Chapter III (1)

I may as well say at once that on the August Bank Holiday of the present year I was a camel--one that carries children about. How many enjoyed exercise at my expense I cannot say; I only know that the tortures of the day appeared endless. I had lived a thousand years of physical anguish before the sun set. Then I was marched back to my stall with a sore hump and a sick heart. The ingenuity of my tormentor was more than human. I shall shudder to my dying day when I hear esoteric Buddhism mentioned, and it ages me even now to read or hear the name of Robinson. After the camel episode I had comparative leisure as a kangaroo, and then, upon the sudden arrival of an Australian ornithorhynchus at the Gardens, Robinson transferred me to this uncanny nightmare. On the occasion of my becoming the infant hippopotamus he accosted me again in the shape of the new giraffe, and told me that all the doctors, save one only, now considered that I was a dead man.

“There’s been a deal of correspondence in the _Lancet_,” he said, “and the consensus of scientific opinion now inclines to the conclusion that you have passed away. The Directors of the Westminster Aquarium wanted you for a side-show, but your executors declined to accept the terms offered.”

“I should hope so!” I answered.

“Primrose has lost two stone and a half since your extinction,” he proceeded. “I need hardly tell you that she is ignorant of the truth.”

I made no answer and he became personal.

“You’re going strong, I suppose?”

“I’m going mad,” I answered.

“Providence not much to the front yet?”

“No,” I replied. “The ways of Providence are beyond our comprehension. But one thing has struck me, that come what may to me, _you_ will not go unpunished. I’d rather be in my fix than yours. You’ll probably have all eternity in which to regret this abominable performance.”

He showed no dismay.

“You are an obstinate soul, Tarver, and a pluckier man than I thought. But you’ll have to cut it--you’ll have to cave in. We’ll try what a few hours in the python will do for you. And all this fuss because you won’t marry a good woman.”

“You call it fuss!” I screamed indignantly. But then, thinking that my excitement was caused by hunger, the keepers came and led me to my parent, by which I mean the maternal hippopotamus.

There are things that cannot be written.

As a python I ate live rabbits and lived the ordinary disgusting life of that reptile. The animals into which I migrated, having no conscious existence of their own, were powerless to resent their visitor. Not one of my hosts appeared aware of my presence, not one showed the least concern about me. From the python I passed on to the tarantula, and after abandoning that atrocious insect, I became a monkey. This was a last refinement of cruelty on the part of Robinson, for he had heard more than once my openly expressed dislike of these beasts. Moreover, I was very unattractive; and yet a gleam of hope animated me under this affliction, for I conceived that with a pencil and paper I might now explain my position to some sympathetic third person. But though the public offered me many things, a pencil and paper were not amongst them. My companions, seeming to know that something was amiss, bullied me, cuffed me, pulled my tail, pretended to catch fleas on me, and generally made my life purgatory; while, to crown all, an ape’s intelligence being apparently superior to that of most other animals, the beast I inhabited evidently felt that he was out of sorts. I cannot say what he thought was wrong with him or how he explained the problem, but he had a will of his own, and evil passions, and a bad disposition--all of which I found myself powerless to keep in check. After two days of this infernal life Robinson dropped in again and I was thankful to hear him speak from the throat of a spider monkey; for my spirit was broken, I could wait for Providence no longer. I had, in fact, determined to yield.

Robinson sidled up to me with a nut in his cheek, winked wickedly, put a paw on my shoulder and spoke.

“Gay doings in this department, eh, Tarver?”

“We needn’t discuss them,” I said. “I give in. I will marry your sister.”

“That’s awkward,” he answered. “In fact, you’ve run the time too fine, old man. You can’t now. Why, when I came home from town to-day and kissed Primrose as usual and asked her what she’d been doing, d’you know what she said?”

“It doesn’t interest me.”

“Yes, I think it will, Tarver. She answered, with a sob, that she had been strewing pale lilies on your grave.”

“On my _what_!” I screamed.

“Your grave, dear old boy! The last doctor gave in three days ago, and as the whole committee were then of one opinion, there seemed naturally nothing to do but to inter you. The people at your office sent a wreath of cheap hardy annuals, and your executors told me to-day that you had cut up rather better than they expected. You notice I choose to appear in this black monkey; that is a compliment to you. In fact, you’re dead, Tarver--dead as a door-nail. It’s your own fault, and be blessed if I know what programme to arrange for you now.”

Of course I saw that it was no good asking to go back to my earthly tabernacle if the wretched thing was six feet underground. That must simply mean being buried alive. I looked at Robinson speechlessly, and I think my expression touched him, for he spoke again.

“Poor old bounder! No, no; I’m getting at you, my son. It isn’t as bad as all that, really. I wouldn’t let ’em bury you. But the position must come to a climax pretty soon. Your landlady’s getting sick of it, and your nephew--the youngster to whom you have left everything--is simply clamouring to have you buried.”

Even marriage with Primrose Robinson presented a bright picture compared to the last.

“I tell you, then, that I will give in; I will wed Miss Robinson; I will do as you desire; only let me get back. I’m evidently wanted at home. I shall lose my official appointment and everything,” I said.

