The Dedalus Book of British Fantasy: 19th Century (European Literary Fantasy Anthologies)

by Brian Stableford

  The two saints would have liked a fine theological set to. But Eudaemon only smiled. Eudaemon was always smiling; and that was one of the worst signs about him: for a man, let alone a saint, who smiles, expresses thereby satisfaction with this world and confidence in his salvation, both of which are slights to Heaven. Moreover, Eudaemon talked in a profane manner; and there was far too much marrying and giving in marriage among the poor folk he had gathered round him. He showed unseemly interest in women in labour, even assisting them with physic, and advising them on the rearing of infants; he rarely chastised young children, and allowed the lads and maidens to tell him their love-affairs, never exhorting either to a life of abstinence and celibacy. He attended to the ailments of animals, and was frequently heard to address speech to them as if they had been possessed of an immortal soul, and as if their likings and dislikings should be considered; thus he made brooding nests for the doves, and placed dishes of water for the swallows, and was surrounded by birds, allowing them to perch on his shoulders and hands, and calling them by name. Various things he said might almost have led you to suspect - had such suspicion not been too uncharitable - that he considered birds and beasts as the creatures of God and brethren to man; nay, that plants also had life, and recognised the Creator; but when he came to speak of such matters, calling the sun and moon brother and sister, and attributing Christian virtues, as humility, chastity, joyousness, to water, and fire, and clouds, and winds, his discourses were such that it was more charitable to consider them as ravings, and himself as one of the halfwitted; and this, indeed, Eudaemon probably was, and not utterly damned, otherwise Carpophorus could scarcely have borrowed his altar clothes and tapers, or Ursicinus accepted his lettuces and honeycomb.

  The two saints were devoured by curiosity to know what might be the secret relations of their fellow saint with the world of devils. For these delicate matters gave a saint his position; and on these it was customary to show a subtle mixture of reticence and bragging. Had Eudaemon ever had encounters with the Prince of Darkness? Had he been tempted? Had lovely ladies burst in upon his visions, or large stones been rained down through his roof? Carpophorus, feigning to speak of a third person, made some extraordinary statements concerning himself; and Ursicinus led to even more marvellous suppositions by refusal to go into details. But Eudaemon showed no interest in these discourses, neither courting nor evading them. He stated drily that he had undergone no temptations of an unusual sort, and no persecutions worth considering. As to encounters with devils, and with heathen divinities, upon which his fellow-saints insisted upon explicit answers, he had nothing to report that concerned anyone. He had, indeed, on the coast of Syria once come across a creature who was half man, half horse, of the sort which the pagans called Centaur, of whom he had asked his way in the sand and grass, and who had answered with difficulty, making whinnying noises, and pawing, and cocking his ears; and some years later, among the oakwoods round the lake of Nemi, he had met a Faun, a rustic creature shaped like a man, but with goat's horns and legs, who had entertained him pleasantly in a cool brake of reeds, and given him nuts and very succulent roots for a midday meal; and it was his opinion that such creatures, although denied human speech, were aware of the goodness of God, and possessed some way of their own, however different from ours, of expressing their joy therein. Indeed, was there aught in the Scriptures which affirmed or suggested that any one of God's creatures was destitute of such sense of His loving-kindness? As regards the gods of the heathens, what manner of harm could they do to a Christian? Can false gods hurt any except their believers? Nay, Eudaemon actually seemed to hint that these Pagan divinities were deserving of compassion, and that they also, like the sun and moon, the wolves and the lambs, the grass and the trees, were God's children and our brethren, if only they knew it...

  Of course, however, Carpophorus and Ursicinus never allowed Eudaemon to become quite explicit on this point of doctrine, lest they should have to consider him damned beyond remission, and therefore, unfit for their society. As things stood, the two saints were comfortably persuaded that those little visits, with accompanying loans and gifts, were probably poor Eudaemon's one chance of salvation.

  And now for the miracle.

