Journey to the Isles of Atlantis and Other Fanciful Excursions

by Brian Stableford

  On speaking about him, after so many days, my tears are flowing, and I can scarcely go on. I think I can still see him, bloody in my arms, his head already cold, leaning against my breast...37

  XV. In which the voyager receives hospitality

  in a convent of a sect of the old religion.

  I rendered Constantin funeral duties. Then, throwing away my arms, I turned on my heels and cursed the war.

  I wandered through the countryside for a long time. Entirely given to my dolor, I marched straight ahead. Night surprised me in the solitude of a forest.

  I soon found an isolated dwelling illuminated by the moon. It was vast, partly ruined, and ancient in appearance. Lights were shining in several windows. I knocked on the door. A long space of time went by. It was opened. I perceived an aged man entirely clad in white. He stood aside in order to let me enter.

  “I request hospitality for the night,” I said to him. “I’m far from the city and exhausted by fatigue.”

  The man bowed his head and replied: “Be welcome, brother, and remain with us for as long as you please.”

  He showed me into a vaulted room where a large number of old men were sitting, similarly clad in white. They stood up and bowed to me silently. One of them brought me a chair. They all remained silent, and I was troubled, considering those beings, doubting their reality.

  The oldest advanced slowly toward me. He held out his hands as if to bless me.

  “The Divine Spirit,” he said, “has ordered thus: ‘Welcome the man who knocks at your door as you would me, for it is me who sends him to you.’”

  He had a bronze bowl brought, and a jug full of water, and he washed my feet, without my daring to forbid him to do so. Then I was presented with milk and a few fruits. When I was restored, I addressed myself to the old man who was presiding over the assembly

  “Pardon me, Father,” I said to him, “but in truth, I would like to know more about you. Your generous hospitality and your venerable appearance already fill me with respect and affection for you. I am a stranger and know very little about this country, but I bless the fate that sent me to you at the moment when I am mourning the dearest of my friends.”

  The watchers gazed at me without saying a word. The one to whom I had addressed myself waited for me to finish, and nodded his head.

  “My son,” he said, “here you are among the last believers in the Living God. I do not want to expose our dogma to you. Know that our religion was once that of the entire nation. The people and their masters now worship vulgar idols, simulacra of divinities that never were. Since you have come from the city you must have seen that in reality, the people there worship nothing but themselves. The god Ego is the only one they know. May the unique Creator absolve them. May he enlighten them one day. That is our daily prayer.

  “The governors of this land, viewing us with anger, maltreated us at first, and ended up banishing us. We are permitted, in return for money, to remain in this refuge. We spend our lives here invoking our God and affirming ourselves in the expectation of an eternal life.

  “You have just said, young man, that you are mourning a dear friend. Believe me, weep no more. It is an article of our faith that will counsel you. We know that the soul is immortal. The brother you regret has been born to another life, an aerial, spiritual life full of new knowledge

  “My religion, Father, has a resemblance with yours,” I exclaimed, “but I confess to you that I doubt that eternity. I would like so much to believe in it!”

  “Listen,” said the priest. “In the neighboring sea, seven hours by sail from the eastern coast, there is an island where the dead live. Perhaps I ought not to reveal it to you, but as a foreigner, you are not bound by our rules. That island, we are not allowed to visit. You can. In fact, you should, in order to remove the doubt of which you speak from your soul.

  “Remember, however, that I am delivering a secret to you. The mariners of that coast know full well that there is something supernatural about that island, but they do not know what. No one dares disembark there. Navigators avoid it like the deadliest reef. Go there without dread, however.”

  Thus the chief of the followers of the old religion spoke to me. Then he wished me good night and had me conducted to a bedroom.

  I slept poorly. The old man’s words were going through my head all night. Sometimes I was inclined to think that it was some devout and excessively fabulous invention. Sometimes I was ready to add faith to it.