“All right,” answered Robinson, cheerfully. “They’re going to measure you for your last resting-place to-night, so if you start sharp you’ll be there in time to see some fun. Are you ready to go?”

Before I had replied to this ironical question, I found myself at home in bed, while several medical men were in the room, all talking at once.

“It’s murder, I tell you,” said one.

Whereupon I sat up and asked for brandy-and-water.

* * * * *

I should write no more, but it is only fair to explain how matters ultimately fell out. As a man of honour I offered my heart and hand to Primrose Robinson in due course; and she refused them! She admitted that she had loved me once, but even she drew the line at catalepsy, and she declined absolutely to marry a man who might fall into a trance at any moment. So her brother’s esoteric machinations on her behalf really defeated his own object. At least, thus it appeared to me. Providence seldom really fails, only it takes its own time, and from the point of view of a business man, is dilatory and too casual. Providence, in fact, exhibits those faults that attach to any monopoly.

* * * * *

Six months after these unparalleled events I met Robinson in the City, and he asked me to lunch with him, an invitation which I accepted, feeling it better to run no more risks. He talked of the past, and said:

“I suppose you thought that when dear Primrose declined you she gave you the true reason for so doing?”

“Yes,” I answered, “it struck me that Providence came in there.”

“Not at all,” he said. “She had found another and a better man. They were thrown together during the period of your temporary extinction. In his case it was love at first sight. A fine young fellow. I like him.”

“Who?” I asked with interest.

“Your nephew, the young man who will inherit your little property.”

“Never! He raised heaven and earth to have me buried. I have cut him out of my will,” I replied.

“Yes, I know,” said Robinson, “but, if you think of it quietly and take my advice, you will put him back again. As my brother-in-law he will have claims on me.”

Of course I put him back, but I didn’t go to the wedding; and when they sent cake I flung it into the dustbin; and if Robinson dies before I do, I shall change my will again.

So let there be no more nonsense about not believing in Mahatmas. The things exist, and nearer than Thibet too. There is one of them on the Stock Exchange, at any rate, and his name is John Robinson. Tax him and he will probably deny it; but don’t push him too far, or you may find out the truth of my assertion to your cost.

THE FIRST WORD

Upon my honour, some married people don’t deserve to have a baby at all. Take my parents. Here am I just about to celebrate the first anniversary of my birthday, and, candidly, at times I feel disposed to give up fighting even here, on the very threshold of a career which many experts have agreed to consider most promising. If it were not for my bottle-holder, I should have thrown up the sponge long ago. My papa and mamma, to be frank, get on my nerves and age me; my nurse alone has power to calm the storm. The truth is, that with a first child the average inexperienced young father and mother expect a jolly deal too much. The parents of a long family take new babies as they come, and don’t worry about them and boast about them, and look for signs and wonders before a chap is weaned. But your beginners! What my people expect I don’t know. I try to oblige, but there is always something wrong. If they would only leave me to my nurse--who is a particularly pleasing, competent person, and knows her business--it might be better for everybody concerned. And that is true, because I have heard her say so a dozen times in private. Moreover, they--I mean my father and mother--might give Nature a chance. To hear them you would think that Nature had overlooked me altogether. For instance, it cannot be denied that she was a trifle behindhand with my first teeth--the four little front ones. Well, what then? It merely amounted to a question of a few days. _I_ didn’t want the teeth. My whole life stretched out before me, and a fortnight more or less without them made no practical difference. I knew--nobody better--that they were on the way all right. But my parents had read somewhere at what time the teeth were due; or else my doctor, like a fool, had been worried into giving a definite date; and when the day arrived and the teeth didn’t, my mother cried and my father poked about in my mouth with his forefinger until I felt I would have given something for a tooth or two, just to remonstrate with. I couldn’t say what I thought about it, but my nurse could, thank God, and did. And then my mother said she had produced a horrid, toothless freak of Nature, and my father went away to town with a face from which all joy in life had departed. It was the same look which he wore for a week during my vaccinating troubles. It is not too much to say that he added a pang to the horrors of that circumstance. I “took” badly, and came out speckled one morning in consequence. My medical man was sent for, and said it was a “noble arm,” and seemed pleased at what he had arranged. Well, that was good enough for me. The man had brought me into the world, and I trusted him. But my father declared that he had never seen vaccination speckle a child on the stomach in his life (which was doubtless true) and he murmured something about a second opinion. The doctor was good-natured about it, fortunately; many practitioners would have thrown up the case; but when the speckles went off my father wrote and apologised.

