Edwin L. Arnold - Guliver on Mars

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GULLIVER OF MARS by Edwin L. Arnold Original Title: Lieut. Gulliver Jones

CHAPTER I Dare I say it? Dare I say that I, a plain, prosaic lieutenant in the republican

service have done the incredible things here set out for the love of a woman--for a chimera in

female shape; for a pale, vapid ghost of woman-loveliness? At times I tell myself I dare not: that

you will laugh, and cast me aside as a fabricator; and then again I pick up my pen and collect the

scattered pages, for I MUST write it--the pallid splendour of that thing I loved, and won, and

lost is ever before me, and will not be forgotten. The tumult of the struggle into which that

vision led me still throbs in my mind, the soft, lisping voices of the planet I ransacked for its

sake and the roar of the destruction which followed me back from the quest drowns all other sounds

in my ears! I must and will write--it relieves me; read and believe as you list. At the moment

this story commences I was thinking of grill- ed steak and tomatoes--steak crisp and brown on both

sides, and tomatoes red as a setting sun! Much else though I have forgotten, THAT fact remains as

clear as the last sight of a well-remembered shore in the mind of some wave-tossed traveller. And

the occasion which produced that prosaic thought was a night well calculated to make one think of

supper and fireside, though the one might be frugal and the other lonely, and as I, Gulliver

Jones, the poor foresaid Navy lieutenant, with the honoured stars of our Republic on my collar,

and an undeserved snub from those in authority rankling in my heart, picked my way homeward by a

short cut through the dismalness of a New York slum I longed for steak and stout, slippers and a

pipe, with all the pathetic keenness of a troubled soul. It was a wild, black kind of night, and

the weirdness of it showed up as I passed from light to light or crossed the mouths of dim alleys

leading Heaven knows to what infernal dens of mystery and crime even in this latter-day city of

ours. The moon was up as far as the church steeples; large vapoury clouds scudding across the sky

between us and her, and a strong, gusty wind, laden with big raindrops snarled angrily round

corners and sighed in the parapets like strange voices talking about things not of human interest.

It made no difference to me, of course. New York in this year of grace is not the place for the

supernatural be the time never so fit for witch-riding and the night wind in the chimney-stacks

sound never so much like the last gurgling cries of throttled men. No! the world was very matter-

of-fact, and particularly so to me, a poor younger son with five dollars in my purse by way of

fortune, a packet of unpaid bills in my breastpocket, and round my neck a locket with a portrait

therein of that dear buxom, freckled, stub-nosed girl away in a little southern seaport town whom

I thought I loved with a magnificent affection. Gods! I had not even touched the fringe of that

affliction. Thus sauntering along moodily, my chin on my chest and much too absorbed in

reflection to have any nice apprecia- tion of what was happening about me, I was crossing in front

of a dilapidated block of houses, dating back nearly to the time of the Pilgrim Fathers, when I

had a vague consciousness of something dark suddenly sweeping by me-- a thing like a huge bat, or

a solid shadow, if such a thing could be, and the next instant there was a thud and a bump, a bump

again, a half-stifled cry, and then a hurried vision of some black carpeting that flapped and

shook as though all the winds of Eblis were in its folds, and then apparently disgorged from its

inmost recesses a little man. Before my first start of half-amused surprise was over I saw him by

the flickering lamp-light clutch at space as he tried to steady himself, stumble on the slippery

curb, and the next moment go down on the back of his head with a most ugly thud. Now I was not

destitute of feeling, though it had been my lot to see men die in many ways, and I ran over to

that motionless form without an idea that anything but an ordinary accident had occurred. There

he lay, silent and, as it turned out afterwards, dead as a door-nail, the strangest old fellow

ever eyes looked upon, dressed in shabby sorrel- coloured clothes of antique cut, with a long grey

beard upon his chin, pent-roof eyebrows, and a wizened complexion so puckered and tanned by

exposure to Heaven only knew what weathers that it was impossible to guess his nationality. I

lifted him up out of the puddle of black blood in which he was lying, and his head dropped back

over my arm as though it had been fixed to his body with string alone. There was neither heart-

beat nor breath in him, and the last flicker of life faded out of that gaunt face even as I

watched. It was not altogether a pleasant situation, and the only thing to do appeared to be to

get the dead man into proper care (though little good it could do him now!) as speedily as

possible. So, sending a chance passer-by into the main street for a cab, I placed him into it as

soon as it came, and there being nobody else to go, got in with him myself, telling the driver at

the same time to take us to the nearest hospital. "Is this your rug, captain?" asked a bystander

just as we were driving off. "Not mine," I answered somewhat roughly. "You don't suppose I go

about at this time of night with Turkey carpets under my arm, do you? It belongs to this old chap

here who has just dropped out of the skies on to his head; chuck it on top and shut the door!"

And that rug, the very main- spring of the startling things which followed, was thus care- lessly

thrown on to the carriage, and off we went. Well, to be brief, I handed in that stark old

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traveller from nowhere at the hospital, and as a matter of curiosity sat in the waiting-room while

they examined him. In five minutes the house-surgeon on duty came in to see me, and with a shake

of his head said briefly-- "Gone, sir--clean gone! Broke his neck like a pipe-stem. Most strange-

looking man, and none of us can even guess at his age. Not a friend of yours, I suppose?"

