"A CONNECTICUT YANKEE IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT\n\nby\n\nMARK TWAIN\n(Samuel L. Clemens)\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\nThe ungentle laws and customs touched upon in this tale are\nhistorical, and the episodes which are used to illustrate them\nare also historical.  It is not pretended that these laws and\ncustoms existed in England in the sixth century; no, it is only\npretended that inasmuch as they existed in the English and other\ncivilizations of far later times, it is safe to consider that it is\nno libel upon the sixth century to suppose them to have been in\npractice in that day also.  One is quite justified in inferring\nthat whatever one of these laws or customs was lacking in that\nremote time, its place was competently filled by a worse one.\n\nThe question as to whether there is such a thing as divine right\nof kings is not settled in this book.  It was found too difficult.\nThat the executive head of a nation should be a person of lofty\ncharacter and extraordinary ability, was manifest and indisputable;\nthat none but the Deity could select that head unerringly, was\nalso manifest and indisputable; that the Deity ought to make that\nselection, then, was likewise manifest and indisputable; consequently,\nthat He does make it, as claimed, was an unavoidable deduction.\nI mean, until the author of this book encountered the Pompadour,\nand Lady Castlemaine, and some other executive heads of that kind;\nthese were found so difficult to work into the scheme, that it\nwas judged better to take the other tack in this book (which\nmust be issued this fall), and then go into training and settle\nthe question in another book.  It is, of course, a thing which\nought to be settled, and I am not going to have anything particular\nto do next winter anyway.\n\nMARK TWAIN\n\nHARTFORD, July 21, 1889\n\n\n\n\n\n\nA CONNECTICUT YANKEE IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT\n\n\n\n\nA WORD OF EXPLANATION\n\nIt was in Warwick Castle that I came across the curious stranger\nwhom I am going to talk about.  He attracted me by three things:\nhis candid simplicity, his marvelous familiarity with ancient armor,\nand the restfulness of his company--for he did all the talking.\nWe fell together, as modest people will, in the tail of the herd\nthat was being shown through, and he at once began to say things\nwhich interested me.  As he talked along, softly, pleasantly,\nflowingly, he seemed to drift away imperceptibly out of this world\nand time, and into some remote era and old forgotten country;\nand so he gradually wove such a spell about me that I seemed\nto move among the specters and shadows and dust and mold of a gray\nantiquity, holding speech with a relic of it!  Exactly as I would\nspeak of my nearest personal friends or enemies, or my most familiar\nneighbors, he spoke of Sir Bedivere, Sir Bors de Ganis, Sir Launcelot\nof the Lake, Sir Galahad, and all the other great names of the\nTable Round--and how old, old, unspeakably old and faded and dry\nand musty and ancient he came to look as he went on!  Presently\nhe turned to me and said, just as one might speak of the weather,\nor any other common matter--\n\n\"You know about transmigration of souls; do you know about\ntransposition of epochs--and bodies?\"\n\nI said I had not heard of it.  He was so little interested--just\nas when people speak of the weather--that he did not notice\nwhether I made him any answer or not. There was half a moment\nof silence, immediately interrupted by the droning voice of the\nsalaried cicerone:\n\n\"Ancient hauberk, date of the sixth century, time of King Arthur\nand the Round Table; said to have belonged to the knight Sir Sagramor\nle Desirous; observe the round hole through the chain-mail in\nthe left breast; can't be accounted for; supposed to have been\ndone with a bullet since invention of firearms--perhaps maliciously\nby Cromwell's soldiers.\"\n\nMy acquaintance smiled--not a modern smile, but one that must\nhave gone out of general use many, many centuries ago--and muttered\napparently to himself:\n\n\"Wit ye well, _I saw it done_.\"  Then, after a pause, added:\n\"I did it myself.\"\n\nBy the time I had recovered from the electric surprise of this\nremark, he was gone.\n\nAll that evening I sat by my fire at the Warwick Arms, steeped\nin a dream of the olden time, while the rain beat upon the windows,\nand the wind roared about the eaves and corners.  From time to\ntime I dipped into old Sir Thomas Malory's enchanting book, and\nfed at its rich feast of prodigies and adventures, breathed in\nthe fragrance of its obsolete names, and dreamed again.  Midnight\nbeing come at length, I read another tale, for a nightcap--this\nwhich here follows, to wit:\n\nHOW SIR LAUNCELOT SLEW TWO GIANTS, AND MADE A CASTLE FREE\n\n   Anon withal came there upon him two great giants,\n   well armed, all save the heads, with two horrible\n   clubs in their hands.  Sir Launcelot put his shield\n   afore him, and put the stroke away of the one\n   giant, and with his sword he clave his head asunder.\n   When his fellow saw that, he ran away as he were\n   wood [*demented], for fear of the horrible strokes,\n   and Sir Launcelot after him with all his might,\n   and smote him on the shoulder, and clave him to\n   the middle.  Then Sir Launcelot went into the hall,\n   and there came afore him three score ladies and\n   damsels, and all kneeled unto him, and thanked\n   God and him of their deliverance.  For, sir, said\n   they, the most part of us have been here this\n   seven year their prisoners, and we have worked all\n   manner of silk works for our meat, and we are all\n   great gentle-women born, and blessed be the time,\n   knight, that ever thou wert born; for thou hast\n   done the most worship that ever did knight in the\n   world, that will we bear record, and we all pray\n   you to tell us your name, that we may tell our\n   friends who delivered us out of prison.  Fair\n   damsels, he said, my name is Sir Launcelot du\n   Lake.  And so he departed from them and betaught\n   them unto God.  And then he mounted upon his\n   horse, and rode into many strange and wild\n   countries, and through many waters and valleys,\n   and evil was he lodged.  And at the last by\n   fortune him happened against a night to come to\n   a fair courtilage, and therein he found an old\n   gentle-woman that lodged him with a good-will,\n   and there he had good cheer for him and his horse.\n   And when time was, his host brought him into a\n   fair garret over the gate to his bed. There\n   Sir Launcelot unarmed him, and set his harness\n   by him, and went to bed, and anon he fell on\n   sleep. So, soon after there came one on\n   horseback, and knocked at the gate in great\n   haste.  And when Sir Launcelot heard this he rose\n   up, and looked out at the window, and saw by the\n   moonlight three knights come riding after that\n   one man, and all three lashed on him at once\n   with swords, and that one knight turned on them\n   knightly again and defended him. Truly, said\n   Sir Launcelot, yonder one knight shall I help,\n   for it were shame for me to see three knights\n   on one, and if he be slain I am partner of his\n   death.  And therewith he took his harness and\n   went out at a window by a sheet down to the four\n   knights, and then Sir Launcelot said on high,\n   Turn you knights unto me, and leave your\n   fighting with that knight. And then they all\n   three left Sir Kay, and turned unto Sir Launcelot,\n   and there began great battle, for they alight\n   all three, and strake many strokes at Sir\n   Launcelot, and assailed him on every side. Then\n   Sir Kay dressed him for to have holpen Sir\n   Launcelot.  Nay, sir, said he, I will none of\n   your help, therefore as ye will have my help\n   let me alone with them.  Sir Kay for the pleasure\n   of the knight suffered him for to do his will,\n   and so stood aside. And then anon within six\n   strokes Sir Launcelot had stricken them to the earth.\n\n   And then they all three cried, Sir Knight, we\n   yield us unto you as man of might matchless.  As\n   to that, said Sir Launcelot, I will not take\n   your yielding unto me, but so that ye yield\n   you unto Sir Kay the seneschal, on that covenant\n   I will save your lives and else not.  Fair knight,\n   said they, that were we loath to do; for as for\n   Sir Kay we chased him hither, and had overcome\n   him had ye not been; therefore, to yield us unto\n   him it were no reason.  Well, as to that, said\n   Sir Launcelot, advise you well, for ye may\n   choose whether ye will die or live, for an ye be\n   yielden, it shall be unto Sir Kay.  Fair knight,\n   then they said, in saving our lives we will do\n   as thou commandest us.  Then shall ye, said Sir\n   Launcelot, on Whitsunday next coming go unto the\n   court of King Arthur, and there shall ye yield\n   you unto Queen Guenever, and put you all three\n   in her grace and mercy, and say that Sir Kay\n   sent you thither to be her prisoners.  On the morn\n   Sir Launcelot arose early, and left Sir Kay\n   sleeping; and Sir Launcelot took Sir Kay's armor\n   and his shield and armed him, and so he went to\n   the stable and took his horse, and took his leave\n   of his host, and so he departed.  Then soon after\n   arose Sir Kay and missed Sir Launcelot; and\n   then he espied that he had his armor and his\n   horse. Now by my faith I know well that he will\n   grieve some of the court of King Arthur; for on\n   him knights will be bold, and deem that it is I,\n   and that will beguile them; and because of his\n   armor and shield I am sure I shall ride in peace.\n   And then soon after departed Sir Kay, and\n   thanked his host.\n\n\nAs I laid the book down there was a knock at the door, and my\nstranger came in.  I gave him a pipe and a chair, and made him\nwelcome.  I also comforted him with a hot Scotch whisky; gave him\nanother one; then still another--hoping always for his story.\nAfter a fourth persuader, he drifted into it himself, in a quite\nsimple and natural way:\n\n\n\nTHE STRANGER'S HISTORY\n\nI am an American.  I was born and reared in Hartford, in the State\nof Connecticut--anyway, just over the river, in the country.  So\nI am a Yankee of the Yankees--and practical; yes, and nearly\nbarren of sentiment, I suppose--or poetry, in other words.  My\nfather was a blacksmith, my uncle was a horse doctor, and I was\nboth, along at first.  Then I went over to the great arms factory\nand learned my real trade; learned all there was to it; learned\nto make everything: guns, revolvers, cannon, boilers, engines, all\nsorts of labor-saving machinery.  Why, I could make anything\na body wanted--anything in the world, it didn't make any difference\nwhat; and if there wasn't any quick new-fangled way to make a thing,\nI could invent one--and do it as easy as rolling off a log.  I became\nhead superintendent; had a couple of thousand men under me.\n\nWell, a man like that is a man that is full of fight--that goes\nwithout saying.  With a couple of thousand rough men under one,\none has plenty of that sort of amusement.  I had, anyway.  At last\nI met my match, and I got my dose.  It was during a misunderstanding\nconducted with crowbars with a fellow we used to call Hercules.\nHe laid me out with a crusher alongside the head that made everything\ncrack, and seemed to spring every joint in my skull and made it\noverlap its neighbor.  Then the world went out in darkness, and\nI didn't feel anything more, and didn't know anything at all\n--at least for a while.\n\nWhen I came to again, I was sitting under an oak tree, on the\ngrass, with a whole beautiful and broad country landscape all\nto myself--nearly.  Not entirely; for there was a fellow on a horse,\nlooking down at me--a fellow fresh out of a picture-book.  He was\nin old-time iron armor from head to heel, with a helmet on his\nhead the shape of a nail-keg with slits in it; and he had a shield,\nand a sword, and a prodigious spear; and his horse had armor on,\ntoo, and a steel horn projecting from his forehead, and gorgeous\nred and green silk trappings that hung down all around him like\na bedquilt, nearly to the ground.\n\n\"Fair sir, will ye just?\" said this fellow.\n\n\"Will I which?\"\n\n\"Will ye try a passage of arms for land or lady or for--\"\n\n\"What are you giving me?\" I said.  \"Get along back to your circus,\nor I'll report you.\"\n\nNow what does this man do but fall back a couple of hundred yards\nand then come rushing at me as hard as he could tear, with his\nnail-keg bent down nearly to his horse's neck and his long spear\npointed straight ahead.  I saw he meant business, so I was up\nthe tree when he arrived.\n\nHe allowed that I was his property, the captive of his spear.\nThere was argument on his side--and the bulk of the advantage\n--so I judged it best to humor him.  We fixed up an agreement\nwhereby I was to go with him and he was not to hurt me.  I came\ndown, and we started away, I walking by the side of his horse.\nWe marched comfortably along, through glades and over brooks which\nI could not remember to have seen before--which puzzled me and\nmade me wonder--and yet we did not come to any circus or sign of\na circus.  So I gave up the idea of a circus, and concluded he was\nfrom an asylum.  But we never came to an asylum--so I was up\na stump, as you may say.  I asked him how far we were from Hartford.\nHe said he had never heard of the place; which I took to be a lie,\nbut allowed it to go at that.  At the end of an hour we saw a\nfar-away town sleeping in a valley by a winding river; and beyond\nit on a hill, a vast gray fortress, with towers and turrets,\nthe first I had ever seen out of a picture.\n\n\"Bridgeport?\" said I, pointing.\n\n\"Camelot,\" said he.\n\n\nMy stranger had been showing signs of sleepiness.  He caught\nhimself nodding, now, and smiled one of those pathetic, obsolete\nsmiles of his, and said:\n\n\"I find I can't go on; but come with me, I've got it all written\nout, and you can read it if you like.\"\n\nIn his chamber, he said: \"First, I kept a journal; then by and by,\nafter years, I took the journal and turned it into a book. How\nlong ago that was!\"\n\nHe handed me his manuscript, and pointed out the place where\nI should begin:\n\n\"Begin here--I've already told you what goes before.\"  He was\nsteeped in drowsiness by this time.  As I went out at his door\nI heard him murmur sleepily: \"Give you good den, fair sir.\"\n\nI sat down by my fire and examined my treasure.  The first part\nof it--the great bulk of it--was parchment, and yellow with age.\nI scanned a leaf particularly and saw that it was a palimpsest.\nUnder the old dim writing of the Yankee historian appeared traces\nof a penmanship which was older and dimmer still--Latin words\nand sentences: fragments from old monkish legends, evidently.\nI turned to the place indicated by my stranger and began to read\n--as follows:\n\n\n\n\nTHE TALE OF THE LOST LAND\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nCAMELOT\n\n\"Camelot--Camelot,\" said I to myself.  \"I don't seem to remember\nhearing of it before.  Name of the asylum, likely.\"\n\nIt was a soft, reposeful summer landscape, as lovely as a dream,\nand as lonesome as Sunday.  The air was full of the smell of\nflowers, and the buzzing of insects, and the twittering of birds,\nand there were no people, no wagons, there was no stir of life,\nnothing going on.  The road was mainly a winding path with hoof-prints\nin it, and now and then a faint trace of wheels on either side in\nthe grass--wheels that apparently had a tire as broad as one's hand.\n\nPresently a fair slip of a girl, about ten years old, with a cataract\nof golden hair streaming down over her shoulders, came along.\nAround her head she wore a hoop of flame-red poppies. It was as\nsweet an outfit as ever I saw, what there was of it.  She walked\nindolently along, with a mind at rest, its peace reflected in her\ninnocent face.  The circus man paid no attention to her; didn't\neven seem to see her.  And she--she was no more startled at his\nfantastic make-up than if she was used to his like every day of\nher life.  She was going by as indifferently as she might have gone\nby a couple of cows; but when she happened to notice me, _then_\nthere was a change!  Up went her hands, and she was turned to stone;\nher mouth dropped open, her eyes stared wide and timorously, she\nwas the picture of astonished curiosity touched with fear.  And\nthere she stood gazing, in a sort of stupefied fascination, till\nwe turned a corner of the wood and were lost to her view.  That\nshe should be startled at me instead of at the other man, was too\nmany for me; I couldn't make head or tail of it.  And that she\nshould seem to consider me a spectacle, and totally overlook her\nown merits in that respect, was another puzzling thing, and a\ndisplay of magnanimity, too, that was surprising in one so young.\nThere was food for thought here.  I moved along as one in a dream.\n\nAs we approached the town, signs of life began to appear.  At\nintervals we passed a wretched cabin, with a thatched roof, and\nabout it small fields and garden patches in an indifferent state of\ncultivation.  There were people, too; brawny men, with long, coarse,\nuncombed hair that hung down over their faces and made them look\nlike animals.  They and the women, as a rule, wore a coarse\ntow-linen robe that came well below the knee, and a rude sort of\nsandal, and many wore an iron collar.  The small boys and girls\nwere always naked; but nobody seemed to know it.  All of these\npeople stared at me, talked about me, ran into the huts and fetched\nout their families to gape at me; but nobody ever noticed that\nother fellow, except to make him humble salutation and get no\nresponse for their pains.\n\nIn the town were some substantial windowless houses of stone\nscattered among a wilderness of thatched cabins; the streets were\nmere crooked alleys, and unpaved; troops of dogs and nude children\nplayed in the sun and made life and noise; hogs roamed and rooted\ncontentedly about, and one of them lay in a reeking wallow in\nthe middle of the main thoroughfare and suckled her family.\nPresently there was a distant blare of military music; it came\nnearer, still nearer, and soon a noble cavalcade wound into view,\nglorious with plumed helmets and flashing mail and flaunting banners\nand rich doublets and horse-cloths and gilded spearheads; and\nthrough the muck and swine, and naked brats, and joyous dogs, and\nshabby huts, it took its gallant way, and in its wake we followed.\nFollowed through one winding alley and then another,--and climbing,\nalways climbing--till at last we gained the breezy height where\nthe huge castle stood.  There was an exchange of bugle blasts;\nthen a parley from the walls, where men-at-arms, in hauberk and\nmorion, marched back and forth with halberd at shoulder under\nflapping banners with the rude figure of a dragon displayed upon\nthem; and then the great gates were flung open, the drawbridge\nwas lowered, and the head of the cavalcade swept forward under\nthe frowning arches; and we, following, soon found ourselves in\na great paved court, with towers and turrets stretching up into\nthe blue air on all the four sides; and all about us the dismount\nwas going on, and much greeting and ceremony, and running to and\nfro, and a gay display of moving and intermingling colors, and\nan altogether pleasant stir and noise and confusion.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nKING ARTHUR'S COURT\n\nThe moment I got a chance I slipped aside privately and touched\nan ancient common looking man on the shoulder and said, in an\ninsinuating, confidential way:\n\n\"Friend, do me a kindness.  Do you belong to the asylum, or are\nyou just on a visit or something like that?\"\n\nHe looked me over stupidly, and said:\n\n\"Marry, fair sir, me seemeth--\"\n\n\"That will do,\" I said; \"I reckon you are a patient.\"\n\nI moved away, cogitating, and at the same time keeping an eye\nout for any chance passenger in his right mind that might come\nalong and give me some light.  I judged I had found one, presently;\nso I drew him aside and said in his ear:\n\n\"If I could see the head keeper a minute--only just a minute--\"\n\n\"Prithee do not let me.\"\n\n\"Let you _what_?\"\n\n\"_Hinder_ me, then, if the word please thee better.  Then he went\non to say he was an under-cook and could not stop to gossip,\nthough he would like it another time; for it would comfort his\nvery liver to know where I got my clothes.  As he started away he\npointed and said yonder was one who was idle enough for my purpose,\nand was seeking me besides, no doubt.  This was an airy slim boy\nin shrimp-colored tights that made him look like a forked carrot,\nthe rest of his gear was blue silk and dainty laces and ruffles;\nand he had long yellow curls, and wore a plumed pink satin cap\ntilted complacently over his ear.  By his look, he was good-natured;\nby his gait, he was satisfied with himself.  He was pretty enough\nto frame.  He arrived, looked me over with a smiling and impudent\ncuriosity; said he had come for me, and informed me that he was a page.\n\n\"Go 'long,\" I said; \"you ain't more than a paragraph.\"\n\nIt was pretty severe, but I was nettled.  However, it never phazed\nhim; he didn't appear to know he was hurt.  He began to talk and\nlaugh, in happy, thoughtless, boyish fashion, as we walked along,\nand made himself old friends with me at once; asked me all sorts\nof questions about myself and about my clothes, but never waited\nfor an answer--always chattered straight ahead, as if he didn't\nknow he had asked a question and wasn't expecting any reply, until\nat last he happened to mention that he was born in the beginning\nof the year 513.\n\nIt made the cold chills creep over me!  I stopped and said,\na little faintly:\n\n\"Maybe I didn't hear you just right.  Say it again--and say it\nslow.  What year was it?\"\n\n\"513.\"\n\n\"513!  You don't look it!  Come, my boy, I am a stranger and\nfriendless; be honest and honorable with me.  Are you in your\nright mind?\"\n\nHe said he was.\n\n\"Are these other people in their right minds?\"\n\nHe said they were.\n\n\"And this isn't an asylum?  I mean, it isn't a place where they\ncure crazy people?\"\n\nHe said it wasn't.\n\n\"Well, then,\" I said, \"either I am a lunatic, or something just\nas awful has happened.  Now tell me, honest and true, where am I?\"\n\n\"IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT.\"\n\nI waited a minute, to let that idea shudder its way home,\nand then said:\n\n\"And according to your notions, what year is it now?\"\n\n\"528--nineteenth of June.\"\n\nI felt a mournful sinking at the heart, and muttered: \"I shall\nnever see my friends again--never, never again.  They will not\nbe born for more than thirteen hundred years yet.\"\n\nI seemed to believe the boy, I didn't know why.  _Something_ in me\nseemed to believe him--my consciousness, as you may say; but my\nreason didn't.  My reason straightway began to clamor; that was\nnatural.  I didn't know how to go about satisfying it, because\nI knew that the testimony of men wouldn't serve--my reason would\nsay they were lunatics, and throw out their evidence.  But all\nof a sudden I stumbled on the very thing, just by luck.  I knew\nthat the only total eclipse of the sun in the first half of the\nsixth century occurred on the 21st of June, A.D. 528, O.S., and\nbegan at 3 minutes after 12 noon.  I also knew that no total eclipse\nof the sun was due in what to _me_ was the present year--i.e., 1879.\nSo, if I could keep my anxiety and curiosity from eating the heart\nout of me for forty-eight hours, I should then find out for certain\nwhether this boy was telling me the truth or not.\n\nWherefore, being a practical Connecticut man, I now shoved this\nwhole problem clear out of my mind till its appointed day and hour\nshould come, in order that I might turn all my attention to the\ncircumstances of the present moment, and be alert and ready to\nmake the most out of them that could be made.  One thing at a time,\nis my motto--and just play that thing for all it is worth, even\nif it's only two pair and a jack.  I made up my mind to two things:\nif it was still the nineteenth century and I was among lunatics\nand couldn't get away, I would presently boss that asylum or know\nthe reason why; and if, on the other hand, it was really the sixth\ncentury, all right, I didn't want any softer thing: I would boss\nthe whole country inside of three months; for I judged I would\nhave the start of the best-educated man in the kingdom by a matter\nof thirteen hundred years and upward.  I'm not a man to waste\ntime after my mind's made up and there's work on hand; so I said\nto the page:\n\n\"Now, Clarence, my boy--if that might happen to be your name\n--I'll get you to post me up a little if you don't mind.  What is\nthe name of that apparition that brought me here?\"\n\n\"My master and thine?  That is the good knight and great lord\nSir Kay the Seneschal, foster brother to our liege the king.\"\n\n\"Very good; go on, tell me everything.\"\n\nHe made a long story of it; but the part that had immediate interest\nfor me was this: He said I was Sir Kay's prisoner, and that\nin the due course of custom I would be flung into a dungeon and\nleft there on scant commons until my friends ransomed me--unless\nI chanced to rot, first.  I saw that the last chance had the best\nshow, but I didn't waste any bother about that; time was too\nprecious.  The page said, further, that dinner was about ended\nin the great hall by this time, and that as soon as the sociability\nand the heavy drinking should begin, Sir Kay would have me in and\nexhibit me before King Arthur and his illustrious knights seated at\nthe Table Round, and would brag about his exploit in capturing\nme, and would probably exaggerate the facts a little, but it\nwouldn't be good form for me to correct him, and not over safe,\neither; and when I was done being exhibited, then ho for the\ndungeon; but he, Clarence, would find a way to come and see me every\nnow and then, and cheer me up, and help me get word to my friends.\n\nGet word to my friends!  I thanked him; I couldn't do less; and\nabout this time a lackey came to say I was wanted; so Clarence\nled me in and took me off to one side and sat down by me.\n\nWell, it was a curious kind of spectacle, and interesting. It was\nan immense place, and rather naked--yes, and full of loud contrasts.\nIt was very, very lofty; so lofty that the banners depending from\nthe arched beams and girders away up there floated in a sort of\ntwilight; there was a stone-railed gallery at each end, high up,\nwith musicians in the one, and women, clothed in stunning colors,\nin the other.  The floor was of big stone flags laid in black and\nwhite squares, rather battered by age and use, and needing repair.\nAs to ornament, there wasn't any, strictly speaking; though on\nthe walls hung some huge tapestries which were probably taxed\nas works of art; battle-pieces, they were, with horses shaped like\nthose which children cut out of paper or create in gingerbread;\nwith men on them in scale armor whose scales are represented by\nround holes--so that the man's coat looks as if it had been done\nwith a biscuit-punch.  There was a fireplace big enough to camp in;\nand its projecting sides and hood, of carved and pillared stonework,\nhad the look of a cathedral door.  Along the walls stood men-at-arms,\nin breastplate and morion, with halberds for their only weapon\n--rigid as statues; and that is what they looked like.\n\nIn the middle of this groined and vaulted public square was an oaken\ntable which they called the Table Round.  It was as large as\na circus ring; and around it sat a great company of men dressed\nin such various and splendid colors that it hurt one's eyes to look\nat them.  They wore their plumed hats, right along, except that\nwhenever one addressed himself directly to the king, he lifted\nhis hat a trifle just as he was beginning his remark.\n\nMainly they were drinking--from entire ox horns; but a few were\nstill munching bread or gnawing beef bones.  There was about\nan average of two dogs to one man; and these sat in expectant\nattitudes till a spent bone was flung to them, and then they went\nfor it by brigades and divisions, with a rush, and there ensued\na fight which filled the prospect with a tumultuous chaos of\nplunging heads and bodies and flashing tails, and the storm of\nhowlings and barkings deafened all speech for the time; but that\nwas no matter, for the dog-fight was always a bigger interest\nanyway; the men rose, sometimes, to observe it the better and bet\non it, and the ladies and the musicians stretched themselves out\nover their balusters with the same object; and all broke into\ndelighted ejaculations from time to time. In the end, the winning\ndog stretched himself out comfortably with his bone between his\npaws, and proceeded to growl over it, and gnaw it, and grease\nthe floor with it, just as fifty others were already doing; and the\nrest of the court resumed their previous industries and entertainments.\n\nAs a rule, the speech and behavior of these people were gracious\nand courtly; and I noticed that they were good and serious listeners\nwhen anybody was telling anything--I mean in a dog-fightless\ninterval.  And plainly, too, they were a childlike and innocent lot;\ntelling lies of the stateliest pattern with a most gentle and\nwinning naivety, and ready and willing to listen to anybody else's\nlie, and believe it, too.  It was hard to associate them with\nanything cruel or dreadful; and yet they dealt in tales of blood\nand suffering with a guileless relish that made me almost forget\nto shudder.\n\nI was not the only prisoner present.  There were twenty or more.\nPoor devils, many of them were maimed, hacked, carved, in a frightful\nway; and their hair, their faces, their clothing, were caked with\nblack and stiffened drenchings of blood.  They were suffering\nsharp physical pain, of course; and weariness, and hunger and\nthirst, no doubt; and at least none had given them the comfort\nof a wash, or even the poor charity of a lotion for their wounds;\nyet you never heard them utter a moan or a groan, or saw them show\nany sign of restlessness, or any disposition to complain.  The\nthought was forced upon me: \"The rascals--_they_ have served other\npeople so in their day; it being their own turn, now, they were\nnot expecting any better treatment than this; so their philosophical\nbearing is not an outcome of mental training, intellectual fortitude,\nreasoning; it is mere animal training; they are white Indians.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nKNIGHTS OF THE TABLE ROUND\n\nMainly the Round Table talk was monologues--narrative accounts\nof the adventures in which these prisoners were captured and their\nfriends and backers killed and stripped of their steeds and armor.\nAs a general thing--as far as I could make out--these murderous\nadventures were not forays undertaken to avenge injuries, nor to\nsettle old disputes or sudden fallings out; no, as a rule they were\nsimply duels between strangers--duels between people who had never\neven been introduced to each other, and between whom existed no\ncause of offense whatever.  Many a time I had seen a couple of boys,\nstrangers, meet by chance, and say simultaneously, \"I can lick you,\"\nand go at it on the spot; but I had always imagined until now that\nthat sort of thing belonged to children only, and was a sign and\nmark of childhood; but here were these big boobies sticking to it\nand taking pride in it clear up into full age and beyond.  Yet there\nwas something very engaging about these great simple-hearted\ncreatures, something attractive and lovable.  There did not seem\nto be brains enough in the entire nursery, so to speak, to bait\na fish-hook with; but you didn't seem to mind that, after a little,\nbecause you soon saw that brains were not needed in a society\nlike that, and indeed would have marred it, hindered it, spoiled\nits symmetry--perhaps rendered its existence impossible.\n\nThere was a fine manliness observable in almost every face; and\nin some a certain loftiness and sweetness that rebuked your\nbelittling criticisms and stilled them.  A most noble benignity\nand purity reposed in the countenance of him they called Sir Galahad,\nand likewise in the king's also; and there was majesty and greatness\nin the giant frame and high bearing of Sir Launcelot of the Lake.\n\nThere was presently an incident which centered the general interest\nupon this Sir Launcelot.  At a sign from a sort of master of\nceremonies, six or eight of the prisoners rose and came forward\nin a body and knelt on the floor and lifted up their hands toward\nthe ladies' gallery and begged the grace of a word with the queen.\nThe most conspicuously situated lady in that massed flower-bed\nof feminine show and finery inclined her head by way of assent,\nand then the spokesman of the prisoners delivered himself and his\nfellows into her hands for free pardon, ransom, captivity, or death,\nas she in her good pleasure might elect; and this, as he said, he\nwas doing by command of Sir Kay the Seneschal, whose prisoners\nthey were, he having vanquished them by his single might and\nprowess in sturdy conflict in the field.\n\nSurprise and astonishment flashed from face to face all over\nthe house; the queen's gratified smile faded out at the name of\nSir Kay, and she looked disappointed; and the page whispered in\nmy ear with an accent and manner expressive of extravagant derision--\n\n\"Sir _Kay_, forsooth!  Oh, call me pet names, dearest, call me\na marine!  In twice a thousand years shall the unholy invention\nof man labor at odds to beget the fellow to this majestic lie!\"\n\nEvery eye was fastened with severe inquiry upon Sir Kay. But he\nwas equal to the occasion.  He got up and played his hand like\na major--and took every trick.  He said he would state the case\nexactly according to the facts; he would tell the simple\nstraightforward tale, without comment of his own; \"and then,\"\nsaid he, \"if ye find glory and honor due, ye will give it unto him\nwho is the mightiest man of his hands that ever bare shield or\nstrake with sword in the ranks of Christian battle--even him that\nsitteth there!\" and he pointed to Sir Launcelot.  Ah, he fetched\nthem; it was a rattling good stroke.  Then he went on and told\nhow Sir Launcelot, seeking adventures, some brief time gone by,\nkilled seven giants at one sweep of his sword, and set a hundred\nand forty-two captive maidens free; and then went further, still\nseeking adventures, and found him (Sir Kay) fighting a desperate\nfight against nine foreign knights, and straightway took the battle\nsolely into his own hands, and conquered the nine; and that night\nSir Launcelot rose quietly, and dressed him in Sir Kay's armor and\ntook Sir Kay's horse and gat him away into distant lands, and\nvanquished sixteen knights in one pitched battle and thirty-four\nin another; and all these and the former nine he made to swear\nthat about Whitsuntide they would ride to Arthur's court and yield\nthem to Queen Guenever's hands as captives of Sir Kay the Seneschal,\nspoil of his knightly prowess; and now here were these half dozen,\nand the rest would be along as soon as they might be healed of\ntheir desperate wounds.\n\nWell, it was touching to see the queen blush and smile, and look\nembarrassed and happy, and fling furtive glances at Sir Launcelot\nthat would have got him shot in Arkansas, to a dead certainty.\n\nEverybody praised the valor and magnanimity of Sir Launcelot; and\nas for me, I was perfectly amazed, that one man, all by himself,\nshould have been able to beat down and capture such battalions\nof practiced fighters.  I said as much to Clarence; but this mocking\nfeatherhead only said:\n\n\"An Sir Kay had had time to get another skin of sour wine into him,\nye had seen the accompt doubled.\"\n\nI looked at the boy in sorrow; and as I looked I saw the cloud of\na deep despondency settle upon his countenance.  I followed the\ndirection of his eye, and saw that a very old and white-bearded\nman, clothed in a flowing black gown, had risen and was standing\nat the table upon unsteady legs, and feebly swaying his ancient\nhead and surveying the company with his watery and wandering eye.\nThe same suffering look that was in the page's face was observable\nin all the faces around--the look of dumb creatures who know that\nthey must endure and make no moan.\n\n\"Marry, we shall have it again,\" sighed the boy; \"that same old\nweary tale that he hath told a thousand times in the same words,\nand that he _will_ tell till he dieth, every time he hath gotten his\nbarrel full and feeleth his exaggeration-mill a-working.  Would\nGod I had died or I saw this day!\"\n\n\"Who is it?\"\n\n\"Merlin, the mighty liar and magician, perdition singe him for\nthe weariness he worketh with his one tale!  But that men fear\nhim for that he hath the storms and the lightnings and all the\ndevils that be in hell at his beck and call, they would have dug\nhis entrails out these many years ago to get at that tale and\nsquelch it.  He telleth it always in the third person, making\nbelieve he is too modest to glorify himself--maledictions light\nupon him, misfortune be his dole!  Good friend, prithee call me\nfor evensong.\"\n\nThe boy nestled himself upon my shoulder and pretended to go\nto sleep.  The old man began his tale; and presently the lad was\nasleep in reality; so also were the dogs, and the court, the lackeys,\nand the files of men-at-arms.  The droning voice droned on; a soft\nsnoring arose on all sides and supported it like a deep and subdued\naccompaniment of wind instruments.  Some heads were bowed upon\nfolded arms, some lay back with open mouths that issued unconscious\nmusic; the flies buzzed and bit, unmolested, the rats swarmed\nsoftly out from a hundred holes, and pattered about, and made\nthemselves at home everywhere; and one of them sat up like a\nsquirrel on the king's head and held a bit of cheese in its hands\nand nibbled it, and dribbled the crumbs in the king's face with\nnaive and impudent irreverence.  It was a tranquil scene, and\nrestful to the weary eye and the jaded spirit.\n\nThis was the old man's tale.  He said:\n\n\"Right so the king and Merlin departed, and went until an hermit\nthat was a good man and a great leech.  So the hermit searched\nall his wounds and gave him good salves; so the king was there\nthree days, and then were his wounds well amended that he might\nride and go, and so departed.  And as they rode, Arthur said,\nI have no sword.  No force,* [*Footnote from M.T.: No matter.]\nsaid Merlin, hereby is a sword that shall be yours and I may.\nSo they rode till they came to a lake, the which was a fair water\nand broad, and in the midst of the lake Arthur was ware of an arm\nclothed in white samite, that held a fair sword in that hand.\nLo, said Merlin, yonder is that sword that I spake of.  With that\nthey saw a damsel going upon the lake.  What damsel is that?\nsaid Arthur.  That is the Lady of the lake, said Merlin; and within\nthat lake is a rock, and therein is as fair a place as any on earth,\nand richly beseen, and this damsel will come to you anon, and then\nspeak ye fair to her that she will give you that sword.  Anon\nwithal came the damsel unto Arthur and saluted him, and he her\nagain.  Damsel, said Arthur, what sword is that, that yonder\nthe arm holdeth above the water?  I would it were mine, for I have\nno sword.  Sir Arthur King, said the damsel, that sword is mine,\nand if ye will give me a gift when I ask it you, ye shall have it.\nBy my faith, said Arthur, I will give you what gift ye will ask.\nWell, said the damsel, go ye into yonder barge and row yourself\nto the sword, and take it and the scabbard with you, and I will ask\nmy gift when I see my time.  So Sir Arthur and Merlin alight, and\ntied their horses to two trees, and so they went into the ship,\nand when they came to the sword that the hand held, Sir Arthur\ntook it up by the handles, and took it with him.  And the arm\nand the hand went under the water; and so they came unto the land\nand rode forth.  And then Sir Arthur saw a rich pavilion.  What\nsignifieth yonder pavilion?  It is the knight's pavilion, said\nMerlin, that ye fought with last, Sir Pellinore, but he is out,\nhe is not there; he hath ado with a knight of yours, that hight\nEgglame, and they have fought together, but at the last Egglame\nfled, and else he had been dead, and he hath chased him even\nto Carlion, and we shall meet with him anon in the highway.  That\nis well said, said Arthur, now have I a sword, now will I wage\nbattle with him, and be avenged on him.  Sir, ye shall not so,\nsaid Merlin, for the knight is weary of fighting and chasing, so\nthat ye shall have no worship to have ado with him; also, he will\nnot lightly be matched of one knight living; and therefore it is my\ncounsel, let him pass, for he shall do you good service in short\ntime, and his sons, after his days.  Also ye shall see that day\nin short space ye shall be right glad to give him your sister\nto wed.  When I see him, I will do as ye advise me, said Arthur.\nThen Sir Arthur looked on the sword, and liked it passing well.\nWhether liketh you better, said Merlin, the sword or the scabbard?\nMe liketh better the sword, said Arthur.  Ye are more unwise,\nsaid Merlin, for the scabbard is worth ten of the sword, for while\nye have the scabbard upon you ye shall never lose no blood, be ye\nnever so sore wounded; therefore, keep well the scabbard always\nwith you.  So they rode into Carlion, and by the way they met with\nSir Pellinore; but Merlin had done such a craft that Pellinore saw\nnot Arthur, and he passed by without any words.  I marvel, said\nArthur, that the knight would not speak.  Sir, said Merlin, he saw\nyou not; for and he had seen you ye had not lightly departed.  So\nthey came unto Carlion, whereof his knights were passing glad.\nAnd when they heard of his adventures they marveled that he would\njeopard his person so alone.  But all men of worship said it was\nmerry to be under such a chieftain that would put his person in\nadventure as other poor knights did.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nSIR DINADAN THE HUMORIST\n\nIt seemed to me that this quaint lie was most simply and beautifully\ntold; but then I had heard it only once, and that makes a difference;\nit was pleasant to the others when it was fresh, no doubt.\n\nSir Dinadan the Humorist was the first to awake, and he soon roused\nthe rest with a practical joke of a sufficiently poor quality.\nHe tied some metal mugs to a dog's tail and turned him loose,\nand he tore around and around the place in a frenzy of fright,\nwith all the other dogs bellowing after him and battering and\ncrashing against everything that came in their way and making\naltogether a chaos of confusion and a most deafening din and\nturmoil; at which every man and woman of the multitude laughed\ntill the tears flowed, and some fell out of their chairs and\nwallowed on the floor in ecstasy.  It was just like so many children.\nSir Dinadan was so proud of his exploit that he could not keep\nfrom telling over and over again, to weariness, how the immortal\nidea happened to occur to him; and as is the way with humorists\nof his breed, he was still laughing at it after everybody else had\ngot through.  He was so set up that he concluded to make a speech\n--of course a humorous speech.  I think I never heard so many old\nplayed-out jokes strung together in my life.  He was worse than\nthe minstrels, worse than the clown in the circus.  It seemed\npeculiarly sad to sit here, thirteen hundred years before I was\nborn, and listen again to poor, flat, worm-eaten jokes that had\ngiven me the dry gripes when I was a boy thirteen hundred years\nafterwards.  It about convinced me that there isn't any such thing\nas a new joke possible.  Everybody laughed at these antiquities\n--but then they always do; I had noticed that, centuries later.\nHowever, of course the scoffer didn't laugh--I mean the boy.  No,\nhe scoffed; there wasn't anything he wouldn't scoff at. He said\nthe most of Sir Dinadan's jokes were rotten and the rest were\npetrified.  I said \"petrified\" was good; as I believed, myself,\nthat the only right way to classify the majestic ages of some of\nthose jokes was by geologic periods.  But that neat idea hit\nthe boy in a blank place, for geology hadn't been invented yet.\nHowever, I made a note of the remark, and calculated to educate\nthe commonwealth up to it if I pulled through.  It is no use\nto throw a good thing away merely because the market isn't ripe yet.\n\nNow Sir Kay arose and began to fire up on his history-mill with me\nfor fuel.  It was time for me to feel serious, and I did.  Sir Kay\ntold how he had encountered me in a far land of barbarians, who\nall wore the same ridiculous garb that I did--a garb that was a work\nof enchantment, and intended to make the wearer secure from hurt\nby human hands.  However he had nullified the force of the\nenchantment by prayer, and had killed my thirteen knights in\na three hours' battle, and taken me prisoner, sparing my life\nin order that so strange a curiosity as I was might be exhibited\nto the wonder and admiration of the king and the court.  He spoke\nof me all the time, in the blandest way, as \"this prodigious giant,\"\nand \"this horrible sky-towering monster,\" and \"this tusked and\ntaloned man-devouring ogre\", and everybody took in all this bosh\nin the naivest way, and never smiled or seemed to notice that\nthere was any discrepancy between these watered statistics and me.\nHe said that in trying to escape from him I sprang into the top of\na tree two hundred cubits high at a single bound, but he dislodged\nme with a stone the size of a cow, which \"all-to brast\" the most\nof my bones, and then swore me to appear at Arthur's court for\nsentence.  He ended by condemning me to die at noon on the 21st;\nand was so little concerned about it that he stopped to yawn before\nhe named the date.\n\nI was in a dismal state by this time; indeed, I was hardly enough\nin my right mind to keep the run of a dispute that sprung up as\nto how I had better be killed, the possibility of the killing being\ndoubted by some, because of the enchantment in my clothes. And yet\nit was nothing but an ordinary suit of fifteen-dollar slop-shops.\nStill, I was sane enough to notice this detail, to wit: many of\nthe terms used in the most matter-of-fact way by this great\nassemblage of the first ladies and gentlemen in the land would\nhave made a Comanche blush.  Indelicacy is too mild a term to convey\nthe idea.  However, I had read \"Tom Jones,\" and \"Roderick Random,\"\nand other books of that kind, and knew that the highest and first\nladies and gentlemen in England had remained little or no cleaner\nin their talk, and in the morals and conduct which such talk\nimplies, clear up to a hundred years ago; in fact clear into our\nown nineteenth century--in which century, broadly speaking,\nthe earliest samples of the real lady and real gentleman discoverable\nin English history--or in European history, for that matter--may be\nsaid to have made their appearance.  Suppose Sir Walter, instead\nof putting the conversations into the mouths of his characters,\nhad allowed the characters to speak for themselves?  We should\nhave had talk from Rebecca and Ivanhoe and the soft lady Rowena\nwhich would embarrass a tramp in our day.  However, to the\nunconsciously indelicate all things are delicate.  King Arthur's\npeople were not aware that they were indecent and I had presence\nof mind enough not to mention it.\n\nThey were so troubled about my enchanted clothes that they were\nmightily relieved, at last, when old Merlin swept the difficulty\naway for them with a common-sense hint.  He asked them why they\nwere so dull--why didn't it occur to them to strip me.  In half a\nminute I was as naked as a pair of tongs!  And dear, dear, to think\nof it: I was the only embarrassed person there.  Everybody discussed\nme; and did it as unconcernedly as if I had been a cabbage.\nQueen Guenever was as naively interested as the rest, and said\nshe had never seen anybody with legs just like mine before.  It was\nthe only compliment I got--if it was a compliment.\n\nFinally I was carried off in one direction, and my perilous clothes\nin another.  I was shoved into a dark and narrow cell in a dungeon,\nwith some scant remnants for dinner, some moldy straw for a bed,\nand no end of rats for company.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nAN INSPIRATION\n\nI was so tired that even my fears were not able to keep me awake long.\n\nWhen I next came to myself, I seemed to have been asleep a very\nlong time.  My first thought was, \"Well, what an astonishing dream\nI've had!  I reckon I've waked only just in time to keep from\nbeing hanged or drowned or burned or something....  I'll nap again\ntill the whistle blows, and then I'll go down to the arms factory\nand have it out with Hercules.\"\n\nBut just then I heard the harsh music of rusty chains and bolts,\na light flashed in my eyes, and that butterfly, Clarence, stood\nbefore me!  I gasped with surprise; my breath almost got away from me.\n\n\"What!\" I said, \"you here yet?  Go along with the rest of\nthe dream! scatter!\"\n\nBut he only laughed, in his light-hearted way, and fell to making\nfun of my sorry plight.\n\n\"All right,\" I said resignedly, \"let the dream go on; I'm in no hurry.\"\n\n\"Prithee what dream?\"\n\n\"What dream?  Why, the dream that I am in Arthur's court--a person\nwho never existed; and that I am talking to you, who are nothing\nbut a work of the imagination.\"\n\n\"Oh, la, indeed! and is it a dream that you're to be burned\nto-morrow?  Ho-ho--answer me that!\"\n\nThe shock that went through me was distressing.  I now began\nto reason that my situation was in the last degree serious, dream\nor no dream; for I knew by past experience of the lifelike intensity\nof dreams, that to be burned to death, even in a dream, would be\nvery far from being a jest, and was a thing to be avoided, by any\nmeans, fair or foul, that I could contrive.  So I said beseechingly:\n\n\"Ah, Clarence, good boy, only friend I've got,--for you _are_ my\nfriend, aren't you?--don't fail me; help me to devise some way\nof escaping from this place!\"\n\n\"Now do but hear thyself!  Escape?  Why, man, the corridors are\nin guard and keep of men-at-arms.\"\n\n\"No doubt, no doubt.  But how many, Clarence?  Not many, I hope?\"\n\n\"Full a score.  One may not hope to escape.\"  After a pause\n--hesitatingly: \"and there be other reasons--and weightier.\"\n\n\"Other ones? What are they?\"\n\n\"Well, they say--oh, but I daren't, indeed daren't!\"\n\n\"Why, poor lad, what is the matter?  Why do you blench?  Why do\nyou tremble so?\"\n\n\"Oh, in sooth, there is need!  I do want to tell you, but--\"\n\n\"Come, come, be brave, be a man--speak out, there's a good lad!\"\n\nHe hesitated, pulled one way by desire, the other way by fear;\nthen he stole to the door and peeped out, listening; and finally\ncrept close to me and put his mouth to my ear and told me his\nfearful news in a whisper, and with all the cowering apprehension\nof one who was venturing upon awful ground and speaking of things\nwhose very mention might be freighted with death.\n\n\"Merlin, in his malice, has woven a spell about this dungeon, and\nthere bides not the man in these kingdoms that would be desperate\nenough to essay to cross its lines with you!  Now God pity me,\nI have told it!  Ah, be kind to me, be merciful to a poor boy who\nmeans thee well; for an thou betray me I am lost!\"\n\nI laughed the only really refreshing laugh I had had for some time;\nand shouted:\n\n\"Merlin has wrought a spell!  _Merlin_, forsooth!  That cheap old\nhumbug, that maundering old ass?  Bosh, pure bosh, the silliest bosh\nin the world!  Why, it does seem to me that of all the childish,\nidiotic, chuckle-headed, chicken-livered superstitions that ev\n--oh, damn Merlin!\"\n\nBut Clarence had slumped to his knees before I had half finished,\nand he was like to go out of his mind with fright.\n\n\"Oh, beware!  These are awful words!  Any moment these walls\nmay crumble upon us if you say such things.  Oh call them back\nbefore it is too late!\"\n\nNow this strange exhibition gave me a good idea and set me to\nthinking.  If everybody about here was so honestly and sincerely\nafraid of Merlin's pretended magic as Clarence was, certainly\na superior man like me ought to be shrewd enough to contrive\nsome way to take advantage of such a state of things.  I went\non thinking, and worked out a plan. Then I said:\n\n\"Get up.  Pull yourself together; look me in the eye.  Do you\nknow why I laughed?\"\n\n\"No--but for our blessed Lady's sake, do it no more.\"\n\n\"Well, I'll tell you why I laughed.  Because I'm a magician myself.\"\n\n\"Thou!\"  The boy recoiled a step, and caught his breath, for\nthe thing hit him rather sudden; but the aspect which he took\non was very, very respectful.  I took quick note of that; it\nindicated that a humbug didn't need to have a reputation in this\nasylum; people stood ready to take him at his word, without that.\nI resumed.\n\n\"I've known Merlin seven hundred years, and he--\"\n\n\"Seven hun--\"\n\n\"Don't interrupt me.  He has died and come alive again thirteen\ntimes, and traveled under a new name every time: Smith, Jones,\nRobinson, Jackson, Peters, Haskins, Merlin--a new alias every\ntime he turns up.  I knew him in Egypt three hundred years ago;\nI knew him in India five hundred years ago--he is always blethering\naround in my way, everywhere I go; he makes me tired.  He don't\namount to shucks, as a magician; knows some of the old common\ntricks, but has never got beyond the rudiments, and never will.\nHe is well enough for the provinces--one-night stands and that\nsort of thing, you know--but dear me, _he_ oughtn't to set up for\nan expert--anyway not where there's a real artist.  Now look here,\nClarence, I am going to stand your friend, right along, and in\nreturn you must be mine.  I want you to do me a favor.  I want\nyou to get word to the king that I am a magician myself--and the\nSupreme Grand High-yu-Muck-amuck and head of the tribe, at that;\nand I want him to be made to understand that I am just quietly\narranging a little calamity here that will make the fur fly in these\nrealms if Sir Kay's project is carried out and any harm comes\nto me.  Will you get that to the king for me?\"\n\nThe poor boy was in such a state that he could hardly answer me.\nIt was pitiful to see a creature so terrified, so unnerved, so\ndemoralized.  But he promised everything; and on my side he made\nme promise over and over again that I would remain his friend, and\nnever turn against him or cast any enchantments upon him. Then\nhe worked his way out, staying himself with his hand along the\nwall, like a sick person.\n\nPresently this thought occurred to me: how heedless I have been!\nWhen the boy gets calm, he will wonder why a great magician like me\nshould have begged a boy like him to help me get out of this place;\nhe will put this and that together, and will see that I am a humbug.\n\nI worried over that heedless blunder for an hour, and called myself\na great many hard names, meantime.  But finally it occurred to me\nall of a sudden that these animals didn't reason; that _they_ never\nput this and that together; that all their talk showed that they\ndidn't know a discrepancy when they saw it.  I was at rest, then.\n\nBut as soon as one is at rest, in this world, off he goes on\nsomething else to worry about.  It occurred to me that I had made\nanother blunder: I had sent the boy off to alarm his betters with\na threat--I intending to invent a calamity at my leisure; now\nthe people who are the readiest and eagerest and willingest to\nswallow miracles are the very ones who are hungriest to see you\nperform them; suppose I should be called on for a sample?  Suppose\nI should be asked to name my calamity?  Yes, I had made a blunder;\nI ought to have invented my calamity first.  \"What shall I do?\nwhat can I say, to gain a little time?\"  I was in trouble again;\nin the deepest kind of trouble...\n\n\"There's a footstep!--they're coming.  If I had only just a moment\nto think....  Good, I've got it.  I'm all right.\"\n\nYou see, it was the eclipse.  It came into my mind in the nick\nof time, how Columbus, or Cortez, or one of those people, played\nan eclipse as a saving trump once, on some savages, and I saw my\nchance.  I could play it myself, now, and it wouldn't be any\nplagiarism, either, because I should get it in nearly a thousand\nyears ahead of those parties.\n\nClarence came in, subdued, distressed, and said:\n\n\"I hasted the message to our liege the king, and straightway he\nhad me to his presence.  He was frighted even to the marrow,\nand was minded to give order for your instant enlargement, and\nthat you be clothed in fine raiment and lodged as befitted one so\ngreat; but then came Merlin and spoiled all; for he persuaded\nthe king that you are mad, and know not whereof you speak; and\nsaid your threat is but foolishness and idle vaporing.  They\ndisputed long, but in the end, Merlin, scoffing, said, 'Wherefore\nhath he not _named_ his brave calamity?  Verily it is because he\ncannot.'  This thrust did in a most sudden sort close the king's\nmouth, and he could offer naught to turn the argument; and so,\nreluctant, and full loth to do you the discourtesy, he yet prayeth\nyou to consider his perplexed case, as noting how the matter stands,\nand name the calamity--if so be you have determined the nature\nof it and the time of its coming.  Oh, prithee delay not; to delay\nat such a time were to double and treble the perils that already\ncompass thee about.  Oh, be thou wise--name the calamity!\"\n\nI allowed silence to accumulate while I got my impressiveness\ntogether, and then said:\n\n\"How long have I been shut up in this hole?\"\n\n\"Ye were shut up when yesterday was well spent.  It is 9 of\nthe morning now.\"\n\n\"No!  Then I have slept well, sure enough.  Nine in the morning\nnow!  And yet it is the very complexion of midnight, to a shade.\nThis is the 20th, then?\"\n\n\"The 20th--yes.\"\n\n\"And I am to be burned alive to-morrow.\"  The boy shuddered.\n\n\"At what hour?\"\n\n\"At high noon.\"\n\n\"Now then, I will tell you what to say.\"  I paused, and stood over\nthat cowering lad a whole minute in awful silence; then, in a voice\ndeep, measured, charged with doom, I began, and rose by dramatically\ngraded stages to my colossal climax, which I delivered in as sublime\nand noble a way as ever I did such a thing in my life: \"Go back\nand tell the king that at that hour I will smother the whole world\nin the dead blackness of midnight; I will blot out the sun, and he\nshall never shine again; the fruits of the earth shall rot for lack\nof light and warmth, and the peoples of the earth shall famish\nand die, to the last man!\"\n\nI had to carry the boy out myself, he sunk into such a collapse.\nI handed him over to the soldiers, and went back.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE ECLIPSE\n\nIn the stillness and the darkness, realization soon began to\nsupplement knowledge.  The mere knowledge of a fact is pale; but\nwhen you come to _realize_ your fact, it takes on color. It is\nall the difference between hearing of a man being stabbed to\nthe heart, and seeing it done.  In the stillness and the darkness,\nthe knowledge that I was in deadly danger took to itself deeper\nand deeper meaning all the time; a something which was realization\ncrept inch by inch through my veins and turned me cold.\n\nBut it is a blessed provision of nature that at times like these,\nas soon as a man's mercury has got down to a certain point there\ncomes a revulsion, and he rallies.  Hope springs up, and cheerfulness\nalong with it, and then he is in good shape to do something for\nhimself, if anything can be done.  When my rally came, it came with\na bound.  I said to myself that my eclipse would be sure to save me,\nand make me the greatest man in the kingdom besides; and straightway\nmy mercury went up to the top of the tube, and my solicitudes\nall vanished.  I was as happy a man as there was in the world.\nI was even impatient for to-morrow to come, I so wanted to gather\nin that great triumph and be the center of all the nation's wonder\nand reverence.  Besides, in a business way it would be the making\nof me; I knew that.\n\nMeantime there was one thing which had got pushed into the background\nof my mind.  That was the half-conviction that when the nature\nof my proposed calamity should be reported to those superstitious\npeople, it would have such an effect that they would want to\ncompromise.  So, by and by when I heard footsteps coming, that\nthought was recalled to me, and I said to myself, \"As sure as\nanything, it's the compromise.  Well, if it is good, all right,\nI will accept; but if it isn't, I mean to stand my ground and play\nmy hand for all it is worth.\"\n\nThe door opened, and some men-at-arms appeared.  The leader said:\n\n\"The stake is ready. Come!\"\n\nThe stake!  The strength went out of me, and I almost fell down.\nIt is hard to get one's breath at such a time, such lumps come into\none's throat, and such gaspings; but as soon as I could speak, I said:\n\n\"But this is a mistake--the execution is to-morrow.\"\n\n\"Order changed; been set forward a day.  Haste thee!\"\n\nI was lost.  There was no help for me.  I was dazed, stupefied;\nI had no command over myself, I only wandered purposely about,\nlike one out of his mind; so the soldiers took hold of me, and\npulled me along with them, out of the cell and along the maze of\nunderground corridors, and finally into the fierce glare of daylight\nand the upper world.  As we stepped into the vast enclosed court\nof the castle I got a shock; for the first thing I saw was the stake,\nstanding in the center, and near it the piled fagots and a monk.\nOn all four sides of the court the seated multitudes rose rank\nabove rank, forming sloping terraces that were rich with color.\nThe king and the queen sat in their thrones, the most conspicuous\nfigures there, of course.\n\nTo note all this, occupied but a second.  The next second Clarence\nhad slipped from some place of concealment and was pouring news\ninto my ear, his eyes beaming with triumph and gladness.  He said:\n\n\"Tis through _me_ the change was wrought!  And main hard have I worked\nto do it, too.  But when I revealed to them the calamity in store,\nand saw how mighty was the terror it did engender, then saw I also\nthat this was the time to strike!  Wherefore I diligently pretended,\nunto this and that and the other one, that your power against the sun\ncould not reach its full until the morrow; and so if any would save\nthe sun and the world, you must be slain to-day, while your\nenchantments are but in the weaving and lack potency.  Odsbodikins,\nit was but a dull lie, a most indifferent invention, but you should\nhave seen them seize it and swallow it, in the frenzy of their\nfright, as it were salvation sent from heaven; and all the while\nwas I laughing in my sleeve the one moment, to see them so cheaply\ndeceived, and glorifying God the next, that He was content to let\nthe meanest of His creatures be His instrument to the saving of\nthy life.  Ah how happy has the matter sped!  You will not need\nto do the sun a _real_ hurt--ah, forget not that, on your soul forget\nit not!  Only make a little darkness--only the littlest little\ndarkness, mind, and cease with that.  It will be sufficient.  They\nwill see that I spoke falsely,--being ignorant, as they will fancy\n--and with the falling of the first shadow of that darkness you\nshall see them go mad with fear; and they will set you free and\nmake you great!  Go to thy triumph, now!  But remember--ah, good\nfriend, I implore thee remember my supplication, and do the blessed\nsun no hurt.  For _my_ sake, thy true friend.\"\n\nI choked out some words through my grief and misery; as much as\nto say I would spare the sun; for which the lad's eyes paid me back\nwith such deep and loving gratitude that I had not the heart\nto tell him his good-hearted foolishness had ruined me and sent me\nto my death.\n\nAs the soldiers assisted me across the court the stillness was\nso profound that if I had been blindfold I should have supposed\nI was in a solitude instead of walled in by four thousand people.\nThere was not a movement perceptible in those masses of humanity;\nthey were as rigid as stone images, and as pale; and dread sat\nupon every countenance.  This hush continued while I was being\nchained to the stake; it still continued while the fagots were\ncarefully and tediously piled about my ankles, my knees, my thighs,\nmy body.  Then there was a pause, and a deeper hush, if possible,\nand a man knelt down at my feet with a blazing torch; the multitude\nstrained forward, gazing, and parting slightly from their seats\nwithout knowing it; the monk raised his hands above my head, and\nhis eyes toward the blue sky, and began some words in Latin; in\nthis attitude he droned on and on, a little while, and then stopped.\nI waited two or three moments; then looked up; he was standing\nthere petrified.  With a common impulse the multitude rose slowly\nup and stared into the sky.  I followed their eyes, as sure as guns,\nthere was my eclipse beginning!  The life went boiling through\nmy veins; I was a new man!  The rim of black spread slowly into\nthe sun's disk, my heart beat higher and higher, and still the\nassemblage and the priest stared into the sky, motionless.  I knew\nthat this gaze would be turned upon me, next.  When it was, I was\nready.  I was in one of the most grand attitudes I ever struck,\nwith my arm stretched up pointing to the sun.  It was a noble\neffect.  You could _see_ the shudder sweep the mass like a wave.\nTwo shouts rang out, one close upon the heels of the other:\n\n\"Apply the torch!\"\n\n\"I forbid it!\"\n\nThe one was from Merlin, the other from the king.  Merlin started\nfrom his place--to apply the torch himself, I judged.  I said:\n\n\"Stay where you are.  If any man moves--even the king--before\nI give him leave, I will blast him with thunder, I will consume\nhim with lightnings!\"\n\nThe multitude sank meekly into their seats, and I was just expecting\nthey would.  Merlin hesitated a moment or two, and I was on pins\nand needles during that little while.  Then he sat down, and I took\na good breath; for I knew I was master of the situation now.\nThe king said:\n\n\"Be merciful, fair sir, and essay no further in this perilous matter,\nlest disaster follow.  It was reported to us that your powers could\nnot attain unto their full strength until the morrow; but--\"\n\n\"Your Majesty thinks the report may have been a lie?  It _was_ a lie.\"\n\nThat made an immense effect; up went appealing hands everywhere,\nand the king was assailed with a storm of supplications that\nI might be bought off at any price, and the calamity stayed.\nThe king was eager to comply. He said:\n\n\"Name any terms, reverend sir, even to the halving of my kingdom;\nbut banish this calamity, spare the sun!\"\n\nMy fortune was made.  I would have taken him up in a minute, but\nI couldn't stop an eclipse; the thing was out of the question.  So\nI asked time to consider.  The king said:\n\n\"How long--ah, how long, good sir?  Be merciful; look, it groweth\ndarker, moment by moment.  Prithee how long?\"\n\n\"Not long.  Half an hour--maybe an hour.\"\n\nThere were a thousand pathetic protests, but I couldn't shorten up\nany, for I couldn't remember how long a total eclipse lasts.  I was\nin a puzzled condition, anyway, and wanted to think.  Something\nwas wrong about that eclipse, and the fact was very unsettling.\nIf this wasn't the one I was after, how was I to tell whether this\nwas the sixth century, or nothing but a dream?  Dear me, if I could\nonly prove it was the latter!  Here was a glad new hope.  If the boy\nwas right about the date, and this was surely the 20th, it _wasn't_\nthe sixth century.  I reached for the monk's sleeve, in considerable\nexcitement, and asked him what day of the month it was.\n\nHang him, he said it was the _twenty-first_!  It made me turn cold\nto hear him.  I begged him not to make any mistake about it; but\nhe was sure; he knew it was the 21st.  So, that feather-headed\nboy had botched things again!  The time of the day was right\nfor the eclipse; I had seen that for myself, in the beginning,\nby the dial that was near by.  Yes, I was in King Arthur's court,\nand I might as well make the most out of it I could.\n\nThe darkness was steadily growing, the people becoming more and\nmore distressed.  I now said:\n\n\"I have reflected, Sir King.  For a lesson, I will let this darkness\nproceed, and spread night in the world; but whether I blot out\nthe sun for good, or restore it, shall rest with you.  These are\nthe terms, to wit: You shall remain king over all your dominions,\nand receive all the glories and honors that belong to the kingship;\nbut you shall appoint me your perpetual minister and executive,\nand give me for my services one per cent of such actual increase\nof revenue over and above its present amount as I may succeed\nin creating for the state.  If I can't live on that, I sha'n't ask\nanybody to give me a lift.  Is it satisfactory?\"\n\nThere was a prodigious roar of applause, and out of the midst\nof it the king's voice rose, saying:\n\n\"Away with his bonds, and set him free! and do him homage, high\nand low, rich and poor, for he is become the king's right hand,\nis clothed with power and authority, and his seat is upon the highest\nstep of the throne!  Now sweep away this creeping night, and bring\nthe light and cheer again, that all the world may bless thee.\"\n\nBut I said:\n\n\"That a common man should be shamed before the world, is nothing;\nbut it were dishonor to the _king_ if any that saw his minister naked\nshould not also see him delivered from his shame.  If I might ask\nthat my clothes be brought again--\"\n\n\"They are not meet,\" the king broke in.  \"Fetch raiment of another\nsort; clothe him like a prince!\"\n\nMy idea worked.  I wanted to keep things as they were till the\neclipse was total, otherwise they would be trying again to get\nme to dismiss the darkness, and of course I couldn't do it.  Sending\nfor the clothes gained some delay, but not enough.  So I had to make\nanother excuse.  I said it would be but natural if the king should\nchange his mind and repent to some extent of what he had done\nunder excitement; therefore I would let the darkness grow a while,\nand if at the end of a reasonable time the king had kept his mind\nthe same, the darkness should be dismissed.  Neither the king nor\nanybody else was satisfied with that arrangement, but I had\nto stick to my point.\n\nIt grew darker and darker and blacker and blacker, while I struggled\nwith those awkward sixth-century clothes.  It got to be pitch dark,\nat last, and the multitude groaned with horror to feel the cold\nuncanny night breezes fan through the place and see the stars\ncome out and twinkle in the sky.  At last the eclipse was total,\nand I was very glad of it, but everybody else was in misery; which\nwas quite natural. I said:\n\n\"The king, by his silence, still stands to the terms.\"  Then\nI lifted up my hands--stood just so a moment--then I said, with\nthe most awful solemnity: \"Let the enchantment dissolve and\npass harmless away!\"\n\nThere was no response, for a moment, in that deep darkness and\nthat graveyard hush.  But when the silver rim of the sun pushed\nitself out, a moment or two later, the assemblage broke loose with\na vast shout and came pouring down like a deluge to smother me\nwith blessings and gratitude; and Clarence was not the last of\nthe wash, to be sure.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nMERLIN'S TOWER\n\nInasmuch as I was now the second personage in the Kingdom, as far\nas political power and authority were concerned, much was made\nof me.  My raiment was of silks and velvets and cloth of gold,\nand by consequence was very showy, also uncomfortable.  But habit\nwould soon reconcile me to my clothes; I was aware of that.  I was\ngiven the choicest suite of apartments in the castle, after\nthe king's.  They were aglow with loud-colored silken hangings,\nbut the stone floors had nothing but rushes on them for a carpet,\nand they were misfit rushes at that, being not all of one breed.\nAs for conveniences, properly speaking, there weren't any.  I mean\n_little_ conveniences; it is the little conveniences that make\nthe real comfort of life.  The big oaken chairs, graced with rude\ncarvings, were well enough, but that was the stopping place.