  In the morning, I went to say my adieux to my venerable host. I asked him what path I needed to take in order to arrive at the edge of the sea in a convenient place to embark for the Isle of the Dead. He gave me all the necessary directions, and I left.

  Three days later I reached the shore of the ocean. The sight of it reminded me of my shipwreck. I thought more strongly than ever about means of returning to France, and the last words of the dying Constantin returned to my memory:

  “Master, my good Master, leave this country quickly, if you can, or something bad will happen to you.”

  I promised myself to reflect seriously on that as soon as I had returned from the island where I was going.

  Finding sailors who were repairing their nets on the strand, I asked them to take me in their boat to a place where I had to go. They agreed, and asked me where that place was. I named the Isle of the Dead. They refused fearfully. I convinced them by means of money.

  We took to the sea, and three hours after midday, the mariners, going pale, showed me the goal of our voyage.

  XVI. The Isle of the Dead

  When we had approached and my gaze had scanned the shore both directions and the interior of the land, I felt disillusioned, for it was an island like any other, with hills and valleys, streams, rocks and woods.

  The sailors who had brought me refused to set foot there, and I disembarked alone and advanced over the firm ground, following a small rivulet. The accidents of the terrain soon his the sea from me and I suddenly found myself in a place planted with green oaks and myrtle bushes,

  A timidity for which I excuse myself prevented me from advancing then. I remained pensive, not daring to go on and not wanting to recoil. Sitting on a stone, I waited. I thought I could hear faint and sparse syllables, as if the wind were speaking softly in a human language.

  After a few moments, an exceedingly old man emerged from the wood. He was leaning on an ash-wood staff. A mantle of red cloth covered him entirely. I did not think that he was a shade, as he had all the appearances of a terrestrial complexion.

  Approaching him, I said: “Old man, tell me who you are, or, if it is the case, who you were, and whether I have a living man or a phantom before me.”

  “Young man,” he said, “I am living the same life as you. I lost count of my years a long time ago. Know, however, that I am to a centenarian as a centenarian is to an infant. I am one of the servants of the dead, and one of the youngest. Do not believe that I am eternal, for my hour also will come. But no matter: what are you doing here?”

  “Very venerable old man, I have come to visit the dead. I have been assured that they inhabit this island. If there are any here of my nation, whom I once knew, or of whom the glorious rumor has reached me, I shall ask you whether it would be permissible for me to see then, and converse with them. But above all, I would like it to be given to me to see again a former friend from Atlantis, who died four days ago.”

  “I know your language,” said the old man, “and the land where you were born. You have chosen fortunately in coming to this isle. Here you will find the souls of the great and immortal Latin race. If your evil genius had pushed your boat toward the Northern isles, eternally covered with mist and snow, you would only have found barbaric shades, the spirits of scarcely human races: those of Africa and the Pole, and also Germany. They are, as you now, disinherited peoples whose vulgar breath resembles that which animates the elephant or the seal. As for the Atlantidean you seek, you cannot find him here. His dwelling is in another place, w
hich I cannot indicate to you. Speak now; tell me who you want to see. Perhaps you would prefer to wander with me in the great forest, interrogating whoever might seem good to you?”

  I acquiesced to that proposition and we penetrated into the undergrowth. The murmur hat I had heard previously became clearer. I suddenly perceived, in places, the transparent forms of defunct souls. One might have thought them reflections, or imprecise images. From time to time, I perceived several. That rarity surprised me, and I expressed my astonishment.

  My guide said: “This place is the abode of the great souls. Here you will only find those who passed over the earth like incomparable torches whose light is still resplendent over the living.”

  He was still speaking when two bright shades loomed up before us. One was great and majestic and the other majestic and small. They said to me, in unison: “You, who come from our homeland, tell us how people think there, and how they act there.”

  Then, fixing my gaze upon those phantoms with effaced features, I finally recognized Charlemagne and Napoléon, who were holding hands. I knelt down in the grass, and, stammering with emotion, I told them what I had seen and heard in my fatherland since my childhood.