"Nothing whatever to do with me, sir. He slipped on the pavement and fell in front of me just

now, and as a mat- ter of common charity I brought him in here. Were there any means of

identification on him?" "None whatever," answered the doctor, taking out his notebook and, as a

matter of form, writing down my name and address and a few brief particulars, "nothing what- ever

except this curious-looking bead hung round his neck by a blackened thong of leather," and he

handed me a thing about as big as a filbert nut with a loop for suspension and apparently of rock

crystal, though so begrimed and dull its nature was difficult to speak of with certainty. The

bead was of no seeming value and slipped unintentionally into my waistcoat pocket as I chatted for

a few minutes more with the doctor, and then, shaking hands, I said goodbye, and went back to the

cab which was still waiting outside. It was only on reaching home I noticed the hospital porters

had omitted to take the dead man's carpet from the roof of the cab when they carried him in, and

as the cab- man did not care about driving back to the hospital with it, and it could not well be

left in the street, I somewhat reluctantly carried it indoors with me. Once in the shine of my

own lamp and a cigar in my mouth I had a closer look at that ancient piece of art work from

heaven, or the other place, only knows what ancient loom. A big, strong rug of faded Oriental

colouring, it covered half the floor of my sitting-room, the substance being of a material more

like camel's hair than anything else, and run- ning across, when examined closely, were some dark

fibres so long and fine that surely they must have come from the tail of Solomon's favourite black

stallion itself. But the strangest thing about that carpet was its pattern. It was threadbare

enough to all conscience in places, yet the design still lived in solemn, age-wasted hues, and, as

I dragged it to my stove-front and spread it out, it seemed to me that it was as much like a star

map done by a scribe who had lately recovered from delirium tremens as anything else. In the

centre appeared a round such as might be taken for the sun, while here and there, "in the field,"

as heralds say, were lesser orbs which from their size and position could represent smaller worlds

circling about it. Between these orbs were dotted lines and arrow-heads of the oldest form

pointing in all directions, while all the intervening spaces were filled up with woven characters

half-way in appearance between Runes and Cryptic-Sanskrit. Round the borders these characters ran

into a wild maze, a perfect jungle of an alphabet through which none but a wizard could have

forced a way in search of meaning. Altogether, I thought as I kicked it out straight upon my

floor, it was a strange and not unhandsome article of furniture--it would do nicely for the mess-

room on the Carolina, and if any representatives of yonder poor old fel- low turned up tomorrow,

why, I would give them a couple of dollars for it. Little did I guess how dear it would be at any

price! Meanwhile that steak was late, and now that the tempor- ary excitement of the evening was

wearing off I fell dull again. What a dark, sodden world it was that frowned in on me as I moved

over to the window and opened it for the benefit of the cool air, and how the wind howled about

the roof tops. How lonely I was! What a fool I had been to ask for long leave and come ashore

like this, to curry favour with a set of stubborn dunderheads who cared nothing for me--or Polly,

and could not or would not understand how important it was to the best interests of the Service

that I should get that promotion which alone would send me back to her an eligible wooer! What a

fool I was not to have volunteered for some desperate service instead of wast- ing time like this!

Then at least life would have been interesting; now it was dull as ditch-water, with wretched

vistas of stagnant waiting between now and that joyful day when I could claim that dear, rosy-

checked girl for my own. What a fool I had been! "I wish, I wish," I exclaimed, walking round

the little room, "I wish I were--" While these unfinished exclamations were actually passing my

lips I chanced to cross that infernal mat, and it is no more startling than true, but at my word a

quiver of expectation ran through that gaunt web--a rustle of antici- pation filled its ancient

fabric, and one frayed corner surged up, and as I passed off its surface in my stride, the

sentence still unfinished on my lips, wrapped itself about my left leg with extraordinary

swiftness and so effectively that I nearly fell into the arms of my landlady, who opened the door

at the moment and came in with a tray and the steak and tomatoes mentioned more than once already.

It was the draught caused by the opening door, of course, that had made the dead man's rug lift so

strangely-- what else could it have been? I made this apology to the good woman, and when she had

set the table and closed the door took another turn or two about my den, con- tinuing as I did so

my angry thoughts. "Yes, yes," I said at last, returning to the stove and taking my stand, hands

in pockets, in front of it, "anything were better than this, any enterprise however wild, any

adventure however desperate. Oh, I wish I were anywhere but here, anywhere out of this redtape-

ridden world of ours! I WISH I WERE IN THE PLANET MARS!" How can I describe what followed those

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luckless words? Even as I spoke the magic carpet quivered responsively under my feet, and an

undulation went all round the fringe as though a sudden wind were shaking it. It humped up in the

middle so abruptly that I came down sitting with a shock that numbed me for the moment. It threw

me on my back and billowed up round me as though I were in the trough of a stormy sea. Quicker

than I can write it lapped a corner over and rolled me in its folds like a chrysalis in a cocoon.

I gave a wild yell and made one frantic struggle, but it was too late. With the leathery strength

of a giant and the swiftness of an accomplished cigar- roller covering a "core" with leaf, it

swamped my efforts, straightened my limbs, rolled me over, lapped me in fold after fold till head

and feet and everything were gone-- crushed life and breath back into my innermost being, and

then, with the last particle of consciousness, I felt myself lifted from the floor, pass once

round the room, and finally shoot out, point foremost, into space through the open window, and go

up and up and up with a sound of rending atmospheres that seemed to tear like riven silk in one

pro- longed shriek under my head, and to close up in thunder astern until my reeling senses could

stand it no longer. and time and space and circumstances all lost their meaning to me.

CHAPTER II How long that wild rush lasted I have no means of judging. It may have been an hour, a

day, or many days, for I was throughout in a state of suspended animation, but presently my senses

began to return and with them a sensa- tion of lessening speed, a grateful relief to a heavy

pressure which had held my life crushed in its grasp, without destroy- ing it completely. It was

just that sort of sensation though more keen which, drowsy in his bunk, a traveller feels when he

is aware, without special perception, harbour is reached and a voyage comes to an end. But in my

case the slowing down was for a long time comparative. Yet the sensation served to revive my

scattered senses, and just as I was awakening to a lively sense of amazement, an incredible doubt

of my own emotions, and an eager desire to know what had happened, my strange conveyance

oscillated once or twice, undulated lightly up and down, like a wood- pecker flying from tree to

tree, and then grounded, bows first, rolled over several times, then steadied again, and, coming

at last to rest, the next minute the infernal rug opened, quiver- ing along all its borders in its

peculiar way, and humping up in the middle shot me five feet into the air like a cat tossed from a

schoolboy's blanket. As I turned over I had a dim vision of a clear light like the shine of dawn,

and solid ground sloping away below me. Upon that slope was ranged a crowd of squatting people,

and a staid-looking individual with his back turned stood nearer by. Afterwards I found he was

lecturing all those sitters on the ethics of gravity and the inherent properties of falling

bodies; at the moment I only knew he was directly in my line as I descended, and him round the

waist I seized, giddy with the light and fresh air, waltzed him down the slope with the force of

my impetus, and, tripping at the bottom, rolled over and over recklessly with him sheer into the