Babies hate fussiness. But who realises that? Every morning it is, “How has he slept, nurse?” “How is his little inside, nurse?” “How is his precious outside, nurse?” “Has that mark where the cat scratched him gone, nurse?” “Did I hear him crying at half-past four, nurse?” “Isn’t he strangely silent this morning and puffy under the eyes, nurse?” and so forth, and so forth. I often wonder why my nurse hangs on at all. My nursemaid asked her the same question once, when she and my mother had differed about some little matter involving magnesia; and the nurse explained that she stopped for two reasons: because she got thirty pounds a year for doing so, and because she felt it would be next thing to murder to leave me until my mother knew her business. But, mind you, I want to be just to both my parents. My mamma can sing me to sleep with considerable skill; my papa can pick me up and fling me towards the ceiling with a nerve and strength that causes me infinite gratification when I am in the vein. But even upon a simple thing like that he exercises no discretion. There are occasional times when a chap doesn’t care to be flung up to the ceiling. How would he like it, for instance, the next moment after he had drunk his bottle, or whatever might be the equivalent with him? Then my mother will interfere with the temperature of my bath. She has a conviction, amounting to mania, that some day I shall be boiled alive or scalded to death. Her idea seems to be that I should sit quietly and patiently while this painful operation was being performed, and suffer nobody to hear anything of it until I was cooked to a turn. The result of her alarm is that I rarely get my dip at a tidy temperature, though everybody likes a real hot bath now and again. Thank Heaven, they will grow older, these parents of mine. With years must surely come experience and wisdom and patience. At present--and I say it without the least animus--I would not give a broken rattle for the united knowledge of the pair of them.

It was of my first experiment in language that I set out to speak, when other grievances came between me and my subject. At ten months, or a shade over, I had amassed a vocabulary of three words--not that three words were of the slightest use in dealing with a woman like my mamma; but I did my best with them. The second and third were more or less trivial expressions of good feeling depending for their result on my inflection of voice; the first, of which I want more particularly to speak, created some sensation in its way and, indeed, produced a sort of result so startling that I have never to this moment entirely fathomed the significance of it. The matter fell out thus. After my ninth month had passed and nothing but my own language of laughter and tears had broken the silence, my father had a gloomy inspiration that I must be a dumb idiot, and that he and my mamma were jointly responsible for a being unlikely to add to the fame or repute of either. To calm their poor, foolish fears as soon as possible was obviously my duty under these circumstances, and I set about it. A brief, jocund monosyllable commended itself to me in this connection. I had heard my father use it under somewhat humorous circumstances, after falling over a chair on a night when he crept into my room to see me asleep. I was not asleep and we both laughed heartily at the time. He doubtless went away and forgot the incident; I, on the contrary, thought over it, practised the word, and tried it as a simple exclamation on my mother, doubting nothing that she would glory in it and perhaps reward me. Judge then of my surprise when she regarded me with horror and fear, almost dropped me back into my cradle, and burst into a flood of tears.

“Oh, baby! how could you?” she asked, between her sobs. “I’ve been praying for you to talk for months and months, and now--oh, it can’t be true--it can’t!”

Suspecting that my pronunciation was at fault, I uttered the word again with the greatest distinctness, whereupon my mamma became hysterical and fled from the nursery. She brought my father up when he came home, and I observed she was still in tears.

“Such--such a dreadful thing,” she said; “he’s spoken, James.”

“Good business!” exclaimed my father. “The little beggar isn’t dumb then, thank the Lord. What did he say? I’ll bet he tried to lisp your name.”

“He didn’t lisp at all--he spoke only too clearly. I don’t know how to tell you. He--he swore!”

And my mamma broke down entirely, while my papa gazed upon me with frank amazement.

“He swore?” repeated my papa, blankly. “What at? Why should he swear? I’m sure no kid ever had a better time.”

“To think that the very first word which has passed his lips----!” cried my mamma.

“But what did he swear at?”

“At me, his own loving mother. I just woke him up and danced him and cuddled him and asked him when he was going to bring joy into my life and prattle sweet baby words into my ear. Then, without any warning, he said--he said, ‘Damn!’ And when I dropped him into his cradle and began to cry, he said it again!”

“Such a thing was never heard of in the whole history of infancy,” declared my father. “I see how it is; he’s picked it up from nurse. Nurse must go!”

“He might have heard you,” said my mother, reproachfully. “You _do_ say it oftener than you think. But what will the career of a baby be who begins swearing before he can even walk straight? It’s horrible--it’s ruined my life!”

“I should be the last to swear before a child,” said my papa.

And then they went wrangling off. Not a jump to the ceiling did I get, not a smile, not a word of affection. Perhaps ingratitude in a parent is as painful a spectacle as a family furnishes. I kept my mouth shut for two months after that fiasco, but it made them mad to hear of the good things I said to nurse when they were not present. I will affirm of nurse that she is a capital listener, and lets me use what language I like, and never questions either my statements or conclusions. But there, when all is said, a really capable nurse is a luxury, whereas parents appear to be a grim necessity, as far as I have yet been able to understand.

“STAR O’ BOSTON”

He was a very elderly merman, and he had lived in one cave under the Caribbean Sea for seventy submarine years.

“It’s hard,” he said, “cruel hard at my time of life to be turned out after all the rent I’ve paid. If I’d only gone to a Building Society I should have bought the blessed place ten times over by this time.”

He wept a senile tear, which added one drop to the waters of the Caribbean; then he drew his black seaweed covering round him, put out a phosphorescent lamp, and went to sleep. The morrow would see him and his merdaughter turned away for ever from the home of their fathers. And all about a paltry matter of two years’ rent.