\nThere was no soap, no matches, no looking-glass--except a metal\none, about as powerful as a pail of water.  And not a chromo.\nI had been used to chromos for years, and I saw now that without\nmy suspecting it a passion for art had got worked into the fabric\nof my being, and was become a part of me.  It made me homesick\nto look around over this proud and gaudy but heartless barrenness\nand remember that in our house in East Hartford, all unpretending\nas it was, you couldn't go into a room but you would find an\ninsurance-chromo, or at least a three-color God-Bless-Our-Home\nover the door; and in the parlor we had nine.  But here, even in\nmy grand room of state, there wasn't anything in the nature of\na picture except a thing the size of a bedquilt, which was either\nwoven or knitted (it had darned places in it), and nothing in it\nwas the right color or the right shape; and as for proportions,\neven Raphael himself couldn't have botched them more formidably,\nafter all his practice on those nightmares they call his \"celebrated\nHampton Court cartoons.\"  Raphael was a bird.  We had several\nof his chromos; one was his \"Miraculous Draught of Fishes,\" where\nhe puts in a miracle of his own--puts three men into a canoe which\nwouldn't have held a dog without upsetting.  I always admired\nto study R.'s art, it was so fresh and unconventional.\n\nThere wasn't even a bell or a speaking-tube in the castle.  I had\na great many servants, and those that were on duty lolled in the\nanteroom; and when I wanted one of them I had to go and call for him.\nThere was no gas, there were no candles; a bronze dish half full\nof boarding-house butter with a blazing rag floating in it was\nthe thing that produced what was regarded as light.  A lot of\nthese hung along the walls and modified the dark, just toned it\ndown enough to make it dismal.  If you went out at night, your\nservants carried torches.  There were no books, pens, paper or\nink, and no glass in the openings they believed to be windows.\nIt is a little thing--glass is--until it is absent, then it becomes\na big thing.  But perhaps the worst of all was, that there wasn't\nany sugar, coffee, tea, or tobacco.  I saw that I was just another\nRobinson Crusoe cast away on an uninhabited island, with no society\nbut some more or less tame animals, and if I wanted to make life\nbearable I must do as he did--invent, contrive, create, reorganize\nthings; set brain and hand to work, and keep them busy.  Well,\nthat was in my line.\n\nOne thing troubled me along at first--the immense interest which\npeople took in me.  Apparently the whole nation wanted a look\nat me.  It soon transpired that the eclipse had scared the British\nworld almost to death; that while it lasted the whole country,\nfrom one end to the other, was in a pitiable state of panic, and\nthe churches, hermitages, and monkeries overflowed with praying\nand weeping poor creatures who thought the end of the world was\ncome.  Then had followed the news that the producer of this awful\nevent was a stranger, a mighty magician at Arthur's court; that he\ncould have blown out the sun like a candle, and was just going\nto do it when his mercy was purchased, and he then dissolved\nhis enchantments, and was now recognized and honored as the man\nwho had by his unaided might saved the globe from destruction and\nits peoples from extinction.  Now if you consider that everybody\nbelieved that, and not only believed it, but never even dreamed\nof doubting it, you will easily understand that there was not\na person in all Britain that would not have walked fifty miles\nto get a sight of me.  Of course I was all the talk--all other\nsubjects were dropped; even the king became suddenly a person of\nminor interest and notoriety.  Within twenty-four hours the\ndelegations began to arrive, and from that time onward for a fortnight\nthey kept coming.  The village was crowded, and all the countryside.\nI had to go out a dozen times a day and show myself to these\nreverent and awe-stricken multitudes.  It came to be a great burden,\nas to time and trouble, but of course it was at the same time\ncompensatingly agreeable to be so celebrated and such a center\nof homage.  It turned Brer Merlin green with envy and spite, which\nwas a great satisfaction to me.  But there was one thing I couldn't\nunderstand--nobody had asked for an autograph.  I spoke to Clarence\nabout it.  By George!  I had to explain to him what it was.  Then\nhe said nobody in the country could read or write but a few dozen\npriests.  Land! think of that.\n\nThere was another thing that troubled me a little.  Those multitudes\npresently began to agitate for another miracle.  That was natural.\nTo be able to carry back to their far homes the boast that they\nhad seen the man who could command the sun, riding in the heavens,\nand be obeyed, would make them great in the eyes of their neighbors,\nand envied by them all; but to be able to also say they had seen\nhim work a miracle themselves--why, people would come a distance\nto see _them_.  The pressure got to be pretty strong.  There was\ngoing to be an eclipse of the moon, and I knew the date and hour,\nbut it was too far away.  Two years.  I would have given a good\ndeal for license to hurry it up and use it now when there was\na big market for it.  It seemed a great pity to have it wasted so,\nand come lagging along at a time when a body wouldn't have any\nuse for it, as like as not.  If it had been booked for only a month\naway, I could have sold it short; but, as matters stood, I couldn't\nseem to cipher out any way to make it do me any good, so I gave up\ntrying.  Next, Clarence found that old Merlin was making himself\nbusy on the sly among those people.  He was spreading a report that\nI was a humbug, and that the reason I didn't accommodate the people\nwith a miracle was because I couldn't.  I saw that I must do\nsomething.  I presently thought out a plan.\n\nBy my authority as executive I threw Merlin into prison--the same\ncell I had occupied myself.  Then I gave public notice by herald\nand trumpet that I should be busy with affairs of state for\na fortnight, but about the end of that time I would take a moment's\nleisure and blow up Merlin's stone tower by fires from heaven;\nin the meantime, whoso listened to evil reports about me, let him\nbeware.  Furthermore, I would perform but this one miracle at\nthis time, and no more; if it failed to satisfy and any murmured,\nI would turn the murmurers into horses, and make them useful.\nQuiet ensued.\n\nI took Clarence into my confidence, to a certain degree, and we\nwent to work privately.  I told him that this was a sort of miracle\nthat required a trifle of preparation, and that it would be sudden\ndeath to ever talk about these preparations to anybody.  That made\nhis mouth safe enough.  Clandestinely we made a few bushels of\nfirst-rate blasting powder, and I superintended my armorers while\nthey constructed a lightning-rod and some wires.  This old stone\ntower was very massive--and rather ruinous, too, for it was Roman,\nand four hundred years old.  Yes, and handsome, after a rude\nfashion, and clothed with ivy from base to summit, as with a shirt\nof scale mail.  It stood on a lonely eminence, in good view from\nthe castle, and about half a mile away.\n\nWorking by night, we stowed the powder in the tower--dug stones\nout, on the inside, and buried the powder in the walls themselves,\nwhich were fifteen feet thick at the base.  We put in a peck\nat a time, in a dozen places.  We could have blown up the Tower\nof London with these charges.  When the thirteenth night was come\nwe put up our lightning-rod, bedded it in one of the batches of\npowder, and ran wires from it to the other batches.  Everybody\nhad shunned that locality from the day of my proclamation, but\non the morning of the fourteenth I thought best to warn the people,\nthrough the heralds, to keep clear away--a quarter of a mile away.\nThen added, by command, that at some time during the twenty-four\nhours I would consummate the miracle, but would first give a brief\nnotice; by flags on the castle towers if in the daytime, by\ntorch-baskets in the same places if at night.\n\nThunder-showers had been tolerably frequent of late, and I was\nnot much afraid of a failure; still, I shouldn't have cared for\na delay of a day or two; I should have explained that I was busy\nwith affairs of state yet, and the people must wait.\n\nOf course, we had a blazing sunny day--almost the first one without\na cloud for three weeks; things always happen so.  I kept secluded,\nand watched the weather.  Clarence dropped in from time to time\nand said the public excitement was growing and growing all the\ntime, and the whole country filling up with human masses as far\nas one could see from the battlements.  At last the wind sprang up\nand a cloud appeared--in the right quarter, too, and just at\nnightfall.  For a little while I watched that distant cloud spread\nand blacken, then I judged it was time for me to appear.  I ordered\nthe torch-baskets to be lit, and Merlin liberated and sent to me.\nA quarter of an hour later I ascended the parapet and there found\nthe king and the court assembled and gazing off in the darkness\ntoward Merlin's Tower.  Already the darkness was so heavy that\none could not see far; these people and the old turrets, being\npartly in deep shadow and partly in the red glow from the great\ntorch-baskets overhead, made a good deal of a picture.\n\nMerlin arrived in a gloomy mood.  I said:\n\n\"You wanted to burn me alive when I had not done you any harm,\nand latterly you have been trying to injure my professional\nreputation.  Therefore I am going to call down fire and blow up\nyour tower, but it is only fair to give you a chance; now if you\nthink you can break my enchantments and ward off the fires, step\nto the bat, it's your innings.\"\n\n\"I can, fair sir, and I will. Doubt it not.\"\n\nHe drew an imaginary circle on the stones of the roof, and burnt\na pinch of powder in it, which sent up a small cloud of aromatic\nsmoke, whereat everybody fell back and began to cross themselves\nand get uncomfortable.  Then he began to mutter and make passes\nin the air with his hands.  He worked himself up slowly and\ngradually into a sort of frenzy, and got to thrashing around with\nhis arms like the sails of a windmill.  By this time the storm had\nabout reached us; the gusts of wind were flaring the torches and\nmaking the shadows swash about, the first heavy drops of rain\nwere falling, the world abroad was black as pitch, the lightning\nbegan to wink fitfully.  Of course, my rod would be loading itself\nnow.  In fact, things were imminent. So I said:\n\n\"You have had time enough.  I have given you every advantage,\nand not interfered.  It is plain your magic is weak. It is only\nfair that I begin now.\"\n\nI made about three passes in the air, and then there was an awful\ncrash and that old tower leaped into the sky in chunks, along\nwith a vast volcanic fountain of fire that turned night to noonday,\nand showed a thousand acres of human beings groveling on the ground\nin a general collapse of consternation.  Well, it rained mortar and\nmasonry the rest of the week.  This was the report; but probably\nthe facts would have modified it.\n\nIt was an effective miracle.  The great bothersome temporary\npopulation vanished.  There were a good many thousand tracks\nin the mud the next morning, but they were all outward bound.\nIf I had advertised another miracle I couldn't have raised an\naudience with a sheriff.\n\nMerlin's stock was flat.  The king wanted to stop his wages; he\neven wanted to banish him, but I interfered.  I said he would be\nuseful to work the weather, and attend to small matters like that,\nand I would give him a lift now and then when his poor little\nparlor-magic soured on him.  There wasn't a rag of his tower left,\nbut I had the government rebuild it for him, and advised him\nto take boarders; but he was too high-toned for that.  And as for\nbeing grateful, he never even said thank you.  He was a rather\nhard lot, take him how you might; but then you couldn't fairly\nexpect a man to be sweet that had been set back so.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE BOSS\n\nTo be vested with enormous authority is a fine thing; but to have\nthe on-looking world consent to it is a finer.  The tower episode\nsolidified my power, and made it impregnable.  If any were perchance\ndisposed to be jealous and critical before that, they experienced\na change of heart, now.  There was not any one in the kingdom\nwho would have considered it good judgment to meddle with my matters.\n\nI was fast getting adjusted to my situation and circumstances.\nFor a time, I used to wake up, mornings, and smile at my \"dream,\"\nand listen for the Colt's factory whistle; but that sort of thing\nplayed itself out, gradually, and at last I was fully able to realize\nthat I was actually living in the sixth century, and in Arthur's\ncourt, not a lunatic asylum.  After that, I was just as much\nat home in that century as I could have been in any other; and\nas for preference, I wouldn't have traded it for the twentieth.\nLook at the opportunities here for a man of knowledge, brains,\npluck, and enterprise to sail in and grow up with the country.\nThe grandest field that ever was; and all my own; not a competitor;\nnot a man who wasn't a baby to me in acquirements and capacities;\nwhereas, what would I amount to in the twentieth century?  I should\nbe foreman of a factory, that is about all; and could drag a seine\ndown street any day and catch a hundred better men than myself.\n\nWhat a jump I had made!  I couldn't keep from thinking about it,\nand contemplating it, just as one does who has struck oil.  There\nwas nothing back of me that could approach it, unless it might be\nJoseph's case; and Joseph's only approached it, it didn't equal\nit, quite.  For it stands to reason that as Joseph's splendid\nfinancial ingenuities advantaged nobody but the king, the general\npublic must have regarded him with a good deal of disfavor, whereas\nI had done my entire public a kindness in sparing the sun, and was\npopular by reason of it.\n\nI was no shadow of a king; I was the substance; the king himself\nwas the shadow.  My power was colossal; and it was not a mere\nname, as such things have generally been, it was the genuine\narticle.  I stood here, at the very spring and source of the second\ngreat period of the world's history; and could see the trickling\nstream of that history gather and deepen and broaden, and roll\nits mighty tides down the far centuries; and I could note the\nupspringing of adventurers like myself in the shelter of its long\narray of thrones: De Montforts, Gavestons, Mortimers, Villierses;\nthe war-making, campaign-directing wantons of France, and Charles\nthe Second's scepter-wielding drabs; but nowhere in the procession\nwas my full-sized fellow visible.  I was a Unique; and glad to know\nthat that fact could not be dislodged or challenged for thirteen\ncenturies and a half, for sure.  Yes, in power I was equal to\nthe king.  At the same time there was another power that was\na trifle stronger than both of us put together.  That was the Church.\nI do not wish to disguise that fact.  I couldn't, if I wanted to.\nBut never mind about that, now; it will show up, in its proper\nplace, later on.  It didn't cause me any trouble in the beginning\n--at least any of consequence.\n\nWell, it was a curious country, and full of interest.  And the\npeople!  They were the quaintest and simplest and trustingest race;\nwhy, they were nothing but rabbits.  It was pitiful for a person\nborn in a wholesome free atmosphere to listen to their humble\nand hearty outpourings of loyalty toward their king and Church\nand nobility; as if they had any more occasion to love and honor\nking and Church and noble than a slave has to love and honor\nthe lash, or a dog has to love and honor the stranger that kicks him!\nWhy, dear me, _any_ kind of royalty, howsoever modified, _any_ kind\nof aristocracy, howsoever pruned, is rightly an insult; but if you\nare born and brought up under that sort of arrangement you probably\nnever find it out for yourself, and don't believe it when somebody\nelse tells you.  It is enough to make a body ashamed of his race\nto think of the sort of froth that has always occupied its thrones\nwithout shadow of right or reason, and the seventh-rate people\nthat have always figured as its aristocracies--a company of monarchs\nand nobles who, as a rule, would have achieved only poverty and\nobscurity if left, like their betters, to their own exertions.\n\nThe most of King Arthur's British nation were slaves, pure and\nsimple, and bore that name, and wore the iron collar on their\nnecks; and the rest were slaves in fact, but without the name;\nthey imagined themselves men and freemen, and called themselves\nso.  The truth was, the nation as a body was in the world for one\nobject, and one only: to grovel before king and Church and noble;\nto slave for them, sweat blood for them, starve that they might\nbe fed, work that they might play, drink misery to the dregs that\nthey might be happy, go naked that they might wear silks and\njewels, pay taxes that they might be spared from paying them,\nbe familiar all their lives with the degrading language and postures\nof adulation that they might walk in pride and think themselves\nthe gods of this world.  And for all this, the thanks they got were\ncuffs and contempt; and so poor-spirited were they that they took\neven this sort of attention as an honor.\n\nInherited ideas are a curious thing, and interesting to observe\nand examine.  I had mine, the king and his people had theirs.\nIn both cases they flowed in ruts worn deep by time and habit,\nand the man who should have proposed to divert them by reason\nand argument would have had a long contract on his hands.  For\ninstance, those people had inherited the idea that all men without\ntitle and a long pedigree, whether they had great natural gifts\nand acquirements or hadn't, were creatures of no more consideration\nthan so many animals, bugs, insects; whereas I had inherited the idea\nthat human daws who can consent to masquerade in the peacock-shams\nof inherited dignities and unearned titles, are of no good but\nto be laughed at.  The way I was looked upon was odd, but it was\nnatural.  You know how the keeper and the public regard the elephant\nin the menagerie: well, that is the idea.  They are full of\nadmiration of his vast bulk and his prodigious strength; they\nspeak with pride of the fact that he can do a hundred marvels\nwhich are far and away beyond their own powers; and they speak\nwith the same pride of the fact that in his wrath he is able\nto drive a thousand men before him.  But does that make him one\nof _them_?  No; the raggedest tramp in the pit would smile at\nthe idea.  He couldn't comprehend it; couldn't take it in; couldn't\nin any remote way conceive of it.  Well, to the king, the nobles,\nand all the nation, down to the very slaves and tramps, I was\njust that kind of an elephant, and nothing more.  I was admired,\nalso feared; but it was as an animal is admired and feared.\nThe animal is not reverenced, neither was I; I was not even\nrespected.  I had no pedigree, no inherited title; so in the king's\nand nobles' eyes I was mere dirt; the people regarded me with\nwonder and awe, but there was no reverence mixed with it; through\nthe force of inherited ideas they were not able to conceive of\nanything being entitled to that except pedigree and lordship.\nThere you see the hand of that awful power, the Roman Catholic\nChurch.  In two or three little centuries it had converted a nation\nof men to a nation of worms.  Before the day of the Church's\nsupremacy in the world, men were men, and held their heads up,\nand had a man's pride and spirit and independence; and what\nof greatness and position a person got, he got mainly by achievement,\nnot by birth.  But then the Church came to the front, with an axe\nto grind; and she was wise, subtle, and knew more than one way\nto skin a cat--or a nation; she invented \"divine right of kings,\"\nand propped it all around, brick by brick, with the Beatitudes\n--wrenching them from their good purpose to make them fortify\nan evil one; she preached (to the commoner) humility, obedience\nto superiors, the beauty of self-sacrifice; she preached (to the\ncommoner) meekness under insult; preached (still to the commoner,\nalways to the commoner) patience, meanness of spirit, non-resistance\nunder oppression; and she introduced heritable ranks and\naristocracies, and taught all the Christian populations of the earth\nto bow down to them and worship them.  Even down to my birth-century\nthat poison was still in the blood of Christendom, and the best\nof English commoners was still content to see his inferiors\nimpudently continuing to hold a number of positions, such as\nlordships and the throne, to which the grotesque laws of his country\ndid not allow him to aspire; in fact, he was not merely contented\nwith this strange condition of things, he was even able to persuade\nhimself that he was proud of it.  It seems to show that there isn't\nanything you can't stand, if you are only born and bred to it.\nOf course that taint, that reverence for rank and title, had been\nin our American blood, too--I know that; but when I left America\nit had disappeared--at least to all intents and purposes.  The\nremnant of it was restricted to the dudes and dudesses.  When\na disease has worked its way down to that level, it may fairly\nbe said to be out of the system.\n\nBut to return to my anomalous position in King Arthur's kingdom.\nHere I was, a giant among pigmies, a man among children, a master\nintelligence among intellectual moles: by all rational measurement\nthe one and only actually great man in that whole British world;\nand yet there and then, just as in the remote England of my\nbirth-time, the sheep-witted earl who could claim long descent\nfrom a king's leman, acquired at second-hand from the slums of\nLondon, was a better man than I was.  Such a personage was fawned\nupon in Arthur's realm and reverently looked up to by everybody,\neven though his dispositions were as mean as his intelligence,\nand his morals as base as his lineage.  There were times when\n_he_ could sit down in the king's presence, but I couldn't.  I could\nhave got a title easily enough, and that would have raised me\na large step in everybody's eyes; even in the king's, the giver\nof it.  But I didn't ask for it; and I declined it when it was\noffered.  I couldn't have enjoyed such a thing with my notions;\nand it wouldn't have been fair, anyway, because as far back as\nI could go, our tribe had always been short of the bar sinister.\nI couldn't have felt really and satisfactorily fine and proud\nand set-up over any title except one that should come from the nation\nitself, the only legitimate source; and such an one I hoped to win;\nand in the course of years of honest and honorable endeavor, I did\nwin it and did wear it with a high and clean pride.  This title\nfell casually from the lips of a blacksmith, one day, in a village,\nwas caught up as a happy thought and tossed from mouth to mouth\nwith a laugh and an affirmative vote; in ten days it had swept\nthe kingdom, and was become as familiar as the king's name.  I was\nnever known by any other designation afterward, whether in the\nnation's talk or in grave debate upon matters of state at the\ncouncil-board of the sovereign.  This title, translated into modern\nspeech, would be THE BOSS.  Elected by the nation.  That suited me.\nAnd it was a pretty high title.  There were very few THE'S, and\nI was one of them.  If you spoke of the duke, or the earl, or\nthe bishop, how could anybody tell which one you meant?  But if\nyou spoke of The King or The Queen or The Boss, it was different.\n\nWell, I liked the king, and as king I respected him--respected\nthe office; at least respected it as much as I was capable of\nrespecting any unearned supremacy; but as MEN I looked down upon\nhim and his nobles--privately.  And he and they liked me, and\nrespected my office; but as an animal, without birth or sham title,\nthey looked down upon me--and were not particularly private about it,\neither.  I didn't charge for my opinion about them, and they didn't\ncharge for their opinion about me: the account was square, the\nbooks balanced, everybody was satisfied.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE TOURNAMENT\n\nThey were always having grand tournaments there at Camelot; and\nvery stirring and picturesque and ridiculous human bull-fights\nthey were, too, but just a little wearisome to the practical mind.\nHowever, I was generally on hand--for two reasons: a man must\nnot hold himself aloof from the things which his friends and his\ncommunity have at heart if he would be liked--especially as\na statesman; and both as business man and statesman I wanted\nto study the tournament and see if I couldn't invent an improvement\non it.  That reminds me to remark, in passing, that the very first\nofficial thing I did, in my administration--and it was on the very\nfirst day of it, too--was to start a patent office; for I knew\nthat a country without a patent office and good patent laws was\njust a crab, and couldn't travel any way but sideways or backways.\n\nThings ran along, a tournament nearly every week; and now and then\nthe boys used to want me to take a hand--I mean Sir Launcelot and\nthe rest--but I said I would by and by; no hurry yet, and too much\ngovernment machinery to oil up and set to rights and start a-going.\n\nWe had one tournament which was continued from day to day during\nmore than a week, and as many as five hundred knights took part\nin it, from first to last.  They were weeks gathering.  They came\non horseback from everywhere; from the very ends of the country,\nand even from beyond the sea; and many brought ladies, and all\nbrought squires and troops of servants.  It was a most gaudy and\ngorgeous crowd, as to costumery, and very characteristic of the\ncountry and the time, in the way of high animal spirits, innocent\nindecencies of language, and happy-hearted indifference to morals.\nIt was fight or look on, all day and every day; and sing, gamble,\ndance, carouse half the night every night.  They had a most noble\ngood time.  You never saw such people.  Those banks of beautiful\nladies, shining in their barbaric splendors, would see a knight\nsprawl from his horse in the lists with a lanceshaft the thickness\nof your ankle clean through him and the blood spouting, and instead\nof fainting they would clap their hands and crowd each other for a\nbetter view; only sometimes one would dive into her handkerchief,\nand look ostentatiously broken-hearted, and then you could lay\ntwo to one that there was a scandal there somewhere and she was\nafraid the public hadn't found it out.\n\nThe noise at night would have been annoying to me ordinarily, but\nI didn't mind it in the present circumstances, because it kept me\nfrom hearing the quacks detaching legs and arms from the day's\ncripples.  They ruined an uncommon good old cross-cut saw for me,\nand broke the saw-buck, too, but I let it pass.  And as for my\naxe--well, I made up my mind that the next time I lent an axe\nto a surgeon I would pick my century.\n\nI not only watched this tournament from day to day, but detailed\nan intelligent priest from my Department of Public Morals and\nAgriculture, and ordered him to report it; for it was my purpose\nby and by, when I should have gotten the people along far enough,\nto start a newspaper.  The first thing you want in a new country,\nis a patent office; then work up your school system; and after that,\nout with your paper.  A newspaper has its faults, and plenty of them,\nbut no matter, it's hark from the tomb for a dead nation, and don't\nyou forget it.  You can't resurrect a dead nation without it; there\nisn't any way.  So I wanted to sample things, and be finding out\nwhat sort of reporter-material I might be able to rake together out\nof the sixth century when I should come to need it.\n\nWell, the priest did very well, considering.  He got in all\nthe details, and that is a good thing in a local item: you see,\nhe had kept books for the undertaker-department of his church\nwhen he was younger, and there, you know, the money's in the details;\nthe more details, the more swag: bearers, mutes, candles, prayers\n--everything counts; and if the bereaved don't buy prayers enough\nyou mark up your candles with a forked pencil, and your bill\nshows up all right.  And he had a good knack at getting in the\ncomplimentary thing here and there about a knight that was likely\nto advertise--no, I mean a knight that had influence; and he also\nhad a neat gift of exaggeration, for in his time he had kept door\nfor a pious hermit who lived in a sty and worked miracles.\n\nOf course this novice's report lacked whoop and crash and lurid\ndescription, and therefore wanted the true ring; but its antique\nwording was quaint and sweet and simple, and full of the fragrances\nand flavors of the time, and these little merits made up in a measure\nfor its more important lacks.  Here is an extract from it:\n\n  Then Sir Brian de les Isles and Grummore Grummorsum,\n  knights of the castle, encountered with Sir Aglovale and\n  Sir Tor, and Sir Tor smote down Sir Grummore Grummorsum\n  to the earth.  Then came Sir Carados of the dolorous\n  tower, and Sir Turquine, knights of the castle, and\n  there encountered with them Sir Percivale de Galis\n  and Sir Lamorak de Galis, that were two brethren, and\n  there encountered Sir Percivale with Sir Carados, and\n  either brake their spears unto their hands, and then\n  Sir Turquine with Sir Lamorak, and either of them smote\n  down other, horse and all, to the earth, and either\n  parties rescued other and horsed them again.  And Sir\n  Arnold, and Sir Gauter, knights of the castle,\n  encountered with Sir Brandiles and Sir Kay, and these\n  four knights encountered mightily, and brake their\n  spears to their hands.  Then came Sir Pertolope from\n  the castle, and there encountered with him Sir Lionel,\n  and there Sir Pertolope the green knight smote down Sir\n  Lionel, brother to Sir Launcelot.  All this was marked\n  by noble heralds, who bare him best, and their names.\n  Then Sir Bleobaris brake his spear upon Sir Gareth,\n  but of that stroke Sir Bleobaris fell to the earth.\n  When Sir Galihodin saw that, he bad Sir Gareth keep him,\n  and Sir Gareth smote him to the earth.  Then Sir Galihud\n  gat a spear to avenge his brother, and in the same wise\n  Sir Gareth served him, and Sir Dinadan and his brother\n  La Cote Male Taile, and Sir Sagramore le Disirous, and\n  Sir Dodinas le Savage; all these he bare down with one\n  spear.  When King Aswisance of Ireland saw Sir Gareth\n  fare so he marvelled what he might be, that one time\n  seemed green, and another time, at his again coming,\n  he seemed blue.  And thus at every course that he rode\n  to and fro he changed his color, so that there might\n  neither king nor knight have ready cognizance of him.\n  Then Sir Agwisance the King of Ireland encountered\n  with Sir Gareth, and there Sir Gareth smote him from\n  his horse, saddle and all.  And then came King Carados\n  of Scotland, and Sir Gareth smote him down horse and\n  man.  And in the same wise he served King Uriens of the\n  land of Gore.  And then there came in Sir Bagdemagus,\n  and Sir Gareth smote him down horse and man to the\n  earth.  And Bagdemagus's son Meliganus brake a spear\n  upon Sir Gareth mightily and knightly.  And then Sir\n  Galahault the noble prince cried on high, Knight with\n  the many colors, well hast thou justed; now make thee\n  ready that I may just with thee.  Sir Gareth heard him,\n  and he gat a great spear, and so they encountered\n  together, and there the prince brake his spear; but Sir\n  Gareth smote him upon the left side of the helm, that\n  he reeled here and there, and he had fallen down had not\n  his men recovered him.  Truly, said King Arthur, that\n  knight with the many colors is a good knight.  Wherefore\n  the king called unto him Sir Launcelot, and prayed him\n  to encounter with that knight.  Sir, said Launcelot, I\n  may as well find in my heart for to forbear him at\n  this time, for he hath had travail enough this day, and\n  when a good knight doth so well upon some day, it is\n  no good knight's part to let him of his worship, and,\n  namely, when he seeth a knight hath done so great\n  labour; for peradventure, said Sir Launcelot, his\n  quarrel is here this day, and peradventure he is best\n  beloved with this lady of all that be here, for I see\n  well he paineth himself and enforceth him to do great\n  deeds, and therefore, said Sir Launcelot, as for me,\n  this day he shall have the honour; though it lay in my\n  power to put him from it, I would not.\n\nThere was an unpleasant little episode that day, which for reasons\nof state I struck out of my priest's report.  You will have noticed\nthat Garry was doing some great fighting in the engagement.  When\nI say Garry I mean Sir Gareth.  Garry was my private pet name\nfor him; it suggests that I had a deep affection for him, and that\nwas the case.  But it was a private pet name only, and never spoken\naloud to any one, much less to him; being a noble, he would not\nhave endured a familiarity like that from me.  Well, to proceed:\nI sat in the private box set apart for me as the king's minister.\nWhile Sir Dinadan was waiting for his turn to enter the lists,\nhe came in there and sat down and began to talk; for he was always\nmaking up to me, because I was a stranger and he liked to have\na fresh market for his jokes, the most of them having reached that\nstage of wear where the teller has to do the laughing himself while\nthe other person looks sick.  I had always responded to his efforts\nas well as I could, and felt a very deep and real kindness for him,\ntoo, for the reason that if by malice of fate he knew the one\nparticular anecdote which I had heard oftenest and had most hated\nand most loathed all my life, he had at least spared it me.  It was\none which I had heard attributed to every humorous person who\nhad ever stood on American soil, from Columbus down to Artemus Ward.\nIt was about a humorous lecturer who flooded an ignorant audience\nwith the killingest jokes for an hour and never got a laugh; and\nthen when he was leaving, some gray simpletons wrung him gratefully\nby the hand and said it had been the funniest thing they had ever\nheard, and \"it was all they could do to keep from laughin' right\nout in meetin'.\"  That anecdote never saw the day that it was\nworth the telling; and yet I had sat under the telling of it\nhundreds and thousands and millions and billions of times, and\ncried and cursed all the way through.  Then who can hope to know\nwhat my feelings were, to hear this armor-plated ass start in on\nit again, in the murky twilight of tradition, before the dawn of\nhistory, while even Lactantius might be referred to as \"the late\nLactantius,\" and the Crusades wouldn't be born for five hundred\nyears yet?  Just as he finished, the call-boy came; so, haw-hawing\nlike a demon, he went rattling and clanking out like a crate of\nloose castings, and I knew nothing more.  It was some minutes\nbefore I came to, and then I opened my eyes just in time to see\nSir Gareth fetch him an awful welt, and I unconsciously out with\nthe prayer, \"I hope to gracious he's killed!\"  But by ill-luck,\nbefore I had got half through with the words, Sir Gareth crashed\ninto Sir Sagramor le Desirous and sent him thundering over his\nhorse's crupper, and Sir Sagramor caught my remark and thought\nI meant it for _him_.\n\nWell, whenever one of those people got a thing into his head,\nthere was no getting it out again.  I knew that, so I saved my\nbreath, and offered no explanations.  As soon as Sir Sagramor\ngot well, he notified me that there was a little account to settle\nbetween us, and he named a day three or four years in the future;\nplace of settlement, the lists where the offense had been given.\nI said I would be ready when he got back.  You see, he was going\nfor the Holy Grail.  The boys all took a flier at the Holy Grail\nnow and then.  It was a several years' cruise.  They always put in\nthe long absence snooping around, in the most conscientious way,\nthough none of them had any idea where the Holy Grail really was,\nand I don't think any of them actually expected to find it, or\nwould have known what to do with it if he _had_ run across it.\nYou see, it was just the Northwest Passage of that day, as you may\nsay; that was all.  Every year expeditions went out holy grailing,\nand next year relief expeditions went out to hunt for _them_.  There\nwas worlds of reputation in it, but no money.  Why, they actually\nwanted _me_ to put in!  Well, I should smile.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nBEGINNINGS OF CIVILIZATION\n\nThe Round Table soon heard of the challenge, and of course it was\na good deal discussed, for such things interested the boys.\nThe king thought I ought now to set forth in quest of adventures,\nso that I might gain renown and be the more worthy to meet\nSir Sagramor when the several years should have rolled away.\nI excused myself for the present; I said it would take me three\nor four years yet to get things well fixed up and going smoothly;\nthen I should be ready; all the chances were that at the end of\nthat time Sir Sagramor would still be out grailing, so no valuable\ntime would be lost by the postponement; I should then have been\nin office six or seven years, and I believed my system and machinery\nwould be so well developed that I could take a holiday without\nits working any harm.\n\nI was pretty well satisfied with what I had already accomplished.\nIn various quiet nooks and corners I had the beginnings of all\nsorts of industries under way--nuclei of future vast factories,\nthe iron and steel missionaries of my future civilization.  In these\nwere gathered together the brightest young minds I could find,\nand I kept agents out raking the country for more, all the time.\nI was training a crowd of ignorant folk into experts--experts\nin every sort of handiwork and scientific calling.  These nurseries\nof mine went smoothly and privately along undisturbed in their\nobscure country retreats, for nobody was allowed to come into their\nprecincts without a special permit--for I was afraid of the Church.\n\nI had started a teacher-factory and a lot of Sunday-schools the\nfirst thing; as a result, I now had an admirable system of graded\nschools in full blast in those places, and also a complete variety\nof Protestant congregations all in a prosperous and growing\ncondition.  Everybody could be any kind of a Christian he wanted\nto; there was perfect freedom in that matter.  But I confined public\nreligious teaching to the churches and the Sunday-schools, permitting\nnothing of it in my other educational buildings.  I could have\ngiven my own sect the preference and made everybody a Presbyterian\nwithout any trouble, but that would have been to affront a law\nof human nature: spiritual wants and instincts are as various in\nthe human family as are physical appetites, complexions, and\nfeatures, and a man is only at his best, morally, when he is\nequipped with the religious garment whose color and shape and\nsize most nicely accommodate themselves to the spiritual complexion,\nangularities, and stature of the individual who wears it; and,\nbesides, I was afraid of a united Church; it makes a mighty power,\nthe mightiest conceivable, and then when it by and by gets into\nselfish hands, as it is always bound to do, it means death to\nhuman liberty and paralysis to human thought.\n\nAll mines were royal property, and there were a good many of them.\nThey had formerly been worked as savages always work mines--holes\ngrubbed in the earth and the mineral brought up in sacks of hide by\nhand, at the rate of a ton a day; but I had begun to put the mining\non a scientific basis as early as I could.\n\nYes, I had made pretty handsome progress when Sir Sagramor's\nchallenge struck me.\n\nFour years rolled by--and then!  Well, you would never imagine\nit in the world.  Unlimited power is the ideal thing when it is in\nsafe hands.  The despotism of heaven is the one absolutely perfect\ngovernment.  An earthly despotism would be the absolutely perfect\nearthly government, if the conditions were the same, namely, the\ndespot the perfectest individual of the human race, and his lease\nof life perpetual.  But as a perishable perfect man must die, and\nleave his despotism in the hands of an imperfect successor, an\nearthly despotism is not merely a bad form of government, it is\nthe worst form that is possible.\n\nMy works showed what a despot could do with the resources of\na kingdom at his command.  Unsuspected by this dark land, I had\nthe civilization of the nineteenth century booming under its very\nnose!  It was fenced away from the public view, but there it was,\na gigantic and unassailable fact--and to be heard from, yet, if\nI lived and had luck.  There it was, as sure a fact and as substantial\na fact as any serene volcano, standing innocent with its smokeless\nsummit in the blue sky and giving no sign of the rising hell in its\nbowels.  My schools and churches were children four years before;\nthey were grown-up now; my shops of that day were vast factories\nnow; where I had a dozen trained men then, I had a thousand now;\nwhere I had one brilliant expert then, I had fifty now.  I stood\nwith my hand on the cock, so to speak, ready to turn it on and\nflood the midnight world with light at any moment.  But I was not\ngoing to do the thing in that sudden way.  It was not my policy.\nThe people could not have stood it; and, moreover, I should have\nhad the Established Roman Catholic Church on my back in a minute.\n\nNo, I had been going cautiously all the while.  I had had confidential\nagents trickling through the country some time, whose office was\nto undermine knighthood by imperceptible degrees, and to gnaw\na little at this and that and the other superstition, and so prepare\nthe way gradually for a better order of things.  I was turning on\nmy light one-candle-power at a time, and meant to continue to do so.\n\nI had scattered some branch schools secretly about the kingdom,\nand they were doing very well.  I meant to work this racket more\nand more, as time wore on, if nothing occurred to frighten me.\nOne of my deepest secrets was my West Point--my military academy.\nI kept that most jealously out of sight; and I did the same with my\nnaval academy which I had established at a remote seaport.  Both\nwere prospering to my satisfaction.\n\nClarence was twenty-two now, and was my head executive, my right\nhand.  He was a darling; he was equal to anything; there wasn't\nanything he couldn't turn his hand to.  Of late I had been training\nhim for journalism, for the time seemed about right for a start\nin the newspaper line; nothing big, but just a small weekly for\nexperimental circulation in my civilization-nurseries.  He took\nto it like a duck; there was an editor concealed in him, sure.\nAlready he had doubled himself in one way; he talked sixth century\nand wrote nineteenth.  His journalistic style was climbing,\nsteadily; it was already up to the back settlement Alabama mark,\nand couldn't be told from the editorial output of that region\neither by matter or flavor.\n\nWe had another large departure on hand, too.  This was a telegraph\nand a telephone; our first venture in this line.  These wires were\nfor private service only, as yet, and must be kept private until\na riper day should come.  We had a gang of men on the road, working\nmainly by night.  They were stringing ground wires; we were afraid\nto put up poles, for they would attract too much inquiry.  Ground\nwires were good enough, in both instances, for my wires were\nprotected by an insulation of my own invention which was perfect.\nMy men had orders to strike across country, avoiding roads, and\nestablishing connection with any considerable towns whose lights\nbetrayed their presence, and leaving experts in charge. Nobody\ncould tell you how to find any place in the kingdom, for nobody\never went intentionally to any place, but only struck it by\naccident in his wanderings, and then generally left it without\nthinking to inquire what its name was.  At one time and another\nwe had sent out topographical expeditions to survey and map the\nkingdom, but the priests had always interfered and raised trouble.\nSo we had given the thing up, for the present; it would be poor\nwisdom to antagonize the Church.\n\nAs for the general condition of the country, it was as it had been\nwhen I arrived in it, to all intents and purposes.  I had made\nchanges, but they were necessarily slight, and they were not\nnoticeable.  Thus far, I had not even meddled with taxation,\noutside of the taxes which provided the royal revenues.  I had\nsystematized those, and put the service on an effective and\nrighteous basis.  As a result, these revenues were already quadrupled,\nand yet the burden was so much more equably distributed than\nbefore, that all the kingdom felt a sense of relief, and the praises\nof my administration were hearty and general.\n\nPersonally, I struck an interruption, now, but I did not mind it,\nit could not have happened at a better time.  Earlier it could\nhave annoyed me, but now everything was in good hands and swimming\nright along.  The king had reminded me several times, of late, that\nthe postponement I had asked for, four years before, had about\nrun out now.  It was a hint that I ought to be starting out to seek\nadventures and get up a reputation of a size to make me worthy\nof the honor of breaking a lance with Sir Sagramor, who was still\nout grailing, but was being hunted for by various relief expeditions,\nand might be found any year, now.  So you see I was expecting\nthis interruption; it did not take me by surprise.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nTHE YANKEE IN SEARCH OF ADVENTURES\n\nThere never was such a country for wandering liars; and they were\nof both sexes.  Hardly a month went by without one of these tramps\narriving; and generally loaded with a tale about some princess or\nother wanting help to get her out of some far-away castle where\nshe was held in captivity by a lawless scoundrel, usually a giant.\nNow you would think that the first thing the king would do after\nlistening to such a novelette from an entire stranger, would be\nto ask for credentials--yes, and a pointer or two as to locality\nof castle, best route to it, and so on.  But nobody ever thought\nof so simple and common-sense a thing at that.  No, everybody\nswallowed these people's lies whole, and never asked a question\nof any sort or about anything.  Well, one day when I was not\naround, one of these people came along--it was a she one, this\ntime--and told a tale of the usual pattern.  Her mistress was\na captive in a vast and gloomy castle, along with forty-four other\nyoung and beautiful girls, pretty much all of them princesses;\nthey had been languishing in that cruel captivity for twenty-six\nyears; the masters of the castle were three stupendous brothers,\neach with four arms and one eye--the eye in the center of the\nforehead, and as big as a fruit.  Sort of fruit not mentioned;\ntheir usual slovenliness in statistics.\n\nWould you believe it?  The king and the whole Round Table were\nin raptures over this preposterous opportunity for adventure.\nEvery knight of the Table jumped for the chance, and begged for it;\nbut to their vexation and chagrin the king conferred it upon me,\nwho had not asked for it at all.\n\nBy an effort, I contained my joy when Clarence brought me the news.\nBut he--he could not contain his.  His mouth gushed delight and\ngratitude in a steady discharge--delight in my good fortune,\ngratitude to the king for this splendid mark of his favor for me.\nHe could keep neither his legs nor his body still, but pirouetted\nabout the place in an airy ecstasy of happiness.\n\nOn my side, I could have cursed the kindness that conferred upon\nme this benefaction, but I kept my vexation under the surface\nfor policy's sake, and did what I could to let on to be glad.\nIndeed, I _said_ I was glad.  And in a way it was true; I was as\nglad as a person is when he is scalped.\n\nWell, one must make the best of things, and not waste time with\nuseless fretting, but get down to business and see what can be\ndone.  In all lies there is wheat among the chaff; I must get at\nthe wheat in this case: so I sent for the girl and she came.  She\nwas a comely enough creature, and soft and modest, but, if signs\nwent for anything, she didn't know as much as a lady's watch.  I said:\n\n\"My dear, have you been questioned as to particulars?\"\n\nShe said she hadn't.\n\n\"Well, I didn't expect you had, but I thought I would ask, to make\nsure; it's the way I've been raised.  Now you mustn't take it\nunkindly if I remind you that as we don't know you, we must go\na little slow.  You may be all right, of course, and we'll hope\nthat you are; but to take it for granted isn't business.  _You_\nunderstand that.  I'm obliged to ask you a few questions; just\nanswer up fair and square, and don't be afraid.  Where do you\nlive, when you are at home?\"\n\n\"In the land of Moder, fair sir.\"\n\n\"Land of Moder.  I don't remember hearing of it before.\nParents living?\"\n\n\"As to that, I know not if they be yet on live, sith it is many\nyears that I have lain shut up in the castle.\"\n\n\"Your name, please?\"\n\n\"I hight the Demoiselle Alisande la Carteloise, an it please you.\"\n\n\"Do you know anybody here who can identify you?\"\n\n\"That were not likely, fair lord, I being come hither now for\nthe first time.\"\n\n\"Have you brought any letters--any documents--any proofs that\nyou are trustworthy and truthful?\"\n\n\"Of a surety, no; and wherefore should I?  Have I not a tongue,\nand cannot I say all that myself?\"\n\n\"But _your_ saying it, you know, and somebody else's saying it,\nis different.\"\n\n\"Different?  How might that be?  I fear me I do not understand.\"\n\n\"Don't _understand_?  Land of--why, you see--you see--why, great Scott,\ncan't you understand a little thing like that?  Can't you understand\nthe difference between your--_why_ do you look so innocent and idiotic!\"\n\n\"I?  In truth I know not, but an it were the will of God.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, I reckon that's about the size of it.  Don't mind my\nseeming excited; I'm not.  Let us change the subject.  Now as\nto this castle, with forty-five princesses in it, and three ogres\nat the head of it, tell me--where is this harem?\"\n\n\"Harem?\"\n\n\"The _castle_, you understand; where is the castle?\"\n\n\"Oh, as to that, it is great, and strong, and well beseen, and\nlieth in a far country.  Yes, it is many leagues.\"\n\n\"_How_ many?\"\n\n\"Ah, fair sir, it were woundily hard to tell, they are so many,\nand do so lap the one upon the other, and being made all in the\nsame image and tincted with the same color, one may not know\nthe one league from its fellow, nor how to count them except\nthey be taken apart, and ye wit well it were God's work to do\nthat, being not within man's capacity; for ye will note--\"\n\n\"Hold on, hold on, never mind about the distance; _whereabouts_\ndoes the castle lie?  What's the direction from here?\"\n\n\"Ah, please you sir, it hath no direction from here; by reason\nthat the road lieth not straight, but turneth evermore; wherefore\nthe direction of its place abideth not, but is some time under\nthe one sky and anon under another, whereso if ye be minded that\nit is in the east, and wend thitherward, ye shall observe that\nthe way of the road doth yet again turn upon itself by the space\nof half a circle, and this marvel happing again and yet again and\nstill again, it will grieve you that you had thought by vanities\nof the mind to thwart and bring to naught the will of Him that\ngiveth not a castle a direction from a place except it pleaseth\nHim, and if it please Him not, will the rather that even all castles\nand all directions thereunto vanish out of the earth, leaving the\nplaces wherein they tarried desolate and vacant, so warning His\ncreatures that where He will He will, and where He will not He--\"\n\n\"Oh, that's all right, that's all right, give us a rest; never mind\nabout the direction, _hang_ the direction--I beg pardon, I beg\na thousand pardons, I am not well to-day; pay no attention when\nI soliloquize, it is an old habit, an old, bad habit, and hard\nto get rid of when one's digestion is all disordered with eating\nfood that was raised forever and ever before he was born; good\nland! a man can't keep his functions regular on spring chickens\nthirteen hundred years old.  But come--never mind about that;\nlet's--have you got such a thing as a map of that region about\nyou?  Now a good map--\"\n\n\"Is it peradventure that manner of thing which of late the unbelievers\nhave brought from over the great seas, which, being boiled in oil,\nand an onion and salt added thereto, doth--\"\n\n\"What, a map?  What are you talking about?  Don't you know what\na map is?  There, there, never mind, don't explain, I hate\nexplanations; they fog a thing up so that you can't tell anything\nabout it.  Run along, dear; good-day; show her the way, Clarence.\"\n\nOh, well, it was reasonably plain, now, why these donkeys didn't\nprospect these liars for details.  It may be that this girl had\na fact in her somewhere, but I don't believe you could have sluiced\nit out with a hydraulic; nor got it with the earlier forms of\nblasting, even; it was a case for dynamite.  Why, she was a perfect\nass; and yet the king and his knights had listened to her as if\nshe had been a leaf out of the gospel.  It kind of sizes up the\nwhole party.  And think of the simple ways of this court: this\nwandering wench hadn't any more trouble to get access to the king\nin his palace than she would have had to get into the poorhouse\nin my day and country.  In fact, he was glad to see her, glad\nto hear her tale; with that adventure of hers to offer, she was\nas welcome as a corpse is to a coroner.\n\nJust as I was ending-up these reflections, Clarence came back.\nI remarked upon the barren result of my efforts with the girl;\nhadn't got hold of a single point that could help me to find\nthe castle.  The youth looked a little surprised, or puzzled,\nor something, and intimated that he had been wondering to himself\nwhat I had wanted to ask the girl all those questions for.\n\n\"Why, great guns,\" I said, \"don't I want to find the castle?  And\nhow else would I go about it?\"\n\n\"La, sweet your worship, one may lightly answer that, I ween.\nShe will go with thee.  They always do.  She will ride with thee.\"\n\n\"Ride with me?  Nonsense!\"\n\n\"But of a truth she will.  She will ride with thee.  Thou shalt see.\"\n\n\"What?  She browse around the hills and scour the woods with me\n--alone--and I as good as engaged to be married?  Why, it's scandalous.\nThink how it would look.\"\n\nMy, the dear face that rose before me!  The boy was eager to know\nall about this tender matter.  I swore him to secrecy and then\nwhispered her name--\"Puss Flanagan.\"  He looked disappointed,\nand said he didn't remember the countess.  How natural it was for\nthe little courtier to give her a rank.  He asked me where she lived.\n\n\"In East Har--\" I came to myself and stopped, a little confused;\nthen I said, \"Never mind, now; I'll tell you some time.\"\n\nAnd might he see her?  Would I let him see her some day?\n\nIt was but a little thing to promise--thirteen hundred years\nor so--and he so eager; so I said Yes.  But I sighed; I couldn't\nhelp it.  And yet there was no sense in sighing, for she wasn't\nborn yet.  But that is the way we are made: we don't reason,\nwhere we feel; we just feel.\n\nMy expedition was all the talk that day and that night, and the\nboys were very good to me, and made much of me, and seemed to have\nforgotten their vexation and disappointment, and come to be as\nanxious for me to hive those ogres and set those ripe old virgins\nloose as if it were themselves that had the contract.  Well, they\n_were_ good children--but just children, that is all.  And they\ngave me no end of points about how to scout for giants, and how\nto scoop them in; and they told me all sorts of charms against\nenchantments, and gave me salves and other rubbish to put on my\nwounds.  But it never occurred to one of them to reflect that if\nI was such a wonderful necromancer as I was pretending to be,\nI ought not to need salves or instructions, or charms against\nenchantments, and, least of all, arms and armor, on a foray of any\nkind--even against fire-spouting dragons, and devils hot from\nperdition, let alone such poor adversaries as these I was after,\nthese commonplace ogres of the back settlements.\n\nI was to have an early breakfast, and start at dawn, for that was\nthe usual way; but I had the demon's own time with my armor,\nand this delayed me a little.  It is troublesome to get into, and\nthere is so much detail.  First you wrap a layer or two of blanket\naround your body, for a sort of cushion and to keep off the cold\niron; then you put on your sleeves and shirt of chain mail--these\nare made of small steel links woven together, and they form a fabric\nso flexible that if you toss your shirt onto the floor, it slumps\ninto a pile like a peck of wet fish-net; it is very heavy and\nis nearly the uncomfortablest material in the world for a night\nshirt, yet plenty used it for that--tax collectors, and reformers,\nand one-horse kings with a defective title, and those sorts of\npeople; then you put on your shoes--flat-boats roofed over with\ninterleaving bands of steel--and screw your clumsy spurs into\nthe heels.  Next you buckle your greaves on your legs, and your\ncuisses on your thighs; then come your backplate and your breastplate,\nand you begin to feel crowded; then you hitch onto the breastplate\nthe half-petticoat of broad overlapping bands of steel which hangs\ndown in front but is scolloped out behind so you can sit down,\nand isn't any real improvement on an inverted coal scuttle, either\nfor looks or for wear, or to wipe your hands on; next you belt\non your sword; then you put your stove-pipe joints onto your arms,\nyour iron gauntlets onto your hands, your iron rat-trap onto your\nhead, with a rag of steel web hitched onto it to hang over the back\nof your neck--and there you are, snug as a candle in a candle-mould.\nThis is no time to dance.  Well, a man that is packed away like\nthat is a nut that isn't worth the cracking, there is so little of\nthe meat, when you get down to it, by comparison with the shell.\n\nThe boys helped me, or I never could have got in.  Just as we\nfinished, Sir Bedivere happened in, and I saw that as like as not\nI hadn't chosen the most convenient outfit for a long trip.  How\nstately he looked; and tall and broad and grand.  He had on his\nhead a conical steel casque that only came down to his ears, and\nfor visor had only a narrow steel bar that extended down to his\nupper lip and protected his nose; and all the rest of him, from\nneck to heel, was flexible chain mail, trousers and all.  But\npretty much all of him was hidden under his outside garment, which\nof course was of chain mail, as I said, and hung straight from his\nshoulders to his ankles; and from his middle to the bottom, both\nbefore and behind, was divided, so that he could ride and let the\nskirts hang down on each side.  He was going grailing, and it was\njust the outfit for it, too.  I would have given a good deal for\nthat ulster, but it was too late now to be fooling around.  The sun\nwas just up, the king and the court were all on hand to see me off\nand wish me luck; so it wouldn't be etiquette for me to tarry.\nYou don't get on your horse yourself; no, if you tried it you\nwould get disappointed.  They carry you out, just as they carry\na sun-struck man to the drug store, and put you on, and help get\nyou to rights, and fix your feet in the stirrups; and all the while\nyou do feel so strange and stuffy and like somebody else--like\nsomebody that has been married on a sudden, or struck by lightning,\nor something like that, and hasn't quite fetched around yet, and\nis sort of numb, and can't just get his bearings.  Then they\nstood up the mast they called a spear, in its socket by my left\nfoot, and I gripped it with my hand; lastly they hung my shield\naround my neck, and I was all complete and ready to up anchor\nand get to sea.  Everybody was as good to me as they could be,\nand a maid of honor gave me the stirrup-cup her own self.  There was\nnothing more to do now, but for that damsel to get up behind me on\na pillion, which she did, and put an arm or so around me to hold on.\n\nAnd so we started, and everybody gave us a goodbye and waved their\nhandkerchiefs or helmets.  And everybody we met, going down the hill\nand through the village was respectful to us, except some shabby\nlittle boys on the outskirts.  They said:\n\n\"Oh, what a guy!\"  And hove clods at us.\n\nIn my experience boys are the same in all ages.  They don't respect\nanything, they don't care for anything or anybody.  They say\n\"Go up, baldhead\" to the prophet going his unoffending way in\nthe gray of antiquity; they sass me in the holy gloom of the\nMiddle Ages; and I had seen them act the same way in Buchanan's\nadministration; I remember, because I was there and helped.  The\nprophet had his bears and settled with his boys; and I wanted\nto get down and settle with mine, but it wouldn't answer, because\nI couldn't have got up again.  I hate a country without a derrick.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nSLOW TORTURE\n\nStraight off, we were in the country.  It was most lovely and\npleasant in those sylvan solitudes in the early cool morning\nin the first freshness of autumn.  From hilltops we saw fair\ngreen valleys lying spread out below, with streams winding through\nthem, and island groves of trees here and there, and huge lonely\noaks scattered about and casting black blots of shade; and beyond\nthe valleys we saw the ranges of hills, blue with haze, stretching\naway in billowy perspective to the horizon, with at wide intervals\na dim fleck of white or gray on a wave-summit, which we knew was\na castle.  We crossed broad natural lawns sparkling with dew,\nand we moved like spirits, the cushioned turf giving out no sound\nof footfall; we dreamed along through glades in a mist of green\nlight that got its tint from the sun-drenched roof of leaves\noverhead, and by our feet the clearest and coldest of runlets\nwent frisking and gossiping over its reefs and making a sort of\nwhispering music, comfortable to hear; and at times we left the\nworld behind and entered into the solemn great deeps and rich\ngloom of the forest, where furtive wild things whisked and scurried\nby and were gone before you could even get your eye on the place\nwhere the noise was; and where only the earliest birds were turning\nout and getting to business with a song here and a quarrel yonder\nand a mysterious far-off hammering and drumming for worms on\na tree trunk away somewhere in the impenetrable remotenesses of\nthe woods.  And by and by out we would swing again into the glare.\n\nAbout the third or fourth or fifth time that we swung out into\nthe glare--it was along there somewhere, a couple of hours or so\nafter sun-up--it wasn't as pleasant as it had been.  It was\nbeginning to get hot.  This was quite noticeable.  We had a very\nlong pull, after that, without any shade.  Now it is curious how\nprogressively little frets grow and multiply after they once get\na start.  Things which I didn't mind at all, at first, I began\nto mind now--and more and more, too, all the time.  The first\nten or fifteen times I wanted my handkerchief I didn't seem to care;\nI got along, and said never mind, it isn't any matter, and dropped\nit out of my mind.  But now it was different; I wanted it all\nthe time; it was nag, nag, nag, right along, and no rest; I couldn't\nget it out of my mind; and so at last I lost my temper and said\nhang a man that would make a suit of armor without any pockets\nin it.  You see I had my handkerchief in my helmet; and some other\nthings; but it was that kind of a helmet that you can't take off\nby yourself.  That hadn't occurred to me when I put it there;\nand in fact I didn't know it.  I supposed it would be particularly\nconvenient there.  And so now, the thought of its being there,\nso handy and close by, and yet not get-at-able, made it all the\nworse and the harder to bear.  Yes, the thing that you can't get\nis the thing that you want, mainly; every one has noticed that.\nWell, it took my mind off from everything else; took it clear off,\nand centered it in my helmet; and mile after mile, there it stayed,\nimagining the handkerchief, picturing the handkerchief; and it\nwas bitter and aggravating to have the salt sweat keep trickling\ndown into my eyes, and I couldn't get at it.  It seems like a little\nthing, on paper, but it was not a little thing at all; it was\nthe most real kind of misery.  I would not say it if it was not so.\nI made up my mind that I would carry along a reticule next time,\nlet it look how it might, and people say what they would.  Of course\nthese iron dudes of the Round Table would think it was scandalous,\nand maybe raise Sheol about it, but as for me, give me comfort\nfirst, and style afterwards.  So we jogged along, and now and then\nwe struck a stretch of dust, and it would tumble up in clouds and\nget into my nose and make me sneeze and cry; and of course I said\nthings I oughtn't to have said, I don't deny that.  I am not\nbetter than others.\n\nWe couldn't seem to meet anybody in this lonesome Britain, not\neven an ogre; and, in the mood I was in then, it was well for\nthe ogre; that is, an ogre with a handkerchief.  Most knights\nwould have thought of nothing but getting his armor; but so I got\nhis bandanna, he could keep his hardware, for all of me.\n\nMeantime, it was getting hotter and hotter in there.  You see,\nthe sun was beating down and warming up the iron more and more\nall the time.  Well, when you are hot, that way, every little thing\nirritates you.  When I trotted, I rattled like a crate of dishes,\nand that annoyed me; and moreover I couldn't seem to stand that\nshield slatting and banging, now about my breast, now around my\nback; and if I dropped into a walk my joints creaked and screeched\nin that wearisome way that a wheelbarrow does, and as we didn't\ncreate any breeze at that gait, I was like to get fried in that\nstove; and besides, the quieter you went the heavier the iron\nsettled down on you and the more and more tons you seemed to weigh\nevery minute.  And you had to be always changing hands, and passing\nyour spear over to the other foot, it got so irksome for one hand\nto hold it long at a time.\n\nWell, you know, when you perspire that way, in rivers, there comes\na time when you--when you--well, when you itch.  You are inside,\nyour hands are outside; so there you are; nothing but iron between.\nIt is not a light thing, let it sound as it may.  First it is one\nplace; then another; then some more; and it goes on spreading and\nspreading, and at last the territory is all occupied, and nobody\ncan imagine what you feel like, nor how unpleasant it is.  And\nwhen it had got to the worst, and it seemed to me that I could\nnot stand anything more, a fly got in through the bars and settled\non my nose, and the bars were stuck and wouldn't work, and I\ncouldn't get the visor up; and I could only shake my head, which\nwas baking hot by this time, and the fly--well, you know how a fly\nacts when he has got a certainty--he only minded the shaking enough\nto change from nose to lip, and lip to ear, and buzz and buzz\nall around in there, and keep on lighting and biting, in a way\nthat a person, already so distressed as I was, simply could not\nstand.  So I gave in, and got Alisande to unship the helmet and\nrelieve me of it.  Then she emptied the conveniences out of it\nand fetched it full of water, and I drank and then stood up, and\nshe poured the rest down inside the armor. One cannot think how\nrefreshing it was.  She continued to fetch and pour until I was\nwell soaked and thoroughly comfortable.\n\nIt was good to have a rest--and peace.  But nothing is quite\nperfect in this life, at any time.  I had made a pipe a while back,\nand also some pretty fair tobacco; not the real thing, but what\nsome of the Indians use: the inside bark of the willow, dried.\nThese comforts had been in the helmet, and now I had them again,\nbut no matches.\n\nGradually, as the time wore along, one annoying fact was borne in\nupon my understanding--that we were weather-bound.  An armed novice\ncannot mount his horse without help and plenty of it.  Sandy was\nnot enough; not enough for me, anyway.  We had to wait until\nsomebody should come along.  Waiting, in silence, would have been\nagreeable enough, for I was full of matter for reflection, and\nwanted to give it a chance to work.  I wanted to try and think out\nhow it was that rational or even half-rational men could ever\nhave learned to wear armor, considering its inconveniences; and\nhow they had managed to keep up such a fashion for generations\nwhen it was plain that what I had suffered to-day they had had\nto suffer all the days of their lives.  I wanted to think that out;\nand moreover I wanted to think out some way to reform this evil\nand persuade the people to let the foolish fashion die out; but\nthinking was out of the question in the circumstances.  You couldn't\nthink, where Sandy was.\n\nShe was a quite biddable creature and good-hearted, but she had\na flow of talk that was as steady as a mill, and made your head\nsore like the drays and wagons in a city.  If she had had a cork\nshe would have been a comfort.  But you can't cork that kind;\nthey would die.  Her clack was going all day, and you would think\nsomething would surely happen to her works, by and by; but no,\nthey never got out of order; and she never had to slack up for\nwords.  She could grind, and pump, and churn, and buzz by the week,\nand never stop to oil up or blow out.  And yet the result was just\nnothing but wind.  She never had any ideas, any more than a fog\nhas.  She was a perfect blatherskite; I mean for jaw, jaw, jaw,\ntalk, talk, talk, jabber, jabber, jabber; but just as good as she\ncould be.  I hadn't minded her mill that morning, on account of\nhaving that hornets' nest of other troubles; but more than once\nin the afternoon I had to say:\n\n\"Take a rest, child; the way you are using up all the domestic air,\nthe kingdom will have to go to importing it by to-morrow, and it's\na low enough treasury without that.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nFREEMEN\n\nYes, it is strange how little a while at a time a person can be\ncontented.  Only a little while back, when I was riding and\nsuffering, what a heaven this peace, this rest, this sweet serenity\nin this secluded shady nook by this purling stream would have\nseemed, where I could keep perfectly comfortable all the time\nby pouring a dipper of water into my armor now and then; yet\nalready I was getting dissatisfied; partly because I could not\nlight my pipe--for, although I had long ago started a match factory,\nI had forgotten to bring matches with me--and partly because we\nhad nothing to eat.  Here was another illustration of the childlike\nimprovidence of this age and people.  A man in armor always trusted\nto chance for his food on a journey, and would have been scandalized\nat the idea of hanging a basket of sandwiches on his spear.  There\nwas probably not a knight of all the Round Table combination who\nwould not rather have died than been caught carrying such a thing\nas that on his flagstaff.  And yet there could not be anything more\nsensible.  It had been my intention to smuggle a couple of sandwiches\ninto my helmet, but I was interrupted in the act, and had to make\nan excuse and lay them aside, and a dog got them.\n\nNight approached, and with it a storm.  The darkness came on fast.\nWe must camp, of course.  I found a good shelter for the demoiselle\nunder a rock, and went off and found another for myself.  But\nI was obliged to remain in my armor, because I could not get it off\nby myself and yet could not allow Alisande to help, because it\nwould have seemed so like undressing before folk.  It would not\nhave amounted to that in reality, because I had clothes on\nunderneath; but the prejudices of one's breeding are not gotten\nrid of just at a jump, and I knew that when it came to stripping\noff that bob-tailed iron petticoat I should be embarrassed.