arms of the gaping crowd below. Over and over we went into the thickest mass of bodies, making a

way through the people, until at last we came to a stop in a perfect mound of writhing forms and

waving legs and arms. When we had done the mass disentangled itself and I was able to raise my

head from the shoulder of someone on whom I had fallen, lifting him, or her--which was it?--into a

sitting posture alongside of me at the same time, while the others rose about us like wheat-stalks

after a storm, and edged shyly off, as well as they might. Such a sleek, slim youth it was who

sat up facing me, with a flush of gentle surprise on his face, and dapper hands that felt

cautiously about his anatomy for injured places. He looked so quaintly rueful yet withal so good-

tempered that I could not help bursting into laughter in spite of my own amazement. Then he

laughed too, a sedate, musical chuckle, and said something incomprehensible, point- ing at the

same time to a cut upon my finger that was bleed- ing a little. I shook my head, meaning thereby

that it was nothing, but the stranger with graceful solicitude took my hand, and, after examining

the hurt, deliberately tore a strip of cloth from a bright yellow toga-like garment he was wearing

and bound the place up with a woman's tenderness. Meanwhile, as he ministered, there was time to

look about me. Where was I? It was not the Broadway; it was not Staten Island on a Saturday

afternoon. The night was just over, and the sun on the point of rising. Yet it was still shadowy

all about, the air being marvellously tepid and pleasant to the senses. Quaint, soft aromas like

the breath of a new world--the fragrance of unknown flowers, and the dewy scent of never-trodden

fields drifted to my nostrils; and to my ears came a sound of laughter scarcely more human than

the murmur of the wind in the trees, and a pretty undulating whisper as though a great concourse

of people were talking softly in their sleep. I gazed about scarcely knowing how much of my

senses or surroundings were real and how much fanciful, until I presently be- came aware the rosy

twilight was broadening into day, and under the increasing shine a strange scene was fashion- ing

itself. At first it was an opal sea I looked on of mist, shot along its upper surface with the

rosy gold and pinks of dawn. Then, as that soft, translucent lake ebbed, jutting hills came

through it, black and crimson, and as they seemed to mount into the air other lower hills showed

through the veil with rounded forest knobs till at last the brightening day dis- pelled the mist,

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and as the rosy-coloured gauzy fragments went slowly floating away a wonderfully fair country lay

at my feet, with a broad sea glimmering in many arms and bays in the distance beyond. It was all

dim and unreal at first, the mountains shadowy, the ocean unreal, the flowery fields be- tween it

and me vacant and shadowy. Yet were they vacant? As my eyes cleared and day brightened still

more, and I turned my head this way and that, it presently dawned upon me all the meadow cop-

pices and terraces northwards of where I lay, all that blue and spacious ground I had thought to

be bare and vacant, were alive with a teeming city of booths and tents; now I came to look more

closely there was a whole town upon the slope, built as might be in a night of boughs and branches

still unwithered, the streets and ways of that city in the shadows thronged with expectant people

moving in groups and shifting to and fro in lively streams--chatting at the stalls and clustering

round the tent doors in soft, gauzy, parti-coloured crowds in a way both fascinating and per-

plexing. I stared about me like a child at its first pantomime, dimly understanding all I saw was

novel, but more allured to the colour and life of the picture than concerned with its exact

meaning; and while I stared and turned my finger was bandaged, and my new friend had been lisping

away to me without getting anything in turn but a shake of the head. This made him thoughtful,

and thereon followed a curious incident which I cannot explain. I doubt even whether you will

believe it; but what am I to do in that case? You have already accepted the episode of my com-

ing, or you would have shut the covers before arriving at this page of my modest narrative, and

this emboldens me. I may strengthen my claim on your credulity by pointing out the extraordinary

marvels which science is teaching you even on our own little world. To quote a single instance:

If any one had declared ten years ago that it would shortly be practicable and easy for two

persons to converse from shore to shore across the Atlantic without any intervening medium, he

would have been laughed at as a possibly amusing but certainly extravagant romancer. Yet that pic-

turesque lie of yesterday is amongst the accomplished facts of today! Therefore I am encouraged

to ask your in- dulgence, in the name of your previous errors, for the following and any other

instances in which I may appear to trifle with strict veracity. There is no such thing as the

impossible in our universe! When my friendly companion found I could not under- stand him, he

looked serious for a minute or two, then shortened his brilliant yellow toga, as though he had ar-

rived at some resolve, and knelt down directly in front of me. He next took my face between his

hands, and putting his nose within an inch of mine, stared into my eyes with all his might. At

first I was inclined to laugh, but before long the most curious sensations took hold of me. They

commenced with a thrill which passed all up my body, and next all feeling save the consciousness

of the loud beating of my heart ceased. Then it seemed that boy's eyes were inside my head and

not outside, while along with them an intangible something pervaded my brain. The sensation at

first was like the application of ether to the skin--a cool, numbing emotion. It was followed by

a curious tingling feeling, as some dormant cells in my mind answered to the thought-transfer, and

were filled and fertil- ised! My other brain-cells most distinctly felt the vitalising of their

companions, and for about a minute I experi- enced extreme nausea and a headache such as comes

from over-study, though both passed swiftly off. I presume that in the future we shall all obtain

knowledge in this way. The Professors of a later day will perhaps keep shops for the sale of

miscellaneous information, and we shall drop in and be inflated with learning just as the

bicyclist gets his tire pumped up, or the motorist is recharged with electricity at so much per

unit. Examinations will then become matters of capacity in the real meaning of that word, and we

shall be tempted to invest our pocket-money by advertisements of "A cheap line in Astrology," "Try

our double-strength, two- minute course of Classics," "This is remnant day for Trig- onometry and

Metaphysics," and so on. My friend did not get as far as that. With him the process did not take

more than a minute, but it was startling in its results, and reduced me to an extraordinary state

of hypnotic receptibility. When it was over my instructor tapped with a finger on my lips,

uttering aloud as he did so the words-- "Know none; know some; know little; know morel" again

and again; and the strangest part of it is that as he spoke I did know at first a little, then

more, and still more, by swift accumulation, of his speech and meaning. In fact, when pre- sently

he suddenly laid a hand over my eyes and then let go of my head with a pleasantly put question as

to how I felt, I had no difficulty whatever in answering him in his own tongue, and rose from the

ground as one gets from a hair-dresser's chair, with a vague idea of looking round for my hat and

offering him his fee. "My word, sir!" I said, in lisping Martian, as I pulled down my cuffs and

put my cravat straight, "that was a quick process. I once heard of a man who learnt a language in

the moments he gave each day to having his boots blacked; but this beats all. I trust I was a

docile pupil?" "Oh, fairly, sir," answered the soft, musical voice of the strange being by me;

"but your head is thick and your brain tough. I could have taught another in half the time."