  It happened that in digging the ground for a fresh piece of vineyard, a spade struck upon an uncommonly large round stone, which being uncovered, disclosed itself to be a full-length woman, carved in marble, and embedded in the clay, face upwards. The peasants fled in terror, some crying out that they had found an embalmed Pagan, and some, a sleeping female devil. But Eudaemon merely smiled, and wiped the earth off the figure, which was exceedingly comely, and mended one of its arms with cement, and set it up on a carved tombstone of the ancients, at the end of the grass walk through the orchard, and close to the beehives.

  Carpophorus and Ursicinus heard the news, and hastening to the spot, instantly offered Eudaemon their help in breaking the figure to bits and conveying it to a limekiln by the Tiber. For it was evidently an image of the goddess Venus, by far the wickedest of all the devils. The two saints examined the statue with holy curiosity, and quoted, respectively, several passages of Athenagoras, and Lactantius, and many anecdotes of the Hermit St. Paul, and of other anchorites of the Thebais. But Eudaemon merely thanked them very sweetly for their exhortations, and sent them away with a pair of new sandals and a flask of oil as a gift. After this, the two saints did not consider themselves free to call upon him any longer, and took no notice of the presents he continued to send. They would greatly have liked to behold that idol again, not on account of its comeliness, which neither recognised, but from intense curiosity to see devils a little closer. But having preached openly against it, and tried to stir the peasants to knock it down and break it, they were ashamed of entering the orchard; and merely sought for opportunities of looking across the narrow valley, and seeing the figure of the goddess, shining white among the criss-cross reeds and the big fig-trees of Eudaemon's vineyard.

  This being the case, judge of the joy of the two holy men when one June evening - and it was the vigil of the Birth of John Baptist - the news was brought that Eudaemon had at last been caught hold of by the Devil! All other considerations vanished, for brotherly charity required that they should fly to the spot and behold the catastrophe.

  The two saints were rather disappointed. The Devil had not carried off Eudaemon, whom, indeed, they found peaceably watering some clove-pinks; but he had carried off, or a least appropriated, a notable piece of Eudaemon's property. For Eudaemon, of all the worldly goods he had once enjoyed, had retained one only, but that surely the most sinful, a wedding-ring. It was quite useless to his neighbours, and a token of earthly affections, having been bought by him to stick on the hand of the girl he had been about to marry. The ring had been a subject of scandal to Carpophorus and Ursicinus, the more so that Eudaemon had flown into a rage (the only time in their experience), when they suggested he should exchange it in the city against a chapel bell; and it was highly satisfactory that the Devil should have opened his campaign by seizing this object above all others.

  The way it had happened was this. It being the vigil of the Birth of John Baptist, Eudaemon had, according to a habit of his, which was far from commendable, allowed his peasant folk to make merry, nay, had spread tables for them in the vineyard, and arranged games for young and old; a way of celebrating the occasion the less desirable, that it was said that the vigil of John Baptist happened to coincide with the old feast of the devil Venus, and that the rustics still celebrated it with ceremonies connected with that evil spirit, and in themselves worthy of blame, such as picking bundles of lavender for their linen lockers, making garlands of clove-pinks and lighting bonfires, all of which were countenanced by Eudaemon. On this occasion Eudaemon thought fit to open the bowling-green, which he had just finished building up of green sods, carefully jointed and beaten, with planks to keep the balls from straying. He was showing the rustics how to bowl their balls, and had, for this purpose, girt
up his white woollen smock above his knees, when he was stung by a wasp, a creature, no doubt of the Devil. Seeing his finger begin to swell and unwilling to be prevented from continuing the game, he had, for the first time on record, removed that gold wedding-ring, and, after a minute's hesitation how to dispose of it, stuck it on the extended right annular figure of the marble statue of the devil Venus; and then gone on playing. But that rash action, so unworthy of a Christian saint, and in which so many blameable acts culminated - for there should have been neither ring to remove nor idol to stick it on - that altogether reprehensible action was punished as it deserved. After a few rounds of the game, Eudaemon bade the peasants fall to on the dinner he had provided for them, while he himself retired to say his prayers. So doing, he sought his ring. But - 0 prodigy! 0 terror! it was in vain. The marble she-devil had bent her finger and closed her hand. She had accepted the ring (and with it, doubtless, his wretched sinful soul) and refused to relinquish it. No sooner had a single one of the rustics found out what had happened, than the whole crew of them, men, women, and children, fled in confusion, muttering prayers and shrieking exorcisms, and carrying away what victuals they could.