“San Francisco” slept peacefully despite the pending eviction. His coverlet of living seaweed rose and fell regularly; once he turned and smiled sadly and uttered the name of his dead merwife. “Alas! my fair ‘Moonflower,’” he said; “it is well-nigh over with us now, for ‘Lord Aberdeen’ refuses me tenancy of the old cavern any longer, owing to my natural and increasing disinclination to pay rent. For how can I pay what I myself lack? His only alternative offer is that he have our little ‘Star o’ Boston’ to wife; and she with a mergirl’s unwisdom loves elsewhere, her affections being wholly fixed on the penniless but personable merboy ‘Theodore H. Jackson.’”

From these dreamy utterances of the venerable merman you will learn certain interesting facts. First, it becomes apparent that the merpeople are faced with like problems and plagued by emotions similar to those within human experience; while secondly, as to the matter of nomenclature, the submarine system differs widely from any other. Every merchild is in fact named after a sunken ship; and as the merfolks are not a numerous race nor yet a prolific, maritime disaster sufficient for the purpose occurs annually, and merbabies receive their names in order. Sometimes the wrecks are in excess of the sea-children, then the names of the ill-fated vessels are preserved until those are born who will bear them.

“Star o’ Boston” sat and watched her father sleeping his last sleep in the old home. Her hair was the colour of the red-brown seaweed torn from the rocks in times of storm; her eyes were aqua-marine and reflected the cool, green, eternal twilight of the deep. She was fair to see even for a mermaid, and mystery shared her face with beauty. She drew her wonderful hair over her bosom, murmured the name of “Theodore H. Jackson,” and sighed. Love and duty struggled in her heart; she swayed her golden tail idly and drew conventional designs on the sand with the delicate coral-red fins at the end of it. Little fishes swam about her and rubbed themselves lovingly against her fair body; an octopus, who served the purposes of a chandelier, stretched down three or four of his arms and stroked her; a hermit-crab sat upon her shoulder, and there was a pathos in his black, beady eyes as they poked out of his head on stalks and looked at his mistress. Thus her pets--the poor dumb creatures of the Caribbean--showed their humble sympathy; but they could not help “Star o’ Boston” to a decision. She thought of “Lord Aberdeen” and shivered. He was a wealthy sea-owner, and lived in a cave of pink coral gloriously illumined by electricity stolen from a cable. He was old and ugly; he had been married three times and divorced twice. He had lost an eye in a fight with a sword-fish, which he was torturing from a mere love of cruelty. He habitually used the vilest language, and his temper was soured by the sea-snails which are the mosquitoes of the ocean, and cannot be kept out of a house. Many a bald-headed merman has been driven mad by them.

“Star o’ Boston” pictured her fair person in the grasp of this marine satyr, and pressed her little pink hands over her face to shut out the hideous scene. Then she imagined her father limping away from the old home to return no more.

At the same moment a merpage in mother-o’-pearl buttons brought a note from “Lord Aberdeen.” It was written in verse, which he constantly employed with indifferent success, and in the effusion his lordship made a last appeal, and reminded “Star o’ Boston” that the offer would not be renewed.

The mergirl dropped the oyster-shell on which the letter was written from her hand, then with a gliding and almost snake-like motion swam out of the cavern. She designed to consult “Anna Bailey,” a vivacious but shrewd merwidow who knew life and who usually wore the blue coat, with gold braid and brass buttons, of a dead sea-captain. This she did, by the way, from motives of vanity, not delicacy, for the merpeople have never eaten from the Tree of Knowledge and are clean of mind as the sea in which they live is clean. Of course there are exceptions amongst them. “Lord Aberdeen,” for example, was a notorious libertine, with the morals of a porpoise.

“Marry him,” said “Anna Bailey.” “You take my advice. He cannot live long. And afterwards you’ll be among the wealthiest in the sea and able to marry again where your heart suggests. There he is. Mark my words: he’s nearly run his course. Blessed if he hasn’t got a face like a dog-fish! But what does that matter? You needn’t look at him.”

“Lord Aberdeen” rolled by in a huge conch shell drawn by two sharks. His wicked little eyes glittered and he waved a pearl-laden hand to “Star o’ Boston.” Hardly had he disappeared when “Theodore H. Jackson” came along, swimming thoughtfully. He was a god-like merman, mighty of size, with hair as crisp and emerald green as sea-endive, with a fine forehead, a straight nose and ruby eyes, of a colour like to the red sea-anemones.

“Come, ‘Star o’ Boston,’ my own little green-eyed love,” he said. “Leave talking with this worldly widow and follow me and take the air, for there is nothing like a whiff of the strange, pure fluid of the air-breathers at times of sorrow and anxiety.”

He put his Titan arm round her, and they swam away to a little coral island in the Caribbean--one of those uprising islets not known of men and not marked in the charts of ships until some vessel has perchance found it in the dark, and gone down.

Even so it was now; and as the merman and his maid approached along the dim-lit floor of the ocean to where the coral island swelled like a mountain through it, they saw, beside the great achievement of a million generations of coral insects, a lesser object lying unsightly, black and alone.