"Curiously enough," was my response, "those are almost the very words with which my dear old tutor

dismissed me the morning I left college. Never mind, the thing is done. Shall I pay you

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anything?" "I do not understand." "Any honorarium, then? Some people understand one word and

not the other." But the boy only shook his head in answer. Strangely enough, I was not greatly

surprised all this time either at the novelty of my whereabouts or at the hypnotic instruction in

a new language just received. Per- haps it was because my head still spun too giddily with that

flight in the old rug for much thought; perhaps be- cause I did not yet fully realise the thing

that had happened. But, anyhow, there is the fact, which, like so many others in my narrative,

must, alas! remain unexplained for the moment. The rug, by the way, had completely disap- peared,

my friend comforting me on this score, however, by saying he had seen it rolled up and taken away

by one whom he knew. "We are very tidy people here, stranger," he said, "and everything found

Lying about goes back to the Palace store- rooms. You will laugh to see the lumber there, for few

of us ever take the trouble to reclaim our property." Heaven knows I was in no laughing mood when

I saw that enchanted web again! When I had lain and watched the brightening scene for a time, I

got up, and having stretched and shaken my clothes into some sort of order, we strolled down the

hill and joined the light-hearted crowds that twined across the plain and through the streets of

their city of booths. They were the prettiest, daintiest folk ever eyes looked upon, well-formed

and like to us as could be in the main, but slender and willowy, so dainty and light, both the men

and the women, so pretty of cheek and hair, so mild of aspect, I felt, as I strode amongst them, I

could have plucked them like flowers and bound them up in bunches with my belt. And yet somehow I

liked them from the first minute; such a happy, careless, light-hearted race, again I say, never

was seen before. There was not a stain of thought or care on a single one of those white

foreheads that eddied round me under their peaked, blossom-like caps, the perpetual smile their

faces wore never suffered rebuke anywhere; their very movements were graceful and slow, their

laughter was low and musical, there was an odour of friendly, slothful happiness about them that

made me admire whether I would or no. Unfortunately I was not able to live on laughter, as they

appeared to be, so presently turning to my acquaintance, who had told me his name was the plain

monosyllabic An, and clapping my hand on his shoulder as he stood lost in sleepy reflection, said,

in a good, hearty way, "Hullo, friend Yellow-jerkin! If a stranger might set himself athwart the

cheerful current of your meditations, may such a one ask how far 'tis to the nearest wine-shop or

a booth where a thirsty man may get a mug of ale at a moderate reckoning?" That gilded youth

staggered under my friendly blow as though the hammer of Thor himself had suddenly lit upon his

shoulder, and ruefully rubbing his tender skin, he turned on me mild, handsome eyes, answering

after a moment, dur- ing which his native mildness struggled with the pain I had unwittingly given

him-- "If your thirst be as emphatic as your greeting, friend Heavy-fist, it will certainly be a

kindly deed to lead you to the drinking-place. My shoulder tingles with your good- fellowship,"

he added, keeping two arms'-lengths clear of me. "Do you wish," he said, "merely to cleanse a

dusty throat, or for blue or pink oblivion?" "Why," I answered laughingly, "I have come a longish

journey since yesterday night--a journey out of count of all reasonable mileage--and I might

fairly plead a dusty throat as excuse for a beginning; but as to the other things mentioned, those

tinted forgetfulnesses, I do not even know what you mean." "Undoubtedly you are a stranger," said

the friendly youth, eyeing me from top to toe with renewed wonder, "and by your unknown garb one

from afar." "From how far no man can say--not even I--but from very far, in truth. Let that stay

your curiosity for the time. And now to bench and ale-mug, on good fellow!--the short- est way. I

was never so thirsty as this since our water-butts went overboard when I sailed the southern seas

as a tramp apprentice, and for three days we had to damp our black tongues with the puddles the

night-dews left in the lift of our mainsail." Without more words, being a little awed of me, I

thought, the boy led me through the good-humoured crowd to where, facing the main road to the

town, but a little sheltered by a thicket of trees covered with gigantic pink blossoms, stood a

drinking-place--a cluster of tables set round an open grass-plot. Here he brought me a platter of

some light inefficient cakes which merely served to make hunger more self-conscious, and some fine

aromatic wine contained in a triple-bodied flask, each division containing vintage of a separate

hue. We broke our biscuits, sipped that mysterious wine, and talked of many things until at last

something set us on the subject of astronomy, a study I found my dapper gallant had some knowledge

of-- which was not to be wondered at seeing he dwelt under skies each night set thick above his

curly head with tawny planets, and glittering constellations sprinkled through space like flowers

in May meadows. He knew what worlds went round the sun, larger or lesser, and seeing this I be-

gan to question him, for I was uneasy in my innermost mind and, you will remember, so far had no

certain knowledge of where I was, only a dim, restless suspicion that I had come beyond the ken of

all men's knowledge. Therefore, sweeping clear the board with my sleeve, and breaking the wafer

cake I was eating, I set down one central piece for the sun, and, "See here!" I said, "good fel-

low! This morsel shall stand for that sun you have just been welcoming back with quaint ritual.

Now stretch your starry knowledge to the utmost, and put down that tankard for a moment. If this

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be yonder sun and this lesser crumb be the outermost one of our revolving system, and this the

next within, and this the next, and so on; now if this be so tell me which of these fragmentary

orbs is ours--which of all these crumbs from the hand of the primordial would be that we stand

upon?" And I waited with an anxiety a light manner thinly hid, to hear his answer. It came at

once. Laughing as though the question were too trivial, and more to humour my wayward fancy than

aught else, that boy circled his rosy thumb about a minute and brought it down on the planet Mars!