\n\nWith the storm came a change of weather; and the stronger the wind\nblew, and the wilder the rain lashed around, the colder and colder\nit got.  Pretty soon, various kinds of bugs and ants and worms\nand things began to flock in out of the wet and crawl down inside\nmy armor to get warm; and while some of them behaved well enough,\nand snuggled up amongst my clothes and got quiet, the majority\nwere of a restless, uncomfortable sort, and never stayed still,\nbut went on prowling and hunting for they did not know what;\nespecially the ants, which went tickling along in wearisome\nprocession from one end of me to the other by the hour, and are\na kind of creatures which I never wish to sleep with again.\nIt would be my advice to persons situated in this way, to not roll\nor thrash around, because this excites the interest of all the\ndifferent sorts of animals and makes every last one of them want\nto turn out and see what is going on, and this makes things worse\nthan they were before, and of course makes you objurgate harder,\ntoo, if you can.  Still, if one did not roll and thrash around\nhe would die; so perhaps it is as well to do one way as the other;\nthere is no real choice.  Even after I was frozen solid I could\nstill distinguish that tickling, just as a corpse does when he is\ntaking electric treatment.  I said I would never wear armor\nafter this trip.\n\nAll those trying hours whilst I was frozen and yet was in a living\nfire, as you may say, on account of that swarm of crawlers, that\nsame unanswerable question kept circling and circling through my\ntired head: How do people stand this miserable armor?  How have\nthey managed to stand it all these generations?  How can they sleep\nat night for dreading the tortures of next day?\n\nWhen the morning came at last, I was in a bad enough plight: seedy,\ndrowsy, fagged, from want of sleep; weary from thrashing around,\nfamished from long fasting; pining for a bath, and to get rid of\nthe animals; and crippled with rheumatism.  And how had it fared\nwith the nobly born, the titled aristocrat, the Demoiselle Alisande\nla Carteloise?  Why, she was as fresh as a squirrel; she had slept\nlike the dead; and as for a bath, probably neither she nor any\nother noble in the land had ever had one, and so she was not\nmissing it.  Measured by modern standards, they were merely modified\nsavages, those people.  This noble lady showed no impatience to get\nto breakfast--and that smacks of the savage, too.  On their journeys\nthose Britons were used to long fasts, and knew how to bear them;\nand also how to freight up against probable fasts before starting,\nafter the style of the Indian and the anaconda.  As like as not,\nSandy was loaded for a three-day stretch.\n\nWe were off before sunrise, Sandy riding and I limping along\nbehind.  In half an hour we came upon a group of ragged poor\ncreatures who had assembled to mend the thing which was regarded\nas a road.  They were as humble as animals to me; and when I\nproposed to breakfast with them, they were so flattered, so\noverwhelmed by this extraordinary condescension of mine that\nat first they were not able to believe that I was in earnest.\nMy lady put up her scornful lip and withdrew to one side; she said\nin their hearing that she would as soon think of eating with the\nother cattle--a remark which embarrassed these poor devils merely\nbecause it referred to them, and not because it insulted or offended\nthem, for it didn't.  And yet they were not slaves, not chattels.\nBy a sarcasm of law and phrase they were freemen.  Seven-tenths\nof the free population of the country were of just their class and\ndegree: small \"independent\" farmers, artisans, etc.; which is\nto say, they were the nation, the actual Nation; they were about\nall of it that was useful, or worth saving, or really respect-worthy,\nand to subtract them would have been to subtract the Nation and\nleave behind some dregs, some refuse, in the shape of a king,\nnobility and gentry, idle, unproductive, acquainted mainly with\nthe arts of wasting and destroying, and of no sort of use or value\nin any rationally constructed world.  And yet, by ingenious\ncontrivance, this gilded minority, instead of being in the tail\nof the procession where it belonged, was marching head up and\nbanners flying, at the other end of it; had elected itself to be\nthe Nation, and these innumerable clams had permitted it so long\nthat they had come at last to accept it as a truth; and not only\nthat, but to believe it right and as it should be.  The priests\nhad told their fathers and themselves that this ironical state\nof things was ordained of God; and so, not reflecting upon how\nunlike God it would be to amuse himself with sarcasms, and especially\nsuch poor transparent ones as this, they had dropped the matter\nthere and become respectfully quiet.\n\nThe talk of these meek people had a strange enough sound in\na formerly American ear.  They were freemen, but they could not\nleave the estates of their lord or their bishop without his\npermission; they could not prepare their own bread, but must have\ntheir corn ground and their bread baked at his mill and his bakery,\nand pay roundly for the same; they could not sell a piece of their\nown property without paying him a handsome percentage of the\nproceeds, nor buy a piece of somebody else's without remembering\nhim in cash for the privilege; they had to harvest his grain for him\ngratis, and be ready to come at a moment's notice, leaving their\nown crop to destruction by the threatened storm; they had to let\nhim plant fruit trees in their fields, and then keep their indignation\nto themselves when his heedless fruit-gatherers trampled the grain\naround the trees; they had to smother their anger when his hunting\nparties galloped through their fields laying waste the result of\ntheir patient toil; they were not allowed to keep doves themselves,\nand when the swarms from my lord's dovecote settled on their crops\nthey must not lose their temper and kill a bird, for awful would\nthe penalty be; when the harvest was at last gathered, then came\nthe procession of robbers to levy their blackmail upon it: first\nthe Church carted off its fat tenth, then the king's commissioner\ntook his twentieth, then my lord's people made a mighty inroad\nupon the remainder; after which, the skinned freeman had liberty\nto bestow the remnant in his barn, in case it was worth the trouble;\nthere were taxes, and taxes, and taxes, and more taxes, and taxes\nagain, and yet other taxes--upon this free and independent pauper,\nbut none upon his lord the baron or the bishop, none upon the\nwasteful nobility or the all-devouring Church; if the baron would\nsleep unvexed, the freeman must sit up all night after his day's\nwork and whip the ponds to keep the frogs quiet; if the freeman's\ndaughter--but no, that last infamy of monarchical government is\nunprintable; and finally, if the freeman, grown desperate with his\ntortures, found his life unendurable under such conditions, and\nsacrificed it and fled to death for mercy and refuge, the gentle\nChurch condemned him to eternal fire, the gentle law buried him\nat midnight at the cross-roads with a stake through his back,\nand his master the baron or the bishop confiscated all his property\nand turned his widow and his orphans out of doors.\n\nAnd here were these freemen assembled in the early morning to work\non their lord the bishop's road three days each--gratis; every\nhead of a family, and every son of a family, three days each,\ngratis, and a day or so added for their servants.  Why, it was\nlike reading about France and the French, before the ever memorable\nand blessed Revolution, which swept a thousand years of such\nvillany away in one swift tidal-wave of blood--one: a settlement\nof that hoary debt in the proportion of half a drop of blood for\neach hogshead of it that had been pressed by slow tortures out of\nthat people in the weary stretch of ten centuries of wrong and\nshame and misery the like of which was not to be mated but in hell.\nThere were two \"Reigns of Terror,\" if we would but remember it\nand consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other\nin heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had\nlasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand\npersons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are\nall for the \"horrors\" of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror,\nso to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe,\ncompared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty,\nand heart-break?  What is swift death by lightning compared with\ndeath by slow fire at the stake?  A city cemetery could contain the\ncoffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so\ndiligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could\nhardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror\n--that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has\nbeen taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.\n\nThese poor ostensible freemen who were sharing their breakfast\nand their talk with me, were as full of humble reverence for their\nking and Church and nobility as their worst enemy could desire.\nThere was something pitifully ludicrous about it.  I asked them\nif they supposed a nation of people ever existed, who, with a free\nvote in every man's hand, would elect that a single family and its\ndescendants should reign over it forever, whether gifted or boobies,\nto the exclusion of all other families--including the voter's; and\nwould also elect that a certain hundred families should be raised\nto dizzy summits of rank, and clothed on with offensive transmissible\nglories and privileges to the exclusion of the rest of the nation's\nfamilies--_including his own_.\n\nThey all looked unhit, and said they didn't know; that they had\nnever thought about it before, and it hadn't ever occurred to them\nthat a nation could be so situated that every man _could_ have\na say in the government.  I said I had seen one--and that it would\nlast until it had an Established Church.  Again they were all\nunhit--at first.  But presently one man looked up and asked me\nto state that proposition again; and state it slowly, so it could\nsoak into his understanding.  I did it; and after a little he had\nthe idea, and he brought his fist down and said _he_ didn't believe\na nation where every man had a vote would voluntarily get down\nin the mud and dirt in any such way; and that to steal from a nation\nits will and preference must be a crime and the first of all crimes.\nI said to myself:\n\n\"This one's a man.  If I were backed by enough of his sort, I would\nmake a strike for the welfare of this country, and try to prove\nmyself its loyalest citizen by making a wholesome change in its\nsystem of government.\"\n\nYou see my kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to\nits institutions or its office-holders.  The country is the real\nthing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing\nto watch over, and care for, and be loyal to; institutions are\nextraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out,\nbecome ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body\nfrom winter, disease, and death.  To be loyal to rags, to shout\nfor rags, to worship rags, to die for rags--that is a loyalty\nof unreason, it is pure animal; it belongs to monarchy, was invented\nby monarchy; let monarchy keep it.  I was from Connecticut, whose\nConstitution declares \"that all political power is inherent in\nthe people, and all free governments are founded on their authority\nand instituted for their benefit; and that they have _at all times_\nan undeniable and indefeasible right to _alter their form of\ngovernment_ in such a manner as they may think expedient.\"\n\nUnder that gospel, the citizen who thinks he sees that the\ncommonwealth's political clothes are worn out, and yet holds his\npeace and does not agitate for a new suit, is disloyal; he is\na traitor.  That he may be the only one who thinks he sees this\ndecay, does not excuse him; it is his duty to agitate anyway, and\nit is the duty of the others to vote him down if they do not see\nthe matter as he does.\n\nAnd now here I was, in a country where a right to say how the\ncountry should be governed was restricted to six persons in each\nthousand of its population.  For the nine hundred and ninety-four\nto express dissatisfaction with the regnant system and propose\nto change it, would have made the whole six shudder as one man,\nit would have been so disloyal, so dishonorable, such putrid black\ntreason.  So to speak, I was become a stockholder in a corporation\nwhere nine hundred and ninety-four of the members furnished all\nthe money and did all the work, and the other six elected themselves\na permanent board of direction and took all the dividends.  It seemed\nto me that what the nine hundred and ninety-four dupes needed was\na new deal.  The thing that would have best suited the circus side\nof my nature would have been to resign the Boss-ship and get up\nan insurrection and turn it into a revolution; but I knew that the\nJack Cade or the Wat Tyler who tries such a thing without first\neducating his materials up to revolution grade is almost absolutely\ncertain to get left.  I had never been accustomed to getting left,\neven if I do say it myself.  Wherefore, the \"deal\" which had been\nfor some time working into shape in my mind was of a quite different\npattern from the Cade-Tyler sort.\n\nSo I did not talk blood and insurrection to that man there who sat\nmunching black bread with that abused and mistaught herd of human\nsheep, but took him aside and talked matter of another sort to him.\nAfter I had finished, I got him to lend me a little ink from his\nveins; and with this and a sliver I wrote on a piece of bark--\n\n   Put him in the Man-factory--\n\nand gave it to him, and said:\n\n\"Take it to the palace at Camelot and give it into the hands of\nAmyas le Poulet, whom I call Clarence, and he will understand.\"\n\n\"He is a priest, then,\" said the man, and some of the enthusiasm\nwent out of his face.\n\n\"How--a priest?  Didn't I tell you that no chattel of the Church,\nno bond-slave of pope or bishop can enter my Man-Factory?  Didn't\nI tell you that _you_ couldn't enter unless your religion, whatever\nit might be, was your own free property?\"\n\n\"Marry, it is so, and for that I was glad; wherefore it liked me not,\nand bred in me a cold doubt, to hear of this priest being there.\"\n\n\"But he isn't a priest, I tell you.\"\n\nThe man looked far from satisfied.  He said:\n\n\"He is not a priest, and yet can read?\"\n\n\"He is not a priest and yet can read--yes, and write, too, for that\nmatter.  I taught him myself.\" The man's face cleared.  \"And it is\nthe first thing that you yourself will be taught in that Factory--\"\n\n\"I?  I would give blood out of my heart to know that art.  Why,\nI will be your slave, your--\"\n\n\"No you won't, you won't be anybody's slave.  Take your family\nand go along.  Your lord the bishop will confiscate your small\nproperty, but no matter.  Clarence will fix you all right.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\n\"DEFEND THEE, LORD\"\n\nI paid three pennies for my breakfast, and a most extravagant\nprice it was, too, seeing that one could have breakfasted a dozen\npersons for that money; but I was feeling good by this time, and\nI had always been a kind of spendthrift anyway; and then these\npeople had wanted to give me the food for nothing, scant as\ntheir provision was, and so it was a grateful pleasure to emphasize\nmy appreciation and sincere thankfulness with a good big financial\nlift where the money would do so much more good than it would\nin my helmet, where, these pennies being made of iron and not\nstinted in weight, my half-dollar's worth was a good deal of a\nburden to me.  I spent money rather too freely in those days,\nit is true; but one reason for it was that I hadn't got the\nproportions of things entirely adjusted, even yet, after so long\na sojourn in Britain--hadn't got along to where I was able to\nabsolutely realize that a penny in Arthur's land and a couple of\ndollars in Connecticut were about one and the same thing: just\ntwins, as you may say, in purchasing power.  If my start from\nCamelot could have been delayed a very few days I could have paid\nthese people in beautiful new coins from our own mint, and that\nwould have pleased me; and them, too, not less.  I had adopted\nthe American values exclusively.  In a week or two now, cents,\nnickels, dimes, quarters, and half-dollars, and also a trifle of\ngold, would be trickling in thin but steady streams all through\nthe commercial veins of the kingdom, and I looked to see this\nnew blood freshen up its life.\n\nThe farmers were bound to throw in something, to sort of offset\nmy liberality, whether I would or no; so I let them give me a flint\nand steel; and as soon as they had comfortably bestowed Sandy\nand me on our horse, I lit my pipe.  When the first blast of smoke\nshot out through the bars of my helmet, all those people broke\nfor the woods, and Sandy went over backwards and struck the ground\nwith a dull thud.  They thought I was one of those fire-belching\ndragons they had heard so much about from knights and other\nprofessional liars.  I had infinite trouble to persuade those people\nto venture back within explaining distance.  Then I told them that\nthis was only a bit of enchantment which would work harm to none\nbut my enemies.  And I promised, with my hand on my heart, that\nif all who felt no enmity toward me would come forward and pass\nbefore me they should see that only those who remained behind would\nbe struck dead.  The procession moved with a good deal of promptness.\nThere were no casualties to report, for nobody had curiosity enough\nto remain behind to see what would happen.\n\nI lost some time, now, for these big children, their fears gone,\nbecame so ravished with wonder over my awe-compelling fireworks\nthat I had to stay there and smoke a couple of pipes out before\nthey would let me go.  Still the delay was not wholly unproductive,\nfor it took all that time to get Sandy thoroughly wonted to the new\nthing, she being so close to it, you know.  It plugged up her\nconversation mill, too, for a considerable while, and that was\na gain.  But above all other benefits accruing, I had learned\nsomething.  I was ready for any giant or any ogre that might come\nalong, now.\n\nWe tarried with a holy hermit, that night, and my opportunity\ncame about the middle of the next afternoon.  We were crossing\na vast meadow by way of short-cut, and I was musing absently,\nhearing nothing, seeing nothing, when Sandy suddenly interrupted\na remark which she had begun that morning, with the cry:\n\n\"Defend thee, lord!--peril of life is toward!\"\n\nAnd she slipped down from the horse and ran a little way and stood.\nI looked up and saw, far off in the shade of a tree, half a dozen\narmed knights and their squires; and straightway there was bustle\namong them and tightening of saddle-girths for the mount.  My pipe\nwas ready and would have been lit, if I had not been lost in\nthinking about how to banish oppression from this land and restore\nto all its people their stolen rights and manhood without disobliging\nanybody.  I lit up at once, and by the time I had got a good head\nof reserved steam on, here they came.  All together, too; none of\nthose chivalrous magnanimities which one reads so much about\n--one courtly rascal at a time, and the rest standing by to see fair\nplay.  No, they came in a body, they came with a whirr and a rush,\nthey came like a volley from a battery; came with heads low down,\nplumes streaming out behind, lances advanced at a level.  It was\na handsome sight, a beautiful sight--for a man up a tree.  I laid\nmy lance in rest and waited, with my heart beating, till the iron\nwave was just ready to break over me, then spouted a column of\nwhite smoke through the bars of my helmet.  You should have seen\nthe wave go to pieces and scatter!  This was a finer sight than\nthe other one.\n\nBut these people stopped, two or three hundred yards away, and\nthis troubled me.  My satisfaction collapsed, and fear came;\nI judged I was a lost man.  But Sandy was radiant; and was going\nto be eloquent--but I stopped her, and told her my magic had\nmiscarried, somehow or other, and she must mount, with all despatch,\nand we must ride for life.  No, she wouldn't.  She said that my\nenchantment had disabled those knights; they were not riding on,\nbecause they couldn't; wait, they would drop out of their saddles\npresently, and we would get their horses and harness.  I could not\ndeceive such trusting simplicity, so I said it was a mistake; that\nwhen my fireworks killed at all, they killed instantly; no, the men\nwould not die, there was something wrong about my apparatus,\nI couldn't tell what; but we must hurry and get away, for those\npeople would attack us again, in a minute.  Sandy laughed, and said:\n\n\"Lack-a-day, sir, they be not of that breed!  Sir Launcelot will\ngive battle to dragons, and will abide by them, and will assail\nthem again, and yet again, and still again, until he do conquer\nand destroy them; and so likewise will Sir Pellinore and Sir Aglovale\nand Sir Carados, and mayhap others, but there be none else that\nwill venture it, let the idle say what the idle will.  And, la,\nas to yonder base rufflers, think ye they have not their fill,\nbut yet desire more?\"\n\n\"Well, then, what are they waiting for?  Why don't they leave?\nNobody's hindering.  Good land, I'm willing to let bygones be\nbygones, I'm sure.\"\n\n\"Leave, is it?  Oh, give thyself easement as to that.  They dream\nnot of it, no, not they.  They wait to yield them.\"\n\n\"Come--really, is that 'sooth'--as you people say?  If they want to,\nwhy don't they?\"\n\n\"It would like them much; but an ye wot how dragons are esteemed,\nye would not hold them blamable. They fear to come.\"\n\n\"Well, then, suppose I go to them instead, and--\"\n\n\"Ah, wit ye well they would not abide your coming.  I will go.\"\n\nAnd she did.  She was a handy person to have along on a raid.\nI would have considered this a doubtful errand, myself.  I presently\nsaw the knights riding away, and Sandy coming back.  That was\na relief.  I judged she had somehow failed to get the first innings\n--I mean in the conversation; otherwise the interview wouldn't have\nbeen so short.  But it turned out that she had managed the business\nwell; in fact, admirably.  She said that when she told those people\nI was The Boss, it hit them where they lived: \"smote them sore\nwith fear and dread\" was her word; and then they were ready to\nput up with anything she might require.  So she swore them to appear\nat Arthur's court within two days and yield them, with horse and\nharness, and be my knights henceforth, and subject to my command.\nHow much better she managed that thing than I should have done\nit myself!  She was a daisy.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nSANDY'S TALE\n\n\"And so I'm proprietor of some knights,\" said I, as we rode off.\n\"Who would ever have supposed that I should live to list up assets\nof that sort.  I shan't know what to do with them; unless I raffle\nthem off.  How many of them are there, Sandy?\"\n\n\"Seven, please you, sir, and their squires.\"\n\n\"It is a good haul.  Who are they?  Where do they hang out?\"\n\n\"Where do they hang out?\"\n\n\"Yes, where do they live?\"\n\n\"Ah, I understood thee not.  That will I tell eftsoons.\"  Then she\nsaid musingly, and softly, turning the words daintily over her\ntongue: \"Hang they out--hang they out--where hang--where do they\nhang out; eh, right so; where do they hang out.  Of a truth the\nphrase hath a fair and winsome grace, and is prettily worded\nwithal.  I will repeat it anon and anon in mine idlesse, whereby\nI may peradventure learn it.  Where do they hang out.  Even so!\nalready it falleth trippingly from my tongue, and forasmuch as--\"\n\n\"Don't forget the cowboys, Sandy.\"\n\n\"Cowboys?\"\n\n\"Yes; the knights, you know: You were going to tell me about them.\nA while back, you remember.  Figuratively speaking, game's called.\"\n\n\"Game--\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, yes!  Go to the bat.  I mean, get to work on your\nstatistics, and don't burn so much kindling getting your fire\nstarted.  Tell me about the knights.\"\n\n\"I will well, and lightly will begin.  So they two departed and\nrode into a great forest.  And--\"\n\n\"Great Scott!\"\n\nYou see, I recognized my mistake at once.  I had set her works\na-going; it was my own fault; she would be thirty days getting down\nto those facts.  And she generally began without a preface and\nfinished without a result.  If you interrupted her she would either\ngo right along without noticing, or answer with a couple of words,\nand go back and say the sentence over again.  So, interruptions\nonly did harm; and yet I had to interrupt, and interrupt pretty\nfrequently, too, in order to save my life; a person would die if\nhe let her monotony drip on him right along all day.\n\n\"Great Scott!\" I said in my distress.  She went right back and\nbegan over again:\n\n\"So they two departed and rode into a great forest.  And--\"\n\n\"_Which_ two?\"\n\n\"Sir Gawaine and Sir Uwaine.  And so they came to an abbey of monks,\nand there were well lodged.  So on the morn they heard their masses\nin the abbey, and so they rode forth till they came to a great\nforest; then was Sir Gawaine ware in a valley by a turret, of\ntwelve fair damsels, and two knights armed on great horses, and\nthe damsels went to and fro by a tree.  And then was Sir Gawaine\nware how there hung a white shield on that tree, and ever as the\ndamsels came by it they spit upon it, and some threw mire upon\nthe shield--\"\n\n\"Now, if I hadn't seen the like myself in this country, Sandy,\nI wouldn't believe it.  But I've seen it, and I can just see those\ncreatures now, parading before that shield and acting like that.\nThe women here do certainly act like all possessed.  Yes, and\nI mean your best, too, society's very choicest brands.  The humblest\nhello-girl along ten thousand miles of wire could teach gentleness,\npatience, modesty, manners, to the highest duchess in Arthur's land.\"\n\n\"Hello-girl?\"\n\n\"Yes, but don't you ask me to explain; it's a new kind of a girl;\nthey don't have them here; one often speaks sharply to them when\nthey are not the least in fault, and he can't get over feeling\nsorry for it and ashamed of himself in thirteen hundred years,\nit's such shabby mean conduct and so unprovoked; the fact is,\nno gentleman ever does it--though I--well, I myself, if I've got\nto confess--\"\n\n\"Peradventure she--\"\n\n\"Never mind her; never mind her; I tell you I couldn't ever explain\nher so you would understand.\"\n\n\"Even so be it, sith ye are so minded.  Then Sir Gawaine and\nSir Uwaine went and saluted them, and asked them why they did that\ndespite to the shield.  Sirs, said the damsels, we shall tell you.\nThere is a knight in this country that owneth this white shield,\nand he is a passing good man of his hands, but he hateth all\nladies and gentlewomen, and therefore we do all this despite to\nthe shield.  I will say you, said Sir Gawaine, it beseemeth evil\na good knight to despise all ladies and gentlewomen, and peradventure\nthough he hate you he hath some cause, and peradventure he loveth\nin some other places ladies and gentlewomen, and to be loved again,\nand he such a man of prowess as ye speak of--\"\n\n\"Man of prowess--yes, that is the man to please them, Sandy.\nMan of brains--that is a thing they never think of.  Tom Sayers\n--John Heenan--John L. Sullivan--pity but you could be here.  You\nwould have your legs under the Round Table and a 'Sir' in front\nof your names within the twenty-four hours; and you could bring\nabout a new distribution of the married princesses and duchesses\nof the Court in another twenty-four.  The fact is, it is just\na sort of polished-up court of Comanches, and there isn't a squaw\nin it who doesn't stand ready at the dropping of a hat to desert\nto the buck with the biggest string of scalps at his belt.\"\n\n\"--and he be such a man of prowess as ye speak of, said Sir Gawaine.\nNow, what is his name?  Sir, said they, his name is Marhaus the\nking's son of Ireland.\"\n\n\"Son of the king of Ireland, you mean; the other form doesn't mean\nanything.  And look out and hold on tight, now, we must jump\nthis gully....  There, we are all right now.  This horse belongs in\nthe circus; he is born before his time.\"\n\n\"I know him well, said Sir Uwaine, he is a passing good knight as\nany is on live.\"\n\n\"_On live_.  If you've got a fault in the world, Sandy, it is that\nyou are a shade too archaic.  But it isn't any matter.\"\n\n\"--for I saw him once proved at a justs where many knights were\ngathered, and that time there might no man withstand him.  Ah, said\nSir Gawaine, damsels, methinketh ye are to blame, for it is to\nsuppose he that hung that shield there will not be long therefrom,\nand then may those knights match him on horseback, and that is\nmore your worship than thus; for I will abide no longer to see\na knight's shield dishonored.  And therewith Sir Uwaine and\nSir Gawaine departed a little from them, and then were they ware\nwhere Sir Marhaus came riding on a great horse straight toward\nthem.  And when the twelve damsels saw Sir Marhaus they fled into\nthe turret as they were wild, so that some of them fell by the way.\nThen the one of the knights of the tower dressed his shield, and\nsaid on high, Sir Marhaus defend thee.  And so they ran together\nthat the knight brake his spear on Marhaus, and Sir Marhaus smote\nhim so hard that he brake his neck and the horse's back--\"\n\n\"Well, that is just the trouble about this state of things,\nit ruins so many horses.\"\n\n\"That saw the other knight of the turret, and dressed him toward\nMarhaus, and they went so eagerly together, that the knight of\nthe turret was soon smitten down, horse and man, stark dead--\"\n\n\"_Another_ horse gone; I tell you it is a custom that ought to be\nbroken up.  I don't see how people with any feeling can applaud\nand support it.\"\n\n    .   .   .   .\n\n\"So these two knights came together with great random--\"\n\nI saw that I had been asleep and missed a chapter, but I didn't\nsay anything.  I judged that the Irish knight was in trouble with\nthe visitors by this time, and this turned out to be the case.\n\n\"--that Sir Uwaine smote Sir Marhaus that his spear brast in pieces\non the shield, and Sir Marhaus smote him so sore that horse and\nman he bare to the earth, and hurt Sir Uwaine on the left side--\"\n\n\"The truth is, Alisande, these archaics are a little _too_ simple;\nthe vocabulary is too limited, and so, by consequence, descriptions\nsuffer in the matter of variety; they run too much to level Saharas\nof fact, and not enough to picturesque detail; this throws about\nthem a certain air of the monotonous; in fact the fights are all\nalike: a couple of people come together with great random\n--random is a good word, and so is exegesis, for that matter, and\nso is holocaust, and defalcation, and usufruct and a hundred others,\nbut land! a body ought to discriminate--they come together with\ngreat random, and a spear is brast, and one party brake his shield\nand the other one goes down, horse and man, over his horse-tail\nand brake his neck, and then the next candidate comes randoming in,\nand brast _his_ spear, and the other man brast his shield, and down\n_he_ goes, horse and man, over his horse-tail, and brake _his_ neck,\nand then there's another elected, and another and another and still\nanother, till the material is all used up; and when you come to\nfigure up results, you can't tell one fight from another, nor who\nwhipped; and as a _picture_, of living, raging, roaring battle,\nsho! why, it's pale and noiseless--just ghosts scuffling in a fog.\nDear me, what would this barren vocabulary get out of the mightiest\nspectacle?--the burning of Rome in Nero's time, for instance?\nWhy, it would merely say, 'Town burned down; no insurance; boy\nbrast a window, fireman brake his neck!'  Why, _that_ ain't a picture!\"\n\nIt was a good deal of a lecture, I thought, but it didn't disturb\nSandy, didn't turn a feather; her steam soared steadily up again,\nthe minute I took off the lid:\n\n\"Then Sir Marhaus turned his horse and rode toward Gawaine with\nhis spear.  And when Sir Gawaine saw that, he dressed his shield,\nand they aventred their spears, and they came together with all\nthe might of their horses, that either knight smote other so hard\nin the midst of their shields, but Sir Gawaine's spear brake--\"\n\n\"I knew it would.\"\n\n--\"but Sir Marhaus's spear held; and therewith Sir Gawaine and\nhis horse rushed down to the earth--\"\n\n\"Just so--and brake his back.\"\n\n--\"and lightly Sir Gawaine rose upon his feet and pulled out\nhis sword, and dressed him toward Sir Marhaus on foot, and therewith\neither came unto other eagerly, and smote together with their\nswords, that their shields flew in cantels, and they bruised their\nhelms and their hauberks, and wounded either other.  But Sir Gawaine,\nfro it passed nine of the clock, waxed by the space of three hours\never stronger and stronger and thrice his might was increased.\nAll this espied Sir Marhaus, and had great wonder how his might\nincreased, and so they wounded other passing sore; and then when\nit was come noon--\"\n\nThe pelting sing-song of it carried me forward to scenes and\nsounds of my boyhood days:\n\n\"N-e-e-ew Haven! ten minutes for refreshments--knductr'll strike\nthe gong-bell two minutes before train leaves--passengers for\nthe Shore line please take seats in the rear k'yar, this k'yar\ndon't go no furder--_ahh_-pls, _aw_-rnjz, b'_nan_ners,\n_s-a-n-d_'ches, p--_op_-corn!\"\n\n--\"and waxed past noon and drew toward evensong.  Sir Gawaine's\nstrength feebled and waxed passing faint, that unnethes he might\ndure any longer, and Sir Marhaus was then bigger and bigger--\"\n\n\"Which strained his armor, of course; and yet little would one\nof these people mind a small thing like that.\"\n\n--\"and so, Sir Knight, said Sir Marhaus, I have well felt that\nye are a passing good knight, and a marvelous man of might as ever\nI felt any, while it lasteth, and our quarrels are not great, and\ntherefore it were a pity to do you hurt, for I feel you are passing\nfeeble.  Ah, said Sir Gawaine, gentle knight, ye say the word\nthat I should say.  And therewith they took off their helms and\neither kissed other, and there they swore together either to love\nother as brethren--\"\n\nBut I lost the thread there, and dozed off to slumber, thinking\nabout what a pity it was that men with such superb strength\n--strength enabling them to stand up cased in cruelly burdensome\niron and drenched with perspiration, and hack and batter and bang\neach other for six hours on a stretch--should not have been born\nat a time when they could put it to some useful purpose.  Take\na jackass, for instance: a jackass has that kind of strength, and\nputs it to a useful purpose, and is valuable to this world because\nhe is a jackass; but a nobleman is not valuable because he is\na jackass.  It is a mixture that is always ineffectual, and should\nnever have been attempted in the first place.  And yet, once you\nstart a mistake, the trouble is done and you never know what is\ngoing to come of it.\n\nWhen I came to myself again and began to listen, I perceived that\nI had lost another chapter, and that Alisande had wandered a long\nway off with her people.\n\n\"And so they rode and came into a deep valley full of stones,\nand thereby they saw a fair stream of water; above thereby was\nthe head of the stream, a fair fountain, and three damsels sitting\nthereby. In this country, said Sir Marhaus, came never knight\nsince it was christened, but he found strange adventures--\"\n\n\"This is not good form, Alisande.  Sir Marhaus the king's son of\nIreland talks like all the rest; you ought to give him a brogue,\nor at least a characteristic expletive; by this means one would\nrecognize him as soon as he spoke, without his ever being named.\nIt is a common literary device with the great authors.  You should\nmake him say, 'In this country, be jabers, came never knight since\nit was christened, but he found strange adventures, be jabers.'\nYou see how much better that sounds.\"\n\n--\"came never knight but he found strange adventures, be jabers.\nOf a truth it doth indeed, fair lord, albeit 'tis passing hard\nto say, though peradventure that will not tarry but better speed\nwith usage.  And then they rode to the damsels, and either saluted\nother, and the eldest had a garland of gold about her head, and\nshe was threescore winter of age or more--\"\n\n\"The _damsel_ was?\"\n\n\"Even so, dear lord--and her hair was white under the garland--\"\n\n\"Celluloid teeth, nine dollars a set, as like as not--the loose-fit\nkind, that go up and down like a portcullis when you eat, and\nfall out when you laugh.\"\n\n\"The second damsel was of thirty winter of age, with a circlet of\ngold about her head.  The third damsel was but fifteen year of age--\"\n\nBillows of thought came rolling over my soul, and the voice faded\nout of my hearing!\n\nFifteen!  Break--my heart! oh, my lost darling!  Just her age\nwho was so gentle, and lovely, and all the world to me, and whom\nI shall never see again!  How the thought of her carries me back\nover wide seas of memory to a vague dim time, a happy time, so many,\nmany centuries hence, when I used to wake in the soft summer\nmornings, out of sweet dreams of her, and say \"Hello, Central!\"\njust to hear her dear voice come melting back to me with a\n\"Hello, Hank!\" that was music of the spheres to my enchanted ear.\nShe got three dollars a week, but she was worth it.\n\nI could not follow Alisande's further explanation of who our\ncaptured knights were, now--I mean in case she should ever get\nto explaining who they were.  My interest was gone, my thoughts\nwere far away, and sad.  By fitful glimpses of the drifting tale,\ncaught here and there and now and then, I merely noted in a vague\nway that each of these three knights took one of these three damsels\nup behind him on his horse, and one rode north, another east,\nthe other south, to seek adventures, and meet again and lie, after\nyear and day.  Year and day--and without baggage.  It was of\na piece with the general simplicity of the country.\n\nThe sun was now setting.  It was about three in the afternoon when\nAlisande had begun to tell me who the cowboys were; so she had made\npretty good progress with it--for her.  She would arrive some time\nor other, no doubt, but she was not a person who could be hurried.\n\nWe were approaching a castle which stood on high ground; a huge,\nstrong, venerable structure, whose gray towers and battlements were\ncharmingly draped with ivy, and whose whole majestic mass was\ndrenched with splendors flung from the sinking sun.  It was the\nlargest castle we had seen, and so I thought it might be the one\nwe were after, but Sandy said no.  She did not know who owned it;\nshe said she had passed it without calling, when she went down\nto Camelot.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nMORGAN LE FAY\n\nIf knights errant were to be believed, not all castles were desirable\nplaces to seek hospitality in.  As a matter of fact, knights errant\nwere _not_ persons to be believed--that is, measured by modern\nstandards of veracity; yet, measured by the standards of their own\ntime, and scaled accordingly, you got the truth.  It was very\nsimple: you discounted a statement ninety-seven per cent; the rest\nwas fact.  Now after making this allowance, the truth remained\nthat if I could find out something about a castle before ringing\nthe door-bell--I mean hailing the warders--it was the sensible\nthing to do.  So I was pleased when I saw in the distance a horseman\nmaking the bottom turn of the road that wound down from this castle.\n\nAs we approached each other, I saw that he wore a plumed helmet,\nand seemed to be otherwise clothed in steel, but bore a curious\naddition also--a stiff square garment like a herald's tabard.\nHowever, I had to smile at my own forgetfulness when I got nearer\nand read this sign on his tabard:\n\n  \"Persimmon's Soap -- All the Prime-Donna Use It.\"\n\nThat was a little idea of my own, and had several wholesome purposes\nin view toward the civilizing and uplifting of this nation.  In the\nfirst place, it was a furtive, underhand blow at this nonsense\nof knight errantry, though nobody suspected that but me.  I had\nstarted a number of these people out--the bravest knights I could\nget--each sandwiched between bulletin-boards bearing one device\nor another, and I judged that by and by when they got to be numerous\nenough they would begin to look ridiculous; and then, even the\nsteel-clad ass that _hadn't_ any board would himself begin to look\nridiculous because he was out of the fashion.\n\nSecondly, these missionaries would gradually, and without creating\nsuspicion or exciting alarm, introduce a rudimentary cleanliness\namong the nobility, and from them it would work down to the people,\nif the priests could be kept quiet.  This would undermine the Church.\nI mean would be a step toward that.  Next, education--next, freedom\n--and then she would begin to crumble.  It being my conviction that\nany Established Church is an established crime, an established\nslave-pen, I had no scruples, but was willing to assail it in\nany way or with any weapon that promised to hurt it.  Why, in my\nown former day--in remote centuries not yet stirring in the womb\nof time--there were old Englishmen who imagined that they had been\nborn in a free country: a \"free\" country with the Corporation Act\nand the Test still in force in it--timbers propped against men's\nliberties and dishonored consciences to shore up an Established\nAnachronism with.\n\nMy missionaries were taught to spell out the gilt signs on their\ntabards--the showy gilding was a neat idea, I could have got the\nking to wear a bulletin-board for the sake of that barbaric\nsplendor--they were to spell out these signs and then explain to\nthe lords and ladies what soap was; and if the lords and ladies\nwere afraid of it, get them to try it on a dog.  The missionary's\nnext move was to get the family together and try it on himself;\nhe was to stop at no experiment, however desperate, that could\nconvince the nobility that soap was harmless; if any final doubt\nremained, he must catch a hermit--the woods were full of them;\nsaints they called themselves, and saints they were believed to be.\nThey were unspeakably holy, and worked miracles, and everybody\nstood in awe of them.  If a hermit could survive a wash, and that\nfailed to convince a duke, give him up, let him alone.\n\nWhenever my missionaries overcame a knight errant on the road\nthey washed him, and when he got well they swore him to go and\nget a bulletin-board and disseminate soap and civilization the rest\nof his days.  As a consequence the workers in the field were\nincreasing by degrees, and the reform was steadily spreading.\nMy soap factory felt the strain early.  At first I had only two\nhands; but before I had left home I was already employing fifteen,\nand running night and day; and the atmospheric result was getting\nso pronounced that the king went sort of fainting and gasping\naround and said he did not believe he could stand it much longer,\nand Sir Launcelot got so that he did hardly anything but walk up\nand down the roof and swear, although I told him it was worse up\nthere than anywhere else, but he said he wanted plenty of air; and\nhe was always complaining that a palace was no place for a soap\nfactory anyway, and said if a man was to start one in his house\nhe would be damned if he wouldn't strangle him.  There were ladies\npresent, too, but much these people ever cared for that; they would\nswear before children, if the wind was their way when the factory\nwas going.\n\nThis missionary knight's name was La Cote Male Taile, and he said\nthat this castle was the abode of Morgan le Fay, sister of\nKing Arthur, and wife of King Uriens, monarch of a realm about\nas big as the District of Columbia--you could stand in the middle\nof it and throw bricks into the next kingdom.  \"Kings\" and \"Kingdoms\"\nwere as thick in Britain as they had been in little Palestine in\nJoshua's time, when people had to sleep with their knees pulled up\nbecause they couldn't stretch out without a passport.\n\nLa Cote was much depressed, for he had scored here the worst\nfailure of his campaign.  He had not worked off a cake; yet he had\ntried all the tricks of the trade, even to the washing of a hermit;\nbut the hermit died.  This was, indeed, a bad failure, for this\nanimal would now be dubbed a martyr, and would take his place\namong the saints of the Roman calendar.  Thus made he his moan,\nthis poor Sir La Cote Male Taile, and sorrowed passing sore.  And\nso my heart bled for him, and I was moved to comfort and stay him.\nWherefore I said:\n\n\"Forbear to grieve, fair knight, for this is not a defeat.  We have\nbrains, you and I; and for such as have brains there are no defeats,\nbut only victories.  Observe how we will turn this seeming disaster\ninto an advertisement; an advertisement for our soap; and the\nbiggest one, to draw, that was ever thought of; an advertisement\nthat will transform that Mount Washington defeat into a Matterhorn\nvictory.  We will put on your bulletin-board, '_Patronized by the\nelect_.'  How does that strike you?\"\n\n\"Verily, it is wonderly bethought!\"\n\n\"Well, a body is bound to admit that for just a modest little\none-line ad, it's a corker.\"\n\nSo the poor colporteur's griefs vanished away.  He was a brave\nfellow, and had done mighty feats of arms in his time.  His chief\ncelebrity rested upon the events of an excursion like this one\nof mine, which he had once made with a damsel named Maledisant,\nwho was as handy with her tongue as was Sandy, though in a different\nway, for her tongue churned forth only railings and insult, whereas\nSandy's music was of a kindlier sort.  I knew his story well, and so\nI knew how to interpret the compassion that was in his face when he\nbade me farewell.  He supposed I was having a bitter hard time of it.\n\nSandy and I discussed his story, as we rode along, and she said\nthat La Cote's bad luck had begun with the very beginning of that\ntrip; for the king's fool had overthrown him on the first day,\nand in such cases it was customary for the girl to desert to the\nconqueror, but Maledisant didn't do it; and also persisted afterward\nin sticking to him, after all his defeats.  But, said I, suppose\nthe victor should decline to accept his spoil?  She said that that\nwouldn't answer--he must.  He couldn't decline; it wouldn't be\nregular.  I made a note of that.  If Sandy's music got to be too\nburdensome, some time, I would let a knight defeat me, on the chance\nthat she would desert to him.\n\nIn due time we were challenged by the warders, from the castle\nwalls, and after a parley admitted.  I have nothing pleasant to\ntell about that visit.  But it was not a disappointment, for I knew\nMrs. le Fay by reputation, and was not expecting anything pleasant.\nShe was held in awe by the whole realm, for she had made everybody\nbelieve she was a great sorceress.  All her ways were wicked, all\nher instincts devilish.  She was loaded to the eyelids with cold\nmalice.  All her history was black with crime; and among her crimes\nmurder was common.  I was most curious to see her; as curious as\nI could have been to see Satan.  To my surprise she was beautiful;\nblack thoughts had failed to make her expression repulsive, age\nhad failed to wrinkle her satin skin or mar its bloomy freshness.\nShe could have passed for old Uriens' granddaughter, she could\nhave been mistaken for sister to her own son.\n\nAs soon as we were fairly within the castle gates we were ordered\ninto her presence.  King Uriens was there, a kind-faced old man\nwith a subdued look; and also the son, Sir Uwaine le Blanchemains,\nin whom I was, of course, interested on account of the tradition\nthat he had once done battle with thirty knights, and also on\naccount of his trip with Sir Gawaine and Sir Marhaus, which Sandy\nhad been aging me with.  But Morgan was the main attraction, the\nconspicuous personality here; she was head chief of this household,\nthat was plain.  She caused us to be seated, and then she began,\nwith all manner of pretty graces and graciousnesses, to ask me\nquestions.  Dear me, it was like a bird or a flute, or something,\ntalking.  I felt persuaded that this woman must have been\nmisrepresented, lied about.  She trilled along, and trilled along,\nand presently a handsome young page, clothed like the rainbow, and\nas easy and undulatory of movement as a wave, came with something\non a golden salver, and, kneeling to present it to her, overdid\nhis graces and lost his balance, and so fell lightly against her\nknee.  She slipped a dirk into him in as matter-of-course a way as\nanother person would have harpooned a rat!\n\nPoor child! he slumped to the floor, twisted his silken limbs in\none great straining contortion of pain, and was dead.  Out of the\nold king was wrung an involuntary \"O-h!\" of compassion.  The look\nhe got, made him cut it suddenly short and not put any more hyphens\nin it.  Sir Uwaine, at a sign from his mother, went to the anteroom\nand called some servants, and meanwhile madame went rippling sweetly\nalong with her talk.\n\nI saw that she was a good housekeeper, for while she talked she\nkept a corner of her eye on the servants to see that they made\nno balks in handling the body and getting it out; when they came\nwith fresh clean towels, she sent back for the other kind; and\nwhen they had finished wiping the floor and were going, she indicated\na crimson fleck the size of a tear which their duller eyes had\noverlooked.  It was plain to me that La Cote Male Taile had failed\nto see the mistress of the house.  Often, how louder and clearer\nthan any tongue, does dumb circumstantial evidence speak.\n\nMorgan le Fay rippled along as musically as ever.  Marvelous woman.\nAnd what a glance she had: when it fell in reproof upon those\nservants, they shrunk and quailed as timid people do when the\nlightning flashes out of a cloud.  I could have got the habit\nmyself.  It was the same with that poor old Brer Uriens; he was\nalways on the ragged edge of apprehension; she could not even turn\ntoward him but he winced.\n\nIn the midst of the talk I let drop a complimentary word about\nKing Arthur, forgetting for the moment how this woman hated her\nbrother.  That one little compliment was enough.  She clouded up\nlike storm; she called for her guards, and said:\n\n\"Hale me these varlets to the dungeons.\"\n\nThat struck cold on my ears, for her dungeons had a reputation.\nNothing occurred to me to say--or do.  But not so with Sandy.\nAs the guard laid a hand upon me, she piped up with the tranquilest\nconfidence, and said:\n\n\"God's wounds, dost thou covet destruction, thou maniac?  It is\nThe Boss!\"\n\nNow what a happy idea that was!--and so simple; yet it would never\nhave occurred to me.  I was born modest; not all over, but in spots;\nand this was one of the spots.\n\nThe effect upon madame was electrical.  It cleared her countenance\nand brought back her smiles and all her persuasive graces and\nblandishments; but nevertheless she was not able to entirely cover up\nwith them the fact that she was in a ghastly fright. She said:\n\n\"La, but do list to thine handmaid! as if one gifted with powers\nlike to mine might say the thing which I have said unto one who\nhas vanquished Merlin, and not be jesting.  By mine enchantments\nI foresaw your coming, and by them I knew you when you entered\nhere.  I did but play this little jest with hope to surprise you\ninto some display of your art, as not doubting you would blast\nthe guards with occult fires, consuming them to ashes on the spot,\na marvel much beyond mine own ability, yet one which I have long\nbeen childishly curious to see.\"\n\nThe guards were less curious, and got out as soon as they got permission.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nA ROYAL BANQUET\n\nMadame, seeing me pacific and unresentful, no doubt judged that\nI was deceived by her excuse; for her fright dissolved away, and\nshe was soon so importunate to have me give an exhibition and kill\nsomebody, that the thing grew to be embarrassing.  However, to my\nrelief she was presently interrupted by the call to prayers.  I will\nsay this much for the nobility: that, tyrannical, murderous,\nrapacious, and morally rotten as they were, they were deeply and\nenthusiastically religious.  Nothing could divert them from the\nregular and faithful performance of the pieties enjoined by the\nChurch.  More than once I had seen a noble who had gotten his\nenemy at a disadvantage, stop to pray before cutting his throat;\nmore than once I had seen a noble, after ambushing and despatching\nhis enemy, retire to the nearest wayside shrine and humbly give\nthanks, without even waiting to rob the body.  There was to be\nnothing finer or sweeter in the life of even Benvenuto Cellini,\nthat rough-hewn saint, ten centuries later.  All the nobles of\nBritain, with their families, attended divine service morning and\nnight daily, in their private chapels, and even the worst of them\nhad family worship five or six times a day besides.  The credit\nof this belonged entirely to the Church.  Although I was no friend\nto that Catholic Church, I was obliged to admit this.  And often,\nin spite of me, I found myself saying, \"What would this country\nbe without the Church?\"\n\nAfter prayers we had dinner in a great banqueting hall which was\nlighted by hundreds of grease-jets, and everything was as fine and\nlavish and rudely splendid as might become the royal degree of the\nhosts.  At the head of the hall, on a dais, was the table of the\nking, queen, and their son, Prince Uwaine.  Stretching down the hall\nfrom this, was the general table, on the floor.  At this, above\nthe salt, sat the visiting nobles and the grown members of their\nfamilies, of both sexes,--the resident Court, in effect--sixty-one\npersons; below the salt sat minor officers of the household, with\ntheir principal subordinates: altogether a hundred and eighteen\npersons sitting, and about as many liveried servants standing\nbehind their chairs, or serving in one capacity or another.  It was\na very fine show.  In a gallery a band with cymbals, horns, harps,\nand other horrors, opened the proceedings with what seemed to be\nthe crude first-draft or original agony of the wail known to later\ncenturies as \"In the Sweet Bye and Bye.\"  It was new, and ought\nto have been rehearsed a little more.  For some reason or other\nthe queen had the composer hanged, after dinner.\n\nAfter this music, the priest who stood behind the royal table said\na noble long grace in ostensible Latin.  Then the battalion of\nwaiters broke away from their posts, and darted, rushed, flew,\nfetched and carried, and the mighty feeding began; no words\nanywhere, but absorbing attention to business.  The rows of chops\nopened and shut in vast unison, and the sound of it was like to\nthe muffled burr of subterranean machinery.\n\nThe havoc continued an hour and a half, and unimaginable was the\ndestruction of substantials.  Of the chief feature of the feast\n--the huge wild boar that lay stretched out so portly and imposing\nat the start--nothing was left but the semblance of a hoop-skirt;\nand he was but the type and symbol of what had happened to all\nthe other dishes.\n\nWith the pastries and so on, the heavy drinking began--and the talk.\nGallon after gallon of wine and mead disappeared, and everybody\ngot comfortable, then happy, then sparklingly joyous--both sexes,\n--and by and by pretty noisy.  Men told anecdotes that were terrific\nto hear, but nobody blushed; and when the nub was sprung, the\nassemblage let go with a horse-laugh that shook the fortress.\nLadies answered back with historiettes that would almost have made\nQueen Margaret of Navarre or even the great Elizabeth of England\nhide behind a handkerchief, but nobody hid here, but only laughed\n--howled, you may say.  In pretty much all of these dreadful stories,\necclesiastics were the hardy heroes, but that didn't worry the\nchaplain any, he had his laugh with the rest; more than that, upon\ninvitation he roared out a song which was of as daring a sort as\nany that was sung that night.\n\nBy midnight everybody was fagged out, and sore with laughing; and,\nas a rule, drunk: some weepingly, some affectionately, some\nhilariously, some quarrelsomely, some dead and under the table.\nOf the ladies, the worst spectacle was a lovely young duchess, whose\nwedding-eve this was; and indeed she was a spectacle, sure enough.\nJust as she was she could have sat in advance for the portrait of the\nyoung daughter of the Regent d'Orleans, at the famous dinner whence\nshe was carried, foul-mouthed, intoxicated, and helpless, to her bed,\nin the lost and lamented days of the Ancient Regime.\n\nSuddenly, even while the priest was lifting his hands, and all\nconscious heads were bowed in reverent expectation of the coming\nblessing, there appeared under the arch of the far-off door at\nthe bottom of the hall an old and bent and white-haired lady,\nleaning upon a crutch-stick; and she lifted the stick and pointed it\ntoward the queen and cried out:\n\n\"The wrath and curse of God fall upon you, woman without pity,\nwho have slain mine innocent grandchild and made desolate this\nold heart that had nor chick, nor friend nor stay nor comfort in\nall this world but him!\"\n\nEverybody crossed himself in a grisly fright, for a curse was an\nawful thing to those people; but the queen rose up majestic, with\nthe death-light in her eye, and flung back this ruthless command:\n\n\"Lay hands on her!  To the stake with her!\"\n\nThe guards left their posts to obey.  It was a shame; it was a\ncruel thing to see.  What could be done?  Sandy gave me a look;\nI knew she had another inspiration.  I said:\n\n\"Do what you choose.\"\n\nShe was up and facing toward the queen in a moment.  She indicated\nme, and said:\n\n\"Madame, _he_ saith this may not be.  Recall the commandment, or he\nwill dissolve the castle and it shall vanish away like the instable\nfabric of a dream!\"\n\nConfound it, what a crazy contract to pledge a person to!  What if\nthe queen--\n\nBut my consternation subsided there, and my panic passed off;\nfor the queen, all in a collapse, made no show of resistance but\ngave a countermanding sign and sunk into her seat.  When she reached\nit she was sober.  So were many of the others.  The assemblage rose,\nwhiffed ceremony to the winds, and rushed for the door like a mob;\noverturning chairs, smashing crockery, tugging, struggling,\nshouldering, crowding--anything to get out before I should change\nmy mind and puff the castle into the measureless dim vacancies of\nspace.  Well, well, well, they _were_ a superstitious lot.  It is\nall a body can do to conceive of it.\n\nThe poor queen was so scared and humbled that she was even afraid\nto hang the composer without first consulting me.  I was very sorry\nfor her--indeed, any one would have been, for she was really\nsuffering; so I was willing to do anything that was reasonable, and\nhad no desire to carry things to wanton extremities.  I therefore\nconsidered the matter thoughtfully, and ended by having the\nmusicians ordered into our presence to play that Sweet Bye and\nBye again, which they did.  Then I saw that she was right, and\ngave her permission to hang the whole band.  This little relaxation\nof sternness had a good effect upon the queen.  A statesman gains\nlittle by the arbitrary exercise of iron-clad authority upon all\noccasions that offer, for this wounds the just pride of his\nsubordinates, and thus tends to undermine his strength.  A little\nconcession, now and then, where it can do no harm, is the wiser policy.\n\nNow that the queen was at ease in her mind once more, and measurably\nhappy, her wine naturally began to assert itself again, and it got\na little the start of her.  I mean it set her music going--her silver\nbell of a tongue.  Dear me, she was a master talker.  It would not\nbecome me to suggest that it was pretty late and that I was a tired\nman and very sleepy.  I wished I had gone off to bed when I had\nthe chance.  Now I must stick it out; there was no other way.  So\nshe tinkled along and along, in the otherwise profound and ghostly\nhush of the sleeping castle, until by and by there came, as if\nfrom deep down under us, a far-away sound, as of a muffled shriek\n--with an expression of agony about it that made my flesh crawl.\nThe queen stopped, and her eyes lighted with pleasure; she tilted\nher graceful head as a bird does when it listens.  The sound bored\nits way up through the stillness again.\n\n\"What is it?\" I said.\n\n\"It is truly a stubborn soul, and endureth long.  It is many hours now.\"\n\n\"Endureth what?\"\n\n\"The rack.  Come--ye shall see a blithe sight.  An he yield not\nhis secret now, ye shall see him torn asunder.\"\n\nWhat a silky smooth hellion she was; and so composed and serene,\nwhen the cords all down my legs were hurting in sympathy with that\nman's pain.  Conducted by mailed guards bearing flaring torches,\nwe tramped along echoing corridors, and down stone stairways dank\nand dripping, and smelling of mould and ages of imprisoned night\n--a chill, uncanny journey and a long one, and not made the shorter\nor the cheerier by the sorceress's talk, which was about this\nsufferer and his crime.  He had been accused by an anonymous\ninformer, of having killed a stag in the royal preserves.  I said:\n\n\"Anonymous testimony isn't just the right thing, your Highness.\nIt were fairer to confront the accused with the accuser.\"\n\n\"I had not thought of that, it being but of small consequence.\nBut an I would, I could not, for that the accuser came masked by\nnight, and told the forester, and straightway got him hence again,\nand so the forester knoweth him not.\"\n\n\"Then is this Unknown the only person who saw the stag killed?\"\n\n\"Marry, _no_ man _saw_ the killing, but this Unknown saw this hardy\nwretch near to the spot where the stag lay, and came with right\nloyal zeal and betrayed him to the forester.\"\n\n\"So the Unknown was near the dead stag, too?  Isn't it just possible\nthat he did the killing himself?  His loyal zeal--in a mask--looks\njust a shade suspicious.  But what is your highness's idea for\nracking the prisoner?  Where is the profit?\"\n\n\"He will not confess, else; and then were his soul lost.  For his\ncrime his life is forfeited by the law--and of a surety will I see\nthat he payeth it!--but it were peril to my own soul to let him\ndie unconfessed and unabsolved.  Nay, I were a fool to fling me\ninto hell for _his_ accommodation.\"\n\n\"But, your Highness, suppose he has nothing to confess?\"\n\n\"As to that, we shall see, anon.  An I rack him to death and he\nconfess not, it will peradventure show that he had indeed naught\nto confess--ye will grant that that is sooth?  Then shall I not be\ndamned for an unconfessed man that had naught to confess\n--wherefore, I shall be safe.\"\n\nIt was the stubborn unreasoning of the time.  It was useless to\nargue with her.  Arguments have no chance against petrified\ntraining; they wear it as little as the waves wear a cliff.  And\nher training was everybody's.  The brightest intellect in the land\nwould not have been able to see that her position was defective.\n\nAs we entered the rack-cell I caught a picture that will not go\nfrom me; I wish it would.  A native young giant of thirty or\nthereabouts lay stretched upon the frame on his back, with his\nwrists and ankles tied to ropes which led over windlasses at either\nend.  There was no color in him; his features were contorted and\nset, and sweat-drops stood upon his forehead.  A priest bent over\nhim on each side; the executioner stood by; guards were on duty;\nsmoking torches stood in sockets along the walls; in a corner\ncrouched a poor young creature, her face drawn with anguish,\na half-wild and hunted look in her eyes, and in her lap lay a little\nchild asleep.  Just as we stepped across the threshold the\nexecutioner gave his machine a slight turn, which wrung a cry\nfrom both the prisoner and the woman; but I shouted, and the\nexecutioner released the strain without waiting to see who spoke.\nI could not let this horror go on; it would have killed me to\nsee it.  I asked the queen to let me clear the place and speak\nto the prisoner privately; and when she was going to object I spoke\nin a low voice and said I did not want to make a scene before\nher servants, but I must have my way; for I was King Arthur's\nrepresentative, and was speaking in his name.  She saw she had\nto yield.  I asked her to indorse me to these people, and then\nleave me.  It was not pleasant for her, but she took the pill;\nand even went further than I was meaning to require.  I only wanted\nthe backing of her own authority; but she said:\n\n\"Ye will do in all things as this lord shall command.  It is The Boss.\"\n\nIt was certainly a good word to conjure with: you could see it\nby the squirming of these rats.  The queen's guards fell into line,\nand she and they marched away, with their torch-bearers, and woke\nthe echoes of the cavernous tunnels with the measured beat of their\nretreating footfalls.  I had the prisoner taken from the rack and\nplaced upon his bed, and medicaments applied to his hurts, and\nwine given him to drink.  The woman crept near and looked on,\neagerly, lovingly, but timorously,--like one who fears a repulse;\nindeed, she tried furtively to touch the man's forehead, and jumped\nback, the picture of fright, when I turned unconsciously toward\nher.  It was pitiful to see.\n\n\"Lord,\" I said, \"stroke him, lass, if you want to.  Do anything\nyou're a mind to; don't mind me.\"\n\nWhy, her eyes were as grateful as an animal's, when you do it\na kindness that it understands.  The baby was out of her way and\nshe had her cheek against the man's in a minute and her hands\nfondling his hair, and her happy tears running down.  The man\nrevived and caressed his wife with his eyes, which was all he\ncould do.  I judged I might clear the den, now, and I did; cleared\nit of all but the family and myself.  Then I said:\n\n\"Now, my friend, tell me your side of this matter; I know\nthe other side.\"\n\nThe man moved his head in sign of refusal.  But the woman looked\npleased--as it seemed to me--pleased with my suggestion.  I went on--\n\n\"You know of me?\"\n\n\"Yes.  All do, in Arthur's realms.\"\n\n\"If my reputation has come to you right and straight, you should\nnot be afraid to speak.\"\n\nThe woman broke in, eagerly:\n\n\"Ah, fair my lord, do thou persuade him!  Thou canst an thou wilt.\nAh, he suffereth so; and it is for me--for _me_!  And how can I bear it?\nI would I might see him die--a sweet, swift death; oh, my Hugo,\nI cannot bear this one!\"\n\nAnd she fell to sobbing and grovelling about my feet, and still\nimploring.  Imploring what?  The man's death?  I could not quite\nget the bearings of the thing.  But Hugo interrupted her and said:\n\n\"Peace!  Ye wit not what ye ask.  Shall I starve whom I love,\nto win a gentle death?  I wend thou knewest me better.\"\n\n\"Well,\" I said, \"I can't quite make this out.  It is a puzzle.  Now--\"\n\n\"Ah, dear my lord, an ye will but persuade him!  Consider how\nthese his tortures wound me!  Oh, and he will not speak!--whereas,\nthe healing, the solace that lie in a blessed swift death--\"\n\n\"What _are_ you maundering about?  He's going out from here a free\nman and whole--he's not going to die.\"\n\nThe man's white face lit up, and the woman flung herself at me\nin a most surprising explosion of joy, and cried out:\n\n\"He is saved!--for it is the king's word by the mouth of the king's\nservant--Arthur, the king whose word is gold!\"\n\n\"Well, then you do believe I can be trusted, after all.  Why\ndidn't you before?\"\n\n\"Who doubted?  Not I, indeed; and not she.\"\n\n\"Well, why wouldn't you tell me your story, then?\"\n\n\"Ye had made no promise; else had it been otherwise.\"\n\n\"I see, I see....  And yet I believe I don't quite see, after all.\nYou stood the torture and refused to confess; which shows plain\nenough to even the dullest understanding that you had nothing\nto confess--\"\n\n\"I, my lord?  How so?  It was I that killed the deer!\"\n\n\"You _did_?  Oh, dear, this is the most mixed-up business that ever--\"\n\n\"Dear lord, I begged him on my knees to confess, but--\"\n\n\"You _did_!  It gets thicker and thicker.  What did you want him\nto do that for?\"\n\n\"Sith it would bring him a quick death and save him all this\ncruel pain.\"\n\n\"Well--yes, there is reason in that.  But _he_ didn't want the\nquick death.\"\n\n\"He?  Why, of a surety he _did_.\"\n\n\"Well, then, why in the world _didn't_ he confess?\"\n\n\"Ah, sweet sir, and leave my wife and chick without bread and shelter?\"\n\n\"Oh, heart of gold, now I see it!  The bitter law takes the convicted\nman's estate and beggars his widow and his orphans.  They could\ntorture you to death, but without conviction or confession they\ncould not rob your wife and baby.  You stood by them like a man;\nand _you_--true wife and the woman that you are--you would have\nbought him release from torture at cost to yourself of slow\nstarvation and death--well, it humbles a body to think what your\nsex can do when it comes to self-sacrifice.  I'll book you both\nfor my colony; you'll like it there; it's a Factory where I'm going\nto turn groping and grubbing automata into _men_.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nIN THE QUEEN'S DUNGEONS\n\nWell, I arranged all that; and I had the man sent to his home.\nI had a great desire to rack the executioner; not because he was\na good, painstaking and paingiving official,--for surely it was\nnot to his discredit that he performed his functions well--but to\npay him back for wantonly cuffing and otherwise distressing that\nyoung woman.  The priests told me about this, and were generously\nhot to have him punished.  Something of this disagreeable sort\nwas turning up every now and then.  I mean, episodes that showed\nthat not all priests were frauds and self-seekers, but that many,\neven the great majority, of these that were down on the ground\namong the common people, were sincere and right-hearted, and\ndevoted to the alleviation of human troubles and sufferings.\nWell, it was a thing which could not be helped, so I seldom fretted\nabout it, and never many minutes at a time; it has never been my\nway to bother much about things which you can't cure.  But I did\nnot like it, for it was just the sort of thing to keep people\nreconciled to an Established Church.  We _must_ have a religion\n--it goes without saying--but my idea is, to have it cut up into\nforty free sects, so that they will police each other, as had been\nthe case in the United States in my time.  Concentration of power\nin a political machine is bad; and an Established Church is\nonly a political machine; it was invented for that; it is nursed,\ncradled, preserved for that; it is an enemy to human liberty, and\ndoes no good which it could not better do in a split-up and scattered\ncondition.  That wasn't law; it wasn't gospel: it was only\nan opinion--my opinion, and I was only a man, one man: so it wasn't\nworth any more than the pope's--or any less, for that matter.\n\nWell, I couldn't rack the executioner, neither would I overlook\nthe just complaint of the priests.  The man must be punished\nsomehow or other, so I degraded him from his office and made him\nleader of the band--the new one that was to be started.  He begged\nhard, and said he couldn't play--a plausible excuse, but too thin;\nthere wasn't a musician in the country that could.\n\nThe queen was a good deal outraged, next morning when she found\nshe was going to have neither Hugo's life nor his property.  But\nI told her she must bear this cross; that while by law and custom\nshe certainly was entitled to both the man's life and his property,\nthere were extenuating circumstances, and so in Arthur the king's\nname I had pardoned him.  The deer was ravaging the man's fields,\nand he had killed it in sudden passion, and not for gain; and he\nhad carried it into the royal forest in the hope that that might make\ndetection of the misdoer impossible.  Confound her, I couldn't\nmake her see that sudden passion is an extenuating circumstance\nin the killing of venison--or of a person--so I gave it up and let\nher sulk it out.  I _did_ think I was going to make her see it by\nremarking that her own sudden passion in the case of the page\nmodified that crime.