“It is a new monster. Let us go speak with it,” said “Star o’ Boston,” who feared nothing but “Lord Aberdeen.”

“Nay, golden-tail, ’tis a human wreck! Of such are the ships that sail the face of the sea. This is Fate, and we are the first to find it, save the fishes. Heaven grant there is bullion aboard, then all may yet be well.”

It will be news to the reader that the submarine currency depends on nautical mishaps. Their coinage is silver and gold. It explains a point which often puzzles quite well-informed people. Why do the Marine Treasure Recovery Companies never recover anything but old cannons and similar rubbish? Because the merfolks take the money and use it for their own purposes.

“Star o’ Boston” likewise hoped that she and her lover might chance upon some bullion.

“I’ll catch a torpedo fish,” said “Theodore H. Jackson,” “then we’ll burst open the ship’s safe and see.”

But there was no bullion apparently. The vessel proved to be only a little coasting schooner called “Flying Fish.” She was laden with cocoanuts, and as the merman broke open the imprisoned bags, the nuts rushed up to the surface of the sea, like balloons. Then “Star o’ Boston” found a dead sailor with a big black beard, clasping a bottle. He had broken into the spirit locker as the ship went down, but had not found time to drown his death agony with alcohol, for the bottle was apparently unopened.

“Old Tom Rum,” read out “Star o’ Boston.” “What’s that?”

“A drink of the Upper People. We will carry it with us. It may perhaps serve to cheer the desolation of your parent.”

“Theodore H. Jackson” drove off the great grey shark that glimmered sulkily at him out of wolfish eyes; then approached the dead sailor and wrenched the bottle from his grasp.

“Now I come to think of it, I have heard ‘Lord Aberdeen’ speak of this same rum,” declared “Star o’ Boston.” “He told my father that once, long ago, he became possessed of a bottle and that it was like glorious fire in a merman’s veins.”

“By Neptune! then this liquor may prove as valuable as bullion after all--in fact more so. Money won’t buy rum as a rule, excepting on dry land. He shall pay for this.”

Clutching her treasure, “Star o’ Boston” swam back as fast as her fins would carry her.

“I believe,” she said, “that it will be possible to make any bargain I like with him.”

“Then don’t let it go too cheaply. Let him pay heavily for his luxuries. He wants you much; I only hope we may find he wants the rum more.”

“There are plenty of mermaids, but only one bottle of rum that we know of. I swam all through the sunken ship and drove the fishes from the dead men, and a drowned woman with a baby in her arms. There is no rum left there. Air-breathers must love the liquid also, for they had all rushed to drink before their drowning. Only this one poor wretch had no time. Hence our happiness now.”

“I will come with you, my green-eyes, for the rascal may prove too much for you.”

So “Theodore H. Jackson” supported his love and together they entered the pink coral abode of “Lord Aberdeen.”

That old scamp’s black eyes glittered strangely as he saw the mermaid, but when he observed what she carried with her, his excitement was terrific and burst all bounds.

“Great Serpent! Rum, as I live!” he screamed.

But for the paucity of opportunities his lordship had long since drunk himself to death. His spirit was willing, but alcohol proved too rare a thing. He remembered rum in the past; he was getting old; and he felt that the treasure displayed before him now was worth half his fortune.

“Rum it is,” said “Star o’ Boston,” “the last bottle left from a wreck. The air-breathers drank all the rest before they were drowned. I thought you’d like to see the bottle.”

“Ay, mergirl of the crimson fins,--and more than the bottle; this must be mine!”

“Not so, ‘Lord Aberdeen,’ it goes to cheer my dear father, ‘San Francisco,’ in his desolation. He much wants this warm, delicious stuff to strengthen his sore heart. Remember, to-morrow he and I are homeless.”

“Circumstances alter cases,” said “Lord Aberdeen.” “Rum is a luxury, and you are not justified in giving your parent luxuries in his present financial position.”

“Nevertheless, he will drink this bottle,” said “Star o’ Boston.” “Every luscious drop will go to cheer his failing spirit.”

“Sit down,” replied the other. “This is a matter which cannot be settled in a moment. Recline on yonder velvet sea-moss and listen. I am willing to offer reasonable terms for that bottle.”

“’Tis the seller’s place to dictate the terms,” said “Theodore H. Jackson.”

“Well, perhaps so. At least let us be reasonable. Not that I am myself particularly anxious to buy the stuff,” answered the old merman, growing cautious. Nevertheless his mouth watered as he looked at the squat, four-sided bottle; he passed his hands nervously over his round bald head and licked his lips in spite of himself.

“Then we need talk no more, for my terms are high. But I will not abate them. You must first undertake to let my father dwell in his cave for the remainder of his life; and you must next give to me rent free another cave suitable to a young couple beginning life--a four-caverned cave handsomely furnished. And I don’t want it more than twenty fathoms deep either.”

“Quite right; it’s very important in the case of merbabies that they have ample light, with occasional visits to the sea surface for air,” declared “Theodore H. Jackson.”

“All this for one bottle of rum?” asked “Lord Aberdeen” indignantly.

“A thing is worth what it will fetch. Now I come to think of it, I shall want six strings of good orient pearls and fifty pounds in English money as well,” replied “Star o’ Boston,” with admirable coolness.

