island act with less wisdom than formerly. When they were birds they only
+quarrelled during the season of their love affairs. But now they dispute all
+the time; they pick quarrels with each other in summer as well as in winter.
+How greatly have they fallen from that peaceful majesty which made the
+assembly of the penguins look like the Senate of a wise republic!
+
+"Look towards Surelle, Bulloch, my son. In yonder pleasant valley a dozen men
+penguins are busy knocking each other down with the spades and picks that they
+might employ better in tilling the ground. The women, still more cruel than
+the men, are tearing their opponents' faces with their nails. Alas! Bulloch,
+my son, why are they murdering each other in this way?"
+
+"From a spirit of fellowship, father, and through forethought for the future,"
+answered Bulloch. "For man is essentially provident and sociable. Such is his
+character and it is impossible to imagine it apart from a certain
+appropriation of things. Those penguins whom you see are dividing the ground
+among themselves."
+
+"Could they not divide it with less violence?" asked the aged man. "As they
+fight they exchange invectives and threats. I do not distinguish their words,
+but they are angry ones, judging from the tone."
+
+"They are accusing one another of theft and encroachment," answered Bulloch.
+"That is the general sense of their speech."
+
+At that moment the holy Mael clasped his hands and sighed deeply.
+
+"Do you see, my son," he exclaimed, "that madman who with his teeth is biting
+the nose of the adversary he has overthrown and that other one who is pounding
+a woman's head with a huge stone?"
+
+"I see them," said Bulloch. "They are creating law; they are founding
+property; they are establishing the principles of civilization, the basis of
+society, and the foundations of the State."
+
+"How is that?" asked old Mael.
+
+"By setting bounds to their fields. That is the origin of all government. Your
+penguins, O Master, are performing the most august of functions. Throughout
+the ages their work will be consecrated by lawyers, and magistrates will
+confirm it."
+
+Whilst the monk, Bulloch, was pronouncing these words a big penguin with a
+fair skin and red hair went down into the valley carrying a trunk of a tree
+upon his shoulder. He went up to a little penguin who was watering his
+vegetables in the heat of the sun, and shouted to him:
+
+"Your field is mine!"
+
+And having delivered himself of this stout utterance he brought down his club
+on the head of the little penguin, who fell dead upon the field that his own
+hands had tilled.
+
+At this sight the holy Mael shuddered through his whole body and poured forth
+a flood of tears.
+
+And in a voice stifled by horror and fear he addressed this prayer to heaven:
+
+"O Lord, my God, O thou who didst receive young Abel's sacrifices, thou who
+didst curse Cain, avenge, O Lord, this innocent penguin sacrificed upon his
+own field and make the murderer feel the weight of thy arm. Is there a more
+odious crime, is there a graver offence against thy justice, O Lord, than this
+murder and this robbery?"
+
+"Take care, father," said Bulloch gently, "that what you call murder and
+robbery may not really be war and conquest, those sacred foundations of
+empires, those sources of all human virtues and all human greatness. Reflect,
+above all, that in blaming the big penguin you are attacking property in its
+origin and in its source. I shall have no trouble in showing you how. To till
+the land is one thing, to possess it is another, and these two things must not
+be confused; as regards ownership the right of the first occupier is uncertain
+and badly founded. The right of conquest, on the other hand, rests on more
+solid foundations. It is the only right that receives respect since it is the
+only one that makes itself respected. The sole and proud origin of property is
+force. It is born and preserved by force. In that it is august and yields only
+to a greater force. This is why it is correct to say that he who possesses is
+noble. And that big red man, when he knocked down a labourer to get possession
+of his field, founded at that moment a very noble house upon this earth. I
+congratulate him upon it."
+
+Having thus spoken, Bulloch approached the big penguin, who was leaning upon
+his club as he stood in the blood-stained furrow:
+
+"Lord Greatauk, dreaded Prince," said he, bowing to the ground, "I come to pay
+you the homage due to the founder of legitimate power and hereditary wealth.
+The skull of the vile Penguin you have overthrown will, buried in your field,
+attest for ever the sacred rights of your posterity over this soil that you
+have ennobled. Blessed be your suns and your sons' sons! They shall be
+Greatauks, Dukes of Skull, and they shall rule over this island of Alca."
+
+Then raising his voice and turning towards the holy Mael:
+
+"Bless Greatauk, father, for all power comes from God."
+
+Mael remained silent and motionless, with his eyes raised towards heaven; he
+felt a painful uncertainty in judging the monk Bulloch's doctrine. It was,
+however, the doctrine destined to prevail in epochs of advanced civilization.
+Bulloch can be considered as the creator of civil law in Penguinia.
+
+
+
+IV. THE FIRST ASSEMBLY OF THE ESTATES OF PENGUINIA
+
+"Bulloch, my son," said old Mael, "we ought to make a census of the Penguins
+and inscribe each of their names in a book."
+
+"It is a most urgent matter," answered Bulloch, "there can be no good
+government without it."
+
+Forthwith, the apostle, with the help of twelve monks, proceeded to make a
+census of the people.
+
+And old Mael then said:
+
+"Now that we keep a register of all the inhabitants, we ought, Bulloch, my
+son, to levy a just tax so as to provide for public expenses and the
+maintenance of the Abbey. Each ought to contribute according to his means. For
+this reason, my son, call together the Elders of Alca, and in agreement with
+them we shall establish the tax."
+
+The Elders, being called together, assembled to the number of thirty under the
+great sycamore in the courtyard of the wooden monastery. They were the first
+Estates of Penguinia. Three-fourths of them were substantial peasants of
+Surelle and Clange. Greatauk, as the noblest of the Penguins, sat upon the
+highest stone.
+
+The venerable Mael took his place in the midst of his monks and uttered these
+words:
+
+"Children, the Lord when he pleases grants riches to men and he takes them
+away from them. Now I have called you together to levy contributions from the
+people so as to provide for public expenses and the maintenance of the monks.
+I consider that these contributions ought to be in proportion to the wealth of
+each. Therefore he who has a hundred oxen will give ten; he who has ten will
+give one."
+
+When the holy man had spoken, Morio, a, labourer at Anis-on-the-Clange, one of
+the richest of the Penguins, rose up and said:
+
+"O Father Mael, I think it right that each should contribute to the public
+expenses and to the support of the Church. or my part I am ready to give up
+all that I possess in the interest of my brother Penguins, and if it were
+necessary I would even cheerfully part with my shirt. All the elders of the
+people are ready, like me, to sacrifice their goods, and no one can doubt
+their absolute devotion to their country and their creed. We have, then, only
+to consider the public interest and to do what it requires. Now, Father, what
+it requires, what it demands, is not to ask much from those who possess much,
+for then the rich would be less rich and the poor still poorer. The poor live
+on the wealth of the rich and that is the reason why that wealth is sacred. Do
+not touch it, to do so would be an uncalled for evil. You will get no great
+profit by taking from the rich, for they are very few in number; on the
+contrary you will strip yourself of all your resources and plunge the country
+into misery. Whereas if you ask a little from each inhabitant without regard
+to his wealth, you will collect enough for the public necessities and you will
+have no need to enquire into each citizen's resources, a thing that would be
+regarded by all as a most vexatious measure. By taxing all equally and easily
+you will spare the poor, for you Will leave them the wealth of the rich. And
+how could you possibly proportion taxes to wealth? Yesterday I had two hundred
+oxen, to-day I have sixty, to-morrow I shall have a hundred. Clunic has three
+cows, but they are thin; Nicclu has only two, but they are fat. Which is the
+richer, Clunic or Nicclu? The signs of opulence are deceitful. What is certain
+is that everyone eats and drinks. Tax people according to what they consume.
+That would be wisdom and it would be justice."
+
+Thus spoke Morio amid the applause of the Elders.
+
+"I ask that this speech be graven on bronze," cried the monk, Bulloch. "It is
+spoken for the future; in fifteen hundred years the best of the Penguins will
+not speak otherwise."
+
+The Elders were still applauding when Greatauk, his hand on the pommel of his
+sword, made this brief declaration:
+
+"Being noble, I shall not contribute; for to contribute is ignoble. It is for
+the rabble to pay."
+
+After this warning the Elders separated in silence.
+
+As in Rome, a new census was taken every five years; and by this means it was
+observed that the population increased rapidly. Although children died in
+marvellous abundance and plagues and famines came with perfect regularity to
+devastate entire villages, new Penguins, in continually greater numbers,
+contributed by their private misery to the public prosperity.
+
+
+
+V. THE MARRIAGE OF KRAKEN AND ORBEROSIA
+
+During these times there lived in the island of Alca a Penguin whose arm was
+strong and whose mind was subtle. He was called Kraken, and had his dwelling
+on the Beach of Shadows whither the inhabitants never ventured for fear of
+serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest they might encounter
+the souls of Penguins that had died without baptism. These, in appearance like
+livid flames, and uttering doleful groans, wandered night and day along the
+deserted beach. For it was generally believed, though without proof, that
+among the Penguins that had been changed into men at the blessed Mael's
+prayer, several had not received baptism and returned after their death to
+lament amid the tempests. Kraken dwelt on this savage coast in an inaccessible
+cavern. The only way to it was through a natural tunnel a hundred feet long,
+the entrance of which was concealed by a thick wood. One evening as Kraken was
+walking through this deserted plain he happened to meet a young and charming
+woman Penguin. She was the one that the monk Magis had clothed with his own
+hands and thus was the first to have worn the garments of chastity. In
+remembrance of the day when the astonished crowd of Penguins had seen her
+moving gloriously in her robe tinted like the dawn, this maiden had received
+the name of Orberosia.*
+
+* "Orb, poetically, a globe when speaking of the heavenly bodies. By extension
+any species of globular body."--Littre
+
+
+At the sight of Kraken she uttered a cry of alarm and darted forward to escape
+from him. But the hero seized her by the garments that floated behind, her,
+and addressed her in these words:
+
+"Damsel, tell me thy name, thy family and thy country."
+
+But Orberosia kept looking at Kraken with alarm.
+
+"Is it you, I see, sir," she asked him, trembling, "or is it not rather your
+troubled spirit?"
+
+She spoke in this way because the inhabitants of Alca, having no news of
+Kraken since he went to live on the Beach of Shadows, believed that he had
+died and descended among the demons of night.
+
+"Cease to fear, daughter of Alca," answered Kraken. "He who speaks to thee is
+not a wandering spirit, but a man full of strength and might. I shall soon
+possess great riches."
+
+And young Orberosia asked:
+
+"How dost thou think of acquiring great riches, O Kraken, since thou art a
+child of Penguins?"
+
+"By my intelligence," answered Kraken.
+
+"I know," said Orberosia, "that in the time that thou dwelt among us thou wert
+renowned for thy skill in hunting and fishing. No one equalled thee in taking
+fishes in a net or in piercing with thy arrows the swift-flying birds."
+
+"It was but a vulgar and laborious industry, O maiden. I have found a means of
+gaining much wealth for myself without fatigue. But tell me who thou art?"
+
+"I am called Orberosia," answered the young girl.
+
+"Why art thou so far away from thy dwelling and in the night?"
+
+"Kraken, it was not without the will of Heaven."
+
+"What meanest thou, Orberosia?"
+
+"That Heaven, O Kraken, placed me in thy path, for what reason I know not."
+
+Kraken beheld her for a long time in silence.
+
+Then he said with gentleness:
+
+"Orberosia, come into my house; it is that of the bravest and most ingenious
+of the sons of the Penguins. If thou art willing to follow me, I will make
+thee my companion."
+
+Then casting down her eyes, she murmured:
+
+"I will follow thee, master."
+
+It is thus that the fair Orberosia became the consort of the hero Kraken. This
+marriage was not celebrated with songs and torches because Kraken did not
+consent to show himself to the people of the Penguins; but hidden in his cave
+he planned great designs.
+
+
+
+VI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA
+
+"We afterwards went to visit the cabinet of natural history. . . . The
+care-taker showed us a sort of packet bound in straw that he told us contained
+the skeleton of a dragon; a proof, added he, that the dragon is not a fabulous
+animal."--Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, Paris, 1843. Vol. IV., pp. 404, 405
+
+In the meantime the inhabitants of Alca practised the labours of peace. Those
+of the northern coast went in boats to fish or to search for shell-fish. The
+labourers of Dombes cultivated oats, rye, and wheat. The rich Penguins of the
+valley of Dalles reared domestic animals, while those of the Bay of Divers
+cultivated their orchards. Merchants of Port-Alca carried on a trade in salt
+fish with Armorica and the gold of the two Britains, which began to be
+introduced into the island, facilitated exchange. The Penguin people were
+enjoying the fruit of their labours in perfect tranquillity when suddenly a
+sinister rumour ran from village to village. It was said everywhere that
+frightful dragon had ravaged two farms in the Bay of Divers.
+
+A few days before, the maiden Orberosia had disappeared. Her absence had at
+first caused no uneasiness because on several occasions she had been carried
+off by violent men who were consumed with love. And thoughtful people were not
+astonished at this, reflecting that the maiden was the most beautiful of the
+Penguins. It was even remarked that she sometimes went to meet her ravishers,
+for none of us can escape his destiny. But this time, as she did not return,
+it was feared that the dragon had devoured her. The more so as the inhabitants
+of the valley of Dalles soon knew that the dragon was not a fable told by the
+women around the fountains. For one night the monster devoured out of the
+village of Anis six hens, a sheep, and a young orphan child called little Elo.
+The next morning nothing was to be found either of the animals or of the
+child.
+
+Immediately the Elders of the village assembled in the public place and seated
+themselves on the stone bench to take counsel concerning what it was expedient
+to do in these terrible circumstances.
+
+Having called all those Penguins who had seen the dragon during the disastrous
+night, they asked them:
+
+"Have you not noticed his form and his behaviour?"
+
+And each answered in his turn:
+
+"He has the claws of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and the tail of a
+serpent."
+
+"His back bristles with thorny crests."
+
+"His whole body is covered with yellow scales."
+
+"His look fascinates and confounds. He vomits flames."
+
+"He poisons the air with his breath."
+
+"He has the head of a dragon, the claws of a lion, and the tail of a fish."
+
+And a woman of Anis, who was regarded as intelligent and of sound judgment and
+from whom the dragon had taken three hens, deposed as follows:
+
+"He is formed like a man. The proof is that I thought he was my husband, and I
+said to him, 'Come to bed, you old fool.'"
+
+Others said:
+
+"He is formed like a cloud."
+
+"He looks like a mountain."
+
+And a little child came and said:
+
+"I saw the dragon taking off his head in the barn so that he might give a kiss
+to my sister Minnie."
+
+And the Elders also asked the inhabitants:
+
+"How big is the dragon?"
+
+And it was answered:
+
+"As big as an ox."
+
+"Like the big merchant ships of the Bretons."
+
+"He is the height of a man."
+
+"He is higher than the fig-tree under which you are sitting."
+
+"He is as large as a dog."
+
+Questioned finally on his colour, the inhabitants said:
+
+"Red."
+
+"Green."
+
+"Blue."
+
+"Yellow."
+
+"His head is bright green, his wings are brilliant orange tinged with pink,
+his limbs are silver grey, his hind-quarters and his tail are striped with
+brown and pink bands, his belly bright yellow spotted with black."
+
+"His colour? He has no colour."
+
+"He is the colour of a dragon."
+
+After hearing this evidence the Elders remained uncertain as to what should be
+done. Some advised to watch for him, to surprise him and overthrow him by a
+multitude of arrows. Others, thinking it vain to oppose so powerful a monster
+by force, counselled that he should be appeased by offerings.
+
+"Pay him tribute," said one of them who passed for a wise man. "We can render
+him propitious to us by giving him agreeable presents, fruits, wine, lambs, a
+young virgin."
+
+Others held for poisoning the fountains where he was accustomed to drink or
+for smoking him out of his cavern.
+
+But none of these counsels prevailed. The dispute was lengthy and the Elders
+dispersed without coming to any resolution.
+
+
+
+VII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+During all the month dedicated by the Romans to their false god Mars or
+Mavors, the dragon ravaged the farms of Dalles and Dombes. He carried off
+fifty sheep, twelve pigs, and three young boys. Every family was in mourning
+and the island was full of lamentations. In order to remove the scourge, the
+Elders of the unfortunate villages watered by the Clange and the Surelle
+resolved to assemble and together go and ask the help of the blessed Mael.
+
+On the fifth day of the month whose name among the Latins signifies opening,
+because it opens the year, they went in procession to the wooden monastery
+that had been built on the southern coast of the island. When they were
+introduced into the cloister they filled it with their sobs and groans. Moved
+by their lamentations, old Mael left the room in which he devoted himself to
+the study of astronomy and the meditation of the Scriptures, and went down to
+them, leaning on his pastoral staff. At his approach, the Elders, prostrating
+themselves, held out to him green branches of trees and some of them burnt
+aromatic herbs.
+
+And the holy man, seating himself beside the cloistral fountain under an
+ancient fig-tree, uttered these words:
+
+"O my sons, offspring of the Penguins, why do you weep and groan? Why do you
+hold out those suppliant boughs towards me? Why do you raise towards heaven
+the smoke of those herbs? What calamity do you expect that I can avert from
+your heads? Why do you beseech me? I am ready to give my life for you. Only
+tell your father what it is you hope from him."
+
+To these questions the chief of the Elders answered:
+
+"O Mael, father of the sons of Alca, I will speak for all. A horrible dragon
+is laying waste our lands, depopulating our cattle-sheds, and carrying off the
+flower of our youth. He has devoured the child Elo and seven young boys; he
+has mangled the maiden Orberosia, the fairest of the Penguins with his teeth.
+There is not a village in which he does not emit his poisoned breath and which
+he has not filled with desolation. A prey to this terrible scourge, we come, O
+Mael, to pray thee, as the wisest, to advise us concerning the safety of the
+inhabitants of this island lest the ancient race of Penguins be extinguished."
+
+"O chief of the Elders of Alca," replied Mael, "thy words fill me with
+profound grief, and I groan at the thought that this island is the prey of a
+terrible dragon. But such an occurrence is not unique, for we find in books
+several tales of very fierce dragons. The monsters are oftenest found in
+caverns, by the brinks of waters, and, in preference, among pagan peoples.
+Perhaps there are some among you who, although they have received holy baptism
+and been incorporated into the family of Abraham, have yet worshipped idols,
+like the ancient Romans, or hung up images, votive tablets, fillets of wool,
+and garlands of flowers on the branches of some sacred tree. Or perhaps some
+of the women Penguins have danced round a magic stone and drunk water from the
+fountains where the nymphs dwell. If it be so, believe, O Penguins, that the
+Lord has sent this dragon to punish all for the crimes of some, and to lead
+you, O children of the Penguins, to exterminate blasphemy, superstition, and
+impiety from amongst you. For this reason I advise, as a remedy against the
+great evil from which you suffer, that you carefully search your dwellings for
+idolatry, and extirpate it from them. I think it would be also efficacious to
+pray and do penance."
+
+Thus spoke the holy Mael. And the Elders of the Penguin people kissed his feet
+and returned to their villages with renewed hope.
+
+
+
+VIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Following the counsel of the holy Mael the inhabitants of Alca endeavoured to
+uproot the superstitions that had sprung up amongst them. They took care to
+prevent the girls from dancing with incantations round the fairy tree. Young
+mothers were sternly forbidden to rub their children against the stones that
+stood upright in the fields so as to make them strong. An old man of Dombes
+who foretold the future by shaking grains of barley on a sieve, was thrown
+into a well.
+
+However, each night the monster still raided the poultry-yards and the
+cattle-sheds. The frightened peasants barricaded themselves in their houses. A
+woman with child who saw the shadow of a dragon on the road through a window
+in the moonlight, was so terrified that she was brought to bed before her
+time.
+
+In those days of trial, the holy Mael meditated unceasingly on the nature of
+dragons and the means of combating them. After six months of study and prayer
+he thought he had found what he sought. One evening as he was walking by the
+sea with a young monk called Samuel, he to him in these terms:
+
+"I have studied at length the history and habits of dragons, not to satisfy a
+vain curiosity, but to discover examples to follow in the present
+circumstances. For such, Samuel, my son, is the use of history.
+
+"It is an invariable fact that dragons are extremely vigilant. They never
+sleep, and for this reason we often find them employed in guarding treasures.
+A dragon guarded at Colchis the golden fleece that Jason conquered from him. A
+dragon watched over the golden apples in the garden of the Hesperides. He was
+killed by Hercules and transformed into a star by Juno. This fact is related
+in some books, and if it be true, it was done by magic, for the gods of the
+pagans are in reality demons. A dragon prevented barbarous and ignorant men
+from drinking at the fountain of Castalia. We must also remember the dragon of
+Andromeda, which was slain by Perseus. But let us turn from these pagan
+fables, in which error is always mixed with truth. We meet dragons in the
+histories of the glorious archangel Michael, of St. George, St. Philip, St.
+James the Great, St. Patrick, St. Martha, and St. Margaret. And it is in such
+writings, since they are worthy of full credence, that we ought to look for
+comfort and counsel.
+
+"The story of the dragon of Silena affords us particularly precious examples.
+You must know, my son, that on the banks of a vast pool close to that town
+there dwelt a dragon who sometimes approached the walls and poisoned with his
+breath all who dwelt in the suburbs. And that they might not be devoured by
+the monster, the inhabitants of Silena delivered up to him one of their number
+expressed his thought every morning. The victim was chosen by lot, and after a
+hundred others, the lot fell upon the king's daughter.
+
+"Now St. George, who was a military tribune, as he passed through the town of
+Silena, learned that the king's daughter had just been given to the fierce
+beast. He immediately mounted his horse, and, armed with his lance, rushed to
+encounter the dragon, whom he reached just as the monster was about to devour
+the royal virgin. And when St. George had overthrown the dragon, the king's
+daughter fastened her girdle round the beast's neck and he followed her like a
+dog led on a leash.
+
+"That is an example for us of the power of virgins over dragons. The history
+of St. Martha furnishes us with a still more certain proof. Do you know the
+story, Samuel, my son?"
+
+"Yes, father," answered Samuel.
+
+And the blessed Mael went on:
+
+"There was in a forest on the banks of the Rhone, between Arles and Avignon, a
+dragon half quadruped and half fish, larger than an ox, with sharp teeth like
+horns and huge-wings at his shoulders. He sank the boats and devoured their
+passengers. Now St. Martha, at the entreaty of the people, approached this
+dragon, whom she found devouring a man. She put her girdle round his neck and
+led him easily into the town.
+
+"These two examples lead me to think that we should have recourse to the power
+of some virgin so as to conquer the dragon who scatters terror and death
+through the island of Alca.
+
+"For this reason, Samuel thy son, gird up thy loins and go, I pray thee, with
+two of thy companions, into all the villages of this island, and proclaim
+everywhere that a virgin alone shall be able to deliver the island from the
+monster that devastates it.
+
+"Thou shalt sing psalms and canticles and thou shalt say:
+
+"'O sons of the Penguins, if there be among you a pure virgin, let her arise
+and go, armed with the sign of the cross, to combat the dragon!'"
+
+Thus the old man spake, and Samuel promised to obey him. The next day he
+girded up his loins and set out with two of his companions to proclaim to the
+inhabitants of Alca that a virgin alone would be able to deliver the Penguins
+from the rage of the dragon.
+
+
+
+X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia loved her husband, but she did not love him alone. At the hour when
+Venus lightens in the pale sky, whilst Kraken scattered terror through the
+villages, she used to visit in his moving hut, a young shepherd of Dalles
+called Marcel, whose pleasing form was invested with inexhaustible vigour. The
+fair Orberosia shared the shepherd's aromatic couch with delight, but far from
+making herself known to him, she took the name of Bridget, and said that she
+was the daughter of a gardener in the Bay of Divers. When regretfully she left
+his arms she walked across the smoking fields towards the Coast of Shadows,
+and if she happened to meet some belated peasant she immediately spread out
+her garments like great wings and cried:
+
+"Passer by, lower your eyes, that you may not have to say, 'Alas! alas! woe is
+me, for I have seen the angel of the Lord.'"
+
+The villagers tremblingly knelt with their faces to the round. And several of
+them used to say that angels, whom it would be death to see, passed along the
+roads of the island in the night time.
+
+Kraken did not know of the loves of Orberosia and Marcel, for he was a hero,
+and heroes never discover the secrets of their wives. But though he did not
+know of these loves, he reaped the benefit of them. Every night he found his
+companion more good-humoured and more beautiful, exhaling pleasure and
+perfuming the nuptial bed with a delicious odour of fennel and vervain. She
+loved Kraken with a love that never became importunate or anxious, because she
+did not rest its whole weight on him alone.
+
+This lucky infidelity of Orberosia was destined soon to save the hero from a
+great peril and to assure his fortune and his glory for ever. For it happened
+that she saw passing in the twilight a neatherd from Belmont, who was goading
+on his oxen, and she fell more deeply in love with him than she had ever been
+with the shepherd Marcel. He was hunch-backed; his shoulders were higher than
+his ears; his body was supported by legs of different lengths; his rolling
+eyes flashed, from beneath his matted hair. From his throat issued a hoarse
+voice and strident laughter; he smelt of the cow-shed. However, to her he was
+beautiful. "A plant," as Gnatho says, "has been loved by one, a stream by
+another, a beast by a third."
+
+Now, one day, as she was sighing within the neatherd's arms in a village barn,
+suddenly the blasts of a trumpet, with sounds and footsteps, fell upon her
+ears; she looked through the window and saw the inhabitants collected in the
+marketplace round a young monk, who, standing upon a rock, uttered these words
+in a distinct voice:
+
+"Inhabitants of Belmont, Abbot Mael, our venerable father, informs you through
+my mouth that neither by strength nor skill in arms shall you prevail against
+the dragon; but the beast shall be overcome by a virgin. If, then, there be
+among you a perfectly pure virgin, let her arise and go towards the monster;
+and when she meets him let her tie her girdle round his neck and she shall
+lead him as easily as if he were a little dog."
+
+And the young monk, replacing his hood upon his head, departed to carry the
+proclamation of the blessed Mael to other villages.
+
+Orberosia sat in the amorous straw, resting her head in her hand and
+supporting her elbow upon her knee, meditating on what she had just heard.
+
+Although, so far as Kraken was concerned, she feared the power of a virgin
+much less than the strength of armed men, she did not feel reassured by the
+proclamation of the blessed Mael. A vague but sure instinct ruled her mind and
+warned her that Kraken could not henceforth be a dragon with safety.
+
+She said to the neatherd:
+
+"My own heart, what do you think about the dragon?"
+
+The rustic shook his head.
+
+"It is certain that dragons laid waste the earth in ancient times and some
+have been seen as large as mountains. But they come no longer, and I believe
+that what has been taken for a dragon is not one at all, but pirates or
+merchants who have carried off the fair Orberosia and the best of the children
+of Alca in their ships. But if one of those brigands attempts to rob me of my
+oxen, I will either by force or craft find a way to prevent him from doing me
+any harm."
+
+This remark of the neatherd increased Orberosia's apprehensions and added to
+her solicitude for the husband whom she loved. 
+
+
+
+X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+The days passed by and no maiden arose in the island to combat the monster.
+And in the wooden monastery old Mael, seated on a bench in the shade of an old
+fig-tree, accompanied by a pious monk called Regimental, kept asking himself
+anxiously and sadly how it was that there was not in Alca a single virgin fit
+to overthrow the monster.
+
+He sighed and brother Regimental sighed too. At that moment old Mael called
+young Samuel, who happened to pass through the garden, and said to him:
+
+"I have meditated anew, my son, on the means of destroying the dragon who
+devours the flower of our youth, our flocks, and our harvests. In this respect
+the story of the dragons of St. Riok and of St. Pol de Leon seems to me
+particularly instructive. The dragon of St. Riok was six fathoms long; his
+head was derived from the cock and the basilisk, his body from the ox and the
+serpent; he ravaged the banks of the Elorn in the time of King Bristocus. St.
+Riok, then aged two years, led him by a leash to the sea, in which the monster
+drowned himself of his own accord. St. Pol's dragon was sixty feet long and
+not less terrible. The blessed apostle of Leon bound him with his stole and
+allowed a young noble of great purity of life to lead him. These examples
+prove that in the eyes of God a chaste young man is as agreeable as a chaste
+girl. Heaven makes no distinction between them. For this reason, my son, if
+you believe what I say, we will both go to the Coast of Shadows; when we reach
+the dragon's cavern we will call the monster in a loud voice, and when he
+comes forth I will tie my stole round his neck and you will lead him to the
+sea, where he will not fail to drown himself."
+
+At the old man's words Samuel cast down his head and did not answer.
+
+"You seem to hesitate, my son," said Mael.
+
+Brother Regimental, contrary to his custom, spoke without being addressed.
+
+"There is at least cause for some hesitation," said he. "St. Riok was only two
+years old when he overcame the dragon. Who says that nine or ten years later
+he could have done as much? Remember, father, that the dragon who is
+devastating our island has devoured little Elo and four or five other young
+boys. Brother Samuel is not go presumptuous as to believe that at nineteen
+years of age he is more innocent than they were at twelve and fourteen.
+
+"Alas!" added the monk, with a groan, "who can boast of being chaste in this
+world, where everything gives the example and model of love, where all things
+in nature, animals, and plants, show us the caresses of love and advise us to
+share them? Animals are eager to unite in their own fashion, but the various
+marriages of quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and reptiles are far from equalling in
+lust the nuptials of the trees. The greatest extremes of lewdness that the
+pagans have imagined in their fables are outstripped by the simple flowers of
+the field, and, if you knew the irregularities of lilies and roses you would
+take those chalices of impurity, those vases of scandal, away from your
+altars."
+
+"Do not speak in this way, Brother Regimental," answered old Mael. "Since they
+are subject to the law of nature, animals and plants are always innocent. They
+have no souls to save, whilst man--"
+
+"You are right," replied Brother Regimental, "it is quite a different thing.
+But do not send young Samuel to the dragon--the dragon might devour him. For
+the last five years Samuel is not in a state to show his innocence to
+monsters. In the year of the comet, the Devil in order to seduce him, put in
+his path a milkmaid, who was lifting up her petticoat to cross a ford. Samuel
+was tempted, but he overcame the temptation. The Devil, who never tires, sent
+him the image of that young girl in a dream. The shade did what the reality
+was unable to accomplish, and Samuel yielded. When he awoke be moistened his
+couch with his tears, but alas! repentance did not give him back his
+innocence."
+
+As he listened to this story Samuel asked himself how his secret could be
+known, for he was ignorant that the Devil had borrowed the appearance of
+Brother Regimental, so as to trouble the hearts of the monks of Alca.
+
+And old Mael remained deep in thought and kept asking himself in grief:
+
+"Who will deliver us from the dragon's tooth? Who will preserve us from his
+breath? Who will save us from his look?"
+
+However, the inhabitants of Alca began to take courage. The labourers of
+Dombes and the neatherds of Belmont swore that they themselves would be of
+more avail than a girl against the ferocious beast, and they exclaimed as they
+stroked the muscles on their arms, "Let the dragon come!" Many men and women
+had seen him. They did not agree about his form and his figure, but all now
+united in saying that he was not as big as they had thought, and that his
+height was not much greater than a man's. The defence was organised; towards
+nightfall watches were stationed at the entrances of the villages ready to
+give the alarm; and during the night companies armed with pitchforks and
+scythes protected the paddocks in which the animals were shut up. Indeed, once
+in the village of Anis some plucky labourers surprised him as he was scaling
+Morio's wall, and, as they had flails, scythes, and pitchforks, they fell upon
+him and pressed him hard. One of them, a very quick and courageous man,
+thought to have run him through with his pitchfork; but he slipped in a pool
+and so let him escape. The others would certainly have caught him had they not
+waited to pick up the rabbits and fowls that he dropped in his flight.
+
+Those labourers declared to the Elders of the village that the monster's form
+and proportions appeased to them human enough except for his head and his
+tail, which were, in truth, terrifying.
+
+
+
+XI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+On that day Kraken came back to his cavern sooner than usual. He took from his
+head his sealskin helmet with its two bull's horns and its visor trimmed with
+terrible hooks. He threw on the table his gloves that ended in horrible
+claws--they were the beaks of sea-birds. He unhooked his belt from which hung
+a long green tail twisted into many folds. Then he ordered his page, Elo, to
+help him off with his boots and, as the child did not succeed in doing this
+very quickly, he gave him a kick that sent him to the other end of the grotto.
+
+Without looking at the fair Orberosia, who was spinning, he seated himself in
+front of the fireplace, on which a sheep was roasting, and he muttered:
+
+"Ignoble Penguins. . . . There is no worse trade than a dragon's."
+
+"What does my master say?" asked the fair Orberosia.
+
+"They fear me no longer," continued Kraken. "Formerly everyone fled at my
+approach. I carried away hens and rabbits in my bag; I drove sheep and pigs,
+cows, and oxen before me. To-day these clod-hoppers keep a good guard; they
+sit up at night. Just now I was pursued in the village of Anis by doughty
+labourers armed with flails and scythes and pitchforks. I had to drop the hens
+and rabbits, put my tail under my arm, and run as fast as I could. Now I ask
+you, is it seemly for a dragon of Cappadocia to run away like a robber with
+his tail under his arm? Further, incommoded as I was by crests, horns, hooks,
+claws, and scales, I barely escaped a brute who ran half an inch of his
+pitchfork into my left thigh."
+
+As he said this he carefully ran his hand over the insulted part, and, after
+giving himself up for a few moments to bitter meditation:
+
+"What idiots those Penguins are! I am tired of blowing flames in the faces of
+such imbeciles. Orberosia, do you hear me?"
+
+Having thus spoken the hero raised his terrible helmet in his hands and gazed
+at it for a long time in gloomy silence. Then he pronounced these rapid words:
+
+"I have made this helmet with my own hands in the shape of a fish's head,
+covering it with the skin of a seal. To make it more terrible I have put on it
+the horns of a bull and I have given it a boar's jaws; I have hung from it a
+horse's tail dyed vermilion. When in the gloomy twilight I threw it over my
+shoulders no inhabitant of this island had courage to withstand its sight.
+Women and children, young men and old men fled distracted at its approach, and
+I carried terror among the whole race of Penguins. By what advice does that
+insolent people lose its earlier fears and dare to-day to behold these
+horrible jaws and to attack this terrible crest?"
+
+And throwing his helmet on the rocky soil:
+
+"Perish, deceitful helmet!" cried Kraken. "I swear by all the demons of Armor
+that I will never bear you upon my head again."
+
+And having uttered this oath he stamped upon his helmet, his gloves, his
+boots, and upon his tail with its twisted folds.
+
+"Kraken," said the fair Orberosia, "will you allow your servant to employ
+artifice to save your reputation and your goods? Do not despise a woman's
+help. You need it, for all men are imbeciles."
+
+"Woman," asked Kraken, "what are your plans?"
+
+And the fair Orberosia informed her husband that the monks were going through
+the villages teaching the inhabitants the best way of combating the dragon;
+that, according to their instructions, the beast would be overcome by a
+virgin, and that if a maid placed her girdle around the dragon's neck she
+could lead him as easily as if he were a little dog.
+
+"How do you know that the monks teach this?" asked Kraken.
+
+"My friend," answered Orberosia, "do not interrupt a serious subject by
+frivolous questions. . . . 'If, then,' added the monks, 'there be in Alca a
+pure virgin, let her arise!' Now, Kraken, I have determined to answer their
+call. I will go and find the holy Mael and I will say to him: 'I am the virgin
+destined by Heaven to overthrow the dragon.'"
+
+At these words Kraken exclaimed: "How can you be that pure virgin? And why do
+you want to overthrow me, Orberosia? Have you lost your reason? Be sure that I
+will not allow myself to be conquered by you!"
+
+"Can you not try and understand me before you get angry?" sighed the fair
+Orberosia with deep though gentle contempt.
+
+And she explained the cunning designs that she had formed.
+
+As he listened, the hero remained pensive. And when she ceased speaking:
+
+"Orberosia, your cunning, is deep," said he, "And if your plans are carried
+out according to your intentions I shall derive great advantages from them.
+But how can you be the virgin destined by heaven?"
+
+"Don't bother about that," she replied, "and come to bed."
+
+The next day in the grease-laden atmosphere of the cavern, Kraken plaited a
+deformed skeleton out of osier rods and covered it with bristling, scaly, and
+filthy skins. To one extremity of the skeleton Orberosia sewed the fierce
+crest and the hideous mask that Kraken used to wear in his plundering
+expeditions, and to the other end she fastened the tail with twisted folds
+which the hero was wont to trail behind him. And when the work was finished
+they showed little Elo and the other five children who waited on them how to
+get inside this machine, how to make it walk, how to blow horns and burn tow
+in it so as to send forth smoke and flames through the dragon's mouth.
+
+
+
+XII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)
+
+Orberosia, having clothed herself in a robe made of coarse stuff and girt
+herself with a thick cord, went to the monastery and asked to speak to the
+blessed Mael. And because women were forbidden to enter the enclosure of the
+monastery the old man advanced outside the gates, holding his pastoral cross
+in his right hand and resting his left on the shoulder of Brother Samuel, the
+youngest of his disciples.
+
+He asked:
+
+"Woman, who art thou?"
+
+"I am the maiden Orberosia."
+
+At this reply Mael raised his trembling arms to heaven.
+
+"Do you speak truth, woman? It is a certain fact that Orberosia was devoured
+by the dragon. And yet I see Orberosia and hear her. Did you not, O my
+daughter, while within the dragon's bowels arm yourself with the sign of the
+cross and come uninjured out of his throat? That is what seems to me the most
+credible explanation."
+
+"You are not deceived, father," answered Orberosia. "That is precisely what
+happened to me. Immediately I came out of the creature's bowels I took refuge
+in a hermitage on the Coast of Shadows. I lived there in solitude, giving
+myself up to prayer and meditation, and performing unheard of austerities,
+until I learnt by a revelation from heaven that a maid alone could overcome
+the dragon, and that I was that maid."
+
+"Show me a sign of your mission," said the old man.
+
+"I myself am the sign," answered Orberosia.
+
+"I am not ignorant of the power of those who have placed a seal upon their
+flesh," replied the apostle of the Penguins. But are you indeed such as you
+say?"
+
+"You will see by the result," answered Orberosia.
+
+The monk Regimental drew near:
+
+"That will," said he, "be the best proof. King Solomon has said: 'Three things
+are hard to understand and a fourth is impossible: they are the way of a
+serpent on the earth, the way of a bird in the air, the way of a ship in the
+sea, and the way of a man with a maid!' I regard such matrons as nothing less
+than presumptuous who claim to compare themselves in these matters with the
+wisest of kings. Father, if you are led by me you will not consult them in
+regard to the pious Orberosia. When they have given their opinion you will not
+be a bit farther on than before. Virginity is not less difficult to prove than
+to keep. Pliny tells us in his history that its signs are either imaginary or
+very uncertain.* One who bears upon her the fourteen signs of corruption may
+yet be pure in the eyes of the angels, and, on the contrary, another who has
+been pronounced pure by the matrons who inspected her may know that her good
+appearance is due to the artifices of a cunning perversity. As for the purity
+of this holy girl here, I would put my hand in the fire in witness of it."
+
+* We have vainly sought for this phrase in Pliny's "Natural History."--Editor.
+
+
+He spoke thus because he was the Devil. But old Mael did not know it. He asked
+the pious Orberosia:
+
+"My daughter, how, would you proceed to conquer so fierce an animal as he who
+devoured you?"
+
+The virgin answered:
+
+"To-morrow at sunrise, O Mael, you will summon the people together on the hill
+in front of the desolate moor that extends to the Coast of Shadows, and you
+will take care that no man of the Penguins remains less than five hundred
+paces from those rocks so that he may not be poisoned by the monster's breath.
+And the dragon will come out of the rocks and I will put my girdle round his
+neck and lead him like an obedient dog."
+
+"Ought you not to be accompanied by a courageous and pious man who will kill
+the dragon?" asked Mael.
+
+"It will be as thou sayest, venerable father. I shall deliver the monster to
+Kraken, who will stay him with his flashing sword. For I tell thee that the
+noble Kraken, who was believed to be dead, will return among the Penguins and
+he shall slay the dragon. And from the creature's belly will come forth the
+little children whom he has devoured."
+
+"What you declare to me, O virgin," cried the apostle, "seems wonderful and
+beyond human power."
+
+"It is," answered the virgin Orberosia. "But learn, O Mael, that I have had a
+revelation that as a reward for their deliverance, the Penguin people will pay
+to the knight Kraken an annual tribute of three hundred fowls, twelve sheep,
+two oxen, three pigs, one thousand eight hundred bushels of corn, and
+vegetables according to their season; and that, moreover, the children who
+will come out of the dragon's belly will be given and committed to the said
+Kraken to serve him and obey him in all things. If the Penguin people fail to
+keep their engagements a new dragon will come upon the island more terrible
+than the first. I have spoken."
+
+
+
+XIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation and End)
+
+The people of the Penguins were assembled by Mael and they spent the night on
+the Coast of Shadows within the bounds which the holy man had prescribed in
+order that none among the Penguins should be poisoned by the monster's breath.
+
+The veil of night still covered the earth when, preceded by a hoarse
+bellowing, the dragon showed his indistinct and monstrous form upon the rocky
+coast. He crawled like a serpent and his writhing body seemed about fifteen
+feet long. At his appearance the crowd drew back in terror. But soon all eyes
+were turned towards the Virgin Orberosia, who, in the first light of the dawn,
+clothed in white, advanced over the purple heather. With an intrepid though
+modest gait she walked towards the beast, who, uttering awful bellowings,
+opened his flaming throat. An immense cry of terror and pity arose from the
+midst of the Penguins. But the virgin, unloosing her linen girdle, put it
+round the dragon's neck and led him on the leash like a faithful dog amid the
+acclamations of the spectators.
+
+She had walked over a long stretch of the heath when Kraken appeared armed
+with a flashing sword. The people, who believed him dead, uttered cries of joy
+and surprise. The hero rushed towards the beast, turned him over on his back,
+and with his sword cut open his belly, from whence came forth in their shirts,
+with curling hair and folded hands, little Elo and the five other children
+whom the monster had devoured.
+
+Immediately they threw themselves on their knees before the virgin Orberosia,
+who took them in her arms and whispered into their ears:
+
+"You will go through the villages saying: 'We are the poor little children who
+were devoured by the dragon, and we came out of his belly in our shirts.' The
+inhabitants will give you abundance of all that you can desire. But if you say
+anything else you will get nothing but cuffs and whippings. Go!"
+
+Several Penguins, seeing the dragon disembowelled, rushed forward to cut him
+to pieces, some from a feeling of rage and vengeance, others to get the magic
+stone called dragonite, that is engendered in his head. The mothers of the
+children who had come back to life ran to embrace their little ones. But the
+holy Mael kept them back, saying that none of them were holy enough to
+approach a dragon without dying.
+
+And soon little Elo, and the five other children came towards the people and
+said:
+
+"We are the poor little children who were devoured by the dragon and we came
+out of his belly in our shirts."
+
+And all who heard them kissed them and said:
+
+"Blessed children, we will give you abundance of all that you can desire."
+
+And the crowd of people dispersed, full of joy, singing hymns and canticles.
+
+To commemorate this day on which Providence delivered the people from a cruel
+scourge, processions were established in which the effigy of a chained dragon
+was led about.
+
+Kraken levied the tribute and became the richest and most powerful of the
+Penguins. As a sign of his victory and so as to inspire a salutary terror, he
+wore a dragon's crest upon his head and he had a habit of saying to the
+people:
+
+"Now that the monster is dead I am the dragon."
+
+For many years Orberosia bestowed her favours upon neatherds and shepherds,
+whom she thought equal to the gods. But when she was no longer beautiful she
+consecrated herself to the Lord.
+
+At her death she became the object of public veneration, and was admitted into
+the calendar of the saints and adopted as the patron saint of Penguinia.
+
+Kraken left a son, who, like his father, wore a dragon's crest, and he was for
+this reason surnamed Draco. He was the founder of the first royal dynasty of
+the Penguins. 
+
+
+
+BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE
+
+I. BRIAN THE GOOD AND QUEEN GLAMORGAN
+
+The kings of Alca were descended from Draco,the son of Kraken,and they wore on
+their heads a terrible dragon's crest, as a sacred badge whose appearance
+alone inspired the people with veneration, terror, and love. They were
+perpetually in conflict either with their own vassals and subjects or with the
+princes of the adjoining islands and continents.
+
+The most ancient of these kings has left but a name. We do not even know how
+to pronounce or write it. The first of the Draconides whose history is known
+was Brian the Good, renowned for his skill and courage in war and in the
+chase.
+
+He was a Christian and loved learning. He also favoured men who had vowed
+themselves to the monastic life. In the hall of his palace where, under the
+sooty rafters, there hung the heads, pelts, and horns of wild beasts, he held
+feasts to which all the harpers of Alca and of the neighbouring islands were
+invited, and he himself used to join in singing the praises of the heroes. He
+was just and magnanimous, but inflamed by so ardent a love of glory that he
+could not restrain himself from putting to death those who had sung better
+than himself.
+
+The monks of Yvern having been driven out by the pagans who ravaged Brittany,
+King Brian summoned them into his kingdom and built a wooden monastery for
+them near his palace. Every day he went with Queen Glamorgan, his wife, into
+the monastery chapel and was present at the religious ceremonies and joined in
+the hymns.
+
+Now among these monks there was a brother called Oddoul, who, while still in
+the flower of his youth, had adorned himself with knowledge and virtue. The
+devil entertained a great grudge against him, and attempted several times to
+lead him into temptation. He took several shapes and appeared to him in turn
+as a war-horse, a young maiden, and a cup of mead. Then he rattled two dice in
+a dicebox and said to him:
+
+"Will you play with me for the kingdoms of, the world against one of the hairs
+of your head?"
+
+But the man of the Lord, armed with the sign of the Cross, repulsed the enemy.
+Perceiving that he could not seduce him, the devil thought of an artful plan
+to ruin him. One summer night he approached the queen, who slept upon her
+couch, showed her an image of the young monk whom she saw every day in the
+wooden monastery, and upon this image he placed a spell. Forthwith, like a
+subtle poison, love flowed into Glamorgan's veins, and she burned with an
+ardent desire to do as she listed with Oddoul. She found unceasing pretexts to
+have him near her. Several times she asked him to teach reading and singing to
+her children.
+
+"I entrust them to you," said she to him. "And will follow the lessons you
+will give them so that I myself may learn also. You will teach both mother and
+sons at the same time."
+
+But the young monk kept making excuses. At times he would say that he was not
+a learned enough teacher, and on other occasions that his state forbade him
+all intercourse with women. This refusal inflamed Glamorgan's passion. One day
+as she lay pining upon her couch, her malady having become intolerable, she
+summoned Oddoul to her chamber. He came in obedience to her orders, but
+remained with his eyes cast down towards the threshold of the door. With
+impatience and grief she resented his not looking at her.
+
+"See," said she to him, "I have no more strength, a shadow is on my eyes. My
+body is both burning and freezing."
+
+And as he kept silence and made no movement, she called him in a voice of
+entreaty:
+
+"Come to me, come!"
+
+With outstretched arms to which passion gave more length, she endeavoured to
+seize him and draw him towards her.
+
+But he fled away, reproaching her for her wantonness.
+
+Then, incensed with rage and fearing that Oddoul might divulge the shame into
+which she had fallen, she determined to ruin him so that he might not ruin
+her.
+
+In a voice of lamentation that resounded throughout all the palace she called
+for help, as if, in truth, she were in some great danger. Her servants rushed
+up and saw the young monk fleeing and the queen pulling back the sheets upon
+her couch. They all cried out together. And when King Brian, attracted by the
+noise, entered the chamber, Glamorgan, showing him her dishevelled hair, her
+eyes flooded with tears, and her bosom that in the fury of her love she had
+torn with her nails, said:
+
+"My lord and husband, behold the traces of the insults I have undergone.
+Driven by an infamous desire Oddoul has approached me and attempted to do me
+violence."
+
+When he heard these complaints and saw the blood, the king, transported with
+fury, ordered his guards to seize the young monk and burn him alive before the
+palace under the queen's eyes.
+
+Being told of the affair, the Abbot of Yvern went to the king and said to him:
+
+"King Brian, know by this example the difference between a Christian woman and
+a pagan. Roman Lucretia was the most virtuous of idolatrous princesses, yet
+she had not the strength to defend herself against the attacks of an
+effeminate youth, and, ashamed of her weakness, she gave way to despair,
+whilst Glamorgan has successfully withstood the assaults of a criminal filled
+with rage, and possessed by the most terrible of demons." Meanwhile Oddoul, in
+the prison of the palace, was waitin for the moment when he should be burned
+alive. But God did not suffer an innocent to perish. He sent to him an angel,
+who, taking the form of one of the queen's servants called Gudrune, took him
+out of his prison and led him into the very room where the woman whose
+appearance he had taken dwelt.
+
+And the angel said to young Oddoul:
+
+"I love thee because thou art daring."
+
+And young Oddoul, believing that it was Gudrune herself, answered with
+downcast looks:
+
+"It is by the grace of the Lord that I have resisted the violence of the queen
+and braved the anger of that powerful woman."
+
+And the angel asked:
+
+"What? Hast thou not done what the queen accuses thee of?"
+
+"In truth no, I have not done it," answered Oddoul, his hand on his heart.
+
+"Thou hast not done it?"
+
+"No, I have not done it. The very thought of such an action fills me with
+horror."
+
+"Then," cried the angel, "what art thou doing here, thou impotent creature?" *
+
+* The Penguin chronicler who relates the fact employs the expression, Species
+inductilis. I have endeavoured to translate it literally.
+
+
+And she opened the door to facilitate the young man's escape. Oddoul felt
+himself pushed violently out. Scarcely had he gone down into the street than a
+chamber-pot was poured over his head; and he thought:
+
+"Mysterious are thy designs, O Lord, and thy ways past finding out."
+
+
+
+II. DRACO THE GREAT (Translation of the Relics of St. Orberosia)
+
+The direct posterity of Brian the Good was extinguished about the year 900 in
+the person of Collic of the Short Nose. A cousin of that prince, Bosco the
+Magnanimous, succeeded him, and took care, in order to assure himself of the
+throne, to put to death all his relations. There issued from him a long line
+of powerful kings.
+
+One of them, Draco the Great, attained great renown as a man of war. He was
+defeated more frequently than the others. It is by this constancy in defeat
+that great captains are recognized. In twenty years he burned down more than a
+hundred thousand hamlets, market towns, unwalled towns, villages, walled
+towns, cities, and universities. He set fire impartially to his enemies'
+territory and to his own domains. And he used to explain his conduct by
+saying:
+
+"War without fire is like tripe without mustard: it is an insipid thing."
+
+His justice was rigorous. When the peasants whom he made prisoners were unable
+to raise the money for their ransoms he had them hanged from a tree, and if
+any unhappy woman came to plead for her destitute husband he dragged her by
+the hair at his horse's tail. He lived like a soldier without effeminacy. It
+is satisfactory to relate that his manner of life was pure. Not only did he
+not allow his kingdom to decline from its hereditary glory, but, even in his
+reverses he valiantly supported the honour of the Penguin people.
+
+Draco the Great caused the relics of St. Orberosia to be transferred to Alca.
+
+The body of the blessed saint had been buried in a grotto on the Coast of
+Shadows at the end of a scented heath. The first pilgrims who went to visit it
+were the boys and girls from the neighbouring villages. They used to go there
+in the evening, by preference in couples, as if their pious desires naturally
+sought satisfaction in darkness and solitude. They worshipped the saint with a
+fervent and discreet worship whose mystery they seemed jealously to guard, for
+they did not like to publish too openly the experiences they felt. But they
+were heard to murmur one to another words of love, delight, and rapture with
+which they mingled the name of Orberosia. Some would sigh that there they
+forgot the world; others would say that they came out of the grotto in peace
+and calm; the young girls among them used to recall to each other the joy with
+which they had been filled in it.
+
+Such were the marvels that the virgin of Alca performed in the morning of her
+glorious eternity; they had the sweetness and indefiniteness of the dawn. Soon
+the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume throughout the land; it was a
+ground of joy and edification for pious souls, and corrupt men endeavoured,
+though in vain, by falsehood and calumny, to divert the faithful from the
+springs of grace that flowed from the saint's tomb. The Church took measures
+so that these graces should not remain reserved for a few children, but should
+be diffused throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up their quarters
+in the grotto, they built a monastery, a chapel, and a hostelry on the coast,
+and pilgrims began to flock thither.
+
+As if strengthened by a longer sojourn in heaven, the blessed Orberosia now
+performed still greater miracles for those who came to lay their offerings on
+her tomb. She gave hopes to women who had been hitherto barren, she sent
+dreams to reassure jealous old men concerning the fidelity of the young wives
+whom they had suspected without cause, and she protected the country from
+plagues, murrains, famines, tempests, and dragons of Cappadocia.
+
+But during the troubles that desolated the kingdom in the time of King Collic
+and his successors, the tomb of St. Orberosia was plundered of its wealth, the
+monastery burned down, and the monks dispersed. The road that had been so long
+trodden by devout pilgrims was overgrown with furze and heather, and the blue
+thistles of the sands. For a hundred years the miraculous tomb had been
+visited by none save vipers, weasels, and bats, when, one day the saint
+appeared to a peasant of the neighbourhood, Momordic by name.
+
+"I am the virgin Orberosia," said she to him; "I have chosen thee to restore
+my sanctuary. Warn the inhabitants of the country that if they allow my memory
+to be blotted out, and leave my tomb without honour and wealth, a new dragon
+will come and devastate Penguinia."
+
+Learned churchmen held an inquiry concerning this apparition, and pronounced
+it genuine, and not diabolical but truly heavenly, and in later years it was
+remarked that in France, in like circumstances, St. Foy and St. Catherine had
+acted in the same way and made use of similar language.
+
+The monastery was restored and pilgrims flocked to it anew. The virgin
+Orberosia worked greater and greater miracles. She cured divers hurtful
+maladies, particularly club-foot, dropsy, paralysis, and St. Guy's disease.
+The monks who kept the tomb were enjoying an enviable opulence, when the
+saint, appearing to King Draco the Great, ordered him to recognise her as the
+heavenly patron of the kingdom and to transfer her precious remains to the
+cathedral of Alca.
+
+In consequence, the odoriferous relics of that virgin were carried with great
+pomp to the metropolitan church and placed in the middle of the choir in a
+shrine made of gold and enamel and ornamented with precious stones.
+
+The chapter kept a record of the miracles wrought by the blessed Orberosia.
+
+Draco the Great, who had never ceased to defend and exalt the Christian faith,
+died fulfilled with the most pious sentiments and bequeathed his great
+possessions to the Church.
+
+
+
+II. QUEEN CRUCHA
+
+Terrible disorders followed the death of Draco the Great. That prince's
+successors have often been accused of weakness, and it is true that none of
+them followed, even from afar, the example of their valiant ancestor.
+
+His son, Chum, who was lame, failed to increase the territory of the Penguins.
+Bolo, the son of Chum, was assassinated by the palace guards at the age of
+nine, just as he was ascending the throne. His brother Gun succeeded him. He
+was only seven years old and allowed himself to be governed by his mother,
+Queen Crucha.
+
+Crucha was beautiful, learned, and intelligent; but she was unable to curb her
+own passions.
+
+These are the terms in which the venerable Talpa expresses himself in his
+chronicle regarding that illustrious queen:
+
+"In beauty of face and symmetry of figure Queen Crucha yields neither to
+Semiramis of Babylon nor to Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons; nor to Salome,
+the daughter of Herodias. But she offers in her person certain singularities
+that will appear beautiful or uncomely according to the contradictory opinions
+of men and the varying judgments of the world. She has on her forehead two
+small horns which she conceals in the abundant folds of her golden hair; one
+of her eyes is blue and one is black; her neck is bent towards the left side;
+and, like Alexander of Macedon, she has six fingers on her right hand, and a
+stain like a little monkey's head upon her skin.
+
+"Her gait is majestic and her manner affable. She is magnificent in her
+expenses, but she is not always able to rule desire by reason.
+
+"One day, having noticed in the palace stables, a young groom of great beauty,
+she immediately fell violently in love with him, and entrusted to him the
+command of her armies. What one must praise unreservedly in this great queen
+is the abundance of gifts that she makes to the churches, monasteries, and
+chapels in her kingdom, and especially to the holy house of Beargarden, where,
+by the grace of the Lord, I made my profession in my fourteenth year. She has
+founded masses for the repose of her soul in such great numbers that every
+priest in the Penguin Church is, so to speak, transformed into a taper lighted
+in the sight of heaven to draw down the divine mercy upon the august Crucha."
+
+From these lines and from some others with which have enriched my text the
+reader can judge of the historical and literary value of the "Gesta
+Penguinorum." Unhappily, that chronicle suddenly comes suddenly to an end at
+third year of Draco the Simple, the successor of Gun the Weak. Having reached
+that point of my history, I deplore the loss of an agreeable and trustworthy
+guide.
+
+During the two centuries that followed, the Penguins remained plunged in
+blood-stained disorder. All the arts perished. In the midst of the general
+ignorance, the monks in the shadow of their cloister devoted themselves to
+study, and copied the Holy Scriptures with indefatigable zeal. As parchment
+was scarce,they scraped the writing off old manuscripts in order to transcribe
+upon them the divine word. Thus throughout the breadth of Penguinia Bibles
+blossomed forth like roses on a bush.
+
+A monk of the order of St. Benedict, Ermold the Penguin, had himself alone
+defaced four thousand Greek and Latin manuscripts so as to copy out the Gospel
+of St. John four thousand times. Thus the masterpieces of ancient poetry and
+eloquence were destroyed in great numbers. Historians are unanimous in
+recognising that the Penguin convents were the refuge of learning during the
+Middle Ages.
+
+Unending wars between the Penguins and the Porpoises filled the close of this
+period. It is extremely difficult to know the truth concerning these wars, not
+because accounts are wanting, but because there are so many of them. The
+Porpoise Chronicles contradict the Penguin Chronicles at every point. And,
+moreover, the Penguins contradict each other as well as the Porpoises. I have
+discovered two chronicles that are in agreement, but one has copied from the
+other. A single fact is certain, namely, that massacres, rapes,
+conflagrations, and plunder succeeded one another without interruption.
+
+Under the unhappy prince Bosco IX. the kingdom was at the verge of ruin. On
+the news that the Porpoise fleet, composed of six hundred great ships, was in
+sight of Alca, the bishop ordered a solemn procession. The cathedral chapter,
+the elected magistrates, the members of Parliament, and the clerics of the
+University entered the Cathedral and, taking up St. Orberosia's shrine, led it
+in procession through the town, followed by the entire people singing hymns.
+The holy patron of Penguinia was not invoked in vain. Nevertheless, the
+Porpoises besieged the town both by land and sea, took it by assault, and for
+three days and three nights killed, plundered, violated, and burned, with all
+the indifference that habit produces.
+
+Our astonishment cannot be too great at the fact that, during those iron ages,
+the faith was preserved intact among the Penguins. The splendour of the truth
+in those times illumined all souls that had not been corrupted by sophisms.
+This is the explanation of the unity of belief. A constant practice of the
+Church doubtless contributed also to maintain this happy communion of the
+faithful--every Penguin who thought differently from the others was
+immediately burned at the stake.
+
+
+
+IV. LETTERS: JOHANNES TALPA
+
+During the minority of King Gun, Johannes Talpa, in the monastery of
+Beargarden, where at the age of fourteen he had made his profession and from
+which he never departed for a single day throughout his life, composed his
+celebrated Latin chronicle in twelve books called "De Gestis Penguinorum."
+
+The monastery of Beargarden lifts its high walls on the summit of an
+inaccessible peak. One sees around it only the blue tops of mountains, divided
+by the clouds.
+
+When he began to write his "Gesta Penguinorum," Johannes Talpa was already
+old. The good monk has taken care to tell us this in his book: "My head has
+long since lost," he says, "its adornment of fair hair, and my scalp resembles
+those convex mirrors of metal which the Penguin ladies consult with so much
+care and zeal. My stature, naturally small, has with years become diminished
+and bent. My white beard gives warmth to my breast."
+
+With a charming simplicity, Talpa informs us of certain circumstances in his
+life and some features in his character. "Descended," he tells us, "from a
+noble family, and destined from childhood for the ecclesiastical state, I was
+taught grammar and music. I learnt to read under the guidance of a master who
+was called Amicus, and who would have been better named Inimicus. As I did not
+easily attain to a knowledge of my letters, he beat me violently with rods so
+that I can say that he printed the alphabet in strokes upon my back."
+
+In another passage Talpa confesses his natural inclination towards pleasure.
+These are his expressive words: "In my youth the ardour of my senses was such
+that in the shadow of the woods I experienced a sensation of boiling in a pot
+rather than of breathing the fresh air. I fled from women, but in vain, for
+every object recalled them to me."
+
+While he was writing his chronicle, a terrible war, at once foreign and
+domestic, laid waste the Penguin land. The soldiers of Crucha came to defend
+the monastery of Beargarden against the Penguin barbarians and established
+themselves strongly within its walls. In order to render it impregnable they
+pierced loop-holes through the walls and they took the lead off the church
+roof to make balls for their slings. At night they lighted huge fires in the
+courts and cloisters and on them they roasted whole oxen which they spitted
+upon the ancient pine-trees of the mountain. Sitting around the flames, amid
+smoke filled with a mingled odour of resin and fat, they broached huge casks
+of wine and beer. Their songs, their blasphemies, and the noise of their
+quarrels drowned the sound of the morning bells.
+
+At last the Porpoises, having crossed the defiles, laid siege to the
+monastery. They were warriors from the North, clad in copper armour. They
+fastened ladders a hundred and fifty fathoms long to the sides of the cliffs
+and sometimes in the darkness and storm these broke beneath the weight of men
+and arms, and bunches of the besiegers were hurled into the ravines and
+precipices. A prolonged wail would be heard going down into the darkness, and
+the assault would begin again. The Penguins poured streams of burning wax upon
+their assailants, which made them blaze like torches. Sixty times the enraged
+Porpoises attempted to scale the monastery and sixty times they were repulsed.
+
+For six months they had closely invested the monastery, when, on the day of
+the Epiphany, a shepherd of the valley showed them a hidden path by which they
+climbed the mountain, penetrated into the vaults of the abbey, ran through the
+cloisters, the kitchens, the church, the chapter halls, the library, the
+laundry, the cells, the refectories, and the dormitories, and burned the
+buildings, killing and violating without distinction of age or sex. The
+Penguins, awakened unexpectedly, ran to arms, but in the darkness and alarm
+they struck at one another, whilst the Porpoises with blows of their axes
+disputed the sacred vessels, the censers, the candlesticks, dalmatics,
+reliquaries, golden crosses, and precious stones.
+
+The air was filled with an acrid odour of burnt flesh. Groans and death-cries
+arose in the midst of the flames, and on the edges of the crumbling roofs
+monks ran in thousands like ants, and fell into the valley. Yet Johannes Talpa
+kept on writing his Chronicle. The soldiers of Crucha retreated speedily and
+filled up all the issues from the monastery with pieces of rock so as to shut
+up the Porpoises in the burning buildings. And to crush the enemy beneath the
+ruin they employed the trunks of old oaks as battering-rams. The burning
+timbers fell in with a noise like thunder and the lofty arches of the naves
+crumbled beneath the shock of these giant trees when moved by six hundred men
+together. Soon there was left nothing of the rich and extensive abbey but the
+cell of Johannes Talpa, which, by a marvellous chance, hung from the ruin of a
+smoking gable. The old chronicler still kept writing.
+
+This admirable intensity of thought may seem excessive in the case of an
+annalist who applies himself to relate the events of his own time. However
+abstracted and detached we may be from surrounding things, we nevertheless
+resent their influence. I have consulted the original manuscript of Johannes
+Talpa in the National Library, where it is preserved (Monumenta Peng., K. L6.,
+12390 four). It is a parchment manuscript of 628 leaves. The writing is
+extremely confused, the letters instead of being in a straight line, stray in
+all directions and are mingled together in great disorder, or, more correctly
+speaking, in absolute confusion. They are so badly formed that for the most
+part it is impossible not merely to say what they are, but even to distinguish
+them from the splashes of ink with which they are plentifully interspersed.
+Those inestimable pages bear witness in this way to the troubles amid which
+they were written. To read them is difficult. On the other hand, the monk of
+Beargarden's style shows no trace of emotion. The tone of the "Gesta
+Penguinorum" never departs from simplicity. The narration is rapid and of a
+conciseness that sometimes approaches dryness. The reflections are rare and,
+as a rule, judicious.
+
+
+
+V. THE ARTS: THE PRIMITIVES OF PENGUIN PAINTING
+
+The Penguin critics vie with one another in affirming that Penguin art has
+from its origin been distinguished by a powerful and pleasing originality, and
+that we may look elsewhere in vain for the qualities of grace and reason that
+characterise its earliest works. But the Porpoises claim that their artists
+were undoubtedly the instructors and masters of the Penguins. It is difficult
+to form an opinion on the matter, because the Penguins, before they began to
+admire their primitive painters, destroyed all their works.
+
+We cannot be too sorry for this loss. For my own part I feel it cruelly, for I
+venerate the Penguin antiquities and I adore the primitives. They are
+delightful. I do not say the are all alike, for that would be untrue, but they
+have common characters that are found in all schools--I mean formulas from
+which they never depart--and there is besides something finished in their
+work, for what they know they know well. Luckily we can form a notion of the
+Penguin primitives from the Italian, Flemish, and Dutch primitives, and from
+the French primitives, who are superior to all the rest; as M. Gruyer tells us
+they are more logical, logic being a peculiarly French quality. Even if this
+is denied it must at least be admitted that to France belongs the credit of
+having kept primitives when the other nations knew them no longer. The
+Exhibition of French Primitives at the Pavilion Marsan in 1904 contained
+several little panels contemporary with the later Valois kings and with Henry
+IV.
+
+I have made many journeys to see the pictures of the brothers Van Eyck, of
+Memling, of Roger van der Weyden, of the painter of the death of Mary, of
+Ambrogio Lorenzetti, and of the old Umbrian masters. It was, however, neither
+Bruges, nor Cologne, nor Sienna, nor Perugia, that completed my initiation; it
+was in the little town of Arezzo that I became a conscious adept in primitive
+painting. That was ten years ago or even longer. At that period of indigence
+and simplicity, the municipal museums, though usually kept shut, were always
+opened to foreigners. One evening an old woman with a candle showed me, for
+half a lira, the sordid museum of Arezzo, and in it I discovered a painting by
+Margaritone, a "St. Francis," the pious sadness of which moved me to tears. I
+was deeply touched, and Margaritone,of Arezzo became from that day my dearest
+primitive.
+
+I picture to myself the Penguin primitives in conformity with the works of
+that master. It will not therefore be thought superfluous if in this place I
+consider his works with some attention, if not in detail, at least under their
+more general and, if I dare say so, most representative aspect.
+
+We possess five or six pictures signed with his hand. His masterpiece,
+preserved in the National Gallery of London, represents the Virgin seated on a
+throne and holding the infant Jesus in her arms. What strikes one first when
+one looks at this figure is the proportion. The body from the neck to the feet
+is only twice as long as the head, so that it appears extremely short and
+podgy. This work is not less remarkable for its painting than for its drawing.
+The great Margaritone had but a limited number of colours in his possession,
+and he used them in all their purity without ever modifying the tones. From
+this it follows that his colouring has more vivacity than harmony. The cheeks
+of the Virgin and those of the Child are of a bright vermilion which the old
+master, from a naive preference for clear definitions, has placed on each face
+in two circumferences as exact as if they had been traced out by a pair of
+compasses.
+
+A learned critic of the eighteenth century, the Abbe Lanzi, has treated
+Margaritone's works with profound disdain. "They are," he says. "merely crude
+daubs. In those unfortunate times people could neither draw nor paint." Such
+was the common opinion of the connoisseurs of the days of powdered wigs. But
+the great Margaritone and his contemporaries were soon to be avenged for this
+cruel contempt. There was born in the nineteenth century, in the biblical
+villages and reformed cottages of pious England, a multitude of little Samuels
+and little St. Johns, with hair curling like lambs, who, about 1840, and 1850,
+became spectacled professors and founded the cult of the primitives.
+
+That eminent theorist of Pre-Raphaelitism, Sir James Tuckett, does not shrink
+from placing the Madonna of the National Gallery on a level with the
+masterpieces of Christian art. "By giving to the Virgin's head," says Sir
+James Tuckett, "a third of the total height of the figure, the old master
+attracts the spectator's attention and keeps it directed towards the more
+sublime parts of the human figure, and in particular the eyes, which we
+ordinarily describe as the spiritual organs. In this picture, colouring and
+design conspire to produce an ideal and mystical impression. The vermilion of
+the cheeks does not recall the natural appearance of the skin; it rather seems
+as if the old master has applied the roses of Paradise to the faces of the
+Mother and the Child."
+
+We see, in such a criticism as this, a shining reflection, so to speak, of the
+work which it exalts; yet MacSilly, the seraphic aesthete of Edinburgh, has
+expressed in a still more moving and penetrating fashion the impression
+produced upon his mind by the sight of this primitive painting. "The Madonna
+of Margaritone," says the revered MacSilly, "attains the transcendent end of
+art. It inspires its beholders with feelings of innocence and purity; it makes
+them like little children. And so true is this, that at the age of sixty-six,
+after having had the joy of contemplating it closely for three hours, I felt
+myself suddenly transformed into a little child. While my cab was taking me
+through Trafalgar Square I kept laughing and prattling and shaking my
+spectacle-case as if it were a rattle. And when the maid in my boarding-house
+had served my meal I kept pouring spoonfuls of soup into my ear with all the
+artlessness of childhood."
+
+"It is by such results," adds MacSilly, "that the excellence of a work of art
+is proved."
+
+Margaritone, according to Vasari, died at the age of seventy-seven,
+"regretting that he had lived to see a new form of art arising and the new
+artists crowned with fame."
+
+These lines, which I translate literally, have inspired Sir James Tuckett with
+what are perhaps the finest pages in his work. They form part of his "Breviary
+for Aesthetes"; all the Pre-Raphaelites know them by heart. I place them here
+as the most precious ornament of this book. You will agree that nothing more
+sublime has been written since the days of the Hebrew prophets.
+
+MARGARITONE'S VISION
+
+Margaritone, full of years and labours, went one day to visit the studio of a
+young painter who had lately settled in the town. He noticed in the studio a
+freshly painted Madonna, which, although severe and rigid, nevertheless, by a
+certain exactness in the proportions and a devilish mingling of light and
+shade, assumed an appearance of relief and life. At this sight the artless and
+sublime worker of Arezzo perceived with horror what the future of painting
+would be. With his brow clasped in his hands he exclaimed:
+
+"What things of shame does not this figure show forth! I discern in it the end
+of that Christian art which paints the soul and inspires the beholder with an
+ardent desire for heaven. Future painters will not restrain themselves as does
+this one to portraying on the side of a wall or on a wooden panel the cursed
+matter of which our bodies are formed; they will celebrate and glorify it.
+They will clothe their figures with dangerous appearances of flesh, and these
+figures will seem like real persons. Their bodies will be seen; their forms
+will appear through their clothing. St. Magdalen will have a bosom. St. Martha
+a belly, St. Barbara hips, St. Agnes buttocks; St. Sebastian will unveil his
+youthful beauty, and St. George will display beneath his armour the muscular
+wealth of a robust virility; apostles, confessors, doctors, and God the Father
+himself will appear as ordinary beings like you and me; the angels will affect
+an equivocal, ambiguous, mysterious beauty which will trouble hearts. What
+desire for heaven will these representations impart? None; but from them you
+will learn to take pleasure in the forms of terrestrial life. Where will
+painters stop in their indiscreet inquiries? They will stop nowhere. They will
+go so far as to show men and women naked like the idols of the Romans. There
+will be a sacred art and a profane art, and the sacred art will not be less
+profane than the other."
+
+"Get ye behind me, demons," exclaimed the old master. For in prophetic vision
+he saw the righteous and the saints assuming the appearance of melancholy
+athletes. He saw Apollos playing the lute on a flowery hill, in the midst of
+the Muses wearing light tunics. He saw Venuses lying under shady myrtles and
+the Danae exposing their charming sides to the golden rain. He saw pictures of
+Jesus under the pillar's of the temple amidst patricians, fair ladies,
+musicians, pages, negroes, dogs, and parrots. He saw in an inextricable
+confusion of human limbs, outspread wings, and flying draperies, crowds of
+tumultuous Nativities, opulent Holy Families, emphatic Crucifixions. He saw
+St. Catherines, St. Barbaras, St. Agneses humiliating patricians by the
+sumptuousness of their velvets, their brocades, and their pearls, and by the
+splendour of their breasts. He saw Auroras scattering roses, and a multitude
+of naked Dianas and Nymphs surprised on the banks of retired streams. And the
+great Margaritone died, strangled by so horrible a presentiment of the
+Renaissance and the Bolognese School.
+
+
+
+VI. MARBODIUS
+
+We possess a precious monument of the Penguin literature of the fifteenth
+century. It is a narrative of a journey to hell undertaken by the monk
+Marbodius, of the order of St. Benedict, who professed a fervent admiration
+for the poet Virgil. This narrative, written in fairly good Latin, has been
+published by M. du Clos des Limes. It is here translated for the first time. I
+believe that I am doing a service to my fellow-countrymen in making them
+acquainted with these pages, though doubtless they are far from forming a
+unique example of this class of mediaeval Latin literature. Among the fictions
+that may be compared with them we may mention "The Voyage of St. Brendan,"
+"The Vision of Albericus," and "St. Patrick's Purgatory," imaginary
+descriptions, like Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy," of the supposed abode of
+the dead. The narrative of Marbodius is one of the latest works dealing with
+this theme, but it is not the least singular.
+
+THE DESCENT OF MARBODIUS INTO HELL
+
+In the fourteen hundred and fifty-third year of the incarnation of the Son of
+God, a few days before the enemies of the Cross entered the city of Helena and
+the great Constantine, it was given to me, Brother Marbodius, an unworthy
+monk, to see and to hear what none had hitherto seen or heard. I have composed
+a faithful narrative of those things so that their memory may not perish with
+me, for man's time is short.
+
+On the first day of May in the aforesaid year, at the hour of vespers, I was
+seated in the Abbey of Corrigan on a stone in the cloisters and, as my custom
+was, I read the verses of the poet whom I love best of all, Virgil, who has
+sung of the labours: of the field, of shepherds, and of heroes. Evening was
+hanging its purple folds from the arches of the cloisters and in a voice of
+emotion I was murmuring the verses which describe how Dido, the Phoenician
+queen, wanders with her ever-bleeding wound beneath the myrtles of hell. At
+that moment Brother Hilary happened to pass by, followed by Brother Jacinth,
+the porter.
+
+Brought up in the barbarous ages before the resurrection of the Muses, Brother
+Hilary has not been initiated into the wisdom of the ancients; nevertheless,
+the poetry of the Mantuan has, like a subtle torch, shed some gleams of light
+into his understanding.
+
+"Brother Marbodius," he asked me, "do those verses that you utter with
+swelling breast and sparkling eyes--do they belong to that great 'Aeneid' from
+which morning or evening your glances are never withheld?"
+
+I answered that I was reading in Virgil how the son of Anchises perceived Dido
+like a moon behind the foliage.*
+
+* The text runs
+
+    . . .qualem primo qui syrgere mense
+  Aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam.
+
+Brother Marbodius, by a strange misunderstanding, substitutes an entirely
+different image for the one created by the poet.
+
+
+"Brother Marbodius," he replied, "I am certain that on all occasions Virgil
+gives expression to wise maxims and profound thoughts. But the songs that he
+modulates on his Syracusan flute hold such a lofty meaning and such exalted
+doctrine that I am continually puzzled by them."
+
+"Take care, father," cried Brother Jacinth, in an agitated voice. "Virgil was
+a magician who wrought marvels by the help of demons. It is thus he pierced
+through a mountain near Naples and fashioned a bronze horse that had power to
+heal all the diseases of horses. He was a necromancer, and there is still
+shown, in a certain town in Italy, the mirror in which he made the dead
+appear. And yet a woman deceived this great sorcerer. A Neapolitan courtesan
+invited him to hoist himself up to her window in the basket that was used to
+bring the provisions, and she left him all night suspended between two
+storeys."
+
+Brother Hilary did not appear to hear these observations.
+
+"Virgil is a prophet," he replied, "and a prophet who leaves far behind him
+the sibyls with their sacred verses as well as the daughter of King Priam, and
+that great diviner of future things, Plato of Athens. You will find in the
+fourth of his Syracusan cantos the birth of our Lord foretold in a lancune
+that seems of heaven rather than of earth.* In the time of my early studies,
+when I read for the first time JAM REDIT ET VIRGO, I felt myself bathed in an
+infinite delight, but I immediately experienced intense grief at the thought
+that, for ever deprived of the presence of God, the author of this prophetic
+verse, the noblest that has come from human lips, was pining among the heathen
+in eternal darkness. This cruel thought did not leave me. It pursued me even
+in my studies, my prayers, my meditations, and my ascetic labours. Thinkin
+that Virgil was deprived of the sight of God and that possibly he might even
+be suffering the fate of the reprobate in hell, I could neither enjoy peace
+nor rest, and I went so far as to exclaim several times a day with my arms
+outstretched to heaven:
+
+" 'Reveal to me, O Lord, the lot thou hast assigned to him who sang on earth
+as the angels sing in heaven!'
+
+*Three centuries before the epoch in which our Marbodius lived the words--  
+     Maro, vates gentilium
+     Da Christo testimonium
+  Were sung in the churches on Christmas Day.
+
+
+"After some years my anguish ceased when I read in an old book that the great
+apostle St. Paul, who called the Gentiles into the Church of Christ, went to
+Naples and sanctified with his tears the tomb of the prince of poets.* This
+was some ground for believing that Virgil, like the Emperor Trajan, was
+admitted to Paradise because even in error he had a presentiment of the truth.
+We are not compelled to believe it, but I can easily persuade myself that it
+is true."
+
+   *Ad maronis mausoleum
+    Ductus, fudit super eum
+    Piae rorem lacrymae.
+    Quem te, intuit, reddidissem,
+    Si te vivum invenissem
+    Poetarum maxime!
+
+
+Having thus spoken, old Hilary wished me the peace of a holy night and went
+away with Brother Jacinth.
+
+I resumed the delightful study of my poet. Book in hand, I meditated upon the
+way in which those whom Love destroys with its cruel malady wander through the
+secret paths in the depth of the myrtle forest, and, as I meditated, the
+quivering reflections of the stars came and mingled with those of the leafless
+eglantines in the waters of the cloister fountain. Suddenly the lights and the
+perfumes and the stillness of the sky were overwhelmed, a fierce Northwind
+charged with storm and darkness burst roaring upon me. It lifted me up and
+carried me like a wisp of straw over fields, cities, rivers, and mountains,
+and through the midst of thunder-clouds, during a long night composed of a
+whole series of nights and days. And when, after this prolonged and cruel
+rage, the hurricane was at last stilled, I found myself far from my native
+land at the bottom of a valley bordered by cypress trees. Then a woman of wild
+beauty, trailing long garments behind her, approached me. She placed her left
+hand on my shoulder, and, pointing her right arm to an oak with thick foliage:
+
+"Look!" said she to me.
+
+Immediately I recognised the Sibyl who guards the sacred wood of Avernus, and
+I discerned the fair Proserpine's beautiful golden twig amongst the tufted
+boughs of the tree to which her finger pointed.
+
+"O prophetic Virgin," I exclaimed, "thou hast comprehended my desire and thou
+hast satisfied it in this way. Thou hast revealed to me the tree that bears
+the shining twig without which none can enter alive into the dwelling-place of
+the dead. And in truth, eagerly did I long to converse with the shade of
+Virgil."
+
+Having said this, I snatched the golden branch from its ancient trunk and I
+advanced without fear into the smoking gulf that leads to the miry banks of
+the Styx, upon which the shades are tossed about like dead leaves. At sight of
+the branch dedicated to Proserpine, Charon took me in his bark, which groaned
+beneath my weight, and I alighted on the shores of the dead, and was greeted
+by the mute baying of the threefold Cerberus. I pretended to throw the shade
+of a stone at him, and the vain monster fled into his cave. There, amidst the
+rushes, wandered the souls of those children whose eyes had but opened and
+shut to the kindly light of day, and there in a gloomy cavern Minos judges
+men. I penetrated into the myrtle wood in which the victims of love wander
+languishing, Phaedra, Procris, the sad Eriphyle, Evadne, Pasiphae, Laodamia,
+and Cenis, and the Phoenician Dido. Then I went through the dusty plains
+reserved for famous warriors. Beyond them open two ways. That to the left
+leads to Tartarus, the abode of the wicked. I took that to the right, which
+leads to Elysium and to the dwellings of Dis. Having hung the sacred branch at
+the goddess's door, I reached pleasant fields flooded with purple light. The
+shades of philosophers and poets hold grave converse there. The Graces and the
+Muses formed sprightly choirs upon the grass. Old Homer sang, accompanying
+himself upon his rustic lyre. His eyes were closed, but divine images shone
+upon his lips. I saw Solon, Democritus, and Pythagoras watching the games of
+the young men in the meadow, and, through the foliage of an ancient laurel, I
+perceived also Hesiod, Orpheus, the melancholy Euripides, and the masculine
+Sappho. I passed and recognised, as they sat on the bank of a fresh rivulet,
+the poet Horace, Varius, Gallus, and Lycoris. A little apart, leaning against
+the trunk of a dark holm-oak, Virgil was gazing pensively at the grove. Of
+lofty stature, though spare, he still preserved that swarthy complexion, that
+rustic air, that negligent bearing, and unpolished appearance which during his
+lifetime concealed his genius. I saluted him piously and remained for a long
+time without speech.
+
+At last when my halting voice could proceed out of my throat:
+
+"O thou, so dear to the Ausonian Muses, thou honour of the Latin name,
+Virgil," cried I, "it is through thee I have known what beauty is, it is
+through thee I have known what the tables of the gods and the beds of the
+goddesses are like. Suffer the praises of the humblest of thy adorers."
+
+"Arise, stranger," answered the divine poet. "I perceive that thou art a
+living being among the shades, and that thy body treads down the grass in this
+eternal evening. Thou art not the first man who has descended before his death
+into these dwellings, although all intercourse between us and the living is
+difficult. But cease from praise; I do not like eulogies and the confused
+sounds of glory have always offended my ears. That is why I fled from Rome,
+where I was known to the idle and curious, and laboured in the solitude of my
+beloved Parthenope. And then I am not so convinced that the men of thy
+generation understand my verses that should be gratified by thy praises. Who
+art thou?"
+
+"I am called Marbodius of the Kingdom of Alca. I made my profession in the
+Abbey of Corrigan. I read thy poems by day and I read them by night. It is
+thee whom I have come to see in Hell; I was impatient to know what thy fate
+was. On earth the learned often dispute about it. Some hold it probable that,
+having lived under the power of demons, thou art now burning in
+inextinguishable flames; others, more cautious, pronounce no opinion,
+believing that all which is said concerning the dead is uncertain and full of
+lies; several, though not in truth the ablest, maintain that, because thou
+didst elevate the tone of the Sicilian Muses and foretell that a new progeny
+would descend from heaven, thou wert admitted, like the Emperor Trajan, to
+enjoy eternal blessedness in the Christian heaven."
+
+"Thou seest that such is not the case," answered the shade, smiling.
+
+"I meet thee in truth, O Virgil, among the heroes and sages in those Elysian
+Fields which thou thyself hast described. Thus, contrary to what several on
+earth believe, no one has come to seek thee on the part of Him who reigns on
+high?
+
+After a rather long silence:
+
+"I will conceal nought from thee. He sent for me; one of his messengers, a
+simple man, came to say that I was expected, and that, although I had not been
+initiated into their mysteries, in consideration of my prophetic verses, a
+place had been reserved for me among those of the new sect. But I refused to
+accept that invitation; I had no desire to change my lace. I did so not
+because I share the admiration of the Greeks for the Elysian fields, or
+because I taste here those joys which caused Proserpine to lose the
+remembrance of her mother. I never believed much myself in what I say about
+these things in the 'Aeneid.' I was instructed by philosophers and men of
+science and I had a correct foreboding of the truth. Life in hell is extremely
+attenuated; we feel neither pleasure nor pain; we are as if we were not. The
+dead have no existence here except such as the living lend them. Nevertheless
+I prefer to remain here."
+
+"But what reason didst thou give, O Virgil, for so strange a refusal?"
+
+"I gave excellent ones. I said to the messenger of the god that I did not
+deserve the honour he brought me, and that a meaning had been given to my
+verses which they did not bear. In truth I have not in my fourth Eclogue
+betrayed the faith of my ancestors. Some ignorant Jews alone have interpreted
+in favour of a barbarian god a verse which celebrates the return of the golden
+age predicted by the Sibylline oracles. I excused myself then on the ground
+that I could not occupy a place which was destined for me in error and to
+which I recognised that I had no right. Then I alleged my disposition and my
+tastes, which do not accord with the customs of the new heavens.
+
+"'I am not unsociable,' said I to this man. 'I have shown in life a
+complaisant and easy disposition, although the extreme simplicity of my habits
+caused me to be suspected of avarice. I kept nothing for myself alone. My
+library was open to all and I have conformed my conduct to that fine saying of
+Euripides, "all ought to be common among friends." Those praises that seemed
+obtrusive when I myself received them became agreeable to me when addressed to
+Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I am rustic and uncultivated. I take
+pleasure in the society of animals; I was so zealous in observing them and
+took so much care of them that I was regarded, not altogether wrongly, as a
+good veterinary surgeon. I am told that the people of thy sect claim an
+immortal soul for themselves, but refuse one to the animals. That is a piece
+of nonsense that makes me doubt their judgment. Perhaps I love the flocks and
+the shepherds a little too much. That would not seem right amongst you. There
+is a maxim to which I endeavour to conform my actions, "Nothing too much."
+More even than my feeble health my philosophy teaches me to use things with
+measure. I am sober; a lettuce and some olives with a drop of Falernian wine
+form all my meals. I have, indeed, to some extent gone with strange women, but
+I have not delayed over long in taverns to watch the young Syrians dance to
+the sound of the crotalum.* But if I have restrained my desires it was for my
+own satisfaction and for the sake of good discipline. To fear pleasure and to
+fly from joy appears to me the worst insult that one can offer to nature. I am
+assured that during their lives certain of the elect of thy god abstained from
+food and avoided women through love of asceticism, and voluntarily exposed
+themselves to useless sufferings. I should be afraid of meeting those,
+criminals whose frenzy horrifies me. A poet must not be asked to attach
+himself too strictly to any scientific or moral doctrine. Moreover, I am a
+Roman, and the Romans, unlike the Greeks, are unable to pursue profound
+speculations in a subtle manner. If they adopt a philosophy it is above all in
+order to derive some practical advantages from it. Siro, who enjoyed great
+renown among us, taught me the system of Epicurus and thus freed me from vain
+terrors and turned me aside from the cruelties to which religion persuades
+ignorant men. I have embraced the views of Pythagoras concerning the souls of
+men and animals, both of which are of divine essence; this invites us to look
+upon ourselves without pride and without shame. I have learnt from the
+Alexandrines how the earth, at first soft and without form, hardened in
+proportion as Nereus withdrew himself from it to dig his humid dwellings; I
+have learned how things were formed insensibly; in what manner the rains,
+falling from the burdened clouds, nourished the silent forests, and by what
+progress a few animals at last began to wander over the nameless mountains. I
+could not accustom myself to your cosmogony either, for it seems to me fitter
+for a camel-driver on the Syrian sands than for a disciple of Aristarchus of
+Samos. And what would become of me in the abode of your beatitude if I did not
+find there my friends, my ancestors, my masters, and my gods, and if it is not
+given to me to see Rhea's noble son, or Venus, mother of Aeneas, with her
+winning smile, or Pan, or the young Dryads, or the Sylvans, or old Silenus,
+with his face stained by Aegle's purple mulberries.' These are the reasons
+which I begged that simple man to plead before the successor of Jupiter."
+
+* This phrase seems to indicate that, if one is to believe Macrobius, the
+"Copa" is by Virgil.
+
+
+"And since then, O great shade, thou hast received no other messages?"
+
+"I have received none."
+
+"To console themselves for thy absence, O Virgil, they have three poets,
+Commodianus, Prudentius, and Fortunatus, who were all three born in those dark
+plays when neither prosody nor grammar were known. But tell me, O Mantuan,
+hast thou never received other intelligence of the God whose company thou
+didst so deliberately refuse?"
+
+"Never that I remember."
+
+"Hast thou not told me that I am not the first who descended alive into these
+abodes and presented himself before thee?"
+
+
+"Thou dost remind me of it. A century and a half ago, or so it seems to me (it
+is difficult to reckon days and years amid the shades), my profound peace was
+intruded upon by a strange visitor. As I was wandering beneath the gloomy
+foliage that borders the Styx, I saw rising before me a human form more opaque
+and darker than that of the inhabitants of these shores. I recognised a living
+person. He was of high stature, thin, with an aquiline nose, sharp chin, and
+hollow cheeks. His dark eyes shot forth fire; a red hood girt with a crown of
+laurels bound his lean brows. His bones pierced through the tight brown cloak
+that descended to his heels. He saluted me with deference, tempered by a sort
+of fierce pride, and addressed me in a speech more obscure and incorrect than
+that of those Gauls with whom the divine Julius filled both his legions and
+the Curia. At last I understood that he had been born near Fiesole, in an
+ancient Etruscan colony that Sulla had founded on the banks of the Arno, and
+which had prospered; that he had obtained municipal honours, but that he had
+thrown himself vehemently into the sanguinary quarrels which arose between the
+senate, the knights, and the people, that he had been defeated and banished,
+and now he wandered in exile throughout the world. He described Italy to me as
+distracted by more wars and discords than in the time of my youth, and as
+sighing anew for a second Augustus. I pitied his misfortune, remembering what
+I myself had formerly endured.
+
+"An audacious spirit unceasingly disquieted him, and his mind harboured great
+thoughts, but alas! his rudeness and ignorance displayed the triumph of
+barbarism. He knew neither poetry, nor science, nor even the tongue of the
+Greeks, and he was ignorant, too, of the ancient traditions concerning the
+origin of the world and the nature of the gods. He bravely repeated fables
+which in my time would have brought smiles to the little children who were not
+yet old enough to pay for admission at the baths. The vulgar easily believe in
+monsters. The Etruscans especially peopled hell with demons, hideous as a sick
+man's dreams. That they have not abandoned their childish imaginings after so
+many centuries is explained by the continuation and progress of ignorance and
+misery, but that one of their magistrates whose mind is raised above the
+common level should share these popular illusions and should be frightened by
+the hideous demons that the inhabitants of that country painted on the walls
+of their tombs in the time of Porsena--that is something which might sadden
+even a sage. My Etruscan visitor repeated verses to me which he had composed
+in a new dialect, called by him the vulgar tongue, the sense of which I could
+not understand. My ears were more surprised than charmed as I heard him repeat
+the same sound three or four times at regular intervals in his efforts to mark
+the rhythm. That artifice did not seem ingenious to me; but it is not for the
+dead to judge of novelties.
+
+"But I do not reproach this colonist of Sulla, born in an unhappy time, for
+making inharmonious verses or for being, if it be possible, as bad a poet as
+Bavius or Maevius. I have grievances against him which touch me more closely.
+The thing is monstrous and scarcely credible, but when this man returned to
+earth he disseminated the most odious lies about me. He affirmed in several
+passages of his barbarous poems that I had served him as a guide in the modern
+Tartarus, a place I know nothing of. He insolently proclaimed that I had
+spoken of the gods of Rome as false and lying gods, and that I held as the
+true God the present successor of Jupiter. Friend, when thou art restored to
+the kindly light of day and beholdest again thy native land, contradict those
+abominable falsehoods. Say to thy people that the singer of the pious Aeneas
+has never worshipped the god of the Jews. I am assured that his power is
+declining and that his approaching fall is manifested by undoubted
+indications. This news would give me some pleasure if one could rejoice in
+these abodes. where we feel neither fears nor desires."
+
+He spoke, and with a gesture of farewell he went away. I beheld his. shade
+gliding over the asphodels without bending their stalks. I saw that it became
+fainter and vaguer as it receded farther from me, and it vanished before it
+reached the wood of evergreen laurels. Then I understood the meaning of the
+words, "The dead have no life, but that which the living lend them," and I
+walked slowly through the pale meadow to the gate of horn.
+
+I affirm that all in this writing is true.*
+
+* There is in Marbodius's narrative a passage very worthy of notice, viz.,
+that in which the monk of Corrigan describes Dante Alighieri such as we
+picture him to ourselves to-day. The miniatures in a very old manuscript of
+the "Divine Comedy," the "Codex Venetianus," represent the poet as a little
+fat man clad in a short tunic, the skirts of which fall above his knees. As
+for Virgil, he still wears the philosophical beard, in the wood-engravings of
+the sixteenth century.
+
+One would not have thought either that Marbodius, or even Virgil, could have
+known the Etruscan tombs of Chiusi and Corneto, where, in fact, there are
+horrible and burlesque devils closely resembling those of Orcagna.
+Nevertheless, the authenticity of the "Descent of Marbodius into Hell" is
+indisputable. M. du Clos des Lunes has firmly established it. To doubt it
+would be to doubt palaeography itself.
+
+
+
+VII. SIGNS IN THE MOON
+
+At that time, whilst Penguinia was still plunged in ignorance and barbarism,
+Giles Bird-catcher, a Franciscan monk, known by his writings under the name
+Aegidius Aucupis, devoted himself with indefatigable zeal to the study of
+letters and the sciences. He gave his nights to mathematics and music, which
+he called the two adorable sisters, the harmonious daughters of Number and
+Imagination. He was versed in medicine and astrology. He was suspected of
+practising magic, and it seemed true that he wrought metamorphoses and
+discovered hidden things.
+
+The monks of his convent, finding in his cell Greek books which they could not
+read, imagined them to be conjuring-books, and denounced their too learned
+brother as a wizard. Aegidius Aucupis fled, and reached the island of Ireland,
+where he lived for thirty studious years. He went from monastery to monastery,
+searching for and copying the Greek and Latin manuscripts which they
+contained. He also studied physics and alchemy. He acquired a universal
+knowledge and discovered notable secrets concerning animals, plants, and
+stones. He was found one day in the company of a very beautiful woman who sang
+to her own accompaniment on the lute, and who was afterwards discovered to be
+a machine which he had himself constructed.
+
+He often crossed the Irish Sea to go into the land of Wales and to visit the
+libraries of the monasteries there. During one of these crossings, as he
+remained during the night on the bridge of the ship, he saw beneath the waters
+two sturgeons swimming side by side. He had very good hearing and he knew the
+language of fishes. Now he heard one of the sturgeons say to the other:
+
+"The man in the moon, whom we have often seen carrying fagots on his
+shoulders, has fallen into the sea.
+
+And the other sturgeon said in its turn:
+
+"And in the silver disc there will be seen the image of two lovers kissing
+each other on the mouth."
+
+Some years later, having returned to his native country, Aegidius Aucupis
+found that ancient learning had been restored. Manners had softened. Men no
+longer pursued the nymphs of the fountains, of the woods, and of the mountains
+with their insults. They placed images of the Muses and of the modest Graces
+in their gardens, and they rendered her former honours to the Goddess with
+ambrosial lips, the joy of men and gods. They were becoming reconciled to
+nature. They trampled vain terrors beneath their feet and raised their eyes to
+heaven without fearing, as they formerly did, to read signs of anger and
+threats of damnation in the skies.
+
+At this spectacle Aegidius Aucupis remembered what the two sturgeons of the
+sea of Erin had foretold.
+
+
+
+BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO
+
+I. MOTHER ROUQUIN
+
+Aegidius Aucupis, the Erasmus of the Penguins, was not mistaken; his age was
+an age of free inquiry. But that great man mistook the elegances of the
+humanists for softness of manners, and he did not foresee the effects that the
+awaking of intelligence would have amongst the Penguins. It brought about the
+religious Reformation; Catholics massacred Protestants and Protestants
+massacred Catholics. Such were the first results of liberty of thought. The
+Catholics prevailed in Penguinia. But the spirit of inquiry had penetrated
+among them without their knowing it. They joined reason to faith, and claimed
+that religion had been divested of the superstitious practices that
+dishonoured it, just as in later days the booths that the cobblers, hucksters,
+and dealers in old clothes had built against the walls of the cathedrals were
+cleared away. The word, legend, which at first indicated what the faithful
+ought to read, soon suggested the idea of pious fables and childish tales.
+
+The saints had to suffer from this state of mind. An obscure canon called
+Princeteau, a very austere and crabbed man, designated so great a number of
+them as not worthy of having their days observed, that he was surnamed the
+exposer of the saints. He did not think, for instance, that if St. Margaret's
+prayer were applied as a poultice to a woman in travail that the pains of
+childbirth would be softened.
+
+Even the venerable patron saint of Penguinia did not escape his rigid
+criticism. This is what he says of her in his "Antiquities of Alca":
+
+"Nothing is more uncertain than the history, or even the existence, of St.
+Orberosia. An ancient anonymous annalist, a monk of Dombes, relates that a
+woman called Orberosia was possessed by the devil in a cavern where, even down
+to his own days, the little boys and girls of the village used to play at a
+sort of game representing the devil and the fair Orberosia. He adds that this
+woman became the concubine of a horrible dragon, who ravaged the country. Such
+a statement is hardly credible, but the history of Orberosia, as it has since
+been related, seems hardly more worthy of belief. The life of that saint by
+the Abbot Simplicissimus is three hundred years later than the pretended
+events which it relates and that author shows himself excessively credulous
+and devoid of all critical faculty."
+
+Suspicion attacked even the supernatural origin of the Penguins. The historian
+Ovidius Capito went so far as to deny the miracle of their transformation. He
+thus begins his "Annals of Penguinia":
+
+"A dense obscurity envelopes this history, and it would be no exaggeration to
+say that it is a tissue of puerile fables and popular tales. The Penguins
+claim that they are descended from birds who were baptized by St. Mael and
+whom God changed into men at the intercession of that glorious apostle. They
+hold that, situated at first in the frozen ocean, their island, floating like
+Delos, was brought to anchor in these heaven-favoured seas, of which it is
+to-day the queen. I conclude that this myth is a reminiscence of the ancient
+migrations of the Penguins."
+
+In the following century, which was that of the philosophers, scepticism
+became still more acute. No further evidence of it is needed than the
+following celebrated passage from the "Moral Essay":
+
+"Arriving we know not from whence (for indeed their origins are not very
+clear), and successively invaded and conquered by four or five peoples from
+the north, south, east, and west, miscegenated, interbred, amalgamated, and
+commingled, the Penguins boast of the purity of their race, and with justice,
+for they have become a pure race. This mixture of all mankind, red, black,
+yellow, and white, round-headed and long-headed, as formed in the course of
+ages a fairly homogeneous human family, and one which is recognisable by
+certain features due to a community of life and customs.
+
+"This idea that they belong to the best race in the world, and that they are
+its finest family, inspires them with noble pride, indomitable courage, and a
+hatred for the human race.
+
+"The life of a people is but a succession of miseries, crimes, and follies.
+This is true of the Penguin nation, as of all other nations. Save for this
+exception its history is admirable from beginning to end."
+
+The two classic ages of the Penguins are too well-known for me to lay stress
+upon them. But what has not been sufficiently noticed is the way in which the
+rationalist theologians such as Canon Princeteau called into existence the
+unbelievers of the succeeding age. The former employed their reason to destroy
+what did not seem to them, essential to their religion; they only left
+untouched the most rigid article of faith. Their intellectual successors,
+being taught by them how to make use of science and reason, employed them
+against whatever beliefs remained. Thus rational theology engendered natural
+philosophy.
+
+That is why (if I may turn from the Penguins of former days to the Sovereign
+Pontiff, who, to-day governs the universal Church) we cannot admire too
+greatly the wisdom of Pope Pius X. in condemning the study of exegesis as
+contrary to revealed truth, fatal to sound theological doctrine, and deadly to
+the faith. Those clerics who maintain the rights of science in opposition to
+him are pernicious doctors and pestilent teachers, and the faithful who
+approve of them are lacking in either mental or moral ballast.
+
+At the end of the age of philosophers, the ancient kingdom of Penguinia was
+utterly destroyed, the king put to death, the privileges of the nobles
+abolished, and a Republic proclaimed in the midst of public misfortunes and
+while a terrible war was raging. The assembly which then governed Penguinia
+ordered all the metal articles contained in the churches to be melted down.
+The patriots even desecrated the tombs of the kings. It is said that when the
+tomb of Draco the Great was opened, that king presented an appearance as black
+as ebony and so majestic that those who profaned his corpse fled in terror.
+According to other accounts, these churlish men insulted him by putting a pipe
+in his mouth and derisively offering him a glass of wine.
+
+On the seventeenth day of the month of Mayflowers, the shrine of St.
+Orberosia, which had for five hundred years been exposed to the veneration of
+the faithful in the Church of St. Mael, was transported into the town-hall and
+submitted to the examination of a jury of experts appointed by the
+municipality. It was made of gilded copper in shape like the nave of a church,
+entirely covered with enamels and decorated with precious stones, which latter
+were perceived to be false. The chapter in its foresight had removed the
+rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and great balls of rock-crystal, and had
+substituted pieces of glass in their place. It contained only a little dust
+and a piece of old linen, which were thrown into a great fire that had been
+lighted on the Place de Greve to burn the relics of the saints. The people
+danced around it singing patriotic songs.
+
+From the threshold of their booth, which leant against the town-hall, a man
+called Rouquin and his wife were watching this group of madmen. Rouquin
+clipped dogs and gelded cats; he also frequented the inns. His wife was a
+ragpicker and a bawd, but she had plenty of shrewdness.
+
+"You see, Rouquin," said she to her man, "they are committing a sacrilege.
+They will repent of it."
+
+"You know nothing about it, wife," answered Rouquin; "they, have become
+philosophers, and when one is once a philosopher he is a philosopher for
+ever."
+
+"I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret what they are
+doing to-day. They ill-treat the saints because they have not helped them
+enough, but for all that the quails won't fall ready cooked into their mouths.
+They will soon find themselves as badly off as before, and when they have put
+out their tongues for enough they will become pious again. Sooner than people
+think the day will come when Penguinia will again begin to honour her blessed
+patron. Rouquin, it would be a good thing, in readiness for that day, if we
+kept a handful of ashes and some rags and bones in an old pot in our lodgings.
+We will say that they are the relics of St. Orberosia and that we have saved
+them from the flames at the peril of our lives. I am greatly mistaken if we
+don't get honour and profit out of them. That good action might be worth a
+place from the Cure to sell tapers and hire chairs in the chapel of St.
+Orberosia."
+
+On that same day Mother Rouquin took home with her a little ashes and some
+bones, and put them in an old jam-pot in her cupboard.
+
+
+
+II. TRINCO
+
+The sovereign Nation had taken possession of the lands of the nobility and
+clergy to sell them at a low price to the middle classes and the peasants. The
+middle classes and the peasants thought that the revolution was a good thing
+for acquiring lands and a bad one for retaining them.
+
+The legislators of the Republic made terrible laws for the defence of
+property, and decreed death to anyone who should propose a division of wealth.
+But that did not avail the Republic. The peasants who had become proprietors
+bethought themselves that though it had made them rich, the Republic had
+nevertheless caused a disturbance to wealth, and they desired a system more
+respectful of private property and more capable of assuring the permanence of
+the new institutions.
+
+They had not long to wait. The Republic, like Agrippina, bore her destroyer in
+her bosom.
+
+Having great wars to carry on, it created military forces, and these were
+destined both to save it and to destroy it. Its legislators thought they could
+restrain their generals by the fear of punishment, but if they sometimes cut
+off the heads of unlucky soldiers they could not do the same to the fortunate
+soldiers who obtained over it the advantages of having saved its existence.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory the renovated Penguins delivered themselves up to
+a dragon, more terrible than that of their fables, who, like a stork amongst
+frogs, devoured them for fourteen years with his insatiable beak.
+
+Half a century after the reign of the new dragon a young Maharajah of Malay,
+called Djambi, desirous, like the Scythian Anacharsis, of instructing himself
+by travel, visited Penguinia and wrote an interesting account of his travels.
+I transcribe the first page of his account:
+
+ACCOUNT OF THE TRAVELS OF YOUNG DJAMBI IN PENGUINIA
+
+After a voyage of ninety days I landed at the vast and deserted port of the
+Penguins and travelled over untilled fields to their ruined capital.
+Surrounded by ramparts and full of barracks and arsenals it had a martial
+though desolate appearance. Feeble and crippled men wandered proudly through
+the streets, wearing old uniforms and carrying rusty weapons.
+
+"What do you want?" I was rudely asked at the gate of the city by a soldier
+whose moustaches pointed to the skies.