\n\n\"Crime!\" she exclaimed.  \"How thou talkest!  Crime, forsooth!\nMan, I am going to _pay_ for him!\"\n\nOh, it was no use to waste sense on her.  Training--training is\neverything; training is all there is _to_ a person.  We speak of\nnature; it is folly; there is no such thing as nature; what we\ncall by that misleading name is merely heredity and training.\nWe have no thoughts of our own, no opinions of our own; they are\ntransmitted to us, trained into us.  All that is original in us,\nand therefore fairly creditable or discreditable to us, can be\ncovered up and hidden by the point of a cambric needle, all the\nrest being atoms contributed by, and inherited from, a procession\nof ancestors that stretches back a billion years to the Adam-clam\nor grasshopper or monkey from whom our race has been so tediously\nand ostentatiously and unprofitably developed.  And as for me,\nall that I think about in this plodding sad pilgrimage, this\npathetic drift between the eternities, is to look out and humbly\nlive a pure and high and blameless life, and save that one\nmicroscopic atom in me that is truly _me_: the rest may land in\nSheol and welcome for all I care.\n\nNo, confound her, her intellect was good, she had brains enough,\nbut her training made her an ass--that is, from a many-centuries-later\npoint of view.  To kill the page was no crime--it was her right;\nand upon her right she stood, serenely and unconscious of offense.\nShe was a result of generations of training in the unexamined and\nunassailed belief that the law which permitted her to kill a subject\nwhen she chose was a perfectly right and righteous one.\n\nWell, we must give even Satan his due.  She deserved a compliment\nfor one thing; and I tried to pay it, but the words stuck in my\nthroat.  She had a right to kill the boy, but she was in no wise\nobliged to pay for him.  That was law for some other people, but\nnot for her.  She knew quite well that she was doing a large and\ngenerous thing to pay for that lad, and that I ought in common\nfairness to come out with something handsome about it, but I\ncouldn't--my mouth refused.  I couldn't help seeing, in my fancy,\nthat poor old grandma with the broken heart, and that fair young\ncreature lying butchered, his little silken pomps and vanities\nlaced with his golden blood.  How could she _pay_ for him!  _Whom_\ncould she pay?  And so, well knowing that this woman, trained\nas she had been, deserved praise, even adulation, I was yet not\nable to utter it, trained as I had been.  The best I could do was\nto fish up a compliment from outside, so to speak--and the pity\nof it was, that it was true:\n\n\"Madame, your people will adore you for this.\"\n\nQuite true, but I meant to hang her for it some day if I lived.\nSome of those laws were too bad, altogether too bad.  A master\nmight kill his slave for nothing--for mere spite, malice, or\nto pass the time--just as we have seen that the crowned head could\ndo it with _his_ slave, that is to say, anybody.  A gentleman could\nkill a free commoner, and pay for him--cash or garden-truck.\nA noble could kill a noble without expense, as far as the law was\nconcerned, but reprisals in kind were to be expected.  _Any_body\ncould kill _some_body, except the commoner and the slave; these had\nno privileges.  If they killed, it was murder, and the law wouldn't\nstand murder.  It made short work of the experimenter--and of\nhis family, too, if he murdered somebody who belonged up among\nthe ornamental ranks.  If a commoner gave a noble even so much\nas a Damiens-scratch which didn't kill or even hurt, he got Damiens'\ndose for it just the same; they pulled him to rags and tatters\nwith horses, and all the world came to see the show, and crack\njokes, and have a good time; and some of the performances of the\nbest people present were as tough, and as properly unprintable,\nas any that have been printed by the pleasant Casanova in his\nchapter about the dismemberment of Louis XV's poor awkward enemy.\n\nI had had enough of this grisly place by this time, and wanted\nto leave, but I couldn't, because I had something on my mind that\nmy conscience kept prodding me about, and wouldn't let me forget.\nIf I had the remaking of man, he wouldn't have any conscience.\nIt is one of the most disagreeable things connected with a person;\nand although it certainly does a great deal of good, it cannot\nbe said to pay, in the long run; it would be much better to have\nless good and more comfort.  Still, this is only my opinion, and\nI am only one man; others, with less experience, may think\ndifferently.  They have a right to their view.  I only stand\nto this: I have noticed my conscience for many years, and I know\nit is more trouble and bother to me than anything else I started\nwith.  I suppose that in the beginning I prized it, because we\nprize anything that is ours; and yet how foolish it was to think so.\nIf we look at it in another way, we see how absurd it is: if I had\nan anvil in me would I prize it?  Of course not.  And yet when you\ncome to think, there is no real difference between a conscience\nand an anvil--I mean for comfort.  I have noticed it a thousand\ntimes.  And you could dissolve an anvil with acids, when you\ncouldn't stand it any longer; but there isn't any way that you can\nwork off a conscience--at least so it will stay worked off; not\nthat I know of, anyway.\n\nThere was something I wanted to do before leaving, but it was\na disagreeable matter, and I hated to go at it.  Well, it bothered\nme all the morning.  I could have mentioned it to the old king,\nbut what would be the use?--he was but an extinct volcano; he had\nbeen active in his time, but his fire was out, this good while,\nhe was only a stately ash-pile now; gentle enough, and kindly\nenough for my purpose, without doubt, but not usable.  He was\nnothing, this so-called king: the queen was the only power there.\nAnd she was a Vesuvius.  As a favor, she might consent to warm\na flock of sparrows for you, but then she might take that very\nopportunity to turn herself loose and bury a city.  However,\nI reflected that as often as any other way, when you are expecting\nthe worst, you get something that is not so bad, after all.\n\nSo I braced up and placed my matter before her royal Highness.\nI said I had been having a general jail-delivery at Camelot and\namong neighboring castles, and with her permission I would like\nto examine her collection, her bric-a-brac--that is to say, her\nprisoners.  She resisted; but I was expecting that.  But she finally\nconsented.  I was expecting that, too, but not so soon.  That about\nended my discomfort.  She called her guards and torches, and\nwe went down into the dungeons.  These were down under the castle's\nfoundations, and mainly were small cells hollowed out of the living\nrock.  Some of these cells had no light at all.  In one of them was\na woman, in foul rags, who sat on the ground, and would not answer\na question or speak a word, but only looked up at us once or twice,\nthrough a cobweb of tangled hair, as if to see what casual thing\nit might be that was disturbing with sound and light the meaningless\ndull dream that was become her life; after that, she sat bowed,\nwith her dirt-caked fingers idly interlocked in her lap, and gave\nno further sign.  This poor rack of bones was a woman of middle\nage, apparently; but only apparently; she had been there nine\nyears, and was eighteen when she entered.  She was a commoner,\nand had been sent here on her bridal night by Sir Breuse Sance Pite,\na neighboring lord whose vassal her father was, and to which said\nlord she had refused what has since been called le droit du\nseigneur, and, moreover, had opposed violence to violence and spilt\nhalf a gill of his almost sacred blood.  The young husband had\ninterfered at that point, believing the bride's life in danger,\nand had flung the noble out into the midst of the humble and\ntrembling wedding guests, in the parlor, and left him there\nastonished at this strange treatment, and implacably embittered\nagainst both bride and groom.  The said lord being cramped for\ndungeon-room had asked the queen to accommodate his two criminals,\nand here in her bastile they had been ever since; hither, indeed,\nthey had come before their crime was an hour old, and had never\nseen each other since.  Here they were, kenneled like toads in the\nsame rock; they had passed nine pitch dark years within fifty feet\nof each other, yet neither knew whether the other was alive or not.\nAll the first years, their only question had been--asked with\nbeseechings and tears that might have moved stones, in time,\nperhaps, but hearts are not stones: \"Is he alive?\"  \"Is she alive?\"\nBut they had never got an answer; and at last that question was\nnot asked any more--or any other.\n\nI wanted to see the man, after hearing all this.  He was thirty-four\nyears old, and looked sixty.  He sat upon a squared block of\nstone, with his head bent down, his forearms resting on his knees,\nhis long hair hanging like a fringe before his face, and he was\nmuttering to himself.  He raised his chin and looked us slowly\nover, in a listless dull way, blinking with the distress of the\ntorchlight, then dropped his head and fell to muttering again\nand took no further notice of us.  There were some pathetically\nsuggestive dumb witnesses present.  On his wrists and ankles were\ncicatrices, old smooth scars, and fastened to the stone on which\nhe sat was a chain with manacles and fetters attached; but this\napparatus lay idle on the ground, and was thick with rust.  Chains\ncease to be needed after the spirit has gone out of a prisoner.\n\nI could not rouse the man; so I said we would take him to her,\nand see--to the bride who was the fairest thing in the earth to him,\nonce--roses, pearls, and dew made flesh, for him; a wonder-work,\nthe master-work of nature: with eyes like no other eyes, and voice\nlike no other voice, and a freshness, and lithe young grace, and\nbeauty, that belonged properly to the creatures of dreams--as he\nthought--and to no other.  The sight of her would set his stagnant\nblood leaping; the sight of her--\n\nBut it was a disappointment.  They sat together on the ground and\nlooked dimly wondering into each other's faces a while, with a\nsort of weak animal curiosity; then forgot each other's presence,\nand dropped their eyes, and you saw that they were away again and\nwandering in some far land of dreams and shadows that we know\nnothing about.\n\nI had them taken out and sent to their friends.  The queen did not\nlike it much.  Not that she felt any personal interest in the matter,\nbut she thought it disrespectful to Sir Breuse Sance Pite.  However,\nI assured her that if he found he couldn't stand it I would fix him\nso that he could.\n\nI set forty-seven prisoners loose out of those awful rat-holes,\nand left only one in captivity.  He was a lord, and had killed\nanother lord, a sort of kinsman of the queen.  That other lord\nhad ambushed him to assassinate him, but this fellow had got the\nbest of him and cut his throat.  However, it was not for that that\nI left him jailed, but for maliciously destroying the only public\nwell in one of his wretched villages.  The queen was bound to hang\nhim for killing her kinsman, but I would not allow it: it was no\ncrime to kill an assassin.  But I said I was willing to let her\nhang him for destroying the well; so she concluded to put up with\nthat, as it was better than nothing.\n\nDear me, for what trifling offenses the most of those forty-seven\nmen and women were shut up there!  Indeed, some were there for\nno distinct offense at all, but only to gratify somebody's spite;\nand not always the queen's by any means, but a friend's.  The newest\nprisoner's crime was a mere remark which he had made.  He said\nhe believed that men were about all alike, and one man as good\nas another, barring clothes.  He said he believed that if you were\nto strip the nation naked and send a stranger through the crowd, he\ncouldn't tell the king from a quack doctor, nor a duke from a hotel\nclerk.  Apparently here was a man whose brains had not been reduced\nto an ineffectual mush by idiotic training.  I set him loose and\nsent him to the Factory.\n\nSome of the cells carved in the living rock were just behind the\nface of the precipice, and in each of these an arrow-slit had been\npierced outward to the daylight, and so the captive had a thin\nray from the blessed sun for his comfort.  The case of one of\nthese poor fellows was particularly hard.  From his dusky swallow's\nhole high up in that vast wall of native rock he could peer out\nthrough the arrow-slit and see his own home off yonder in the\nvalley; and for twenty-two years he had watched it, with heartache\nand longing, through that crack.  He could see the lights shine\nthere at night, and in the daytime he could see figures go in and\ncome out--his wife and children, some of them, no doubt, though\nhe could not make out at that distance.  In the course of years\nhe noted festivities there, and tried to rejoice, and wondered\nif they were weddings or what they might be.  And he noted funerals;\nand they wrung his heart.  He could make out the coffin, but he\ncould not determine its size, and so could not tell whether it was\nwife or child.  He could see the procession form, with priests\nand mourners, and move solemnly away, bearing the secret with\nthem.  He had left behind him five children and a wife; and in\nnineteen years he had seen five funerals issue, and none of them\nhumble enough in pomp to denote a servant.  So he had lost five\nof his treasures; there must still be one remaining--one now\ninfinitely, unspeakably precious,--but _which_ one? wife, or child?\nThat was the question that tortured him, by night and by day,\nasleep and awake.  Well, to have an interest, of some sort, and\nhalf a ray of light, when you are in a dungeon, is a great support\nto the body and preserver of the intellect.  This man was in pretty\ngood condition yet.  By the time he had finished telling me his\ndistressful tale, I was in the same state of mind that you would\nhave been in yourself, if you have got average human curiosity;\nthat is to say, I was as burning up as he was to find out which\nmember of the family it was that was left.  So I took him over\nhome myself; and an amazing kind of a surprise party it was, too\n--typhoons and cyclones of frantic joy, and whole Niagaras of happy\ntears; and by George! we found the aforetime young matron graying\ntoward the imminent verge of her half century, and the babies all\nmen and women, and some of them married and experimenting familywise\nthemselves--for not a soul of the tribe was dead!  Conceive of the\ningenious devilishness of that queen: she had a special hatred for\nthis prisoner, and she had _invented_ all those funerals herself,\nto scorch his heart with; and the sublimest stroke of genius of\nthe whole thing was leaving the family-invoice a funeral _short_,\nso as to let him wear his poor old soul out guessing.\n\nBut for me, he never would have got out.  Morgan le Fay hated him\nwith her whole heart, and she never would have softened toward him.\nAnd yet his crime was committed more in thoughtlessness than\ndeliberate depravity.  He had said she had red hair.  Well, she\nhad; but that was no way to speak of it.  When red-headed people\nare above a certain social grade their hair is auburn.\n\nConsider it: among these forty-seven captives there were five\nwhose names, offenses, and dates of incarceration were no longer\nknown!  One woman and four men--all bent, and wrinkled, and\nmind-extinguished patriarchs.  They themselves had long ago forgotten\nthese details; at any rate they had mere vague theories about them,\nnothing definite and nothing that they repeated twice in the same\nway.  The succession of priests whose office it had been to pray\ndaily with the captives and remind them that God had put them\nthere, for some wise purpose or other, and teach them that patience,\nhumbleness, and submission to oppression was what He loved to see\nin parties of a subordinate rank, had traditions about these poor\nold human ruins, but nothing more.  These traditions went but\nlittle way, for they concerned the length of the incarceration only,\nand not the names of the offenses.  And even by the help of\ntradition the only thing that could be proven was that none of\nthe five had seen daylight for thirty-five years: how much longer\nthis privation has lasted was not guessable.  The king and the queen\nknew nothing about these poor creatures, except that they were\nheirlooms, assets inherited, along with the throne, from the former\nfirm.  Nothing of their history had been transmitted with their\npersons, and so the inheriting owners had considered them of no\nvalue, and had felt no interest in them.  I said to the queen:\n\n\"Then why in the world didn't you set them free?\"\n\nThe question was a puzzler.  She didn't know _why_ she hadn't, the\nthing had never come up in her mind.  So here she was, forecasting\nthe veritable history of future prisoners of the Castle d'If,\nwithout knowing it.  It seemed plain to me now, that with her\ntraining, those inherited prisoners were merely property--nothing\nmore, nothing less.  Well, when we inherit property, it does not\noccur to us to throw it away, even when we do not value it.\n\nWhen I brought my procession of human bats up into the open world\nand the glare of the afternoon sun--previously blindfolding them,\nin charity for eyes so long untortured by light--they were a\nspectacle to look at.  Skeletons, scarecrows, goblins, pathetic\nfrights, every one; legitimatest possible children of Monarchy\nby the Grace of God and the Established Church.  I muttered absently:\n\n\"I _wish_ I could photograph them!\"\n\nYou have seen that kind of people who will never let on that they\ndon't know the meaning of a new big word.  The more ignorant they\nare, the more pitifully certain they are to pretend you haven't\nshot over their heads.  The queen was just one of that sort, and\nwas always making the stupidest blunders by reason of it.  She\nhesitated a moment; then her face brightened up with sudden\ncomprehension, and she said she would do it for me.\n\nI thought to myself: She? why what can she know about photography?\nBut it was a poor time to be thinking.  When I looked around, she\nwas moving on the procession with an axe!\n\nWell, she certainly was a curious one, was Morgan le Fay.  I have\nseen a good many kinds of women in my time, but she laid over them\nall for variety.  And how sharply characteristic of her this episode\nwas.  She had no more idea than a horse of how to photograph\na procession; but being in doubt, it was just like her to try\nto do it with an axe.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nKNIGHT-ERRANTRY AS A TRADE\n\nSandy and I were on the road again, next morning, bright and early.\nIt was so good to open up one's lungs and take in whole luscious\nbarrels-ful of the blessed God's untainted, dew-fashioned,\nwoodland-scented air once more, after suffocating body and mind for two\ndays and nights in the moral and physical stenches of that intolerable\nold buzzard-roost!  I mean, for me: of course the place was all\nright and agreeable enough for Sandy, for she had been used to\nhigh life all her days.\n\nPoor girl, her jaws had had a wearisome rest now for a while,\nand I was expecting to get the consequences.  I was right; but she\nhad stood by me most helpfully in the castle, and had mightily\nsupported and reinforced me with gigantic foolishnesses which were\nworth more for the occasion than wisdoms double their size; so\nI thought she had earned a right to work her mill for a while,\nif she wanted to, and I felt not a pang when she started it up:\n\n\"Now turn we unto Sir Marhaus that rode with the damsel of thirty\nwinter of age southward--\"\n\n\"Are you going to see if you can work up another half-stretch on\nthe trail of the cowboys, Sandy?\"\n\n\"Even so, fair my lord.\"\n\n\"Go ahead, then.  I won't interrupt this time, if I can help it.\nBegin over again; start fair, and shake out all your reefs, and\nI will load my pipe and give good attention.\"\n\n\"Now turn we unto Sir Marhaus that rode with the damsel of thirty\nwinter of age southward.  And so they came into a deep forest,\nand by fortune they were nighted, and rode along in a deep way,\nand at the last they came into a courtelage where abode the duke\nof South Marches, and there they asked harbour.  And on the morn\nthe duke sent unto Sir Marhaus, and bad him make him ready.  And\nso Sir Marhaus arose and armed him, and there was a mass sung\nafore him, and he brake his fast, and so mounted on horseback in\nthe court of the castle, there they should do the battle.  So there\nwas the duke already on horseback, clean armed, and his six sons\nby him, and every each had a spear in his hand, and so they\nencountered, whereas the duke and his two sons brake their spears\nupon him, but Sir Marhaus held up his spear and touched none of\nthem.  Then came the four sons by couples, and two of them brake\ntheir spears, and so did the other two.  And all this while\nSir Marhaus touched them not.  Then Sir Marhaus ran to the duke,\nand smote him with his spear that horse and man fell to the earth.\nAnd so he served his sons.  And then Sir Marhaus alight down, and\nbad the duke yield him or else he would slay him.  And then some\nof his sons recovered, and would have set upon Sir Marhaus.  Then\nSir Marhaus said to the duke, Cease thy sons, or else I will do\nthe uttermost to you all.  When the duke saw he might not escape\nthe death, he cried to his sons, and charged them to yield them\nto Sir Marhaus.  And they kneeled all down and put the pommels\nof their swords to the knight, and so he received them.  And then\nthey holp up their father, and so by their common assent promised\nunto Sir Marhaus never to be foes unto King Arthur, and thereupon\nat Whitsuntide after, to come he and his sons, and put them in\nthe king's grace.*\n\n[*Footnote: The story is borrowed, language and all, from the\nMorte d'Arthur.--M.T.]\n\n\"Even so standeth the history, fair Sir Boss.  Now ye shall wit\nthat that very duke and his six sons are they whom but few days\npast you also did overcome and send to Arthur's court!\"\n\n\"Why, Sandy, you can't mean it!\"\n\n\"An I speak not sooth, let it be the worse for me.\"\n\n\"Well, well, well,--now who would ever have thought it?  One\nwhole duke and six dukelets; why, Sandy, it was an elegant haul.\nKnight-errantry is a most chuckle-headed trade, and it is tedious\nhard work, too, but I begin to see that there _is_ money in it,\nafter all, if you have luck.  Not that I would ever engage in it\nas a business, for I wouldn't.  No sound and legitimate business\ncan be established on a basis of speculation.  A successful whirl\nin the knight-errantry line--now what is it when you blow away\nthe nonsense and come down to the cold facts?  It's just a corner\nin pork, that's all, and you can't make anything else out of it.\nYou're rich--yes,--suddenly rich--for about a day, maybe a week;\nthen somebody corners the market on _you_, and down goes your\nbucket-shop; ain't that so, Sandy?\"\n\n\"Whethersoever it be that my mind miscarrieth, bewraying simple\nlanguage in such sort that the words do seem to come endlong\nand overthwart--\"\n\n\"There's no use in beating about the bush and trying to get around\nit that way, Sandy, it's _so_, just as I say.  I _know_ it's so.  And,\nmoreover, when you come right down to the bedrock, knight-errantry\nis _worse_ than pork; for whatever happens, the pork's left, and\nso somebody's benefited anyway; but when the market breaks, in a\nknight-errantry whirl, and every knight in the pool passes in his\nchecks, what have you got for assets?  Just a rubbish-pile of\nbattered corpses and a barrel or two of busted hardware.  Can you\ncall _those_ assets?  Give me pork, every time.  Am I right?\"\n\n\"Ah, peradventure my head being distraught by the manifold matters\nwhereunto the confusions of these but late adventured haps and\nfortunings whereby not I alone nor you alone, but every each of us,\nmeseemeth--\"\n\n\"No, it's not your head, Sandy.  Your head's all right, as far as\nit goes, but you don't know business; that's where the trouble\nis.  It unfits you to argue about business, and you're wrong\nto be always trying.  However, that aside, it was a good haul,\nanyway, and will breed a handsome crop of reputation in Arthur's\ncourt.  And speaking of the cowboys, what a curious country this\nis for women and men that never get old.  Now there's Morgan le Fay,\nas fresh and young as a Vassar pullet, to all appearances, and\nhere is this old duke of the South Marches still slashing away with\nsword and lance at his time of life, after raising such a family\nas he has raised.  As I understand it, Sir Gawaine killed seven\nof his sons, and still he had six left for Sir Marhaus and me to\ntake into camp.  And then there was that damsel of sixty winter\nof age still excursioning around in her frosty bloom--How old\nare you, Sandy?\"\n\nIt was the first time I ever struck a still place in her.  The mill\nhad shut down for repairs, or something.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nTHE OGRE'S CASTLE\n\nBetween six and nine we made ten miles, which was plenty for a\nhorse carrying triple--man, woman, and armor; then we stopped\nfor a long nooning under some trees by a limpid brook.\n\nRight so came by and by a knight riding; and as he drew near he\nmade dolorous moan, and by the words of it I perceived that he\nwas cursing and swearing; yet nevertheless was I glad of his\ncoming, for that I saw he bore a bulletin-board whereon in letters\nall of shining gold was writ:\n\n    \"USE PETERSON'S PROPHYLACTIC TOOTH-BRUSH--ALL THE GO.\"\n\nI was glad of his coming, for even by this token I knew him for\nknight of mine.  It was Sir Madok de la Montaine, a burly great\nfellow whose chief distinction was that he had come within an ace\nof sending Sir Launcelot down over his horse-tail once.  He was\nnever long in a stranger's presence without finding some pretext\nor other to let out that great fact.  But there was another fact\nof nearly the same size, which he never pushed upon anybody unasked,\nand yet never withheld when asked: that was, that the reason he\ndidn't quite succeed was, that he was interrupted and sent down\nover horse-tail himself.  This innocent vast lubber did not see\nany particular difference between the two facts.  I liked him,\nfor he was earnest in his work, and very valuable.  And he was so\nfine to look at, with his broad mailed shoulders, and the grand\nleonine set of his plumed head, and his big shield with its quaint\ndevice of a gauntleted hand clutching a prophylactic tooth-brush,\nwith motto: \"Try Noyoudont.\"  This was a tooth-wash that I was\nintroducing.\n\nHe was aweary, he said, and indeed he looked it; but he would not\nalight.  He said he was after the stove-polish man; and with this\nhe broke out cursing and swearing anew.  The bulletin-boarder\nreferred to was Sir Ossaise of Surluse, a brave knight, and of\nconsiderable celebrity on account of his having tried conclusions\nin a tournament once, with no less a Mogul than Sir Gaheris\nhimself--although not successfully.  He was of a light and laughing\ndisposition, and to him nothing in this world was serious.  It was\nfor this reason that I had chosen him to work up a stove-polish\nsentiment.  There were no stoves yet, and so there could be nothing\nserious about stove-polish.  All that the agent needed to do was\nto deftly and by degrees prepare the public for the great change,\nand have them established in predilections toward neatness against\nthe time when the stove should appear upon the stage.\n\nSir Madok was very bitter, and brake out anew with cursings.  He\nsaid he had cursed his soul to rags; and yet he would not get down\nfrom his horse, neither would he take any rest, or listen to any\ncomfort, until he should have found Sir Ossaise and settled this\naccount.  It appeared, by what I could piece together of the\nunprofane fragments of his statement, that he had chanced upon\nSir Ossaise at dawn of the morning, and been told that if he would\nmake a short cut across the fields and swamps and broken hills and\nglades, he could head off a company of travelers who would be rare\ncustomers for prophylactics and tooth-wash.  With characteristic\nzeal Sir Madok had plunged away at once upon this quest, and after\nthree hours of awful crosslot riding had overhauled his game.  And\nbehold, it was the five patriarchs that had been released from the\ndungeons the evening before!  Poor old creatures, it was all of\ntwenty years since any one of them had known what it was to be\nequipped with any remaining snag or remnant of a tooth.\n\n\"Blank-blank-blank him,\" said Sir Madok, \"an I do not stove-polish\nhim an I may find him, leave it to me; for never no knight that\nhight Ossaise or aught else may do me this disservice and bide\non live, an I may find him, the which I have thereunto sworn a\ngreat oath this day.\"\n\nAnd with these words and others, he lightly took his spear and\ngat him thence.  In the middle of the afternoon we came upon one\nof those very patriarchs ourselves, in the edge of a poor village.\nHe was basking in the love of relatives and friends whom he had not\nseen for fifty years; and about him and caressing him were also\ndescendants of his own body whom he had never seen at all till now;\nbut to him these were all strangers, his memory was gone, his mind\nwas stagnant.  It seemed incredible that a man could outlast half\na century shut up in a dark hole like a rat, but here were his old\nwife and some old comrades to testify to it.  They could remember\nhim as he was in the freshness and strength of his young manhood,\nwhen he kissed his child and delivered it to its mother's hands\nand went away into that long oblivion.  The people at the castle\ncould not tell within half a generation the length of time the man\nhad been shut up there for his unrecorded and forgotten offense;\nbut this old wife knew; and so did her old child, who stood there\namong her married sons and daughters trying to realize a father\nwho had been to her a name, a thought, a formless image, a tradition,\nall her life, and now was suddenly concreted into actual flesh\nand blood and set before her face.\n\nIt was a curious situation; yet it is not on that account that\nI have made room for it here, but on account of a thing which\nseemed to me still more curious.  To wit, that this dreadful matter\nbrought from these downtrodden people no outburst of rage against\nthese oppressors.  They had been heritors and subjects of cruelty\nand outrage so long that nothing could have startled them but\na kindness.  Yes, here was a curious revelation, indeed, of the\ndepth to which this people had been sunk in slavery.  Their entire\nbeing was reduced to a monotonous dead level of patience, resignation,\ndumb uncomplaining acceptance of whatever might befall them in\nthis life.  Their very imagination was dead.  When you can say\nthat of a man, he has struck bottom, I reckon; there is no lower\ndeep for him.\n\nI rather wished I had gone some other road.  This was not the sort\nof experience for a statesman to encounter who was planning out\na peaceful revolution in his mind.  For it could not help bringing\nup the unget-aroundable fact that, all gentle cant and philosophizing\nto the contrary notwithstanding, no people in the world ever did\nachieve their freedom by goody-goody talk and moral suasion:\nit being immutable law that all revolutions that will succeed must\n_begin_ in blood, whatever may answer afterward.  If history teaches\nanything, it teaches that.  What this folk needed, then, was a\nReign of Terror and a guillotine, and I was the wrong man for them.\n\nTwo days later, toward noon, Sandy began to show signs of excitement\nand feverish expectancy.  She said we were approaching the ogre's\ncastle.  I was surprised into an uncomfortable shock.  The object\nof our quest had gradually dropped out of my mind; this sudden\nresurrection of it made it seem quite a real and startling thing\nfor a moment, and roused up in me a smart interest.  Sandy's\nexcitement increased every moment; and so did mine, for that sort\nof thing is catching.  My heart got to thumping.  You can't reason\nwith your heart; it has its own laws, and thumps about things which\nthe intellect scorns.  Presently, when Sandy slid from the horse,\nmotioned me to stop, and went creeping stealthily, with her head\nbent nearly to her knees, toward a row of bushes that bordered\na declivity, the thumpings grew stronger and quicker.  And they\nkept it up while she was gaining her ambush and getting her glimpse\nover the declivity; and also while I was creeping to her side on\nmy knees.  Her eyes were burning now, as she pointed with her\nfinger, and said in a panting whisper:\n\n\"The castle!  The castle!  Lo, where it looms!\"\n\nWhat a welcome disappointment I experienced!  I said:\n\n\"Castle?  It is nothing but a pigsty; a pigsty with a wattled\nfence around it.\"\n\nShe looked surprised and distressed.  The animation faded out of\nher face; and during many moments she was lost in thought and\nsilent.  Then:\n\n\"It was not enchanted aforetime,\" she said in a musing fashion,\nas if to herself.  \"And how strange is this marvel, and how awful\n--that to the one perception it is enchanted and dight in a base\nand shameful aspect; yet to the perception of the other it is not\nenchanted, hath suffered no change, but stands firm and stately\nstill, girt with its moat and waving its banners in the blue air\nfrom its towers.  And God shield us, how it pricks the heart to\nsee again these gracious captives, and the sorrow deepened in their\nsweet faces!  We have tarried along, and are to blame.\"\n\nI saw my cue.  The castle was enchanted to _me_, not to her. It would\nbe wasted time to try to argue her out of her delusion, it couldn't\nbe done; I must just humor it.  So I said:\n\n\"This is a common case--the enchanting of a thing to one eye and\nleaving it in its proper form to another.  You have heard of it\nbefore, Sandy, though you haven't happened to experience it.\nBut no harm is done.  In fact, it is lucky the way it is.  If these\nladies were hogs to everybody and to themselves, it would be\nnecessary to break the enchantment, and that might be impossible\nif one failed to find out the particular process of the enchantment.\nAnd hazardous, too; for in attempting a disenchantment without the\ntrue key, you are liable to err, and turn your hogs into dogs,\nand the dogs into cats, the cats into rats, and so on, and end by\nreducing your materials to nothing finally, or to an odorless gas\nwhich you can't follow--which, of course, amounts to the same\nthing.  But here, by good luck, no one's eyes but mine are under\nthe enchantment, and so it is of no consequence to dissolve it.\nThese ladies remain ladies to you, and to themselves, and to\neverybody else; and at the same time they will suffer in no way\nfrom my delusion, for when I know that an ostensible hog is a\nlady, that is enough for me, I know how to treat her.\"\n\n\"Thanks, oh, sweet my lord, thou talkest like an angel.  And I know\nthat thou wilt deliver them, for that thou art minded to great\ndeeds and art as strong a knight of your hands and as brave to will\nand to do, as any that is on live.\"\n\n\"I will not leave a princess in the sty, Sandy.  Are those three\nyonder that to my disordered eyes are starveling swine-herds--\"\n\n\"The ogres, Are _they_ changed also?  It is most wonderful.  Now\nam I fearful; for how canst thou strike with sure aim when five of\ntheir nine cubits of stature are to thee invisible?  Ah, go warily,\nfair sir; this is a mightier emprise than I wend.\"\n\n\"You be easy, Sandy.  All I need to know is, how _much_ of an ogre\nis invisible; then I know how to locate his vitals.  Don't you be\nafraid, I will make short work of these bunco-steerers.  Stay\nwhere you are.\"\n\nI left Sandy kneeling there, corpse-faced but plucky and hopeful,\nand rode down to the pigsty, and struck up a trade with the\nswine-herds.  I won their gratitude by buying out all the hogs\nat the lump sum of sixteen pennies, which was rather above latest\nquotations.  I was just in time; for the Church, the lord of the\nmanor, and the rest of the tax-gatherers would have been along\nnext day and swept off pretty much all the stock, leaving the\nswine-herds very short of hogs and Sandy out of princesses.  But\nnow the tax people could be paid in cash, and there would be\na stake left besides.  One of the men had ten children; and he\nsaid that last year when a priest came and of his ten pigs took\nthe fattest one for tithes, the wife burst out upon him, and offered\nhim a child and said:\n\n\"Thou beast without bowels of mercy, why leave me my child, yet\nrob me of the wherewithal to feed it?\"\n\nHow curious.  The same thing had happened in the Wales of my day,\nunder this same old Established Church, which was supposed by many\nto have changed its nature when it changed its disguise.\n\nI sent the three men away, and then opened the sty gate and beckoned\nSandy to come--which she did; and not leisurely, but with the rush\nof a prairie fire.  And when I saw her fling herself upon those\nhogs, with tears of joy running down her cheeks, and strain them\nto her heart, and kiss them, and caress them, and call them\nreverently by grand princely names, I was ashamed of her, ashamed\nof the human race.\n\nWe had to drive those hogs home--ten miles; and no ladies were\never more fickle-minded or contrary.  They would stay in no road,\nno path; they broke out through the brush on all sides, and flowed\naway in all directions, over rocks, and hills, and the roughest\nplaces they could find.  And they must not be struck, or roughly\naccosted; Sandy could not bear to see them treated in ways unbecoming\ntheir rank.  The troublesomest old sow of the lot had to be called\nmy Lady, and your Highness, like the rest.  It is annoying and\ndifficult to scour around after hogs, in armor.  There was one\nsmall countess, with an iron ring in her snout and hardly any hair\non her back, that was the devil for perversity.  She gave me a race\nof an hour, over all sorts of country, and then we were right where\nwe had started from, having made not a rod of real progress.\nI seized her at last by the tail, and brought her along squealing.\nWhen I overtook Sandy she was horrified, and said it was in the\nlast degree indelicate to drag a countess by her train.\n\nWe got the hogs home just at dark--most of them.  The princess\nNerovens de Morganore was missing, and two of her ladies in waiting:\nnamely, Miss Angela Bohun, and the Demoiselle Elaine Courtemains,\nthe former of these two being a young black sow with a white star\nin her forehead, and the latter a brown one with thin legs and a\nslight limp in the forward shank on the starboard side--a couple\nof the tryingest blisters to drive that I ever saw.  Also among\nthe missing were several mere baronesses--and I wanted them to\nstay missing; but no, all that sausage-meat had to be found; so\nservants were sent out with torches to scour the woods and hills\nto that end.\n\nOf course, the whole drove was housed in the house, and, great\nguns!--well, I never saw anything like it.  Nor ever heard anything\nlike it.  And never smelt anything like it.  It was like an\ninsurrection in a gasometer.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nTHE PILGRIMS\n\nWhen I did get to bed at last I was unspeakably tired; the stretching\nout, and the relaxing of the long-tense muscles, how luxurious,\nhow delicious! but that was as far as I could get--sleep was out of\nthe question for the present.  The ripping and tearing and squealing\nof the nobility up and down the halls and corridors was pandemonium\ncome again, and kept me broad awake.  Being awake, my thoughts\nwere busy, of course; and mainly they busied themselves with Sandy's\ncurious delusion.  Here she was, as sane a person as the kingdom\ncould produce; and yet, from my point of view she was acting like\na crazy woman.  My land, the power of training! of influence!\nof education!  It can bring a body up to believe anything.  I had\nto put myself in Sandy's place to realize that she was not a\nlunatic.  Yes, and put her in mine, to demonstrate how easy it is\nto seem a lunatic to a person who has not been taught as you have\nbeen taught.  If I had told Sandy I had seen a wagon, uninfluenced\nby enchantment, spin along fifty miles an hour; had seen a man,\nunequipped with magic powers, get into a basket and soar out of\nsight among the clouds; and had listened, without any necromancer's\nhelp, to the conversation of a person who was several hundred miles\naway, Sandy would not merely have supposed me to be crazy, she\nwould have thought she knew it.  Everybody around her believed in\nenchantments; nobody had any doubts; to doubt that a castle could\nbe turned into a sty, and its occupants into hogs, would have been\nthe same as my doubting among Connecticut people the actuality\nof the telephone and its wonders,--and in both cases would be\nabsolute proof of a diseased mind, an unsettled reason.  Yes, Sandy\nwas sane; that must be admitted.  If I also would be sane--to Sandy\n--I must keep my superstitions about unenchanted and unmiraculous\nlocomotives, balloons, and telephones, to myself.  Also, I believed\nthat the world was not flat, and hadn't pillars under it to support\nit, nor a canopy over it to turn off a universe of water that\noccupied all space above; but as I was the only person in the kingdom\nafflicted with such impious and criminal opinions, I recognized\nthat it would be good wisdom to keep quiet about this matter, too,\nif I did not wish to be suddenly shunned and forsaken by everybody\nas a madman.\n\nThe next morning Sandy assembled the swine in the dining-room and\ngave them their breakfast, waiting upon them personally and\nmanifesting in every way the deep reverence which the natives of\nher island, ancient and modern, have always felt for rank, let its\noutward casket and the mental and moral contents be what they may.\nI could have eaten with the hogs if I had had birth approaching my\nlofty official rank; but I hadn't, and so accepted the unavoidable\nslight and made no complaint.  Sandy and I had our breakfast at\nthe second table.  The family were not at home.  I said:\n\n\"How many are in the family, Sandy, and where do they keep themselves?\"\n\n\"Family?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Which family, good my lord?\"\n\n\"Why, this family; your own family.\"\n\n\"Sooth to say, I understand you not.  I have no family.\"\n\n\"No family?  Why, Sandy, isn't this your home?\"\n\n\"Now how indeed might that be?  I have no home.\"\n\n\"Well, then, whose house is this?\"\n\n\"Ah, wit you well I would tell you an I knew myself.\"\n\n\"Come--you don't even know these people?  Then who invited us here?\"\n\n\"None invited us.  We but came; that is all.\"\n\n\"Why, woman, this is a most extraordinary performance.  The\neffrontery of it is beyond admiration.  We blandly march into\na man's house, and cram it full of the only really valuable nobility\nthe sun has yet discovered in the earth, and then it turns out\nthat we don't even know the man's name.  How did you ever venture\nto take this extravagant liberty?  I supposed, of course, it was\nyour home.  What will the man say?\"\n\n\"What will he say?  Forsooth what can he say but give thanks?\"\n\n\"Thanks for what?\"\n\nHer face was filled with a puzzled surprise:\n\n\"Verily, thou troublest mine understanding with strange words.\nDo ye dream that one of his estate is like to have the honor twice\nin his life to entertain company such as we have brought to grace\nhis house withal?\"\n\n\"Well, no--when you come to that.  No, it's an even bet that this\nis the first time he has had a treat like this.\"\n\n\"Then let him be thankful, and manifest the same by grateful speech\nand due humility; he were a dog, else, and the heir and ancestor\nof dogs.\"\n\nTo my mind, the situation was uncomfortable.  It might become more so.\nIt might be a good idea to muster the hogs and move on.  So I said:\n\n\"The day is wasting, Sandy.  It is time to get the nobility together\nand be moving.\"\n\n\"Wherefore, fair sir and Boss?\"\n\n\"We want to take them to their home, don't we?\"\n\n\"La, but list to him!  They be of all the regions of the earth!\nEach must hie to her own home; wend you we might do all these\njourneys in one so brief life as He hath appointed that created\nlife, and thereto death likewise with help of Adam, who by sin\ndone through persuasion of his helpmeet, she being wrought upon\nand bewrayed by the beguilements of the great enemy of man, that\nserpent hight Satan, aforetime consecrated and set apart unto that\nevil work by overmastering spite and envy begotten in his heart\nthrough fell ambitions that did blight and mildew a nature erst\nso white and pure whenso it hove with the shining multitudes\nits brethren-born in glade and shade of that fair heaven wherein\nall such as native be to that rich estate and--\"\n\n\"Great Scott!\"\n\n\"My lord?\"\n\n\"Well, you know we haven't got time for this sort of thing.  Don't\nyou see, we could distribute these people around the earth in less\ntime than it is going to take you to explain that we can't.  We\nmustn't talk now, we must act.  You want to be careful; you mustn't\nlet your mill get the start of you that way, at a time like this.\nTo business now--and sharp's the word.  Who is to take the\naristocracy home?\"\n\n\"Even their friends.  These will come for them from the far parts\nof the earth.\"\n\nThis was lightning from a clear sky, for unexpectedness; and the\nrelief of it was like pardon to a prisoner.  She would remain to\ndeliver the goods, of course.\n\n\"Well, then, Sandy, as our enterprise is handsomely and successfully\nended, I will go home and report; and if ever another one--\"\n\n\"I also am ready; I will go with thee.\"\n\nThis was recalling the pardon.\n\n\"How?  You will go with me?  Why should you?\"\n\n\"Will I be traitor to my knight, dost think?  That were dishonor.\nI may not part from thee until in knightly encounter in the field\nsome overmatching champion shall fairly win and fairly wear me.\nI were to blame an I thought that that might ever hap.\"\n\n\"Elected for the long term,\" I sighed to myself.  \"I may as well\nmake the best of it.\"  So then I spoke up and said:\n\n\"All right; let us make a start.\"\n\nWhile she was gone to cry her farewells over the pork, I gave that\nwhole peerage away to the servants.  And I asked them to take\na duster and dust around a little where the nobilities had mainly\nlodged and promenaded; but they considered that that would be\nhardly worth while, and would moreover be a rather grave departure\nfrom custom, and therefore likely to make talk.  A departure from\ncustom--that settled it; it was a nation capable of committing any\ncrime but that.  The servants said they would follow the fashion,\na fashion grown sacred through immemorial observance; they would\nscatter fresh rushes in all the rooms and halls, and then the\nevidence of the aristocratic visitation would be no longer visible.\nIt was a kind of satire on Nature: it was the scientific method,\nthe geologic method; it deposited the history of the family in\na stratified record; and the antiquary could dig through it and\ntell by the remains of each period what changes of diet the family\nhad introduced successively for a hundred years.\n\nThe first thing we struck that day was a procession of pilgrims.\nIt was not going our way, but we joined it, nevertheless; for it\nwas hourly being borne in upon me now, that if I would govern\nthis country wisely, I must be posted in the details of its life,\nand not at second hand, but by personal observation and scrutiny.\n\nThis company of pilgrims resembled Chaucer's in this: that it\nhad in it a sample of about all the upper occupations and professions\nthe country could show, and a corresponding variety of costume.\nThere were young men and old men, young women and old women,\nlively folk and grave folk.  They rode upon mules and horses, and\nthere was not a side-saddle in the party; for this specialty was\nto remain unknown in England for nine hundred years yet.\n\nIt was a pleasant, friendly, sociable herd; pious, happy, merry and\nfull of unconscious coarsenesses and innocent indecencies.  What\nthey regarded as the merry tale went the continual round and caused\nno more embarrassment than it would have caused in the best English\nsociety twelve centuries later.  Practical jokes worthy of the\nEnglish wits of the first quarter of the far-off nineteenth century\nwere sprung here and there and yonder along the line, and compelled\nthe delightedest applause; and sometimes when a bright remark was\nmade at one end of the procession and started on its travels toward\nthe other, you could note its progress all the way by the sparkling\nspray of laughter it threw off from its bows as it plowed along;\nand also by the blushes of the mules in its wake.\n\nSandy knew the goal and purpose of this pilgrimage, and she posted\nme.  She said:\n\n\"They journey to the Valley of Holiness, for to be blessed of the\ngodly hermits and drink of the miraculous waters and be cleansed\nfrom sin.\"\n\n\"Where is this watering place?\"\n\n\"It lieth a two-day journey hence, by the borders of the land that\nhight the Cuckoo Kingdom.\"\n\n\"Tell me about it.  Is it a celebrated place?\"\n\n\"Oh, of a truth, yes.  There be none more so.  Of old time there\nlived there an abbot and his monks.  Belike were none in the world\nmore holy than these; for they gave themselves to study of pious\nbooks, and spoke not the one to the other, or indeed to any, and\nate decayed herbs and naught thereto, and slept hard, and prayed\nmuch, and washed never; also they wore the same garment until it\nfell from their bodies through age and decay.  Right so came they\nto be known of all the world by reason of these holy austerities,\nand visited by rich and poor, and reverenced.\"\n\n\"Proceed.\"\n\n\"But always there was lack of water there.  Whereas, upon a time,\nthe holy abbot prayed, and for answer a great stream of clear\nwater burst forth by miracle in a desert place.  Now were the\nfickle monks tempted of the Fiend, and they wrought with their\nabbot unceasingly by beggings and beseechings that he would construct\na bath; and when he was become aweary and might not resist more,\nhe said have ye your will, then, and granted that they asked.\nNow mark thou what 'tis to forsake the ways of purity the which\nHe loveth, and wanton with such as be worldly and an offense.\nThese monks did enter into the bath and come thence washed as\nwhite as snow; and lo, in that moment His sign appeared, in\nmiraculous rebuke! for His insulted waters ceased to flow, and\nutterly vanished away.\"\n\n\"They fared mildly, Sandy, considering how that kind of crime\nis regarded in this country.\"\n\n\"Belike; but it was their first sin; and they had been of perfect\nlife for long, and differing in naught from the angels.  Prayers,\ntears, torturings of the flesh, all was vain to beguile that water\nto flow again.  Even processions; even burnt-offerings; even votive\ncandles to the Virgin, did fail every each of them; and all in\nthe land did marvel.\"\n\n\"How odd to find that even this industry has its financial panics,\nand at times sees its assignats and greenbacks languish to zero,\nand everything come to a standstill.  Go on, Sandy.\"\n\n\"And so upon a time, after year and day, the good abbot made humble\nsurrender and destroyed the bath.  And behold, His anger was in that\nmoment appeased, and the waters gushed richly forth again, and even\nunto this day they have not ceased to flow in that generous measure.\"\n\n\"Then I take it nobody has washed since.\"\n\n\"He that would essay it could have his halter free; yes, and\nswiftly would he need it, too.\"\n\n\"The community has prospered since?\"\n\n\"Even from that very day.  The fame of the miracle went abroad\ninto all lands.  From every land came monks to join; they came\neven as the fishes come, in shoals; and the monastery added building\nto building, and yet others to these, and so spread wide its arms\nand took them in.  And nuns came, also; and more again, and yet\nmore; and built over against the monastery on the yon side of the\nvale, and added building to building, until mighty was that nunnery.\nAnd these were friendly unto those, and they joined their loving\nlabors together, and together they built a fair great foundling\nasylum midway of the valley between.\"\n\n\"You spoke of some hermits, Sandy.\"\n\n\"These have gathered there from the ends of the earth.  A hermit\nthriveth best where there be multitudes of pilgrims.  Ye shall not\nfind no hermit of no sort wanting.  If any shall mention a hermit\nof a kind he thinketh new and not to be found but in some far\nstrange land, let him but scratch among the holes and caves and\nswamps that line that Valley of Holiness, and whatsoever be his\nbreed, it skills not, he shall find a sample of it there.\"\n\nI closed up alongside of a burly fellow with a fat good-humored\nface, purposing to make myself agreeable and pick up some further\ncrumbs of fact; but I had hardly more than scraped acquaintance\nwith him when he began eagerly and awkwardly to lead up, in the\nimmemorial way, to that same old anecdote--the one Sir Dinadan\ntold me, what time I got into trouble with Sir Sagramor and was\nchallenged of him on account of it.  I excused myself and dropped\nto the rear of the procession, sad at heart, willing to go hence\nfrom this troubled life, this vale of tears, this brief day of\nbroken rest, of cloud and storm, of weary struggle and monotonous\ndefeat; and yet shrinking from the change, as remembering how long\neternity is, and how many have wended thither who know that anecdote.\n\nEarly in the afternoon we overtook another procession of pilgrims;\nbut in this one was no merriment, no jokes, no laughter, no playful\nways, nor any happy giddiness, whether of youth or age.  Yet both\nwere here, both age and youth; gray old men and women, strong men\nand women of middle age, young husbands, young wives, little boys\nand girls, and three babies at the breast.  Even the children were\nsmileless; there was not a face among all these half a hundred\npeople but was cast down, and bore that set expression of hopelessness\nwhich is bred of long and hard trials and old acquaintance with\ndespair.  They were slaves.  Chains led from their fettered feet\nand their manacled hands to a sole-leather belt about their waists;\nand all except the children were also linked together in a file\nsix feet apart, by a single chain which led from collar to collar\nall down the line.  They were on foot, and had tramped three\nhundred miles in eighteen days, upon the cheapest odds and ends\nof food, and stingy rations of that.  They had slept in these\nchains every night, bundled together like swine.  They had upon\ntheir bodies some poor rags, but they could not be said to be\nclothed.  Their irons had chafed the skin from their ankles and\nmade sores which were ulcerated and wormy.  Their naked feet were\ntorn, and none walked without a limp.  Originally there had been a\nhundred of these unfortunates, but about half had been sold on\nthe trip.  The trader in charge of them rode a horse and carried\na whip with a short handle and a long heavy lash divided into\nseveral knotted tails at the end.  With this whip he cut the\nshoulders of any that tottered from weariness and pain, and\nstraightened them up.  He did not speak; the whip conveyed his\ndesire without that.  None of these poor creatures looked up as\nwe rode along by; they showed no consciousness of our presence.\nAnd they made no sound but one; that was the dull and awful clank\nof their chains from end to end of the long file, as forty-three\nburdened feet rose and fell in unison.  The file moved in a cloud\nof its own making.\n\nAll these faces were gray with a coating of dust.  One has seen\nthe like of this coating upon furniture in unoccupied houses, and\nhas written his idle thought in it with his finger.  I was reminded\nof this when I noticed the faces of some of those women, young\nmothers carrying babes that were near to death and freedom, how\na something in their hearts was written in the dust upon their\nfaces, plain to see, and lord, how plain to read! for it was the\ntrack of tears.  One of these young mothers was but a girl, and\nit hurt me to the heart to read that writing, and reflect that it\nwas come up out of the breast of such a child, a breast that ought\nnot to know trouble yet, but only the gladness of the morning of\nlife; and no doubt--\n\nShe reeled just then, giddy with fatigue, and down came the lash\nand flicked a flake of skin from her naked shoulder.  It stung me\nas if I had been hit instead.  The master halted the file and\njumped from his horse.  He stormed and swore at this girl, and\nsaid she had made annoyance enough with her laziness, and as this\nwas the last chance he should have, he would settle the account now.\nShe dropped on her knees and put up her hands and began to beg,\nand cry, and implore, in a passion of terror, but the master gave\nno attention.  He snatched the child from her, and then made the\nmen-slaves who were chained before and behind her throw her on\nthe ground and hold her there and expose her body; and then he\nlaid on with his lash like a madman till her back was flayed, she\nshrieking and struggling the while piteously.  One of the men who\nwas holding her turned away his face, and for this humanity he was\nreviled and flogged.\n\nAll our pilgrims looked on and commented--on the expert way in\nwhich the whip was handled.  They were too much hardened by lifelong\neveryday familiarity with slavery to notice that there was anything\nelse in the exhibition that invited comment.  This was what slavery\ncould do, in the way of ossifying what one may call the superior\nlobe of human feeling; for these pilgrims were kind-hearted people,\nand they would not have allowed that man to treat a horse like that.\n\nI wanted to stop the whole thing and set the slaves free, but that\nwould not do.  I must not interfere too much and get myself a name\nfor riding over the country's laws and the citizen's rights\nroughshod.  If I lived and prospered I would be the death of\nslavery, that I was resolved upon; but I would try to fix it so\nthat when I became its executioner it should be by command of\nthe nation.\n\nJust here was the wayside shop of a smith; and now arrived a landed\nproprietor who had bought this girl a few miles back, deliverable\nhere where her irons could be taken off.  They were removed; then\nthere was a squabble between the gentleman and the dealer as to\nwhich should pay the blacksmith.  The moment the girl was delivered\nfrom her irons, she flung herself, all tears and frantic sobbings,\ninto the arms of the slave who had turned away his face when she\nwas whipped.  He strained her to his breast, and smothered her\nface and the child's with kisses, and washed them with the rain\nof his tears.  I suspected.  I inquired.  Yes, I was right; it was\nhusband and wife.  They had to be torn apart by force; the girl\nhad to be dragged away, and she struggled and fought and shrieked\nlike one gone mad till a turn of the road hid her from sight; and\neven after that, we could still make out the fading plaint of those\nreceding shrieks.  And the husband and father, with his wife and\nchild gone, never to be seen by him again in life?--well, the look\nof him one might not bear at all, and so I turned away; but I knew\nI should never get his picture out of my mind again, and there\nit is to this day, to wring my heartstrings whenever I think of it.\n\nWe put up at the inn in a village just at nightfall, and when\nI rose next morning and looked abroad, I was ware where a knight\ncame riding in the golden glory of the new day, and recognized him\nfor knight of mine--Sir Ozana le Cure Hardy.  He was in the\ngentlemen's furnishing line, and his missionarying specialty was\nplug hats.  He was clothed all in steel, in the beautifulest armor\nof the time--up to where his helmet ought to have been; but he\nhadn't any helmet, he wore a shiny stove-pipe hat, and was ridiculous\na spectacle as one might want to see.  It was another of my\nsurreptitious schemes for extinguishing knighthood by making it\ngrotesque and absurd.  Sir Ozana's saddle was hung about with\nleather hat boxes, and every time he overcame a wandering knight\nhe swore him into my service and fitted him with a plug and made\nhim wear it.  I dressed and ran down to welcome Sir Ozana and\nget his news.\n\n\"How is trade?\" I asked.\n\n\"Ye will note that I have but these four left; yet were they sixteen\nwhenas I got me from Camelot.\"\n\n\"Why, you have certainly done nobly, Sir Ozana.  Where have you\nbeen foraging of late?\"\n\n\"I am but now come from the Valley of Holiness, please you sir.\"\n\n\"I am pointed for that place myself.  Is there anything stirring\nin the monkery, more than common?\"\n\n\"By the mass ye may not question it!....  Give him good feed,\nboy, and stint it not, an thou valuest thy crown; so get ye lightly\nto the stable and do even as I bid....  Sir, it is parlous news\nI bring, and--be these pilgrims?  Then ye may not do better, good\nfolk, than gather and hear the tale I have to tell, sith it\nconcerneth you, forasmuch as ye go to find that ye will not find,\nand seek that ye will seek in vain, my life being hostage for my\nword, and my word and message being these, namely: That a hap\nhas happened whereof the like has not been seen no more but once\nthis two hundred years, which was the first and last time that\nthat said misfortune strake the holy valley in that form by\ncommandment of the Most High whereto by reasons just and causes\nthereunto contributing, wherein the matter--\"\n\n\"The miraculous fount hath ceased to flow!\"  This shout burst from\ntwenty pilgrim mouths at once.\n\n\"Ye say well, good people.  I was verging to it, even when ye spake.\"\n\n\"Has somebody been washing again?\"\n\n\"Nay, it is suspected, but none believe it.  It is thought to be\nsome other sin, but none wit what.\"\n\n\"How are they feeling about the calamity?\"\n\n\"None may describe it in words.  The fount is these nine days dry.\nThe prayers that did begin then, and the lamentations in sackcloth\nand ashes, and the holy processions, none of these have ceased\nnor night nor day; and so the monks and the nuns and the foundlings\nbe all exhausted, and do hang up prayers writ upon parchment,\nsith that no strength is left in man to lift up voice.  And at last\nthey sent for thee, Sir Boss, to try magic and enchantment; and\nif you could not come, then was the messenger to fetch Merlin,\nand he is there these three days now, and saith he will fetch that\nwater though he burst the globe and wreck its kingdoms to accomplish\nit; and right bravely doth he work his magic and call upon his\nhellions to hie them hither and help, but not a whiff of moisture\nhath he started yet, even so much as might qualify as mist upon\na copper mirror an ye count not the barrel of sweat he sweateth\nbetwixt sun and sun over the dire labors of his task; and if ye--\"\n\nBreakfast was ready.  As soon as it was over I showed to Sir Ozana\nthese words which I had written on the inside of his hat: \"Chemical\nDepartment, Laboratory extension, Section G. Pxxp.  Send two of\nfirst size, two of No. 3, and six of No. 4, together with the proper\ncomplementary details--and two of my trained assistants.\"  And I said:\n\n\"Now get you to Camelot as fast as you can fly, brave knight, and\nshow the writing to Clarence, and tell him to have these required\nmatters in the Valley of Holiness with all possible dispatch.\"\n\n\"I will well, Sir Boss,\" and he was off.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nTHE HOLY FOUNTAIN\n\nThe pilgrims were human beings.  Otherwise they would have acted\ndifferently.  They had come a long and difficult journey, and now\nwhen the journey was nearly finished, and they learned that the main\nthing they had come for had ceased to exist, they didn't do as\nhorses or cats or angle-worms would probably have done--turn back\nand get at something profitable--no, anxious as they had before\nbeen to see the miraculous fountain, they were as much as forty\ntimes as anxious now to see the place where it had used to be.\nThere is no accounting for human beings.\n\nWe made good time; and a couple of hours before sunset we stood\nupon the high confines of the Valley of Holiness, and our eyes\nswept it from end to end and noted its features.  That is, its\nlarge features.  These were the three masses of buildings.  They\nwere distant and isolated temporalities shrunken to toy constructions\nin the lonely waste of what seemed a desert--and was.  Such a scene\nis always mournful, it is so impressively still, and looks so\nsteeped in death.  But there was a sound here which interrupted\nthe stillness only to add to its mournfulness; this was the faint\nfar sound of tolling bells which floated fitfully to us on the\npassing breeze, and so faintly, so softly, that we hardly knew\nwhether we heard it with our ears or with our spirits.\n\nWe reached the monastery before dark, and there the males were\ngiven lodging, but the women were sent over to the nunnery.  The\nbells were close at hand now, and their solemn booming smote\nupon the ear like a message of doom.  A superstitious despair\npossessed the heart of every monk and published itself in his\nghastly face.  Everywhere, these black-robed, soft-sandaled,\ntallow-visaged specters appeared, flitted about and disappeared,\nnoiseless as the creatures of a troubled dream, and as uncanny.\n\nThe old abbot's joy to see me was pathetic.  Even to tears; but\nhe did the shedding himself.  He said:\n\n\"Delay not, son, but get to thy saving work.  An we bring not\nthe water back again, and soon, we are ruined, and the good work\nof two hundred years must end.  And see thou do it with enchantments\nthat be holy, for the Church will not endure that work in her cause\nbe done by devil's magic.\"\n\n\"When I work, Father, be sure there will be no devil's work\nconnected with it.  I shall use no arts that come of the devil,\nand no elements not created by the hand of God.  But is Merlin\nworking strictly on pious lines?\"\n\n\"Ah, he said he would, my son, he said he would, and took oath\nto make his promise good.\"\n\n\"Well, in that case, let him proceed.\"\n\n\"But surely you will not sit idle by, but help?\"\n\n\"It will not answer to mix methods, Father; neither would it be\nprofessional courtesy.  Two of a trade must not underbid each\nother.  We might as well cut rates and be done with it; it would\narrive at that in the end.  Merlin has the contract; no other\nmagician can touch it till he throws it up.\"\n\n\"But I will take it from him; it is a terrible emergency and the\nact is thereby justified.  And if it were not so, who will give\nlaw to the Church?  The Church giveth law to all; and what she\nwills to do, that she may do, hurt whom it may.  I will take it\nfrom him; you shall begin upon the moment.\"\n\n\"It may not be, Father.  No doubt, as you say, where power is\nsupreme, one can do as one likes and suffer no injury; but we poor\nmagicians are not so situated.  Merlin is a very good magician\nin a small way, and has quite a neat provincial reputation.  He\nis struggling along, doing the best he can, and it would not be\netiquette for me to take his job until he himself abandons it.\"\n\nThe abbot's face lighted.\n\n\"Ah, that is simple.  There are ways to persuade him to abandon it.\"\n\n\"No-no, Father, it skills not, as these people say.  If he were\npersuaded against his will, he would load that well with a malicious\nenchantment which would balk me until I found out its secret.\nIt might take a month.  I could set up a little enchantment of\nmine which I call the telephone, and he could not find out its\nsecret in a hundred years.  Yes, you perceive, he might block me\nfor a month.  Would you like to risk a month in a dry time like this?\"\n\n\"A month!  The mere thought of it maketh me to shudder.  Have it\nthy way, my son.  But my heart is heavy with this disappointment.\nLeave me, and let me wear my spirit with weariness and waiting,\neven as I have done these ten long days, counterfeiting thus\nthe thing that is called rest, the prone body making outward sign\nof repose where inwardly is none.\"\n\nOf course, it would have been best, all round, for Merlin to waive\netiquette and quit and call it half a day, since he would never be\nable to start that water, for he was a true magician of the time;\nwhich is to say, the big miracles, the ones that gave him his\nreputation, always had the luck to be performed when nobody but\nMerlin was present; he couldn't start this well with all this crowd\naround to see; a crowd was as bad for a magician's miracle in\nthat day as it was for a spiritualist's miracle in mine; there was\nsure to be some skeptic on hand to turn up the gas at the crucial\nmoment and spoil everything.  But I did not want Merlin to retire\nfrom the job until I was ready to take hold of it effectively\nmyself; and I could not do that until I got my things from Camelot,\nand that would take two or three days.\n\nMy presence gave the monks hope, and cheered them up a good deal;\ninsomuch that they ate a square meal that night for the first time\nin ten days.  As soon as their stomachs had been properly reinforced\nwith food, their spirits began to rise fast; when the mead began to\ngo round they rose faster.  By the time everybody was half-seas over,\nthe holy community was in good shape to make a night of it; so we\nstayed by the board and put it through on that line.  Matters got\nto be very jolly.  Good old questionable stories were told that made\nthe tears run down and cavernous mouths stand wide and the round\nbellies shake with laughter; and questionable songs were bellowed out\nin a mighty chorus that drowned the boom of the tolling bells.\n\nAt last I ventured a story myself; and vast was the success of it.\nNot right off, of course, for the native of those islands does\nnot, as a rule, dissolve upon the early applications of a humorous\nthing; but the fifth time I told it, they began to crack in places;\nthe eight time I told it, they began to crumble; at the twelfth\nrepetition they fell apart in chunks; and at the fifteenth they\ndisintegrated, and I got a broom and swept them up.  This language\nis figurative.  Those islanders--well, they are slow pay at first,\nin the matter of return for your investment of effort, but in the end\nthey make the pay of all other nations poor and small by contrast.\n\nI was at the well next day betimes.  Merlin was there, enchanting\naway like a beaver, but not raising the moisture.  He was not in\na pleasant humor; and every time I hinted that perhaps this contract\nwas a shade too hefty for a novice he unlimbered his tongue and\ncursed like a bishop--French bishop of the Regency days, I mean.\n\nMatters were about as I expected to find them.  The \"fountain\" was\nan ordinary well, it had been dug in the ordinary way, and stoned up\nin the ordinary way.  There was no miracle about it.  Even the lie\nthat had created its reputation was not miraculous; I could have\ntold it myself, with one hand tied behind me.  The well was in a\ndark chamber which stood in the center of a cut-stone chapel, whose\nwalls were hung with pious pictures of a workmanship that would\nhave made a chromo feel good; pictures historically commemorative\nof curative miracles which had been achieved by the waters when\nnobody was looking.  That is, nobody but angels; they are always\non deck when there is a miracle to the fore--so as to get put in\nthe picture, perhaps.  Angels are as fond of that as a fire company;\nlook at the old masters.\n\nThe well-chamber was dimly lighted by lamps; the water was drawn\nwith a windlass and chain by monks, and poured into troughs which\ndelivered it into stone reservoirs outside in the chapel--when\nthere was water to draw, I mean--and none but monks could enter\nthe well-chamber.  I entered it, for I had temporary authority\nto do so, by courtesy of my professional brother and subordinate.\nBut he hadn't entered it himself.  He did everything by incantations;\nhe never worked his intellect.  If he had stepped in there and used\nhis eyes, instead of his disordered mind, he could have cured\nthe well by natural means, and then turned it into a miracle in\nthe customary way; but no, he was an old numskull, a magician who\nbelieved in his own magic; and no magician can thrive who is\nhandicapped with a superstition like that.