The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle
Page 20
Suddenly I saw the old man point upward, to the highest mountain in theisland; and looking over my shoulder, I was just in time to see theHanging Stone topple slowly out of sight—down into the heart of thevolcano.
“See ye, Men of the Moving Land!” the old man cried: “The stone hasfallen and our legend has come true: the King of Kings is crowned thisday!”
The Doctor too had seen the stone fall and he was now standing uplooking at the sea expectantly.
“He’s thinking of the air-chamber,” said Bumpo in my ear. “Let us hopethat the sea isn’t very deep in these parts.”
After a full minute (so long did it take the stone to fall that depth)we heard a muffled, distant, crunching thud—and then immediately after,a great hissing of escaping air. The Doctor, his face tense withanxiety, sat down in the throne again still watching the blue water ofthe ocean with staring eyes.
Soon we felt the island slowly sinking beneath us. We saw the sea creepinland over the beaches as the shores went down—one foot, three feet,ten feet, twenty, fifty, a hundred. And then, thank goodness, gently asa butterfly alighting on a rose, it stopped! Spidermonkey Island hadcome to rest on the sandy bottom of the Atlantic, and earth was joinedto earth once more.
Of course many of the houses near the shores were now under water.Popsipetel Village itself had entirely disappeared. But it didn’tmatter. No one was drowned; for every soul in the island was high upin the hills watching the coronation of King Jong.
The Indians themselves did not realize at the time what was takingplace, though of course they had felt the land sinking beneath them.The Doctor told us afterwards that it must have been the shock of thattremendous shout, coming from a million throats at once, which hadtoppled the Hanging Stone off its perch. But in Popsipetel history thestory was handed down (and it is firmly believed to this day) that whenKing Jong sat upon the throne, so great was his mighty weight, that thevery island itself sank down to do him honor and never moved again.
PART SIX
_THE FIRST CHAPTER_
NEW POPSIPETEL
JONG THINKALOT had not ruled over his new kingdom for more than acouple of days before my notions about kings and the kind of lives theyled changed very considerably. I had thought that all that kings had todo was to sit on a throne and have people bow down before them severaltimes a day. I now saw that a king can be the hardest-working man inthe world—if he attends properly to his business.
From the moment that he got up, early in the morning, till the time hewent to bed, late at night—seven days in the week—John Dolittle wasbusy, busy, busy. First of all there was the new town to be built. Thevillage of Popsipetel had disappeared: the City of New Popsipetel mustbe made. With great care a place was chosen for it—and a very beautifulposition it was, at the mouth of a large river. The shores of theisland at this point formed a lovely wide bay where canoes—and shipstoo, if they should ever come—could lie peacefully at anchor withoutdanger from storms.
In building this town the Doctor gave the Indians a lot of newideas. He showed them what town-sewers were, and how garbage shouldbe collected each day and burnt. High up in the hills he made a largelake by damming a stream. This was the water-supply for the town. Noneof these things had the Indians ever seen; and many of the sicknesseswhich they had suffered from before were now entirely prevented byproper drainage and pure drinking-water.
Peoples who don’t use fire do not of course have metals either; becausewithout fire it is almost impossible to shape iron and steel. One ofthe first things that John Dolittle did was to search the mountainstill he found iron and copper mines. Then he set to work to teach theIndians how these metals could be melted and made into knives and plowsand water-pipes and all manner of things.
In his kingdom the Doctor tried his hardest to do away with most of theold-fashioned pomp and grandeur of a royal court. As he said to Bumpoand me, if he must be a king he meant to be a thoroughly democraticone, that is a king who is chummy and friendly with his subjects anddoesn’t put on airs. And when he drew up the plans for the City of NewPopsipetel he had no palace shown of any kind. A little cottage in aback street was all that he had provided for himself.