+
+"Sir," I answered, "I come as an inquirer to visit this island."
+
+"It is not an island," replied the soldier.
+
+"What!" I exclaimed, "Penguin Island is not an island?"
+
+"No, sir, it is an insula. It was formerly called an island, but for a century
+it has been decreed that it shall bear the name of insula. It is the only
+insula in the whole universe. Have you a passport?"
+
+"Here it is."
+
+"Go and get it signed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
+
+A lame guide who conducted me came to a pause in a vast square.
+
+"The insula," said he, "has given birth, as you know, to Trinco, the greatest
+genius of the universe, whose statue you see before you. That obelisk standing
+to your right commemorates Trinco's birth; the column that rises to your left
+has Trinco crowned with a diadem upon its summit. You see here the triumphal
+arch dedicated to the glory of Trinco and his family."
+
+"What extraordinary feat has Trinco performed?" I asked.
+
+"War."
+
+"That is nothing extraordinary. We Malayans make war constantly."
+
+"That may be, but Trinco is the greatest warrior of all countries and all
+times. There never existed a greater conqueror than he. As you anchored in our
+port you saw to the east a volcanic island called Ampelophoria, shaped like a
+cone, and of small size, but renowned for its wines. And to the west a larger
+island which raises to the sky a long range of sharp teeth; for this reason it
+is called the Dog's Jaws. It is rich in copper mines. We possessed both before
+Trinco's reign and they were the boundaries of our empire. Trinco extended the
+Penguin dominion over the Archipelago of the Turquoises and the Green
+Continent, subdued the gloomy Porpoises, and planted his flag amid the
+icebergs of the Pole and on the burning sands of the African deserts. He
+raised troops in all the countries he conquered, and when his armies marched
+past in the wake of our own light infantry, our island grenadiers, our
+hussars, our dragoons, our artillery, and our engineers there were to be seen
+yellow soldiers looking in their blue armour like crayfish standing on their
+tails; red men with parrots' plumes, tattooed with solar and Phallic emblems,
+and with quivers of poisoned arrows resounding on their backs; naked blacks
+armed only with their teeth and nails; pygmies riding on cranes; gorillas
+carrying trunks of trees and led by an old ape who wore upon his hairy breast
+the cross of the Legion of Honour. And all those troops, led to Trinco's
+banner by the most ardent patriotism, flew on from victory to victory, and in
+thirty years of war Trinco conquered half the known world."
+
+"What!" cried I, "you possess half of the world."
+
+"Trinco conquered it for us, and Trinco lost it to us. As great in his defeats
+as in his victories he surrendered all that he had conquered. He even allowed
+those two islands we possessed before his time, Ampelophoria and the Dog's
+Jaws, to be taken from us. He left Penguinia impoverished and depopulated. The
+flower of the insula perished in his wars. At the time of his fall there were
+left in our country none but the hunchbacks and cripples from whom we are
+descended. But he gave us glory."
+
+"He made you pay dearly for it!"
+
+"Glory never costs too much," replied my guide.
+
+
+
+III. THE JOURNEY OF DOCTOR OBNUBILE
+
+After a succession of amazing vicissitudes, the memory of which is in great
+part lost by the wrongs of time and the bad style of historians, the Penguins
+established the government of the Penguins by themselves. They elected a diet
+or assembly, and invested it with the privilege of naming the Head of the
+State. The latter, chosen from among the simple Penguins, wore no formidable
+monster's crest upon his head and exercised no absolute authority over the
+people. He was himself subject to the laws of the nation. He was not given the
+title of king, and no ordinal number followed his name. He bore such names as
+Paturle, Janvion, Traffaldin, Coquenhot, and Bredouille. These magistrates did
+not make war. They were not suited for that.
+
+The new state received the name of Public Thing or Republic. Its partisans
+were called republicanists or republicans. They were also named Thingmongers
+and sometimes Scamps, but this latter name was taken in ill part.
+
+The Penguin democracy did not itself govern. It obeyed a financial oligarchy
+which formed opinion by means of the newspapers, and held in its hands the
+representatives, the ministers, and the president. It controlled the finances
+of the republic, and directed the foreign affairs of the country as if it were
+possessed of sovereign power.
+
+Empires and kingdoms in those days kept up enormous fleets. Penguinia,
+compelled to do as they did, sank under the pressure of her armaments.
+Everybody deplored or pretended to deplore so grievous a necessity. However,
+the rich, and those engaged in business or affairs, submitted to it with a
+good heart through a spirit of patriotism, and because they counted on the
+soldiers and sailors to defend their goods at home and to acquire markets and
+territories abroad. The great manufacturers encouraged the making of cannons
+and ships through a zeal for the national defence and in order to obtain
+orders. Among the citizens of middle rank and of the liberal professions some
+resigned themselves to this state of affairs without complaining, believing
+that it would last for ever; others waited impatiently for its end and thought
+they might be able to lead the powers to a simultaneous disarmament.
+
+The illustrious Professor Obnubile belonged to this latter class.
+
+"War," said he, "is a barbarity to which the progress of civilization will put
+an end. The great democracies are pacific and will soon impose their will upon
+the aristocrats."
+
+Professor Obnubile, who had for sixty years led a solitary and retired life in
+his laboratory, whither external noises did not penetrate, resolved to observe
+the spirit of the peoples for himself. He began his studies with the greatest
+of all democracies and set sail for New Atlantis.
+
+After a voyage of fifteen days his steamer entered, during the night, the
+harbour of Titanport, where thousands of ships were anchored. An iron bridge
+thrown across the water and shining with lights, stretched between two piers
+so far apart that Professor Obnubile imagined he was sailing on the seas of
+Saturn and that he saw the marvellous ring which girds the planet of the Old
+Man. And this immense conduit bore upon it more than a quarter of the wealth
+of the world. The learned Penguin, having disembarked, was waited on by
+automatons in a hotel forty-eight stories high. Then he took the great railway
+that led to Gigantopolis, the capital of New Atlantis. In the train there were
+restaurants, gaming-rooms, athletic arenas, telegraphic, commercial, and
+financial offices, a Protestant Church, and the printing-office of a great
+newspaper, which latter the doctor was unable to read, as he did not know the
+language of the New Atlantans. The train passed along the banks of great
+rivers, through manufacturing cities which concealed the sky with the smoke
+from their chimneys, towns black in the day, towns red at night, full of noise
+by day and full of noise also by night.
+
+"Here," thought the doctor, "is a people far too much engaged in industry and
+trade to make war. I am already certain that the New Atlantans pursue a policy
+of peace. For it is an axiom admitted by all economists that peace without and
+peace within are necessary for the progress of commerce and industry."
+
+As he surveyed Gigantopolis, he was confirmed in this opinion. People went
+through the streets so swiftly propelled by hurry that they knocked down all
+who were in their way. Obnubile was thrown down several times, but soon
+succeeded in learning how to demean himself better; after an hour's walking he
+himself knocked down an Atlantan.
+
+Having reached a great square he saw the portico of a palace in the Classic
+style, whose Corinthian columns reared their capitals of arborescent acanthus
+seventy metres above the stylobate.
+
+As he stood with his head thrown back admiring the building, a man of modest
+appearance approached him and said in Penguin:
+
+"I see by your dress that you are from Penguinia. I know your language; I am a
+sworn interpreter. This is the Parliament palace. At the present moment the
+representatives of the States are in deliberation. Would you like to be
+present at the sitting?"
+
+The doctor was brought into the hall and cast his looks upon the crowd of
+legislators who were sitting on cane chairs with their feet upon their desks.
+
+The president arose and, in the midst of general inattention, muttered rather
+than spoke the following formulas which the interpreter immediately translated
+to the doctor.
+
+"The war for the opening of the Mongol markets being ended to the satisfaction
+of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid before the finance
+committee . . . ."
+
+"Is there any opposition? . . ."
+
+"The proposal is carried."
+
+"The war for the opening of the markets of Third-Zealand being ended to the
+satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid before the
+finance committee. . . ."
+
+"Is there any opposition? . . ."
+
+"The proposal is carried."
+
+"Have I heard aright?" asked Professor Obnubile. "What? you an industrial
+people and engaged in all these wars!"
+
+"Certainly," answered the interpreter, "these are industrial wars. Peoples who
+have neither commerce nor industry are not obliged to make war, but a business
+people is forced to adopt a policy of conquest. The number of wars necessarily
+increases with our productive activity. As soon as one of our industries fails
+to find a market for its products a war is necessary to open new outlets. It
+is in this way we have had a coal war, a copper war, and a cotton war. In
+Third-Zealand we have killed two-thirds of the inhabitants in order to compel
+the remainder to buy our umbrellas and braces."
+
+At that moment a fat man who was sitting in the middle of the assembly
+ascended the tribune.
+
+"I claim," said he, "a war against the Emerald Republic, which insolently
+contends with our pigs for the hegemony of hams and sauces in all the markets
+of the universe."
+
+"Who is that legislator?" asked Doctor Obnubile.
+
+"He is a pig merchant."
+
+"Is there any opposition?" said the President. "I put the proposition to the
+vote."
+
+The war against the Emerald Republic was voted with uplifted hands by a very
+large majority.
+
+"What?" said Obnubile to the interpreter; "you have voted a war with that
+rapidity and that indifference!"
+
+"Oh! it is an unimportant war which will hardly cost eight million dollars."
+
+"And men . . ."
+
+"The men are included in the eight million dollars."
+
+Then Doctor Obnubile bent his head in bitter reflection.
+
+"Since wealth and civilization admit of as many causes of wars as poverty and
+barbarism, since the folly and wickedness of men are incurable, there remains
+but one good action to be done. The wise man will collect enough dynamite to
+blow up this planet. When its fragments fly through space an imperceptible
+amelioration will be accomplished in the universe and a satisfaction will be
+given to the universal conscience. Moreover, this universal conscience does
+not exist."
+
+
+
+BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON
+
+I. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Every system of government produces people who are dissatisfied. The Republic
+or Public Thing produced them at first from among the nobles who had been
+despoiled of their ancient privileges. These looked with regret and hope to
+Prince Crucho, the last of the Draconides, a prince adorned both with the
+grace of youth and the melancholy of exile. It also produced them from among
+the smaller traders, who, owing to profound economic causes, no longer gained
+a livelihood. They believed that this was the fault of the republic which they
+had at first adored and from which each day they were now becoming more
+detached. The financiers, both Christians and Jews, became by their insolence
+and their cupidity the scourge of the country, which they plundered and
+degraded, as well as the scandal of a government which they never troubled
+either to destroy or preserve, so confident were they that they could operate
+without hindrance under all governments. Nevertheless, their sympathies
+inclined to absolute power as the best protection against the socialists,
+their puny but ardent adversaries. And just as they imitated the habits of the
+aristocrats, so they imitated their political and religious sentiments. Their
+women, in particular, loved the Prince and had dreams of appearing one day at
+his Court.
+
+However, the Republic retained some partisans and defenders. If it was not in
+a position to believe in the fidelity of its own officials it could at least
+still count on the devotion of the manual labourers, although it had never
+relieved their misery. These came forth in crowds from their quarries and
+their factories to defend it, and marched in long processions, gloomy,
+emaciated, and sinister. They would have died for it because it had given them
+hope.
+
+Now, under the Presidency of Theodore Formose, there lived in a peaceable
+suburb of Alca a monk called Agaric, who kept a school and assisted in
+arranging marriages. In his school he taught fencing and riding to the sons of
+old families, illustrious by their birth, but now as destitute of wealth as of
+privilege. And as soon as they were old enough he married them to the
+daughters of the opulent and despised caste of financiers.
+
+Tall, thin, and dark, Agaric used to walk in deep thought, with his breviary
+in his hand and his brow loaded with care, through the corridors of the school
+and the alleys of the garden. His care was not limited to inculcating in his
+pupils abstruse doctrines and mechanical precepts and to endowing them
+afterwards with legitimate and rich wives. He entertained political designs
+and pursued the realisation of a gigantic plan. His thought of thoughts and
+labour of labours was to overthrow the Republic. He was not moved to this by
+any personal interest. He believed that a democratic state was opposed to the
+holy society to which body and soul he belonged. And all the other monks, his
+brethren, thought the same. The Republic was perpetually at strife with the
+congregation of monks and the assembly of the faithful. True, to plot the
+death of the new government was a difficult and perilous enterprise. Still,
+Agaric was in a position to carry on a formidable conspiracy. At that epoch,
+when the clergy guided the superior classes of the Penguins, this monk
+exercised a tremendous influence over the aristocracy of Alca.
+
+All the young men whom he had brought up waited only for a favourable moment
+to march against the popular power. The sons of the ancient families did not
+practise the arts or engage in business. They were almost all soldiers and
+served the Republic. They served it, but they did not love it; they regretted
+the dragon's crest. And the fair Jewesses shared in these regrets in order
+that they might be taken for Christians.
+
+One July as he was walking in a suburban street which ended in some dusty
+fields, Agaric heard groans coming from a moss-grown well that had been
+abandoned by the gardeners. And almost immediately he was told by a cobbler of
+the neighbourhood that a ragged man who had shouted out "Hurrah for the
+Republic!" had been thrown into the well by some cavalry officers who were
+passing, and had sunk up to his ears in the mud. Agaric was quite ready to see
+a general significance in this particular fact. He inferred a great
+fermentation in the whole aristocratic and military caste, and concluded that
+it was the moment to act.
+
+The next day he went to the end of the Wood of Conils to visit the good Father
+Cornemuse. He found the monk in his laboratory pouring a golden-coloured
+liquor into a still. He was a short, fat, little man, with vermilion-tinted
+cheeks and an elaborately polished bald head. His eyes had ruby-coloured
+pupils like a guinea-pig's. He graciously saluted his visitor and offered him
+a glass of the St. Orberosian liqueur, which he manufactured, and from the
+sale of which he gained immense wealth.
+
+Agaric made a gesture of refusal. Then, standing on his long feet and pressing
+his melancholy hat against his stomach, he remained silent.
+
+"Take a seat," said Cornemuse to him.
+
+Agaric sat down on a rickety stool, but continued mute.
+
+Then the monk of Conils inquired:
+
+"Tell me some news of your young pupils. Have the dear children sound views?"
+
+"I am very satisfied with them," answered the teacher. "It is everything to be
+nurtured in sound principles. It is necessary to have sound views before
+having any views at all, for afterwards it is too late. . . . Yes, I have
+great grounds for comfort. But we live in a sad age."
+
+"Alas!" sighed Cornemuse.
+
+"We are passing through evil days. . . ."
+
+"Times of trial."
+
+"Yet, Cornemuse, the mind of the public is not so entirely corrupted as it
+seems."
+
+"Perhaps you are right."
+
+"The people are tired of a government that ruins them and does nothing for
+them. Every day fresh scandals spring up. The Republic is sunk in shame. It is
+ruined."
+
+"May God grant it!"
+
+"Cornemuse, what do you think of Prince Crucho?"
+
+"He is an amiable young man and, I dare say, a worthy scion of an august
+stock. I pity him for having to endure the pains of exile at so early an age.
+Spring has no flowers for the exile, and autumn no fruits. Prince Crucho has
+sound views; he respects the clergy; he practises our religion; besides, he
+consumes a good deal of my little products."
+
+"Cornemuse, in many homes, both rich and poor, his return is hoped for.
+Believe me, he will come back."
+
+"May I live to throw my mantle beneath his feet!" sighed Cornemuse.
+
+Seeing that he held these sentiments, Agaric depicted to him the state of
+people's minds such as he himself imagined them. He showed him the nobles and
+the rich exasperated against the popular government; the army refusing to
+endure fresh insults; the officials willing to betray their chiefs; the people
+discontented, riot ready to burst forth, and the enemies of the monks, the
+agents of the constituted authority, thrown into the wells of Alca. He
+concluded that it was the moment to strike a great blow.
+
+"We can," he cried, "save the Penguin people, we can deliver it from its
+tyrants, deliver it from itself, restore the Dragon's crest, re-establish the
+ancient State, the good State, for the honour of the faith and the exaltation
+of the Church. We can do this if we will. We possess great wealth and we exert
+secret influences; by our evangelistic and outspoken journals we communicate
+with all the ecclesiastics in towns and county alike, and we inspire them with
+our own eager enthusiasm and our own burning faith. They will kindle their
+penitents and their congregations. I can dispose of the chiefs of the army; I
+have an understanding with the men of the people. Unknown to them I sway the
+minds of umbrella sellers, publicans, shopmen, gutter merchants, newspaper
+boys, women of the streets, and police agents. We have more people on our side
+than we need. What are we waiting for? Let us act!"
+
+"What do you think of doing?" asked Cornemuse.
+
+"Of forming a vast conspiracy and overthrowing the Republic, of
+re-establishing Crucho on the throne of the Draconides."
+
+Cornemuse moistened his lips with his tongue several times. Then he said with
+unction:
+
+"Certainly the restoration of the Draconides is desirable; it is eminently
+desirable; and for my part, desire it with all my heart. As for the Republic,
+you know what I think of it. . . . But would it not te better to abandon it to
+its fate and let it die of the vices of its own constitution? Doubtless,
+Agaric, what you propose is noble and generous. It would be a fine thing to
+save this great and unhappy country, to re-establish it in its ancient
+splendour. But reflect on it, we are Christians before we are Penguins. And we
+must take heed not to compromise religion in political enterprises."
+
+Agaric replied eagerly:
+
+"Fear nothing. We shall hold all the threads of the plot, but we ourselves
+shall remain in the background. We shall not be seen."
+
+"Like flies in milk," murmured the monk of Conils.
+
+And turning his keen ruby-coloured eyes towards his brother monk:
+
+"Take care. Perhaps the Republic is stronger than it seems. Possibly, too, by
+dragging it out of the nerveless inertia in which it now rests we may only
+consolidate its forces. Its malice is great; if we attack it, it will defend
+itself. It makes bad laws which hardly affect us; if it is frightened it will
+make terrible ones against us. Let us not lightly engage in an adventure in
+which we may get fleeced. You think the opportunity a good one. I don't, and I
+am going to tell you why. The present government is not yet known by
+everybody, that is to say, it is known by nobody. It proclaims that it is the
+Public Thing, the common thing. The populace believes it and remains
+democratic and Republican. But patience! This same people will one day demand
+that the public thing be the people's thing. I need not tell you how insolent,
+unregulated, and contrary to Scriptural polity such claims seem to me. But the
+people will make them, and enforce them, and then there will be an end of the
+present government. The moment cannot now be far distant; and it is then that
+we ought to act in the interests of our august body. Let us wait. What hurries
+us? Our existence is not in peril. It has not been rendered absolutely
+intolerable to us. The Republic fails in respect and submission to us; it does
+not give the priests the honours it owes them. But it lets us live. And such
+is the excellence of our position that with us to live is to prosper. The
+Republic is hostile to us, but women revere us. President Formose does not
+assist at the celebration of our mysteries, but I have seen his wife and
+daughters at my feet. They buy my phials by the gross. I have no better
+clients even among the aristocracy. Let us say what there is to be said for
+it. There is no country in the world as good for priests and monks as
+Penguinia. In what other country would you find our virgin wax, our virile
+incense, our rosaries, our scapulars, our holy water, and our St. Orberosian
+liqueur sold in such great quantities? What other people would, like the
+Penguins, give a hundred golden crowns for a wave of our hands, a sound from
+our mouths, a movement of our lips? For my part, I gain a thousand times more,
+in this pleasant, faithful, and docile Penguinia, by extracting the essence
+from a bundle of thyme, than I could make by tiring my lungs with preaching
+the remission of sins in the most populous states of Europe and America.
+Honestly, would Penguinia be better off if a police officer came to take me
+away from here and put me on a steamboat bound for the Islands of Night?"
+
+Having thus spoken, the monk of Conils got up and led his guest into a huge
+shed where hundreds of orphans clothed in blue were packing bottles, nailing
+up cases, and gumming tickets. The ear was deafened by the noise of hammers
+mingled with the dull rumbling of bales being placed upon the rails.
+
+"It is from here that consignments are forwarded," said Cornemuse. "I have
+obtained from the government a railway through the Wood and a station at my
+door. Every three days I fill a truck with my own products. You see that the
+Republic has not killed all beliefs."
+
+Agaric made a last effort to engage the wise distiller in his enterprise. He
+pointed him to a prompt, certain, dazzling success.
+
+"Don't you wish to share in it?" he added. "Don't you wish to bring back your
+king from exile?"
+
+"Exile is pleasant to men of good will," answered the monk of Conils. "If you
+are guided by me, my dear Brother Agaric, you will give up your project for
+the present. For my own part I have no illusions. Whether or not I belong to
+your party, if you lose, I shall have to pay like you."
+
+Father Agaric took leave of his friend and went back satisfied to his school.
+"Cornemuse," thought he, "not being able to prevent the plot, would like to
+make it succeed and he will give money." Agaric was not deceived. Such,
+indeed, was the solidarity among priests and monks that the acts of a single
+one bound them all. That was at once both their strength and their weakness.
+
+
+
+V. PRINCE CRUCHO
+
+Agaric resolved to proceed without delay to Prince Crucho, who honoured him
+with his familiarity. In the dusk of the evening he went out of his school by
+the side door, disguised as a cattle merchant and took passage on board the
+St. Mael.
+
+The next day he landed in Porpoisea, for it was at Chitterlings Castle on this
+hospitable soil that Crucho ate the bitter bread of exile.
+
+Agaric met the Prince on the road driving in a motor-car with two young ladies
+at the rate of a hundred miles an hour. When the monk saw him he shook his red
+umbrella and the prince stopped his car.
+
+"Is it you, Agaric? Get in! There are already three of us, but we can make
+room for you. You can take one of these young ladies on your knee."
+
+The pious Agaric got in.
+
+"What news, worthy father?" asked the young prince.
+
+"Great news," answered Agaric. "Can I speak?"
+
+"You can. I have nothing secret from these two ladies."
+
+"Sire, Penguinia claims you. You will not be deaf to her call."
+
+Agaric described the state of feeling and outlined a vast plot.
+
+"On my first signal," said he, "all your partisans will rise at once. With
+cross in hand and habits girded up, your venerable clergy will lead the armed
+crowd into Formose's palace. We shall carry terror and death among your
+enemies. For a reward of our efforts we only ask of you, Sire, that you will
+not render them useless. We entreat you to come and seat yourself on the
+throne that we shall prepare."
+
+The prince returned a simple answer:
+
+"I shall enter Alca on a green horse."
+
+Agaric declared that he accepted this manly response. Although, contrary to
+his custom, he had a lady on his knee, he adjured the young prince, with a
+sublime loftiness of soul, to be faithful to his royal duties.
+
+"Sire," he cried, with tears in his eyes, "you will live to remember the day
+on which you have been restored from exile, given back to your people,
+reestablished on the throne of your ancestors by the hands of your monks, and
+crowned by them with the august crest of the Dragon. King Crucho, may you
+equal the glory of your ancestor Draco the Great!"
+
+The young prince threw himself with emotion on his restorer and attempted to
+embrace him, but he was prevented from reaching him by the girth of the two
+ladies, so tightly packed were they all in that historic carriage.
+
+"Worthy father," said he, "I would like all Penguinia to witness this
+embrace."
+
+"It would be a cheering spectacle," said Agaric.
+
+In the mean time the motor-car rushed like a tornado through hamlets and
+villages, crushing hens, geese, turkeys, ducks, guinea-fowls, cats, dogs,
+pigs, children, labourers, and women beneath its insatiable tyres. And the
+pious Agaric turned over his great designs in his mind. His voice, coming from
+behind one of the ladies, expressed this thought:
+
+"We must have money, a great deal of money."
+
+"That is your business," answered the prince.
+
+But already the park gates were opening to the formidable motor-car.
+
+The dinner was sumptuous. They toasted the Dragon's crest. Everybody knows
+that a closed goblet is a sign of sovereignty; so Prince Crucho and Princess
+Gudrune, his wife, drank out of goblets that were covered-over like ciboriums.
+The prince had his filled several times with the wines of Penguinia, both
+white and red.
+
+Crucho had received a truly princely education, and he excelled in motoring,
+but was not ignorant of history either. He was said to be well versed in the
+antiquities and famous deeds of his family; and, indeed, he gave a notable
+proof of his knowledge in this respect. As they were speaking of the various
+remarkable peculiarities that had been noticed in famous women,
+
+"It is perfectly true," said he, "that Queen Crucha, whose name I bear, had
+the mark of a little monkey's head upon her body."
+
+During the evening Agaric had a decisive interview with three of the prince's
+oldest councillors. It was decided to ask for funds from Crucho's
+father-in-law, as he was anxious to have a king for son-in-law, from several
+Jewish ladies, who were impatient to become ennobled, and, finally, from the
+Prince Regent of the Porpoises, who had promised his aid to the Draconides,
+thinking that by Crucho's restoration he would weaken the Penguins, the
+hereditary enemies of his people. The three old councillors divided among
+themselves the three chief offices of the Court, those of Chamberlain,
+Seneschal, and High Steward, and authorised the monk to distribute the other
+places to the prince's best advantage.
+
+"Devotion has to be rewarded," said the three old councillors.
+
+"And treachery also," said Agaric.
+
+"It is but too true," replied one of them, the Marquis of Sevenwounds, who had
+experience of revolutions.
+
+There was dancing, and after the ball Princess Gudrune tore up her green robe
+to make cockades. With her own hands she sewed a piece of it on the monk's
+breast, upon which he shed tears of sensibility and gratitude.
+
+M. de Plume, the prince's equerry, set out the same evening to look for a
+green horse.
+
+
+
+III. THE CABAL
+
+After his return to the capital of Penguinia, the Reverend Father Agaric
+disclosed his projects to Prince Adelestan des Boscenos, of whose Draconian
+sentiments he was well aware.
+
+The prince belonged to the highest nobility. The Torticol des Boscenos went
+back to Brian the Good, and under the Draconides had held the highest offices
+in the kingdom. In 1179, Philip Torticol, High Admiral of Penguinia, a brave,
+faithful, and generous, but vindictive man, delivered over the port of La
+Crique and the Penguin fleet to the enemies of the kingdom, because he
+suspected that Queen Crucha, whose lover he was, had been unfaithful to him
+and loved a stable-boy. It was that great queen who gave to the Boscenos the
+silver warming-pan which they bear in their arms. As for their motto, it only
+goes back to the sixteenth century. The story of its origin is as follows: One
+gala night, as he mingled with the crowd of courtiers who were watching the
+fire-works in the king's garden, Duke John des Boscenos approached the Duchess
+of Skull and put his hand under the petticoat of that lady, who made no
+complaint at the gesture. The king, happening to pass, surprised them and
+contented himself with saying, "And thus I find you." These four words became
+the motto of the Boscenos.
+
+Prince Adelestan had not degenerated from his ancestors. He preserved an
+unalterable fidelity for the race of the Draconides and desired nothing so
+much as the restoration of Prince Crucho, an event which was in his eyes to be
+the fore-runner of the restoration of his own fortune. He therefore readily
+entered into the Reverend Father Agaric's plans. He joined himself at once to
+the monk's projects, and hastened to put him into communication with the most
+loyal Royalists of his acquaintance, Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount
+Olive, and M. Bigourd. They met together one night in the Duke of Ampoule's
+country house, six miles eastward of Alca, to consider ways and means.
+
+M. de La Trumelle was in favour of legal action.
+
+"We ought to keep within the law," said he in substance. "We are for order. It
+is by an untiring propaganda that we shall best pursue the realisation of our
+hopes. We must change the feeling of the country. Our cause will conquer
+because it is just."
+
+The Prince des Boscenos expressed a contrary opinion. He thought that, in
+order to triumph, just causes need force quite as much and even more than
+unjust causes require it.
+
+"In the present situation," said he tranquilly, "three methods of action
+present themselves: to hire the butcher boys, to corrupt the ministers, and to
+kidnap President Formose."
+
+"It would be a mistake to kidnap Formose," objected M. de La Trumelle. "The
+President is on our side."
+
+The attitude and sentiments of the President of the Republic are explained by
+the fact that one Dracophil proposed to seize Formose while another Dracophil
+regarded him as a friend. Formose showed himself favourable to the Royalists,
+whose habits he admired and imitated. If he smiled at the mention of the
+Dragon's crest it was at the thought of putting it on his own head. He was
+envious of sovereign power, not because he felt himself capable of exercising
+it, but because he loved to appear so. According to the expression of a
+Penguin chronicler, "he was a goose."
+
+Prince des Boscenos maintained his proposal to march against Formose's palace
+and the House of Parliament.
+
+Count Clena was even still more energetic.
+
+"Let us begin," said he, "by slaughtering, disembowelling, and braining the
+Republicans and all partisans of the government. Afterwards we shall see what
+more need be done."
+
+M. de La Trumelle was a moderate, and moderates are always moderately opposed
+to violence. He recognised that Count Clena's policy was inspired by a noble
+feeling and that it was high-minded, but he timidly objected that perhaps it
+was not conformable to principle, and that it presented certain dangers. At
+last he consented to discuss it.
+
+"I propose," added he, "to draw up an appeal to the people. Let us show who we
+are. For my own part I can assure you that I shall not hide my flag in my
+pocket."
+
+M. Bigourd began to speak.
+
+"Gentlemen, the Penguins are dissatisfied with the new order because it
+exists, and it is natural for men to complain of their condition. But at the
+same time the Penguins are afraid to change their government because new
+things alarm them. They have not known the Dragon's crest and, although they
+sometimes say that they regret it, we must not believe them. It is easy to see
+that they speak in this way either without thought or because they are in an
+ill-temper. Let us not have any illusions about their feelings towards
+ourselves. They do not like us. They hate the aristocracy both from a base
+envy and from a generous love of equality. And these two united feelings are
+very strong in a people. Public opinion is not against us, because it knows
+nothing about us. But when it knows what we want it will not follow us. If we
+let it be seen that we wish to destroy democratic government and restore the
+Dragon's crest, who will be our partisans? Only the butcher-boys and the
+little shopkeepers of Alca. And could we even count on them to the end? They
+are dissatisfied, but at the bottom of their hearts they are Republicans. They
+are more anxious to sell their cursed wares than to see Crucho again. If we
+act openly we shall only cause alarm.
+
+"To make people sympathise with us and follow us we must make them believe
+that we want, not to overthrow the Republic, but, on the contrary, to restore
+it, to cleanse, to purify, to embellish, to adorn, to beautify, and to
+ornament it, to render it, in a word, glorious and attractive. Therefore, we
+ought not to act openly ourselves. It is known that we are not favourable to
+the present order. We must have recourse to a friend of the Republic, and, if
+we are to do what is best, to a defender of this government. We have plenty to
+choose from. It would be well to prefer the most popular and, if I dare say
+so, the most republican of them. We shall win him over to us by flattery, by
+presents, and above all by promises. Promises cost less than presents, and are
+worth more. No one gives as much as he who gives hopes. It is not necessary
+for the man we choose to be of brilliant intellect. I would even prefer him to
+be of no great ability. Stupid people show an inimitable grace in roguery. Be
+guided by me, gentlemen, and overthrow the Republic by the agency of a
+Republican. Let us be prudent. But prudence does not exclude energy. If you
+need me you will find me at your disposal."
+
+This speech made a great impression upon those who heard it. The mind of the
+pious Agaric was particularly impressed. But each of them was anxious to
+appoint himself to a position of honour and profit. A secret government was
+organised of which all those present were elected active members. The Duke of
+Ampoule, who was the great financier of the party, was chosen treasurer and
+charged with organising funds for the propaganda.
+
+The meeting was on the point of coming to an end when a rough voice was heard
+singing an old air:
+
+    Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+    On en va faire des andouilles
+    Des saucisses et du jambon
+    Pour le reveillon des pauv' bougres.
+
+It had, for two hundred years, been a well-known song in the slums of Alca.
+Prince Boscenos did not like to hear it. He went down into the street, and,
+perceiving that the singer was a workman who was placing some slates on the
+roof of a church, he politely asked him to sing something else.
+
+"I will sing what I like," answered the man.
+
+"My friend, to please me. . . ."
+
+"I don't want to please you."
+
+Prince Boscenos was as a rule good-tempered, but he was easily angered and a
+man of great strength.
+
+"Fellow, come down or I will go up to you," cried he, in a terrible voice.
+
+As the workman, astride on his coping, showed no sign of budging, the prince
+climbed quickly up the staircase of the tower and attacked the singer. He gave
+him a blow that broke his jaw-bone and sent him rolling into a water-spout. At
+that moment seven or eight carpenters, who were working on the rafters, heard
+their companion's cry and looked through the window. Seeing the prince on the
+coping they climbed along a ladder that was leaning on the slates and reached
+him just as he was slipping into the tower. They sent him, head foremost, down
+the one hundred and thirty-seven steps of the spiral staircase.
+
+
+
+IV. VISCOUNTESS OLIVE
+
+The Penguins had the finest army in the world. So had the Porpoises. And it
+was the same with the other nations of Europe. The smallest amount of thought
+will prevent any surprise at this. For all armies are the finest in the world.
+The second finest army, if one could exist, would be in a notoriously inferior
+position; it would be certain to be beaten. It ought to be disbanded at once.
+Therefore, all armies are the finest in the world. In France the illustrious
+Colonel Marchand understood this when, before the passage of the Yalou, being
+questioned by some journalists about the Russo-Japanese war, he did not
+hesitate to describe the Russian army as the finest in the world, and also the
+Japanese. And it should be noticed that even after suffering the most terrible
+reverses an army does not fall from its position of being the finest in the
+world. For if nations ascribe their victories to the ability of their generals
+and the courage of their soldiers, they always attribute their defeats to an
+inexplicable fatality. On the other hand, navies are classed according to the
+number of their ships. There is a first, a second, a third, and so on. So that
+there exists no doubt as to the result of naval wars.
+
+The Penguins had the finest army and the second navy in the world. This navy
+was commanded by the famous Chatillon, who bore the title of Emiralbahr, and
+by abbreviation Emiral. It is the same word which, unfortunately in a corrupt
+form, is used to-day among several European nations to designate the highest
+grade in the naval service. But as there was but one Emiral among the
+Penguins, a singular prestige, if I dare say so, was attached to that rank.
+
+The Emiral did not belong to the nobility. A child of the people, he was loved
+by the people. They were flattered to see a man who sprang from their own
+ranks holding a position of honour. Chatillon was good-looking and fortune
+favoured him. He was not over-addicted to thought. No event ever disturbed his
+serene outlook.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric, surrendering to M. Bigourd's reasons and
+recognising that the existing government could only be destroyed by one of its
+defenders, cast his eyes upon Emiral Chatillon. He asked a large sum of money
+from his friend, the Reverend Father Cornemuse, which the latter handed him
+with a sigh. And with this sum he hired six hundred butcher boys of Alca to
+run behind Chatillon's horse and shout, "Hurrah for the Emiral!" Henceforth
+Chatillon could not take a single step without being cheered.
+
+Viscountess Olive asked him for a private interview. He received her at the
+Admiralty* in a room decorated with anchors, shells, and grenades.
+
+* Or better, Emiralty.
+
+
+She was discreetly dressed in greyish blue. A hat trimmed with roses covered
+her pretty, fair hair, Behind her veil her eyes shone like sapphires. Although
+she came of Jewish origin there was no more fashionable woman in the whole
+nobility. She was tall and well shaped; her form was that of the year, her
+figure that of the season.
+
+"Emiral," said she, in a delightful voice, "I cannot conceal my emotion from
+you. . . . It is very natural . . . before a hero."
+
+"You are too kind. But tell me, Viscountess, what brings me the honour of your
+visit."
+
+"For a long time I have been anxious to see you, to speak to you. . . . So I
+very willingly undertook to convey a message to you."
+
+"Please take a seat."
+
+"How still it is here."
+
+"Yes, it is quiet enough."
+
+"You can hear the birds singing."
+
+"Sit down, then, dear lady."
+
+And he drew up an arm-chair for her.
+
+She took a seat with her back to the light.
+
+"Emiral, I came to bring you a very important message, a message. . ."
+
+"Explain."
+
+"Emiral, have you ever seen Prince Crucho?"
+
+"Never."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"It is a great pity. He would be so delighted to see you! He esteems and
+appreciates you. He has your portrait on his desk beside his mother's. What a
+pity it is he is not better known! He is a charming prince and so grateful for
+what is done for him! He will be a great king. For he will be king without
+doubt. He will come back and sooner than people think. . . . What I have to
+tell you, the message with which I am entrusted, refers precisely to. . ."
+
+The Emiral stood up.
+
+"Not a word more, dear lady. I have the esteem, the confidence of the
+Republic. I will not betray it. And why should I betray it? I am loaded
+honours and dignities."
+
+"Allow me to tell you, my dear Emiral, that your honours and dignities are far
+from equalling what you deserve. If your services were properly rewarded, you
+would be Emiralissimo and Generalissimo, Commander-in-chief of the troops both
+on land and sea. The Republic is very ungrateful to you."
+
+"All governments are more or less ungrateful."
+
+"Yes, but the Republicans are jealous of you. That class of person is always
+afraid of his superiors. They cannot endure the Services. Everything that has
+to do with the navy and the army is odious to them. They are afraid of you."
+
+"That is possible."
+
+"They are wretches; they are ruining the country. Don't you wish to save
+Penguinia?
+
+"In what way?"
+
+"By sweeping away all the rascals of the Republic, all the Republicans."
+
+"What a proposal to make to me, dear lady!"
+
+"It is what will certainly be done, if not by you, then by some one else. The
+Generalissimo, to mention him alone, is ready to throw all the ministers,
+deputies, and senators into the sea, and to recall Prince Crucho."
+
+"Oh, the rascal, the scoundrel," exclaimed the Emiral.
+
+"Do to him what he would do to you. The prince will know how to recognise your
+services, He will give you the Constable's sword and a magnificent grant. I am
+commissioned, in the mean time, to hand you a pledge of his royal friendship."
+
+As she said these words she drew a green cockade from her bosom.
+
+"What is that?" asked the Emiral.
+
+"It is his colours which Crucho sends you."
+
+"Be good enough to take them back."
+
+"So that they may be offered to the Generalissimo who will accept them! . . .
+No, Emiral, let me place them on your glorious breast."
+
+Chatillon gently repelled the lady. But for some minutes he thought her
+extremely pretty, and he felt this impression still more when two bare arms
+and the rosy palms of two delicate hands touched him lightly. He yielded
+almost immediately. Olive was slow in fastening the ribbon. Then when it was
+done she made a low courtesy and saluted Chatillon with the title of
+Constable.
+
+"I have been ambitious like my comrades," answered the sailor, "I don't hide
+it, and perhaps I am so still; but u on my word of honour, when I look at you,
+the only, desire I feel is for a cottage and a heart."
+
+She turned upon him the charming sapphire glances that flashed from under her
+eyelids.
+
+"That is to be had also . . . what are you doing, Emiral?"
+
+"I am looking for the heart."
+
+When she left the Admiralty, the Viscountess went immediately to the Reverend
+Father Agaric to give an account of her visit.
+
+"You must go to him again, dear lady," said that austere monk.
+
+
+
+V. THE PRINCE DES BOSCENOS
+
+Morning and evening the newspapers that had been bought by the Dracophils
+proclaimed Chatillon's praises and hurled shame and opprobrium upon the
+Ministers of the Republic. Chatillon's portrait was sold through the streets
+of Alca. Those young descendants of Remus who carry plaster figures on their
+heads, offered busts of Chatillon for sale upon the bridges.
+
+Every evening Chatillon rode upon his white horse round the Queen's Meadow, a
+place frequented by the people of fashion. The Dracophils posted along the
+Emiral's route a crowd of needy Penguins who kept shouting: "It is Chatillon
+we want." The middle classes of Alca conceived a profound admiration for the
+Emiral. Shopwomen murmured: "He is good-looking." Women of fashion slackened
+the speed of their motor-cars and kissed hands to him as they passed, amidst
+the hurrahs of an enthusiastic populace.
+
+One day, as he went into a tobacco shop, two Penguins who were putting letters
+in the box recognized Chatillon and cried at the top of their voices: "Hurrah
+for the Emiral! Down with the Republicans." All those who were passing stopped
+in front of the shop. Chatillon lighted his cigar before the eyes of a dense
+crowd of frenzied citizens who waved their hats and cheered. The crowd kept
+increasing, and the whole town, singing and marching behind its hero, went
+back with him to the Admiralty.
+
+The Emiral had an old comrade in arms, Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, who had
+served with great distinction, a man as true as gold and as loyal as his
+sword. Vulcanmould plumed himself on his thoroughgoing independence and he
+went among the partisans of Crucho and the Minister of the Republic telling
+both parties what he thought of them. M. Bigourd maliciously declared that he
+told each party what the other party thought of it. In truth he had on several
+occasions been guilty of regrettable indiscretions, which were overlooked as
+being the freedoms of a soldier who knew nothing of intrigue. Every morning he
+went to see Chatillon, whom he treated with the cordial roughness of a brother
+in arms.
+
+"Well, old buffer, so you are popular," said he to him. "Your phiz is sold on
+the heads of pipes and on liqueur bottles and every drunkard in Alca spits out
+your name as he rolls in the gutter. . . . Chatillon, the hero of the
+Penguins! Chatillon, defender of the Penguin glory! . . . Who would have said
+it? Who would have thought it?"
+
+And he laughed with his harsh laugh. Then changing his tone: "But, joking
+aside, are you not a bit surprised at what is happening to you?"
+
+"No, indeed," answered Chatillon.
+
+And out went the honest Vulcanmould, banging the door behind him.
+
+In the mean time Chatillon had taken a little flat at number 18 Johannes-Talpa
+Street, so that he might receive Viscountess Olive. They met there every day.
+He was desperately in love with her. During his martial and neptunian life he
+had loved crowds of women, red, black, yellow, and white, and some of them had
+been very beautiful. But before he met the Viscountess he did not know what a
+woman really was. When the Viscountess Olive called him her darling, her dear
+darling, he felt in heaven and it seemed to him that the stars shone in her
+hair.
+
+She would come a little late, and, as she put her ba,q on the table, she would
+ask pensively:
+
+"Let me sit on your knee."
+
+And then she would talk of subjects suggested by the pious Agaric,
+interrupting the conversation with sighs and kisses. She would ask him to
+dismiss such and such an officer, to give a command to another, to send the
+squadron here or there. And at the right moment she would exclaim:
+
+"How young you are, my dear!"
+
+And he did whatever she wished, for he was simple, he was anxious to wear the
+Constable's sword, and to receive a large grant; he did not dislike playing a
+double part, he had a vague idea of saving Penguinia, and he was in love.
+
+This delightful woman induced him to remove the troops that were at La Cirque,
+the port where Crucho was to land. By this means it was made certain that
+there would be no obstacle to prevent the prince from entering Penguinia.
+
+The pious Agaric organised public meetings so as to keep up the agitation. The
+Dracophils held one or two every day in some of the thirty-six districts of
+Alca, and preferably in the poorer quarters. They desired to win over the
+poor, for they are the most numerous. On the fourth of May a particularly fine
+meeting was held in an old cattle-market, situated in the centre of a populous
+suburb filled with housewives sitting on the doorsteps and children playing in
+the gutters. There were present about two thousand people, in the opinion of
+the Republicans, and six thousand according to the reckoning of the
+Dracophils. In the audience was to be seen the flower of Penguin society,
+including Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, M.
+Bigourd, and several rich Jewish ladies.
+
+The Generalissimo of the national army had come in uniform. He was cheered.
+
+The committee had been carefully formed. A man of the people, a workman, but a
+man of sound principles, M. Rauchin, the secretary of the yellow syndicate,
+was asked to preside, supported by Count Clena and M. Michaud, a butcher.
+
+The government which Penguinia had freely given itself was called by such
+names as cesspool and drain in several eloquent speeches. But President
+Formose was spared and no mention was made of Crucho or the priests.
+
+The meeting was not unanimous. A defender of the modern State and of the
+Republic, a manual labourer, stood up.
+
+"Gentlemen," said M. Rauchin, the chairman, "we have told you that this
+meeting would not be unanimous. We are not like our opponents, we are honest
+men. I allow our opponent to speak. Heaven knows what you are going to hear.
+Gentlemen, I beg of you to restrain as long as you can the expression of your
+contempt, your disgust, and your indignation."
+
+"Gentlemen," said the opponent. . . .
+
+Immediately he was knocked down, trampled beneath the feet of the indignant
+crowd, and his unrecognisable remains thrown out of the hall.
+
+The tumult was still resounding when Count Clena ascended the tribune. Cheers
+took the place of groans and when silence was restored the orator uttered
+these words:
+
+"Comrades, we are going to see whether you have blood in your veins. What we
+have got to do is to slaughter, disembowel, and brain all the Republicans."
+
+This speech let loose such a thunder of applause that the old shed rocked with
+it, and a cloud of acrid and thick dust fell from its filthy walls and
+worm-eaten beams and enveloped the audience.
+
+A resolution was carried vilifying the government and acclaiming Chatillon.
+And the audience departed singing the hymn of the liberator: "It is Chatillon
+we want."
+
+The only way out of the old market was through a muddy alley shut in by
+omnibus stables and coal sheds. There was no moon and a cold drizzle was
+coming down. The police, who were assembled in great numbers, blocked the
+alley and compelled the Dracophils to disperse in little groups. These were
+the instructions they had received from their chief, who was anxious to check
+the enthusiasm of the excited crowd.
+
+The Dracophils who were detained in the alley kept marking time and singing,
+"It is Chatillon we want." Soon, becoming impatient of the delay, the cause of
+which they did not know, they began to push those in front of them. This
+movement, propagated along the alley, threw those in front against the broad
+chests of the police. The latter had no hatred for the Dracophils. In the
+bottom of their hearts they liked Chatillon. But it is natural to resist
+aggression and strong men are inclined to make use of their strength. For
+these reasons the police kicked the Dracophils with their hob-nailed boots. As
+a result there were sudden rushes backwards and forwards. Threats and cries
+mingled with the songs.
+
+"Murder! Murder! . . . It is Chatillon we want! Murder! Murder!"
+
+And in the gloomy alley the more prudent kept saying, "Don't push." Among
+these latter, in the darkness, his lofty figure rising above the moving crowd,
+his broad shoulders and robust body noticeable among the trampled limbs and
+crushed sides of the rest, stood the Prince des Boscenos, calm, immovable, and
+placid. Serenely and indulgently he waited. In the mean time, as the exit was
+opened at regular intervals between the ranks of the police, the pressure of
+elbows against the chests of those around the prince diminished and people
+began to breathe again.
+
+"You see we shall soon be able to go out," said that kindly giant, with a
+pleasant smile. "Time and patience . . ."
+
+He took a cigar from his case, raised it to his lips and struck a match.
+Suddenly, in the light of the match, he saw Princess Anne, his wife, clasped
+in Count Clena's arms. At this sight he rushed towards them, striking both
+them and those around with his cane. He was disarmed, though not without
+difficulty, but he could not be separated from his opponent. And whilst the
+fainting princess was lifted from arm to arm to her carriage over the excited
+and curious crowd, the two men still fought furiously. Prince des Boscenos
+lost his hat, his eye-glass, his cigar, his necktie, and his portfolio full of
+private letters and political correspondence; he even lost the miraculous
+medals that he had received from the good Father Cornemuse. But he gave his
+opponent so terrible a kick in the stomach that the unfortunate Count was
+knocked through an iron grating and went, head foremost, through a glass door
+and into a coal-shed.
+
+Attracted by the struggle and the cries of those around, the police rushed
+towards the prince, who furiously resisted them. He stretched three of them
+gasping at his feet and put seven others to flight, with, respectively, a
+broken jaw, a split lip, a nose pouring blood, a fractured skull, a torn ear,
+a dislocated collar-bone, and broken ribs. He fell, however, and was dragged
+bleeding and disfigured, with his clothes in rags, to the nearest
+police-station, where, jumping about and bellowing, he spent the night.
+
+At daybreak groups of demonstrators went about the town singing, "It is
+Chatillon we want," and breaking the windows of the houses in which the
+Ministers of the Republic lived.
+
+
+
+VI. THE EMIRAL'S FALL
+
+That night marked the culmination of the Dracophil movement. The Royalists had
+no longer any doubt of its triumph. Their chiefs sent congratulations to
+Prince Crucho by wireless telegraphy. Their ladies embroidered scarves and
+slippers for him. M. de Plume had found the green horse.
+
+The pious Agaric shared the common hope. But he still worked to win partisans
+for the Pretender. They ought, he said, to lay their foundations upon the
+bed-rock.
+
+With this design he had an interview with three Trade Union workmen.
+
+In these times the artisans no longer lived, as in the days of the Draconides,
+under the government of corporations. They were free, but they had no assured
+pay. After having remained isolated from each other for a long time, without
+help and without support, they had formed themselves into unions. The coffers
+of the unions were empty, as it was not the habit of the unionists to pay
+their subscriptions. There were unions numbering thirty thousand members,
+others with a thousand, five hundred, two hundred, and so forth. Several
+numbered two or three members only, or even a few less. But as the lists of
+adherents were not published, it was not easy to distinguish the great unions
+from the small ones.
+
+After some dark and indirect steps the pious Agaric was put into communication
+in a room in the Moulin de la Galette, with comrades Dagobert, Tronc, and
+Balafille, the secretaries of three unions of which the first numbered
+fourteen members, the second twenty-four, and the third only one. Agaric
+showed extreme cleverness at this interview.
+
+"Gentlemen," said he, "you and I have not, in most respects, the same
+political and social views, but there are points in which we may come to an
+understanding. We have a common enemy. The government exploits you and
+despises us. Help us to overthrow it; we will supply you with the means so far
+as we are able, and you can in addition count on our gratitude."
+
+"Fork out the tin," said Dagobert.
+
+The Reverend Father placed on the table a bag which the distiller of Conils
+had given him with tears in his eyes.
+
+"Done!" said the three companions.
+
+Thus was the solemn compact sealed.
+
+As soon as the monk had departed, carrying with him the joy of having won over
+the masses to his cause, Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille whistled to their
+wives, Amelia, Queenie, and Matilda, who were waiting in the street for the
+signal, and all six holding each other's hands, danced around the bag,
+singing:
+
+    J'ai du bon pognon,
+    Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!
+    Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+And they ordered a salad-bowl full of warm wine.
+
+In the evening all six went through the street from stall to stall singing
+their new song. The song became popular, for the detectives reported that
+every day showed an increase of the number of workpeople who sang through the
+slums:
+
+    J'ai du bon pognon;
+    Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!
+    Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+The Dracophil agitation made no progress in the provinces. The pious Agaric
+sought to find the cause of this, but was unable to discover it until old
+Cornemuse revealed it to him.
+
+"I have proofs," sighed the monk of Conils, "that the Duke of Ampoule, the
+treasurer of the Dracophils, has brought property in Porpoisia with the funds
+that he received for the propaganda."
+
+The party wanted money. Prince des Boscenos had lost his portfolio in a brawl
+and he was reduced to painful expedients which were repugnant to his impetuous
+character. The Viscountess Olive was expensive. Cornemuse advised that the
+monthly allowance of that lady should be diminished.
+
+"She is very useful to us," objected the pious Agaric.
+
+"Undoubtedly," answered Cornemuse, "but she does us an injury by ruining us."
+
+A schism divided the Dracophils. Misunderstandings reigned in their councils.
+Some wished that in accordance with the policy of M. Bigourd and the pious
+Agaric, they should carry on the design of reforming the Republic. Others,
+wearied by their long constraint, had resolved to proclaim the Dragon's crest
+and swore to conquer beneath that sign.
+
+The latter urged the advantage of a clear situation and the impossibility of
+making a pretence much longer, and in truth, the public began to see whither
+the agitation was tending and that the Emiral's partisans wanted to destroy
+the very foundations of the Republic.
+
+A report was spread that the prince was to land at La Cirque and make his
+entry into Alca on a green horse.
+
+These rumours excited the fanatical monks, delighted the poor nobles,
+satisfied the rich Jewish ladies, and put hope in the hearts of the small
+traders. But very few of them were inclined to purchase these benefits at the
+price of a social catastrophe and the overthrow of the public credit; and
+there were fewer still who would have risked their money, their peace, their
+liberty, or a single hour from their pleasures in the business. On the other
+hand, the workmen held themselves ready, as ever, to give a day's work to the
+Republic, and a strong resistance was being formed in the suburbs.
+
+"The people are with us," the pious Agaric used to say.
+
+However, men, women, and children, when leaving their factories, used to shout
+with one voice:
+
+     A bas Chatillon!
+     Hou! Hou! la calotte!
+
+As for the government, it showed the weakness, indecision, flabbiness, and
+heedlessness common to all governments, and from which none has ever departed
+without falling into arbitrariness and violence. In three words it knew
+nothing, wanted nothing, and would do nothing. Formose, shut in his
+presidential palace, remained blind, dumb, deaf, huge, invisible, wrapped up
+in his pride as in an eider-down.
+
+Count Olive advised the Dracophils to make a last appeal for funds and to
+attempt a great stroke while Alca was still in a ferment.
+
+An executive committee, which he himself had chosen, decided to kidnap the
+members of the Chamber of Deputies, and considered ways and means.
+
+The affair was fixed for the twenty-eighth of July. On that day the sun rose
+radiantly over the city. In front of the legislative palace women passed to
+market with their baskets; hawkers cried their peaches, pears, and grapes; cab
+horses with their noses in their bags munched their hay. Nobody expected
+anything, not because the secret had been kept but because it met with nothing
+but unbelievers. Nobody believed in a revolution, and from this fact we may
+conclude that nobody desired one. About two o'clock the deputies began to
+pass, few and unnoticed, through the side-door of the palace. At three o'clock
+a few groups of badly dressed men had formed. At half past three black masses
+coming from the adjacent streets spread over Revolution Square. This vast
+expanse was soon covered by an ocean of soft hats, and the crowd of
+demonstrators, continually increased by sight-seers, having crossed the
+bridge, struck its dark wave against the walls of the legislative enclosure.
+Cries, murmurs, and songs went up to the impassive sky. "It is Chatillon we
+want!" "Down with the Deputies!" "Down with the Republicans!" "Death to the
+Republicans!" The devoted band of Dracophils, led by Prince des Boscenos,
+struck up the august canticle:
+
+       Vive Crucho,
+       Vaillant et sage,
+       Plein de courage 
+       Des le berceau!
+
+Behind the wall silence alone replied.
+
+This silence and the absence of guards encouraged and at the same time
+frightened the crowd. Suddenly a formidable voice cried out:
+
+"Attack!"
+
+And Prince des Boscenos was seen raising his gigantic form to the top of the
+wall, which was covered with barbs and iron spikes. Behind him rushed his
+companions, and the people followed. Some hammered against the wall to make
+holes in it; others endeavoured to tear down the spikes and to pull out the
+barbs. These defences had given way in places and some of the invaders had
+stripped the wall and were sitting astride on the top. Prince des Boscenos was
+waving an immense green flag. Suddenly the crowd wavered and from it came a
+long cry of terror. The police and the Republican carabineers issuing out of
+all the entrances of the palace formed themselves into a column beneath the
+wall and in a moment it was cleared of its besiegers. After a long moment of
+suspense the noise of arms was heard, and the police charged the crowd with
+fixed bayonets. An instant afterwards and on the deserted square strewn with
+hats and walking-sticks there reigned a sinister silence. Twice again the
+Dracophils attempted to form, twice they were repulsed. The rising was
+conquered. But Prince des Boscenos, standing on the wall of the hostile
+palace, his flag in his hand, still repelled the attack of a whole brigade. He
+knocked down all who approached him. At last he, too, was thrown down, and
+fell on an iron spike, to which he remained hooked, still clasping the
+standard of the Draconides.
+
+On the following day the Ministers of the Republic and the Members of
+Parliament determined to take energetic measures. In vain, this time, did
+President Formose attempt to evade his responsibilities. The government
+discussed the question of depriving Chatillon of his rank and dignities and of
+indicting him before the High Court as a conspirator, an enemy of the public
+good, a traitor, etc.
+
+At this news the Emiral's old companions in arms, who the very evening before
+had beset him with their adulations, made no effort to conceal their joy. But
+Chatillon remained popular with the middle classes of Alca and one still heard
+the hymn of the liberator sounding in the streets, "It is Chatillon we want."
+
+The Ministers were embarrassed. They intended to indict Chatillon before the
+High Court. But they knew nothing; they remained in that total ignorance
+reserved for those who govern men. They were incapable of advancing any grave
+charges against Chatillon. They could supply the prosecution with nothing but
+the ridiculous lies of their spies. Chatillon's share in the plot and his
+relations with Prince Crucho remained the secret of the thirty thousand
+Dracophils. The Ministers and the Deputies had suspicions and even
+certainties, but they had no proofs. The Public Prosecutor said to the
+Minister of justice: "Very little is needed for a political prosecution! but I
+have nothing at all and that is not enough." The affair made no progress. The
+enemies of the Republic were triumphant.
+
+On the eighteenth of September the news ran in Alca that Chatillon had taken
+flight. Everywhere there was surprise and astonishment. People doubted, for
+they could not understand.
+
+This is what had happened: One day as the brave Under-Emiral Vulcanmould
+happened, as if by chance, to go into the office of M. Barbotan, the Minister
+of Foreign Affairs, he remarked with his usual frankness:
+
+"M. Barbotan, your colleagues do not seem to me to be up to much; it is
+evident that they have never commanded a ship. That fool Chatillon gives them
+a deuced bad fit of the shivers."
+
+The Minister, in sign of denial, waved his paper-knife in the air above his
+desk.
+
+"Don't deny it," answered Vulcanmould. "You don't know how to get rid of
+Chatillon. You do not dare to indict him before the High Court because you are
+not sure of being able to bring forward a strong enough charge. Bigourd will
+defend him, and Bigourd is a clever advocate. . . . You are right, M.
+Barbotan, you are right. It would be a dangerous trial."
+
+"Ah! my friend," said the Minister, in a careless tone, "if you knew how
+satisfied we are. . . . I receive the most reassuring news from my prefects.
+The good sense of the Penguins will do justice to the intrigues of this
+mutinous soldier. Can you suppose for a moment that a great people, an
+intelligent, laborious people, devoted to liberal institutions which. . ."
+
+Vulcanmould interrupted with a great sigh:
+
+"Ah! If I had time to do it I would relieve you of your difficulty. I would
+juggle away my Chatillon like a nutmeg out of a thimble. I would fillip him
+off to Porpoisia."
+
+The Minister paid close attention.
+
+"It would not take long," continued the sailor. "I would rid you in a trice of
+the creature. . . . But just now I have other fish to fry. . . . I am in a bad
+hole. I must find a pretty big sum. But, deuce take it, honour before
+everything."
+
+The Minister and the Under-Emiral looked at each other for a moment in
+silence. Then Barbotan said with authority:
+
+"Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, get rid of this seditious soldier. You will render
+a great service to Penguinia, and the Minister of Home Affairs will see that
+your gambling debts are paid."
+
+The same evening Vulcanmould called on Chatillon and looked at him for some
+time with an expression of grief and mystery.
+
+"My do you look like that?" asked the Emiral in an uneasy tone.
+
+Vulcanmould said to him sadly:
+
+"Old brother in arms, all is discovered. For the past half-hour the government
+knows everything."
+
+At these words Chatillon sank down overwhelmed.
+
+Vulcanmould continued:
+
+"You may be arrested any moment. I advise you to make off."
+
+And drawing out his watch:
+
+"Not a minute to lose."
+
+"Have I time to call on the Viscountess Olive?"
+
+"It would be mad," said Vulcanmould, handing him a passport and a pair of blue
+spectacles, and telling him to have courage.
+
+"I will," said Chatillon.
+
+"Good-bye! old chum."
+
+"Good-bye and thanks! You have saved my life."
+
+"That is the least I could do."
+
+A quarter of an hour later the brave Emiral had left the city of Alca.
+
+He embarked at night on an old cutter at La Cirque and set sail for Porpoisia.
+But eight miles from the coast he was captured by a despatch-boat which was
+sailing without lights and which was under, the flag of the Queen of the Black
+Islands. That Queen had for a long time nourished a fatal passion for
+Chatillon.
+
+
+
+VII. CONCLUSION
+
+Nunc est bibendum. Delivered from its fears and pleased at having escaped from
+so great a danger, the government resolved to celebrate the anniversary of the
+Penguin regeneration and the establishment of the Republic by holding a
+general holiday.
+
+President Formose, the Ministers, and the members of the Chamber and of the
+Senate were present at the ceremony.
+
+The Generalissimo of the Penguin army was present in uniform. He was cheered.
+
+Preceded by the black flag of misery and the red flag of revolt, deputations
+of workmen walked in the procession, their aspect one of grim protection.
+
+President, Ministers, Deputies, officials, heads of the magistracy and of the
+army, each, in their own names and in the name of the sovereign people,
+renewed the ancient oath to live in freedom or to die. It was an alternative
+upon which they were resolutely determined. But they preferred to live in
+freedom. There were games, speeches, and songs.
+
+After the departure of the representatives of the State the crowd of citizens
+separated slowly and peaceably, shouting out, "Hurrah for the Republic!"
+"Hurrah for liberty!" "Down with the shaven pates!"
+
+The newspapers mentioned only one regrettable incident that happened on that
+wonderful day. Prince des Boscenos was quietly smoking a cigar in the Queen's
+Meadow when the State procession passed by. The prince approached the
+Minister's carriage and said in a loud voice: "Death to the Republicans!" He
+was immediately apprehended by the police, to whom he offered a most desperate
+resistance. He knocked them down in crowds, but he was conquered by numbers,
+and, bruised, scratched, swollen, and unrecognisable even to the eyes of. his
+wife, he was dragged through the joyous streets into an obscure prison.
+
+The magistrates carried on the case against Chatillon in a peculiar style.
+Letters were found at the Admiralty which revealed the complicity of the
+Reverend Father Agaric in the plot. Immediately public opinion was inflamed
+against the monks, and Parliament voted, one after the other, a dozen laws
+which restrained, diminished, limited, prescribed, suppressed, determined, and
+curtailed, their rights, immunities, exemptions, privileges, and benefits, and
+created many invalidating disqualifications against them.
+
+The Reverend Father Agaric steadfastly endured the rigour of the laws which
+struck himself personally, as well as the terrible fall of the Emiral of which
+he was the chief cause. Far from yielding to evil fortune, he regarded it as
+but a bird of passage. He was planning new political designs more audacious
+than the first.
+
+When his projects were sufficiently ripe he went one day to the Wood of
+Conils. A thrush sang in a tree and a little hedgehog crossed the stony path
+in front of him with awkward steps. Agaric walked with great strides,
+muttering fragments of sentences to himself.
+
+When he reached the door of the laboratory in which, for so many years, the
+pious manufacturer bad distilled the golden liqueur of St. Orberosia, he found
+the place deserted and the door shut. Having walked around the building he saw
+in the backyard the venerable Cornemuse, who, with his habit pinned up, was
+climbing a ladder that leant against the wall.
+
+"Is that you, my dear friend?" said he to him. "What are you doing there?"
+
+"You can see for yourself," answered the monk of Conils in a feeble voice,
+turning a sorrowful look Upon Agaric. "I am going into my house."
+
+The red pupils of his eyes no longer imitated the triumph and brilliance of
+the ruby, they flashed mournful and troubled glances. His countenance had lost
+its happy fulness. His shining head was no longer pleasant to the sight;
+perspiration and inflamed blotches bad altered its inestimable perfection.
+
+"I don't understand," said Agaric.
+
+"It is easy enough to understand. You see the consequences of your plot.
+Although a multitude of laws are directed against me I have managed to elude
+the greater number of them. Some, however, have struck me. These vindictive
+men have closed my laboratories and my shops, and confiscated my bottles, my
+stills, and my retorts. They have put seals on my doors and now I am compelled
+to go in through the window. I am barely able to extract in secret and from
+time to time the juice of a few plants and that with an apparatus which the
+humblest labourer would despise."
+
+"You suffer from the persecution," said Agaric. "It strikes us all."
+
+The monk of Conils passed his hand over his afflicted brow:
+
+"I told you so, Brother Agaric; I told you that your enterprise would turn
+against ourselves."
+
+"Our defeat is only momentary," replied Agaric eagerly. "It is due to purely
+accidental causes; it results from mere contingencies. Chatillon was a fool;
+he has drowned himself in his own ineptitude. Listen to me, Brother Cornemuse.
+We have not a moment to lose. We must free the Penguin people, we must deliver
+them from their tyrants, save them from themselves, restore the Dragon's
+crest, reestablish the ancient State, the good State, for the honour of
+religion and the exaltation of the Catholic faith. Chatillon was a bad
+instrument; he broke in our hands. Let us take a better instrument to replace
+him. I have the man who will destroy this impious democracy. He is a civil
+official; his name is Gomoru. The Penguins worship him, He has already
+betrayed his party for a plate of rice. There's the man we want!"
+
+At the beginning of this speech the monk of Conils had climbed into his window
+and pulled up the ladder.
+
+"I foresee," answered he, with his nose through the sash, "that you will not
+stop until you have us all expelled from this pleasant, agreeable, and sweet
+land of Penguinia. Good night; God keep you!"
+
+Agaric, standing before the wall, entreated his dearest brother to listen to
+him for a moment:
+
+"Understand your own interest better, Cornemuse! Penguinia is ours. What do we
+need to conquer it? just one effort more . . . one more little sacrifice of
+money and . . ."
+
+But without listening further, the monk of Conils drew in his head and closed
+his window.
+
+
+
+BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES.
+
+THE AFFAIR OF THE EIGHTY THOUSAND TRUSSES OF HAY
+
+O Father Zeus, only save thou the sons of the Acheans from the darkness, and
+make clear sky and vouchsafe sight to our eyes, and then, so it be but light,
+slay us, since such is thy good pleasure.  (Iliad, xvii. 645 et seq.)
+
+
+I. GENERAL GREATAUK, DUKE OF SKULL
+
+A short time after the flight of the Emiral, a middle-class Jew called Pyrot,
+desirous of associating with the aristocracy and wishing to serve his country,
+entered the Penguin army. The Minister of War, who at the time was Greatauk,
+Duke of Skull, could not endure him. He blamed him for his zeal, his hooked
+nose, his vanity, his fondness for study, his thick lips, and his exemplary
+conduct. Every time the author of any misdeed was looked for, Greatauk used to
+say:
+
+"It must be Pyrot!"
+
+One morning General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, informed Greatauk of a
+serious matter. Eighty thousand trusses of hay intended for the cavalry had
+disappeared and not a trace of them was to be found.
+
+Greatauk exclaimed at once:
+
+"It must be Pyrot who has stolen them!"
+
+He remained in thought for some time and said: "The more I think of it the
+more I am convinced that Pyrot has stolen those eighty thousand trusses of
+hay. And I know it by this: he stole them in order that he might sell them to
+our bitter enemies the Porpoises. What an infamous piece of treachery!
+
+"There is no doubt about it," answered Panther; "it only remains to prove it."
+
+The same day, as he passed by a cavalry barracks, Prince des Boscenos heard
+the troopers as they were sweeping out the yard, singing:
+
+   Boscenos est un gros cochon;
+   On en va faire des andouilles,
+   Des saucisses et du jambon
+   Pour le riveillon des pauy' bougres.
+
+It seemed to him contrary to all discipline that soldiers should sing this
+domestic and revolutionary refrain which on days of riot had been uttered by
+the lips of jeering workmen. On this occasion he deplored the moral
+degeneration of the army, and thought with a bitter smile that his old comrade
+Greatauk, the head of this degenerate army, basely exposed him to the malice
+of an unpatriotic government. And he promised himself that he would make an
+improvement before long.
+
+"That scoundrel Greatauk," said he to himself, "will, not remain long a
+Minister."
+
+Prince des Boscenos was the most irreconcilable of the opponents of modem
+democracy, free thought, and the government which the Penguins had voluntarily
+given themselves. He had a vigorous and undisguised hatred for the Jews, and
+he worked in public and in private, night and day, for the restoration of the
+line of the Draconides. His ardent royalism was still further excited by the
+thought of his private affairs, which were in a bad way and were hourly
+growing worse. He had no hope of seeing an end to his pecuniary embarrassments
+until the heir of Draco the Great entered the city of Alca.
+
+When he returned to his house, the prince took out of his safe a bundle of old
+letters consisting of a private correspondence of the most secret nature,
+which he had obtained from a treacherous secretary. They proved that his old
+comrade Greatauk, the Duke of Skull, had been guilty of jobbery regarding the
+military stores and had received a present of no great value from a
+manufacturer called Maloury. The very smallness of this present deprived the
+Minister who had accepted it of all excuse.
+
+The prince re-read the letters with a bitter satisfaction, put them carefully
+back into his safe, and dashed to the Minister of War. He was a man of
+resolute character. On being told that the Minister could see no one he
+knocked down the ushers, swept aside the orderlies, trampled under foot the
+civil and military clerks, burst through the doors, and entered the room of
+the astonished Greatauk.
+
+"I will not say much," said he to him, "but I will speak to the point. You are
+a confounded cad. I have asked you to put a flea in the ear of General
+Mouchin, the tool of those Republicans, and you would not do it. I have asked
+you to give a command to General des Clapiers, who works for the Dracophils,
+and who has obliged me personally, and you would not do it. I have asked you
+to dismiss General Tandem, the commander of Port Alca, who robbed me of fifty
+louis at cards, and who had me handcuffed when I was brought before the High
+Court as Emiral Chatillon's accomplice. You would not do it. I asked you for
+the hay and bran stores. You would not give them. I asked you to send me on a
+secret mission to Porpoisia. You refused. And not satisfied with these
+repeated refusals you have designated me to your Government colleagues as a
+dangerous person, who ought to be watched, and it is owing to you that I have
+been shadowed by the police. You old traitor! I ask nothing more from you and
+I have but one word to say to you: Clear out; you have bothered us too long.
+Besides, we will force the vile Republic to replace you by one of our own
+party. You know that I am a man of my word. If in twenty-four hours you have
+not handed in your resignation I will publish the Maloury dossier in the
+newspapers."
+
+But Greatauk calmly and serenely replied:
+
+"Be quiet, you fool. I am just having a Jew transported. I am handing over
+Pyrot to justice as guilty of having stolen eighty thousand trusses of hay."
+
+Prince Boscenos, whose anger vanished like a dream, smiled.
+
+"Is that true?"
+
+"You will see."
+
+"My congratulations, Greatauk. But as one always needs to take precautions
+with you I shall immediately publish the good news. People will read this
+evening about Pyrot's arrest in every newspaper in Alca . . . ."
+
+And he went away muttering:
+
+"That Pyrot! I suspected he would come to a bad end."
+
+A moment later General Panther appeared before Greatauk.
+
+"Sir," said he, "I have just examined the business of the eighty thousand
+trusses of hay. There is no evidence against Pyrot."
+
+"Let it be found," answered Greatauk. "Justice requires it. Have Pyrot
+arrested at once."
+
+
+
+I. PYROT
+
+All Penguinia heard with horror of Pyrot's crime; at the same time there was a
+sort of satisfaction that this embezzlement combined with treachery and even
+bordering on sacrilege, had been committed by a Jew. In order to understand
+this feeling it is necessary to be acquainted with the state of public opinion
+regarding the Jews both great and small. As we have had occasion to say in
+this history, the universally detested and all powerful financial caste was
+composed of Christians and of Jews. The Jews who formed part of it and on whom
+the people poured all their hatred were the upper-class Jews. They possessed
+immense riches and, it was said, held more than a fifth part of the total
+property of Penguinia. Outside this formidable caste there was a multitude of
+Jews of a mediocre condition, who were not more loved than the others and who
+were feared much less. In every ordered State, wealth is a sacred thing: in
+democracies it is the only sacred thing. Now the Penguin State was democratic.
+Three or four financial companies exercised a more extensive, and above all,
+more effective and continuous power, than that of the Ministers of the
+Republic. The latter were puppets whom the companies ruled in secret, whom
+they compelled by intimidation or corruption to favour themselves at the
+expense of the State, and whom they ruined by calumnies in the press if they
+remained honest. In spite of the secrecy of the Exchequer, enough appeared to
+make the country indignant, but the middle-class Penguins had, from the
+greatest to the least of them, been brought up to hold money in great
+reverence, and as they all had property, either much or little, they were
+strongly impressed with the solidarity of capital and understood that a small
+fortune is not safe unless a big one is protected. For these reasons they
+conceived a religious respect for the Jews' millions, and self-interest being
+stronger with them than aversion, they were as much afraid as they were of
+death to touch a single hair of one of the rich Jews whom they detested.
+Towards the poorer Jews they felt less ceremonious and when they saw any of
+them down they trampled on them. That is why the entire nation learnt with
+thorough satisfaction that the traitor was a Jew. They could take vengeance on
+all Israel in his person without any fear of compromising the public credit.
+
+That Pyrot had stolen the eighty thousand trusses of hay nobody hesitated for
+a moment to believe. No one doubted because the general ignorance in which
+everybody was concerning the affair did not allow of doubt, for doubt is a
+thing that demands motives. People do not doubt without reasons in the same
+way that people believe without reasons. The thing was not doubted because it
+was repeated everywhere and, with the public, to repeat is to prove. It was
+not doubted because people wished to believe Pyrot guilty and one believes
+what one wishes to believe. Finally, it was not doubted because the faculty of
+doubt is rare amongst men; very few minds carry in them its germs and these
+are not developed without cultivation. Doubt is singular, exquisite,
+philosophic, immoral, transcendent, monstrous, full of malignity, injurious to
+persons and to property, contrary to the good order of governments, and to the
+prosperity of empires, fatal to humanity, destructive of the gods, held in
+horror by heaven and earth. The mass of the Penguins were ignorant of doubt:
+it believed in Pyrot's guilt and this conviction immediately became one of its
+chief national beliefs and an essential truth in its patriotic creed.
+
+Pyrot was tried secretly and condemned.
+
+General Panther immediately went to the Minister of War to tell him the
+result.
+
+"Luckily," said he, "the judges were certain, for they had no proofs."
+
+"Proofs," muttered Greatauk, "Proofs, what do they prove? There is only one
+certain, irrefragable proof--the confession of the guilty person. Has Pyrot
+confessed?"
+
+"No, General."
+
+"He will confess, he ought to. Panther, we must induce him; tell him it is to
+his interest. Promise him that, if he confesses, he will obtain favours, a
+reduction of his sentence, full pardon; promise him that if he confesses his
+innocence will be admitted, that he will be decorated. Appeal to his good
+feelings. Let him confess from patriotism, for the flag, for the sake of
+order, from respect for the hierarchy, at the special command of the Minister
+of War militarily. . . . But tell me, Panther, has he not confessed already?
+There are tacit confessions; silence is a confession."
+
+"But, General, he is not silent; he keeps on squealing like a pig that he is
+innocent."
+
+"Panther, the confessions of a guilty man sometimes result from the vehemence
+of his denials. To deny desperately is to confess. Pyrot has confessed; we
+must have witnesses of his confessions, justice requires them."
+
+There was in Western Penguinia a seaport called La Cirque, formed of three
+small bays and formerly greatly frequented by ships, but now solitary and
+deserted. Gloomy lagoons stretched along its low coasts exhaling a pestilent
+odour, while fever hovered over its sleepy waters. Here, on the borders of the
+sea, there was built a high square tower, like the old Campanile at Venice,
+from the side of which, close to the summit hung an open cage which was
+fastened by a chain to a transverse beam. In the times of the Draconides the
+Inquisitors of Alca used to put heretical clergy into this cage. It had been
+empty for three hundred years, but now Pirot was imprisoned in it under the
+guard of sixty warders, who lived in the tower and did not lose sight of him
+night or day, spying on him for confessions that they might afterwards report
+to the Minister of War. For Greatauk, careful and prudent, desired confessions
+and still further confessions. Greatauk, who was looked upon as a fool, was in
+reality a man of great ability and full of rare foresight.
+
+In the mean time Pyrot, burnt by the sun, eaten by mosquitoes, soaked in the
+rain, hail and snow, frozen by the cold, tossed about terribly by the wind,
+beset by the sinister croaking of the ravens that perched upon his cage, kept
+writing down his innocence on pieces torn off his shirt with a tooth-pick
+dipped in blood. These rags were lost in the sea or fell into the hands of the
+gaolers. But Pyrot's protests moved nobody because his confessions had been
+published.
+
+
+
+III. COUNT DE MAUBEC DE LA DENTDULYNX
+
+The morals of the Jews were not always pure; in most cases they were averse
+from none of the vices of Christian civilization, but they retained from the
+Patriarchal age a recognition of family, ties and an attachment to the
+interests of the tribe. Pyrot's brothers, half-brothers, uncles, great-uncles,
+first, second, and third cousins, nephews and great-nephews, relations by
+blood and relations by marriage, and all who were related to him to the number
+of about seven hundred, were at first overwhelmed by the blow that had struck
+their relative, and they shut themselves up in their houses, covering
+themselves with ashes and blessing the hand that had chastised them. For forty
+days they kept a strict fast. Then they bathed themselves and resolved to
+search, without rest, at the cost of any toil and at the risk of eve danger,
+for the demonstration of an innocence which they did not doubt. And how could
+they have doubted? Pyrot's innocence had been revealed to them in the same way
+that his guilt had been revealed to Christian Penguinia's; for these things,
+being hidden, assume a mystic character and take on the authority of religious
+truths. The seven hundred Pyrotists set to work with as much zeal as prudence,
+and made the most thorough inquiries in secret. They were everywhere; they
+were seen nowhere. One would have said that, like the pilot of Ulysses, they
+wandered freely over the earth. They penetrated into the War Office and
+approached, under different disguises, the judges, the registrars, and the
+witnesses of the affair. Then Greatauk's cleverness was seen. The witnesses
+knew nothing; the judges and registrars knew nothing. Emissaries reached even
+Pyrot and anxiously questioned him in his cage amid the prolonged moanings of
+the sea and the hoarse croaks of the ravens. It was in vain; the prisoner knew
+nothing. The seven hundred Pyrotists could not subvert the proofs of the
+accusation because they could not know what they were, and they could not know
+what they were because there were none. Pyrot's guilt was indefeasible through
+its very nullity. And it was with a legitimate pride that Greatauk, expressing
+himself as a true artist, said one day to General Panther: "This case is a
+master-piece: it is made out of nothing." The seven hundred Pyrotists
+despaired of ever clearing up this dark business, when suddenly they
+discovered, from a stolen letter, that the eighty thousand trusses of hay had
+never existed, that a most distinguished nobleman, Count de Maubec, had sold
+them to the State, that he had received the price but had never delivered
+them. Indeed seeing that he was descended from the richest landed proprietors
+of ancient Penguinia, the heir of the Maubecs of Dentdulynx, once the
+possessors of four duchies, sixty counties, and six hundred and twelve
+marquisates, baronies, and viscounties, he did not possess as much land as he
+could cover with his hand, and would not have been able to cut a single day'S
+mowing of forage off his own domains. As to his getting a single rush from a
+land-owner or a merchant, that would have been quite impossible, for everybody
+except the Ministers of State and the Government officials knew that it would
+be easier to get blood from a stone than a farthing from a Maubec.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists made a minute inquiry concerning the Count Maubec
+de la Dentdulynx's financial resources, and they proved that that nobleman was
+chiefly supported by a house in which some generous ladies were ready to
+furnish all comers with the most lavish hospitality. They publicly proclaimed
+that he was guilty of the theft of the eighty thousand trusses of straw for
+which an innocent man had been condemned and was now imprisoned in the cage.
+
+Maubec belonged to an illustrious family which was allied to the Draconides.
+There is nothing that a democracy esteems more highly than noble birth. Maubec
+had also served in the Penguin army, and since the Penguins were all soldiers,
+they loved their army to idolatry. Maubec, on the field of battle, had
+received the Cross, which is a sign of honour among the Penguins and which
+they valued even more highly than the embraces of their wives. All Penguinia
+declared for Maubec, and the voice of the people which began to assume a
+threatening tone, demanded severe punishments for the seven hundred
+calumniating Pyrotists.
+
+Maubec was a nobleman; he challenged the seven hundred Pyrotists to combat
+with either sword, sabre, pistols, carabines, or sticks.
+
+"Vile dogs," he wrote to them in a famous letter, "you have crucified my God
+and you want my life too; I warn you that I will not be such a duffer as He
+was and that I will cut off your fourteen hundred ears. Accept my boot on your
+seven hundred behinds."
+
+The Chief of the Government at the time was a peasant called Robin Mielleux, a
+man pleasant to the rich and powerful, but hard towards the poor, a man of
+small courage and ignorant of his own interests. In a public declaration he
+guaranteed Maubec's innocence and honour, and presented the seven hundred
+Pyrotists: to the criminal courts where they were condemned, as libellers, to
+imprisonment, to enormous fines, and to all the damages that were claimed by
+their innocent victim.
+
+It seemed as if Pyrot was destined to remain for ever shut in the cage on
+which the ravens perched. But all the Penguins being anxious to know and prove
+that this Jew was guilty, all the proofs brought forward were found not to be
+good, while some of them were also contradictory. The officers of the Staff
+showed zeal but lacked prudence. Whilst Greatauk kept an admirable silence,
+General Panther made inexhaustible speeches and every morning demonstrated in
+the newspapers that the condemned man was guilty. He would have done better,
+perhaps, if he had said nothing. The guilt was evident and what is evident
+cannot be demonstrated. So much reasoning disturbed people's minds; their
+faith, though still alive, became less serene. The more proofs one gives a
+crowd the more they ask for.
+
+Nevertheless the danger of proving too much would not have been great if there
+had not been in Penguinia, as there are, indeed, everywhere, minds framed for
+free inquiry, capable of studying a difficult question, and inclined to
+philosophic doubt. They were few; they were not all inclined to speak, and the
+public was by no means inclined to listen to them. Still, they did not always
+meet with deaf ears. The great Jews, all the Israelite millionaires of Alca,
+when spoken to of Pyrot, said: "We do not know the man"; but they thought of
+saving him. They preserved the prudence to which their wealth inclined them
+and wished that others would be less timid. Their wish was to be gratified.
+
+
+
+V. COLOMBAN
+
+Some weeks after the conviction of the seven hundred Pyrotists, a little,
+gruff, hairy, short-sighted man left his house one morning with a paste-pot, a
+ladder, and a bundle of posters and went about the streets pasting placards to
+the walls on which might be read in large letters: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec
+is guilty. He was not a bill-poster; his name was Colomban, and as the author
+of sixty volumes on Penguin sociology he was numbered among the most laborious
+and respected writers in Alca. Having given sufficient thought to the matter
+and no longer doubting Pyrot's innocence, he proclaimed it in the manner which
+he thought would be most sensational. He met with no hindrance while posting
+his bills in the quiet streets, but when he came to the populous quarters,
+every time he mounted his ladder, inquisitive people crowded round him and,
+dumbfounded with surprise and indignation, threw at him threatening looks
+which he received with the calm that comes from courage and short-sightedness.
+Whilst caretakers and tradespeople tore down the bills he had posted, he kept
+on zealously placarding, carrying his tools and followed by little boys who,
+with their baskets under their arms or their satchels on their backs, were in
+no hurry to reach school. To the mute indignation against him, protests and
+murmurs were now added. But Colomban did not condescend to see or hear
+anything. As, at the entrance to the Rue St. Orberosia, he was posting one of
+his squares of paper bearing the words: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty,
+the riotous crowd showed signs of the most violent anger. They called after
+him, "Traitor, thief, rascal, scoundrel." A woman opened a window and emptied
+a vase full of filth over his head, a cabby sent his hat flying from one end
+of the street to the other by a blow of his whip amid the cheers of the crowd
+who now felt themselves avenged. A butcher's boy knocked Colomban with his
+paste-pot, his brush, and his posters, from the top of his ladder into the
+gutter, and the proud Penguins then felt the greatness of their country.
+Colomban stood up,, covered with filth, lame, and with his elbow injured, but
+tranquil and resolute.
+
+"Low brutes," he muttered, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+Then he went down on all-fours in the gutter to look for his glasses which he
+had lost in his fall. t was then seen that his coat was split from the collar
+to the tails and that his trousers were in rags. The rancour of the crowd grew
+stronger.
+
+On the other side of the street stretched the big St. Orberosian Stores. The
+patriots seized whatever they could lay their hands on from the shop front,
+and hurled at Colomban oranges, lemons, pots of jam, pieces of chocolate,
+bottles of liqueurs, boxes of sardines, pots of foie gras, hams, fowls, flasks
+of oil, and bags of haricots. Covered with the debris of the food, bruised,
+tattered, lame, and blind, he took to flight, followed by the shop-boys,
+bakers, loafers, citizens, and hooligans whose number increased each moment
+and who kept shouting: "Duck him! Death to the traitor! Duck him!" This
+torrent of vulgar humanity swept along the streets and rushed into the Rue St.
+Mael. The police did their duty. From all the adjacent streets constables
+proceeded and, holding their scabbards with their left hands, they went at
+full speed in front of the pursuers. They were on the point of grabbing
+Colomban in their huge hands when he suddenly escaped them by falling through
+an open man-hole to the bottom of a sewer.
+
+He spent the night there in the darkness, sitting close by the dirty water
+amidst the fat and slimy rats. He thought of his task, and his swelling heart
+filled with courage and pity. And when the dawn threw a pale ray of light into
+the air-hole he got up and said, speaking to himself:
+
+"I see that the fight will be a stiff one."
+
+Forthwith he composed a memorandum in which he clearly showed that Pyrot could
+not have stolen from the Ministry of War the eighty thousand trusses of hay
+which it had never received, for the reason that Maubec had never delivered
+them, though he had received the money. Colomban caused this statement to be
+distributed in the streets of Alca. The people refused to read it and tore it
+up in anger. The shop-keepers shook their fists at the distributers, who made
+off, chased by angry women armed with brooms. Feelings grew warm and the
+ferment lasted the whole day. In the evening bands of wild and ragged men went
+about the streets yelling: "Death to Colomban!" The patriots snatched whole
+bundles of the memorandum from the newsboys and burned them in the public
+squares, dancing wildly round these bon-fires with girls whose petticoats were
+tied up to their waists.
+
+Some of the more enthusiastic among them went and broke the windows of the
+house in which Colomban had lived in perfect tranquillity during his forty
+years of work.
+
+Parliament was roused and asked the Chief of the Government what measures he
+proposed to take in order to repel the odious attacks made by Colomban upon
+the honour of the National Arm and the safety of Penguinia. Robin Mielleux
+denounced Colomban's impious audacity and proclaimed amid the cheers of the
+legislators that the man would be summoned before the Courts to answer for his
+infamous libel.
+
+The Minister of War was called to the tribune and appeared in it transfigured.
+He had no longer the air, as in former days, of one of the sacred geese of the
+Penguin citadels. Now, bristling, with outstretched neck and hooked beak, he
+seemed the symbolical vulture fastened to the livers of his country's enemies.
+
+In the august silence of the assembly he pronounced these words only:
+
+"I swear that Pyrot is a rascal."
+
+This speech of Greatauk was reported all over Penguinia and satisfied the
+public conscience.
+
+
+
+V. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE
+
+Colomban bore with meekness and surprise the weight of the general
+reprobation. He could not go out without being stoned, so he did not go out.
+He remained in his study with a superb obstinacy, writing new memoranda in
+favour of the encaged innocent. In the mean time among the few readers that he
+found, some, about a dozen, were struck by his reasons and began to doubt
+Pyrot's guilt. They broached the subject to their friends and endeavoured to
+spread the light that had arisen in their minds. One of them was a friend of
+Robin Mielleux and confided to him his perplexities, with the result that he
+was no longer received by that Minister. Another demanded explanations in an
+open letter to the Minister of War. A third published a terrible pamphlet. The
+latter, whose name was Kerdanic, was a formidable controversialist. The public
+was unmoved. It was said that these defenders of the traitor had been bribed
+by the rich Jews; they were stigmatized by the name of Pyrotists and the
+patriots swore to exterminate them. There were only a thousand or twelve
+hundred Pyrotists in the whole vast Republic, but it was believed that they
+were everywhere. People were afraid of finding them in the promenades, at
+meetings, at receptions, in fashionable drawing-rooms, at the dinner-table,
+even in the conjugal couch. One half of the population was suspected by the
+other half. The discord set all Alca on fire.
+
+In the mean time Father Agaric, who managed his big school for young nobles,
+followed events with anxious attention. The misfortunes of the Penguin Church
+had not disheartened him. He remained faithful to Prince Crucho and preserved
+the hope of restoring the heir of the Draconides to the Penguin throne. It
+appeared to him that the events that were happening or about to happen in the
+country, the state of mind of which they were at once the effect and the
+cause, and the troubles that necessarily resulted from them might--if they
+were directed, guided, and led by the profound wisdom of a monk--overthrow the
+Republic and incline the Penguins to restore Prince Crucho, from whose piety
+the faithful hoped for so much solace. Wearing his huge black hat, the brims
+of which looked like the wings of Night, he walked through the Wood of Conils
+towards the factory where his venerable friend, Father Cornemuse, distilled
+the hygienic St. Orberosian liqueur, The good monk's industry, so cruelly
+affected in the time of Emiral Chatillon, was being restored from its ruins.
+One heard goods trains rumbling through the Wood and one saw in the sheds
+hundreds of orphans clothed in blue, packing bottles and nailing up cases.
+
+Agaric found the venerable Cornemuse standing before his stoves and surrounded
+by his retorts. The shining pupils of the old man's eyes had again become as
+rubies, his skull shone with its former elaborate and careful polish.
+
+Agaric first congratulated the pious distiller on the restored activity of his
+laboratories and workshops.
+
+"Business is recovering. I thank God for it," answered the old man of Conils.
+"Alas! it had fallen into a bad state, Brother Agaric. You raw the desolation
+of this establishment. I need say no more."
+
+Agaric turned away his head.
+
+"The St. Orberosian liqueur," continued Cornemuse, "is making fresh conquests.
+But none the less my industry remains uncertain and precarious. The laws of
+ruin and desolation that struck it have not been abrogated, they have only
+been suspended."
+
+And the monk of Conils lifted his ruby eyes to heaven.
+
+Agaric put his hand on his shoulder.
+
+"What a sight, Cornemuse, does unhappy Penguinia present to us! Everywhere
+disobedience, independence, liberty! We seethe proud, the haughty, the men of
+revolt rising up. After having braved the Divine laws they now rear themselves
+against human laws, so true is it that in order to be a good citizen a man
+must be a good Christian. Colomban is trying to imitate Satan. Numerous
+criminals are following his fatal example. They want, in their rage, to put
+aside all checks, to throw off all yokes, to free themselves from the most
+sacred bonds, to escape from the most salutary restraints. They strike their
+country to make it obey them. But they will be overcome by the weight of
+public animadversion, vituperation, indignation, fury, execration, and
+abomination. That is the abyss to which they have been led by atheism, free
+thought, and the monstrous claim to judge for themselves and to form their own
+opinions."
+
+"Doubtless, doubtless," replied Father Cornemuse, shaking his head, "but I
+confess that the care of distilling these simples has prevented me from
+following public affairs. I only know that people are talking a great deal
+about a man called Pyrot. Some maintain that he is guilty, others affirm that
+he is innocent, but I do not clearly understand the motives that drive both
+parties to mix themselves up in a business that concerns neither of them."
+
+The pious Agaric asked eagerly:
+
+"You do not doubt Pyrot's guilt?"
+
+"I cannot doubt it, dear Agaric," answered the monk of Conils. "That would be
+contrary to the laws of my country which we ought to respect as long as they
+are not opposed to the Divine laws. Pyrot is guilty, for he has been
+convicted. As to saying more for or against his guilt, that would be to erect
+my own authority against that of the judges, a thing which I will take good
+care not to do. Besides, it is useless, for Pyrot has been convicted. If he
+has not been convicted because he is guilty, he is guilty because he has been
+convicted; it comes to the same thing. I believe in his guilt as every good
+citizen ought to believe in it; and I will believe in it as long as the
+established jurisdiction will order me to believe in it, for it is not for a
+private person but for a judge to proclaim the innocence of a convicted
+person. Human justice is venerable even in the errors inherent in its fallible
+and limited nature. These errors are never irreparable; if the judges do not
+repair them on earth, God will repair them in Heaven. Besides I have great
+confidence in general Greatauk, who, though he certainly does not look it,
+seems to me to be an abler man than all those who are attacking him."
+
+"Dearest Cornemuse," cried the pious Agaric, "the Pyrot affair, if pushed to
+the point whither we can lead it by the help of God and the necessary funds,
+will produce the greatest benefits. It will lay bare the vices of this
+Anti-Christian Republic and will incline the Penguins to restore the throne of
+the Draconides and the prerogatives of the Church. But to do that it is
+necessary for the people to see the clergy in the front rank of its defenders.
+Let us march against the enemies of the army, against those who insult our
+heroes, and everybody will follow us."
+
+"Everybody will be too many," murmured the monk of Conils, shaking his head.
+"I see that the Penguins want to quarrel. If we mix ourselves up in their
+quarrel they will become reconciled at our expense and we shall have to pay
+the cost of the war. That is why, if you are guided by me, dear Agaric, you
+will not engage the Church in this adventure."
+
+"You know my energy; you know my prudence. I will compromise nothing. . . .
+Dear Cornemuse, I only want from you the funds necessary for us to begin the
+campaign."
+
+For a long time Cornemuse refused to bear the expenses of what he thought was
+a fatal enterprise. Agaric was in turn pathetic and terrible. At last,
+yielding to his prayers and threats, Cornemuse, with banging head and swinging
+arms, went to the austere cell that concealed his evangelical poverty. In the
+whitewashed wall under a branch of blessed box, there was fixed a safe. He
+opened it, and with a sigh took out a bundle of bills which, with hesitating
+hands, he gave to the pious Agaric.
+
+"Do not doubt it, dear Cornemuse," said the latter, thrusting the papers into
+the pocket of his overcoat, "this Pyrot affair has been sent us by God for the
+glory and exaltation of the Church of Penguinia."
+
+"I pray that you may be right!" sighed the monk of Conils.
+
+And, left alone in his laboratory, he gazed, through his exquisite eyes, with
+an ineffable sadness at his stoves and his retorts.
+
+
+
+VI. THE SEVEN HUNDRED PYROTISTS
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists inspired the public with an increasing aversion.
+Every day two or three of them were beaten to death in the streets. One of
+them was publicly whipped, another thrown into the river, a third tarred and
+feathered and led through a laughing crowd, a fourth had his nose cut off by a
+captain of dragoons. They did not dare to show themselves at their clubs, at
+tennis, or at the races; they put on a disguise when they went to the Stock
+Exchange. In these circumstances the Prince des Boscenos thought it urgent to
+curb their audacity and repress their insolence. For this purpose he joined
+with Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd in
+founding a great anti-Pyrotist association to which citizens in hundreds of
+thousands, soldiers in companies, regiments, brigades, divisions, and army
+corps, towns, districts, and provinces, all gave their adhesion.
+
+About this time the Minister of War happening to visit one day his Chief of
+Staff, saw with surprise that the large room where General Panther worked,
+which was formerly quite bare, had now along each wall from floor to ceiling
+in sets of deep pigeon-holes, triple and quadruple rows of paper bundles of
+every as form and colour. These sudden and monstrous records had in a few days
+reached the dimensions of a pile of archives such as it takes centuries to
+accumulate.
+
+"What is this?" asked the astonished minister.
+
+"Proofs against Pyrot," answered General Panther with patriotic satisfaction.
+"We had not got them when we convicted him, but we have plenty of them now."
+
+The door was open, and Greatauk saw coming up the stair-case a long file of
+porters who were unloading heavy bales of papers in the hall, and he saw the
+lift slowly rising heavily loaded with paper packets.
+
+"What are those others?" said he.
+
+"They are fresh proofs against Pyrot that are now reaching us," said Panther.
+"I have asked for them in every county of Penguinia, in every Staff Office and
+in every Court in Europe. I have ordered them in every town in America and in
+Australia, and in every factory in Africa, and I am expecting bales of them
+from Bremen and a ship-load from Melbourne." And Panther turned towards the
+Minister of War the tranquil and radiant look of a hero. However, Greatauk,
+his eye-glass in his eye, was looking at the formidable pile of papers with
+less satisfaction than uneasiness.
+
+"Very good," said he, "very good! but I am afraid that this Pyrot business may
+lose its beautiful simplicity. It was limpid; like a rock-crystal its value
+lay in its transparency. You could have searched it in vain with a
+magnifying-glass for a straw, a bend, a blot, for the least fault. When it
+left my hands it was as pure as the light. Indeed it was the light. I give you
+a pearl and you make a mountain out of it. To tell you the truth I am afraid
+that by wishing to do too well you have done less well. Proofs! of course it
+is good to have proofs, but perhaps it is better to have none at all. I have
+already told you, Panther, there is only one irrefutable proof, the confession
+of the guilty person (or if the innocent what matter!). The Pyrot affair, as I
+arranged it, left no room for criticism; there was no spot where it could be
+touched. It defied assault. t was invulnerable because it was invisible. Now
+it gives an enormous handle for discussion. I advise you, Panther, to use your
+paper packets with great reserve. I should be particularly grateful if you
+would be more sparing of your communications to journalists. You speak well,
+but you say too much. Tell me, Panther, are there any forged documents among
+these?"
+
+"There are some adapted ones."
+
+"That is what I meant. There are some adapted ones. So much the better. As
+proofs, forged documents, in general, are better than genuine ones, first of
+all because they have been expressly made to suit the needs of the case, to
+order and measure, and therefore they are fitting and exact. They are also
+preferable because they carry the mind into an ideal world and turn it aside
+from the reality which, alas! in this world is never without some alloy. . . .
+Nevertheless, I think I should have preferred, Panther, that we had no proofs
+at all."
+
+The first act of the Anti-Pyrotist Association was to ask the Government
+immediately to summon the seven hundred Pyrotists and their accomplices before
+the High Court of Justice as guilty of high treason. Prince des Boscenos was
+charged to speak on behalf of the Association and presented himself before the
+Council which had assembled to hear him. He expressed a hope that the
+vigilance and firmness of the Government would rise to the height of the
+occasion. He shook hands with each of the ministers and as he passed General
+Greatauk he whispered in his ear:
+
+"Behave properly, you ruffian, or I will publish the Maloury dossier!"
+
+Some days later by a unanimous vote of both Houses, on a motion proposed by
+the Government, the Anti-Pyrotist Association was granted a charter
+recognising it as beneficial to the public interest.
+
+The Association immediately sent a deputation to Chitterlings Castle in
+Porpoisia, where Crucho was eating the bitter bread of exile, to assure the
+prince of the love and devotion of the Anti-Pyrotist members.
+
+However, the Pyrotists grew in numbers, and now counted ten thousand. They had
+their regular cafes on the boulevards. The patriots had theirs also, richer
+and bigger, and every evening glasses of beer, saucers, match-stands, jugs,
+chairs, and tables were hurled from one to the other. Mirrors were smashed to
+bits, and the police ended the struggles by impartially trampling the
+combatants of both parties under their hob-nailed shoes.
+
+On one of these glorious nights, as Prince des Boscenos was leaving a
+fashionable cafe in the company of some patriots, M. de La Trumelle pointed
+out to him a little, bearded man with glasses, hatless, and having only one
+sleeve to his coat, who was painfully dragging himself along the
+rubbish-strewn pavement.
+
+"Look!" said he, "there is Colomban!"
+
+The prince had gentleness as well as strength; he was exceedingly mild; but at
+the name of Colomban his blood boiled. He rushed at the little spectacled man,
+and knocked him down with one blow of his fist on the nose.
+
+M. de La Trumelle then perceived that, misled by an undeserved resemblance, he
+had mistaken for Colomban, M. Bazile, a retired lawyer, the secretary of the
+Anti-pyrotist Association, and an ardent and generous patriot. Prince des
+Boscenos was one of those antique souls who never bend. However, he knew how
+to recognise his faults.
+
+"M. Bazile," said he, raising his hat, "if I have touched your face with my
+hand you will excuse me and you will understand me, you will approve of me,
+nay, you will compliment me, you will congratulate me and felicitate me, when
+you know the cause of that act. I took you for Colomban."
+
+M. Bazile, wiping his bleeding nostrils with his handkerchief and displaying
+an elbow laid bare by the absence of his sleeve:
+
+"No, sir," answered he drily, "I shall not felicitate you, I shall not
+congratulate you, I shall not compliment you, for your action was, at the very
+least, superfluous; it was, I will even say, supererogatory. Already this
+evening I have been three times mistaken for Colomban and received a
+sufficient amount of the treatment he deserves. The patriots have knocked in
+my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion that that was enough."
+
+Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists appeared, and
+misled in their turn by that insidious resemblance, they believed that the
+patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des Boscenos and his
+companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and left them for dead. Then
+seizing Bazile they carried him in triumph, and in spite of his protests,
+along the boulevards, amid cries of: "Hurrah for Colomban! Hurrah for Pyrot!"
+At last the police, who had been sent after them, attacked and defeated them
+and dragged them ignominiously to the station, where Bazile, under the name of
+Colomban, was trampled on by an innumerable quantity of thick, hob-nailed
+shoes.
+
+
+
+VII. BIDAULT-COQUILLE AND MANIFLORE, THE SOCIALISTS
+
+Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine Bidault- Coquille,
+poorest and happiest of astronomers, installed in an old steam-engine of the
+time of the Draconides, was observing the heavens through a bad telescope, and
+photographing the paths of the meteors upon some damaged photographic plates.
+His genius corrected the errors of his instruments and his love of science
+triumphed over the worthlessness of his apparatus. With an inextinguishable
+ardour he observed aerolites, meteors, and fire-balls, and all the glowing
+ruins and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial atmosphere with
+prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he received the
+indifference of the public, the ingratitude of the State and the blame of the
+learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew not what occurred
+upon the surface of the earth. He never read the newspapers, and when he
+walked through the town his mind was occupied with the November asteroids, and
+more than once he found himself at the bottom of a pond in one of the public
+parks or beneath the wheels of a motor omnibus.
+
+Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and others. This was
+shown by his cold politeness as well as by a very thin black frock coat and a
+tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once emaciated and sublime.
+He took his meals in a little restaurant from which all customers less
+intellectual than himself had fled, and thenceforth his napkin bound by its
+wooden ring rested alone in the abandoned rack.
+
+In this cook-shop his eyes fell one evening upon Colomban's memorandum in
+favour of Pyrot. He read it as he was cracking some bad nuts and suddenly,
+exalted with astonishment, admiration, horror, and pity, he forgot all about
+falling meteors and shooting stars and saw nothing but the innocent man
+hanging in his cage exposed to the winds of heaven and the ravens perching
+upon it.
+
+That image did not leave him. For a week he had been obsessed by the innocent
+convict, when, as he was leaving his cook-shop, he saw a crowd of citizens
+entering a public-house in which a public meeting was going on. He went in.
+The meeting was disorderly; they were yelling, abusing one another and
+knocking one another down in the smoke-laden hall. The Pyrotists and the
+Anti-Pyrotists spoke in turn and were alternately cheered and hissed at. An
+obscure and confused enthusiasm moved the audience. With the audacity of a
+timid and retired man Bidault-Coquille leaped upon the platform and spoke for
+three-quarters of an hour. He spoke very quickly, without order, but with
+vehemence, and with all the conviction of a mathematical mystic. He was
+cheered. When he got down from the platform a big woman of uncertain age,
+dressed in red, and wearing an immense hat trimmed with heroic feathers,
+throwing herself into his arms, embraced him, and said to him:
+
+"You are splendid!"
+
+He thought in his simplicity that there was some truth in the statement.
+
+She declared to him that henceforth she would live but for Pyrot's defence and
+Colomban's glory. He thought her sublime and beautiful. She was Maniflore, a
+poor old courtesan, now forgotten and discarded, who had suddenly become a
+vehement politician.
+
+She never left him. They spent glorious hours together in doss-houses and in
+lodgings beautified by their love, in newspaper offices, in meeting-halls and
+in lecture-halls. As he was an idealist, he persisted in thinking her
+beautiful, although she gave him abundant opportunity of seeing that she had
+preserved no charm of any kind. From her past beauty she only retained a
+confidence in her capacity for pleasing and a lofty assurance in demanding
+homage. Still, it must be admitted that this Pyrot affair, so fruitful in
+prodigies, invested Maniflore with a sort of civic majesty, and transformed
+her, at public meetings, into an august symbol of justice and truth.
+
+Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore did not kindle the least spark of irony or
+amusement in a single Anti-Pyrotist, a single defender of Greatauk, or a
+single supporter of the army. The gods, in their anger, had refused to those
+men the precious gift of humour. They gravely accused the courtesan and the
+astronomer of being spies, of treachery, and of plotting against their
+country. Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore grew visibly greater beneath insult,
+abuse, and calumny.
+
+For long months Penguinia had been divided into two camps and, though at first
+sight it may appear strange, hitherto the socialists had taken no part in the
+contest. Their groups comprised almost all the manual workers in the country,
+necessarily scattered, confused, broken up, and divided, but formidable. The
+Pyrot affair threw the group leaders into a singular embarrassment. They did
+not wish to place themselves either on the side of the financiers or on the
+side of the army. They regarded the Jews, both great and small, as their
+uncompromising opponents. Their principles were not at stake, nor were their
+interests concerned in the affair. Still the greater number felt how difficult
+it was growing for them to remain aloof from struggles in which all Penguinia
+was engaged.