I started and stared at him; then all of a tremble cried, "You trifle with me! Choose again--

there, see, I will set the symbols and name them to you anew. There now, on your soul tell me

truly which this planet is, the one here at our feet?" And again the boy shook his head,

wondering at my eagerness, and pointed to Mars, saying gently as he did so the fact was certain as

the day above us, nothing was marvellous but my questioning. Mars! oh, dreadful, tremendous,

unexpected! With a cry of affright, and bringing my fist down on the table till all the cups upon

it leapt, I told him he lied--lied like a simpleton whose astronomy was as rotten as his wit--

smote the table and scowled at him for a spell, then turned away and let my chin fall upon my

breast and my hands upon my lap. And yet, and yet, it might be so! Everything about me was new

and strange, the crisp, thin air I breathed was new; the lukewarm sunshine new; the sleek, long,

ivory faces of the people new! Yesterday--was it yesterday?--I was back there--away in a world

that pines to know of other worlds, and one fantastic wish of mine, backed by a hideous, infernal

chance, had swung back the doors of space and shot me--if that boy spoke true--into the outer void

where never living man had been before: all my wits about me, all the horrible bathos of my

earthly clothing on me, all my terrestrial hungers in my veins! I sprang to my feet and swept my

hands across my eyes. Was that a dream, or this? No, no, both were too real. The hum of my

faraway city still rang in my ears: a swift vision of the girl I had loved; of the men I had

hated; of the things I had hoped for rose before me, still dazing my inner eye. And these about

me were real people, too; it was real earth; real skies, trees, and rocks--had the infernal gods

indeed heard, I asked myself, the foolish wish that started from my lips in a moment of fierce

discontent, and swept me into another sphere, another existence? I looked at the boy as though he

could answer that question, but there was nothing in his face but vacuous wonder; I clapped my

hands together and beat my breast; it was true; my soul within me said it was true; the boy had

not lied; the djins had heard; I was just in the flesh I had; my common human hungers still

unsatisfied where never mortal man had hungered before; and scarcely knowing whether I feared or

not, whether to laugh or cry, but with all the wonder and terror of that great remove sweeping

suddenly upon me I staggered back to my seat, and dropping my arms upon the table, leant my head

heavily upon them and strove to choke back the passion which beset me. CHAPTER III It was the

light touch of the boy An upon my shoulder which roused me. He was bending down, his pretty face

full of concernful sympathy, and in a minute said--know- ing nothing of my thoughts, of course,

"It is the wine, stranger, the pink oblivion, it sometimes makes one feel like that until enough

is taken; you stopped just short of what you should have had, and the next cup would have been

delight--I should have told you." "Ay," I answered, glad he should think so, "it was the wine, no

doubt; your quaint drink, sir, tangled up my senses for the moment, but they are clearer now, and

I am eager past expression to learn a little more of this strange country I have wandered into."

"I would rather," said the boy, relapsing again into his state of kindly lethargy, "that you

learnt things as you went, for talking is work, and work we hate, but today we are all new and

fresh, and if ever you are to ask questions now is certainly the time. Come with me to the city

yonder, and as we go I will answer the things you wish to know;" and I went with him, for I was

humble and amazed, and, in truth, at that moment, had not a word to say for myself. All the way

from the plain where I had awoke to the walls of the city stood booths, drinking-places, and

gardens divided by labyrinths of canals, and embowered in shrub- beries that seemed coming into

leaf and flower as we looked, so swift was the process of their growth. These waterways were

covered with skiffs being pushed and rowed in every direction; the cheerful rowers calling to each

other through the leafy screens separating one lane from another till the place was full of their

happy chirruping. Every booth and way-side halting-place was thronged with these delicate and

sprightly people, so friendly, so gracious, and withal so pur- poseless. I began to think we

should never reach the town itself, for first my guide would sit down on a green stream-bank, his

feet a-dangle in the clear water, and bandy wit with a passing boat as though there were nothing

else in the world to think of. And when I dragged him out of that, whisper- ing in his ear, "The

town, my dear boy! the town! I am all agape to see it," he would saunter reluctantly to a booth a

hundred yards further on and fall to eating strange con- fections or sipping coloured wines with

chance acquaintances, till again I plucked him by the sleeve and said: "Seth, good comrade--was it

not so you called your city just now?--take me to the gates, and I will be grateful to you," then

on again down a flowery lane, aimless and happy, wasting my time and his, with placid civility I

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was led by that simple guide. Wherever we went the people stared at me, as well they might, as I

walked through them overtopping the tallest by a head or more. The drinking-cups paused half-way

to their mouths; the jests died away upon their lips; and the blinking eyes of the drinkers shone

with a momentary sparkle of wonder as their minds reeled down those many- tinted floods to the

realms of oblivion they loved. I heard men whisper one to another, "Who is he?"; "Whence does he

come?"; "Is he a tribute-taker?" as I strolled amongst them, my mind still so thrilled with doubt

and wonder that to me they seemed hardly more than painted puppets, the vistas of their lovely

glades and the ivory town beyond only the fancy of a dream, and their talk as incontinent as the

babble of a stream. Then happily, as I walked along with bent head brood- ing over the incredible

thing that had happened, my com- panion's shapely legs gave out, and with a sigh of fatigue he

suggested we should take a skiff amongst the many ly- ing about upon the margins and sail towards

the town, "For," said he, "the breeze blows thitherward, and 'tis a shame to use one's limbs when

Nature will carry us for nothing!" "But have you a boat of your own hereabouts?" I queried; "for

to tell the truth I came from home myself somewhat poorly provided with means to buy or barter,

and if your purse be not heavier than mine we must still do as poor men do." "Oh!" said An,

"there is no need to think of that, no one here to hire or hire of; we will just take the first

skiff we see that suits us." "And what if the owner should come along and find his boat gone?"