But this the Indians would not permit on any account. They had beenused to having their kings rule in a truly grand and kingly manner;and they insisted that he have built for himself the most magnificentpalace ever seen. In all else they let him have his own way absolutely;but they wouldn’t allow him to wriggle out of any of the ceremony orshow that goes with being a king. A thousand servants he had to keep inhis palace, night and day, to wait on him. The Royal Canoe had to bekept up—a gorgeous, polished mahogany boat, seventy feet long, inlaidwith mother-o’-pearl and paddled by the hundred strongest men in theisland. The palace-gardens covered a square mile and employed a hundredand sixty gardeners.
Even in his dress the poor man was compelled always to be grand andelegant and uncomfortable. The beloved and battered high hat was putaway in a closet and only looked at secretly. State robes had to beworn on all occasions. And when the Doctor did once in a while manageto sneak off for a short, natural-history expedition he never dared towear his old clothes, but had to chase his butterflies with a crownupon his head and a scarlet cloak flying behind him in the wind.
There was no end to the kinds of duties the Doctor had to perform andthe questions he had to decide upon—everything, from settling disputesabout lands and boundaries, to making peace between husband and wifewho had been throwing shoes at one another. In the east wing of theRoyal Palace was the Hall of Justice. And here King Jong sat everymorning from nine to eleven passing judgment on all cases that werebrought before him.
“Had to chase his butterflies with a crown upon hishead”]
Then in the afternoon he taught school. The sort of things he taughtwere not always those you find in ordinary schools. Grown-ups as wellas children came to learn. You see, these Indians were ignorant of manyof the things that quite small white children know—though it is alsotrue that they knew a lot that white grown-ups never dreamed of.
Bumpo and I helped with the teaching as far as we could—simplearithmetic, and easy things like that. But the classes in astronomy,farming science, the proper care of babies, with a host of othersubjects, the Doctor had to teach himself. The Indians weretremendously keen about the schooling and they came in droves andcrowds; so that even with the open-air classes (a school-house wasimpossible of course) the Doctor had to take them in relays and batchesof five or six thousand at a time and used a big megaphone or trumpetto make himself heard.
The rest of his day was more than filled with road-making, buildingwater-mills, attending the sick and a million other things.
In spite of his being so unwilling to become a king, John Dolittlemade a very good one—once he got started. He may not have been asdignified as many kings in history who were always running off to warand getting themselves into romantic situations; but since I have grownup and seen something of foreign lands and governments I have oftenthought that Popsipetel under the reign of Jong Thinkalot was perhapsthe best ruled state in the history of the world.
The Doctor’s birthday came round after we had been on the islandsix months and a half. The people made a great public holiday of itand there was much feasting, dancing, fireworks, speechmaking andjollification.
Towards the close of the day the chief men of the two tribes formed aprocession and passed through the streets of the town, carrying a verygorgeously painted tablet of ebony wood, ten feet high. This was apicture-history, such as they preserved for each of the ancient kingsof Popsipetel to record their deeds.
With great and solemn ceremony it was set up over the door of the newpalace: and everybody then clustered round to look at it. It had sixpictures on it commemorating the six great events in the life of KingJong and beneath were written the verses that explained them. They werecomposed by the Court Poet; and this is a translation:
I
(_His Landing on The Island_)
II
(_His Meeting With The Beetle_)
By moonlight in the mountains He communed with beasts. The shy Jabizri brings him picture-words Of great distress.
III
(_He liberates The Lost Families_)
Big was his heart with pity; Big were his hands with strength. See how he tears the mountain like a yam! See how the lost ones Dance forth to greet the day!
IV
(_He Makes Fire_)
Our land was cold and dying. He waved his hand and lo! Lightning leapt from cloudless skies; The sun leant down; And Fire was born! Then while we crowded round The grateful glow, pushed he Our wayward, floating land Back to peaceful anchorage In sunny seas.
V
(_He Leads The People To Victory in War_)
Once only Was his kindly countenance Darkened by a deadly frown. Woe to the wicked enemy That dares attack The tribe with Thinkalot for Chief!