+
+Their leaders called a sitting of their federation at the Rue de la
+Queue-du-diable-St. Mael, to take into consideration the conduct they ought to
+adopt in the present circumstances and in future eventualities.
+
+Comrade Phoenix was the first to speak.
+
+"A crime," said he, "the most odious and cowardly of crimes, a judicial crime,
+has been committed. Military judges, coerced or misled by their superior
+officers, have condemned an innocent man to an infamous and cruel punishment.
+Let us not say that the victim is not one of our own party, that he belongs to
+a caste which was, and always will be, our enemy. Our party is the party of
+social justice; it can look upon no iniquity with indifference.
+
+"It would be a shame for us if we left it to Kerdanic, a radical, to Colomban,
+a member of the middle classes, and to a few moderate Republicans, alone to
+proceed against the crimes of the army. If the victim is not one of us, his
+executioners are our brothers' executioners, and before Greatauk struck down
+this soldier he shot our comrades who were on strike.
+
+"Comrades, by an intellectual, moral and material effort you must rescue Pyrot
+from his torment, and in performing this generous act you are not turning
+aside from the liberating and revolutionary task you have undertaken, for
+Pyrot his become the symbol of the oppressed and of all the social iniquities
+that now exist; by destroying one you make all the others tremble."
+
+When Phoenix ended, comrade Sapor spoke in these terms:
+
+"You are advised to abandon your task in order to do something with which you
+have no concern. Why throw yourselves into a conflict where, on whatever side
+you turn, you will find none but your natural, uncompromising, even necessary
+opponents? Are the financiers to be less hated by us than the army? What inept
+and criminal generosity is it that hurries you to save those seven hundred
+Pyrotists whom you will always find confronting you in the social war?
+
+"It is proposed that you act the part of the police for your enemies, and that
+you are to re-establish for them the order which their own crimes have
+disturbed. Magnanimity pushed to this degree changes its name.
+
+"Comrades, there is a point at which infamy becomes fatal to a society.
+Penguin society is being strangled by its infamy, and you are requested to
+save it, to give it air that it can breathe. This is simply turning you into
+ridicule.
+
+"Leave is to smother itself and let us gaze at its last convulsions with
+joyful contempt, only regretting that it has so entirely corrupted the soil on
+which it has been built that we shall find nothing but poisoned mud on which
+to lay the foundations of a new society."
+
+When Sapor had ended his speech comrade Lapersonne pronounced these few words:
+
+"Phoenix calls us to Pyrot's help for the reason that Pyrot is innocent. It
+seems to me that that is a very bad reason. If Pyrot is innocent he has
+behaved like a good soldier and has always conscientiously worked at his
+trade, which principally consists in shooting the people. That is not a motive
+to make the people brave all dangers in his defence. When it is demonstrated
+to me that Pyrot is guilty and that he stole the army hay, I shall be on his
+side."
+
+Comrade Larrivee afterwards spoke.
+
+"I am not of my friend, Phoenix's opinion but I am not with my friend Sapor
+either. I do not believe that the party is bound to embrace a cause as soon as
+we are told that that cause is just. That, I am afraid, is a grievous abuse of
+words and a dangerous equivocation. For social justice is not revolutionary
+justice. They are both in perpetual antagonism: to serve the one is to oppose
+the other. As for me, my choice is made. I am for revolutionary justice as
+against social justice. Still, in the present case I am against abstention. I
+say that when a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we should be fools
+not to profit by it.
+
+"How? We are given an opportunity of striking terrible, perhaps fatal, blows
+against militarism. And am I to fold my arms? I tell you, comrades, I am not a
+fakir, I have never been a fakir, and if there are fakirs here let them not
+count on me. To sit in meditation is a policy without results and one which I
+shall never adopt.
+
+"A party like ours ought to be continually asserting itself. It ought to prove
+its existence by continual action. We will intervene in the Pyrot affair but
+we will intervene in it in a revolutionary manner; we will adopt violent
+action. . . . Perhaps you think that violence is old-fashioned and
+superannuated, to be scrapped along with diligences, hand-presses and aerial
+telegraphy. You are mistaken. To-day as yesterday nothing is obtained except
+by violence; it is the one efficient instrument. The only thing necessary is
+to know how to use it. You ask what will our action be? I will tell you: it
+will be to stir up the governing classes against one another, to put the army
+in conflict with the capitalists, the government with the magistracy, the
+nobility and clergy with the Jews, and if possible to drive them all to
+destroy one another. To do this would be to carry on an agitation which would
+weaken government in the same way that fever wears out the sick.
+
+"The Pyrot affair, little as we know how to turn it to advantage, will put
+forward by ten years the growth of the Social party and the emancipation of
+the proletariat, by disarmament, the general strike, and revolution."
+
+The leaders of the party having each expressed a different opinion, the
+discussion was continued, not without vivacity. The orators, as always happens
+in such a case, reproduced the arguments they had already brought forward,
+though with less order and moderation than before. The dispute was prolonged
+and none changed his opinion. These opinions, in the final analysis, were
+reduced to two: that of Sapor and Lapersonne who advised abstention, and that
+of Phoenix and Larrivee, who wanted intervention. Even these two contrary
+opinions were united in a common hatred of the heads of the army and of their
+justice, and in a common belief in Pyrot's innocence. So that public opinion
+was hardly mistaken in regarding all the Socialist leaders as pernicious
+Anti-Pyrotists.
+
+As for the vast masses in whose name they spoke and whom they represented as
+far as speech can express the impossible--as for the proletarians whose
+thought is difficult to know and who do not know it themselves, it seemed that
+the Pyrot affair did not interest them. It was too literary for them, it was
+in too classical a style, and had an upper-middle-class and high-finance tone
+about it that did not please them much.
+
+
+
+VIII. THE COLOMBAN TRIAL
+
+When the Colomban trial began, the Pyrotists were not many more than thirty
+thousand, but they were every where and might be found even among the priests
+and millionaires. What injured them most was the sympathy of the rich Jews. On
+the other hand they derived valuable advantages from their feeble number. In
+the first place there were among them fewer fools than among their opponents,
+who were over-burdened with them. Comprising but a feeble minority, they
+co-operated easily, acted with harmony, and had no temptation to divide and
+thus counteract one another's efforts. Each of them felt the necessity of
+doing the best possible and was the more careful of his conduct as he found
+himself more in the public eye. Finally, they had every reason to hope that
+they would gain fresh adherents, while their opponents, having had everybody
+with them at the beginning, could only decrease.
+
+Summoned before the judges at a public sitting, Colomban immediately perceived
+that his judges were not anxious to discover the truth. As soon as he opened
+his mouth the President ordered him to be silent in the superior interests of
+the State. For the same reason, which is the supreme reason, the witnesses for
+the defence were not heard. General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, appeared
+in the witness-box, in full uniform and decorated with all his orders. He
+deposed as follows:
+
+"The infamous Colomban states that we have no proofs against Pyrot. He lies;
+we have them. I have in my archives seven hundred and thirty-two square yards
+of them which at five hundred pounds each make three hundred and sixty-six
+thousand pounds."
+
+That superior officer afterwards gave, with elegance and ease, a summary of
+those proofs.
+
+"They are of all colours and all shades," said he in substance, "they are of
+every form--pot, crown, sovereign, grape, dove-cot, grand eagle, etc. The
+smallest is less than the hundredth part of a square inch, the largest
+measures seventy yards long by ninety yards broad."
+
+At this revelation the audience shuddered with horror.
+
+Greatauk came to give evidence in his turn. Simpler, and perhaps greater, he
+wore a grey tunic and held his hands joined behind his back.
+
+"I leave," said he calmly and in a slightly raised voice, "I leave to M.
+Colomban the responsibility for an act that has brought our country to the
+brink of ruin. The Pyrot affair is secret; it ought to remain secret. If it
+were divulged the cruelest ills, wars, pillages, depredations, fires,
+massacres, and epidemics would immediately burst upon Penguinia. I should
+consider myself guilty of high treason if I uttered another word."
+
+Some persons known for their political experience, among others M. Bigourd,
+considered the evidence of the Minister of War as abler and of greater weight
+than that of his Chief of Staff.
+
+The evidence of Colonel de Boisjoli made a great impression.
+
+"One evening at the Ministry of War," said that officer, "the attache of a
+neighbouring Power told me that while visiting his sovereign's stables he had
+once admired some soft and fragrant hay, of a pretty green colour, the finest
+hay he had ever seen! 'Where did it come from?' I asked him. He did not
+answer, but there seemed to me no doubt about its origin. It was the hay Pyrot
+had stolen. Those qualities of verdure, softness, and aroma, are those of our
+national hay. The forage of the neighbouring Power is grey and brittle; it
+sounds under the fork and smells of dust. One can draw one own conclusions."
+
+Lieutenant-Colonel Hastaing said in the witness-box, amid hisses, that he did
+not believe Pyrot guilty. He was immediately seized by the police and thrown
+into the bottom of a dungeon where, amid vipers, toads, and broken glass, he
+remained insensible both to promises and threats.
+
+The usher called:
+
+"Count Pierre Maubec de la Dentdulynx."
+
+There was deep silence, and a stately but ill-dressed nobleman, whose
+moustaches pointed to the skies and whose dark eyes shot forth flashing
+glances, was seen advancing toward the witness-box.
+
+He approached Colomban and casting upon him a look of ineffable disdain:
+
+"My evidence," said he, "here it is: you excrement!"
+
+At these words the entire hall burst into enthusiastic applause and jumped up,
+moved by one of those transports that stir men's hearts and rouse them to
+extraordinary actions. Without another word Count Maubec de la Dentdulynx
+withdrew.
+
+All those present left the Court and formed a procession behind him. Prostrate
+at his feet, Princess des Boscenos held his legs in a close embrace, but he
+went on, stern and impassive, beneath a shower of handkerchiefs and flowers.
+Viscountess Olive, clinging to his neck, could not be removed, and the calm
+hero bore her along with him, floating on his breast like a light scarf.
+
+When the court resumed its sitting, which it had been compelled to suspend,
+the President called the experts.
+
+Vermillard, the famous expert in handwriting, gave the results of his
+researches.
+
+"Having carefully studied," said he, "the papers found in Pyrot's house, in
+particular his account book and his laundry books, I noticed that, though
+apparently not out of the common, they formed an impenetrable cryptogram, the
+key to which, however, I discovered. The traitor's infamy is to be seen in
+every line. In this system of writing the words 'Three glasses of beer and
+twenty francs for Adele' mean 'I have delivered thirty thousand trusses of hay
+to a neighbouring Power! From these documents I have even been able to
+establish the composition of the hay delivered by this officer. The words
+waistcoat, drawers, pocket handkerchief, collars, drink, tobacco, cigars, mean
+clover, meadowgrass, lucern, burnet, oats, rye-grass, vernal-grass, and common
+cat's tail grass. And these are precisely the constituents of the hay
+furnished by Count Maubec to the Penguin cavalry. In this way Pyrot mentioned
+his crimes in a language that he believed would always remain indecipherable.
+One is confounded by so much astuteness and so great a want of conscience."
+
+Colomban, pronounced guilty without any extenuating circumstances, was
+condemned to the severest penalty. The judges immediately signed a warrant
+consuming him to solitary confinement.
+
+In the Place du Palais on the sides of a river whose banks had during the
+course of twelve centuries seen so great a history, fifty thousand persons
+were tumultuously awaiting the result of the trial. Here were the heads of the
+Anti-Pyrotist Association, among whom might be seen Prince des Boscenos, Count
+Clena, Viscount Olive, and M. de La Trumelle; here crowded the Reverend Father
+Agaric and the teachers of St. Mael College with their pupils; here the monk
+Douillard and General Caraguel, embracing each other, formed a sublime group.
+The market women and laundry women with spits, shovels, tongs, beetles, and
+kettles full of water might be seen running across the Pont-Vieux. On the
+steps in front of the bronze gates were assembled all the defenders of Pyrot
+in Alca, professors, publicists, workmen, some conservatives, others Radicals
+or Revolutionaries, and by their negligent dress and fierce aspect could be
+recognised comrades Phoenix, Larrivee, Lapersonne, Dagobert, and Varambille.
+Squeezed in his funereal frock-coat and wearing his hat of ceremony,
+Bidault-Coquille invoked the sentimental mathematics on behalf of Colomban and
+Colonel Hastaing. Maniflore shone smiling and resplendent on the topmost step,
+anxious, like Leaena, to deserve a glorious monument, or to be given, like
+Epicharis, the praises of history.
+
+The seven hundred Pyrotists disguised as lemonade sellers, utter-merchants,
+collectors of odds and ends, or anti-Pyrotists, wandered round the vast
+building.
+
+When Colomban appeared, so great an uproar burst forth that, struck by the
+commotion of air and water, birds fell from the trees and fishes floated on
+the surface of the stream.
+
+On all sides there were yells:
+
+"Duck Colomban, duck him, duck him!"
+
+There were some cries of "Justice and truth!" and a voice was even heard
+shouting:
+
+"Down with the Army!"
+
+This was the signal for a terrible struggle. The combatants fell in thousands,
+and their bodies formed howling and moving mounds on top of which fresh
+champions gripped each other by the throats. Women, eager, pale, and
+dishevelled, with clenched teeth and frantic nails, rushed on the man, in
+transports that, in the brilliant light of the public square, gave to their
+faces expressions unsurpassed even in the shade of curtains and in the hollows
+of pillows. They were going to seize Colomban, to bite him, to strangle,
+dismember and rend him, when Maniflore, tall and dignified in her red tunic,
+stood forth, serene and terrible, confronting these furies who recoiled from
+before her in terror. Colomban seemed to be saved; his partisans succeeded in
+clearing a passage for him through the Place du Palais and in putting him into
+a cab stationed at the comer of the Pont-Vieux. The horse was already in full
+trot when Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, and M. de La Trumelle knocked the
+driver off his seat. Then, making the animal back and pushing the spokes of
+the wheels, they ran the vehicle on to the parapet of the bridge, whence they
+overturned it into the river amid the cheers of the delirious crowd. With a
+resounding splash a jet of water rose upwards, and then nothing but a slight
+eddy was to be seen on the surface of the stream.
+
+Almost immediately comrades Dagobert and Varambille, with the help of the
+seven hundred disguised Pyrotists, sent Prince des Boscenos head foremost into
+a river-laundry in which he was lamentably swallowed up.
+
+Serene night descended over the Place du Palais and shed silence and peace
+upon the frightful ruins with which it was strewed. In the mean time,
+Colomban, three thousand yards down the stream, cowering beside a lame old
+horse on a bridge, was meditating on the ignorance and injustice of crowds.
+
+"The business," said he to himself, "is even more troublesome than I believed.
+I foresee fresh difficulties."
+
+He got up and approached the unhappy animal.
+
+"What have you, poor friend, done to them?" said he. "It is on my account they
+have used you so cruelly."
+
+He embraced the unfortunate beast and kissed the white star on his forehead.
+Then he took him by the bridle and led him, both of them limping, trough the
+sleeping city to his house, where sleep soon allowed them to forget mankind.
+
+
+
+X. FATHER DOUILLARD
+
+In their infinite gentleness and at the suggestion of the common father of the
+faithful, the bishops, canons, vicars, curates, abbots, and friars of
+Penguinia resolved to hold a solemn service in the cathedral of Alca, and to
+pray that Divine mercy would deign to put an end to the troubles that
+distracted one of the noblest countries in Christendom, and grant to repentant
+Penguinia pardon for its crimes against God and the ministers of religion.
+
+The ceremony took place on the fifteenth of June. General Caraguel, surrounded
+by his staff, occupied the churchwarden's pew. The congregation was numerous
+and brilliant. According to M. Bigourd's expression it was both crowded and
+select. In the front rank was to be seen M. de la Bertheoseille, Chamberlain
+to his Highness Prince Crucho. Near the pulpit, which was to be ascended by
+the Reverend Father Douillard, of the Order of St. Francis, were gathered, in
+an attitude of attention with their hands crossed upon their wands of office,
+the great dignitaries of the Anti-Pyrotist association, Viscount Olive, M. de
+La Trumelle, Count Clena, the Duke d'Ampoule, and Prince des Boscenos. Father
+Agaric was in the apse with the teachers and pupils of St. Mael College. The
+right-hand transept and aisle were reserved for officers and soldiers in
+uniform, this side being thought the more honourable, since the Lord leaned
+his head to the right when he died on the Cross. The ladies of the
+aristocracy, and among them Countess Clena, Viscountess Olive, and Princess
+des Boscenos, occupied reserved seats. In the immense building and in the
+square outside were gathered twenty thousand clergy of all sorts, as well as
+thirty thousand of the laity.
+
+After the expiatory and propitiatory ceremony the Reverend Father Douillard
+ascended the pulpit. The sermon had at first been entrusted to the Reverend
+Father Agaric, but, in spite of his merits, he was thought unequal to the
+occasion in zeal and doctrine, and the eloquent Capuchin friar, who for six
+months had gone through the barracks preaching against the enemies of God and
+authority, had been chosen in his place.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, taking as his text, "He hath put down the
+mighty from their seat," established that all temporal power has God as its
+principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when it turns aside
+from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from the end to which
+He has directed it.
+
+Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he drew a terrible
+picture of the evils that the country's rulers had been unable either to
+prevent or to foresee.
+
+"The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my brethren," said
+he, "is only too well known to you. He is a monster whose destiny is
+providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from the Greek word,
+pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this etymology that a Jew
+was to set ablaze the country that had welcomed him."
+
+He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the Church, and
+crying in its agony:
+
+"O woe! O glory! Those who have crucified my God are crucifying me!"
+
+At these words a prolonged shudder passed through the assembly.
+
+The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he described the
+proud and crime-stained Colomban, plunged into the stream, all the waters of
+which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the humiliations and all the
+perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the President of the Republic and
+his Prime Minister with them.
+
+"That Minister," said he, "having been guilty of degrading cowardice in not
+exterminating the seven hundred Pyrotists with their allies and defenders, as
+Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered himself unworthy of
+exercising the power. that God delegated to him, and every good citizen ought
+henceforth to insult his contemptible government. Heaven will look favourably
+on those who despise him. 'He hath put down the mighty from their seat.' God
+will depose these pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their place strong men
+who will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you officers,
+non-commissioned officers, and soldiers who listen to me, I tell you General
+of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey God's orders, if
+in His name you do not depose those now in authority, if you do not establish
+a religious and strong government in Penguinia, God will none the less destroy
+what He has condemned, He will none the less save His people. He will save
+them, but, if you are wanting, He will do so by means of a humble artisan or a
+simple corporal. Hasten! The hour will soon be past."
+
+Excited by this ardent exhortation, the sixty thousand people present rose up
+trembling and shouting: "To arms! To arms! Death to the Pyrotists! Hurrah for
+Crucho!" and all of them, monks, women, soldiers, noblemen, citizens, and
+loafers, who were gathered beneath the superhuman arm uplifted in the pulpit,
+struck up the hymn, "Let us save Penguinia! They rushed impetuously from the
+basilica and marched along the quays to the Chamber of Deputies.
+
+Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting his arms to
+heaven, murmured in broken accents:
+
+"Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well whither this will
+lead us."
+
+The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace was repulsed.
+Vigorously charged by the police and Alcan guards, the assailants were already
+fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists, running from the slums and led by
+comrades Phoenix, Dagobert, Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw themselves upon
+them and completed their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and d'Ampoule were
+taken to the police station. Prince des Boscenos, after a valiant struggle,
+fell upon the bloody pavement with a fractured skull.
+
+In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an innumerable crowd
+of paper-sellers and gutter-merchants, ran through the boulevards all night,
+carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the mirrors of the cafes and the
+glasses of the street lamps amid cries of "Down with Crucho! Hurrah for the
+Social Revolution!" The Anti-Pyrotists in their turn upset the newspaper
+kiosks and tore down the hoardings.
+
+These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and they were fit
+causes for grief to the municipal authorities, who desired to preserve the
+good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder for a man of heart
+was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from fear of blows, kept at an
+equal distance from the two camps, and who, although they allowed their
+selfishness and cowardice to be visible, claimed admiration for the generosity
+of their sentiments and the nobility of their souls. They rubbed their eyes
+with onions, gaped like whitings, blew violently into their handkerchiefs,
+and, bringing their voices out of the depths of their stomachs, groaned forth:
+"O Penguins, cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend your mother's
+bosom!" As if men could live in society without disputes and without quarrels,
+and as if civil discords were not the necessary conditions of national life
+and progress. They showed themselves hypocritical cowards by proposing a
+compromise between the just and the unjust, offending the just in his
+rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these creatures, the rich and
+powerful Machimel, a champion coward, rose upon the town like a colossus of
+grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at his feet and his sighs capsized the
+boats of the fishermen.
+
+During these stormy nights Bidault-Coquille at the top of his old
+steam-engine, under the serene sky, boasted in his heart, while the shooting
+stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He was fighting for
+justice. He loved and was loved with a sublime passion. Insult and calumny
+raised him to the clouds. A caricature of him in company with those of
+Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be seen in the newspaper
+kiosks. The Anti-Pyrotists proclaimed that he had received fifty thousand
+francs from the big Jewish financiers. The reporters of the militarist sheets
+held interviews regarding his scientific knowledge with official scholars, who
+declared he had no knowledge of the stars, disputed his most solid
+observations, denied his most certain discoveries, and condemned his most
+ingenious and most fruitful hypotheses. He exulted under these flattering
+blows of hatred and envy.
+
+He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of lights, without
+giving a thought to all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias, vain dreams,
+spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a great city contains.
+
+"It is in this enormous city," said he to himself, "that the just and the
+unjust are joining battle."
+
+And substituting a simple and magnificent poetry for the multiple and vulgar
+reality, he represented to himself the Pyrot affair as a struggle between good
+and bad angels. He awaited the eternal triumph of the Sons of Light and
+congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day confounding the Children of
+Night.
+
+
+
+X. MR. JUSTICE CHAUSSEPIED
+
+Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the bands of Friar
+Douillard and the partisans of Prince Crucho, the Republicans at last opened
+their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair. The deputies who
+had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the patriotic crowds became,
+not indeed more courageous, but altered their cowardice and blamed Robin
+Mielleux for disorders which their own compliance had encouraged, and the
+instigators of which they had several times slavishly congratulated. They
+reproached him for having imperilled the Republic by a weakness which was
+really theirs and a timidity which they themselves had imposed upon him. Some
+of them began to doubt whether it was not to their interest to believe in
+Pyrot's innocence rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward they felt a
+bitter anguish at the thought that the unhappy man might have been wrongly
+convicted and that in his aerial cage he might be expiating another man's
+crimes. "I cannot sleep on account of it!" was what several members of
+Minister Guillaumette's majority used to say. But these were ambitious to
+replace their chief.
+
+These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the President of the
+Republic put in Robin Mielleux's place, a patriarchal Republican with a
+flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the Penguins, understood
+nothing about the affair, but thought that too many monks were mixed up in it.
+
+General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his final advice to
+Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.
+
+"I go and you remain," said he, as he shook hands with him. "The Pyrot affair
+is my daughter; I confide her to you, she is worthy of your love and your
+care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves the shade, is
+leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her modesty with
+gentleness. Too many indiscreet looks have already profaned her charms. . . .
+Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You have many, perhaps too
+many, in your possession. I see that there will be many tiresome interventions
+and much dangerous curiosity. If I were in your place I would tear up all
+those documents. Believe me, the best of proofs is none at all. That is the
+only one which nobody discusses."
+
+Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this advice. The future
+was only too thoroughly to justify Greatauk's perspicacity. La Trinite
+demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche, his Minister
+of War, refused them in the superior interests of the national defence,
+telling him that the documents under General Panther's care formed the hugest
+mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied the case as well as he
+could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of the matter, suspected it of
+irregularity. Conformably to his rights and prerogatives he then ordered a
+fresh trial to be held. Immediately, Peniche, his Minister of War, accused him
+of insulting the army and betraying the country and flung his portfolio at his
+head. He was replaced by a second, who did the same. To him succeeded a third,
+who imitated these examples, and those after him to the number of seventy
+acted like their predecessors, until the venerable La Trinite groaned beneathe
+the weight of bellicose portfolios. The seventy-first Minister of War, van
+Julep, retained office. Not that he was in disagreement with so many and such
+noble colleagues, but he had been commissioned by them generously to betray
+his Prime Minister, to cover him with shame and opprobrium, and to convert the
+new trial to the glory of Greatauk, the satisfaction of the Anti-Pyrotists,
+the profit of the monks, and the restoration of Prince Crucho.
+
+General van Julep, though endowed with high military virtues, was not
+intelligent enough to employ the subtle conduct and exquisite methods of
+Greatauk. He thought, like General Panther, that tangible proofs against Pyrot
+were necessary, that they could never ave too many of them, that they could
+never have even enough. He expressed these' sentiments to his Chief of Staff,
+who was only too inclined to agree with them.
+
+"Panther," said he, "we are at the moment when we need abundant and
+superabundant proofs."
+
+"You have said enough, General," answered Panther, "I will complete my piles
+of documents."
+
+Six months later the proofs against Pyrot filled two storeys of the Ministry
+of War. The ceiling fell in beneath the weight of the bundles, and the
+avalanche of falling documents crushed two head clerks, fourteen second
+clerks, and sixty copying clerks, who were at work upon the ground floor
+arranging a change in the fashion of the cavalry gaiters. The walls of the
+huge edifice had to be propped. Passers-by saw with amazement enormous beams
+and monstrous stanchions which reared themselves obliquely against the noble
+front of the building, now tottering and disjointed, and blocked up the
+streets, stopped the carriages, and presented to the motor-omnibuses an
+obstacle against which they dashed with their loads of passengers.
+
+The judges who had condemned Pyrot were not, properly speaking, judges but
+soldiers. The judges who had condemned Colomban were real judges, but of
+inferior rank, wearing seedy black clothes like church vergers, unlucky
+wretches of judges, miserable judgelings. Above them were the superior judges
+who wore ermine robes over their black gowns. These, renowned for their
+knowledge and doctrine, formed a court whose terrible name expressed power. It
+was called the Court of Appeal (Cassation) so as to make it clear that it was
+the hammer suspended over the judgments and decrees of all other
+jurisdictions.
+
+One of these superior red Judges of the Supreme Court, called Chaussepied, led
+a modest and tranquil life in a suburb of Alca. His soul was pure, his heart
+honest, his spirit just. When he had finished studying his documents he used
+to play the violin and cultivate hyacinths. Every Sunday he dined with his
+neighbours the Mesdemoiselles Helbivore. His old age was cheerful and robust
+and his friends often praised the amenity of his character.
+
+For some months, however, he had been irritable and touchy, and when he opened
+a newspaper his broad and ruddy face would become covered with dolorous
+wrinkles and darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the cause of it. Justice
+Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could have committed so black
+a crime as to hand over eighty thousand trusses of military hay to a
+neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could still less conceive how a
+scoundrel should have found official defenders in Penguinia. The thought that
+there existed in his country a Pyrot, a Colonel Hastaing, a Colomban, a
+Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his hyacinths,his violin, his heaven, and his
+earth, all nature, and even his dinner with the Mesdemoiselles Helbivore!
+
+In the mean time the Pyrot case, having been presented to the Supreme Court by
+the Keeper of Seals, it fell to Chaussepied to examine it and cover its
+defects, in case any existed. Although as upright and honest as a man can be,
+and trained by long habit to exercise his magistracy without fear or favour,
+he expected to find in the documents he submitted to him proofs of certain
+guilt and obvious criminality. After lengthened difficulties and repeated
+refusals on the part of General Julep, Justice Chaussepied was allowed to
+examine the documents. Numbered and initialed they ran to the number of
+fourteen millions six hundred and twenty-six thousand three hundred and
+twelve. As he studied them the judge was at first surprised, then astonished,
+then stupefied, amazed, and, if I dare say so, flabbergasted. He found among
+the documents prospectuses of new fancy shops, newspapers, fashion-plates,
+paper bags, old business letters, exercise books, brown paper, green paper for
+rubbing parquet floors, playing cards, diagrams, six thousand copies of the
+"Key to Dreams," but not a single document in which any mention was made of
+Pyrot.
+
+
+
+XI. CONCLUSION
+
+The appeal was allowed, and Pyrot was brought down from his cage. But the
+Anti-Pyrotists did not regard themselves as beaten. The military judges
+re-tried Pyrot. Greatauk, in this second affair, surpassed himself. He
+obtained a second conviction; he obtained it by declaring that the proofs
+communicated to the Supreme Court were worth nothing, and that great care had
+been taken to keep back the good ones, since they ought to remain secret. In
+the opinion of connoisseurs he had never shown so much address. On leaving the
+court, as he passed through the vestibule with a tranquil step, and his hands
+behind his back, amidst a crowd of sight-seers, a woman dressed in red and
+with her face covered by a black veil rushed at him, brandishing a kitchen
+knife.
+
+"Die, scoundrel!" she cried. It was Maniflore. Before those present could
+understand what was happening, the general seized her by the wrist, and with
+apparent gentleness, squeezed it so forcibly that the knife fell from her
+aching hand.
+
+Then he picked it up and handed it to Maniflore.
+
+"Madam," said he with a bow, "you have dropped a household utensil."
+
+He could not prevent the heroine from being taken to the police-station; but
+he had her immediately released and afterwards he employed all his influence
+to stop the prosecution.
+
+The second conviction of Pyrot was Greatauk's last victory.
+
+Justice Chaussepied, who had formerly liked soldiers so much, and esteemed
+their justice so highly,, being now enraged with the military judges, quashed
+their judgments as a monkey cracks nuts. He rehabilitated Pyrot a second time;
+he would, if necessary, have rehabilitated him five hundred times.
+
+Furious at having been cowards and at having allowed themselves to be deceived
+and made game of, the Republicans turned against the monks and clergy. The
+deputies passed laws of expulsion, separation, and spoliation against them.
+What Father Cornemuse had foreseen took place. That good monk was driven from
+the Wood of Conils. Treasury officers confiscated his retorts and his stills,
+and the liquidators divided amongst them his bottles of St. Oberosian liqueur.
+The pious distiller lost the annual income of three million five hundred
+thousand francs that his products procured for him. Father Agaric went into
+exile, abandoning his school into the hands of laymen, who soon allowed it to
+fall into decay. Separated from its foster-mother, the State, the Church of
+Penguinia withered like a plucked flower.
+
+The victorious defenders of the innocent man now abused each other and
+overwhelmed each other reciprocally with insults and calumnies. The vehement
+Kerdanic hurled himself upon Phoenix as if ready to devour him. The wealthy
+Jews and the seven hundred Pyrotists turned away with disdain from the
+socialist comrades whose aid they had humbly implored in the past.
+
+"We know you no longer," said they. "To the devil with you and your social
+justice. Social justice is the defence of property."
+
+Having been elected a Deputy and chosen to be the leader of the new majority,
+comrade Larrivee was appointed by the Chamber and public opinion to the
+Premiership. He showed himself an energetic defender of the military tribunals
+that had condemned Pyrot. When his former socialist comrades claimed a little
+more justice and liberty for the employes of the State as well as for manual
+workers, he opposed their proposals in an eloquent speech.
+
+"Liberty," said he, "is not licence. Between order and disorder my choice is
+made: revolution is impotence. Progress has no more formidable enemy than
+violence. Gentlemen, those who, as I am, are anxious for reform, ought to
+apply themselves before everything else to cure this agitation which enfeebles
+government just as fever exhausts those who are ill. It is time to reassure
+honest people."
+
+This speech was received with applause. The government of the Republic
+remained in subjection to the great financial companies, the army was
+exclusively devoted to the defence of capital, while the fleet was designed
+solely to procure fresh orders for the mine-owners. Since the rich refused to
+pay their just share of the taxes, the poor, as in the past, paid for them.
+
+In the mean time from the height of his old steamline, beneath the crowded
+stars of night, Bidault-Coquille gazed sadly at the sleeping city. Maniflore
+had left him. Consumed with a desire for fresh devotions and fresh sacrifices,
+she had gone in company with a young Bulgarian to bear justice and vengeance
+to Sofia. He did not regret her, having perceived after the Affair, that she
+was less beautiful in form and in thought than he had at first imagined. His
+impressions had been modified in the same direction concerning many other
+forms and many other thoughts. And what was cruelest of all to him, he
+regarded himself as not so great, not so splendid, as he had believed.
+
+And he reflected:
+
+"You considered yourself sublime when you had but candour and good-will. Of
+what were you proud, Bidault-Coquille? Of having been one of the first to know
+that Pyrot was innocent and Greatauk a scoundrel. But three-fourths of those
+who defended Greatauk against the attacks of the seven hundred Pyrotists knew
+that better than you. Of what then did you show yourself so proud? Of having
+dared to say what you thought? That is civic courage, and, like military
+courage, it is a mere result of imprudence. You have been imprudent. So far so
+good, but that is no reason for praising yourself beyond measure. Your
+imprudence was trifling; it exposed you to trifling perils; you did not risk
+your head by it. The Penguins have lost that cruel and sanguinary pride which
+formerly gave a tragic grandeur to their revolutions; it is the fatal result
+of the weakening of beliefs and character. Ought one to look upon oneself as a
+superior spirit for having shown a little more clear-sightedness than the
+vulgar? I am very much afraid, on the contrary, Bidault-Coquille, that you
+have given proof of a gross misunderstanding of the conditions of the moral
+and intellectual development of a people. You imagined that social injustices
+were threaded together like pearls and that it would be enough to pull off one
+in order to unfasten the whole necklace. That is a very ingenuous conception.
+You flattered yourself that at one stroke you were establishing justice in
+your own country and in the universe. You were a brave man, an honest
+idealist, though without much experimental philosophy. But go home to your own
+heart and you will recognise that you had in you a spice of malice and that
+our ingenuousness was not without cunning. You believed you were performing a
+fine moral action. You said to yourself: 'Here am I, just and courageous once
+for all. I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the praise of
+historians.' And now that you have lost your illusions, now that you know how
+hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the task must ever be begun afresh, you
+are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but go back to them with
+modesty, Bidault-Coquille!"
+
+
+
+BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES
+
+MADAME CERES
+
+"Only extreme things are tolerable."  Count Robert de Montesquiou.
+
+I. MADAME CLARENCE'S DRAWING-ROOM
+
+Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the Republic, loved to
+entertain. Every Thursday she collected together some friends of modest
+condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who went to see her,
+very different in age and rank, were all without money, and had all suffered
+much. There was a duchess who looked like a fortune-teller and a
+fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. Madame Clarence was pretty enough to
+maintain some old liaisons, but not to form new ones, and she generally
+inspired a quiet esteem. She had a very pretty daughter, who, since she had no
+dower, caused some alarm among the male guests; for the Penguins were as much
+afraid of portionless girls as they were of the devil himself. Eveline
+Clarence, noticing their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them
+their tea with an air of disdain. Moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties
+and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her discreet and
+retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those who took
+part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she would not
+understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might listen to
+everything.
+
+One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence's drawing-room, the conversation
+turned upon love. The ladies spoke of it with pride, delicacy, and mystery,
+the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone took an interest in the
+conversation, for each one was interested in what he or she said. A great deal
+of wit flowed; brilliant apostrophes were launched forth and keen repartees
+were returned. But when Professor Haddi began to speak he overwhelmed
+everybody.
+
+"It is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on everything else,"
+said he, "they rest upon anterior habits whose very memory has been effaced.
+In morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds for existing, the most
+useless obligations, the cruelest and most injurious restraints, are because
+of their profound antiquity and the mystery of their origin, the least
+disputed and the least disputable as well as the most respected, and they are
+those that cannot be violated without incurring the most severe blame. All
+morality relative to the relations of the sexes is founded on this principle:
+that a woman once obtained belongs to the man, that she is his property like
+his horse or his weapons. And this having ceased to be true, absurdities
+result from it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a woman to a man,
+with clauses restricting the right of ownership introduced as a consequence of
+the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.
+
+"The obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her virginity to her
+husband comes from the times when girls were married immediately they were of
+a marriageable age. It is ridiculous that a girl who marries at twenty-five or
+thirty should be subject to that obligation. You will, perhaps, say that it is
+a present with which her husband, if she gets one at last, will be gratified;
+but every moment we see men wooing married women and showing themselves
+perfectly satisfied to take them as they find them.
+
+"Still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined in religious
+morality by the old belief that God, the most powerful of warriors, is
+polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself, and that men can
+only take those whom he has left. This belief, although traces of it exist in
+several metaphors of mysticism, is abandoned to-day, by most civilised
+peoples. However, it still dominates the education of girls not only among our
+believers, but even among our free-thinkers, who, as a rule, think freely for
+the reason that they do not think at all.
+
+"Discretion means ability to separate and discern. We say that a girl is
+discreet when she knows nothing at all. We cultivate her ignorance. In spite
+of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot conceal from
+them their own nature and their own sensations. But they know badly, they know
+in a wrong way. That is all we obtain by our careful education. . . ."
+
+"Sir," suddenly said Joseph Boutourle, the High Treasurer of Alca, "believe
+me, there are innocent girls, perfectly innocent girls, and it is a great
+pity. I have known three. They married, and the result was tragical."
+
+"I have noticed," Professor Haddock went on, "that Europeans in general and
+Penguins in particular occupy themselves, after sport and motoring, with
+nothing so much as with love. It is giving a great deal of importance to a
+matter that has very little weight."
+
+"Then, Professor," exclaimed Madame Cremeur in a choking voice, "when a woman
+has completely surrendered herself to you, you think it is a matter of no
+importance?"
+
+"No, Madame; it can have its importance," answered Professor Haddock, "but it
+is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she offers us a
+delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions. And then, do we
+not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather than gives herself.
+Look at the pretty Madame Pensee. . . ."
+
+"She is my mother," said a tall, fair young man.
+
+"Sir, I have the greatest respect for her," replied Professor Haddock; "do not
+be afraid that I intend to say anything in the least offensive about her. But
+allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of sons about their mothers
+are not to be relied on. They do not bear enough in mind that a mother is a
+mother only because she loved, and that she can still love. That, however, is
+the case, and it would be deplorable were it otherwise. I have noticed, on the
+contrary, that daughters do not deceive themselves about their mothers'
+faculty for loving or about the use they make of it; they are rivals; they
+have their eyes upon them."
+
+The insupportable Professor spoke a great deal longer, adding indecorum to
+awkwardness, and impertinence to incivility, accumulating incongruities,
+despising what is respectable, respecting what is despicable; but no one
+listened to him further.
+
+During this time in a room that was simple without grace, a room sad for the
+want of love, a room which, like all young girls' rooms, had something of the
+cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, Eveline Clarence turned over
+the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of charities in order to obtain
+from them some acquaintance with society. Being convinced that her mother,
+shut up in her own intellectual but poor world, could neither bring her out or
+push her into prominence, she decided that she herself would seek the best
+means of winning a husband. At once calm and obstinate, without dreams or
+illusions, and regarding marriage as but a ticket of admission or a passport,
+she kept before her mind a clear notion of the hazards, difficulties, and
+chances of her enterprise. She had the art of pleasing and a coldness of
+temperament that enabled her to turn it to its fullest advantage. Her weakness
+lay in the fact that she was dazzled by anything that had an aristocratic air.
+
+When she was alone with her mother she said:
+
+"Mamma, we will go to-morrow to Father Douillard's retreat."
+
+
+
+II. THE CHARITY OF ST. ORBEROSIA
+
+Every Friday evening at nine o'clock the choicest of Alcan society assembled
+in the aristocratic church of St. Mael for the Reverend Father Douillard's
+retreat. Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Viscount and Viscountess Olive, M.
+and Madame Bigourd, Monsieur and Madame de La Trumelle were never absent. The
+flower of the aristocracy might be seen there, and fair Jewish baronesses also
+adorned it by their presence, for the Jewish baronesses of Alca were
+Christians.
+
+This retreat, like all religious retreats, had for its object to procure for
+those living in the world opportunities for recollection so that they might
+think of their eternal salvation. It was also intended to draw down upon so
+man noble and illustrious families the benediction of L. Orberosia, who loves
+the Penguins. The Reverend Father Douillard strove for the completion of his
+task with a truly apostolical zeal. He hoped to restore the prerogatives of
+St. Orberosia as the patron saint of Penguinia and to dedicate to her a
+monumental church on one of the hills that dominate the city. His efforts had
+been crowned with great success, and for the accomplishing of this national
+enterprise he had already united more than a hundred thousand adherents and
+collected more than twenty millions of francs.
+
+It was in the choir of St. Mael's that St. Orberosia's new shrine, shining
+with gold, sparkling with precious stones, and surrounded by tapers and
+flowers, had been erected.
+
+The following account may be read in the "History of the Miracles of the
+Patron Saint of Alca" by the Abbe Plantain:
+
+"The ancient shrine had been melted down during the Terror and the precious
+relics of the saint thrown into a fire that had been lit on the Place de
+Greve; but a poor woman of great piety, named Rouquin, went by night at the
+peril of her life to gather up the calcined bones and the ashes of the blessed
+saint. She preserved them in a jam-pot, and when religion was again restored,
+brought them to the venerable Cure of St. Maels. The woman ended her days
+piously as a vendor of tapers and custodian of seats in the saint's chapel."
+
+It is certain that in the time of Father Douillard, although faith was
+declining, the cult of St. Orberosia, which for three hundred years had fallen
+under the criticism of Canon Princeteau and the silence of the Doctors of the
+Church, recovered, and was surrounded with more pomp, more splendour, and more
+fervour than ever. The theologians did not now subtract a single iota from the
+legend. They held as certainly established all the facts related by Abbot
+Simplicissimus, and in particular declared, on the testimony of that monk,
+that the devil, assuming a monk's form had carried off the saint to a cave and
+had there striven with her until she overcame him. Neither places nor dates
+caused them any embarrassment. They paid no heed to exegesis and took good
+care not to grant as much to science as Canon Princeteau had formerly
+conceded. They knew too well whither that would lead.
+
+The church shone with lights and flowers. An operatic tenor sang the famous
+canticle of St. Orberosia:
+
+    Virgin of Paradise
+    Come, come in the dusky night
+    And on us shed
+    Thy beams of light.
+
+Mademoiselle Clarence sat beside her mother and in front of Viscount Clena.
+She remained kneeling during a considerable time, for the attitude of prayer
+is natural to discreet virgins and it shows off their figures.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. He was a powerful orator
+and could, at once melt, surprise, and rouse his hearers. Women complained
+only that he fulminated against vice with excessive harshness and in crude
+terms that made them blush. But they liked him none the less for it.
+
+He treated in his sermon of the seventh trial of St. Orberosia, who was
+tempted by the dragon which she went forth to combat. But she did not yield,
+and she disarmed the monster. The orator demonstrated without difficulty that
+we, also, by the aid of St. Orberosia, and strong in the virtue which she
+inspires, can in our turn overthrow the dragons that dart upon us and are
+waiting to devour us, the dragon of doubt, the dragon of impiety, the dragon
+of forgetfulness of religious duties. He proved that the charity of St.
+Orberosia was a work of social regeneration, and he concluded by an ardent
+appeal to the faithful "to become instruments of the Divine mercy, eager
+upholders and supporters of the charity of St. Orberosia, and to furnish it
+with all the means which it required to take its flight and bear its salutary
+fruits." *
+
+* Cf. J. Ernest Charles in the "Censeur," May-August, 1907, p. 562, col. 2.
+
+
+After the ceremony, the Reverend Father Douillard remained in the sacristy at
+the disposal of those of the faithful who desired information concerning the
+charity, or who wished to bring their contributions. Mademoiselle Clarence
+wished to speak to Father Douillard, so did Viscount Clena. The crowd was
+large, and a queue was formed. By chance Viscount Clena and Mademoiselle
+Clarence were side by side and possibly they were squeezed a little closely to
+each other by the crowd. Eveline had noticed this fashionable young man, who
+was almost as well known as his father in the world of sport. Clena had
+noticed her, and, as he thought her pretty, he bowed to her, then apologised
+and pretended to believe that he had been introduced to the ladies, but could
+not remember where. They pretended to believe it also.
+
+He presented himself the following week at Madame Clarence's, thinking that
+her house was a bit fast--a thing not likely to displease him--and when he saw
+Eveline again he felt he had not been mistaken and that she was an extremely
+pretty girl.
+
+Viscount Clena had the finest motor-car in Europe. For three months he drove
+the Clarences every day over hills and plains, through woods and valleys; they
+visited famous sites and went over celebrated castles. He said to Eveline all
+that could be said and did all that could be done to overcome her resistance.
+She did not conceal from him that she loved him, that she would always love
+him, and love no one but him. She remained grave and trembling by his side. To
+his devouring passion she opposed the invincible defence of a virtue conscious
+of its danger. At the end of three months, after having gone uphill and down
+hill, turned sharp corners, and negotiated level crossings, and experienced
+innumerable break-downs, he knew her as well as he knew the fly-wheel of his
+car, but not much better. He employed surprises, adventures, sudden stoppages
+in the depths of forests and before hotels, but he had advanced no farther. He
+said to himself that it was absurd; then, taking her again in his car he set
+off at fifty miles an hour quite prepared to upset her in a ditch or to smash
+himself and her against a tree.
+
+One day, having come to take her on some excursion, he found her more charming
+than ever, and more provoking. He darted upon her as a storm falls upon the
+reeds that border a lake. She bent with adorable weakness beneath the breath
+of the storm, and twenty times was almost carried away by its strength, but
+twenty times she arose, supple and, bowing to the wind. After all these shocks
+one would have said that a light breeze had barely touched her charming stem;
+she smiled as if ready to be plucked by a bold hand. Then her unhappy
+aggressor, desperate, enraged, and three parts mad, fled so as not to kill
+her, mistook the door, went into the bedroom of Madame Clarence, whom he found
+putting on her hat in front of a wardrobe, seized her, flung her on the bed,
+and possessed her before she knew what had happened.
+
+The same day Eveline, who had been making inquiries, learned that Viscount
+Clena had nothing but debts, lived on money given him by an elderly lady, and
+promoted the sale of the latest models of a motor-car manufacturer. They
+separated with common accord and Eveline began again disdainfully to serve tea
+to her mother's guests.
+
+
+
+III. HIPPOLYTE CERES
+
+In Madame Clarence's drawing-room the conversation turned upon love, and many
+charming things were said about it.
+
+"Love is a sacrifice," sighed Madame Cremeur.
+
+"I agree with you," replied M. Boutourle with animation.
+
+But Professor Haddock soon displayed his fastidious insolence.
+
+"It seems to me," said he, "that the Penguin ladies have made a great fuss
+since, through St. Mael's agency, they became viviparous. But there is nothing
+to be particularly proud of in that, for it is a state they share in common
+with cows and pigs, and even with orange and lemon trees, for the seeds of
+these plants germinate in the pericarp."
+
+"The self-importance which the Penguin ladies give themselves does not go so
+far back as that," answered M. Boutourle. "It dates from the day when the holy
+apostle gave them clothes. But this self-importance was long kept in
+restraint, and displayed itself fully only with increased luxury of dress and
+in a small section of society. For go only two leagues from Alca into the
+country at harvest time, and you will see whether women are over-precise or
+self-important."
+
+On that day M. Hippolyte Ceres paid his first call. He was a Deputy of Alca,
+and one of the youngest members of the House. His father was said to have kept
+a dram shop, but he himself was a lawyer of robust physique, a good though
+prolix speaker, with a self-important air and a reputation for ability.
+
+"M. Ceres," said the mistress of the house, "your constituency is one of the
+finest in Alca."
+
+"And there are fresh improvements made in it every day, Madame."
+
+"Unfortunately, it is impossible to take a stroll through it any longer," said
+M. Boutourle.
+
+"Why?" asked M. Ceres.
+
+"On account of the motors, of course."
+
+"Do not give them a bad name," answered the Deputy. "They are our great
+national industry."
+
+"I know. The Penguins of to-day make me think of the ancient Egyptians.
+According to Clement of Alexandria, Taine tells us--though he misquotes the
+text--the Egyptians worshipped the crocodiles that devoured them. The Penguins
+to-day worship the motors that crush them. Without a doubt the future belongs
+to the metal beast. We are no more likely to go back to cabs than we are to go
+back to the diligence. And the long martyrdom of the horse will come to an
+end. The motor, which the frenzied cupidity of manufacturers hurls like a
+juggernaut's car upon the bewildered people and of which the idle and
+fashionable make a foolish though fatal elegance, will soon begin to perform
+its true function, and putting its strength at the service of the entire
+people, will behave like a docile, toiling monster. But in order that the
+motor may cease to be injurious and become beneficent we must build roads
+suited to its speed, roads which it cannot tear up with its ferocious tyres,
+and from which it will send no clouds of poisonous dust into human lungs. We
+ought not to allow slower vehicles or mere animals to go upon those roads, and
+we should establish garages upon them and foot-bridges over them, and so
+create order and harmony among the means of communication of the future. That
+is the wish of every good citizen."
+
+Madame Clarence led the conversation back to the improvements in M. Ceres'
+constituency. M. Ceres showed his enthusiasm for demolitions, tunnelings,
+constructions, reconstructions, and all other fruitful operations.
+
+"We build to-day in an admirable style," said he; "everywhere majestic avenues
+are being reared. Was ever anything as fine as our arcaded bridges and our
+domed hotels!"
+
+"You are forgetting that big palace surmounted an immense melon-shaped dome,"
+grumbled by M. Daniset, an old art amateur, in a voice of restrained rage. "I
+am amazed at the degree of ugliness which a modern city can attain. Alca is
+becoming Americanised. Everywhere we are destroying all that is free,
+unexpected, measured, restrained, human, or traditional among the things that
+are left us. Everywhere we are destroying that charming object, a piece of an
+old wall that bears up the branches of a tree. Everywhere we are suppressing
+some fragment of light and air, some fragment of nature, some fragment of the
+associations that still remain with us, some fragment of our fathers, some
+fragment of ourselves. And we are putting up frightful, enormous, infamous
+houses, surmounted in Viennese style by ridiculous domes, or fashioned after
+the models of the 'new art' without mouldings, or having profiles with
+sinister corbels and burlesque pinnacles, and such monsters as these
+shamelessly peer over the surrounding buildings. We see bulbous protuberances
+stuck on the fronts of buildings and we are told they are 'new art' motives. I
+have seen the 'new art' in other countries, but it is not so ugly as with us;
+it has fancy and it has simplicity. It is only in our own country that by a
+sad privilege we may behold the newest and most diverse styles of
+architectural ugliness. Not an enviable privilege!"
+
+"Are you not afraid," asked M. Ceres severely, "are you not afraid that these
+bitter criticisms tend to keep out of our capital the foreigners who flow into
+it from all arts of the world and who leave millions behind them?"
+
+"You may set your mind at rest about that," answered M. Daniset. "Foreigners
+do not come to admire our buildings; they come to see our courtesans, our
+dressmakers, and our dancing saloons."
+
+"We have one bad habit," sighed M. Ceres, "it is that we calumniate
+ourselves."
+
+Madame Clarence as an accomplished hostess thought it was time to return to
+the subject of love and asked M. Jumel his opinion of M. Leon Blum's recent
+book in which the author complained. . . .
+
+". . . That an irrational custom," went on Professor Haddock, "prevents
+respectable young ladies from making love, a thing they would enjoy doing,
+whilst mercenary girls do it too much and without getting any enjoyment out of
+it. It is indeed deplorable. But M. Leon Blum need not fret too much. If the
+evil exists, as he says it does, in our middle-class society, I can assure him
+that everywhere else he would see a consoling spectacle. Among the people, the
+mass of the people through town and country, girls do not deny themselves that
+pleasure."
+
+"It is depravity!" said Madame Cremeur.
+
+And she praised the innocence of young girls in terms full of modesty and
+grace. It was charming to hear her.
+
+Professor Haddock's views on the same subject were, on the contrary, painful
+to listen to.
+
+"Respectable young girls," said he, "are guarded and watched over. Besides,
+men do not, as a rule, pursue them much, either through probity, or from a
+fear of grave responsibilities, or because the seduction of a young girl would
+not be to their credit. Even then we do not know what really takes place, for
+the reason that what is hidden is not seen. This is a condition necessary to
+the existence of all society. The scruples of respectable young girls could be
+more easily overcome than those of married women if the same pressure were
+brought to bear on them, and for this there are two reasons: they have more
+illusions, and their curiosity has not been satisfied. Women, for the most
+part, have been so disappointed by their husbands that they have not courage
+enough to begin again with somebody else. I myself have been met by this
+obstacle several times in my attempts at seduction."
+
+At the moment when Professor Haddock ended his unpleasant remarks,
+Mademoiselle Eveline Clarence entered the drawing-room and listlessly handed
+about tea with that expression of boredom which gave an oriental charm to her
+beauty.
+
+"For my part," said Hippolyte Ceres, looking at her, "I declare myself the
+young ladies' champion."
+
+"He must be a fool," thought the girl.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, who had never set foot outside of his political world of
+electors and elected, thought Madame Clarence's drawing-room most select, its
+mistress exquisite, and her daughter amazingly beautiful. His visits became
+frequent and he paid court to both of them. Madame Clarence, who now liked
+attention, thought him agreeable. Eveline showed no friendliness towards him,
+and treated him with a hauteur and disdain that he took for aristocratic
+behaviour and fashionable manners, and he thought all the more of her on that
+account. This busy man taxed his ingenuity to please them, and he sometimes
+succeeded. He got them cards for fashionable functions and boxes at the Opera.
+He furnished Mademoiselle Clarence with several opportunities of appearing to
+great advantage and in particular at a garden party which, although given by a
+Minister, was regarded as really fashionable, and gained its first success in
+society circles for the Republic.
+
+At that party Eveline had been much noticed and had attracted the special
+attention of a young diplomat called Roger Lambilly who, imagining that she
+belonged to a rather fast set, invited her to his bachelor's flat. She thought
+him handsome and believed him rich, and she accepted. A little moved, almost
+disquieted, she very nearly became the victim of her daring, and only avoided
+defeat by an offensive measure audaciously carried out. This was the most
+foolish escapade in her unmarried life.
+
+Being now on friendly terms with Ministers and with the President, Eveline
+continued to wear her aristocratic and pious affectations, and these won for
+her the sympathy of the chief personages in the anti-clerical and democratic
+Republic. M. Hippolyte Ceres, seeing that she was succeeding and doing him
+credit, liked her still more. He even went so far as to fall madly in love
+with her.
+
+Henceforth, in spite of everything, she began to observe him with interest,
+being curious to see if his passion would increase. He appeared to her without
+elegance or grace, and not well bred, but active, clear-sighted, full of
+resource, and not too great a bore. She still made fun of him, but he had now
+won her interest.
+
+One day she wished to test him. It was during the elections, when members of
+Parliament were, as the phrase runs, requesting a renewal of their mandates.
+He had an opponent, who, though not dangerous at first and not much of an
+orator, was rich and was reported to be gaining votes every day. Hippolyte
+Ceres, banishing both dull security and foolish alarm from his mind, redoubled
+his care. His chief method of action was by public meetings at which he spoke
+vehemently against the rival candidate. His committee held huge meetings on
+Saturday evenings and at three o'clock on Sunday afternoons. One Sunday, as he
+called on the Clarences, he found Eveline alone in the drawing-room. He had
+been chatting for about twenty or twenty-five minutes, when, taking out his
+watch, he saw that it was a quarter to three. The young girl showed herself
+amiable, engaging, attractive, and full of promises. Ceres was fascinated, but
+he stood up to go.
+
+"Stay a little longer," said she in a pressing and agreeable voice which made
+him promptly sit down again.
+
+She was full of interest, of abandon, curiosity, and weakness. He blushed,
+turned pale, and again got up.
+
+Then, in order to keep him still longer, she looked at him out of two grey and
+melting eyes, and though her bosom was heaving, she did not say another word.
+He fell at her feet in distraction,, but once more looking at his watch, he
+jumped up with a terrible oath.
+
+"D--! a quarter to four! I must be off."
+
+And immediately he rushed down the stairs.
+
+From that time onwards she had a certain amount of esteem for him.
+
+
+
+IV. A POLITICIAN'S MARRIAGE
+
+She was not quite in love with him, but she wished him to be in love with her.
+She was, moreover, very reserved with him, and that not solely from any want
+of inclination to be otherwise, since in affairs of love some things are due
+to indifference, to inattention, to woman's instinct, to traditional custom
+and feeling, to a desire to try one's power, and to satisfaction at seeing its
+results. The reason of her prudence was that she knew him to be very much
+infatuated and capable of taking advantage of any familiarities she allowed as
+well as of reproaching her coarsely afterwards if she discontinued them.
+
+As he was a professed anti-clerical and free-thinker, she thought it a good
+plan to affect an appearance of piety in his presence and to be seen with
+prayer-books bound in red morocco, such as Queen Marie Leczinska's or the
+Dauphiness Marie Josephine's "The Last Two Weeks of Lent." She lost no
+opportunity, either, of showing him the subscriptions that she collected for
+the endowment of the national cult of St. Orberosia. Eveline did not act in
+this way because she wished to tease him. Nor did it spring from a young
+girl's archness, or a spirit of constraint, or even from snobbishness, though
+there was more than a suspicion of this latter in her behaviour. It was but
+her way of asserting herself, of stamping herself with a definite character,
+of increasing her value. To rouse the Deputy's courage she wrapped herself up
+in religion, just as Brunhild surrounded herself with flames so as to attract
+Sigurd. Her audacity was successful. He thought her still more beautiful thus.
+Clericalism was in his eyes a sign of good form.
+
+Ceres was re-elected by an enormous majority and returned to a House which
+showed itself more inclined to the Left, more advanced, and, as it seemed,
+more eager for reform than its predecessor. Perceiving at once that so much
+zeal was but intended to hide a fear of change, and a sincere desire to do
+nothing, he determined to adopt a policy that would satisfy these aspirations.
+At the beginning of the session he made a great speech, cleverly thought out
+and well arranged, dealing with the idea that all reform ought to be put off
+for a long time. He showed himself heated, even fervid; holding the principle
+that an orator should recommend moderation with extreme vehemence. He was
+applauded by the entire assembly. The Clarences listened to him from the
+President's box and Eveline trembled in spite of herself at the solemn sound
+of the applause. On the same bench the fair Madame Pensee shivered at the
+intonations of his virile voice.
+
+As soon as he descended from the tribune, Ceres, even while the audience were
+still clapping, went without a moment's delay to salute the Clarences in their
+box. Eveline saw in him the beauty of success, and as he leaned towards the
+ladies, wiping his neck with his handkerchief and receiving their
+congratulations with an air of modesty though not without a tinge of
+self-conceit, the young girl glanced towards Madame Pensee and saw her,
+palpitating and breathless, drinking in the hero's applause with her head
+thrown backwards. It seemed as if she were on the point of fainting. Eveline
+immediately smiled tenderly on M. Ceres.
+
+The Alcan deputy's speech had a great vogue. In political "spheres" it was
+regarded as extremely able. "We have at last heard an honest pronouncement,"
+said the chief Moderate journal. "It is a regular programme!" they said in the
+House. It was agreed that he was a man of immense talent.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres had now established himself as leader of the radicals,
+socialists, and anti-clericals, and they appointed him President of their
+group, which was then the most considerable in the House. He thus found
+himself marked out for office in the next ministerial combination.
+
+After a long hesitation Eveline Clarence accepted the idea of marrying M.
+Hippolyte Ceres. The great man was a little common for her taste. Nothing had
+yet proved that he would one day reach the point where politics bring in large
+sums of money. But she was entering her twenty-seventh year and knew enough of
+life to see that she must not be too fastidious or show herself too difficult
+to please.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was celebrated; Hippolyte Ceres was happy. He was no longer
+recognisable; the elegance of his clothes and deportment had increased
+tremendously. He wore an undue number of white gloves. Now that he was too
+much of a society man, Eveline began to doubt if it was not worse than being
+too little of one. Madame Clarence regarded the engagement with favour. She
+was reassured concerning her daughter's future and pleased to have flowers
+given her every Thursday for her drawing-room.
+
+The celebration of the marriage raised some difficulties. Eveline was pious
+and wished to receive the benediction of the Church. Hippolyte Ceres, tolerant
+but a free-thinker, wanted only a civil marriage. There were many discussions
+and even some violent scenes upon the subject. The last took place in the
+young girl's room at the moment when the invitations were being written.
+Eveline declared that if she did not go to church she would not believe
+herself married. She spoke of breaking off the engagement, and of going abroad
+with her mother, or of retiring into a convent. Then she became tender, weak,
+suppliant. She sighed, and everything in her virginal chamber sighed in
+chorus, the holy-water font, the palm-branch above her white bed, the books of
+devotion on their little shelves, and the blue and white statuette of St.
+Orberosia chaining the dragon of Cappadocia, that stood upon the marble
+mantelpiece. Hippolyte Ceres was moved, softened, melted.
+
+Beautiful in her grief, her eyes shining with tears, her wrists girt by a
+rosary of lapis lazuli and, so to speak, chained by her faith, she suddenly
+flung herself at Hippolyte's feet, and dishevelled, almost dying, she embraced
+his knees.
+
+He nearly yielded.
+
+"A religious marriage," he muttered, "a marriage in church, I could make my
+constituents stand that, but my committee would not swallow the matter so
+easily. . . . Still I'll explain it to them . . . toleration, social
+necessities . . . . They all send their daughters to Sunday school . . . . But
+as for office, my dear I am afraid we are going to drown all hope of that in
+your holy water."
+
+At these words she stood up grave, generous, resigned, conquered also in her
+turn.
+
+"My dear, I insist no longer."
+
+"Then we won't have a religious marriage. It will be better, much better not."
+
+"Very well, but be guided by me. I am going to try and arrange everything both
+to your satisfaction and mine."
+
+She sought the Reverend Father Douillard and explained the situation. He
+showed himself even more accommodating and yielding than she had hoped.
+
+"Your husband is an intelligent man, a man of order and reason; he will come
+over to us. You will sanctify him. It is not in vain that God has granted him
+the blessing of a Christian wife. The Church needs no pomp and ceremonial
+display for her benedictions. Now that she is persecuted, the shadow of the
+crypts and the recesses of the catacombs are in better accord with her
+festivals. Mademoiselle, when you have performed the civil formalities come
+here to my private chapel in costume with M. Ceres. I will marry you, a
+observe the most absolute discretion. I will obtain the necessary
+dispensations from the Archbishop as well as all facilities regarding the
+banns, confession-tickets, etc."
+
+Hippolyte, although he thought the combination a little dangerous, agreed to
+it, a good deal flattered, at bottom.
+
+"I will go in a short coat," he said.
+
+He went in a frock coat with white gloves and varnished shoes, and he
+genuflected.
+
+"Politeness demands. . . ."
+
+
+
+V. THE VISIRE CABINET
+
+The Ceres household was established with modest decency in a pretty flat
+situated in a new building. Ceres loved his wife in a calm and tranquil
+fashion. He was often kept late from home by the Commission on the Budget and
+he worked more than three nights a week at a report on the postal finances of
+which he hoped to make a masterpiece. Eveline thought she could twist him
+round her finger, and this did not displease him. The bad side of their
+situation was that they had not much money; in truth they had very little. The
+servants of the Republic do not grow rich in her service as easily as people
+think. Since the sovereign is no longer there to distribute favours, each of
+them takes what he can, and his depredations, limited by the depredations of
+all the others, are reduced to modest proportions. Hence that austerity of
+morals that is noticed in democratic leaders. They can only grow rich during
+periods of great business activity and then they find themselves exposed to
+the envy of their less favoured colleagues. Hippolyte Ceres had for a long
+time foreseen such a period. He was one of those who had made preparations for
+its arrival. Whilst waiting for it he endured his poverty with dignity, and
+Eveline shared that poverty without suffering as much as one might have
+thought. She was in close intimacy with the Reverend Father Douillard and
+frequented the chapel of St. Orberosia, where she met with serious society and
+people in a position to render her useful services. She knew how to choose
+among them and gave her confidence to none but those who deserved it. She had
+gained experience since her motor excursions with Viscount Clena, and above
+all she had now acquired the value of a married woman.
+
+The deputy was at first uneasy about these pious practices, which were
+ridiculed by the demagogic newspapers, but he was soon reassured, for he saw
+all around him democratic leaders joyfully becoming reconciled to the
+aristocracy and the Church.
+
+They found that they had reached one of those periods (which often recur) when
+advance had been carried a little too far. Hippolyte Ceres gave a moderate
+support to this view. His policy was not a policy of persecution but a policy
+of tolerance. He had laid its foundations in his splendid speech on the
+preparations for reform. The Prime Minister was looked upon as too advanced.
+He proposed schemes which were admitted to be dangerous to capital, and the
+great financial companies were opposed to him. Of course it followed that the
+papers of all views supported the companies. Seeing the danger increasing, the
+Cabinet abandoned its schemes, its programme, and its opinions, but it was too
+late. A new administration was already ready. An insidious question by Paul
+Visire which was immediately made the subject of a resolution, and a fine
+speech by Hippolyte Ceres, overthrew the Cabinet.
+
+The President of the Republic entrusted the formation of a new Cabinet to this
+same Paul Visire, who, though still very young, had been a Minister twice. He
+was a charming man, spending much of his time in the green-rooms of theatres,
+very artistic, a great society man, of amazing ability and industry. Paul
+Visire formed a temporary ministry intended to reassure public feeling which
+had taken alarm, and Hippolyte Ceres was invited to hold office in it.
+
+The new ministry, belonging to all the groups in the majority, represented the
+most diverse and contrary opinions, but they were all moderate and convinced
+conservatives.* The Minister of Foreign Affairs was retained from the former
+cabinet. He was a little dark man called Crombile, who worked fourteen hours a
+day with the conviction that he dealt with tremendous questions. He refused to
+see even his own diplomatic agents, and was terribly uneasy, though he did not
+disturb anybody else, for the want of foresight of peoples is infinite and
+that of governments is just as great.
+
+* As this ministry exercised considerable influence upon the destinies of the
+country and of the world, we think it well to give its composition: Minister
+of the Interior and Prime Minister, Paul Visire; Minister of Justice, Pierre
+Bouc; Foreign Affairs, Victor Crombile; Finance, Terrasson; Education,
+Labillette; Commerce, Posts and Telegraphs, Hippolyte Ceres; Agriculture,
+Aulac; Public Works, Lapersonne; War, General Debonnaire; Admiralty, Admiral
+Vivier des Murenes.
+
+The office of Public Works was given to a Socialist, Fortune Lapersonne. It
+was then a political custom and one of the most solemn, most severe, most
+rigorous, and if I may dare say so, the most terrible and cruel of all
+political customs, to include a member of the Socialist party in each ministry
+intended to oppose Socialism, so that the enemies of wealth and property
+should suffer the shame of being attacked by one of their own party, and so
+that they could not unite against these forces without turning to some one who
+might possibly attack themselves in the future. Nothing but a profound
+ignorance of the human heart would permit the belief that it was difficult to
+find a Socialist to occupy these functions. Citizen Fortune Lapersonne entered
+the Visire cabinet of his own free will and without any constraint; and he
+found those who approved of his action even among his former friends, so great
+was the fascination that power exercised over the Penguins!
+
+General Debonnaire went to the War Office. He was looked upon as one of the
+ablest generals in the army, but he was ruled by a woman, the Baroness
+Bildermann, who, though she had reached the age of intrigue, was still
+beautiful. She was in the pay of a neighbouring and hostile Power.
+
+The new Minister of Marine, the worthy Admiral Vivier des Murenes, was
+generally regarded as an excellent seaman. He displayed a piety that would
+have seemed excessive in an anti-clerical minister, if the Republic had not
+recognised that religion was of great maritime utility. Acting on the
+instruction of his spiritual director, the Reverend Father Douillard, the
+worthy Admiral had dedicated his fleet to St. Orberosia and directed canticles
+in honour of the Alcan Virgin to be composed by Christian bards. These
+replaced the national hymn in the music played by the navy.
+
+Prime Minister Visire declared himself to be distinctly anticlerical but ready
+to respect all creeds; he asserted that he was a sober-minded reformer. Paul
+Visire and his colleagues desired reforms, and it was in order not to
+compromise reform that they proposed none; for they were true politicians and
+knew that reforms are compromised the moment they are proposed. The government
+was well received, respectable people were reassured, and the funds rose.
+
+The administration announced that four new ironclads would be put into
+commission, that prosecutions would be undertaken against the Socialists, and
+it formally declared its intention to have nothing to do with any
+inquisitorial income-tax. The choice of Terrasson as Minister of Finance was
+warmly approved by the press. Terrasson, an old minister famous for his
+financial operations, gave warrant to all the hopes of the financiers and
+shadowed forth a period of great business activity. Soon those three udders of
+modern nations, monopolies, bill discounting, and fraudulent speculation, were
+swollen with the milk of wealth. Already whispers were heard of distant
+enterprises, and of planting colonies, and the boldest put forward in the
+newspapers the project of a military and financial protectorate over Nigritia.
+
+Without having yet shown what he was capable of, Hippolyte Ceres was
+considered a man of weight. Business people thought highly of him. He was
+congratulated on all sides for having broken with the extreme sections, the
+dangerous men, and for having realised the responsibilities of government.
+
+Madame Ceres shone alone amid the Ministers' wives. Crombile withered away in
+bachelordom. Paul Visire had married money in the person of Mademoiselle
+Blampignon, an accomplished, estimable, and simple lady who was always ill,
+and whose feeble health compelled her to stay with her mother in the depths of
+a remote province. The other Ministers' wives were not born to charm the
+sight, and people smiled when they read that Madame Labillette had appeared at
+the Presidency Ball wearing a headdress of birds of paradise. Madame Vivier
+des Murenes, a woman of good family, was stout rather than tall, had a face
+like a beef-steak and the voice of a newspaper-seller. Madame Debonnaire,
+tall, dry, and florid, was devoted to young officers. She ruined herself by
+her escapades and crimes and only regained consideration by dint of ugliness
+and insolence.
+
+Madame Ceres was the charm of the Ministry and its tide to consideration.
+Young, beautiful, and irreproachable, she charmed alike society and the masses
+by her combination of elegant costumes and pleasant smiles.
+
+Her receptions were thronged by the great Jewish financiers. She gave the most
+fashionable garden parties in the Republic. The newspapers described her
+dresses and the milliners did not ask her to pay for them. She went to Mass;
+she protected the chapel of St. Orberosia from the ill-will of the people; and
+she aroused in aristocratic hearts the hope of a fresh Concordat.
+
+With her golden hair, grey eyes, and supple and slight though rounded figure,
+she was indeed pretty. She enjoyed an excellent reputation and she was so
+adroit, and calm, so much mistress of herself, that she would have preserved
+it intact even if she had been discovered in the very act of ruining it.
+
+The session ended with a victory for the cabinet which, amid the almost
+unanimous applause of the House, defeated a proposal for an inquisitorial tax,
+and with a triumph for Madame Ceres who gave parties in honour of three kings
+who were at the moment passing through Alca.
+
+
+
+VI. THE SOFA OF THE FAVOURITE
+
+The Prime Minister invited Monsieur and Madame Ceres to spend a couple of
+weeks of the holidays in a little villa that he had taken in the mountains,
+and in which he lived alone. The deplorable health of Madame Paul Visire did
+not allow her to accompany her husband, and she remained with her relatives in
+one of the southern provinces.
+
+The villa had belonged to the mistress of one of the last Kings of Alca: the
+drawing-room retained its old furniture, and in it was still to be found the
+Sofa of the Favourite. The country was charming; a pretty blue stream, the
+Aiselle, flowed at the foot of the hill that dominated the villa. Hippolyte
+Ceres loved fishing; when engaged at this monotonous occupation he often
+formed his best Parliamentary combinations, and his happiest oratorical
+inspirations. Trout swarmed in the Aiselle; he fished it from morning till
+evening in a boat that the Prime Minister readily placed at is disposal.
+
+In the mean time, Eveline and Paul Visire sometimes took a turn together in
+the garden, or had a little chat in the drawing-room. Eveline, although she
+recognised the attraction that Visire had for women, had hitherto displayed
+towards him only an intermittent and superficial coquetry, without any deep
+intentions or settled design. He was a connoisseur and saw that she was
+pretty. The House and the Opera had deprived him of all leisure, but, in a
+little villa, the grey eyes and rounded figure of Eveline took on a value in
+his eyes. One day as Hippolyte Ceres was fishing in the Aiselle, he made her
+sit beside him on the Sofa of the Favourite. Long rays of gold struck Eveline
+like arrows from a hidden Cupid through the chinks of the curtains which
+protected her from the heat and glare of a brilliant day. Beneath her white
+muslin dress her rounded yet slender form was outlined in its grace and youth.
+Her skin was cool and fresh, and had the fragrance of freshly mown hay. Paul
+Visire behaved as the occasion warranted, and for her part, she was opposed
+neither to the games of chance or of society. She believed it would be nothing
+or a trifle; she was mistaken.
+
+"There was," says the famous German ballad, "on the sunny side of the town
+square, beside a wall whereon the creeper grew, a pretty little letter-box, as
+blue as the corn-flowers, smiling and tranquil.
+
+"All day long there came to it, in their heavy shoes, small shop-keepers, rich
+farmers, citizens, the tax-collector and the policeman, and they put into it
+their business letters, their invoices, their summonses their notices to pay
+taxes, the judges' returns, and orders for the recruits to assemble. It
+remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"With joy, or in anxiety, there advanced towards it workmen and farm servants,
+maids and nursemaids, accountants, clerks, and women carrying their little
+children in their arms; they put into it notifications of births. marriages,
+and deaths, letters between engaged couples, between husbands and wives, from
+mothers to their sons, and from sons to their mothers. It remained smiling and
+tranquil.
+
+"At twilight, young lads and young girls slipped furtively to it, and put in
+love-letters, some moistened with tears that blotted the ink, others with a
+little circle to show the place to kiss, all of them very long. It remained
+smiling and tranquil.
+
+"Rich merchants came themselves through excess of carefulness at the hour of
+daybreak, and put into it registered letters, and letters with five red seals,
+full of bank notes or cheques on the great financial establishments of the
+Empire. It remained smiling and tranquil.
+
+"But one day, Gaspar, whom it had never seen, and whom it did not know from
+Adam, came to put in a letter, of which nothing is known but that it was
+folded like a little hat. Immediately the pretty letter-box fell into a swoon.
+Henceforth it remains no longer in its place; it runs through streets, fields,
+and woods, girdled with ivy, and crowned with roses. It keeps running up hill
+and down dale; the country policeman surprises it sometimes, amidst the corn,
+in Gaspar's arms kissing him upon the mouth."
+
+Paul Visire had recovered all his customary nonchalance. Eveline remained
+stretched on the Divan of the Favourite in an attitude of delicious
+astonishment.
+
+The Reverend Father Douillard, an excellent moral theologian, and a man who in
+the decadence of the Church has preserved his principles, was very right to
+teach, in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers, that while a woman
+commits a great sin by giving herself for money, she commits a much greater
+one by giving herself for nothing. For, in the first case she acts to support
+her life, and that is sometimes not merely excusable but pardonable, and even
+worthy of the Divine Grace, for God forbids suicide, and is unwilling that his
+creatures should destroy themselves. Besides, in giving herself in order to
+live, she remains humble, and derives no pleasure from it a thing which
+diminishes the sin. But a woman who gives herself for nothing sins with
+pleasure and exults in her fault. The pride and delight with which she burdens
+her crime increase its load of moral guilt.
+
+Madame Hippolyte Ceres' example shows the profundity of these moral truths.
+She perceived that she had senses. A second was enough to bring about this
+discovery, to change her soul, to alter her whole life. To have learned to
+know herself was at first a delight. The {greek here} of the ancient
+philosophy is not a precept the moral fulfilment of which procures any
+pleasure, since one enjoys little satisfaction from knowing one's soul. It is
+not the same with the flesh, for in it sources of pleasure may be revealed to
+us. Eveline immediately felt an obligation to her revealer equal to the
+benefit she had received, and she imagined that he who had discovered these
+heavenly depths was the sole possessor of the key to them. Was this an error,
+and might she not be able to find others who also had the golden key? It is
+difficult to decide; and Professor Haddock, when the facts were divulged
+(which happened without much delay as we shall see), treated the matter from
+an experimental point of view, in a scientific review, and concluded that the
+chances Madame C-- would have of finding the exact equivalent of M. V-- were
+in the proportion of 305 to 975008. This is as much as to say that she would
+never find it. Doubtless her instinct told her the same, for she attached
+herself distractedly to him.
+
+I have related these facts with all the circumstances which seemed to me
+worthy of attracting the attention of meditative and philosophic minds. The
+Sofa of the Favourite is worthy of the majesty of history; on it were decided
+the destinies of a great people; nay, on it was accomplished an act whose
+renown was to extend over the neighbouring nations both friendly and hostile,
+and even over all humanity. Too often events of this nature escape the
+superficial minds and shallow spirits who inconsiderately assume the task of
+writing history. Thus the secret springs of events remain hidden from us. The
+fall of Empires and the transmission of dominions astonish us and remain
+incomprehensible to us, because we have not discovered the imperceptible
+point, or touched the secret spring which when put in movement has destroyed
+and overthrown everything. The author of this great history knows better than
+anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do himself this
+justice--that he has always kept the moderation, the seriousness, the
+austerity, which an account of affairs of State demands, and that he has never
+departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of human actions.
+
+
+
+VII. THE FIRST CONSEQUENCES
+
+When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never experienced anything
+similar, he did not believe her. He had had a good deal to do with women and
+knew that they readily say these things to men in order to make them more in
+love with them. Thus his experience, as sometimes happens, made him disregard
+the truth. Incredulous, but gratified all the same, he soon felt love and
+something more for her. This state at first seemed favourable to his
+intellectual faculties. Visire delivered in the chief town of his constituency
+a speech full of grace, brilliant and happy, which was considered to be a
+masterpiece.
+
+The re-opening of Parliament was serene. A few isolated jealousies, a few
+timid ambitions raised their heads in the House, and that was all. A smile
+from the Prime Minister was enough to dissipate these shadows. She and he saw
+each other twice a day, and wrote to each other in the interval. He was
+accustomed to intimate relationships, was adroit, and knew how to dissimulate;
+but Eveline displayed a foolish imprudence: she made herself conspicuous with
+him in drawing-rooms, at the theatre, in the House, and at the Embassies; she
+wore her love upon her face, upon her whole person, in her moist glances, in
+the languishing smile of her lips, in the heaving of her breast, in all her
+heightened, agitated, and distracted beauty. Soon the entire country knew of
+their intimacy. Foreign Courts were informed of it. The President of the
+Republic and Eveline's husband alone remained in ignorance. The President
+became acquainted with it in the country, through a misplaced police report
+which found its way, it is not known how, into his portmanteau.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, without being either very subtle, or very perspicacious,
+noticed that there was something different in his home. Eveline, who quite
+lately had interested herself in his affairs, and shown, if not tenderness, at
+least affection, towards him, displayed henceforth nothing but indifference
+and repulsion. She had always had periods of absence, and made prolonged
+visits to the Charity of St. Orberosia; now, she went out in the morning,
+remained out all day, and sat down to dinner at nine o'clock in the evening
+with the face of a somnambulist. Her husband thought it absurd; however, he
+might perhaps have never known the reason for this; a profound ignorance of
+women, a crass confidence in his own merit, and in his own fortune, might
+perhaps have always hidden the truth from him, if the two lovers had not, so
+to speak, compelled him to discover it.
+
+When Paul Visire went to Eveline's house and found her alone, they used to
+say, as they embraced each other; "Not here! not here!" and immediately they
+affected an extreme reserve. That was their invariable rule. Now, one day,
+Paul Visire went to the house of his colleague Ceres, with whom he had an
+engagement. It was Eveline who received him, the Minister of Commerce being
+delayed by a commission.
+
+"Not here!" said the lovers, smiling.
+
+They said it, mouth to mouth, embracing, and clasping each other. They were
+still saying it, when Hippolyte Ceres entered the drawing-room.
+
+Paul Visire did not lose his presence of mind. He declared to Madame Ceres
+that he would give up his attempt to take the dust out of her eye. By this
+attitude he did not deceive the husband, but he was able to leave the room
+with some dignity.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres was thunderstruck. Eveline's conduct appeared incomprehensible
+to him; he asked her what reasons she had for it.
+
+"Why? why?" he kept repeating continually, "why?"
+
+She denied everything, not to convince him, for he had seen them, but from
+expediency and good taste, and to avoid painful explanations. Hippolyte Ceres
+suffered all the tortures of jealousy. He admitted it to himself, he kept
+saying inwardly, "I am a strong man; I am clad in armour; but the wound is
+underneath, it is in my heart," and turning towards his wife, who looked
+beautiful in her guilt, he would say:
+
+"It ought not to have been with him."
+
+He was right--Eveline ought not to have loved in government circles.
+
+He suffered so much that he took up his revolver, exclaiming: "I will go and
+kill him!" But he remembered that a Minister of Commerce cannot kill his own
+Prime Minister, and he put his revolver back into his drawer.
+
+The weeks passed without calming his sufferings. Each morning he buckled his
+strong man's armour over his wound and sought in work and fame the peace that
+fled from him. Every Sunday he inaugurated busts, statues, fountains, artesian
+wells, hospitals, dispensaries, railways, canals, public markets, drainage
+systems, triumphal arches, and slaughter houses, and delivered moving speeches
+on each of these occasions. His fervid activity devoured whole piles of
+documents; he changed the colours of the postage stamps fourteen times in one
+week. Nevertheless, he gave vent to outbursts of grief and rage that drove him
+insane; for whole days his reason abandoned him. If he had been in the
+employment of a private administration this would have been noticed
+immediately, but it is much more difficult to discover insanity or frenzy in
+the conduct of affairs of State. At that moment the government employees were
+forming themselves into associations and federations amid a ferment that was
+giving alarm both to the Parliament and to public feeling. The postmen were
+especially prominent in their enthusiasm for trade unions.
+
+Hippolyte Ceres informed them in a circular that their action was strictly
+legal. The following day he sent out a second circular forbidding all
+associations of government employees as illegal. He dismissed one hundred and
+eighty postmen, reinstated them, reprimanded them--and awarded them
+gratuities. At Cabinet councils he was always on the point of bursting forth.
+The presence of the Head of the State scarcely restrained him within the
+limits of the decencies, and as he did not dare to attack his rival he
+consoled himself by heaping invectives upon General Debonnaire, the respected
+Minister of War. The General did not hear them. for he was deaf and occupied
+himself in composing verses for the Baroness Bildermann. Hippolyte Ceres
+offered an indistinct opposition to everything the Prime Minister proposed. In
+a word, he was a madman. One faculty alone escaped the ruin of his intellect:
+he retained his Parliamentary sense, his consciousness of the temper of
+majorities, his thorough knowledge of groups, and his certainty of the
+direction in which affairs were moving.
+
+
+
+VIII. FURTHER CONSEQUENCES
+
+The session ended calmly, and the Ministry saw no dangerous signs upon the
+benches where the majority sat. It was visible, however, from certain articles
+in the Moderate journals, that the demands of the Jewish and Christian
+financiers were increasing daily, that the patriotism of the banks required a
+civilizing expedition to Nigritia, and that the steel trusts, eager in the
+defence of our coasts and colonies, were crying out for armoured cruisers and
+still more armoured cruisers. Rumours of war began to be heard. Such rumours
+sprang up every year as regularly as the trade winds; serious people paid no
+heed to them and the government usually let them die away from their own
+weakness unless they grew stronger and spread. For in that case the country
+would be alarmed. The financiers only wanted colonial wars and the people did
+not want any wars at all. It loved to see its government proud and even
+insolent, but at the least suspicion that a European war was brewing, its
+violent emotion would quickly have reached the House. Paul Visire was not
+uneasy. The European situation was in his view completely reassuring. He was
+only irritated by the maniacal silence of his Minister of Foreign Affairs.
+That gnome went to the Cabinet meetings with a portfolio bigger than himself
+stuffed full of papers, said nothing, refused to answer all questions, even
+those asked him by the respected President of the Republic, and, exhausted by
+his obstinate labours, took a few moments' sleep in his arm-chair in which
+nothing but the top of his little black head was to be seen above the green
+tablecloth.
+
+In the mean time Hippolyte Ceres became a strong man again. In company with
+his colleague Lapersonne he formed numerous intimacies with ladies of the
+theatre. They were both to be seen at night entering fashionable restaurants
+in the company of ladies whom they over-topped by their lofty stature and
+their new hats, and they were soon reckoned amongst the most sympathetic
+frequenters of the boulevards. Fortune Lapersonne had his own wound beneath
+his armour, His wife, a young milliner whom he carried off from a marquis, had
+gone to live with a chauffeur. He loved her still, and could not console
+himself for her loss, so that very often in the private room of a restaurant,
+in the midst of a group of girls who laughed and ate crayfish, the two
+ministers exchanged a look full of their common sorrow and wiped away an
+unbidden tear. 
+
+Hippolyte Ceres, although wounded to the heart, did not allow himself to be
+beaten. He swore that he would be avenged.
+
+Madame Paul Visire, whose deplorable health forced her to live with her
+relatives in a distant province, received an anonymous letter specifying that
+M. Paul Visire, who had not a half-penny when he married her, was spending her
+dowry on a married woman, E-- C--, that he gave this woman
+thirty-thousand-franc motor-cars, and pearl necklaces costing twenty-five
+thousand francs, and that he was going straight to dishonour and ruin. Madame
+Paul Visire read the letter, fell into hysterics, and handed it to her father.
+
+"I am going to box your husband's ears," said M. Blampignon; "he is a
+blackguard who will land you both in the workhouse unless we look out. He may
+be Prime Minister, but he won't frighten me."
+
+When he stepped off the train M. Blampignon presented himself at the Ministry
+of the Interior, and was immediately received. He entered the Prime Minister's
+room in a fury.
+
+"I have something to say to you, sir!" And he waved the anonymous letter.
+
+Paul Visire welcomed him smiling.
+
+"You are welcome, my dear father. I was going to write to you. . . . Yes, to
+tell you of your nomination to the rank of officer of the Legion of Honour. I
+signed the patent this morning."
+
+M. Blampignon thanked his son-in-law warmly and threw the anonymous letter
+into the fire.
+
+He returned to his provincial house and found his daughter fretting and
+agitated.
+
+"Well! I saw your husband. He is a delightful fellow. But then, you don't
+understand how to deal with him."
+
+About this time Hippolyte Ceres learned through a little scandalous newspaper
+(it is always through the newspapers that ministers are informed of the
+affairs of State) that the Prime Minister dined every evening with
+Mademoiselle Lysiane of the Folies Dramatiques, whose charm seemed to have
+made a great impression on him. Thenceforth Ceres took a gloomy joy in
+watching his wife. She came in every evening to dine or dress with an air of
+agreeable fatigue and the serenity that comes from enjoyment.
+
+Thinking that she knew nothing, he sent her anonymous communications. She read
+them at the table before him and remained still listless and smiling.
+
+He then persuaded himself that she gave no heed to these vague reports, and
+that in order to disturb her it would be necessary to enable her to verify her
+lover's infidelity and treason for herself. There were at the Ministry a
+number of trustworthy agents charged with secret inquiries regarding the
+national defence. They were then employed in watching the spies of a
+neighbouring and hostile Power who had succeeded in entering the Postal and
+Telegraphic service. M. Ceres ordered them to suspend their work for the
+present and to inquire where, when, and how, the Minister of the Interior saw
+Mademoiselle Lysiane. The agents performed their missions faithfully and told
+the minister that they had several times seen the Prime Minister with a woman,
+but that she was not Mademoiselle Lysiane. Hippolyte Ceres asked them nothing
+further. He was right; the loves of Paul Visire and Lysiane were but an alibi
+invented by Paul Visire himself, with Eveline's approval, for his fame was
+rather inconvenient to her, and she sighed for secrecy and mystery.
+
+They were not shadowed by the agents of the Ministry of Commerce alone. They
+were also followed by those of the Prefect of Police, and even by those of the
+Minister of the Interior, who disputed with each other the honour of
+protecting their chief. Then there were the emissaries of several royalist,
+imperialist, and clerical organisations, those of eight or ten blackmailers,
+several amateur detectives, a multitude of reporters, and a crowd of
+photographers, who all made their appearance wherever these two took refuge in
+their perambulating love affairs, at big hotels, small hotels, town houses,
+country houses, private apartments, villas, museums, palaces, hovels. They
+kept watch in the streets, from neighbouring houses, trees, walls,
+stair-cases, landings, roofs, adjoining rooms, and even chimneys. The Minister
+and his friend saw with alarm all round their bed room, gimlets boring through
+doors and shutters, and drills making holes in the walls. A photograph of
+Madame Ceres in night attire buttoning her boots was the utmost that had been
+obtained.
+
+Paul Visire grew impatient and irritable, and often lost his good humour and
+agreeableness. He came to the cabinet meetings in a rage and he, too, poured
+invectives upon General Debonnaire--a brave man under fire but a lax
+disciplinarian--and launched his sarcasms at against the venerable admiral
+Vivier des Murenes whose ships went to the bottom without any apparent reason.
+
+Fortune Lapersonne listened open-eyed, and grumbled scoffingly between his
+teeth:
+
+"He is not satisfied with robbing Hippolyte Ceres of his wife, but he must go
+and rob him of his catchwords too."
+
+These storms were made known by the indiscretion of some ministers and by the
+complaints of the two old warriors, who declared their intention of flinging
+their portfolios at the beggar's head, but who did nothing of the sort. These
+outbursts, far from injuring the lucky Prime Minister, had an excellent effect
+on Parliament and public opinion, who looked on them as signs of a keen
+solicitude for the welfare of the national army and navy. The Prime Minister
+was the recipient of general approbation.
+
+To the congratulations of the various groups and of notable personages, he
+replied with simple firmness: "Those are my principles!" and he had seven or
+eight Socialists put in prison.
+
+The session ended, and Paul Visire, very exhausted, went to take the waters.
+Hippolyte Ceres refused to leave his Ministry, where the trade union of
+telephone girls was in tumultuous agitation. He opposed it with an unheard of
+violence, for he had now become a woman-hater. On Sundays he went into the
+suburbs to fish along with his colleague Lapersonne, wearing the tall hat that
+never left him since he had become a Minister. And both of them, forgetting
+the fish,, complained of the inconstancy of women and mingled their griefs.
+
+Hippolyte still loved Eveline and he still suffered. However, hope had slipped
+into his heart. She was now separated from her ]over, and, thinking to win her
+back, he directed all his efforts to that end. He put forth all his skill,
+showed himself sincere, adaptable, affectionate, devoted, even discreet; his
+heart taught him the delicacies of feeling. He said charming and touching
+things to the faithless one, and, to soften her, he told her all that he had
+suffered.
+
+Crossing the band of his trousers upon his stomach.
+
+"See," said he, "how thin I have got."
+
+He promised her everything he thought could gratify a woman, country parties,
+hats, jewels.
+
+Sometimes he thought she would take pity on him.
+
+She no longer displayed an insolently happy countenance. Being separated from
+Paul, her sadness had an air of gentleness. But the moment he made a gesture
+to recover her she turned away fiercely and gloomily, girt with her fault as
+if with a golden girdle.
+
+He did not give up, making himself humble, suppliant, lamentable.
+
+One day he went to Lapersonne and said to him with tears in his eyes:
+
+"Will you speak to her?"
+
+Lapersonne excused himself, thinking that his intervention would be useless,
+but he gave some advice to his friend.
+
+"Make her think that you don't care about her, that you love another, and she
+will come back to you."
+
+Hippolyte, adopting this method, inserted in the newspapers that he was always
+to be found in the company of Mademoiselle Guinaud of the Opera. He came home
+late or did not come home at all, assumed in Eveline's presence an appearance
+of inward joy impossible to restrain, took out of his pocket, at dinner, a
+letter on scented paper which he pretended to read with delight, and his lips
+seemed as in a dream to kiss invisible lips. Nothing happened. Eveline did not
+even notice the change. Insensible to all around her, she only came out of her
+lethargy to ask for some louis from her husband, and if he did not give them
+she threw him a look of contempt, ready to upbraid him with the shame which
+she poured upon him in the sight of the whole world. Since she had loved she
+spent a great deal on dress. She needed money, and she had only her husband to
+secure it for her; she was so far faithful to him.
+
+He lost patience, became furious, and threatened her with his revolver. He
+said one day before her to Madame Clarence:
+
+"I congratulate you, Madame; you have brought up your daughter to be a wanton
+hussy."
+
+"Take me away, Mamma," exclaimed Eveline. "I will get a divorce!"
+
+He loved her more ardently than ever. In his jealous rage, suspecting her, not
+without probability, of sending and receiving letters, he swore that he would
+intercept them, re-established a censorship over the post, threw private
+correspondence into confusion, delayed stock-exchange quotations, prevented
+assignations, brought about bankruptcies, thwarted passions, and caused
+suicides. The independent press gave utterance to the complaints of the public
+and indignantly supported them. To justify these arbitrary measures, the
+ministerial journals spoke darkly of plots and public dangers, and promoted a
+belief in a monarchical conspiracy. The less well-informed sheets gave more
+precise information, told of the seizure of fifty thousand guns, and the
+landing of Prince Crucho. Feeling grew throughout the country, and the
+republican organs called for the immediate meeting of Parliament. Paul Visire
+returned to Paris, summoned his colleagues, held an important Cabinet Council,
+and proclaimed through his agencies that a plot had been actually formed
+against the national representation, but that the Prime Minister held the
+threads of it in his hand, and that a judicial inquiry was about to be opened.
+
+He immediately ordered the arrest of thirty Socialists, and whilst the entire
+country was acclaiming him as its saviour, baffling the watchfulness of his
+six hundred detectives, he secretly took Eveline to a little house near the
+Northern railway station, where they remained until night. After their
+departure, the maid of their hotel, as she was putting their room in order,
+saw seven little crosses traced by a hairpin on the wall at the head of the
+bed.
+
+That is all that Hippolyte Ceres obtained as a reward of his efforts.
+
+
+
+IX. THE FINAL CONSEQUENCES
+
+Jealousy is a virtue of democracies which preserves them from tyrants.
+Deputies began to envy the Prime Minister his golden key. For a year his
+domination over the beauteous Madame Ceres had been known to the whole
+universe. The provinces, whither news and fashions only arrive after a
+complete revolution of the earth round the sun, were at last informed of the
+illegitimate loves of the Cabinet. The provinces preserve an austere morality;
+women are more virtuous there than they are in the capital.
+
+Various reasons have been alleged for this: Education, example, simplicity of
+life. Professor Haddock asserts that this virtue of provincial ladies is
+solely due to the fact that the heels of their shoes are low. "A woman," said
+he, in a learned article in the "Anthropological Review", "a woman attracts a
+civilized man in proportion as her feet make an angle with the ground. If this
+angle is as much as thirty-five degrees, the attraction becomes acute. For the
+position of the feet upon the ground determines the whole carriage of the
+body, and it results that provincial women, since they wear low heels, are not
+very attractive, and preserve their virtue with ease." These conclusions were
+not generally accepted. It was objected that under the influence of English
+and American fashions, low heels had been introduced generally without
+producing the results attributed to them by the learned Professor; moreover,
+it was said that the difference he pretended to establish between the morals
+of the metropolis and those of the provinces is perhaps illusory, and that if
+it exists, it is apparently due to the fact that great cities offer more
+advantages and facilities for love than small towns provide. However that may
+be, the provinces began to murmur against the Prime Minister, and to raise a
+scandal. This was not yet a danger, but there was a possibility that it might
+become one.
+
+For the moment the peril was nowhere and yet everywhere. The majority remained
+solid; but the leaders became stiff and exacting. Perhaps Hippolyte Ceres
+would never have intentionally sacrificed his interests to his vengeance. But
+thinking that he could henceforth, without compromising his own fortune,
+secretly damage that of Paul Visire, he devoted himself to the skilful and
+careful preparation of difficulties and perils for the Head of the Government.
+Though far from equalling his rival in talent, knowledge, and authority, he
+greatly surpassed him in his skill as a lobbyist. The most acute
+parliamentarians attributed the recent misfortunes of the majority to his
+refusal to vote. At committees, by a calculated imprudence, he favoured
+motions which he knew the Prime Minister could not accept. One day his
+intentional awkwardness provoked a sudden and violent conflict between the
+Minister of the Interior, and his departmental Treasurer. Then Ceres became
+frightened and went no further. It would have been dangerous for him to
+overthrow the ministry too soon. His ingenious hatred found an issue by
+circuitous paths. Paul Visire had a poor cousin of easy morals who bore his
+name. Ceres, remembering this lady, Celine Visire, brought her into
+prominence, arranged that she should become intimate with several foreigners,
+and procured her engagements in the music-halls. One summer night, on a stage
+in the Champs Elysees before a tumultuous crowd, she performed risky dances to
+the sounds of wild music which was audible in the gardens where the President
+of the Republic was entertaining Royalty. The name of Visire, associated with
+these scandals, covered the walls of the town, filled the newspapers, was
+repeated in the cafes and at balls, and blazed forth in letters of fire upon
+the boulevards.
+
+Nobody regarded the Prime Minister as responsible for the scandal of his
+relatives, but a bad idea of his family came into existence, and the influence
+of the statesman was diminished.
+
+Almost immediately he was made to feel this in a pretty sharp fashion. One day
+in the House, on a simple question, Labillette, the Minister of Religion and
+Public Worship, who was suffering from an attack of liver, and beginning to be
+exasperated by the intentions and intrigues of the clergy, threatened to close
+the Chapel of St. Orberosia, and spoke without respect of the National Virgin.
+The entire Right rose up in indignation; the Left appeared to give but a
+half-hearted support to the rash Minister. The leaders of the majority did not
+care to attack a popular cult which brought thirty millions a year into the
+country. The most moderate of the supporters of the Right, M. Bigourd, made
+the question the subject of a resolution and endangered the Cabinet. Luckily,
+Fortune Lapersonne, the Minister of Public Works, always conscious of the
+obligations of power, was able in the Prime Minister's absence to repair the
+awkwardness and indecorum of his colleague, the Minister of Public Worship. He
+ascended the tribune and bore witness to the respect in which the Government
+held the heavenly Patron of the country, the consoler of so many ills which
+science admitted its powerlessness to relieve.
+
+When Paul Visire, snatched at last from Eveline's arms, appeared in the House,
+the administration was saved; but the Prime Minister saw himself compelled to
+grant important concessions to the upper classes. He proposed in Parliament
+that six armoured cruisers should be laid down, and thus won the sympathies of
+the Steel Trust; he gave new assurances that the income tax would not be
+imposed, and he had eighteen Socialists arrested.
+
+He was soon to find himself opposed by more formidable obstacles. The
+Chancellor of the neighbouring Empire in an ingenious and profound speech upon
+the foreign relations of his sovereign, made a sly allusion to the intrigues
+that inspired the policy of a great country. This reference, which was receive
+with smiles by the Imperial Parliament, was certain to irritate a punctilious
+republic. It aroused the national susceptibility, which directed its wrath
+against its amorous Minister. The Deputies seized upon a frivolous pretext to
+show their dissatisfaction. A ridiculous incident, the fact that the wife of a
+subprefect had danced at the Moulin Rouge, forced the minister to face a vote
+of censure, and he was within a few votes of being defeated. According to
+general opinion, Paul Visire had never been so weak, so vacillating, or so
+spiritless, as on that occasion.
+
+He understood that he could only keep himself in office by a great political
+stroke, and he decided on the expedition to Nigritia. This measure was
+demanded by the great financial and industrial corporations and was one which
+would bring concessions of immense forests to the capitalists, a loan of eight
+millions to the banking companies, as well as promotions and decorations to
+the naval and military officers. A pretext presented itself; some insult
+needed to be avenged, or some debt to be collected. Six battleships, fourteen
+cruisers, and eighteen transports sailed up the mouth of the river
+Hippopotamus. Six hundred canoes vainly opposed the landing of the troops.
+Admiral Vivier des Murenes' cannons produced an appalling effect upon the
+blacks, who replied to them with flights of arrows, but in spite of their
+fanatical courage they were entirely defeated. Popular enthusiasm was kindled
+by the newspapers which the financiers subsidised, and burst into a blaze.
+Some Socialists alone protested against this barbarous, doubtful, and
+dangerous enterprise. They were at once arrested.
+
+At that moment when the Minister, supported by wealth, and now beloved by the
+poor, seemed unconquerable, the light of hate showed Hippolyte Ceres alone the
+danger, and looking with a gloomy joy at his rival, he muttered between his
+teeth, "He is wrecked, the brigand!"
+
+Whilst the country intoxicated itself with glory, the neighbouring Empire
+protested against the occupation of Nigritia by a European power, and these
+protests following one another at shorter and shorter intervals became more
+and more vehement. The newspapers of the interested Republic concealed all
+causes for uneasiness; but Hippolyte Ceres heard the growing menace, and
+determined at last to risk everything, even the fate of the ministry, in order
+to ruin his enemy. He got men whom he could trust to write and insert articles
+in several of the official journals, which, seeming to express Paul Visire's
+precise views, attributed warlike intentions to the Head of the Government.
+
+These articles roused a terrible echo abroad, and they alarmed the public
+opinion of a nation which, while fond of soldiers, was not fond of war.
+Questioned in the House on the foreign policy of his government, Paul Visire
+made a re-assuring statement, and promised to maintain a face compatible with
+the dignity of a great nation. His Minister of Foreign Affairs, Crombile, read
+a declaration which was absolutely unintelligible, for the reason that it was
+couched in diplomatic language. The Minister obtained a large majority.
+
+But the rumours of war did not cease, and in order to avoid a new and
+dangerous motion, the Prime Minister distributed eighty thousand acres of
+forests in Nigritia among the Deputies, and had fourteen Socialists arrested.
+Hippolyte Ceres went gloomily about the lobbies, confiding to the Deputies of
+his group that he was endeavouring to induce the Cabinet to adopt a pacific
+policy, and that he still hoped to succeed. Day by day the sinister rumours
+grew in volume, and penetrating amongst the public, spread uneasiness and
+disquiet. Paul Visire himself began to take alarm. What disturbed him most
+were the silence and absence of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Crombile no
+longer came to the meetings of the Cabinet. Rising at five o'clock in the
+morning, he worked eighteen hours at his desk, and at last fell exhausted into
+his waste-paper basket, from whence the registrars removed him, together with
+the papers which they were going to sell to the military attaches of the
+neighbouring Empire.
+
+General Debonnaire believed that a campaign was imminent, and prepared for it.
+Far from fearing war, he prayed for it, and confided his generous hopes to
+Baroness Bildermann, who informed the neighbouring nation, which, acting on
+her information, proceeded to a rapid mobilization.
+
+The Minister of Finance unintentionally precipitated events. At the moment, he
+was speculating for a fall, and in order to bring about a panic on the Stock
+Exchange, he spread the rumour that war was now inevitable. The neighbouring
+Empire, deceived by this action, and expecting to see its territory invaded,
+mobilized its troops in all haste. The terrified Chamber overthrew the Visire
+ministry by an enormous majority (814 votes to 7, with 28 abstentions). It was
+too late. The very day of this fall the neighbouring and hostile nation
+recalled its ambassador and flung eight millions of men into Madame Ceres'
+country. War became universal, and the whole world was drowned in a torrent of
+blood.
+
+
+THE ZENITH OF PENGUIN CIVILIZATION
+
+Half a century after the events we have just related, Madame Ceres died
+surrounded with respect and veneration, in the eighty-ninth year of her age.
+She had long been the widow of a statesman whose name she bore with dignity.
+Her modest and quiet funeral was followed by the orphans of the parish and the
+sisters of the Sacred Compassion.
+
+The deceased left all her property to the Charity of St. Orberosia.
+
+"Alas!" sighed M. Monnoyer, a canon of St. Mael, as he received the pious
+legacy, "it was high time for a generous benefactor to come to the relief of
+our necessities. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant are turning away from us.
+And when we try to lead back these misguided souls, neither threats nor
+promises, neither gentleness nor violence, nor anything else is now
+successful. The Penguin clergy pine in desolation; our country priests,
+reduced to following the humblest of trades, are shoeless, and compelled to
+live upon such scraps as they can pick up. In our ruined churches the rain of
+heaven falls upon the faithful, and during the holy offices they can hear the
+noise of stones falling from the arches. The tower of the cathedral is
+tottering and will soon fall. St. Orberosia is forgotten by the Penguins, her
+devotion abandoned, and her sanctuary deserted. On her shrine, bereft of its
+gold and precious stones, the spider silently weaves her web."
+
+Hearing these lamentations, Pierre Mille, who at the age of ninety-eight years
+had lost nothing of his intellectual and moral power, asked, the canon if he
+did not think that St. Orberosia would one day rise out of this wrongful
+oblivion.
+
+"I hardly dare to hope so," sighed M. Monnoyer.
