by Lord Dunsany
Produced by Tom Harris. HTML version by Al Haines.
TALES OF WONDER
by Lord Dunsany
A Tale of London Thirteen at Table The City on Mallington Moor Why the Milkman Shudders When He Perceives the Dawn The Bad Old Woman in Black The Bird of the Difficult Eye The Long Porter's Tale The Loot of Loma The Secret of the Sea How Ali Came to the Black Country The Bureau d'Echange de Maux A Story of Land and Sea
Guarantee To The Reader
A Tale of the Equator A Narrow Escape The Watch-tower How Plash-Goo Came to the Land of None's Desire The Three Sailors' Gambit The Exiles Club The Three Infernal Jokes
Preface
Ebrington Barracks
Aug. 16th 1916.
I do not know where I may be when this preface is read. As I write itin August 1916, I am at Ebrington Barracks, Londonderry, recoveringfrom a slight wound. But it does not greatly matter where I am; mydreams are here before you amongst the following pages; and writing ina day when life is cheap, dreams seem to me all the dearer, the onlythings that survive.
Just now the civilization of Europe seems almost to have ceased, andnothing seems to grow in her torn fields but death, yet this is onlyfor a while and dreams will come back again and bloom as of old, allthe more radiantly for this terrible ploughing, as the flowers willbloom again where the trenches are and the primroses shelter inshell-holes for many seasons, when weeping Liberty has come home toFlanders.
To some of you in America this may seem an unnecessary and wastefulquarrel, as other people's quarrels often are; but it comes to thisthat though we are all killed there will be songs again, but if wewere to submit and so survive there could be neither songs nor dreams,nor any joyous free things any more.
And do not regret the lives that are wasted amongst us, or the workthat the dead would have done, for war is no accident that man's carecould have averted, but is as natural, though not as regular, as thetides; as well regret the things that the tide has washed away, whichdestroys and cleanses and crumbles, and spares the minutest shells.
And now I will write nothing further about our war, but offer youthese books of dreams from Europe as one throws things of value, ifonly to oneself, at the last moment out of a burning house.
DUNSANY.
A Tale of London
"Come," said the Sultan to his hasheesh-eater in the very furthestlands that know Bagdad, "dream to me now of London."
And the hasheesh-eater made a low obeisance and seated himselfcross-legged upon a purple cushion broidered with golden poppies, onthe floor, beside an ivory bowl where the hasheesh was, and havingeaten liberally of the hasheesh blinked seven times and spoke thus:
"O Friend of God, know then that London is the desiderate town even ofall Earth's cities. Its houses are of ebony and cedar which they roofwith thin copper plates that the hand of Time turns green. They havegolden balconies in which amethysts are where they sit and watch thesunset. Musicians in the gloaming steal softly along the ways; unheardtheir feet fall on the white sea-sand with which those ways arestrewn, and in the darkness suddenly they play on dulcimers andinstruments with strings. Then are there murmurs in the balconiespraising their skill, then are there bracelets cast down to them forreward and golden necklaces and even pearls.
"Indeed but the city is fair; there is by the sandy ways a paving allalabaster, and the lanterns along it are of chrysoprase, all nightlong they shine green, but of amethyst are the lanterns of thebalconies.
"As the musicians go along the ways dancers gather about them anddance upon the alabaster pavings, for joy and not for hire. Sometimesa window opens far up in an ebony palace and a wreath is cast down toa dancer or orchids showered upon them.
"Indeed of many cities have I dreamt but of none fairer, through manymarble metropolitan gates hasheesh has led me, but London is itssecret, the last gate of all; the ivory bowl has nothing more to show.And indeed even now the imps that crawl behind me and that will notlet me be are plucking me by the elbow and bidding my spirit return,for well they know that I have seen too much. 'No, not London,' theysay; and therefore I will speak of some other city, a city of someless mysterious land, and anger not the imps with forbidden things. Iwill speak of Persepolis or famous Thebes."
A shade of annoyance crossed the Sultan's face, a look of thunder thatyou had scarcely seen, but in those lands they watched his visagewell, and though his spirit was wandering far away and his eyes werebleared with hasheesh yet that storyteller there and then perceivedthe look that was death, and sent his spirit back at once to London asa man runs into his house when the thunder comes.
"And therefore," he continued, "in the desiderate city, in London, alltheir camels are pure white. Remarkable is the swiftness of theirhorses, that draw their chariots that are of ivory along those sandyways and that are of surpassing lightness, they have little bells ofsilver upon their horses' heads. O Friend of God, if you perceivedtheir merchants! The glory of their dresses in the noonday! They areno less gorgeous than those butterflies that float about theirstreets. They have overcloaks of green and vestments of azure, hugepurple flowers blaze on their overcloaks, the work of cunning needles,the centres of the flowers are of gold and the petals of purple. Alltheir hats are black--" ("No, no," said the Sultan)--"but irises areset about the brims, and green plumes float above the crowns of them.
"They have a river that is named the Thames, on it their ships go upwith violet sails bringing incense for the braziers that perfume thestreets, new songs exchanged for gold with alien tribes, raw silverfor the statues of their heroes, gold to make balconies where thewomen sit, great sapphires to reward their poets with, the secrets ofold cities and strange lands, the earning of the dwellers in farisles, emeralds, diamonds, and the hoards of the sea. And whenever aship comes into port and furls its violet sails and the news spreadsthrough London that she has come, then all the merchants go down tothe river to barter, and all day long the chariots whirl through thestreets, and the sound of their going is a mighty roar all day untilevening, their roar is even like--"
"Not so," said the Sultan.
"Truth is not hidden from the Friend of God," replied thehasheesh-eater, "I have erred being drunken with the hasheesh, for inthe desiderate city, even in London, so thick upon the ways is thewhite sea-sand with which the city glimmers that no sound comes fromthe path of the charioteers, but they go softly like a lightsea-wind." ("It is well," said the Sultan.) "They go softly down tothe port where the vessels are, and the merchandise in from the sea,amongst the wonders that the sailors show, on land by the high ships,and softly they go though swiftly at evening back to their homes.
"O would that the Munificent, the Illustrious, the Friend of God, hadeven seen these things, had seen the jewellers with their emptybaskets, bargaining there by the ships, when the barrels of emeraldscame up from the hold. Or would that he had seen the fountains therein silver basins in the midst of the ways. I have seen small spiresupon their ebony houses and the spires were all of gold, birdsstrutted there upon the copper roofs from golden spire to spire thathave no equal for splendour in all the woods of the world. And overLondon the desiderate city the sky is so deep a blue that by thisalone the traveller may know where he has come, and may end hisfortunate journey. Nor yet for any colour of the sky is there toogreat heat in London, for along its ways a wind blows always from theSouth gently and cools the city.
"Such, O Friend of God, is indeed the city of London, lying very faroff on the yonder side of Bagdad, without a peer for beauty orexcellence of its ways among the towns of the earth or cities of song;and even so, as I have told, its
fortunate citizens dwell, with theirhearts ever devising beautiful things and from the beauty of their ownfair work that is more abundant around them every year, receiving newinspirations to work things more beautiful yet."
"And is their government good?" the Sultan said.
"It is most good," said the hasheesh-eater, and fell backwards uponthe floor.
He lay thus and was silent. And when the Sultan perceived he wouldspeak no more that night he smiled and lightly applauded.
And there was envy in that palace, in lands beyond Bagdad, of all thatdwell in London.