VI
(_He Is Crowned King_)
The birds of the air rejoiced; The Sea laughed and gambolled with her shores; All Red-skins wept for joy The day we crowned him King. He is the Builder, the Healer, the Teacher and the Prince; He is the greatest of them all. May he live a thousand thousand years, Happy in his heart, To bless our land with Peace.
_THE SECOND CHAPTER_
THOUGHTS OF HOME
IN the Royal Palace Bumpo and I had a beautiful suite of rooms of ourvery own—which Polynesia, Jip and Chee-Chee shared with us. OfficiallyBumpo was Minister of the Interior; while I was First Lord of theTreasury. Long Arrow also had quarters there; but at present he wasabsent, traveling abroad.
One night after supper when the Doctor was away in the town somewherevisiting a new-born baby, we were all sitting round the big table inBumpo’s reception-room. This we did every evening, to talk over theplans for the following day and various affairs of state. It was a kindof Cabinet Meeting.
To-night however we were talking about England—and also about thingsto eat. We had got a little tired of Indian food. You see, none ofthe natives knew how to cook; and we had the most discouraging timetraining a chef for the Royal Kitchen. Most of them were champions atspoiling good food. Often we got so hungry that the Doctor would sneakdownstairs with us into the palace basement, after all the cooks weresafe in bed, and fry pancakes secretly over the dying embers of thefire. The Doctor himself was the finest cook that ever lived. But heused to make a terrible mess of the kitchen; and of course we had to beawfully careful that we didn’t get caught.
Well, as I was saying, to-night food was the subject of discussion atthe Cabinet Meeting; and I had just been reminding Bumpo of the nicedishes we had had at the bed-maker’s house in Monteverde.
“I tell you what I would like now,” said Bumpo: “a large cup of cocoawith whipped cream on the top of it. In Oxford we used to be able toget the most wonderful cocoa. It is really too bad they haven’t anycocoa-trees in this island, or cows to give cream.”
“When do you suppose,” asked Jip, “the Doctor intends to move on fromhere?”
“I was talking to him about that only yesterday,” said Polynesia. “ButI couldn’t get any satisfactory answer out of him. He didn’t seem towant to speak about it.”
There was a pause in the conversation.
“Do you know what I believe?” she added presently. “I believe theDoctor has given up even thinking of going home.”
“Good Lord!” cried Bumpo. “You don’t say!”
“Sh!” said Polynesia. “What’s that noise?”
We listened; and away off in the distant corridors of the palace weheard the sentries crying,
“The King!—Make way!—The King!”
“It’s he—at last,” whispered Polynesia—“late, as usual. Poor man, howhe does work!—Chee-Chee, get the pipe and tobacco out of the cupboardand lay the dressing-gown ready on his chair.”
When the Doctor came into the room he looked serious and thoughtful.Wearily he took off his crown and hung it on a peg behind the door.Then he exchanged the royal cloak for the dressing-gown, dropped intohis chair at the head of the table with a deep sigh and started to fillhis pipe.
“Well,” asked Polynesia quietly, “how did you find the baby?”
“The baby?” he murmured—his thoughts still seemed to be very faraway—“Ah yes. The baby was much better, thank you—It has cut its secondtooth.”
Then he was silent again, staring dreamily at the ceiling through acloud of tobacco-smoke; while we all sat round quite still, waiting.
“We were wondering, Doctor,” said I at last,—“just before you camein—when you would be starting home again. We will have been on thisisland seven months to-morrow.”
The Doctor sat forward in his chair looking rather uncomfortable.