“Death and the Kraaken!”

“And--and--I shall also want----”

“Done on the last bargain!” screamed “Lord Aberdeen.” He knew that the longer he waited the worse the position would become from his point of view.

“Very well; ‘Theodore H. Jackson’ is our witness. You are going to give me a nice new home and let my dear father stop on in his old one. Then six strings of good pearls and fifty pounds in English money. I, in my turn, shall yield up to you this beautiful bottle of rum. I may say that my dear ruby-eyed merboy here and myself design to marry at no distant date. A little memento on that occasion will increase our regard for you considerably.”

“I’ll see about that when the time comes. Now we will adjourn to my solicitor’s office. I shall demand that this bottle of rum be placed in a safe position before I go further. It makes my blood run cold to see the careless way you hold it.”

* * * * *

Thus did prosperity and unlooked-for happiness crown the last days of “San Francisco,” and brighten the wedded life of “Star o’ Boston” and her merhusband. But, unfortunately for himself, “Lord Aberdeen” came badly out of the transaction after all. He made good his promises, acquired the bottle of rum, and reached that supreme moment when he opened it to have his first nautilus-shell full. Then a strange thing transpired, for though the bottle was labelled “Rum” in large letters, its contents resembled neither rum nor any other liquor. There was only a piece of crumpled paper inside it with words written thereon.

“Lord Aberdeen” gazed blankly at the scrawl, then gave full play to his vile and varied vocabulary.

“_‘Flying Fish’ struck on unknown rock or wreck. Going down fast.
God have mercy upon us! John Ladywell, Master. (Wife, child, and six
hands aboard.)_”

Three merjudges tried the action brought against “Star o’ Boston,” and the defendant won her case and costs. It was argued, you see, that a corked bottle labelled “Rum” might reasonably be supposed to contain that liquid. The bargain had been carried out in good faith. “In fact,” said the President of the Tribunal, “‘_Caveat emptor_’ sums up the position. ‘Lord Aberdeen’ has been unfortunate and is the victim of chance; but it cannot be considered or justly argued that any criminal attempt was made to obtain from him money or property under false pretences. As to the real contents of the rum bottle, it would appear that one John Ladywell, finding his ship going down under him, and knowing that death lay hidden in the deep water and the grey sharks which live beneath it, conceived the idea of recording the sudden end which he saw was now to fall upon himself, his wife, child, and the six seamen of the ‘Flying Fish.’ Had the bottle not gone down with him, clenched to his breast in his last agony, it might have floated away and reached some shore whereon the Upper People congregate. But it sank instead. Hence a natural and unfortunate confusion.”

So that is the end of this mer-story, and I shall only add that “Star o’ Boston” and “Theodore H. Jackson” lived mighty happily ever afterwards, though “Lord Aberdeen” sent no wedding present. Anon a merbaby was born to them, and they called her “Flying Fish” in memory of a great experience. Their narrative is perhaps interesting from some points of view, for it shows that deep-sea researches are as yet quite incomplete, so far at least as the Caribbean is concerned; and it also indicates that, assert what people may to the contrary, fiction is still frequently stranger than fact.

THE SACRIFICE

A wise man has said that of the inward senses Phantasie alone is free upon occasion to escape from her sisters Common Sense and Memory. In time of sleep it is that Phantasie can so break the meshes that hold her when the reason is waking; in time of a man’s sleep she wings whither she will, “producing many monstrous and prodigious things, especially if she be stirred up by some terrible object, presented to her by Common Sense or Memory.”

And in my experience the scenes of her most active effort lie not in the depths of sleep, but about the portal of it. Then, and chiefly at the dawn, shall Phantasie be found to wing her wildest flight.

In such a morning hour, on the turn of reason’s tide, my airy theatre of dreams was lighted by a blaze of high noon sun, and I, standing upon a green hill, looked down at vast plains where they stretched beneath, and an infinite multitude that thronged them. A people in number like the sands of the shore swept through the great plain, and the sound of them was the sound of a stormy sea.

The Kingdoms of the Earth had sent hither these legions, and all Christendom streamed beneath me. To vanward great armies gleamed, and the sun made a shining fire of their steel; the companies of the workers also thundered forward together--the industrial millions that are the circulating heart’s blood in the veins of Nations. Workers in iron and brass; wielders of the hammer, the axe, the spade; diggers and delvers; the men of the soil and the men of the sea--all were here assembled; and the earth shook beneath the tramp of them; the round earth groaned under the accumulated weight of the Nations.

In the forefront of this unexampled multitude shone pomp and pageantry, for there--to the peal of trumpet and the bellowing of great ordnance--marched mighty ones: kings and rulers of the earth; monarchs and those that led them; the symbols of power and the banners of power; the keys of all mundane principalities and creeds held in the hands of such as Chance throws crest-high on the tides of human authority and earthly fame.

Forward swept the kings of the earth and all the hosts of them, whilst I approached a little nearer and became conscious that before the great wave of this advancing army, walking alone in solemn, solitary state, there moved three maidens. They led the myriads, as it seemed, and their white raiment shone like the snow where they went before, and heeded not the roaring host behind them.