+
+"It is a pity!" answered Pierre Mille. "Orberosia is a charming figure and her
+legend is a beautiful one. I discovered the other day by the merest chance,
+one of her most delightful miracles, the miracle of Jean Violle. Would you
+like to hear it, M. Monnoyer?"
+
+"I should be very pleased, M. Mille."
+
+"Here it is, then, just as I found it in a fifteenth-century manuscript
+
+"Cecile, the wife of Nicolas Gaubert, a jeweller on the Pont-au-Change, after
+having led an honest and chaste life for many years, and being now past her
+prime, became infatuated with Jean Violle, the Countess de Maubec's page, who
+lived at the Hotel du Paon on the Place de Greve. He was not yet eighteen
+years old, and his face and figure were attractive. Not being able to conquer
+her passion, Cecile resolved to satisfy it. She attracted the page to her
+house, loaded him with caresses, supplied him with sweetmeats and finally did
+as she wished with him.
+
+"Now one day, as they were together in the jeweller's bed, Master Nicholas
+came home sooner than he was expected. He found the bolt drawn, and heard his
+wife on the other side of the door exclaiming, 'My heart! my angel! my love!'
+Then suspecting that she was shut up with a gallant, he struck great blows
+upon the door and began to shout 'Slut! hussy! wanton! open so that I may cut
+off your nose and ears!' In this peril, the jeweller's wife besought St.
+Orberosia, and vowed her a large candle if she helped her and the little page,
+who was dying of fear beside the bed, out of their difficulty.
+
+"The saint heard the prayer. She immediately changed Jean Violle into a girl.
+Seeing this, Cecile was completely reassured, and began to call out to her
+husband: 'Oh! you brutal villain, you jealous wretch! Speak gently if you want
+the door to be opened.' And scolding in this way, she ran to the wardrobe and
+took out of it an old hood, a pair of stays, and a long grey petticoat, in
+which she hastily wrapped the transformed page. Then when this was done,
+'Catherine, dear Catherine,' said she, loudly, 'open the door for your uncle;
+he is more fool than knave, and won't do you any harm." The boy who had become
+a girl, obeyed. Master Nicholas entered the room and found in it a young maid
+whom he did not know, and his wife in bed. 'Big booby,' said the latter to
+him, 'don't stand gaping at what you see. just as I had come to bed because
+had a stomach ache, I received a visit from Catherine, the daughter of my
+sister Jeanne de Palaiseau, with whom we quarrelled fifteen years ago. Kiss
+your niece. She is well worth the trouble.' The jeweller gave Violle a hug,
+and from that moment wanted nothing so much as to be alone with her a moment,
+so that he might embrace her as much as he liked. For this reason he led her
+without any delay down to the kitchen, under the pretext of giving her some
+walnuts and wine, and he was no sooner there with her than he began to caress
+her very affectionately. He would not have stopped at that if St. Orberosia
+had not inspired his good wife with the idea of seeing what he was about. She
+found him with the pretended niece sitting on his knee. She called him a
+debauched creature, boxed his ears, and forced him to beg her pardon. The next
+day Violle resumed his previous form."
+
+Having heard this story the venerable Canon Monnoyer thanked Pierre Mille for
+having told it, and, taking up his pen, began to write out a list of horses
+that would win at the next race meeting. For he was a book-maker's clerk.
+
+In the mean time Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who produced the
+things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not produce them had
+more than enough. "But these," as a member of the Institute said, "are
+necessary economic fatalities." The great Penguin people had no longer either
+traditions, intellectual culture, or arts. The progress of civilisation
+manifested itself among them by murderous industry, infamous speculation, and
+hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as did all the great cities of the time,
+a cosmopolitan and financial character. An immense and regular ugliness
+reigned within it. The country enjoyed perfect tranquillity. It had reached
+its zenith.
+
+
+Book VII. FUTURE TIMES
+
+THE ENDLESS HISTORY
+
+Alca is becoming Americanised.--M. Daniset.
+
+And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of
+the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.--Genesis xix. 25
+
+{greek here](Herodotus, Histories, VII cii.)
+
+Poverty hast ever been familiar to Greece, but virtue has been acquired,
+having been accomplished by wisdom and firm laws.-- Henry Cary's Translation.
+
+You have not seen angels then.--Liber Terribilis.
+
+Bqfttfusftpvtuse jufbmmbb b up sjufef tspjtfucftfnqfsfvstbqsftbnpjsqsp
+dmbnfuspjtghjttdmjcfsufnbgsbodftftutpbnjtfbeftdpnqb   hojtgjobo -- difsftr --
+vjejtqpteoueftsjdifttftevqbzt fuqbsmfn Pzfoevofqsf ttfbdifuffejsjhfboumpqjojno 
+  Voufnpjoxfsiejrvf
+
+We are now beginning to study a chemistry which will deal with effects
+produced by bodies containing a quantity of concentrated energy the like of
+which we have not yet had at our disposal.--Sir William Ramsay.
+
+
+
+S. I
+
+The houses were never high enough to satisfy them; they kept on making them
+still higher and built them of thirty or forty storeys: with offices, shops,
+banks, societies one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper
+downwards.
+
+Fifteen millions of men laboured in a giant town by the light of beacons which
+shed forth their glare both day and night. No light of heaven pierced through
+the smoke of the factories with which the town was girt, but sometimes the red
+disk of a rayless sun might be seen riding in the black firmament through
+which iron bridges ploughed their way, and from which there descended a
+continual shower of soot and cinders. It was the most industrial of all the
+cities in the world and the richest. Its organisation seemed perfect. None of
+the ancient aristocratic or democratic forms remained; everything was
+subordinated to the interests of the trusts. This environment gave rise to
+what anthropologists called the multi-millionaire type. The men of this type
+were at once energetic and frail, capable of great activity in forming mental
+combinations and of prolonged labour in offices, but men whose nervous
+irritability suffered from hereditary troubles which increased as time went
+on.
+
+Like all true aristocrats, like the patricians of republican Rome or the
+squires of old England, these powerful men affected a great severity in their
+habits and customs. They were the ascetics of wealth. At the meetings of the
+trusts an observer would have noticed their smooth and puffy faces, their
+lantern cheeks, their sunken eyes and wrinkled brows. With bodies more
+withered, complexions yellower, lips drier, and eyes filled with a more
+burning fanaticism than those of the old Spanish monks, these
+multimillionaires gave themselves up with inextinguishable ardour to the
+austerities of banking and industry. Several, denying themselves all
+happiness, all pleasure, and all rest, spent their miserable lives in rooms
+without light or air, furnished only with electrical apparatus, living on eggs
+and milk, and sleeping on camp beds. By doing nothing except pressing nickel
+buttons with their fingers, these mystics heaped up riches of which they never
+even saw the signs, and acquired the vain possibility of gratifying desires
+that they never experienced.
+
+The worship of wealth had its martyrs. One of these multi-millionaires, the
+famous Samuel Box, preferred to die rather than surrender the smallest atom of
+his property. One of his workmen, the victim of an accident while at work,
+being refused any indemnity by his employer, obtained a verdict in the courts,
+but repelled by innumerable obstacles of procedure, he fell into the direst
+poverty. Being thus reduced to despair, he succeeded by dint of cunning and
+audacity in confronting his employer with a loaded revolver in his hand, and
+threatened to blow out his brains if he did not give him some assistance.
+Samuel Box gave nothing, and let himself be killed for the sake of principle.
+
+Examples that come from high quarters are followed. Those who possessed some
+small capital (and they were necessarily the greater number), affected the
+ideas and habits of the multi-millionaires, in order that they might be
+classed among them. All passions which injured the increase or the
+preservation of wealth, were regarded as dishonourable; neither indolence, nor
+idleness, nor the taste for disinterested study, nor love of the arts, nor,
+above all, extravagance, was ever forgiven; pity was condemned as a dangerous
+weakness. Whilst every inclination to licentiousness excited public
+reprobation, the violent and brutal satisfaction of an appetite was, on the
+contrary, excused; violence, in truth, was regarded as less injurious to
+morality, since it manifested a form of social energy. The State was firmly
+based on two great public virtues: respect for the rich and contempt for the
+poor. Feeble spirits who were still moved by human suffering had no other
+resource than to take refuge in a hypocrisy which it was impossible to blame,
+since it contributed to the maintenance of order and the solidity of
+institutions.
+
+Thus, among the rich, all were devoted to their social order, or seemed to be
+so; all gave good examples, if all did not follow them. Some felt the gravity
+of their position cruelly; but they endured it either from pride or from duty.
+Some attempted, in secret and by subterfuge, to escape from it for a moment.
+One of these, Edward Martin, the President, of the Steel Trust, sometimes
+dressed himself as a poor man, went: forth to beg his bread, and allowed
+himself to be jostled by the passers-by. One day, as he asked alms on a
+bridge, he engaged in a quarrel with a real beggar, and filled with a fury of
+envy, he strangled him.
+
+As they devoted their whole intelligence to business, they sought no
+intellectual pleasures. The theatre, which had formerly been very flourishing
+among them, was now reduced to pantomimes and comic dances. Even the pieces in
+which women acted were given up; the taste for pretty forms and brilliant
+toilettes had been lost; the somersaults of clowns and the music of negroes
+were preferred above them, and what roused enthusiasm was the sight of women
+upon the stage whose necks were bedizened with diamonds, or processions
+carrying golden bars in triumph. Ladies of wealth were as much compelled as
+the men to lead a respectable life. According to a tendency common to all
+civilizations, public feeling set them up as symbols; they were, by their
+austere magnificence, to represent both the splendour of wealth and its
+intangible . The old habits of gallantry had been reformed, Tut fashionable
+lovers were now secretly replaced by muscular labourers or stray grooms.
+Nevertheless, scandals were rare, a foreign journey concealed nearly all of
+them, and the Princesses of the Trusts remained objects of universal esteem.
+
+The rich formed only a small minority, but their collaborators, who composed
+the entire people, had been completely won over or completely subjugated by
+them. They formed two classes, the agents of commerce or banking, and workers
+in the factories. The former contributed an immense amount of work and
+received large salaries. Some of them succeeded in founding establishments of
+their own; for in the constant increase of the public wealth the more
+intelligent and audacious could hope for anything. Doubtless it would have
+been possible to find a certain number of discontented and rebellious persons
+among the immense crowd of engineers and accountants, but this powerful
+society had imprinted its firm discipline even on the minds of its opponents.
+The very anarchists were laborious and regular.
+
+As for the workmen who toiled in the factories that surrounded the town, their
+decadence, both physical and moral, was terrible; they were examples of the
+type of poverty as it is set forth by anthropology. Although the development
+among them of certain muscles, due to the particular nature of their work,
+might give a false idea of their strength, they presented sure signs of morbid
+debility. Of low stature, with small heads and narrow chests, they were
+further distinguished from the comfortable classes by a multitude of
+physiological anomalies, and, in particular, by a common want of symmetry
+between the head and the limbs. And they were destined to a gradual and
+continuous degeneration, for the State made soldiers of the more robust among
+them, and the health of these did not long withstand the brothels and the
+drink-shops that sprang up around their barracks. The proletarians became more
+and more feeble in mind. The continued weakening of their intellectual
+faculties was not entirely due to their manner of life; it resulted also from
+a methodical selection carried out by the employers. The latter, fearing that
+workmen of too great ability might be inclined to put forward legitimate
+demands, took care to eliminate them by every possible means, and preferred to
+engage ignorant and stupid labourers, who were incapable of defending their
+rights, but were yet intelligent enough to perform their toil, which highly
+perfected machines rendered extremely simple. Thus the proletarians were
+unable to do anything to improve their lot. With difficulty did they succeed
+by means of strikes in maintaining the rate of their wages. Even this means
+began to fail them. The alternations of production inherent in the capitalist
+system caused such cessations of work that, in several branches of industry,
+as soon as a strike was declared, the accumulation of products allowed the
+employers to dispense with the strikers. In a word, these miserable employees
+were plunged in a gloomy apathy that nothing enlightened and nothing
+exasperated. They were necessary instruments for the social order and well
+adapted to their purpose.
+
+Upon the whole, this social order seemed the most firmly established that had
+yet been seen, at least amon kind, for that of bees and ants is incomparably
+more stable. Nothing could foreshadow the ruin of a system founded on what is
+strongest in human nature, pride and cupidity. However, keen observers
+discovered several grounds for uneasiness. The most certain, although the
+least apparent, were of an economic order, and consisted in the continually
+increasing amount of over-production, which entailed long and cruel
+interruptions of labour, though these were, it is true, utilized by the
+manufacturers as a means of breaking the power of the workmen, by facing them
+with the prospect of a lock-out. A more obvious peril resulted from the
+physiological state of almost the entire population. "The health of the poor
+is what it must be," said the experts in hygiene, "but that of the rich leaves
+much to be desired." It was not difficult to find the causes of this. The
+supply of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the city, and men
+breathed in an artificial air. The food trusts, by means of the most daring
+chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk, fruit, and
+vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and brain troubles.
+The multi-millionaires were bald at the age of eighteen; some showed from time
+to time a dangerous weakness of mind. Over-strung and enfeebled, they gave
+enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a common thing for some
+bath-attendant or other trumpery who turned healer or prophet, to make a rapid
+fortune by the practice of medicine or theology. The number of lunatics
+increased continually; suicides multiplied in the world of wealth, and many of
+them were accompanied by atrocious and extraordinary circumstances, which bore
+witness to an unheard o perversion of intelligence and sensibility.
+
+Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average minds. Terrible
+accidents, henceforth periodical and regular, entered into people's
+calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in statistical tables. Every
+day, machines burst into fragments, houses fell down, trains laden with
+merchandise fell on to the streets, demolishing entire buildings and crushing
+hundreds of passers-by. Through the ground, honey-combed with tunnels, two or
+three storeys of work-shops would often crash, engulfing all those who worked
+in them.
+
+S. 2
+
+In the southwestern district of the city, on an eminence which had preserved
+its ancient name of Fort Saint-Michel, there stretched a square where some old
+trees still spread their exhausted arms above the greensward. Landscape
+gardeners had constructed a cascade, grottos, a torrent, a lake, and an
+island, on its northern slope. From this side one could see the whole town
+with its streets, its boulevards, its squares, the multitude of its roofs and
+domes, its air-passages, and its crowds of men, covered with a veil of
+silence, and seemingly enchanted by the distance. This square was the
+healthiest place in the capital; here no smoke obscured the sky, and children
+were brought here to play. In summer some employees from the neighbouring
+offices and laboratories used to resort to it for a moment after their
+luncheons, but they did not disturb its solitude and peace.
+
+It was owing to this custom that, one day in June, about mid-day, a telegraph
+clerk, Caroline Meslier, came and sat down on a bench at the end of a terrace.
+In order to refresh her eyes by the sight of a little green, she turned her
+back to the town. Dark, with brown eyes, robust and placid, Caroline appeared
+to be from twenty-five to twenty-eight years of age. Almost immediately, a
+clerk in the Electricity Trust, George Clair, took his place beside her. Fair,
+thin, and supple, he had features of a feminine delicacy; he was scarcely
+older than she, and looked still younger. As they met almost every day in this
+place, a comradeship had sprung up between them, and they enjoyed chatting
+together. But their conversation had never been tender, affectionate, or even
+intimate. Caroline, although it had happened to her in the past to repent of
+her confidence, might perhaps have been less reserved had not George Clair
+always shown himself extremely restrained in his expressions and behaviour. He
+always gave a purely intellectual character to the conversation, keeping it
+within the realm of general ideas, and, moreover, expressing himself on all
+subjects with the greatest freedom. He spoke frequently of the organization of
+society, and the conditions of labour.
+
+"Wealth," said he, "is one of the means of living happily; but people have
+made it the sole end of existence."
+
+And this state of things seemed monstrous to both of them.
+
+They returned continually to various scientific subjects with which they were
+both familiar.
+
+On that day they discussed the evolution of chemistry.
+
+"From the moment," said Clair, "that radium was seen to be transformed into
+helium, people ceased to affirm the immutability of simple bodies; in this way
+all those old laws about simple relations and about the indestructibility of
+matter were abolished."
+
+"However," said she, "chemical laws exist."
+
+For, being a woman, she had need of belief.
+
+He resumed carelessly:
+
+"Now that we can procure radium in sufficient quantities, science possesses
+incomparable means of analysis; even at present we get glimpses, within what
+are called simple bodies, of extremely diversified complex ones, and we
+discover energies in matter which seem to increase even by reason of its
+tenuity."
+
+As they talked, they threw bits of bread to the birds, and some children
+played around them.
+
+Passing from one subject to another:
+
+"This hill, in the quaternary epoch," said Clair, "was inhabited by wild
+horses. Last year, as they were tunnelling for the water mains, they found a
+layer of the bones of primeval horses."
+
+She was anxious to know whether, at that distant epoch, man had yet appeared.
+
+He told her that man used to hunt the primeval horse long before he tried to
+domesticate him.
+
+"Man," he added, "was at first a hunter, then he became a shepherd, a
+cultivator, a manufacturer . . . and these diverse civilizations succeeded
+each other at intervals of time that the mind cannot conceive."
+
+He took out his watch.
+
+Caroline asked if it was already time to go back to the office.
+
+He said it was not, that it was scarcely half-past twelve.
+
+A little girl was making mud pies at the foot of their bench; a little boy of
+seven or eight years was playing in front of them. Whilst his mother was
+sewing on an adjoining bench, he played all alone at being a run-away horse,
+and with that power of illusion, of which children are capable, he imagined
+that he was at the same time the horse, and those who ran after him, and those
+who fled in terror before him. He kept struggling with himself and shouting:
+"Stop him, Hi! Hi! This is an awful horse, he has got the bit between his
+teeth."
+
+Caroline asked the question:
+
+"Do you think that men were happy formerly?"
+
+Her companion answered:
+
+"They suffered less when they were younger. They acted like that little boy:
+they played; they played at arts, at virtues, at vices, at heroism, at
+beliefs, at pleasures; they had illusions which entertained them; they made a
+noise; they amused themselves. But now. . . ."
+
+He interrupted himself, and looked again at his watch.
+
+The child, who was running, struck his foot against the little girl's pail,
+and fell his full length on the gravel. He remained a moment stretched out
+motionless, then raised himself up on the palms of his hands. His forehead
+puckered, his mouth opened, and he burst into tears. His mother ran up, but
+Caroline had lifted him from the ground and was wiping his eyes and mouth with
+her handkerchief.
+
+The child kept on sobbing and Clair took him in his arms.
+
+"Come, don't cry, my little man! I am going to tell you a story.
+
+"A fisherman once threw his net into the sea and drew out a little, sealed,
+copper pot, which he opened with his knife. Smoke came out of it, and as it
+mounted up to the clouds the smoke grew thicker and thicker and became a giant
+who gave such a terrible yawn that the whole world was blown to dust.
+
+Clair stopped himself, gave a dry laugh, and handed the child back to his
+mother. Then he took out his watch again, and kneeling on the bench with his
+elbows resting on its back he gazed at the town. As far as the eye could
+reach, the multitude of houses stood out in their tiny immensity.
+
+Caroline turned her eyes in the same direction.
+
+"What splendid weather it is!" said she. "The sun's rays change the smoke on
+the horizon into gold. The worst thing about civilization is that it deprives
+one of the light of day."
+
+We did not answer; his looks remained fixed on a place in the town.
+
+After some seconds of silence they saw about half a mile away, in the richer
+district on the other side of the river, a sort of tragic fog rearing itself
+upwards. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard even where they were
+sitting, and an immense tree of smoke mounted towards the pure sky. Little by
+little the air was filled with an imperceptible murmur caused by the shouts of
+thousands of men. Cries burst forth quite close to the square.
+
+"What has been blown up?"
+
+The bewilderment was great, for although accidents were common, such a violent
+explosion as this one had never been seen, and everybody perceived that
+something terribly strange had happened.
+
+Attempts were made to locate the place of the accident; districts, streets,
+different buildings, clubs, theatres, and shops were mentioned. Information
+gradually became more precise and at last the truth was known.
+
+"The Steel Trust has just been blown up."
+
+Clair put his watch back into his pocket.
+
+Caroline looked at him closely and her eyes filled with astonishment.
+
+At last she whispered in his ear:
+
+"Did you know it? Were you expecting it? Was it you . . .?"
+
+He answered very calmly:
+
+"That town ought to be destroyed."
+
+She replied in a gentle and thoughtful tone:
+
+"I think so too."
+
+And both of them returned quietly to their work.
+
+
+S. 3
+
+From that day onward, anarchist attempts followed one another every week
+without interruption. The victims were numerous, and almost all of them
+belonged to the poorer classes. These crimes roused public resentment. It was
+among domestic servants, hotel-keepers, and the employees of such small shops
+as the Trusts still allowed to exist, that indignation burst forth most
+vehemently. In popular districts women might be heard demanding unusual
+punishments for the dynamitards. (They were called by this old name, although
+it was hardly appropriate to them, since, to these unknown chemists, dynamite
+was an innocent material only fit to destroy ant-hills, and they considered it
+mere child's play to explode nitro-glycerine with a cartridge made of
+fulminate of mercury.) Business ceased suddenly, and those who were least rich
+were the first to feel the effects. They spoke of doing justice themselves to
+the anarchists. In the mean time the factory workers remained hostile or
+indifferent to violent action. They were threatened, as a result of the
+decline of business, with a likelihood of losing their work, or even a
+lock-out in all the factories. The Federation of Trade Unions proposed a
+general strike as the most powerful means of influencing the employers, and
+the best aid that could be given to the revolutionists, but all the trades
+with the exception of the gliders refused to cease work.
+
+The police made numerous arrests. Troops summoned from all parts of the
+National Federation protected the offices of the Trusts, the houses of the
+multi-millionaires, the public halls, the banks, and the big shops. A
+fortnight passed without a single explosion, and it was concluded that the
+dynamitards, in all probability but a handful of persons, perhaps even Still
+fewer, had all been killed or captured, or that they were in hiding, or had
+taken flight. Confidence returned; it returned at first among the poorer
+classes. Two or three hundred thousand soldiers, who bad been lodged in the
+most closely populated districts, stimulated trade, and people began to cry
+out: "Hurrah for the army!"
+
+The rich, who had not been so quick to take alarm, were reassured more slowly.
+But at the Stock Exchange a group of "bulls" spread optimistic rumours and by
+a powerful effort put a brake upon the fall in prices. Business improved.
+Newspapers with big circulations supported the movement. With patriotic
+eloquence they depicted capital as laughing in its impregnable position at the
+assaults of a few dastardly criminals, and public wealth maintaining its
+serene ascendency in spite of the vain threats made against it. They were
+sincere in their attitude, though at the same time they found it benefited
+them. Outrages were forgotten or their occurrence denied. On Sundays, at the
+race-meetings, the stands were adorned by women covered with pearls and
+diamonds. It was observed with joy that the capitalists had not suffered.
+Cheers were given for the multi-millionaires in the saddling rooms.
+
+On the following day the Southern Railway Station, the Petroleum Trust, and
+the huge church built at the expense of Thomas Morcellet were all blown up.
+Thirty houses were in flames, and the beginning of a fire was discovered at
+the docks. The firemen showed amazing intrepidity and zeal. They managed their
+tall fire-escapes with automatic precision, and climbed as high as thirty
+storeys to rescue the luckless inhabitants from the flames. The soldiers
+performed their duties with spirit, and were given a double ration of coffee.
+But these fresh casualties started a panic. Millions of people, who wanted to
+take their money with them and leave the town at once, crowded the great
+banking houses. These establishments, after paying out money for three days,
+closed their doors amid mutterings of a riot. A crowd of fugitives, laden with
+their baggage, besieged the railway stations and took the town by storm. Many
+who were anxious to lay in a stock of provisions and take refuge in the
+cellars, attacked the grocery stores, although they were guarded by soldiers
+with fixed bayonets. The public authorities displayed energy. Numerous arrests
+were made and thousands of warrants issued against suspected persons.
+
+During the three weeks that followed no outrage was committed. There was a
+rumour that bombs had been found in the Opera House, in the cellars of the
+Town Hall, and beside one of the Pillars of the Stock Exchange. But it was
+soon known that these were boxes of sweets that had been put in those places
+by practical jokers or lunatics. One of the accused, when questioned by a
+magistrate, declared that he was the chief author of the explosions, and said
+that all his accomplices had lost their lives. These confessions were
+published by the newspapers and helped to reassure public opinion. It was only
+towards the close of the examination that the magistrates saw they had to deal
+with a pretender who was in no way connected with any of the crimes.
+
+The experts chosen by the courts discovered nothing that enabled them to
+determine the engine employed in the work of destruction. According to their
+conjectures the new explosive emanated from a gas which radium evolves, and it
+was supposed that electric waves, produced by a special type of oscillator,
+were propagated through space and thus caused the explosion. But even the
+ablest chemist could say nothing precise or certain. At last two policemen,
+who were passing in front of the Hotel Meyer, found on the pavement, close to
+a ventilator, an egg made of white metal and provided with a capsule at each
+end. They picked it up carefully, and, on the orders of their chief, carried
+it to the municipal laboratory. Scarcely had the experts assembled to examine
+it, than the egg burst and blew up the amphitheatre and the dome. All the
+experts perished, and with them Collin, the General of Artillery, and the
+famous Professor Tigre.
+
+The capitalist society did not allow itself to be daunted by this fresh
+disaster. The great banks re-opened their doors, declaring that they would
+meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money guaranteed by the
+State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange, in spite of the complete
+cessation of business, decided not to suspend their sittings.
+
+In the mean time the magisterial investigation into the case of those who had
+been first accused had come to an end. Perhaps the evidence brought against
+them might have appeared insufficient under other circumstances, but the zeal
+both of the magistrates and the public made up for this insufficiency. On the
+eve of the day fixed for the trial the Courts of justice were blown up and
+eight hundred people were killed, the greater number of them being judges and
+lawyers. A furious crowd broke into the prison and lynched the prisoners. The
+troops sent to restore order were received with showers of stones and revolver
+shots; several soldiers being dragged from their horses and trampled
+underfoot. The soldiers fired on the mob and many persons were killed. At last
+the public authorities succeeded in establishing tranquillity. Next day the
+Bank was blown up.
+
+From that time onwards unheard-of things took place. The factory workers, who
+had refused to strike, rushed in crowds into the town and set fire to the
+houses. Entire regiments, led by their officers, joined the workmen, went with
+them through the town singing revolutionary hymns, and took barrels of
+petroleum from the docks with which to feed the fires. Explosions were
+continual. One morning a monstrous tree of smoke, like the ghost of a huge
+palm tree half a mile in height, rose above the giant Telegraph Hall which
+suddenly fell into a complete ruin.
+
+Whilst half the town was in flames, the other half pursued its accustomed
+life. In the mornings, milk pails could be heard jingling in the dairy carts.
+In a deserted avenue some old navvy might be seen seated against a wall slowly
+eating hunks of bread with perhaps a little meat. Almost all the presidents of
+the trusts remained at their posts. Some of them performed their duty with
+heroic simplicity. Raphael Box, the son of a martyred multi-millionaire, was
+blown up as he was presiding at the general meeting of the Sugar Trust. He was
+given a magnificent funeral and the procession on its way to the cemetery had
+to climb six times over piles of ruins or cross upon planks over the uprooted
+roads.
+
+The ordinary helpers of the rich, the clerks, employees, brokers, and agents,
+preserved an unshaken fidelity. The surviving clerks of the Bank that had been
+blown up, made their way along the ruined streets through the midst of smoking
+houses to hand in their bills of exchange, and several were swallowed up in
+the flames while endeavouring to present their receipts.
+
+Nevertheless, any illusion concerning the state of affairs was impossible. The
+enemy was master of the town. Instead of silence the noise of explosions was
+now continuous and produced an insurmountable feeling of horror. The lighting
+apparatus having been destroyed, the city was plunged in darkness all through
+the night, and appalling crimes were committed. The populous districts alone,
+having suffered the least, still preserved measures of protection. The were
+paraded by patrols of volunteers who shot the robbers, and at every street
+corner one stumbled over a body lying in a pool of blood, the hands bound
+behind the back, a handkerchief over the face, and a placard pinned upon the
+breast.
+
+It became impossible to clear away the ruins or to bury the dead. Soon the
+stench from the corpses became intolerable. Epidemics raged and caused
+innumerable deaths, while they also rendered the survivors feeble and
+listless. Famine carried off almost all who were left. A hundred and one days
+after the first outrage, whilst six army corps with field artillery and siege
+artillery were marching, at night, into the poorest quarter of the city,
+Caroline and Clair, holding each other's hands, were watching from the roof a
+lofty house, the only one still left standing, but now surrounded by smoke and
+flame. joyous songs ascended from the street, where the crowd was dancing in
+delirium.
+
+"To-morrow it will be ended," said the man, "and it will be better."
+
+The young woman, her hair loosened and her face shining with the reflection of
+the flames, gazed with a pious joy at the circle of fire that was growing
+closer around them.
+
+"It will be better," said she also.
+
+And throwing herself into the destroyer's arms she pressed a passionate kiss
+upon his lips.
+
+S. 4
+
+The other towns of the federation also suffered from disturbances and
+outbreaks, and then order was restored. Reforms were introduced into
+institutions and great changes took place in habits and customs, but the
+country never recovered the loss of its capital, and never regained its former
+prosperity. Commerce and industry dwindled away, and civilization abandoned
+those countries which for so long it bad preferred to all others. They became
+insalubrious and sterile; the territory that had supported so many millions of
+men became nothing more than a desert. On the hill of Fort St. Michel wild
+horses cropped the coarse grass.
+
+Days flowed by like water from the fountains, and the centuries passed like
+drops falling from the ends of stalactites. Hunters came to chase the bears
+upon the hills that covered the forgotten city; shepherds led their flocks
+upon them; labourers turned up the soil with their ploughs; gardeners
+cultivated their lettuces and grafted their pear trees. They were not rich,
+and they had no arts. The walls of their cabins were covered with old vines
+and roses, A goat-skin clothed their tanned limbs, while their wives dressed
+themselves with the wool that they themselves had spun. The goat-herds moulded
+little figures of men and animals out of clay, or sang songs about the young
+girl who follows her lover through woods or among the browsing goats while the
+pine trees whisper together and the water utters its murmuring sound. The
+master of the house grew angry with the beetles who devoured his figs; he
+planned snares to protect his fowls from the velvet-tailed fox, and he poured
+out wine for his neighbours saying:
+
+"Drink! The flies have not spoilt my vintage; the vines were dry before they
+came."
+
+Then in the course of ages the wealth of the villages and the corn that filled
+the fields were pillaged by barbarian invaders. The country changed its
+masters several times. The conquerors built castles upon the hills;
+cultivation increased; mills, forges) tanneries, and looms were established;
+roads were opened through the woods and over the marshes; the river was
+covered with boats. The hamlets became large villages and joining together
+formed a town which protected itself by deep trenches and lofty walls. Later,
+becoming the capital of a great State, it found itself straitened within its
+now useless ramparts and it converted them into grass-covered walks.
+
+It grew very rich and large beyond measure. The houses were never high enough
+to satisfy the people; they kept on making them still higher and built them of
+thirty or forty storeys, with offices, shops, banks, societies one above
+another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper downwards. Fifteen millions
+of men laboured in the giant town.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
+
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+Title: Penguin Island
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PENGUIN ISLAND ***
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+Scanned by Aaron Cannon of Paradise, California
+
+<p>PENGUIN ISLAND</p>
+
+<p>by ANATOLE FRANCE</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ CONTENTS</p>
+
+<p>BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS<br>
+ BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES<br>
+ BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE<br>
+ BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO<br>
+ BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON<br>
+ BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES<br>
+ BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES<br>
+ BOOK VIII. FUTURE TIMES</p>
+
+<h1><br>
+ BOOK I. THE BEGINNINGS</h1>
+
+<h2>I. LIFE OF SAINT MAEL</h2>
+
+<p>Mael, a scion of a royal family of Cambria, was sent in his
+ninth year to the<br>
+ Abbey of Yvern so that he might there study both sacred and
+profane learning.<br>
+ At the age of fourteen he renounced his patrimony and took a vow
+to serve the<br>
+ Lord. His time was divided, according to the rule, between the
+singing of<br>
+ hymns, the study of grammar, and the meditation of eternal
+truths.</p>
+
+<p>A celestial perfume soon disclosed the virtues of the monk
+throughout the<br>
+ cloister, and when the blessed Gal, the Abbot of Yvern, departed
+from this<br>
+ world into the next, young Mael succeeded him in the government
+of the<br>
+ monastery. He established therein a school, an infirmary, a
+guest-house, a<br>
+ forge, work-shops of all kinds, and sheds for building ships,
+and he compelled<br>
+ the monks to till the lands in the neighbourhood. With his own
+hands he<br>
+ cultivated the garden of the Abbey, he worked in metals, he
+instructed the<br>
+ novices, and his life was gently gliding along like a stream
+that reflects the<br>
+ heaven and fertilizes the fields.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ At the close of the day this servant of God was accustomed to
+seat himself on<br>
+ the cliff, in the place that is to-day still called St. Mael's
+chair. At his<br>
+ feet the rocks bristling with green seaweed and tawny wrack
+seemed like black<br>
+ dragons as they faced the foam of the waves with their monstrous
+breasts. He<br>
+ watched the sun descending into the ocean like a red Host whose
+glorious blood<br>
+ gave a purple tone to the clouds and to the summits of the
+waves. And the holy<br>
+ man saw in this the image of the mystery of the Cross, by which
+the divine<br>
+ blood has clothed the earth with a royal purple. In the offing a
+line of dark<br>
+ blue marked the shores of the island of Gad, where St. Bridget,
+who had been<br>
+ given the veil by St. Malo, ruled over a convent of women.</p>
+
+<p>Now Bridget, knowing the merits of the venerable Mael, begged
+from him some<br>
+ work of his hands as a rich present. Mael cast a hand-bell of
+bronze for her<br>
+ and, when it was finished, he blessed it and threw it into the
+sea. And the<br>
+ bell went ringing towards the coast of Gad, where St. Bridget,
+warned by the<br>
+ sound of the bell upon the waves, received it piously, and
+carried it in<br>
+ solemn procession with singing of psalms into the chapel of the
+convent.</p>
+
+<p>Thus the holy Mael advanced from virtue to virtue. He had
+already passed<br>
+ through two-thirds of the way of life, and he hoped peacefully
+to reach his<br>
+ terrestrial end in the midst of his spiritual brethren, when he
+knew by a<br>
+ certain sign that the Divine wisdom had decided otherwise, and
+that the Lord<br>
+ was calling him to less peaceful but not less meritorious
+labours.</p>
+
+<h2>II. THE APOSTOLICAL VOCATION OF SAINT MAEL</h2>
+
+<p>One day as he walked in meditation to the furthest point of a
+tranquil beach,<br>
+ for which rocks jutting out into the sea formed a rugged dam, he
+saw a trough<br>
+ of stone which floated like a boat upon the waters.</p>
+
+<p>It was in a vessel similar to this that St. Guirec, the great
+St. Columba, and<br>
+ so many holy men from Scotland and from Ireland had gone forth
+to evangelize<br>
+ Armorica. More recently still, St. Avoye having come from
+England, ascended<br>
+ the river Auray in a mortar made of rose-coloured granite into
+which children<br>
+ were afterwards placed in order to make them strong; St. Vouga
+passed from<br>
+ Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock whose fragments, preserved at
+Penmarch, will<br>
+ cure of fever such pilgrims as place these splinters on their
+heads. St.<br>
+ Samson entered the Bay of St. Michael's Mount in a granite
+vessel which will<br>
+ one day be called St. Samson's basin. It is because of these
+facts that when<br>
+ he saw the stone trough the holy Mael understood that the Lord
+intended him<br>
+ for the apostolate of the pagans who still peopled the coast and
+the Breton<br>
+ islands.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ He handed his ashen staff to the holy Budoc, thus investing him
+with the<br>
+ government of the monastery. Then, furnished with bread, a
+barrel of fresh<br>
+ water, and the book of the Holy Gospels, he entered the stone
+trough which<br>
+ carried him gently to the island of Hoedic.</p>
+
+<p>This island is perpetually buffeted by the winds. In it some
+poor men fished<br>
+ among the clefts of the rocks and labouriously cultivated
+vegetables in<br>
+ gardens full of sand and pebbles that were sheltered from the
+wind by walls of<br>
+ barren stone and hedges of tamarisk. A beautiful fig-tree raised
+itself in a<br>
+ hollow of the island and thrust forth its branches far and wide.
+The<br>
+ inhabitants of the island used to worship it.</p>
+
+<p>And the holy Mael said to them: "You worship this tree because
+it is<br>
+ beautiful. Therefore you are capable of feeling beauty. Now I
+come to reveal<br>
+ to you the hidden beauty." And he taught them the Gospel. And
+after having<br>
+ instructed them, he baptized them with salt and water.</p>
+
+<p>The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than
+they are<br>
+ to-day. For since then many have been swallowed up by the sea.
+St. Mael<br>
+ evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he
+ascended the river<br>
+ Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a
+Roman house. A<br>
+ thin column of smoke went up from the roof. The holy man crossed
+the threshold<br>
+ on which there was a mosaic representing a dog with its hind
+legs outstretched<br>
+ and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed by an old couple,
+Marcus Combabus and<br>
+ Valeria Moerens, who lived there on the products of their lands.
+There was a<br>
+ portico round the interior court the columns of which were
+painted red, half<br>
+ their height upwards from the base. A fountain made of shells
+stood against<br>
+ the wall and under the portico there rose an altar with a niche
+in which the<br>
+ master of the house had placed some little idols made of baked
+earth and<br>
+ whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged children,
+others Apollo or<br>
+ Mercury, and several were in the form of a naked woman twisting
+her hair. But<br>
+ the holy Mael, observing those figures, discovered among them
+the image of a<br>
+ young mother holding a child upon her knees.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately pointing to that image he said:</p>
+
+<p>"That is the Virgin, the mother of God. The poet Virgil
+foretold her in<br>
+ Sibylline verses before she was born and, in angelical tones he
+sang Jam redit<br>
+ et virgo. Throughout heathendom prophetic figures of her have
+been made, like<br>
+ that which you, O Marcus, have placed upon this altar. And
+without doubt it is<br>
+ she who has protected your modest household. Thus it is that
+those who<br>
+ faithfully observe the natural law prepare themselves for the
+knowledge of<br>
+ revealed truths."</p>
+
+<p>Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, having been instructed by
+this speech,<br>
+ were converted to the Christian faith. They received baptism
+together with<br>
+ their young freedwoman, Caelia Avitella, who was dearer to them
+than the light<br>
+ of their eyes. All their tenants renounced paganism and were
+baptized on the<br>
+ same day.</p>
+
+<p>Marcus Combabus, Valeria Moerens, and Caelia Avitella led
+thenceforth a life<br>
+ full of merit. They died in the Lord and were admitted into the
+canon of the<br>
+ saints.</p>
+
+<p>For thirty-seven years longer the blessed Mael evangelized the
+pagans of the<br>
+ inner lands. He built two hundred and eighteen chapels and
+seventy-four<br>
+ abbeys.</p>
+
+<p>Now on a certain day in the city of Vannes, when he was
+preaching the Gospel,<br>
+ he learned that the monks of Yvern had in his absence declined
+from the rule<br>
+ of St. Gal. Immediately, with the zeal of a hen who gathers her
+brood, he<br>
+ repaired to his erring children. He was then towards the end of
+his<br>
+ ninety-seventh year; his figure was bent, but his arms were
+still strong, and<br>
+ his speech was poured forth abundantly like winter snow in the
+depths of the<br>
+ valleys.</p>
+
+<p>Abbot Budoc restored the ashen staff to St. Mael and informed
+him of the<br>
+ unhappy state into which the Abbey had fallen. The monks were in
+disagreement<br>
+ as to the date an which the festival of Easter ought to be
+celebrated. Some<br>
+ held for the Roman calendar, others for the Greek calendar, and
+the horrors of<br>
+ a chronological schism distracted the monastery.</p>
+
+<p>There also prevailed another cause of disorder. The nuns of
+the island of Gad,<br>
+ sadly fallen from their former virtue, continually came in boats
+to the coast<br>
+ of Yvern. The monks received them in the guesthouse and from
+this there arose<br>
+ scandals which filled pious souls with desolation.</p>
+
+<p>Having finished his faithful report, Abbot Budoc concluded in
+these terms:</p>
+
+<p>"Since the coming of these nuns the innocence and peace of the
+monks are at an<br>
+ end."</p>
+
+<p>"I readily believe it," answered the blessed Mael. "For woman
+is a cleverly<br>
+ constructed snare by which we are taken even before we suspect
+the trap. Alas!<br>
+ the delightful attraction of these creatures is exerted with
+even greater<br>
+ force from a distance than when they are close at hand. The less
+they satisfy<br>
+ desire the more they inspire it. This is the reason why a poet
+wrote this<br>
+ verse to one of them:</p>
+
+<p>When present I avoid thee, but when away I find thee.</p>
+
+<p>Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love
+have more power<br>
+ over hermits and monks than over men who live in the world. All
+through my<br>
+ life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but his
+strongest<br>
+ temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman, however
+beautiful and<br>
+ fragrant she was. They came to me from the image of an absent
+woman. Even now,<br>
+ though full of days and approaching my ninety-eighth year, I am
+often led by<br>
+ the Enemy to sin against chastity, at least in thought. At night
+when I am<br>
+ cold in my bed and my frozen old bones rattle together with a
+dull sound I<br>
+ hear voices reciting the second verse of the third Book of the
+Kings:<br>
+ 'Wherefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for
+my lord the<br>
+ king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let
+her cherish<br>
+ him, and let her lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get
+heat,' and<br>
+ the devil shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to me:
+'I am thy<br>
+ Abishag; I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy
+couch.'</p>
+
+<p>"Believe me," added the old man, "it is only by the special
+aid of Heaven that<br>
+ a monk can keep his chastity in act and in intention."</p>
+
+<p>Applying himself immediately to restore innocence and peace to
+the monastery,<br>
+ he corrected the calendar according to the calculations of
+chronology and<br>
+ astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his decision;
+he sent the<br>
+ women who had declined from St. Bridget's rule back to their
+convent; but far<br>
+ from driving them away brutally, he caused them to be led to
+their boat with<br>
+ singing of psalms and litanies.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us respect in them," he said, "the daughters of Bridget
+and the betrothed<br>
+ of the Lord. Let us beware lest we imitate the Pharisees who
+affect to despise<br>
+ sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons should be
+abased, and<br>
+ they should be made ashamed of what they have done and not of
+what they are,<br>
+ for they are all creatures of God."</p>
+
+<p>And the holy man exhorted his monks to obey faithfully the
+rule of their<br>
+ order.</p>
+
+<p>"When it does not yield to the rudder," said he to them, "the
+ship yields to<br>
+ the rock."</p>
+
+<h2>III. THE TEMPTATION OF SAINT MAEL</h2>
+
+<p>The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of
+Yvern before he<br>
+ learned that the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic, his first
+catechumens<br>
+ and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to paganism,
+and that they<br>
+ were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of wool to the
+branches of the<br>
+ sacred fig-tree.</p>
+
+<p>The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that
+soon those<br>
+ misguided men might violently destroy the chapel that had been
+built on the<br>
+ shore of their island.</p>
+
+<p>The holy man resolved forthwith to visit his faithless
+children, so that he<br>
+ might lead them back to the faith and prevent them from yielding
+to such<br>
+ sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was
+moored, he<br>
+ turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of saws
+and of<br>
+ hammers, which, thirty years before, he had erected on the
+fringe of that bay<br>
+ for the purpose of building ships.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the
+sheds and, under<br>
+ the appearance of a monk called Samsok, he approached the holy
+man and tempted<br>
+ him thus:</p>
+
+<p>"Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins
+unceasingly.<br>
+ Every moment that passes removes them farther from God. They are
+soon going to<br>
+ use violence towards the chapel that you have raised with your
+own venerable<br>
+ hands on the shore of their island. Time is pressing. Do you not
+think that<br>
+ your stone trough would carry you more quickly towards them if
+it were rigged<br>
+ like a boat and furnished with a rudder, a mast, and a sail, for
+then you<br>
+ would be driven by the wind? Your arms are still strong and able
+to steer a<br>
+ small craft. It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem
+in front of<br>
+ your apostolic trough. You are much too clear-sighted not to
+have thought of<br>
+ it already."</p>
+
+<p>"Truly time is pressing," answered the holy man. "But to do as
+you say,<br>
+ Samson, my son, would it not be to make myself like those men of
+little faith<br>
+ who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts
+of Him who has<br>
+ sent me this stone vessel without rigging or sail?"</p>
+
+<p>This question, the Devil, who is a great theologian, answered
+by another.</p>
+
+<p>"Father, is it praiseworthy to wait, with our arms folded,
+until help comes<br>
+ from on high, and to ask everything from Him who can do all
+things, instead of<br>
+ acting by human prudence and helping ourselves?</p>
+
+<p>"It certainly is not," answered the holy Mael, "and to neglect
+to act by human<br>
+ prudence is tempting God."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," urged the Devil, "is it not prudence in this case to
+rig the vessel?"</p>
+
+<p>"It would be prudence if we could not attain our end in any
+other way."</p>
+
+<p>"Is your vessel then so very speedy?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is as speedy as God pleases."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you know about it? It goes like Abbot Budoc's mule.
+It is a regular<br>
+ old tub. Are you forbidden to make it speedier?"</p>
+
+<p>"My son, clearness adorns your words, but they are unduly
+over-confident.<br>
+ Remember that this vessel is miraculous."</p>
+
+<p>"It is, father. A granite trough that floats on the water like
+a cork is a<br>
+ miraculous trough. There is not the slightest doubt about it.
+What conclusion<br>
+ do you draw from that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am greatly perplexed. Is it right to perfect so miraculous
+a machine by<br>
+ human and natural means?"</p>
+
+<p>"Father, if you lost your right foot and God restored it to
+you, would not<br>
+ that foot be miraculous?"</p>
+
+<p>"Without doubt, my son."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you put a shoe on it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Assuredly."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, if you believe that one may cover a miraculous
+foot with a<br>
+ natural shoe, you should also believe that we can put natural
+rigging on a<br>
+ miraculous boat. That is clear. Alas! Why must the holiest
+persons have their<br>
+ moments of weakness and despondency? The most illustrious of the
+apostles of<br>
+ Brittany could accomplish works worthy of eternal glory . . .
+But his spirit<br>
+ is tardy and his hand is slothful. Farewell then, father! Travel
+by short and<br>
+ slow stages and when at last you approach the coast of Hoedic
+you will see the<br>
+ smoking ruins of the chapel that was built and consecrated by
+your own hands.<br>
+ The pagans will have burned it and with it the deacon you left
+there. He will<br>
+ be as thoroughly roasted as a black pudding."</p>
+
+<p>"My trouble is extreme," said the servant of God, drying with
+his sleeve the<br>
+ sweat that gathered upon his brow. "But tell me, Samson, my son,
+would not<br>
+ rigging this stone trough be a difficult piece of work? And if
+we undertook it<br>
+ might we not lose time instead of gaining it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! father," exclaimed the Devil, "in one turning of the
+hour-glass the thing<br>
+ would be done. We shall find the necessary rigging in this shed
+that you have<br>
+ formerly built here on the coast and in those store-houses
+abundantly stocked<br>
+ through your care. I will myself regulate all the ship's
+fittings. Before<br>
+ being a monk I was a sailor and a carpenter and I have worked at
+many other<br>
+ trades as well. Let us to work."</p>
+
+<p>Immediately he drew the holy man into an outhouse filled with
+all things<br>
+ needful for fitting out a boat.</p>
+
+<p>"That for you, father!"</p>
+
+<p>And he placed on his shoulders the sail, the mast, the gaff,
+and the boom.</p>
+
+<p>Then, himself bearing a stem and a rudder with its screw and
+tiller, and<br>
+ seizing a carpenter's bag full of tools, he ran to the shore,
+dragging the<br>
+ holy man after him by his habit. The latter was bent, sweating,
+and<br>
+ breathless, under the burden of canvas and wood.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IV. ST. MAEL'S NAVIGATION ON THE OCEAN OF ICE</h2>
+
+<p>The Devil, having tucked his clothes up to his arm-pits,
+dragged the trough on<br>
+ the sand, and fitted the rigging in less than an hour.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as the holy Mael had embarked, the vessel, with all
+its sails set,<br>
+ cleft through the waters with such speed that the coast was
+almost immediately<br>
+ out of sight. The old man steered to the south so as to double
+the Land's End,<br>
+ but an irresistible current carried him to the south-west. He
+went along the<br>
+ southern coast of Ireland and turned sharply towards the north.
+In the evening<br>
+ the wind freshened. In vain did Mael attempt to furl the sail.
+The vessel flew<br>
+ distractedly towards the fabulous seas.</p>
+
+<p>By the light of the moon the immodest sirens of the North came
+around him with<br>
+ their hempen-coloured hair, raising their white throats and
+their rose-tinted<br>
+ limbs out of the sea; and beating the water into foam with their
+emerald<br>
+ tails, they sang in cadence:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p><br>
+ Whither go'st thou, gentle Mael,<br>
+ In thy trough distracted?<br>
+ All distended is thy sail<br>
+ Like the breast of Juno<br>
+ When from it gushed the Milky Way.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>For a moment their harmonious laughter followed him beneath
+the stars, but the<br>
+ vessel fled on, a hundred times more swiftly than the red ship
+of a Viking.<br>
+ And the petrels, surprised in their flight, clung with their
+feet to the hair<br>
+ of the holy man.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Soon a tempest arose full of darkness and groanings, and the
+trough, driven by<br>
+ a furious wind, flew like a sea-mew through the mist and the
+surge.</p>
+
+<p>After a night of three times twenty-four hours the darkness
+was suddenly rent<br>
+ and the holy man discovered on the horizon a shore more dazzling
+than diamond.<br>
+ The coast rapidly grew larger, and soon by the glacial light of
+a torpid and<br>
+ sunken sun, Mael saw, rising above the waves, the silent streets
+of a white<br>
+ city, which, vaster than Thebes with its hundred gates, extended
+as far as the<br>
+ eye could see the ruins of its forum built of snow, its palaces
+of frost, its<br>
+ crystal arches, and its iridescent obelisks.</p>
+
+<p>The ocean was covered with floating ice-bergs around which
+swam men of the sea<br>
+ of a wild yet gentle appearance. And Leviathan passed by hurling
+a column of<br>
+ water up to the clouds.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, on a block of ice which floated at the same rate as
+the stone trough<br>
+ there was seated a white bear holding her little one in her
+arms, and Mael<br>
+ heard her murmuring in a low voice this verse of Virgil, Incipe
+parve puer.</p>
+
+<p>And full of sadness and trouble, the old man wept.</p>
+
+<p>The fresh water had frozen and burst the barrel that contained
+it. And Mael<br>
+ was sucking pieces of ice to quench his thirst, and his food was
+bread dipped<br>
+ in dirty water. His beard and his hair were broken like glass.
+His habit was<br>
+ covered with a layer of ice and cut into him at every movement
+of his limbs.<br>
+ Huge waves rose up and opened their foaming jaws at the old man.
+Twenty times<br>
+ the boat was filled by masses of sea. And the ocean swallowed up
+the book of<br>
+ the Holy Gospels which the apostle guarded with extreme care in
+a purple cover<br>
+ marked with a golden cross.</p>
+
+<p>Now on the thirtieth day the sea calmed. And lo! with a
+frightful clamour of<br>
+ sky and waters a mountain of dazzling whiteness advanced towards
+the stone<br>
+ vessel. Mael steered to avoid it, but the tiller broke in his
+hands. To lessen<br>
+ the speed of his progress towards the rock he attempted to reef
+the sails, but<br>
+ when he tried to knot the reef-points the wind pulled them away
+from him and<br>
+ the rope seared his hands. He saw three demons with wings of
+black skin having<br>
+ hooks at their ends, who, hanging from the rigging, were puffing
+with their<br>
+ breath against the sails.</p>
+
+<p>Understanding from this sight that the Enemy had governed him
+in all these<br>
+ things, he guarded himself by making the sign of the Cross.
+Immediately a<br>
+ furious gust of wind filled with the noise of sobs and howls
+struck the stone<br>
+ trough, carried off the mast with all the sails, and tore away
+the rudder and<br>
+ the stem.</p>
+
+<p>The trough was drifting on the sea, which had now grown calm.
+The holy man<br>
+ knelt and gave thanks to the Lord who had delivered him from the
+snares of the<br>
+ demon. Then he recognised, sitting on a block of ice, the mother
+bear who had<br>
+ spoken during the storm. She pressed her beloved child to her
+bosom, and in<br>
+ her hand she held a purple book marked with a golden cross.
+Hailing the<br>
+ granite trough, she saluted the holy man with these words:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>"Pax tibi Mael"</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>And she held out the book to him.</p>
+
+<p>The holy man recognised his evangelistary, and, full of
+astonishment, he sang<br>
+ in the tepid air a hymn to the Creator and His creation.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE BAPTISM OF THE PENGUINS</h2>
+
+<p>After having drifted for an hour the holy man approached a
+narrow strand, shut<br>
+ in by steep mountains. He went along the coast for a whole day
+and a night,<br>
+ passing around the reef which formed an insuperable barrier. He
+discovered in<br>
+ this way that it was a round island in the middle of which rose
+a mountain<br>
+ crowned with clouds. He joyfully breathed the fresh breath of
+the moist air.<br>
+ Rain fell, and this rain was so pleasant that the holy man said
+to the Lord:</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Lord, this is the island of tears, the island of
+contrition."</p>
+
+<p>The strand was deserted. Worn out with fatigue and hunger, he
+sat down on a<br>
+ rock in the hollow of which there lay some yellow eggs, marked
+with black<br>
+ spots, and about as large as those of a swan. But he did not
+touch them,<br>
+ saying:</p>
+
+<p>"Birds are the living praises of God. I should not like a
+single one of these<br>
+ praises to be lacking through me."</p>
+
+<p>And he munched the lichens which he tore from the crannies of
+the rocks.</p>
+
+<p>The holy man had gone almost entirely round the island without
+meeting any<br>
+ inhabitants, when he came to a vast amphitheatre formed of black
+and red rocks<br>
+ whose summits became tinged with blue as they rose towards the
+clouds, and<br>
+ they were filled with sonorous cascades.</p>
+
+<p>The reflection from the polar ice had hurt the old man's eyes,
+but a feeble<br>
+ gleam of light still shone through his swollen eyelids. He
+distinguished<br>
+ animated forms which filled the rocks, in stages, like a crowd
+of men on the<br>
+ tiers of an amphitheatre. And at the same time, his ears,
+deafened by the<br>
+ continual noises of the sea, heard a feeble sound of voices.
+Thinking that<br>
+ what he saw were men living under the natural law, and that the
+Lord had sent<br>
+ him to teach them the Divine law, he preached the gospel to
+them.</p>
+
+<p>Mounted on a lofty stone in the midst of the wild circus:</p>
+
+<p>"Inhabitants of this island," said he, "although you be of
+small stature, you<br>
+ look less like a band of fishermen and mariners than like the
+senate of a<br>
+ judicious republic. By your gravity, your silence, your tranquil
+deportment,<br>
+ you form on this wild rock an assembly comparable to the
+Conscript Fathers at<br>
+ Rome deliberating in the temple of Victory, or rather, to the
+philosophers of<br>
+ Athens disputing on the benches of the Areopagus. Doubtless you
+possess<br>
+ neither their science nor their genius, but perhaps in the sight
+of God you<br>
+ are their superiors. I believe that you are simple and good. As
+I went round<br>
+ your island I saw no image of murder, no sign of carnage, no
+enemies' heads or<br>
+ scalps hung from a lofty pole or nailed to the doors of your
+villages. You<br>
+ appear to me to have no arts and not to work in metals. But your
+hearts are<br>
+ pure and your hands are innocent, and the truth will easily
+enter into your<br>
+ souls."</p>
+
+<p>Now what he had taken for men of small stature but of grave
+bearing were<br>
+ penguins whom the spring had gathered together, and who were
+ranged in couples<br>
+ on the natural steps of the rock, erect in the majesty of their
+large white<br>
+ bellies. From moment to moment they moved their winglets like
+arms, and<br>
+ uttered peaceful cries. They did not fear men, for they did not
+know them, and<br>
+ had never received any harm from them; and there was in the monk
+a certain<br>
+ gentleness that reassured the most timid animals and that
+pleased these<br>
+ penguins extremely. With a friendly curiosity they turned
+towards him their<br>
+ little round eyes lengthened in front by a white oval spot that
+gave something<br>
+ odd and human to their appearance.</p>
+
+<p>Touched by their attention, the holy man taught them the
+Gospel.</p>
+
+<p>"Inhabitants of this island, the earthly day that has just
+risen over your<br>
+ rocks is the image of the heavenly day that rises in your souls.
+For I bring<br>
+ you the inner light; I bring you the light and heat of the soul.
+Just as the<br>
+ sun melts the ice of your mountains so Jesus Christ will melt
+the ice of your<br>
+ hearts."</p>
+
+<p>Thus the old man spoke. As everywhere throughout nature voice
+calls to voice,<br>
+ as all which breathes in the light of day loves alternate
+strains, these<br>
+ penguins answered the old man by the sounds of their throats.
+And their voices<br>
+ were soft, for it was the season of their loves.</p>
+
+<p>The holy man, persuaded that they belonged to some idolatrous
+people and that<br>
+ in their own language they gave adherence to the Christian
+faith, invited them<br>
+ to receive baptism.</p>
+
+<p>"I think," said he to them, "that you bathe often, for all the
+hollows of the<br>
+ rocks are full of pure water, and as I came to your assembly I
+saw several of<br>
+ you plunging into these natural baths. Now purity of body is the
+image of<br>
+ spiritual purity."</p>
+
+<p>And he taught them the origin, the nature, and the effects of
+baptism.</p>
+
+<p>"Baptism," said he to them, "is Adoption, New Birth,
+Regeneration,<br>
+ Illumination."</p>
+
+<p>And he explained each of these points to them in
+succession.</p>
+
+<p>Then, having previously blessed the water that fell from the
+cascades and<br>
+ recited the exorcisms, he baptized those whom he had just
+taught, pouring on<br>
+ each of their heads a drop of pure water and pronouncing the
+sacred words.</p>
+
+<p>And thus for three days and three nights he baptized the
+birds.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE</h2>
+
+<p>When the baptism of the penguins was known in Paradise, it
+caused neither joy<br>
+ nor sorrow, but an extreme surprise. The Lord himself was
+embarrassed. He<br>
+ gathered an assembly of clerics and doctors, and asked them
+whether they<br>
+ regarded the baptism as valid.</p>
+
+<p>"It is void," said St. Patrick.</p>
+
+<p>"Why is it void?" asked St. Gal, who had evangelized the
+people of Cornwall<br>
+ and had trained the holy Mael for his apostolical labours.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "The sacrament of baptism," answered St. Patrick, "is void when
+it is given to<br>
+ birds, just as the sacrament of marriage is void when it is
+given to a<br>
+ eunuch."</p>
+
+<p>But St. Gal replied:</p>
+
+<p>"What relation do you claim to establish between the baptism
+of a bird and the<br>
+ marriage of a eunuch? There is none at all. Marriage is, if I
+may say so, a<br>
+ conditional, a contingent sacrament. The priest blesses an event
+beforehand;<br>
+ it is evident that if the act is not consummated the benediction
+remains<br>
+ without effect. That is obvious. I have known on earth, in the
+town of Antrim,<br>
+ a rich man named Sadoc, who, living in concubinage with a woman,
+caused her to<br>
+ be the mother of nine children. In his old age, yielding to my
+reproofs, he<br>
+ consented to marry her, and I blessed their union. Unfortunately
+Sadoc's great<br>
+ age prevented him from consummating the marriage. A short time
+afterwards he<br>
+ lost all his property, and Germaine (that was the name of the
+woman), not<br>
+ feeling herself able to endure poverty, asked for the annulment
+of a marriage<br>
+ which was no reality. The Pope granted her request, for it was
+just. So much<br>
+ for marriage. But baptism is conferred without restrictions or
+reserves of any<br>
+ kind. There is no doubt about it, what the penguins have
+received is a<br>
+ sacrament."</p>
+
+<p>Called to give his opinion, Pope St. Damascus expressed
+himself in these<br>
+ terms:</p>
+
+<p>"In order to know if a baptism is valid and will produce its
+result, that is<br>
+ to say, sanctification, it is necessary to consider who gives it
+and not who<br>
+ receives it. In truth, the sanctifying virtue of this sacrament
+results from<br>
+ the exterior act by which it is conferred, without the baptized
+person<br>
+ cooperating in his own sanctification by any personal act; if it
+were<br>
+ otherwise it would not be administered to the newly born. And
+there is no<br>
+ need, in order to baptize, to fulfil any special condition; it
+is not<br>
+ necessary to be in a state of grace; it is sufficient to have
+the intention of<br>
+ doing what the Church does, to pronounce the consecrated words
+and to observe<br>
+ the prescribed forms. Now we cannot doubt that the venerable
+Mael has observed<br>
+ these conditions. Therefore the penguins are baptized."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think so?" asked St. Guenole. "And what then do you
+believe that<br>
+ baptism really is? Baptism is the process of regeneration by
+which man is born<br>
+ of water and of the spirit, for having entered the water covered
+with crimes,<br>
+ he goes out of it a neophyte, a new creature, abounding in the
+fruits of<br>
+ righteousness; baptism is the seed of immortality; baptism is
+the pledge of<br>
+ the resurrection; baptism is the burying with Christ in His
+death and<br>
+ participation in His departure from the sepulchre. That is not a
+gift to<br>
+ bestow upon birds. Reverend Fathers, let us consider. Baptism
+washes away<br>
+ original sin; now the penguins were not conceived in sin. It
+removes the<br>
+ penalty of sin; now the penguins have not sinned. It produces
+grace and the<br>
+ gift of virtues, uniting Christians to Jesus Christ, as the
+members to the<br>
+ body, and it is obvious to the senses that penguins cannot
+acquire the virtues<br>
+ of confessors, of virgins, and of widows, or receive grace and
+be united to--"</p>
+
+<p>St. Damascus did not allow him to finish.</p>
+
+<p>"That proves," said he warmly, "that the baptism was useless;
+it does not<br>
+ prove that it was not effective."</p>
+
+<p>"But by this reasoning," said St. Guenole, "one might baptize
+in the name of<br>
+ the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by aspersion or
+immersion, not<br>
+ only a bird or a quadruped, but also an inanimate object, a
+statue, a table, a<br>
+ chair, etc. That animal would be Christian, that idol, that
+table would be<br>
+ Christian! It is absurd!"</p>
+
+<p>St. Augustine began to speak. There was a great silence.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going," said the ardent bishop of Hippo, "to show you,
+by an example,<br>
+ the power of formulas. It deals, it is true, with a diabolical
+operation. But<br>
+ if it be established that formulas taught by the Devil have
+effect upon<br>
+ unintelligent animals or even on inanimate objects, how can we
+longer doubt<br>
+ that the effect of the sacramental formulas extends to the minds
+of beasts and<br>
+ even to inert matter?</p>
+
+<p>"This is the example. There was during my lifetime in the town
+of Madaura, the<br>
+ birthplace of the philosopher Apuleius, a witch who was able to
+attract men to<br>
+ her chamber by burning a few of their hairs along with certain
+herbs upon her<br>
+ tripod, pronouncing at the same time certain words. Now one day
+when she<br>
+ wished by this means to gain the, love of a young man, she was
+deceived by her<br>
+ maid, and instead of the young man's hairs, she burned some
+hairs pulled from<br>
+ a leather bottle, made out of a goatskin that hung in a tavern.
+During the<br>
+ night the leather bottle, full of wine, capered through the town
+up to the<br>
+ witch's door. This fact is undoubted. And in sacraments as in
+enchantments it<br>
+ is the form which operates. The effect of a divine formula
+cannot be less in<br>
+ power and extent than the effect of an infernal formula."</p>
+
+<p>Having spoken in this fashion the great St. Augustine sat down
+amidst<br>
+ applause.</p>
+
+<p>One of the blessed, of an advanced age and having a melancholy
+appearance,<br>
+ asked permission to speak. No one knew him. His name was Probus,
+and he was<br>
+ not enrolled in the canon of the saints.</p>
+
+<p>"I beg the company's pardon," said he, "I have no halo, and I
+gained eternal<br>
+ blessedness without any eminent distinction. But after what the
+great St.<br>
+ Augustine has just told you I believe it right to impart a cruel
+experience,<br>
+ which I had, relative to the conditions necessary for the
+validity of a<br>
+ sacrament. The bishop of Hippo is indeed right in what he said.
+A sacrament<br>
+ depends on the form; its virtue is in its form; its vice is in
+its form.<br>
+ Listen, confessors and pontiffs, to my woeful story. I was a
+priest in Rome<br>
+ under the rule of the Emperor Gordianus. Without desiring to
+recommend myself<br>
+ to you for any special merit, I may say that I exercised my
+priesthood with<br>
+ piety and zeal. For forty years I served the church of St.<br>
+ Modestus-beyond-the-Walls. My habits were regular. Every
+Saturday I went to a<br>
+ tavern-keeper called Barjas, who dwelt with his wine-jars under
+the Porta<br>
+ Capena, and from him I bought the wine that I consecrated daily
+throughout the<br>
+ week. During that.long space of time I never failed for a single
+morning to<br>
+ consecrate the holy sacrifice of the mass. However, I had no
+joy, and it was<br>
+ with a heart oppressed by sorrow that, on the steps of the altar
+I used to<br>
+ ask, 'Why art thou so heavy, O my soul, and why art thou so
+disquieted within<br>
+ me?' The faithful whom I invited to the holy table gave me cause
+for<br>
+ affliction, for having, so to speak, the Host that I
+administered still upon<br>
+ their tongues, they fell again into sin just as if the sacrament
+had been<br>
+ without power or efficacy. At last I reached the end of my
+earthly trials, and<br>
+ failing asleep in the Lord, I awoke in this abode of the elect.
+I learned then<br>
+ from the mouth of the angel who brought me here, that Barjas,
+the<br>
+ tavern-keeper of the Porta Capena, had sold for wine a decoction
+of roots and<br>
+ barks in which there was not a single drop of the juice of the
+grape. I had<br>
+ been unable to transmute this vile brew into blood, for it was
+not wine, and<br>
+ wine alone is changed into the blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore
+all my<br>
+ consecrations were invalid, and unknown to us, my faithful and
+myself had for<br>
+ forty years been deprived of the sacrament and were in fact in a
+state of<br>
+ excommunication. This revelation threw me into a stupor which
+overwhelms me<br>
+ even to-day in this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise
+without ever<br>
+ meeting a single one of those Christians whom formerly I
+admitted to the holy<br>
+ table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of the
+bread of<br>
+ angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and
+they have all<br>
+ gone to hell. It gives me some satisfaction to think that
+Barjas, the<br>
+ tavern-keeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic
+worthy of the<br>
+ author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that
+it is<br>
+ sometimes inconvenient that form should prevail over essence in
+the<br>
+ sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy
+this?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," answered the Lord. "The remedy would be worse than the
+disease. It would<br>
+ be the ruin of the priesthood if essence prevailed over form in
+the laws of<br>
+ salvation."</p>
+
+<p>"Alas! Lord," sighed the humble Probus. "Be persuaded by my
+humble experience;<br>
+ as long as you reduce your sacraments to formulas your justice
+will meet with<br>
+ terrible obstacles."</p>
+
+<p>"I know that better than you do," replied the Lord. "I see in
+a single glance<br>
+ both the actual problems which are difficult, and the future
+problems which<br>
+ will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when the
+sun will have<br>
+ turned round the earth two hundred and forty times more.</p>
+
+<p>"Sublime language," exclaimed the angels.</p>
+
+<p>"And worthy of the creator of the world," answered the
+pontiffs.</p>
+
+<p>"It is," resumed the Lord, "a manner of speaking in accordance
+with my old<br>
+ cosmogony and one which I cannot give up without losing my
+immutability. . . .</p>
+
+<p>"After the sun, then, will have turned another two hundred and
+forty times<br>
+ round the earth, there will not be a single cleric left in Rome
+who knows<br>
+ Latin. When they sing their litanies in the churches people will
+invoke<br>
+ Orichel, Roguel, and Totichel, and, as you know, these are
+devils and not<br>
+ angels. Many robbers desiring to make their communions, but
+fearing that<br>
+ before obtaining pardon they would be forced to give up the
+things they had<br>
+ robbed to the Church, will make their confessions to travelling
+priests,who,<br>
+ ignorant of both Italian and Latin, and only speaking the patois
+of their<br>
+ village, will go through cities and towns selling the remission
+of sins for a<br>
+ base price, often for a bottle of wine. Probably we shall not
+be<br>
+ inconvenienced by those absolutions as they will want contrition
+to make them<br>
+ valid, but it may be that their baptisms will cause us some
+embarrassment. The<br>
+ priests will become so ignorant that they will baptize children
+in nomine<br>
+ patria et filia et spirita sancta, as Louis de Potter will take
+a pleasure in<br>
+ relating in the third volume of his 'Philosophical, Political,
+and Critical<br>
+ History of Christianity.' It will be an arduous question to
+decide on the<br>
+ validity of such baptisms; for even if in my sacred writings I
+tolerate a<br>
+ Greek less elegant than Plato's and a scarcely Ciceronian Latin,
+I cannot<br>
+ possibly admit a piece of pure patois as a liturgical formula.
+And one<br>
+ shudders when one thinks that millions of new-born babes will be
+baptized by<br>
+ this method. But let us return to our penguins."</p>
+
+<p>"Your divine words, Lord, have already led us back to them,"
+said St. Gal. "In<br>
+ the signs of religion and the laws of salvation form necessarily
+prevails over<br>
+ essence, and the validity of a sacrament solely depends upon its
+form. The<br>
+ whole question is whether the penguins have been baptized with
+the proper<br>
+ forms. Now there is no doubt about the answer."</p>
+
+<p>The fathers and the doctors agreed, and their perplexity
+became only the more<br>
+ cruel.</p>
+
+<p>"The Christian state," said St. Cornelius, "is not without
+serious<br>
+ inconveniences for a penguin. In it the birds are obliged to
+work out their<br>
+ own salvation. How can they succeed? The habits of birds are, in
+many points,<br>
+ contrary to the commandments of the Church, and the penguins
+have no reason<br>
+ for changing theirs. I mean that they are not intelligent enough
+to give up<br>
+ their present habits and assume better."</p>
+
+<p>"They cannot," said the Lord; "my decrees prevent them."</p>
+
+<p>"Nevertheless," resumed St. Cornelius, "in virtue of their
+baptism their<br>
+ actions no longer remain indifferent. Henceforth they will be
+good or bad,<br>
+ susceptible of merit or of demerit."</p>
+
+<p>"That is precisely the question we have to deal with," said
+the Lord.</p>
+
+<p>"I see only one solution," said St. Augustine. "The penguins
+will go to hell."</p>
+
+<p>"But they have no soul," observed St. Irenaeus.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a pity"" sighed Tertullian.</p>
+
+<p>"It is indeed," resumed St. Gal. "And I admit that my
+disciple, the holy Mael,<br>
+ has, in his blind zeal, created great theological difficulties
+for the Holy<br>
+ Spirit and introduced disorder into the economy of
+mysteries."</p>
+
+<p>"He is an old blunderer," cried St. Adjutor of Alsace,
+shrugging his<br>
+ shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>But the Lord cast a reproachful look on Adjutor.</p>
+
+<p>"Allow me to speak," said he; "the holy Mael has not intuitive
+knowledge like<br>
+ you, my blessed ones. He does not see me. He is an old man
+burdened by<br>
+ infirmities; he is half deaf and three parts blind. You are too
+severe on him.<br>
+ However, I recognise that the situation is an embarrassing
+one."</p>
+
+<p>"Luckily it is but a passing disorder," said St. Irenaeus.
+"The penguins are<br>
+ baptized, but their eggs are not, and the evil will stop with
+the present<br>
+ generation."</p>
+
+<p>"Do not speak thus, Irenaeus my son," said the Lord. "There
+are exceptions to<br>
+ the laws that men of science lay down on the earth because they
+are imperfect<br>
+ and have not an exact application to nature. But the laws that I
+establish are<br>
+ perfect and suffer no exception. We must decide the fate of the
+baptized<br>
+ penguins without violating any divine law, and in a manner
+conformable to the<br>
+ decalogue as well as to the commandments of my Church."</p>
+
+<p>"Lord," said St. Gregory Nazianzen, "give them an immortal
+soul."</p>
+
+<p>"Alas! Lord, what would they do with it," sighed Lactantius.
+"They have not<br>
+ tuneful voices to sing your praises. They would not be able to
+celebrate your<br>
+ mysteries."</p>
+
+<p>"Without doubt," said St. Augustine, "they would not observe
+the divine law."</p>
+
+<p>"They could not," said the Lord.</p>
+
+<p>"They could not," continued St. Augustine. "And if, Lord, in
+your wisdom, you<br>
+ pour an immortal soul into them, they will burn eternally in
+hell in virtue of<br>
+ your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent order, that
+this old<br>
+ Welshman has disturbed, be re-established."</p>
+
+<p>"You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica," said
+the Lord, "and one<br>
+ that accords with my wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy.
+And, although<br>
+ in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure, the more I
+incline to<br>
+ mildness. This change of character is evident to anyone who
+reads my two<br>
+ Testaments."</p>
+
+<p>As the discussion continued without much light being thrown
+upon the matter<br>
+ and as the blessed showed a disposition to keep repeating the
+same thing, it<br>
+ was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This is what
+was usually<br>
+ done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had confounded
+fifty very<br>
+ learned doctors. She knew Plato's philosophy in addition to the
+Holy<br>
+ Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of rhetoric.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE (Continuation and End)</h2>
+
+<p>St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a
+crown of emeralds,<br>
+ sapphires, and pearls, and she was clad in a robe of cloth of
+gold. She<br>
+ carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one whose
+fragments had<br>
+ struck her persecutors.</p>
+
+<p>The Lord having invited her to speak, she expressed herself in
+these terms:</p>
+
+<p>"Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me
+I shall not<br>
+ study the habits of animals in general nor those of birds in
+particular. I<br>
+ shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs
+gathered in this<br>
+ assembly that the separation between man and animal is not
+complete since<br>
+ there are monsters who proceed from both. Such are
+chimeras--half nymphs and<br>
+ half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and the Capripeds;
+such are the<br>
+ Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the sea. These have a woman's
+breast and a<br>
+ fish's tail. Such also are the Centaurs, men down to the waist
+and the<br>
+ remainder horses. They are a noble race of monsters. One of
+them, as you know,<br>
+ was able, guided by the light of reason alone, to direct his
+steps towards<br>
+ eternal blessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom
+prancing on the<br>
+ clouds. Chiron, the Centaur, deserved for his works on the earth
+to share the<br>
+ abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his education;
+and that<br>
+ young hero, when he left the Centaur's hands, lived for two
+years, dressed as<br>
+ a young girl, among the daughters of King Lycomedes. He shared
+their games and<br>
+ their bed without allowing any suspicion to arise that he was
+not a young<br>
+ virgin like them. Chiron, who taught him such good morals, is,
+with the<br>
+ Emperor Trajan, the only righteous man who obtained celestial
+glory by<br>
+ following the law of nature. And yet he was but half human.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternal
+blessedness, it<br>
+ is enough to possess some parts of humanity, always on the
+condition that they<br>
+ are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur, could obtain without
+having been<br>
+ regenerated by baptism, would not the penguins deserve too, if
+they became<br>
+ half penguins and half men? That is why, Lord, I entreat you to
+give old<br>
+ Mael's penguins a human head and breast so that they can praise
+you worthily.<br>
+ And grant them also an immortal soul--but one of small
+size."</p>
+
+<p>Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors,
+and pontiffs heard<br>
+ her with a murmur of approbation.</p>
+
+<p>But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and
+knotty arms<br>
+ towards the Most High:</p>
+
+<p>"Do not so, O Lord God," he cried, "in the name of your holy
+Paraclete, do not<br>
+ so!"</p>
+
+<p>He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook
+on his chin like<br>
+ the empty nose-bag of a hungry horse.</p>
+
+<p>"Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St.
+Catherine has told<br>
+ us nothing new."</p>
+
+<p>"The imagination groups and compares; it never creates,"
+replied St. Catherine<br>
+ drily.</p>
+
+<p>"They exist already," continued St. Antony, who would listen
+to nothing. "They<br>
+ are called harpies, and they are the most obscene animals in
+creation. One day<br>
+ as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot St. Paul, I
+placed the<br>
+ table outside my cabin under an old sycamore tree. The harpies
+came and sat in<br>
+ its branches; they deafened us with their shrill cries and cast
+their<br>
+ excrement over all our food. The clamour of the monsters
+prevented me from<br>
+ listening to the teaching of the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate
+birds' dung with<br>
+ our bread and lettuces. Lord, it is impossible to believe that
+harpies could<br>
+ give thee worthy praise.</p>
+
+<p>"Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not
+only<br>
+ women-serpents and women-fishes, but beings still more
+confusedly formed such<br>
+ as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a
+cupboard full<br>
+ of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors and
+windows through<br>
+ which people engaged in their domestic tasks could be seen.
+Eternity would not<br>
+ suffice were I to describe all the monsters that assailed me in
+my solitude,<br>
+ from whales rigged like ships to a shower of red insects which
+changed the<br>
+ water of my fountain into blood. But none were as disgusting as
+the harpies<br>
+ whose offal polluted the leaves of my sycamore."</p>
+
+<p>"Harpies," observed Lactantius, "are female Monsters with
+birds' bodies. They<br>
+ have a woman's head and breast. Their forwardness, their
+shamelessness, and<br>
+ their obscenity proceed from their female nature as the poet
+Virgil<br>
+ demonstrated in his 'Aeneid.' They share the curse of Eve."</p>
+
+<p>"Let us not speak of the curse of Eve," said the Lord. "The
+second Eve has<br>
+ redeemed the first."</p>
+
+<p>Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet
+was to imitate in<br>
+ later years, arose and prayed to the Lord:</p>
+
+<p>"Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony's. Do not make any more
+monsters like the<br>
+ Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns, whom the Greeks, those collectors
+of fables,<br>
+ loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species
+of monsters<br>
+ have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not dispose
+them to<br>
+ purity of morals."</p>
+
+<p>The bland Lactantius replied in these terms:</p>
+
+<p>"He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in
+Paradise, for<br>
+ Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Velleius Paterculus,
+Cornelius Nepos,<br>
+ Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and
+Lampridius are<br>
+ deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell the
+torments that<br>
+ are reserved for blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does not know
+heaven as well as<br>
+ he knows the earth, for he does not seem to bear in mind that
+the angels, who<br>
+ proceed from man and bird, are purity itself."</p>
+
+<p>"We are wandering," said the Eternal. "What have we to do with
+all those<br>
+ centaurs, harpies, and angels? We have to deal with
+penguins."</p>
+
+<p>"You have spoken to the point, Lord," said the chief of the
+fifty doctors,<br>
+ who, during their mortal life had been confounded by the Virgin
+of Alexandria,<br>
+ "and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an end to
+the scandal by<br>
+ which heaven is now stirred, old Mael's penguins should, as St.
+Catherine who<br>
+ confounded us has proposed, be given half of a human body with
+an eternal soul<br>
+ proportioned to that half."</p>
+
+<p>At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of
+private<br>
+ conversations and disputes of the doctors. The Greek fathers
+argued with the<br>
+ Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the
+soul that<br>
+ should be given to the penguins.</p>
+
+<p>"Confessors and pontiffs," exclaimed the Lord, "do not imitate
+the conclaves<br>
+ and synods of the earth. And do not bring into the Church
+Triumphant those<br>
+ violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is but too
+true that in all<br>
+ the councils held under the inspiration of my spirit, in Europe,
+in Asia, and<br>
+ in Africa, fathers have torn the beards and scratched the eyes
+of other<br>
+ fathers. Nevertheless they were infallible, for I was with
+them."</p>
+
+<p>Order being restored, old Hermas arose and slowly uttered
+these words:</p>
+
+<p>"I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother,
+Saphira, to be born<br>
+ amidst your people, in the days when the dew of heaven refreshed
+the earth<br>
+ which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you,
+Lord, for having<br>
+ granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles of your
+divine Son. And<br>
+ I will speak in this illustrious assembly because you have
+willed that truth<br>
+ should proceed out of the mouths of the humble, and I will say:
+'Change these<br>
+ penguins to men. It is the only determination conformable to
+your justice and<br>
+ your mercy.'"</p>
+
+<p>Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do
+so. No one<br>
+ listened, and all the confessors were tumultuously shaking their
+palms and<br>
+ their crowns.</p>
+
+<p>The Lord, by a gesture of his right hand, appeased the
+quarrels of his elect.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us not deliberate any longer," said he. "The opinion
+broached by gentle<br>
+ old Hermas is the only one conformable to my eternal designs.
+These birds will<br>
+ be changed into men. I foresee in this several disadvantages.
+Many of those<br>
+ men will commit sins they would not have committed as penguins.
+Truly their<br>
+ fate through this change will be far less enviable than if they
+had been<br>
+ without this baptism and this incorporation into the family of
+Abraham. But my<br>
+ foreknowledge must not encroach upon their free will.</p>
+
+<p>"In order not to impair human liberty, I will be ignorant of
+what I know, I<br>
+ will thicken upon my eyes the veils I have pierced, and in my
+blind<br>
+ clearsightedness I will let myself be surprised by what I have
+foreseen."</p>
+
+<p>And immediately calling the archangel Raphael:</p>
+
+<p>"Go and find the holy Mael," said he to him; "inform him of
+his mistake and<br>
+ tell him, armed with my Name, to change these penguins into
+men."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. METAMORPHOSIS OF THE PENGUINS</h2>
+
+<p>The archangel, having gone down into the Island of the
+Penguins, found the<br>
+ holy man asleep in the hollow of a rock surrounded by his new
+disciples. He<br>
+ laid his hand on his shoulder and, having waked him, said in a
+gentle voice:</p>
+
+<p>"Mael, fear not!"</p>
+
+<p>The holy man, dazzled by a vivid light, inebriated by a
+delicious odour,<br>
+ recognised the angel of the Lord, and prostrated himself with
+his forehead on<br>
+ the ground.</p>
+
+<p>The angel continued:</p>
+
+<p>"Mael, know thy error, believing that thou wert baptizing
+children of Adam<br>
+ thou hast baptized birds; and it is, through thee that penguins
+have entered<br>
+ into the Church of God."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ At these words the old man remained stupefied.</p>
+
+<p>And the angel resumed:</p>
+
+<p>"Arise, Mael, arm thyself with the mighty Name of the Lord,
+and say to these<br>
+ birds, 'Be ye men!'"</p>
+
+<p>And the holy Mael, having wept and prayed, armed himself with
+the mighty Name<br>
+ of the Lord and said to the birds:</p>
+
+<p>"Be ye men!"</p>
+
+<p>Immediately the penguins were transformed. Their foreheads
+enlarged and their<br>
+ heads grew round like the dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome.
+Their oval eyes<br>
+ opened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose clothed the
+two clefts of<br>
+ their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and from
+their mouths<br>
+ went forth speech; their necks grew short and thick; their wings
+became arms<br>
+ and their claws legs; a restless soul dwelt within the breast of
+each of them.</p>
+
+<p>However, there remained with them some traces of their first
+nature. They were<br>
+ inclined to look sideways; they balanced themselves on their
+short thighs;<br>
+ their bodies were covered with fine down.</p>
+
+<p>And Mael gave thanks to the Lord, because he had incorporated
+these penguins<br>
+ into the family of Abraham.</p>
+
+<p>But he grieved at the thought that he would soon leave the
+island to come back<br>
+ no more, and that perhaps when he was far away the faith of the
+penguins would<br>
+ perish for want of care like a young and tender plant.</p>
+
+<p>And he formed the idea of transporting their island to the
+coasts of Armorica.</p>
+
+<p>"I know not the designs of eternal Wisdom," said he to
+himself. "But if God<br>
+ wills that this island be transported, who could prevent
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>And the holy man made a very fine cord about forty feet long
+out of the flax<br>
+ of his stole. He fastened one end of the cord round a point of
+rock that<br>
+ jutted up through the sand of the shore and, holding the other
+end of the cord<br>
+ in his hand, he entered the stone trough.</p>
+
+<p>The trough glided over the sea and towed Penguin Island behind
+it; after nine<br>
+ days' sailing it approached the Breton coast, bringing the
+island with it.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK II. THE ANCIENT TIMES</h1>
+
+<h2>I. THE FIRST CLOTHES</h2>
+
+<p>One day St. Mael was sitting by the seashore on a warm stone
+that he found. He<br>
+ thought it had been warmed by the sun and he gave thanks to God
+for it, not<br>
+ knowing that the Devil had been resting on it. The apostle was
+waiting for the<br>
+ monks of Yvern who had been commissioned to bring a freight of
+skins and<br>
+ fabrics to clothe the inhabitants of the island of Alca.</p>
+
+<p>Soon he saw a monk called Magis coming ashore and carrying a
+chest upon his<br>
+ back. This monk enjoyed a great reputation for holiness.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ When he had drawn near to the old man he laid the chest on the
+ground and<br>
+ wiping his forehead with the back of his sleeve, he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Well, father, you wish then to clothe these penguins?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing is more needful, my son," said the old man. "Since
+they have been<br>
+ incorporated into the family of Abraham these penguins share the
+curse of Eve,<br>
+ and they know that they are naked, a thing of which they were
+ignorant before.<br>
+ And it is high time to clothe them, for they are losing the down
+that remained<br>
+ on them after their metamorphosis."</p>
+
+<p>"It is true," said Magis as he cast his eyes over the coast
+where the penguins<br>
+ were to be seen looking for shrimps, gathering mussels, singing,
+or sleeping,<br>
+ "they are naked. But do you not think, father, that it would be
+better to<br>
+ leave them naked? Why clothe them? When they wear clothes and
+are under the<br>
+ moral law they will assume an immense pride, a vile hypocrisy,
+and an<br>
+ excessive cruelty."</p>
+
+<p>"Is it possible, my son," sighed the old man, "that you
+understand so badly<br>
+ the effects of the moral law to which even the heathen
+submit?"</p>
+
+<p>"The moral law," answered Magis, "forces men who are beasts to
+live otherwise<br>
+ than beasts, a thine that doubtless puts a constraint upon them,
+but that also<br>
+ flatters and reassures them; and as they are proud, cowardly,
+and covetous of<br>
+ pleasure, they willingly submit to restraints that tickle their
+vanity and on<br>
+ which they found both their present security and the hope of
+their future<br>
+ happiness. That is the principle of all morality. . . . But let
+us not mislead<br>
+ ourselves. My companions are unloading their cargo of stuffs and
+skins on the<br>
+ island. Think, father, while there is still time I To clothe the
+penguins is a<br>
+ very serious business. At present when a penguin desires a
+penguin he knows<br>
+ precisely what he desires and his lust is limited by an exact
+knowledge of its<br>
+ object. At this moment two or three couples of penguins are
+making love on the<br>
+ beach. See with what simplicity! No one pays any attention and
+the actors<br>
+ themselves do not seem to be greatly preoccupied. But when the
+female penguins<br>
+ are clothed, the male penguin will not form so exact a notion of
+what it is<br>
+ that attracts him to them. His indeterminate desires will fly
+out into all<br>
+ sorts of dreams and illusions; in short, father, he will know
+love and its mad<br>
+ torments. And all the time the female penguins will cast down
+their eyes and<br>
+ bite their lips, and take on airs as if they kept a treasure
+under their<br>
+ clothes! . . . what a pity!</p>
+
+<p>"The evil will be endurable as long as these people remain
+rude and poor; but<br>
+ only wait for a thousand years and you will see, father, with
+what powerful<br>
+ weapons you have endowed the daughters of Alca. If you will
+allow me, I can<br>
+ give you some idea of it beforehand. I have some old clothes in
+this chest.<br>
+ Let us take at hazard one of these female penguins to whom the
+male penguins<br>
+ give such little thought, and let us dress her as well as we
+can.</p>
+
+<p>"Here is one coming towards us. She is neither more beautiful
+nor uglier than<br>
+ the others; she is young. No one looks at her. She strolls
+indolently along<br>
+ the shore, scratching her back and with her finger at her nose
+as she walks.<br>
+ You cannot help seeing, father, that she has narrow shoulders,
+clumsy breasts,<br>
+ a stout figure, and short legs. Her reddish knees pucker at
+every step she<br>
+ takes, and there is, at each of her joints, what looks like a
+little monkey's<br>
+ head. Her broad and sinewy feet cling to the rock with their
+four crooked<br>
+ toes, while the great toes stick up like the heads of two
+cunning serpents.<br>
+ She begins to walk, all her muscles are engaged in the task,
+and, when we see<br>
+ them working, we think of her as a machine intended for walking
+rather than as<br>
+ a machine intended for making love, although visibly she is
+both, and contains<br>
+ within herself several other pieces of machinery, besides. Well,
+venerable<br>
+ apostle, you will see what I am going to make of her."</p>
+
+<p>With these words the monk, Magis, reached the female penguin
+in three bounds,<br>
+ lifted her up, carried her in his arms with her hair trailing
+behind her, and<br>
+ threw her, overcome with fright, at the feet of the holy
+Mael.</p>
+
+<p>And whilst she wept and begged him to do her no harm, he took
+a pair of<br>
+ sandals out of his chest and commanded her to put them on.</p>
+
+<p>"Her feet," observed the old man, "will appear smaller when
+squeezed in by the<br>
+ woollen cords. The soles, being two fingers high, will give an
+elegant length<br>
+ to her legs and the weight they bear will seem magnified."</p>
+
+<p>As the penguin tied on her sandals she threw a curious look
+towards the open<br>
+ coffer, and seeing that it was full of jewels and finery, she
+smiled through<br>
+ her tears.</p>
+
+<p>The monk twisted her hair on the back of her head and covered
+it with a<br>
+ chaplet of flowers. He encircled her wrist with golden bracelets
+and making<br>
+ her stand upright, he passed a large linen band beneath her
+breasts, alleging<br>
+ that her bosom would thereby derive a new dignity and that her
+sides would be<br>
+ compressed to the greater glory of her hips.</p>
+
+<p>He fixed this band with pins, taking them one by one out of
+his mouth.</p>
+
+<p>"You can tighten it still more," said the penguin.</p>
+
+<p>When he had, with much care and study, enclosed the soft parts
+of her bust in<br>
+ this way, he covered her whole body with a rose-coloured tunic
+which gently<br>
+ followed the lines of her figure.</p>
+
+<p>"Does it hang well?" asked the penguin.</p>
+
+<p>And bending forward with her head on one side and her chin on
+her shoulder,<br>
+ she kept looking attentively at the appearance of her
+toilet.</p>
+
+<p>Magis asked her if she did not think the dress a little long,
+but she answered<br>
+ with assurance that it was not--she would hold it up.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately, taking the back of her skirt in her left hand,
+she drew it<br>
+ obliquely across her hips, taking care to disclose a glimpse of
+her heels.<br>
+ Then she went away, walking with short steps and swinging her
+hips.</p>
+
+<p>She did not turn her head, but as she passed near a stream she
+glanced out of<br>
+ the corner of her eye at her own reflection.</p>
+
+<p>A male penguin, who met her by chance, stopped in surprise,
+and retracing his<br>
+ steps began to follow her. As she went along the shore, others
+coming back<br>
+ from fishing, went up to her, and after looking at her, walked
+behind her.<br>
+ Those who were lying on the sand got up and joined the rest.</p>
+
+<p>Unceasingly, as she advanced, fresh penguins, descending from
+the paths of the<br>
+ mountain, coming out of clefts of the rocks, and emerging from
+the water,<br>
+ added to the size of her retinue.</p>
+
+<p>And all of them, men of ripe age with vigorous shoulders and
+hairy breasts,<br>
+ agile youths, old men shaking the multitudinous wrinkles of
+their rosy, and<br>
+ white-haired skins, or dragging their legs thinner and drier
+than the juniper<br>
+ staff that served them as a third leg, hurried on, panting and
+emitting an<br>
+ acrid odour and hoarse gasps. Yet she went on peacefully and
+seemed to see<br>
+ nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"Father," cried Magis, "notice how each one advances with his
+nose pointed<br>
+ towards the centre of gravity of that young damsel now that the
+centre is<br>
+ covered by a garment. The sphere inspires the meditations of
+geometers by the<br>
+ number of its properties. When it proceeds from a physical and
+living nature<br>
+ it acquires new qualities, and in order that the interest of
+that figure might<br>
+ be fully revealed to the penguins it was necessary that, ceasing
+to see it<br>
+ distinctly with their eyes, they should be led to represent it
+to themselves<br>
+ in their minds. I myself feel at this moment irresistibly
+attracted towards<br>
+ that penguin. Whether it be because her skirt gives more
+importance to her<br>
+ hips, and that in its simple magnificence it invests them with a
+synthetic and<br>
+ general character and allows only the pure idea, the divine
+principle, of them<br>
+ to be seen, whether this be the cause I cannot say, but I feel
+that if I<br>
+ embraced her I would hold in my hands the heaven of human
+pleasure. It is<br>
+ certain that modesty communicates an invincible attraction to
+women. My<br>
+ uneasiness is so great that it would be vain for me to try to
+conceal it."</p>
+
+<p>He spoke, and, gathering up his habit, he rushed among the
+crowd of penguins,<br>
+ pushing, jostling, trampling, and crushing, until he reached the
+daughter of<br>
+ Alca, whom he seized and suddenly carried in his arms into a
+cave that had<br>
+ been hollowed out by the sea.</p>
+
+<p>Then the penguins felt as if the sun had gone out. And the
+holy Mael knew that<br>
+ the Devil had taken the features of the monk, Magis, in order
+that he might<br>
+ give clothes to the daughter of Alca. He was troubled in spirit,
+and his soul<br>
+ was sad. As with slow steps he went towards his hermitage he saw
+the little<br>
+ penguins of six and seven years of age tightening their waists
+with belts made<br>
+ of sea-weed and walking along the shore to see if anybody would
+follow them.</p>
+
+<h2>II. THE FIRST CLOTHES (Continuation and End)</h2>
+
+<p>The holy Mael felt a profound sadness that the first clothes
+put upon a<br>
+ daughter of Alca should have betrayed the penguin modesty
+instead of helping<br>
+ it. He persisted, none the less, in his design of giving clothes
+to the<br>
+ inhabitants of the miraculous island. Assembling them on the
+shore, he<br>
+ distributed to them the garments that the monks of Yvern had
+brought. The male<br>
+ penguins received short tunics and breeches, the female penguins
+long robes.<br>
+ But these robes were far from creating the effect that the
+former one had<br>
+ produced. They were not so beautiful, their shape was uncouth
+and without art,<br>
+ and no attention was paid to them since every woman bad one. As
+they prepared<br>
+ the meals and worked in the fields they soon had nothing but
+slovenly bodices<br>
+ and soiled petticoats.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The male penguins loaded their unfortunate consorts with work
+until they<br>
+ looked like beasts of burden. They knew nothing of the troubles
+of the heart<br>
+ and the disorders of passion. Their habits were innocent.
+Incest, though<br>
+ frequent, was a sign of rustic simplicity and if drunkenness led
+a youth to<br>
+ commit some such crime he thought nothing more about it the day
+afterwards.</p>
+
+<h2>III. SETTING BOUNDS TO THE FIELDS AND THE ORIGIN OF
+PROPERTY</h2>
+
+<p>The island did not preserve the rugged appearance that it had
+formerly, when,<br>
+ in the midst of floating icebergs it sheltered a population of
+birds within<br>
+ its rocky amphitheatre. Its snow-clad peak had sunk down into a
+hill from the<br>
+ summit of which one could see the coasts of Armorica eternally
+covered with<br>
+ mist, and the ocean strewn with sullen reefs like monsters half
+raised out of<br>
+ its depths.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Its coasts were now very extensive and clearly defined and its
+shape reminded<br>
+ one of a mulberry leaf. It was suddenly covered with coarse
+grass, pleasing to<br>
+ the flocks, and with willows, ancient figtrees, and mighty oaks.
+This fact is<br>
+ attested by the Venerable Bede and several other authors worthy
+of credence.</p>
+
+<p>To the north the shore formed a deep bay that in after years
+became one of the<br>
+ most famous ports in the universe. To the east, along a rocky
+coast beaten by<br>
+ a foaming sea, there stretched a deserted and fragrant heath. It
+was the Beach<br>
+ of Shadows, and the inhabitants of the island never ventured on
+it for fear of<br>
+ the serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest
+they might<br>
+ encounter the souls of the dead who resembled livid flames. To
+the south,<br>
+ orchards and woods bounded the languid Bay of Divers. On this
+fortunate shore<br>
+ old Mael built a wooden church and a monastery. To the west, two
+streams, the<br>
+ Clange and the Surelle, watered the fertile valleys of Dalles
+and Dombes.</p>
+
+<p>Now one autumn morning, as the blessed Mael was walking in the
+valley of<br>
+ Clange in company with a monk of Yvern called Bulloch, he saw
+bands of<br>
+ fierce-looking men loaded with stones passing along the roads.
+At the same<br>
+ time he heard in all directions cries and complaints mounting up
+from the<br>
+ valley towards the tranquil sky.</p>
+
+<p>And he said to Bulloch:</p>
+
+<p>"I notice with sadness, my son, that since they became men the
+inhabitants of<br>
+ this island act with less wisdom than formerly. When they were
+birds they only<br>
+ quarrelled during the season of their love affairs. But now they
+dispute all<br>
+ the time; they pick quarrels with each other in summer as well
+as in winter.<br>
+ How greatly have they fallen from that peaceful majesty which
+made the<br>
+ assembly of the penguins look like the Senate of a wise
+republic!</p>
+
+<p>"Look towards Surelle, Bulloch, my son. In yonder pleasant
+valley a dozen men<br>
+ penguins are busy knocking each other down with the spades and
+picks that they<br>
+ might employ better in tilling the ground. The women, still more
+cruel than<br>
+ the men, are tearing their opponents' faces with their nails.
+Alas! Bulloch,<br>
+ my son, why are they murdering each other in this way?"</p>
+
+<p>"From a spirit of fellowship, father, and through forethought
+for the future,"<br>
+ answered Bulloch. "For man is essentially provident and
+sociable. Such is his<br>
+ character and it is impossible to imagine it apart from a
+certain<br>
+ appropriation of things. Those penguins whom you see are
+dividing the ground<br>
+ among themselves."</p>
+
+<p>"Could they not divide it with less violence?" asked the aged
+man. "As they<br>
+ fight they exchange invectives and threats. I do not distinguish
+their words,<br>
+ but they are angry ones, judging from the tone."</p>
+
+<p>"They are accusing one another of theft and encroachment,"
+answered Bulloch.<br>
+ "That is the general sense of their speech."</p>
+
+<p>At that moment the holy Mael clasped his hands and sighed
+deeply.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you see, my son," he exclaimed, "that madman who with his
+teeth is biting<br>
+ the nose of the adversary he has overthrown and that other one
+who is pounding<br>
+ a woman's head with a huge stone?"</p>
+
+<p>"I see them," said Bulloch. "They are creating law; they are
+founding<br>
+ property; they are establishing the principles of civilization,
+the basis of<br>
+ society, and the foundations of the State."</p>
+
+<p>"How is that?" asked old Mael.</p>
+
+<p>"By setting bounds to their fields. That is the origin of all
+government. Your<br>
+ penguins, O Master, are performing the most august of functions.
+Throughout<br>
+ the ages their work will be consecrated by lawyers, and
+magistrates will<br>
+ confirm it."</p>
+
+<p>Whilst the monk, Bulloch, was pronouncing these words a big
+penguin with a<br>
+ fair skin and red hair went down into the valley carrying a
+trunk of a tree<br>
+ upon his shoulder. He went up to a little penguin who was
+watering his<br>
+ vegetables in the heat of the sun, and shouted to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Your field is mine!"</p>
+
+<p>And having delivered himself of this stout utterance he
+brought down his club<br>
+ on the head of the little penguin, who fell dead upon the field
+that his own<br>
+ hands had tilled.</p>
+
+<p>At this sight the holy Mael shuddered through his whole body
+and poured forth<br>
+ a flood of tears.</p>
+
+<p>And in a voice stifled by horror and fear he addressed this
+prayer to heaven:</p>
+
+<p>"O Lord, my God, O thou who didst receive young Abel's
+sacrifices, thou who<br>
+ didst curse Cain, avenge, O Lord, this innocent penguin
+sacrificed upon his<br>
+ own field and make the murderer feel the weight of thy arm. Is
+there a more<br>
+ odious crime, is there a graver offence against thy justice, O
+Lord, than this<br>
+ murder and this robbery?"</p>
+
+<p>"Take care, father," said Bulloch gently, "that what you call
+murder and<br>
+ robbery may not really be war and conquest, those sacred
+foundations of<br>
+ empires, those sources of all human virtues and all human
+greatness. Reflect,<br>
+ above all, that in blaming the big penguin you are attacking
+property in its<br>
+ origin and in its source. I shall have no trouble in showing you
+how. To till<br>
+ the land is one thing, to possess it is another, and these two
+things must not<br>
+ be confused; as regards ownership the right of the first
+occupier is uncertain<br>
+ and badly founded. The right of conquest, on the other hand,
+rests on more<br>
+ solid foundations. It is the only right that receives respect
+since it is the<br>
+ only one that makes itself respected. The sole and proud origin
+of property is<br>
+ force. It is born and preserved by force. In that it is august
+and yields only<br>
+ to a greater force. This is why it is correct to say that he who
+possesses is<br>
+ noble. And that big red man, when he knocked down a labourer to
+get possession<br>
+ of his field, founded at that moment a very noble house upon
+this earth. I<br>
+ congratulate him upon it."</p>
+
+<p>Having thus spoken, Bulloch approached the big penguin, who
+was leaning upon<br>
+ his club as he stood in the blood-stained furrow:</p>
+
+<p>"Lord Greatauk, dreaded Prince," said he, bowing to the
+ground, "I come to pay<br>
+ you the homage due to the founder of legitimate power and
+hereditary wealth.<br>
+ The skull of the vile Penguin you have overthrown will, buried
+in your field,<br>
+ attest for ever the sacred rights of your posterity over this
+soil that you<br>
+ have ennobled. Blessed be your suns and your sons' sons! They
+shall be<br>
+ Greatauks, Dukes of Skull, and they shall rule over this island
+of Alca."</p>
+
+<p>Then raising his voice and turning towards the holy Mael:</p>
+
+<p>"Bless Greatauk, father, for all power comes from God."</p>
+
+<p>Mael remained silent and motionless, with his eyes raised
+towards heaven; he<br>
+ felt a painful uncertainty in judging the monk Bulloch's
+doctrine. It was,<br>
+ however, the doctrine destined to prevail in epochs of advanced
+civilization.<br>
+ Bulloch can be considered as the creator of civil law in
+Penguinia.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IV. THE FIRST ASSEMBLY OF THE ESTATES OF PENGUINIA</h2>
+
+<p>"Bulloch, my son," said old Mael, "we ought to make a census
+of the Penguins<br>
+ and inscribe each of their names in a book."</p>
+
+<p>"It is a most urgent matter," answered Bulloch, "there can be
+no good<br>
+ government without it."</p>
+
+<p>Forthwith, the apostle, with the help of twelve monks,
+proceeded to make a<br>
+ census of the people.</p>
+
+<p>And old Mael then said:</p>
+
+<p>"Now that we keep a register of all the inhabitants, we ought,
+Bulloch, my<br>
+ son, to levy a just tax so as to provide for public expenses and
+the<br>
+ maintenance of the Abbey. Each ought to contribute according to
+his means. For<br>
+ this reason, my son, call together the Elders of Alca, and in
+agreement with<br>
+ them we shall establish the tax."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The Elders, being called together, assembled to the number of
+thirty under the<br>
+ great sycamore in the courtyard of the wooden monastery. They
+were the first<br>
+ Estates of Penguinia. Three-fourths of them were substantial
+peasants of<br>
+ Surelle and Clange. Greatauk, as the noblest of the Penguins,
+sat upon the<br>
+ highest stone.</p>
+
+<p>The venerable Mael took his place in the midst of his monks
+and uttered these<br>
+ words:</p>
+
+<p>"Children, the Lord when he pleases grants riches to men and
+he takes them<br>
+ away from them. Now I have called you together to levy
+contributions from the<br>
+ people so as to provide for public expenses and the maintenance
+of the monks.<br>
+ I consider that these contributions ought to be in proportion to
+the wealth of<br>
+ each. Therefore he who has a hundred oxen will give ten; he who
+has ten will<br>
+ give one."</p>
+
+<p>When the holy man had spoken, Morio, a, labourer at
+Anis-on-the-Clange, one of<br>
+ the richest of the Penguins, rose up and said:</p>
+
+<p>"O Father Mael, I think it right that each should contribute
+to the public<br>
+ expenses and to the support of the Church. or my part I am ready
+to give up<br>
+ all that I possess in the interest of my brother Penguins, and
+if it were<br>
+ necessary I would even cheerfully part with my shirt. All the
+elders of the<br>
+ people are ready, like me, to sacrifice their goods, and no one
+can doubt<br>
+ their absolute devotion to their country and their creed. We
+have, then, only<br>
+ to consider the public interest and to do what it requires. Now,
+Father, what<br>
+ it requires, what it demands, is not to ask much from those who
+possess much,<br>
+ for then the rich would be less rich and the poor still poorer.
