Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II

by Herman Melville

  "Ha, now's the time! In his cups learn king-craft from a king. Ay, ay,my lord, your royal order will endure, so long as men will fight.Break the spears, and free the nations. Kings reap the harvests thatwave on battle-fields. And oft you kings do snatch the aloe-flower,whose slow blossoming mankind watches for a hundred years.--Say on, mylord."

  "All this I know; and, therefore, rest content. My children's childrenwill be kings; though, haply, called by other titles. Mardi growsfastidious in names: we royalties will humor it. The steerswould burst their yokes, but have not hands. The whole herd rears andplunges, but soon will bow again: the old, old way!"

  "Yet, in Porpheero, strong scepters have been wrested from anointedhands. Mankind seems in arms."

  "Let them arm on. They hate us:--good;--they always have; yet stillwe've reigned, son after sire. Sometimes they slay us, Babbalanja;pour out our marrow, as I this wine; but they spill no kinless blood.'Twas justly held of old, that but to touch a monarch, was to strikeat Oro.--Truth. The palest vengeance is a royal ghost; and regicidesbut father slaves. Thrones, not scepters, have been broken. Mohi, whatof the past? Has it not ever proved so?"

  "Pardon, my lord; the times seem changed. 'Tis held, that demi-gods nomore rule by right divine. In Vivenza's land, they swear the lastkings now reign in Mardi."

  "Is the last day at hand, old man? Mohi, your beard is gray; but,Yoomy, listen. When you die, look around; mark then if any mightychange be seen. Old kingdoms may be on the wane; but new dynastiesadvance. Though revolutions rise to high spring-tide, monarchs willstill drown hard;--monarchs survived the flood!"

  "Are all our dreams, then, vain?" sighed Yoomy. "Is this no dawn ofday that streaks the crimson East! Naught but the false and flickeringlights which sometimes mock Aurora in the north! Ah, man, my brother!have all martyrs for thee bled in vain; in vain we poets sang, andprophets spoken? Nay, nay; great Mardi, helmed and mailed, strikes atOppression's shield, and challenges to battle! Oro will defend theright, and royal crests must roll."

  "Thus, Yoomy, ages since, you mortal poets sang; but the world may notbe moved from out the orbit in which first it rolled. On the map thatcharts the spheres, Mardi is marked 'the world of kings.' Roundcenturies on centuries have wheeled by:--has all this been itsnonage? Now, when the rocks grow gray, does man first sprout hisbeard? Or, is your golden time, your equinoctial year, at hand, thatyour race fast presses toward perfection; and every hand grasps at ascepter, that kings may be no more?"

  "But free Vivenza! Is she not the star, that must, ere long, lead upthe constellations, though now unrisen? No kings are in Vivenza; yet,spite her thralls, in that land seems more of good than elsewhere. Ourhopes are not wild dreams: Vivenza cheers our hearts. She is a rainbowto the isles!"

  "Ay, truth it is, that in Vivenza they have prospered. But thence itcomes not, that all men may be as they. Are all men of one heart andbrain; one bone and sinew? Are all nations sprung of Dominora's loins?Or, has Vivenza yet proved her creed? Yoomy! the years that prove aman, prove not a nation. But two kings'-reigns have passed sinceVivenza was a monarch's. Her climacteric is not come; hers is not yeta nation's manhood even; though now in childhood, she anticipates heryouth, and lusts for empire like any czar. Yoomy! judge not yet. Timehath tales to tell. Many books, and many long, long chapters, arewanting to Vivenza's history; and whet history but is full of blood?"

  "There stop, my lord," said Babbalanja, "nor aught predict. Fatelaughs at prophets; and of all birds, the raven is a liar!"

  CHAPTER LXIThey Round The Stormy Cape Of Capes

  Long leagues, for weary days, we voyaged along that coast, till wecame to regions where we multiplied our mantles.

  The sky grew overcast. Each a night, black storm-clouds swept thewintry sea; and like Sahara caravans, which leave their sandy wakes--so, thick and fleet, slanted the scud behind. Through all this rackand mist, ten thousand foam-flaked dromedary-humps uprose.

  Deep among those panting, moaning fugitives, the three canoes raced on.

  And now, the air grew nipping cold. The clouds shed off their fleeces;a snow-hillock, each canoe; our beards, white-frosted.

  And so, as seated in our shrouds, we sailed in among great mountainpasses of ice-isles; from icy ledges scaring shivering seals, andwhite bears, musical with icicles, jingling from their shaggy ermine.