"Why, what should he do but take the next along the bank, and the master of that the next again--

how else could it be?" said the Martian, and shrugging my shoulders, for I was in no great mood to

argue, we went down to the waterway, through a thicket of budding trees underlaid with a carpet of

small red flowers filling the air with a scent of honey, and soon found a diminutive craft pulled

up on the bank. There were some dainty cloaks and wraps in it which An took out and laid under a

tree. But first he felt in the pouch of one for a sweetmeat which his fine nostrils, acute as a

squirrel's, told him was there, and taking the lump out bit a piece from it, afterwards replacing

it in the owner's pocket with the frankest simplicity. Then we pushed off, hoisted the slender

mast, set the smallest lug-sail that ever a sailor smiled at, and, myself at the helm, and that

golden youth amidships, away we drifted under thickets of drooping canes tasselled with yel- low

catkin-flowers, up the blue alley of the water into the broader open river beyond with its rapid

flow and crowd- ing boats, the white city front now towering clear before us. The air was full of

sunshine and merry voices; birds were singing, trees were budding; only my heart was heavy, my

mind confused. Yet why should I be sad, I said to myself presently? Life beat in my pulses; what

had I to fear? This world I had tumbled into was new and strange, no doubt, but tomorrow it would

be old and familiar; it dis- credited my manhood to sit brow-bent like that, so with an effort I

roused myself. "Old chap!" I said to my companion, as he sat astride of a thwart slowly chewing

something sticky and eyeing me out of the corner of his eyes with vapid wonder, "tell me something

of this land of yours, or something about yourself--which reminds me I have a question to ask. It

is a bit delicate, but you look a sensible sort of fellow, and will take no offence. The fact is,

I have noticed as we came along half your population dresses in all the colours of the rainbow--

'fancy suitings' our tailors could call it at home--and this half of the census are undoubtedly

men and women. The rub is that the other half, to which you be- long, all dress alike in YELLOW,

and I will be fired from the biggest gun on the Carolina's main deck if I can tell what sex you

belong to! I took you for a boy in the begin- ning, and the way you closed with the idea of

having a drink with me seemed to show I was dead on the right course. Then a little later on I

heard you and a friend abusing our sex from an outside point of view in a way which was very

disconcerting. This, and some other things, have set me all abroad again, and as fate seems

determined to make us chums for this voyage--why--well, frankly, I should be glad to know if you

be boy or girl? If you are as I am, no more nor less then--for I like you--there's my hand in

comradeship. If you are otherwise, as those sleek outlines seem to promise--why, here's my hand

again! But man or woman you must be--come, which is it?" If I had been perplexed before, to

watch that boy now was more curious than ever. He drew back from me with a show of wounded

dignity, then bit his lips, and sighed, and stared, and frowned. "Come," I said laughingly,

"speak! it engenders ambiguity to be so ambiguous of gender! 'Tis no great matter, yes or no, a

plain answer will set us fairly in our friendship; if it is comrade, then comrade let it be; if

maid, why, I shall not quarrel with that, though it cost me a likely messmate." "You mock me."

"Not I, I never mocked any one." "And does my robe tell you nothing?" "Nothing so much; a yellow

tunic and becoming enough, but nothing about it to hang a deduction on. Come! Are you a girl,

after all?" "I do not count myself a girl." "Why, then, you are the most blooming boy that ever

eyes were set upon; and though 'tis with some tinge of regret, yet cheerfully I welcome you into

the ranks of man- hood." "I hate your manhood, send it after the maidhood; it fits me just as

badly." "But An, be reasonable; man or maid you must be." "Must be; why?" "Why?" Was ever such

a question put to a sane mortal before? I stared at that ambiguous thing before me, and then, a

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little wroth to be played with, growled out some- thing about Martians being all drunk or mad.

"'Tis you yourself are one or other," said that individual, by this time pink with anger, "and if

you think because I am what I am you can safely taunt me, you are wrong. See! I have a sting,"

and like a thwarted child my com- panion half drew from the folds of the yellow tunic-dress the

daintiest, most harmless-looking little dagger that was ever seen. "Oh, if it comes to that," I

answered, touching the Navy scabbard still at my hip, and regaining my temper at the sight of

hers, "why, I have a sting also--and twice as long as yours! But in truth, An, let us not talk of

these things; if something in what I have said has offended nice Martian scruples I am sorry, and

will question no more, leaving my wonder for time to settle." "No," said the other, "it was my

fault to be hasty of offence; I am not so angered once a year. But in truth your question moves

us yellow robes deeply. Did you not really know that we who wear this saffron tunic are slaves,--

a race apart, despised by all." "'Slaves,' no; how should I know it?" "I thought you must

understand a thing so fundamental, and it was that thought which made your questions seem unkind.

But if indeed you have come so far as not to under- stand even this, then let me tell you once we

of this garb were women--priestesses of the immaculate conceptions of humanity; guardians of those

great hopes and longings which die so easily. And because we forgot our high station and took to

aping another sex the gods deserted and men despised us, giving us, in the fierceness of their

contempt, what we asked for. We are the slave ants of the nest, the work-bees of the hive, come,

in truth, of those here who still be men and women of a sort, but toilers only; un- known in love,

unregretted in death--those who dangle all children but their own--slaves cursed with the

accomplish- ment of their own ambition." There was no doubt poor An believed what she said, for

her attitude was one of extreme dejection while she spoke, and to cheer her I laughed. "Oh! come,

it can't be as bad as that. Surely sometimes some of you win back to womanhood? You yourself do

not look so far gone but what some deed of abnegation, some strong love if you could but conceive

it would set you right again. Surely you of the primrose robes can sometimes love?" Whereat

unwittingly I troubled the waters in the placid soul of that outcast Martian! I cannot exactly

describe how it was, but she bent her head silently for a moment or two, and then, with a sigh,

lifting her eyes suddenly to mine, said quietly, "Yes, sometimes; sometimes--but very sel- dom,"

while for an instant across her face there flashed the summer lightning of a new hope, a single

transient glance of wistful, timid entreaty; of wonder and delight that dared not even yet

acknowledge itself. Then it was my turn to sit silent, and the pause was so awkward that in a

minute, to break it, I exclaimed-- "Let's drop personalities, old chap--I mean my dear Miss An.