+The poor live<br>
+ on the wealth of the rich and that is the reason why that wealth
+is sacred. Do<br>
+ not touch it, to do so would be an uncalled for evil. You will
+get no great<br>
+ profit by taking from the rich, for they are very few in number;
+on the<br>
+ contrary you will strip yourself of all your resources and
+plunge the country<br>
+ into misery. Whereas if you ask a little from each inhabitant
+without regard<br>
+ to his wealth, you will collect enough for the public
+necessities and you will<br>
+ have no need to enquire into each citizen's resources, a thing
+that would be<br>
+ regarded by all as a most vexatious measure. By taxing all
+equally and easily<br>
+ you will spare the poor, for you Will leave them the wealth of
+the rich. And<br>
+ how could you possibly proportion taxes to wealth? Yesterday I
+had two hundred<br>
+ oxen, to-day I have sixty, to-morrow I shall have a hundred.
+Clunic has three<br>
+ cows, but they are thin; Nicclu has only two, but they are fat.
+Which is the<br>
+ richer, Clunic or Nicclu? The signs of opulence are deceitful.
+What is certain<br>
+ is that everyone eats and drinks. Tax people according to what
+they consume.<br>
+ That would be wisdom and it would be justice."</p>
+
+<p>Thus spoke Morio amid the applause of the Elders.</p>
+
+<p>"I ask that this speech be graven on bronze," cried the monk,
+Bulloch. "It is<br>
+ spoken for the future; in fifteen hundred years the best of the
+Penguins will<br>
+ not speak otherwise."</p>
+
+<p>The Elders were still applauding when Greatauk, his hand on
+the pommel of his<br>
+ sword, made this brief declaration:</p>
+
+<p>"Being noble, I shall not contribute; for to contribute is
+ignoble. It is for<br>
+ the rabble to pay."</p>
+
+<p>After this warning the Elders separated in silence.</p>
+
+<p>As in Rome, a new census was taken every five years; and by
+this means it was<br>
+ observed that the population increased rapidly. Although
+children died in<br>
+ marvellous abundance and plagues and famines came with perfect
+regularity to<br>
+ devastate entire villages, new Penguins, in continually greater
+numbers,<br>
+ contributed by their private misery to the public
+prosperity.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE MARRIAGE OF KRAKEN AND ORBEROSIA</h2>
+
+<p>During these times there lived in the island of Alca a Penguin
+whose arm was<br>
+ strong and whose mind was subtle. He was called Kraken, and had
+his dwelling<br>
+ on the Beach of Shadows whither the inhabitants never ventured
+for fear of<br>
+ serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest they
+might encounter<br>
+ the souls of Penguins that had died without baptism. These, in
+appearance like<br>
+ livid flames, and uttering doleful groans, wandered night and
+day along the<br>
+ deserted beach. For it was generally believed, though without
+proof, that<br>
+ among the Penguins that had been changed into men at the blessed
+Mael's<br>
+ prayer, several had not received baptism and returned after
+their death to<br>
+ lament amid the tempests. Kraken dwelt on this savage coast in
+an inaccessible<br>
+ cavern. The only way to it was through a natural tunnel a
+hundred feet long,<br>
+ the entrance of which was concealed by a thick wood. One evening
+as Kraken was<br>
+ walking through this deserted plain he happened to meet a young
+and charming<br>
+ woman Penguin. She was the one that the monk Magis had clothed
+with his own<br>
+ hands and thus was the first to have worn the garments of
+chastity. In<br>
+ remembrance of the day when the astonished crowd of Penguins had
+seen her<br>
+ moving gloriously in her robe tinted like the dawn, this maiden
+had received<br>
+ the name of Orberosia.*</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ * "Orb, poetically, a globe when speaking of the heavenly
+bodies. By extension<br>
+ any species of globular body."--Littre</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ At the sight of Kraken she uttered a cry of alarm and darted
+forward to escape<br>
+ from him. But the hero seized her by the garments that floated
+behind, her,<br>
+ and addressed her in these words:</p>
+
+<p>"Damsel, tell me thy name, thy family and thy country."</p>
+
+<p>But Orberosia kept looking at Kraken with alarm.</p>
+
+<p>"Is it you, I see, sir," she asked him, trembling, "or is it
+not rather your<br>
+ troubled spirit?"</p>
+
+<p>She spoke in this way because the inhabitants of Alca, having
+no news of<br>
+ Kraken since he went to live on the Beach of Shadows, believed
+that he had<br>
+ died and descended among the demons of night.</p>
+
+<p>"Cease to fear, daughter of Alca," answered Kraken. "He who
+speaks to thee is<br>
+ not a wandering spirit, but a man full of strength and might. I
+shall soon<br>
+ possess great riches."</p>
+
+<p>And young Orberosia asked:</p>
+
+<p>"How dost thou think of acquiring great riches, O Kraken,
+since thou art a<br>
+ child of Penguins?"</p>
+
+<p>"By my intelligence," answered Kraken.</p>
+
+<p>"I know," said Orberosia, "that in the time that thou dwelt
+among us thou wert<br>
+ renowned for thy skill in hunting and fishing. No one equalled
+thee in taking<br>
+ fishes in a net or in piercing with thy arrows the swift-flying
+birds."</p>
+
+<p>"It was but a vulgar and laborious industry, O maiden. I have
+found a means of<br>
+ gaining much wealth for myself without fatigue. But tell me who
+thou art?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am called Orberosia," answered the young girl.</p>
+
+<p>"Why art thou so far away from thy dwelling and in the
+night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Kraken, it was not without the will of Heaven."</p>
+
+<p>"What meanest thou, Orberosia?"</p>
+
+<p>"That Heaven, O Kraken, placed me in thy path, for what reason
+I know not."</p>
+
+<p>Kraken beheld her for a long time in silence.</p>
+
+<p>Then he said with gentleness:</p>
+
+<p>"Orberosia, come into my house; it is that of the bravest and
+most ingenious<br>
+ of the sons of the Penguins. If thou art willing to follow me, I
+will make<br>
+ thee my companion."</p>
+
+<p>Then casting down her eyes, she murmured:</p>
+
+<p>"I will follow thee, master."</p>
+
+<p>It is thus that the fair Orberosia became the consort of the
+hero Kraken. This<br>
+ marriage was not celebrated with songs and torches because
+Kraken did not<br>
+ consent to show himself to the people of the Penguins; but
+hidden in his cave<br>
+ he planned great designs.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA</h2>
+
+<p>"We afterwards went to visit the cabinet of natural history. .
+. . The<br>
+ care-taker showed us a sort of packet bound in straw that he
+told us contained<br>
+ the skeleton of a dragon; a proof, added he, that the dragon is
+not a fabulous<br>
+ animal."--Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, Paris, 1843. Vol. IV.,
+pp. 404, 405</p>
+
+<p>In the meantime the inhabitants of Alca practised the labours
+of peace. Those<br>
+ of the northern coast went in boats to fish or to search for
+shell-fish. The<br>
+ labourers of Dombes cultivated oats, rye, and wheat. The rich
+Penguins of the<br>
+ valley of Dalles reared domestic animals, while those of the Bay
+of Divers<br>
+ cultivated their orchards. Merchants of Port-Alca carried on a
+trade in salt<br>
+ fish with Armorica and the gold of the two Britains, which began
+to be<br>
+ introduced into the island, facilitated exchange. The Penguin
+people were<br>
+ enjoying the fruit of their labours in perfect tranquillity when
+suddenly a<br>
+ sinister rumour ran from village to village. It was said
+everywhere that<br>
+ frightful dragon had ravaged two farms in the Bay of Divers.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ A few days before, the maiden Orberosia had disappeared. Her
+absence had at<br>
+ first caused no uneasiness because on several occasions she had
+been carried<br>
+ off by violent men who were consumed with love. And thoughtful
+people were not<br>
+ astonished at this, reflecting that the maiden was the most
+beautiful of the<br>
+ Penguins. It was even remarked that she sometimes went to meet
+her ravishers,<br>
+ for none of us can escape his destiny. But this time, as she did
+not return,<br>
+ it was feared that the dragon had devoured her. The more so as
+the inhabitants<br>
+ of the valley of Dalles soon knew that the dragon was not a
+fable told by the<br>
+ women around the fountains. For one night the monster devoured
+out of the<br>
+ village of Anis six hens, a sheep, and a young orphan child
+called little Elo.<br>
+ The next morning nothing was to be found either of the animals
+or of the<br>
+ child.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately the Elders of the village assembled in the public
+place and seated<br>
+ themselves on the stone bench to take counsel concerning what it
+was expedient<br>
+ to do in these terrible circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>Having called all those Penguins who had seen the dragon
+during the disastrous<br>
+ night, they asked them:</p>
+
+<p>"Have you not noticed his form and his behaviour?"</p>
+
+<p>And each answered in his turn:</p>
+
+<p>"He has the claws of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and the
+tail of a<br>
+ serpent."</p>
+
+<p>"His back bristles with thorny crests."</p>
+
+<p>"His whole body is covered with yellow scales."</p>
+
+<p>"His look fascinates and confounds. He vomits flames."</p>
+
+<p>"He poisons the air with his breath."</p>
+
+<p>"He has the head of a dragon, the claws of a lion, and the
+tail of a fish."</p>
+
+<p>And a woman of Anis, who was regarded as intelligent and of
+sound judgment and<br>
+ from whom the dragon had taken three hens, deposed as
+follows:</p>
+
+<p>"He is formed like a man. The proof is that I thought he was
+my husband, and I<br>
+ said to him, 'Come to bed, you old fool.'"</p>
+
+<p>Others said:</p>
+
+<p>"He is formed like a cloud."</p>
+
+<p>"He looks like a mountain."</p>
+
+<p>And a little child came and said:</p>
+
+<p>"I saw the dragon taking off his head in the barn so that he
+might give a kiss<br>
+ to my sister Minnie."</p>
+
+<p>And the Elders also asked the inhabitants:</p>
+
+<p>"How big is the dragon?"</p>
+
+<p>And it was answered:</p>
+
+<p>"As big as an ox."</p>
+
+<p>"Like the big merchant ships of the Bretons."</p>
+
+<p>"He is the height of a man."</p>
+
+<p>"He is higher than the fig-tree under which you are
+sitting."</p>
+
+<p>"He is as large as a dog."</p>
+
+<p>Questioned finally on his colour, the inhabitants said:</p>
+
+<p>"Red."</p>
+
+<p>"Green."</p>
+
+<p>"Blue."</p>
+
+<p>"Yellow."</p>
+
+<p>"His head is bright green, his wings are brilliant orange
+tinged with pink,<br>
+ his limbs are silver grey, his hind-quarters and his tail are
+striped with<br>
+ brown and pink bands, his belly bright yellow spotted with
+black."</p>
+
+<p>"His colour? He has no colour."</p>
+
+<p>"He is the colour of a dragon."</p>
+
+<p>After hearing this evidence the Elders remained uncertain as
+to what should be<br>
+ done. Some advised to watch for him, to surprise him and
+overthrow him by a<br>
+ multitude of arrows. Others, thinking it vain to oppose so
+powerful a monster<br>
+ by force, counselled that he should be appeased by
+offerings.</p>
+
+<p>"Pay him tribute," said one of them who passed for a wise man.
+"We can render<br>
+ him propitious to us by giving him agreeable presents, fruits,
+wine, lambs, a<br>
+ young virgin."</p>
+
+<p>Others held for poisoning the fountains where he was
+accustomed to drink or<br>
+ for smoking him out of his cavern.</p>
+
+<p>But none of these counsels prevailed. The dispute was lengthy
+and the Elders<br>
+ dispersed without coming to any resolution.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>During all the month dedicated by the Romans to their false
+god Mars or<br>
+ Mavors, the dragon ravaged the farms of Dalles and Dombes. He
+carried off<br>
+ fifty sheep, twelve pigs, and three young boys. Every family was
+in mourning<br>
+ and the island was full of lamentations. In order to remove the
+scourge, the<br>
+ Elders of the unfortunate villages watered by the Clange and the
+Surelle<br>
+ resolved to assemble and together go and ask the help of the
+blessed Mael.</p>
+
+<p>On the fifth day of the month whose name among the Latins
+signifies opening,<br>
+ because it opens the year, they went in procession to the wooden
+monastery<br>
+ that had been built on the southern coast of the island. When
+they were<br>
+ introduced into the cloister they filled it with their sobs and
+groans. Moved<br>
+ by their lamentations, old Mael left the room in which he
+devoted himself to<br>
+ the study of astronomy and the meditation of the Scriptures, and
+went down to<br>
+ them, leaning on his pastoral staff. At his approach, the
+Elders, prostrating<br>
+ themselves, held out to him green branches of trees and some of
+them burnt<br>
+ aromatic herbs.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ And the holy man, seating himself beside the cloistral fountain
+under an<br>
+ ancient fig-tree, uttered these words:</p>
+
+<p>"O my sons, offspring of the Penguins, why do you weep and
+groan? Why do you<br>
+ hold out those suppliant boughs towards me? Why do you raise
+towards heaven<br>
+ the smoke of those herbs? What calamity do you expect that I can
+avert from<br>
+ your heads? Why do you beseech me? I am ready to give my life
+for you. Only<br>
+ tell your father what it is you hope from him."</p>
+
+<p>To these questions the chief of the Elders answered:</p>
+
+<p>"O Mael, father of the sons of Alca, I will speak for all. A
+horrible dragon<br>
+ is laying waste our lands, depopulating our cattle-sheds, and
+carrying off the<br>
+ flower of our youth. He has devoured the child Elo and seven
+young boys; he<br>
+ has mangled the maiden Orberosia, the fairest of the Penguins
+with his teeth.<br>
+ There is not a village in which he does not emit his poisoned
+breath and which<br>
+ he has not filled with desolation. A prey to this terrible
+scourge, we come, O<br>
+ Mael, to pray thee, as the wisest, to advise us concerning the
+safety of the<br>
+ inhabitants of this island lest the ancient race of Penguins be
+extinguished."</p>
+
+<p>"O chief of the Elders of Alca," replied Mael, "thy words fill
+me with<br>
+ profound grief, and I groan at the thought that this island is
+the prey of a<br>
+ terrible dragon. But such an occurrence is not unique, for we
+find in books<br>
+ several tales of very fierce dragons. The monsters are oftenest
+found in<br>
+ caverns, by the brinks of waters, and, in preference, among
+pagan peoples.<br>
+ Perhaps there are some among you who, although they have
+received holy baptism<br>
+ and been incorporated into the family of Abraham, have yet
+worshipped idols,<br>
+ like the ancient Romans, or hung up images, votive tablets,
+fillets of wool,<br>
+ and garlands of flowers on the branches of some sacred tree. Or
+perhaps some<br>
+ of the women Penguins have danced round a magic stone and drunk
+water from the<br>
+ fountains where the nymphs dwell. If it be so, believe, O
+Penguins, that the<br>
+ Lord has sent this dragon to punish all for the crimes of some,
+and to lead<br>
+ you, O children of the Penguins, to exterminate blasphemy,
+superstition, and<br>
+ impiety from amongst you. For this reason I advise, as a remedy
+against the<br>
+ great evil from which you suffer, that you carefully search your
+dwellings for<br>
+ idolatry, and extirpate it from them. I think it would be also
+efficacious to<br>
+ pray and do penance."</p>
+
+<p>Thus spoke the holy Mael. And the Elders of the Penguin people
+kissed his feet<br>
+ and returned to their villages with renewed hope.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>Following the counsel of the holy Mael the inhabitants of Alca
+endeavoured to<br>
+ uproot the superstitions that had sprung up amongst them. They
+took care to<br>
+ prevent the girls from dancing with incantations round the fairy
+tree. Young<br>
+ mothers were sternly forbidden to rub their children against the
+stones that<br>
+ stood upright in the fields so as to make them strong. An old
+man of Dombes<br>
+ who foretold the future by shaking grains of barley on a sieve,
+was thrown<br>
+ into a well.</p>
+
+<p>However, each night the monster still raided the poultry-yards
+and the<br>
+ cattle-sheds. The frightened peasants barricaded themselves in
+their houses. A<br>
+ woman with child who saw the shadow of a dragon on the road
+through a window<br>
+ in the moonlight, was so terrified that she was brought to bed
+before her<br>
+ time.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ In those days of trial, the holy Mael meditated unceasingly on
+the nature of<br>
+ dragons and the means of combating them. After six months of
+study and prayer<br>
+ he thought he had found what he sought. One evening as he was
+walking by the<br>
+ sea with a young monk called Samuel, he to him in these
+terms:</p>
+
+<p>"I have studied at length the history and habits of dragons,
+not to satisfy a<br>
+ vain curiosity, but to discover examples to follow in the
+present<br>
+ circumstances. For such, Samuel, my son, is the use of
+history.</p>
+
+<p>"It is an invariable fact that dragons are extremely vigilant.
+They never<br>
+ sleep, and for this reason we often find them employed in
+guarding treasures.<br>
+ A dragon guarded at Colchis the golden fleece that Jason
+conquered from him. A<br>
+ dragon watched over the golden apples in the garden of the
+Hesperides. He was<br>
+ killed by Hercules and transformed into a star by Juno. This
+fact is related<br>
+ in some books, and if it be true, it was done by magic, for the
+gods of the<br>
+ pagans are in reality demons. A dragon prevented barbarous and
+ignorant men<br>
+ from drinking at the fountain of Castalia. We must also remember
+the dragon of<br>
+ Andromeda, which was slain by Perseus. But let us turn from
+these pagan<br>
+ fables, in which error is always mixed with truth. We meet
+dragons in the<br>
+ histories of the glorious archangel Michael, of St. George, St.
+Philip, St.<br>
+ James the Great, St. Patrick, St. Martha, and St. Margaret. And
+it is in such<br>
+ writings, since they are worthy of full credence, that we ought
+to look for<br>
+ comfort and counsel.</p>
+
+<p>"The story of the dragon of Silena affords us particularly
+precious examples.<br>
+ You must know, my son, that on the banks of a vast pool close to
+that town<br>
+ there dwelt a dragon who sometimes approached the walls and
+poisoned with his<br>
+ breath all who dwelt in the suburbs. And that they might not be
+devoured by<br>
+ the monster, the inhabitants of Silena delivered up to him one
+of their number<br>
+ expressed his thought every morning. The victim was chosen by
+lot, and after a<br>
+ hundred others, the lot fell upon the king's daughter.</p>
+
+<p>"Now St. George, who was a military tribune, as he passed
+through the town of<br>
+ Silena, learned that the king's daughter had just been given to
+the fierce<br>
+ beast. He immediately mounted his horse, and, armed with his
+lance, rushed to<br>
+ encounter the dragon, whom he reached just as the monster was
+about to devour<br>
+ the royal virgin. And when St. George had overthrown the dragon,
+the king's<br>
+ daughter fastened her girdle round the beast's neck and he
+followed her like a<br>
+ dog led on a leash.</p>
+
+<p>"That is an example for us of the power of virgins over
+dragons. The history<br>
+ of St. Martha furnishes us with a still more certain proof. Do
+you know the<br>
+ story, Samuel, my son?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, father," answered Samuel.</p>
+
+<p>And the blessed Mael went on:</p>
+
+<p>"There was in a forest on the banks of the Rhone, between
+Arles and Avignon, a<br>
+ dragon half quadruped and half fish, larger than an ox, with
+sharp teeth like<br>
+ horns and huge-wings at his shoulders. He sank the boats and
+devoured their<br>
+ passengers. Now St. Martha, at the entreaty of the people,
+approached this<br>
+ dragon, whom she found devouring a man. She put her girdle round
+his neck and<br>
+ led him easily into the town.</p>
+
+<p>"These two examples lead me to think that we should have
+recourse to the power<br>
+ of some virgin so as to conquer the dragon who scatters terror
+and death<br>
+ through the island of Alca.</p>
+
+<p>"For this reason, Samuel thy son, gird up thy loins and go, I
+pray thee, with<br>
+ two of thy companions, into all the villages of this island, and
+proclaim<br>
+ everywhere that a virgin alone shall be able to deliver the
+island from the<br>
+ monster that devastates it.</p>
+
+<p>"Thou shalt sing psalms and canticles and thou shalt say:</p>
+
+<p>"'O sons of the Penguins, if there be among you a pure virgin,
+let her arise<br>
+ and go, armed with the sign of the cross, to combat the
+dragon!'"</p>
+
+<p>Thus the old man spake, and Samuel promised to obey him. The
+next day he<br>
+ girded up his loins and set out with two of his companions to
+proclaim to the<br>
+ inhabitants of Alca that a virgin alone would be able to deliver
+the Penguins<br>
+ from the rage of the dragon.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>Orberosia loved her husband, but she did not love him alone.
+At the hour when<br>
+ Venus lightens in the pale sky, whilst Kraken scattered terror
+through the<br>
+ villages, she used to visit in his moving hut, a young shepherd
+of Dalles<br>
+ called Marcel, whose pleasing form was invested with
+inexhaustible vigour. The<br>
+ fair Orberosia shared the shepherd's aromatic couch with
+delight, but far from<br>
+ making herself known to him, she took the name of Bridget, and
+said that she<br>
+ was the daughter of a gardener in the Bay of Divers. When
+regretfully she left<br>
+ his arms she walked across the smoking fields towards the Coast
+of Shadows,<br>
+ and if she happened to meet some belated peasant she immediately
+spread out<br>
+ her garments like great wings and cried:</p>
+
+<p>"Passer by, lower your eyes, that you may not have to say,
+'Alas! alas! woe is<br>
+ me, for I have seen the angel of the Lord.'"</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The villagers tremblingly knelt with their faces to the round.
+And several of<br>
+ them used to say that angels, whom it would be death to see,
+passed along the<br>
+ roads of the island in the night time.</p>
+
+<p>Kraken did not know of the loves of Orberosia and Marcel, for
+he was a hero,<br>
+ and heroes never discover the secrets of their wives. But though
+he did not<br>
+ know of these loves, he reaped the benefit of them. Every night
+he found his<br>
+ companion more good-humoured and more beautiful, exhaling
+pleasure and<br>
+ perfuming the nuptial bed with a delicious odour of fennel and
+vervain. She<br>
+ loved Kraken with a love that never became importunate or
+anxious, because she<br>
+ did not rest its whole weight on him alone.</p>
+
+<p>This lucky infidelity of Orberosia was destined soon to save
+the hero from a<br>
+ great peril and to assure his fortune and his glory for ever.
+For it happened<br>
+ that she saw passing in the twilight a neatherd from Belmont,
+who was goading<br>
+ on his oxen, and she fell more deeply in love with him than she
+had ever been<br>
+ with the shepherd Marcel. He was hunch-backed; his shoulders
+were higher than<br>
+ his ears; his body was supported by legs of different lengths;
+his rolling<br>
+ eyes flashed, from beneath his matted hair. From his throat
+issued a hoarse<br>
+ voice and strident laughter; he smelt of the cow-shed. However,
+to her he was<br>
+ beautiful. "A plant," as Gnatho says, "has been loved by one, a
+stream by<br>
+ another, a beast by a third."</p>
+
+<p>Now, one day, as she was sighing within the neatherd's arms in
+a village barn,<br>
+ suddenly the blasts of a trumpet, with sounds and footsteps,
+fell upon her<br>
+ ears; she looked through the window and saw the inhabitants
+collected in the<br>
+ marketplace round a young monk, who, standing upon a rock,
+uttered these words<br>
+ in a distinct voice:</p>
+
+<p>"Inhabitants of Belmont, Abbot Mael, our venerable father,
+informs you through<br>
+ my mouth that neither by strength nor skill in arms shall you
+prevail against<br>
+ the dragon; but the beast shall be overcome by a virgin. If,
+then, there be<br>
+ among you a perfectly pure virgin, let her arise and go towards
+the monster;<br>
+ and when she meets him let her tie her girdle round his neck and
+she shall<br>
+ lead him as easily as if he were a little dog."</p>
+
+<p>And the young monk, replacing his hood upon his head, departed
+to carry the<br>
+ proclamation of the blessed Mael to other villages.</p>
+
+<p>Orberosia sat in the amorous straw, resting her head in her
+hand and<br>
+ supporting her elbow upon her knee, meditating on what she had
+just heard.</p>
+
+<p>Although, so far as Kraken was concerned, she feared the power
+of a virgin<br>
+ much less than the strength of armed men, she did not feel
+reassured by the<br>
+ proclamation of the blessed Mael. A vague but sure instinct
+ruled her mind and<br>
+ warned her that Kraken could not henceforth be a dragon with
+safety.</p>
+
+<p>She said to the neatherd:</p>
+
+<p>"My own heart, what do you think about the dragon?"</p>
+
+<p>The rustic shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>"It is certain that dragons laid waste the earth in ancient
+times and some<br>
+ have been seen as large as mountains. But they come no longer,
+and I believe<br>
+ that what has been taken for a dragon is not one at all, but
+pirates or<br>
+ merchants who have carried off the fair Orberosia and the best
+of the children<br>
+ of Alca in their ships. But if one of those brigands attempts to
+rob me of my<br>
+ oxen, I will either by force or craft find a way to prevent him
+from doing me<br>
+ any harm."</p>
+
+<p>This remark of the neatherd increased Orberosia's
+apprehensions and added to<br>
+ her solicitude for the husband whom she loved.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>X. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>The days passed by and no maiden arose in the island to combat
+the monster.<br>
+ And in the wooden monastery old Mael, seated on a bench in the
+shade of an old<br>
+ fig-tree, accompanied by a pious monk called Regimental, kept
+asking himself<br>
+ anxiously and sadly how it was that there was not in Alca a
+single virgin fit<br>
+ to overthrow the monster.</p>
+
+<p>He sighed and brother Regimental sighed too. At that moment
+old Mael called<br>
+ young Samuel, who happened to pass through the garden, and said
+to him:</p>
+
+<p>"I have meditated anew, my son, on the means of destroying the
+dragon who<br>
+ devours the flower of our youth, our flocks, and our harvests.
+In this respect<br>
+ the story of the dragons of St. Riok and of St. Pol de Leon
+seems to me<br>
+ particularly instructive. The dragon of St. Riok was six fathoms
+long; his<br>
+ head was derived from the cock and the basilisk, his body from
+the ox and the<br>
+ serpent; he ravaged the banks of the Elorn in the time of King
+Bristocus. St.<br>
+ Riok, then aged two years, led him by a leash to the sea, in
+which the monster<br>
+ drowned himself of his own accord. St. Pol's dragon was sixty
+feet long and<br>
+ not less terrible. The blessed apostle of Leon bound him with
+his stole and<br>
+ allowed a young noble of great purity of life to lead him. These
+examples<br>
+ prove that in the eyes of God a chaste young man is as agreeable
+as a chaste<br>
+ girl. Heaven makes no distinction between them. For this reason,
+my son, if<br>
+ you believe what I say, we will both go to the Coast of Shadows;
+when we reach<br>
+ the dragon's cavern we will call the monster in a loud voice,
+and when he<br>
+ comes forth I will tie my stole round his neck and you will lead
+him to the<br>
+ sea, where he will not fail to drown himself."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ At the old man's words Samuel cast down his head and did not
+answer.</p>
+
+<p>"You seem to hesitate, my son," said Mael.</p>
+
+<p>Brother Regimental, contrary to his custom, spoke without
+being addressed.</p>
+
+<p>"There is at least cause for some hesitation," said he. "St.
+Riok was only two<br>
+ years old when he overcame the dragon. Who says that nine or ten
+years later<br>
+ he could have done as much? Remember, father, that the dragon
+who is<br>
+ devastating our island has devoured little Elo and four or five
+other young<br>
+ boys. Brother Samuel is not go presumptuous as to believe that
+at nineteen<br>
+ years of age he is more innocent than they were at twelve and
+fourteen.</p>
+
+<p>"Alas!" added the monk, with a groan, "who can boast of being
+chaste in this<br>
+ world, where everything gives the example and model of love,
+where all things<br>
+ in nature, animals, and plants, show us the caresses of love and
+advise us to<br>
+ share them? Animals are eager to unite in their own fashion, but
+the various<br>
+ marriages of quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and reptiles are far
+from equalling in<br>
+ lust the nuptials of the trees. The greatest extremes of
+lewdness that the<br>
+ pagans have imagined in their fables are outstripped by the
+simple flowers of<br>
+ the field, and, if you knew the irregularities of lilies and
+roses you would<br>
+ take those chalices of impurity, those vases of scandal, away
+from your<br>
+ altars."</p>
+
+<p>"Do not speak in this way, Brother Regimental," answered old
+Mael. "Since they<br>
+ are subject to the law of nature, animals and plants are always
+innocent. They<br>
+ have no souls to save, whilst man--"</p>
+
+<p>"You are right," replied Brother Regimental, "it is quite a
+different thing.<br>
+ But do not send young Samuel to the dragon--the dragon might
+devour him. For<br>
+ the last five years Samuel is not in a state to show his
+innocence to<br>
+ monsters. In the year of the comet, the Devil in order to seduce
+him, put in<br>
+ his path a milkmaid, who was lifting up her petticoat to cross a
+ford. Samuel<br>
+ was tempted, but he overcame the temptation. The Devil, who
+never tires, sent<br>
+ him the image of that young girl in a dream. The shade did what
+the reality<br>
+ was unable to accomplish, and Samuel yielded. When he awoke be
+moistened his<br>
+ couch with his tears, but alas! repentance did not give him back
+his<br>
+ innocence."</p>
+
+<p>As he listened to this story Samuel asked himself how his
+secret could be<br>
+ known, for he was ignorant that the Devil had borrowed the
+appearance of<br>
+ Brother Regimental, so as to trouble the hearts of the monks of
+Alca.</p>
+
+<p>And old Mael remained deep in thought and kept asking himself
+in grief:</p>
+
+<p>"Who will deliver us from the dragon's tooth? Who will
+preserve us from his<br>
+ breath? Who will save us from his look?"</p>
+
+<p>However, the inhabitants of Alca began to take courage. The
+labourers of<br>
+ Dombes and the neatherds of Belmont swore that they themselves
+would be of<br>
+ more avail than a girl against the ferocious beast, and they
+exclaimed as they<br>
+ stroked the muscles on their arms, "Let the dragon come!" Many
+men and women<br>
+ had seen him. They did not agree about his form and his figure,
+but all now<br>
+ united in saying that he was not as big as they had thought, and
+that his<br>
+ height was not much greater than a man's. The defence was
+organised; towards<br>
+ nightfall watches were stationed at the entrances of the
+villages ready to<br>
+ give the alarm; and during the night companies armed with
+pitchforks and<br>
+ scythes protected the paddocks in which the animals were shut
+up. Indeed, once<br>
+ in the village of Anis some plucky labourers surprised him as he
+was scaling<br>
+ Morio's wall, and, as they had flails, scythes, and pitchforks,
+they fell upon<br>
+ him and pressed him hard. One of them, a very quick and
+courageous man,<br>
+ thought to have run him through with his pitchfork; but he
+slipped in a pool<br>
+ and so let him escape. The others would certainly have caught
+him had they not<br>
+ waited to pick up the rabbits and fowls that he dropped in his
+flight.</p>
+
+<p>Those labourers declared to the Elders of the village that the
+monster's form<br>
+ and proportions appeased to them human enough except for his
+head and his<br>
+ tail, which were, in truth, terrifying.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>XI. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>On that day Kraken came back to his cavern sooner than usual.
+He took from his<br>
+ head his sealskin helmet with its two bull's horns and its visor
+trimmed with<br>
+ terrible hooks. He threw on the table his gloves that ended in
+horrible<br>
+ claws--they were the beaks of sea-birds. He unhooked his belt
+from which hung<br>
+ a long green tail twisted into many folds. Then he ordered his
+page, Elo, to<br>
+ help him off with his boots and, as the child did not succeed in
+doing this<br>
+ very quickly, he gave him a kick that sent him to the other end
+of the grotto.</p>
+
+<p>Without looking at the fair Orberosia, who was spinning, he
+seated himself in<br>
+ front of the fireplace, on which a sheep was roasting, and he
+muttered:</p>
+
+<p>"Ignoble Penguins. . . . There is no worse trade than a
+dragon's."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "What does my master say?" asked the fair Orberosia.</p>
+
+<p>"They fear me no longer," continued Kraken. "Formerly everyone
+fled at my<br>
+ approach. I carried away hens and rabbits in my bag; I drove
+sheep and pigs,<br>
+ cows, and oxen before me. To-day these clod-hoppers keep a good
+guard; they<br>
+ sit up at night. Just now I was pursued in the village of Anis
+by doughty<br>
+ labourers armed with flails and scythes and pitchforks. I had to
+drop the hens<br>
+ and rabbits, put my tail under my arm, and run as fast as I
+could. Now I ask<br>
+ you, is it seemly for a dragon of Cappadocia to run away like a
+robber with<br>
+ his tail under his arm? Further, incommoded as I was by crests,
+horns, hooks,<br>
+ claws, and scales, I barely escaped a brute who ran half an inch
+of his<br>
+ pitchfork into my left thigh."</p>
+
+<p>As he said this he carefully ran his hand over the insulted
+part, and, after<br>
+ giving himself up for a few moments to bitter meditation:</p>
+
+<p>"What idiots those Penguins are! I am tired of blowing flames
+in the faces of<br>
+ such imbeciles. Orberosia, do you hear me?"</p>
+
+<p>Having thus spoken the hero raised his terrible helmet in his
+hands and gazed<br>
+ at it for a long time in gloomy silence. Then he pronounced
+these rapid words:</p>
+
+<p>"I have made this helmet with my own hands in the shape of a
+fish's head,<br>
+ covering it with the skin of a seal. To make it more terrible I
+have put on it<br>
+ the horns of a bull and I have given it a boar's jaws; I have
+hung from it a<br>
+ horse's tail dyed vermilion. When in the gloomy twilight I threw
+it over my<br>
+ shoulders no inhabitant of this island had courage to withstand
+its sight.<br>
+ Women and children, young men and old men fled distracted at its
+approach, and<br>
+ I carried terror among the whole race of Penguins. By what
+advice does that<br>
+ insolent people lose its earlier fears and dare to-day to behold
+these<br>
+ horrible jaws and to attack this terrible crest?"</p>
+
+<p>And throwing his helmet on the rocky soil:</p>
+
+<p>"Perish, deceitful helmet!" cried Kraken. "I swear by all the
+demons of Armor<br>
+ that I will never bear you upon my head again."</p>
+
+<p>And having uttered this oath he stamped upon his helmet, his
+gloves, his<br>
+ boots, and upon his tail with its twisted folds.</p>
+
+<p>"Kraken," said the fair Orberosia, "will you allow your
+servant to employ<br>
+ artifice to save your reputation and your goods? Do not despise
+a woman's<br>
+ help. You need it, for all men are imbeciles."</p>
+
+<p>"Woman," asked Kraken, "what are your plans?"</p>
+
+<p>And the fair Orberosia informed her husband that the monks
+were going through<br>
+ the villages teaching the inhabitants the best way of combating
+the dragon;<br>
+ that, according to their instructions, the beast would be
+overcome by a<br>
+ virgin, and that if a maid placed her girdle around the dragon's
+neck she<br>
+ could lead him as easily as if he were a little dog.</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know that the monks teach this?" asked Kraken.</p>
+
+<p>"My friend," answered Orberosia, "do not interrupt a serious
+subject by<br>
+ frivolous questions. . . . 'If, then,' added the monks, 'there
+be in Alca a<br>
+ pure virgin, let her arise!' Now, Kraken, I have determined to
+answer their<br>
+ call. I will go and find the holy Mael and I will say to him: 'I
+am the virgin<br>
+ destined by Heaven to overthrow the dragon.'"</p>
+
+<p>At these words Kraken exclaimed: "How can you be that pure
+virgin? And why do<br>
+ you want to overthrow me, Orberosia? Have you lost your reason?
+Be sure that I<br>
+ will not allow myself to be conquered by you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Can you not try and understand me before you get angry?"
+sighed the fair<br>
+ Orberosia with deep though gentle contempt.</p>
+
+<p>And she explained the cunning designs that she had formed.</p>
+
+<p>As he listened, the hero remained pensive. And when she ceased
+speaking:</p>
+
+<p>"Orberosia, your cunning, is deep," said he, "And if your
+plans are carried<br>
+ out according to your intentions I shall derive great advantages
+from them.<br>
+ But how can you be the virgin destined by heaven?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't bother about that," she replied, "and come to bed."</p>
+
+<p>The next day in the grease-laden atmosphere of the cavern,
+Kraken plaited a<br>
+ deformed skeleton out of osier rods and covered it with
+bristling, scaly, and<br>
+ filthy skins. To one extremity of the skeleton Orberosia sewed
+the fierce<br>
+ crest and the hideous mask that Kraken used to wear in his
+plundering<br>
+ expeditions, and to the other end she fastened the tail with
+twisted folds<br>
+ which the hero was wont to trail behind him. And when the work
+was finished<br>
+ they showed little Elo and the other five children who waited on
+them how to<br>
+ get inside this machine, how to make it walk, how to blow horns
+and burn tow<br>
+ in it so as to send forth smoke and flames through the dragon's
+mouth.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>XII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation)</h2>
+
+<p>Orberosia, having clothed herself in a robe made of coarse
+stuff and girt<br>
+ herself with a thick cord, went to the monastery and asked to
+speak to the<br>
+ blessed Mael. And because women were forbidden to enter the
+enclosure of the<br>
+ monastery the old man advanced outside the gates, holding his
+pastoral cross<br>
+ in his right hand and resting his left on the shoulder of
+Brother Samuel, the<br>
+ youngest of his disciples.</p>
+
+<p>He asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Woman, who art thou?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am the maiden Orberosia."</p>
+
+<p>At this reply Mael raised his trembling arms to heaven.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you speak truth, woman? It is a certain fact that
+Orberosia was devoured<br>
+ by the dragon. And yet I see Orberosia and hear her. Did you
+not, O my<br>
+ daughter, while within the dragon's bowels arm yourself with the
+sign of the<br>
+ cross and come uninjured out of his throat? That is what seems
+to me the most<br>
+ credible explanation."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "You are not deceived, father," answered Orberosia. "That is
+precisely what<br>
+ happened to me. Immediately I came out of the creature's bowels
+I took refuge<br>
+ in a hermitage on the Coast of Shadows. I lived there in
+solitude, giving<br>
+ myself up to prayer and meditation, and performing unheard of
+austerities,<br>
+ until I learnt by a revelation from heaven that a maid alone
+could overcome<br>
+ the dragon, and that I was that maid."</p>
+
+<p>"Show me a sign of your mission," said the old man.</p>
+
+<p>"I myself am the sign," answered Orberosia.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not ignorant of the power of those who have placed a
+seal upon their<br>
+ flesh," replied the apostle of the Penguins. But are you indeed
+such as you<br>
+ say?"</p>
+
+<p>"You will see by the result," answered Orberosia.</p>
+
+<p>The monk Regimental drew near:</p>
+
+<p>"That will," said he, "be the best proof. King Solomon has
+said: 'Three things<br>
+ are hard to understand and a fourth is impossible: they are the
+way of a<br>
+ serpent on the earth, the way of a bird in the air, the way of a
+ship in the<br>
+ sea, and the way of a man with a maid!' I regard such matrons as
+nothing less<br>
+ than presumptuous who claim to compare themselves in these
+matters with the<br>
+ wisest of kings. Father, if you are led by me you will not
+consult them in<br>
+ regard to the pious Orberosia. When they have given their
+opinion you will not<br>
+ be a bit farther on than before. Virginity is not less difficult
+to prove than<br>
+ to keep. Pliny tells us in his history that its signs are either
+imaginary or<br>
+ very uncertain.* One who bears upon her the fourteen signs of
+corruption may<br>
+ yet be pure in the eyes of the angels, and, on the contrary,
+another who has<br>
+ been pronounced pure by the matrons who inspected her may know
+that her good<br>
+ appearance is due to the artifices of a cunning perversity. As
+for the purity<br>
+ of this holy girl here, I would put my hand in the fire in
+witness of it."</p>
+
+<p>* We have vainly sought for this phrase in Pliny's "Natural
+History."--Editor.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ He spoke thus because he was the Devil. But old Mael did not
+know it. He asked<br>
+ the pious Orberosia:</p>
+
+<p>"My daughter, how, would you proceed to conquer so fierce an
+animal as he who<br>
+ devoured you?"</p>
+
+<p>The virgin answered:</p>
+
+<p>"To-morrow at sunrise, O Mael, you will summon the people
+together on the hill<br>
+ in front of the desolate moor that extends to the Coast of
+Shadows, and you<br>
+ will take care that no man of the Penguins remains less than
+five hundred<br>
+ paces from those rocks so that he may not be poisoned by the
+monster's breath.<br>
+ And the dragon will come out of the rocks and I will put my
+girdle round his<br>
+ neck and lead him like an obedient dog."</p>
+
+<p>"Ought you not to be accompanied by a courageous and pious man
+who will kill<br>
+ the dragon?" asked Mael.</p>
+
+<p>"It will be as thou sayest, venerable father. I shall deliver
+the monster to<br>
+ Kraken, who will stay him with his flashing sword. For I tell
+thee that the<br>
+ noble Kraken, who was believed to be dead, will return among the
+Penguins and<br>
+ he shall slay the dragon. And from the creature's belly will
+come forth the<br>
+ little children whom he has devoured."</p>
+
+<p>"What you declare to me, O virgin," cried the apostle, "seems
+wonderful and<br>
+ beyond human power."</p>
+
+<p>"It is," answered the virgin Orberosia. "But learn, O Mael,
+that I have had a<br>
+ revelation that as a reward for their deliverance, the Penguin
+people will pay<br>
+ to the knight Kraken an annual tribute of three hundred fowls,
+twelve sheep,<br>
+ two oxen, three pigs, one thousand eight hundred bushels of
+corn, and<br>
+ vegetables according to their season; and that, moreover, the
+children who<br>
+ will come out of the dragon's belly will be given and committed
+to the said<br>
+ Kraken to serve him and obey him in all things. If the Penguin
+people fail to<br>
+ keep their engagements a new dragon will come upon the island
+more terrible<br>
+ than the first. I have spoken."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>XIII. THE DRAGON OF ALCA (Continuation and End)</h2>
+
+<p>The people of the Penguins were assembled by Mael and they
+spent the night on<br>
+ the Coast of Shadows within the bounds which the holy man had
+prescribed in<br>
+ order that none among the Penguins should be poisoned by the
+monster's breath.</p>
+
+<p>The veil of night still covered the earth when, preceded by a
+hoarse<br>
+ bellowing, the dragon showed his indistinct and monstrous form
+upon the rocky<br>
+ coast. He crawled like a serpent and his writhing body seemed
+about fifteen<br>
+ feet long. At his appearance the crowd drew back in terror. But
+soon all eyes<br>
+ were turned towards the Virgin Orberosia, who, in the first
+light of the dawn,<br>
+ clothed in white, advanced over the purple heather. With an
+intrepid though<br>
+ modest gait she walked towards the beast, who, uttering awful
+bellowings,<br>
+ opened his flaming throat. An immense cry of terror and pity
+arose from the<br>
+ midst of the Penguins. But the virgin, unloosing her linen
+girdle, put it<br>
+ round the dragon's neck and led him on the leash like a faithful
+dog amid the<br>
+ acclamations of the spectators.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ She had walked over a long stretch of the heath when Kraken
+appeared armed<br>
+ with a flashing sword. The people, who believed him dead,
+uttered cries of joy<br>
+ and surprise. The hero rushed towards the beast, turned him over
+on his back,<br>
+ and with his sword cut open his belly, from whence came forth in
+their shirts,<br>
+ with curling hair and folded hands, little Elo and the five
+other children<br>
+ whom the monster had devoured.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately they threw themselves on their knees before the
+virgin Orberosia,<br>
+ who took them in her arms and whispered into their ears:</p>
+
+<p>"You will go through the villages saying: 'We are the poor
+little children who<br>
+ were devoured by the dragon, and we came out of his belly in our
+shirts.' The<br>
+ inhabitants will give you abundance of all that you can desire.
+But if you say<br>
+ anything else you will get nothing but cuffs and whippings.
+Go!"</p>
+
+<p>Several Penguins, seeing the dragon disembowelled, rushed
+forward to cut him<br>
+ to pieces, some from a feeling of rage and vengeance, others to
+get the magic<br>
+ stone called dragonite, that is engendered in his head. The
+mothers of the<br>
+ children who had come back to life ran to embrace their little
+ones. But the<br>
+ holy Mael kept them back, saying that none of them were holy
+enough to<br>
+ approach a dragon without dying.</p>
+
+<p>And soon little Elo, and the five other children came towards
+the people and<br>
+ said:</p>
+
+<p>"We are the poor little children who were devoured by the
+dragon and we came<br>
+ out of his belly in our shirts."</p>
+
+<p>And all who heard them kissed them and said:</p>
+
+<p>"Blessed children, we will give you abundance of all that you
+can desire."</p>
+
+<p>And the crowd of people dispersed, full of joy, singing hymns
+and canticles.</p>
+
+<p>To commemorate this day on which Providence delivered the
+people from a cruel<br>
+ scourge, processions were established in which the effigy of a
+chained dragon<br>
+ was led about.</p>
+
+<p>Kraken levied the tribute and became the richest and most
+powerful of the<br>
+ Penguins. As a sign of his victory and so as to inspire a
+salutary terror, he<br>
+ wore a dragon's crest upon his head and he had a habit of saying
+to the<br>
+ people:</p>
+
+<p>"Now that the monster is dead I am the dragon."</p>
+
+<p>For many years Orberosia bestowed her favours upon neatherds
+and shepherds,<br>
+ whom she thought equal to the gods. But when she was no longer
+beautiful she<br>
+ consecrated herself to the Lord.</p>
+
+<p>At her death she became the object of public veneration, and
+was admitted into<br>
+ the calendar of the saints and adopted as the patron saint of
+Penguinia.</p>
+
+<p>Kraken left a son, who, like his father, wore a dragon's
+crest, and he was for<br>
+ this reason surnamed Draco. He was the founder of the first
+royal dynasty of<br>
+ the Penguins.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK III. THE MIDDLE AGES AND THE RENAISSANCE</h1>
+
+<h1>�</h1>
+
+<h2>I. BRIAN THE GOOD AND QUEEN GLAMORGAN</h2>
+
+<p>The kings of Alca were descended from Draco,the son of
+Kraken,and they wore on<br>
+ their heads a terrible dragon's crest, as a sacred badge whose
+appearance<br>
+ alone inspired the people with veneration, terror, and love.
+They were<br>
+ perpetually in conflict either with their own vassals and
+subjects or with the<br>
+ princes of the adjoining islands and continents.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The most ancient of these kings has left but a name. We do not
+even know how<br>
+ to pronounce or write it. The first of the Draconides whose
+history is known<br>
+ was Brian the Good, renowned for his skill and courage in war
+and in the<br>
+ chase.</p>
+
+<p>He was a Christian and loved learning. He also favoured men
+who had vowed<br>
+ themselves to the monastic life. In the hall of his palace
+where, under the<br>
+ sooty rafters, there hung the heads, pelts, and horns of wild
+beasts, he held<br>
+ feasts to which all the harpers of Alca and of the neighbouring
+islands were<br>
+ invited, and he himself used to join in singing the praises of
+the heroes. He<br>
+ was just and magnanimous, but inflamed by so ardent a love of
+glory that he<br>
+ could not restrain himself from putting to death those who had
+sung better<br>
+ than himself.</p>
+
+<p>The monks of Yvern having been driven out by the pagans who
+ravaged Brittany,<br>
+ King Brian summoned them into his kingdom and built a wooden
+monastery for<br>
+ them near his palace. Every day he went with Queen Glamorgan,
+his wife, into<br>
+ the monastery chapel and was present at the religious ceremonies
+and joined in<br>
+ the hymns.</p>
+
+<p>Now among these monks there was a brother called Oddoul, who,
+while still in<br>
+ the flower of his youth, had adorned himself with knowledge and
+virtue. The<br>
+ devil entertained a great grudge against him, and attempted
+several times to<br>
+ lead him into temptation. He took several shapes and appeared to
+him in turn<br>
+ as a war-horse, a young maiden, and a cup of mead. Then he
+rattled two dice in<br>
+ a dicebox and said to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Will you play with me for the kingdoms of, the world against
+one of the hairs<br>
+ of your head?"</p>
+
+<p>But the man of the Lord, armed with the sign of the Cross,
+repulsed the enemy.<br>
+ Perceiving that he could not seduce him, the devil thought of an
+artful plan<br>
+ to ruin him. One summer night he approached the queen, who slept
+upon her<br>
+ couch, showed her an image of the young monk whom she saw every
+day in the<br>
+ wooden monastery, and upon this image he placed a spell.
+Forthwith, like a<br>
+ subtle poison, love flowed into Glamorgan's veins, and she
+burned with an<br>
+ ardent desire to do as she listed with Oddoul. She found
+unceasing pretexts to<br>
+ have him near her. Several times she asked him to teach reading
+and singing to<br>
+ her children.</p>
+
+<p>"I entrust them to you," said she to him. "And will follow the
+lessons you<br>
+ will give them so that I myself may learn also. You will teach
+both mother and<br>
+ sons at the same time."</p>
+
+<p>But the young monk kept making excuses. At times he would say
+that he was not<br>
+ a learned enough teacher, and on other occasions that his state
+forbade him<br>
+ all intercourse with women. This refusal inflamed Glamorgan's
+passion. One day<br>
+ as she lay pining upon her couch, her malady having become
+intolerable, she<br>
+ summoned Oddoul to her chamber. He came in obedience to her
+orders, but<br>
+ remained with his eyes cast down towards the threshold of the
+door. With<br>
+ impatience and grief she resented his not looking at her.</p>
+
+<p>"See," said she to him, "I have no more strength, a shadow is
+on my eyes. My<br>
+ body is both burning and freezing."</p>
+
+<p>And as he kept silence and made no movement, she called him in
+a voice of<br>
+ entreaty:</p>
+
+<p>"Come to me, come!"</p>
+
+<p>With outstretched arms to which passion gave more length, she
+endeavoured to<br>
+ seize him and draw him towards her.</p>
+
+<p>But he fled away, reproaching her for her wantonness.</p>
+
+<p>Then, incensed with rage and fearing that Oddoul might divulge
+the shame into<br>
+ which she had fallen, she determined to ruin him so that he
+might not ruin<br>
+ her.</p>
+
+<p>In a voice of lamentation that resounded throughout all the
+palace she called<br>
+ for help, as if, in truth, she were in some great danger. Her
+servants rushed<br>
+ up and saw the young monk fleeing and the queen pulling back the
+sheets upon<br>
+ her couch. They all cried out together. And when King Brian,
+attracted by the<br>
+ noise, entered the chamber, Glamorgan, showing him her
+dishevelled hair, her<br>
+ eyes flooded with tears, and her bosom that in the fury of her
+love she had<br>
+ torn with her nails, said:</p>
+
+<p>"My lord and husband, behold the traces of the insults I have
+undergone.<br>
+ Driven by an infamous desire Oddoul has approached me and
+attempted to do me<br>
+ violence."</p>
+
+<p>When he heard these complaints and saw the blood, the king,
+transported with<br>
+ fury, ordered his guards to seize the young monk and burn him
+alive before the<br>
+ palace under the queen's eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Being told of the affair, the Abbot of Yvern went to the king
+and said to him:</p>
+
+<p>"King Brian, know by this example the difference between a
+Christian woman and<br>
+ a pagan. Roman Lucretia was the most virtuous of idolatrous
+princesses, yet<br>
+ she had not the strength to defend herself against the attacks
+of an<br>
+ effeminate youth, and, ashamed of her weakness, she gave way to
+despair,<br>
+ whilst Glamorgan has successfully withstood the assaults of a
+criminal filled<br>
+ with rage, and possessed by the most terrible of demons."
+Meanwhile Oddoul, in<br>
+ the prison of the palace, was waitin for the moment when he
+should be burned<br>
+ alive. But God did not suffer an innocent to perish. He sent to
+him an angel,<br>
+ who, taking the form of one of the queen's servants called
+Gudrune, took him<br>
+ out of his prison and led him into the very room where the woman
+whose<br>
+ appearance he had taken dwelt.</p>
+
+<p>And the angel said to young Oddoul:</p>
+
+<p>"I love thee because thou art daring."</p>
+
+<p>And young Oddoul, believing that it was Gudrune herself,
+answered with<br>
+ downcast looks:</p>
+
+<p>"It is by the grace of the Lord that I have resisted the
+violence of the queen<br>
+ and braved the anger of that powerful woman."</p>
+
+<p>And the angel asked:</p>
+
+<p>"What? Hast thou not done what the queen accuses thee of?"</p>
+
+<p>"In truth no, I have not done it," answered Oddoul, his hand
+on his heart.</p>
+
+<p>"Thou hast not done it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I have not done it. The very thought of such an action
+fills me with<br>
+ horror."</p>
+
+<p>"Then," cried the angel, "what art thou doing here, thou
+impotent creature?" *</p>
+
+<p>* The Penguin chronicler who relates the fact employs the
+expression, Species<br>
+ inductilis. I have endeavoured to translate it literally.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ And she opened the door to facilitate the young man's escape.
+Oddoul felt<br>
+ himself pushed violently out. Scarcely had he gone down into the
+street than a<br>
+ chamber-pot was poured over his head; and he thought:</p>
+
+<p>"Mysterious are thy designs, O Lord, and thy ways past finding
+out."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>II. DRACO THE GREAT (Translation of the Relics of St.
+Orberosia)</h2>
+
+<p>The direct posterity of Brian the Good was extinguished about
+the year 900 in<br>
+ the person of Collic of the Short Nose. A cousin of that prince,
+Bosco the<br>
+ Magnanimous, succeeded him, and took care, in order to assure
+himself of the<br>
+ throne, to put to death all his relations. There issued from him
+a long line<br>
+ of powerful kings.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ One of them, Draco the Great, attained great renown as a man of
+war. He was<br>
+ defeated more frequently than the others. It is by this
+constancy in defeat<br>
+ that great captains are recognized. In twenty years he burned
+down more than a<br>
+ hundred thousand hamlets, market towns, unwalled towns,
+villages, walled<br>
+ towns, cities, and universities. He set fire impartially to his
+enemies'<br>
+ territory and to his own domains. And he used to explain his
+conduct by<br>
+ saying:</p>
+
+<p>"War without fire is like tripe without mustard: it is an
+insipid thing."</p>
+
+<p>His justice was rigorous. When the peasants whom he made
+prisoners were unable<br>
+ to raise the money for their ransoms he had them hanged from a
+tree, and if<br>
+ any unhappy woman came to plead for her destitute husband he
+dragged her by<br>
+ the hair at his horse's tail. He lived like a soldier without
+effeminacy. It<br>
+ is satisfactory to relate that his manner of life was pure. Not
+only did he<br>
+ not allow his kingdom to decline from its hereditary glory, but,
+even in his<br>
+ reverses he valiantly supported the honour of the Penguin
+people.</p>
+
+<p>Draco the Great caused the relics of St. Orberosia to be
+transferred to Alca.</p>
+
+<p>The body of the blessed saint had been buried in a grotto on
+the Coast of<br>
+ Shadows at the end of a scented heath. The first pilgrims who
+went to visit it<br>
+ were the boys and girls from the neighbouring villages. They
+used to go there<br>
+ in the evening, by preference in couples, as if their pious
+desires naturally<br>
+ sought satisfaction in darkness and solitude. They worshipped
+the saint with a<br>
+ fervent and discreet worship whose mystery they seemed jealously
+to guard, for<br>
+ they did not like to publish too openly the experiences they
+felt. But they<br>
+ were heard to murmur one to another words of love, delight, and
+rapture with<br>
+ which they mingled the name of Orberosia. Some would sigh that
+there they<br>
+ forgot the world; others would say that they came out of the
+grotto in peace<br>
+ and calm; the young girls among them used to recall to each
+other the joy with<br>
+ which they had been filled in it.</p>
+
+<p>Such were the marvels that the virgin of Alca performed in the
+morning of her<br>
+ glorious eternity; they had the sweetness and indefiniteness of
+the dawn. Soon<br>
+ the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume throughout the
+land; it was a<br>
+ ground of joy and edification for pious souls, and corrupt men
+endeavoured,<br>
+ though in vain, by falsehood and calumny, to divert the faithful
+from the<br>
+ springs of grace that flowed from the saint's tomb. The Church
+took measures<br>
+ so that these graces should not remain reserved for a few
+children, but should<br>
+ be diffused throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up
+their quarters<br>
+ in the grotto, they built a monastery, a chapel, and a hostelry
+on the coast,<br>
+ and pilgrims began to flock thither.</p>
+
+<p>As if strengthened by a longer sojourn in heaven, the blessed
+Orberosia now<br>
+ performed still greater miracles for those who came to lay their
+offerings on<br>
+ her tomb. She gave hopes to women who had been hitherto barren,
+she sent<br>
+ dreams to reassure jealous old men concerning the fidelity of
+the young wives<br>
+ whom they had suspected without cause, and she protected the
+country from<br>
+ plagues, murrains, famines, tempests, and dragons of
+Cappadocia.</p>
+
+<p>But during the troubles that desolated the kingdom in the time
+of King Collic<br>
+ and his successors, the tomb of St. Orberosia was plundered of
+its wealth, the<br>
+ monastery burned down, and the monks dispersed. The road that
+had been so long<br>
+ trodden by devout pilgrims was overgrown with furze and heather,
+and the blue<br>
+ thistles of the sands. For a hundred years the miraculous tomb
+had been<br>
+ visited by none save vipers, weasels, and bats, when, one day
+the saint<br>
+ appeared to a peasant of the neighbourhood, Momordic by
+name.</p>
+
+<p>"I am the virgin Orberosia," said she to him; "I have chosen
+thee to restore<br>
+ my sanctuary. Warn the inhabitants of the country that if they
+allow my memory<br>
+ to be blotted out, and leave my tomb without honour and wealth,
+a new dragon<br>
+ will come and devastate Penguinia."</p>
+
+<p>Learned churchmen held an inquiry concerning this apparition,
+and pronounced<br>
+ it genuine, and not diabolical but truly heavenly, and in later
+years it was<br>
+ remarked that in France, in like circumstances, St. Foy and St.
+Catherine had<br>
+ acted in the same way and made use of similar language.</p>
+
+<p>The monastery was restored and pilgrims flocked to it anew.
+The virgin<br>
+ Orberosia worked greater and greater miracles. She cured divers
+hurtful<br>
+ maladies, particularly club-foot, dropsy, paralysis, and St.
+Guy's disease.<br>
+ The monks who kept the tomb were enjoying an enviable opulence,
+when the<br>
+ saint, appearing to King Draco the Great, ordered him to
+recognise her as the<br>
+ heavenly patron of the kingdom and to transfer her precious
+remains to the<br>
+ cathedral of Alca.</p>
+
+<p>In consequence, the odoriferous relics of that virgin were
+carried with great<br>
+ pomp to the metropolitan church and placed in the middle of the
+choir in a<br>
+ shrine made of gold and enamel and ornamented with precious
+stones.</p>
+
+<p>The chapter kept a record of the miracles wrought by the
+blessed Orberosia.</p>
+
+<p>Draco the Great, who had never ceased to defend and exalt the
+Christian faith,<br>
+ died fulfilled with the most pious sentiments and bequeathed his
+great<br>
+ possessions to the Church.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>II. QUEEN CRUCHA</h2>
+
+<p>Terrible disorders followed the death of Draco the Great. That
+prince's<br>
+ successors have often been accused of weakness, and it is true
+that none of<br>
+ them followed, even from afar, the example of their valiant
+ancestor.</p>
+
+<p>His son, Chum, who was lame, failed to increase the territory
+of the Penguins.<br>
+ Bolo, the son of Chum, was assassinated by the palace guards at
+the age of<br>
+ nine, just as he was ascending the throne. His brother Gun
+succeeded him. He<br>
+ was only seven years old and allowed himself to be governed by
+his mother,<br>
+ Queen Crucha.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Crucha was beautiful, learned, and intelligent; but she was
+unable to curb her<br>
+ own passions.</p>
+
+<p>These are the terms in which the venerable Talpa expresses
+himself in his<br>
+ chronicle regarding that illustrious queen:</p>
+
+<p>"In beauty of face and symmetry of figure Queen Crucha yields
+neither to<br>
+ Semiramis of Babylon nor to Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons;
+nor to Salome,<br>
+ the daughter of Herodias. But she offers in her person certain
+singularities<br>
+ that will appear beautiful or uncomely according to the
+contradictory opinions<br>
+ of men and the varying judgments of the world. She has on her
+forehead two<br>
+ small horns which she conceals in the abundant folds of her
+golden hair; one<br>
+ of her eyes is blue and one is black; her neck is bent towards
+the left side;<br>
+ and, like Alexander of Macedon, she has six fingers on her right
+hand, and a<br>
+ stain like a little monkey's head upon her skin.</p>
+
+<p>"Her gait is majestic and her manner affable. She is
+magnificent in her<br>
+ expenses, but she is not always able to rule desire by
+reason.</p>
+
+<p>"One day, having noticed in the palace stables, a young groom
+of great beauty,<br>
+ she immediately fell violently in love with him, and entrusted
+to him the<br>
+ command of her armies. What one must praise unreservedly in this
+great queen<br>
+ is the abundance of gifts that she makes to the churches,
+monasteries, and<br>
+ chapels in her kingdom, and especially to the holy house of
+Beargarden, where,<br>
+ by the grace of the Lord, I made my profession in my fourteenth
+year. She has<br>
+ founded masses for the repose of her soul in such great numbers
+that every<br>
+ priest in the Penguin Church is, so to speak, transformed into a
+taper lighted<br>
+ in the sight of heaven to draw down the divine mercy upon the
+august Crucha."</p>
+
+<p>From these lines and from some others with which have enriched
+my text the<br>
+ reader can judge of the historical and literary value of the
+"Gesta<br>
+ Penguinorum." Unhappily, that chronicle suddenly comes suddenly
+to an end at<br>
+ third year of Draco the Simple, the successor of Gun the Weak.
+Having reached<br>
+ that point of my history, I deplore the loss of an agreeable and
+trustworthy<br>
+ guide.</p>
+
+<p>During the two centuries that followed, the Penguins remained
+plunged in<br>
+ blood-stained disorder. All the arts perished. In the midst of
+the general<br>
+ ignorance, the monks in the shadow of their cloister devoted
+themselves to<br>
+ study, and copied the Holy Scriptures with indefatigable zeal.
+As parchment<br>
+ was scarce,they scraped the writing off old manuscripts in order
+to transcribe<br>
+ upon them the divine word. Thus throughout the breadth of
+Penguinia Bibles<br>
+ blossomed forth like roses on a bush.</p>
+
+<p>A monk of the order of St. Benedict, Ermold the Penguin, had
+himself alone<br>
+ defaced four thousand Greek and Latin manuscripts so as to copy
+out the Gospel<br>
+ of St. John four thousand times. Thus the masterpieces of
+ancient poetry and<br>
+ eloquence were destroyed in great numbers. Historians are
+unanimous in<br>
+ recognising that the Penguin convents were the refuge of
+learning during the<br>
+ Middle Ages.</p>
+
+<p>Unending wars between the Penguins and the Porpoises filled
+the close of this<br>
+ period. It is extremely difficult to know the truth concerning
+these wars, not<br>
+ because accounts are wanting, but because there are so many of
+them. The<br>
+ Porpoise Chronicles contradict the Penguin Chronicles at every
+point. And,<br>
+ moreover, the Penguins contradict each other as well as the
+Porpoises. I have<br>
+ discovered two chronicles that are in agreement, but one has
+copied from the<br>
+ other. A single fact is certain, namely, that massacres,
+rapes,<br>
+ conflagrations, and plunder succeeded one another without
+interruption.</p>
+
+<p>Under the unhappy prince Bosco IX. the kingdom was at the
+verge of ruin. On<br>
+ the news that the Porpoise fleet, composed of six hundred great
+ships, was in<br>
+ sight of Alca, the bishop ordered a solemn procession. The
+cathedral chapter,<br>
+ the elected magistrates, the members of Parliament, and the
+clerics of the<br>
+ University entered the Cathedral and, taking up St. Orberosia's
+shrine, led it<br>
+ in procession through the town, followed by the entire people
+singing hymns.<br>
+ The holy patron of Penguinia was not invoked in vain.
+Nevertheless, the<br>
+ Porpoises besieged the town both by land and sea, took it by
+assault, and for<br>
+ three days and three nights killed, plundered, violated, and
+burned, with all<br>
+ the indifference that habit produces.</p>
+
+<p>Our astonishment cannot be too great at the fact that, during
+those iron ages,<br>
+ the faith was preserved intact among the Penguins. The splendour
+of the truth<br>
+ in those times illumined all souls that had not been corrupted
+by sophisms.<br>
+ This is the explanation of the unity of belief. A constant
+practice of the<br>
+ Church doubtless contributed also to maintain this happy
+communion of the<br>
+ faithful--every Penguin who thought differently from the others
+was<br>
+ immediately burned at the stake.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IV. LETTERS: JOHANNES TALPA</h2>
+
+<p>During the minority of King Gun, Johannes Talpa, in the
+monastery of<br>
+ Beargarden, where at the age of fourteen he had made his
+profession and from<br>
+ which he never departed for a single day throughout his life,
+composed his<br>
+ celebrated Latin chronicle in twelve books called "De Gestis
+Penguinorum."</p>
+
+<p>The monastery of Beargarden lifts its high walls on the summit
+of an<br>
+ inaccessible peak. One sees around it only the blue tops of
+mountains, divided<br>
+ by the clouds.</p>
+
+<p>When he began to write his "Gesta Penguinorum," Johannes Talpa
+was already<br>
+ old. The good monk has taken care to tell us this in his book:
+"My head has<br>
+ long since lost," he says, "its adornment of fair hair, and my
+scalp resembles<br>
+ those convex mirrors of metal which the Penguin ladies consult
+with so much<br>
+ care and zeal. My stature, naturally small, has with years
+become diminished<br>
+ and bent. My white beard gives warmth to my breast."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ With a charming simplicity, Talpa informs us of certain
+circumstances in his<br>
+ life and some features in his character. "Descended," he tells
+us, "from a<br>
+ noble family, and destined from childhood for the ecclesiastical
+state, I was<br>
+ taught grammar and music. I learnt to read under the guidance of
+a master who<br>
+ was called Amicus, and who would have been better named
+Inimicus. As I did not<br>
+ easily attain to a knowledge of my letters, he beat me violently
+with rods so<br>
+ that I can say that he printed the alphabet in strokes upon my
+back."</p>
+
+<p>In another passage Talpa confesses his natural inclination
+towards pleasure.<br>
+ These are his expressive words: "In my youth the ardour of my
+senses was such<br>
+ that in the shadow of the woods I experienced a sensation of
+boiling in a pot<br>
+ rather than of breathing the fresh air. I fled from women, but
+in vain, for<br>
+ every object recalled them to me."</p>
+
+<p>While he was writing his chronicle, a terrible war, at once
+foreign and<br>
+ domestic, laid waste the Penguin land. The soldiers of Crucha
+came to defend<br>
+ the monastery of Beargarden against the Penguin barbarians and
+established<br>
+ themselves strongly within its walls. In order to render it
+impregnable they<br>
+ pierced loop-holes through the walls and they took the lead off
+the church<br>
+ roof to make balls for their slings. At night they lighted huge
+fires in the<br>
+ courts and cloisters and on them they roasted whole oxen which
+they spitted<br>
+ upon the ancient pine-trees of the mountain. Sitting around the
+flames, amid<br>
+ smoke filled with a mingled odour of resin and fat, they
+broached huge casks<br>
+ of wine and beer. Their songs, their blasphemies, and the noise
+of their<br>
+ quarrels drowned the sound of the morning bells.</p>
+
+<p>At last the Porpoises, having crossed the defiles, laid siege
+to the<br>
+ monastery. They were warriors from the North, clad in copper
+armour. They<br>
+ fastened ladders a hundred and fifty fathoms long to the sides
+of the cliffs<br>
+ and sometimes in the darkness and storm these broke beneath the
+weight of men<br>
+ and arms, and bunches of the besiegers were hurled into the
+ravines and<br>
+ precipices. A prolonged wail would be heard going down into the
+darkness, and<br>
+ the assault would begin again. The Penguins poured streams of
+burning wax upon<br>
+ their assailants, which made them blaze like torches. Sixty
+times the enraged<br>
+ Porpoises attempted to scale the monastery and sixty times they
+were repulsed.</p>
+
+<p>For six months they had closely invested the monastery, when,
+on the day of<br>
+ the Epiphany, a shepherd of the valley showed them a hidden path
+by which they<br>
+ climbed the mountain, penetrated into the vaults of the abbey,
+ran through the<br>
+ cloisters, the kitchens, the church, the chapter halls, the
+library, the<br>
+ laundry, the cells, the refectories, and the dormitories, and
+burned the<br>
+ buildings, killing and violating without distinction of age or
+sex. The<br>
+ Penguins, awakened unexpectedly, ran to arms, but in the
+darkness and alarm<br>
+ they struck at one another, whilst the Porpoises with blows of
+their axes<br>
+ disputed the sacred vessels, the censers, the candlesticks,
+dalmatics,<br>
+ reliquaries, golden crosses, and precious stones.</p>
+
+<p>The air was filled with an acrid odour of burnt flesh. Groans
+and death-cries<br>
+ arose in the midst of the flames, and on the edges of the
+crumbling roofs<br>
+ monks ran in thousands like ants, and fell into the valley. Yet
+Johannes Talpa<br>
+ kept on writing his Chronicle. The soldiers of Crucha retreated
+speedily and<br>
+ filled up all the issues from the monastery with pieces of rock
+so as to shut<br>
+ up the Porpoises in the burning buildings. And to crush the
+enemy beneath the<br>
+ ruin they employed the trunks of old oaks as battering-rams. The
+burning<br>
+ timbers fell in with a noise like thunder and the lofty arches
+of the naves<br>
+ crumbled beneath the shock of these giant trees when moved by
+six hundred men<br>
+ together. Soon there was left nothing of the rich and extensive
+abbey but the<br>
+ cell of Johannes Talpa, which, by a marvellous chance, hung from
+the ruin of a<br>
+ smoking gable. The old chronicler still kept writing.</p>
+
+<p>This admirable intensity of thought may seem excessive in the
+case of an<br>
+ annalist who applies himself to relate the events of his own
+time. However<br>
+ abstracted and detached we may be from surrounding things, we
+nevertheless<br>
+ resent their influence. I have consulted the original manuscript
+of Johannes<br>
+ Talpa in the National Library, where it is preserved (Monumenta
+Peng., K. L6.,<br>
+ 12390 four). It is a parchment manuscript of 628 leaves. The
+writing is<br>
+ extremely confused, the letters instead of being in a straight
+line, stray in<br>
+ all directions and are mingled together in great disorder, or,
+more correctly<br>
+ speaking, in absolute confusion. They are so badly formed that
+for the most<br>
+ part it is impossible not merely to say what they are, but even
+to distinguish<br>
+ them from the splashes of ink with which they are plentifully
+interspersed.<br>
+ Those inestimable pages bear witness in this way to the troubles
+amid which<br>
+ they were written. To read them is difficult. On the other hand,
+the monk of<br>
+ Beargarden's style shows no trace of emotion. The tone of the
+"Gesta<br>
+ Penguinorum" never departs from simplicity. The narration is
+rapid and of a<br>
+ conciseness that sometimes approaches dryness. The reflections
+are rare and,<br>
+ as a rule, judicious.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE ARTS: THE PRIMITIVES OF PENGUIN PAINTING</h2>
+
+<p>The Penguin critics vie with one another in affirming that
+Penguin art has<br>
+ from its origin been distinguished by a powerful and pleasing
+originality, and<br>
+ that we may look elsewhere in vain for the qualities of grace
+and reason that<br>
+ characterise its earliest works. But the Porpoises claim that
+their artists<br>
+ were undoubtedly the instructors and masters of the Penguins. It
+is difficult<br>
+ to form an opinion on the matter, because the Penguins, before
+they began to<br>
+ admire their primitive painters, destroyed all their works.</p>
+
+<p>We cannot be too sorry for this loss. For my own part I feel
+it cruelly, for I<br>
+ venerate the Penguin antiquities and I adore the primitives.
+They are<br>
+ delightful. I do not say the are all alike, for that would be
+untrue, but they<br>
+ have common characters that are found in all schools--I mean
+formulas from<br>
+ which they never depart--and there is besides something finished
+in their<br>
+ work, for what they know they know well. Luckily we can form a
+notion of the<br>
+ Penguin primitives from the Italian, Flemish, and Dutch
+primitives, and from<br>
+ the French primitives, who are superior to all the rest; as M.
+Gruyer tells us<br>
+ they are more logical, logic being a peculiarly French quality.
+Even if this<br>
+ is denied it must at least be admitted that to France belongs
+the credit of<br>
+ having kept primitives when the other nations knew them no
+longer. The<br>
+ Exhibition of French Primitives at the Pavilion Marsan in 1904
+contained<br>
+ several little panels contemporary with the later Valois kings
+and with Henry<br>
+ IV.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ I have made many journeys to see the pictures of the brothers
+Van Eyck, of<br>
+ Memling, of Roger van der Weyden, of the painter of the death of
+Mary, of<br>
+ Ambrogio Lorenzetti, and of the old Umbrian masters. It was,
+however, neither<br>
+ Bruges, nor Cologne, nor Sienna, nor Perugia, that completed my
+initiation; it<br>
+ was in the little town of Arezzo that I became a conscious adept
+in primitive<br>
+ painting. That was ten years ago or even longer. At that period
+of indigence<br>
+ and simplicity, the municipal museums, though usually kept shut,
+were always<br>
+ opened to foreigners. One evening an old woman with a candle
+showed me, for<br>
+ half a lira, the sordid museum of Arezzo, and in it I discovered
+a painting by<br>
+ Margaritone, a "St. Francis," the pious sadness of which moved
+me to tears. I<br>
+ was deeply touched, and Margaritone,of Arezzo became from that
+day my dearest<br>
+ primitive.</p>
+
+<p>I picture to myself the Penguin primitives in conformity with
+the works of<br>
+ that master. It will not therefore be thought superfluous if in
+this place I<br>
+ consider his works with some attention, if not in detail, at
+least under their<br>
+ more general and, if I dare say so, most representative
+aspect.</p>
+
+<p>We possess five or six pictures signed with his hand. His
+masterpiece,<br>
+ preserved in the National Gallery of London, represents the
+Virgin seated on a<br>
+ throne and holding the infant Jesus in her arms. What strikes
+one first when<br>
+ one looks at this figure is the proportion. The body from the
+neck to the feet<br>
+ is only twice as long as the head, so that it appears extremely
+short and<br>
+ podgy. This work is not less remarkable for its painting than
+for its drawing.<br>
+ The great Margaritone had but a limited number of colours in his
+possession,<br>
+ and he used them in all their purity without ever modifying the
+tones. From<br>
+ this it follows that his colouring has more vivacity than
+harmony. The cheeks<br>
+ of the Virgin and those of the Child are of a bright vermilion
+which the old<br>
+ master, from a naive preference for clear definitions, has
+placed on each face<br>
+ in two circumferences as exact as if they had been traced out by
+a pair of<br>
+ compasses.</p>
+
+<p>A learned critic of the eighteenth century, the Abbe Lanzi,
+has treated<br>
+ Margaritone's works with profound disdain. "They are," he says.
+"merely crude<br>
+ daubs. In those unfortunate times people could neither draw nor
+paint." Such<br>
+ was the common opinion of the connoisseurs of the days of
+powdered wigs. But<br>
+ the great Margaritone and his contemporaries were soon to be
+avenged for this<br>
+ cruel contempt. There was born in the nineteenth century, in the
+biblical<br>
+ villages and reformed cottages of pious England, a multitude of
+little Samuels<br>
+ and little St. Johns, with hair curling like lambs, who, about
+1840, and 1850,<br>
+ became spectacled professors and founded the cult of the
+primitives.</p>
+
+<p>That eminent theorist of Pre-Raphaelitism, Sir James Tuckett,
+does not shrink<br>
+ from placing the Madonna of the National Gallery on a level with
+the<br>
+ masterpieces of Christian art. "By giving to the Virgin's head,"
+says Sir<br>
+ James Tuckett, "a third of the total height of the figure, the
+old master<br>
+ attracts the spectator's attention and keeps it directed towards
+the more<br>
+ sublime parts of the human figure, and in particular the eyes,
+which we<br>
+ ordinarily describe as the spiritual organs. In this picture,
+colouring and<br>
+ design conspire to produce an ideal and mystical impression. The
+vermilion of<br>
+ the cheeks does not recall the natural appearance of the skin;
+it rather seems<br>
+ as if the old master has applied the roses of Paradise to the
+faces of the<br>
+ Mother and the Child."</p>
+
+<p>We see, in such a criticism as this, a shining reflection, so
+to speak, of the<br>
+ work which it exalts; yet MacSilly, the seraphic aesthete of
+Edinburgh, has<br>
+ expressed in a still more moving and penetrating fashion the
+impression<br>
+ produced upon his mind by the sight of this primitive painting.
+"The Madonna<br>
+ of Margaritone," says the revered MacSilly, "attains the
+transcendent end of<br>
+ art. It inspires its beholders with feelings of innocence and
+purity; it makes<br>
+ them like little children. And so true is this, that at the age
+of sixty-six,<br>
+ after having had the joy of contemplating it closely for three
+hours, I felt<br>
+ myself suddenly transformed into a little child. While my cab
+was taking me<br>
+ through Trafalgar Square I kept laughing and prattling and
+shaking my<br>
+ spectacle-case as if it were a rattle. And when the maid in my
+boarding-house<br>
+ had served my meal I kept pouring spoonfuls of soup into my ear
+with all the<br>
+ artlessness of childhood."</p>
+
+<p>"It is by such results," adds MacSilly, "that the excellence
+of a work of art<br>
+ is proved."</p>
+
+<p>Margaritone, according to Vasari, died at the age of
+seventy-seven,<br>
+ "regretting that he had lived to see a new form of art arising
+and the new<br>
+ artists crowned with fame."</p>
+
+<p>These lines, which I translate literally, have inspired Sir
+James Tuckett with<br>
+ what are perhaps the finest pages in his work. They form part of
+his "Breviary<br>
+ for Aesthetes"; all the Pre-Raphaelites know them by heart. I
+place them here<br>
+ as the most precious ornament of this book. You will agree that
+nothing more<br>
+ sublime has been written since the days of the Hebrew
+prophets.</p>
+
+<h3>MARGARITONE'S VISION</h3>
+
+<p>Margaritone, full of years and labours, went one day to visit
+the studio of a<br>
+ young painter who had lately settled in the town. He noticed in
+the studio a<br>
+ freshly painted Madonna, which, although severe and rigid,
+nevertheless, by a<br>
+ certain exactness in the proportions and a devilish mingling of
+light and<br>
+ shade, assumed an appearance of relief and life. At this sight
+the artless and<br>
+ sublime worker of Arezzo perceived with horror what the future
+of painting<br>
+ would be. With his brow clasped in his hands he exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "What things of shame does not this figure show forth! I discern
+in it the end<br>
+ of that Christian art which paints the soul and inspires the
+beholder with an<br>
+ ardent desire for heaven. Future painters will not restrain
+themselves as does<br>
+ this one to portraying on the side of a wall or on a wooden
+panel the cursed<br>
+ matter of which our bodies are formed; they will celebrate and
+glorify it.<br>
+ They will clothe their figures with dangerous appearances of
+flesh, and these<br>
+ figures will seem like real persons. Their bodies will be seen;
+their forms<br>
+ will appear through their clothing. St. Magdalen will have a
+bosom. St. Martha<br>
+ a belly, St. Barbara hips, St. Agnes buttocks; St. Sebastian
+will unveil his<br>
+ youthful beauty, and St. George will display beneath his armour
+the muscular<br>
+ wealth of a robust virility; apostles, confessors, doctors, and
+God the Father<br>
+ himself will appear as ordinary beings like you and me; the
+angels will affect<br>
+ an equivocal, ambiguous, mysterious beauty which will trouble
+hearts. What<br>
+ desire for heaven will these representations impart? None; but
+from them you<br>
+ will learn to take pleasure in the forms of terrestrial life.
+Where will<br>
+ painters stop in their indiscreet inquiries? They will stop
+nowhere. They will<br>
+ go so far as to show men and women naked like the idols of the
+Romans. There<br>
+ will be a sacred art and a profane art, and the sacred art will
+not be less<br>
+ profane than the other."</p>
+
+<p>"Get ye behind me, demons," exclaimed the old master. For in
+prophetic vision<br>
+ he saw the righteous and the saints assuming the appearance of
+melancholy<br>
+ athletes. He saw Apollos playing the lute on a flowery hill, in
+the midst of<br>
+ the Muses wearing light tunics. He saw Venuses lying under shady
+myrtles and<br>
+ the Danae exposing their charming sides to the golden rain. He
+saw pictures of<br>
+ Jesus under the pillar's of the temple amidst patricians, fair
+ladies,<br>
+ musicians, pages, negroes, dogs, and parrots. He saw in an
+inextricable<br>
+ confusion of human limbs, outspread wings, and flying draperies,
+crowds of<br>
+ tumultuous Nativities, opulent Holy Families, emphatic
+Crucifixions. He saw<br>
+ St. Catherines, St. Barbaras, St. Agneses humiliating patricians
+by the<br>
+ sumptuousness of their velvets, their brocades, and their
+pearls, and by the<br>
+ splendour of their breasts. He saw Auroras scattering roses, and
+a multitude<br>
+ of naked Dianas and Nymphs surprised on the banks of retired
+streams. And the<br>
+ great Margaritone died, strangled by so horrible a presentiment
+of the<br>
+ Renaissance and the Bolognese School.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. MARBODIUS</h2>
+
+<p>We possess a precious monument of the Penguin literature of
+the fifteenth<br>
+ century. It is a narrative of a journey to hell undertaken by
+the monk<br>
+ Marbodius, of the order of St. Benedict, who professed a fervent
+admiration<br>
+ for the poet Virgil. This narrative, written in fairly good
+Latin, has been<br>
+ published by M. du Clos des Limes. It is here translated for the
+first time. I<br>
+ believe that I am doing a service to my fellow-countrymen in
+making them<br>
+ acquainted with these pages, though doubtless they are far from
+forming a<br>
+ unique example of this class of mediaeval Latin literature.
+Among the fictions<br>
+ that may be compared with them we may mention "The Voyage of St.
+Brendan,"<br>
+ "The Vision of Albericus," and "St. Patrick's Purgatory,"
+imaginary<br>
+ descriptions, like Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy," of the
+supposed abode of<br>
+ the dead. The narrative of Marbodius is one of the latest works
+dealing with<br>
+ this theme, but it is not the least singular.</p>
+
+<h3><br>
+ THE DESCENT OF MARBODIUS INTO HELL</h3>
+
+<p>In the fourteen hundred and fifty-third year of the
+incarnation of the Son of<br>
+ God, a few days before the enemies of the Cross entered the city
+of Helena and<br>
+ the great Constantine, it was given to me, Brother Marbodius, an
+unworthy<br>
+ monk, to see and to hear what none had hitherto seen or heard. I
+have composed<br>
+ a faithful narrative of those things so that their memory may
+not perish with<br>
+ me, for man's time is short.</p>
+
+<p>On the first day of May in the aforesaid year, at the hour of
+vespers, I was<br>
+ seated in the Abbey of Corrigan on a stone in the cloisters and,
+as my custom<br>
+ was, I read the verses of the poet whom I love best of all,
+Virgil, who has<br>
+ sung of the labours: of the field, of shepherds, and of heroes.
+Evening was<br>
+ hanging its purple folds from the arches of the cloisters and in
+a voice of<br>
+ emotion I was murmuring the verses which describe how Dido, the
+Phoenician<br>
+ queen, wanders with her ever-bleeding wound beneath the myrtles
+of hell. At<br>
+ that moment Brother Hilary happened to pass by, followed by
+Brother Jacinth,<br>
+ the porter.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Brought up in the barbarous ages before the resurrection of the
+Muses, Brother<br>
+ Hilary has not been initiated into the wisdom of the ancients;
+nevertheless,<br>
+ the poetry of the Mantuan has, like a subtle torch, shed some
+gleams of light<br>
+ into his understanding.</p>
+
+<p>"Brother Marbodius," he asked me, "do those verses that you
+utter with<br>
+ swelling breast and sparkling eyes--do they belong to that great
+'Aeneid' from<br>
+ which morning or evening your glances are never withheld?"</p>
+
+<p>I answered that I was reading in Virgil how the son of
+Anchises perceived Dido<br>
+ like a moon behind the foliage.*</p>
+
+<p>* The text runs</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>. . .qualem primo qui syrgere mense<br>
+ Aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>Brother Marbodius, by a strange misunderstanding, substitutes
+an entirely<br>
+ different image for the one created by the poet.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Brother Marbodius," he replied, "I am certain that on all
+occasions Virgil<br>
+ gives expression to wise maxims and profound thoughts. But the
+songs that he<br>
+ modulates on his Syracusan flute hold such a lofty meaning and
+such exalted<br>
+ doctrine that I am continually puzzled by them."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Take care, father," cried Brother Jacinth, in an agitated
+voice. "Virgil was<br>
+ a magician who wrought marvels by the help of demons. It is thus
+he pierced<br>
+ through a mountain near Naples and fashioned a bronze horse that
+had power to<br>
+ heal all the diseases of horses. He was a necromancer, and there
+is still<br>
+ shown, in a certain town in Italy, the mirror in which he made
+the dead<br>
+ appear. And yet a woman deceived this great sorcerer. A
+Neapolitan courtesan<br>
+ invited him to hoist himself up to her window in the basket that
+was used to<br>
+ bring the provisions, and she left him all night suspended
+between two<br>
+ storeys."</p>
+
+<p>Brother Hilary did not appear to hear these observations.</p>
+
+<p>"Virgil is a prophet," he replied, "and a prophet who leaves
+far behind him<br>
+ the sibyls with their sacred verses as well as the daughter of
+King Priam, and<br>
+ that great diviner of future things, Plato of Athens. You will
+find in the<br>
+ fourth of his Syracusan cantos the birth of our Lord foretold in
+a lancune<br>
+ that seems of heaven rather than of earth.* In the time of my
+early studies,<br>
+ when I read for the first time JAM REDIT ET VIRGO, I felt myself
+bathed in an<br>
+ infinite delight, but I immediately experienced intense grief at
+the thought<br>
+ that, for ever deprived of the presence of God, the author of
+this prophetic<br>
+ verse, the noblest that has come from human lips, was pining
+among the heathen<br>
+ in eternal darkness. This cruel thought did not leave me. It
+pursued me even<br>
+ in my studies, my prayers, my meditations, and my ascetic
+labours. Thinkin<br>
+ that Virgil was deprived of the sight of God and that possibly
+he might even<br>
+ be suffering the fate of the reprobate in hell, I could neither
+enjoy peace<br>
+ nor rest, and I went so far as to exclaim several times a day
+with my arms<br>
+ outstretched to heaven:</p>
+
+<p>" 'Reveal to me, O Lord, the lot thou hast assigned to him who
+sang on earth<br>
+ as the angels sing in heaven!'</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>*Three centuries before the epoch in which our Marbodius lived
+the words--<br>
+ Maro, vates gentilium<br>
+ Da Christo testimonium<br>
+ Were sung in the churches on Christmas Day.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p><br>
+ "After some years my anguish ceased when I read in an old book
+that the great<br>
+ apostle St. Paul, who called the Gentiles into the Church of
+Christ, went to<br>
+ Naples and sanctified with his tears the tomb of the prince of
+poets.* This<br>
+ was some ground for believing that Virgil, like the Emperor
+Trajan, was<br>
+ admitted to Paradise because even in error he had a presentiment
+of the truth.<br>
+ We are not compelled to believe it, but I can easily persuade
+myself that it<br>
+ is true."</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>*Ad maronis mausoleum<br>
+ Ductus, fudit super eum<br>
+ Piae rorem lacrymae.<br>
+ Quem te, intuit, reddidissem,<br>
+ Si te vivum invenissem<br>
+ Poetarum maxime!</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p><br>
+ Having thus spoken, old Hilary wished me the peace of a holy
+night and went<br>
+ away with Brother Jacinth.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ I resumed the delightful study of my poet. Book in hand, I
+meditated upon the<br>
+ way in which those whom Love destroys with its cruel malady
+wander through the<br>
+ secret paths in the depth of the myrtle forest, and, as I
+meditated, the<br>
+ quivering reflections of the stars came and mingled with those
+of the leafless<br>
+ eglantines in the waters of the cloister fountain. Suddenly the
+lights and the<br>
+ perfumes and the stillness of the sky were overwhelmed, a fierce
+Northwind<br>
+ charged with storm and darkness burst roaring upon me. It lifted
+me up and<br>
+ carried me like a wisp of straw over fields, cities, rivers, and
+mountains,<br>
+ and through the midst of thunder-clouds, during a long night
+composed of a<br>
+ whole series of nights and days. And when, after this prolonged
+and cruel<br>
+ rage, the hurricane was at last stilled, I found myself far from
+my native<br>
+ land at the bottom of a valley bordered by cypress trees. Then a
+woman of wild<br>
+ beauty, trailing long garments behind her, approached me. She
+placed her left<br>
+ hand on my shoulder, and, pointing her right arm to an oak with
+thick foliage:</p>
+
+<p>"Look!" said she to me.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately I recognised the Sibyl who guards the sacred wood
+of Avernus, and<br>
+ I discerned the fair Proserpine's beautiful golden twig amongst
+the tufted<br>
+ boughs of the tree to which her finger pointed.</p>
+
+<p>"O prophetic Virgin," I exclaimed, "thou hast comprehended my
+desire and thou<br>
+ hast satisfied it in this way. Thou hast revealed to me the tree
+that bears<br>
+ the shining twig without which none can enter alive into the
+dwelling-place of<br>
+ the dead. And in truth, eagerly did I long to converse with the
+shade of<br>
+ Virgil."</p>
+
+<p>Having said this, I snatched the golden branch from its
+ancient trunk and I<br>
+ advanced without fear into the smoking gulf that leads to the
+miry banks of<br>
+ the Styx, upon which the shades are tossed about like dead
+leaves. At sight of<br>
+ the branch dedicated to Proserpine, Charon took me in his bark,
+which groaned<br>
+ beneath my weight, and I alighted on the shores of the dead, and
+was greeted<br>
+ by the mute baying of the threefold Cerberus. I pretended to
+throw the shade<br>
+ of a stone at him, and the vain monster fled into his cave.
+There, amidst the<br>
+ rushes, wandered the souls of those children whose eyes had but
+opened and<br>
+ shut to the kindly light of day, and there in a gloomy cavern
+Minos judges<br>
+ men. I penetrated into the myrtle wood in which the victims of
+love wander<br>
+ languishing, Phaedra, Procris, the sad Eriphyle, Evadne,
+Pasiphae, Laodamia,<br>
+ and Cenis, and the Phoenician Dido. Then I went through the
+dusty plains<br>
+ reserved for famous warriors. Beyond them open two ways. That to
+the left<br>
+ leads to Tartarus, the abode of the wicked. I took that to the
+right, which<br>
+ leads to Elysium and to the dwellings of Dis. Having hung the
+sacred branch at<br>
+ the goddess's door, I reached pleasant fields flooded with
+purple light. The<br>
+ shades of philosophers and poets hold grave converse there. The
+Graces and the<br>
+ Muses formed sprightly choirs upon the grass. Old Homer sang,
+accompanying<br>
+ himself upon his rustic lyre. His eyes were closed, but divine
+images shone<br>
+ upon his lips. I saw Solon, Democritus, and Pythagoras watching
+the games of<br>
+ the young men in the meadow, and, through the foliage of an
+ancient laurel, I<br>
+ perceived also Hesiod, Orpheus, the melancholy Euripides, and
+the masculine<br>
+ Sappho. I passed and recognised, as they sat on the bank of a
+fresh rivulet,<br>
+ the poet Horace, Varius, Gallus, and Lycoris. A little apart,
+leaning against<br>
+ the trunk of a dark holm-oak, Virgil was gazing pensively at the
+grove. Of<br>
+ lofty stature, though spare, he still preserved that swarthy
+complexion, that<br>
+ rustic air, that negligent bearing, and unpolished appearance
+which during his<br>
+ lifetime concealed his genius. I saluted him piously and
+remained for a long<br>
+ time without speech.</p>
+
+<p>At last when my halting voice could proceed out of my
+throat:</p>
+
+<p>"O thou, so dear to the Ausonian Muses, thou honour of the
+Latin name,<br>
+ Virgil," cried I, "it is through thee I have known what beauty
+is, it is<br>
+ through thee I have known what the tables of the gods and the
+beds of the<br>
+ goddesses are like. Suffer the praises of the humblest of thy
+adorers."</p>
+
+<p>"Arise, stranger," answered the divine poet. "I perceive that
+thou art a<br>
+ living being among the shades, and that thy body treads down the
+grass in this<br>
+ eternal evening. Thou art not the first man who has descended
+before his death<br>
+ into these dwellings, although all intercourse between us and
+the living is<br>
+ difficult. But cease from praise; I do not like eulogies and the
+confused<br>
+ sounds of glory have always offended my ears. That is why I fled
+from Rome,<br>
+ where I was known to the idle and curious, and laboured in the
+solitude of my<br>
+ beloved Parthenope. And then I am not so convinced that the men
+of thy<br>
+ generation understand my verses that should be gratified by thy
+praises. Who<br>
+ art thou?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am called Marbodius of the Kingdom of Alca. I made my
+profession in the<br>
+ Abbey of Corrigan. I read thy poems by day and I read them by
+night. It is<br>
+ thee whom I have come to see in Hell; I was impatient to know
+what thy fate<br>
+ was. On earth the learned often dispute about it. Some hold it
+probable that,<br>
+ having lived under the power of demons, thou art now burning
+in<br>
+ inextinguishable flames; others, more cautious, pronounce no
+opinion,<br>
+ believing that all which is said concerning the dead is
+uncertain and full of<br>
+ lies; several, though not in truth the ablest, maintain that,
+because thou<br>
+ didst elevate the tone of the Sicilian Muses and foretell that a
+new progeny<br>
+ would descend from heaven, thou wert admitted, like the Emperor
+Trajan, to<br>
+ enjoy eternal blessedness in the Christian heaven."</p>
+
+<p>"Thou seest that such is not the case," answered the shade,
+smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"I meet thee in truth, O Virgil, among the heroes and sages in
+those Elysian<br>
+ Fields which thou thyself hast described. Thus, contrary to what
+several on<br>
+ earth believe, no one has come to seek thee on the part of Him
+who reigns on<br>
+ high?</p>
+
+<p>After a rather long silence:</p>
+
+<p>"I will conceal nought from thee. He sent for me; one of his
+messengers, a<br>
+ simple man, came to say that I was expected, and that, although
+I had not been<br>
+ initiated into their mysteries, in consideration of my prophetic
+verses, a<br>
+ place had been reserved for me among those of the new sect. But
+I refused to<br>
+ accept that invitation; I had no desire to change my lace. I did
+so not<br>
+ because I share the admiration of the Greeks for the Elysian
+fields, or<br>
+ because I taste here those joys which caused Proserpine to lose
+the<br>
+ remembrance of her mother. I never believed much myself in what
+I say about<br>
+ these things in the 'Aeneid.' I was instructed by philosophers
+and men of<br>
+ science and I had a correct foreboding of the truth. Life in
+hell is extremely<br>
+ attenuated; we feel neither pleasure nor pain; we are as if we
+were not. The<br>
+ dead have no existence here except such as the living lend them.
+Nevertheless<br>
+ I prefer to remain here."</p>
+
+<p>"But what reason didst thou give, O Virgil, for so strange a
+refusal?"</p>
+
+<p>"I gave excellent ones. I said to the messenger of the god
+that I did not<br>
+ deserve the honour he brought me, and that a meaning had been
+given to my<br>
+ verses which they did not bear. In truth I have not in my fourth
+Eclogue<br>
+ betrayed the faith of my ancestors. Some ignorant Jews alone
+have interpreted<br>
+ in favour of a barbarian god a verse which celebrates the return
+of the golden<br>
+ age predicted by the Sibylline oracles. I excused myself then on
+the ground<br>
+ that I could not occupy a place which was destined for me in
+error and to<br>
+ which I recognised that I had no right. Then I alleged my
+disposition and my<br>
+ tastes, which do not accord with the customs of the new
+heavens.</p>
+
+<p>"'I am not unsociable,' said I to this man. 'I have shown in
+life a<br>
+ complaisant and easy disposition, although the extreme
+simplicity of my habits<br>
+ caused me to be suspected of avarice. I kept nothing for myself
+alone. My<br>
+ library was open to all and I have conformed my conduct to that
+fine saying of<br>
+ Euripides, "all ought to be common among friends." Those praises
+that seemed<br>
+ obtrusive when I myself received them became agreeable to me
+when addressed to<br>
+ Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I am rustic and uncultivated.
+I take<br>
+ pleasure in the society of animals; I was so zealous in
+observing them and<br>
+ took so much care of them that I was regarded, not altogether
+wrongly, as a<br>
+ good veterinary surgeon. I am told that the people of thy sect
+claim an<br>
+ immortal soul for themselves, but refuse one to the animals.
+That is a piece<br>
+ of nonsense that makes me doubt their judgment. Perhaps I love
+the flocks and<br>
+ the shepherds a little too much. That would not seem right
+amongst you. There<br>
+ is a maxim to which I endeavour to conform my actions, "Nothing
+too much."<br>
+ More even than my feeble health my philosophy teaches me to use
+things with<br>
+ measure. I am sober; a lettuce and some olives with a drop of
+Falernian wine<br>
+ form all my meals. I have, indeed, to some extent gone with
+strange women, but<br>
+ I have not delayed over long in taverns to watch the young
+Syrians dance to<br>
+ the sound of the crotalum.* But if I have restrained my desires
+it was for my<br>
+ own satisfaction and for the sake of good discipline. To fear
+pleasure and to<br>
+ fly from joy appears to me the worst insult that one can offer
+to nature. I am<br>
+ assured that during their lives certain of the elect of thy god
+abstained from<br>
+ food and avoided women through love of asceticism, and
+voluntarily exposed<br>
+ themselves to useless sufferings. I should be afraid of meeting
+those,<br>
+ criminals whose frenzy horrifies me. A poet must not be asked to
+attach<br>
+ himself too strictly to any scientific or moral doctrine.