“Well, as a matter of fact,” said he after a moment, “I meant to speakto you myself this evening on that very subject. But it’s—er—a littlehard to make any one exactly understand the situation. I am afraidthat it would be impossible for me to leave the work I am now engagedon.... You remember, when they first insisted on making me king, I toldyou it was not easy to shake off responsibilities, once you had takenthem up. These people have come to rely on me for a great number ofthings. We found them ignorant of much that white people enjoy. And wehave, one might say, changed the current of their lives considerably.Now it is a very ticklish business, to change the lives of otherpeople. And whether the changes we have made will be, in the end, forgood or for bad, is our lookout.”
He thought a moment—then went on in a quieter, sadder voice:
“I would like to continue my voyages and my natural history work; andI would like to go back to Puddleby—as much as any of you. This isMarch, and the crocuses will be showing in the lawn.... But that whichI feared has come true: I cannot close my eyes to what might happen ifI should leave these people and run away. They would probably go backto their old habits and customs: wars, superstitions, devil-worship andwhat not; and many of the new things we have taught them might be putto improper use and make their condition, then, worse by far than thatin which we found them.... They like me; they trust me; they have cometo look to me for help in all their problems and troubles. And no manwants to do unfair things to them who trust him.... And then again, _I_like _them_. They are, as it were, my children—I never had any childrenof my own—and I am terribly interested in how they will grow up. Don’tyou see what I mean?—How can I possibly run away and leave them in thelurch?... No. I have thought it over a good deal and tried to decidewhat was best. And I am afraid that the work I took up when I assumedthe crown I must stick to. I’m afraid—I’ve got to stay.”
“For good—for your whole life?” asked Bumpo in a low voice.
For some moments the Doctor, frowning, made no answer.
“I don’t know,” he said at last—“Anyhow for the present there iscertainly no hope of my leaving. It wouldn’t be right.”
The sad silence that followed was broken finally by a knock upon thedoor.
With a patient sigh the Doctor got up and put on his crown and cloakagain.
“Come in,” he called, sitting down in his chair once more.
The door opened and a footman—one of the hundred and forty-three whowere always on night duty—stood bowing in the entrance.
“Oh, Kindly One,” said he, “there is a traveler at the palace-gate whowould have speech with Your Majesty.”
“Another baby’s been born, I’ll bet a shilling,” muttered Polynesia.
“Did you ask the traveler’s name?” enquired the Doctor.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” said the footman. “It is Long Arrow, the son ofGolden Arrow.”
_THE THIRD CHAPTER_
THE RED MAN’S SCIE
NCE
“LONG ARROW!” cried the Doctor. “How splendid! Show him in—show him inat once.”
“I’m so glad,” he continued, turning to us as soon as the footman hadgone. “I’ve missed Long Arrow terribly. He’s an awfully good man tohave around—even if he doesn’t talk much. Let me see: it’s five monthsnow since he went off to Brazil. I’m so glad he’s back safe. He doestake such tremendous chances with that canoe of his—clever as he is.It’s no joke, crossing a hundred miles of open sea in a twelve-footcanoe. I wouldn’t care to try it.”
Another knock; and when the door swung open in answer to the Doctor’scall, there stood our big friend on the threshold, a smile upon hisstrong, bronzed face. Behind him appeared two porters carrying loadsdone up in Indian palm-matting. These, when the first salutations wereover, Long Arrow ordered to lay their burdens down.
“Behold, oh Kindly One,” said he, “I bring you, as I promised, mycollection of plants which I had hidden in a cave in the Andes. Thesetreasures represent the labors of my life.”
The packages were opened; and inside were many smaller packages andbundles. Carefully they were laid out in rows upon the table.
It appeared at first a large but disappointing display. There wereplants, flowers, fruits, leaves, roots, nuts, beans, honeys, gums,bark, seeds, bees and a few kinds of insects.
The study of plants—or botany, as it is called—was a kind of naturalhistory which had never interested me very much. I had considered it,compared with the study of animals, a dull science. But as Long Arrowbegan taking up the various things in his collection and explainingtheir qualities to us, I became more and more fascinated. And beforehe had done I was completely absorbed by the wonders of the VegetableKingdom which he had brought so far.