Tell me something about your people, and let us begin properly at the top: have you got a king,

for instance?" To this the girl, pulling herself out of the pleasant slough of her listlessness,

and falling into my vein, answered-- "Both yes and no, sir traveller from afar--no chiefly, and

yet perhaps yes. If it were no then it were so, and if yes then Hath were our king." "A mild

king I should judge by your uncertainty. In the place where I came from kings press their

individualities somewhat more clearly on their subjects' minds. Is Hath here in the city? Does

he come to your feasts today?" An nodded. Hath was on the river, he had been to see the sunrise;

even now she thought the laughter and singing down behind the bend might be the king's barge

coming up citywards. "He will not be late," said my companion, "because the marriage-feast is set

for tomorrow in the palace." I became interested. Kings, palaces, marriage-feasts--why, here was

something substantial to go upon; after all these gauzy folk might turn out good fellows, jolly

com- rades to sojourn amongst--and marriage-feasts reminded me again I was hungry. "Who is it," I

asked, with more interest in my tone, "who gets married?--is it your ambiguous king himself?"

Whereat An's purple eyes broadened with wonder: then as though she would not be uncivil she

checked herself, and answered with smothered pity for my ignorance, "Not only Hath himself, but

every one, stranger, they are all married tomorrow; you would not have them married one at a time,

would you?"--this with inexpressible derision. I said, with humility, something like that

happened in the place I came from, asking her how it chanced the convenience of so many came to

one climax at the same mo- ment. "Surely, An, this is a marvel of arrangement. Where I dwelt

wooings would sometimes be long or sometimes short, and all maids were not complacent by such

universal agree- ment." The girl was clearly perplexed. She stared at me a space, then said,

"What have wooings long or short to do with weddings? You talk as if you did your wooing first

and then came to marriage--we get married first and woo after- wards!" "'Tis not a bad idea, and

I can see it might lend an ease and certainty to the pastime which our method lacks. But if the

woman is got first and sued subsequently, who brings you together? Who sees to the essential

preliminaries of assortment?" An, looking at my shoes as though she speculated on the remoteness

of the journey I had come if it were measured by my ignorance, replied, "The urn, stranger, the

urn does that--what else? How it may be in that out-fashioned region you have come from I cannot

tell, but here--'tis so commonplace I should have thought you must have known it--we put each new

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year the names of all womenkind into an urn and the men draw for them, each town, each village by

itself, and those they draw are theirs; is it conceivable your race has other methods?" I told

her it was so--we picked and chose for ourselves, beseeching the damsels, fighting for them, and

holding the sun of romance was at its setting just where the Martians held it to rise. Whereat An

burst out laughing--a clear, ringing laugh that set all the light-hearted folk in the nearest

boats laughing in sympathy. But when the grotesqueness of the idea had somewhat worn off, she

turned grave and asked me if such a fancy did not lead to spite, envy, and bickerings. "Why, it

seems to me," she said, shaking her curly head, "such a plan might fire cities, desolate plains,

and empty palaces--" "Such things have been." "Ah! our way is much the better. See!" quoth that

gentle philosopher. "'Here,' one of our women would say, 'am I to-day, unwed, as free of thought

as yonder bird chasing the catkin down; tomorrow I shall be married, with a whole summer to make

love in, relieved at one bound of all those uncertainties you acknowledge to, with nothing to do

but lie about on sunny banks with him whom chance sends me, come to the goal of love without any

travelling to get there.' Why, you must acknowledge this is the per- fection of ease." "But

supposing," I said, "chance dealt unkindly to you from your nuptial urn, supposing the man was not

to your liking, or another coveted him?" To which An answered, with some shrewdness-- "In the

first case we should do what we might, being no worse off than those in your land who had played

ill providence to themselves. In the second, no maid would covet him whom fate had given to

another, it were too fatiguing, or if such a thing DID happen, then one of them would waive his

claims, for no man or woman ever born was worth a wrangle, and it is allowed us to barter and

change a little." All this was strange enough. I could not but laugh, while An laughed at the

lightest invitation, and thus chatting and deriding each other's social arrangements we floated

idly townwards and presently came out into the main waterway perhaps a mile wide and flowing

rapidly, as streams will on the threshold of the spring, with brash or waste of distant beaches

riding down it, and every now and then a broken branch or tree-stem glancing through waves whose

crests a fresh wind lifted and sowed in golden showers in the inter- vening furrows. The Martians

seemed expert upon the water, steering nimbly between these floating dangers when they met them,

but for the most part hugging the shore where a more placid stream better suited their fancies,

and for a time all went well. An, as we went along, was telling me more of her strange country,

pointing out birds or flowers and naming them to me. "Now that," she said, pointing to a small

grey owl who sat reflective on a floating log we were approaching-- "that is a bird of omen; cover

your face and look away, for it is not well to watch it." Whereat I laughed. "Oh!" I answered,

"so those ancient follies have come as far as this, have they? But it is no bird grey or black or

white that can frighten folk where I come from; see, I will ruffle his philosophy for him," and

suiting the action to the words I lifted a pebble that happened to lie at the bottom of the boat

and flung it at that creature with the melancholy eyes. Away went the owl, dipping his wings into

the water at every stroke, and as he went wailing out a ghostly cry, which even amongst sunshine

and glitter made one's flesh creep. An shook her head. "You should not have done that," she

said; "our dead whom we send down over the falls come back in the body of yonder little bird. But

he has gone now," she added, with relief; "see, he settles far up stream upon the point of yonder

rotten bough; I would not disturb him again if I were you--" Whatever more An would have said was

lost, for amidst a sound of flutes and singing round the bend of the river below came a crowd of

boats decked with flowers and gar- lands, all clustering round a barge barely able to move, so

thick those lesser skiffs pressed upon it. So close those wherries hung about that the garlanded

rowers who sat at the oars could scarcely pull, but, here as everywhere, it was the same good

temper, the same carelessness of order, as like a flowery island in the dancing blue water the

motley fleet came up. I steered our skiff a space out from the bank to get a better view, while

An clapped her hands together and laughed. "It is Hath--he himself and those of the palace with

him. Steer a little nearer still, friend--so! between yon floating rubbish flats, for those with

Hath are good to look at." Nothing loth I made out into mid-stream to see that strange prince go

by, little thinking in a few minutes I should be shaking hands with him, a wet and dripping hero.