+Moreover, I am a<br>
+ Roman, and the Romans, unlike the Greeks, are unable to pursue
+profound<br>
+ speculations in a subtle manner. If they adopt a philosophy it
+is above all in<br>
+ order to derive some practical advantages from it. Siro, who
+enjoyed great<br>
+ renown among us, taught me the system of Epicurus and thus freed
+me from vain<br>
+ terrors and turned me aside from the cruelties to which religion
+persuades<br>
+ ignorant men. I have embraced the views of Pythagoras concerning
+the souls of<br>
+ men and animals, both of which are of divine essence; this
+invites us to look<br>
+ upon ourselves without pride and without shame. I have learnt
+from the<br>
+ Alexandrines how the earth, at first soft and without form,
+hardened in<br>
+ proportion as Nereus withdrew himself from it to dig his humid
+dwellings; I<br>
+ have learned how things were formed insensibly; in what manner
+the rains,<br>
+ falling from the burdened clouds, nourished the silent forests,
+and by what<br>
+ progress a few animals at last began to wander over the nameless
+mountains. I<br>
+ could not accustom myself to your cosmogony either, for it seems
+to me fitter<br>
+ for a camel-driver on the Syrian sands than for a disciple of
+Aristarchus of<br>
+ Samos. And what would become of me in the abode of your
+beatitude if I did not<br>
+ find there my friends, my ancestors, my masters, and my gods,
+and if it is not<br>
+ given to me to see Rhea's noble son, or Venus, mother of Aeneas,
+with her<br>
+ winning smile, or Pan, or the young Dryads, or the Sylvans, or
+old Silenus,<br>
+ with his face stained by Aegle's purple mulberries.' These are
+the reasons<br>
+ which I begged that simple man to plead before the successor of
+Jupiter."</p>
+
+<p>* This phrase seems to indicate that, if one is to believe
+Macrobius, the<br>
+ "Copa" is by Virgil.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "And since then, O great shade, thou hast received no other
+messages?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have received none."</p>
+
+<p>"To console themselves for thy absence, O Virgil, they have
+three poets,<br>
+ Commodianus, Prudentius, and Fortunatus, who were all three born
+in those dark<br>
+ plays when neither prosody nor grammar were known. But tell me,
+O Mantuan,<br>
+ hast thou never received other intelligence of the God whose
+company thou<br>
+ didst so deliberately refuse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never that I remember."</p>
+
+<p>"Hast thou not told me that I am not the first who descended
+alive into these<br>
+ abodes and presented himself before thee?"</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Thou dost remind me of it. A century and a half ago, or so it
+seems to me (it<br>
+ is difficult to reckon days and years amid the shades), my
+profound peace was<br>
+ intruded upon by a strange visitor. As I was wandering beneath
+the gloomy<br>
+ foliage that borders the Styx, I saw rising before me a human
+form more opaque<br>
+ and darker than that of the inhabitants of these shores. I
+recognised a living<br>
+ person. He was of high stature, thin, with an aquiline nose,
+sharp chin, and<br>
+ hollow cheeks. His dark eyes shot forth fire; a red hood girt
+with a crown of<br>
+ laurels bound his lean brows. His bones pierced through the
+tight brown cloak<br>
+ that descended to his heels. He saluted me with deference,
+tempered by a sort<br>
+ of fierce pride, and addressed me in a speech more obscure and
+incorrect than<br>
+ that of those Gauls with whom the divine Julius filled both his
+legions and<br>
+ the Curia. At last I understood that he had been born near
+Fiesole, in an<br>
+ ancient Etruscan colony that Sulla had founded on the banks of
+the Arno, and<br>
+ which had prospered; that he had obtained municipal honours, but
+that he had<br>
+ thrown himself vehemently into the sanguinary quarrels which
+arose between the<br>
+ senate, the knights, and the people, that he had been defeated
+and banished,<br>
+ and now he wandered in exile throughout the world. He described
+Italy to me as<br>
+ distracted by more wars and discords than in the time of my
+youth, and as<br>
+ sighing anew for a second Augustus. I pitied his misfortune,
+remembering what<br>
+ I myself had formerly endured.</p>
+
+<p>"An audacious spirit unceasingly disquieted him, and his mind
+harboured great<br>
+ thoughts, but alas! his rudeness and ignorance displayed the
+triumph of<br>
+ barbarism. He knew neither poetry, nor science, nor even the
+tongue of the<br>
+ Greeks, and he was ignorant, too, of the ancient traditions
+concerning the<br>
+ origin of the world and the nature of the gods. He bravely
+repeated fables<br>
+ which in my time would have brought smiles to the little
+children who were not<br>
+ yet old enough to pay for admission at the baths. The vulgar
+easily believe in<br>
+ monsters. The Etruscans especially peopled hell with demons,
+hideous as a sick<br>
+ man's dreams. That they have not abandoned their childish
+imaginings after so<br>
+ many centuries is explained by the continuation and progress of
+ignorance and<br>
+ misery, but that one of their magistrates whose mind is raised
+above the<br>
+ common level should share these popular illusions and should be
+frightened by<br>
+ the hideous demons that the inhabitants of that country painted
+on the walls<br>
+ of their tombs in the time of Porsena--that is something which
+might sadden<br>
+ even a sage. My Etruscan visitor repeated verses to me which he
+had composed<br>
+ in a new dialect, called by him the vulgar tongue, the sense of
+which I could<br>
+ not understand. My ears were more surprised than charmed as I
+heard him repeat<br>
+ the same sound three or four times at regular intervals in his
+efforts to mark<br>
+ the rhythm. That artifice did not seem ingenious to me; but it
+is not for the<br>
+ dead to judge of novelties.</p>
+
+<p>"But I do not reproach this colonist of Sulla, born in an
+unhappy time, for<br>
+ making inharmonious verses or for being, if it be possible, as
+bad a poet as<br>
+ Bavius or Maevius. I have grievances against him which touch me
+more closely.<br>
+ The thing is monstrous and scarcely credible, but when this man
+returned to<br>
+ earth he disseminated the most odious lies about me. He affirmed
+in several<br>
+ passages of his barbarous poems that I had served him as a guide
+in the modern<br>
+ Tartarus, a place I know nothing of. He insolently proclaimed
+that I had<br>
+ spoken of the gods of Rome as false and lying gods, and that I
+held as the<br>
+ true God the present successor of Jupiter. Friend, when thou art
+restored to<br>
+ the kindly light of day and beholdest again thy native land,
+contradict those<br>
+ abominable falsehoods. Say to thy people that the singer of the
+pious Aeneas<br>
+ has never worshipped the god of the Jews. I am assured that his
+power is<br>
+ declining and that his approaching fall is manifested by
+undoubted<br>
+ indications. This news would give me some pleasure if one could
+rejoice in<br>
+ these abodes. where we feel neither fears nor desires."</p>
+
+<p>He spoke, and with a gesture of farewell he went away. I
+beheld his. shade<br>
+ gliding over the asphodels without bending their stalks. I saw
+that it became<br>
+ fainter and vaguer as it receded farther from me, and it
+vanished before it<br>
+ reached the wood of evergreen laurels. Then I understood the
+meaning of the<br>
+ words, "The dead have no life, but that which the living lend
+them," and I<br>
+ walked slowly through the pale meadow to the gate of horn.</p>
+
+<p>I affirm that all in this writing is true.*</p>
+
+<p>* There is in Marbodius's narrative a passage very worthy of
+notice, viz.,<br>
+ that in which the monk of Corrigan describes Dante Alighieri
+such as we<br>
+ picture him to ourselves to-day. The miniatures in a very old
+manuscript of<br>
+ the "Divine Comedy," the "Codex Venetianus," represent the poet
+as a little<br>
+ fat man clad in a short tunic, the skirts of which fall above
+his knees. As<br>
+ for Virgil, he still wears the philosophical beard, in the
+wood-engravings of<br>
+ the sixteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>One would not have thought either that Marbodius, or even
+Virgil, could have<br>
+ known the Etruscan tombs of Chiusi and Corneto, where, in fact,
+there are<br>
+ horrible and burlesque devils closely resembling those of
+Orcagna.<br>
+ Nevertheless, the authenticity of the "Descent of Marbodius into
+Hell" is<br>
+ indisputable. M. du Clos des Lunes has firmly established it. To
+doubt it<br>
+ would be to doubt palaeography itself.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. SIGNS IN THE MOON</h2>
+
+<p>At that time, whilst Penguinia was still plunged in ignorance
+and barbarism,<br>
+ Giles Bird-catcher, a Franciscan monk, known by his writings
+under the name<br>
+ Aegidius Aucupis, devoted himself with indefatigable zeal to the
+study of<br>
+ letters and the sciences. He gave his nights to mathematics and
+music, which<br>
+ he called the two adorable sisters, the harmonious daughters of
+Number and<br>
+ Imagination. He was versed in medicine and astrology. He was
+suspected of<br>
+ practising magic, and it seemed true that he wrought
+metamorphoses and<br>
+ discovered hidden things.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The monks of his convent, finding in his cell Greek books which
+they could not<br>
+ read, imagined them to be conjuring-books, and denounced their
+too learned<br>
+ brother as a wizard. Aegidius Aucupis fled, and reached the
+island of Ireland,<br>
+ where he lived for thirty studious years. He went from monastery
+to monastery,<br>
+ searching for and copying the Greek and Latin manuscripts which
+they<br>
+ contained. He also studied physics and alchemy. He acquired a
+universal<br>
+ knowledge and discovered notable secrets concerning animals,
+plants, and<br>
+ stones. He was found one day in the company of a very beautiful
+woman who sang<br>
+ to her own accompaniment on the lute, and who was afterwards
+discovered to be<br>
+ a machine which he had himself constructed.</p>
+
+<p>He often crossed the Irish Sea to go into the land of Wales
+and to visit the<br>
+ libraries of the monasteries there. During one of these
+crossings, as he<br>
+ remained during the night on the bridge of the ship, he saw
+beneath the waters<br>
+ two sturgeons swimming side by side. He had very good hearing
+and he knew the<br>
+ language of fishes. Now he heard one of the sturgeons say to the
+other:</p>
+
+<p>"The man in the moon, whom we have often seen carrying fagots
+on his<br>
+ shoulders, has fallen into the sea.</p>
+
+<p>And the other sturgeon said in its turn:</p>
+
+<p>"And in the silver disc there will be seen the image of two
+lovers kissing<br>
+ each other on the mouth."</p>
+
+<p>Some years later, having returned to his native country,
+Aegidius Aucupis<br>
+ found that ancient learning had been restored. Manners had
+softened. Men no<br>
+ longer pursued the nymphs of the fountains, of the woods, and of
+the mountains<br>
+ with their insults. They placed images of the Muses and of the
+modest Graces<br>
+ in their gardens, and they rendered her former honours to the
+Goddess with<br>
+ ambrosial lips, the joy of men and gods. They were becoming
+reconciled to<br>
+ nature. They trampled vain terrors beneath their feet and raised
+their eyes to<br>
+ heaven without fearing, as they formerly did, to read signs of
+anger and<br>
+ threats of damnation in the skies.</p>
+
+<p>At this spectacle Aegidius Aucupis remembered what the two
+sturgeons of the<br>
+ sea of Erin had foretold.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK IV. MODERN TIMES: TRINCO</h1>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>I. MOTHER ROUQUIN</h2>
+
+<p>Aegidius Aucupis, the Erasmus of the Penguins, was not
+mistaken; his age was<br>
+ an age of free inquiry. But that great man mistook the elegances
+of the<br>
+ humanists for softness of manners, and he did not foresee the
+effects that the<br>
+ awaking of intelligence would have amongst the Penguins. It
+brought about the<br>
+ religious Reformation; Catholics massacred Protestants and
+Protestants<br>
+ massacred Catholics. Such were the first results of liberty of
+thought. The<br>
+ Catholics prevailed in Penguinia. But the spirit of inquiry had
+penetrated<br>
+ among them without their knowing it. They joined reason to
+faith, and claimed<br>
+ that religion had been divested of the superstitious practices
+that<br>
+ dishonoured it, just as in later days the booths that the
+cobblers, hucksters,<br>
+ and dealers in old clothes had built against the walls of the
+cathedrals were<br>
+ cleared away. The word, legend, which at first indicated what
+the faithful<br>
+ ought to read, soon suggested the idea of pious fables and
+childish tales.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The saints had to suffer from this state of mind. An obscure
+canon called<br>
+ Princeteau, a very austere and crabbed man, designated so great
+a number of<br>
+ them as not worthy of having their days observed, that he was
+surnamed the<br>
+ exposer of the saints. He did not think, for instance, that if
+St. Margaret's<br>
+ prayer were applied as a poultice to a woman in travail that the
+pains of<br>
+ childbirth would be softened.</p>
+
+<p>Even the venerable patron saint of Penguinia did not escape
+his rigid<br>
+ criticism. This is what he says of her in his "Antiquities of
+Alca":</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing is more uncertain than the history, or even the
+existence, of St.<br>
+ Orberosia. An ancient anonymous annalist, a monk of Dombes,
+relates that a<br>
+ woman called Orberosia was possessed by the devil in a cavern
+where, even down<br>
+ to his own days, the little boys and girls of the village used
+to play at a<br>
+ sort of game representing the devil and the fair Orberosia. He
+adds that this<br>
+ woman became the concubine of a horrible dragon, who ravaged the
+country. Such<br>
+ a statement is hardly credible, but the history of Orberosia, as
+it has since<br>
+ been related, seems hardly more worthy of belief. The life of
+that saint by<br>
+ the Abbot Simplicissimus is three hundred years later than the
+pretended<br>
+ events which it relates and that author shows himself
+excessively credulous<br>
+ and devoid of all critical faculty."</p>
+
+<p>Suspicion attacked even the supernatural origin of the
+Penguins. The historian<br>
+ Ovidius Capito went so far as to deny the miracle of their
+transformation. He<br>
+ thus begins his "Annals of Penguinia":</p>
+
+<p>"A dense obscurity envelopes this history, and it would be no
+exaggeration to<br>
+ say that it is a tissue of puerile fables and popular tales. The
+Penguins<br>
+ claim that they are descended from birds who were baptized by
+St. Mael and<br>
+ whom God changed into men at the intercession of that glorious
+apostle. They<br>
+ hold that, situated at first in the frozen ocean, their island,
+floating like<br>
+ Delos, was brought to anchor in these heaven-favoured seas, of
+which it is<br>
+ to-day the queen. I conclude that this myth is a reminiscence of
+the ancient<br>
+ migrations of the Penguins."</p>
+
+<p>In the following century, which was that of the philosophers,
+scepticism<br>
+ became still more acute. No further evidence of it is needed
+than the<br>
+ following celebrated passage from the "Moral Essay":</p>
+
+<p>"Arriving we know not from whence (for indeed their origins
+are not very<br>
+ clear), and successively invaded and conquered by four or five
+peoples from<br>
+ the north, south, east, and west, miscegenated, interbred,
+amalgamated, and<br>
+ commingled, the Penguins boast of the purity of their race, and
+with justice,<br>
+ for they have become a pure race. This mixture of all mankind,
+red, black,<br>
+ yellow, and white, round-headed and long-headed, as formed in
+the course of<br>
+ ages a fairly homogeneous human family, and one which is
+recognisable by<br>
+ certain features due to a community of life and customs.</p>
+
+<p>"This idea that they belong to the best race in the world, and
+that they are<br>
+ its finest family, inspires them with noble pride, indomitable
+courage, and a<br>
+ hatred for the human race.</p>
+
+<p>"The life of a people is but a succession of miseries, crimes,
+and follies.<br>
+ This is true of the Penguin nation, as of all other nations.
+Save for this<br>
+ exception its history is admirable from beginning to end."</p>
+
+<p>The two classic ages of the Penguins are too well-known for me
+to lay stress<br>
+ upon them. But what has not been sufficiently noticed is the way
+in which the<br>
+ rationalist theologians such as Canon Princeteau called into
+existence the<br>
+ unbelievers of the succeeding age. The former employed their
+reason to destroy<br>
+ what did not seem to them, essential to their religion; they
+only left<br>
+ untouched the most rigid article of faith. Their intellectual
+successors,<br>
+ being taught by them how to make use of science and reason,
+employed them<br>
+ against whatever beliefs remained. Thus rational theology
+engendered natural<br>
+ philosophy.</p>
+
+<p>That is why (if I may turn from the Penguins of former days to
+the Sovereign<br>
+ Pontiff, who, to-day governs the universal Church) we cannot
+admire too<br>
+ greatly the wisdom of Pope Pius X. in condemning the study of
+exegesis as<br>
+ contrary to revealed truth, fatal to sound theological doctrine,
+and deadly to<br>
+ the faith. Those clerics who maintain the rights of science in
+opposition to<br>
+ him are pernicious doctors and pestilent teachers, and the
+faithful who<br>
+ approve of them are lacking in either mental or moral
+ballast.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of the age of philosophers, the ancient kingdom of
+Penguinia was<br>
+ utterly destroyed, the king put to death, the privileges of the
+nobles<br>
+ abolished, and a Republic proclaimed in the midst of public
+misfortunes and<br>
+ while a terrible war was raging. The assembly which then
+governed Penguinia<br>
+ ordered all the metal articles contained in the churches to be
+melted down.<br>
+ The patriots even desecrated the tombs of the kings. It is said
+that when the<br>
+ tomb of Draco the Great was opened, that king presented an
+appearance as black<br>
+ as ebony and so majestic that those who profaned his corpse fled
+in terror.<br>
+ According to other accounts, these churlish men insulted him by
+putting a pipe<br>
+ in his mouth and derisively offering him a glass of wine.</p>
+
+<p>On the seventeenth day of the month of Mayflowers, the shrine
+of St.<br>
+ Orberosia, which had for five hundred years been exposed to the
+veneration of<br>
+ the faithful in the Church of St. Mael, was transported into the
+town-hall and<br>
+ submitted to the examination of a jury of experts appointed by
+the<br>
+ municipality. It was made of gilded copper in shape like the
+nave of a church,<br>
+ entirely covered with enamels and decorated with precious
+stones, which latter<br>
+ were perceived to be false. The chapter in its foresight had
+removed the<br>
+ rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and great balls of rock-crystal,
+and had<br>
+ substituted pieces of glass in their place. It contained only a
+little dust<br>
+ and a piece of old linen, which were thrown into a great fire
+that had been<br>
+ lighted on the Place de Greve to burn the relics of the saints.
+The people<br>
+ danced around it singing patriotic songs.</p>
+
+<p>From the threshold of their booth, which leant against the
+town-hall, a man<br>
+ called Rouquin and his wife were watching this group of madmen.
+Rouquin<br>
+ clipped dogs and gelded cats; he also frequented the inns. His
+wife was a<br>
+ ragpicker and a bawd, but she had plenty of shrewdness.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Rouquin," said she to her man, "they are committing
+a sacrilege.<br>
+ They will repent of it."</p>
+
+<p>"You know nothing about it, wife," answered Rouquin; "they,
+have become<br>
+ philosophers, and when one is once a philosopher he is a
+philosopher for<br>
+ ever."</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret
+what they are<br>
+ doing to-day. They ill-treat the saints because they have not
+helped them<br>
+ enough, but for all that the quails won't fall ready cooked into
+their mouths.<br>
+ They will soon find themselves as badly off as before, and when
+they have put<br>
+ out their tongues for enough they will become pious again.
+Sooner than people<br>
+ think the day will come when Penguinia will again begin to
+honour her blessed<br>
+ patron. Rouquin, it would be a good thing, in readiness for that
+day, if we<br>
+ kept a handful of ashes and some rags and bones in an old pot in
+our lodgings.<br>
+ We will say that they are the relics of St. Orberosia and that
+we have saved<br>
+ them from the flames at the peril of our lives. I am greatly
+mistaken if we<br>
+ don't get honour and profit out of them. That good action might
+be worth a<br>
+ place from the Cure to sell tapers and hire chairs in the chapel
+of St.<br>
+ Orberosia."</p>
+
+<p>On that same day Mother Rouquin took home with her a little
+ashes and some<br>
+ bones, and put them in an old jam-pot in her cupboard.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>II. TRINCO</h2>
+
+<p>The sovereign Nation had taken possession of the lands of the
+nobility and<br>
+ clergy to sell them at a low price to the middle classes and the
+peasants. The<br>
+ middle classes and the peasants thought that the revolution was
+a good thing<br>
+ for acquiring lands and a bad one for retaining them.</p>
+
+<p>The legislators of the Republic made terrible laws for the
+defence of<br>
+ property, and decreed death to anyone who should propose a
+division of wealth.<br>
+ But that did not avail the Republic. The peasants who had become
+proprietors<br>
+ bethought themselves that though it had made them rich, the
+Republic had<br>
+ nevertheless caused a disturbance to wealth, and they desired a
+system more<br>
+ respectful of private property and more capable of assuring the
+permanence of<br>
+ the new institutions.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ They had not long to wait. The Republic, like Agrippina, bore
+her destroyer in<br>
+ her bosom.</p>
+
+<p>Having great wars to carry on, it created military forces, and
+these were<br>
+ destined both to save it and to destroy it. Its legislators
+thought they could<br>
+ restrain their generals by the fear of punishment, but if they
+sometimes cut<br>
+ off the heads of unlucky soldiers they could not do the same to
+the fortunate<br>
+ soldiers who obtained over it the advantages of having saved its
+existence.</p>
+
+<p>In the enthusiasm of victory the renovated Penguins delivered
+themselves up to<br>
+ a dragon, more terrible than that of their fables, who, like a
+stork amongst<br>
+ frogs, devoured them for fourteen years with his insatiable
+beak.</p>
+
+<p>Half a century after the reign of the new dragon a young
+Maharajah of Malay,<br>
+ called Djambi, desirous, like the Scythian Anacharsis, of
+instructing himself<br>
+ by travel, visited Penguinia and wrote an interesting account of
+his travels.<br>
+ I transcribe the first page of his account:</p>
+
+<p>ACCOUNT OF THE TRAVELS OF YOUNG DJAMBI IN PENGUINIA</p>
+
+<p>After a voyage of ninety days I landed at the vast and
+deserted port of the<br>
+ Penguins and travelled over untilled fields to their ruined
+capital.<br>
+ Surrounded by ramparts and full of barracks and arsenals it had
+a martial<br>
+ though desolate appearance. Feeble and crippled men wandered
+proudly through<br>
+ the streets, wearing old uniforms and carrying rusty
+weapons.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you want?" I was rudely asked at the gate of the city
+by a soldier<br>
+ whose moustaches pointed to the skies.</p>
+
+<p>"Sir," I answered, "I come as an inquirer to visit this
+island."</p>
+
+<p>"It is not an island," replied the soldier.</p>
+
+<p>"What!" I exclaimed, "Penguin Island is not an island?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir, it is an insula. It was formerly called an island,
+but for a century<br>
+ it has been decreed that it shall bear the name of insula. It is
+the only<br>
+ insula in the whole universe. Have you a passport?"</p>
+
+<p>"Here it is."</p>
+
+<p>"Go and get it signed at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs."</p>
+
+<p>A lame guide who conducted me came to a pause in a vast
+square.</p>
+
+<p>"The insula," said he, "has given birth, as you know, to
+Trinco, the greatest<br>
+ genius of the universe, whose statue you see before you. That
+obelisk standing<br>
+ to your right commemorates Trinco's birth; the column that rises
+to your left<br>
+ has Trinco crowned with a diadem upon its summit. You see here
+the triumphal<br>
+ arch dedicated to the glory of Trinco and his family."</p>
+
+<p>"What extraordinary feat has Trinco performed?" I asked.</p>
+
+<p>"War."</p>
+
+<p>"That is nothing extraordinary. We Malayans make war
+constantly."</p>
+
+<p>"That may be, but Trinco is the greatest warrior of all
+countries and all<br>
+ times. There never existed a greater conqueror than he. As you
+anchored in our<br>
+ port you saw to the east a volcanic island called Ampelophoria,
+shaped like a<br>
+ cone, and of small size, but renowned for its wines. And to the
+west a larger<br>
+ island which raises to the sky a long range of sharp teeth; for
+this reason it<br>
+ is called the Dog's Jaws. It is rich in copper mines. We
+possessed both before<br>
+ Trinco's reign and they were the boundaries of our empire.
+Trinco extended the<br>
+ Penguin dominion over the Archipelago of the Turquoises and the
+Green<br>
+ Continent, subdued the gloomy Porpoises, and planted his flag
+amid the<br>
+ icebergs of the Pole and on the burning sands of the African
+deserts. He<br>
+ raised troops in all the countries he conquered, and when his
+armies marched<br>
+ past in the wake of our own light infantry, our island
+grenadiers, our<br>
+ hussars, our dragoons, our artillery, and our engineers there
+were to be seen<br>
+ yellow soldiers looking in their blue armour like crayfish
+standing on their<br>
+ tails; red men with parrots' plumes, tattooed with solar and
+Phallic emblems,<br>
+ and with quivers of poisoned arrows resounding on their backs;
+naked blacks<br>
+ armed only with their teeth and nails; pygmies riding on cranes;
+gorillas<br>
+ carrying trunks of trees and led by an old ape who wore upon his
+hairy breast<br>
+ the cross of the Legion of Honour. And all those troops, led to
+Trinco's<br>
+ banner by the most ardent patriotism, flew on from victory to
+victory, and in<br>
+ thirty years of war Trinco conquered half the known world."</p>
+
+<p>"What!" cried I, "you possess half of the world."</p>
+
+<p>"Trinco conquered it for us, and Trinco lost it to us. As
+great in his defeats<br>
+ as in his victories he surrendered all that he had conquered. He
+even allowed<br>
+ those two islands we possessed before his time, Ampelophoria and
+the Dog's<br>
+ Jaws, to be taken from us. He left Penguinia impoverished and
+depopulated. The<br>
+ flower of the insula perished in his wars. At the time of his
+fall there were<br>
+ left in our country none but the hunchbacks and cripples from
+whom we are<br>
+ descended. But he gave us glory."</p>
+
+<p>"He made you pay dearly for it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Glory never costs too much," replied my guide.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>III. THE JOURNEY OF DOCTOR OBNUBILE</h2>
+
+<p>After a succession of amazing vicissitudes, the memory of
+which is in great<br>
+ part lost by the wrongs of time and the bad style of historians,
+the Penguins<br>
+ established the government of the Penguins by themselves. They
+elected a diet<br>
+ or assembly, and invested it with the privilege of naming the
+Head of the<br>
+ State. The latter, chosen from among the simple Penguins, wore
+no formidable<br>
+ monster's crest upon his head and exercised no absolute
+authority over the<br>
+ people. He was himself subject to the laws of the nation. He was
+not given the<br>
+ title of king, and no ordinal number followed his name. He bore
+such names as<br>
+ Paturle, Janvion, Traffaldin, Coquenhot, and Bredouille. These
+magistrates did<br>
+ not make war. They were not suited for that.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The new state received the name of Public Thing or Republic. Its
+partisans<br>
+ were called republicanists or republicans. They were also named
+Thingmongers<br>
+ and sometimes Scamps, but this latter name was taken in ill
+part.</p>
+
+<p>The Penguin democracy did not itself govern. It obeyed a
+financial oligarchy<br>
+ which formed opinion by means of the newspapers, and held in its
+hands the<br>
+ representatives, the ministers, and the president. It controlled
+the finances<br>
+ of the republic, and directed the foreign affairs of the country
+as if it were<br>
+ possessed of sovereign power.</p>
+
+<p>Empires and kingdoms in those days kept up enormous fleets.
+Penguinia,<br>
+ compelled to do as they did, sank under the pressure of her
+armaments.<br>
+ Everybody deplored or pretended to deplore so grievous a
+necessity. However,<br>
+ the rich, and those engaged in business or affairs, submitted to
+it with a<br>
+ good heart through a spirit of patriotism, and because they
+counted on the<br>
+ soldiers and sailors to defend their goods at home and to
+acquire markets and<br>
+ territories abroad. The great manufacturers encouraged the
+making of cannons<br>
+ and ships through a zeal for the national defence and in order
+to obtain<br>
+ orders. Among the citizens of middle rank and of the liberal
+professions some<br>
+ resigned themselves to this state of affairs without
+complaining, believing<br>
+ that it would last for ever; others waited impatiently for its
+end and thought<br>
+ they might be able to lead the powers to a simultaneous
+disarmament.</p>
+
+<p>The illustrious Professor Obnubile belonged to this latter
+class.</p>
+
+<p>"War," said he, "is a barbarity to which the progress of
+civilization will put<br>
+ an end. The great democracies are pacific and will soon impose
+their will upon<br>
+ the aristocrats."</p>
+
+<p>Professor Obnubile, who had for sixty years led a solitary and
+retired life in<br>
+ his laboratory, whither external noises did not penetrate,
+resolved to observe<br>
+ the spirit of the peoples for himself. He began his studies with
+the greatest<br>
+ of all democracies and set sail for New Atlantis.</p>
+
+<p>After a voyage of fifteen days his steamer entered, during the
+night, the<br>
+ harbour of Titanport, where thousands of ships were anchored. An
+iron bridge<br>
+ thrown across the water and shining with lights, stretched
+between two piers<br>
+ so far apart that Professor Obnubile imagined he was sailing on
+the seas of<br>
+ Saturn and that he saw the marvellous ring which girds the
+planet of the Old<br>
+ Man. And this immense conduit bore upon it more than a quarter
+of the wealth<br>
+ of the world. The learned Penguin, having disembarked, was
+waited on by<br>
+ automatons in a hotel forty-eight stories high. Then he took the
+great railway<br>
+ that led to Gigantopolis, the capital of New Atlantis. In the
+train there were<br>
+ restaurants, gaming-rooms, athletic arenas, telegraphic,
+commercial, and<br>
+ financial offices, a Protestant Church, and the printing-office
+of a great<br>
+ newspaper, which latter the doctor was unable to read, as he did
+not know the<br>
+ language of the New Atlantans. The train passed along the banks
+of great<br>
+ rivers, through manufacturing cities which concealed the sky
+with the smoke<br>
+ from their chimneys, towns black in the day, towns red at night,
+full of noise<br>
+ by day and full of noise also by night.</p>
+
+<p>"Here," thought the doctor, "is a people far too much engaged
+in industry and<br>
+ trade to make war. I am already certain that the New Atlantans
+pursue a policy<br>
+ of peace. For it is an axiom admitted by all economists that
+peace without and<br>
+ peace within are necessary for the progress of commerce and
+industry."</p>
+
+<p>As he surveyed Gigantopolis, he was confirmed in this opinion.
+People went<br>
+ through the streets so swiftly propelled by hurry that they
+knocked down all<br>
+ who were in their way. Obnubile was thrown down several times,
+but soon<br>
+ succeeded in learning how to demean himself better; after an
+hour's walking he<br>
+ himself knocked down an Atlantan.</p>
+
+<p>Having reached a great square he saw the portico of a palace
+in the Classic<br>
+ style, whose Corinthian columns reared their capitals of
+arborescent acanthus<br>
+ seventy metres above the stylobate.</p>
+
+<p>As he stood with his head thrown back admiring the building, a
+man of modest<br>
+ appearance approached him and said in Penguin:</p>
+
+<p>"I see by your dress that you are from Penguinia. I know your
+language; I am a<br>
+ sworn interpreter. This is the Parliament palace. At the present
+moment the<br>
+ representatives of the States are in deliberation. Would you
+like to be<br>
+ present at the sitting?"</p>
+
+<p>The doctor was brought into the hall and cast his looks upon
+the crowd of<br>
+ legislators who were sitting on cane chairs with their feet upon
+their desks.</p>
+
+<p>The president arose and, in the midst of general inattention,
+muttered rather<br>
+ than spoke the following formulas which the interpreter
+immediately translated<br>
+ to the doctor.</p>
+
+<p>"The war for the opening of the Mongol markets being ended to
+the satisfaction<br>
+ of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid before the
+finance<br>
+ committee . . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"Is there any opposition? . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"The proposal is carried."</p>
+
+<p>"The war for the opening of the markets of Third-Zealand being
+ended to the<br>
+ satisfaction of the States, I propose that the accounts be laid
+before the<br>
+ finance committee. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"Is there any opposition? . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"The proposal is carried."</p>
+
+<p>"Have I heard aright?" asked Professor Obnubile. "What? you an
+industrial<br>
+ people and engaged in all these wars!"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly," answered the interpreter, "these are industrial
+wars. Peoples who<br>
+ have neither commerce nor industry are not obliged to make war,
+but a business<br>
+ people is forced to adopt a policy of conquest. The number of
+wars necessarily<br>
+ increases with our productive activity. As soon as one of our
+industries fails<br>
+ to find a market for its products a war is necessary to open new
+outlets. It<br>
+ is in this way we have had a coal war, a copper war, and a
+cotton war. In<br>
+ Third-Zealand we have killed two-thirds of the inhabitants in
+order to compel<br>
+ the remainder to buy our umbrellas and braces."</p>
+
+<p>At that moment a fat man who was sitting in the middle of the
+assembly<br>
+ ascended the tribune.</p>
+
+<p>"I claim," said he, "a war against the Emerald Republic, which
+insolently<br>
+ contends with our pigs for the hegemony of hams and sauces in
+all the markets<br>
+ of the universe."</p>
+
+<p>"Who is that legislator?" asked Doctor Obnubile.</p>
+
+<p>"He is a pig merchant."</p>
+
+<p>"Is there any opposition?" said the President. "I put the
+proposition to the<br>
+ vote."</p>
+
+<p>The war against the Emerald Republic was voted with uplifted
+hands by a very<br>
+ large majority.</p>
+
+<p>"What?" said Obnubile to the interpreter; "you have voted a
+war with that<br>
+ rapidity and that indifference!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! it is an unimportant war which will hardly cost eight
+million dollars."</p>
+
+<p>"And men . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"The men are included in the eight million dollars."</p>
+
+<p>Then Doctor Obnubile bent his head in bitter reflection.</p>
+
+<p>"Since wealth and civilization admit of as many causes of wars
+as poverty and<br>
+ barbarism, since the folly and wickedness of men are incurable,
+there remains<br>
+ but one good action to be done. The wise man will collect enough
+dynamite to<br>
+ blow up this planet. When its fragments fly through space an
+imperceptible<br>
+ amelioration will be accomplished in the universe and a
+satisfaction will be<br>
+ given to the universal conscience. Moreover, this universal
+conscience does<br>
+ not exist."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK V. MODERN TIMES: CHATILLON</h1>
+
+<h1>�</h1>
+
+<h2>I. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE</h2>
+
+<p>Every system of government produces people who are
+dissatisfied. The Republic<br>
+ or Public Thing produced them at first from among the nobles who
+had been<br>
+ despoiled of their ancient privileges. These looked with regret
+and hope to<br>
+ Prince Crucho, the last of the Draconides, a prince adorned both
+with the<br>
+ grace of youth and the melancholy of exile. It also produced
+them from among<br>
+ the smaller traders, who, owing to profound economic causes, no
+longer gained<br>
+ a livelihood. They believed that this was the fault of the
+republic which they<br>
+ had at first adored and from which each day they were now
+becoming more<br>
+ detached. The financiers, both Christians and Jews, became by
+their insolence<br>
+ and their cupidity the scourge of the country, which they
+plundered and<br>
+ degraded, as well as the scandal of a government which they
+never troubled<br>
+ either to destroy or preserve, so confident were they that they
+could operate<br>
+ without hindrance under all governments. Nevertheless, their
+sympathies<br>
+ inclined to absolute power as the best protection against the
+socialists,<br>
+ their puny but ardent adversaries. And just as they imitated the
+habits of the<br>
+ aristocrats, so they imitated their political and religious
+sentiments. Their<br>
+ women, in particular, loved the Prince and had dreams of
+appearing one day at<br>
+ his Court.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ However, the Republic retained some partisans and defenders. If
+it was not in<br>
+ a position to believe in the fidelity of its own officials it
+could at least<br>
+ still count on the devotion of the manual labourers, although it
+had never<br>
+ relieved their misery. These came forth in crowds from their
+quarries and<br>
+ their factories to defend it, and marched in long processions,
+gloomy,<br>
+ emaciated, and sinister. They would have died for it because it
+had given them<br>
+ hope.</p>
+
+<p>Now, under the Presidency of Theodore Formose, there lived in
+a peaceable<br>
+ suburb of Alca a monk called Agaric, who kept a school and
+assisted in<br>
+ arranging marriages. In his school he taught fencing and riding
+to the sons of<br>
+ old families, illustrious by their birth, but now as destitute
+of wealth as of<br>
+ privilege. And as soon as they were old enough he married them
+to the<br>
+ daughters of the opulent and despised caste of financiers.</p>
+
+<p>Tall, thin, and dark, Agaric used to walk in deep thought,
+with his breviary<br>
+ in his hand and his brow loaded with care, through the corridors
+of the school<br>
+ and the alleys of the garden. His care was not limited to
+inculcating in his<br>
+ pupils abstruse doctrines and mechanical precepts and to
+endowing them<br>
+ afterwards with legitimate and rich wives. He entertained
+political designs<br>
+ and pursued the realisation of a gigantic plan. His thought of
+thoughts and<br>
+ labour of labours was to overthrow the Republic. He was not
+moved to this by<br>
+ any personal interest. He believed that a democratic state was
+opposed to the<br>
+ holy society to which body and soul he belonged. And all the
+other monks, his<br>
+ brethren, thought the same. The Republic was perpetually at
+strife with the<br>
+ congregation of monks and the assembly of the faithful. True, to
+plot the<br>
+ death of the new government was a difficult and perilous
+enterprise. Still,<br>
+ Agaric was in a position to carry on a formidable conspiracy. At
+that epoch,<br>
+ when the clergy guided the superior classes of the Penguins,
+this monk<br>
+ exercised a tremendous influence over the aristocracy of
+Alca.</p>
+
+<p>All the young men whom he had brought up waited only for a
+favourable moment<br>
+ to march against the popular power. The sons of the ancient
+families did not<br>
+ practise the arts or engage in business. They were almost all
+soldiers and<br>
+ served the Republic. They served it, but they did not love it;
+they regretted<br>
+ the dragon's crest. And the fair Jewesses shared in these
+regrets in order<br>
+ that they might be taken for Christians.</p>
+
+<p>One July as he was walking in a suburban street which ended in
+some dusty<br>
+ fields, Agaric heard groans coming from a moss-grown well that
+had been<br>
+ abandoned by the gardeners. And almost immediately he was told
+by a cobbler of<br>
+ the neighbourhood that a ragged man who had shouted out "Hurrah
+for the<br>
+ Republic!" had been thrown into the well by some cavalry
+officers who were<br>
+ passing, and had sunk up to his ears in the mud. Agaric was
+quite ready to see<br>
+ a general significance in this particular fact. He inferred a
+great<br>
+ fermentation in the whole aristocratic and military caste, and
+concluded that<br>
+ it was the moment to act.</p>
+
+<p>The next day he went to the end of the Wood of Conils to visit
+the good Father<br>
+ Cornemuse. He found the monk in his laboratory pouring a
+golden-coloured<br>
+ liquor into a still. He was a short, fat, little man, with
+vermilion-tinted<br>
+ cheeks and an elaborately polished bald head. His eyes had
+ruby-coloured<br>
+ pupils like a guinea-pig's. He graciously saluted his visitor
+and offered him<br>
+ a glass of the St. Orberosian liqueur, which he manufactured,
+and from the<br>
+ sale of which he gained immense wealth.</p>
+
+<p>Agaric made a gesture of refusal. Then, standing on his long
+feet and pressing<br>
+ his melancholy hat against his stomach, he remained silent.</p>
+
+<p>"Take a seat," said Cornemuse to him.</p>
+
+<p>Agaric sat down on a rickety stool, but continued mute.</p>
+
+<p>Then the monk of Conils inquired:</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me some news of your young pupils. Have the dear
+children sound views?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am very satisfied with them," answered the teacher. "It is
+everything to be<br>
+ nurtured in sound principles. It is necessary to have sound
+views before<br>
+ having any views at all, for afterwards it is too late. . . .
+Yes, I have<br>
+ great grounds for comfort. But we live in a sad age."</p>
+
+<p>"Alas!" sighed Cornemuse.</p>
+
+<p>"We are passing through evil days. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"Times of trial."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet, Cornemuse, the mind of the public is not so entirely
+corrupted as it<br>
+ seems."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps you are right."</p>
+
+<p>"The people are tired of a government that ruins them and does
+nothing for<br>
+ them. Every day fresh scandals spring up. The Republic is sunk
+in shame. It is<br>
+ ruined."</p>
+
+<p>"May God grant it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Cornemuse, what do you think of Prince Crucho?"</p>
+
+<p>"He is an amiable young man and, I dare say, a worthy scion of
+an august<br>
+ stock. I pity him for having to endure the pains of exile at so
+early an age.<br>
+ Spring has no flowers for the exile, and autumn no fruits.
+Prince Crucho has<br>
+ sound views; he respects the clergy; he practises our religion;
+besides, he<br>
+ consumes a good deal of my little products."</p>
+
+<p>"Cornemuse, in many homes, both rich and poor, his return is
+hoped for.<br>
+ Believe me, he will come back."</p>
+
+<p>"May I live to throw my mantle beneath his feet!" sighed
+Cornemuse.</p>
+
+<p>Seeing that he held these sentiments, Agaric depicted to him
+the state of<br>
+ people's minds such as he himself imagined them. He showed him
+the nobles and<br>
+ the rich exasperated against the popular government; the army
+refusing to<br>
+ endure fresh insults; the officials willing to betray their
+chiefs; the people<br>
+ discontented, riot ready to burst forth, and the enemies of the
+monks, the<br>
+ agents of the constituted authority, thrown into the wells of
+Alca. He<br>
+ concluded that it was the moment to strike a great blow.</p>
+
+<p>"We can," he cried, "save the Penguin people, we can deliver
+it from its<br>
+ tyrants, deliver it from itself, restore the Dragon's crest,
+re-establish the<br>
+ ancient State, the good State, for the honour of the faith and
+the exaltation<br>
+ of the Church. We can do this if we will. We possess great
+wealth and we exert<br>
+ secret influences; by our evangelistic and outspoken journals we
+communicate<br>
+ with all the ecclesiastics in towns and county alike, and we
+inspire them with<br>
+ our own eager enthusiasm and our own burning faith. They will
+kindle their<br>
+ penitents and their congregations. I can dispose of the chiefs
+of the army; I<br>
+ have an understanding with the men of the people. Unknown to
+them I sway the<br>
+ minds of umbrella sellers, publicans, shopmen, gutter merchants,
+newspaper<br>
+ boys, women of the streets, and police agents. We have more
+people on our side<br>
+ than we need. What are we waiting for? Let us act!"</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think of doing?" asked Cornemuse.</p>
+
+<p>"Of forming a vast conspiracy and overthrowing the Republic,
+of<br>
+ re-establishing Crucho on the throne of the Draconides."</p>
+
+<p>Cornemuse moistened his lips with his tongue several times.
+Then he said with<br>
+ unction:</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly the restoration of the Draconides is desirable; it
+is eminently<br>
+ desirable; and for my part, desire it with all my heart. As for
+the Republic,<br>
+ you know what I think of it. . . . But would it not te better to
+abandon it to<br>
+ its fate and let it die of the vices of its own constitution?
+Doubtless,<br>
+ Agaric, what you propose is noble and generous. It would be a
+fine thing to<br>
+ save this great and unhappy country, to re-establish it in its
+ancient<br>
+ splendour. But reflect on it, we are Christians before we are
+Penguins. And we<br>
+ must take heed not to compromise religion in political
+enterprises."</p>
+
+<p>Agaric replied eagerly:</p>
+
+<p>"Fear nothing. We shall hold all the threads of the plot, but
+we ourselves<br>
+ shall remain in the background. We shall not be seen."</p>
+
+<p>"Like flies in milk," murmured the monk of Conils.</p>
+
+<p>And turning his keen ruby-coloured eyes towards his brother
+monk:</p>
+
+<p>"Take care. Perhaps the Republic is stronger than it seems.
+Possibly, too, by<br>
+ dragging it out of the nerveless inertia in which it now rests
+we may only<br>
+ consolidate its forces. Its malice is great; if we attack it, it
+will defend<br>
+ itself. It makes bad laws which hardly affect us; if it is
+frightened it will<br>
+ make terrible ones against us. Let us not lightly engage in an
+adventure in<br>
+ which we may get fleeced. You think the opportunity a good one.
+I don't, and I<br>
+ am going to tell you why. The present government is not yet
+known by<br>
+ everybody, that is to say, it is known by nobody. It proclaims
+that it is the<br>
+ Public Thing, the common thing. The populace believes it and
+remains<br>
+ democratic and Republican. But patience! This same people will
+one day demand<br>
+ that the public thing be the people's thing. I need not tell you
+how insolent,<br>
+ unregulated, and contrary to Scriptural polity such claims seem
+to me. But the<br>
+ people will make them, and enforce them, and then there will be
+an end of the<br>
+ present government. The moment cannot now be far distant; and it
+is then that<br>
+ we ought to act in the interests of our august body. Let us
+wait. What hurries<br>
+ us? Our existence is not in peril. It has not been rendered
+absolutely<br>
+ intolerable to us. The Republic fails in respect and submission
+to us; it does<br>
+ not give the priests the honours it owes them. But it lets us
+live. And such<br>
+ is the excellence of our position that with us to live is to
+prosper. The<br>
+ Republic is hostile to us, but women revere us. President
+Formose does not<br>
+ assist at the celebration of our mysteries, but I have seen his
+wife and<br>
+ daughters at my feet. They buy my phials by the gross. I have no
+better<br>
+ clients even among the aristocracy. Let us say what there is to
+be said for<br>
+ it. There is no country in the world as good for priests and
+monks as<br>
+ Penguinia. In what other country would you find our virgin wax,
+our virile<br>
+ incense, our rosaries, our scapulars, our holy water, and our
+St. Orberosian<br>
+ liqueur sold in such great quantities? What other people would,
+like the<br>
+ Penguins, give a hundred golden crowns for a wave of our hands,
+a sound from<br>
+ our mouths, a movement of our lips? For my part, I gain a
+thousand times more,<br>
+ in this pleasant, faithful, and docile Penguinia, by extracting
+the essence<br>
+ from a bundle of thyme, than I could make by tiring my lungs
+with preaching<br>
+ the remission of sins in the most populous states of Europe and
+America.<br>
+ Honestly, would Penguinia be better off if a police officer came
+to take me<br>
+ away from here and put me on a steamboat bound for the Islands
+of Night?"</p>
+
+<p>Having thus spoken, the monk of Conils got up and led his
+guest into a huge<br>
+ shed where hundreds of orphans clothed in blue were packing
+bottles, nailing<br>
+ up cases, and gumming tickets. The ear was deafened by the noise
+of hammers<br>
+ mingled with the dull rumbling of bales being placed upon the
+rails.</p>
+
+<p>"It is from here that consignments are forwarded," said
+Cornemuse. "I have<br>
+ obtained from the government a railway through the Wood and a
+station at my<br>
+ door. Every three days I fill a truck with my own products. You
+see that the<br>
+ Republic has not killed all beliefs."</p>
+
+<p>Agaric made a last effort to engage the wise distiller in his
+enterprise. He<br>
+ pointed him to a prompt, certain, dazzling success.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you wish to share in it?" he added. "Don't you wish to
+bring back your<br>
+ king from exile?"</p>
+
+<p>"Exile is pleasant to men of good will," answered the monk of
+Conils. "If you<br>
+ are guided by me, my dear Brother Agaric, you will give up your
+project for<br>
+ the present. For my own part I have no illusions. Whether or not
+I belong to<br>
+ your party, if you lose, I shall have to pay like you."</p>
+
+<p>Father Agaric took leave of his friend and went back satisfied
+to his school.<br>
+ "Cornemuse," thought he, "not being able to prevent the plot,
+would like to<br>
+ make it succeed and he will give money." Agaric was not
+deceived. Such,<br>
+ indeed, was the solidarity among priests and monks that the acts
+of a single<br>
+ one bound them all. That was at once both their strength and
+their weakness.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. PRINCE CRUCHO</h2>
+
+<p>Agaric resolved to proceed without delay to Prince Crucho, who
+honoured him<br>
+ with his familiarity. In the dusk of the evening he went out of
+his school by<br>
+ the side door, disguised as a cattle merchant and took passage
+on board the<br>
+ St. Mael.</p>
+
+<p>The next day he landed in Porpoisea, for it was at
+Chitterlings Castle on this<br>
+ hospitable soil that Crucho ate the bitter bread of exile.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Agaric met the Prince on the road driving in a motor-car with
+two young ladies<br>
+ at the rate of a hundred miles an hour. When the monk saw him he
+shook his red<br>
+ umbrella and the prince stopped his car.</p>
+
+<p>"Is it you, Agaric? Get in! There are already three of us, but
+we can make<br>
+ room for you. You can take one of these young ladies on your
+knee."</p>
+
+<p>The pious Agaric got in.</p>
+
+<p>"What news, worthy father?" asked the young prince.</p>
+
+<p>"Great news," answered Agaric. "Can I speak?"</p>
+
+<p>"You can. I have nothing secret from these two ladies."</p>
+
+<p>"Sire, Penguinia claims you. You will not be deaf to her
+call."</p>
+
+<p>Agaric described the state of feeling and outlined a vast
+plot.</p>
+
+<p>"On my first signal," said he, "all your partisans will rise
+at once. With<br>
+ cross in hand and habits girded up, your venerable clergy will
+lead the armed<br>
+ crowd into Formose's palace. We shall carry terror and death
+among your<br>
+ enemies. For a reward of our efforts we only ask of you, Sire,
+that you will<br>
+ not render them useless. We entreat you to come and seat
+yourself on the<br>
+ throne that we shall prepare."</p>
+
+<p>The prince returned a simple answer:</p>
+
+<p>"I shall enter Alca on a green horse."</p>
+
+<p>Agaric declared that he accepted this manly response.
+Although, contrary to<br>
+ his custom, he had a lady on his knee, he adjured the young
+prince, with a<br>
+ sublime loftiness of soul, to be faithful to his royal
+duties.</p>
+
+<p>"Sire," he cried, with tears in his eyes, "you will live to
+remember the day<br>
+ on which you have been restored from exile, given back to your
+people,<br>
+ reestablished on the throne of your ancestors by the hands of
+your monks, and<br>
+ crowned by them with the august crest of the Dragon. King
+Crucho, may you<br>
+ equal the glory of your ancestor Draco the Great!"</p>
+
+<p>The young prince threw himself with emotion on his restorer
+and attempted to<br>
+ embrace him, but he was prevented from reaching him by the girth
+of the two<br>
+ ladies, so tightly packed were they all in that historic
+carriage.</p>
+
+<p>"Worthy father," said he, "I would like all Penguinia to
+witness this<br>
+ embrace."</p>
+
+<p>"It would be a cheering spectacle," said Agaric.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time the motor-car rushed like a tornado through
+hamlets and<br>
+ villages, crushing hens, geese, turkeys, ducks, guinea-fowls,
+cats, dogs,<br>
+ pigs, children, labourers, and women beneath its insatiable
+tyres. And the<br>
+ pious Agaric turned over his great designs in his mind. His
+voice, coming from<br>
+ behind one of the ladies, expressed this thought:</p>
+
+<p>"We must have money, a great deal of money."</p>
+
+<p>"That is your business," answered the prince.</p>
+
+<p>But already the park gates were opening to the formidable
+motor-car.</p>
+
+<p>The dinner was sumptuous. They toasted the Dragon's crest.
+Everybody knows<br>
+ that a closed goblet is a sign of sovereignty; so Prince Crucho
+and Princess<br>
+ Gudrune, his wife, drank out of goblets that were covered-over
+like ciboriums.<br>
+ The prince had his filled several times with the wines of
+Penguinia, both<br>
+ white and red.</p>
+
+<p>Crucho had received a truly princely education, and he
+excelled in motoring,<br>
+ but was not ignorant of history either. He was said to be well
+versed in the<br>
+ antiquities and famous deeds of his family; and, indeed, he gave
+a notable<br>
+ proof of his knowledge in this respect. As they were speaking of
+the various<br>
+ remarkable peculiarities that had been noticed in famous
+women,</p>
+
+<p>"It is perfectly true," said he, "that Queen Crucha, whose
+name I bear, had<br>
+ the mark of a little monkey's head upon her body."</p>
+
+<p>During the evening Agaric had a decisive interview with three
+of the prince's<br>
+ oldest councillors. It was decided to ask for funds from
+Crucho's<br>
+ father-in-law, as he was anxious to have a king for son-in-law,
+from several<br>
+ Jewish ladies, who were impatient to become ennobled, and,
+finally, from the<br>
+ Prince Regent of the Porpoises, who had promised his aid to the
+Draconides,<br>
+ thinking that by Crucho's restoration he would weaken the
+Penguins, the<br>
+ hereditary enemies of his people. The three old councillors
+divided among<br>
+ themselves the three chief offices of the Court, those of
+Chamberlain,<br>
+ Seneschal, and High Steward, and authorised the monk to
+distribute the other<br>
+ places to the prince's best advantage.</p>
+
+<p>"Devotion has to be rewarded," said the three old
+councillors.</p>
+
+<p>"And treachery also," said Agaric.</p>
+
+<p>"It is but too true," replied one of them, the Marquis of
+Sevenwounds, who had<br>
+ experience of revolutions.</p>
+
+<p>There was dancing, and after the ball Princess Gudrune tore up
+her green robe<br>
+ to make cockades. With her own hands she sewed a piece of it on
+the monk's<br>
+ breast, upon which he shed tears of sensibility and
+gratitude.</p>
+
+<p>M. de Plume, the prince's equerry, set out the same evening to
+look for a<br>
+ green horse.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>III. THE CABAL</h2>
+
+<p>After his return to the capital of Penguinia, the Reverend
+Father Agaric<br>
+ disclosed his projects to Prince Adelestan des Boscenos, of
+whose Draconian<br>
+ sentiments he was well aware.</p>
+
+<p>The prince belonged to the highest nobility. The Torticol des
+Boscenos went<br>
+ back to Brian the Good, and under the Draconides had held the
+highest offices<br>
+ in the kingdom. In 1179, Philip Torticol, High Admiral of
+Penguinia, a brave,<br>
+ faithful, and generous, but vindictive man, delivered over the
+port of La<br>
+ Crique and the Penguin fleet to the enemies of the kingdom,
+because he<br>
+ suspected that Queen Crucha, whose lover he was, had been
+unfaithful to him<br>
+ and loved a stable-boy. It was that great queen who gave to the
+Boscenos the<br>
+ silver warming-pan which they bear in their arms. As for their
+motto, it only<br>
+ goes back to the sixteenth century. The story of its origin is
+as follows: One<br>
+ gala night, as he mingled with the crowd of courtiers who were
+watching the<br>
+ fire-works in the king's garden, Duke John des Boscenos
+approached the Duchess<br>
+ of Skull and put his hand under the petticoat of that lady, who
+made no<br>
+ complaint at the gesture. The king, happening to pass, surprised
+them and<br>
+ contented himself with saying, "And thus I find you." These four
+words became<br>
+ the motto of the Boscenos.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Prince Adelestan had not degenerated from his ancestors. He
+preserved an<br>
+ unalterable fidelity for the race of the Draconides and desired
+nothing so<br>
+ much as the restoration of Prince Crucho, an event which was in
+his eyes to be<br>
+ the fore-runner of the restoration of his own fortune. He
+therefore readily<br>
+ entered into the Reverend Father Agaric's plans. He joined
+himself at once to<br>
+ the monk's projects, and hastened to put him into communication
+with the most<br>
+ loyal Royalists of his acquaintance, Count Clena, M. de La
+Trumelle, Viscount<br>
+ Olive, and M. Bigourd. They met together one night in the Duke
+of Ampoule's<br>
+ country house, six miles eastward of Alca, to consider ways and
+means.</p>
+
+<p>M. de La Trumelle was in favour of legal action.</p>
+
+<p>"We ought to keep within the law," said he in substance. "We
+are for order. It<br>
+ is by an untiring propaganda that we shall best pursue the
+realisation of our<br>
+ hopes. We must change the feeling of the country. Our cause will
+conquer<br>
+ because it is just."</p>
+
+<p>The Prince des Boscenos expressed a contrary opinion. He
+thought that, in<br>
+ order to triumph, just causes need force quite as much and even
+more than<br>
+ unjust causes require it.</p>
+
+<p>"In the present situation," said he tranquilly, "three methods
+of action<br>
+ present themselves: to hire the butcher boys, to corrupt the
+ministers, and to<br>
+ kidnap President Formose."</p>
+
+<p>"It would be a mistake to kidnap Formose," objected M. de La
+Trumelle. "The<br>
+ President is on our side."</p>
+
+<p>The attitude and sentiments of the President of the Republic
+are explained by<br>
+ the fact that one Dracophil proposed to seize Formose while
+another Dracophil<br>
+ regarded him as a friend. Formose showed himself favourable to
+the Royalists,<br>
+ whose habits he admired and imitated. If he smiled at the
+mention of the<br>
+ Dragon's crest it was at the thought of putting it on his own
+head. He was<br>
+ envious of sovereign power, not because he felt himself capable
+of exercising<br>
+ it, but because he loved to appear so. According to the
+expression of a<br>
+ Penguin chronicler, "he was a goose."</p>
+
+<p>Prince des Boscenos maintained his proposal to march against
+Formose's palace<br>
+ and the House of Parliament.</p>
+
+<p>Count Clena was even still more energetic.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us begin," said he, "by slaughtering, disembowelling, and
+braining the<br>
+ Republicans and all partisans of the government. Afterwards we
+shall see what<br>
+ more need be done."</p>
+
+<p>M. de La Trumelle was a moderate, and moderates are always
+moderately opposed<br>
+ to violence. He recognised that Count Clena's policy was
+inspired by a noble<br>
+ feeling and that it was high-minded, but he timidly objected
+that perhaps it<br>
+ was not conformable to principle, and that it presented certain
+dangers. At<br>
+ last he consented to discuss it.</p>
+
+<p>"I propose," added he, "to draw up an appeal to the people.
+Let us show who we<br>
+ are. For my own part I can assure you that I shall not hide my
+flag in my<br>
+ pocket."</p>
+
+<p>M. Bigourd began to speak.</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen, the Penguins are dissatisfied with the new order
+because it<br>
+ exists, and it is natural for men to complain of their
+condition. But at the<br>
+ same time the Penguins are afraid to change their government
+because new<br>
+ things alarm them. They have not known the Dragon's crest and,
+although they<br>
+ sometimes say that they regret it, we must not believe them. It
+is easy to see<br>
+ that they speak in this way either without thought or because
+they are in an<br>
+ ill-temper. Let us not have any illusions about their feelings
+towards<br>
+ ourselves. They do not like us. They hate the aristocracy both
+from a base<br>
+ envy and from a generous love of equality. And these two united
+feelings are<br>
+ very strong in a people. Public opinion is not against us,
+because it knows<br>
+ nothing about us. But when it knows what we want it will not
+follow us. If we<br>
+ let it be seen that we wish to destroy democratic government and
+restore the<br>
+ Dragon's crest, who will be our partisans? Only the butcher-boys
+and the<br>
+ little shopkeepers of Alca. And could we even count on them to
+the end? They<br>
+ are dissatisfied, but at the bottom of their hearts they are
+Republicans. They<br>
+ are more anxious to sell their cursed wares than to see Crucho
+again. If we<br>
+ act openly we shall only cause alarm.</p>
+
+<p>"To make people sympathise with us and follow us we must make
+them believe<br>
+ that we want, not to overthrow the Republic, but, on the
+contrary, to restore<br>
+ it, to cleanse, to purify, to embellish, to adorn, to beautify,
+and to<br>
+ ornament it, to render it, in a word, glorious and attractive.
+Therefore, we<br>
+ ought not to act openly ourselves. It is known that we are not
+favourable to<br>
+ the present order. We must have recourse to a friend of the
+Republic, and, if<br>
+ we are to do what is best, to a defender of this government. We
+have plenty to<br>
+ choose from. It would be well to prefer the most popular and, if
+I dare say<br>
+ so, the most republican of them. We shall win him over to us by
+flattery, by<br>
+ presents, and above all by promises. Promises cost less than
+presents, and are<br>
+ worth more. No one gives as much as he who gives hopes. It is
+not necessary<br>
+ for the man we choose to be of brilliant intellect. I would even
+prefer him to<br>
+ be of no great ability. Stupid people show an inimitable grace
+in roguery. Be<br>
+ guided by me, gentlemen, and overthrow the Republic by the
+agency of a<br>
+ Republican. Let us be prudent. But prudence does not exclude
+energy. If you<br>
+ need me you will find me at your disposal."</p>
+
+<p>This speech made a great impression upon those who heard it.
+The mind of the<br>
+ pious Agaric was particularly impressed. But each of them was
+anxious to<br>
+ appoint himself to a position of honour and profit. A secret
+government was<br>
+ organised of which all those present were elected active
+members. The Duke of<br>
+ Ampoule, who was the great financier of the party, was chosen
+treasurer and<br>
+ charged with organising funds for the propaganda.</p>
+
+<p>The meeting was on the point of coming to an end when a rough
+voice was heard<br>
+ singing an old air:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>Boscenos est un gros cochon;<br>
+ On en va faire des andouilles<br>
+ Des saucisses et du jambon<br>
+ Pour le reveillon des pauv' bougres.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>It had, for two hundred years, been a well-known song in the
+slums of Alca.<br>
+ Prince Boscenos did not like to hear it. He went down into the
+street, and,<br>
+ perceiving that the singer was a workman who was placing some
+slates on the<br>
+ roof of a church, he politely asked him to sing something
+else.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "I will sing what I like," answered the man.</p>
+
+<p>"My friend, to please me. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't want to please you."</p>
+
+<p>Prince Boscenos was as a rule good-tempered, but he was easily
+angered and a<br>
+ man of great strength.</p>
+
+<p>"Fellow, come down or I will go up to you," cried he, in a
+terrible voice.</p>
+
+<p>As the workman, astride on his coping, showed no sign of
+budging, the prince<br>
+ climbed quickly up the staircase of the tower and attacked the
+singer. He gave<br>
+ him a blow that broke his jaw-bone and sent him rolling into a
+water-spout. At<br>
+ that moment seven or eight carpenters, who were working on the
+rafters, heard<br>
+ their companion's cry and looked through the window. Seeing the
+prince on the<br>
+ coping they climbed along a ladder that was leaning on the
+slates and reached<br>
+ him just as he was slipping into the tower. They sent him, head
+foremost, down<br>
+ the one hundred and thirty-seven steps of the spiral
+staircase.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IV. VISCOUNTESS OLIVE</h2>
+
+<p>The Penguins had the finest army in the world. So had the
+Porpoises. And it<br>
+ was the same with the other nations of Europe. The smallest
+amount of thought<br>
+ will prevent any surprise at this. For all armies are the finest
+in the world.<br>
+ The second finest army, if one could exist, would be in a
+notoriously inferior<br>
+ position; it would be certain to be beaten. It ought to be
+disbanded at once.<br>
+ Therefore, all armies are the finest in the world. In France the
+illustrious<br>
+ Colonel Marchand understood this when, before the passage of the
+Yalou, being<br>
+ questioned by some journalists about the Russo-Japanese war, he
+did not<br>
+ hesitate to describe the Russian army as the finest in the
+world, and also the<br>
+ Japanese. And it should be noticed that even after suffering the
+most terrible<br>
+ reverses an army does not fall from its position of being the
+finest in the<br>
+ world. For if nations ascribe their victories to the ability of
+their generals<br>
+ and the courage of their soldiers, they always attribute their
+defeats to an<br>
+ inexplicable fatality. On the other hand, navies are classed
+according to the<br>
+ number of their ships. There is a first, a second, a third, and
+so on. So that<br>
+ there exists no doubt as to the result of naval wars.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The Penguins had the finest army and the second navy in the
+world. This navy<br>
+ was commanded by the famous Chatillon, who bore the title of
+Emiralbahr, and<br>
+ by abbreviation Emiral. It is the same word which, unfortunately
+in a corrupt<br>
+ form, is used to-day among several European nations to designate
+the highest<br>
+ grade in the naval service. But as there was but one Emiral
+among the<br>
+ Penguins, a singular prestige, if I dare say so, was attached to
+that rank.</p>
+
+<p>The Emiral did not belong to the nobility. A child of the
+people, he was loved<br>
+ by the people. They were flattered to see a man who sprang from
+their own<br>
+ ranks holding a position of honour. Chatillon was good-looking
+and fortune<br>
+ favoured him. He was not over-addicted to thought. No event ever
+disturbed his<br>
+ serene outlook.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father Agaric, surrendering to M. Bigourd's
+reasons and<br>
+ recognising that the existing government could only be destroyed
+by one of its<br>
+ defenders, cast his eyes upon Emiral Chatillon. He asked a large
+sum of money<br>
+ from his friend, the Reverend Father Cornemuse, which the latter
+handed him<br>
+ with a sigh. And with this sum he hired six hundred butcher boys
+of Alca to<br>
+ run behind Chatillon's horse and shout, "Hurrah for the Emiral!"
+Henceforth<br>
+ Chatillon could not take a single step without being
+cheered.</p>
+
+<p>Viscountess Olive asked him for a private interview. He
+received her at the<br>
+ Admiralty* in a room decorated with anchors, shells, and
+grenades.</p>
+
+<p>* Or better, Emiralty.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ She was discreetly dressed in greyish blue. A hat trimmed with
+roses covered<br>
+ her pretty, fair hair, Behind her veil her eyes shone like
+sapphires. Although<br>
+ she came of Jewish origin there was no more fashionable woman in
+the whole<br>
+ nobility. She was tall and well shaped; her form was that of the
+year, her<br>
+ figure that of the season.</p>
+
+<p>"Emiral," said she, in a delightful voice, "I cannot conceal
+my emotion from<br>
+ you. . . . It is very natural . . . before a hero."</p>
+
+<p>"You are too kind. But tell me, Viscountess, what brings me
+the honour of your<br>
+ visit."</p>
+
+<p>"For a long time I have been anxious to see you, to speak to
+you. . . . So I<br>
+ very willingly undertook to convey a message to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Please take a seat."</p>
+
+<p>"How still it is here."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, it is quiet enough."</p>
+
+<p>"You can hear the birds singing."</p>
+
+<p>"Sit down, then, dear lady."</p>
+
+<p>And he drew up an arm-chair for her.</p>
+
+<p>She took a seat with her back to the light.</p>
+
+<p>"Emiral, I came to bring you a very important message, a
+message. . ."</p>
+
+<p>"Explain."</p>
+
+<p>"Emiral, have you ever seen Prince Crucho?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never."</p>
+
+<p>She sighed.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a great pity. He would be so delighted to see you! He
+esteems and<br>
+ appreciates you. He has your portrait on his desk beside his
+mother's. What a<br>
+ pity it is he is not better known! He is a charming prince and
+so grateful for<br>
+ what is done for him! He will be a great king. For he will be
+king without<br>
+ doubt. He will come back and sooner than people think. . . .
+What I have to<br>
+ tell you, the message with which I am entrusted, refers
+precisely to. . ."</p>
+
+<p>The Emiral stood up.</p>
+
+<p>"Not a word more, dear lady. I have the esteem, the confidence
+of the<br>
+ Republic. I will not betray it. And why should I betray it? I am
+loaded<br>
+ honours and dignities."</p>
+
+<p>"Allow me to tell you, my dear Emiral, that your honours and
+dignities are far<br>
+ from equalling what you deserve. If your services were properly
+rewarded, you<br>
+ would be Emiralissimo and Generalissimo, Commander-in-chief of
+the troops both<br>
+ on land and sea. The Republic is very ungrateful to you."</p>
+
+<p>"All governments are more or less ungrateful."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but the Republicans are jealous of you. That class of
+person is always<br>
+ afraid of his superiors. They cannot endure the Services.
+Everything that has<br>
+ to do with the navy and the army is odious to them. They are
+afraid of you."</p>
+
+<p>"That is possible."</p>
+
+<p>"They are wretches; they are ruining the country. Don't you
+wish to save<br>
+ Penguinia?</p>
+
+<p>"In what way?"</p>
+
+<p>"By sweeping away all the rascals of the Republic, all the
+Republicans."</p>
+
+<p>"What a proposal to make to me, dear lady!"</p>
+
+<p>"It is what will certainly be done, if not by you, then by
+some one else. The<br>
+ Generalissimo, to mention him alone, is ready to throw all the
+ministers,<br>
+ deputies, and senators into the sea, and to recall Prince
+Crucho."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, the rascal, the scoundrel," exclaimed the Emiral.</p>
+
+<p>"Do to him what he would do to you. The prince will know how
+to recognise your<br>
+ services, He will give you the Constable's sword and a
+magnificent grant. I am<br>
+ commissioned, in the mean time, to hand you a pledge of his
+royal friendship."</p>
+
+<p>As she said these words she drew a green cockade from her
+bosom.</p>
+
+<p>"What is that?" asked the Emiral.</p>
+
+<p>"It is his colours which Crucho sends you."</p>
+
+<p>"Be good enough to take them back."</p>
+
+<p>"So that they may be offered to the Generalissimo who will
+accept them! . . .<br>
+ No, Emiral, let me place them on your glorious breast."</p>
+
+<p>Chatillon gently repelled the lady. But for some minutes he
+thought her<br>
+ extremely pretty, and he felt this impression still more when
+two bare arms<br>
+ and the rosy palms of two delicate hands touched him lightly. He
+yielded<br>
+ almost immediately. Olive was slow in fastening the ribbon. Then
+when it was<br>
+ done she made a low courtesy and saluted Chatillon with the
+title of<br>
+ Constable.</p>
+
+<p>"I have been ambitious like my comrades," answered the sailor,
+"I don't hide<br>
+ it, and perhaps I am so still; but u on my word of honour, when
+I look at you,<br>
+ the only, desire I feel is for a cottage and a heart."</p>
+
+<p>She turned upon him the charming sapphire glances that flashed
+from under her<br>
+ eyelids.</p>
+
+<p>"That is to be had also . . . what are you doing, Emiral?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am looking for the heart."</p>
+
+<p>When she left the Admiralty, the Viscountess went immediately
+to the Reverend<br>
+ Father Agaric to give an account of her visit.</p>
+
+<p>"You must go to him again, dear lady," said that austere
+monk.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE PRINCE DES BOSCENOS</h2>
+
+<p>Morning and evening the newspapers that had been bought by the
+Dracophils<br>
+ proclaimed Chatillon's praises and hurled shame and opprobrium
+upon the<br>
+ Ministers of the Republic. Chatillon's portrait was sold through
+the streets<br>
+ of Alca. Those young descendants of Remus who carry plaster
+figures on their<br>
+ heads, offered busts of Chatillon for sale upon the bridges.</p>
+
+<p>Every evening Chatillon rode upon his white horse round the
+Queen's Meadow, a<br>
+ place frequented by the people of fashion. The Dracophils posted
+along the<br>
+ Emiral's route a crowd of needy Penguins who kept shouting: "It
+is Chatillon<br>
+ we want." The middle classes of Alca conceived a profound
+admiration for the<br>
+ Emiral. Shopwomen murmured: "He is good-looking." Women of
+fashion slackened<br>
+ the speed of their motor-cars and kissed hands to him as they
+passed, amidst<br>
+ the hurrahs of an enthusiastic populace.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ One day, as he went into a tobacco shop, two Penguins who were
+putting letters<br>
+ in the box recognized Chatillon and cried at the top of their
+voices: "Hurrah<br>
+ for the Emiral! Down with the Republicans." All those who were
+passing stopped<br>
+ in front of the shop. Chatillon lighted his cigar before the
+eyes of a dense<br>
+ crowd of frenzied citizens who waved their hats and cheered. The
+crowd kept<br>
+ increasing, and the whole town, singing and marching behind its
+hero, went<br>
+ back with him to the Admiralty.</p>
+
+<p>The Emiral had an old comrade in arms, Under-Emiral
+Vulcanmould, who had<br>
+ served with great distinction, a man as true as gold and as
+loyal as his<br>
+ sword. Vulcanmould plumed himself on his thoroughgoing
+independence and he<br>
+ went among the partisans of Crucho and the Minister of the
+Republic telling<br>
+ both parties what he thought of them. M. Bigourd maliciously
+declared that he<br>
+ told each party what the other party thought of it. In truth he
+had on several<br>
+ occasions been guilty of regrettable indiscretions, which were
+overlooked as<br>
+ being the freedoms of a soldier who knew nothing of intrigue.
+Every morning he<br>
+ went to see Chatillon, whom he treated with the cordial
+roughness of a brother<br>
+ in arms.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, old buffer, so you are popular," said he to him. "Your
+phiz is sold on<br>
+ the heads of pipes and on liqueur bottles and every drunkard in
+Alca spits out<br>
+ your name as he rolls in the gutter. . . . Chatillon, the hero
+of the<br>
+ Penguins! Chatillon, defender of the Penguin glory! . . . Who
+would have said<br>
+ it? Who would have thought it?"</p>
+
+<p>And he laughed with his harsh laugh. Then changing his tone:
+"But, joking<br>
+ aside, are you not a bit surprised at what is happening to
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, indeed," answered Chatillon.</p>
+
+<p>And out went the honest Vulcanmould, banging the door behind
+him.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time Chatillon had taken a little flat at number
+18 Johannes-Talpa<br>
+ Street, so that he might receive Viscountess Olive. They met
+there every day.<br>
+ He was desperately in love with her. During his martial and
+neptunian life he<br>
+ had loved crowds of women, red, black, yellow, and white, and
+some of them had<br>
+ been very beautiful. But before he met the Viscountess he did
+not know what a<br>
+ woman really was. When the Viscountess Olive called him her
+darling, her dear<br>
+ darling, he felt in heaven and it seemed to him that the stars
+shone in her<br>
+ hair.</p>
+
+<p>She would come a little late, and, as she put her ba,q on the
+table, she would<br>
+ ask pensively:</p>
+
+<p>"Let me sit on your knee."</p>
+
+<p>And then she would talk of subjects suggested by the pious
+Agaric,<br>
+ interrupting the conversation with sighs and kisses. She would
+ask him to<br>
+ dismiss such and such an officer, to give a command to another,
+to send the<br>
+ squadron here or there. And at the right moment she would
+exclaim:</p>
+
+<p>"How young you are, my dear!"</p>
+
+<p>And he did whatever she wished, for he was simple, he was
+anxious to wear the<br>
+ Constable's sword, and to receive a large grant; he did not
+dislike playing a<br>
+ double part, he had a vague idea of saving Penguinia, and he was
+in love.</p>
+
+<p>This delightful woman induced him to remove the troops that
+were at La Cirque,<br>
+ the port where Crucho was to land. By this means it was made
+certain that<br>
+ there would be no obstacle to prevent the prince from entering
+Penguinia.</p>
+
+<p>The pious Agaric organised public meetings so as to keep up
+the agitation. The<br>
+ Dracophils held one or two every day in some of the thirty-six
+districts of<br>
+ Alca, and preferably in the poorer quarters. They desired to win
+over the<br>
+ poor, for they are the most numerous. On the fourth of May a
+particularly fine<br>
+ meeting was held in an old cattle-market, situated in the centre
+of a populous<br>
+ suburb filled with housewives sitting on the doorsteps and
+children playing in<br>
+ the gutters. There were present about two thousand people, in
+the opinion of<br>
+ the Republicans, and six thousand according to the reckoning of
+the<br>
+ Dracophils. In the audience was to be seen the flower of Penguin
+society,<br>
+ including Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Count Clena, M. de
+La Trumelle, M.<br>
+ Bigourd, and several rich Jewish ladies.</p>
+
+<p>The Generalissimo of the national army had come in uniform. He
+was cheered.</p>
+
+<p>The committee had been carefully formed. A man of the people,
+a workman, but a<br>
+ man of sound principles, M. Rauchin, the secretary of the yellow
+syndicate,<br>
+ was asked to preside, supported by Count Clena and M. Michaud, a
+butcher.</p>
+
+<p>The government which Penguinia had freely given itself was
+called by such<br>
+ names as cesspool and drain in several eloquent speeches. But
+President<br>
+ Formose was spared and no mention was made of Crucho or the
+priests.</p>
+
+<p>The meeting was not unanimous. A defender of the modern State
+and of the<br>
+ Republic, a manual labourer, stood up.</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen," said M. Rauchin, the chairman, "we have told you
+that this<br>
+ meeting would not be unanimous. We are not like our opponents,
+we are honest<br>
+ men. I allow our opponent to speak. Heaven knows what you are
+going to hear.<br>
+ Gentlemen, I beg of you to restrain as long as you can the
+expression of your<br>
+ contempt, your disgust, and your indignation."</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen," said the opponent. . . .</p>
+
+<p>Immediately he was knocked down, trampled beneath the feet of
+the indignant<br>
+ crowd, and his unrecognisable remains thrown out of the
+hall.</p>
+
+<p>The tumult was still resounding when Count Clena ascended the
+tribune. Cheers<br>
+ took the place of groans and when silence was restored the
+orator uttered<br>
+ these words:</p>
+
+<p>"Comrades, we are going to see whether you have blood in your
+veins. What we<br>
+ have got to do is to slaughter, disembowel, and brain all the
+Republicans."</p>
+
+<p>This speech let loose such a thunder of applause that the old
+shed rocked with<br>
+ it, and a cloud of acrid and thick dust fell from its filthy
+walls and<br>
+ worm-eaten beams and enveloped the audience.</p>
+
+<p>A resolution was carried vilifying the government and
+acclaiming Chatillon.<br>
+ And the audience departed singing the hymn of the liberator: "It
+is Chatillon<br>
+ we want."</p>
+
+<p>The only way out of the old market was through a muddy alley
+shut in by<br>
+ omnibus stables and coal sheds. There was no moon and a cold
+drizzle was<br>
+ coming down. The police, who were assembled in great numbers,
+blocked the<br>
+ alley and compelled the Dracophils to disperse in little groups.
+These were<br>
+ the instructions they had received from their chief, who was
+anxious to check<br>
+ the enthusiasm of the excited crowd.</p>
+
+<p>The Dracophils who were detained in the alley kept marking
+time and singing,<br>
+ "It is Chatillon we want." Soon, becoming impatient of the
+delay, the cause of<br>
+ which they did not know, they began to push those in front of
+them. This<br>
+ movement, propagated along the alley, threw those in front
+against the broad<br>
+ chests of the police. The latter had no hatred for the
+Dracophils. In the<br>
+ bottom of their hearts they liked Chatillon. But it is natural
+to resist<br>
+ aggression and strong men are inclined to make use of their
+strength. For<br>
+ these reasons the police kicked the Dracophils with their
+hob-nailed boots. As<br>
+ a result there were sudden rushes backwards and forwards.
+Threats and cries<br>
+ mingled with the songs.</p>
+
+<p>"Murder! Murder! . . . It is Chatillon we want! Murder!
+Murder!"</p>
+
+<p>And in the gloomy alley the more prudent kept saying, "Don't
+push." Among<br>
+ these latter, in the darkness, his lofty figure rising above the
+moving crowd,<br>
+ his broad shoulders and robust body noticeable among the
+trampled limbs and<br>
+ crushed sides of the rest, stood the Prince des Boscenos, calm,
+immovable, and<br>
+ placid. Serenely and indulgently he waited. In the mean time, as
+the exit was<br>
+ opened at regular intervals between the ranks of the police, the
+pressure of<br>
+ elbows against the chests of those around the prince diminished
+and people<br>
+ began to breathe again.</p>
+
+<p>"You see we shall soon be able to go out," said that kindly
+giant, with a<br>
+ pleasant smile. "Time and patience . . ."</p>
+
+<p>He took a cigar from his case, raised it to his lips and
+struck a match.<br>
+ Suddenly, in the light of the match, he saw Princess Anne, his
+wife, clasped<br>
+ in Count Clena's arms. At this sight he rushed towards them,
+striking both<br>
+ them and those around with his cane. He was disarmed, though not
+without<br>
+ difficulty, but he could not be separated from his opponent. And
+whilst the<br>
+ fainting princess was lifted from arm to arm to her carriage
+over the excited<br>
+ and curious crowd, the two men still fought furiously. Prince
+des Boscenos<br>
+ lost his hat, his eye-glass, his cigar, his necktie, and his
+portfolio full of<br>
+ private letters and political correspondence; he even lost the
+miraculous<br>
+ medals that he had received from the good Father Cornemuse. But
+he gave his<br>
+ opponent so terrible a kick in the stomach that the unfortunate
+Count was<br>
+ knocked through an iron grating and went, head foremost, through
+a glass door<br>
+ and into a coal-shed.</p>
+
+<p>Attracted by the struggle and the cries of those around, the
+police rushed<br>
+ towards the prince, who furiously resisted them. He stretched
+three of them<br>
+ gasping at his feet and put seven others to flight, with,
+respectively, a<br>
+ broken jaw, a split lip, a nose pouring blood, a fractured
+skull, a torn ear,<br>
+ a dislocated collar-bone, and broken ribs. He fell, however, and
+was dragged<br>
+ bleeding and disfigured, with his clothes in rags, to the
+nearest<br>
+ police-station, where, jumping about and bellowing, he spent the
+night.</p>
+
+<p>At daybreak groups of demonstrators went about the town
+singing, "It is<br>
+ Chatillon we want," and breaking the windows of the houses in
+which the<br>
+ Ministers of the Republic lived.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. THE EMIRAL'S FALL</h2>
+
+<p>That night marked the culmination of the Dracophil movement.
+The Royalists had<br>
+ no longer any doubt of its triumph. Their chiefs sent
+congratulations to<br>
+ Prince Crucho by wireless telegraphy. Their ladies embroidered
+scarves and<br>
+ slippers for him. M. de Plume had found the green horse.</p>
+
+<p>The pious Agaric shared the common hope. But he still worked
+to win partisans<br>
+ for the Pretender. They ought, he said, to lay their foundations
+upon the<br>
+ bed-rock.</p>
+
+<p>With this design he had an interview with three Trade Union
+workmen.</p>
+
+<p>In these times the artisans no longer lived, as in the days of
+the Draconides,<br>
+ under the government of corporations. They were free, but they
+had no assured<br>
+ pay. After having remained isolated from each other for a long
+time, without<br>
+ help and without support, they had formed themselves into
+unions. The coffers<br>
+ of the unions were empty, as it was not the habit of the
+unionists to pay<br>
+ their subscriptions. There were unions numbering thirty thousand
+members,<br>
+ others with a thousand, five hundred, two hundred, and so forth.
+Several<br>
+ numbered two or three members only, or even a few less. But as
+the lists of<br>
+ adherents were not published, it was not easy to distinguish the
+great unions<br>
+ from the small ones.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ After some dark and indirect steps the pious Agaric was put into
+communication<br>
+ in a room in the Moulin de la Galette, with comrades Dagobert,
+Tronc, and<br>
+ Balafille, the secretaries of three unions of which the first
+numbered<br>
+ fourteen members, the second twenty-four, and the third only
+one. Agaric<br>
+ showed extreme cleverness at this interview.</p>
+
+<p>"Gentlemen," said he, "you and I have not, in most respects,
+the same<br>
+ political and social views, but there are points in which we may
+come to an<br>
+ understanding. We have a common enemy. The government exploits
+you and<br>
+ despises us. Help us to overthrow it; we will supply you with
+the means so far<br>
+ as we are able, and you can in addition count on our
+gratitude."</p>
+
+<p>"Fork out the tin," said Dagobert.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father placed on the table a bag which the
+distiller of Conils<br>
+ had given him with tears in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Done!" said the three companions.</p>
+
+<p>Thus was the solemn compact sealed.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as the monk had departed, carrying with him the joy of
+having won over<br>
+ the masses to his cause, Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille whistled
+to their<br>
+ wives, Amelia, Queenie, and Matilda, who were waiting in the
+street for the<br>
+ signal, and all six holding each other's hands, danced around
+the bag,<br>
+ singing:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>J'ai du bon pognon,<br>
+ Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!<br>
+ Hou! Hou! la calotte!</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>And they ordered a salad-bowl full of warm wine.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening all six went through the street from stall to
+stall singing<br>
+ their new song. The song became popular, for the detectives
+reported that<br>
+ every day showed an increase of the number of workpeople who
+sang through the<br>
+ slums:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>J'ai du bon pognon;<br>
+ Tu n'l'auras pas Chatillon!<br>
+ Hou! Hou! la calotte!</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>The Dracophil agitation made no progress in the provinces. The
+pious Agaric<br>
+ sought to find the cause of this, but was unable to discover it
+until old<br>
+ Cornemuse revealed it to him.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "I have proofs," sighed the monk of Conils, "that the Duke of
+Ampoule, the<br>
+ treasurer of the Dracophils, has brought property in Porpoisia
+with the funds<br>
+ that he received for the propaganda."</p>
+
+<p>The party wanted money. Prince des Boscenos had lost his
+portfolio in a brawl<br>
+ and he was reduced to painful expedients which were repugnant to
+his impetuous<br>
+ character. The Viscountess Olive was expensive. Cornemuse
+advised that the<br>
+ monthly allowance of that lady should be diminished.</p>
+
+<p>"She is very useful to us," objected the pious Agaric.</p>
+
+<p>"Undoubtedly," answered Cornemuse, "but she does us an injury
+by ruining us."</p>
+
+<p>A schism divided the Dracophils. Misunderstandings reigned in
+their councils.<br>
+ Some wished that in accordance with the policy of M. Bigourd and
+the pious<br>
+ Agaric, they should carry on the design of reforming the
+Republic. Others,<br>
+ wearied by their long constraint, had resolved to proclaim the
+Dragon's crest<br>
+ and swore to conquer beneath that sign.</p>
+
+<p>The latter urged the advantage of a clear situation and the
+impossibility of<br>
+ making a pretence much longer, and in truth, the public began to
+see whither<br>
+ the agitation was tending and that the Emiral's partisans wanted
+to destroy<br>
+ the very foundations of the Republic.</p>
+
+<p>A report was spread that the prince was to land at La Cirque
+and make his<br>
+ entry into Alca on a green horse.</p>
+
+<p>These rumours excited the fanatical monks, delighted the poor
+nobles,<br>
+ satisfied the rich Jewish ladies, and put hope in the hearts of
+the small<br>
+ traders. But very few of them were inclined to purchase these
+benefits at the<br>
+ price of a social catastrophe and the overthrow of the public
+credit; and<br>
+ there were fewer still who would have risked their money, their
+peace, their<br>
+ liberty, or a single hour from their pleasures in the business.
+On the other<br>
+ hand, the workmen held themselves ready, as ever, to give a
+day's work to the<br>
+ Republic, and a strong resistance was being formed in the
+suburbs.</p>
+
+<p>"The people are with us," the pious Agaric used to say.</p>
+
+<p>However, men, women, and children, when leaving their
+factories, used to shout<br>
+ with one voice:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>A bas Chatillon!<br>
+ Hou! Hou! la calotte!</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>As for the government, it showed the weakness, indecision,
+flabbiness, and<br>
+ heedlessness common to all governments, and from which none has
+ever departed<br>
+ without falling into arbitrariness and violence. In three words
+it knew<br>
+ nothing, wanted nothing, and would do nothing. Formose, shut in
+his<br>
+ presidential palace, remained blind, dumb, deaf, huge,
+invisible, wrapped up<br>
+ in his pride as in an eider-down.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Count Olive advised the Dracophils to make a last appeal for
+funds and to<br>
+ attempt a great stroke while Alca was still in a ferment.</p>
+
+<p>An executive committee, which he himself had chosen, decided
+to kidnap the<br>
+ members of the Chamber of Deputies, and considered ways and
+means.</p>
+
+<p>The affair was fixed for the twenty-eighth of July. On that
+day the sun rose<br>
+ radiantly over the city. In front of the legislative palace
+women passed to<br>
+ market with their baskets; hawkers cried their peaches, pears,
+and grapes; cab<br>
+ horses with their noses in their bags munched their hay. Nobody
+expected<br>
+ anything, not because the secret had been kept but because it
+met with nothing<br>
+ but unbelievers. Nobody believed in a revolution, and from this
+fact we may<br>
+ conclude that nobody desired one. About two o'clock the deputies
+began to<br>
+ pass, few and unnoticed, through the side-door of the palace. At
+three o'clock<br>
+ a few groups of badly dressed men had formed. At half past three
+black masses<br>
+ coming from the adjacent streets spread over Revolution Square.
+This vast<br>
+ expanse was soon covered by an ocean of soft hats, and the crowd
+of<br>
+ demonstrators, continually increased by sight-seers, having
+crossed the<br>
+ bridge, struck its dark wave against the walls of the
+legislative enclosure.<br>
+ Cries, murmurs, and songs went up to the impassive sky. "It is
+Chatillon we<br>
+ want!" "Down with the Deputies!" "Down with the Republicans!"
+"Death to the<br>
+ Republicans!" The devoted band of Dracophils, led by Prince des
+Boscenos,<br>
+ struck up the august canticle:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>Vive Crucho,<br>
+ Vaillant et sage,<br>
+ Plein de courage<br>
+ Des le berceau!</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>Behind the wall silence alone replied.</p>
+
+<p>This silence and the absence of guards encouraged and at the
+same time<br>
+ frightened the crowd. Suddenly a formidable voice cried out:</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Attack!"</p>
+
+<p>And Prince des Boscenos was seen raising his gigantic form to
+the top of the<br>
+ wall, which was covered with barbs and iron spikes. Behind him
+rushed his<br>
+ companions, and the people followed. Some hammered against the
+wall to make<br>
+ holes in it; others endeavoured to tear down the spikes and to
+pull out the<br>
+ barbs. These defences had given way in places and some of the
+invaders had<br>
+ stripped the wall and were sitting astride on the top. Prince
+des Boscenos was<br>
+ waving an immense green flag. Suddenly the crowd wavered and
+from it came a<br>
+ long cry of terror. The police and the Republican carabineers
+issuing out of<br>
+ all the entrances of the palace formed themselves into a column
+beneath the<br>
+ wall and in a moment it was cleared of its besiegers. After a
+long moment of<br>
+ suspense the noise of arms was heard, and the police charged the
+crowd with<br>
+ fixed bayonets. An instant afterwards and on the deserted square
+strewn with<br>
+ hats and walking-sticks there reigned a sinister silence. Twice
+again the<br>
+ Dracophils attempted to form, twice they were repulsed. The
+rising was<br>
+ conquered. But Prince des Boscenos, standing on the wall of the
+hostile<br>
+ palace, his flag in his hand, still repelled the attack of a
+whole brigade. He<br>
+ knocked down all who approached him. At last he, too, was thrown
+down, and<br>
+ fell on an iron spike, to which he remained hooked, still
+clasping the<br>
+ standard of the Draconides.</p>
+
+<p>On the following day the Ministers of the Republic and the
+Members of<br>
+ Parliament determined to take energetic measures. In vain, this
+time, did<br>
+ President Formose attempt to evade his responsibilities. The
+government<br>
+ discussed the question of depriving Chatillon of his rank and
+dignities and of<br>
+ indicting him before the High Court as a conspirator, an enemy
+of the public<br>
+ good, a traitor, etc.</p>
+
+<p>At this news the Emiral's old companions in arms, who the very
+evening before<br>
+ had beset him with their adulations, made no effort to conceal
+their joy. But<br>
+ Chatillon remained popular with the middle classes of Alca and
+one still heard<br>
+ the hymn of the liberator sounding in the streets, "It is
+Chatillon we want."</p>
+
+<p>The Ministers were embarrassed. They intended to indict
+Chatillon before the<br>
+ High Court. But they knew nothing; they remained in that total
+ignorance<br>
+ reserved for those who govern men. They were incapable of
+advancing any grave<br>
+ charges against Chatillon. They could supply the prosecution
+with nothing but<br>
+ the ridiculous lies of their spies. Chatillon's share in the
+plot and his<br>
+ relations with Prince Crucho remained the secret of the thirty
+thousand<br>
+ Dracophils. The Ministers and the Deputies had suspicions and
+even<br>
+ certainties, but they had no proofs. The Public Prosecutor said
+to the<br>
+ Minister of justice: "Very little is needed for a political
+prosecution! but I<br>
+ have nothing at all and that is not enough." The affair made no
+progress. The<br>
+ enemies of the Republic were triumphant.</p>
+
+<p>On the eighteenth of September the news ran in Alca that
+Chatillon had taken<br>
+ flight. Everywhere there was surprise and astonishment. People
+doubted, for<br>
+ they could not understand.</p>
+
+<p>This is what had happened: One day as the brave Under-Emiral
+Vulcanmould<br>
+ happened, as if by chance, to go into the office of M. Barbotan,
+the Minister<br>
+ of Foreign Affairs, he remarked with his usual frankness:</p>
+
+<p>"M. Barbotan, your colleagues do not seem to me to be up to
+much; it is<br>
+ evident that they have never commanded a ship. That fool
+Chatillon gives them<br>
+ a deuced bad fit of the shivers."</p>
+
+<p>The Minister, in sign of denial, waved his paper-knife in the
+air above his<br>
+ desk.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't deny it," answered Vulcanmould. "You don't know how to
+get rid of<br>
+ Chatillon. You do not dare to indict him before the High Court
+because you are<br>
+ not sure of being able to bring forward a strong enough charge.
+Bigourd will<br>
+ defend him, and Bigourd is a clever advocate. . . . You are
+right, M.<br>
+ Barbotan, you are right. It would be a dangerous trial."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! my friend," said the Minister, in a careless tone, "if
+you knew how<br>
+ satisfied we are. . . . I receive the most reassuring news from
+my prefects.<br>
+ The good sense of the Penguins will do justice to the intrigues
+of this<br>
+ mutinous soldier. Can you suppose for a moment that a great
+people, an<br>
+ intelligent, laborious people, devoted to liberal institutions
+which. . ."</p>
+
+<p>Vulcanmould interrupted with a great sigh:</p>
+
+<p>"Ah! If I had time to do it I would relieve you of your
+difficulty. I would<br>
+ juggle away my Chatillon like a nutmeg out of a thimble. I would
+fillip him<br>
+ off to Porpoisia."</p>
+
+<p>The Minister paid close attention.</p>
+
+<p>"It would not take long," continued the sailor. "I would rid
+you in a trice of<br>
+ the creature. . . . But just now I have other fish to fry. . . .
+I am in a bad<br>
+ hole. I must find a pretty big sum. But, deuce take it, honour
+before<br>
+ everything."</p>
+
+<p>The Minister and the Under-Emiral looked at each other for a
+moment in<br>
+ silence. Then Barbotan said with authority:</p>
+
+<p>"Under-Emiral Vulcanmould, get rid of this seditious soldier.
+You will render<br>
+ a great service to Penguinia, and the Minister of Home Affairs
+will see that<br>
+ your gambling debts are paid."</p>
+
+<p>The same evening Vulcanmould called on Chatillon and looked at
+him for some<br>
+ time with an expression of grief and mystery.</p>
+
+<p>"My do you look like that?" asked the Emiral in an uneasy
+tone.</p>
+
+<p>Vulcanmould said to him sadly:</p>
+
+<p>"Old brother in arms, all is discovered. For the past
+half-hour the government<br>
+ knows everything."</p>
+
+<p>At these words Chatillon sank down overwhelmed.</p>
+
+<p>Vulcanmould continued:</p>
+
+<p>"You may be arrested any moment. I advise you to make
+off."</p>
+
+<p>And drawing out his watch:</p>
+
+<p>"Not a minute to lose."</p>
+
+<p>"Have I time to call on the Viscountess Olive?"</p>
+
+<p>"It would be mad," said Vulcanmould, handing him a passport
+and a pair of blue<br>
+ spectacles, and telling him to have courage.</p>
+
+<p>"I will," said Chatillon.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye! old chum."</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye and thanks! You have saved my life."</p>
+
+<p>"That is the least I could do."</p>
+
+<p>A quarter of an hour later the brave Emiral had left the city
+of Alca.</p>
+
+<p>He embarked at night on an old cutter at La Cirque and set
+sail for Porpoisia.<br>
+ But eight miles from the coast he was captured by a
+despatch-boat which was<br>
+ sailing without lights and which was under, the flag of the
+Queen of the Black<br>
+ Islands. That Queen had for a long time nourished a fatal
+passion for<br>
+ Chatillon.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. CONCLUSION</h2>
+
+<p>Nunc est bibendum. Delivered from its fears and pleased at
+having escaped from<br>
+ so great a danger, the government resolved to celebrate the
+anniversary of the<br>
+ Penguin regeneration and the establishment of the Republic by
+holding a<br>
+ general holiday.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ President Formose, the Ministers, and the members of the Chamber
+and of the<br>
+ Senate were present at the ceremony.</p>
+
+<p>The Generalissimo of the Penguin army was present in uniform.
+He was cheered.</p>
+
+<p>Preceded by the black flag of misery and the red flag of
+revolt, deputations<br>
+ of workmen walked in the procession, their aspect one of grim
+protection.</p>
+
+<p>President, Ministers, Deputies, officials, heads of the
+magistracy and of the<br>
+ army, each, in their own names and in the name of the sovereign
+people,<br>
+ renewed the ancient oath to live in freedom or to die. It was an
+alternative<br>
+ upon which they were resolutely determined. But they preferred
+to live in<br>
+ freedom. There were games, speeches, and songs.</p>
+
+<p>After the departure of the representatives of the State the
+crowd of citizens<br>
+ separated slowly and peaceably, shouting out, "Hurrah for the
+Republic!"<br>
+ "Hurrah for liberty!" "Down with the shaven pates!"</p>
+
+<p>The newspapers mentioned only one regrettable incident that
+happened on that<br>
+ wonderful day. Prince des Boscenos was quietly smoking a cigar
+in the Queen's<br>
+ Meadow when the State procession passed by. The prince
+approached the<br>
+ Minister's carriage and said in a loud voice: "Death to the
+Republicans!" He<br>
+ was immediately apprehended by the police, to whom he offered a
+most desperate<br>
+ resistance. He knocked them down in crowds, but he was conquered
+by numbers,<br>
+ and, bruised, scratched, swollen, and unrecognisable even to the
+eyes of. his<br>
+ wife, he was dragged through the joyous streets into an obscure
+prison.</p>
+
+<p>The magistrates carried on the case against Chatillon in a
+peculiar style.<br>
+ Letters were found at the Admiralty which revealed the
+complicity of the<br>
+ Reverend Father Agaric in the plot. Immediately public opinion
+was inflamed<br>
+ against the monks, and Parliament voted, one after the other, a
+dozen laws<br>
+ which restrained, diminished, limited, prescribed, suppressed,
+determined, and<br>
+ curtailed, their rights, immunities, exemptions, privileges, and
+benefits, and<br>
+ created many invalidating disqualifications against them.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father Agaric steadfastly endured the rigour of
+the laws which<br>
+ struck himself personally, as well as the terrible fall of the
+Emiral of which<br>
+ he was the chief cause. Far from yielding to evil fortune, he
+regarded it as<br>
+ but a bird of passage. He was planning new political designs
+more audacious<br>
+ than the first.</p>
+
+<p>When his projects were sufficiently ripe he went one day to
+the Wood of<br>
+ Conils. A thrush sang in a tree and a little hedgehog crossed
+the stony path<br>
+ in front of him with awkward steps. Agaric walked with great
+strides,<br>
+ muttering fragments of sentences to himself.</p>
+
+<p>When he reached the door of the laboratory in which, for so
+many years, the<br>
+ pious manufacturer bad distilled the golden liqueur of St.
+Orberosia, he found<br>
+ the place deserted and the door shut. Having walked around the
+building he saw<br>
+ in the backyard the venerable Cornemuse, who, with his habit
+pinned up, was<br>
+ climbing a ladder that leant against the wall.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that you, my dear friend?" said he to him. "What are you
+doing there?"</p>
+
+<p>"You can see for yourself," answered the monk of Conils in a
+feeble voice,<br>
+ turning a sorrowful look Upon Agaric. "I am going into my
+house."</p>
+
+<p>The red pupils of his eyes no longer imitated the triumph and
+brilliance of<br>
+ the ruby, they flashed mournful and troubled glances. His
+countenance had lost<br>
+ its happy fulness. His shining head was no longer pleasant to
+the sight;<br>
+ perspiration and inflamed blotches bad altered its inestimable
+perfection.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't understand," said Agaric.</p>
+
+<p>"It is easy enough to understand. You see the consequences of
+your plot.<br>
+ Although a multitude of laws are directed against me I have
+managed to elude<br>
+ the greater number of them. Some, however, have struck me. These
+vindictive<br>
+ men have closed my laboratories and my shops, and confiscated my
+bottles, my<br>
+ stills, and my retorts. They have put seals on my doors and now
+I am compelled<br>
+ to go in through the window. I am barely able to extract in
+secret and from<br>
+ time to time the juice of a few plants and that with an
+apparatus which the<br>
+ humblest labourer would despise."</p>
+
+<p>"You suffer from the persecution," said Agaric. "It strikes us
+all."</p>
+
+<p>The monk of Conils passed his hand over his afflicted
+brow:</p>
+
+<p>"I told you so, Brother Agaric; I told you that your
+enterprise would turn<br>
+ against ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>"Our defeat is only momentary," replied Agaric eagerly. "It is
+due to purely<br>
+ accidental causes; it results from mere contingencies. Chatillon
+was a fool;<br>
+ he has drowned himself in his own ineptitude. Listen to me,
+Brother Cornemuse.<br>
+ We have not a moment to lose. We must free the Penguin people,
+we must deliver<br>
+ them from their tyrants, save them from themselves, restore the
+Dragon's<br>
+ crest, reestablish the ancient State, the good State, for the
+honour of<br>
+ religion and the exaltation of the Catholic faith. Chatillon was
+a bad<br>
+ instrument; he broke in our hands. Let us take a better
+instrument to replace<br>
+ him. I have the man who will destroy this impious democracy. He
+is a civil<br>
+ official; his name is Gomoru. The Penguins worship him, He has
+already<br>
+ betrayed his party for a plate of rice. There's the man we
+want!"</p>
+
+<p>At the beginning of this speech the monk of Conils had climbed
+into his window<br>
+ and pulled up the ladder.</p>
+
+<p>"I foresee," answered he, with his nose through the sash,
+"that you will not<br>
+ stop until you have us all expelled from this pleasant,
+agreeable, and sweet<br>
+ land of Penguinia. Good night; God keep you!"</p>
+
+<p>Agaric, standing before the wall, entreated his dearest
+brother to listen to<br>
+ him for a moment:</p>
+
+<p>"Understand your own interest better, Cornemuse! Penguinia is
+ours. What do we<br>
+ need to conquer it? just one effort more . . . one more little
+sacrifice of<br>
+ money and . . ."</p>
+
+<p>But without listening further, the monk of Conils drew in his
+head and closed<br>
+ his window.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK VI. MODERN TIMES.</h1>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>THE AFFAIR OF THE EIGHTY THOUSAND TRUSSES OF HAY</h2>
+
+<p>O Father Zeus, only save thou the sons of the Acheans from the
+darkness, and<br>
+ make clear sky and vouchsafe sight to our eyes, and then, so it
+be but light,<br>
+ slay us, since such is thy good pleasure. (Iliad, xvii. 645 et
+seq.)</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2><br>
+ I. GENERAL GREATAUK, DUKE OF SKULL</h2>
+
+<p>A short time after the flight of the Emiral, a middle-class
+Jew called Pyrot,<br>
+ desirous of associating with the aristocracy and wishing to
+serve his country,<br>
+ entered the Penguin army. The Minister of War, who at the time
+was Greatauk,<br>
+ Duke of Skull, could not endure him. He blamed him for his zeal,
+his hooked<br>
+ nose, his vanity, his fondness for study, his thick lips, and
+his exemplary<br>
+ conduct. Every time the author of any misdeed was looked for,
+Greatauk used to<br>
+ say:</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "It must be Pyrot!"</p>
+
+<p>One morning General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, informed
+Greatauk of a<br>
+ serious matter. Eighty thousand trusses of hay intended for the
+cavalry had<br>
+ disappeared and not a trace of them was to be found.</p>
+
+<p>Greatauk exclaimed at once:</p>
+
+<p>"It must be Pyrot who has stolen them!"</p>
+
+<p>He remained in thought for some time and said: "The more I
+think of it the<br>
+ more I am convinced that Pyrot has stolen those eighty thousand
+trusses of<br>
+ hay. And I know it by this: he stole them in order that he might
+sell them to<br>
+ our bitter enemies the Porpoises. What an infamous piece of
+treachery!</p>
+
+<p>"There is no doubt about it," answered Panther; "it only
+remains to prove it."</p>
+
+<p>The same day, as he passed by a cavalry barracks, Prince des
+Boscenos heard<br>
+ the troopers as they were sweeping out the yard, singing:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>Boscenos est un gros cochon;<br>
+ On en va faire des andouilles,<br>
+ Des saucisses et du jambon<br>
+ Pour le riveillon des pauy' bougres.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>It seemed to him contrary to all discipline that soldiers
+should sing this<br>
+ domestic and revolutionary refrain which on days of riot had
+been uttered by<br>
+ the lips of jeering workmen. On this occasion he deplored the
+moral<br>
+ degeneration of the army, and thought with a bitter smile that
+his old comrade<br>
+ Greatauk, the head of this degenerate army, basely exposed him
+to the malice<br>
+ of an unpatriotic government. And he promised himself that he
+would make an<br>
+ improvement before long.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "That scoundrel Greatauk," said he to himself, "will, not remain
+long a<br>
+ Minister."</p>
+
+<p>Prince des Boscenos was the most irreconcilable of the
+opponents of modem<br>
+ democracy, free thought, and the government which the Penguins
+had voluntarily<br>
+ given themselves. He had a vigorous and undisguised hatred for
+the Jews, and<br>
+ he worked in public and in private, night and day, for the
+restoration of the<br>
+ line of the Draconides. His ardent royalism was still further
+excited by the<br>
+ thought of his private affairs, which were in a bad way and were
+hourly<br>
+ growing worse. He had no hope of seeing an end to his pecuniary
+embarrassments<br>
+ until the heir of Draco the Great entered the city of Alca.</p>
+
+<p>When he returned to his house, the prince took out of his safe
+a bundle of old<br>
+ letters consisting of a private correspondence of the most
+secret nature,<br>
+ which he had obtained from a treacherous secretary. They proved
+that his old<br>
+ comrade Greatauk, the Duke of Skull, had been guilty of jobbery
+regarding the<br>
+ military stores and had received a present of no great value
+from a<br>
+ manufacturer called Maloury. The very smallness of this present
+deprived the<br>
+ Minister who had accepted it of all excuse.</p>
+
+<p>The prince re-read the letters with a bitter satisfaction, put
+them carefully<br>
+ back into his safe, and dashed to the Minister of War. He was a
+man of<br>
+ resolute character. On being told that the Minister could see no
+one he<br>
+ knocked down the ushers, swept aside the orderlies, trampled
+under foot the<br>
+ civil and military clerks, burst through the doors, and entered
+the room of<br>
+ the astonished Greatauk.</p>
+
+<p>"I will not say much," said he to him, "but I will speak to
+the point. You are<br>
+ a confounded cad. I have asked you to put a flea in the ear of
+General<br>
+ Mouchin, the tool of those Republicans, and you would not do it.
+I have asked<br>
+ you to give a command to General des Clapiers, who works for the
+Dracophils,<br>
+ and who has obliged me personally, and you would not do it. I
+have asked you<br>
+ to dismiss General Tandem, the commander of Port Alca, who
+robbed me of fifty<br>
+ louis at cards, and who had me handcuffed when I was brought
+before the High<br>
+ Court as Emiral Chatillon's accomplice. You would not do it. I
+asked you for<br>
+ the hay and bran stores. You would not give them. I asked you to
+send me on a<br>
+ secret mission to Porpoisia. You refused. And not satisfied with
+these<br>
+ repeated refusals you have designated me to your Government
+colleagues as a<br>
+ dangerous person, who ought to be watched, and it is owing to
+you that I have<br>
+ been shadowed by the police. You old traitor! I ask nothing more
+from you and<br>
+ I have but one word to say to you: Clear out; you have bothered
+us too long.<br>
+ Besides, we will force the vile Republic to replace you by one
+of our own<br>
+ party. You know that I am a man of my word. If in twenty-four
+hours you have<br>
+ not handed in your resignation I will publish the Maloury
+dossier in the<br>
+ newspapers."</p>
+
+<p>But Greatauk calmly and serenely replied:</p>
+
+<p>"Be quiet, you fool. I am just having a Jew transported. I am
+handing over<br>
+ Pyrot to justice as guilty of having stolen eighty thousand
+trusses of hay."</p>
+
+<p>Prince Boscenos, whose anger vanished like a dream,
+smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that true?"</p>
+
+<p>"You will see."</p>
+
+<p>"My congratulations, Greatauk. But as one always needs to take
+precautions<br>
+ with you I shall immediately publish the good news. People will
+read this<br>
+ evening about Pyrot's arrest in every newspaper in Alca . . .
+."</p>
+
+<p>And he went away muttering:</p>
+
+<p>"That Pyrot! I suspected he would come to a bad end."</p>
+
+<p>A moment later General Panther appeared before Greatauk.</p>
+
+<p>"Sir," said he, "I have just examined the business of the
+eighty thousand<br>
+ trusses of hay. There is no evidence against Pyrot."</p>
+
+<p>"Let it be found," answered Greatauk. "Justice requires it.
+Have Pyrot<br>
+ arrested at once."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>I. PYROT</h2>
+
+<p>All Penguinia heard with horror of Pyrot's crime; at the same
+time there was a<br>
+ sort of satisfaction that this embezzlement combined with
+treachery and even<br>
+ bordering on sacrilege, had been committed by a Jew. In order to
+understand<br>
+ this feeling it is necessary to be acquainted with the state of
+public opinion<br>
+ regarding the Jews both great and small. As we have had occasion
+to say in<br>
+ this history, the universally detested and all powerful
+financial caste was<br>
+ composed of Christians and of Jews. The Jews who formed part of
+it and on whom<br>
+ the people poured all their hatred were the upper-class Jews.