  When I had finished, the great Emperor of the Occident hid his face in his hands, while the other murmured: “The French have become women.” Then those illustrious souls disappeared, and I stood up, crushed by sadness.

  We resumed our march. My eyes were fixed on the ground and my tears were flowing. My guide touched me on the shoulder.

  “Look,” he said, “at that shade sitting by himself on the edge of that stream. Doubtless you’ve heard mention of him; he’s the great Florentine Leonardo da Vinci.”

  We approached, and I said to him: “Spirit that I admire among all others, will you deign to speak to a living man strayed into the Isle of the Dead? For your words would be an inestimable aid to me for the rest of my life.”

  The shade smiled softly. “You want a counsel,” he murmured. “Listen, then: the finest work that one can accomplish on earth is to make one’s life a poem and ennoble one’s immortal soul by the exercise of elevated thoughts and sublime passions.”

  He made me a sign of adieu and fell back into his meditation.

  While I was walking, thinking about what old Leonardo had said, the servant of the dead showed me a phantom a few paces away from us and said: “Of all the dead on this island, this is one of the most illustrious; Virgil is the first to salute him. Plato speaks of him with respect. He has turned the soul of Saint Jerome to derision, who has gone way, chagrined, to hide no one knows where. It is François Rabelais.”

  I went pale and started to tremble then. I ran toward the adorable shade.

  “Oh, Master, my venerated Master,” I cried, “is it really true that I can see you, that I am speaking to you? I would like to stay here for eternity, on my knees, contemplating you and listening to you.”

  Master Francois started laughing and said: “Friend, the praise of the living rejoices the dead of past centuries, but believe me, return very quickly to the sunlight and hurry to drink to the better, for the days on which one can do so are counted. For myself, I would gladly give the glory that is heaped upon me and this flattering Elysian solitude in exchange for four old bottles of the Chinon wine that I loved so much. O sun of Touraine, the young women of my village, friend Estissac’s dinners, among men of good taste and heart, and profound science! Who can ever return all that to me? What a life a man can lead! But he prefers to play the weeper and the miser, to flee what he loves and seek bother.”

  “No, Master,” I said. “For myself, penetrated by your doctrine, believe that I lead a sweet life, in spite of snags, and that I have never secreted any excess of bile. I love all good and beautiful things, and simply turn away from the unpleasant. For the rest, I am pleased to laugh at human infirmities and blindness, commencing with my own.”

  “Yes,” said Master François, “You’re right. But that’s not all. Life, in order to be beautiful, must also be noble. I confess to you that Panurge, and Brother Jean des Entommeures, remain my preferred children. But don’t go believing that, in order to be one of mine, it’s necessary to be a rogue, ribald, to live off women, and all the rest. I adopt for disciples all those who love life and who, knowing how to comprehend it, don’t see it through the black-tinted spectacles of our old astrologers.

  “But as for you, don’t stay here. The society of phantoms is depressing for a living being, and you’ll have plenty of time to frequent the dead. It’s not the same for the living. Go back, my son, believe me, go back.”

  I obeyed the sublime shade and quit the forest where the dead were wandering. My companion, the old man, suddenly slipped away and I found myself beside the sea.

  I no longer saw the boat or the sailors. A strange change had transformed the entire island. The place to which I had returned was certainly the one where I had disembarked, but the foliage, green when I arrived, was now red and withered, falling to the foot of the trees. My crossing had taken place on the first of June, and now the russet grass of the meadows was strewn with autumn crocuses. I thought I had been in the forest for an hour but I had stayed there for five months.

  Epilogue

  Shall I recount how I made a raft, on which I embarked stark naked, once my garments, cut into strips, served to hold a few planks together, and how the current, which I thought would carry me toward Atlantis, carried me, on the contrary, southwards into the open sea? That would be quite pointless.