  It was only when Carpophorus and Ursicinus arrived, armed with missals and holy-water brushes, that a few of the boldest rustics consented to return to the scene of the wonder. They found, as I have already mentioned, Eudaemon placidly watering some pots of clove-pinks, which he had prepared as gifts for the maidens. The tables were upset, the bunches of lavender lying about; the lettuces and rosebushes had been trampled. The frogs had begun to wail in the reed-brakes, and the crickets to lament in the ripe corn; bats were circling about and swallows, and the sun was sinking. The last rays fell upon the marble statue at the end of the bowling-green, making the ring glimmer on her finger; and suddenly, just as the two saints entered, reddening and gilding her nakedness into a semblance of life. Carpophorus and Ursicinus gave a yell of terror and nearly fell flat on the ground. Eudaemon looked up from his clove-pinks at them, and at the statue. He understood. "Foolish brothers," he said, "did you not know that Brother Sun can make all things alive?"

  And he continued watering the flowers and going to the well to re-fill his can.

  Carpophorus and Ursicinus had not recovered from their terror; but it was spiced with a certain delight, for were they not about to witness some dreadful proceeding on the part of the Evil One? Meanwhile, they kept at a respectful distance from the idol, and splashing holy water right and left, and swinging censers backwards and forwards, they set up a hymn in a shaky voice, not without some lapses of grammar. But the idol took notice of none of it; she shone out white in the gathering twilight, and on her bent finger, on her closed hand, twinkled the little gold circlet.

  When Eudaemon had finished his watering, he let the bucket once more down in to the well, and took a deep drink of water. Then he dipped his hands, ungirt his white woollen robes, the day's work being done, and walked leisurely down the bowling-green, calling the birds, who whirled round his head; but taking no notice of his fellow-saints and their exorcisms. Before the idol he stood still. He looked up, quite boldly, at her comely limbs and face, and even with a benign smile. "Sister Venus," he said, "you were ever a lover of jests; but every jest has its end. Night is coming on, my outdoor work is over; it is fit I should retire to prayers and to rest. Give me therefore my ring, of which I bade you take charge in return for the hospitality I had shown you."

  Carpophorus and Ursicinus quickened the time of their hymn, and sang much at cross purposes, looking up at the idol with the corner of their eyes.

  The statue did not move. There she stood naked and comely, whiter and whiter as the daylight faded, and the moon rose up in the east. "Sister Venus," resumed Eudaemon, "you are not obliging. I fear, Sister Venus, that you nurture evil designs, such as mankind accounts to your blame. If this be, desist. Foolish persons have said you were wicked, nay a devil; and like enough you have got to believe it, and to glory, perhaps, in the notion. Cast it from you, Sister Venus, for I tell you it is false. And so, restore me my ring."

  But still the idol did not move, but grew only whiter, like silver, in the moonbeams, as she stood above the green grass, in the smoke of the incense. Carpophorus and Ursicinus fixed their eyes on her, wondering when she would break in two pieces, and a dragon smelling of brimstone issue from her with a hideous noise, as a result of the exorcism.

  "Sister Venus," Eudaemon repeated, and his voice, though gentle, grew commanding, "cease your foolish malice, and, inasmuch as one of God's creatures, obey and restore to me my ring."

  A little breeze stirred the air. The white hand of the statue shifted from her white bosom, the finger slowly uncrooked and extended itself.

  With incredible audacity Eudaemon ran into the trap of the Evil One. He advanced, and, rising on tiptoe, stretched forth his hand to the idol's. Now indeed would that devil clasp him to her, and singe his flesh on the way to Hell!

  But it was not so. Eudaemon took the ring, rubbed it tenderly on his white woollen sleeve, and stuck it slowly and pensively on his own finger.