+They possessed<br>
+ immense riches and, it was said, held more than a fifth part of
+the total<br>
+ property of Penguinia. Outside this formidable caste there was a
+multitude of<br>
+ Jews of a mediocre condition, who were not more loved than the
+others and who<br>
+ were feared much less. In every ordered State, wealth is a
+sacred thing: in<br>
+ democracies it is the only sacred thing. Now the Penguin State
+was democratic.<br>
+ Three or four financial companies exercised a more extensive,
+and above all,<br>
+ more effective and continuous power, than that of the Ministers
+of the<br>
+ Republic. The latter were puppets whom the companies ruled in
+secret, whom<br>
+ they compelled by intimidation or corruption to favour
+themselves at the<br>
+ expense of the State, and whom they ruined by calumnies in the
+press if they<br>
+ remained honest. In spite of the secrecy of the Exchequer,
+enough appeared to<br>
+ make the country indignant, but the middle-class Penguins had,
+from the<br>
+ greatest to the least of them, been brought up to hold money in
+great<br>
+ reverence, and as they all had property, either much or little,
+they were<br>
+ strongly impressed with the solidarity of capital and understood
+that a small<br>
+ fortune is not safe unless a big one is protected. For these
+reasons they<br>
+ conceived a religious respect for the Jews' millions, and
+self-interest being<br>
+ stronger with them than aversion, they were as much afraid as
+they were of<br>
+ death to touch a single hair of one of the rich Jews whom they
+detested.<br>
+ Towards the poorer Jews they felt less ceremonious and when they
+saw any of<br>
+ them down they trampled on them. That is why the entire nation
+learnt with<br>
+ thorough satisfaction that the traitor was a Jew. They could
+take vengeance on<br>
+ all Israel in his person without any fear of compromising the
+public credit.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ That Pyrot had stolen the eighty thousand trusses of hay nobody
+hesitated for<br>
+ a moment to believe. No one doubted because the general
+ignorance in which<br>
+ everybody was concerning the affair did not allow of doubt, for
+doubt is a<br>
+ thing that demands motives. People do not doubt without reasons
+in the same<br>
+ way that people believe without reasons. The thing was not
+doubted because it<br>
+ was repeated everywhere and, with the public, to repeat is to
+prove. It was<br>
+ not doubted because people wished to believe Pyrot guilty and
+one believes<br>
+ what one wishes to believe. Finally, it was not doubted because
+the faculty of<br>
+ doubt is rare amongst men; very few minds carry in them its
+germs and these<br>
+ are not developed without cultivation. Doubt is singular,
+exquisite,<br>
+ philosophic, immoral, transcendent, monstrous, full of
+malignity, injurious to<br>
+ persons and to property, contrary to the good order of
+governments, and to the<br>
+ prosperity of empires, fatal to humanity, destructive of the
+gods, held in<br>
+ horror by heaven and earth. The mass of the Penguins were
+ignorant of doubt:<br>
+ it believed in Pyrot's guilt and this conviction immediately
+became one of its<br>
+ chief national beliefs and an essential truth in its patriotic
+creed.</p>
+
+<p>Pyrot was tried secretly and condemned.</p>
+
+<p>General Panther immediately went to the Minister of War to
+tell him the<br>
+ result.</p>
+
+<p>"Luckily," said he, "the judges were certain, for they had no
+proofs."</p>
+
+<p>"Proofs," muttered Greatauk, "Proofs, what do they prove?
+There is only one<br>
+ certain, irrefragable proof--the confession of the guilty
+person. Has Pyrot<br>
+ confessed?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, General."</p>
+
+<p>"He will confess, he ought to. Panther, we must induce him;
+tell him it is to<br>
+ his interest. Promise him that, if he confesses, he will obtain
+favours, a<br>
+ reduction of his sentence, full pardon; promise him that if he
+confesses his<br>
+ innocence will be admitted, that he will be decorated. Appeal to
+his good<br>
+ feelings. Let him confess from patriotism, for the flag, for the
+sake of<br>
+ order, from respect for the hierarchy, at the special command of
+the Minister<br>
+ of War militarily. . . . But tell me, Panther, has he not
+confessed already?<br>
+ There are tacit confessions; silence is a confession."</p>
+
+<p>"But, General, he is not silent; he keeps on squealing like a
+pig that he is<br>
+ innocent."</p>
+
+<p>"Panther, the confessions of a guilty man sometimes result
+from the vehemence<br>
+ of his denials. To deny desperately is to confess. Pyrot has
+confessed; we<br>
+ must have witnesses of his confessions, justice requires
+them."</p>
+
+<p>There was in Western Penguinia a seaport called La Cirque,
+formed of three<br>
+ small bays and formerly greatly frequented by ships, but now
+solitary and<br>
+ deserted. Gloomy lagoons stretched along its low coasts exhaling
+a pestilent<br>
+ odour, while fever hovered over its sleepy waters. Here, on the
+borders of the<br>
+ sea, there was built a high square tower, like the old Campanile
+at Venice,<br>
+ from the side of which, close to the summit hung an open cage
+which was<br>
+ fastened by a chain to a transverse beam. In the times of the
+Draconides the<br>
+ Inquisitors of Alca used to put heretical clergy into this cage.
+It had been<br>
+ empty for three hundred years, but now Pirot was imprisoned in
+it under the<br>
+ guard of sixty warders, who lived in the tower and did not lose
+sight of him<br>
+ night or day, spying on him for confessions that they might
+afterwards report<br>
+ to the Minister of War. For Greatauk, careful and prudent,
+desired confessions<br>
+ and still further confessions. Greatauk, who was looked upon as
+a fool, was in<br>
+ reality a man of great ability and full of rare foresight.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time Pyrot, burnt by the sun, eaten by mosquitoes,
+soaked in the<br>
+ rain, hail and snow, frozen by the cold, tossed about terribly
+by the wind,<br>
+ beset by the sinister croaking of the ravens that perched upon
+his cage, kept<br>
+ writing down his innocence on pieces torn off his shirt with a
+tooth-pick<br>
+ dipped in blood. These rags were lost in the sea or fell into
+the hands of the<br>
+ gaolers. But Pyrot's protests moved nobody because his
+confessions had been<br>
+ published.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>III. COUNT DE MAUBEC DE LA DENTDULYNX</h2>
+
+<p>The morals of the Jews were not always pure; in most cases
+they were averse<br>
+ from none of the vices of Christian civilization, but they
+retained from the<br>
+ Patriarchal age a recognition of family, ties and an attachment
+to the<br>
+ interests of the tribe. Pyrot's brothers, half-brothers, uncles,
+great-uncles,<br>
+ first, second, and third cousins, nephews and great-nephews,
+relations by<br>
+ blood and relations by marriage, and all who were related to him
+to the number<br>
+ of about seven hundred, were at first overwhelmed by the blow
+that had struck<br>
+ their relative, and they shut themselves up in their houses,
+covering<br>
+ themselves with ashes and blessing the hand that had chastised
+them. For forty<br>
+ days they kept a strict fast. Then they bathed themselves and
+resolved to<br>
+ search, without rest, at the cost of any toil and at the risk of
+eve danger,<br>
+ for the demonstration of an innocence which they did not doubt.
+And how could<br>
+ they have doubted? Pyrot's innocence had been revealed to them
+in the same way<br>
+ that his guilt had been revealed to Christian Penguinia's; for
+these things,<br>
+ being hidden, assume a mystic character and take on the
+authority of religious<br>
+ truths. The seven hundred Pyrotists set to work with as much
+zeal as prudence,<br>
+ and made the most thorough inquiries in secret. They were
+everywhere; they<br>
+ were seen nowhere. One would have said that, like the pilot of
+Ulysses, they<br>
+ wandered freely over the earth. They penetrated into the War
+Office and<br>
+ approached, under different disguises, the judges, the
+registrars, and the<br>
+ witnesses of the affair. Then Greatauk's cleverness was seen.
+The witnesses<br>
+ knew nothing; the judges and registrars knew nothing. Emissaries
+reached even<br>
+ Pyrot and anxiously questioned him in his cage amid the
+prolonged moanings of<br>
+ the sea and the hoarse croaks of the ravens. It was in vain; the
+prisoner knew<br>
+ nothing. The seven hundred Pyrotists could not subvert the
+proofs of the<br>
+ accusation because they could not know what they were, and they
+could not know<br>
+ what they were because there were none. Pyrot's guilt was
+indefeasible through<br>
+ its very nullity. And it was with a legitimate pride that
+Greatauk, expressing<br>
+ himself as a true artist, said one day to General Panther: "This
+case is a<br>
+ master-piece: it is made out of nothing." The seven hundred
+Pyrotists<br>
+ despaired of ever clearing up this dark business, when suddenly
+they<br>
+ discovered, from a stolen letter, that the eighty thousand
+trusses of hay had<br>
+ never existed, that a most distinguished nobleman, Count de
+Maubec, had sold<br>
+ them to the State, that he had received the price but had never
+delivered<br>
+ them. Indeed seeing that he was descended from the richest
+landed proprietors<br>
+ of ancient Penguinia, the heir of the Maubecs of Dentdulynx,
+once the<br>
+ possessors of four duchies, sixty counties, and six hundred and
+twelve<br>
+ marquisates, baronies, and viscounties, he did not possess as
+much land as he<br>
+ could cover with his hand, and would not have been able to cut a
+single day'S<br>
+ mowing of forage off his own domains. As to his getting a single
+rush from a<br>
+ land-owner or a merchant, that would have been quite impossible,
+for everybody<br>
+ except the Ministers of State and the Government officials knew
+that it would<br>
+ be easier to get blood from a stone than a farthing from a
+Maubec.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The seven hundred Pyrotists made a minute inquiry concerning the
+Count Maubec<br>
+ de la Dentdulynx's financial resources, and they proved that
+that nobleman was<br>
+ chiefly supported by a house in which some generous ladies were
+ready to<br>
+ furnish all comers with the most lavish hospitality. They
+publicly proclaimed<br>
+ that he was guilty of the theft of the eighty thousand trusses
+of straw for<br>
+ which an innocent man had been condemned and was now imprisoned
+in the cage.</p>
+
+<p>Maubec belonged to an illustrious family which was allied to
+the Draconides.<br>
+ There is nothing that a democracy esteems more highly than noble
+birth. Maubec<br>
+ had also served in the Penguin army, and since the Penguins were
+all soldiers,<br>
+ they loved their army to idolatry. Maubec, on the field of
+battle, had<br>
+ received the Cross, which is a sign of honour among the Penguins
+and which<br>
+ they valued even more highly than the embraces of their wives.
+All Penguinia<br>
+ declared for Maubec, and the voice of the people which began to
+assume a<br>
+ threatening tone, demanded severe punishments for the seven
+hundred<br>
+ calumniating Pyrotists.</p>
+
+<p>Maubec was a nobleman; he challenged the seven hundred
+Pyrotists to combat<br>
+ with either sword, sabre, pistols, carabines, or sticks.</p>
+
+<p>"Vile dogs," he wrote to them in a famous letter, "you have
+crucified my God<br>
+ and you want my life too; I warn you that I will not be such a
+duffer as He<br>
+ was and that I will cut off your fourteen hundred ears. Accept
+my boot on your<br>
+ seven hundred behinds."</p>
+
+<p>The Chief of the Government at the time was a peasant called
+Robin Mielleux, a<br>
+ man pleasant to the rich and powerful, but hard towards the
+poor, a man of<br>
+ small courage and ignorant of his own interests. In a public
+declaration he<br>
+ guaranteed Maubec's innocence and honour, and presented the
+seven hundred<br>
+ Pyrotists: to the criminal courts where they were condemned, as
+libellers, to<br>
+ imprisonment, to enormous fines, and to all the damages that
+were claimed by<br>
+ their innocent victim.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed as if Pyrot was destined to remain for ever shut in
+the cage on<br>
+ which the ravens perched. But all the Penguins being anxious to
+know and prove<br>
+ that this Jew was guilty, all the proofs brought forward were
+found not to be<br>
+ good, while some of them were also contradictory. The officers
+of the Staff<br>
+ showed zeal but lacked prudence. Whilst Greatauk kept an
+admirable silence,<br>
+ General Panther made inexhaustible speeches and every morning
+demonstrated in<br>
+ the newspapers that the condemned man was guilty. He would have
+done better,<br>
+ perhaps, if he had said nothing. The guilt was evident and what
+is evident<br>
+ cannot be demonstrated. So much reasoning disturbed people's
+minds; their<br>
+ faith, though still alive, became less serene. The more proofs
+one gives a<br>
+ crowd the more they ask for.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless the danger of proving too much would not have
+been great if there<br>
+ had not been in Penguinia, as there are, indeed, everywhere,
+minds framed for<br>
+ free inquiry, capable of studying a difficult question, and
+inclined to<br>
+ philosophic doubt. They were few; they were not all inclined to
+speak, and the<br>
+ public was by no means inclined to listen to them. Still, they
+did not always<br>
+ meet with deaf ears. The great Jews, all the Israelite
+millionaires of Alca,<br>
+ when spoken to of Pyrot, said: "We do not know the man"; but
+they thought of<br>
+ saving him. They preserved the prudence to which their wealth
+inclined them<br>
+ and wished that others would be less timid. Their wish was to be
+gratified.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. COLOMBAN</h2>
+
+<p>Some weeks after the conviction of the seven hundred
+Pyrotists, a little,<br>
+ gruff, hairy, short-sighted man left his house one morning with
+a paste-pot, a<br>
+ ladder, and a bundle of posters and went about the streets
+pasting placards to<br>
+ the walls on which might be read in large letters: Pyrot is
+innocent, Maubec<br>
+ is guilty. He was not a bill-poster; his name was Colomban, and
+as the author<br>
+ of sixty volumes on Penguin sociology he was numbered among the
+most laborious<br>
+ and respected writers in Alca. Having given sufficient thought
+to the matter<br>
+ and no longer doubting Pyrot's innocence, he proclaimed it in
+the manner which<br>
+ he thought would be most sensational. He met with no hindrance
+while posting<br>
+ his bills in the quiet streets, but when he came to the populous
+quarters,<br>
+ every time he mounted his ladder, inquisitive people crowded
+round him and,<br>
+ dumbfounded with surprise and indignation, threw at him
+threatening looks<br>
+ which he received with the calm that comes from courage and
+short-sightedness.<br>
+ Whilst caretakers and tradespeople tore down the bills he had
+posted, he kept<br>
+ on zealously placarding, carrying his tools and followed by
+little boys who,<br>
+ with their baskets under their arms or their satchels on their
+backs, were in<br>
+ no hurry to reach school. To the mute indignation against him,
+protests and<br>
+ murmurs were now added. But Colomban did not condescend to see
+or hear<br>
+ anything. As, at the entrance to the Rue St. Orberosia, he was
+posting one of<br>
+ his squares of paper bearing the words: Pyrot is innocent,
+Maubec is guilty,<br>
+ the riotous crowd showed signs of the most violent anger. They
+called after<br>
+ him, "Traitor, thief, rascal, scoundrel." A woman opened a
+window and emptied<br>
+ a vase full of filth over his head, a cabby sent his hat flying
+from one end<br>
+ of the street to the other by a blow of his whip amid the cheers
+of the crowd<br>
+ who now felt themselves avenged. A butcher's boy knocked
+Colomban with his<br>
+ paste-pot, his brush, and his posters, from the top of his
+ladder into the<br>
+ gutter, and the proud Penguins then felt the greatness of their
+country.<br>
+ Colomban stood up,, covered with filth, lame, and with his elbow
+injured, but<br>
+ tranquil and resolute.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Low brutes," he muttered, shrugging his shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>Then he went down on all-fours in the gutter to look for his
+glasses which he<br>
+ had lost in his fall. t was then seen that his coat was split
+from the collar<br>
+ to the tails and that his trousers were in rags. The rancour of
+the crowd grew<br>
+ stronger.</p>
+
+<p>On the other side of the street stretched the big St.
+Orberosian Stores. The<br>
+ patriots seized whatever they could lay their hands on from the
+shop front,<br>
+ and hurled at Colomban oranges, lemons, pots of jam, pieces of
+chocolate,<br>
+ bottles of liqueurs, boxes of sardines, pots of foie gras, hams,
+fowls, flasks<br>
+ of oil, and bags of haricots. Covered with the debris of the
+food, bruised,<br>
+ tattered, lame, and blind, he took to flight, followed by the
+shop-boys,<br>
+ bakers, loafers, citizens, and hooligans whose number increased
+each moment<br>
+ and who kept shouting: "Duck him! Death to the traitor! Duck
+him!" This<br>
+ torrent of vulgar humanity swept along the streets and rushed
+into the Rue St.<br>
+ Mael. The police did their duty. From all the adjacent streets
+constables<br>
+ proceeded and, holding their scabbards with their left hands,
+they went at<br>
+ full speed in front of the pursuers. They were on the point of
+grabbing<br>
+ Colomban in their huge hands when he suddenly escaped them by
+falling through<br>
+ an open man-hole to the bottom of a sewer.</p>
+
+<p>He spent the night there in the darkness, sitting close by the
+dirty water<br>
+ amidst the fat and slimy rats. He thought of his task, and his
+swelling heart<br>
+ filled with courage and pity. And when the dawn threw a pale ray
+of light into<br>
+ the air-hole he got up and said, speaking to himself:</p>
+
+<p>"I see that the fight will be a stiff one."</p>
+
+<p>Forthwith he composed a memorandum in which he clearly showed
+that Pyrot could<br>
+ not have stolen from the Ministry of War the eighty thousand
+trusses of hay<br>
+ which it had never received, for the reason that Maubec had
+never delivered<br>
+ them, though he had received the money. Colomban caused this
+statement to be<br>
+ distributed in the streets of Alca. The people refused to read
+it and tore it<br>
+ up in anger. The shop-keepers shook their fists at the
+distributers, who made<br>
+ off, chased by angry women armed with brooms. Feelings grew warm
+and the<br>
+ ferment lasted the whole day. In the evening bands of wild and
+ragged men went<br>
+ about the streets yelling: "Death to Colomban!" The patriots
+snatched whole<br>
+ bundles of the memorandum from the newsboys and burned them in
+the public<br>
+ squares, dancing wildly round these bon-fires with girls whose
+petticoats were<br>
+ tied up to their waists.</p>
+
+<p>Some of the more enthusiastic among them went and broke the
+windows of the<br>
+ house in which Colomban had lived in perfect tranquillity during
+his forty<br>
+ years of work.</p>
+
+<p>Parliament was roused and asked the Chief of the Government
+what measures he<br>
+ proposed to take in order to repel the odious attacks made by
+Colomban upon<br>
+ the honour of the National Arm and the safety of Penguinia.
+Robin Mielleux<br>
+ denounced Colomban's impious audacity and proclaimed amid the
+cheers of the<br>
+ legislators that the man would be summoned before the Courts to
+answer for his<br>
+ infamous libel.</p>
+
+<p>The Minister of War was called to the tribune and appeared in
+it transfigured.<br>
+ He had no longer the air, as in former days, of one of the
+sacred geese of the<br>
+ Penguin citadels. Now, bristling, with outstretched neck and
+hooked beak, he<br>
+ seemed the symbolical vulture fastened to the livers of his
+country's enemies.</p>
+
+<p>In the august silence of the assembly he pronounced these
+words only:</p>
+
+<p>"I swear that Pyrot is a rascal."</p>
+
+<p>This speech of Greatauk was reported all over Penguinia and
+satisfied the<br>
+ public conscience.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE REVEREND FATHERS AGARIC AND CORNEMUSE</h2>
+
+<p>Colomban bore with meekness and surprise the weight of the
+general<br>
+ reprobation. He could not go out without being stoned, so he did
+not go out.<br>
+ He remained in his study with a superb obstinacy, writing new
+memoranda in<br>
+ favour of the encaged innocent. In the mean time among the few
+readers that he<br>
+ found, some, about a dozen, were struck by his reasons and began
+to doubt<br>
+ Pyrot's guilt. They broached the subject to their friends and
+endeavoured to<br>
+ spread the light that had arisen in their minds. One of them was
+a friend of<br>
+ Robin Mielleux and confided to him his perplexities, with the
+result that he<br>
+ was no longer received by that Minister. Another demanded
+explanations in an<br>
+ open letter to the Minister of War. A third published a terrible
+pamphlet. The<br>
+ latter, whose name was Kerdanic, was a formidable
+controversialist. The public<br>
+ was unmoved. It was said that these defenders of the traitor had
+been bribed<br>
+ by the rich Jews; they were stigmatized by the name of Pyrotists
+and the<br>
+ patriots swore to exterminate them. There were only a thousand
+or twelve<br>
+ hundred Pyrotists in the whole vast Republic, but it was
+believed that they<br>
+ were everywhere. People were afraid of finding them in the
+promenades, at<br>
+ meetings, at receptions, in fashionable drawing-rooms, at the
+dinner-table,<br>
+ even in the conjugal couch. One half of the population was
+suspected by the<br>
+ other half. The discord set all Alca on fire.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ In the mean time Father Agaric, who managed his big school for
+young nobles,<br>
+ followed events with anxious attention. The misfortunes of the
+Penguin Church<br>
+ had not disheartened him. He remained faithful to Prince Crucho
+and preserved<br>
+ the hope of restoring the heir of the Draconides to the Penguin
+throne. It<br>
+ appeared to him that the events that were happening or about to
+happen in the<br>
+ country, the state of mind of which they were at once the effect
+and the<br>
+ cause, and the troubles that necessarily resulted from them
+might--if they<br>
+ were directed, guided, and led by the profound wisdom of a
+monk--overthrow the<br>
+ Republic and incline the Penguins to restore Prince Crucho, from
+whose piety<br>
+ the faithful hoped for so much solace. Wearing his huge black
+hat, the brims<br>
+ of which looked like the wings of Night, he walked through the
+Wood of Conils<br>
+ towards the factory where his venerable friend, Father
+Cornemuse, distilled<br>
+ the hygienic St. Orberosian liqueur, The good monk's industry,
+so cruelly<br>
+ affected in the time of Emiral Chatillon, was being restored
+from its ruins.<br>
+ One heard goods trains rumbling through the Wood and one saw in
+the sheds<br>
+ hundreds of orphans clothed in blue, packing bottles and nailing
+up cases.</p>
+
+<p>Agaric found the venerable Cornemuse standing before his
+stoves and surrounded<br>
+ by his retorts. The shining pupils of the old man's eyes had
+again become as<br>
+ rubies, his skull shone with its former elaborate and careful
+polish.</p>
+
+<p>Agaric first congratulated the pious distiller on the restored
+activity of his<br>
+ laboratories and workshops.</p>
+
+<p>"Business is recovering. I thank God for it," answered the old
+man of Conils.<br>
+ "Alas! it had fallen into a bad state, Brother Agaric. You raw
+the desolation<br>
+ of this establishment. I need say no more."</p>
+
+<p>Agaric turned away his head.</p>
+
+<p>"The St. Orberosian liqueur," continued Cornemuse, "is making
+fresh conquests.<br>
+ But none the less my industry remains uncertain and precarious.
+The laws of<br>
+ ruin and desolation that struck it have not been abrogated, they
+have only<br>
+ been suspended."</p>
+
+<p>And the monk of Conils lifted his ruby eyes to heaven.</p>
+
+<p>Agaric put his hand on his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>"What a sight, Cornemuse, does unhappy Penguinia present to
+us! Everywhere<br>
+ disobedience, independence, liberty! We seethe proud, the
+haughty, the men of<br>
+ revolt rising up. After having braved the Divine laws they now
+rear themselves<br>
+ against human laws, so true is it that in order to be a good
+citizen a man<br>
+ must be a good Christian. Colomban is trying to imitate Satan.
+Numerous<br>
+ criminals are following his fatal example. They want, in their
+rage, to put<br>
+ aside all checks, to throw off all yokes, to free themselves
+from the most<br>
+ sacred bonds, to escape from the most salutary restraints. They
+strike their<br>
+ country to make it obey them. But they will be overcome by the
+weight of<br>
+ public animadversion, vituperation, indignation, fury,
+execration, and<br>
+ abomination. That is the abyss to which they have been led by
+atheism, free<br>
+ thought, and the monstrous claim to judge for themselves and to
+form their own<br>
+ opinions."</p>
+
+<p>"Doubtless, doubtless," replied Father Cornemuse, shaking his
+head, "but I<br>
+ confess that the care of distilling these simples has prevented
+me from<br>
+ following public affairs. I only know that people are talking a
+great deal<br>
+ about a man called Pyrot. Some maintain that he is guilty,
+others affirm that<br>
+ he is innocent, but I do not clearly understand the motives that
+drive both<br>
+ parties to mix themselves up in a business that concerns neither
+of them."</p>
+
+<p>The pious Agaric asked eagerly:</p>
+
+<p>"You do not doubt Pyrot's guilt?"</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot doubt it, dear Agaric," answered the monk of Conils.
+"That would be<br>
+ contrary to the laws of my country which we ought to respect as
+long as they<br>
+ are not opposed to the Divine laws. Pyrot is guilty, for he has
+been<br>
+ convicted. As to saying more for or against his guilt, that
+would be to erect<br>
+ my own authority against that of the judges, a thing which I
+will take good<br>
+ care not to do. Besides, it is useless, for Pyrot has been
+convicted. If he<br>
+ has not been convicted because he is guilty, he is guilty
+because he has been<br>
+ convicted; it comes to the same thing. I believe in his guilt as
+every good<br>
+ citizen ought to believe in it; and I will believe in it as long
+as the<br>
+ established jurisdiction will order me to believe in it, for it
+is not for a<br>
+ private person but for a judge to proclaim the innocence of a
+convicted<br>
+ person. Human justice is venerable even in the errors inherent
+in its fallible<br>
+ and limited nature. These errors are never irreparable; if the
+judges do not<br>
+ repair them on earth, God will repair them in Heaven. Besides I
+have great<br>
+ confidence in general Greatauk, who, though he certainly does
+not look it,<br>
+ seems to me to be an abler man than all those who are attacking
+him."</p>
+
+<p>"Dearest Cornemuse," cried the pious Agaric, "the Pyrot
+affair, if pushed to<br>
+ the point whither we can lead it by the help of God and the
+necessary funds,<br>
+ will produce the greatest benefits. It will lay bare the vices
+of this<br>
+ Anti-Christian Republic and will incline the Penguins to restore
+the throne of<br>
+ the Draconides and the prerogatives of the Church. But to do
+that it is<br>
+ necessary for the people to see the clergy in the front rank of
+its defenders.<br>
+ Let us march against the enemies of the army, against those who
+insult our<br>
+ heroes, and everybody will follow us."</p>
+
+<p>"Everybody will be too many," murmured the monk of Conils,
+shaking his head.<br>
+ "I see that the Penguins want to quarrel. If we mix ourselves up
+in their<br>
+ quarrel they will become reconciled at our expense and we shall
+have to pay<br>
+ the cost of the war. That is why, if you are guided by me, dear
+Agaric, you<br>
+ will not engage the Church in this adventure."</p>
+
+<p>"You know my energy; you know my prudence. I will compromise
+nothing. . . .<br>
+ Dear Cornemuse, I only want from you the funds necessary for us
+to begin the<br>
+ campaign."</p>
+
+<p>For a long time Cornemuse refused to bear the expenses of what
+he thought was<br>
+ a fatal enterprise. Agaric was in turn pathetic and terrible. At
+last,<br>
+ yielding to his prayers and threats, Cornemuse, with banging
+head and swinging<br>
+ arms, went to the austere cell that concealed his evangelical
+poverty. In the<br>
+ whitewashed wall under a branch of blessed box, there was fixed
+a safe. He<br>
+ opened it, and with a sigh took out a bundle of bills which,
+with hesitating<br>
+ hands, he gave to the pious Agaric.</p>
+
+<p>"Do not doubt it, dear Cornemuse," said the latter, thrusting
+the papers into<br>
+ the pocket of his overcoat, "this Pyrot affair has been sent us
+by God for the<br>
+ glory and exaltation of the Church of Penguinia."</p>
+
+<p>"I pray that you may be right!" sighed the monk of Conils.</p>
+
+<p>And, left alone in his laboratory, he gazed, through his
+exquisite eyes, with<br>
+ an ineffable sadness at his stoves and his retorts.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. THE SEVEN HUNDRED PYROTISTS</h2>
+
+<p>The seven hundred Pyrotists inspired the public with an
+increasing aversion.<br>
+ Every day two or three of them were beaten to death in the
+streets. One of<br>
+ them was publicly whipped, another thrown into the river, a
+third tarred and<br>
+ feathered and led through a laughing crowd, a fourth had his
+nose cut off by a<br>
+ captain of dragoons. They did not dare to show themselves at
+their clubs, at<br>
+ tennis, or at the races; they put on a disguise when they went
+to the Stock<br>
+ Exchange. In these circumstances the Prince des Boscenos thought
+it urgent to<br>
+ curb their audacity and repress their insolence. For this
+purpose he joined<br>
+ with Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle, Viscount Olive, and M.
+Bigourd in<br>
+ founding a great anti-Pyrotist association to which citizens in
+hundreds of<br>
+ thousands, soldiers in companies, regiments, brigades,
+divisions, and army<br>
+ corps, towns, districts, and provinces, all gave their
+adhesion.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ About this time the Minister of War happening to visit one day
+his Chief of<br>
+ Staff, saw with surprise that the large room where General
+Panther worked,<br>
+ which was formerly quite bare, had now along each wall from
+floor to ceiling<br>
+ in sets of deep pigeon-holes, triple and quadruple rows of paper
+bundles of<br>
+ every as form and colour. These sudden and monstrous records had
+in a few days<br>
+ reached the dimensions of a pile of archives such as it takes
+centuries to<br>
+ accumulate.</p>
+
+<p>"What is this?" asked the astonished minister.</p>
+
+<p>"Proofs against Pyrot," answered General Panther with
+patriotic satisfaction.<br>
+ "We had not got them when we convicted him, but we have plenty
+of them now."</p>
+
+<p>The door was open, and Greatauk saw coming up the stair-case a
+long file of<br>
+ porters who were unloading heavy bales of papers in the hall,
+and he saw the<br>
+ lift slowly rising heavily loaded with paper packets.</p>
+
+<p>"What are those others?" said he.</p>
+
+<p>"They are fresh proofs against Pyrot that are now reaching
+us," said Panther.<br>
+ "I have asked for them in every county of Penguinia, in every
+Staff Office and<br>
+ in every Court in Europe. I have ordered them in every town in
+America and in<br>
+ Australia, and in every factory in Africa, and I am expecting
+bales of them<br>
+ from Bremen and a ship-load from Melbourne." And Panther turned
+towards the<br>
+ Minister of War the tranquil and radiant look of a hero.
+However, Greatauk,<br>
+ his eye-glass in his eye, was looking at the formidable pile of
+papers with<br>
+ less satisfaction than uneasiness.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good," said he, "very good! but I am afraid that this
+Pyrot business may<br>
+ lose its beautiful simplicity. It was limpid; like a
+rock-crystal its value<br>
+ lay in its transparency. You could have searched it in vain with
+a<br>
+ magnifying-glass for a straw, a bend, a blot, for the least
+fault. When it<br>
+ left my hands it was as pure as the light. Indeed it was the
+light. I give you<br>
+ a pearl and you make a mountain out of it. To tell you the truth
+I am afraid<br>
+ that by wishing to do too well you have done less well. Proofs!
+of course it<br>
+ is good to have proofs, but perhaps it is better to have none at
+all. I have<br>
+ already told you, Panther, there is only one irrefutable proof,
+the confession<br>
+ of the guilty person (or if the innocent what matter!). The
+Pyrot affair, as I<br>
+ arranged it, left no room for criticism; there was no spot where
+it could be<br>
+ touched. It defied assault. t was invulnerable because it was
+invisible. Now<br>
+ it gives an enormous handle for discussion. I advise you,
+Panther, to use your<br>
+ paper packets with great reserve. I should be particularly
+grateful if you<br>
+ would be more sparing of your communications to journalists. You
+speak well,<br>
+ but you say too much. Tell me, Panther, are there any forged
+documents among<br>
+ these?"</p>
+
+<p>"There are some adapted ones."</p>
+
+<p>"That is what I meant. There are some adapted ones. So much
+the better. As<br>
+ proofs, forged documents, in general, are better than genuine
+ones, first of<br>
+ all because they have been expressly made to suit the needs of
+the case, to<br>
+ order and measure, and therefore they are fitting and exact.
+They are also<br>
+ preferable because they carry the mind into an ideal world and
+turn it aside<br>
+ from the reality which, alas! in this world is never without
+some alloy. . . .<br>
+ Nevertheless, I think I should have preferred, Panther, that we
+had no proofs<br>
+ at all."</p>
+
+<p>The first act of the Anti-Pyrotist Association was to ask the
+Government<br>
+ immediately to summon the seven hundred Pyrotists and their
+accomplices before<br>
+ the High Court of Justice as guilty of high treason. Prince des
+Boscenos was<br>
+ charged to speak on behalf of the Association and presented
+himself before the<br>
+ Council which had assembled to hear him. He expressed a hope
+that the<br>
+ vigilance and firmness of the Government would rise to the
+height of the<br>
+ occasion. He shook hands with each of the ministers and as he
+passed General<br>
+ Greatauk he whispered in his ear:</p>
+
+<p>"Behave properly, you ruffian, or I will publish the Maloury
+dossier!"</p>
+
+<p>Some days later by a unanimous vote of both Houses, on a
+motion proposed by<br>
+ the Government, the Anti-Pyrotist Association was granted a
+charter<br>
+ recognising it as beneficial to the public interest.</p>
+
+<p>The Association immediately sent a deputation to Chitterlings
+Castle in<br>
+ Porpoisia, where Crucho was eating the bitter bread of exile, to
+assure the<br>
+ prince of the love and devotion of the Anti-Pyrotist
+members.</p>
+
+<p>However, the Pyrotists grew in numbers, and now counted ten
+thousand. They had<br>
+ their regular cafes on the boulevards. The patriots had theirs
+also, richer<br>
+ and bigger, and every evening glasses of beer, saucers,
+match-stands, jugs,<br>
+ chairs, and tables were hurled from one to the other. Mirrors
+were smashed to<br>
+ bits, and the police ended the struggles by impartially
+trampling the<br>
+ combatants of both parties under their hob-nailed shoes.</p>
+
+<p>On one of these glorious nights, as Prince des Boscenos was
+leaving a<br>
+ fashionable cafe in the company of some patriots, M. de La
+Trumelle pointed<br>
+ out to him a little, bearded man with glasses, hatless, and
+having only one<br>
+ sleeve to his coat, who was painfully dragging himself along
+the<br>
+ rubbish-strewn pavement.</p>
+
+<p>"Look!" said he, "there is Colomban!"</p>
+
+<p>The prince had gentleness as well as strength; he was
+exceedingly mild; but at<br>
+ the name of Colomban his blood boiled. He rushed at the little
+spectacled man,<br>
+ and knocked him down with one blow of his fist on the nose.</p>
+
+<p>M. de La Trumelle then perceived that, misled by an undeserved
+resemblance, he<br>
+ had mistaken for Colomban, M. Bazile, a retired lawyer, the
+secretary of the<br>
+ Anti-pyrotist Association, and an ardent and generous patriot.
+Prince des<br>
+ Boscenos was one of those antique souls who never bend. However,
+he knew how<br>
+ to recognise his faults.</p>
+
+<p>"M. Bazile," said he, raising his hat, "if I have touched your
+face with my<br>
+ hand you will excuse me and you will understand me, you will
+approve of me,<br>
+ nay, you will compliment me, you will congratulate me and
+felicitate me, when<br>
+ you know the cause of that act. I took you for Colomban."</p>
+
+<p>M. Bazile, wiping his bleeding nostrils with his handkerchief
+and displaying<br>
+ an elbow laid bare by the absence of his sleeve:</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir," answered he drily, "I shall not felicitate you, I
+shall not<br>
+ congratulate you, I shall not compliment you, for your action
+was, at the very<br>
+ least, superfluous; it was, I will even say, supererogatory.
+Already this<br>
+ evening I have been three times mistaken for Colomban and
+received a<br>
+ sufficient amount of the treatment he deserves. The patriots
+have knocked in<br>
+ my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion that that
+was enough."</p>
+
+<p>Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists
+appeared, and<br>
+ misled in their turn by that insidious resemblance, they
+believed that the<br>
+ patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des Boscenos
+and his<br>
+ companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and left them
+for dead. Then<br>
+ seizing Bazile they carried him in triumph, and in spite of his
+protests,<br>
+ along the boulevards, amid cries of: "Hurrah for Colomban!
+Hurrah for Pyrot!"<br>
+ At last the police, who had been sent after them, attacked and
+defeated them<br>
+ and dragged them ignominiously to the station, where Bazile,
+under the name of<br>
+ Colomban, was trampled on by an innumerable quantity of thick,
+hob-nailed<br>
+ shoes.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. BIDAULT-COQUILLE AND MANIFLORE, THE SOCIALISTS</h2>
+
+<p>Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine
+Bidault- Coquille,<br>
+ poorest and happiest of astronomers, installed in an old
+steam-engine of the<br>
+ time of the Draconides, was observing the heavens through a bad
+telescope, and<br>
+ photographing the paths of the meteors upon some damaged
+photographic plates.<br>
+ His genius corrected the errors of his instruments and his love
+of science<br>
+ triumphed over the worthlessness of his apparatus. With an
+inextinguishable<br>
+ ardour he observed aerolites, meteors, and fire-balls, and all
+the glowing<br>
+ ruins and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial
+atmosphere with<br>
+ prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he
+received the<br>
+ indifference of the public, the ingratitude of the State and the
+blame of the<br>
+ learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew not
+what occurred<br>
+ upon the surface of the earth. He never read the newspapers, and
+when he<br>
+ walked through the town his mind was occupied with the November
+asteroids, and<br>
+ more than once he found himself at the bottom of a pond in one
+of the public<br>
+ parks or beneath the wheels of a motor omnibus.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and
+others. This was<br>
+ shown by his cold politeness as well as by a very thin black
+frock coat and a<br>
+ tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once
+emaciated and sublime.<br>
+ He took his meals in a little restaurant from which all
+customers less<br>
+ intellectual than himself had fled, and thenceforth his napkin
+bound by its<br>
+ wooden ring rested alone in the abandoned rack.</p>
+
+<p>In this cook-shop his eyes fell one evening upon Colomban's
+memorandum in<br>
+ favour of Pyrot. He read it as he was cracking some bad nuts and
+suddenly,<br>
+ exalted with astonishment, admiration, horror, and pity, he
+forgot all about<br>
+ falling meteors and shooting stars and saw nothing but the
+innocent man<br>
+ hanging in his cage exposed to the winds of heaven and the
+ravens perching<br>
+ upon it.</p>
+
+<p>That image did not leave him. For a week he had been obsessed
+by the innocent<br>
+ convict, when, as he was leaving his cook-shop, he saw a crowd
+of citizens<br>
+ entering a public-house in which a public meeting was going on.
+He went in.<br>
+ The meeting was disorderly; they were yelling, abusing one
+another and<br>
+ knocking one another down in the smoke-laden hall. The Pyrotists
+and the<br>
+ Anti-Pyrotists spoke in turn and were alternately cheered and
+hissed at. An<br>
+ obscure and confused enthusiasm moved the audience. With the
+audacity of a<br>
+ timid and retired man Bidault-Coquille leaped upon the platform
+and spoke for<br>
+ three-quarters of an hour. He spoke very quickly, without order,
+but with<br>
+ vehemence, and with all the conviction of a mathematical mystic.
+He was<br>
+ cheered. When he got down from the platform a big woman of
+uncertain age,<br>
+ dressed in red, and wearing an immense hat trimmed with heroic
+feathers,<br>
+ throwing herself into his arms, embraced him, and said to
+him:</p>
+
+<p>"You are splendid!"</p>
+
+<p>He thought in his simplicity that there was some truth in the
+statement.</p>
+
+<p>She declared to him that henceforth she would live but for
+Pyrot's defence and<br>
+ Colomban's glory. He thought her sublime and beautiful. She was
+Maniflore, a<br>
+ poor old courtesan, now forgotten and discarded, who had
+suddenly become a<br>
+ vehement politician.</p>
+
+<p>She never left him. They spent glorious hours together in
+doss-houses and in<br>
+ lodgings beautified by their love, in newspaper offices, in
+meeting-halls and<br>
+ in lecture-halls. As he was an idealist, he persisted in
+thinking her<br>
+ beautiful, although she gave him abundant opportunity of seeing
+that she had<br>
+ preserved no charm of any kind. From her past beauty she only
+retained a<br>
+ confidence in her capacity for pleasing and a lofty assurance in
+demanding<br>
+ homage. Still, it must be admitted that this Pyrot affair, so
+fruitful in<br>
+ prodigies, invested Maniflore with a sort of civic majesty, and
+transformed<br>
+ her, at public meetings, into an august symbol of justice and
+truth.</p>
+
+<p>Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore did not kindle the least spark
+of irony or<br>
+ amusement in a single Anti-Pyrotist, a single defender of
+Greatauk, or a<br>
+ single supporter of the army. The gods, in their anger, had
+refused to those<br>
+ men the precious gift of humour. They gravely accused the
+courtesan and the<br>
+ astronomer of being spies, of treachery, and of plotting against
+their<br>
+ country. Bidault-Coquille and Maniflore grew visibly greater
+beneath insult,<br>
+ abuse, and calumny.</p>
+
+<p>For long months Penguinia had been divided into two camps and,
+though at first<br>
+ sight it may appear strange, hitherto the socialists had taken
+no part in the<br>
+ contest. Their groups comprised almost all the manual workers in
+the country,<br>
+ necessarily scattered, confused, broken up, and divided, but
+formidable. The<br>
+ Pyrot affair threw the group leaders into a singular
+embarrassment. They did<br>
+ not wish to place themselves either on the side of the
+financiers or on the<br>
+ side of the army. They regarded the Jews, both great and small,
+as their<br>
+ uncompromising opponents. Their principles were not at stake,
+nor were their<br>
+ interests concerned in the affair. Still the greater number felt
+how difficult<br>
+ it was growing for them to remain aloof from struggles in which
+all Penguinia<br>
+ was engaged.</p>
+
+<p>Their leaders called a sitting of their federation at the Rue
+de la<br>
+ Queue-du-diable-St. Mael, to take into consideration the conduct
+they ought to<br>
+ adopt in the present circumstances and in future
+eventualities.</p>
+
+<p>Comrade Phoenix was the first to speak.</p>
+
+<p>"A crime," said he, "the most odious and cowardly of crimes, a
+judicial crime,<br>
+ has been committed. Military judges, coerced or misled by their
+superior<br>
+ officers, have condemned an innocent man to an infamous and
+cruel punishment.<br>
+ Let us not say that the victim is not one of our own party, that
+he belongs to<br>
+ a caste which was, and always will be, our enemy. Our party is
+the party of<br>
+ social justice; it can look upon no iniquity with
+indifference.</p>
+
+<p>"It would be a shame for us if we left it to Kerdanic, a
+radical, to Colomban,<br>
+ a member of the middle classes, and to a few moderate
+Republicans, alone to<br>
+ proceed against the crimes of the army. If the victim is not one
+of us, his<br>
+ executioners are our brothers' executioners, and before Greatauk
+struck down<br>
+ this soldier he shot our comrades who were on strike.</p>
+
+<p>"Comrades, by an intellectual, moral and material effort you
+must rescue Pyrot<br>
+ from his torment, and in performing this generous act you are
+not turning<br>
+ aside from the liberating and revolutionary task you have
+undertaken, for<br>
+ Pyrot his become the symbol of the oppressed and of all the
+social iniquities<br>
+ that now exist; by destroying one you make all the others
+tremble."</p>
+
+<p>When Phoenix ended, comrade Sapor spoke in these terms:</p>
+
+<p>"You are advised to abandon your task in order to do something
+with which you<br>
+ have no concern. Why throw yourselves into a conflict where, on
+whatever side<br>
+ you turn, you will find none but your natural, uncompromising,
+even necessary<br>
+ opponents? Are the financiers to be less hated by us than the
+army? What inept<br>
+ and criminal generosity is it that hurries you to save those
+seven hundred<br>
+ Pyrotists whom you will always find confronting you in the
+social war?</p>
+
+<p>"It is proposed that you act the part of the police for your
+enemies, and that<br>
+ you are to re-establish for them the order which their own
+crimes have<br>
+ disturbed. Magnanimity pushed to this degree changes its
+name.</p>
+
+<p>"Comrades, there is a point at which infamy becomes fatal to a
+society.<br>
+ Penguin society is being strangled by its infamy, and you are
+requested to<br>
+ save it, to give it air that it can breathe. This is simply
+turning you into<br>
+ ridicule.</p>
+
+<p>"Leave is to smother itself and let us gaze at its last
+convulsions with<br>
+ joyful contempt, only regretting that it has so entirely
+corrupted the soil on<br>
+ which it has been built that we shall find nothing but poisoned
+mud on which<br>
+ to lay the foundations of a new society."</p>
+
+<p>When Sapor had ended his speech comrade Lapersonne pronounced
+these few words:</p>
+
+<p>"Phoenix calls us to Pyrot's help for the reason that Pyrot is
+innocent. It<br>
+ seems to me that that is a very bad reason. If Pyrot is innocent
+he has<br>
+ behaved like a good soldier and has always conscientiously
+worked at his<br>
+ trade, which principally consists in shooting the people. That
+is not a motive<br>
+ to make the people brave all dangers in his defence. When it is
+demonstrated<br>
+ to me that Pyrot is guilty and that he stole the army hay, I
+shall be on his<br>
+ side."</p>
+
+<p>Comrade Larrivee afterwards spoke.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not of my friend, Phoenix's opinion but I am not with my
+friend Sapor<br>
+ either. I do not believe that the party is bound to embrace a
+cause as soon as<br>
+ we are told that that cause is just. That, I am afraid, is a
+grievous abuse of<br>
+ words and a dangerous equivocation. For social justice is not
+revolutionary<br>
+ justice. They are both in perpetual antagonism: to serve the one
+is to oppose<br>
+ the other. As for me, my choice is made. I am for revolutionary
+justice as<br>
+ against social justice. Still, in the present case I am against
+abstention. I<br>
+ say that when a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we
+should be fools<br>
+ not to profit by it.</p>
+
+<p>"How? We are given an opportunity of striking terrible,
+perhaps fatal, blows<br>
+ against militarism. And am I to fold my arms? I tell you,
+comrades, I am not a<br>
+ fakir, I have never been a fakir, and if there are fakirs here
+let them not<br>
+ count on me. To sit in meditation is a policy without results
+and one which I<br>
+ shall never adopt.</p>
+
+<p>"A party like ours ought to be continually asserting itself.
+It ought to prove<br>
+ its existence by continual action. We will intervene in the
+Pyrot affair but<br>
+ we will intervene in it in a revolutionary manner; we will adopt
+violent<br>
+ action. . . . Perhaps you think that violence is old-fashioned
+and<br>
+ superannuated, to be scrapped along with diligences,
+hand-presses and aerial<br>
+ telegraphy. You are mistaken. To-day as yesterday nothing is
+obtained except<br>
+ by violence; it is the one efficient instrument. The only thing
+necessary is<br>
+ to know how to use it. You ask what will our action be? I will
+tell you: it<br>
+ will be to stir up the governing classes against one another, to
+put the army<br>
+ in conflict with the capitalists, the government with the
+magistracy, the<br>
+ nobility and clergy with the Jews, and if possible to drive them
+all to<br>
+ destroy one another. To do this would be to carry on an
+agitation which would<br>
+ weaken government in the same way that fever wears out the
+sick.</p>
+
+<p>"The Pyrot affair, little as we know how to turn it to
+advantage, will put<br>
+ forward by ten years the growth of the Social party and the
+emancipation of<br>
+ the proletariat, by disarmament, the general strike, and
+revolution."</p>
+
+<p>The leaders of the party having each expressed a different
+opinion, the<br>
+ discussion was continued, not without vivacity. The orators, as
+always happens<br>
+ in such a case, reproduced the arguments they had already
+brought forward,<br>
+ though with less order and moderation than before. The dispute
+was prolonged<br>
+ and none changed his opinion. These opinions, in the final
+analysis, were<br>
+ reduced to two: that of Sapor and Lapersonne who advised
+abstention, and that<br>
+ of Phoenix and Larrivee, who wanted intervention. Even these two
+contrary<br>
+ opinions were united in a common hatred of the heads of the army
+and of their<br>
+ justice, and in a common belief in Pyrot's innocence. So that
+public opinion<br>
+ was hardly mistaken in regarding all the Socialist leaders as
+pernicious<br>
+ Anti-Pyrotists.</p>
+
+<p>As for the vast masses in whose name they spoke and whom they
+represented as<br>
+ far as speech can express the impossible--as for the
+proletarians whose<br>
+ thought is difficult to know and who do not know it themselves,
+it seemed that<br>
+ the Pyrot affair did not interest them. It was too literary for
+them, it was<br>
+ in too classical a style, and had an upper-middle-class and
+high-finance tone<br>
+ about it that did not please them much.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VIII. THE COLOMBAN TRIAL</h2>
+
+<p>When the Colomban trial began, the Pyrotists were not many
+more than thirty<br>
+ thousand, but they were every where and might be found even
+among the priests<br>
+ and millionaires. What injured them most was the sympathy of the
+rich Jews. On<br>
+ the other hand they derived valuable advantages from their
+feeble number. In<br>
+ the first place there were among them fewer fools than among
+their opponents,<br>
+ who were over-burdened with them. Comprising but a feeble
+minority, they<br>
+ co-operated easily, acted with harmony, and had no temptation to
+divide and<br>
+ thus counteract one another's efforts. Each of them felt the
+necessity of<br>
+ doing the best possible and was the more careful of his conduct
+as he found<br>
+ himself more in the public eye. Finally, they had every reason
+to hope that<br>
+ they would gain fresh adherents, while their opponents, having
+had everybody<br>
+ with them at the beginning, could only decrease.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Summoned before the judges at a public sitting, Colomban
+immediately perceived<br>
+ that his judges were not anxious to discover the truth. As soon
+as he opened<br>
+ his mouth the President ordered him to be silent in the superior
+interests of<br>
+ the State. For the same reason, which is the supreme reason, the
+witnesses for<br>
+ the defence were not heard. General Panther, the Chief of the
+Staff, appeared<br>
+ in the witness-box, in full uniform and decorated with all his
+orders. He<br>
+ deposed as follows:</p>
+
+<p>"The infamous Colomban states that we have no proofs against
+Pyrot. He lies;<br>
+ we have them. I have in my archives seven hundred and thirty-two
+square yards<br>
+ of them which at five hundred pounds each make three hundred and
+sixty-six<br>
+ thousand pounds."</p>
+
+<p>That superior officer afterwards gave, with elegance and ease,
+a summary of<br>
+ those proofs.</p>
+
+<p>"They are of all colours and all shades," said he in
+substance, "they are of<br>
+ every form--pot, crown, sovereign, grape, dove-cot, grand eagle,
+etc. The<br>
+ smallest is less than the hundredth part of a square inch, the
+largest<br>
+ measures seventy yards long by ninety yards broad."</p>
+
+<p>At this revelation the audience shuddered with horror.</p>
+
+<p>Greatauk came to give evidence in his turn. Simpler, and
+perhaps greater, he<br>
+ wore a grey tunic and held his hands joined behind his back.</p>
+
+<p>"I leave," said he calmly and in a slightly raised voice, "I
+leave to M.<br>
+ Colomban the responsibility for an act that has brought our
+country to the<br>
+ brink of ruin. The Pyrot affair is secret; it ought to remain
+secret. If it<br>
+ were divulged the cruelest ills, wars, pillages, depredations,
+fires,<br>
+ massacres, and epidemics would immediately burst upon Penguinia.
+I should<br>
+ consider myself guilty of high treason if I uttered another
+word."</p>
+
+<p>Some persons known for their political experience, among
+others M. Bigourd,<br>
+ considered the evidence of the Minister of War as abler and of
+greater weight<br>
+ than that of his Chief of Staff.</p>
+
+<p>The evidence of Colonel de Boisjoli made a great
+impression.</p>
+
+<p>"One evening at the Ministry of War," said that officer, "the
+attache of a<br>
+ neighbouring Power told me that while visiting his sovereign's
+stables he had<br>
+ once admired some soft and fragrant hay, of a pretty green
+colour, the finest<br>
+ hay he had ever seen! 'Where did it come from?' I asked him. He
+did not<br>
+ answer, but there seemed to me no doubt about its origin. It was
+the hay Pyrot<br>
+ had stolen. Those qualities of verdure, softness, and aroma, are
+those of our<br>
+ national hay. The forage of the neighbouring Power is grey and
+brittle; it<br>
+ sounds under the fork and smells of dust. One can draw one own
+conclusions."</p>
+
+<p>Lieutenant-Colonel Hastaing said in the witness-box, amid
+hisses, that he did<br>
+ not believe Pyrot guilty. He was immediately seized by the
+police and thrown<br>
+ into the bottom of a dungeon where, amid vipers, toads, and
+broken glass, he<br>
+ remained insensible both to promises and threats.</p>
+
+<p>The usher called:</p>
+
+<p>"Count Pierre Maubec de la Dentdulynx."</p>
+
+<p>There was deep silence, and a stately but ill-dressed
+nobleman, whose<br>
+ moustaches pointed to the skies and whose dark eyes shot forth
+flashing<br>
+ glances, was seen advancing toward the witness-box.</p>
+
+<p>He approached Colomban and casting upon him a look of
+ineffable disdain:</p>
+
+<p>"My evidence," said he, "here it is: you excrement!"</p>
+
+<p>At these words the entire hall burst into enthusiastic
+applause and jumped up,<br>
+ moved by one of those transports that stir men's hearts and
+rouse them to<br>
+ extraordinary actions. Without another word Count Maubec de la
+Dentdulynx<br>
+ withdrew.</p>
+
+<p>All those present left the Court and formed a procession
+behind him. Prostrate<br>
+ at his feet, Princess des Boscenos held his legs in a close
+embrace, but he<br>
+ went on, stern and impassive, beneath a shower of handkerchiefs
+and flowers.<br>
+ Viscountess Olive, clinging to his neck, could not be removed,
+and the calm<br>
+ hero bore her along with him, floating on his breast like a
+light scarf.</p>
+
+<p>When the court resumed its sitting, which it had been
+compelled to suspend,<br>
+ the President called the experts.</p>
+
+<p>Vermillard, the famous expert in handwriting, gave the results
+of his<br>
+ researches.</p>
+
+<p>"Having carefully studied," said he, "the papers found in
+Pyrot's house, in<br>
+ particular his account book and his laundry books, I noticed
+that, though<br>
+ apparently not out of the common, they formed an impenetrable
+cryptogram, the<br>
+ key to which, however, I discovered. The traitor's infamy is to
+be seen in<br>
+ every line. In this system of writing the words 'Three glasses
+of beer and<br>
+ twenty francs for Adele' mean 'I have delivered thirty thousand
+trusses of hay<br>
+ to a neighbouring Power! From these documents I have even been
+able to<br>
+ establish the composition of the hay delivered by this officer.
+The words<br>
+ waistcoat, drawers, pocket handkerchief, collars, drink,
+tobacco, cigars, mean<br>
+ clover, meadowgrass, lucern, burnet, oats, rye-grass,
+vernal-grass, and common<br>
+ cat's tail grass. And these are precisely the constituents of
+the hay<br>
+ furnished by Count Maubec to the Penguin cavalry. In this way
+Pyrot mentioned<br>
+ his crimes in a language that he believed would always remain
+indecipherable.<br>
+ One is confounded by so much astuteness and so great a want of
+conscience."</p>
+
+<p>Colomban, pronounced guilty without any extenuating
+circumstances, was<br>
+ condemned to the severest penalty. The judges immediately signed
+a warrant<br>
+ consuming him to solitary confinement.</p>
+
+<p>In the Place du Palais on the sides of a river whose banks had
+during the<br>
+ course of twelve centuries seen so great a history, fifty
+thousand persons<br>
+ were tumultuously awaiting the result of the trial. Here were
+the heads of the<br>
+ Anti-Pyrotist Association, among whom might be seen Prince des
+Boscenos, Count<br>
+ Clena, Viscount Olive, and M. de La Trumelle; here crowded the
+Reverend Father<br>
+ Agaric and the teachers of St. Mael College with their pupils;
+here the monk<br>
+ Douillard and General Caraguel, embracing each other, formed a
+sublime group.<br>
+ The market women and laundry women with spits, shovels, tongs,
+beetles, and<br>
+ kettles full of water might be seen running across the
+Pont-Vieux. On the<br>
+ steps in front of the bronze gates were assembled all the
+defenders of Pyrot<br>
+ in Alca, professors, publicists, workmen, some conservatives,
+others Radicals<br>
+ or Revolutionaries, and by their negligent dress and fierce
+aspect could be<br>
+ recognised comrades Phoenix, Larrivee, Lapersonne, Dagobert, and
+Varambille.<br>
+ Squeezed in his funereal frock-coat and wearing his hat of
+ceremony,<br>
+ Bidault-Coquille invoked the sentimental mathematics on behalf
+of Colomban and<br>
+ Colonel Hastaing. Maniflore shone smiling and resplendent on the
+topmost step,<br>
+ anxious, like Leaena, to deserve a glorious monument, or to be
+given, like<br>
+ Epicharis, the praises of history.</p>
+
+<p>The seven hundred Pyrotists disguised as lemonade sellers,
+utter-merchants,<br>
+ collectors of odds and ends, or anti-Pyrotists, wandered round
+the vast<br>
+ building.</p>
+
+<p>When Colomban appeared, so great an uproar burst forth that,
+struck by the<br>
+ commotion of air and water, birds fell from the trees and fishes
+floated on<br>
+ the surface of the stream.</p>
+
+<p>On all sides there were yells:</p>
+
+<p>"Duck Colomban, duck him, duck him!"</p>
+
+<p>There were some cries of "Justice and truth!" and a voice was
+even heard<br>
+ shouting:</p>
+
+<p>"Down with the Army!"</p>
+
+<p>This was the signal for a terrible struggle. The combatants
+fell in thousands,<br>
+ and their bodies formed howling and moving mounds on top of
+which fresh<br>
+ champions gripped each other by the throats. Women, eager, pale,
+and<br>
+ dishevelled, with clenched teeth and frantic nails, rushed on
+the man, in<br>
+ transports that, in the brilliant light of the public square,
+gave to their<br>
+ faces expressions unsurpassed even in the shade of curtains and
+in the hollows<br>
+ of pillows. They were going to seize Colomban, to bite him, to
+strangle,<br>
+ dismember and rend him, when Maniflore, tall and dignified in
+her red tunic,<br>
+ stood forth, serene and terrible, confronting these furies who
+recoiled from<br>
+ before her in terror. Colomban seemed to be saved; his partisans
+succeeded in<br>
+ clearing a passage for him through the Place du Palais and in
+putting him into<br>
+ a cab stationed at the comer of the Pont-Vieux. The horse was
+already in full<br>
+ trot when Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, and M. de La
+Trumelle knocked the<br>
+ driver off his seat. Then, making the animal back and pushing
+the spokes of<br>
+ the wheels, they ran the vehicle on to the parapet of the
+bridge, whence they<br>
+ overturned it into the river amid the cheers of the delirious
+crowd. With a<br>
+ resounding splash a jet of water rose upwards, and then nothing
+but a slight<br>
+ eddy was to be seen on the surface of the stream.</p>
+
+<p>Almost immediately comrades Dagobert and Varambille, with the
+help of the<br>
+ seven hundred disguised Pyrotists, sent Prince des Boscenos head
+foremost into<br>
+ a river-laundry in which he was lamentably swallowed up.</p>
+
+<p>Serene night descended over the Place du Palais and shed
+silence and peace<br>
+ upon the frightful ruins with which it was strewed. In the mean
+time,<br>
+ Colomban, three thousand yards down the stream, cowering beside
+a lame old<br>
+ horse on a bridge, was meditating on the ignorance and injustice
+of crowds.</p>
+
+<p>"The business," said he to himself, "is even more troublesome
+than I believed.<br>
+ I foresee fresh difficulties."</p>
+
+<p>He got up and approached the unhappy animal.</p>
+
+<p>"What have you, poor friend, done to them?" said he. "It is on
+my account they<br>
+ have used you so cruelly."</p>
+
+<p>He embraced the unfortunate beast and kissed the white star on
+his forehead.<br>
+ Then he took him by the bridle and led him, both of them
+limping, trough the<br>
+ sleeping city to his house, where sleep soon allowed them to
+forget mankind.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>X. FATHER DOUILLARD</h2>
+
+<p>In their infinite gentleness and at the suggestion of the
+common father of the<br>
+ faithful, the bishops, canons, vicars, curates, abbots, and
+friars of<br>
+ Penguinia resolved to hold a solemn service in the cathedral of
+Alca, and to<br>
+ pray that Divine mercy would deign to put an end to the troubles
+that<br>
+ distracted one of the noblest countries in Christendom, and
+grant to repentant<br>
+ Penguinia pardon for its crimes against God and the ministers of
+religion.</p>
+
+<p>The ceremony took place on the fifteenth of June. General
+Caraguel, surrounded<br>
+ by his staff, occupied the churchwarden's pew. The congregation
+was numerous<br>
+ and brilliant. According to M. Bigourd's expression it was both
+crowded and<br>
+ select. In the front rank was to be seen M. de la Bertheoseille,
+Chamberlain<br>
+ to his Highness Prince Crucho. Near the pulpit, which was to be
+ascended by<br>
+ the Reverend Father Douillard, of the Order of St. Francis, were
+gathered, in<br>
+ an attitude of attention with their hands crossed upon their
+wands of office,<br>
+ the great dignitaries of the Anti-Pyrotist association, Viscount
+Olive, M. de<br>
+ La Trumelle, Count Clena, the Duke d'Ampoule, and Prince des
+Boscenos. Father<br>
+ Agaric was in the apse with the teachers and pupils of St. Mael
+College. The<br>
+ right-hand transept and aisle were reserved for officers and
+soldiers in<br>
+ uniform, this side being thought the more honourable, since the
+Lord leaned<br>
+ his head to the right when he died on the Cross. The ladies of
+the<br>
+ aristocracy, and among them Countess Clena, Viscountess Olive,
+and Princess<br>
+ des Boscenos, occupied reserved seats. In the immense building
+and in the<br>
+ square outside were gathered twenty thousand clergy of all
+sorts, as well as<br>
+ thirty thousand of the laity.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ After the expiatory and propitiatory ceremony the Reverend
+Father Douillard<br>
+ ascended the pulpit. The sermon had at first been entrusted to
+the Reverend<br>
+ Father Agaric, but, in spite of his merits, he was thought
+unequal to the<br>
+ occasion in zeal and doctrine, and the eloquent Capuchin friar,
+who for six<br>
+ months had gone through the barracks preaching against the
+enemies of God and<br>
+ authority, had been chosen in his place.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father Douillard, taking as his text, "He hath
+put down the<br>
+ mighty from their seat," established that all temporal power has
+God as its<br>
+ principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when
+it turns aside<br>
+ from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from the
+end to which<br>
+ He has directed it.</p>
+
+<p>Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he
+drew a terrible<br>
+ picture of the evils that the country's rulers had been unable
+either to<br>
+ prevent or to foresee.</p>
+
+<p>"The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my
+brethren," said<br>
+ he, "is only too well known to you. He is a monster whose
+destiny is<br>
+ providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from
+the Greek word,<br>
+ pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this
+etymology that a Jew<br>
+ was to set ablaze the country that had welcomed him."</p>
+
+<p>He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the
+Church, and<br>
+ crying in its agony:</p>
+
+<p>"O woe! O glory! Those who have crucified my God are
+crucifying me!"</p>
+
+<p>At these words a prolonged shudder passed through the
+assembly.</p>
+
+<p>The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he
+described the<br>
+ proud and crime-stained Colomban, plunged into the stream, all
+the waters of<br>
+ which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the humiliations
+and all the<br>
+ perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the President of the
+Republic and<br>
+ his Prime Minister with them.</p>
+
+<p>"That Minister," said he, "having been guilty of degrading
+cowardice in not<br>
+ exterminating the seven hundred Pyrotists with their allies and
+defenders, as<br>
+ Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered
+himself unworthy of<br>
+ exercising the power. that God delegated to him, and every good
+citizen ought<br>
+ henceforth to insult his contemptible government. Heaven will
+look favourably<br>
+ on those who despise him. 'He hath put down the mighty from
+their seat.' God<br>
+ will depose these pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their
+place strong men<br>
+ who will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you
+officers,<br>
+ non-commissioned officers, and soldiers who listen to me, I tell
+you General<br>
+ of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey
+God's orders, if<br>
+ in His name you do not depose those now in authority, if you do
+not establish<br>
+ a religious and strong government in Penguinia, God will none
+the less destroy<br>
+ what He has condemned, He will none the less save His people. He
+will save<br>
+ them, but, if you are wanting, He will do so by means of a
+humble artisan or a<br>
+ simple corporal. Hasten! The hour will soon be past."</p>
+
+<p>Excited by this ardent exhortation, the sixty thousand people
+present rose up<br>
+ trembling and shouting: "To arms! To arms! Death to the
+Pyrotists! Hurrah for<br>
+ Crucho!" and all of them, monks, women, soldiers, noblemen,
+citizens, and<br>
+ loafers, who were gathered beneath the superhuman arm uplifted
+in the pulpit,<br>
+ struck up the hymn, "Let us save Penguinia! They rushed
+impetuously from the<br>
+ basilica and marched along the quays to the Chamber of
+Deputies.</p>
+
+<p>Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting
+his arms to<br>
+ heaven, murmured in broken accents:</p>
+
+<p>"Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well
+whither this will<br>
+ lead us."</p>
+
+<p>The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace
+was repulsed.<br>
+ Vigorously charged by the police and Alcan guards, the
+assailants were already<br>
+ fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists, running from the slums
+and led by<br>
+ comrades Phoenix, Dagobert, Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw
+themselves upon<br>
+ them and completed their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and
+d'Ampoule were<br>
+ taken to the police station. Prince des Boscenos, after a
+valiant struggle,<br>
+ fell upon the bloody pavement with a fractured skull.</p>
+
+<p>In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an
+innumerable crowd<br>
+ of paper-sellers and gutter-merchants, ran through the
+boulevards all night,<br>
+ carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the mirrors of the
+cafes and the<br>
+ glasses of the street lamps amid cries of "Down with Crucho!
+Hurrah for the<br>
+ Social Revolution!" The Anti-Pyrotists in their turn upset the
+newspaper<br>
+ kiosks and tore down the hoardings.</p>
+
+<p>These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and
+they were fit<br>
+ causes for grief to the municipal authorities, who desired to
+preserve the<br>
+ good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder for a
+man of heart<br>
+ was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from fear of blows,
+kept at an<br>
+ equal distance from the two camps, and who, although they
+allowed their<br>
+ selfishness and cowardice to be visible, claimed admiration for
+the generosity<br>
+ of their sentiments and the nobility of their souls. They rubbed
+their eyes<br>
+ with onions, gaped like whitings, blew violently into their
+handkerchiefs,<br>
+ and, bringing their voices out of the depths of their stomachs,
+groaned forth:<br>
+ "O Penguins, cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend
+your mother's<br>
+ bosom!" As if men could live in society without disputes and
+without quarrels,<br>
+ and as if civil discords were not the necessary conditions of
+national life<br>
+ and progress. They showed themselves hypocritical cowards by
+proposing a<br>
+ compromise between the just and the unjust, offending the just
+in his<br>
+ rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these creatures,
+the rich and<br>
+ powerful Machimel, a champion coward, rose upon the town like a
+colossus of<br>
+ grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at his feet and his
+sighs capsized the<br>
+ boats of the fishermen.</p>
+
+<p>During these stormy nights Bidault-Coquille at the top of his
+old<br>
+ steam-engine, under the serene sky, boasted in his heart, while
+the shooting<br>
+ stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He was
+fighting for<br>
+ justice. He loved and was loved with a sublime passion. Insult
+and calumny<br>
+ raised him to the clouds. A caricature of him in company with
+those of<br>
+ Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be seen in the
+newspaper<br>
+ kiosks. The Anti-Pyrotists proclaimed that he had received fifty
+thousand<br>
+ francs from the big Jewish financiers. The reporters of the
+militarist sheets<br>
+ held interviews regarding his scientific knowledge with official
+scholars, who<br>
+ declared he had no knowledge of the stars, disputed his most
+solid<br>
+ observations, denied his most certain discoveries, and condemned
+his most<br>
+ ingenious and most fruitful hypotheses. He exulted under these
+flattering<br>
+ blows of hatred and envy.</p>
+
+<p>He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of
+lights, without<br>
+ giving a thought to all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias,
+vain dreams,<br>
+ spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a great
+city contains.</p>
+
+<p>"It is in this enormous city," said he to himself, "that the
+just and the<br>
+ unjust are joining battle."</p>
+
+<p>And substituting a simple and magnificent poetry for the
+multiple and vulgar<br>
+ reality, he represented to himself the Pyrot affair as a
+struggle between good<br>
+ and bad angels. He awaited the eternal triumph of the Sons of
+Light and<br>
+ congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day confounding
+the Children of<br>
+ Night.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>X. MR. JUSTICE CHAUSSEPIED</h2>
+
+<p>Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the
+bands of Friar<br>
+ Douillard and the partisans of Prince Crucho, the Republicans at
+last opened<br>
+ their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair. The
+deputies who<br>
+ had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the patriotic
+crowds became,<br>
+ not indeed more courageous, but altered their cowardice and
+blamed Robin<br>
+ Mielleux for disorders which their own compliance had
+encouraged, and the<br>
+ instigators of which they had several times slavishly
+congratulated. They<br>
+ reproached him for having imperilled the Republic by a weakness
+which was<br>
+ really theirs and a timidity which they themselves had imposed
+upon him. Some<br>
+ of them began to doubt whether it was not to their interest to
+believe in<br>
+ Pyrot's innocence rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward
+they felt a<br>
+ bitter anguish at the thought that the unhappy man might have
+been wrongly<br>
+ convicted and that in his aerial cage he might be expiating
+another man's<br>
+ crimes. "I cannot sleep on account of it!" was what several
+members of<br>
+ Minister Guillaumette's majority used to say. But these were
+ambitious to<br>
+ replace their chief.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the
+President of the<br>
+ Republic put in Robin Mielleux's place, a patriarchal Republican
+with a<br>
+ flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the
+Penguins, understood<br>
+ nothing about the affair, but thought that too many monks were
+mixed up in it.</p>
+
+<p>General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his
+final advice to<br>
+ Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.</p>
+
+<p>"I go and you remain," said he, as he shook hands with him.
+"The Pyrot affair<br>
+ is my daughter; I confide her to you, she is worthy of your love
+and your<br>
+ care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves the
+shade, is<br>
+ leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her
+modesty with<br>
+ gentleness. Too many indiscreet looks have already profaned her
+charms. . . .<br>
+ Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You have
+many, perhaps too<br>
+ many, in your possession. I see that there will be many tiresome
+interventions<br>
+ and much dangerous curiosity. If I were in your place I would
+tear up all<br>
+ those documents. Believe me, the best of proofs is none at all.
+That is the<br>
+ only one which nobody discusses."</p>
+
+<p>Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this
+advice. The future<br>
+ was only too thoroughly to justify Greatauk's perspicacity. La
+Trinite<br>
+ demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche,
+his Minister<br>
+ of War, refused them in the superior interests of the national
+defence,<br>
+ telling him that the documents under General Panther's care
+formed the hugest<br>
+ mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied the case as
+well as he<br>
+ could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of the matter,
+suspected it of<br>
+ irregularity. Conformably to his rights and prerogatives he then
+ordered a<br>
+ fresh trial to be held. Immediately, Peniche, his Minister of
+War, accused him<br>
+ of insulting the army and betraying the country and flung his
+portfolio at his<br>
+ head. He was replaced by a second, who did the same. To him
+succeeded a third,<br>
+ who imitated these examples, and those after him to the number
+of seventy<br>
+ acted like their predecessors, until the venerable La Trinite
+groaned beneathe<br>
+ the weight of bellicose portfolios. The seventy-first Minister
+of War, van<br>
+ Julep, retained office. Not that he was in disagreement with so
+many and such<br>
+ noble colleagues, but he had been commissioned by them
+generously to betray<br>
+ his Prime Minister, to cover him with shame and opprobrium, and
+to convert the<br>
+ new trial to the glory of Greatauk, the satisfaction of the
+Anti-Pyrotists,<br>
+ the profit of the monks, and the restoration of Prince
+Crucho.</p>
+
+<p>General van Julep, though endowed with high military virtues,
+was not<br>
+ intelligent enough to employ the subtle conduct and exquisite
+methods of<br>
+ Greatauk. He thought, like General Panther, that tangible proofs
+against Pyrot<br>
+ were necessary, that they could never ave too many of them, that
+they could<br>
+ never have even enough. He expressed these' sentiments to his
+Chief of Staff,<br>
+ who was only too inclined to agree with them.</p>
+
+<p>"Panther," said he, "we are at the moment when we need
+abundant and<br>
+ superabundant proofs."</p>
+
+<p>"You have said enough, General," answered Panther, "I will
+complete my piles<br>
+ of documents."</p>
+
+<p>Six months later the proofs against Pyrot filled two storeys
+of the Ministry<br>
+ of War. The ceiling fell in beneath the weight of the bundles,
+and the<br>
+ avalanche of falling documents crushed two head clerks, fourteen
+second<br>
+ clerks, and sixty copying clerks, who were at work upon the
+ground floor<br>
+ arranging a change in the fashion of the cavalry gaiters. The
+walls of the<br>
+ huge edifice had to be propped. Passers-by saw with amazement
+enormous beams<br>
+ and monstrous stanchions which reared themselves obliquely
+against the noble<br>
+ front of the building, now tottering and disjointed, and blocked
+up the<br>
+ streets, stopped the carriages, and presented to the
+motor-omnibuses an<br>
+ obstacle against which they dashed with their loads of
+passengers.</p>
+
+<p>The judges who had condemned Pyrot were not, properly
+speaking, judges but<br>
+ soldiers. The judges who had condemned Colomban were real
+judges, but of<br>
+ inferior rank, wearing seedy black clothes like church vergers,
+unlucky<br>
+ wretches of judges, miserable judgelings. Above them were the
+superior judges<br>
+ who wore ermine robes over their black gowns. These, renowned
+for their<br>
+ knowledge and doctrine, formed a court whose terrible name
+expressed power. It<br>
+ was called the Court of Appeal (Cassation) so as to make it
+clear that it was<br>
+ the hammer suspended over the judgments and decrees of all
+other<br>
+ jurisdictions.</p>
+
+<p>One of these superior red Judges of the Supreme Court, called
+Chaussepied, led<br>
+ a modest and tranquil life in a suburb of Alca. His soul was
+pure, his heart<br>
+ honest, his spirit just. When he had finished studying his
+documents he used<br>
+ to play the violin and cultivate hyacinths. Every Sunday he
+dined with his<br>
+ neighbours the Mesdemoiselles Helbivore. His old age was
+cheerful and robust<br>
+ and his friends often praised the amenity of his character.</p>
+
+<p>For some months, however, he had been irritable and touchy,
+and when he opened<br>
+ a newspaper his broad and ruddy face would become covered with
+dolorous<br>
+ wrinkles and darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the cause
+of it. Justice<br>
+ Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could have
+committed so black<br>
+ a crime as to hand over eighty thousand trusses of military hay
+to a<br>
+ neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could still less conceive
+how a<br>
+ scoundrel should have found official defenders in Penguinia. The
+thought that<br>
+ there existed in his country a Pyrot, a Colonel Hastaing, a
+Colomban, a<br>
+ Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his hyacinths,his violin, his
+heaven, and his<br>
+ earth, all nature, and even his dinner with the Mesdemoiselles
+Helbivore!</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time the Pyrot case, having been presented to the
+Supreme Court by<br>
+ the Keeper of Seals, it fell to Chaussepied to examine it and
+cover its<br>
+ defects, in case any existed. Although as upright and honest as
+a man can be,<br>
+ and trained by long habit to exercise his magistracy without
+fear or favour,<br>
+ he expected to find in the documents he submitted to him proofs
+of certain<br>
+ guilt and obvious criminality. After lengthened difficulties and
+repeated<br>
+ refusals on the part of General Julep, Justice Chaussepied was
+allowed to<br>
+ examine the documents. Numbered and initialed they ran to the
+number of<br>
+ fourteen millions six hundred and twenty-six thousand three
+hundred and<br>
+ twelve. As he studied them the judge was at first surprised,
+then astonished,<br>
+ then stupefied, amazed, and, if I dare say so, flabbergasted. He
+found among<br>
+ the documents prospectuses of new fancy shops, newspapers,
+fashion-plates,<br>
+ paper bags, old business letters, exercise books, brown paper,
+green paper for<br>
+ rubbing parquet floors, playing cards, diagrams, six thousand
+copies of the<br>
+ "Key to Dreams," but not a single document in which any mention
+was made of<br>
+ Pyrot.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>XI. CONCLUSION</h2>
+
+<p>The appeal was allowed, and Pyrot was brought down from his
+cage. But the<br>
+ Anti-Pyrotists did not regard themselves as beaten. The military
+judges<br>
+ re-tried Pyrot. Greatauk, in this second affair, surpassed
+himself. He<br>
+ obtained a second conviction; he obtained it by declaring that
+the proofs<br>
+ communicated to the Supreme Court were worth nothing, and that
+great care had<br>
+ been taken to keep back the good ones, since they ought to
+remain secret. In<br>
+ the opinion of connoisseurs he had never shown so much address.
+On leaving the<br>
+ court, as he passed through the vestibule with a tranquil step,
+and his hands<br>
+ behind his back, amidst a crowd of sight-seers, a woman dressed
+in red and<br>
+ with her face covered by a black veil rushed at him, brandishing
+a kitchen<br>
+ knife.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "Die, scoundrel!" she cried. It was Maniflore. Before those
+present could<br>
+ understand what was happening, the general seized her by the
+wrist, and with<br>
+ apparent gentleness, squeezed it so forcibly that the knife fell
+from her<br>
+ aching hand.</p>
+
+<p>Then he picked it up and handed it to Maniflore.</p>
+
+<p>"Madam," said he with a bow, "you have dropped a household
+utensil."</p>
+
+<p>He could not prevent the heroine from being taken to the
+police-station; but<br>
+ he had her immediately released and afterwards he employed all
+his influence<br>
+ to stop the prosecution.</p>
+
+<p>The second conviction of Pyrot was Greatauk's last
+victory.</p>
+
+<p>Justice Chaussepied, who had formerly liked soldiers so much,
+and esteemed<br>
+ their justice so highly,, being now enraged with the military
+judges, quashed<br>
+ their judgments as a monkey cracks nuts. He rehabilitated Pyrot
+a second time;<br>
+ he would, if necessary, have rehabilitated him five hundred
+times.</p>
+
+<p>Furious at having been cowards and at having allowed
+themselves to be deceived<br>
+ and made game of, the Republicans turned against the monks and
+clergy. The<br>
+ deputies passed laws of expulsion, separation, and spoliation
+against them.<br>
+ What Father Cornemuse had foreseen took place. That good monk
+was driven from<br>
+ the Wood of Conils. Treasury officers confiscated his retorts
+and his stills,<br>
+ and the liquidators divided amongst them his bottles of St.
+Oberosian liqueur.<br>
+ The pious distiller lost the annual income of three million five
+hundred<br>
+ thousand francs that his products procured for him. Father
+Agaric went into<br>
+ exile, abandoning his school into the hands of laymen, who soon
+allowed it to<br>
+ fall into decay. Separated from its foster-mother, the State,
+the Church of<br>
+ Penguinia withered like a plucked flower.</p>
+
+<p>The victorious defenders of the innocent man now abused each
+other and<br>
+ overwhelmed each other reciprocally with insults and calumnies.
+The vehement<br>
+ Kerdanic hurled himself upon Phoenix as if ready to devour him.
+The wealthy<br>
+ Jews and the seven hundred Pyrotists turned away with disdain
+from the<br>
+ socialist comrades whose aid they had humbly implored in the
+past.</p>
+
+<p>"We know you no longer," said they. "To the devil with you and
+your social<br>
+ justice. Social justice is the defence of property."</p>
+
+<p>Having been elected a Deputy and chosen to be the leader of
+the new majority,<br>
+ comrade Larrivee was appointed by the Chamber and public opinion
+to the<br>
+ Premiership. He showed himself an energetic defender of the
+military tribunals<br>
+ that had condemned Pyrot. When his former socialist comrades
+claimed a little<br>
+ more justice and liberty for the employes of the State as well
+as for manual<br>
+ workers, he opposed their proposals in an eloquent speech.</p>
+
+<p>"Liberty," said he, "is not licence. Between order and
+disorder my choice is<br>
+ made: revolution is impotence. Progress has no more formidable
+enemy than<br>
+ violence. Gentlemen, those who, as I am, are anxious for reform,
+ought to<br>
+ apply themselves before everything else to cure this agitation
+which enfeebles<br>
+ government just as fever exhausts those who are ill. It is time
+to reassure<br>
+ honest people."</p>
+
+<p>This speech was received with applause. The government of the
+Republic<br>
+ remained in subjection to the great financial companies, the
+army was<br>
+ exclusively devoted to the defence of capital, while the fleet
+was designed<br>
+ solely to procure fresh orders for the mine-owners. Since the
+rich refused to<br>
+ pay their just share of the taxes, the poor, as in the past,
+paid for them.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time from the height of his old steamline, beneath
+the crowded<br>
+ stars of night, Bidault-Coquille gazed sadly at the sleeping
+city. Maniflore<br>
+ had left him. Consumed with a desire for fresh devotions and
+fresh sacrifices,<br>
+ she had gone in company with a young Bulgarian to bear justice
+and vengeance<br>
+ to Sofia. He did not regret her, having perceived after the
+Affair, that she<br>
+ was less beautiful in form and in thought than he had at first
+imagined. His<br>
+ impressions had been modified in the same direction concerning
+many other<br>
+ forms and many other thoughts. And what was cruelest of all to
+him, he<br>
+ regarded himself as not so great, not so splendid, as he had
+believed.</p>
+
+<p>And he reflected:</p>
+
+<p>"You considered yourself sublime when you had but candour and
+good-will. Of<br>
+ what were you proud, Bidault-Coquille? Of having been one of the
+first to know<br>
+ that Pyrot was innocent and Greatauk a scoundrel. But
+three-fourths of those<br>
+ who defended Greatauk against the attacks of the seven hundred
+Pyrotists knew<br>
+ that better than you. Of what then did you show yourself so
+proud? Of having<br>
+ dared to say what you thought? That is civic courage, and, like
+military<br>
+ courage, it is a mere result of imprudence. You have been
+imprudent. So far so<br>
+ good, but that is no reason for praising yourself beyond
+measure. Your<br>
+ imprudence was trifling; it exposed you to trifling perils; you
+did not risk<br>
+ your head by it. The Penguins have lost that cruel and
+sanguinary pride which<br>
+ formerly gave a tragic grandeur to their revolutions; it is the
+fatal result<br>
+ of the weakening of beliefs and character. Ought one to look
+upon oneself as a<br>
+ superior spirit for having shown a little more clear-sightedness
+than the<br>
+ vulgar? I am very much afraid, on the contrary,
+Bidault-Coquille, that you<br>
+ have given proof of a gross misunderstanding of the conditions
+of the moral<br>
+ and intellectual development of a people. You imagined that
+social injustices<br>
+ were threaded together like pearls and that it would be enough
+to pull off one<br>
+ in order to unfasten the whole necklace. That is a very
+ingenuous conception.<br>
+ You flattered yourself that at one stroke you were establishing
+justice in<br>
+ your own country and in the universe. You were a brave man, an
+honest<br>
+ idealist, though without much experimental philosophy. But go
+home to your own<br>
+ heart and you will recognise that you had in you a spice of
+malice and that<br>
+ our ingenuousness was not without cunning. You believed you were
+performing a<br>
+ fine moral action. You said to yourself: 'Here am I, just and
+courageous once<br>
+ for all. I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the
+praise of<br>
+ historians.' And now that you have lost your illusions, now that
+you know how<br>
+ hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the task must ever be
+begun afresh, you<br>
+ are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but go back to
+them with<br>
+ modesty, Bidault-Coquille!"</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1>BOOK VII. MODERN TIMES</h1>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>MADAME CERES</h2>
+
+<p>"Only extreme things are tolerable." Count Robert de
+Montesquiou.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>I. MADAME CLARENCE'S DRAWING-ROOM</h2>
+
+<p>Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the
+Republic, loved to<br>
+ entertain. Every Thursday she collected together some friends of
+modest<br>
+ condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who went
+to see her,<br>
+ very different in age and rank, were all without money, and had
+all suffered<br>
+ much. There was a duchess who looked like a fortune-teller and
+a<br>
+ fortune-teller who looked like a duchess. Madame Clarence was
+pretty enough to<br>
+ maintain some old liaisons, but not to form new ones, and she
+generally<br>
+ inspired a quiet esteem. She had a very pretty daughter, who,
+since she had no<br>
+ dower, caused some alarm among the male guests; for the Penguins
+were as much<br>
+ afraid of portionless girls as they were of the devil himself.
+Eveline<br>
+ Clarence, noticing their reserve and perceiving its cause, used
+to hand them<br>
+ their tea with an air of disdain. Moreover, she seldom appeared
+at the parties<br>
+ and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her
+discreet and<br>
+ retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since
+those who took<br>
+ part in it thought either that as she was a young girl she would
+not<br>
+ understand it, or that, being twenty-five years old, she might
+listen to<br>
+ everything.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence's drawing-room, the
+conversation<br>
+ turned upon love. The ladies spoke of it with pride, delicacy,
+and mystery,<br>
+ the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone took an interest
+in the<br>
+ conversation, for each one was interested in what he or she
+said. A great deal<br>
+ of wit flowed; brilliant apostrophes were launched forth and
+keen repartees<br>
+ were returned. But when Professor Haddi began to speak he
+overwhelmed<br>
+ everybody.</p>
+
+<p>"It is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on
+everything else,"<br>
+ said he, "they rest upon anterior habits whose very memory has
+been effaced.<br>
+ In morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds for
+existing, the most<br>
+ useless obligations, the cruelest and most injurious restraints,
+are because<br>
+ of their profound antiquity and the mystery of their origin, the
+least<br>
+ disputed and the least disputable as well as the most respected,
+and they are<br>
+ those that cannot be violated without incurring the most severe
+blame. All<br>
+ morality relative to the relations of the sexes is founded on
+this principle:<br>
+ that a woman once obtained belongs to the man, that she is his
+property like<br>
+ his horse or his weapons. And this having ceased to be true,
+absurdities<br>
+ result from it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a
+woman to a man,<br>
+ with clauses restricting the right of ownership introduced as a
+consequence of<br>
+ the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.</p>
+
+<p>"The obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her
+virginity to her<br>
+ husband comes from the times when girls were married immediately
+they were of<br>
+ a marriageable age. It is ridiculous that a girl who marries at
+twenty-five or<br>
+ thirty should be subject to that obligation. You will, perhaps,
+say that it is<br>
+ a present with which her husband, if she gets one at last, will
+be gratified;<br>
+ but every moment we see men wooing married women and showing
+themselves<br>
+ perfectly satisfied to take them as they find them.</p>
+
+<p>"Still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined
+in religious<br>
+ morality by the old belief that God, the most powerful of
+warriors, is<br>
+ polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself, and
+that men can<br>
+ only take those whom he has left. This belief, although traces
+of it exist in<br>
+ several metaphors of mysticism, is abandoned to-day, by most
+civilised<br>
+ peoples. However, it still dominates the education of girls not
+only among our<br>
+ believers, but even among our free-thinkers, who, as a rule,
+think freely for<br>
+ the reason that they do not think at all.</p>
+
+<p>"Discretion means ability to separate and discern. We say that
+a girl is<br>
+ discreet when she knows nothing at all. We cultivate her
+ignorance. In spite<br>
+ of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot
+conceal from<br>
+ them their own nature and their own sensations. But they know
+badly, they know<br>
+ in a wrong way. That is all we obtain by our careful education.
+. . ."</p>
+
+<p>"Sir," suddenly said Joseph Boutourle, the High Treasurer of
+Alca, "believe<br>
+ me, there are innocent girls, perfectly innocent girls, and it
+is a great<br>
+ pity. I have known three. They married, and the result was
+tragical."</p>
+
+<p>"I have noticed," Professor Haddock went on, "that Europeans
+in general and<br>
+ Penguins in particular occupy themselves, after sport and
+motoring, with<br>
+ nothing so much as with love. It is giving a great deal of
+importance to a<br>
+ matter that has very little weight."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, Professor," exclaimed Madame Cremeur in a choking
+voice, "when a woman<br>
+ has completely surrendered herself to you, you think it is a
+matter of no<br>
+ importance?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, Madame; it can have its importance," answered Professor
+Haddock, "but it<br>
+ is necessary to examine if when she surrenders herself to us she
+offers us a<br>
+ delicious fruit-garden or a plot of thistles and dandelions. And
+then, do we<br>
+ not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather than
+gives herself.<br>
+ Look at the pretty Madame Pensee. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>"She is my mother," said a tall, fair young man.</p>
+
+<p>"Sir, I have the greatest respect for her," replied Professor
+Haddock; "do not<br>
+ be afraid that I intend to say anything in the least offensive
+about her. But<br>
+ allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of sons about
+their mothers<br>
+ are not to be relied on. They do not bear enough in mind that a
+mother is a<br>
+ mother only because she loved, and that she can still love.
+That, however, is<br>
+ the case, and it would be deplorable were it otherwise. I have
+noticed, on the<br>
+ contrary, that daughters do not deceive themselves about their
+mothers'<br>
+ faculty for loving or about the use they make of it; they are
+rivals; they<br>
+ have their eyes upon them."</p>
+
+<p>The insupportable Professor spoke a great deal longer, adding
+indecorum to<br>
+ awkwardness, and impertinence to incivility, accumulating
+incongruities,<br>
+ despising what is respectable, respecting what is despicable;
+but no one<br>
+ listened to him further.</p>
+
+<p>During this time in a room that was simple without grace, a
+room sad for the<br>
+ want of love, a room which, like all young girls' rooms, had
+something of the<br>
+ cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, Eveline Clarence
+turned over<br>
+ the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of charities in order
+to obtain<br>
+ from them some acquaintance with society. Being convinced that
+her mother,<br>
+ shut up in her own intellectual but poor world, could neither
+bring her out or<br>
+ push her into prominence, she decided that she herself would
+seek the best<br>
+ means of winning a husband. At once calm and obstinate, without
+dreams or<br>
+ illusions, and regarding marriage as but a ticket of admission
+or a passport,<br>
+ she kept before her mind a clear notion of the hazards,
+difficulties, and<br>
+ chances of her enterprise. She had the art of pleasing and a
+coldness of<br>
+ temperament that enabled her to turn it to its fullest
+advantage. Her weakness<br>
+ lay in the fact that she was dazzled by anything that had an
+aristocratic air.</p>
+
+<p>When she was alone with her mother she said:</p>
+
+<p>"Mamma, we will go to-morrow to Father Douillard's
+retreat."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>II. THE CHARITY OF ST. ORBEROSIA</h2>
+
+<p>Every Friday evening at nine o'clock the choicest of Alcan
+society assembled<br>
+ in the aristocratic church of St. Mael for the Reverend Father
+Douillard's<br>
+ retreat. Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Viscount and
+Viscountess Olive, M.<br>
+ and Madame Bigourd, Monsieur and Madame de La Trumelle were
+never absent. The<br>
+ flower of the aristocracy might be seen there, and fair Jewish
+baronesses also<br>
+ adorned it by their presence, for the Jewish baronesses of Alca
+were<br>
+ Christians.</p>
+
+<p>This retreat, like all religious retreats, had for its object
+to procure for<br>
+ those living in the world opportunities for recollection so that
+they might<br>
+ think of their eternal salvation. It was also intended to draw
+down upon so<br>
+ man noble and illustrious families the benediction of L.
+Orberosia, who loves<br>
+ the Penguins. The Reverend Father Douillard strove for the
+completion of his<br>
+ task with a truly apostolical zeal. He hoped to restore the
+prerogatives of<br>
+ St. Orberosia as the patron saint of Penguinia and to dedicate
+to her a<br>
+ monumental church on one of the hills that dominate the city.
+His efforts had<br>
+ been crowned with great success, and for the accomplishing of
+this national<br>
+ enterprise he had already united more than a hundred thousand
+adherents and<br>
+ collected more than twenty millions of francs.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ It was in the choir of St. Mael's that St. Orberosia's new
+shrine, shining<br>
+ with gold, sparkling with precious stones, and surrounded by
+tapers and<br>
+ flowers, had been erected.</p>
+
+<p>The following account may be read in the "History of the
+Miracles of the<br>
+ Patron Saint of Alca" by the Abbe Plantain:</p>
+
+<p>"The ancient shrine had been melted down during the Terror and
+the precious<br>
+ relics of the saint thrown into a fire that had been lit on the
+Place de<br>
+ Greve; but a poor woman of great piety, named Rouquin, went by
+night at the<br>
+ peril of her life to gather up the calcined bones and the ashes
+of the blessed<br>
+ saint. She preserved them in a jam-pot, and when religion was
+again restored,<br>
+ brought them to the venerable Cure of St. Maels. The woman ended
+her days<br>
+ piously as a vendor of tapers and custodian of seats in the
+saint's chapel."</p>
+
+<p>It is certain that in the time of Father Douillard, although
+faith was<br>
+ declining, the cult of St. Orberosia, which for three hundred
+years had fallen<br>
+ under the criticism of Canon Princeteau and the silence of the
+Doctors of the<br>
+ Church, recovered, and was surrounded with more pomp, more
+splendour, and more<br>
+ fervour than ever. The theologians did not now subtract a single
+iota from the<br>
+ legend. They held as certainly established all the facts related
+by Abbot<br>
+ Simplicissimus, and in particular declared, on the testimony of
+that monk,<br>
+ that the devil, assuming a monk's form had carried off the saint
+to a cave and<br>
+ had there striven with her until she overcame him. Neither
+places nor dates<br>
+ caused them any embarrassment. They paid no heed to exegesis and
+took good<br>
+ care not to grant as much to science as Canon Princeteau had
+formerly<br>
+ conceded. They knew too well whither that would lead.</p>
+
+<p>The church shone with lights and flowers. An operatic tenor
+sang the famous<br>
+ canticle of St. Orberosia:</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>Virgin of Paradise<br>
+ Come, come in the dusky night<br>
+ And on us shed<br>
+ Thy beams of light.</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+<p>Mademoiselle Clarence sat beside her mother and in front of
+Viscount Clena.<br>
+ She remained kneeling during a considerable time, for the
+attitude of prayer<br>
+ is natural to discreet virgins and it shows off their
+figures.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. He was a
+powerful orator<br>
+ and could, at once melt, surprise, and rouse his hearers. Women
+complained<br>
+ only that he fulminated against vice with excessive harshness
+and in crude<br>
+ terms that made them blush. But they liked him none the less for
+it.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ He treated in his sermon of the seventh trial of St. Orberosia,
+who was<br>
+ tempted by the dragon which she went forth to combat. But she
+did not yield,<br>
+ and she disarmed the monster. The orator demonstrated without
+difficulty that<br>
+ we, also, by the aid of St. Orberosia, and strong in the virtue
+which she<br>
+ inspires, can in our turn overthrow the dragons that dart upon
+us and are<br>
+ waiting to devour us, the dragon of doubt, the dragon of
+impiety, the dragon<br>
+ of forgetfulness of religious duties. He proved that the charity
+of St.<br>
+ Orberosia was a work of social regeneration, and he concluded by
+an ardent<br>
+ appeal to the faithful "to become instruments of the Divine
+mercy, eager<br>
+ upholders and supporters of the charity of St. Orberosia, and to
+furnish it<br>
+ with all the means which it required to take its flight and bear
+its salutary<br>
+ fruits." *</p>
+
+<p>* Cf. J. Ernest Charles in the "Censeur," May-August, 1907, p.
+562, col. 2.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ After the ceremony, the Reverend Father Douillard remained in
+the sacristy at<br>
+ the disposal of those of the faithful who desired information
+concerning the<br>
+ charity, or who wished to bring their contributions.
+Mademoiselle Clarence<br>
+ wished to speak to Father Douillard, so did Viscount Clena. The
+crowd was<br>
+ large, and a queue was formed. By chance Viscount Clena and
+Mademoiselle<br>
+ Clarence were side by side and possibly they were squeezed a
+little closely to<br>
+ each other by the crowd. Eveline had noticed this fashionable
+young man, who<br>
+ was almost as well known as his father in the world of sport.
+Clena had<br>
+ noticed her, and, as he thought her pretty, he bowed to her,
+then apologised<br>
+ and pretended to believe that he had been introduced to the
+ladies, but could<br>
+ not remember where. They pretended to believe it also.</p>
+
+<p>He presented himself the following week at Madame Clarence's,
+thinking that<br>
+ her house was a bit fast--a thing not likely to displease
+him--and when he saw<br>
+ Eveline again he felt he had not been mistaken and that she was
+an extremely<br>
+ pretty girl.</p>
+
+<p>Viscount Clena had the finest motor-car in Europe. For three
+months he drove<br>
+ the Clarences every day over hills and plains, through woods and
+valleys; they<br>
+ visited famous sites and went over celebrated castles. He said
+to Eveline all<br>
+ that could be said and did all that could be done to overcome
+her resistance.<br>
+ She did not conceal from him that she loved him, that she would
+always love<br>
+ him, and love no one but him. She remained grave and trembling
+by his side. To<br>
+ his devouring passion she opposed the invincible defence of a
+virtue conscious<br>
+ of its danger. At the end of three months, after having gone
+uphill and down<br>
+ hill, turned sharp corners, and negotiated level crossings, and
+experienced<br>
+ innumerable break-downs, he knew her as well as he knew the
+fly-wheel of his<br>
+ car, but not much better. He employed surprises, adventures,
+sudden stoppages<br>
+ in the depths of forests and before hotels, but he had advanced
+no farther. He<br>
+ said to himself that it was absurd; then, taking her again in
+his car he set<br>
+ off at fifty miles an hour quite prepared to upset her in a
+ditch or to smash<br>
+ himself and her against a tree.</p>
+
+<p>One day, having come to take her on some excursion, he found
+her more charming<br>
+ than ever, and more provoking. He darted upon her as a storm
+falls upon the<br>
+ reeds that border a lake. She bent with adorable weakness
+beneath the breath<br>
+ of the storm, and twenty times was almost carried away by its
+strength, but<br>
+ twenty times she arose, supple and, bowing to the wind. After
+all these shocks<br>
+ one would have said that a light breeze had barely touched her
+charming stem;<br>
+ she smiled as if ready to be plucked by a bold hand. Then her
+unhappy<br>
+ aggressor, desperate, enraged, and three parts mad, fled so as
+not to kill<br>
+ her, mistook the door, went into the bedroom of Madame Clarence,
+whom he found<br>
+ putting on her hat in front of a wardrobe, seized her, flung her
+on the bed,<br>
+ and possessed her before she knew what had happened.</p>
+
+<p>The same day Eveline, who had been making inquiries, learned
+that Viscount<br>
+ Clena had nothing but debts, lived on money given him by an
+elderly lady, and<br>
+ promoted the sale of the latest models of a motor-car
+manufacturer. They<br>
+ separated with common accord and Eveline began again
+disdainfully to serve tea<br>
+ to her mother's guests.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>III. HIPPOLYTE CERES</h2>
+
+<p>In Madame Clarence's drawing-room the conversation turned upon
+love, and many<br>
+ charming things were said about it.</p>
+
+<p>"Love is a sacrifice," sighed Madame Cremeur.</p>
+
+<p>"I agree with you," replied M. Boutourle with animation.</p>
+
+<p>But Professor Haddock soon displayed his fastidious
+insolence.</p>
+
+<p>"It seems to me," said he, "that the Penguin ladies have made
+a great fuss<br>
+ since, through St. Mael's agency, they became viviparous. But
+there is nothing<br>
+ to be particularly proud of in that, for it is a state they
+share in common<br>
+ with cows and pigs, and even with orange and lemon trees, for
+the seeds of<br>
+ these plants germinate in the pericarp."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ "The self-importance which the Penguin ladies give themselves
+does not go so<br>
+ far back as that," answered M. Boutourle. "It dates from the day
+when the holy<br>
+ apostle gave them clothes. But this self-importance was long
+kept in<br>
+ restraint, and displayed itself fully only with increased luxury
+of dress and<br>
+ in a small section of society. For go only two leagues from Alca
+into the<br>
+ country at harvest time, and you will see whether women are
+over-precise or<br>
+ self-important."</p>
+
+<p>On that day M. Hippolyte Ceres paid his first call. He was a
+Deputy of Alca,<br>
+ and one of the youngest members of the House. His father was
+said to have kept<br>
+ a dram shop, but he himself was a lawyer of robust physique, a
+good though<br>
+ prolix speaker, with a self-important air and a reputation for
+ability.</p>
+
+<p>"M. Ceres," said the mistress of the house, "your constituency
+is one of the<br>
+ finest in Alca."</p>
+
+<p>"And there are fresh improvements made in it every day,
+Madame."</p>
+
+<p>"Unfortunately, it is impossible to take a stroll through it
+any longer," said<br>
+ M. Boutourle.</p>
+
+<p>"Why?" asked M. Ceres.</p>
+
+<p>"On account of the motors, of course."</p>
+
+<p>"Do not give them a bad name," answered the Deputy. "They are
+our great<br>
+ national industry."</p>
+
+<p>"I know. The Penguins of to-day make me think of the ancient
+Egyptians.<br>
+ According to Clement of Alexandria, Taine tells us--though he
+misquotes the<br>
+ text--the Egyptians worshipped the crocodiles that devoured
+them. The Penguins<br>
+ to-day worship the motors that crush them. Without a doubt the
+future belongs<br>
+ to the metal beast. We are no more likely to go back to cabs
+than we are to go<br>
+ back to the diligence. And the long martyrdom of the horse will
+come to an<br>
+ end. The motor, which the frenzied cupidity of manufacturers
+hurls like a<br>
+ juggernaut's car upon the bewildered people and of which the
+idle and<br>
+ fashionable make a foolish though fatal elegance, will soon
+begin to perform<br>
+ its true function, and putting its strength at the service of
+the entire<br>
+ people, will behave like a docile, toiling monster. But in order
+that the<br>
+ motor may cease to be injurious and become beneficent we must
+build roads<br>
+ suited to its speed, roads which it cannot tear up with its
+ferocious tyres,<br>
+ and from which it will send no clouds of poisonous dust into
+human lungs. We<br>
+ ought not to allow slower vehicles or mere animals to go upon
+those roads, and<br>
+ we should establish garages upon them and foot-bridges over
+them, and so<br>
+ create order and harmony among the means of communication of the
+future. That<br>
+ is the wish of every good citizen."</p>
+
+<p>Madame Clarence led the conversation back to the improvements
+in M. Ceres'<br>
+ constituency. M. Ceres showed his enthusiasm for demolitions,
+tunnelings,<br>
+ constructions, reconstructions, and all other fruitful
+operations.</p>
+
+<p>"We build to-day in an admirable style," said he; "everywhere
+majestic avenues<br>
+ are being reared. Was ever anything as fine as our arcaded
+bridges and our<br>
+ domed hotels!"</p>
+
+<p>"You are forgetting that big palace surmounted an immense
+melon-shaped dome,"<br>
+ grumbled by M. Daniset, an old art amateur, in a voice of
+restrained rage. "I<br>
+ am amazed at the degree of ugliness which a modern city can
+attain. Alca is<br>
+ becoming Americanised. Everywhere we are destroying all that is
+free,<br>
+ unexpected, measured, restrained, human, or traditional among
+the things that<br>
+ are left us. Everywhere we are destroying that charming object,
+a piece of an<br>
+ old wall that bears up the branches of a tree. Everywhere we are
+suppressing<br>
+ some fragment of light and air, some fragment of nature, some
+fragment of the<br>
+ associations that still remain with us, some fragment of our
+fathers, some<br>
+ fragment of ourselves. And we are putting up frightful,
+enormous, infamous<br>
+ houses, surmounted in Viennese style by ridiculous domes, or
+fashioned after<br>
+ the models of the 'new art' without mouldings, or having
+profiles with<br>
+ sinister corbels and burlesque pinnacles, and such monsters as
+these<br>
+ shamelessly peer over the surrounding buildings. We see bulbous
+protuberances<br>
+ stuck on the fronts of buildings and we are told they are 'new
+art' motives. I<br>
+ have seen the 'new art' in other countries, but it is not so
+ugly as with us;<br>
+ it has fancy and it has simplicity. It is only in our own
+country that by a<br>
+ sad privilege we may behold the newest and most diverse styles
+of<br>
+ architectural ugliness. Not an enviable privilege!"</p>
+
+<p>"Are you not afraid," asked M. Ceres severely, "are you not
+afraid that these<br>
+ bitter criticisms tend to keep out of our capital the foreigners
+who flow into<br>
+ it from all arts of the world and who leave millions behind
+them?"</p>
+
+<p>"You may set your mind at rest about that," answered M.