\n\nI had an idea that the well had sprung a leak; that some of the\nwall stones near the bottom had fallen and exposed fissures that\nallowed the water to escape.  I measured the chain--98 feet.  Then\nI called in a couple of monks, locked the door, took a candle, and\nmade them lower me in the bucket.  When the chain was all paid out,\nthe candle confirmed my suspicion; a considerable section of the\nwall was gone, exposing a good big fissure.\n\nI almost regretted that my theory about the well's trouble was\ncorrect, because I had another one that had a showy point or two\nabout it for a miracle.  I remembered that in America, many\ncenturies later, when an oil well ceased to flow, they used to\nblast it out with a dynamite torpedo.  If I should find this well\ndry and no explanation of it, I could astonish these people most\nnobly by having a person of no especial value drop a dynamite\nbomb into it.  It was my idea to appoint Merlin.  However, it was\nplain that there was no occasion for the bomb.  One cannot have\neverything the way he would like it.  A man has no business to\nbe depressed by a disappointment, anyway; he ought to make up his\nmind to get even.  That is what I did.  I said to myself, I am in no\nhurry, I can wait; that bomb will come good yet.  And it did, too.\n\nWhen I was above ground again, I turned out the monks, and let down\na fish-line; the well was a hundred and fifty feet deep, and there\nwas forty-one feet of water in it.  I called in a monk and asked:\n\n\"How deep is the well?\"\n\n\"That, sir, I wit not, having never been told.\"\n\n\"How does the water usually stand in it?\"\n\n\"Near to the top, these two centuries, as the testimony goeth,\nbrought down to us through our predecessors.\"\n\nIt was true--as to recent times at least--for there was witness\nto it, and better witness than a monk; only about twenty or thirty\nfeet of the chain showed wear and use, the rest of it was unworn\nand rusty.  What had happened when the well gave out that other\ntime?  Without doubt some practical person had come along and\nmended the leak, and then had come up and told the abbot he had\ndiscovered by divination that if the sinful bath were destroyed\nthe well would flow again.  The leak had befallen again now, and\nthese children would have prayed, and processioned, and tolled\ntheir bells for heavenly succor till they all dried up and blew\naway, and no innocent of them all would ever have thought to drop\na fish-line into the well or go down in it and find out what was\nreally the matter.  Old habit of mind is one of the toughest things\nto get away from in the world.  It transmits itself like physical\nform and feature; and for a man, in those days, to have had an idea\nthat his ancestors hadn't had, would have brought him under suspicion\nof being illegitimate.  I said to the monk:\n\n\"It is a difficult miracle to restore water in a dry well, but we\nwill try, if my brother Merlin fails.  Brother Merlin is a very\npassable artist, but only in the parlor-magic line, and he may\nnot succeed; in fact, is not likely to succeed.  But that should\nbe nothing to his discredit; the man that can do _this_ kind of\nmiracle knows enough to keep hotel.\"\n\n\"Hotel?  I mind not to have heard--\"\n\n\"Of hotel?  It's what you call hostel.  The man that can do this\nmiracle can keep hostel.  I can do this miracle; I shall do this\nmiracle; yet I do not try to conceal from you that it is a miracle\nto tax the occult powers to the last strain.\"\n\n\"None knoweth that truth better than the brotherhood, indeed; for\nit is of record that aforetime it was parlous difficult and took\na year.  Natheless, God send you good success, and to that end\nwill we pray.\"\n\nAs a matter of business it was a good idea to get the notion around\nthat the thing was difficult.  Many a small thing has been made\nlarge by the right kind of advertising.  That monk was filled up\nwith the difficulty of this enterprise; he would fill up the others.\nIn two days the solicitude would be booming.\n\nOn my way home at noon, I met Sandy.  She had been sampling the\nhermits.  I said:\n\n\"I would like to do that myself.  This is Wednesday.  Is there\na matinee?\"\n\n\"A which, please you, sir?\"\n\n\"Matinee.  Do they keep open afternoons?\"\n\n\"Who?\"\n\n\"The hermits, of course.\"\n\n\"Keep open?\"\n\n\"Yes, keep open.  Isn't that plain enough?  Do they knock off at noon?\"\n\n\"Knock off?\"\n\n\"Knock off?--yes, knock off.  What is the matter with knock off?\nI never saw such a dunderhead; can't you understand anything at all?\nIn plain terms, do they shut up shop, draw the game, bank the fires--\"\n\n\"Shut up shop, draw--\"\n\n\"There, never mind, let it go; you make me tired.  You can't seem\nto understand the simplest thing.\"\n\n\"I would I might please thee, sir, and it is to me dole and sorrow\nthat I fail, albeit sith I am but a simple damsel and taught of\nnone, being from the cradle unbaptized in those deep waters of\nlearning that do anoint with a sovereignty him that partaketh of\nthat most noble sacrament, investing him with reverend state to\nthe mental eye of the humble mortal who, by bar and lack of that\ngreat consecration seeth in his own unlearned estate but a symbol\nof that other sort of lack and loss which men do publish to the\npitying eye with sackcloth trappings whereon the ashes of grief\ndo lie bepowdered and bestrewn, and so, when such shall in the\ndarkness of his mind encounter these golden phrases of high mystery,\nthese shut-up-shops, and draw-the-game, and bank-the-fires, it is\nbut by the grace of God that he burst not for envy of the mind that\ncan beget, and tongue that can deliver so great and mellow-sounding\nmiracles of speech, and if there do ensue confusion in that humbler\nmind, and failure to divine the meanings of these wonders, then\nif so be this miscomprehension is not vain but sooth and true,\nwit ye well it is the very substance of worshipful dear homage and\nmay not lightly be misprized, nor had been, an ye had noted this\ncomplexion of mood and mind and understood that that I would\nI could not, and that I could not I might not, nor yet nor might\n_nor_ could, nor might-not nor could-not, might be by advantage\nturned to the desired _would_, and so I pray you mercy of my fault,\nand that ye will of your kindness and your charity forgive it, good\nmy master and most dear lord.\"\n\nI couldn't make it all out--that is, the details--but I got the\ngeneral idea; and enough of it, too, to be ashamed.  It was not\nfair to spring those nineteenth century technicalities upon the\nuntutored infant of the sixth and then rail at her because she\ncouldn't get their drift; and when she was making the honest best\ndrive at it she could, too, and no fault of hers that she couldn't\nfetch the home plate; and so I apologized.  Then we meandered\npleasantly away toward the hermit holes in sociable converse\ntogether, and better friends than ever.\n\nI was gradually coming to have a mysterious and shuddery reverence\nfor this girl; nowadays whenever she pulled out from the station\nand got her train fairly started on one of those horizonless\ntranscontinental sentences of hers, it was borne in upon me that\nI was standing in the awful presence of the Mother of the German\nLanguage.  I was so impressed with this, that sometimes when she\nbegan to empty one of these sentences on me I unconsciously took\nthe very attitude of reverence, and stood uncovered; and if words\nhad been water, I had been drowned, sure.  She had exactly the\nGerman way; whatever was in her mind to be delivered, whether a\nmere remark, or a sermon, or a cyclopedia, or the history of a war,\nshe would get it into a single sentence or die.  Whenever the literary\nGerman dives into a sentence, that is the last you are going to see\nof him till he emerges on the other side of his Atlantic with his\nverb in his mouth.\n\nWe drifted from hermit to hermit all the afternoon.  It was a most\nstrange menagerie.  The chief emulation among them seemed to be,\nto see which could manage to be the uncleanest and most prosperous\nwith vermin.  Their manner and attitudes were the last expression\nof complacent self-righteousness.  It was one anchorite's pride\nto lie naked in the mud and let the insects bite him and blister\nhim unmolested; it was another's to lean against a rock, all day\nlong, conspicuous to the admiration of the throng of pilgrims\nand pray; it was another's to go naked and crawl around on all fours;\nit was another's to drag about with him, year in and year out,\neighty pounds of iron; it was another's to never lie down when\nhe slept, but to stand among the thorn-bushes and snore when there\nwere pilgrims around to look; a woman, who had the white hair of\nage, and no other apparel, was black from crown to heel with\nforty-seven years of holy abstinence from water.  Groups of gazing\npilgrims stood around all and every of these strange objects, lost\nin reverent wonder, and envious of the fleckless sanctity which\nthese pious austerities had won for them from an exacting heaven.\n\nBy and by we went to see one of the supremely great ones.  He was\na mighty celebrity; his fame had penetrated all Christendom; the\nnoble and the renowned journeyed from the remotest lands on the globe\nto pay him reverence.  His stand was in the center of the widest part\nof the valley; and it took all that space to hold his crowds.\n\nHis stand was a pillar sixty feet high, with a broad platform on\nthe top of it.  He was now doing what he had been doing every day\nfor twenty years up there--bowing his body ceaselessly and rapidly\nalmost to his feet.  It was his way of praying.  I timed him with a\nstop watch, and he made 1,244 revolutions in 24 minutes and\n46 seconds.  It seemed a pity to have all this power going to waste.\nIt was one of the most useful motions in mechanics, the pedal\nmovement; so I made a note in my memorandum book, purposing some\nday to apply a system of elastic cords to him and run a sewing\nmachine with it.  I afterward carried out that scheme, and got\nfive years' good service out of him; in which time he turned out\nupward of eighteen thousand first-rate tow-linen shirts, which\nwas ten a day.  I worked him Sundays and all; he was going, Sundays,\nthe same as week days, and it was no use to waste the power.\nThese shirts cost me nothing but just the mere trifle for the\nmaterials--I furnished those myself, it would not have been right\nto make him do that--and they sold like smoke to pilgrims at a\ndollar and a half apiece, which was the price of fifty cows or\na blooded race horse in Arthurdom.  They were regarded as a perfect\nprotection against sin, and advertised as such by my knights\neverywhere, with the paint-pot and stencil-plate; insomuch that\nthere was not a cliff or a bowlder or a dead wall in England but\nyou could read on it at a mile distance:\n\n\"Buy the only genuine St. Stylite; patronized by the Nobility.\nPatent applied for.\"\n\nThere was more money in the business than one knew what to do with.\nAs it extended, I brought out a line of goods suitable for kings,\nand a nobby thing for duchesses and that sort, with ruffles down\nthe forehatch and the running-gear clewed up with a featherstitch\nto leeward and then hauled aft with a back-stay and triced up with\na half-turn in the standing rigging forward of the weather-gaskets.\nYes, it was a daisy.\n\nBut about that time I noticed that the motive power had taken to\nstanding on one leg, and I found that there was something the matter\nwith the other one; so I stocked the business and unloaded, taking\nSir Bors de Ganis into camp financially along with certain of his\nfriends; for the works stopped within a year, and the good saint\ngot him to his rest.  But he had earned it.  I can say that for him.\n\nWhen I saw him that first time--however, his personal condition\nwill not quite bear description here.  You can read it in the\nLives of the Saints.*\n\n[*All the details concerning the hermits, in this chapter, are from\nLecky--but greatly modified.  This book not being a history but\nonly a tale, the majority of the historian's frank details were too\nstrong for reproduction in it.--_Editor_]\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nRESTORATION OF THE FOUNTAIN\n\nSaturday noon I went to the well and looked on a while.  Merlin\nwas still burning smoke-powders, and pawing the air, and muttering\ngibberish as hard as ever, but looking pretty down-hearted, for\nof course he had not started even a perspiration in that well yet.\nFinally I said:\n\n\"How does the thing promise by this time, partner?\"\n\n\"Behold, I am even now busied with trial of the powerfulest\nenchantment known to the princes of the occult arts in the lands\nof the East; an it fail me, naught can avail.  Peace, until I finish.\"\n\nHe raised a smoke this time that darkened all the region, and must\nhave made matters uncomfortable for the hermits, for the wind\nwas their way, and it rolled down over their dens in a dense and\nbillowy fog.  He poured out volumes of speech to match, and contorted\nhis body and sawed the air with his hands in a most extraordinary\nway.  At the end of twenty minutes he dropped down panting, and\nabout exhausted.  Now arrived the abbot and several hundred monks\nand nuns, and behind them a multitude of pilgrims and a couple of\nacres of foundlings, all drawn by the prodigious smoke, and all\nin a grand state of excitement.  The abbot inquired anxiously for\nresults.  Merlin said:\n\n\"If any labor of mortal might break the spell that binds these\nwaters, this which I have but just essayed had done it.  It has\nfailed; whereby I do now know that that which I had feared is\na truth established; the sign of this failure is, that the most\npotent spirit known to the magicians of the East, and whose name\nnone may utter and live, has laid his spell upon this well.  The\nmortal does not breathe, nor ever will, who can penetrate the secret\nof that spell, and without that secret none can break it.  The\nwater will flow no more forever, good Father.  I have done what\nman could.  Suffer me to go.\"\n\nOf course this threw the abbot into a good deal of a consternation.\nHe turned to me with the signs of it in his face, and said:\n\n\"Ye have heard him. Is it true?\"\n\n\"Part of it is.\"\n\n\"Not all, then, not all!  What part is true?\"\n\n\"That that spirit with the Russian name has put his spell\nupon the well.\"\n\n\"God's wounds, then are we ruined!\"\n\n\"Possibly.\"\n\n\"But not certainly?  Ye mean, not certainly?\"\n\n\"That is it.\"\n\n\"Wherefore, ye also mean that when he saith none can break the spell--\"\n\n\"Yes, when he says that, he says what isn't necessarily true.\nThere are conditions under which an effort to break it may have\nsome chance--that is, some small, some trifling chance--of success.\"\n\n\"The conditions--\"\n\n\"Oh, they are nothing difficult.  Only these: I want the well\nand the surroundings for the space of half a mile, entirely to\nmyself from sunset to-day until I remove the ban--and nobody\nallowed to cross the ground but by my authority.\"\n\n\"Are these all?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"And you have no fear to try?\"\n\n\"Oh, none.  One may fail, of course; and one may also succeed.\nOne can try, and I am ready to chance it.  I have my conditions?\"\n\n\"These and all others ye may name.  I will issue commandment\nto that effect.\"\n\n\"Wait,\" said Merlin, with an evil smile.  \"Ye wit that he that\nwould break this spell must know that spirit's name?\"\n\n\"Yes, I know his name.\"\n\n\"And wit you also that to know it skills not of itself, but ye\nmust likewise pronounce it?  Ha-ha!  Knew ye that?\"\n\n\"Yes, I knew that, too.\"\n\n\"You had that knowledge!  Art a fool?  Are ye minded to utter\nthat name and die?\"\n\n\"Utter it?  Why certainly.  I would utter it if it was Welsh.\"\n\n\"Ye are even a dead man, then; and I go to tell Arthur.\"\n\n\"That's all right.  Take your gripsack and get along.  The thing\nfor _you_ to do is to go home and work the weather, John W. Merlin.\"\n\nIt was a home shot, and it made him wince; for he was the worst\nweather-failure in the kingdom.  Whenever he ordered up the\ndanger-signals along the coast there was a week's dead calm, sure,\nand every time he prophesied fair weather it rained brickbats.\nBut I kept him in the weather bureau right along, to undermine\nhis reputation.  However, that shot raised his bile, and instead\nof starting home to report my death, he said he would remain\nand enjoy it.\n\nMy two experts arrived in the evening, and pretty well fagged,\nfor they had traveled double tides.  They had pack-mules along,\nand had brought everything I needed--tools, pump, lead pipe,\nGreek fire, sheaves of big rockets, roman candles, colored fire\nsprays, electric apparatus, and a lot of sundries--everything\nnecessary for the stateliest kind of a miracle.  They got their\nsupper and a nap, and about midnight we sallied out through a\nsolitude so wholly vacant and complete that it quite overpassed\nthe required conditions.  We took possession of the well and its\nsurroundings.  My boys were experts in all sorts of things, from\nthe stoning up of a well to the constructing of a mathematical\ninstrument.  An hour before sunrise we had that leak mended in\nship-shape fashion, and the water began to rise.  Then we stowed our\nfireworks in the chapel, locked up the place, and went home to bed.\n\nBefore the noon mass was over, we were at the well again; for there\nwas a deal to do yet, and I was determined to spring the miracle\nbefore midnight, for business reasons: for whereas a miracle\nworked for the Church on a week-day is worth a good deal, it is\nworth six times as much if you get it in on a Sunday.  In nine hours\nthe water had risen to its customary level--that is to say, it was\nwithin twenty-three feet of the top.  We put in a little iron pump,\none of the first turned out by my works near the capital; we bored\ninto a stone reservoir which stood against the outer wall of the\nwell-chamber and inserted a section of lead pipe that was long\nenough to reach to the door of the chapel and project beyond\nthe threshold, where the gushing water would be visible to the\ntwo hundred and fifty acres of people I was intending should be\npresent on the flat plain in front of this little holy hillock at\nthe proper time.\n\nWe knocked the head out of an empty hogshead and hoisted this\nhogshead to the flat roof of the chapel, where we clamped it down\nfast, poured in gunpowder till it lay loosely an inch deep on the\nbottom, then we stood up rockets in the hogshead as thick as they\ncould loosely stand, all the different breeds of rockets there are;\nand they made a portly and imposing sheaf, I can tell you.  We\ngrounded the wire of a pocket electrical battery in that powder,\nwe placed a whole magazine of Greek fire on each corner of the\nroof--blue on one corner, green on another, red on another, and\npurple on the last--and grounded a wire in each.\n\nAbout two hundred yards off, in the flat, we built a pen of\nscantlings, about four feet high, and laid planks on it, and so\nmade a platform.  We covered it with swell tapestries borrowed\nfor the occasion, and topped it off with the abbot's own throne.\nWhen you are going to do a miracle for an ignorant race, you want\nto get in every detail that will count; you want to make all the\nproperties impressive to the public eye; you want to make matters\ncomfortable for your head guest; then you can turn yourself loose\nand play your effects for all they are worth.  I know the value of\nthese things, for I know human nature.  You can't throw too much\nstyle into a miracle.  It costs trouble, and work, and sometimes\nmoney; but it pays in the end.  Well, we brought the wires to\nthe ground at the chapel, and then brought them under the ground\nto the platform, and hid the batteries there.  We put a rope fence\na hundred feet square around the platform to keep off the common\nmultitude, and that finished the work.  My idea was, doors open\nat 10:30, performance to begin at 11:25 sharp.  I wished I could\ncharge admission, but of course that wouldn't answer.  I instructed\nmy boys to be in the chapel as early as 10, before anybody was\naround, and be ready to man the pumps at the proper time, and\nmake the fur fly.  Then we went home to supper.\n\nThe news of the disaster to the well had traveled far by this time;\nand now for two or three days a steady avalanche of people had\nbeen pouring into the valley.  The lower end of the valley was\nbecome one huge camp; we should have a good house, no question\nabout that.  Criers went the rounds early in the evening and\nannounced the coming attempt, which put every pulse up to fever\nheat.  They gave notice that the abbot and his official suite would\nmove in state and occupy the platform at 10:30, up to which time\nall the region which was under my ban must be clear; the bells\nwould then cease from tolling, and this sign should be permission\nto the multitudes to close in and take their places.\n\nI was at the platform and all ready to do the honors when the\nabbot's solemn procession hove in sight--which it did not do till\nit was nearly to the rope fence, because it was a starless black\nnight and no torches permitted.  With it came Merlin, and took\na front seat on the platform; he was as good as his word for once.\nOne could not see the multitudes banked together beyond the ban,\nbut they were there, just the same.  The moment the bells stopped,\nthose banked masses broke and poured over the line like a vast\nblack wave, and for as much as a half hour it continued to flow,\nand then it solidified itself, and you could have walked upon\na pavement of human heads to--well, miles.\n\nWe had a solemn stage-wait, now, for about twenty minutes--a thing\nI had counted on for effect; it is always good to let your audience\nhave a chance to work up its expectancy.  At length, out of the\nsilence a noble Latin chant--men's voices--broke and swelled up\nand rolled away into the night, a majestic tide of melody.  I had\nput that up, too, and it was one of the best effects I ever invented.\nWhen it was finished I stood up on the platform and extended my\nhands abroad, for two minutes, with my face uplifted--that always\nproduces a dead hush--and then slowly pronounced this ghastly word\nwith a kind of awfulness which caused hundreds to tremble, and\nmany women to faint:\n\n\"Constantinopolitanischerdudelsackspfeifenmachersgesellschafft!\"\n\nJust as I was moaning out the closing hunks of that word, I touched\noff one of my electric connections and all that murky world of\npeople stood revealed in a hideous blue glare!  It was immense\n--that effect!  Lots of people shrieked, women curled up and quit\nin every direction, foundlings collapsed by platoons.  The abbot\nand the monks crossed themselves nimbly and their lips fluttered\nwith agitated prayers.  Merlin held his grip, but he was astonished\nclear down to his corns; he had never seen anything to begin\nwith that, before.  Now was the time to pile in the effects.  I lifted\nmy hands and groaned out this word--as it were in agony:\n\n\"Nihilistendynamittheaterkaestchenssprengungsattentaetsversuchungen!\"\n\n--and turned on the red fire!  You should have heard that Atlantic\nof people moan and howl when that crimson hell joined the blue!\nAfter sixty seconds I shouted:\n\n\"Transvaaltruppentropentransporttrampelthiertreibertrauungsthraenen-\ntragoedie!\"\n\n--and lit up the green fire!  After waiting only forty seconds this\ntime, I spread my arms abroad and thundered out the devastating\nsyllables of this word of words:\n\n\"Mekkamuselmannenmassenmenchenmoerdermohrenmuttermarmormonumentenmacher!\"\n\n--and whirled on the purple glare!  There they were, all going\nat once, red, blue, green, purple!--four furious volcanoes pouring\nvast clouds of radiant smoke aloft, and spreading a blinding\nrainbowed noonday to the furthest confines of that valley.  In\nthe distance one could see that fellow on the pillar standing rigid\nagainst the background of sky, his seesaw stopped for the first\ntime in twenty years.  I knew the boys were at the pump now and\nready.  So I said to the abbot:\n\n\"The time is come, Father.  I am about to pronounce the dread name\nand command the spell to dissolve.  You want to brace up, and take\nhold of something.\"  Then I shouted to the people: \"Behold, in\nanother minute the spell will be broken, or no mortal can break it.\nIf it break, all will know it, for you will see the sacred water\ngush from the chapel door!\"\n\nI stood a few moments, to let the hearers have a chance to spread\nmy announcement to those who couldn't hear, and so convey it\nto the furthest ranks, then I made a grand exhibition of extra\nposturing and gesturing, and shouted:\n\n\"Lo, I command the fell spirit that possesses the holy fountain\nto now disgorge into the skies all the infernal fires that still\nremain in him, and straightway dissolve his spell and flee hence\nto the pit, there to lie bound a thousand years.  By his own dread\nname I command it--BGWJJILLIGKKK!\"\n\nThen I touched off the hogshead of rockets, and a vast fountain of\ndazzling lances of fire vomited itself toward the zenith with a\nhissing rush, and burst in mid-sky into a storm of flashing jewels!\nOne mighty groan of terror started up from the massed people\n--then suddenly broke into a wild hosannah of joy--for there, fair\nand plain in the uncanny glare, they saw the freed water leaping\nforth!  The old abbot could not speak a word, for tears and the\nchokings in his throat; without utterance of any sort, he folded me\nin his arms and mashed me.  It was more eloquent than speech.\nAnd harder to get over, too, in a country where there were really\nno doctors that were worth a damaged nickel.\n\nYou should have seen those acres of people throw themselves down\nin that water and kiss it; kiss it, and pet it, and fondle it, and\ntalk to it as if it were alive, and welcome it back with the dear\nnames they gave their darlings, just as if it had been a friend who\nwas long gone away and lost, and was come home again.  Yes, it was\npretty to see, and made me think more of them than I had done before.\n\nI sent Merlin home on a shutter.  He had caved in and gone down\nlike a landslide when I pronounced that fearful name, and had\nnever come to since.  He never had heard that name before,--neither\nhad I--but to him it was the right one.  Any jumble would have\nbeen the right one.  He admitted, afterward, that that spirit's own\nmother could not have pronounced that name better than I did.\nHe never could understand how I survived it, and I didn't tell\nhim.  It is only young magicians that give away a secret like that.\nMerlin spent three months working enchantments to try to find out\nthe deep trick of how to pronounce that name and outlive it.\nBut he didn't arrive.\n\nWhen I started to the chapel, the populace uncovered and fell back\nreverently to make a wide way for me, as if I had been some kind\nof a superior being--and I was.  I was aware of that.  I took along\na night shift of monks, and taught them the mystery of the pump,\nand set them to work, for it was plain that a good part of the\npeople out there were going to sit up with the water all night,\nconsequently it was but right that they should have all they wanted\nof it.  To those monks that pump was a good deal of a miracle\nitself, and they were full of wonder over it; and of admiration,\ntoo, of the exceeding effectiveness of its performance.\n\nIt was a great night, an immense night.  There was reputation in it.\nI could hardly get to sleep for glorying over it.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nA RIVAL MAGICIAN\n\nMy influence in the Valley of Holiness was something prodigious\nnow.  It seemed worth while to try to turn it to some valuable\naccount.  The thought came to me the next morning, and was suggested\nby my seeing one of my knights who was in the soap line come\nriding in.  According to history, the monks of this place two\ncenturies before had been worldly minded enough to want to wash.\nIt might be that there was a leaven of this unrighteousness still\nremaining.  So I sounded a Brother:\n\n\"Wouldn't you like a bath?\"\n\nHe shuddered at the thought--the thought of the peril of it to\nthe well--but he said with feeling:\n\n\"One needs not to ask that of a poor body who has not known that\nblessed refreshment sith that he was a boy.  Would God I might\nwash me! but it may not be, fair sir, tempt me not; it is forbidden.\"\n\nAnd then he sighed in such a sorrowful way that I was resolved\nhe should have at least one layer of his real estate removed,\nif it sized up my whole influence and bankrupted the pile.  So I\nwent to the abbot and asked for a permit for this Brother.  He\nblenched at the idea--I don't mean that you could see him blench,\nfor of course you couldn't see it without you scraped him, and\nI didn't care enough about it to scrape him, but I knew the blench\nwas there, just the same, and within a book-cover's thickness of\nthe surface, too--blenched, and trembled.  He said:\n\n\"Ah, son, ask aught else thou wilt, and it is thine, and freely\ngranted out of a grateful heart--but this, oh, this!  Would you\ndrive away the blessed water again?\"\n\n\"No, Father, I will not drive it away.  I have mysterious knowledge\nwhich teaches me that there was an error that other time when\nit was thought the institution of the bath banished the fountain.\"\nA large interest began to show up in the old man's face.  \"My\nknowledge informs me that the bath was innocent of that misfortune,\nwhich was caused by quite another sort of sin.\"\n\n\"These are brave words--but--but right welcome, if they be true.\"\n\n\"They are true, indeed.  Let me build the bath again, Father.\nLet me build it again, and the fountain shall flow forever.\"\n\n\"You promise this?--you promise it?  Say the word--say you promise it!\"\n\n\"I do promise it.\"\n\n\"Then will I have the first bath myself!  Go--get ye to your work.\nTarry not, tarry not, but go.\"\n\nI and my boys were at work, straight off.  The ruins of the old\nbath were there yet in the basement of the monastery, not a stone\nmissing.  They had been left just so, all these lifetimes, and\navoided with a pious fear, as things accursed.  In two days we\nhad it all done and the water in--a spacious pool of clear pure\nwater that a body could swim in.  It was running water, too.\nIt came in, and went out, through the ancient pipes.  The old abbot\nkept his word, and was the first to try it.  He went down black\nand shaky, leaving the whole black community above troubled and\nworried and full of bodings; but he came back white and joyful,\nand the game was made! another triumph scored.\n\nIt was a good campaign that we made in that Valley of Holiness,\nand I was very well satisfied, and ready to move on now, but\nI struck a disappointment.  I caught a heavy cold, and it started\nup an old lurking rheumatism of mine.  Of course the rheumatism\nhunted up my weakest place and located itself there.  This was\nthe place where the abbot put his arms about me and mashed me, what\ntime he was moved to testify his gratitude to me with an embrace.\n\nWhen at last I got out, I was a shadow.  But everybody was full\nof attentions and kindnesses, and these brought cheer back into\nmy life, and were the right medicine to help a convalescent swiftly\nup toward health and strength again; so I gained fast.\n\nSandy was worn out with nursing; so I made up my mind to turn out\nand go a cruise alone, leaving her at the nunnery to rest up.\nMy idea was to disguise myself as a freeman of peasant degree\nand wander through the country a week or two on foot.  This would\ngive me a chance to eat and lodge with the lowliest and poorest\nclass of free citizens on equal terms.  There was no other way\nto inform myself perfectly of their everyday life and the operation\nof the laws upon it.  If I went among them as a gentleman, there\nwould be restraints and conventionalities which would shut me out\nfrom their private joys and troubles, and I should get no further\nthan the outside shell.\n\nOne morning I was out on a long walk to get up muscle for my trip,\nand had climbed the ridge which bordered the northern extremity\nof the valley, when I came upon an artificial opening in the face\nof a low precipice, and recognized it by its location as a hermitage\nwhich had often been pointed out to me from a distance as the den\nof a hermit of high renown for dirt and austerity.  I knew he had\nlately been offered a situation in the Great Sahara, where lions\nand sandflies made the hermit-life peculiarly attractive and\ndifficult, and had gone to Africa to take possession, so I thought\nI would look in and see how the atmosphere of this den agreed\nwith its reputation.\n\nMy surprise was great: the place was newly swept and scoured.\nThen there was another surprise.  Back in the gloom of the cavern\nI heard the clink of a little bell, and then this exclamation:\n\n\"Hello Central!  Is this you, Camelot?--Behold, thou mayst glad\nthy heart an thou hast faith to believe the wonderful when that\nit cometh in unexpected guise and maketh itself manifest in\nimpossible places--here standeth in the flesh his mightiness\nThe Boss, and with thine own ears shall ye hear him speak!\"\n\nNow what a radical reversal of things this was; what a jumbling\ntogether of extravagant incongruities; what a fantastic conjunction\nof opposites and irreconcilables--the home of the bogus miracle\nbecome the home of a real one, the den of a mediaeval hermit turned\ninto a telephone office!\n\nThe telephone clerk stepped into the light, and I recognized one\nof my young fellows.  I said:\n\n\"How long has this office been established here, Ulfius?\"\n\n\"But since midnight, fair Sir Boss, an it please you.  We saw many\nlights in the valley, and so judged it well to make a station,\nfor that where so many lights be needs must they indicate a town\nof goodly size.\"\n\n\"Quite right.  It isn't a town in the customary sense, but it's\na good stand, anyway.  Do you know where you are?\"\n\n\"Of that I have had no time to make inquiry; for whenas my\ncomradeship moved hence upon their labors, leaving me in charge,\nI got me to needed rest, purposing to inquire when I waked, and\nreport the place's name to Camelot for record.\"\n\n\"Well, this is the Valley of Holiness.\"\n\nIt didn't take; I mean, he didn't start at the name, as I had\nsupposed he would.  He merely said:\n\n\"I will so report it.\"\n\n\"Why, the surrounding regions are filled with the noise of late\nwonders that have happened here!  You didn't hear of them?\"\n\n\"Ah, ye will remember we move by night, and avoid speech with all.\nWe learn naught but that we get by the telephone from Camelot.\"\n\n\"Why _they_ know all about this thing.  Haven't they told you anything\nabout the great miracle of the restoration of a holy fountain?\"\n\n\"Oh, _that_?  Indeed yes.  But the name of _this_ valley doth woundily\ndiffer from the name of _that_ one; indeed to differ wider were not pos--\"\n\n\"What was that name, then?\"\n\n\"The Valley of Hellishness.\"\n\n\"_That_ explains it.  Confound a telephone, anyway.  It is the very\ndemon for conveying similarities of sound that are miracles of\ndivergence from similarity of sense.  But no matter, you know\nthe name of the place now.  Call up Camelot.\"\n\nHe did it, and had Clarence sent for.  It was good to hear my boy's\nvoice again.  It was like being home.  After some affectionate\ninterchanges, and some account of my late illness, I said:\n\n\"What is new?\"\n\n\"The king and queen and many of the court do start even in this\nhour, to go to your valley to pay pious homage to the waters ye\nhave restored, and cleanse themselves of sin, and see the place\nwhere the infernal spirit spouted true hell-flames to the clouds\n--an ye listen sharply ye may hear me wink and hear me likewise\nsmile a smile, sith 'twas I that made selection of those flames\nfrom out our stock and sent them by your order.\"\n\n\"Does the king know the way to this place?\"\n\n\"The king?--no, nor to any other in his realms, mayhap; but the lads\nthat holp you with your miracle will be his guide and lead the way,\nand appoint the places for rests at noons and sleeps at night.\"\n\n\"This will bring them here--when?\"\n\n\"Mid-afternoon, or later, the third day.\"\n\n\"Anything else in the way of news?\"\n\n\"The king hath begun the raising of the standing army ye suggested\nto him; one regiment is complete and officered.\"\n\n\"The mischief!  I wanted a main hand in that myself.  There is\nonly one body of men in the kingdom that are fitted to officer\na regular army.\"\n\n\"Yes--and now ye will marvel to know there's not so much as one\nWest Pointer in that regiment.\"\n\n\"What are you talking about?  Are you in earnest?\"\n\n\"It is truly as I have said.\"\n\n\"Why, this makes me uneasy.  Who were chosen, and what was the\nmethod?  Competitive examination?\"\n\n\"Indeed, I know naught of the method.  I but know this--these\nofficers be all of noble family, and are born--what is it you\ncall it?--chuckleheads.\"\n\n\"There's something wrong, Clarence.\"\n\n\"Comfort yourself, then; for two candidates for a lieutenancy do\ntravel hence with the king--young nobles both--and if you but wait\nwhere you are you will hear them questioned.\"\n\n\"That is news to the purpose.  I will get one West Pointer in,\nanyway.  Mount a man and send him to that school with a message;\nlet him kill horses, if necessary, but he must be there before\nsunset to-night and say--\"\n\n\"There is no need.  I have laid a ground wire to the school.\nPrithee let me connect you with it.\"\n\nIt sounded good!  In this atmosphere of telephones and lightning\ncommunication with distant regions, I was breathing the breath\nof life again after long suffocation.  I realized, then, what a\ncreepy, dull, inanimate horror this land had been to me all these\nyears, and how I had been in such a stifled condition of mind as\nto have grown used to it almost beyond the power to notice it.\n\nI gave my order to the superintendent of the Academy personally.\nI also asked him to bring me some paper and a fountain pen and\na box or so of safety matches.  I was getting tired of doing\nwithout these conveniences.  I could have them now, as I wasn't\ngoing to wear armor any more at present, and therefore could get\nat my pockets.\n\nWhen I got back to the monastery, I found a thing of interest\ngoing on.  The abbot and his monks were assembled in the great\nhall, observing with childish wonder and faith the performances\nof a new magician, a fresh arrival.  His dress was the extreme of\nthe fantastic; as showy and foolish as the sort of thing an Indian\nmedicine-man wears.  He was mowing, and mumbling, and gesticulating,\nand drawing mystical figures in the air and on the floor,--the\nregular thing, you know.  He was a celebrity from Asia--so he\nsaid, and that was enough.  That sort of evidence was as good\nas gold, and passed current everywhere.\n\nHow easy and cheap it was to be a great magician on this fellow's\nterms.  His specialty was to tell you what any individual on the\nface of the globe was doing at the moment; and what he had done\nat any time in the past, and what he would do at any time in the\nfuture.  He asked if any would like to know what the Emperor of\nthe East was doing now?  The sparkling eyes and the delighted rubbing\nof hands made eloquent answer--this reverend crowd _would_ like to\nknow what that monarch was at, just as this moment.  The fraud\nwent through some more mummery, and then made grave announcement:\n\n\"The high and mighty Emperor of the East doth at this moment put\nmoney in the palm of a holy begging friar--one, two, three pieces,\nand they be all of silver.\"\n\nA buzz of admiring exclamations broke out, all around:\n\n\"It is marvelous!\"  \"Wonderful!\"  \"What study, what labor, to have\nacquired a so amazing power as this!\"\n\nWould they like to know what the Supreme Lord of Inde was doing?\nYes.  He told them what the Supreme Lord of Inde was doing.  Then\nhe told them what the Sultan of Egypt was at; also what the King\nof the Remote Seas was about.  And so on and so on; and with each\nnew marvel the astonishment at his accuracy rose higher and higher.\nThey thought he must surely strike an uncertain place some time;\nbut no, he never had to hesitate, he always knew, and always with\nunerring precision.  I saw that if this thing went on I should lose\nmy supremacy, this fellow would capture my following, I should\nbe left out in the cold.  I must put a cog in his wheel, and do it\nright away, too.  I said:\n\n\"If I might ask, I should very greatly like to know what a certain\nperson is doing.\"\n\n\"Speak, and freely.  I will tell you.\"\n\n\"It will be difficult--perhaps impossible.\"\n\n\"My art knoweth not that word.  The more difficult it is, the more\ncertainly will I reveal it to you.\"\n\nYou see, I was working up the interest.  It was getting pretty\nhigh, too; you could see that by the craning necks all around,\nand the half-suspended breathing.  So now I climaxed it:\n\n\"If you make no mistake--if you tell me truly what I want to\nknow--I will give you two hundred silver pennies.\"\n\n\"The fortune is mine!  I will tell you what you would know.\"\n\n\"Then tell me what I am doing with my right hand.\"\n\n\"Ah-h!\"  There was a general gasp of surprise.  It had not occurred\nto anybody in the crowd--that simple trick of inquiring about\nsomebody who wasn't ten thousand miles away.  The magician was\nhit hard; it was an emergency that had never happened in his\nexperience before, and it corked him; he didn't know how to meet\nit.  He looked stunned, confused; he couldn't say a word.  \"Come,\"\nI said, \"what are you waiting for?  Is it possible you can answer up,\nright off, and tell what anybody on the other side of the earth is\ndoing, and yet can't tell what a person is doing who isn't three\nyards from you?  Persons behind me know what I am doing with my\nright hand--they will indorse you if you tell correctly.\"  He was\nstill dumb.  \"Very well, I'll tell you why you don't speak up and\ntell; it is because you don't know.  _You_ a magician!  Good friends,\nthis tramp is a mere fraud and liar.\"\n\nThis distressed the monks and terrified them.  They were not used\nto hearing these awful beings called names, and they did not know\nwhat might be the consequence.  There was a dead silence now;\nsuperstitious bodings were in every mind.  The magician began to\npull his wits together, and when he presently smiled an easy,\nnonchalant smile, it spread a mighty relief around; for it indicated\nthat his mood was not destructive.  He said:\n\n\"It hath struck me speechless, the frivolity of this person's\nspeech.  Let all know, if perchance there be any who know it not,\nthat enchanters of my degree deign not to concern themselves with\nthe doings of any but kings, princes, emperors, them that be born\nin the purple and them only.  Had ye asked me what Arthur the great\nking is doing, it were another matter, and I had told ye; but the\ndoings of a subject interest me not.\"\n\n\"Oh, I misunderstood you.  I thought you said 'anybody,' and so\nI supposed 'anybody' included--well, anybody; that is, everybody.\"\n\n\"It doth--anybody that is of lofty birth; and the better if\nhe be royal.\"\n\n\"That, it meseemeth, might well be,\" said the abbot, who saw his\nopportunity to smooth things and avert disaster, \"for it were not\nlikely that so wonderful a gift as this would be conferred for\nthe revelation of the concerns of lesser beings than such as be\nborn near to the summits of greatness.  Our Arthur the king--\"\n\n\"Would you know of him?\" broke in the enchanter.\n\n\"Most gladly, yea, and gratefully.\"\n\nEverybody was full of awe and interest again right away, the\nincorrigible idiots.  They watched the incantations absorbingly,\nand looked at me with a \"There, now, what can you say to that?\"\nair, when the announcement came:\n\n\"The king is weary with the chase, and lieth in his palace these\ntwo hours sleeping a dreamless sleep.\"\n\n\"God's benison upon him!\" said the abbot, and crossed himself;\n\"may that sleep be to the refreshment of his body and his soul.\"\n\n\"And so it might be, if he were sleeping,\" I said, \"but the king\nis not sleeping, the king rides.\"\n\nHere was trouble again--a conflict of authority.  Nobody knew which\nof us to believe; I still had some reputation left.  The magician's\nscorn was stirred, and he said:\n\n\"Lo, I have seen many wonderful soothsayers and prophets and\nmagicians in my life days, but none before that could sit idle and\nsee to the heart of things with never an incantation to help.\"\n\n\"You have lived in the woods, and lost much by it.  I use incantations\nmyself, as this good brotherhood are aware--but only on occasions\nof moment.\"\n\nWhen it comes to sarcasming, I reckon I know how to keep my end up.\nThat jab made this fellow squirm.  The abbot inquired after the\nqueen and the court, and got this information:\n\n\"They be all on sleep, being overcome by fatigue, like as to the king.\"\n\nI said:\n\n\"That is merely another lie.  Half of them are about their amusements,\nthe queen and the other half are not sleeping, they ride.  Now\nperhaps you can spread yourself a little, and tell us where the king\nand queen and all that are this moment riding with them are going?\"\n\n\"They sleep now, as I said; but on the morrow they will ride,\nfor they go a journey toward the sea.\"\n\n\"And where will they be the day after to-morrow at vespers?\"\n\n\"Far to the north of Camelot, and half their journey will be done.\"\n\n\"That is another lie, by the space of a hundred and fifty miles.\nTheir journey will not be merely half done, it will be all done,\nand they will be _here_, in this valley.\"\n\n_That_ was a noble shot!  It set the abbot and the monks in a whirl\nof excitement, and it rocked the enchanter to his base.  I followed\nthe thing right up:\n\n\"If the king does not arrive, I will have myself ridden on a rail:\nif he does I will ride you on a rail instead.\"\n\nNext day I went up to the telephone office and found that the king\nhad passed through two towns that were on the line.  I spotted\nhis progress on the succeeding day in the same way.  I kept these\nmatters to myself.  The third day's reports showed that if he\nkept up his gait he would arrive by four in the afternoon.  There\nwas still no sign anywhere of interest in his coming; there seemed\nto be no preparations making to receive him in state; a strange\nthing, truly.  Only one thing could explain this: that other\nmagician had been cutting under me, sure.  This was true.  I asked\na friend of mine, a monk, about it, and he said, yes, the magician\nhad tried some further enchantments and found out that the court\nhad concluded to make no journey at all, but stay at home.  Think\nof that!  Observe how much a reputation was worth in such a country.\nThese people had seen me do the very showiest bit of magic in\nhistory, and the only one within their memory that had a positive\nvalue, and yet here they were, ready to take up with an adventurer\nwho could offer no evidence of his powers but his mere unproven word.\n\nHowever, it was not good politics to let the king come without\nany fuss and feathers at all, so I went down and drummed up a\nprocession of pilgrims and smoked out a batch of hermits and\nstarted them out at two o'clock to meet him.  And that was the\nsort of state he arrived in.  The abbot was helpless with rage\nand humiliation when I brought him out on a balcony and showed\nhim the head of the state marching in and never a monk on hand to\noffer him welcome, and no stir of life or clang of joy-bell to glad\nhis spirit.  He took one look and then flew to rouse out his forces.\nThe next minute the bells were dinning furiously, and the various\nbuildings were vomiting monks and nuns, who went swarming in a\nrush toward the coming procession; and with them went that magician\n--and he was on a rail, too, by the abbot's order; and his reputation\nwas in the mud, and mine was in the sky again.  Yes, a man can\nkeep his trademark current in such a country, but he can't sit\naround and do it; he has got to be on deck and attending to business\nright along.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nA COMPETITIVE EXAMINATION\n\nWhen the king traveled for change of air, or made a progress, or\nvisited a distant noble whom he wished to bankrupt with the cost\nof his keep, part of the administration moved with him.  It was\na fashion of the time.  The Commission charged with the examination\nof candidates for posts in the army came with the king to the\nValley, whereas they could have transacted their business just\nas well at home.  And although this expedition was strictly a\nholiday excursion for the king, he kept some of his business\nfunctions going just the same.  He touched for the evil, as usual;\nhe held court in the gate at sunrise and tried cases, for he was\nhimself Chief Justice of the King's Bench.\n\nHe shone very well in this latter office.  He was a wise and humane\njudge, and he clearly did his honest best and fairest,--according\nto his lights.  That is a large reservation.  His lights--I mean\nhis rearing--often colored his decisions.  Whenever there was a\ndispute between a noble or gentleman and a person of lower degree,\nthe king's leanings and sympathies were for the former class always,\nwhether he suspected it or not.  It was impossible that this should\nbe otherwise.  The blunting effects of slavery upon the slaveholder's\nmoral perceptions are known and conceded, the world over; and a\nprivileged class, an aristocracy, is but a band of slaveholders\nunder another name.  This has a harsh sound, and yet should not\nbe offensive to any--even to the noble himself--unless the fact\nitself be an offense: for the statement simply formulates a fact.\nThe repulsive feature of slavery is the _thing_, not its name.  One\nneeds but to hear an aristocrat speak of the classes that are below\nhim to recognize--and in but indifferently modified measure\n--the very air and tone of the actual slaveholder; and behind these\nare the slaveholder's spirit, the slaveholder's blunted feeling.\nThey are the result of the same cause in both cases: the possessor's\nold and inbred custom of regarding himself as a superior being.\nThe king's judgments wrought frequent injustices, but it was merely\nthe fault of his training, his natural and unalterable sympathies.\nHe was as unfitted for a judgeship as would be the average mother\nfor the position of milk-distributor to starving children in\nfamine-time; her own children would fare a shade better than the rest.\n\nOne very curious case came before the king.  A young girl, an\norphan, who had a considerable estate, married a fine young fellow\nwho had nothing.  The girl's property was within a seigniory held\nby the Church.  The bishop of the diocese, an arrogant scion of\nthe great nobility, claimed the girl's estate on the ground that\nshe had married privately, and thus had cheated the Church out\nof one of its rights as lord of the seigniory--the one heretofore\nreferred to as le droit du seigneur.  The penalty of refusal or\navoidance was confiscation.  The girl's defense was, that the\nlordship of the seigniory was vested in the bishop, and the\nparticular right here involved was not transferable, but must be\nexercised by the lord himself or stand vacated; and that an older\nlaw, of the Church itself, strictly barred the bishop from exercising\nit.  It was a very odd case, indeed.\n\nIt reminded me of something I had read in my youth about the\ningenious way in which the aldermen of London raised the money\nthat built the Mansion House.  A person who had not taken the\nSacrament according to the Anglican rite could not stand as a\ncandidate for sheriff of London.  Thus Dissenters were ineligible;\nthey could not run if asked, they could not serve if elected.\nThe aldermen, who without any question were Yankees in disguise,\nhit upon this neat device: they passed a by-law imposing a fine\nof L400 upon any one who should refuse to be a candidate for\nsheriff, and a fine of L600 upon any person who, after being\nelected sheriff, refused to serve.  Then they went to work and\nelected a lot of Dissenters, one after another, and kept it up\nuntil they had collected L15,000 in fines; and there stands the\nstately Mansion House to this day, to keep the blushing citizen\nin mind of a long past and lamented day when a band of Yankees\nslipped into London and played games of the sort that has given\ntheir race a unique and shady reputation among all truly good\nand holy peoples that be in the earth.\n\nThe girl's case seemed strong to me; the bishop's case was just\nas strong.  I did not see how the king was going to get out of\nthis hole.  But he got out.  I append his decision:\n\n\"Truly I find small difficulty here, the matter being even a\nchild's affair for simpleness.  An the young bride had conveyed\nnotice, as in duty bound, to her feudal lord and proper master\nand protector the bishop, she had suffered no loss, for the said\nbishop could have got a dispensation making him, for temporary\nconveniency, eligible to the exercise of his said right, and thus\nwould she have kept all she had.  Whereas, failing in her first\nduty, she hath by that failure failed in all; for whoso, clinging\nto a rope, severeth it above his hands, must fall; it being no\ndefense to claim that the rest of the rope is sound, neither any\ndeliverance from his peril, as he shall find.  Pardy, the woman's\ncase is rotten at the source.  It is the decree of the court that\nshe forfeit to the said lord bishop all her goods, even to the\nlast farthing that she doth possess, and be thereto mulcted in\nthe costs.  Next!\"\n\nHere was a tragic end to a beautiful honeymoon not yet three months\nold.  Poor young creatures!  They had lived these three months\nlapped to the lips in worldly comforts.  These clothes and trinkets\nthey were wearing were as fine and dainty as the shrewdest stretch\nof the sumptuary laws allowed to people of their degree; and in\nthese pretty clothes, she crying on his shoulder, and he trying\nto comfort her with hopeful words set to the music of despair,\nthey went from the judgment seat out into the world homeless,\nbedless, breadless; why, the very beggars by the roadsides were\nnot so poor as they.\n\nWell, the king was out of the hole; and on terms satisfactory to\nthe Church and the rest of the aristocracy, no doubt.  Men write\nmany fine and plausible arguments in support of monarchy, but\nthe fact remains that where every man in a State has a vote, brutal\nlaws are impossible.  Arthur's people were of course poor material\nfor a republic, because they had been debased so long by monarchy;\nand yet even they would have been intelligent enough to make short\nwork of that law which the king had just been administering if it\nhad been submitted to their full and free vote.  There is a phrase\nwhich has grown so common in the world's mouth that it has come\nto seem to have sense and meaning--the sense and meaning implied\nwhen it is used; that is the phrase which refers to this or that or\nthe other nation as possibly being \"capable of self-government\";\nand the implied sense of it is, that there has been a nation\nsomewhere, some time or other which _wasn't_ capable of it--wasn't as\nable to govern itself as some self-appointed specialists were or\nwould be to govern it.  The master minds of all nations, in all\nages, have sprung in affluent multitude from the mass of the nation,\nand from the mass of the nation only--not from its privileged\nclasses; and so, no matter what the nation's intellectual grade\nwas; whether high or low, the bulk of its ability was in the long\nranks of its nameless and its poor, and so it never saw the day\nthat it had not the material in abundance whereby to govern itself.\nWhich is to assert an always self-proven fact: that even the best\ngoverned and most free and most enlightened monarchy is still\nbehind the best condition attainable by its people; and that the\nsame is true of kindred governments of lower grades, all the way\ndown to the lowest.\n\nKing Arthur had hurried up the army business altogether beyond\nmy calculations.  I had not supposed he would move in the matter\nwhile I was away; and so I had not mapped out a scheme for determining\nthe merits of officers; I had only remarked that it would be wise\nto submit every candidate to a sharp and searching examination;\nand privately I meant to put together a list of military qualifications\nthat nobody could answer to but my West Pointers.  That ought\nto have been attended to before I left; for the king was so taken\nwith the idea of a standing army that he couldn't wait but must\nget about it at once, and get up as good a scheme of examination\nas he could invent out of his own head.\n\nI was impatient to see what this was; and to show, too, how much\nmore admirable was the one which I should display to the Examining\nBoard.  I intimated this, gently, to the king, and it fired his\ncuriosity.  When the Board was assembled, I followed him in; and\nbehind us came the candidates.  One of these candidates was a bright\nyoung West Pointer of mine, and with him were a couple of my\nWest Point professors.\n\nWhen I saw the Board, I did not know whether to cry or to laugh.\nThe head of it was the officer known to later centuries as Norroy\nKing-at-Arms!  The two other members were chiefs of bureaus in\nhis department; and all three were priests, of course; all officials\nwho had to know how to read and write were priests.\n\nMy candidate was called first, out of courtesy to me, and the head\nof the Board opened on him with official solemnity:\n\n\"Name?\"\n\n\"Mal-ease.\"\n\n\"Son of?\"\n\n\"Webster.\"\n\n\"Webster--Webster.  H'm--I--my memory faileth to recall the\nname.  Condition?\"\n\n\"Weaver.\"\n\n\"Weaver!--God keep us!\"\n\nThe king was staggered, from his summit to his foundations; one\nclerk fainted, and the others came near it.  The chairman pulled\nhimself together, and said indignantly:\n\n\"It is sufficient.  Get you hence.\"\n\nBut I appealed to the king.  I begged that my candidate might be\nexamined.  The king was willing, but the Board, who were all\nwell-born folk, implored the king to spare them the indignity of\nexamining the weaver's son.  I knew they didn't know enough to\nexamine him anyway, so I joined my prayers to theirs and the king\nturned the duty over to my professors.  I had had a blackboard\nprepared, and it was put up now, and the circus began.  It was\nbeautiful to hear the lad lay out the science of war, and wallow\nin details of battle and siege, of supply, transportation, mining\nand countermining, grand tactics, big strategy and little strategy,\nsignal service, infantry, cavalry, artillery, and all about siege\nguns, field guns, gatling guns, rifled guns, smooth bores, musket\npractice, revolver practice--and not a solitary word of it all\ncould these catfish make head or tail of, you understand--and it\nwas handsome to see him chalk off mathematical nightmares on the\nblackboard that would stump the angels themselves, and do it like\nnothing, too--all about eclipses, and comets, and solstices, and\nconstellations, and mean time, and sidereal time, and dinner time,\nand bedtime, and every other imaginable thing above the clouds or\nunder them that you could harry or bullyrag an enemy with and make\nhim wish he hadn't come--and when the boy made his military salute\nand stood aside at last, I was proud enough to hug him, and all\nthose other people were so dazed they looked partly petrified,\npartly drunk, and wholly caught out and snowed under.  I judged\nthat the cake was ours, and by a large majority.\n\nEducation is a great thing.  This was the same youth who had come\nto West Point so ignorant that when I asked him, \"If a general\nofficer should have a horse shot under him on the field of battle,\nwhat ought he to do?\" answered up naively and said:\n\n\"Get up and brush himself.\"\n\nOne of the young nobles was called up now.  I thought I would\nquestion him a little myself.  I said:\n\n\"Can your lordship read?\"\n\nHis face flushed indignantly, and he fired this at me:\n\n\"Takest me for a clerk?  I trow I am not of a blood that--\"\n\n\"Answer the question!\"\n\nHe crowded his wrath down and made out to answer \"No.\"\n\n\"Can you write?\"\n\nHe wanted to resent this, too, but I said:\n\n\"You will confine yourself to the questions, and make no comments.\nYou are not here to air your blood or your graces, and nothing\nof the sort will be permitted.  Can you write?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Do you know the multiplication table?\"\n\n\"I wit not what ye refer to.\"\n\n\"How much is 9 times 6?\"\n\n\"It is a mystery that is hidden from me by reason that the emergency\nrequiring the fathoming of it hath not in my life-days occurred,\nand so, not having no need to know this thing, I abide barren\nof the knowledge.\"\n\n\"If A trade a barrel of onions to B, worth 2 pence the bushel,\nin exchange for a sheep worth 4 pence and a dog worth a penny,\nand C kill the dog before delivery, because bitten by the same,\nwho mistook him for D, what sum is still due to A from B, and\nwhich party pays for the dog, C or D, and who gets the money?\nIf A, is the penny sufficient, or may he claim consequential damages\nin the form of additional money to represent the possible profit\nwhich might have inured from the dog, and classifiable as earned\nincrement, that is to say, usufruct?\"\n\n\"Verily, in the all-wise and unknowable providence of God, who\nmoveth in mysterious ways his wonders to perform, have I never\nheard the fellow to this question for confusion of the mind and\ncongestion of the ducts of thought.  Wherefore I beseech you let\nthe dog and the onions and these people of the strange and godless\nnames work out their several salvations from their piteous and\nwonderful difficulties without help of mine, for indeed their\ntrouble is sufficient as it is, whereas an I tried to help I should\nbut damage their cause the more and yet mayhap not live myself\nto see the desolation wrought.\"\n\n\"What do you know of the laws of attraction and gravitation?\"\n\n\"If there be such, mayhap his grace the king did promulgate them\nwhilst that I lay sick about the beginning of the year and thereby\nfailed to hear his proclamation.\"\n\n\"What do you know of the science of optics?\"\n\n\"I know of governors of places, and seneschals of castles, and\nsheriffs of counties, and many like small offices and titles of\nhonor, but him you call the Science of Optics I have not heard\nof before; peradventure it is a new dignity.\"\n\n\"Yes, in this country.\"\n\nTry to conceive of this mollusk gravely applying for an official\nposition, of any kind under the sun!  Why, he had all the earmarks\nof a typewriter copyist, if you leave out the disposition to\ncontribute uninvited emendations of your grammar and punctuation.\nIt was unaccountable that he didn't attempt a little help of that\nsort out of his majestic supply of incapacity for the job.  But that\ndidn't prove that he hadn't material in him for the disposition,\nit only proved that he wasn't a typewriter copyist yet.  After\nnagging him a little more, I let the professors loose on him and\nthey turned him inside out, on the line of scientific war, and\nfound him empty, of course.  He knew somewhat about the warfare\nof the time--bushwhacking around for ogres, and bull-fights in\nthe tournament ring, and such things--but otherwise he was empty\nand useless.  Then we took the other young noble in hand, and he\nwas the first one's twin, for ignorance and incapacity.  I delivered\nthem into the hands of the chairman of the Board with the comfortable\nconsciousness that their cake was dough.  They were examined in\nthe previous order of precedence.\n\n\"Name, so please you?\"\n\n\"Pertipole, son of Sir Pertipole, Baron of Barley Mash.\"\n\n\"Grandfather?\"\n\n\"Also Sir Pertipole, Baron of Barley Mash.\"\n\n\"Great-grandfather?\"\n\n\"The same name and title.\"\n\n\"Great-great-grandfather?\"\n\n\"We had none, worshipful sir, the line failing before it had\nreached so far back.\"\n\n\"It mattereth not.  It is a good four generations, and fulfilleth\nthe requirements of the rule.\"\n\n\"Fulfills what rule?\" I asked.\n\n\"The rule requiring four generations of nobility or else the\ncandidate is not eligible.\"\n\n\"A man not eligible for a lieutenancy in the army unless he can\nprove four generations of noble descent?\"\n\n\"Even so; neither lieutenant nor any other officer may be commissioned\nwithout that qualification.\"\n\n\"Oh, come, this is an astonishing thing.  What good is such a\nqualification as that?\"\n\n\"What good?  It is a hardy question, fair sir and Boss, since it doth\ngo far to impugn the wisdom of even our holy Mother Church herself.\"\n\n\"As how?\"\n\n\"For that she hath established the self-same rule regarding\nsaints.  By her law none may be canonized until he hath lain dead\nfour generations.\"\n\n\"I see, I see--it is the same thing.  It is wonderful.  In the one\ncase a man lies dead-alive four generations--mummified in ignorance\nand sloth--and that qualifies him to command live people, and take\ntheir weal and woe into his impotent hands; and in the other case,\na man lies bedded with death and worms four generations, and that\nqualifies him for office in the celestial camp.  Does the king's\ngrace approve of this strange law?\"\n\nThe king said:\n\n\"Why, truly I see naught about it that is strange.  All places of\nhonor and of profit do belong, by natural right, to them that be\nof noble blood, and so these dignities in the army are their\nproperty and would be so without this or any rule.  The rule is\nbut to mark a limit.  Its purpose is to keep out too recent blood,\nwhich would bring into contempt these offices, and men of lofty\nlineage would turn their backs and scorn to take them.  I were\nto blame an I permitted this calamity.  _You_ can permit it an you\nare minded so to do, for you have the delegated authority, but\nthat the king should do it were a most strange madness and not\ncomprehensible to any.\"\n\n\"I yield.  Proceed, sir Chief of the Herald's College.\"\n\nThe chairman resumed as follows:\n\n\"By what illustrious achievement for the honor of the Throne and\nState did the founder of your great line lift himself to the\nsacred dignity of the British nobility?\"\n\n\"He built a brewery.\"\n\n\"Sire, the Board finds this candidate perfect in all the requirements\nand qualifications for military command, and doth hold his case\nopen for decision after due examination of his competitor.\"\n\nThe competitor came forward and proved exactly four generations\nof nobility himself.  So there was a tie in military qualifications\nthat far.\n\nHe stood aside a moment, and Sir Pertipole was questioned further:\n\n\"Of what condition was the wife of the founder of your line?\"\n\n\"She came of the highest landed gentry, yet she was not noble;\nshe was gracious and pure and charitable, of a blameless life and\ncharacter, insomuch that in these regards was she peer of the\nbest lady in the land.\"\n\n\"That will do.  Stand down.\"  He called up the competing lordling\nagain, and asked: \"What was the rank and condition of the\ngreat-grandmother who conferred British nobility upon your\ngreat house?\"\n\n\"She was a king's leman and did climb to that splendid eminence\nby her own unholpen merit from the sewer where she was born.\"\n\n\"Ah, this, indeed, is true nobility, this is the right and perfect\nintermixture.  The lieutenancy is yours, fair lord.  Hold it not in\ncontempt; it is the humble step which will lead to grandeurs more\nworthy of the splendor of an origin like to thine.\"\n\nI was down in the bottomless pit of humiliation.  I had promised\nmyself an easy and zenith-scouring triumph, and this was the outcome!\n\nI was almost ashamed to look my poor disappointed cadet in the\nface.  I told him to go home and be patient, this wasn't the end.\n\nI had a private audience with the king, and made a proposition.\nI said it was quite right to officer that regiment with nobilities,\nand he couldn't have done a wiser thing.  It would also be a good\nidea to add five hundred officers to it; in fact, add as many\nofficers as there were nobles and relatives of nobles in the\ncountry, even if there should finally be five times as many officers\nas privates in it; and thus make it the crack regiment, the envied\nregiment, the King's Own regiment, and entitled to fight on its\nown hook and in its own way, and go whither it would and come\nwhen it pleased, in time of war, and be utterly swell and independent.\nThis would make that regiment the heart's desire of all the\nnobility, and they would all be satisfied and happy.  Then we\nwould make up the rest of the standing army out of commonplace\nmaterials, and officer it with nobodies, as was proper--nobodies\nselected on a basis of mere efficiency--and we would make this\nregiment toe the line, allow it no aristocratic freedom from\nrestraint, and force it to do all the work and persistent hammering,\nto the end that whenever the King's Own was tired and wanted to go\noff for a change and rummage around amongst ogres and have a good\ntime, it could go without uneasiness, knowing that matters were in\nsafe hands behind it, and business going to be continued at the\nold stand, same as usual.  The king was charmed with the idea.\n\nWhen I noticed that, it gave me a valuable notion.  I thought\nI saw my way out of an old and stubborn difficulty at last.  You\nsee, the royalties of the Pendragon stock were a long-lived race\nand very fruitful.  Whenever a child was born to any of these\n--and it was pretty often--there was wild joy in the nation's mouth,\nand piteous sorrow in the nation's heart.  The joy was questionable,\nbut the grief was honest.  Because the event meant another call\nfor a Royal Grant.  Long was the list of these royalties, and\nthey were a heavy and steadily increasing burden upon the treasury\nand a menace to the crown.  Yet Arthur could not believe this\nlatter fact, and he would not listen to any of my various projects\nfor substituting something in the place of the royal grants.  If I\ncould have persuaded him to now and then provide a support for\none of these outlying scions from his own pocket, I could have\nmade a grand to-do over it, and it would have had a good effect\nwith the nation; but no, he wouldn't hear of such a thing.  He had\nsomething like a religious passion for royal grant; he seemed to\nlook upon it as a sort of sacred swag, and one could not irritate\nhim in any way so quickly and so surely as by an attack upon that\nvenerable institution.  If I ventured to cautiously hint that there\nwas not another respectable family in England that would humble\nitself to hold out the hat--however, that is as far as I ever got;\nhe always cut me short there, and peremptorily, too.\n\nBut I believed I saw my chance at last.  I would form this crack\nregiment out of officers alone--not a single private.  Half of it\nshould consist of nobles, who should fill all the places up to\nMajor-General, and serve gratis and pay their own expenses; and\nthey would be glad to do this when they should learn that the rest\nof the regiment would consist exclusively of princes of the blood.\nThese princes of the blood should range in rank from Lieutenant-General\nup to Field Marshal, and be gorgeously salaried and equipped and\nfed by the state.  Moreover--and this was the master stroke\n--it should be decreed that these princely grandees should be always\naddressed by a stunningly gaudy and awe-compelling title (which\nI would presently invent), and they and they only in all England\nshould be so addressed.  Finally, all princes of the blood should\nhave free choice; join that regiment, get that great title, and\nrenounce the royal grant, or stay out and receive a grant.  Neatest\ntouch of all: unborn but imminent princes of the blood could be\n_born_ into the regiment, and start fair, with good wages and a\npermanent situation, upon due notice from the parents.\n\nAll the boys would join, I was sure of that; so, all existing\ngrants would be relinquished; that the newly born would always\njoin was equally certain.  Within sixty days that quaint and\nbizarre anomaly, the Royal Grant, would cease to be a living fact,\nand take its place among the curiosities of the past.