The crowd came up, and having the advantage of the wind, it did not take me long to get a front

place in the ruck, whence I set to work, with republican interest in royalty, to stare at the man

who An said was the head of Martian society. He did not make me desire to renounce my demo-

cratic principles. The royal fellow was sitting in the centre of the barge under a canopy and on

a throne which was a mass of flowers, not bunched together as they would have been with us, but so

cunningly arranged that they rose from the footstool to the pinnacle in a rhythm of colour, a poem

in bud and petals the like of which for harmonious beauty I could not have imagined possible. And

in this fairy den was a thin, gaunt young man, dressed in some sort of black stuff so nondescript

that it amounted to little more than a shadow. I took it for granted that a substance of bone and

muscle was covered by that gloomy suit, but it was the face above that alone riveted my gaze and

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made me return the stare he gave me as we came up with re- doubled interest. It was not an

unhandsome face, but ashy grey in colour and amongst the insipid countenances of the Martians

about him marvellously thoughtful. I do not know whether those who had killed themselves by learn-

ing ever leave ghosts behind, but if so this was the very ideal for such a one. At his feet I

noticed, when I un- hooked my eyes from his at last, sat a girl in a loose coral pink gown who was

his very antipode. Princess Heru, for so she was called, was resting one arm upon his knee at our

approach and pulling a blue convolvulus bud to pieces--a charming picture of dainty idleness.

Anything so soft, so silken as that little lady was never seen before. Who am I, a poor quarter-

deck loafer, that I should attempt to describe what poet and painter alike would have failed to

realise? I know, of course, your stock descriptives: the melting eye, the coral lip, the peachy

cheek, the raven tress; but these were coined for mortal woman--and this was not one of them. I

will not attempt to describe the glorious tenderness of those eyes she turned upon me presently;

the glowing radiance of her skin; the infinite grace of every action; the incredible soul-

searching harmony of her voice, when later on I heard it--you must gather something of these

things as I go--suffice it to say that when I saw her there for the first time in the plenitude of

her beauty I fell desperately, wildly in love with her. Meanwhile, even the most infatuated of

mortals cannot stare for ever without saying something. The grating of our prow against the

garlanded side of the royal barge roused me from my reverie, and nodding to An, to imply I would

be back presently, I lightly jumped on to Hath's vessel, and, with the assurance of a free and

independent American voter, approached that individual, holding out my palm, and saying as I did

so, "Shake hands, Mr. President!" The prince came forward at my bidding and extending his hand

for mine. He bowed slow and sedately, in that peculiar way the Martians have, a ripple of

gratified civility passing up his flesh; lower and lower he bowed, until his face was over our

clasped hands, and then, with simple courtesy, he kissed my finger-tips! This was somewhat em-

barrassing. It was not like the procedure followed in Courts nearer to Washington than this one,

as far as my reading went, and, withdrawing my fingers hastily, I turned to the princess, who had

risen, and was eyeing her somewhat awkwardly, the while wondering what kind of salutation would be

suitable in her case when a startling incident happened. The river, as said, was full of floating

rubbish brought down from some far-away uplands by a spring freshet while the royal convoy was

making slow progress upstream and thus met it all bow on. Some of this stuff was heavy timber,

and when a sudden warning cry went up from the leading boats it did not take my sailor instinct

long to guess what was amiss. Those in front shot side to side, those be- hind tried to drop back

as, bearing straight down on the royal barge, there came a log of black wood twenty feet long and

as thick as the mainmast of an old three-decker. Hath's boat could no more escape than if it had

been planted on a rocky pedestal, garlands and curtains trailing in the water hung so heavy on it.

The gilded paddles of the slender rowers were so feeble--they had but made a half- turn from that

great javelin's road when down it came upon them, knocking the first few pretty oarsmen head over

heels and crackling through their oars like a bull through dry maize stalks. I sprang forward,

and snatching a pole from a half-hearted slave, jammed the end into the head of the log and bore

with all my weight upon it, diverting it a little, and thereby perhaps saving the ship herself,

but not enough. As it flashed by a branch caught upon the trailing tapestry, hurling me to the

deck, ,and tearing away with it all that finery. Then the great spar, tossing half its dripping

length into the air, went plunging downstream with shreds of silk and flowers trailing from it,

and white water bubbling in its rear. When I scrambled to my feet all was ludicrous confusion on

board. Hath still stood by his throne--an island in a sea of disorder--staring at me; all else

was chaos. The rowers and courtiers were kicking and wallowing in the "waist" of the ship like

fish newly shot out of a trawl net, but the princess was gone. Where was she? I brushed the

spray from my eyes, and stared overboard. She was not in the bub- bling blue water alongside.

Then I glanced aft to where the log, now fifteen yards away, was splashing through the sun- shine,

and, as I looked, a fair arm came up from underneath and white fingers clutched convulsively at

the sky. What man could need more? Down the barge I rushed, and drop- ping only my swordbelt,

leapt in to her rescue. The gentle Martians were too numb to raise a hand in help; but it was not

necessary. I had the tide with me, and gained at every stroke. Meanwhile that accursed tree,

with poor Heru's skirts caught on a branch, was drowning her at its leisure; lifting her up as it

rose upon the crests, a fair, helpless bundle, and then sousing her in its fall into the nether

water, where I could see her gleam now and again like pink coral. I redoubled my efforts and got

alongside, clutching the rind of that old stump, and swimming and scrambling, at last was within

reach of the princess. Thereon the log lifted her playfully to my arms, and when I had laid hold

came down, a crushing weight, and forced us far into the clammy bosom of Martian sea. Again we

came up, coughing and choking--I tugging furiously at that tangled raiment, and the lady, a mere

lump of sweetness in my other arm-- then down again with that log upon me and all the noises of

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file:///F|/rah/Arnold%20Edwin/Arnold,%20Edwin%20-%20Guliver%20of%20Mars. xtGULLIVEROFMARSbyEdwinL.ArnoldOriginalTitle:Lieut.GulliverJonesCHAPTERIDareIsayit?DareIsaythatI,aplain,prosaiclieutenantintherepublicanservicehavedonetheincrediblethingsheresetoutfortheloveofawoman--forachimerainfemaleshap...

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Edwin L. Arnold - Guliver on Mars.pdf

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Edwin L. Arnold - Guliver on Mars

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