August and queenly they passed together, and their wonderful eyes were lifted to heaven and full of the dawn; but though their hands were not free, and I perceived that heavy chains hung upon them, yet moved they with the bearing of ministering angels; and their feet were light; and their soft voices were full of joy; while they swept forward as though to happiness rather than sorrow. Infinitely fair were the three maidens--pearls before the dusty rabble and rout of humanity that followed them. Only the very old and the very young wept for them.

The first was clad in white, and her face was pale, yet lighted by an inner radiance of the Seventh Heaven. She moved with silent step and answered not when her sisters sang. In her hands, clasped close upon her breast, was a cross fashioned of one diamond that shone like the morning star. And so she went in silence, with her grey eyes uplifted and Peace upon her forehead.

The second was clad in white, and her face shone like the morning, and the blue harmonies of her unconquerable eyes swept sky and earth. Life and eternity were wrought into the hem of her garment; immortal was she and she moved as an Immortal, singing such music as the lark sings in upper darkness above the first horizontal glimmer of low silver dawns in spring. Her hands were also clasped upon her bosom, and they held fast between them a little anchor of gold.

The third maiden was clad in white, and her head was bent, for her soft hazel eyes swept earth rather than sky, and warm blood throbbed in her cheek while she spoke with a mother’s music of voice to little children that ran beside her and wept and lifted their small hands to hers. A ruby heart was all the adornment that she wore, and it gleamed between her breasts and rose and fell there.

Concerned to know the meaning of this matter, I descended from my standpoint, approached the drifting throng, and asked a loud-voiced son of the people to enlighten my ignorance.

“What,” said I, “is this brave array of the Generations of the Earth? Whence go they, and who are these Daughters of Light that lead them?”

The man stared with great amazement, and in his turn asked a question.

“From what trance have you awakened?” he inquired. “From what lengthy sleep have we aroused you that you have yet to learn the meaning of these armies, and the rite they march to celebrate? Know that you behold the spectacle of Civilisation about to sacrifice to the new-born Century. The Age of Utility now dawns, and mankind have agreed that this world-shaking event shall be celebrated worthily.”

With growing terror I asked the nature of this ceremonial.

“An Age of Utility would surely give to its mechanic gods that of which itself stood least in need,” I said, not without irony.

“Even so,” the artisan replied, ignorant that I spoke in satire. “See yonder maidens: we go to immolate them, to burn them and destroy them. Their work on earth is done; we need them no more; there is no place for them in the years now about to unfold.”

“Yet they are very fair,” I said; “your fathers weep to see them in chains; your mothers pity them; your little children hold their hands and love them.”

“Nevertheless, the adult working world has done with them, and knows them no more,” he answered. “Their thrones are empty; their time is past; their subjects are the ancient, the senile, the anile, and the little ones; but man in the might of his noon-day acknowledges them no more, for he pays suit and service to new sovereigns.”

“The maidens’ names?” I asked, yet knew full well.

“Faith, Hope, Charity,” he answered. “With the first will vanish rainbows, and the songs of birds and the colours of flowers, and all manner of vain things not needful to the welfare of man to-day; with the second we shall leave idle dreaming and building of cloud castles, cease from vain climbing on mountain peaks to see the sunrise, hide our eyes from the unneeded light, and burrow deep in the mud of which we are made; with the third we shall forget the weakling and the laggard, the sick and the sorrowful, the halt and the blind. Henceforth only the Fittest survive, and the race will go to him whose breath is steam, whose muscles are steel, whose eye flashes with electric secrets, whose heart is safely frozen under the icy armour of Utility!”

They passed forward where three great pyres arose upon the plain; and the sky was overcast, while men said that it thundered. But I, in my dream, knew those awful and remote reverberations now echoing and re-echoing behind a dawn that had turned to darkness were the laughter of eternal Nox and primal Chaos, who watched mankind from afar, and waited for the sacrifice, that they might loose their lightnings and mighty winds, and take Earth back again to themselves, that ill deed done.

THE DIARY OF A PERFECT GENTLEMAN

There is to be a break-up in the family, and I gather that my future address will be Peckham Rye. Never heard of the place, and never wanted to, but begin to take interest in it now. I travel in a hamper alone. It seems I was advertised in the _Exchange and Mart_, and my people have sold me for thirty shillings. Thirty shillings for a pure-bred Persian tom kitten! Their business instincts must be paltry. I am worth five pounds if a penny. Not sorry to go. Only regret leaving my mother. I am two months old now, and she has been a great comfort to me since I was born. However, I can lap all right, so she’s no more use. My people tie a ribbon round my neck, pretend to regret my departure, then take me to the station. Thus I enter the world.