  Far and near, in towering ridges, stretched the glassy Andes; withtheir own frost, shuddering through all their domes and pinnacles.Ice-splinters rattled down the cliffs, and seethed into the sea.

  Broad away, in amphitheaters undermined by currents, whole cities ofice-towers, in crashes, toward one center, fell.--In theirearthquakes, Lisbon and Lima never saw the like. Churned and broken inthe boiling tide, they swept off amain;--over and over rolling; likeporpoises to vessels tranced in calms, bringing down the gale.

  At last, rounding an antlered headland, that seemed a moose atbay--ere long, we launched upon blue lake-like waters, serene asWindermere, or Horicon. Thus, from the boisterous storms of youth, weglide upon senility.

  But as we northward voyaged, another aspect wore the sea.

  In far-off, endless vistas, colonnades of water-spouts were seen: allheaven's dome upholding on their shafts: and bright forms gliding upand down within. So at Luz, in his strange vision, Jacob saw the angels.

  A boundless cave of stalactites, it seemed; the cloud-born vaporsdownward spiraling, till they met the whirlpool-column from the sea;then, uniting, over the waters stalked, like ghosts of gods. Or midwaysundered--down, sullen, sunk the watery half; and far up into heaven,was drawn the vapory. As, at death, we mortals part in twain; ourearthy half still here abiding; but our spirits flying whence they came.

  In good time, we gained the thither side of great Kolumbo of the South;and sailing on, long waited for the day; and wondered at the darkness.

  "What steadfast clouds!" cried Yoomy, "yonder! far aloft: that ridge,with many points; it fades below, but shows a faint white crest."

  "Not clouds, but mountains," said Babbalanja, "the vast spine, thattraverses Kolumbo; spurring off in ribs, that nestle loamy valleys,veined with silver streams, and silver ores."

  It was a long, embattled line of pinnacles. And high posted in theEast, those thousand bucklered peaks stood forth, and breasted backthe Dawn. Before their purple bastions bold, Aurora long arrayed herspears, and clashed her golden shells. The summons dies away. But now,her lancers charge the steep, and gain its crest a-glow;--theirglittering spears and blazoned shields triumphant in the morn.

  But ere that sight, we glided on for hours in twilight; when, on thosemountains' farther side, the hunters must have been abroad, morning-glories all astir.

  CHAPTER LXIIThey Encounter Gold-Hunters

  Now, northward coasting along Kolumbo's Western shore, whence came thesame wild forest-sounds, as from the Eastern; and where we landed not,to seek among those wrangling tribes;--after many, many days, we spiedprow after prow, before the wind all northward bound: sails wide-spread, and paddles plying: scaring the fish from before them.

  Their inmates answered not our earnest hail.

  But as they sped, with frantic glee, in one long chorus thus theysang:--

  We rovers bold, To the land of Gold, Over bowling billows are gliding: Eager to toil, For the golden spoil, And every hardship biding. See! See! Before our prows' resistless dashes, The gold-fish fly in golden flashes! 'Neath a sun of gold, We rovers bold, On the golden land are gaining; And every night, We steer aright, By golden stars unwaning! All fires burn a golden glare: No locks so bright as golden hair! All orange groves have golden gushings: All mornings dawn with golden flushings! In a shower of gold, say fables old, A maiden was won by the god of gold! In golden goblets wine is beaming: On golden couches kings are dreaming! The Golden Rule dries many tears! The Golden Number rules the spheres! Gold, g
old it is, that sways the nations: Gold! gold! the center of all rotations! On golden axles worlds are turning: With phosphorescence seas are burning! All fire-flies flame with golden gleamings: Gold-hunters' hearts with golden dreamings! With golden arrows kings are slain: With gold we'll buy a freeman's name! In toilsome trades, for scanty earnings, At home we've slaved, with stifled yearnings: No light! no hope! Oh, heavy woe! When nights fled fast, and days dragged slow. But joyful now, with eager eye, Fast to the Promised Land we fly: Where in deep mines, The treasure shines; Or down in beds of golden streams, The gold-flakes glance in golden gleams! How we long to sift, That yellow drift! Rivers! Rivers! cease your going! Sand-bars! rise, and stay the tide! 'Till we've gained the golden flowing; And in the golden haven ride!

  "Quick, quick, my lord," cried Yoomy, "let us follow them; and fromthe golden waters where she lies, our Yillah may emerge."