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nTHE FIRST NEWSPAPER\n\nWhen I told the king I was going out disguised as a petty freeman\nto scour the country and familiarize myself with the humbler life\nof the people, he was all afire with the novelty of the thing\nin a minute, and was bound to take a chance in the adventure\nhimself--nothing should stop him--he would drop everything and\ngo along--it was the prettiest idea he had run across for many\na day.  He wanted to glide out the back way and start at once;\nbut I showed him that that wouldn't answer.  You see, he was billed\nfor the king's-evil--to touch for it, I mean--and it wouldn't be\nright to disappoint the house and it wouldn't make a delay worth\nconsidering, anyway, it was only a one-night stand.  And I thought\nhe ought to tell the queen he was going away.  He clouded up at\nthat and looked sad.  I was sorry I had spoken, especially when\nhe said mournfully:\n\n\"Thou forgettest that Launcelot is here; and where Launcelot is,\nshe noteth not the going forth of the king, nor what day he returneth.\"\n\nOf course, I changed the Subject.  Yes, Guenever was beautiful,\nit is true, but take her all around she was pretty slack.  I never\nmeddled in these matters, they weren't my affair, but I did hate\nto see the way things were going on, and I don't mind saying that\nmuch.  Many's the time she had asked me, \"Sir Boss, hast seen\nSir Launcelot about?\" but if ever she went fretting around for\nthe king I didn't happen to be around at the time.\n\nThere was a very good lay-out for the king's-evil business--very\ntidy and creditable.  The king sat under a canopy of state; about\nhim were clustered a large body of the clergy in full canonicals.\nConspicuous, both for location and personal outfit, stood Marinel,\na hermit of the quack-doctor species, to introduce the sick.  All\nabroad over the spacious floor, and clear down to the doors,\nin a thick jumble, lay or sat the scrofulous, under a strong light.\nIt was as good as a tableau; in fact, it had all the look of being\ngotten up for that, though it wasn't.  There were eight hundred\nsick people present.  The work was slow; it lacked the interest\nof novelty for me, because I had seen the ceremonies before;\nthe thing soon became tedious, but the proprieties required me\nto stick it out.  The doctor was there for the reason that in all\nsuch crowds there were many people who only imagined something\nwas the matter with them, and many who were consciously sound\nbut wanted the immortal honor of fleshly contact with a king, and\nyet others who pretended to illness in order to get the piece of\ncoin that went with the touch.  Up to this time this coin had been\na wee little gold piece worth about a third of a dollar.  When you\nconsider how much that amount of money would buy, in that age\nand country, and how usual it was to be scrofulous, when not dead,\nyou would understand that the annual king's-evil appropriation was\njust the River and Harbor bill of that government for the grip it\ntook on the treasury and the chance it afforded for skinning the\nsurplus.  So I had privately concluded to touch the treasury itself\nfor the king's-evil.  I covered six-sevenths of the appropriation\ninto the treasury a week before starting from Camelot on my\nadventures, and ordered that the other seventh be inflated into\nfive-cent nickels and delivered into the hands of the head clerk\nof the King's Evil Department; a nickel to take the place of each\ngold coin, you see, and do its work for it.  It might strain the\nnickel some, but I judged it could stand it.  As a rule, I do not\napprove of watering stock, but I considered it square enough\nin this case, for it was just a gift, anyway.  Of course, you can\nwater a gift as much as you want to; and I generally do.  The old\ngold and silver coins of the country were of ancient and unknown\norigin, as a rule, but some of them were Roman; they were ill-shapen,\nand seldom rounder than a moon that is a week past the full; they\nwere hammered, not minted, and they were so worn with use that\nthe devices upon them were as illegible as blisters, and looked\nlike them.  I judged that a sharp, bright new nickel, with a\nfirst-rate likeness of the king on one side of it and Guenever\non the other, and a blooming pious motto, would take the tuck out\nof scrofula as handy as a nobler coin and please the scrofulous\nfancy more; and I was right.  This batch was the first it was\ntried on, and it worked to a charm.  The saving in expense was\na notable economy.  You will see that by these figures: We touched\na trifle over 700 of the 800 patients; at former rates, this would\nhave cost the government about $240; at the new rate we pulled\nthrough for about $35, thus saving upward of $200 at one swoop.\nTo appreciate the full magnitude of this stroke, consider these\nother figures: the annual expenses of a national government amount\nto the equivalent of a contribution of three days' average wages of\nevery individual of the population, counting every individual as\nif he were a man.  If you take a nation of 60,000,000, where average\nwages are $2 per day, three days' wages taken from each individual\nwill provide $360,000,000 and pay the government's expenses.  In my\nday, in my own country, this money was collected from imposts,\nand the citizen imagined that the foreign importer paid it, and it\nmade him comfortable to think so; whereas, in fact, it was paid\nby the American people, and was so equally and exactly distributed\namong them that the annual cost to the 100-millionaire and the\nannual cost to the sucking child of the day-laborer was precisely\nthe same--each paid $6.  Nothing could be equaler than that,\nI reckon.  Well, Scotland and Ireland were tributary to Arthur,\nand the united populations of the British Islands amounted to\nsomething less than 1,000,000.  A mechanic's average wage was\n3 cents a day, when he paid his own keep.  By this rule the national\ngovernment's expenses were $90,000 a year, or about $250 a day.\nThus, by the substitution of nickels for gold on a king's-evil\nday, I not only injured no one, dissatisfied no one, but pleased\nall concerned and saved four-fifths of that day's national expense\ninto the bargain--a saving which would have been the equivalent\nof $800,000 in my day in America.  In making this substitution\nI had drawn upon the wisdom of a very remote source--the wisdom\nof my boyhood--for the true statesman does not despise any wisdom,\nhowsoever lowly may be its origin: in my boyhood I had always\nsaved my pennies and contributed buttons to the foreign missionary\ncause.  The buttons would answer the ignorant savage as well as\nthe coin, the coin would answer me better than the buttons; all\nhands were happy and nobody hurt.\n\nMarinel took the patients as they came.  He examined the candidate;\nif he couldn't qualify he was warned off; if he could he was passed\nalong to the king.  A priest pronounced the words, \"They shall\nlay their hands on the sick, and they shall recover.\"  Then the king\nstroked the ulcers, while the reading continued; finally, the\npatient graduated and got his nickel--the king hanging it around\nhis neck himself--and was dismissed.  Would you think that that\nwould cure?  It certainly did.  Any mummery will cure if the\npatient's faith is strong in it.  Up by Astolat there was a chapel\nwhere the Virgin had once appeared to a girl who used to herd\ngeese around there--the girl said so herself--and they built the\nchapel upon that spot and hung a picture in it representing the\noccurrence--a picture which you would think it dangerous for a sick\nperson to approach; whereas, on the contrary, thousands of the lame\nand the sick came and prayed before it every year and went away\nwhole and sound; and even the well could look upon it and live.\nOf course, when I was told these things I did not believe them;\nbut when I went there and saw them I had to succumb.  I saw the\ncures effected myself; and they were real cures and not questionable.\nI saw cripples whom I had seen around Camelot for years on crutches,\narrive and pray before that picture, and put down their crutches\nand walk off without a limp.  There were piles of crutches there\nwhich had been left by such people as a testimony.\n\nIn other places people operated on a patient's mind, without saying\na word to him, and cured him.  In others, experts assembled patients\nin a room and prayed over them, and appealed to their faith, and\nthose patients went away cured.  Wherever you find a king who can't\ncure the king's-evil you can be sure that the most valuable\nsuperstition that supports his throne--the subject's belief in\nthe divine appointment of his sovereign--has passed away.  In my\nyouth the monarchs of England had ceased to touch for the evil,\nbut there was no occasion for this diffidence: they could have\ncured it forty-nine times in fifty.\n\nWell, when the priest had been droning for three hours, and the\ngood king polishing the evidences, and the sick were still pressing\nforward as plenty as ever, I got to feeling intolerably bored.\nI was sitting by an open window not far from the canopy of state.\nFor the five hundredth time a patient stood forward to have his\nrepulsivenesses stroked; again those words were being droned out:\n\"they shall lay their hands on the sick\"--when outside there rang\nclear as a clarion a note that enchanted my soul and tumbled\nthirteen worthless centuries about my ears: \"Camelot _Weekly\nHosannah and Literary Volcano!_--latest irruption--only two cents\n--all about the big miracle in the Valley of Holiness!\"  One greater\nthan kings had arrived--the newsboy.  But I was the only person\nin all that throng who knew the meaning of this mighty birth, and\nwhat this imperial magician was come into the world to do.\n\nI dropped a nickel out of the window and got my paper; the\nAdam-newsboy of the world went around the corner to get my change;\nis around the corner yet.  It was delicious to see a newspaper\nagain, yet I was conscious of a secret shock when my eye fell upon\nthe first batch of display head-lines.  I had lived in a clammy\natmosphere of reverence, respect, deference, so long that they\nsent a quivery little cold wave through me:\n\n\n              HIGH TIMES IN THE VALLEY\n\n                    OF HOLINESS!\n\n                        ----\n\n               THE WATER-WORKS CORKED!\n\n                        ----\n\n         BRER MERLIN WORKS HIS ARTS, BUT GETS\n                        LEFT?\n\n                        ----\n\n      But the Boss scores on his first Innings!\n\n                        ----\n\n          The Miraculous Well Uncorked amid\n                  awful outbursts of\n\n              INFERNAL FIRE AND SMOKE\n                     ATHUNDER!\n\n                        ----\n\n           THE BUZZARD-ROOST ASTONISHED!\n\n                        ----\n\n              UNPARALLELED REJOIBINGS!\n\n\n--and so on, and so on.  Yes, it was too loud.  Once I could have\nenjoyed it and seen nothing out of the way about it, but now its\nnote was discordant.  It was good Arkansas journalism, but this\nwas not Arkansas.  Moreover, the next to the last line was calculated\nto give offense to the hermits, and perhaps lose us their advertising.\nIndeed, there was too lightsome a tone of flippancy all through\nthe paper.  It was plain I had undergone a considerable change\nwithout noticing it.  I found myself unpleasantly affected by\npert little irreverencies which would have seemed but proper and\nairy graces of speech at an earlier period of my life.  There was an\nabundance of the following breed of items, and they discomforted me:\n\n   LOCAL SMOKE AND CINDERS.\n\n   Sir Launcelot met up with old King\n   Agrivance of Ireland unexpectedly last\n   weok over on the moor south of Sir\n   Balmoral le Merveilleuse's hog dasture.\n   The widow has been notified.\n\n   Expedition No. 3 will start adout the\n   first of mext month on a search f8r Sir\n   Sagramour le Desirous. It is in com-\n   and of the renowned Knight of the Red\n   Lawns, assissted by Sir Persant of Inde,\n   who is compete9t. intelligent, courte-\n   ous, and in every way a brick, and fur-\n   tHer assisted by Sir Palamides the Sara-\n   cen, who is no huckleberry hinself.\n   This is no pic-nic, these boys mean\n   busine&s.\n\n   The readers of the Hosannah will re-\n   gret to learn that the hadndsome and\n   popular Sir Charolais of Gaul, who dur-\n   ing his four weeks' stay at the Bull and\n   Halibut, this city, has won every heart\n   by his polished manners and elegant\n   cPnversation, will pUll out to-day for\n   home. Give us another call, Charley!\n\n   The bdsiness end of the funeral of\n   the late Sir Dalliance the duke's son of\n   Cornwall, killed in an encounter with\n   the Giant of the Knotted Bludgeon last\n   Tuesday on the borders of the Plain of\n   Enchantment was in the hands of the\n   ever affable and efficient Mumble,\n   prince of un3ertakers, then whom there\n   exists none by whom it were a more\n   satisfying pleasure to have the last sad\n   offices performed. Give him a trial.\n\n   The cordial thanks of the Hosannah\n   office are due, from editor down to\n   devil, to the ever courteous and thought-\n   ful Lord High Stew d of the Palace's\n   Third Assistant V  t for several sau-\n   ceTs of ice crEam a quality calculated\n   to make the ey of the recipients hu-\n   mid with grt  ude; and it done it.\n   When this  administration wants to\n   chalk up a desirable name for early\n   promotion, the Hosannah would like a\n   chance to sudgest.\n\n   The Demoiselle Irene Dewlap, of\n   South Astolat, is visiting her uncle, the\n   popular host of the Cattlemen's Board-\n   ing Ho&se, Liver Lane, this city.\n\n   Young Barker the bellows-mender is\n   hoMe again, and looks much improved\n   by his vacation round-up among the out-\n   lying smithies. See his ad.\n\nOf course it was good enough journalism for a beginning; I knew\nthat quite well, and yet it was somehow disappointing.  The\n\"Court Circular\" pleased me better; indeed, its simple and dignified\nrespectfulness was a distinct refreshment to me after all those\ndisgraceful familiarities.  But even it could have been improved.\nDo what one may, there is no getting an air of variety into a court\ncircular, I acknowledge that.  There is a profound monotonousness\nabout its facts that baffles and defeats one's sincerest efforts\nto make them sparkle and enthuse.  The best way to manage--in fact,\nthe only sensible way--is to disguise repetitiousness of fact under\nvariety of form: skin your fact each time and lay on a new cuticle\nof words.  It deceives the eye; you think it is a new fact; it\ngives you the idea that the court is carrying on like everything;\nthis excites you, and you drain the whole column, with a good\nappetite, and perhaps never notice that it's a barrel of soup made\nout of a single bean.  Clarence's way was good, it was simple,\nit was dignified, it was direct and business-like; all I say is,\nit was not the best way:\n\n             COURT CIRCULAR.\n\n   On Monday, the king rode in the park.\n   \"  Tuesday,      \"      \"        \"\n   \"  Wendesday     \"      \"        \"\n   \"  Thursday      \"      \"        \"\n   \"  Friday,       \"      \"        \"\n   \"  Saturday      \"      \"        \"\n   \"  Sunday,       \"      \"        \"\n\n\nHowever, take the paper by and large, I was vastly pleased with it.\nLittle crudities of a mechanical sort were observable here and\nthere, but there were not enough of them to amount to anything,\nand it was good enough Arkansas proof-reading, anyhow, and better\nthan was needed in Arthur's day and realm.  As a rule, the grammar\nwas leaky and the construction more or less lame; but I did not\nmuch mind these things.  They are common defects of my own, and\none mustn't criticise other people on grounds where he can't stand\nperpendicular himself.\n\nI was hungry enough for literature to want to take down the whole\npaper at this one meal, but I got only a few bites, and then had\nto postpone, because the monks around me besieged me so with eager\nquestions: What is this curious thing?  What is it for?  Is it a\nhandkerchief?--saddle blanket?--part of a shirt?  What is it made of?\nHow thin it is, and how dainty and frail; and how it rattles.\nWill it wear, do you think, and won't the rain injure it?  Is it\nwriting that appears on it, or is it only ornamentation?  They\nsuspected it was writing, because those among them who knew how\nto read Latin and had a smattering of Greek, recognized some of\nthe letters, but they could make nothing out of the result as a\nwhole.  I put my information in the simplest form I could:\n\n\"It is a public journal; I will explain what that is, another time.\nIt is not cloth, it is made of paper; some time I will explain\nwhat paper is.  The lines on it are reading matter; and not written\nby hand, but printed; by and by I will explain what printing is.\nA thousand of these sheets have been made, all exactly like this,\nin every minute detail--they can't be told apart.\"  Then they all\nbroke out with exclamations of surprise and admiration:\n\n\"A thousand!  Verily a mighty work--a year's work for many men.\"\n\n\"No--merely a day's work for a man and a boy.\"\n\nThey crossed themselves, and whiffed out a protective prayer or two.\n\n\"Ah-h--a miracle, a wonder!  Dark work of enchantment.\"\n\nI let it go at that.  Then I read in a low voice, to as many as\ncould crowd their shaven heads within hearing distance, part of\nthe account of the miracle of the restoration of the well, and\nwas accompanied by astonished and reverent ejaculations all through:\n\"Ah-h-h!\"  \"How true!\"  \"Amazing, amazing!\"  \"These be the very\nhaps as they happened, in marvelous exactness!\"  And might they\ntake this strange thing in their hands, and feel of it and examine\nit?--they would be very careful.  Yes.  So they took it, handling\nit as cautiously and devoutly as if it had been some holy thing\ncome from some supernatural region; and gently felt of its texture,\ncaressed its pleasant smooth surface with lingering touch, and\nscanned the mysterious characters with fascinated eyes.  These\ngrouped bent heads, these charmed faces, these speaking eyes\n--how beautiful to me!  For was not this my darling, and was not\nall this mute wonder and interest and homage a most eloquent\ntribute and unforced compliment to it?  I knew, then, how a mother\nfeels when women, whether strangers or friends, take her new baby,\nand close themselves about it with one eager impulse, and bend\ntheir heads over it in a tranced adoration that makes all the rest\nof the universe vanish out of their consciousness and be as if it\nwere not, for that time.  I knew how she feels, and that there is\nno other satisfied ambition, whether of king, conqueror, or poet,\nthat ever reaches half-way to that serene far summit or yields half\nso divine a contentment.\n\nDuring all the rest of the seance my paper traveled from group to\ngroup all up and down and about that huge hall, and my happy eye\nwas upon it always, and I sat motionless, steeped in satisfaction,\ndrunk with enjoyment.  Yes, this was heaven; I was tasting it once,\nif I might never taste it more.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nTHE YANKEE AND THE KING TRAVEL INCOGNITO\n\nAbout bedtime I took the king to my private quarters to cut his\nhair and help him get the hang of the lowly raiment he was to wear.\nThe high classes wore their hair banged across the forehead but\nhanging to the shoulders the rest of the way around, whereas the\nlowest ranks of commoners were banged fore and aft both; the slaves\nwere bangless, and allowed their hair free growth.  So I inverted\na bowl over his head and cut away all the locks that hung below it.\nI also trimmed his whiskers and mustache until they were only\nabout a half-inch long; and tried to do it inartistically, and\nsucceeded.  It was a villainous disfigurement.  When he got his\nlubberly sandals on, and his long robe of coarse brown linen cloth,\nwhich hung straight from his neck to his ankle-bones, he was no\nlonger the comeliest man in his kingdom, but one of the unhandsomest\nand most commonplace and unattractive.  We were dressed and barbered\nalike, and could pass for small farmers, or farm bailiffs, or\nshepherds, or carters; yes, or for village artisans, if we chose,\nour costume being in effect universal among the poor, because of\nits strength and cheapness.  I don't mean that it was really cheap\nto a very poor person, but I do mean that it was the cheapest\nmaterial there was for male attire--manufactured material, you\nunderstand.\n\nWe slipped away an hour before dawn, and by broad sun-up had made\neight or ten miles, and were in the midst of a sparsely settled\ncountry.  I had a pretty heavy knapsack; it was laden with\nprovisions--provisions for the king to taper down on, till he\ncould take to the coarse fare of the country without damage.\n\nI found a comfortable seat for the king by the roadside, and then\ngave him a morsel or two to stay his stomach with.  Then I said\nI would find some water for him, and strolled away.  Part of my\nproject was to get out of sight and sit down and rest a little\nmyself.  It had always been my custom to stand when in his presence;\neven at the council board, except upon those rare occasions when\nthe sitting was a very long one, extending over hours; then I had\na trifling little backless thing which was like a reversed culvert\nand was as comfortable as the toothache.  I didn't want to break\nhim in suddenly, but do it by degrees.  We should have to sit\ntogether now when in company, or people would notice; but it would\nnot be good politics for me to be playing equality with him when\nthere was no necessity for it.\n\nI found the water some three hundred yards away, and had been\nresting about twenty minutes, when I heard voices.  That is all\nright, I thought--peasants going to work; nobody else likely to be\nstirring this early.  But the next moment these comers jingled into\nsight around a turn of the road--smartly clad people of quality,\nwith luggage-mules and servants in their train!  I was off like\na shot, through the bushes, by the shortest cut.  For a while it\ndid seem that these people would pass the king before I could\nget to him; but desperation gives you wings, you know, and I canted\nmy body forward, inflated my breast, and held my breath and flew.\nI arrived.  And in plenty good enough time, too.\n\n\"Pardon, my king, but it's no time for ceremony--jump!  Jump to\nyour feet--some quality are coming!\"\n\n\"Is that a marvel?  Let them come.\"\n\n\"But my liege!  You must not be seen sitting.  Rise!--and stand in\nhumble posture while they pass.  You are a peasant, you know.\"\n\n\"True--I had forgot it, so lost was I in planning of a huge war\nwith Gaul\"--he was up by this time, but a farm could have got up\nquicker, if there was any kind of a boom in real estate--\"and\nright-so a thought came randoming overthwart this majestic dream\nthe which--\"\n\n\"A humbler attitude, my lord the king--and quick!  Duck your head!\n--more!--still more!--droop it!\"\n\nHe did his honest best, but lord, it was no great things.  He looked\nas humble as the leaning tower at Pisa.  It is the most you could\nsay of it.  Indeed, it was such a thundering poor success that\nit raised wondering scowls all along the line, and a gorgeous\nflunkey at the tail end of it raised his whip; but I jumped in\ntime and was under it when it fell; and under cover of the volley\nof coarse laughter which followed, I spoke up sharply and warned\nthe king to take no notice.  He mastered himself for the moment,\nbut it was a sore tax; he wanted to eat up the procession.  I said:\n\n\"It would end our adventures at the very start; and we, being\nwithout weapons, could do nothing with that armed gang.  If we\nare going to succeed in our emprise, we must not only look the\npeasant but act the peasant.\"\n\n\"It is wisdom; none can gainsay it.  Let us go on, Sir Boss.\nI will take note and learn, and do the best I may.\"\n\nHe kept his word.  He did the best he could, but I've seen better.\nIf you have ever seen an active, heedless, enterprising child\ngoing diligently out of one mischief and into another all day\nlong, and an anxious mother at its heels all the while, and just\nsaving it by a hair from drowning itself or breaking its neck with\neach new experiment, you've seen the king and me.\n\nIf I could have foreseen what the thing was going to be like,\nI should have said, No, if anybody wants to make his living\nexhibiting a king as a peasant, let him take the layout; I can\ndo better with a menagerie, and last longer.  And yet, during\nthe first three days I never allowed him to enter a hut or other\ndwelling.  If he could pass muster anywhere during his early\nnovitiate it would be in small inns and on the road; so to these\nplaces we confined ourselves.  Yes, he certainly did the best he\ncould, but what of that?  He didn't improve a bit that I could see.\n\nHe was always frightening me, always breaking out with fresh\nastonishers, in new and unexpected places.  Toward evening on\nthe second day, what does he do but blandly fetch out a dirk\nfrom inside his robe!\n\n\"Great guns, my liege, where did you get that?\"\n\n\"From a smuggler at the inn, yester eve.\"\n\n\"What in the world possessed you to buy it?\"\n\n\"We have escaped divers dangers by wit--thy wit--but I have\nbethought me that it were but prudence if I bore a weapon, too.\nThine might fail thee in some pinch.\"\n\n\"But people of our condition are not allowed to carry arms.  What\nwould a lord say--yes, or any other person of whatever condition\n--if he caught an upstart peasant with a dagger on his person?\"\n\nIt was a lucky thing for us that nobody came along just then.\nI persuaded him to throw the dirk away; and it was as easy as\npersuading a child to give up some bright fresh new way of killing\nitself.  We walked along, silent and thinking.  Finally the king said:\n\n\"When ye know that I meditate a thing inconvenient, or that hath\na peril in it, why do you not warn me to cease from that project?\"\n\nIt was a startling question, and a puzzler.  I didn't quite know\nhow to take hold of it, or what to say, and so, of course, I ended\nby saying the natural thing:\n\n\"But, sire, how can I know what your thoughts are?\"\n\nThe king stopped dead in his tracks, and stared at me.\n\n\"I believed thou wert greater than Merlin; and truly in magic\nthou art.  But prophecy is greater than magic.  Merlin is a prophet.\"\n\nI saw I had made a blunder.  I must get back my lost ground.\nAfter a deep reflection and careful planning, I said:\n\n\"Sire, I have been misunderstood.  I will explain.  There are two\nkinds of prophecy.  One is the gift to foretell things that are but\na little way off, the other is the gift to foretell things that\nare whole ages and centuries away.  Which is the mightier gift,\ndo you think?\"\n\n\"Oh, the last, most surely!\"\n\n\"True.  Does Merlin possess it?\"\n\n\"Partly, yes.  He foretold mysteries about my birth and future\nkingship that were twenty years away.\"\n\n\"Has he ever gone beyond that?\"\n\n\"He would not claim more, I think.\"\n\n\"It is probably his limit.  All prophets have their limit.  The limit\nof some of the great prophets has been a hundred years.\"\n\n\"These are few, I ween.\"\n\n\"There have been two still greater ones, whose limit was four\nhundred and six hundred years, and one whose limit compassed\neven seven hundred and twenty.\"\n\n\"Gramercy, it is marvelous!\"\n\n\"But what are these in comparison with me?  They are nothing.\"\n\n\"What?  Canst thou truly look beyond even so vast a stretch\nof time as--\"\n\n\"Seven hundred years?  My liege, as clear as the vision of an eagle\ndoes my prophetic eye penetrate and lay bare the future of this\nworld for nearly thirteen centuries and a half!\"\n\nMy land, you should have seen the king's eyes spread slowly open,\nand lift the earth's entire atmosphere as much as an inch!  That\nsettled Brer Merlin.  One never had any occasion to prove his\nfacts, with these people; all he had to do was to state them.  It\nnever occurred to anybody to doubt the statement.\n\n\"Now, then,\" I continued, \"I _could_ work both kinds of prophecy\n--the long and the short--if I chose to take the trouble to keep\nin practice; but I seldom exercise any but the long kind, because\nthe other is beneath my dignity.  It is properer to Merlin's sort\n--stump-tail prophets, as we call them in the profession.  Of course,\nI whet up now and then and flirt out a minor prophecy, but not\noften--hardly ever, in fact.  You will remember that there was\ngreat talk, when you reached the Valley of Holiness, about my\nhaving prophesied your coming and the very hour of your arrival,\ntwo or three days beforehand.\"\n\n\"Indeed, yes, I mind it now.\"\n\n\"Well, I could have done it as much as forty times easier, and\npiled on a thousand times more detail into the bargain, if it had\nbeen five hundred years away instead of two or three days.\"\n\n\"How amazing that it should be so!\"\n\n\"Yes, a genuine expert can always foretell a thing that is five\nhundred years away easier than he can a thing that's only five\nhundred seconds off.\"\n\n\"And yet in reason it should clearly be the other way; it should\nbe five hundred times as easy to foretell the last as the first,\nfor, indeed, it is so close by that one uninspired might almost\nsee it.  In truth, the law of prophecy doth contradict the likelihoods,\nmost strangely making the difficult easy, and the easy difficult.\"\n\nIt was a wise head.  A peasant's cap was no safe disguise for it;\nyou could know it for a king's under a diving-bell, if you could\nhear it work its intellect.\n\nI had a new trade now, and plenty of business in it.  The king\nwas as hungry to find out everything that was going to happen\nduring the next thirteen centuries as if he were expecting to live\nin them.  From that time out, I prophesied myself bald-headed\ntrying to supply the demand.  I have done some indiscreet things in\nmy day, but this thing of playing myself for a prophet was the\nworst.  Still, it had its ameliorations.  A prophet doesn't have\nto have any brains.  They are good to have, of course, for the\nordinary exigencies of life, but they are no use in professional\nwork.  It is the restfulest vocation there is.  When the spirit of\nprophecy comes upon you, you merely take your intellect and lay it\noff in a cool place for a rest, and unship your jaw and leave it\nalone; it will work itself: the result is prophecy.\n\nEvery day a knight-errant or so came along, and the sight of them\nfired the king's martial spirit every time.  He would have forgotten\nhimself, sure, and said something to them in a style a suspicious\nshade or so above his ostensible degree, and so I always got him\nwell out of the road in time.  Then he would stand and look with\nall his eyes; and a proud light would flash from them, and his\nnostrils would inflate like a war-horse's, and I knew he was\nlonging for a brush with them.  But about noon of the third day\nI had stopped in the road to take a precaution which had been\nsuggested by the whip-stroke that had fallen to my share two days\nbefore; a precaution which I had afterward decided to leave untaken,\nI was so loath to institute it; but now I had just had a fresh\nreminder: while striding heedlessly along, with jaw spread and\nintellect at rest, for I was prophesying, I stubbed my toe and\nfell sprawling.  I was so pale I couldn't think for a moment;\nthen I got softly and carefully up and unstrapped my knapsack.\nI had that dynamite bomb in it, done up in wool in a box.  It was\na good thing to have along; the time would come when I could do\na valuable miracle with it, maybe, but it was a nervous thing\nto have about me, and I didn't like to ask the king to carry it.\nYet I must either throw it away or think up some safe way to get\nalong with its society.  I got it out and slipped it into my scrip,\nand just then here came a couple of knights.  The king stood,\nstately as a statue, gazing toward them--had forgotten himself again,\nof course--and before I could get a word of warning out, it was\ntime for him to skip, and well that he did it, too.  He supposed\nthey would turn aside.  Turn aside to avoid trampling peasant dirt\nunder foot?  When had he ever turned aside himself--or ever had\nthe chance to do it, if a peasant saw him or any other noble knight\nin time to judiciously save him the trouble?  The knights paid\nno attention to the king at all; it was his place to look out\nhimself, and if he hadn't skipped he would have been placidly\nridden down, and laughed at besides.\n\nThe king was in a flaming fury, and launched out his challenge\nand epithets with a most royal vigor.  The knights were some little\ndistance by now.  They halted, greatly surprised, and turned in\ntheir saddles and looked back, as if wondering if it might be worth\nwhile to bother with such scum as we.  Then they wheeled and\nstarted for us.  Not a moment must be lost.  I started for _them_.\nI passed them at a rattling gait, and as I went by I flung out a\nhair-lifting soul-scorching thirteen-jointed insult which made\nthe king's effort poor and cheap by comparison.  I got it out of\nthe nineteenth century where they know how.  They had such headway\nthat they were nearly to the king before they could check up;\nthen, frantic with rage, they stood up their horses on their hind\nhoofs and whirled them around, and the next moment here they came,\nbreast to breast.  I was seventy yards off, then, and scrambling up\na great bowlder at the roadside.  When they were within thirty\nyards of me they let their long lances droop to a level, depressed\ntheir mailed heads, and so, with their horse-hair plumes streaming\nstraight out behind, most gallant to see, this lightning express\ncame tearing for me!  When they were within fifteen yards, I sent\nthat bomb with a sure aim, and it struck the ground just under\nthe horses' noses.\n\nYes, it was a neat thing, very neat and pretty to see.  It resembled\na steamboat explosion on the Mississippi; and during the next\nfifteen minutes we stood under a steady drizzle of microscopic\nfragments of knights and hardware and horse-flesh.  I say we,\nfor the king joined the audience, of course, as soon as he had got\nhis breath again.  There was a hole there which would afford steady\nwork for all the people in that region for some years to come\n--in trying to explain it, I mean; as for filling it up, that service\nwould be comparatively prompt, and would fall to the lot of a\nselect few--peasants of that seignory; and they wouldn't get\nanything for it, either.\n\nBut I explained it to the king myself. I said it was done with a\ndynamite bomb.  This information did him no damage, because it\nleft him as intelligent as he was before.  However, it was a noble\nmiracle, in his eyes, and was another settler for Merlin.  I thought\nit well enough to explain that this was a miracle of so rare a sort\nthat it couldn't be done except when the atmospheric conditions\nwere just right.  Otherwise he would be encoring it every time we\nhad a good subject, and that would be inconvenient, because I\nhadn't any more bombs along.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nDRILLING THE KING\n\nOn the morning of the fourth day, when it was just sunrise, and we\nhad been tramping an hour in the chill dawn, I came to a resolution:\nthe king _must_ be drilled; things could not go on so, he must be\ntaken in hand and deliberately and conscientiously drilled, or we\ncouldn't ever venture to enter a dwelling; the very cats would know\nthis masquerader for a humbug and no peasant.  So I called a halt\nand said:\n\n\"Sire, as between clothes and countenance, you are all right, there\nis no discrepancy; but as between your clothes and your bearing,\nyou are all wrong, there is a most noticeable discrepancy.  Your\nsoldierly stride, your lordly port--these will not do.  You stand\ntoo straight, your looks are too high, too confident.  The cares\nof a kingdom do not stoop the shoulders, they do not droop the chin,\nthey do not depress the high level of the eye-glance, they do not\nput doubt and fear in the heart and hang out the signs of them\nin slouching body and unsure step.  It is the sordid cares of\nthe lowly born that do these things.  You must learn the trick;\nyou must imitate the trademarks of poverty, misery, oppression,\ninsult, and the other several and common inhumanities that sap\nthe manliness out of a man and make him a loyal and proper and\napproved subject and a satisfaction to his masters, or the very\ninfants will know you for better than your disguise, and we shall go\nto pieces at the first hut we stop at.  Pray try to walk like this.\"\n\nThe king took careful note, and then tried an imitation.\n\n\"Pretty fair--pretty fair.  Chin a little lower, please--there, very\ngood.  Eyes too high; pray don't look at the horizon, look at the\nground, ten steps in front of you.  Ah--that is better, that is\nvery good.  Wait, please; you betray too much vigor, too much\ndecision; you want more of a shamble.  Look at me, please--this is\nwhat I mean....  Now you are getting it; that is the idea--at least,\nit sort of approaches it....  Yes, that is pretty fair.  _But!_\nThere is a great big something wanting, I don't quite know what\nit is.  Please walk thirty yards, so that I can get a perspective\non the thing....  Now, then--your head's right, speed's right,\nshoulders right, eyes right, chin right, gait, carriage, general\nstyle right--everything's right!  And yet the fact remains, the\naggregate's wrong.  The account don't balance.  Do it again,\nplease....  _Now_ I think I begin to see what it is.  Yes, I've\nstruck it.  You see, the genuine spiritlessness is wanting; that's\nwhat's the trouble.  It's all _amateur_--mechanical details all\nright, almost to a hair; everything about the delusion perfect,\nexcept that it don't delude.\"\n\n\"What, then, must one do, to prevail?\"\n\n\"Let me think... I can't seem to quite get at it.  In fact, there\nisn't anything that can right the matter but practice.  This is\na good place for it: roots and stony ground to break up your\nstately gait, a region not liable to interruption, only one field\nand one hut in sight, and they so far away that nobody could\nsee us from there.  It will be well to move a little off the road\nand put in the whole day drilling you, sire.\"\n\nAfter the drill had gone on a little while, I said:\n\n\"Now, sire, imagine that we are at the door of the hut yonder,\nand the family are before us.  Proceed, please--accost the head\nof the house.\"\n\nThe king unconsciously straightened up like a monument, and said,\nwith frozen austerity:\n\n\"Varlet, bring a seat; and serve to me what cheer ye have.\"\n\n\"Ah, your grace, that is not well done.\"\n\n\"In what lacketh it?\"\n\n\"These people do not call _each other_ varlets.\"\n\n\"Nay, is that true?\"\n\n\"Yes; only those above them call them so.\"\n\n\"Then must I try again.  I will call him villein.\"\n\n\"No-no; for he may be a freeman.\"\n\n\"Ah--so.  Then peradventure I should call him goodman.\"\n\n\"That would answer, your grace, but it would be still better if\nyou said friend, or brother.\"\n\n\"Brother!--to dirt like that?\"\n\n\"Ah, but _we_ are pretending to be dirt like that, too.\"\n\n\"It is even true.  I will say it.  Brother, bring a seat, and\nthereto what cheer ye have, withal.  Now 'tis right.\"\n\n\"Not quite, not wholly right.  You have asked for one, not _us_\n--for one, not both; food for one, a seat for one.\"\n\nThe king looked puzzled--he wasn't a very heavy weight, intellectually.\nHis head was an hour-glass; it could stow an idea, but it had to do\nit a grain at a time, not the whole idea at once.\n\n\"Would _you_ have a seat also--and sit?\"\n\n\"If I did not sit, the man would perceive that we were only pretending\nto be equals--and playing the deception pretty poorly, too.\"\n\n\"It is well and truly said!  How wonderful is truth, come it in\nwhatsoever unexpected form it may!  Yes, he must bring out seats\nand food for both, and in serving us present not ewer and napkin\nwith more show of respect to the one than to the other.\"\n\n\"And there is even yet a detail that needs correcting.  He must\nbring nothing outside; we will go in--in among the dirt, and\npossibly other repulsive things,--and take the food with the\nhousehold, and after the fashion of the house, and all on equal\nterms, except the man be of the serf class; and finally, there\nwill be no ewer and no napkin, whether he be serf or free.  Please\nwalk again, my liege.  There--it is better--it is the best yet;\nbut not perfect.  The shoulders have known no ignobler burden\nthan iron mail, and they will not stoop.\"\n\n\"Give me, then, the bag.  I will learn the spirit that goeth\nwith burdens that have not honor.  It is the spirit that stoopeth\nthe shoulders, I ween, and not the weight; for armor is heavy,\nyet it is a proud burden, and a man standeth straight in it....\nNay, but me no buts, offer me no objections.  I will have the thing.\nStrap it upon my back.\"\n\nHe was complete now with that knapsack on, and looked as little\nlike a king as any man I had ever seen.  But it was an obstinate\npair of shoulders; they could not seem to learn the trick of\nstooping with any sort of deceptive naturalness.  The drill went on,\nI prompting and correcting:\n\n\"Now, make believe you are in debt, and eaten up by relentless\ncreditors; you are out of work--which is horse-shoeing, let us\nsay--and can get none; and your wife is sick, your children are\ncrying because they are hungry--\"\n\nAnd so on, and so on.  I drilled him as representing in turn all\nsorts of people out of luck and suffering dire privations and\nmisfortunes.  But lord, it was only just words, words--they meant\nnothing in the world to him, I might just as well have whistled.\nWords realize nothing, vivify nothing to you, unless you have\nsuffered in your own person the thing which the words try to\ndescribe.  There are wise people who talk ever so knowingly and\ncomplacently about \"the working classes,\" and satisfy themselves\nthat a day's hard intellectual work is very much harder than\na day's hard manual toil, and is righteously entitled to much\nbigger pay.  Why, they really think that, you know, because they\nknow all about the one, but haven't tried the other.  But I know\nall about both; and so far as I am concerned, there isn't money\nenough in the universe to hire me to swing a pickaxe thirty days,\nbut I will do the hardest kind of intellectual work for just as\nnear nothing as you can cipher it down--and I will be satisfied, too.\n\nIntellectual \"work\" is misnamed; it is a pleasure, a dissipation,\nand is its own highest reward.  The poorest paid architect,\nengineer, general, author, sculptor, painter, lecturer, advocate,\nlegislator, actor, preacher, singer is constructively in heaven\nwhen he is at work; and as for the musician with the fiddle-bow\nin his hand who sits in the midst of a great orchestra with the\nebbing and flowing tides of divine sound washing over him--why,\ncertainly, he is at work, if you wish to call it that, but lord,\nit's a sarcasm just the same.  The law of work does seem utterly\nunfair--but there it is, and nothing can change it: the higher\nthe pay in enjoyment the worker gets out of it, the higher shall\nbe his pay in cash, also.  And it's also the very law of those\ntransparent swindles, transmissible nobility and kingship.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\nTHE SMALLPOX HUT\n\nWhen we arrived at that hut at mid-afternoon, we saw no signs\nof life about it.  The field near by had been denuded of its crop\nsome time before, and had a skinned look, so exhaustively had\nit been harvested and gleaned.  Fences, sheds, everything had a\nruined look, and were eloquent of poverty.  No animal was around\nanywhere, no living thing in sight.  The stillness was awful, it\nwas like the stillness of death.  The cabin was a one-story one,\nwhose thatch was black with age, and ragged from lack of repair.\n\nThe door stood a trifle ajar.  We approached it stealthily--on tiptoe\nand at half-breath--for that is the way one's feeling makes him do,\nat such a time.  The king knocked.  We waited.  No answer.  Knocked\nagain.  No answer.  I pushed the door softly open and looked in.\nI made out some dim forms, and a woman started up from the ground\nand stared at me, as one does who is wakened from sleep.  Presently\nshe found her voice:\n\n\"Have mercy!\" she pleaded.  \"All is taken, nothing is left.\"\n\n\"I have not come to take anything, poor woman.\"\n\n\"You are not a priest?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Nor come not from the lord of the manor?\"\n\n\"No, I am a stranger.\"\n\n\"Oh, then, for the fear of God, who visits with misery and death\nsuch as be harmless, tarry not here, but fly!  This place is under\nhis curse--and his Church's.\"\n\n\"Let me come in and help you--you are sick and in trouble.\"\n\nI was better used to the dim light now.  I could see her hollow\neyes fixed upon me.  I could see how emaciated she was.\n\n\"I tell you the place is under the Church's ban.  Save yourself\n--and go, before some straggler see thee here, and report it.\"\n\n\"Give yourself no trouble about me; I don't care anything for the\nChurch's curse.  Let me help you.\"\n\n\"Now all good spirits--if there be any such--bless thee for that\nword.  Would God I had a sup of water!--but hold, hold, forget\nI said it, and fly; for there is that here that even he that\nfeareth not the Church must fear: this disease whereof we die.\nLeave us, thou brave, good stranger, and take with thee such\nwhole and sincere blessing as them that be accursed can give.\"\n\nBut before this I had picked up a wooden bowl and was rushing\npast the king on my way to the brook.  It was ten yards away.\nWhen I got back and entered, the king was within, and was opening\nthe shutter that closed the window-hole, to let in air and light.\nThe place was full of a foul stench.  I put the bowl to the woman's\nlips, and as she gripped it with her eager talons the shutter came\nopen and a strong light flooded her face.  Smallpox!\n\nI sprang to the king, and said in his ear:\n\n\"Out of the door on the instant, sire! the woman is dying of that\ndisease that wasted the skirts of Camelot two years ago.\"\n\nHe did not budge.\n\n\"Of a truth I shall remain--and likewise help.\"\n\nI whispered again:\n\n\"King, it must not be.  You must go.\"\n\n\"Ye mean well, and ye speak not unwisely.  But it were shame that\na king should know fear, and shame that belted knight should\nwithhold his hand where be such as need succor.  Peace, I will\nnot go.  It is you who must go.  The Church's ban is not upon me,\nbut it forbiddeth you to be here, and she will deal with you with\na heavy hand an word come to her of your trespass.\"\n\nIt was a desperate place for him to be in, and might cost him his\nlife, but it was no use to argue with him.  If he considered his\nknightly honor at stake here, that was the end of argument; he\nwould stay, and nothing could prevent it; I was aware of that.\nAnd so I dropped the subject.  The woman spoke:\n\n\"Fair sir, of your kindness will ye climb the ladder there,\nand bring me news of what ye find?  Be not afraid to report,\nfor times can come when even a mother's heart is past breaking\n--being already broke.\"\n\n\"Abide,\" said the king, \"and give the woman to eat.  I will go.\"\nAnd he put down the knapsack.\n\nI turned to start, but the king had already started.  He halted,\nand looked down upon a man who lay in a dim light, and had not\nnoticed us thus far, or spoken.\n\n\"Is it your husband?\" the king asked.\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Is he asleep?\"\n\n\"God be thanked for that one charity, yes--these three hours.\nWhere shall I pay to the full, my gratitude! for my heart is\nbursting with it for that sleep he sleepeth now.\"\n\nI said:\n\n\"We will be careful.  We will not wake him.\"\n\n\"Ah, no, that ye will not, for he is dead.\"\n\n\"Dead?\"\n\n\"Yes, what triumph it is to know it!  None can harm him, none\ninsult him more.  He is in heaven now, and happy; or if not there,\nhe bides in hell and is content; for in that place he will find\nneither abbot nor yet bishop.  We were boy and girl together; we\nwere man and wife these five and twenty years, and never separated\ntill this day.  Think how long that is to love and suffer together.\nThis morning was he out of his mind, and in his fancy we were\nboy and girl again and wandering in the happy fields; and so in\nthat innocent glad converse wandered he far and farther, still\nlightly gossiping, and entered into those other fields we know\nnot of, and was shut away from mortal sight.  And so there was\nno parting, for in his fancy I went with him; he knew not but\nI went with him, my hand in his--my young soft hand, not this\nwithered claw.  Ah, yes, to go, and know it not; to separate and\nknow it not; how could one go peace--fuller than that?  It was\nhis reward for a cruel life patiently borne.\"\n\nThere was a slight noise from the direction of the dim corner where\nthe ladder was.  It was the king descending.  I could see that he\nwas bearing something in one arm, and assisting himself with the\nother.  He came forward into the light; upon his breast lay a\nslender girl of fifteen.  She was but half conscious; she was dying\nof smallpox.  Here was heroism at its last and loftiest possibility,\nits utmost summit; this was challenging death in the open field\nunarmed, with all the odds against the challenger, no reward set\nupon the contest, and no admiring world in silks and cloth of gold\nto gaze and applaud; and yet the king's bearing was as serenely\nbrave as it had always been in those cheaper contests where knight\nmeets knight in equal fight and clothed in protecting steel.  He\nwas great now; sublimely great.  The rude statues of his ancestors\nin his palace should have an addition--I would see to that; and it\nwould not be a mailed king killing a giant or a dragon, like the\nrest, it would be a king in commoner's garb bearing death in his\narms that a peasant mother might look her last upon her child and\nbe comforted.\n\nHe laid the girl down by her mother, who poured out endearments\nand caresses from an overflowing heart, and one could detect a\nflickering faint light of response in the child's eyes, but that\nwas all.  The mother hung over her, kissing her, petting her, and\nimploring her to speak, but the lips only moved and no sound came.\nI snatched my liquor flask from my knapsack, but the woman forbade\nme, and said:\n\n\"No--she does not suffer; it is better so.  It might bring her back\nto life.  None that be so good and kind as ye are would do her\nthat cruel hurt.  For look you--what is left to live for?  Her\nbrothers are gone, her father is gone, her mother goeth, the\nChurch's curse is upon her, and none may shelter or befriend her\neven though she lay perishing in the road.  She is desolate.  I have\nnot asked you, good heart, if her sister be still on live, here\noverhead; I had no need; ye had gone back, else, and not left\nthe poor thing forsaken--\"\n\n\"She lieth at peace,\" interrupted the king, in a subdued voice.\n\n\"I would not change it.  How rich is this day in happiness!  Ah,\nmy Annis, thou shalt join thy sister soon--thou'rt on thy way,\nand these be merciful friends that will not hinder.\"\n\nAnd so she fell to murmuring and cooing over the girl again, and\nsoftly stroking her face and hair, and kissing her and calling her\nby endearing names; but there was scarcely sign of response now\nin the glazing eyes.  I saw tears well from the king's eyes, and\ntrickle down his face.  The woman noticed them, too, and said:\n\n\"Ah, I know that sign: thou'st a wife at home, poor soul, and\nyou and she have gone hungry to bed, many's the time, that the\nlittle ones might have your crust; you know what poverty is, and\nthe daily insults of your betters, and the heavy hand of the Church\nand the king.\"\n\nThe king winced under this accidental home-shot, but kept still;\nhe was learning his part; and he was playing it well, too, for\na pretty dull beginner.  I struck up a diversion.  I offered the\nwoman food and liquor, but she refused both.  She would allow\nnothing to come between her and the release of death.  Then I slipped\naway and brought the dead child from aloft, and laid it by her.\nThis broke her down again, and there was another scene that was\nfull of heartbreak.  By and by I made another diversion, and beguiled\nher to sketch her story.\n\n\"Ye know it well yourselves, having suffered it--for truly none\nof our condition in Britain escape it.  It is the old, weary tale.\nWe fought and struggled and succeeded; meaning by success, that\nwe lived and did not die; more than that is not to be claimed.  No\ntroubles came that we could not outlive, till this year brought\nthem; then came they all at once, as one might say, and overwhelmed\nus.  Years ago the lord of the manor planted certain fruit trees on\nour farm; in the best part of it, too--a grievous wrong and shame--\"\n\n\"But it was his right,\" interrupted the king.\n\n\"None denieth that, indeed; an the law mean anything, what is\nthe lord's is his, and what is mine is his also.  Our farm was\nours by lease, therefore 'twas likewise his, to do with it as he\nwould.  Some little time ago, three of those trees were found hewn\ndown.  Our three grown sons ran frightened to report the crime.\nWell, in his lordship's dungeon there they lie, who saith there\nshall they lie and rot till they confess.  They have naught to\nconfess, being innocent, wherefore there will they remain until\nthey die.  Ye know that right well, I ween.  Think how this left us;\na man, a woman and two children, to gather a crop that was planted\nby so much greater force, yes, and protect it night and day from\npigeons and prowling animals that be sacred and must not be hurt\nby any of our sort.  When my lord's crop was nearly ready for\nthe harvest, so also was ours; when his bell rang to call us to\nhis fields to harvest his crop for nothing, he would not allow that\nI and my two girls should count for our three captive sons, but\nfor only two of them; so, for the lacking one were we daily fined.\nAll this time our own crop was perishing through neglect; and so\nboth the priest and his lordship fined us because their shares\nof it were suffering through damage.  In the end the fines ate up\nour crop--and they took it all; they took it all and made us harvest\nit for them, without pay or food, and we starving.  Then the worst\ncame when I, being out of my mind with hunger and loss of my boys,\nand grief to see my husband and my little maids in rags and misery\nand despair, uttered a deep blasphemy--oh! a thousand of them!\n--against the Church and the Church's ways.  It was ten days ago.\nI had fallen sick with this disease, and it was to the priest\nI said the words, for he was come to chide me for lack of due\nhumility under the chastening hand of God.  He carried my trespass\nto his betters; I was stubborn; wherefore, presently upon my head\nand upon all heads that were dear to me, fell the curse of Rome.\n\n\"Since that day we are avoided, shunned with horror.  None has\ncome near this hut to know whether we live or not.  The rest of us\nwere taken down.  Then I roused me and got up, as wife and mother\nwill.  It was little they could have eaten in any case; it was\nless than little they had to eat.  But there was water, and I gave\nthem that.  How they craved it! and how they blessed it!  But the\nend came yesterday; my strength broke down.  Yesterday was the\nlast time I ever saw my husband and this youngest child alive.\nI have lain here all these hours--these ages, ye may say--listening,\nlistening for any sound up there that--\"\n\nShe gave a sharp quick glance at her eldest daughter, then cried\nout, \"Oh, my darling!\" and feebly gathered the stiffening form\nto her sheltering arms.  She had recognized the death-rattle.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\n\nTHE TRAGEDY OF THE MANOR-HOUSE\n\nAt midnight all was over, and we sat in the presence of four\ncorpses.  We covered them with such rags as we could find, and\nstarted away, fastening the door behind us.  Their home must be\nthese people's grave, for they could not have Christian burial,\nor be admitted to consecrated ground.  They were as dogs, wild\nbeasts, lepers, and no soul that valued its hope of eternal life\nwould throw it away by meddling in any sort with these rebuked and\nsmitten outcasts.\n\nWe had not moved four steps when I caught a sound as of footsteps\nupon gravel.  My heart flew to my throat.  We must not be seen\ncoming from that house.  I plucked at the king's robe and we drew\nback and took shelter behind the corner of the cabin.\n\n\"Now we are safe,\" I said, \"but it was a close call--so to speak.\nIf the night had been lighter he might have seen us, no doubt,\nhe seemed to be so near.\"\n\n\"Mayhap it is but a beast and not a man at all.\"\n\n\"True.  But man or beast, it will be wise to stay here a minute\nand let it get by and out of the way.\"\n\n\"Hark!  It cometh hither.\"\n\nTrue again.  The step was coming toward us--straight toward the hut.\nIt must be a beast, then, and we might as well have saved our\ntrepidation.  I was going to step out, but the king laid his hand\nupon my arm.  There was a moment of silence, then we heard a soft\nknock on the cabin door.  It made me shiver.  Presently the knock\nwas repeated, and then we heard these words in a guarded voice:\n\n\"Mother!  Father!  Open--we have got free, and we bring news to\npale your cheeks but glad your hearts; and we may not tarry, but\nmust fly!  And--but they answer not.  Mother! father!--\"\n\nI drew the king toward the other end of the hut and whispered:\n\n\"Come--now we can get to the road.\"\n\nThe king hesitated, was going to demur; but just then we heard\nthe door give way, and knew that those desolate men were in the\npresence of their dead.\n\n\"Come, my liege! in a moment they will strike a light, and then\nwill follow that which it would break your heart to hear.\"\n\nHe did not hesitate this time.  The moment we were in the road\nI ran; and after a moment he threw dignity aside and followed.\nI did not want to think of what was happening in the hut--I couldn't\nbear it; I wanted to drive it out of my mind; so I struck into the\nfirst subject that lay under that one in my mind:\n\n\"I have had the disease those people died of, and so have nothing\nto fear; but if you have not had it also--\"\n\nHe broke in upon me to say he was in trouble, and it was his\nconscience that was troubling him:\n\n\"These young men have got free, they say--but _how_?  It is not\nlikely that their lord hath set them free.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, I make no doubt they escaped.\"\n\n\"That is my trouble; I have a fear that this is so, and your\nsuspicion doth confirm it, you having the same fear.\"\n\n\"I should not call it by that name though.  I do suspect that they\nescaped, but if they did, I am not sorry, certainly.\"\n\n\"I am not sorry, I _think_--but--\"\n\n\"What is it?  What is there for one to be troubled about?\"\n\n\"_If_ they did escape, then are we bound in duty to lay hands upon\nthem and deliver them again to their lord; for it is not seemly\nthat one of his quality should suffer a so insolent and high-handed\noutrage from persons of their base degree.\"\n\nThere it was again.  He could see only one side of it.  He was\nborn so, educated so, his veins were full of ancestral blood that\nwas rotten with this sort of unconscious brutality, brought down\nby inheritance from a long procession of hearts that had each done\nits share toward poisoning the stream.  To imprison these men\nwithout proof, and starve their kindred, was no harm, for they were\nmerely peasants and subject to the will and pleasure of their lord,\nno matter what fearful form it might take; but for these men to\nbreak out of unjust captivity was insult and outrage, and a thing\nnot to be countenanced by any conscientious person who knew his\nduty to his sacred caste.\n\nI worked more than half an hour before I got him to change the\nsubject--and even then an outside matter did it for me.  This was\na something which caught our eyes as we struck the summit of a\nsmall hill--a red glow, a good way off.\n\n\"That's a fire,\" said I.\n\nFires interested me considerably, because I was getting a good\ndeal of an insurance business started, and was also training some\nhorses and building some steam fire-engines, with an eye to a paid\nfire department by and by.  The priests opposed both my fire and\nlife insurance, on the ground that it was an insolent attempt to\nhinder the decrees of God; and if you pointed out that they did not\nhinder the decrees in the least, but only modified the hard\nconsequences of them if you took out policies and had luck, they\nretorted that that was gambling against the decrees of God, and was\njust as bad.  So they managed to damage those industries more\nor less, but I got even on my accident business.  As a rule, a knight\nis a lummux, and some times even a labrick, and hence open to pretty\npoor arguments when they come glibly from a superstition-monger,\nbut even _he_ could see the practical side of a thing once in a while;\nand so of late you couldn't clean up a tournament and pile the\nresult without finding one of my accident-tickets in every helmet.\n\nWe stood there awhile, in the thick darkness and stillness, looking\ntoward the red blur in the distance, and trying to make out the\nmeaning of a far-away murmur that rose and fell fitfully on the\nnight.  Sometimes it swelled up and for a moment seemed less\nremote; but when we were hopefully expecting it to betray its cause\nand nature, it dulled and sank again, carrying its mystery with it.\nWe started down the hill in its direction, and the winding road\nplunged us at once into almost solid darkness--darkness that was\npacked and crammed in between two tall forest walls.  We groped\nalong down for half a mile, perhaps, that murmur growing more and\nmore distinct all the time.  The coming storm threatening more and\nmore, with now and then a little shiver of wind, a faint show of\nlightning, and dull grumblings of distant thunder.  I was in the\nlead.  I ran against something--a soft heavy something which gave,\nslightly, to the impulse of my weight; at the same moment the\nlightning glared out, and within a foot of my face was the writhing\nface of a man who was hanging from the limb of a tree!  That is,\nit seemed to be writhing, but it was not.  It was a grewsome sight.\nStraightway there was an ear-splitting explosion of thunder, and\nthe bottom of heaven fell out; the rain poured down in a deluge.\nNo matter, we must try to cut this man down, on the chance that\nthere might be life in him yet, mustn't we?  The lightning came\nquick and sharp now, and the place was alternately noonday and\nmidnight.  One moment the man would be hanging before me in an\nintense light, and the next he was blotted out again in the darkness.\nI told the king we must cut him down.  The king at once objected.\n\n\"If he hanged himself, he was willing to lose him property to\nhis lord; so let him be.  If others hanged him, belike they had\nthe right--let him hang.\"\n\n\"But--\"\n\n\"But me no buts, but even leave him as he is.  And for yet another\nreason.  When the lightning cometh again--there, look abroad.\"\n\nTwo others hanging, within fifty yards of us!\n\n\"It is not weather meet for doing useless courtesies unto dead folk.\nThey are past thanking you.  Come--it is unprofitable to tarry here.\"\n\nThere was reason in what he said, so we moved on.  Within the next\nmile we counted six more hanging forms by the blaze of the lightning,\nand altogether it was a grisly excursion.  That murmur was a murmur\nno longer, it was a roar; a roar of men's voices.  A man came flying\nby now, dimly through the darkness, and other men chasing him.\nThey disappeared.  Presently another case of the kind occurred,\nand then another and another.  Then a sudden turn of the road\nbrought us in sight of that fire--it was a large manor-house, and\nlittle or nothing was left of it--and everywhere men were flying\nand other men raging after them in pursuit.\n\nI warned the king that this was not a safe place for strangers.\nWe would better get away from the light, until matters should\nimprove.  We stepped back a little, and hid in the edge of the\nwood.  From this hiding-place we saw both men and women hunted\nby the mob.  The fearful work went on until nearly dawn.  Then,\nthe fire being out and the storm spent, the voices and flying\nfootsteps presently ceased, and darkness and stillness reigned again.\n\nWe ventured out, and hurried cautiously away; and although we were\nworn out and sleepy, we kept on until we had put this place some\nmiles behind us.  Then we asked hospitality at the hut of a charcoal\nburner, and got what was to be had.  A woman was up and about, but\nthe man was still asleep, on a straw shake-down, on the clay floor.\nThe woman seemed uneasy until I explained that we were travelers\nand had lost our way and been wandering in the woods all night.\nShe became talkative, then, and asked if we had heard of the\nterrible goings-on at the manor-house of Abblasoure.  Yes, we had\nheard of them, but what we wanted now was rest and sleep.  The\nking broke in:\n\n\"Sell us the house and take yourselves away, for we be perilous\ncompany, being late come from people that died of the Spotted Death.\"\n\nIt was good of him, but unnecessary.  One of the commonest decorations\nof the nation was the waffle-iron face.  I had early noticed that\nthe woman and her husband were both so decorated.  She made us\nentirely welcome, and had no fears; and plainly she was immensely\nimpressed by the king's proposition; for, of course, it was a good\ndeal of an event in her life to run across a person of the king's\nhumble appearance who was ready to buy a man's house for the sake\nof a night's lodging.  It gave her a large respect for us, and she\nstrained the lean possibilities of her hovel to the utmost to make\nus comfortable.\n\nWe slept till far into the afternoon, and then got up hungry enough to\nmake cotter fare quite palatable to the king, the more particularly\nas it was scant in quantity.  And also in variety; it consisted\nsolely of onions, salt, and the national black bread made out of\nhorse-feed.  The woman told us about the affair of the evening\nbefore.  At ten or eleven at night, when everybody was in bed,\nthe manor-house burst into flames.  The country-side swarmed to\nthe rescue, and the family were saved, with one exception, the\nmaster.  He did not appear.  Everybody was frantic over this loss,\nand two brave yeomen sacrificed their lives in ransacking the\nburning house seeking that valuable personage.  But after a while\nhe was found--what was left of him--which was his corpse.  It was\nin a copse three hundred yards away, bound, gagged, stabbed in a\ndozen places.\n\nWho had done this?  Suspicion fell upon a humble family in the\nneighborhood who had been lately treated with peculiar harshness\nby the baron; and from these people the suspicion easily extended\nitself to their relatives and familiars.  A suspicion was enough;\nmy lord's liveried retainers proclaimed an instant crusade against\nthese people, and were promptly joined by the community in general.\nThe woman's husband had been active with the mob, and had not\nreturned home until nearly dawn.  He was gone now to find out\nwhat the general result had been.  While we were still talking he\ncame back from his quest.  His report was revolting enough.  Eighteen\npersons hanged or butchered, and two yeomen and thirteen prisoners\nlost in the fire.\n\n\"And how many prisoners were there altogether in the vaults?\"\n\n\"Thirteen.\"\n\n\"Then every one of them was lost?\"\n\n\"Yes, all.\"\n\n\"But the people arrived in time to save the family; how is it they\ncould save none of the prisoners?\"\n\nThe man looked puzzled, and said:\n\n\"Would one unlock the vaults at such a time?  Marry, some would\nhave escaped.\"\n\n\"Then you mean that nobody _did_ unlock them?\"\n\n\"None went near them, either to lock or unlock.  It standeth to\nreason that the bolts were fast; wherefore it was only needful\nto establish a watch, so that if any broke the bonds he might not\nescape, but be taken. None were taken.\"\n\n\"Natheless, three did escape,\" said the king, \"and ye will do well\nto publish it and set justice upon their track, for these murthered\nthe baron and fired the house.\"\n\nI was just expecting he would come out with that.  For a moment\nthe man and his wife showed an eager interest in this news and\nan impatience to go out and spread it; then a sudden something\nelse betrayed itself in their faces, and they began to ask questions.\nI answered the questions myself, and narrowly watched the effects\nproduced.  I was soon satisfied that the knowledge of who these\nthree prisoners were had somehow changed the atmosphere; that\nour hosts' continued eagerness to go and spread the news was now\nonly pretended and not real.  The king did not notice the change,\nand I was glad of that.  I worked the conversation around toward\nother details of the night's proceedings, and noted that these\npeople were relieved to have it take that direction.\n\nThe painful thing observable about all this business was the\nalacrity with which this oppressed community had turned their\ncruel hands against their own class in the interest of the common\noppressor.  This man and woman seemed to feel that in a quarrel\nbetween a person of their own class and his lord, it was the natural\nand proper and rightful thing for that poor devil's whole caste\nto side with the master and fight his battle for him, without ever\nstopping to inquire into the rights or wrongs of the matter.  This\nman had been out helping to hang his neighbors, and had done his\nwork with zeal, and yet was aware that there was nothing against\nthem but a mere suspicion, with nothing back of it describable\nas evidence, still neither he nor his wife seemed to see anything\nhorrible about it.\n\nThis was depressing--to a man with the dream of a republic in his\nhead.  It reminded me of a time thirteen centuries away, when\nthe \"poor whites\" of our South who were always despised and\nfrequently insulted by the slave-lords around them, and who owed\ntheir base condition simply to the presence of slavery in their\nmidst, were yet pusillanimously ready to side with the slave-lords\nin all political moves for the upholding and perpetuating of\nslavery, and did also finally shoulder their muskets and pour out\ntheir lives in an effort to prevent the destruction of that very\ninstitution which degraded them.  And there was only one redeeming\nfeature connected with that pitiful piece of history; and that was,\nthat secretly the \"poor white\" did detest the slave-lord, and did\nfeel his own shame.  That feeling was not brought to the surface,\nbut the fact that it was there and could have been brought out,\nunder favoring circumstances, was something--in fact, it was enough;\nfor it showed that a man is at bottom a man, after all, even if it\ndoesn't show on the outside.\n\nWell, as it turned out, this charcoal burner was just the twin of\nthe Southern \"poor white\" of the far future.  The king presently\nshowed impatience, and said:\n\n\"An ye prattle here all the day, justice will miscarry.  Think ye\nthe criminals will abide in their father's house?  They are fleeing,\nthey are not waiting.  You should look to it that a party of horse\nbe set upon their track.\"\n\nThe woman paled slightly, but quite perceptibly, and the man looked\nflustered and irresolute.  I said:\n\n\"Come, friend, I will walk a little way with you, and explain which\ndirection I think they would try to take.  If they were merely\nresisters of the gabelle or some kindred absurdity I would try\nto protect them from capture; but when men murder a person of\nhigh degree and likewise burn his house, that is another matter.\"\n\nThe last remark was for the king--to quiet him.  On the road\nthe man pulled his resolution together, and began the march with\na steady gait, but there was no eagerness in it.  By and by I said:\n\n\"What relation were these men to you--cousins?\"\n\nHe turned as white as his layer of charcoal would let him, and\nstopped, trembling.\n\n\"Ah, my God, how know ye that?\"\n\n\"I didn't know it; it was a chance guess.\"\n\n\"Poor lads, they are lost.  And good lads they were, too.\"\n\n\"Were you actually going yonder to tell on them?\"\n\nHe didn't quite know how to take that; but he said, hesitatingly:\n\n\"Ye-s.\"\n\n\"Then I think you are a damned scoundrel!\"\n\nIt made him as glad as if I had called him an angel.\n\n\"Say the good words again, brother! for surely ye mean that ye\nwould not betray me an I failed of my duty.