* * * * *

Two maiden ladies have secured me. Might have been worse, for they are a soft-hearted couple. They tell one another that they have a bargain and think themselves clever to have acquired me for £1 10_s._ They laugh when I am introduced to their wire-haired fox-terrier and put up my back and get ready for him. But it seems he has lived with cats all his life. He wags his tail and makes friends. He appears to be a lumbering, well-meaning fool. His nose will be out of joint in four-and-twenty hours. The old women like me, and stuff me, and decide I shall be called “Shah.” So far so good. They talk a great deal about me, and watch me walk around, and quarrel as to where I shall sleep. It is to be a toss-up between a tool-shed and the kitchen. They decide for kitchen. But, when they have gone to bed, the cook decides for tool-shed. Never trust a servant. They are time-serving wretches. They pretend to like a cat about the place. But not one mistress in a hundred knows what we have to put up with behind her back.

* * * * *

Distinct score off the cook last night. She left me in the tool-shed, and during some excursions I fetched down a board with a variety of gardening trifles upon it. Of pots there were broken two score. Gardener annoyed. This man will be my thorn in the flesh, I fancy. He dares cook to put me there again. I am left in the garden while they argue. Dog has a kennel, but I don’t like it. He invites me to join him at breakfast. Cold water and stuff he calls biscuit. I explain I shall take my meals with the family. He hopes I am not home-sick, and tells me that he will do all he can to make things pleasant. Snub him. Explain my origin, and let him plainly understand that there is a social gulf fixed between us. He is humble and apologetic. A good breakfast indoors. The cook assures my mistress that I slept in the kitchen and didn’t behave well. I knew she would. Always be on your guard against a liar.

* * * * *

When a man interferes with my amusement he suffers for it sooner or later. The gardener has told me to keep off a bed of mignonette seed. Fool--he ought to have commanded me to keep on it! A deliberate invitation to do anything in particular always annoys me; a command angers me. I spend much time upon the mignonette. The dog is rather impressed. I invite him to join me, but he refuses, and explains that the gardener dare not touch me, but would not hesitate in his case. Unpleasantness to-day. Was having a game with some stuffed birds in the drawing-room when my old ladies rang for the parlourmaid to remove me. I scratched her hand, and my old ladies laughed and applauded my spirit. But when she got me on the other side of the door, that parlourmaid rubbed it in pretty stiffly. I shan’t forget it. When I’m a grown cat, there will probably be a day of reckoning.

* * * * *

A niece has come to stay with the old ladies. She is very wealthy and engaged. We get on well. But the man, who calls twice a week, is a failure. The first time he came he slighted me, saying that Persians had no spirit or “go,” and were always sleeping or eating. Later on I went round to his silk hat, which was on the floor, and when he came back from a stroll round the garden he knew all about it. My strength is such that I can now jump through the drawing-room window; and when I had made it clear that I was responsible for the hat, I jumped. Tree-climbing very good for the claws; gives strength and tone. Relations strained all round now, because I caught a bee off a white lily yesterday, and broke down the lily. Moth-hunting of an evening is tidy sport.

* * * * *

The niece is called Ethel. She is to be married from here. My own opinion is that the man only wants her money, for he is a low-looking brute, though the servants say he is the younger son of somebody distinguished. The girl talks to me about him. The dog does not like this man either. A trustful animal, a dog. Gives everybody credit for best motives as a rule. But still, this dog bars this man; he cannot tell me why, but says it must be instinct. Have made a friend--an elderly tabby tom from four doors lower down the terrace. He has seen a good deal of the seamy side of life, and gathers his roses where he can. Well up in dustbins. Is called “Jim.” His moral views are elastic. I believe nothing at present, but Jim’s code will suit me well enough. Convenience is its principal beauty. Jim makes a good deal of me. He says I have gifts, and he assures me that it refreshes him and causes him to think deeply when I talk. I have made him free of our dustbin and introduced him to the dog. Henceforth he is safe here. He hates the gardener, too. He had a brother the gardener caught in the fowl-house. Jim knows where his brother was buried--in a tomato bed. Murderous man, the gardener.

* * * * *

Of course I’m not under Jim’s thumb. Yesterday we were walking together in the cool of the evening on the croquet ground, and my old ladies saw us, and rushed out as if I was taking a stroll with the devil. Jim had to hurry, and they picked me up, and told me he was a bad companion and would teach me all sorts of wicked things. What fools women are! I fancy I know a bit more than they think already. And as to Jim--why I teach _him_. He says that I’m always well worth listening to, and constantly asks my advice. Am growing quickly now, and begin to see a little society. Ethel’s wedding comes off this day fortnight. I shall give my first party on that evening. A quiet wedding it is to be; but probably a noisy party. Jim is asking the cats. He says I cannot be too careful about invitations. No doubt he is right. Good fellow, Jim, and worships me. Learning to sing a little. The ladies like it--not my old ladies, but the young ones of my own species. We are badly off for ladies in this terrace; still, I have my eye on a pretty little thing--black, with white paws. She is coming to the party. No catch socially, but love levels all--so Jim says. (Ethel’s wedding breakfast will include salmon. I heard the cook say so.) Row with the oldest of my old ladies. She can’t understand that a cat gets beyond the cork-on-a-string stage. I’m growing up fast. Not that I don’t have a game on the quiet sometimes, but never before people. They turn me out at night now. Much pleasanter. Supped with Jim down the road at his own place. A fair bit of haddock, but no style. There are children in the house.

* * * * *