  My provisions ran out. I had no fresh water. I thought my fate was sealed and understood that I was going to die of thirst in the middle of the sea.

  Destiny treated my better than that. It sent me a ship carrying the English flag. I succeeded in attracting the attention of the mariners. The sight of a naked man gesticulating with all his limbs on a tiny raft appeared to them to be worthy of examination. A boat came to collect me.

  The commodore interrogated me. I began to tell my story, but I was immediately taken for a shipwreck victim driven mad by terror, and they deliberated as to whether to throw me back in the sea. Fortunately, they did nothing of the sort.

  That ship took me to Canada, where I spent seven months in a lunatic asylum, after which it was judged that I was not furiously mad, but a mild and stubborn maniac. The French consul had me repatriated. For fear that a further navigation might exaggerate my delirium, I was put in a straitjacket.

  Disembarking at Le Havre, I found neither relatives nor friends on the dock, but my creditors were waiting for me, more numerous than on my departure. I nearly lost my reason veritably then. Pursued by that mob, I was only just able to escape and hide.

  But what joy! I found my sky again and my fatherland, whose institutions, mores and inhabitants are so superior to those of Atlantis.

  As I have already said, few people will want to believe me. I am therefore publishing this book. Another, reserved for scholars, containing evidence and documents, will appear in a few years, if God will lend me the life and my contemporaries the money.

  Notes

  1 Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-934543-44-3.

  2 Included in The Tower of Destiny, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-101-9.

  3 Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-512-3.

  4 Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-192-7.

  5 Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-182-8.

  6 ISBNs 978-1-61227-095-1, -096-8, -097-5 & -098-2.

  7 Included in In 1965, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-728-8.

  8 Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-328-0.

  9 Included in The Human Ant, Black Coat Press, ISBN 978-1-61227-323-5.

  10 Les talons rouges de Versailles [the red heels of Versailles] was a conventional way of signifying the noblemen of the court.

  11 The quotation is from Lafontaine’s fable “La Cour du lion” (tr. as “The Lion’s Court”), where “louvre” is used as if it were a common noun referring to the court in question by analogy wit
h the Louvre palace.

  12 The Jesuit ethical philosopher Antonio Escobar y Mendoza (1589-1669), whose apologetic arguments caused Blaise Pascal and Jean de La Fontaine to reply, in their different fashions, that good intentions cannot excuse evil deeds.

  13 The counter-revolutionary philosopher Louis de Bonald (1754-1840) was appointed Minister of State and President of the Censorship Commission in 1822. In 1822 René de Châteaubriand (1768-1848), now celebrated as the founder of French Romanticism, was a prominent ultra-royalist supporter of the future Charles X, a pillar of that party’s principal organ of propaganda, Le Conservateur. Jacques-Barthelemy Salgues (1760-1830) was a writer on religious and political topics best known for an account of popular errors and prejudices, first published in 1810.

  14 Le Jardin du roi was the original name of the Jardin des Plantes, the botanical gardens of Paris; in 1792 the Royal Menagerie as moved there from Versailles.

  15 This reference is mistaken; the Elector, or Duke, of Bavaria in 1595 was William IV; he was succeeded in 1597 by Maximilian I, also known as Maximilian the Great, but Maximilian Emanuel was Maximilian II, who became Elector in 1679.

  16 Presumably misquoted, as “pagano” [heathen] does seem to make sense in context; the intended meaning is presumably something like “A hundred years of melancholy does not stem from a quattrino [a coin of very low value] of debt.”

  17 The story that the Greek mathematician Archytas built a mechanical pigeon in the early fourth century B.C. comes from Noctes Atticae [Attic Nights] by the Roman author Aulus Gellius, written in the first century A.D. It is certainly fictitious.

  18 The famous balloonist Gaston Tissandier (1843-1870) did not invent a mechanical bird, but his 1886 book La Navigation Aérienne does include a description of a model ornithopter designed in 1876 by Victor Tatin (which could not fly).