  "Sister Venus," he then said, standing before the statue, with the finches and thrushes and ortolans perching on his shoulders, and the swallows circling round his head, "Sister Venus, I thank you. Forget the malice which foolish mankind have taught you to find in yourself. Remember you are a creature of God's, and good. Teach the flowers to cross their seeds and vary their hues and scents; teach the doves and the swallows and the sheep and the kine and all our speechless brethren to pair and nurture their young; teach the youths and the maidens to love one another and their children. Make this orchard to bloom, and these rustics to sing. But, since in this form you have foolishly tried to give scandal as foolish mortals had taught you to do, accept, Sister Venus, a loving punishment, and in the name of Christ, be a statue no longer, but a fair white tree with sweet-smelling blossoms and golden fruit."

  Eudaemon stood with his hand raised, and made the sign of the cross.

  There was a faint sigh, as of the breeze, and a faint but gathering rustle. And behold, beneath the shining white moon, the statue of Venus changed its outline, put forth minute leaves and twigs, which grew apace, until, while Eudaemon still stood with raised hand, there was a statue no longer at the end of the bowling-green, but a fair orangetree, with leaves and flowers shining silvery in the moonlight.

  Then Eudaemon went in to his prayers; and Carpophorus and Ursicinus returned each in silence, one to his cavern and one to his column, and thought themselves much smaller saints for ever in future.

  As to the orange-tree, it still stands on the slope of the Caelian, opposite the criss-cross reeds of the Aventine vineyards, beside the little church with the fluted broken columns and the big cactus, like a python, on its apse. And the pigeons are most plentiful, and the figs and clove-pinks most sweet and fragrant all round; and there is always water in plenty in the well. And that is the story of St. Eudaemon and his Orange-Tree; but you will not find it in the Golden Legend nor in the Bollandists.

  RICHARD GARNETT (1835-1906) worked for the greater part of his life in the British Museum Library, serving as Supervisor of the Reading Room and as Keeper of Printed Books. Most of his writings were scholarly, but he produced one extraordinary book of stories, The Twilight of the Gods, which is one of the landmarks of British fantasy. It was first issued in 1888 but was enlarged from sixteen stories to twenty-eight in the second edition of 1903. Most of the stories in it are romances of antiquity or historical fantasies, often based in obscure legends; they are carefully embellished with all manner of exotica, stylistically highlypolished, neatly ironic and brilliantly witty. The title story, which describes the later career of Prometheus, reprieved from his horrible punishment following the abdication of the Olympians, is one of several parables which subtly champion liberal humanist values against the excesses of ascetic religion - although such cautionary tales as "The City of the Philosophers" insist that we must be sceptical ev
en of our best and most humane intentions.

  The urbane and flirtatious surfaces of Garnett's stories excuse the fact that their subject matter is mischievously and extravagantly opposed to Victorian ideas and ideals. "Alexander the Ratcatcher" was first published in The Yellow Book in 1897; it is one of several cynical anti-clerical satires recalling the most calculatedly heretical of the tales in Anatole France's The Well of St Clare (1895; tr. 1909). Vernon Lee's fantasies in a similar vein are restrained by comparison, and those of Laurence Housman are even more so.

  by Richard Garnett

  "Alexander Octavus mures, qui Urbem supra modum vexabant, anathemate perculit." Palatius. Fasti Cardinalium, tom. v. p. 46

  I

  "Rome and her rats are at the point of battle!"

  This metaphor of Menenius Agrippa's became, history records, matter of fact in 1689, when rats pervaded the Eternal City from garret to cellar, and Pope Alexander the Eighth seriously apprehended the fate of Bishop Hatto. The situation worried him sorely; he had but lately attained the tiara at an advanced age - the twenty-fourth hour, as he himself remarked in extenuation of his haste to enrich his nephew. The time vouchsafed for worthier deeds was brief, and he dreaded descending to posterity as the Rat Pope. Witty and genial, his sense of humour teased him with a full perception of the absurdity of his position. Peter and Pasquin concurred in forbidding him to desert his post; and he derived but small comfort from the ingenuity of his flatterers, who compared him to St. Paul contending with beasts at Ephesus.