  "No, no," said Babbalanja,--"no Yillah there!--from yonder promised-land, fewer seekers will return, than go. Under a gilded guise,happiness is still their instinctive aim. But vain, Yoomy, to snatchat Happiness. Of that we may not pluck and eat. It is the fruit of ourown toilsome planting; slow it grows, nourished by many teats, and allour earnest tendings. Yet ere it ripen, frosts may nip;--and then, weplant again; and yet again. Deep, Yoomy, deep, true treasure lies;deeper than all Mardi's gold, rooted to Mardi's axis. But unlike gold,it lurks in every soil,--all Mardi over. With golden pills andpotions is sickness warded off?--the shrunken veins of age, dilatedwith new wine of youth? Will gold the heart-ache cure? turn toward ushearts estranged? will gold, on solid centers empires fix? 'Tis toilworld-wasted to toil in mines. Were all the isles gold globes, set ina quicksilver sea, all Mardi were then a desert. Gold is the onlypoverty; of all glittering ills the direst. And that man might notimpoverish himself thereby, Oro hath hidden it, with all otherbanes,--saltpeter and explosives, deep in mountain bowels, and river-beds. But man still will mine for it; and mining, dig his doom.--Yoomy, Yoomy!--she we seek, lurks not in the Golden Hills!"

  "Lo, a vision!" cried Yoomy, his hands wildly passed across his eyes."A vast and silent bay, belted by silent villages:--gaunt dogs howlingover grassy thresholds at stark corpses of old age and infancy; grayhairs mingling with sweet flaxen curls; fields, with turned furrows,choked with briers; arbor-floors strown over with hatchet-helves,rotting in the iron; a thousand paths, marked with foot-prints, allinland leading, none villageward; and strown with traces, as of aflying host. On: over forest--hill, and dale--and lo! the goldenregion! After the glittering spoil, by strange river-margins, andbeneath impending cliffs, thousands delve in quicksands; and, sudden,sink in graves of their own making: with gold dust mingling their ownashes. Still deeper, in more solid ground, other thousands slave; andpile their earth so high, they gasp for air, and die; their comradesmounting on them, and delving still, and dying--grave pile on grave!Here, one haggard hunter murders another in his pit; and murdering,himself is murdered by a third. Shrieks and groans! cries and curses!It seems a golden Hell! With many camels, a sleek stranger comes--pauses before the shining heaps, and shows _his_ treasures: yams andbread-fruit. 'Give, give,' the famished hunters cry--, 'a thousandshekels for a yam!--a prince's ransom for a meal!--Oh,stranger! on our knees we worship thee:--take, take our gold; but letus live!' Yams are thrown them and they fight. Then he who toiled not,dug not, slaved not, straight loads his caravans with gold; regainsthe beach, and swift embarks for home. 'Home! home!' the hunters cry,with bursting eyes. 'With this bright gold, could we but join ourwaiting wives, who wring their hands on distant shores, all then werewell. But we can not fly; our prows lie rotting on the beach. Ah!home! thou only happiness!--better thy silver earnings than all thesegolden findings. Oh, bitter end to all our hopes--we die in goldengraves."

  CHAPTER LXIIIThey Seek Through The Isles Of Palms; And Pass The Isles Of Myrrh

  Now, our prows we turned due west, across the blue lagoon.

  Soon, no land appeared. Far as the eye could sweep, one azure plain;all over flaked with foamy fleeces:--a boundless flock upon aboundless mead!

  Again, all changed. Like stars in multitude, bright islets multipliedaround. Emerald-green, they dotted shapes fantastic: circles, arcs,and crescents;--atolls all, or coral carcanets, begemmed and flashingin the sun.

  By these we glided, group after group; and through the foliage, spiedsweet forms of maidens, like Eves in Edens ere the Fall, orProserpines in Ennas. Artless airs came from the shore; and from thecenser-swinging roses, a bloom, as if from Hebe's cheek.

  "Here, at last, we find sweet Yillah!" murmured Yoomy. "Here must shelurk in innocence! Quick! Let us land and search."

  "If here," said Babbalanja, "Yillah will not stay our coming, but flybefore us through the groves. Wherever a canoe is beached, see you notthe palm-trees pine? Not so, where never keel yet smote the strand. Inmercy, let us fly from hence. I know not why, but our breath here,must prove a blight."

  These regions passed, we came to savage islands, where the glitteringcoral seemed bones imbedded, bleaching in the sun. Savage men stoodnaked on the strand, and brandished uncouth clubs, and gnashed theirteeth like boars.