\"\n\n\"Duty?  There is no duty in the matter, except the duty to keep\nstill and let those men get away.  They've done a righteous deed.\"\n\nHe looked pleased; pleased, and touched with apprehension at the\nsame time.  He looked up and down the road to see that no one\nwas coming, and then said in a cautious voice:\n\n\"From what land come you, brother, that you speak such perilous\nwords, and seem not to be afraid?\"\n\n\"They are not perilous words when spoken to one of my own caste,\nI take it.  You would not tell anybody I said them?\"\n\n\"I?  I would be drawn asunder by wild horses first.\"\n\n\"Well, then, let me say my say.  I have no fears of your repeating\nit.  I think devil's work has been done last night upon those\ninnocent poor people.  That old baron got only what he deserved.\nIf I had my way, all his kind should have the same luck.\"\n\nFear and depression vanished from the man's manner, and gratefulness\nand a brave animation took their place:\n\n\"Even though you be a spy, and your words a trap for my undoing,\nyet are they such refreshment that to hear them again and others\nlike to them, I would go to the gallows happy, as having had one\ngood feast at least in a starved life.  And I will say my say now,\nand ye may report it if ye be so minded.  I helped to hang my\nneighbors for that it were peril to my own life to show lack of\nzeal in the master's cause; the others helped for none other reason.\nAll rejoice to-day that he is dead, but all do go about seemingly\nsorrowing, and shedding the hypocrite's tear, for in that lies\nsafety.  I have said the words, I have said the words! the only\nones that have ever tasted good in my mouth, and the reward of\nthat taste is sufficient.  Lead on, an ye will, be it even to the\nscaffold, for I am ready.\"\n\nThere it was, you see.  A man is a man, at bottom.  Whole ages\nof abuse and oppression cannot crush the manhood clear out of him.\nWhoever thinks it a mistake is himself mistaken.  Yes, there is\nplenty good enough material for a republic in the most degraded\npeople that ever existed--even the Russians; plenty of manhood\nin them--even in the Germans--if one could but force it out of\nits timid and suspicious privacy, to overthrow and trample in the\nmud any throne that ever was set up and any nobility that ever\nsupported it.  We should see certain things yet, let us hope and\nbelieve.  First, a modified monarchy, till Arthur's days were done,\nthen the destruction of the throne, nobility abolished, every\nmember of it bound out to some useful trade, universal suffrage\ninstituted, and the whole government placed in the hands of the\nmen and women of the nation there to remain.  Yes, there was no\noccasion to give up my dream yet a while.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\nMARCO\n\nWe strolled along in a sufficiently indolent fashion now, and\ntalked.  We must dispose of about the amount of time it ought\nto take to go to the little hamlet of Abblasoure and put justice\non the track of those murderers and get back home again.  And\nmeantime I had an auxiliary interest which had never paled yet,\nnever lost its novelty for me since I had been in Arthur's kingdom:\nthe behavior--born of nice and exact subdivisions of caste--of chance\npassers-by toward each other.  Toward the shaven monk who trudged\nalong with his cowl tilted back and the sweat washing down his\nfat jowls, the coal-burner was deeply reverent; to the gentleman\nhe was abject; with the small farmer and the free mechanic he was\ncordial and gossipy; and when a slave passed by with a countenance\nrespectfully lowered, this chap's nose was in the air--he couldn't\neven see him.  Well, there are times when one would like to hang\nthe whole human race and finish the farce.\n\nPresently we struck an incident.  A small mob of half-naked boys\nand girls came tearing out of the woods, scared and shrieking.\nThe eldest among them were not more than twelve or fourteen years\nold.  They implored help, but they were so beside themselves that\nwe couldn't make out what the matter was.  However, we plunged\ninto the wood, they skurrying in the lead, and the trouble was\nquickly revealed: they had hanged a little fellow with a bark rope,\nand he was kicking and struggling, in the process of choking to\ndeath.  We rescued him, and fetched him around.  It was some more\nhuman nature; the admiring little folk imitating their elders;\nthey were playing mob, and had achieved a success which promised\nto be a good deal more serious than they had bargained for.\n\nIt was not a dull excursion for me.  I managed to put in the time\nvery well.  I made various acquaintanceships, and in my quality\nof stranger was able to ask as many questions as I wanted to.\nA thing which naturally interested me, as a statesman, was the\nmatter of wages.  I picked up what I could under that head during\nthe afternoon.  A man who hasn't had much experience, and doesn't\nthink, is apt to measure a nation's prosperity or lack of prosperity\nby the mere size of the prevailing wages; if the wages be high, the\nnation is prosperous; if low, it isn't.  Which is an error.  It\nisn't what sum you get, it's how much you can buy with it, that's\nthe important thing; and it's that that tells whether your wages\nare high in fact or only high in name.  I could remember how it\nwas in the time of our great civil war in the nineteenth century.\nIn the North a carpenter got three dollars a day, gold valuation;\nin the South he got fifty--payable in Confederate shinplasters\nworth a dollar a bushel.  In the North a suit of overalls cost\nthree dollars--a day's wages; in the South it cost seventy-five\n--which was two days' wages.  Other things were in proportion.\nConsequently, wages were twice as high in the North as they were\nin the South, because the one wage had that much more purchasing\npower than the other had.\n\nYes, I made various acquaintances in the hamlet and a thing that\ngratified me a good deal was to find our new coins in circulation\n--lots of milrays, lots of mills, lots of cents, a good many nickels,\nand some silver; all this among the artisans and commonalty\ngenerally; yes, and even some gold--but that was at the bank,\nthat is to say, the goldsmith's.  I dropped in there while Marco,\nthe son of Marco, was haggling with a shopkeeper over a quarter\nof a pound of salt, and asked for change for a twenty-dollar gold\npiece.  They furnished it--that is, after they had chewed the piece,\nand rung it on the counter, and tried acid on it, and asked me\nwhere I got it, and who I was, and where I was from, and where\nI was going to, and when I expected to get there, and perhaps\na couple of hundred more questions; and when they got aground,\nI went right on and furnished them a lot of information voluntarily;\ntold them I owned a dog, and his name was Watch, and my first wife\nwas a Free Will Baptist, and her grandfather was a Prohibitionist,\nand I used to know a man who had two thumbs on each hand and a wart\non the inside of his upper lip, and died in the hope of a glorious\nresurrection, and so on, and so on, and so on, till even that\nhungry village questioner began to look satisfied, and also a shade\nput out; but he had to respect a man of my financial strength,\nand so he didn't give me any lip, but I noticed he took it out of\nhis underlings, which was a perfectly natural thing to do.  Yes,\nthey changed my twenty, but I judged it strained the bank a little,\nwhich was a thing to be expected, for it was the same as walking\ninto a paltry village store in the nineteenth century and requiring\nthe boss of it to change a two thousand-dollar bill for you all\nof a sudden.  He could do it, maybe; but at the same time he\nwould wonder how a small farmer happened to be carrying so much\nmoney around in his pocket; which was probably this goldsmith's\nthought, too; for he followed me to the door and stood there gazing\nafter me with reverent admiration.\n\nOur new money was not only handsomely circulating, but its language\nwas already glibly in use; that is to say, people had dropped\nthe names of the former moneys, and spoke of things as being worth\nso many dollars or cents or mills or milrays now.  It was very\ngratifying.  We were progressing, that was sure.\n\nI got to know several master mechanics, but about the most interesting\nfellow among them was the blacksmith, Dowley.  He was a live man\nand a brisk talker, and had two journeymen and three apprentices,\nand was doing a raging business.  In fact, he was getting rich,\nhand over fist, and was vastly respected.  Marco was very proud of\nhaving such a man for a friend.  He had taken me there ostensibly\nto let me see the big establishment which bought so much of his\ncharcoal, but really to let me see what easy and almost familiar\nterms he was on with this great man.  Dowley and I fraternized\nat once; I had had just such picked men, splendid fellows, under\nme in the Colt Arms Factory.  I was bound to see more of him, so\nI invited him to come out to Marco's Sunday, and dine with us.\nMarco was appalled, and held his breath; and when the grandee\naccepted, he was so grateful that he almost forgot to be astonished\nat the condescension.\n\nMarco's joy was exuberant--but only for a moment; then he grew\nthoughtful, then sad; and when he heard me tell Dowley I should\nhave Dickon, the boss mason, and Smug, the boss wheelwright, out\nthere, too, the coal-dust on his face turned to chalk, and he lost\nhis grip.  But I knew what was the matter with him; it was the\nexpense.  He saw ruin before him; he judged that his financial\ndays were numbered.  However, on our way to invite the others,\nI said:\n\n\"You must allow me to have these friends come; and you must also\nallow me to pay the costs.\"\n\nHis face cleared, and he said with spirit:\n\n\"But not all of it, not all of it.  Ye cannot well bear a burden\nlike to this alone.\"\n\nI stopped him, and said:\n\n\"Now let's understand each other on the spot, old friend.  I am\nonly a farm bailiff, it is true; but I am not poor, nevertheless.\nI have been very fortunate this year--you would be astonished\nto know how I have thriven.  I tell you the honest truth when I say\nI could squander away as many as a dozen feasts like this and never\ncare _that_ for the expense!\" and I snapped my fingers.  I could\nsee myself rise a foot at a time in Marco's estimation, and when\nI fetched out those last words I was become a very tower for style\nand altitude.  \"So you see, you must let me have my way.  You\ncan't contribute a cent to this orgy, that's _settled_.\"\n\n\"It's grand and good of you--\"\n\n\"No, it isn't.  You've opened your house to Jones and me in the\nmost generous way; Jones was remarking upon it to-day, just before\nyou came back from the village; for although he wouldn't be likely\nto say such a thing to you--because Jones isn't a talker, and is\ndiffident in society--he has a good heart and a grateful, and\nknows how to appreciate it when he is well treated; yes, you and\nyour wife have been very hospitable toward us--\"\n\n\"Ah, brother, 'tis nothing--_such_ hospitality!\"\n\n\"But it _is_ something; the best a man has, freely given, is always\nsomething, and is as good as a prince can do, and ranks right\nalong beside it--for even a prince can but do his best.  And so\nwe'll shop around and get up this layout now, and don't you worry\nabout the expense.  I'm one of the worst spendthrifts that ever\nwas born.  Why, do you know, sometimes in a single week I spend\n--but never mind about that--you'd never believe it anyway.\"\n\nAnd so we went gadding along, dropping in here and there, pricing\nthings, and gossiping with the shopkeepers about the riot, and now\nand then running across pathetic reminders of it, in the persons of\nshunned and tearful and houseless remnants of families whose homes\nhad been taken from them and their parents butchered or hanged.\nThe raiment of Marco and his wife was of coarse tow-linen and\nlinsey-woolsey respectively, and resembled township maps, it being\nmade up pretty exclusively of patches which had been added, township\nby township, in the course of five or six years, until hardly a\nhand's-breadth of the original garments was surviving and present.\nNow I wanted to fit these people out with new suits, on account of\nthat swell company, and I didn't know just how to get at it\n--with delicacy, until at last it struck me that as I had already\nbeen liberal in inventing wordy gratitude for the king, it would\nbe just the thing to back it up with evidence of a substantial\nsort; so I said:\n\n\"And Marco, there's another thing which you must permit--out of\nkindness for Jones--because you wouldn't want to offend him.\nHe was very anxious to testify his appreciation in some way, but\nhe is so diffident he couldn't venture it himself, and so he begged\nme to buy some little things and give them to you and Dame Phyllis\nand let him pay for them without your ever knowing they came from\nhim--you know how a delicate person feels about that sort of thing\n--and so I said I would, and we would keep mum.  Well, his idea\nwas, a new outfit of clothes for you both--\"\n\n\"Oh, it is wastefulness!  It may not be, brother, it may not be.\nConsider the vastness of the sum--\"\n\n\"Hang the vastness of the sum!  Try to keep quiet for a moment,\nand see how it would seem; a body can't get in a word edgeways,\nyou talk so much.  You ought to cure that, Marco; it isn't good\nform, you know, and it will grow on you if you don't check it.\nYes, we'll step in here now and price this man's stuff--and don't\nforget to remember to not let on to Jones that you know he had\nanything to do with it.  You can't think how curiously sensitive\nand proud he is.  He's a farmer--pretty fairly well-to-do farmer\n--and I'm his bailiff; _but_--the imagination of that man!  Why,\nsometimes when he forgets himself and gets to blowing off, you'd\nthink he was one of the swells of the earth; and you might listen\nto him a hundred years and never take him for a farmer--especially if\nhe talked agriculture.  He _thinks_ he's a Sheol of a farmer; thinks\nhe's old Grayback from Wayback; but between you and me privately\nhe don't know as much about farming as he does about running\na kingdom--still, whatever he talks about, you want to drop your\nunderjaw and listen, the same as if you had never heard such\nincredible wisdom in all your life before, and were afraid you\nmight die before you got enough of it.  That will please Jones.\"\n\nIt tickled Marco to the marrow to hear about such an odd character;\nbut it also prepared him for accidents; and in my experience when\nyou travel with a king who is letting on to be something else and\ncan't remember it more than about half the time, you can't take\ntoo many precautions.\n\nThis was the best store we had come across yet; it had everything\nin it, in small quantities, from anvils and drygoods all the way\ndown to fish and pinchbeck jewelry.  I concluded I would bunch\nmy whole invoice right here, and not go pricing around any more.\nSo I got rid of Marco, by sending him off to invite the mason and\nthe wheelwright, which left the field free to me.  For I never care\nto do a thing in a quiet way; it's got to be theatrical or I don't\ntake any interest in it.  I showed up money enough, in a careless\nway, to corral the shopkeeper's respect, and then I wrote down\na list of the things I wanted, and handed it to him to see if he\ncould read it.  He could, and was proud to show that he could.\nHe said he had been educated by a priest, and could both read\nand write.  He ran it through, and remarked with satisfaction that\nit was a pretty heavy bill.  Well, and so it was, for a little\nconcern like that.  I was not only providing a swell dinner, but\nsome odds and ends of extras.  I ordered that the things be carted\nout and delivered at the dwelling of Marco, the son of Marco,\nby Saturday evening, and send me the bill at dinner-time Sunday.\nHe said I could depend upon his promptness and exactitude, it was\nthe rule of the house.  He also observed that he would throw in\na couple of miller-guns for the Marcos gratis--that everybody\nwas using them now.  He had a mighty opinion of that clever\ndevice.  I said:\n\n\"And please fill them up to the middle mark, too; and add that\nto the bill.\"\n\nHe would, with pleasure.  He filled them, and I took them with\nme.  I couldn't venture to tell him that the miller-gun was a\nlittle invention of my own, and that I had officially ordered that\nevery shopkeeper in the kingdom keep them on hand and sell them\nat government price--which was the merest trifle, and the shopkeeper\ngot that, not the government.  We furnished them for nothing.\n\nThe king had hardly missed us when we got back at nightfall.  He\nhad early dropped again into his dream of a grand invasion of Gaul\nwith the whole strength of his kingdom at his back, and the afternoon\nhad slipped away without his ever coming to himself again.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\n\nDOWLEY'S HUMILIATION\n\nWell, when that cargo arrived toward sunset, Saturday afternoon,\nI had my hands full to keep the Marcos from fainting.  They were\nsure Jones and I were ruined past help, and they blamed themselves\nas accessories to this bankruptcy.  You see, in addition to the\ndinner-materials, which called for a sufficiently round sum,\nI had bought a lot of extras for the future comfort of the family:\nfor instance, a big lot of wheat, a delicacy as rare to the tables\nof their class as was ice-cream to a hermit's; also a sizeable\ndeal dinner-table; also two entire pounds of salt, which was\nanother piece of extravagance in those people's eyes; also crockery,\nstools, the clothes, a small cask of beer, and so on.  I instructed\nthe Marcos to keep quiet about this sumptuousness, so as to give\nme a chance to surprise the guests and show off a little.  Concerning\nthe new clothes, the simple couple were like children; they were up\nand down, all night, to see if it wasn't nearly daylight, so that\nthey could put them on, and they were into them at last as much\nas an hour before dawn was due.  Then their pleasure--not to say\ndelirium--was so fresh and novel and inspiring that the sight of it\npaid me well for the interruptions which my sleep had suffered.\nThe king had slept just as usual--like the dead.  The Marcos could\nnot thank him for their clothes, that being forbidden; but they\ntried every way they could think of to make him see how grateful\nthey were.  Which all went for nothing: he didn't notice any change.\n\nIt turned out to be one of those rich and rare fall days which is\njust a June day toned down to a degree where it is heaven to be\nout of doors.  Toward noon the guests arrived, and we assembled\nunder a great tree and were soon as sociable as old acquaintances.\nEven the king's reserve melted a little, though it was some little\ntrouble to him to adjust himself to the name of Jones along at\nfirst.  I had asked him to try to not forget that he was a farmer;\nbut I had also considered it prudent to ask him to let the thing\nstand at that, and not elaborate it any.  Because he was just the\nkind of person you could depend on to spoil a little thing like\nthat if you didn't warn him, his tongue was so handy, and his\nspirit so willing, and his information so uncertain.\n\nDowley was in fine feather, and I early got him started, and then\nadroitly worked him around onto his own history for a text and\nhimself for a hero, and then it was good to sit there and hear him\nhum.  Self-made man, you know.  They know how to talk.  They do\ndeserve more credit than any other breed of men, yes, that is true;\nand they are among the very first to find it out, too.  He told how\nhe had begun life an orphan lad without money and without friends\nable to help him; how he had lived as the slaves of the meanest\nmaster lived; how his day's work was from sixteen to eighteen hours\nlong, and yielded him only enough black bread to keep him in a\nhalf-fed condition; how his faithful endeavors finally attracted\nthe attention of a good blacksmith, who came near knocking him\ndead with kindness by suddenly offering, when he was totally\nunprepared, to take him as his bound apprentice for nine years\nand give him board and clothes and teach him the trade--or \"mystery\"\nas Dowley called it.  That was his first great rise, his first\ngorgeous stroke of fortune; and you saw that he couldn't yet speak\nof it without a sort of eloquent wonder and delight that such a\ngilded promotion should have fallen to the lot of a common human\nbeing.  He got no new clothing during his apprenticeship, but on\nhis graduation day his master tricked him out in spang-new tow-linens\nand made him feel unspeakably rich and fine.\n\n\"I remember me of that day!\" the wheelwright sang out, with\nenthusiasm.\n\n\"And I likewise!\" cried the mason.  \"I would not believe they\nwere thine own; in faith I could not.\"\n\n\"Nor other!\" shouted Dowley, with sparkling eyes.  \"I was like\nto lose my character, the neighbors wending I had mayhap been\nstealing.  It was a great day, a great day; one forgetteth not\ndays like that.\"\n\nYes, and his master was a fine man, and prosperous, and always\nhad a great feast of meat twice in the year, and with it white\nbread, true wheaten bread; in fact, lived like a lord, so to speak.\nAnd in time Dowley succeeded to the business and married the daughter.\n\n\"And now consider what is come to pass,\" said he, impressively.\n\"Two times in every month there is fresh meat upon my table.\"\nHe made a pause here, to let that fact sink home, then added\n--\"and eight times salt meat.\"\n\n\"It is even true,\" said the wheelwright, with bated breath.\n\n\"I know it of mine own knowledge,\" said the mason, in the same\nreverent fashion.\n\n\"On my table appeareth white bread every Sunday in the year,\"\nadded the master smith, with solemnity.  \"I leave it to your own\nconsciences, friends, if this is not also true?\"\n\n\"By my head, yes,\" cried the mason.\n\n\"I can testify it--and I do,\" said the wheelwright.\n\n\"And as to furniture, ye shall say yourselves what mine equipment\nis.\"  He waved his hand in fine gesture of granting frank and\nunhampered freedom of speech, and added: \"Speak as ye are moved;\nspeak as ye would speak; an I were not here.\"\n\n\"Ye have five stools, and of the sweetest workmanship at that, albeit\nyour family is but three,\" said the wheelwright, with deep respect.\n\n\"And six wooden goblets, and six platters of wood and two of pewter\nto eat and drink from withal,\" said the mason, impressively.  \"And\nI say it as knowing God is my judge, and we tarry not here alway,\nbut must answer at the last day for the things said in the body,\nbe they false or be they sooth.\"\n\n\"Now ye know what manner of man I am, brother Jones,\" said the\nsmith, with a fine and friendly condescension, \"and doubtless ye\nwould look to find me a man jealous of his due of respect and\nbut sparing of outgo to strangers till their rating and quality be\nassured, but trouble yourself not, as concerning that; wit ye well\nye shall find me a man that regardeth not these matters but is\nwilling to receive any he as his fellow and equal that carrieth\na right heart in his body, be his worldly estate howsoever modest.\nAnd in token of it, here is my hand; and I say with my own mouth\nwe are equals--equals\"--and he smiled around on the company with\nthe satisfaction of a god who is doing the handsome and gracious\nthing and is quite well aware of it.\n\nThe king took the hand with a poorly disguised reluctance, and\nlet go of it as willingly as a lady lets go of a fish; all of which\nhad a good effect, for it was mistaken for an embarrassment natural\nto one who was being called upon by greatness.\n\nThe dame brought out the table now, and set it under the tree.\nIt caused a visible stir of surprise, it being brand new and a\nsumptuous article of deal.  But the surprise rose higher still\nwhen the dame, with a body oozing easy indifference at every pore,\nbut eyes that gave it all away by absolutely flaming with vanity,\nslowly unfolded an actual simon-pure tablecloth and spread it.\nThat was a notch above even the blacksmith's domestic grandeurs,\nand it hit him hard; you could see it.  But Marco was in Paradise;\nyou could see that, too.  Then the dame brought two fine new\nstools--whew! that was a sensation; it was visible in the eyes of\nevery guest.  Then she brought two more--as calmly as she could.\nSensation again--with awed murmurs.  Again she brought two\n--walking on air, she was so proud.  The guests were petrified, and\nthe mason muttered:\n\n\"There is that about earthly pomps which doth ever move to reverence.\"\n\nAs the dame turned away, Marco couldn't help slapping on the climax\nwhile the thing was hot; so he said with what was meant for a\nlanguid composure but was a poor imitation of it:\n\n\"These suffice; leave the rest.\"\n\nSo there were more yet!  It was a fine effect.  I couldn't have\nplayed the hand better myself.\n\nFrom this out, the madam piled up the surprises with a rush that\nfired the general astonishment up to a hundred and fifty in the\nshade, and at the same time paralyzed expression of it down to\ngasped \"Oh's\" and \"Ah's,\" and mute upliftings of hands and eyes.\nShe fetched crockery--new, and plenty of it; new wooden goblets\nand other table furniture; and beer, fish, chicken, a goose, eggs,\nroast beef, roast mutton, a ham, a small roast pig, and a wealth\nof genuine white wheaten bread.  Take it by and large, that spread\nlaid everything far and away in the shade that ever that crowd had\nseen before.  And while they sat there just simply stupefied with\nwonder and awe, I sort of waved my hand as if by accident, and\nthe storekeeper's son emerged from space and said he had come\nto collect.\n\n\"That's all right,\" I said, indifferently.  \"What is the amount?\ngive us the items.\"\n\nThen he read off this bill, while those three amazed men listened,\nand serene waves of satisfaction rolled over my soul and alternate\nwaves of terror and admiration surged over Marco's:\n\n   2 pounds salt . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   200\n   8 dozen pints beer, in the wood . . . . .   800\n   3 bushels wheat . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,700\n   2 pounds fish . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   100\n   3 hens  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   400\n   1 goose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   400\n   3 dozen eggs  . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   150\n   1 roast of beef . . . . . . . . . . . . .   450\n   1 roast of mutton . . . . . . . . . . . .   400\n   1 ham . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   800\n   1 sucking pig . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   500\n   2 crockery dinner sets  . . . . . . . . . 6,000\n   2 men's suits and underwear . . . . . . . 2,800\n   1 stuff and 1 linsey-woolsey gown\n     and underwear . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,600\n   8 wooden goblets  . . . . . . . . . . . .   800\n   Various table furniture . . . . . . . . .10,000\n   1 deal table  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,000\n   8 stools  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,000\n   2 miller guns, loaded . . . . . . . . . . 3,000\n\nHe ceased.  There was a pale and awful silence.  Not a limb stirred.\nNot a nostril betrayed the passage of breath.\n\n\"Is that all?\" I asked, in a voice of the most perfect calmness.\n\n\"All, fair sir, save that certain matters of light moment are\nplaced together under a head hight sundries.  If it would like\nyou, I will sepa--\"\n\n\"It is of no consequence,\" I said, accompanying the words with\na gesture of the most utter indifference; \"give me the grand\ntotal, please.\"\n\nThe clerk leaned against the tree to stay himself, and said:\n\n\"Thirty-nine thousand one hundred and fifty milrays!\"\n\nThe wheelwright fell off his stool, the others grabbed the table\nto save themselves, and there was a deep and general ejaculation of:\n\n\"God be with us in the day of disaster!\"\n\nThe clerk hastened to say:\n\n\"My father chargeth me to say he cannot honorably require you\nto pay it all at this time, and therefore only prayeth you--\"\n\nI paid no more heed than if it were the idle breeze, but, with an\nair of indifference amounting almost to weariness, got out my money\nand tossed four dollars on to the table.  Ah, you should have seen\nthem stare!\n\nThe clerk was astonished and charmed.  He asked me to retain\none of the dollars as security, until he could go to town and\n--I interrupted:\n\n\"What, and fetch back nine cents?  Nonsense!  Take the whole.\nKeep the change.\"\n\nThere was an amazed murmur to this effect:\n\n\"Verily this being is _made_ of money!  He throweth it away even\nas if it were dirt.\"\n\nThe blacksmith was a crushed man.\n\nThe clerk took his money and reeled away drunk with fortune.  I said\nto Marco and his wife:\n\n\"Good folk, here is a little trifle for you\"--handing the miller-guns\nas if it were a matter of no consequence, though each of them\ncontained fifteen cents in solid cash; and while the poor creatures\nwent to pieces with astonishment and gratitude, I turned to the\nothers and said as calmly as one would ask the time of day:\n\n\"Well, if we are all ready, I judge the dinner is.  Come, fall to.\"\n\nAh, well, it was immense; yes, it was a daisy.  I don't know that\nI ever put a situation together better, or got happier spectacular\neffects out of the materials available.  The blacksmith--well, he\nwas simply mashed.  Land! I wouldn't have felt what that man was\nfeeling, for anything in the world.  Here he had been blowing and\nbragging about his grand meat-feast twice a year, and his fresh\nmeat twice a month, and his salt meat twice a week, and his white\nbread every Sunday the year round--all for a family of three; the\nentire cost for the year not above 69.2.6 (sixty-nine cents, two\nmills and six milrays), and all of a sudden here comes along a man\nwho slashes out nearly four dollars on a single blow-out; and not\nonly that, but acts as if it made him tired to handle such small\nsums.  Yes, Dowley was a good deal wilted, and shrunk-up and\ncollapsed; he had the aspect of a bladder-balloon that's been\nstepped on by a cow.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIII\n\nSIXTH CENTURY POLITICAL ECONOMY\n\nHowever, I made a dead set at him, and before the first third\nof the dinner was reached, I had him happy again.  It was easy\nto do--in a country of ranks and castes.  You see, in a country\nwhere they have ranks and castes, a man isn't ever a man, he is\nonly part of a man, he can't ever get his full growth.  You prove\nyour superiority over him in station, or rank, or fortune, and\nthat's the end of it--he knuckles down.  You can't insult him\nafter that.  No, I don't mean quite that; of course you _can_ insult\nhim, I only mean it's difficult; and so, unless you've got a lot\nof useless time on your hands it doesn't pay to try.  I had the\nsmith's reverence now, because I was apparently immensely prosperous\nand rich; I could have had his adoration if I had had some little\ngimcrack title of nobility.  And not only his, but any commoner's\nin the land, though he were the mightiest production of all the ages,\nin intellect, worth, and character, and I bankrupt in all three.\nThis was to remain so, as long as England should exist in the\nearth.  With the spirit of prophecy upon me, I could look into\nthe future and see her erect statues and monuments to her unspeakable\nGeorges and other royal and noble clothes-horses, and leave unhonored\nthe creators of this world--after God--Gutenburg, Watt, Arkwright,\nWhitney, Morse, Stephenson, Bell.\n\nThe king got his cargo aboard, and then, the talk not turning upon\nbattle, conquest, or iron-clad duel, he dulled down to drowsiness\nand went off to take a nap.  Mrs. Marco cleared the table, placed\nthe beer keg handy, and went away to eat her dinner of leavings\nin humble privacy, and the rest of us soon drifted into matters\nnear and dear to the hearts of our sort--business and wages,\nof course.  At a first glance, things appeared to be exceeding\nprosperous in this little tributary kingdom--whose lord was\nKing Bagdemagus--as compared with the state of things in my own\nregion.  They had the \"protection\" system in full force here,\nwhereas we were working along down toward free-trade, by easy\nstages, and were now about half way.  Before long, Dowley and I\nwere doing all the talking, the others hungrily listening.  Dowley\nwarmed to his work, snuffed an advantage in the air, and began\nto put questions which he considered pretty awkward ones for me,\nand they did have something of that look:\n\n\"In your country, brother, what is the wage of a master bailiff,\nmaster hind, carter, shepherd, swineherd?\"\n\n\"Twenty-five milrays a day; that is to say, a quarter of a cent.\"\n\nThe smith's face beamed with joy.  He said:\n\n\"With us they are allowed the double of it!  And what may a mechanic\nget--carpenter, dauber, mason, painter, blacksmith, wheelwright,\nand the like?\"\n\n\"On the average, fifty milrays; half a cent a day.\"\n\n\"Ho-ho!  With us they are allowed a hundred!  With us any good\nmechanic is allowed a cent a day!  I count out the tailor, but\nnot the others--they are all allowed a cent a day, and in driving\ntimes they get more--yes, up to a hundred and ten and even fifteen\nmilrays a day.  I've paid a hundred and fifteen myself, within\nthe week.  'Rah for protection--to Sheol with free-trade!\"\n\nAnd his face shone upon the company like a sunburst.  But I didn't\nscare at all.  I rigged up my pile-driver, and allowed myself\nfifteen minutes to drive him into the earth--drive him _all_ in\n--drive him in till not even the curve of his skull should show\nabove ground.  Here is the way I started in on him.  I asked:\n\n\"What do you pay a pound for salt?\"\n\n\"A hundred milrays.\"\n\n\"We pay forty.  What do you pay for beef and mutton--when you\nbuy it?\"  That was a neat hit; it made the color come.\n\n\"It varieth somewhat, but not much; one may say seventy-five milrays\nthe pound.\"\n\n\"_We_ pay thirty-three.  What do you pay for eggs?\"\n\n\"Fifty milrays the dozen.\"\n\n\"We pay twenty.  What do you pay for beer?\"\n\n\"It costeth us eight and one-half milrays the pint.\"\n\n\"We get it for four; twenty-five bottles for a cent.\nWhat do you pay for wheat?\"\n\n\"At the rate of nine hundred milrays the bushel.\"\n\n\"We pay four hundred.  What do you pay for a man's tow-linen suit?\"\n\n\"Thirteen cents.\"\n\n\"We pay six.  What do you pay for a stuff gown for the wife of the\nlaborer or the mechanic?\"\n\n\"We pay eight cents, four mills.\"\n\n\"Well, observe the difference: you pay eight cents and four mills,\nwe pay only four cents.\"  I prepared now to sock it to him.  I said:\n\"Look here, dear friend, _what's become of your high wages you\nwere bragging so about a few minutes ago?_\"--and I looked around\non the company with placid satisfaction, for I had slipped up\non him gradually and tied him hand and foot, you see, without his\never noticing that he was being tied at all.  \"What's become of\nthose noble high wages of yours?--I seem to have knocked the\nstuffing all out of them, it appears to me.\"\n\nBut if you will believe me, he merely looked surprised, that\nis all! he didn't grasp the situation at all, didn't know he had\nwalked into a trap, didn't discover that he was _in_ a trap.  I could\nhave shot him, from sheer vexation.  With cloudy eye and a struggling\nintellect he fetched this out:\n\n\"Marry, I seem not to understand.  It is _proved_ that our wages\nbe double thine; how then may it be that thou'st knocked therefrom\nthe stuffing?--an miscall not the wonderly word, this being the\nfirst time under grace and providence of God it hath been granted\nme to hear it.\"\n\nWell, I was stunned; partly with this unlooked-for stupidity on\nhis part, and partly because his fellows so manifestly sided with\nhim and were of his mind--if you might call it mind.  My position\nwas simple enough, plain enough; how could it ever be simplified\nmore?  However, I must try:\n\n\"Why, look here, brother Dowley, don't you see?  Your wages are\nmerely higher than ours in _name_, not in _fact_.\"\n\n\"Hear him!  They are the _double_--ye have confessed it yourself.\"\n\n\"Yes-yes, I don't deny that at all.  But that's got nothing to do\nwith it; the _amount_ of the wages in mere coins, with meaningless\nnames attached to them to know them by, has got nothing to do\nwith it.  The thing is, how much can you _buy_ with your wages?\n--that's the idea.  While it is true that with you a good mechanic\nis allowed about three dollars and a half a year, and with us only\nabout a dollar and seventy-five--\"\n\n\"There--ye're confessing it again, ye're confessing it again!\"\n\n\"Confound it, I've never denied it, I tell you!  What I say is\nthis.  With us _half_ a dollar buys more than a _dollar_ buys\nwith you--and THEREFORE it stands to reason and the commonest\nkind of common-sense, that our wages are _higher_ than yours.\"\n\nHe looked dazed, and said, despairingly:\n\n\"Verily, I cannot make it out.  Ye've just said ours are the\nhigher, and with the same breath ye take it back.\"\n\n\"Oh, great Scott, isn't it possible to get such a simple thing\nthrough your head?  Now look here--let me illustrate.  We pay\nfour cents for a woman's stuff gown, you pay 8.4.0, which is\nfour mills more than _double_.  What do you allow a laboring\nwoman who works on a farm?\"\n\n\"Two mills a day.\"\n\n\"Very good; we allow but half as much; we pay her only a tenth\nof a cent a day; and--\"\n\n\"Again ye're conf--\"\n\n\"Wait!  Now, you see, the thing is very simple; this time you'll\nunderstand it.  For instance, it takes your woman 42 days to earn\nher gown, at 2 mills a day--7 weeks' work; but ours earns hers\nin forty days--two days _short_ of 7 weeks.  Your woman has a gown,\nand her whole seven weeks wages are gone; ours has a gown, and\ntwo days' wages left, to buy something else with.  There--_now_\nyou understand it!\"\n\nHe looked--well, he merely looked dubious, it's the most I can say;\nso did the others.  I waited--to let the thing work.  Dowley spoke\nat last--and betrayed the fact that he actually hadn't gotten away\nfrom his rooted and grounded superstitions yet.  He said, with\na trifle of hesitancy:\n\n\"But--but--ye cannot fail to grant that two mills a day is better\nthan one.\"\n\nShucks!  Well, of course, I hated to give it up.  So I chanced\nanother flyer:\n\n\"Let us suppose a case.  Suppose one of your journeymen goes out\nand buys the following articles:\n\n  \"1 pound of salt;\n   1 dozen eggs;\n   1 dozen pints of beer;\n   1 bushel of wheat;\n   1 tow-linen suit;\n   5 pounds of beef;\n   5 pounds of mutton.\n\n\"The lot will cost him 32 cents.  It takes him 32 working days\nto earn the money--5 weeks and 2 days.  Let him come to us and\nwork 32 days at _half_ the wages; he can buy all those things for\na shade under 14 1/2 cents; they will cost him a shade under 29\ndays' work, and he will have about half a week's wages over.  Carry\nit through the year; he would save nearly a week's wages every\ntwo months, _your_ man nothing; thus saving five or six weeks' wages\nin a year, your man not a cent.  _Now_ I reckon you understand that\n'high wages' and 'low wages' are phrases that don't mean anything\nin the world until you find out which of them will _buy_ the most!\"\n\nIt was a crusher.\n\nBut, alas! it didn't crush.  No, I had to give it up.  What those\npeople valued was _high wages_; it didn't seem to be a matter of\nany consequence to them whether the high wages would buy anything\nor not.  They stood for \"protection,\" and swore by it, which was\nreasonable enough, because interested parties had gulled them into\nthe notion that it was protection which had created their high\nwages.  I proved to them that in a quarter of a century their wages\nhad advanced but 30 per cent., while the cost of living had gone\nup 100; and that with us, in a shorter time, wages had advanced\n40 per cent. while the cost of living had gone steadily down.  But\nit didn't do any good.  Nothing could unseat their strange beliefs.\n\nWell, I was smarting under a sense of defeat.  Undeserved defeat,\nbut what of that?  That didn't soften the smart any.  And to think\nof the circumstances! the first statesman of the age, the capablest\nman, the best-informed man in the entire world, the loftiest\nuncrowned head that had moved through the clouds of any political\nfirmament for centuries, sitting here apparently defeated in\nargument by an ignorant country blacksmith!  And I could see that\nthose others were sorry for me--which made me blush till I could\nsmell my whiskers scorching.  Put yourself in my place; feel as mean\nas I did, as ashamed as I felt--wouldn't _you_ have struck below the\nbelt to get even?  Yes, you would; it is simply human nature.\nWell, that is what I did.  I am not trying to justify it; I'm only\nsaying that I was mad, and _anybody_ would have done it.\n\nWell, when I make up my mind to hit a man, I don't plan out\na love-tap; no, that isn't my way; as long as I'm going to hit him\nat all, I'm going to hit him a lifter.  And I don't jump at him\nall of a sudden, and risk making a blundering half-way business\nof it; no, I get away off yonder to one side, and work up on him\ngradually, so that he never suspects that I'm going to hit him\nat all; and by and by, all in a flash, he's flat on his back, and\nhe can't tell for the life of him how it all happened.  That is\nthe way I went for brother Dowley.  I started to talking lazy and\ncomfortable, as if I was just talking to pass the time; and the\noldest man in the world couldn't have taken the bearings of my\nstarting place and guessed where I was going to fetch up:\n\n\"Boys, there's a good many curious things about law, and custom,\nand usage, and all that sort of thing, when you come to look at it;\nyes, and about the drift and progress of human opinion and movement,\ntoo.  There are written laws--they perish; but there are also\nunwritten laws--_they_ are eternal.  Take the unwritten law of wages:\nit says they've got to advance, little by little, straight through\nthe centuries.  And notice how it works.  We know what wages are\nnow, here and there and yonder; we strike an average, and say that's\nthe wages of to-day.  We know what the wages were a hundred years\nago, and what they were two hundred years ago; that's as far back\nas we can get, but it suffices to give us the law of progress,\nthe measure and rate of the periodical augmentation; and so, without\na document to help us, we can come pretty close to determining\nwhat the wages were three and four and five hundred years ago.\nGood, so far.  Do we stop there?  No.  We stop looking backward;\nwe face around and apply the law to the future.  My friends, I can\ntell you what people's wages are going to be at any date in the\nfuture you want to know, for hundreds and hundreds of years.\"\n\n\"What, goodman, what!\"\n\n\"Yes.  In seven hundred years wages will have risen to six times\nwhat they are now, here in your region, and farm hands will be\nallowed 3 cents a day, and mechanics 6.\"\n\n\"I would't I might die now and live then!\" interrupted Smug, the\nwheelwright, with a fine avaricious glow in his eye.\n\n\"And that isn't all; they'll get their board besides--such as it is:\nit won't bloat them.  Two hundred and fifty years later--pay attention\nnow--a mechanic's wages will be--mind you, this is law, not\nguesswork; a mechanic's wages will then be _twenty_ cents a day!\"\n\nThere was a general gasp of awed astonishment, Dickon the mason\nmurmured, with raised eyes and hands:\n\n\"More than three weeks' pay for one day's work!\"\n\n\"Riches!--of a truth, yes, riches!\" muttered Marco, his breath\ncoming quick and short, with excitement.\n\n\"Wages will keep on rising, little by little, little by little,\nas steadily as a tree grows, and at the end of three hundred and\nforty years more there'll be at least _one_ country where the\nmechanic's average wage will be _two hundred_ cents a day!\"\n\nIt knocked them absolutely dumb!  Not a man of them could get\nhis breath for upwards of two minutes.  Then the coal-burner\nsaid prayerfully:\n\n\"Might I but live to see it!\"\n\n\"It is the income of an earl!\" said Smug.\n\n\"An earl, say ye?\" said Dowley; \"ye could say more than that and\nspeak no lie; there's no earl in the realm of Bagdemagus that hath\nan income like to that.  Income of an earl--mf! it's the income\nof an angel!\"\n\n\"Now, then, that is what is going to happen as regards wages.\nIn that remote day, that man will earn, with _one_ week's work,\nthat bill of goods which it takes you upwards of _fifty_ weeks to\nearn now.  Some other pretty surprising things are going to happen,\ntoo.  Brother Dowley, who is it that determines, every spring,\nwhat the particular wage of each kind of mechanic, laborer, and\nservant shall be for that year?\"\n\n\"Sometimes the courts, sometimes the town council; but most of all,\nthe magistrate.  Ye may say, in general terms, it is the magistrate\nthat fixes the wages.\"\n\n\"Doesn't ask any of those poor devils to _help_ him fix their wages\nfor them, does he?\"\n\n\"Hm!  That _were_ an idea!  The master that's to pay him the money\nis the one that's rightly concerned in that matter, ye will notice.\"\n\n\"Yes--but I thought the other man might have some little trifle\nat stake in it, too; and even his wife and children, poor creatures.\nThe masters are these: nobles, rich men, the prosperous generally.\nThese few, who do no work, determine what pay the vast hive shall\nhave who _do_ work.  You see?  They're a 'combine'--a trade union,\nto coin a new phrase--who band themselves together to force their\nlowly brother to take what they choose to give.  Thirteen hundred\nyears hence--so says the unwritten law--the 'combine' will be the\nother way, and then how these fine people's posterity will fume\nand fret and grit their teeth over the insolent tyranny of trade\nunions!  Yes, indeed! the magistrate will tranquilly arrange the\nwages from now clear away down into the nineteenth century; and\nthen all of a sudden the wage-earner will consider that a couple\nof thousand years or so is enough of this one-sided sort of thing;\nand he will rise up and take a hand in fixing his wages himself.\nAh, he will have a long and bitter account of wrong and humiliation\nto settle.\"\n\n\"Do ye believe--\"\n\n\"That he actually will help to fix his own wages?  Yes, indeed.\nAnd he will be strong and able, then.\"\n\n\"Brave times, brave times, of a truth!\" sneered the prosperous smith.\n\n\"Oh,--and there's another detail.  In that day, a master may hire\na man for only just one day, or one week, or one month at a time,\nif he wants to.\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"It's true.  Moreover, a magistrate won't be able to force a man\nto work for a master a whole year on a stretch whether the man\nwants to or not.\"\n\n\"Will there be _no_ law or sense in that day?\"\n\n\"Both of them, Dowley.  In that day a man will be his own property,\nnot the property of magistrate and master.  And he can leave town\nwhenever he wants to, if the wages don't suit him!--and they can't\nput him in the pillory for it.\"\n\n\"Perdition catch such an age!\" shouted Dowley, in strong indignation.\n\"An age of dogs, an age barren of reverence for superiors and\nrespect for authority!  The pillory--\"\n\n\"Oh, wait, brother; say no good word for that institution.  I think\nthe pillory ought to be abolished.\"\n\n\"A most strange idea.  Why?\"\n\n\"Well, I'll tell you why.  Is a man ever put in the pillory for\na capital crime?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Is it right to condemn a man to a slight punishment for a small\noffense and then kill him?\"\n\nThere was no answer.  I had scored my first point!  For the first\ntime, the smith wasn't up and ready.  The company noticed it.\nGood effect.\n\n\"You don't answer, brother.  You were about to glorify the pillory\na while ago, and shed some pity on a future age that isn't going\nto use it.  I think the pillory ought to be abolished.  What\nusually happens when a poor fellow is put in the pillory for some\nlittle offense that didn't amount to anything in the world?  The\nmob try to have some fun with him, don't they?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"They begin by clodding him; and they laugh themselves to pieces\nto see him try to dodge one clod and get hit with another?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Then they throw dead cats at him, don't they?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Well, then, suppose he has a few personal enemies in that mob\nand here and there a man or a woman with a secret grudge against\nhim--and suppose especially that he is unpopular in the community,\nfor his pride, or his prosperity, or one thing or another--stones\nand bricks take the place of clods and cats presently, don't they?\"\n\n\"There is no doubt of it.\"\n\n\"As a rule he is crippled for life, isn't he?--jaws broken, teeth\nsmashed out?--or legs mutilated, gangrened, presently cut off?\n--or an eye knocked out, maybe both eyes?\"\n\n\"It is true, God knoweth it.\"\n\n\"And if he is unpopular he can depend on _dying_, right there in\nthe stocks, can't he?\"\n\n\"He surely can!  One may not deny it.\"\n\n\"I take it none of _you_ are unpopular--by reason of pride or\ninsolence, or conspicuous prosperity, or any of those things that\nexcite envy and malice among the base scum of a village?  _You_\nwouldn't think it much of a risk to take a chance in the stocks?\"\n\nDowley winced, visibly.  I judged he was hit.  But he didn't betray\nit by any spoken word.  As for the others, they spoke out plainly,\nand with strong feeling.  They said they had seen enough of the\nstocks to know what a man's chance in them was, and they would\nnever consent to enter them if they could compromise on a quick\ndeath by hanging.\n\n\"Well, to change the subject--for I think I've established my\npoint that the stocks ought to be abolished.  I think some of our\nlaws are pretty unfair.  For instance, if I do a thing which ought\nto deliver me to the stocks, and you know I did it and yet keep\nstill and don't report me, _you_ will get the stocks if anybody\ninforms on you.\"\n\n\"Ah, but that would serve you but right,\" said Dowley, \"for you\n_must_ inform.  So saith the law.\"\n\nThe others coincided.\n\n\"Well, all right, let it go, since you vote me down.  But there's\none thing which certainly isn't fair.  The magistrate fixes a\nmechanic's wage at one cent a day, for instance.  The law says that\nif any master shall venture, even under utmost press of business,\nto pay anything _over_ that cent a day, even for a single day, he\nshall be both fined and pilloried for it; and whoever knows he did\nit and doesn't inform, they also shall be fined and pilloried.  Now\nit seems to me unfair, Dowley, and a deadly peril to all of us,\nthat because you thoughtlessly confessed, a while ago, that within\na week you have paid a cent and fifteen mil--\"\n\nOh, I tell _you_ it was a smasher!  You ought to have seen them to\ngo to pieces, the whole gang.  I had just slipped up on poor\nsmiling and complacent Dowley so nice and easy and softly, that\nhe never suspected anything was going to happen till the blow\ncame crashing down and knocked him all to rags.\n\nA fine effect.  In fact, as fine as any I ever produced, with so\nlittle time to work it up in.\n\nBut I saw in a moment that I had overdone the thing a little.\nI was expecting to scare them, but I wasn't expecting to scare\nthem to death.  They were mighty near it, though.  You see they\nhad been a whole lifetime learning to appreciate the pillory; and\nto have that thing staring them in the face, and every one of them\ndistinctly at the mercy of me, a stranger, if I chose to go and\nreport--well, it was awful, and they couldn't seem to recover\nfrom the shock, they couldn't seem to pull themselves together.\nPale, shaky, dumb, pitiful?  Why, they weren't any better than\nso many dead men.  It was very uncomfortable.  Of course, I thought\nthey would appeal to me to keep mum, and then we would shake hands,\nand take a drink all round, and laugh it off, and there an end.\nBut no; you see I was an unknown person, among a cruelly oppressed\nand suspicious people, a people always accustomed to having advantage\ntaken of their helplessness, and never expecting just or kind\ntreatment from any but their own families and very closest intimates.\nAppeal to _me_ to be gentle, to be fair, to be generous?  Of course,\nthey wanted to, but they couldn't dare.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIV\n\nTHE YANKEE AND THE KING SOLD AS SLAVES\n\nWell, what had I better do?  Nothing in a hurry, sure.  I must\nget up a diversion; anything to employ me while I could think,\nand while these poor fellows could have a chance to come to life\nagain.  There sat Marco, petrified in the act of trying to get\nthe hang of his miller-gun--turned to stone, just in the attitude\nhe was in when my pile-driver fell, the toy still gripped in his\nunconscious fingers.  So I took it from him and proposed to explain\nits mystery.  Mystery! a simple little thing like that; and yet it\nwas mysterious enough, for that race and that age.\n\nI never saw such an awkward people, with machinery; you see, they\nwere totally unused to it.  The miller-gun was a little double-barreled\ntube of toughened glass, with a neat little trick of a spring\nto it, which upon pressure would let a shot escape.  But the shot\nwouldn't hurt anybody, it would only drop into your hand.  In the\ngun were two sizes--wee mustard-seed shot, and another sort that\nwere several times larger.  They were money.  The mustard-seed\nshot represented milrays, the larger ones mills.  So the gun was\na purse; and very handy, too; you could pay out money in the dark\nwith it, with accuracy; and you could carry it in your mouth; or\nin your vest pocket, if you had one.  I made them of several sizes\n--one size so large that it would carry the equivalent of a dollar.\nUsing shot for money was a good thing for the government; the metal\ncost nothing, and the money couldn't be counterfeited, for I was\nthe only person in the kingdom who knew how to manage a shot tower.\n\"Paying the shot\" soon came to be a common phrase.  Yes, and I knew\nit would still be passing men's lips, away down in the nineteenth\ncentury, yet none would suspect how and when it originated.\n\nThe king joined us, about this time, mightily refreshed by his nap,\nand feeling good.  Anything could make me nervous now, I was so\nuneasy--for our lives were in danger; and so it worried me to\ndetect a complacent something in the king's eye which seemed to\nindicate that he had been loading himself up for a performance\nof some kind or other; confound it, why must he go and choose\nsuch a time as this?\n\nI was right.  He began, straight off, in the most innocently\nartful, and transparent, and lubberly way, to lead up to the\nsubject of agriculture.  The cold sweat broke out all over me.\nI wanted to whisper in his ear, \"Man, we are in awful danger!\nevery moment is worth a principality till we get back these men's\nconfidence; _don't_ waste any of this golden time.\"  But of course\nI couldn't do it.  Whisper to him?  It would look as if we were\nconspiring.  So I had to sit there and look calm and pleasant while\nthe king stood over that dynamite mine and mooned along about his\ndamned onions and things.  At first the tumult of my own thoughts,\nsummoned by the danger-signal and swarming to the rescue from\nevery quarter of my skull, kept up such a hurrah and confusion\nand fifing and drumming that I couldn't take in a word; but\npresently when my mob of gathering plans began to crystallize\nand fall into position and form line of battle, a sort of order and\nquiet ensued and I caught the boom of the king's batteries, as if\nout of remote distance:\n\n\"--were not the best way, methinks, albeit it is not to be denied\nthat authorities differ as concerning this point, some contending\nthat the onion is but an unwholesome berry when stricken early\nfrom the tree--\"\n\nThe audience showed signs of life, and sought each other's eyes\nin a surprised and troubled way.\n\n\"--whileas others do yet maintain, with much show of reason, that\nthis is not of necessity the case, instancing that plums and other\nlike cereals do be always dug in the unripe state--\"\n\nThe audience exhibited distinct distress; yes, and also fear.\n\n\"--yet are they clearly wholesome, the more especially when one\ndoth assuage the asperities of their nature by admixture of the\ntranquilizing juice of the wayward cabbage--\"\n\nThe wild light of terror began to glow in these men's eyes, and\none of them muttered, \"These be errors, every one--God hath surely\nsmitten the mind of this farmer.\"  I was in miserable apprehension;\nI sat upon thorns.\n\n\"--and further instancing the known truth that in the case of\nanimals, the young, which may be called the green fruit of the\ncreature, is the better, all confessing that when a goat is ripe,\nhis fur doth heat and sore engame his flesh, the which defect,\ntaken in connection with his several rancid habits, and fulsome\nappetites, and godless attitudes of mind, and bilious quality\nof morals--\"\n\nThey rose and went for him!  With a fierce shout, \"The one would\nbetray us, the other is mad!  Kill them!  Kill them!\" they flung\nthemselves upon us.  What joy flamed up in the king's eye!  He\nmight be lame in agriculture, but this kind of thing was just in\nhis line.  He had been fasting long, he was hungry for a fight.\nHe hit the blacksmith a crack under the jaw that lifted him clear\noff his feet and stretched him flat on his back.  \"St. George for\nBritain!\" and he downed the wheelwright.  The mason was big, but\nI laid him out like nothing.  The three gathered themselves up and\ncame again; went down again; came again; and kept on repeating\nthis, with native British pluck, until they were battered to jelly,\nreeling with exhaustion, and so blind that they couldn't tell us\nfrom each other; and yet they kept right on, hammering away with\nwhat might was left in them.  Hammering each other--for we stepped\naside and looked on while they rolled, and struggled, and gouged,\nand pounded, and bit, with the strict and wordless attention to\nbusiness of so many bulldogs.  We looked on without apprehension,\nfor they were fast getting past ability to go for help against us,\nand the arena was far enough from the public road to be safe\nfrom intrusion.\n\nWell, while they were gradually playing out, it suddenly occurred\nto me to wonder what had become of Marco.  I looked around; he\nwas nowhere to be seen.  Oh, but this was ominous!  I pulled the\nking's sleeve, and we glided away and rushed for the hut.  No Marco\nthere, no Phyllis there!  They had gone to the road for help, sure.\nI told the king to give his heels wings, and I would explain later.\nWe made good time across the open ground, and as we darted into\nthe shelter of the wood I glanced back and saw a mob of excited\npeasants swarm into view, with Marco and his wife at their head.\nThey were making a world of noise, but that couldn't hurt anybody;\nthe wood was dense, and as soon as we were well into its depths\nwe would take to a tree and let them whistle.  Ah, but then came\nanother sound--dogs!  Yes, that was quite another matter.  It\nmagnified our contract--we must find running water.\n\nWe tore along at a good gait, and soon left the sounds far behind\nand modified to a murmur.  We struck a stream and darted into it.\nWe waded swiftly down it, in the dim forest light, for as much\nas three hundred yards, and then came across an oak with a great\nbough sticking out over the water.  We climbed up on this bough,\nand began to work our way along it to the body of the tree; now\nwe began to hear those sounds more plainly; so the mob had struck\nour trail.  For a while the sounds approached pretty fast.  And\nthen for another while they didn't.  No doubt the dogs had found\nthe place where we had entered the stream, and were now waltzing\nup and down the shores trying to pick up the trail again.\n\nWhen we were snugly lodged in the tree and curtained with foliage,\nthe king was satisfied, but I was doubtful.  I believed we could\ncrawl along a branch and get into the next tree, and I judged it\nworth while to try.  We tried it, and made a success of it, though\nthe king slipped, at the junction, and came near failing to connect.\nWe got comfortable lodgment and satisfactory concealment among\nthe foliage, and then we had nothing to do but listen to the hunt.\n\nPresently we heard it coming--and coming on the jump, too; yes,\nand down both sides of the stream.  Louder--louder--next minute\nit swelled swiftly up into a roar of shoutings, barkings, tramplings,\nand swept by like a cyclone.\n\n\"I was afraid that the overhanging branch would suggest something\nto them,\" said I, \"but I don't mind the disappointment.  Come,\nmy liege, it were well that we make good use of our time.  We've\nflanked them.  Dark is coming on, presently.  If we can cross the\nstream and get a good start, and borrow a couple of horses from\nsomebody's pasture to use for a few hours, we shall be safe enough.\"\n\nWe started down, and got nearly to the lowest limb, when we seemed\nto hear the hunt returning.  We stopped to listen.\n\n\"Yes,\" said I, \"they're baffled, they've given it up, they're on\ntheir way home.  We will climb back to our roost again, and let\nthem go by.\"\n\nSo we climbed back.  The king listened a moment and said:\n\n\"They still search--I wit the sign.  We did best to abide.\"\n\nHe was right.  He knew more about hunting than I did.  The noise\napproached steadily, but not with a rush.  The king said:\n\n\"They reason that we were advantaged by no parlous start of them,\nand being on foot are as yet no mighty way from where we took\nthe water.\"\n\n\"Yes, sire, that is about it, I am afraid, though I was hoping\nbetter things.\"\n\nThe noise drew nearer and nearer, and soon the van was drifting\nunder us, on both sides of the water.  A voice called a halt from\nthe other bank, and said:\n\n\"An they were so minded, they could get to yon tree by this branch\nthat overhangs, and yet not touch ground.  Ye will do well to send\na man up it.\"\n\n\"Marry, that we will do!\"\n\nI was obliged to admire my cuteness in foreseeing this very thing\nand swapping trees to beat it.  But, don't you know, there are\nsome things that can beat smartness and foresight?  Awkwardness\nand stupidity can.  The best swordsman in the world doesn't need\nto fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person\nfor him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never\nhad a sword in his hand before; he doesn't do the thing he ought\nto do, and so the expert isn't prepared for him; he does the thing\nhe ought not to do; and often it catches the expert out and ends\nhim on the spot.  Well, how could I, with all my gifts, make any\nvaluable preparation against a near-sighted, cross-eyed, pudding-headed\nclown who would aim himself at the wrong tree and hit the right\none?  And that is what he did.  He went for the wrong tree, which\nwas, of course, the right one by mistake, and up he started.\n\nMatters were serious now.  We remained still, and awaited developments.\nThe peasant toiled his difficult way up.  The king raised himself\nup and stood; he made a leg ready, and when the comer's head\narrived in reach of it there was a dull thud, and down went the man\nfloundering to the ground.  There was a wild outbreak of anger\nbelow, and the mob swarmed in from all around, and there we were\ntreed, and prisoners.  Another man started up; the bridging bough\nwas detected, and a volunteer started up the tree that furnished\nthe bridge.  The king ordered me to play Horatius and keep the\nbridge.  For a while the enemy came thick and fast; but no matter,\nthe head man of each procession always got a buffet that dislodged\nhim as soon as he came in reach.  The king's spirits rose, his joy\nwas limitless.  He said that if nothing occurred to mar the prospect\nwe should have a beautiful night, for on this line of tactics we\ncould hold the tree against the whole country-side.\n\nHowever, the mob soon came to that conclusion themselves; wherefore\nthey called off the assault and began to debate other plans.\nThey had no weapons, but there were plenty of stones, and stones\nmight answer.  We had no objections.  A stone might possibly\npenetrate to us once in a while, but it wasn't very likely; we were\nwell protected by boughs and foliage, and were not visible from\nany good aiming point.  If they would but waste half an hour in\nstone-throwing, the dark would come to our help.  We were feeling\nvery well satisfied.  We could smile; almost laugh.\n\nBut we didn't; which was just as well, for we should have been\ninterrupted.  Before the stones had been raging through the leaves\nand bouncing from the boughs fifteen minutes, we began to notice\na smell.  A couple of sniffs of it was enough of an explanation\n--it was smoke!  Our game was up at last.  We recognized that.  When\nsmoke invites you, you have to come.  They raised their pile of\ndry brush and damp weeds higher and higher, and when they saw\nthe thick cloud begin to roll up and smother the tree, they broke\nout in a storm of joy-clamors.  I got enough breath to say:\n\n\"Proceed, my liege; after you is manners.\"\n\nThe king gasped:\n\n\"Follow me down, and then back thyself against one side of the\ntrunk, and leave me the other.  Then will we fight.  Let each pile\nhis dead according to his own fashion and taste.\"\n\nThen he descended, barking and coughing, and I followed.  I struck\nthe ground an instant after him; we sprang to our appointed places,\nand began to give and take with all our might.  The powwow and\nracket were prodigious; it was a tempest of riot and confusion and\nthick-falling blows.  Suddenly some horsemen tore into the midst\nof the crowd, and a voice shouted:\n\n\"Hold--or ye are dead men!\"\n\nHow good it sounded!  The owner of the voice bore all the marks of\na gentleman: picturesque and costly raiment, the aspect of command,\na hard countenance, with complexion and features marred by dissipation.\nThe mob fell humbly back, like so many spaniels.  The gentleman\ninspected us critically, then said sharply to the peasants:\n\n\"What are ye doing to these people?\"\n\n\"They be madmen, worshipful sir, that have come wandering we know\nnot whence, and--\"\n\n\"Ye know not whence?  Do ye pretend ye know them not?\"\n\n\"Most honored sir, we speak but the truth.  They are strangers\nand unknown to any in this region; and they be the most violent\nand bloodthirsty madmen that ever--\"\n\n\"Peace!  Ye know not what ye say.  They are not mad.  Who are ye?\nAnd whence are ye?  Explain.\"\n\n\"We are but peaceful strangers, sir,\" I said, \"and traveling upon\nour own concerns.  We are from a far country, and unacquainted\nhere.  We have purposed no harm; and yet but for your brave\ninterference and protection these people would have killed us.\nAs you have divined, sir, we are not mad; neither are we violent\nor bloodthirsty.\"\n\nThe gentleman turned to his retinue and said calmly: \"Lash me\nthese animals to their kennels!\"\n\nThe mob vanished in an instant; and after them plunged the horsemen,\nlaying about them with their whips and pitilessly riding down such\nas were witless enough to keep the road instead of taking to the\nbush.  The shrieks and supplications presently died away in the\ndistance, and soon the horsemen began to straggle back.  Meantime\nthe gentleman had been questioning us more closely, but had dug\nno particulars out of us.  We were lavish of recognition of the\nservice he was doing us, but we revealed nothing more than that we\nwere friendless strangers from a far country.  When the escort were\nall returned, the gentleman said to one of his servants:\n\n\"Bring the led-horses and mount these people.\"\n\n\"Yes, my lord.\"\n\nWe were placed toward the rear, among the servants.  We traveled\npretty fast, and finally drew rein some time after dark at a\nroadside inn some ten or twelve miles from the scene of our\ntroubles.  My lord went immediately to his room, after ordering\nhis supper, and we saw no more of him.  At dawn in the morning\nwe breakfasted and made ready to start.\n\nMy lord's chief attendant sauntered forward at that moment with\nindolent grace, and said:\n\n\"Ye have said ye should continue upon this road, which is our\ndirection likewise; wherefore my lord, the earl Grip, hath given\ncommandment that ye retain the horses and ride, and that certain\nof us ride with ye a twenty mile to a fair town that hight Cambenet,\nwhenso ye shall be out of peril.\"\n\nWe could do nothing less than express our thanks and accept the\noffer.  We jogged along, six in the party, at a moderate and\ncomfortable gait, and in conversation learned that my lord Grip\nwas a very great personage in his own region, which lay a day's\njourney beyond Cambenet.  We loitered to such a degree that it was\nnear the middle of the forenoon when we entered the market square\nof the town.  We dismounted, and left our thanks once more for\nmy lord, and then approached a crowd assembled in the center of\nthe square, to see what might be the object of interest.  It was the\nremnant of that old peregrinating band of slaves!  So they had\nbeen dragging their chains about, all this weary time.  That poor\nhusband was gone, and also many others; and some few purchases\nhad been added to the gang.  The king was not interested, and\nwanted to move along, but I was absorbed, and full of pity.  I could\nnot take my eyes away from these worn and wasted wrecks of humanity.\nThere they sat, grounded upon the ground, silent, uncomplaining,\nwith bowed heads, a pathetic sight.  And by hideous contrast, a\nredundant orator was making a speech to another gathering not thirty\nsteps away, in fulsome laudation of \"our glorious British liberties!\"\n\nI was boiling.  I had forgotten I was a plebeian, I was remembering\nI was a man.  Cost what it might, I would mount that rostrum and--\n\nClick! the king and I were handcuffed together!  Our companions,\nthose servants, had done it; my lord Grip stood looking on.  The\nking burst out in a fury, and said:\n\n\"What meaneth this ill-mannered jest?\"\n\nMy lord merely said to his head miscreant, coolly:\n\n\"Put up the slaves and sell them!\"\n\n_Slaves!_  The word had a new sound--and how unspeakably awful!  The\nking lifted his manacles and brought them down with a deadly force;\nbut my lord was out of the way when they arrived.  A dozen of\nthe rascal's servants sprang forward, and in a moment we were\nhelpless, with our hands bound behind us.  We so loudly and so\nearnestly proclaimed ourselves freemen, that we got the interested\nattention of that liberty-mouthing orator and his patriotic crowd,\nand they gathered about us and assumed a very determined attitude.\nThe orator said:\n\n\"If, indeed, ye are freemen, ye have nought to fear--the God-given\nliberties of Britain are about ye for your shield and shelter!\n(Applause.)  Ye shall soon see. Bring forth your proofs.\"\n\n\"What proofs?\"\n\n\"Proof that ye are freemen.\"\n\nAh--I remembered!  I came to myself; I said nothing.  But the\nking stormed out:\n\n\"Thou'rt insane, man.  It were better, and more in reason, that\nthis thief and scoundrel here prove that we are _not_ freemen.\"\n\nYou see, he knew his own laws just as other people so often know\nthe laws; by words, not by effects.  They take a _meaning_, and get\nto be very vivid, when you come to apply them to yourself.\n\nAll hands shook their heads and looked disappointed; some turned\naway, no longer interested.  The orator said--and this time in the\ntones of business, not of sentiment:\n\n\"An ye do not know your country's laws, it were time ye learned\nthem.  Ye are strangers to us; ye will not deny that. Ye may be\nfreemen, we do not deny that; but also ye may be slaves.  The law\nis clear: it doth not require the claimant to prove ye are slaves,\nit requireth you to prove ye are not.\"\n\nI said:\n\n\"Dear sir, give us only time to send to Astolat; or give us only\ntime to send to the Valley of Holiness--\"\n\n\"Peace, good man, these are extraordinary requests, and you may\nnot hope to have them granted.  It would cost much time, and would\nunwarrantably inconvenience your master--\"\n\n\"_Master_, idiot!\" stormed the king.  \"I have no master, I myself\nam the m--\"\n\n\"Silence, for God's sake!