+Daniset. "Foreigners<br>
+ do not come to admire our buildings; they come to see our
+courtesans, our<br>
+ dressmakers, and our dancing saloons."</p>
+
+<p>"We have one bad habit," sighed M. Ceres, "it is that we
+calumniate<br>
+ ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>Madame Clarence as an accomplished hostess thought it was time
+to return to<br>
+ the subject of love and asked M. Jumel his opinion of M. Leon
+Blum's recent<br>
+ book in which the author complained. . . .</p>
+
+<p>". . . That an irrational custom," went on Professor Haddock,
+"prevents<br>
+ respectable young ladies from making love, a thing they would
+enjoy doing,<br>
+ whilst mercenary girls do it too much and without getting any
+enjoyment out of<br>
+ it. It is indeed deplorable. But M. Leon Blum need not fret too
+much. If the<br>
+ evil exists, as he says it does, in our middle-class society, I
+can assure him<br>
+ that everywhere else he would see a consoling spectacle. Among
+the people, the<br>
+ mass of the people through town and country, girls do not deny
+themselves that<br>
+ pleasure."</p>
+
+<p>"It is depravity!" said Madame Cremeur.</p>
+
+<p>And she praised the innocence of young girls in terms full of
+modesty and<br>
+ grace. It was charming to hear her.</p>
+
+<p>Professor Haddock's views on the same subject were, on the
+contrary, painful<br>
+ to listen to.</p>
+
+<p>"Respectable young girls," said he, "are guarded and watched
+over. Besides,<br>
+ men do not, as a rule, pursue them much, either through probity,
+or from a<br>
+ fear of grave responsibilities, or because the seduction of a
+young girl would<br>
+ not be to their credit. Even then we do not know what really
+takes place, for<br>
+ the reason that what is hidden is not seen. This is a condition
+necessary to<br>
+ the existence of all society. The scruples of respectable young
+girls could be<br>
+ more easily overcome than those of married women if the same
+pressure were<br>
+ brought to bear on them, and for this there are two reasons:
+they have more<br>
+ illusions, and their curiosity has not been satisfied. Women,
+for the most<br>
+ part, have been so disappointed by their husbands that they have
+not courage<br>
+ enough to begin again with somebody else. I myself have been met
+by this<br>
+ obstacle several times in my attempts at seduction."</p>
+
+<p>At the moment when Professor Haddock ended his unpleasant
+remarks,<br>
+ Mademoiselle Eveline Clarence entered the drawing-room and
+listlessly handed<br>
+ about tea with that expression of boredom which gave an oriental
+charm to her<br>
+ beauty.</p>
+
+<p>"For my part," said Hippolyte Ceres, looking at her, "I
+declare myself the<br>
+ young ladies' champion."</p>
+
+<p>"He must be a fool," thought the girl.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres, who had never set foot outside of his
+political world of<br>
+ electors and elected, thought Madame Clarence's drawing-room
+most select, its<br>
+ mistress exquisite, and her daughter amazingly beautiful. His
+visits became<br>
+ frequent and he paid court to both of them. Madame Clarence, who
+now liked<br>
+ attention, thought him agreeable. Eveline showed no friendliness
+towards him,<br>
+ and treated him with a hauteur and disdain that he took for
+aristocratic<br>
+ behaviour and fashionable manners, and he thought all the more
+of her on that<br>
+ account. This busy man taxed his ingenuity to please them, and
+he sometimes<br>
+ succeeded. He got them cards for fashionable functions and boxes
+at the Opera.<br>
+ He furnished Mademoiselle Clarence with several opportunities of
+appearing to<br>
+ great advantage and in particular at a garden party which,
+although given by a<br>
+ Minister, was regarded as really fashionable, and gained its
+first success in<br>
+ society circles for the Republic.</p>
+
+<p>At that party Eveline had been much noticed and had attracted
+the special<br>
+ attention of a young diplomat called Roger Lambilly who,
+imagining that she<br>
+ belonged to a rather fast set, invited her to his bachelor's
+flat. She thought<br>
+ him handsome and believed him rich, and she accepted. A little
+moved, almost<br>
+ disquieted, she very nearly became the victim of her daring, and
+only avoided<br>
+ defeat by an offensive measure audaciously carried out. This was
+the most<br>
+ foolish escapade in her unmarried life.</p>
+
+<p>Being now on friendly terms with Ministers and with the
+President, Eveline<br>
+ continued to wear her aristocratic and pious affectations, and
+these won for<br>
+ her the sympathy of the chief personages in the anti-clerical
+and democratic<br>
+ Republic. M. Hippolyte Ceres, seeing that she was succeeding and
+doing him<br>
+ credit, liked her still more. He even went so far as to fall
+madly in love<br>
+ with her.</p>
+
+<p>Henceforth, in spite of everything, she began to observe him
+with interest,<br>
+ being curious to see if his passion would increase. He appeared
+to her without<br>
+ elegance or grace, and not well bred, but active, clear-sighted,
+full of<br>
+ resource, and not too great a bore. She still made fun of him,
+but he had now<br>
+ won her interest.</p>
+
+<p>One day she wished to test him. It was during the elections,
+when members of<br>
+ Parliament were, as the phrase runs, requesting a renewal of
+their mandates.<br>
+ He had an opponent, who, though not dangerous at first and not
+much of an<br>
+ orator, was rich and was reported to be gaining votes every day.
+Hippolyte<br>
+ Ceres, banishing both dull security and foolish alarm from his
+mind, redoubled<br>
+ his care. His chief method of action was by public meetings at
+which he spoke<br>
+ vehemently against the rival candidate. His committee held huge
+meetings on<br>
+ Saturday evenings and at three o'clock on Sunday afternoons. One
+Sunday, as he<br>
+ called on the Clarences, he found Eveline alone in the
+drawing-room. He had<br>
+ been chatting for about twenty or twenty-five minutes, when,
+taking out his<br>
+ watch, he saw that it was a quarter to three. The young girl
+showed herself<br>
+ amiable, engaging, attractive, and full of promises. Ceres was
+fascinated, but<br>
+ he stood up to go.</p>
+
+<p>"Stay a little longer," said she in a pressing and agreeable
+voice which made<br>
+ him promptly sit down again.</p>
+
+<p>She was full of interest, of abandon, curiosity, and weakness.
+He blushed,<br>
+ turned pale, and again got up.</p>
+
+<p>Then, in order to keep him still longer, she looked at him out
+of two grey and<br>
+ melting eyes, and though her bosom was heaving, she did not say
+another word.<br>
+ He fell at her feet in distraction,, but once more looking at
+his watch, he<br>
+ jumped up with a terrible oath.</p>
+
+<p>"D--! a quarter to four! I must be off."</p>
+
+<p>And immediately he rushed down the stairs.</p>
+
+<p>From that time onwards she had a certain amount of esteem for
+him.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IV. A POLITICIAN'S MARRIAGE</h2>
+
+<p>She was not quite in love with him, but she wished him to be
+in love with her.<br>
+ She was, moreover, very reserved with him, and that not solely
+from any want<br>
+ of inclination to be otherwise, since in affairs of love some
+things are due<br>
+ to indifference, to inattention, to woman's instinct, to
+traditional custom<br>
+ and feeling, to a desire to try one's power, and to satisfaction
+at seeing its<br>
+ results. The reason of her prudence was that she knew him to be
+very much<br>
+ infatuated and capable of taking advantage of any familiarities
+she allowed as<br>
+ well as of reproaching her coarsely afterwards if she
+discontinued them.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ As he was a professed anti-clerical and free-thinker, she
+thought it a good<br>
+ plan to affect an appearance of piety in his presence and to be
+seen with<br>
+ prayer-books bound in red morocco, such as Queen Marie
+Leczinska's or the<br>
+ Dauphiness Marie Josephine's "The Last Two Weeks of Lent." She
+lost no<br>
+ opportunity, either, of showing him the subscriptions that she
+collected for<br>
+ the endowment of the national cult of St. Orberosia. Eveline did
+not act in<br>
+ this way because she wished to tease him. Nor did it spring from
+a young<br>
+ girl's archness, or a spirit of constraint, or even from
+snobbishness, though<br>
+ there was more than a suspicion of this latter in her behaviour.
+It was but<br>
+ her way of asserting herself, of stamping herself with a
+definite character,<br>
+ of increasing her value. To rouse the Deputy's courage she
+wrapped herself up<br>
+ in religion, just as Brunhild surrounded herself with flames so
+as to attract<br>
+ Sigurd. Her audacity was successful. He thought her still more
+beautiful thus.<br>
+ Clericalism was in his eyes a sign of good form.</p>
+
+<p>Ceres was re-elected by an enormous majority and returned to a
+House which<br>
+ showed itself more inclined to the Left, more advanced, and, as
+it seemed,<br>
+ more eager for reform than its predecessor. Perceiving at once
+that so much<br>
+ zeal was but intended to hide a fear of change, and a sincere
+desire to do<br>
+ nothing, he determined to adopt a policy that would satisfy
+these aspirations.<br>
+ At the beginning of the session he made a great speech, cleverly
+thought out<br>
+ and well arranged, dealing with the idea that all reform ought
+to be put off<br>
+ for a long time. He showed himself heated, even fervid; holding
+the principle<br>
+ that an orator should recommend moderation with extreme
+vehemence. He was<br>
+ applauded by the entire assembly. The Clarences listened to him
+from the<br>
+ President's box and Eveline trembled in spite of herself at the
+solemn sound<br>
+ of the applause. On the same bench the fair Madame Pensee
+shivered at the<br>
+ intonations of his virile voice.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as he descended from the tribune, Ceres, even while
+the audience were<br>
+ still clapping, went without a moment's delay to salute the
+Clarences in their<br>
+ box. Eveline saw in him the beauty of success, and as he leaned
+towards the<br>
+ ladies, wiping his neck with his handkerchief and receiving
+their<br>
+ congratulations with an air of modesty though not without a
+tinge of<br>
+ self-conceit, the young girl glanced towards Madame Pensee and
+saw her,<br>
+ palpitating and breathless, drinking in the hero's applause with
+her head<br>
+ thrown backwards. It seemed as if she were on the point of
+fainting. Eveline<br>
+ immediately smiled tenderly on M. Ceres.</p>
+
+<p>The Alcan deputy's speech had a great vogue. In political
+"spheres" it was<br>
+ regarded as extremely able. "We have at last heard an honest
+pronouncement,"<br>
+ said the chief Moderate journal. "It is a regular programme!"
+they said in the<br>
+ House. It was agreed that he was a man of immense talent.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres had now established himself as leader of the
+radicals,<br>
+ socialists, and anti-clericals, and they appointed him President
+of their<br>
+ group, which was then the most considerable in the House. He
+thus found<br>
+ himself marked out for office in the next ministerial
+combination.</p>
+
+<p>After a long hesitation Eveline Clarence accepted the idea of
+marrying M.<br>
+ Hippolyte Ceres. The great man was a little common for her
+taste. Nothing had<br>
+ yet proved that he would one day reach the point where politics
+bring in large<br>
+ sums of money. But she was entering her twenty-seventh year and
+knew enough of<br>
+ life to see that she must not be too fastidious or show herself
+too difficult<br>
+ to please.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres was celebrated; Hippolyte Ceres was happy. He
+was no longer<br>
+ recognisable; the elegance of his clothes and deportment had
+increased<br>
+ tremendously. He wore an undue number of white gloves. Now that
+he was too<br>
+ much of a society man, Eveline began to doubt if it was not
+worse than being<br>
+ too little of one. Madame Clarence regarded the engagement with
+favour. She<br>
+ was reassured concerning her daughter's future and pleased to
+have flowers<br>
+ given her every Thursday for her drawing-room.</p>
+
+<p>The celebration of the marriage raised some difficulties.
+Eveline was pious<br>
+ and wished to receive the benediction of the Church. Hippolyte
+Ceres, tolerant<br>
+ but a free-thinker, wanted only a civil marriage. There were
+many discussions<br>
+ and even some violent scenes upon the subject. The last took
+place in the<br>
+ young girl's room at the moment when the invitations were being
+written.<br>
+ Eveline declared that if she did not go to church she would not
+believe<br>
+ herself married. She spoke of breaking off the engagement, and
+of going abroad<br>
+ with her mother, or of retiring into a convent. Then she became
+tender, weak,<br>
+ suppliant. She sighed, and everything in her virginal chamber
+sighed in<br>
+ chorus, the holy-water font, the palm-branch above her white
+bed, the books of<br>
+ devotion on their little shelves, and the blue and white
+statuette of St.<br>
+ Orberosia chaining the dragon of Cappadocia, that stood upon the
+marble<br>
+ mantelpiece. Hippolyte Ceres was moved, softened, melted.</p>
+
+<p>Beautiful in her grief, her eyes shining with tears, her
+wrists girt by a<br>
+ rosary of lapis lazuli and, so to speak, chained by her faith,
+she suddenly<br>
+ flung herself at Hippolyte's feet, and dishevelled, almost
+dying, she embraced<br>
+ his knees.</p>
+
+<p>He nearly yielded.</p>
+
+<p>"A religious marriage," he muttered, "a marriage in church, I
+could make my<br>
+ constituents stand that, but my committee would not swallow the
+matter so<br>
+ easily. . . . Still I'll explain it to them . . . toleration,
+social<br>
+ necessities . . . . They all send their daughters to Sunday
+school . . . . But<br>
+ as for office, my dear I am afraid we are going to drown all
+hope of that in<br>
+ your holy water."</p>
+
+<p>At these words she stood up grave, generous, resigned,
+conquered also in her<br>
+ turn.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear, I insist no longer."</p>
+
+<p>"Then we won't have a religious marriage. It will be better,
+much better not."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well, but be guided by me. I am going to try and arrange
+everything both<br>
+ to your satisfaction and mine."</p>
+
+<p>She sought the Reverend Father Douillard and explained the
+situation. He<br>
+ showed himself even more accommodating and yielding than she had
+hoped.</p>
+
+<p>"Your husband is an intelligent man, a man of order and
+reason; he will come<br>
+ over to us. You will sanctify him. It is not in vain that God
+has granted him<br>
+ the blessing of a Christian wife. The Church needs no pomp and
+ceremonial<br>
+ display for her benedictions. Now that she is persecuted, the
+shadow of the<br>
+ crypts and the recesses of the catacombs are in better accord
+with her<br>
+ festivals. Mademoiselle, when you have performed the civil
+formalities come<br>
+ here to my private chapel in costume with M. Ceres. I will marry
+you, a<br>
+ observe the most absolute discretion. I will obtain the
+necessary<br>
+ dispensations from the Archbishop as well as all facilities
+regarding the<br>
+ banns, confession-tickets, etc."</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte, although he thought the combination a little
+dangerous, agreed to<br>
+ it, a good deal flattered, at bottom.</p>
+
+<p>"I will go in a short coat," he said.</p>
+
+<p>He went in a frock coat with white gloves and varnished shoes,
+and he<br>
+ genuflected.</p>
+
+<p>"Politeness demands. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>V. THE VISIRE CABINET</h2>
+
+<p>The Ceres household was established with modest decency in a
+pretty flat<br>
+ situated in a new building. Ceres loved his wife in a calm and
+tranquil<br>
+ fashion. He was often kept late from home by the Commission on
+the Budget and<br>
+ he worked more than three nights a week at a report on the
+postal finances of<br>
+ which he hoped to make a masterpiece. Eveline thought she could
+twist him<br>
+ round her finger, and this did not displease him. The bad side
+of their<br>
+ situation was that they had not much money; in truth they had
+very little. The<br>
+ servants of the Republic do not grow rich in her service as
+easily as people<br>
+ think. Since the sovereign is no longer there to distribute
+favours, each of<br>
+ them takes what he can, and his depredations, limited by the
+depredations of<br>
+ all the others, are reduced to modest proportions. Hence that
+austerity of<br>
+ morals that is noticed in democratic leaders. They can only grow
+rich during<br>
+ periods of great business activity and then they find themselves
+exposed to<br>
+ the envy of their less favoured colleagues. Hippolyte Ceres had
+for a long<br>
+ time foreseen such a period. He was one of those who had made
+preparations for<br>
+ its arrival. Whilst waiting for it he endured his poverty with
+dignity, and<br>
+ Eveline shared that poverty without suffering as much as one
+might have<br>
+ thought. She was in close intimacy with the Reverend Father
+Douillard and<br>
+ frequented the chapel of St. Orberosia, where she met with
+serious society and<br>
+ people in a position to render her useful services. She knew how
+to choose<br>
+ among them and gave her confidence to none but those who
+deserved it. She had<br>
+ gained experience since her motor excursions with Viscount
+Clena, and above<br>
+ all she had now acquired the value of a married woman.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The deputy was at first uneasy about these pious practices,
+which were<br>
+ ridiculed by the demagogic newspapers, but he was soon
+reassured, for he saw<br>
+ all around him democratic leaders joyfully becoming reconciled
+to the<br>
+ aristocracy and the Church.</p>
+
+<p>They found that they had reached one of those periods (which
+often recur) when<br>
+ advance had been carried a little too far. Hippolyte Ceres gave
+a moderate<br>
+ support to this view. His policy was not a policy of persecution
+but a policy<br>
+ of tolerance. He had laid its foundations in his splendid speech
+on the<br>
+ preparations for reform. The Prime Minister was looked upon as
+too advanced.<br>
+ He proposed schemes which were admitted to be dangerous to
+capital, and the<br>
+ great financial companies were opposed to him. Of course it
+followed that the<br>
+ papers of all views supported the companies. Seeing the danger
+increasing, the<br>
+ Cabinet abandoned its schemes, its programme, and its opinions,
+but it was too<br>
+ late. A new administration was already ready. An insidious
+question by Paul<br>
+ Visire which was immediately made the subject of a resolution,
+and a fine<br>
+ speech by Hippolyte Ceres, overthrew the Cabinet.</p>
+
+<p>The President of the Republic entrusted the formation of a new
+Cabinet to this<br>
+ same Paul Visire, who, though still very young, had been a
+Minister twice. He<br>
+ was a charming man, spending much of his time in the green-rooms
+of theatres,<br>
+ very artistic, a great society man, of amazing ability and
+industry. Paul<br>
+ Visire formed a temporary ministry intended to reassure public
+feeling which<br>
+ had taken alarm, and Hippolyte Ceres was invited to hold office
+in it.</p>
+
+<p>The new ministry, belonging to all the groups in the majority,
+represented the<br>
+ most diverse and contrary opinions, but they were all moderate
+and convinced<br>
+ conservatives.* The Minister of Foreign Affairs was retained
+from the former<br>
+ cabinet. He was a little dark man called Crombile, who worked
+fourteen hours a<br>
+ day with the conviction that he dealt with tremendous questions.
+He refused to<br>
+ see even his own diplomatic agents, and was terribly uneasy,
+though he did not<br>
+ disturb anybody else, for the want of foresight of peoples is
+infinite and<br>
+ that of governments is just as great.</p>
+
+<p>* As this ministry exercised considerable influence upon the
+destinies of the<br>
+ country and of the world, we think it well to give its
+composition: Minister<br>
+ of the Interior and Prime Minister, Paul Visire; Minister of
+Justice, Pierre<br>
+ Bouc; Foreign Affairs, Victor Crombile; Finance, Terrasson;
+Education,<br>
+ Labillette; Commerce, Posts and Telegraphs, Hippolyte Ceres;
+Agriculture,<br>
+ Aulac; Public Works, Lapersonne; War, General Debonnaire;
+Admiralty, Admiral<br>
+ Vivier des Murenes.</p>
+
+<p>The office of Public Works was given to a Socialist, Fortune
+Lapersonne. It<br>
+ was then a political custom and one of the most solemn, most
+severe, most<br>
+ rigorous, and if I may dare say so, the most terrible and cruel
+of all<br>
+ political customs, to include a member of the Socialist party in
+each ministry<br>
+ intended to oppose Socialism, so that the enemies of wealth and
+property<br>
+ should suffer the shame of being attacked by one of their own
+party, and so<br>
+ that they could not unite against these forces without turning
+to some one who<br>
+ might possibly attack themselves in the future. Nothing but a
+profound<br>
+ ignorance of the human heart would permit the belief that it was
+difficult to<br>
+ find a Socialist to occupy these functions. Citizen Fortune
+Lapersonne entered<br>
+ the Visire cabinet of his own free will and without any
+constraint; and he<br>
+ found those who approved of his action even among his former
+friends, so great<br>
+ was the fascination that power exercised over the Penguins!</p>
+
+<p>General Debonnaire went to the War Office. He was looked upon
+as one of the<br>
+ ablest generals in the army, but he was ruled by a woman, the
+Baroness<br>
+ Bildermann, who, though she had reached the age of intrigue, was
+still<br>
+ beautiful. She was in the pay of a neighbouring and hostile
+Power.</p>
+
+<p>The new Minister of Marine, the worthy Admiral Vivier des
+Murenes, was<br>
+ generally regarded as an excellent seaman. He displayed a piety
+that would<br>
+ have seemed excessive in an anti-clerical minister, if the
+Republic had not<br>
+ recognised that religion was of great maritime utility. Acting
+on the<br>
+ instruction of his spiritual director, the Reverend Father
+Douillard, the<br>
+ worthy Admiral had dedicated his fleet to St. Orberosia and
+directed canticles<br>
+ in honour of the Alcan Virgin to be composed by Christian bards.
+These<br>
+ replaced the national hymn in the music played by the navy.</p>
+
+<p>Prime Minister Visire declared himself to be distinctly
+anticlerical but ready<br>
+ to respect all creeds; he asserted that he was a sober-minded
+reformer. Paul<br>
+ Visire and his colleagues desired reforms, and it was in order
+not to<br>
+ compromise reform that they proposed none; for they were true
+politicians and<br>
+ knew that reforms are compromised the moment they are proposed.
+The government<br>
+ was well received, respectable people were reassured, and the
+funds rose.</p>
+
+<p>The administration announced that four new ironclads would be
+put into<br>
+ commission, that prosecutions would be undertaken against the
+Socialists, and<br>
+ it formally declared its intention to have nothing to do with
+any<br>
+ inquisitorial income-tax. The choice of Terrasson as Minister of
+Finance was<br>
+ warmly approved by the press. Terrasson, an old minister famous
+for his<br>
+ financial operations, gave warrant to all the hopes of the
+financiers and<br>
+ shadowed forth a period of great business activity. Soon those
+three udders of<br>
+ modern nations, monopolies, bill discounting, and fraudulent
+speculation, were<br>
+ swollen with the milk of wealth. Already whispers were heard of
+distant<br>
+ enterprises, and of planting colonies, and the boldest put
+forward in the<br>
+ newspapers the project of a military and financial protectorate
+over Nigritia.</p>
+
+<p>Without having yet shown what he was capable of, Hippolyte
+Ceres was<br>
+ considered a man of weight. Business people thought highly of
+him. He was<br>
+ congratulated on all sides for having broken with the extreme
+sections, the<br>
+ dangerous men, and for having realised the responsibilities of
+government.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Ceres shone alone amid the Ministers' wives. Crombile
+withered away in<br>
+ bachelordom. Paul Visire had married money in the person of
+Mademoiselle<br>
+ Blampignon, an accomplished, estimable, and simple lady who was
+always ill,<br>
+ and whose feeble health compelled her to stay with her mother in
+the depths of<br>
+ a remote province. The other Ministers' wives were not born to
+charm the<br>
+ sight, and people smiled when they read that Madame Labillette
+had appeared at<br>
+ the Presidency Ball wearing a headdress of birds of paradise.
+Madame Vivier<br>
+ des Murenes, a woman of good family, was stout rather than tall,
+had a face<br>
+ like a beef-steak and the voice of a newspaper-seller. Madame
+Debonnaire,<br>
+ tall, dry, and florid, was devoted to young officers. She ruined
+herself by<br>
+ her escapades and crimes and only regained consideration by dint
+of ugliness<br>
+ and insolence.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Ceres was the charm of the Ministry and its tide to
+consideration.<br>
+ Young, beautiful, and irreproachable, she charmed alike society
+and the masses<br>
+ by her combination of elegant costumes and pleasant smiles.</p>
+
+<p>Her receptions were thronged by the great Jewish financiers.
+She gave the most<br>
+ fashionable garden parties in the Republic. The newspapers
+described her<br>
+ dresses and the milliners did not ask her to pay for them. She
+went to Mass;<br>
+ she protected the chapel of St. Orberosia from the ill-will of
+the people; and<br>
+ she aroused in aristocratic hearts the hope of a fresh
+Concordat.</p>
+
+<p>With her golden hair, grey eyes, and supple and slight though
+rounded figure,<br>
+ she was indeed pretty. She enjoyed an excellent reputation and
+she was so<br>
+ adroit, and calm, so much mistress of herself, that she would
+have preserved<br>
+ it intact even if she had been discovered in the very act of
+ruining it.</p>
+
+<p>The session ended with a victory for the cabinet which, amid
+the almost<br>
+ unanimous applause of the House, defeated a proposal for an
+inquisitorial tax,<br>
+ and with a triumph for Madame Ceres who gave parties in honour
+of three kings<br>
+ who were at the moment passing through Alca.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VI. THE SOFA OF THE FAVOURITE</h2>
+
+<p>The Prime Minister invited Monsieur and Madame Ceres to spend
+a couple of<br>
+ weeks of the holidays in a little villa that he had taken in the
+mountains,<br>
+ and in which he lived alone. The deplorable health of Madame
+Paul Visire did<br>
+ not allow her to accompany her husband, and she remained with
+her relatives in<br>
+ one of the southern provinces.</p>
+
+<p>The villa had belonged to the mistress of one of the last
+Kings of Alca: the<br>
+ drawing-room retained its old furniture, and in it was still to
+be found the<br>
+ Sofa of the Favourite. The country was charming; a pretty blue
+stream, the<br>
+ Aiselle, flowed at the foot of the hill that dominated the
+villa. Hippolyte<br>
+ Ceres loved fishing; when engaged at this monotonous occupation
+he often<br>
+ formed his best Parliamentary combinations, and his happiest
+oratorical<br>
+ inspirations. Trout swarmed in the Aiselle; he fished it from
+morning till<br>
+ evening in a boat that the Prime Minister readily placed at is
+disposal.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ In the mean time, Eveline and Paul Visire sometimes took a turn
+together in<br>
+ the garden, or had a little chat in the drawing-room. Eveline,
+although she<br>
+ recognised the attraction that Visire had for women, had
+hitherto displayed<br>
+ towards him only an intermittent and superficial coquetry,
+without any deep<br>
+ intentions or settled design. He was a connoisseur and saw that
+she was<br>
+ pretty. The House and the Opera had deprived him of all leisure,
+but, in a<br>
+ little villa, the grey eyes and rounded figure of Eveline took
+on a value in<br>
+ his eyes. One day as Hippolyte Ceres was fishing in the Aiselle,
+he made her<br>
+ sit beside him on the Sofa of the Favourite. Long rays of gold
+struck Eveline<br>
+ like arrows from a hidden Cupid through the chinks of the
+curtains which<br>
+ protected her from the heat and glare of a brilliant day.
+Beneath her white<br>
+ muslin dress her rounded yet slender form was outlined in its
+grace and youth.<br>
+ Her skin was cool and fresh, and had the fragrance of freshly
+mown hay. Paul<br>
+ Visire behaved as the occasion warranted, and for her part, she
+was opposed<br>
+ neither to the games of chance or of society. She believed it
+would be nothing<br>
+ or a trifle; she was mistaken.</p>
+
+<p>"There was," says the famous German ballad, "on the sunny side
+of the town<br>
+ square, beside a wall whereon the creeper grew, a pretty little
+letter-box, as<br>
+ blue as the corn-flowers, smiling and tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>"All day long there came to it, in their heavy shoes, small
+shop-keepers, rich<br>
+ farmers, citizens, the tax-collector and the policeman, and they
+put into it<br>
+ their business letters, their invoices, their summonses their
+notices to pay<br>
+ taxes, the judges' returns, and orders for the recruits to
+assemble. It<br>
+ remained smiling and tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>"With joy, or in anxiety, there advanced towards it workmen
+and farm servants,<br>
+ maids and nursemaids, accountants, clerks, and women carrying
+their little<br>
+ children in their arms; they put into it notifications of
+births. marriages,<br>
+ and deaths, letters between engaged couples, between husbands
+and wives, from<br>
+ mothers to their sons, and from sons to their mothers. It
+remained smiling and<br>
+ tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>"At twilight, young lads and young girls slipped furtively to
+it, and put in<br>
+ love-letters, some moistened with tears that blotted the ink,
+others with a<br>
+ little circle to show the place to kiss, all of them very long.
+It remained<br>
+ smiling and tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>"Rich merchants came themselves through excess of carefulness
+at the hour of<br>
+ daybreak, and put into it registered letters, and letters with
+five red seals,<br>
+ full of bank notes or cheques on the great financial
+establishments of the<br>
+ Empire. It remained smiling and tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>"But one day, Gaspar, whom it had never seen, and whom it did
+not know from<br>
+ Adam, came to put in a letter, of which nothing is known but
+that it was<br>
+ folded like a little hat. Immediately the pretty letter-box fell
+into a swoon.<br>
+ Henceforth it remains no longer in its place; it runs through
+streets, fields,<br>
+ and woods, girdled with ivy, and crowned with roses. It keeps
+running up hill<br>
+ and down dale; the country policeman surprises it sometimes,
+amidst the corn,<br>
+ in Gaspar's arms kissing him upon the mouth."</p>
+
+<p>Paul Visire had recovered all his customary nonchalance.
+Eveline remained<br>
+ stretched on the Divan of the Favourite in an attitude of
+delicious<br>
+ astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>The Reverend Father Douillard, an excellent moral theologian,
+and a man who in<br>
+ the decadence of the Church has preserved his principles, was
+very right to<br>
+ teach, in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers, that
+while a woman<br>
+ commits a great sin by giving herself for money, she commits a
+much greater<br>
+ one by giving herself for nothing. For, in the first case she
+acts to support<br>
+ her life, and that is sometimes not merely excusable but
+pardonable, and even<br>
+ worthy of the Divine Grace, for God forbids suicide, and is
+unwilling that his<br>
+ creatures should destroy themselves. Besides, in giving herself
+in order to<br>
+ live, she remains humble, and derives no pleasure from it a
+thing which<br>
+ diminishes the sin. But a woman who gives herself for nothing
+sins with<br>
+ pleasure and exults in her fault. The pride and delight with
+which she burdens<br>
+ her crime increase its load of moral guilt.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Hippolyte Ceres' example shows the profundity of these
+moral truths.<br>
+ She perceived that she had senses. A second was enough to bring
+about this<br>
+ discovery, to change her soul, to alter her whole life. To have
+learned to<br>
+ know herself was at first a delight. The {greek here} of the
+ancient<br>
+ philosophy is not a precept the moral fulfilment of which
+procures any<br>
+ pleasure, since one enjoys little satisfaction from knowing
+one's soul. It is<br>
+ not the same with the flesh, for in it sources of pleasure may
+be revealed to<br>
+ us. Eveline immediately felt an obligation to her revealer equal
+to the<br>
+ benefit she had received, and she imagined that he who had
+discovered these<br>
+ heavenly depths was the sole possessor of the key to them. Was
+this an error,<br>
+ and might she not be able to find others who also had the golden
+key? It is<br>
+ difficult to decide; and Professor Haddock, when the facts were
+divulged<br>
+ (which happened without much delay as we shall see), treated the
+matter from<br>
+ an experimental point of view, in a scientific review, and
+concluded that the<br>
+ chances Madame C-- would have of finding the exact equivalent of
+M. V-- were<br>
+ in the proportion of 305 to 975008. This is as much as to say
+that she would<br>
+ never find it. Doubtless her instinct told her the same, for she
+attached<br>
+ herself distractedly to him.</p>
+
+<p>I have related these facts with all the circumstances which
+seemed to me<br>
+ worthy of attracting the attention of meditative and philosophic
+minds. The<br>
+ Sofa of the Favourite is worthy of the majesty of history; on it
+were decided<br>
+ the destinies of a great people; nay, on it was accomplished an
+act whose<br>
+ renown was to extend over the neighbouring nations both friendly
+and hostile,<br>
+ and even over all humanity. Too often events of this nature
+escape the<br>
+ superficial minds and shallow spirits who inconsiderately assume
+the task of<br>
+ writing history. Thus the secret springs of events remain hidden
+from us. The<br>
+ fall of Empires and the transmission of dominions astonish us
+and remain<br>
+ incomprehensible to us, because we have not discovered the
+imperceptible<br>
+ point, or touched the secret spring which when put in movement
+has destroyed<br>
+ and overthrown everything. The author of this great history
+knows better than<br>
+ anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do himself
+this<br>
+ justice--that he has always kept the moderation, the
+seriousness, the<br>
+ austerity, which an account of affairs of State demands, and
+that he has never<br>
+ departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of
+human actions.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VII. THE FIRST CONSEQUENCES</h2>
+
+<p>When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never
+experienced anything<br>
+ similar, he did not believe her. He had had a good deal to do
+with women and<br>
+ knew that they readily say these things to men in order to make
+them more in<br>
+ love with them. Thus his experience, as sometimes happens, made
+him disregard<br>
+ the truth. Incredulous, but gratified all the same, he soon felt
+love and<br>
+ something more for her. This state at first seemed favourable to
+his<br>
+ intellectual faculties. Visire delivered in the chief town of
+his constituency<br>
+ a speech full of grace, brilliant and happy, which was
+considered to be a<br>
+ masterpiece.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The re-opening of Parliament was serene. A few isolated
+jealousies, a few<br>
+ timid ambitions raised their heads in the House, and that was
+all. A smile<br>
+ from the Prime Minister was enough to dissipate these shadows.
+She and he saw<br>
+ each other twice a day, and wrote to each other in the interval.
+He was<br>
+ accustomed to intimate relationships, was adroit, and knew how
+to dissimulate;<br>
+ but Eveline displayed a foolish imprudence: she made herself
+conspicuous with<br>
+ him in drawing-rooms, at the theatre, in the House, and at the
+Embassies; she<br>
+ wore her love upon her face, upon her whole person, in her moist
+glances, in<br>
+ the languishing smile of her lips, in the heaving of her breast,
+in all her<br>
+ heightened, agitated, and distracted beauty. Soon the entire
+country knew of<br>
+ their intimacy. Foreign Courts were informed of it. The
+President of the<br>
+ Republic and Eveline's husband alone remained in ignorance. The
+President<br>
+ became acquainted with it in the country, through a misplaced
+police report<br>
+ which found its way, it is not known how, into his
+portmanteau.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres, without being either very subtle, or very
+perspicacious,<br>
+ noticed that there was something different in his home. Eveline,
+who quite<br>
+ lately had interested herself in his affairs, and shown, if not
+tenderness, at<br>
+ least affection, towards him, displayed henceforth nothing but
+indifference<br>
+ and repulsion. She had always had periods of absence, and made
+prolonged<br>
+ visits to the Charity of St. Orberosia; now, she went out in the
+morning,<br>
+ remained out all day, and sat down to dinner at nine o'clock in
+the evening<br>
+ with the face of a somnambulist. Her husband thought it absurd;
+however, he<br>
+ might perhaps have never known the reason for this; a profound
+ignorance of<br>
+ women, a crass confidence in his own merit, and in his own
+fortune, might<br>
+ perhaps have always hidden the truth from him, if the two lovers
+had not, so<br>
+ to speak, compelled him to discover it.</p>
+
+<p>When Paul Visire went to Eveline's house and found her alone,
+they used to<br>
+ say, as they embraced each other; "Not here! not here!" and
+immediately they<br>
+ affected an extreme reserve. That was their invariable rule.
+Now, one day,<br>
+ Paul Visire went to the house of his colleague Ceres, with whom
+he had an<br>
+ engagement. It was Eveline who received him, the Minister of
+Commerce being<br>
+ delayed by a commission.</p>
+
+<p>"Not here!" said the lovers, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>They said it, mouth to mouth, embracing, and clasping each
+other. They were<br>
+ still saying it, when Hippolyte Ceres entered the
+drawing-room.</p>
+
+<p>Paul Visire did not lose his presence of mind. He declared to
+Madame Ceres<br>
+ that he would give up his attempt to take the dust out of her
+eye. By this<br>
+ attitude he did not deceive the husband, but he was able to
+leave the room<br>
+ with some dignity.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres was thunderstruck. Eveline's conduct appeared
+incomprehensible<br>
+ to him; he asked her what reasons she had for it.</p>
+
+<p>"Why? why?" he kept repeating continually, "why?"</p>
+
+<p>She denied everything, not to convince him, for he had seen
+them, but from<br>
+ expediency and good taste, and to avoid painful explanations.
+Hippolyte Ceres<br>
+ suffered all the tortures of jealousy. He admitted it to
+himself, he kept<br>
+ saying inwardly, "I am a strong man; I am clad in armour; but
+the wound is<br>
+ underneath, it is in my heart," and turning towards his wife,
+who looked<br>
+ beautiful in her guilt, he would say:</p>
+
+<p>"It ought not to have been with him."</p>
+
+<p>He was right--Eveline ought not to have loved in government
+circles.</p>
+
+<p>He suffered so much that he took up his revolver, exclaiming:
+"I will go and<br>
+ kill him!" But he remembered that a Minister of Commerce cannot
+kill his own<br>
+ Prime Minister, and he put his revolver back into his
+drawer.</p>
+
+<p>The weeks passed without calming his sufferings. Each morning
+he buckled his<br>
+ strong man's armour over his wound and sought in work and fame
+the peace that<br>
+ fled from him. Every Sunday he inaugurated busts, statues,
+fountains, artesian<br>
+ wells, hospitals, dispensaries, railways, canals, public
+markets, drainage<br>
+ systems, triumphal arches, and slaughter houses, and delivered
+moving speeches<br>
+ on each of these occasions. His fervid activity devoured whole
+piles of<br>
+ documents; he changed the colours of the postage stamps fourteen
+times in one<br>
+ week. Nevertheless, he gave vent to outbursts of grief and rage
+that drove him<br>
+ insane; for whole days his reason abandoned him. If he had been
+in the<br>
+ employment of a private administration this would have been
+noticed<br>
+ immediately, but it is much more difficult to discover insanity
+or frenzy in<br>
+ the conduct of affairs of State. At that moment the government
+employees were<br>
+ forming themselves into associations and federations amid a
+ferment that was<br>
+ giving alarm both to the Parliament and to public feeling. The
+postmen were<br>
+ especially prominent in their enthusiasm for trade unions.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres informed them in a circular that their action
+was strictly<br>
+ legal. The following day he sent out a second circular
+forbidding all<br>
+ associations of government employees as illegal. He dismissed
+one hundred and<br>
+ eighty postmen, reinstated them, reprimanded them--and awarded
+them<br>
+ gratuities. At Cabinet councils he was always on the point of
+bursting forth.<br>
+ The presence of the Head of the State scarcely restrained him
+within the<br>
+ limits of the decencies, and as he did not dare to attack his
+rival he<br>
+ consoled himself by heaping invectives upon General Debonnaire,
+the respected<br>
+ Minister of War. The General did not hear them. for he was deaf
+and occupied<br>
+ himself in composing verses for the Baroness Bildermann.
+Hippolyte Ceres<br>
+ offered an indistinct opposition to everything the Prime
+Minister proposed. In<br>
+ a word, he was a madman. One faculty alone escaped the ruin of
+his intellect:<br>
+ he retained his Parliamentary sense, his consciousness of the
+temper of<br>
+ majorities, his thorough knowledge of groups, and his certainty
+of the<br>
+ direction in which affairs were moving.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>VIII. FURTHER CONSEQUENCES</h2>
+
+<p>The session ended calmly, and the Ministry saw no dangerous
+signs upon the<br>
+ benches where the majority sat. It was visible, however, from
+certain articles<br>
+ in the Moderate journals, that the demands of the Jewish and
+Christian<br>
+ financiers were increasing daily, that the patriotism of the
+banks required a<br>
+ civilizing expedition to Nigritia, and that the steel trusts,
+eager in the<br>
+ defence of our coasts and colonies, were crying out for armoured
+cruisers and<br>
+ still more armoured cruisers. Rumours of war began to be heard.
+Such rumours<br>
+ sprang up every year as regularly as the trade winds; serious
+people paid no<br>
+ heed to them and the government usually let them die away from
+their own<br>
+ weakness unless they grew stronger and spread. For in that case
+the country<br>
+ would be alarmed. The financiers only wanted colonial wars and
+the people did<br>
+ not want any wars at all. It loved to see its government proud
+and even<br>
+ insolent, but at the least suspicion that a European war was
+brewing, its<br>
+ violent emotion would quickly have reached the House. Paul
+Visire was not<br>
+ uneasy. The European situation was in his view completely
+reassuring. He was<br>
+ only irritated by the maniacal silence of his Minister of
+Foreign Affairs.<br>
+ That gnome went to the Cabinet meetings with a portfolio bigger
+than himself<br>
+ stuffed full of papers, said nothing, refused to answer all
+questions, even<br>
+ those asked him by the respected President of the Republic, and,
+exhausted by<br>
+ his obstinate labours, took a few moments' sleep in his
+arm-chair in which<br>
+ nothing but the top of his little black head was to be seen
+above the green<br>
+ tablecloth.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ In the mean time Hippolyte Ceres became a strong man again. In
+company with<br>
+ his colleague Lapersonne he formed numerous intimacies with
+ladies of the<br>
+ theatre. They were both to be seen at night entering fashionable
+restaurants<br>
+ in the company of ladies whom they over-topped by their lofty
+stature and<br>
+ their new hats, and they were soon reckoned amongst the most
+sympathetic<br>
+ frequenters of the boulevards. Fortune Lapersonne had his own
+wound beneath<br>
+ his armour, His wife, a young milliner whom he carried off from
+a marquis, had<br>
+ gone to live with a chauffeur. He loved her still, and could not
+console<br>
+ himself for her loss, so that very often in the private room of
+a restaurant,<br>
+ in the midst of a group of girls who laughed and ate crayfish,
+the two<br>
+ ministers exchanged a look full of their common sorrow and wiped
+away an<br>
+ unbidden tear.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte Ceres, although wounded to the heart, did not allow
+himself to be<br>
+ beaten. He swore that he would be avenged.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Paul Visire, whose deplorable health forced her to live
+with her<br>
+ relatives in a distant province, received an anonymous letter
+specifying that<br>
+ M. Paul Visire, who had not a half-penny when he married her,
+was spending her<br>
+ dowry on a married woman, E-- C--, that he gave this woman<br>
+ thirty-thousand-franc motor-cars, and pearl necklaces costing
+twenty-five<br>
+ thousand francs, and that he was going straight to dishonour and
+ruin. Madame<br>
+ Paul Visire read the letter, fell into hysterics, and handed it
+to her father.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to box your husband's ears," said M. Blampignon;
+"he is a<br>
+ blackguard who will land you both in the workhouse unless we
+look out. He may<br>
+ be Prime Minister, but he won't frighten me."</p>
+
+<p>When he stepped off the train M. Blampignon presented himself
+at the Ministry<br>
+ of the Interior, and was immediately received. He entered the
+Prime Minister's<br>
+ room in a fury.</p>
+
+<p>"I have something to say to you, sir!" And he waved the
+anonymous letter.</p>
+
+<p>Paul Visire welcomed him smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"You are welcome, my dear father. I was going to write to you.
+. . . Yes, to<br>
+ tell you of your nomination to the rank of officer of the Legion
+of Honour. I<br>
+ signed the patent this morning."</p>
+
+<p>M. Blampignon thanked his son-in-law warmly and threw the
+anonymous letter<br>
+ into the fire.</p>
+
+<p>He returned to his provincial house and found his daughter
+fretting and<br>
+ agitated.</p>
+
+<p>"Well! I saw your husband. He is a delightful fellow. But
+then, you don't<br>
+ understand how to deal with him."</p>
+
+<p>About this time Hippolyte Ceres learned through a little
+scandalous newspaper<br>
+ (it is always through the newspapers that ministers are informed
+of the<br>
+ affairs of State) that the Prime Minister dined every evening
+with<br>
+ Mademoiselle Lysiane of the Folies Dramatiques, whose charm
+seemed to have<br>
+ made a great impression on him. Thenceforth Ceres took a gloomy
+joy in<br>
+ watching his wife. She came in every evening to dine or dress
+with an air of<br>
+ agreeable fatigue and the serenity that comes from
+enjoyment.</p>
+
+<p>Thinking that she knew nothing, he sent her anonymous
+communications. She read<br>
+ them at the table before him and remained still listless and
+smiling.</p>
+
+<p>He then persuaded himself that she gave no heed to these vague
+reports, and<br>
+ that in order to disturb her it would be necessary to enable her
+to verify her<br>
+ lover's infidelity and treason for herself. There were at the
+Ministry a<br>
+ number of trustworthy agents charged with secret inquiries
+regarding the<br>
+ national defence. They were then employed in watching the spies
+of a<br>
+ neighbouring and hostile Power who had succeeded in entering the
+Postal and<br>
+ Telegraphic service. M. Ceres ordered them to suspend their work
+for the<br>
+ present and to inquire where, when, and how, the Minister of the
+Interior saw<br>
+ Mademoiselle Lysiane. The agents performed their missions
+faithfully and told<br>
+ the minister that they had several times seen the Prime Minister
+with a woman,<br>
+ but that she was not Mademoiselle Lysiane. Hippolyte Ceres asked
+them nothing<br>
+ further. He was right; the loves of Paul Visire and Lysiane were
+but an alibi<br>
+ invented by Paul Visire himself, with Eveline's approval, for
+his fame was<br>
+ rather inconvenient to her, and she sighed for secrecy and
+mystery.</p>
+
+<p>They were not shadowed by the agents of the Ministry of
+Commerce alone. They<br>
+ were also followed by those of the Prefect of Police, and even
+by those of the<br>
+ Minister of the Interior, who disputed with each other the
+honour of<br>
+ protecting their chief. Then there were the emissaries of
+several royalist,<br>
+ imperialist, and clerical organisations, those of eight or ten
+blackmailers,<br>
+ several amateur detectives, a multitude of reporters, and a
+crowd of<br>
+ photographers, who all made their appearance wherever these two
+took refuge in<br>
+ their perambulating love affairs, at big hotels, small hotels,
+town houses,<br>
+ country houses, private apartments, villas, museums, palaces,
+hovels. They<br>
+ kept watch in the streets, from neighbouring houses, trees,
+walls,<br>
+ stair-cases, landings, roofs, adjoining rooms, and even
+chimneys. The Minister<br>
+ and his friend saw with alarm all round their bed room, gimlets
+boring through<br>
+ doors and shutters, and drills making holes in the walls. A
+photograph of<br>
+ Madame Ceres in night attire buttoning her boots was the utmost
+that had been<br>
+ obtained.</p>
+
+<p>Paul Visire grew impatient and irritable, and often lost his
+good humour and<br>
+ agreeableness. He came to the cabinet meetings in a rage and he,
+too, poured<br>
+ invectives upon General Debonnaire--a brave man under fire but a
+lax<br>
+ disciplinarian--and launched his sarcasms at against the
+venerable admiral<br>
+ Vivier des Murenes whose ships went to the bottom without any
+apparent reason.</p>
+
+<p>Fortune Lapersonne listened open-eyed, and grumbled scoffingly
+between his<br>
+ teeth:</p>
+
+<p>"He is not satisfied with robbing Hippolyte Ceres of his wife,
+but he must go<br>
+ and rob him of his catchwords too."</p>
+
+<p>These storms were made known by the indiscretion of some
+ministers and by the<br>
+ complaints of the two old warriors, who declared their intention
+of flinging<br>
+ their portfolios at the beggar's head, but who did nothing of
+the sort. These<br>
+ outbursts, far from injuring the lucky Prime Minister, had an
+excellent effect<br>
+ on Parliament and public opinion, who looked on them as signs of
+a keen<br>
+ solicitude for the welfare of the national army and navy. The
+Prime Minister<br>
+ was the recipient of general approbation.</p>
+
+<p>To the congratulations of the various groups and of notable
+personages, he<br>
+ replied with simple firmness: "Those are my principles!" and he
+had seven or<br>
+ eight Socialists put in prison.</p>
+
+<p>The session ended, and Paul Visire, very exhausted, went to
+take the waters.<br>
+ Hippolyte Ceres refused to leave his Ministry, where the trade
+union of<br>
+ telephone girls was in tumultuous agitation. He opposed it with
+an unheard of<br>
+ violence, for he had now become a woman-hater. On Sundays he
+went into the<br>
+ suburbs to fish along with his colleague Lapersonne, wearing the
+tall hat that<br>
+ never left him since he had become a Minister. And both of them,
+forgetting<br>
+ the fish,, complained of the inconstancy of women and mingled
+their griefs.</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte still loved Eveline and he still suffered. However,
+hope had slipped<br>
+ into his heart. She was now separated from her ]over, and,
+thinking to win her<br>
+ back, he directed all his efforts to that end. He put forth all
+his skill,<br>
+ showed himself sincere, adaptable, affectionate, devoted, even
+discreet; his<br>
+ heart taught him the delicacies of feeling. He said charming and
+touching<br>
+ things to the faithless one, and, to soften her, he told her all
+that he had<br>
+ suffered.</p>
+
+<p>Crossing the band of his trousers upon his stomach.</p>
+
+<p>"See," said he, "how thin I have got."</p>
+
+<p>He promised her everything he thought could gratify a woman,
+country parties,<br>
+ hats, jewels.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes he thought she would take pity on him.</p>
+
+<p>She no longer displayed an insolently happy countenance. Being
+separated from<br>
+ Paul, her sadness had an air of gentleness. But the moment he
+made a gesture<br>
+ to recover her she turned away fiercely and gloomily, girt with
+her fault as<br>
+ if with a golden girdle.</p>
+
+<p>He did not give up, making himself humble, suppliant,
+lamentable.</p>
+
+<p>One day he went to Lapersonne and said to him with tears in
+his eyes:</p>
+
+<p>"Will you speak to her?"</p>
+
+<p>Lapersonne excused himself, thinking that his intervention
+would be useless,<br>
+ but he gave some advice to his friend.</p>
+
+<p>"Make her think that you don't care about her, that you love
+another, and she<br>
+ will come back to you."</p>
+
+<p>Hippolyte, adopting this method, inserted in the newspapers
+that he was always<br>
+ to be found in the company of Mademoiselle Guinaud of the Opera.
+He came home<br>
+ late or did not come home at all, assumed in Eveline's presence
+an appearance<br>
+ of inward joy impossible to restrain, took out of his pocket, at
+dinner, a<br>
+ letter on scented paper which he pretended to read with delight,
+and his lips<br>
+ seemed as in a dream to kiss invisible lips. Nothing happened.
+Eveline did not<br>
+ even notice the change. Insensible to all around her, she only
+came out of her<br>
+ lethargy to ask for some louis from her husband, and if he did
+not give them<br>
+ she threw him a look of contempt, ready to upbraid him with the
+shame which<br>
+ she poured upon him in the sight of the whole world. Since she
+had loved she<br>
+ spent a great deal on dress. She needed money, and she had only
+her husband to<br>
+ secure it for her; she was so far faithful to him.</p>
+
+<p>He lost patience, became furious, and threatened her with his
+revolver. He<br>
+ said one day before her to Madame Clarence:</p>
+
+<p>"I congratulate you, Madame; you have brought up your daughter
+to be a wanton<br>
+ hussy."</p>
+
+<p>"Take me away, Mamma," exclaimed Eveline. "I will get a
+divorce!"</p>
+
+<p>He loved her more ardently than ever. In his jealous rage,
+suspecting her, not<br>
+ without probability, of sending and receiving letters, he swore
+that he would<br>
+ intercept them, re-established a censorship over the post, threw
+private<br>
+ correspondence into confusion, delayed stock-exchange
+quotations, prevented<br>
+ assignations, brought about bankruptcies, thwarted passions, and
+caused<br>
+ suicides. The independent press gave utterance to the complaints
+of the public<br>
+ and indignantly supported them. To justify these arbitrary
+measures, the<br>
+ ministerial journals spoke darkly of plots and public dangers,
+and promoted a<br>
+ belief in a monarchical conspiracy. The less well-informed
+sheets gave more<br>
+ precise information, told of the seizure of fifty thousand guns,
+and the<br>
+ landing of Prince Crucho. Feeling grew throughout the country,
+and the<br>
+ republican organs called for the immediate meeting of
+Parliament. Paul Visire<br>
+ returned to Paris, summoned his colleagues, held an important
+Cabinet Council,<br>
+ and proclaimed through his agencies that a plot had been
+actually formed<br>
+ against the national representation, but that the Prime Minister
+held the<br>
+ threads of it in his hand, and that a judicial inquiry was about
+to be opened.</p>
+
+<p>He immediately ordered the arrest of thirty Socialists, and
+whilst the entire<br>
+ country was acclaiming him as its saviour, baffling the
+watchfulness of his<br>
+ six hundred detectives, he secretly took Eveline to a little
+house near the<br>
+ Northern railway station, where they remained until night. After
+their<br>
+ departure, the maid of their hotel, as she was putting their
+room in order,<br>
+ saw seven little crosses traced by a hairpin on the wall at the
+head of the<br>
+ bed.</p>
+
+<p>That is all that Hippolyte Ceres obtained as a reward of his
+efforts.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2>IX. THE FINAL CONSEQUENCES</h2>
+
+<p>Jealousy is a virtue of democracies which preserves them from
+tyrants.<br>
+ Deputies began to envy the Prime Minister his golden key. For a
+year his<br>
+ domination over the beauteous Madame Ceres had been known to the
+whole<br>
+ universe. The provinces, whither news and fashions only arrive
+after a<br>
+ complete revolution of the earth round the sun, were at last
+informed of the<br>
+ illegitimate loves of the Cabinet. The provinces preserve an
+austere morality;<br>
+ women are more virtuous there than they are in the capital.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Various reasons have been alleged for this: Education, example,
+simplicity of<br>
+ life. Professor Haddock asserts that this virtue of provincial
+ladies is<br>
+ solely due to the fact that the heels of their shoes are low. "A
+woman," said<br>
+ he, in a learned article in the "Anthropological Review", "a
+woman attracts a<br>
+ civilized man in proportion as her feet make an angle with the
+ground. If this<br>
+ angle is as much as thirty-five degrees, the attraction becomes
+acute. For the<br>
+ position of the feet upon the ground determines the whole
+carriage of the<br>
+ body, and it results that provincial women, since they wear low
+heels, are not<br>
+ very attractive, and preserve their virtue with ease." These
+conclusions were<br>
+ not generally accepted. It was objected that under the influence
+of English<br>
+ and American fashions, low heels had been introduced generally
+without<br>
+ producing the results attributed to them by the learned
+Professor; moreover,<br>
+ it was said that the difference he pretended to establish
+between the morals<br>
+ of the metropolis and those of the provinces is perhaps
+illusory, and that if<br>
+ it exists, it is apparently due to the fact that great cities
+offer more<br>
+ advantages and facilities for love than small towns provide.
+However that may<br>
+ be, the provinces began to murmur against the Prime Minister,
+and to raise a<br>
+ scandal. This was not yet a danger, but there was a possibility
+that it might<br>
+ become one.</p>
+
+<p>For the moment the peril was nowhere and yet everywhere. The
+majority remained<br>
+ solid; but the leaders became stiff and exacting. Perhaps
+Hippolyte Ceres<br>
+ would never have intentionally sacrificed his interests to his
+vengeance. But<br>
+ thinking that he could henceforth, without compromising his own
+fortune,<br>
+ secretly damage that of Paul Visire, he devoted himself to the
+skilful and<br>
+ careful preparation of difficulties and perils for the Head of
+the Government.<br>
+ Though far from equalling his rival in talent, knowledge, and
+authority, he<br>
+ greatly surpassed him in his skill as a lobbyist. The most
+acute<br>
+ parliamentarians attributed the recent misfortunes of the
+majority to his<br>
+ refusal to vote. At committees, by a calculated imprudence, he
+favoured<br>
+ motions which he knew the Prime Minister could not accept. One
+day his<br>
+ intentional awkwardness provoked a sudden and violent conflict
+between the<br>
+ Minister of the Interior, and his departmental Treasurer. Then
+Ceres became<br>
+ frightened and went no further. It would have been dangerous for
+him to<br>
+ overthrow the ministry too soon. His ingenious hatred found an
+issue by<br>
+ circuitous paths. Paul Visire had a poor cousin of easy morals
+who bore his<br>
+ name. Ceres, remembering this lady, Celine Visire, brought her
+into<br>
+ prominence, arranged that she should become intimate with
+several foreigners,<br>
+ and procured her engagements in the music-halls. One summer
+night, on a stage<br>
+ in the Champs Elysees before a tumultuous crowd, she performed
+risky dances to<br>
+ the sounds of wild music which was audible in the gardens where
+the President<br>
+ of the Republic was entertaining Royalty. The name of Visire,
+associated with<br>
+ these scandals, covered the walls of the town, filled the
+newspapers, was<br>
+ repeated in the cafes and at balls, and blazed forth in letters
+of fire upon<br>
+ the boulevards.</p>
+
+<p>Nobody regarded the Prime Minister as responsible for the
+scandal of his<br>
+ relatives, but a bad idea of his family came into existence, and
+the influence<br>
+ of the statesman was diminished.</p>
+
+<p>Almost immediately he was made to feel this in a pretty sharp
+fashion. One day<br>
+ in the House, on a simple question, Labillette, the Minister of
+Religion and<br>
+ Public Worship, who was suffering from an attack of liver, and
+beginning to be<br>
+ exasperated by the intentions and intrigues of the clergy,
+threatened to close<br>
+ the Chapel of St. Orberosia, and spoke without respect of the
+National Virgin.<br>
+ The entire Right rose up in indignation; the Left appeared to
+give but a<br>
+ half-hearted support to the rash Minister. The leaders of the
+majority did not<br>
+ care to attack a popular cult which brought thirty millions a
+year into the<br>
+ country. The most moderate of the supporters of the Right, M.
+Bigourd, made<br>
+ the question the subject of a resolution and endangered the
+Cabinet. Luckily,<br>
+ Fortune Lapersonne, the Minister of Public Works, always
+conscious of the<br>
+ obligations of power, was able in the Prime Minister's absence
+to repair the<br>
+ awkwardness and indecorum of his colleague, the Minister of
+Public Worship. He<br>
+ ascended the tribune and bore witness to the respect in which
+the Government<br>
+ held the heavenly Patron of the country, the consoler of so many
+ills which<br>
+ science admitted its powerlessness to relieve.</p>
+
+<p>When Paul Visire, snatched at last from Eveline's arms,
+appeared in the House,<br>
+ the administration was saved; but the Prime Minister saw himself
+compelled to<br>
+ grant important concessions to the upper classes. He proposed in
+Parliament<br>
+ that six armoured cruisers should be laid down, and thus won the
+sympathies of<br>
+ the Steel Trust; he gave new assurances that the income tax
+would not be<br>
+ imposed, and he had eighteen Socialists arrested.</p>
+
+<p>He was soon to find himself opposed by more formidable
+obstacles. The<br>
+ Chancellor of the neighbouring Empire in an ingenious and
+profound speech upon<br>
+ the foreign relations of his sovereign, made a sly allusion to
+the intrigues<br>
+ that inspired the policy of a great country. This reference,
+which was receive<br>
+ with smiles by the Imperial Parliament, was certain to irritate
+a punctilious<br>
+ republic. It aroused the national susceptibility, which directed
+its wrath<br>
+ against its amorous Minister. The Deputies seized upon a
+frivolous pretext to<br>
+ show their dissatisfaction. A ridiculous incident, the fact that
+the wife of a<br>
+ subprefect had danced at the Moulin Rouge, forced the minister
+to face a vote<br>
+ of censure, and he was within a few votes of being defeated.
+According to<br>
+ general opinion, Paul Visire had never been so weak, so
+vacillating, or so<br>
+ spiritless, as on that occasion.</p>
+
+<p>He understood that he could only keep himself in office by a
+great political<br>
+ stroke, and he decided on the expedition to Nigritia. This
+measure was<br>
+ demanded by the great financial and industrial corporations and
+was one which<br>
+ would bring concessions of immense forests to the capitalists, a
+loan of eight<br>
+ millions to the banking companies, as well as promotions and
+decorations to<br>
+ the naval and military officers. A pretext presented itself;
+some insult<br>
+ needed to be avenged, or some debt to be collected. Six
+battleships, fourteen<br>
+ cruisers, and eighteen transports sailed up the mouth of the
+river<br>
+ Hippopotamus. Six hundred canoes vainly opposed the landing of
+the troops.<br>
+ Admiral Vivier des Murenes' cannons produced an appalling effect
+upon the<br>
+ blacks, who replied to them with flights of arrows, but in spite
+of their<br>
+ fanatical courage they were entirely defeated. Popular
+enthusiasm was kindled<br>
+ by the newspapers which the financiers subsidised, and burst
+into a blaze.<br>
+ Some Socialists alone protested against this barbarous,
+doubtful, and<br>
+ dangerous enterprise. They were at once arrested.</p>
+
+<p>At that moment when the Minister, supported by wealth, and now
+beloved by the<br>
+ poor, seemed unconquerable, the light of hate showed Hippolyte
+Ceres alone the<br>
+ danger, and looking with a gloomy joy at his rival, he muttered
+between his<br>
+ teeth, "He is wrecked, the brigand!"</p>
+
+<p>Whilst the country intoxicated itself with glory, the
+neighbouring Empire<br>
+ protested against the occupation of Nigritia by a European
+power, and these<br>
+ protests following one another at shorter and shorter intervals
+became more<br>
+ and more vehement. The newspapers of the interested Republic
+concealed all<br>
+ causes for uneasiness; but Hippolyte Ceres heard the growing
+menace, and<br>
+ determined at last to risk everything, even the fate of the
+ministry, in order<br>
+ to ruin his enemy. He got men whom he could trust to write and
+insert articles<br>
+ in several of the official journals, which, seeming to express
+Paul Visire's<br>
+ precise views, attributed warlike intentions to the Head of the
+Government.</p>
+
+<p>These articles roused a terrible echo abroad, and they alarmed
+the public<br>
+ opinion of a nation which, while fond of soldiers, was not fond
+of war.<br>
+ Questioned in the House on the foreign policy of his government,
+Paul Visire<br>
+ made a re-assuring statement, and promised to maintain a face
+compatible with<br>
+ the dignity of a great nation. His Minister of Foreign Affairs,
+Crombile, read<br>
+ a declaration which was absolutely unintelligible, for the
+reason that it was<br>
+ couched in diplomatic language. The Minister obtained a large
+majority.</p>
+
+<p>But the rumours of war did not cease, and in order to avoid a
+new and<br>
+ dangerous motion, the Prime Minister distributed eighty thousand
+acres of<br>
+ forests in Nigritia among the Deputies, and had fourteen
+Socialists arrested.<br>
+ Hippolyte Ceres went gloomily about the lobbies, confiding to
+the Deputies of<br>
+ his group that he was endeavouring to induce the Cabinet to
+adopt a pacific<br>
+ policy, and that he still hoped to succeed. Day by day the
+sinister rumours<br>
+ grew in volume, and penetrating amongst the public, spread
+uneasiness and<br>
+ disquiet. Paul Visire himself began to take alarm. What
+disturbed him most<br>
+ were the silence and absence of the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
+Crombile no<br>
+ longer came to the meetings of the Cabinet. Rising at five
+o'clock in the<br>
+ morning, he worked eighteen hours at his desk, and at last fell
+exhausted into<br>
+ his waste-paper basket, from whence the registrars removed him,
+together with<br>
+ the papers which they were going to sell to the military
+attaches of the<br>
+ neighbouring Empire.</p>
+
+<p>General Debonnaire believed that a campaign was imminent, and
+prepared for it.<br>
+ Far from fearing war, he prayed for it, and confided his
+generous hopes to<br>
+ Baroness Bildermann, who informed the neighbouring nation,
+which, acting on<br>
+ her information, proceeded to a rapid mobilization.</p>
+
+<p>The Minister of Finance unintentionally precipitated events.
+At the moment, he<br>
+ was speculating for a fall, and in order to bring about a panic
+on the Stock<br>
+ Exchange, he spread the rumour that war was now inevitable. The
+neighbouring<br>
+ Empire, deceived by this action, and expecting to see its
+territory invaded,<br>
+ mobilized its troops in all haste. The terrified Chamber
+overthrew the Visire<br>
+ ministry by an enormous majority (814 votes to 7, with 28
+abstentions). It was<br>
+ too late. The very day of this fall the neighbouring and hostile
+nation<br>
+ recalled its ambassador and flung eight millions of men into
+Madame Ceres'<br>
+ country. War became universal, and the whole world was drowned
+in a torrent of<br>
+ blood.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h2><br>
+ THE ZENITH OF PENGUIN CIVILIZATION</h2>
+
+<p>Half a century after the events we have just related, Madame
+Ceres died<br>
+ surrounded with respect and veneration, in the eighty-ninth year
+of her age.<br>
+ She had long been the widow of a statesman whose name she bore
+with dignity.<br>
+ Her modest and quiet funeral was followed by the orphans of the
+parish and the<br>
+ sisters of the Sacred Compassion.</p>
+
+<p>The deceased left all her property to the Charity of St.
+Orberosia.</p>
+
+<p>"Alas!" sighed M. Monnoyer, a canon of St. Mael, as he
+received the pious<br>
+ legacy, "it was high time for a generous benefactor to come to
+the relief of<br>
+ our necessities. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant are turning
+away from us.<br>
+ And when we try to lead back these misguided souls, neither
+threats nor<br>
+ promises, neither gentleness nor violence, nor anything else is
+now<br>
+ successful. The Penguin clergy pine in desolation; our country
+priests,<br>
+ reduced to following the humblest of trades, are shoeless, and
+compelled to<br>
+ live upon such scraps as they can pick up. In our ruined
+churches the rain of<br>
+ heaven falls upon the faithful, and during the holy offices they
+can hear the<br>
+ noise of stones falling from the arches. The tower of the
+cathedral is<br>
+ tottering and will soon fall. St. Orberosia is forgotten by the
+Penguins, her<br>
+ devotion abandoned, and her sanctuary deserted. On her shrine,
+bereft of its<br>
+ gold and precious stones, the spider silently weaves her
+web."</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Hearing these lamentations, Pierre Mille, who at the age of
+ninety-eight years<br>
+ had lost nothing of his intellectual and moral power, asked, the
+canon if he<br>
+ did not think that St. Orberosia would one day rise out of this
+wrongful<br>
+ oblivion.</p>
+
+<p>"I hardly dare to hope so," sighed M. Monnoyer.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a pity!" answered Pierre Mille. "Orberosia is a
+charming figure and her<br>
+ legend is a beautiful one. I discovered the other day by the
+merest chance,<br>
+ one of her most delightful miracles, the miracle of Jean Violle.
+Would you<br>
+ like to hear it, M. Monnoyer?"</p>
+
+<p>"I should be very pleased, M. Mille."</p>
+
+<p>"Here it is, then, just as I found it in a fifteenth-century
+manuscript</p>
+
+<p>"Cecile, the wife of Nicolas Gaubert, a jeweller on the
+Pont-au-Change, after<br>
+ having led an honest and chaste life for many years, and being
+now past her<br>
+ prime, became infatuated with Jean Violle, the Countess de
+Maubec's page, who<br>
+ lived at the Hotel du Paon on the Place de Greve. He was not yet
+eighteen<br>
+ years old, and his face and figure were attractive. Not being
+able to conquer<br>
+ her passion, Cecile resolved to satisfy it. She attracted the
+page to her<br>
+ house, loaded him with caresses, supplied him with sweetmeats
+and finally did<br>
+ as she wished with him.</p>
+
+<p>"Now one day, as they were together in the jeweller's bed,
+Master Nicholas<br>
+ came home sooner than he was expected. He found the bolt drawn,
+and heard his<br>
+ wife on the other side of the door exclaiming, 'My heart! my
+angel! my love!'<br>
+ Then suspecting that she was shut up with a gallant, he struck
+great blows<br>
+ upon the door and began to shout 'Slut! hussy! wanton! open so
+that I may cut<br>
+ off your nose and ears!' In this peril, the jeweller's wife
+besought St.<br>
+ Orberosia, and vowed her a large candle if she helped her and
+the little page,<br>
+ who was dying of fear beside the bed, out of their
+difficulty.</p>
+
+<p>"The saint heard the prayer. She immediately changed Jean
+Violle into a girl.<br>
+ Seeing this, Cecile was completely reassured, and began to call
+out to her<br>
+ husband: 'Oh! you brutal villain, you jealous wretch! Speak
+gently if you want<br>
+ the door to be opened.' And scolding in this way, she ran to the
+wardrobe and<br>
+ took out of it an old hood, a pair of stays, and a long grey
+petticoat, in<br>
+ which she hastily wrapped the transformed page. Then when this
+was done,<br>
+ 'Catherine, dear Catherine,' said she, loudly, 'open the door
+for your uncle;<br>
+ he is more fool than knave, and won't do you any harm." The boy
+who had become<br>
+ a girl, obeyed. Master Nicholas entered the room and found in it
+a young maid<br>
+ whom he did not know, and his wife in bed. 'Big booby,' said the
+latter to<br>
+ him, 'don't stand gaping at what you see. just as I had come to
+bed because<br>
+ had a stomach ache, I received a visit from Catherine, the
+daughter of my<br>
+ sister Jeanne de Palaiseau, with whom we quarrelled fifteen
+years ago. Kiss<br>
+ your niece. She is well worth the trouble.' The jeweller gave
+Violle a hug,<br>
+ and from that moment wanted nothing so much as to be alone with
+her a moment,<br>
+ so that he might embrace her as much as he liked. For this
+reason he led her<br>
+ without any delay down to the kitchen, under the pretext of
+giving her some<br>
+ walnuts and wine, and he was no sooner there with her than he
+began to caress<br>
+ her very affectionately. He would not have stopped at that if
+St. Orberosia<br>
+ had not inspired his good wife with the idea of seeing what he
+was about. She<br>
+ found him with the pretended niece sitting on his knee. She
+called him a<br>
+ debauched creature, boxed his ears, and forced him to beg her
+pardon. The next<br>
+ day Violle resumed his previous form."</p>
+
+<p>Having heard this story the venerable Canon Monnoyer thanked
+Pierre Mille for<br>
+ having told it, and, taking up his pen, began to write out a
+list of horses<br>
+ that would win at the next race meeting. For he was a
+book-maker's clerk.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who
+produced the<br>
+ things necessary for life, wanted them; those who did not
+produce them had<br>
+ more than enough. "But these," as a member of the Institute
+said, "are<br>
+ necessary economic fatalities." The great Penguin people had no
+longer either<br>
+ traditions, intellectual culture, or arts. The progress of
+civilisation<br>
+ manifested itself among them by murderous industry, infamous
+speculation, and<br>
+ hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as did all the great cities
+of the time,<br>
+ a cosmopolitan and financial character. An immense and regular
+ugliness<br>
+ reigned within it. The country enjoyed perfect tranquillity. It
+had reached<br>
+ its zenith.</p>
+
+<p>�</p>
+
+<h1><br>
+ Book VII. FUTURE TIMES</h1>
+
+<h1>�</h1>
+
+<h2>THE ENDLESS HISTORY</h2>
+
+<p>Alca is becoming Americanised.--M. Daniset.</p>
+
+<p>And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the
+inhabitants of<br>
+ the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.--Genesis xix.
+25</p>
+
+<p>{greek here](Herodotus, Histories, VII cii.)</p>
+
+<p>Poverty hast ever been familiar to Greece, but virtue has been
+acquired,<br>
+ having been accomplished by wisdom and firm laws.-- Henry Cary's
+Translation.</p>
+
+<p>You have not seen angels then.--Liber Terribilis.</p>
+
+<p>Bqfttfusftpvtuse jufbmmbb b up sjufef
+tspjtfucftfnqfsfvstbqsftbnpjsqsp<br>
+ dmbnfuspjtghjttdmjcfsufnbgsbodftftutpbnjtfbeftdpnqb hojtgjobo --
+difsftr --<br>
+ vjejtqpteoueftsjdifttftevqbzt fuqbsmfn Pzfoevofqsf
+ttfbdifuffejsjhfboumpqjojno<br>
+ Voufnpjoxfsiejrvf</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ We are now beginning to study a chemistry which will deal with
+effects<br>
+ produced by bodies containing a quantity of concentrated energy
+the like of<br>
+ which we have not yet had at our disposal.--Sir William
+Ramsay.</p>
+
+<h3>S. I</h3>
+
+<p>The houses were never high enough to satisfy them; they kept
+on making them<br>
+ still higher and built them of thirty or forty storeys: with
+offices, shops,<br>
+ banks, societies one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels
+ever deeper<br>
+ downwards.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Fifteen millions of men laboured in a giant town by the light of
+beacons which<br>
+ shed forth their glare both day and night. No light of heaven
+pierced through<br>
+ the smoke of the factories with which the town was girt, but
+sometimes the red<br>
+ disk of a rayless sun might be seen riding in the black
+firmament through<br>
+ which iron bridges ploughed their way, and from which there
+descended a<br>
+ continual shower of soot and cinders. It was the most industrial
+of all the<br>
+ cities in the world and the richest. Its organisation seemed
+perfect. None of<br>
+ the ancient aristocratic or democratic forms remained;
+everything was<br>
+ subordinated to the interests of the trusts. This environment
+gave rise to<br>
+ what anthropologists called the multi-millionaire type. The men
+of this type<br>
+ were at once energetic and frail, capable of great activity in
+forming mental<br>
+ combinations and of prolonged labour in offices, but men whose
+nervous<br>
+ irritability suffered from hereditary troubles which increased
+as time went<br>
+ on.</p>
+
+<p>Like all true aristocrats, like the patricians of republican
+Rome or the<br>
+ squires of old England, these powerful men affected a great
+severity in their<br>
+ habits and customs. They were the ascetics of wealth. At the
+meetings of the<br>
+ trusts an observer would have noticed their smooth and puffy
+faces, their<br>
+ lantern cheeks, their sunken eyes and wrinkled brows. With
+bodies more<br>
+ withered, complexions yellower, lips drier, and eyes filled with
+a more<br>
+ burning fanaticism than those of the old Spanish monks,
+these<br>
+ multimillionaires gave themselves up with inextinguishable
+ardour to the<br>
+ austerities of banking and industry. Several, denying themselves
+all<br>
+ happiness, all pleasure, and all rest, spent their miserable
+lives in rooms<br>
+ without light or air, furnished only with electrical apparatus,
+living on eggs<br>
+ and milk, and sleeping on camp beds. By doing nothing except
+pressing nickel<br>
+ buttons with their fingers, these mystics heaped up riches of
+which they never<br>
+ even saw the signs, and acquired the vain possibility of
+gratifying desires<br>
+ that they never experienced.</p>
+
+<p>The worship of wealth had its martyrs. One of these
+multi-millionaires, the<br>
+ famous Samuel Box, preferred to die rather than surrender the
+smallest atom of<br>
+ his property. One of his workmen, the victim of an accident
+while at work,<br>
+ being refused any indemnity by his employer, obtained a verdict
+in the courts,<br>
+ but repelled by innumerable obstacles of procedure, he fell into
+the direst<br>
+ poverty. Being thus reduced to despair, he succeeded by dint of
+cunning and<br>
+ audacity in confronting his employer with a loaded revolver in
+his hand, and<br>
+ threatened to blow out his brains if he did not give him some
+assistance.<br>
+ Samuel Box gave nothing, and let himself be killed for the sake
+of principle.</p>
+
+<p>Examples that come from high quarters are followed. Those who
+possessed some<br>
+ small capital (and they were necessarily the greater number),
+affected the<br>
+ ideas and habits of the multi-millionaires, in order that they
+might be<br>
+ classed among them. All passions which injured the increase or
+the<br>
+ preservation of wealth, were regarded as dishonourable; neither
+indolence, nor<br>
+ idleness, nor the taste for disinterested study, nor love of the
+arts, nor,<br>
+ above all, extravagance, was ever forgiven; pity was condemned
+as a dangerous<br>
+ weakness. Whilst every inclination to licentiousness excited
+public<br>
+ reprobation, the violent and brutal satisfaction of an appetite
+was, on the<br>
+ contrary, excused; violence, in truth, was regarded as less
+injurious to<br>
+ morality, since it manifested a form of social energy. The State
+was firmly<br>
+ based on two great public virtues: respect for the rich and
+contempt for the<br>
+ poor. Feeble spirits who were still moved by human suffering had
+no other<br>
+ resource than to take refuge in a hypocrisy which it was
+impossible to blame,<br>
+ since it contributed to the maintenance of order and the
+solidity of<br>
+ institutions.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, among the rich, all were devoted to their social order,
+or seemed to be<br>
+ so; all gave good examples, if all did not follow them. Some
+felt the gravity<br>
+ of their position cruelly; but they endured it either from pride
+or from duty.<br>
+ Some attempted, in secret and by subterfuge, to escape from it
+for a moment.<br>
+ One of these, Edward Martin, the President, of the Steel Trust,
+sometimes<br>
+ dressed himself as a poor man, went: forth to beg his bread, and
+allowed<br>
+ himself to be jostled by the passers-by. One day, as he asked
+alms on a<br>
+ bridge, he engaged in a quarrel with a real beggar, and filled
+with a fury of<br>
+ envy, he strangled him.</p>
+
+<p>As they devoted their whole intelligence to business, they
+sought no<br>
+ intellectual pleasures. The theatre, which had formerly been
+very flourishing<br>
+ among them, was now reduced to pantomimes and comic dances. Even
+the pieces in<br>
+ which women acted were given up; the taste for pretty forms and
+brilliant<br>
+ toilettes had been lost; the somersaults of clowns and the music
+of negroes<br>
+ were preferred above them, and what roused enthusiasm was the
+sight of women<br>
+ upon the stage whose necks were bedizened with diamonds, or
+processions<br>
+ carrying golden bars in triumph. Ladies of wealth were as much
+compelled as<br>
+ the men to lead a respectable life. According to a tendency
+common to all<br>
+ civilizations, public feeling set them up as symbols; they were,
+by their<br>
+ austere magnificence, to represent both the splendour of wealth
+and its<br>
+ intangible . The old habits of gallantry had been reformed, Tut
+fashionable<br>
+ lovers were now secretly replaced by muscular labourers or stray
+grooms.<br>
+ Nevertheless, scandals were rare, a foreign journey concealed
+nearly all of<br>
+ them, and the Princesses of the Trusts remained objects of
+universal esteem.</p>
+
+<p>The rich formed only a small minority, but their
+collaborators, who composed<br>
+ the entire people, had been completely won over or completely
+subjugated by<br>
+ them. They formed two classes, the agents of commerce or
+banking, and workers<br>
+ in the factories. The former contributed an immense amount of
+work and<br>
+ received large salaries. Some of them succeeded in founding
+establishments of<br>
+ their own; for in the constant increase of the public wealth the
+more<br>
+ intelligent and audacious could hope for anything. Doubtless it
+would have<br>
+ been possible to find a certain number of discontented and
+rebellious persons<br>
+ among the immense crowd of engineers and accountants, but this
+powerful<br>
+ society had imprinted its firm discipline even on the minds of
+its opponents.<br>
+ The very anarchists were laborious and regular.</p>
+
+<p>As for the workmen who toiled in the factories that surrounded
+the town, their<br>
+ decadence, both physical and moral, was terrible; they were
+examples of the<br>
+ type of poverty as it is set forth by anthropology. Although the
+development<br>
+ among them of certain muscles, due to the particular nature of
+their work,<br>
+ might give a false idea of their strength, they presented sure
+signs of morbid<br>
+ debility. Of low stature, with small heads and narrow chests,
+they were<br>
+ further distinguished from the comfortable classes by a
+multitude of<br>
+ physiological anomalies, and, in particular, by a common want of
+symmetry<br>
+ between the head and the limbs. And they were destined to a
+gradual and<br>
+ continuous degeneration, for the State made soldiers of the more
+robust among<br>
+ them, and the health of these did not long withstand the
+brothels and the<br>
+ drink-shops that sprang up around their barracks. The
+proletarians became more<br>
+ and more feeble in mind. The continued weakening of their
+intellectual<br>
+ faculties was not entirely due to their manner of life; it
+resulted also from<br>
+ a methodical selection carried out by the employers. The latter,
+fearing that<br>
+ workmen of too great ability might be inclined to put forward
+legitimate<br>
+ demands, took care to eliminate them by every possible means,
+and preferred to<br>
+ engage ignorant and stupid labourers, who were incapable of
+defending their<br>
+ rights, but were yet intelligent enough to perform their toil,
+which highly<br>
+ perfected machines rendered extremely simple. Thus the
+proletarians were<br>
+ unable to do anything to improve their lot. With difficulty did
+they succeed<br>
+ by means of strikes in maintaining the rate of their wages. Even
+this means<br>
+ began to fail them. The alternations of production inherent in
+the capitalist<br>
+ system caused such cessations of work that, in several branches
+of industry,<br>
+ as soon as a strike was declared, the accumulation of products
+allowed the<br>
+ employers to dispense with the strikers. In a word, these
+miserable employees<br>
+ were plunged in a gloomy apathy that nothing enlightened and
+nothing<br>
+ exasperated. They were necessary instruments for the social
+order and well<br>
+ adapted to their purpose.</p>
+
+<p>Upon the whole, this social order seemed the most firmly
+established that had<br>
+ yet been seen, at least amon kind, for that of bees and ants is
+incomparably<br>
+ more stable. Nothing could foreshadow the ruin of a system
+founded on what is<br>
+ strongest in human nature, pride and cupidity. However, keen
+observers<br>
+ discovered several grounds for uneasiness. The most certain,
+although the<br>
+ least apparent, were of an economic order, and consisted in the
+continually<br>
+ increasing amount of over-production, which entailed long and
+cruel<br>
+ interruptions of labour, though these were, it is true, utilized
+by the<br>
+ manufacturers as a means of breaking the power of the workmen,
+by facing them<br>
+ with the prospect of a lock-out. A more obvious peril resulted
+from the<br>
+ physiological state of almost the entire population. "The health
+of the poor<br>
+ is what it must be," said the experts in hygiene, "but that of
+the rich leaves<br>
+ much to be desired." It was not difficult to find the causes of
+this. The<br>
+ supply of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the
+city, and men<br>
+ breathed in an artificial air. The food trusts, by means of the
+most daring<br>
+ chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk,
+fruit, and<br>
+ vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and
+brain troubles.<br>
+ The multi-millionaires were bald at the age of eighteen; some
+showed from time<br>
+ to time a dangerous weakness of mind. Over-strung and enfeebled,
+they gave<br>
+ enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a common thing
+for some<br>
+ bath-attendant or other trumpery who turned healer or prophet,
+to make a rapid<br>
+ fortune by the practice of medicine or theology. The number of
+lunatics<br>
+ increased continually; suicides multiplied in the world of
+wealth, and many of<br>
+ them were accompanied by atrocious and extraordinary
+circumstances, which bore<br>
+ witness to an unheard o perversion of intelligence and
+sensibility.</p>
+
+<p>Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average
+minds. Terrible<br>
+ accidents, henceforth periodical and regular, entered into
+people's<br>
+ calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in statistical
+tables. Every<br>
+ day, machines burst into fragments, houses fell down, trains
+laden with<br>
+ merchandise fell on to the streets, demolishing entire buildings
+and crushing<br>
+ hundreds of passers-by. Through the ground, honey-combed with
+tunnels, two or<br>
+ three storeys of work-shops would often crash, engulfing all
+those who worked<br>
+ in them.</p>
+
+<h3>S. 2</h3>
+
+<p>In the southwestern district of the city, on an eminence which
+had preserved<br>
+ its ancient name of Fort Saint-Michel, there stretched a square
+where some old<br>
+ trees still spread their exhausted arms above the greensward.
+Landscape<br>
+ gardeners had constructed a cascade, grottos, a torrent, a lake,
+and an<br>
+ island, on its northern slope. From this side one could see the
+whole town<br>
+ with its streets, its boulevards, its squares, the multitude of
+its roofs and<br>
+ domes, its air-passages, and its crowds of men, covered with a
+veil of<br>
+ silence, and seemingly enchanted by the distance. This square
+was the<br>
+ healthiest place in the capital; here no smoke obscured the sky,
+and children<br>
+ were brought here to play. In summer some employees from the
+neighbouring<br>
+ offices and laboratories used to resort to it for a moment after
+their<br>
+ luncheons, but they did not disturb its solitude and peace.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ It was owing to this custom that, one day in June, about
+mid-day, a telegraph<br>
+ clerk, Caroline Meslier, came and sat down on a bench at the end
+of a terrace.<br>
+ In order to refresh her eyes by the sight of a little green, she
+turned her<br>
+ back to the town. Dark, with brown eyes, robust and placid,
+Caroline appeared<br>
+ to be from twenty-five to twenty-eight years of age. Almost
+immediately, a<br>
+ clerk in the Electricity Trust, George Clair, took his place
+beside her. Fair,<br>
+ thin, and supple, he had features of a feminine delicacy; he was
+scarcely<br>
+ older than she, and looked still younger. As they met almost
+every day in this<br>
+ place, a comradeship had sprung up between them, and they
+enjoyed chatting<br>
+ together. But their conversation had never been tender,
+affectionate, or even<br>
+ intimate. Caroline, although it had happened to her in the past
+to repent of<br>
+ her confidence, might perhaps have been less reserved had not
+George Clair<br>
+ always shown himself extremely restrained in his expressions and
+behaviour. He<br>
+ always gave a purely intellectual character to the conversation,
+keeping it<br>
+ within the realm of general ideas, and, moreover, expressing
+himself on all<br>
+ subjects with the greatest freedom. He spoke frequently of the
+organization of<br>
+ society, and the conditions of labour.</p>
+
+<p>"Wealth," said he, "is one of the means of living happily; but
+people have<br>
+ made it the sole end of existence."</p>
+
+<p>And this state of things seemed monstrous to both of them.</p>
+
+<p>They returned continually to various scientific subjects with
+which they were<br>
+ both familiar.</p>
+
+<p>On that day they discussed the evolution of chemistry.</p>
+
+<p>"From the moment," said Clair, "that radium was seen to be
+transformed into<br>
+ helium, people ceased to affirm the immutability of simple
+bodies; in this way<br>
+ all those old laws about simple relations and about the
+indestructibility of<br>
+ matter were abolished."</p>
+
+<p>"However," said she, "chemical laws exist."</p>
+
+<p>For, being a woman, she had need of belief.</p>
+
+<p>He resumed carelessly:</p>
+
+<p>"Now that we can procure radium in sufficient quantities,
+science possesses<br>
+ incomparable means of analysis; even at present we get glimpses,
+within what<br>
+ are called simple bodies, of extremely diversified complex ones,
+and we<br>
+ discover energies in matter which seem to increase even by
+reason of its<br>
+ tenuity."</p>
+
+<p>As they talked, they threw bits of bread to the birds, and
+some children<br>
+ played around them.</p>
+
+<p>Passing from one subject to another:</p>
+
+<p>"This hill, in the quaternary epoch," said Clair, "was
+inhabited by wild<br>
+ horses. Last year, as they were tunnelling for the water mains,
+they found a<br>
+ layer of the bones of primeval horses."</p>
+
+<p>She was anxious to know whether, at that distant epoch, man
+had yet appeared.</p>
+
+<p>He told her that man used to hunt the primeval horse long
+before he tried to<br>
+ domesticate him.</p>
+
+<p>"Man," he added, "was at first a hunter, then he became a
+shepherd, a<br>
+ cultivator, a manufacturer . . . and these diverse civilizations
+succeeded<br>
+ each other at intervals of time that the mind cannot
+conceive."</p>
+
+<p>He took out his watch.</p>
+
+<p>Caroline asked if it was already time to go back to the
+office.</p>
+
+<p>He said it was not, that it was scarcely half-past twelve.</p>
+
+<p>A little girl was making mud pies at the foot of their bench;
+a little boy of<br>
+ seven or eight years was playing in front of them. Whilst his
+mother was<br>
+ sewing on an adjoining bench, he played all alone at being a
+run-away horse,<br>
+ and with that power of illusion, of which children are capable,
+he imagined<br>
+ that he was at the same time the horse, and those who ran after
+him, and those<br>
+ who fled in terror before him. He kept struggling with himself
+and shouting:<br>
+ "Stop him, Hi! Hi! This is an awful horse, he has got the bit
+between his<br>
+ teeth."</p>
+
+<p>Caroline asked the question:</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think that men were happy formerly?"</p>
+
+<p>Her companion answered:</p>
+
+<p>"They suffered less when they were younger. They acted like
+that little boy:<br>
+ they played; they played at arts, at virtues, at vices, at
+heroism, at<br>
+ beliefs, at pleasures; they had illusions which entertained
+them; they made a<br>
+ noise; they amused themselves. But now. . . ."</p>
+
+<p>He interrupted himself, and looked again at his watch.</p>
+
+<p>The child, who was running, struck his foot against the little
+girl's pail,<br>
+ and fell his full length on the gravel. He remained a moment
+stretched out<br>
+ motionless, then raised himself up on the palms of his hands.
+His forehead<br>
+ puckered, his mouth opened, and he burst into tears. His mother
+ran up, but<br>
+ Caroline had lifted him from the ground and was wiping his eyes
+and mouth with<br>
+ her handkerchief.</p>
+
+<p>The child kept on sobbing and Clair took him in his arms.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, don't cry, my little man! I am going to tell you a
+story.</p>
+
+<p>"A fisherman once threw his net into the sea and drew out a
+little, sealed,<br>
+ copper pot, which he opened with his knife. Smoke came out of
+it, and as it<br>
+ mounted up to the clouds the smoke grew thicker and thicker and
+became a giant<br>
+ who gave such a terrible yawn that the whole world was blown to
+dust.</p>
+
+<p>Clair stopped himself, gave a dry laugh, and handed the child
+back to his<br>
+ mother. Then he took out his watch again, and kneeling on the
+bench with his<br>
+ elbows resting on its back he gazed at the town. As far as the
+eye could<br>
+ reach, the multitude of houses stood out in their tiny
+immensity.</p>
+
+<p>Caroline turned her eyes in the same direction.</p>
+
+<p>"What splendid weather it is!" said she. "The sun's rays
+change the smoke on<br>
+ the horizon into gold. The worst thing about civilization is
+that it deprives<br>
+ one of the light of day."</p>
+
+<p>We did not answer; his looks remained fixed on a place in the
+town.</p>
+
+<p>After some seconds of silence they saw about half a mile away,
+in the richer<br>
+ district on the other side of the river, a sort of tragic fog
+rearing itself<br>
+ upwards. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard even where
+they were<br>
+ sitting, and an immense tree of smoke mounted towards the pure
+sky. Little by<br>
+ little the air was filled with an imperceptible murmur caused by
+the shouts of<br>
+ thousands of men. Cries burst forth quite close to the
+square.</p>
+
+<p>"What has been blown up?"</p>
+
+<p>The bewilderment was great, for although accidents were
+common, such a violent<br>
+ explosion as this one had never been seen, and everybody
+perceived that<br>
+ something terribly strange had happened.</p>
+
+<p>Attempts were made to locate the place of the accident;
+districts, streets,<br>
+ different buildings, clubs, theatres, and shops were mentioned.
+Information<br>
+ gradually became more precise and at last the truth was
+known.</p>
+
+<p>"The Steel Trust has just been blown up."</p>
+
+<p>Clair put his watch back into his pocket.</p>
+
+<p>Caroline looked at him closely and her eyes filled with
+astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>At last she whispered in his ear:</p>
+
+<p>"Did you know it? Were you expecting it? Was it you . .
+.?"</p>
+
+<p>He answered very calmly:</p>
+
+<p>"That town ought to be destroyed."</p>
+
+<p>She replied in a gentle and thoughtful tone:</p>
+
+<p>"I think so too."</p>
+
+<p>And both of them returned quietly to their work.</p>
+
+<h3><br>
+ S. 3</h3>
+
+<p>From that day onward, anarchist attempts followed one another
+every week<br>
+ without interruption. The victims were numerous, and almost all
+of them<br>
+ belonged to the poorer classes. These crimes roused public
+resentment. It was<br>
+ among domestic servants, hotel-keepers, and the employees of
+such small shops<br>
+ as the Trusts still allowed to exist, that indignation burst
+forth most<br>
+ vehemently. In popular districts women might be heard demanding
+unusual<br>
+ punishments for the dynamitards. (They were called by this old
+name, although<br>
+ it was hardly appropriate to them, since, to these unknown
+chemists, dynamite<br>
+ was an innocent material only fit to destroy ant-hills, and they
+considered it<br>
+ mere child's play to explode nitro-glycerine with a cartridge
+made of<br>
+ fulminate of mercury.) Business ceased suddenly, and those who
+were least rich<br>
+ were the first to feel the effects. They spoke of doing justice
+themselves to<br>
+ the anarchists. In the mean time the factory workers remained
+hostile or<br>
+ indifferent to violent action. They were threatened, as a result
+of the<br>
+ decline of business, with a likelihood of losing their work, or
+even a<br>
+ lock-out in all the factories. The Federation of Trade Unions
+proposed a<br>
+ general strike as the most powerful means of influencing the
+employers, and<br>
+ the best aid that could be given to the revolutionists, but all
+the trades<br>
+ with the exception of the gliders refused to cease work.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ The police made numerous arrests. Troops summoned from all parts
+of the<br>
+ National Federation protected the offices of the Trusts, the
+houses of the<br>
+ multi-millionaires, the public halls, the banks, and the big
+shops. A<br>
+ fortnight passed without a single explosion, and it was
+concluded that the<br>
+ dynamitards, in all probability but a handful of persons,
+perhaps even Still<br>
+ fewer, had all been killed or captured, or that they were in
+hiding, or had<br>
+ taken flight. Confidence returned; it returned at first among
+the poorer<br>
+ classes. Two or three hundred thousand soldiers, who bad been
+lodged in the<br>
+ most closely populated districts, stimulated trade, and people
+began to cry<br>
+ out: "Hurrah for the army!"</p>
+
+<p>The rich, who had not been so quick to take alarm, were
+reassured more slowly.<br>
+ But at the Stock Exchange a group of "bulls" spread optimistic
+rumours and by<br>
+ a powerful effort put a brake upon the fall in prices. Business
+improved.<br>
+ Newspapers with big circulations supported the movement. With
+patriotic<br>
+ eloquence they depicted capital as laughing in its impregnable
+position at the<br>
+ assaults of a few dastardly criminals, and public wealth
+maintaining its<br>
+ serene ascendency in spite of the vain threats made against it.
+They were<br>
+ sincere in their attitude, though at the same time they found it
+benefited<br>
+ them. Outrages were forgotten or their occurrence denied. On
+Sundays, at the<br>
+ race-meetings, the stands were adorned by women covered with
+pearls and<br>
+ diamonds. It was observed with joy that the capitalists had not
+suffered.<br>
+ Cheers were given for the multi-millionaires in the saddling
+rooms.</p>
+
+<p>On the following day the Southern Railway Station, the
+Petroleum Trust, and<br>
+ the huge church built at the expense of Thomas Morcellet were
+all blown up.<br>
+ Thirty houses were in flames, and the beginning of a fire was
+discovered at<br>
+ the docks. The firemen showed amazing intrepidity and zeal. They
+managed their<br>
+ tall fire-escapes with automatic precision, and climbed as high
+as thirty<br>
+ storeys to rescue the luckless inhabitants from the flames. The
+soldiers<br>
+ performed their duties with spirit, and were given a double
+ration of coffee.<br>
+ But these fresh casualties started a panic. Millions of people,
+who wanted to<br>
+ take their money with them and leave the town at once, crowded
+the great<br>
+ banking houses. These establishments, after paying out money for
+three days,<br>
+ closed their doors amid mutterings of a riot. A crowd of
+fugitives, laden with<br>
+ their baggage, besieged the railway stations and took the town
+by storm. Many<br>
+ who were anxious to lay in a stock of provisions and take refuge
+in the<br>
+ cellars, attacked the grocery stores, although they were guarded
+by soldiers<br>
+ with fixed bayonets. The public authorities displayed energy.
+Numerous arrests<br>
+ were made and thousands of warrants issued against suspected
+persons.</p>
+
+<p>During the three weeks that followed no outrage was committed.
+There was a<br>
+ rumour that bombs had been found in the Opera House, in the
+cellars of the<br>
+ Town Hall, and beside one of the Pillars of the Stock Exchange.
+But it was<br>
+ soon known that these were boxes of sweets that had been put in
+those places<br>
+ by practical jokers or lunatics. One of the accused, when
+questioned by a<br>
+ magistrate, declared that he was the chief author of the
+explosions, and said<br>
+ that all his accomplices had lost their lives. These confessions
+were<br>
+ published by the newspapers and helped to reassure public
+opinion. It was only<br>
+ towards the close of the examination that the magistrates saw
+they had to deal<br>
+ with a pretender who was in no way connected with any of the
+crimes.</p>
+
+<p>The experts chosen by the courts discovered nothing that
+enabled them to<br>
+ determine the engine employed in the work of destruction.
+According to their<br>
+ conjectures the new explosive emanated from a gas which radium
+evolves, and it<br>
+ was supposed that electric waves, produced by a special type of
+oscillator,<br>
+ were propagated through space and thus caused the explosion. But
+even the<br>
+ ablest chemist could say nothing precise or certain. At last two
+policemen,<br>
+ who were passing in front of the Hotel Meyer, found on the
+pavement, close to<br>
+ a ventilator, an egg made of white metal and provided with a
+capsule at each<br>
+ end. They picked it up carefully, and, on the orders of their
+chief, carried<br>
+ it to the municipal laboratory. Scarcely had the experts
+assembled to examine<br>
+ it, than the egg burst and blew up the amphitheatre and the
+dome. All the<br>
+ experts perished, and with them Collin, the General of
+Artillery, and the<br>
+ famous Professor Tigre.</p>
+
+<p>The capitalist society did not allow itself to be daunted by
+this fresh<br>
+ disaster. The great banks re-opened their doors, declaring that
+they would<br>
+ meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money
+guaranteed by the<br>
+ State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange, in spite of
+the complete<br>
+ cessation of business, decided not to suspend their
+sittings.</p>
+
+<p>In the mean time the magisterial investigation into the case
+of those who had<br>
+ been first accused had come to an end. Perhaps the evidence
+brought against<br>
+ them might have appeared insufficient under other circumstances,
+but the zeal<br>
+ both of the magistrates and the public made up for this
+insufficiency. On the<br>
+ eve of the day fixed for the trial the Courts of justice were
+blown up and<br>
+ eight hundred people were killed, the greater number of them
+being judges and<br>
+ lawyers. A furious crowd broke into the prison and lynched the
+prisoners. The<br>
+ troops sent to restore order were received with showers of
+stones and revolver<br>
+ shots; several soldiers being dragged from their horses and
+trampled<br>
+ underfoot. The soldiers fired on the mob and many persons were
+killed. At last<br>
+ the public authorities succeeded in establishing tranquillity.
+Next day the<br>
+ Bank was blown up.</p>
+
+<p>From that time onwards unheard-of things took place. The
+factory workers, who<br>
+ had refused to strike, rushed in crowds into the town and set
+fire to the<br>
+ houses. Entire regiments, led by their officers, joined the
+workmen, went with<br>
+ them through the town singing revolutionary hymns, and took
+barrels of<br>
+ petroleum from the docks with which to feed the fires.
+Explosions were<br>
+ continual. One morning a monstrous tree of smoke, like the ghost
+of a huge<br>
+ palm tree half a mile in height, rose above the giant Telegraph
+Hall which<br>
+ suddenly fell into a complete ruin.</p>
+
+<p>Whilst half the town was in flames, the other half pursued its
+accustomed<br>
+ life. In the mornings, milk pails could be heard jingling in the
+dairy carts.<br>
+ In a deserted avenue some old navvy might be seen seated against
+a wall slowly<br>
+ eating hunks of bread with perhaps a little meat. Almost all the
+presidents of<br>
+ the trusts remained at their posts. Some of them performed their
+duty with<br>
+ heroic simplicity. Raphael Box, the son of a martyred
+multi-millionaire, was<br>
+ blown up as he was presiding at the general meeting of the Sugar
+Trust. He was<br>
+ given a magnificent funeral and the procession on its way to the
+cemetery had<br>
+ to climb six times over piles of ruins or cross upon planks over
+the uprooted<br>
+ roads.</p>
+
+<p>The ordinary helpers of the rich, the clerks, employees,
+brokers, and agents,<br>
+ preserved an unshaken fidelity. The surviving clerks of the Bank
+that had been<br>
+ blown up, made their way along the ruined streets through the
+midst of smoking<br>
+ houses to hand in their bills of exchange, and several were
+swallowed up in<br>
+ the flames while endeavouring to present their receipts.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, any illusion concerning the state of affairs was
+impossible. The<br>
+ enemy was master of the town. Instead of silence the noise of
+explosions was<br>
+ now continuous and produced an insurmountable feeling of horror.
+The lighting<br>
+ apparatus having been destroyed, the city was plunged in
+darkness all through<br>
+ the night, and appalling crimes were committed. The populous
+districts alone,<br>
+ having suffered the least, still preserved measures of
+protection. The were<br>
+ paraded by patrols of volunteers who shot the robbers, and at
+every street<br>
+ corner one stumbled over a body lying in a pool of blood, the
+hands bound<br>
+ behind the back, a handkerchief over the face, and a placard
+pinned upon the<br>
+ breast.</p>
+
+<p>It became impossible to clear away the ruins or to bury the
+dead. Soon the<br>
+ stench from the corpses became intolerable. Epidemics raged and
+caused<br>
+ innumerable deaths, while they also rendered the survivors
+feeble and<br>
+ listless. Famine carried off almost all who were left. A hundred
+and one days<br>
+ after the first outrage, whilst six army corps with field
+artillery and siege<br>
+ artillery were marching, at night, into the poorest quarter of
+the city,<br>
+ Caroline and Clair, holding each other's hands, were watching
+from the roof a<br>
+ lofty house, the only one still left standing, but now
+surrounded by smoke and<br>
+ flame. joyous songs ascended from the street, where the crowd
+was dancing in<br>
+ delirium.</p>
+
+<p>"To-morrow it will be ended," said the man, "and it will be
+better."</p>
+
+<p>The young woman, her hair loosened and her face shining with
+the reflection of<br>
+ the flames, gazed with a pious joy at the circle of fire that
+was growing<br>
+ closer around them.</p>
+
+<p>"It will be better," said she also.</p>
+
+<p>And throwing herself into the destroyer's arms she pressed a
+passionate kiss<br>
+ upon his lips.</p>
+
+<h3>S. 4</h3>
+
+<p>The other towns of the federation also suffered from
+disturbances and<br>
+ outbreaks, and then order was restored. Reforms were introduced
+into<br>
+ institutions and great changes took place in habits and customs,
+but the<br>
+ country never recovered the loss of its capital, and never
+regained its former<br>
+ prosperity. Commerce and industry dwindled away, and
+civilization abandoned<br>
+ those countries which for so long it bad preferred to all
+others. They became<br>
+ insalubrious and sterile; the territory that had supported so
+many millions of<br>
+ men became nothing more than a desert. On the hill of Fort St.
+Michel wild<br>
+ horses cropped the coarse grass.</p>
+
+<p><br>
+ Days flowed by like water from the fountains, and the centuries
+passed like<br>
+ drops falling from the ends of stalactites. Hunters came to
+chase the bears<br>
+ upon the hills that covered the forgotten city; shepherds led
+their flocks<br>
+ upon them; labourers turned up the soil with their ploughs;
+gardeners<br>
+ cultivated their lettuces and grafted their pear trees. They
+were not rich,<br>
+ and they had no arts. The walls of their cabins were covered
+with old vines<br>
+ and roses, A goat-skin clothed their tanned limbs, while their
+wives dressed<br>
+ themselves with the wool that they themselves had spun. The
+goat-herds moulded<br>
+ little figures of men and animals out of clay, or sang songs
+about the young<br>
+ girl who follows her lover through woods or among the browsing
+goats while the<br>
+ pine trees whisper together and the water utters its murmuring
+sound. The<br>
+ master of the house grew angry with the beetles who devoured his
+figs; he<br>
+ planned snares to protect his fowls from the velvet-tailed fox,
+and he poured<br>
+ out wine for his neighbours saying:</p>
+
+<p>"Drink! The flies have not spoilt my vintage; the vines were
+dry before they<br>
+ came."</p>
+
+<p>Then in the course of ages the wealth of the villages and the
+corn that filled<br>
+ the fields were pillaged by barbarian invaders. The country
+changed its<br>
+ masters several times. The conquerors built castles upon the
+hills;<br>
+ cultivation increased; mills, forges) tanneries, and looms were
+established;<br>
+ roads were opened through the woods and over the marshes; the
+river was<br>
+ covered with boats. The hamlets became large villages and
+joining together<br>
+ formed a town which protected itself by deep trenches and lofty
+walls. Later,<br>
+ becoming the capital of a great State, it found itself
+straitened within its<br>
+ now useless ramparts and it converted them into grass-covered
+walks.</p>
+
+<p>It grew very rich and large beyond measure. The houses were
+never high enough<br>
+ to satisfy the people; they kept on making them still higher and
+built them of<br>
+ thirty or forty storeys, with offices, shops, banks, societies
+one above<br>
+ another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper downwards.
+Fifteen millions<br>
+ of men laboured in the giant town.</p>
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Penguin Island, by Anatole France
+
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