  The full red moon was rising; and, in long review there passed beforeit, phantom shapes of victims, led bound to altars through the groves.Death-rattles filled the air. But a cloud descended, and all was gloom.

  Again blank water spread before us; and after many days, there came agentle breeze, fraught with all spicy breathings; cinnamon aromas; andin the rose-flushed evening air, like glow worms, glowed the islets,where this incense burned.

  "Sweet isles of myrh! oh crimson groves," cried Yoomy. "Woe, woe'syour fate! your brightness and your bloom, like musky fire-flies,double-lure to death! On ye, the nations prey like bears that gorgethemselves with honey."

  Swan-like, our prows sailed in among these isles; and oft we landed;but in vain; and leaving them, we still pursued the setting sun.

  CHAPTER LXIVConcentric, Inward, With Mardi's Reef, They Leave Their Wake AroundThe World

  West, West! West, West! Whitherward point Hope and prophet-fingers;whitherward, at sun-set, kneel all worshipers of fire; whitherward inmid-ocean, the great whales turn to die; whitherward face all theMoslem dead in Persia; whitherward lie Heaven and Hell!--West, West!Whitherward mankind and empires--flocks, caravans, armies, navies;worlds, suns, and stars all wend!--West, West!--Oh boundless boundary!Eternal goal! Whitherward rush, in thousand worlds, ten thousandthousand keels! Beacon, by which the universe is steered!--Like thenorth-star, attracting all needles! Unattainable forever; but foreverleading to great things this side thyself!--Hive of all sunsets!--Gabriel's pinions may not overtake thee!

  Over balmy waves, still westward sailing! From dawn till eve, thebright, bright days sped on, chased by the gloomy nights; and, inglory dying, lent their luster to the starry skies. So, long theradiant dolphins fly before the sable sharks but seized, and torn inflames--die, burning:--their last splendor left, in sparkling scalesthat float along the sea.

  Cymbals, drums and psalteries! the air beats like a pulse with music!--High land! high land! and moving lights, and painted lanterns!--Whatgrand shore is this?

  "Reverence we render thee, Old Orienda!" cried Media, with bared brow,"Original of all empires and emperors!--a crowned king salutes thee!"

  "Mardi's father-land!" cried Mohi, "grandsire of the nations,--hail!"

  "All hail!" cried Yoomy. "Kings and sages hither coming, should comelike palmers,--scrip and staff! Oh Orienda! thou wert our East, wherefirst dawned song and science, with Mardi's primal mornings! But now,how changed! the dawn of light become a darkness, which we kindle withthe gleam of spears! On the world's ancestral hearth, we spill ourbrothers' blood!"

  "Herein," said Babbalanja, "have many distant tribes provedparricidal. In times gone by, Luzianna hither sent her prom; Franko,her scores of captains; and the Dykemen, their peddl
er hosts, withyard-stick spears! But thou, oh Bello! lord of the empire lineage!Noah of the moderns. Sire of the long line of nations yet in germ!--thou, Bello, and thy locust armies, are the present curse of Orienda.Down ancient streams, from holy plains, in rafts thy murdered float!The pestilence that thins thy armies here, is bred of corpses, made bythee. Maramma's priests, thy pious heralds, loud proclaim that of allpagans, Orienda's most resist the truth!--ay! vain all pious voices,that speak from clouds of war! The march of conquest through wildprovinces, may be the march of Mind; but not the march of Love."

  "Thou, Bello!" cried Yoomy, "would'st wrest the crook from Alma'shand, and place in it a spear. But vain to make a conqueror of him,who put off the purple when he came to Mardi; and declining gildedmiters, entered the nations meekly on an ass."

  "Oh curse of commerce!" cried Babbalanja, "that it barters souls forgold. Bello! with opium, thou wouldst drug this land, and murder it insleep!--And what boot thy conquests here? Seed sown by spears butseldom springs; and harvests reaped thereby, are poisoned by thesickle's edge."

  Yet on, and on we coasted; counting not the days.

  "Oh, folds and flocks of nations! dusky tribes innumerable!" criedYoomy, "camped on plains and steppes; on thousand mountains,worshiping the stars; in thousand valleys, offering up first-fruits,till all the forests seem in flames;--where, in fire, the widow'sspirit mounts to meet her lord!--Oh, Orienda, in thee 'tis vain toseek our Yillah!"

  "How dark as death the night!" said Mohi, shaking the dew from hisbraids, "the Heavens blaze not here with stars, as over Dominora'sland, and broad Vivenza."