\"\n\nI got the words out in time to stop the king.  We were in trouble\nenough already; it could not help us any to give these people\nthe notion that we were lunatics.\n\nThere is no use in stringing out the details.  The earl put us up\nand sold us at auction.  This same infernal law had existed in\nour own South in my own time, more than thirteen hundred years\nlater, and under it hundreds of freemen who could not prove that\nthey were freemen had been sold into lifelong slavery without\nthe circumstance making any particular impression upon me; but the\nminute law and the auction block came into my personal experience,\na thing which had been merely improper before became suddenly\nhellish.  Well, that's the way we are made.\n\nYes, we were sold at auction, like swine.  In a big town and an\nactive market we should have brought a good price; but this place\nwas utterly stagnant and so we sold at a figure which makes me\nashamed, every time I think of it.  The King of England brought\nseven dollars, and his prime minister nine; whereas the king was\neasily worth twelve dollars and I as easily worth fifteen.  But\nthat is the way things always go; if you force a sale on a dull\nmarket, I don't care what the property is, you are going to make\na poor business of it, and you can make up your mind to it.  If\nthe earl had had wit enough to--\n\nHowever, there is no occasion for my working my sympathies up\non his account.  Let him go, for the present; I took his number,\nso to speak.\n\nThe slave-dealer bought us both, and hitched us onto that long\nchain of his, and we constituted the rear of his procession.  We\ntook up our line of march and passed out of Cambenet at noon;\nand it seemed to me unaccountably strange and odd that the King\nof England and his chief minister, marching manacled and fettered\nand yoked, in a slave convoy, could move by all manner of idle men\nand women, and under windows where sat the sweet and the lovely,\nand yet never attract a curious eye, never provoke a single remark.\nDear, dear, it only shows that there is nothing diviner about a king\nthan there is about a tramp, after all.  He is just a cheap and\nhollow artificiality when you don't know he is a king.  But reveal\nhis quality, and dear me it takes your very breath away to look\nat him.  I reckon we are all fools. Born so, no doubt.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXV\n\nA PITIFUL INCIDENT\n\nIt's a world of surprises.  The king brooded; this was natural.\nWhat would he brood about, should you say?  Why, about the prodigious\nnature of his fall, of course--from the loftiest place in the world\nto the lowest; from the most illustrious station in the world to\nthe obscurest; from the grandest vocation among men to the basest.\nNo, I take my oath that the thing that graveled him most, to start\nwith, was not this, but the price he had fetched!  He couldn't\nseem to get over that seven dollars.  Well, it stunned me so, when\nI first found it out, that I couldn't believe it; it didn't seem\nnatural.  But as soon as my mental sight cleared and I got a right\nfocus on it, I saw I was mistaken; it _was_ natural.  For this\nreason: a king is a mere artificiality, and so a king's feelings,\nlike the impulses of an automatic doll, are mere artificialities;\nbut as a man, he is a reality, and his feelings, as a man, are\nreal, not phantoms.  It shames the average man to be valued below\nhis own estimate of his worth, and the king certainly wasn't\nanything more than an average man, if he was up that high.\n\nConfound him, he wearied me with arguments to show that in anything\nlike a fair market he would have fetched twenty-five dollars,\nsure--a thing which was plainly nonsense, and full or the baldest\nconceit; I wasn't worth it myself.  But it was tender ground for\nme to argue on.  In fact, I had to simply shirk argument and do\nthe diplomatic instead.  I had to throw conscience aside, and\nbrazenly concede that he ought to have brought twenty-five dollars;\nwhereas I was quite well aware that in all the ages, the world had\nnever seen a king that was worth half the money, and during the\nnext thirteen centuries wouldn't see one that was worth the fourth\nof it.  Yes, he tired me.  If he began to talk about the crops;\nor about the recent weather; or about the condition of politics;\nor about dogs, or cats, or morals, or theology--no matter what\n--I sighed, for I knew what was coming; he was going to get out of it\na palliation of that tiresome seven-dollar sale.  Wherever we\nhalted where there was a crowd, he would give me a look which\nsaid plainly: \"if that thing could be tried over again now, with\nthis kind of folk, you would see a different result.\"  Well, when\nhe was first sold, it secretly tickled me to see him go for seven\ndollars; but before he was done with his sweating and worrying\nI wished he had fetched a hundred.  The thing never got a chance\nto die, for every day, at one place or another, possible purchasers\nlooked us over, and, as often as any other way, their comment on\nthe king was something like this:\n\n\"Here's a two-dollar-and-a-half chump with a thirty-dollar style.\nPity but style was marketable.\"\n\nAt last this sort of remark produced an evil result.  Our owner\nwas a practical person and he perceived that this defect must be\nmended if he hoped to find a purchaser for the king.  So he went\nto work to take the style out of his sacred majesty.  I could have\ngiven the man some valuable advice, but I didn't; you mustn't\nvolunteer advice to a slave-driver unless you want to damage\nthe cause you are arguing for.  I had found it a sufficiently\ndifficult job to reduce the king's style to a peasant's style,\neven when he was a willing and anxious pupil; now then, to undertake\nto reduce the king's style to a slave's style--and by force--go to!\nit was a stately contract.  Never mind the details--it will save me\ntrouble to let you imagine them.  I will only remark that at the\nend of a week there was plenty of evidence that lash and club\nand fist had done their work well; the king's body was a sight\nto see--and to weep over; but his spirit?--why, it wasn't even\nphased.  Even that dull clod of a slave-driver was able to see\nthat there can be such a thing as a slave who will remain a man\ntill he dies; whose bones you can break, but whose manhood you\ncan't.  This man found that from his first effort down to his\nlatest, he couldn't ever come within reach of the king, but the\nking was ready to plunge for him, and did it.  So he gave up\nat last, and left the king in possession of his style unimpaired.\nThe fact is, the king was a good deal more than a king, he was\na man; and when a man is a man, you can't knock it out of him.\n\nWe had a rough time for a month, tramping to and fro in the earth,\nand suffering.  And what Englishman was the most interested in\nthe slavery question by that time?  His grace the king!  Yes; from\nbeing the most indifferent, he was become the most interested.\nHe was become the bitterest hater of the institution I had ever\nheard talk.  And so I ventured to ask once more a question which\nI had asked years before and had gotten such a sharp answer that\nI had not thought it prudent to meddle in the matter further.\nWould he abolish slavery?\n\nHis answer was as sharp as before, but it was music this time;\nI shouldn't ever wish to hear pleasanter, though the profanity\nwas not good, being awkwardly put together, and with the crash-word\nalmost in the middle instead of at the end, where, of course, it\nought to have been.\n\nI was ready and willing to get free now; I hadn't wanted to get\nfree any sooner.  No, I cannot quite say that.  I had wanted to,\nbut I had not been willing to take desperate chances, and had\nalways dissuaded the king from them.  But now--ah, it was a new\natmosphere!  Liberty would be worth any cost that might be put\nupon it now.  I set about a plan, and was straightway charmed\nwith it.  It would require time, yes, and patience, too, a great\ndeal of both.  One could invent quicker ways, and fully as sure\nones; but none that would be as picturesque as this; none that\ncould be made so dramatic.  And so I was not going to give this\none up.  It might delay us months, but no matter, I would carry\nit out or break something.\n\nNow and then we had an adventure.  One night we were overtaken\nby a snow-storm while still a mile from the village we were making\nfor.  Almost instantly we were shut up as in a fog, the driving\nsnow was so thick.  You couldn't see a thing, and we were soon\nlost.  The slave-driver lashed us desperately, for he saw ruin\nbefore him, but his lashings only made matters worse, for they\ndrove us further from the road and from likelihood of succor.\nSo we had to stop at last and slump down in the snow where we\nwere.  The storm continued until toward midnight, then ceased.\nBy this time two of our feebler men and three of our women were\ndead, and others past moving and threatened with death.  Our\nmaster was nearly beside himself.  He stirred up the living, and\nmade us stand, jump, slap ourselves, to restore our circulation,\nand he helped as well as he could with his whip.\n\nNow came a diversion.  We heard shrieks and yells, and soon a\nwoman came running and crying; and seeing our group, she flung\nherself into our midst and begged for protection.  A mob of people\ncame tearing after her, some with torches, and they said she was a\nwitch who had caused several cows to die by a strange disease,\nand practiced her arts by help of a devil in the form of a black\ncat.  This poor woman had been stoned until she hardly looked\nhuman, she was so battered and bloody.  The mob wanted to burn her.\n\nWell, now, what do you suppose our master did?  When we closed\naround this poor creature to shelter her, he saw his chance.  He\nsaid, burn her here, or they shouldn't have her at all.  Imagine\nthat!  They were willing.  They fastened her to a post; they\nbrought wood and piled it about her; they applied the torch while\nshe shrieked and pleaded and strained her two young daughters\nto her breast; and our brute, with a heart solely for business,\nlashed us into position about the stake and warmed us into life\nand commercial value by the same fire which took away the innocent\nlife of that poor harmless mother.  That was the sort of master we\nhad.  I took _his_ number.  That snow-storm cost him nine of his\nflock; and he was more brutal to us than ever, after that, for\nmany days together, he was so enraged over his loss.\n\nWe had adventures all along.  One day we ran into a procession.\nAnd such a procession!  All the riffraff of the kingdom seemed\nto be comprehended in it; and all drunk at that.  In the van was\na cart with a coffin in it, and on the coffin sat a comely young\ngirl of about eighteen suckling a baby, which she squeezed to her\nbreast in a passion of love every little while, and every little\nwhile wiped from its face the tears which her eyes rained down\nupon it; and always the foolish little thing smiled up at her,\nhappy and content, kneading her breast with its dimpled fat hand,\nwhich she patted and fondled right over her breaking heart.\n\nMen and women, boys and girls, trotted along beside or after\nthe cart, hooting, shouting profane and ribald remarks, singing\nsnatches of foul song, skipping, dancing--a very holiday of\nhellions, a sickening sight.  We had struck a suburb of London,\noutside the walls, and this was a sample of one sort of London\nsociety.  Our master secured a good place for us near the gallows.\nA priest was in attendance, and he helped the girl climb up, and\nsaid comforting words to her, and made the under-sheriff provide\na stool for her.  Then he stood there by her on the gallows, and\nfor a moment looked down upon the mass of upturned faces at his\nfeet, then out over the solid pavement of heads that stretched away\non every side occupying the vacancies far and near, and then began\nto tell the story of the case.  And there was pity in his voice\n--how seldom a sound that was in that ignorant and savage land!\nI remember every detail of what he said, except the words he said\nit in; and so I change it into my own words:\n\n\"Law is intended to mete out justice.  Sometimes it fails. This\ncannot be helped.  We can only grieve, and be resigned, and pray\nfor the soul of him who falls unfairly by the arm of the law, and\nthat his fellows may be few.  A law sends this poor young thing\nto death--and it is right.  But another law had placed her where\nshe must commit her crime or starve with her child--and before God\nthat law is responsible for both her crime and her ignominious death!\n\n\"A little while ago this young thing, this child of eighteen years,\nwas as happy a wife and mother as any in England; and her lips\nwere blithe with song, which is the native speech of glad and\ninnocent hearts.  Her young husband was as happy as she; for he was\ndoing his whole duty, he worked early and late at his handicraft,\nhis bread was honest bread well and fairly earned, he was prospering,\nhe was furnishing shelter and sustenance to his family, he was\nadding his mite to the wealth of the nation.  By consent of a\ntreacherous law, instant destruction fell upon this holy home and\nswept it away!  That young husband was waylaid and impressed,\nand sent to sea.  The wife knew nothing of it.  She sought him\neverywhere, she moved the hardest hearts with the supplications\nof her tears, the broken eloquence of her despair.  Weeks dragged\nby, she watching, waiting, hoping, her mind going slowly to wreck\nunder the burden of her misery.  Little by little all her small\npossessions went for food.  When she could no longer pay her rent,\nthey turned her out of doors.  She begged, while she had strength;\nwhen she was starving at last, and her milk failing, she stole a\npiece of linen cloth of the value of a fourth part of a cent,\nthinking to sell it and save her child.  But she was seen by the\nowner of the cloth.  She was put in jail and brought to trial.\nThe man testified to the facts.  A plea was made for her, and her\nsorrowful story was told in her behalf.  She spoke, too, by\npermission, and said she did steal the cloth, but that her mind\nwas so disordered of late by trouble that when she was overborne\nwith hunger all acts, criminal or other, swam meaningless through\nher brain and she knew nothing rightly, except that she was so\nhungry!  For a moment all were touched, and there was disposition\nto deal mercifully with her, seeing that she was so young and\nfriendless, and her case so piteous, and the law that robbed her\nof her support to blame as being the first and only cause of her\ntransgression; but the prosecuting officer replied that whereas\nthese things were all true, and most pitiful as well, still there\nwas much small theft in these days, and mistimed mercy here would\nbe a danger to property--oh, my God, is there no property in ruined\nhomes, and orphaned babes, and broken hearts that British law\nholds precious!--and so he must require sentence.\n\n\"When the judge put on his black cap, the owner of the stolen\nlinen rose trembling up, his lip quivering, his face as gray as\nashes; and when the awful words came, he cried out, 'Oh, poor\nchild, poor child, I did not know it was death!' and fell as a\ntree falls.  When they lifted him up his reason was gone; before\nthe sun was set, he had taken his own life.  A kindly man; a man\nwhose heart was right, at bottom; add his murder to this that\nis to be now done here; and charge them both where they belong\n--to the rulers and the bitter laws of Britain.  The time is come, my\nchild; let me pray over thee--not _for_ thee, dear abused poor heart\nand innocent, but for them that be guilty of thy ruin and death,\nwho need it more.\"\n\nAfter his prayer they put the noose around the young girl's neck,\nand they had great trouble to adjust the knot under her ear,\nbecause she was devouring the baby all the time, wildly kissing it,\nand snatching it to her face and her breast, and drenching it\nwith tears, and half moaning, half shrieking all the while, and the\nbaby crowing, and laughing, and kicking its feet with delight over\nwhat it took for romp and play.  Even the hangman couldn't stand it,\nbut turned away.  When all was ready the priest gently pulled and\ntugged and forced the child out of the mother's arms, and stepped\nquickly out of her reach; but she clasped her hands, and made a\nwild spring toward him, with a shriek; but the rope--and the\nunder-sheriff--held her short.  Then she went on her knees and\nstretched out her hands and cried:\n\n\"One more kiss--oh, my God, one more, one more,--it is the dying\nthat begs it!\"\n\nShe got it; she almost smothered the little thing.  And when they\ngot it away again, she cried out:\n\n\"Oh, my child, my darling, it will die!  It has no home, it has\nno father, no friend, no mother--\"\n\n\"It has them all!\" said that good priest.  \"All these will I be\nto it till I die.\"\n\nYou should have seen her face then!  Gratitude?  Lord, what do\nyou want with words to express that?  Words are only painted fire;\na look is the fire itself.  She gave that look, and carried it away\nto the treasury of heaven, where all things that are divine belong.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVI\n\nAN ENCOUNTER IN THE DARK\n\nLondon--to a slave--was a sufficiently interesting place.  It was\nmerely a great big village; and mainly mud and thatch.  The streets\nwere muddy, crooked, unpaved.  The populace was an ever flocking\nand drifting swarm of rags, and splendors, of nodding plumes and\nshining armor.  The king had a palace there; he saw the outside\nof it.  It made him sigh; yes, and swear a little, in a poor\njuvenile sixth century way.  We saw knights and grandees whom\nwe knew, but they didn't know us in our rags and dirt and raw\nwelts and bruises, and wouldn't have recognized us if we had hailed\nthem, nor stopped to answer, either, it being unlawful to speak\nwith slaves on a chain.  Sandy passed within ten yards of me on\na mule--hunting for me, I imagined.  But the thing which clean\nbroke my heart was something which happened in front of our old\nbarrack in a square, while we were enduring the spectacle of a man\nbeing boiled to death in oil for counterfeiting pennies.  It was\nthe sight of a newsboy--and I couldn't get at him!  Still, I had\none comfort--here was proof that Clarence was still alive and\nbanging away.  I meant to be with him before long; the thought was\nfull of cheer.\n\nI had one little glimpse of another thing, one day, which gave me\na great uplift.  It was a wire stretching from housetop to housetop.\nTelegraph or telephone, sure.  I did very much wish I had a little\npiece of it.  It was just what I needed, in order to carry out my\nproject of escape.  My idea was to get loose some night, along with\nthe king, then gag and bind our master, change clothes with him,\nbatter him into the aspect of a stranger, hitch him to the slave-chain,\nassume possession of the property, march to Camelot, and--\n\nBut you get my idea; you see what a stunning dramatic surprise\nI would wind up with at the palace.  It was all feasible, if\nI could only get hold of a slender piece of iron which I could\nshape into a lock-pick.  I could then undo the lumbering padlocks\nwith which our chains were fastened, whenever I might choose.\nBut I never had any luck; no such thing ever happened to fall\nin my way.  However, my chance came at last.  A gentleman who\nhad come twice before to dicker for me, without result, or indeed\nany approach to a result, came again.  I was far from expecting\never to belong to him, for the price asked for me from the time\nI was first enslaved was exorbitant, and always provoked either\nanger or derision, yet my master stuck stubbornly to it--twenty-two\ndollars.  He wouldn't bate a cent.  The king was greatly admired,\nbecause of his grand physique, but his kingly style was against\nhim, and he wasn't salable; nobody wanted that kind of a slave.\nI considered myself safe from parting from him because of my\nextravagant price.  No, I was not expecting to ever belong to\nthis gentleman whom I have spoken of, but he had something which\nI expected would belong to me eventually, if he would but visit\nus often enough.  It was a steel thing with a long pin to it, with\nwhich his long cloth outside garment was fastened together in\nfront.  There were three of them. He had disappointed me twice,\nbecause he did not come quite close enough to me to make my project\nentirely safe; but this time I succeeded; I captured the lower\nclasp of the three, and when he missed it he thought he had lost\nit on the way.\n\nI had a chance to be glad about a minute, then straightway a chance\nto be sad again.  For when the purchase was about to fail, as usual,\nthe master suddenly spoke up and said what would be worded thus\n--in modern English:\n\n\"I'll tell you what I'll do.  I'm tired supporting these two for\nno good.  Give me twenty-two dollars for this one, and I'll throw\nthe other one in.\"\n\nThe king couldn't get his breath, he was in such a fury.  He began\nto choke and gag, and meantime the master and the gentleman moved\naway discussing.\n\n\"An ye will keep the offer open--\"\n\n\"'Tis open till the morrow at this hour.\"\n\n\"Then I will answer you at that time,\" said the gentleman, and\ndisappeared, the master following him.\n\nI had a time of it to cool the king down, but I managed it.\nI whispered in his ear, to this effect:\n\n\"Your grace _will_ go for nothing, but after another fashion.  And\nso shall I.  To-night we shall both be free.\"\n\n\"Ah!  How is that?\"\n\n\"With this thing which I have stolen, I will unlock these locks\nand cast off these chains to-night.  When he comes about nine-thirty\nto inspect us for the night, we will seize him, gag him, batter\nhim, and early in the morning we will march out of this town,\nproprietors of this caravan of slaves.\"\n\nThat was as far as I went, but the king was charmed and satisfied.\nThat evening we waited patiently for our fellow-slaves to get\nto sleep and signify it by the usual sign, for you must not take\nmany chances on those poor fellows if you can avoid it.  It is\nbest to keep your own secrets.  No doubt they fidgeted only about\nas usual, but it didn't seem so to me.  It seemed to me that they\nwere going to be forever getting down to their regular snoring.\nAs the time dragged on I got nervously afraid we shouldn't have\nenough of it left for our needs; so I made several premature\nattempts, and merely delayed things by it; for I couldn't seem\nto touch a padlock, there in the dark, without starting a rattle\nout of it which interrupted somebody's sleep and made him turn\nover and wake some more of the gang.\n\nBut finally I did get my last iron off, and was a free man once\nmore.  I took a good breath of relief, and reached for the king's\nirons.  Too late! in comes the master, with a light in one hand\nand his heavy walking-staff in the other.  I snuggled close among\nthe wallow of snorers, to conceal as nearly as possible that I was\nnaked of irons; and I kept a sharp lookout and prepared to spring\nfor my man the moment he should bend over me.\n\nBut he didn't approach.  He stopped, gazed absently toward our\ndusky mass a minute, evidently thinking about something else;\nthen set down his light, moved musingly toward the door, and before\na body could imagine what he was going to do, he was out of the\ndoor and had closed it behind him.\n\n\"Quick!\" said the king.  \"Fetch him back!\"\n\nOf course, it was the thing to do, and I was up and out in a\nmoment.  But, dear me, there were no lamps in those days, and\nit was a dark night.  But I glimpsed a dim figure a few steps\naway.  I darted for it, threw myself upon it, and then there was\na state of things and lively!  We fought and scuffled and struggled,\nand drew a crowd in no time.  They took an immense interest in\nthe fight and encouraged us all they could, and, in fact, couldn't\nhave been pleasanter or more cordial if it had been their own\nfight.  Then a tremendous row broke out behind us, and as much\nas half of our audience left us, with a rush, to invest some\nsympathy in that.  Lanterns began to swing in all directions;\nit was the watch gathering from far and near.  Presently a halberd\nfell across my back, as a reminder, and I knew what it meant.\nI was in custody.  So was my adversary.  We were marched off toward\nprison, one on each side of the watchman.  Here was disaster,\nhere was a fine scheme gone to sudden destruction!  I tried to\nimagine what would happen when the master should discover that\nit was I who had been fighting him; and what would happen if they\njailed us together in the general apartment for brawlers and petty\nlaw-breakers, as was the custom; and what might--\n\nJust then my antagonist turned his face around in my direction,\nthe freckled light from the watchman's tin lantern fell on it,\nand, by George, he was the wrong man!\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVII\n\nAN AWFUL PREDICAMENT\n\nSleep?  It was impossible.  It would naturally have been impossible\nin that noisome cavern of a jail, with its mangy crowd of drunken,\nquarrelsome, and song-singing rapscallions.  But the thing that\nmade sleep all the more a thing not to be dreamed of, was my\nracking impatience to get out of this place and find out the whole\nsize of what might have happened yonder in the slave-quarters\nin consequence of that intolerable miscarriage of mine.\n\nIt was a long night, but the morning got around at last.  I made\na full and frank explanation to the court.  I said I was a slave,\nthe property of the great Earl Grip, who had arrived just after\ndark at the Tabard inn in the village on the other side of the\nwater, and had stopped there over night, by compulsion, he being\ntaken deadly sick with a strange and sudden disorder.  I had been\nordered to cross to the city in all haste and bring the best\nphysician; I was doing my best; naturally I was running with all\nmy might; the night was dark, I ran against this common person\nhere, who seized me by the throat and began to pummel me, although\nI told him my errand, and implored him, for the sake of the great\nearl my master's mortal peril--\n\nThe common person interrupted and said it was a lie; and was going\nto explain how I rushed upon him and attacked him without a word--\n\n\"Silence, sirrah!\" from the court.  \"Take him hence and give him\na few stripes whereby to teach him how to treat the servant of\na nobleman after a different fashion another time.  Go!\"\n\nThen the court begged my pardon, and hoped I would not fail\nto tell his lordship it was in no wise the court's fault that this\nhigh-handed thing had happened.  I said I would make it all right,\nand so took my leave.  Took it just in time, too; he was starting\nto ask me why I didn't fetch out these facts the moment I was\narrested.  I said I would if I had thought of it--which was true\n--but that I was so battered by that man that all my wit was knocked\nout of me--and so forth and so on, and got myself away, still\nmumbling.  I didn't wait for breakfast.  No grass grew under my\nfeet.  I was soon at the slave quarters.  Empty--everybody gone!\nThat is, everybody except one body--the slave-master's.  It lay\nthere all battered to pulp; and all about were the evidences of\na terrific fight.  There was a rude board coffin on a cart at\nthe door, and workmen, assisted by the police, were thinning a\nroad through the gaping crowd in order that they might bring it in.\n\nI picked out a man humble enough in life to condescend to talk\nwith one so shabby as I, and got his account of the matter.\n\n\"There were sixteen slaves here.  They rose against their master\nin the night, and thou seest how it ended.\"\n\n\"Yes.  How did it begin?\"\n\n\"There was no witness but the slaves.  They said the slave that\nwas most valuable got free of his bonds and escaped in some strange\nway--by magic arts 'twas thought, by reason that he had no key,\nand the locks were neither broke nor in any wise injured.  When\nthe master discovered his loss, he was mad with despair, and threw\nhimself upon his people with his heavy stick, who resisted and\nbrake his back and in other and divers ways did give him hurts\nthat brought him swiftly to his end.\"\n\n\"This is dreadful.  It will go hard with the slaves, no doubt,\nupon the trial.\"\n\n\"Marry, the trial is over.\"\n\n\"Over!\"\n\n\"Would they be a week, think you--and the matter so simple?  They\nwere not the half of a quarter of an hour at it.\"\n\n\"Why, I don't see how they could determine which were the guilty\nones in so short a time.\"\n\n\"_Which_ ones?  Indeed, they considered not particulars like to that.\nThey condemned them in a body.  Wit ye not the law?--which men\nsay the Romans left behind them here when they went--that if one\nslave killeth his master all the slaves of that man must die for it.\"\n\n\"True.  I had forgotten.  And when will these die?\"\n\n\"Belike within a four and twenty hours; albeit some say they will\nwait a pair of days more, if peradventure they may find the missing\none meantime.\"\n\nThe missing one!  It made me feel uncomfortable.\n\n\"Is it likely they will find him?\"\n\n\"Before the day is spent--yes.  They seek him everywhere.  They\nstand at the gates of the town, with certain of the slaves who\nwill discover him to them if he cometh, and none can pass out\nbut he will be first examined.\"\n\n\"Might one see the place where the rest are confined?\"\n\n\"The outside of it--yes.  The inside of it--but ye will not want\nto see that.\"\n\nI took the address of that prison for future reference and then\nsauntered off.  At the first second-hand clothing shop I came to,\nup a back street, I got a rough rig suitable for a common seaman\nwho might be going on a cold voyage, and bound up my face with\na liberal bandage, saying I had a toothache.  This concealed my\nworst bruises.  It was a transformation.  I no longer resembled my\nformer self.  Then I struck out for that wire, found it and\nfollowed it to its den.  It was a little room over a butcher's\nshop--which meant that business wasn't very brisk in the telegraphic\nline.  The young chap in charge was drowsing at his table.  I locked\nthe door and put the vast key in my bosom.  This alarmed the young\nfellow, and he was going to make a noise; but I said:\n\n\"Save your wind; if you open your mouth you are dead, sure.  Tackle\nyour instrument.  Lively, now!  Call Camelot.\"\n\n\"This doth amaze me!  How should such as you know aught of such\nmatters as--\"\n\n\"Call Camelot!  I am a desperate man.  Call Camelot, or get away\nfrom the instrument and I will do it myself.\"\n\n\"What--you?\"\n\n\"Yes--certainly.  Stop gabbling.  Call the palace.\"\n\nHe made the call.\n\n\"Now, then, call Clarence.\"\n\n\"Clarence _who_?\"\n\n\"Never mind Clarence who.  Say you want Clarence; you'll get\nan answer.\"\n\nHe did so.  We waited five nerve-straining minutes--ten minutes\n--how long it did seem!--and then came a click that was as familiar\nto me as a human voice; for Clarence had been my own pupil.\n\n\"Now, my lad, vacate!  They would have known _my_ touch, maybe,\nand so your call was surest; but I'm all right now.\"\n\nHe vacated the place and cocked his ear to listen--but it didn't\nwin.  I used a cipher.  I didn't waste any time in sociabilities\nwith Clarence, but squared away for business, straight-off--thus:\n\n\"The king is here and in danger.  We were captured and brought\nhere as slaves.  We should not be able to prove our identity\n--and the fact is, I am not in a position to try.  Send a telegram\nfor the palace here which will carry conviction with it.\"\n\nHis answer came straight back:\n\n\"They don't know anything about the telegraph; they haven't had\nany experience yet, the line to London is so new.  Better not\nventure that.  They might hang you.  Think up something else.\"\n\nMight hang us!  Little he knew how closely he was crowding the\nfacts.  I couldn't think up anything for the moment.  Then an idea\nstruck me, and I started it along:\n\n\"Send five hundred picked knights with Launcelot in the lead; and\nsend them on the jump.  Let them enter by the southwest gate, and\nlook out for the man with a white cloth around his right arm.\"\n\nThe answer was prompt:\n\n\"They shall start in half an hour.\"\n\n\"All right, Clarence; now tell this lad here that I'm a friend\nof yours and a dead-head; and that he must be discreet and say\nnothing about this visit of mine.\"\n\nThe instrument began to talk to the youth and I hurried away.\nI fell to ciphering.  In half an hour it would be nine o'clock.\nKnights and horses in heavy armor couldn't travel very fast.\nThese would make the best time they could, and now that the ground\nwas in good condition, and no snow or mud, they would probably\nmake a seven-mile gait; they would have to change horses a couple\nof times; they would arrive about six, or a little after; it would\nstill be plenty light enough; they would see the white cloth which\nI should tie around my right arm, and I would take command.  We\nwould surround that prison and have the king out in no time.\nIt would be showy and picturesque enough, all things considered,\nthough I would have preferred noonday, on account of the more\ntheatrical aspect the thing would have.\n\nNow, then, in order to increase the strings to my bow, I thought\nI would look up some of those people whom I had formerly recognized,\nand make myself known.  That would help us out of our scrape,\nwithout the knights.  But I must proceed cautiously, for it was\na risky business.  I must get into sumptuous raiment, and it\nwouldn't do to run and jump into it.  No, I must work up to it\nby degrees, buying suit after suit of clothes, in shops wide apart,\nand getting a little finer article with each change, until I should\nfinally reach silk and velvet, and be ready for my project.  So\nI started.\n\nBut the scheme fell through like scat!  The first corner I turned,\nI came plump upon one of our slaves, snooping around with a watchman.\nI coughed at the moment, and he gave me a sudden look that bit right\ninto my marrow.  I judge he thought he had heard that cough before.\nI turned immediately into a shop and worked along down the counter,\npricing things and watching out of the corner of my eye.  Those\npeople had stopped, and were talking together and looking in at\nthe door.  I made up my mind to get out the back way, if there\nwas a back way, and I asked the shopwoman if I could step out\nthere and look for the escaped slave, who was believed to be in\nhiding back there somewhere, and said I was an officer in disguise,\nand my pard was yonder at the door with one of the murderers in\ncharge, and would she be good enough to step there and tell him\nhe needn't wait, but had better go at once to the further end of\nthe back alley and be ready to head him off when I rousted him out.\n\nShe was blazing with eagerness to see one of those already celebrated\nmurderers, and she started on the errand at once.  I slipped out\nthe back way, locked the door behind me, put the key in my pocket\nand started off, chuckling to myself and comfortable.\n\nWell, I had gone and spoiled it again, made another mistake.\nA double one, in fact.  There were plenty of ways to get rid of\nthat officer by some simple and plausible device, but no, I must\npick out a picturesque one; it is the crying defect of my character.\nAnd then, I had ordered my procedure upon what the officer, being\nhuman, would _naturally_ do; whereas when you are least expecting it,\na man will now and then go and do the very thing which it's _not_\nnatural for him to do.  The natural thing for the officer to do,\nin this case, was to follow straight on my heels; he would find\na stout oaken door, securely locked, between him and me; before\nhe could break it down, I should be far away and engaged in slipping\ninto a succession of baffling disguises which would soon get me\ninto a sort of raiment which was a surer protection from meddling\nlaw-dogs in Britain than any amount of mere innocence and purity\nof character.  But instead of doing the natural thing, the officer\ntook me at my word, and followed my instructions.  And so, as I\ncame trotting out of that cul de sac, full of satisfaction with my\nown cleverness, he turned the corner and I walked right into his\nhandcuffs.  If I had known it was a cul de sac--however, there\nisn't any excusing a blunder like that, let it go.  Charge it up\nto profit and loss.\n\nOf course, I was indignant, and swore I had just come ashore from\na long voyage, and all that sort of thing--just to see, you know,\nif it would deceive that slave.  But it didn't.  He knew me.  Then\nI reproached him for betraying me.  He was more surprised than\nhurt.  He stretched his eyes wide, and said:\n\n\"What, wouldst have me let thee, of all men, escape and not hang\nwith us, when thou'rt the very _cause_ of our hanging?  Go to!\"\n\n\"Go to\" was their way of saying \"I should smile!\" or \"I like that!\"\nQueer talkers, those people.\n\nWell, there was a sort of bastard justice in his view of the case,\nand so I dropped the matter.  When you can't cure a disaster by\nargument, what is the use to argue?  It isn't my way.  So I only said:\n\n\"You're not going to be hanged.  None of us are.\"\n\nBoth men laughed, and the slave said:\n\n\"Ye have not ranked as a fool--before.  You might better keep\nyour reputation, seeing the strain would not be for long.\"\n\n\"It will stand it, I reckon.  Before to-morrow we shall be out\nof prison, and free to go where we will, besides.\"\n\nThe witty officer lifted at his left ear with his thumb, made\na rasping noise in his throat, and said:\n\n\"Out of prison--yes--ye say true.  And free likewise to go where\nye will, so ye wander not out of his grace the Devil's sultry realm.\"\n\nI kept my temper, and said, indifferently:\n\n\"Now I suppose you really think we are going to hang within\na day or two.\"\n\n\"I thought it not many minutes ago, for so the thing was decided\nand proclaimed.\"\n\n\"Ah, then you've changed your mind, is that it?\"\n\n\"Even that.  I only _thought_, then; I _know_, now.\"\n\nI felt sarcastical, so I said:\n\n\"Oh, sapient servant of the law, condescend to tell us, then,\nwhat you _know_.\"\n\n\"That ye will all be hanged _to-day_, at mid-afternoon!  Oho! that\nshot hit home!  Lean upon me.\"\n\nThe fact is I did need to lean upon somebody.  My knights couldn't\narrive in time.  They would be as much as three hours too late.\nNothing in the world could save the King of England; nor me, which\nwas more important.  More important, not merely to me, but to\nthe nation--the only nation on earth standing ready to blossom\ninto civilization.  I was sick.  I said no more, there wasn't\nanything to say.  I knew what the man meant; that if the missing\nslave was found, the postponement would be revoked, the execution\ntake place to-day.  Well, the missing slave was found.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXVIII\n\nSIR LAUNCELOT AND KNIGHTS TO THE RESCUE\n\nNearing four in the afternoon.  The scene was just outside the\nwalls of London.  A cool, comfortable, superb day, with a brilliant\nsun; the kind of day to make one want to live, not die.  The\nmultitude was prodigious and far-reaching; and yet we fifteen\npoor devils hadn't a friend in it.  There was something painful\nin that thought, look at it how you might.  There we sat, on our\ntall scaffold, the butt of the hate and mockery of all those\nenemies.  We were being made a holiday spectacle.  They had built\na sort of grand stand for the nobility and gentry, and these were\nthere in full force, with their ladies.  We recognized a good\nmany of them.\n\nThe crowd got a brief and unexpected dash of diversion out of\nthe king.  The moment we were freed of our bonds he sprang up,\nin his fantastic rags, with face bruised out of all recognition, and\nproclaimed himself Arthur, King of Britain, and denounced the\nawful penalties of treason upon every soul there present if hair\nof his sacred head were touched.  It startled and surprised him\nto hear them break into a vast roar of laughter.  It wounded his\ndignity, and he locked himself up in silence.  Then, although\nthe crowd begged him to go on, and tried to provoke him to it\nby catcalls, jeers, and shouts of:\n\n\"Let him speak!  The king!  The king! his humble subjects hunger\nand thirst for words of wisdom out of the mouth of their master\nhis Serene and Sacred Raggedness!\"\n\nBut it went for nothing.  He put on all his majesty and sat under\nthis rain of contempt and insult unmoved.  He certainly was great\nin his way.  Absently, I had taken off my white bandage and wound\nit about my right arm.  When the crowd noticed this, they began\nupon me.  They said:\n\n\"Doubtless this sailor-man is his minister--observe his costly\nbadge of office!\"\n\nI let them go on until they got tired, and then I said:\n\n\"Yes, I am his minister, The Boss; and to-morrow you will hear\nthat from Camelot which--\"\n\nI got no further.  They drowned me out with joyous derision.  But\npresently there was silence; for the sheriffs of London, in their\nofficial robes, with their subordinates, began to make a stir which\nindicated that business was about to begin.  In the hush which\nfollowed, our crime was recited, the death warrant read, then\neverybody uncovered while a priest uttered a prayer.\n\nThen a slave was blindfolded; the hangman unslung his rope.  There\nlay the smooth road below us, we upon one side of it, the banked\nmultitude wailing its other side--a good clear road, and kept free\nby the police--how good it would be to see my five hundred horsemen\ncome tearing down it!  But no, it was out of the possibilities.\nI followed its receding thread out into the distance--not a horseman\non it, or sign of one.\n\nThere was a jerk, and the slave hung dangling; dangling and hideously\nsquirming, for his limbs were not tied.\n\nA second rope was unslung, in a moment another slave was dangling.\n\nIn a minute a third slave was struggling in the air.  It was\ndreadful.  I turned away my head a moment, and when I turned back\nI missed the king!  They were blindfolding him!  I was paralyzed;\nI couldn't move, I was choking, my tongue was petrified.  They\nfinished blindfolding him, they led him under the rope.  I couldn't\nshake off that clinging impotence.  But when I saw them put the\nnoose around his neck, then everything let go in me and I made\na spring to the rescue--and as I made it I shot one more glance\nabroad--by George! here they came, a-tilting!--five hundred mailed\nand belted knights on bicycles!\n\nThe grandest sight that ever was seen.  Lord, how the plumes\nstreamed, how the sun flamed and flashed from the endless procession\nof webby wheels!\n\nI waved my right arm as Launcelot swept in--he recognized my rag\n--I tore away noose and bandage, and shouted:\n\n\"On your knees, every rascal of you, and salute the king!  Who\nfails shall sup in hell to-night!\"\n\nI always use that high style when I'm climaxing an effect.  Well,\nit was noble to see Launcelot and the boys swarm up onto that\nscaffold and heave sheriffs and such overboard.  And it was fine\nto see that astonished multitude go down on their knees and beg\ntheir lives of the king they had just been deriding and insulting.\nAnd as he stood apart there, receiving this homage in rags,\nI thought to myself, well, really there is something peculiarly\ngrand about the gait and bearing of a king, after all.\n\nI was immensely satisfied.  Take the whole situation all around,\nit was one of the gaudiest effects I ever instigated.\n\nAnd presently up comes Clarence, his own self! and winks, and\nsays, very modernly:\n\n\"Good deal of a surprise, wasn't it?  I knew you'd like it.  I've\nhad the boys practicing this long time, privately; and just hungry\nfor a chance to show off.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXIX\n\nTHE YANKEE'S FIGHT WITH THE KNIGHTS\n\nHome again, at Camelot.  A morning or two later I found the paper,\ndamp from the press, by my plate at the breakfast table.  I turned\nto the advertising columns, knowing I should find something of\npersonal interest to me there.  It was this:\n\n             DE PAR LE ROI.\n\n   Know that the great lord and illus-\n   trious Kni8ht, SIR SAGRAMOR LE\n   DESIROUS having condescended to\n   meet the King's Minister, Hank Mor-\n    gan, the which is surnamed The Boss,\n   for satisfgction of offence anciently given,\n   these wilL engage in the lists by\n   Camelot about the fourth hour of the\n   morning of the sixteenth day of this\n   next succeeding month. The battle\n   will be a l outrance, sith the said offence\n   was of a deadly sort, admitting of no\n   comPosition.\n\n             DE PAR LE ROI\n\n\nClarence's editorial reference to this affair was to this effect:\n\n   It will be observed, by a gl7nce at our\n   advertising columns, that the commu-\n   nity is to be favored with a treat of un-\n   usual interest in the tournament line.\n   The names of the artists are warrant of\n   good enterrainment. The box-office\n   will be open at noon of the 13th; ad-\n   mission 3 cents, reserved seatsh 5; pro-\n   ceeds to go to the hospital fund  The\n   royal pair and all the Court will be pres-\n   ent. With these exceptions, and the\n   press and the clergy, the free list is strict-\n   ly susPended. Parties are hereby warn-\n   ed against buying tickets of speculators;\n   they will not be good at the door.\n   Everybody knows and likes The Boss,\n   everybody knows and likes Sir Sag.;\n   come, let us give the lads a good send-\n   off. ReMember, the proceeds go to a\n   great and free charity, and one whose\n   broad begevolence stretches out its help-\n   ing hand, warm with the blood of a lov-\n   ing heart, to all that suffer, regardless of\n   race, creed, condition or color--the\n   only charity yet established in the earth\n   which has no politico-religious stop-\n   cock on its compassion, but says Here\n   flows the stream, let ALL come and\n   drink! Turn out, all hands! fetch along\n   your dou3hnuts and your gum-drops\n   and have a good time. Pie for sale on\n   the grounds, and rocks to crack it with;\n   and ciRcus-lemonade--three drops of\n   lime juice to a barrel of water.\n\n   N.B. This is the first tournament\n   under the new law, whidh allow each\n   combatant to use any weapon he may pre-\n   fer. You may want to make a note of that.\n\nUp to the day set, there was no talk in all Britain of anything\nbut this combat.  All other topics sank into insignificance and\npassed out of men's thoughts and interest.  It was not because\na tournament was a great matter, it was not because Sir Sagramor\nhad found the Holy Grail, for he had not, but had failed; it was\nnot because the second (official) personage in the kingdom was\none of the duellists; no, all these features were commonplace.\nYet there was abundant reason for the extraordinary interest which\nthis coming fight was creating.  It was born of the fact that all\nthe nation knew that this was not to be a duel between mere men,\nso to speak, but a duel between two mighty magicians; a duel not\nof muscle but of mind, not of human skill but of superhuman art\nand craft; a final struggle for supremacy between the two master\nenchanters of the age.  It was realized that the most prodigious\nachievements of the most renowned knights could not be worthy\nof comparison with a spectacle like this; they could be but child's\nplay, contrasted with this mysterious and awful battle of the gods.\nYes, all the world knew it was going to be in reality a duel\nbetween Merlin and me, a measuring of his magic powers against\nmine.  It was known that Merlin had been busy whole days and nights\ntogether, imbuing Sir Sagramor's arms and armor with supernal\npowers of offense and defense, and that he had procured for him\nfrom the spirits of the air a fleecy veil which would render the\nwearer invisible to his antagonist while still visible to other\nmen.  Against Sir Sagramor, so weaponed and protected, a thousand\nknights could accomplish nothing; against him no known enchantments\ncould prevail.  These facts were sure; regarding them there was\nno doubt, no reason for doubt.  There was but one question: might\nthere be still other enchantments, _unknown_ to Merlin, which could\nrender Sir Sagramor's veil transparent to me, and make his enchanted\nmail vulnerable to my weapons?  This was the one thing to be\ndecided in the lists.  Until then the world must remain in suspense.\n\nSo the world thought there was a vast matter at stake here, and\nthe world was right, but it was not the one they had in their\nminds.  No, a far vaster one was upon the cast of this die:\n_the life of knight-errantry_.  I was a champion, it was true, but\nnot the champion of the frivolous black arts, I was the champion\nof hard unsentimental common-sense and reason.  I was entering\nthe lists to either destroy knight-errantry or be its victim.\n\nVast as the show-grounds were, there were no vacant spaces in them\noutside of the lists, at ten o'clock on the morning of the 16th.\nThe mammoth grand-stand was clothed in flags, streamers, and rich\ntapestries, and packed with several acres of small-fry tributary\nkings, their suites, and the British aristocracy; with our own\nroyal gang in the chief place, and each and every individual\na flashing prism of gaudy silks and velvets--well, I never saw\nanything to begin with it but a fight between an Upper Mississippi\nsunset and the aurora borealis.  The huge camp of beflagged and\ngay-colored tents at one end of the lists, with a stiff-standing\nsentinel at every door and a shining shield hanging by him for\nchallenge, was another fine sight.  You see, every knight was\nthere who had any ambition or any caste feeling; for my feeling\ntoward their order was not much of a secret, and so here was their\nchance.  If I won my fight with Sir Sagramor, others would have\nthe right to call me out as long as I might be willing to respond.\n\nDown at our end there were but two tents; one for me, and another\nfor my servants.  At the appointed hour the king made a sign, and\nthe heralds, in their tabards, appeared and made proclamation,\nnaming the combatants and stating the cause of quarrel.  There\nwas a pause, then a ringing bugle-blast, which was the signal for\nus to come forth.  All the multitude caught their breath, and\nan eager curiosity flashed into every face.\n\nOut from his tent rode great Sir Sagramor, an imposing tower\nof iron, stately and rigid, his huge spear standing upright in its\nsocket and grasped in his strong hand, his grand horse's face and\nbreast cased in steel, his body clothed in rich trappings that\nalmost dragged the ground--oh, a most noble picture.  A great\nshout went up, of welcome and admiration.\n\nAnd then out I came.  But I didn't get any shout.  There was\na wondering and eloquent silence for a moment, then a great wave\nof laughter began to sweep along that human sea, but a warning\nbugle-blast cut its career short.  I was in the simplest and\ncomfortablest of gymnast costumes--flesh-colored tights from neck\nto heel, with blue silk puffings about my loins, and bareheaded.\nMy horse was not above medium size, but he was alert, slender-limbed,\nmuscled with watchsprings, and just a greyhound to go.  He was\na beauty, glossy as silk, and naked as he was when he was born,\nexcept for bridle and ranger-saddle.\n\nThe iron tower and the gorgeous bedquilt came cumbrously but\ngracefully pirouetting down the lists, and we tripped lightly up\nto meet them.  We halted; the tower saluted, I responded; then\nwe wheeled and rode side by side to the grand-stand and faced\nour king and queen, to whom we made obeisance.  The queen exclaimed:\n\n\"Alack, Sir Boss, wilt fight naked, and without lance or sword or--\"\n\nBut the king checked her and made her understand, with a polite\nphrase or two, that this was none of her business.  The bugles\nrang again; and we separated and rode to the ends of the lists,\nand took position.  Now old Merlin stepped into view and cast\na dainty web of gossamer threads over Sir Sagramor which turned\nhim into Hamlet's ghost; the king made a sign, the bugles blew,\nSir Sagramor laid his great lance in rest, and the next moment here\nhe came thundering down the course with his veil flying out behind,\nand I went whistling through the air like an arrow to meet him\n--cocking my ear the while, as if noting the invisible knight's\nposition and progress by hearing, not sight.  A chorus of encouraging\nshouts burst out for him, and one brave voice flung out a heartening\nword for me--said:\n\n\"Go it, slim Jim!\"\n\nIt was an even bet that Clarence had procured that favor for me\n--and furnished the language, too.  When that formidable lance-point\nwas within a yard and a half of my breast I twitched my horse aside\nwithout an effort, and the big knight swept by, scoring a blank.\nI got plenty of applause that time.  We turned, braced up, and\ndown we came again.  Another blank for the knight, a roar of\napplause for me.  This same thing was repeated once more; and\nit fetched such a whirlwind of applause that Sir Sagramor lost his\ntemper, and at once changed his tactics and set himself the task\nof chasing me down.  Why, he hadn't any show in the world at that;\nit was a game of tag, with all the advantage on my side; I whirled\nout of his path with ease whenever I chose, and once I slapped him\non the back as I went to the rear.  Finally I took the chase into\nmy own hands; and after that, turn, or twist, or do what he would,\nhe was never able to get behind me again; he found himself always\nin front at the end of his maneuver.  So he gave up that business\nand retired to his end of the lists.  His temper was clear gone now,\nand he forgot himself and flung an insult at me which disposed\nof mine.  I slipped my lasso from the horn of my saddle, and\ngrasped the coil in my right hand.  This time you should have seen\nhim come!--it was a business trip, sure; by his gait there was\nblood in his eye.  I was sitting my horse at ease, and swinging\nthe great loop of my lasso in wide circles about my head; the\nmoment he was under way, I started for him; when the space between\nus had narrowed to forty feet, I sent the snaky spirals of the rope\na-cleaving through the air, then darted aside and faced about and\nbrought my trained animal to a halt with all his feet braced under\nhim for a surge.  The next moment the rope sprang taut and yanked\nSir Sagramor out of the saddle!  Great Scott, but there was\na sensation!\n\nUnquestionably, the popular thing in this world is novelty.  These\npeople had never seen anything of that cowboy business before,\nand it carried them clear off their feet with delight.  From all\naround and everywhere, the shout went up:\n\n\"Encore! encore!\"\n\nI wondered where they got the word, but there was no time to cipher\non philological matters, because the whole knight-errantry hive\nwas just humming now, and my prospect for trade couldn't have\nbeen better.  The moment my lasso was released and Sir Sagramor\nhad been assisted to his tent, I hauled in the slack, took my\nstation and began to swing my loop around my head again.  I was\nsure to have use for it as soon as they could elect a successor\nfor Sir Sagramor, and that couldn't take long where there were\nso many hungry candidates.  Indeed, they elected one straight off\n--Sir Hervis de Revel.\n\n_Bzz_!  Here he came, like a house afire; I dodged: he passed like\na flash, with my horse-hair coils settling around his neck;\na second or so later, _fst_! his saddle was empty.\n\nI got another encore; and another, and another, and still another.\nWhen I had snaked five men out, things began to look serious to\nthe ironclads, and they stopped and consulted together.  As a\nresult, they decided that it was time to waive etiquette and send\ntheir greatest and best against me.  To the astonishment of that\nlittle world, I lassoed Sir Lamorak de Galis, and after him\nSir Galahad.  So you see there was simply nothing to be done now,\nbut play their right bower--bring out the superbest of the superb,\nthe mightiest of the mighty, the great Sir Launcelot himself!\n\nA proud moment for me?  I should think so.  Yonder was Arthur,\nKing of Britain; yonder was Guenever; yes, and whole tribes of\nlittle provincial kings and kinglets; and in the tented camp yonder,\nrenowned knights from many lands; and likewise the selectest body\nknown to chivalry, the Knights of the Table Round, the most\nillustrious in Christendom; and biggest fact of all, the very sun\nof their shining system was yonder couching his lance, the focal\npoint of forty thousand adoring eyes; and all by myself, here was\nI laying for him.  Across my mind flitted the dear image of a\ncertain hello-girl of West Hartford, and I wished she could see\nme now.  In that moment, down came the Invincible, with the rush\nof a whirlwind--the courtly world rose to its feet and bent forward\n--the fateful coils went circling through the air, and before you\ncould wink I was towing Sir Launcelot across the field on his\nback, and kissing my hand to the storm of waving kerchiefs and\nthe thunder-crash of applause that greeted me!\n\nSaid I to myself, as I coiled my lariat and hung it on my saddle-horn,\nand sat there drunk with glory, \"The victory is perfect--no other\nwill venture against me--knight-errantry is dead.\"  Now imagine my\nastonishment--and everybody else's, too--to hear the peculiar\nbugle-call which announces that another competitor is about to\nenter the lists!  There was a mystery here; I couldn't account for\nthis thing.  Next, I noticed Merlin gliding away from me; and then\nI noticed that my lasso was gone!  The old sleight-of-hand expert\nhad stolen it, sure, and slipped it under his robe.\n\nThe bugle blew again.  I looked, and down came Sagramor riding\nagain, with his dust brushed off and his veil nicely re-arranged.\nI trotted up to meet him, and pretended to find him by the sound\nof his horse's hoofs.  He said:\n\n\"Thou'rt quick of ear, but it will not save thee from this!\" and\nhe touched the hilt of his great sword.  \"An ye are not able to see\nit, because of the influence of the veil, know that it is no cumbrous\nlance, but a sword--and I ween ye will not be able to avoid it.\"\n\nHis visor was up; there was death in his smile.  I should never\nbe able to dodge his sword, that was plain.  Somebody was going\nto die this time.  If he got the drop on me, I could name the\ncorpse.  We rode forward together, and saluted the royalties.\nThis time the king was disturbed.  He said:\n\n\"Where is thy strange weapon?\"\n\n\"It is stolen, sire.\"\n\n\"Hast another at hand?\"\n\n\"No, sire, I brought only the one.\"\n\nThen Merlin mixed in:\n\n\"He brought but the one because there was but the one to bring.\nThere exists none other but that one.  It belongeth to the king\nof the Demons of the Sea.  This man is a pretender, and ignorant,\nelse he had known that that weapon can be used in but eight bouts\nonly, and then it vanisheth away to its home under the sea.\"\n\n\"Then is he weaponless,\" said the king.  \"Sir Sagramore, ye will\ngrant him leave to borrow.\"\n\n\"And I will lend!\" said Sir Launcelot, limping up.  \"He is as\nbrave a knight of his hands as any that be on live, and he shall\nhave mine.\"\n\nHe put his hand on his sword to draw it, but Sir Sagramor said:\n\n\"Stay, it may not be.  He shall fight with his own weapons; it\nwas his privilege to choose them and bring them.  If he has erred,\non his head be it.\"\n\n\"Knight!\" said the king.  \"Thou'rt overwrought with passion; it\ndisorders thy mind.  Wouldst kill a naked man?\"\n\n\"An he do it, he shall answer it to me,\" said Sir Launcelot.\n\n\"I will answer it to any he that desireth!\" retorted Sir Sagramor hotly.\n\nMerlin broke in, rubbing his hands and smiling his lowdownest\nsmile of malicious gratification:\n\n\"'Tis well said, right well said!  And 'tis enough of parleying,\nlet my lord the king deliver the battle signal.\"\n\nThe king had to yield.  The bugle made proclamation, and we turned\napart and rode to our stations.  There we stood, a hundred yards\napart, facing each other, rigid and motionless, like horsed statues.\nAnd so we remained, in a soundless hush, as much as a full minute,\neverybody gazing, nobody stirring.  It seemed as if the king could\nnot take heart to give the signal.  But at last he lifted his hand,\nthe clear note of the bugle followed, Sir Sagramor's long blade\ndescribed a flashing curve in the air, and it was superb to see him\ncome.  I sat still.  On he came.  I did not move.  People got so\nexcited that they shouted to me:\n\n\"Fly, fly!  Save thyself!  This is murther!\"\n\nI never budged so much as an inch till that thundering apparition\nhad got within fifteen paces of me; then I snatched a dragoon\nrevolver out of my holster, there was a flash and a roar, and\nthe revolver was back in the holster before anybody could tell\nwhat had happened.\n\nHere was a riderless horse plunging by, and yonder lay Sir Sagramor,\nstone dead.\n\nThe people that ran to him were stricken dumb to find that the life\nwas actually gone out of the man and no reason for it visible,\nno hurt upon his body, nothing like a wound.  There was a hole\nthrough the breast of his chain-mail, but they attached no importance\nto a little thing like that; and as a bullet wound there produces\nbut little blood, none came in sight because of the clothing and\nswaddlings under the armor.  The body was dragged over to let\nthe king and the swells look down upon it.  They were stupefied\nwith astonishment naturally.  I was requested to come and explain\nthe miracle.  But I remained in my tracks, like a statue, and said:\n\n\"If it is a command, I will come, but my lord the king knows that\nI am where the laws of combat require me to remain while any desire\nto come against me.\"\n\nI waited.  Nobody challenged.  Then I said:\n\n\"If there are any who doubt that this field is well and fairly won,\nI do not wait for them to challenge me, I challenge them.\"\n\n\"It is a gallant offer,\" said the king, \"and well beseems you.\nWhom will you name first?\"\n\n\"I name none, I challenge all!  Here I stand, and dare the chivalry\nof England to come against me--not by individuals, but in mass!\"\n\n\"What!\" shouted a score of knights.\n\n\"You have heard the challenge.  Take it, or I proclaim you recreant\nknights and vanquished, every one!\"\n\nIt was a \"bluff\" you know.  At such a time it is sound judgment\nto put on a bold face and play your hand for a hundred times what\nit is worth; forty-nine times out of fifty nobody dares to \"call,\"\nand you rake in the chips.  But just this once--well, things looked\nsqually!  In just no time, five hundred knights were scrambling\ninto their saddles, and before you could wink a widely scattering\ndrove were under way and clattering down upon me.  I snatched\nboth revolvers from the holsters and began to measure distances\nand calculate chances.\n\nBang!  One saddle empty.  Bang! another one.  Bang--bang, and\nI bagged two.  Well, it was nip and tuck with us, and I knew it.\nIf I spent the eleventh shot without convincing these people,\nthe twelfth man would kill me, sure.  And so I never did feel\nso happy as I did when my ninth downed its man and I detected\nthe wavering in the crowd which is premonitory of panic.  An instant\nlost now could knock out my last chance.  But I didn't lose it.\nI raised both revolvers and pointed them--the halted host stood\ntheir ground just about one good square moment, then broke and fled.\n\nThe day was mine.  Knight-errantry was a doomed institution.  The\nmarch of civilization was begun.  How did I feel?  Ah, you never\ncould imagine it.\n\nAnd Brer Merlin?  His stock was flat again.  Somehow, every time\nthe magic of fol-de-rol tried conclusions with the magic of science,\nthe magic of fol-de-rol got left.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XL\n\nTHREE YEARS LATER\n\nWhen I broke the back of knight-errantry that time, I no longer\nfelt obliged to work in secret.  So, the very next day I exposed\nmy hidden schools, my mines, and my vast system of clandestine\nfactories and workshops to an astonished world.  That is to say,\nI exposed the nineteenth century to the inspection of the sixth.\n\nWell, it is always a good plan to follow up an advantage promptly.\nThe knights were temporarily down, but if I would keep them so\nI must just simply paralyze them--nothing short of that would\nanswer.  You see, I was \"bluffing\" that last time in the field;\nit would be natural for them to work around to that conclusion,\nif I gave them a chance.  So I must not give them time; and I didn't.\n\nI renewed my challenge, engraved it on brass, posted it up where\nany priest could read it to them, and also kept it standing in\nthe advertising columns of the paper.\n\nI not only renewed it, but added to its proportions.  I said,\nname the day, and I would take fifty assistants and stand up\n_against the massed chivalry of the whole earth and destroy it_.\n\nI was not bluffing this time.  I meant what I said; I could do\nwhat I promised.  There wasn't any way to misunderstand the language\nof that challenge.  Even the dullest of the chivalry perceived\nthat this was a plain case of \"put up, or shut up.\"  They were\nwise and did the latter.  In all the next three years they gave\nme no trouble worth mentioning.\n\nConsider the three years sped.  Now look around on England.  A happy\nand prosperous country, and strangely altered.  Schools everywhere,\nand several colleges; a number of pretty good newspapers.  Even\nauthorship was taking a start; Sir Dinadan the Humorist was first\nin the field, with a volume of gray-headed jokes which I had been\nfamiliar with during thirteen centuries.  If he had left out that\nold rancid one about the lecturer I wouldn't have said anything;\nbut I couldn't stand that one.  I suppressed the book and hanged\nthe author.\n\nSlavery was dead and gone; all men were equal before the law;\ntaxation had been equalized.  The telegraph, the telephone, the\nphonograph, the typewriter, the sewing-machine, and all the thousand\nwilling and handy servants of steam and electricity were working\ntheir way into favor.  We had a steamboat or two on the Thames,\nwe had steam warships, and the beginnings of a steam commercial\nmarine; I was getting ready to send out an expedition to discover\nAmerica.\n\nWe were building several lines of railway, and our line from\nCamelot to London was already finished and in operation.  I was\nshrewd enough to make all offices connected with the passenger\nservice places of high and distinguished honor.  My idea was\nto attract the chivalry and nobility, and make them useful and keep\nthem out of mischief.  The plan worked very well, the competition\nfor the places was hot.  The conductor of the 4.33 express was\na duke; there wasn't a passenger conductor on the line below\nthe degree of earl.  They were good men, every one, but they had\ntwo defects which I couldn't cure, and so had to wink at: they\nwouldn't lay aside their armor, and they would \"knock down\" fare\n--I mean rob the company.\n\nThere was hardly a knight in all the land who wasn't in some useful\nemployment.  They were going from end to end of the country in all\nmanner of useful missionary capacities; their penchant for wandering,\nand their experience in it, made them altogether the most effective\nspreaders of civilization we had.  They went clothed in steel and\nequipped with sword and lance and battle-axe, and if they couldn't\npersuade a person to try a sewing-machine on the installment plan,\nor a melodeon, or a barbed-wire fence, or a prohibition journal,\nor any of the other thousand and one things they canvassed for,\nthey removed him and passed on.\n\nI was very happy.  Things were working steadily toward a secretly\nlonged-for point.  You see, I had two schemes in my head which\nwere the vastest of all my projects.  The one was to overthrow the\nCatholic Church and set up the Protestant faith on its ruins\n--not as an Established Church, but a go-as-you-please one; and\nthe other project was to get a decree issued by and by, commanding\nthat upon Arthur's death unlimited suffrage should be introduced,\nand given to men and women alike--at any rate to all men, wise\nor unwise, and to all mothers who at middle age should be found\nto know nearly as much as their sons at twenty-one.  Arthur was\ngood for thirty years yet, he being about my own age--that is\nto say, forty--and I believed that in that time I could easily\nhave the active part of the population of that day ready and eager\nfor an event which should be the first of its kind in the history\nof the world--a rounded and complete governmental revolution\nwithout bloodshed.  The result to be a republic.  Well, I may\nas well confess, though I do feel ashamed when I think of it:\nI was beginning to have a base hankering to be its first president\nmyself.  Yes, there was more or less human nature in me; I found\nthat out.\n\nClarence was with me as concerned the revolution, but in a modified\nway.  His idea was a republic, without privileged orders, but with\na hereditary royal family at the head of it instead of an elective\nchief magistrate.  He believed that no nation that had ever known\nthe joy of worshiping a royal family could ever be robbed of it\nand not fade away and die of melancholy.  I urged that kings were\ndangerous.  He said, then have cats.  He was sure that a royal\nfamily of cats would answer every purpose.  They would be as useful\nas any other royal family, they would know as much, they would\nhave the same virtues and the same treacheries, the same disposition\nto get up shindies with other royal cats, they would be laughably\nvain and absurd and never know it, they would be wholly inexpensive;\nfinally, they would have as sound a divine right as any other\nroyal house, and \"Tom VII, or Tom XI, or Tom XIV by the grace\nof God King,\" would sound as well as it would when applied to\nthe ordinary royal tomcat with tights on.  \"And as a rule,\" said\nhe, in his neat modern English, \"the character of these cats would\nbe considerably above the character of the average king, and this\nwould be an immense moral advantage to the nation, for the reason\nthat a nation always models its morals after its monarch's.  The\nworship of royalty being founded in unreason, these graceful and\nharmless cats would easily become as sacred as any other royalties,\nand indeed more so, because it would presently be noticed that\nthey hanged nobody, beheaded nobody, imprisoned nobody, inflicted\nno cruelties or injustices of any sort, and so must be worthy of\na deeper love and reverence than the customary human king, and\nwould certainly get it.  The eyes of the whole harried world would\nsoon be fixed upon this humane and gentle system, and royal butchers\nwould presently begin to disappear; their subjects would fill\nthe vacancies with catlings from our own royal house; we should\nbecome a factory; we should supply the thrones of the world; within\nforty years all Europe would be governed by cats, and we should\nfurnish the cats.  The reign of universal peace would begin then,\nto end no more forever....  Me-e-e-yow-ow-ow-ow--fzt!--wow!\"\n\nHang him, I supposed he was in earnest, and was beginning to be\npersuaded by him, until he exploded that cat-howl and startled me\nalmost out of my clothes.  But he never could be in earnest.  He\ndidn't know what it was.  He had pictured a distinct and perfectly\nrational and feasible improvement upon constitutional monarchy,\nbut he was too feather-headed to know it, or care anything about\nit, either.  I was going to give him a scolding, but Sandy came\nflying in at that moment, wild with terror, and so choked with sobs\nthat for a minute she could not get her voice.  I ran and took her\nin my arms, and lavished caresses upon her and said, beseechingly:\n\n\"Speak, darling, speak!  What is it?\"\n\nHer head fell limp upon my bosom, and she gasped, almost inaudibly:\n\n\"HELLO-CENTRAL!\"\n\n\"Quick!\" I shouted to Clarence; \"telephone the king's homeopath\nto come!\"\n\nIn two minutes I was kneeling by the child's crib, and Sandy was\ndispatching servants here, there, and everywhere, all over the\npalace.  I took in the situation almost at a glance--membranous\ncroup!  I bent down and whispered:\n\n\"Wake up, sweetheart!  Hello-Central.\"\n\nShe opened her soft eyes languidly, and made out to say:\n\n\"Papa.\"\n\nThat was a comfort.  She was far from dead yet.  I sent for\npreparations of sulphur, I rousted out the croup-kettle myself;\nfor I don't sit down and wait for doctors when Sandy or the child\nis sick.  I knew how to nurse both of them, and had had experience.\nThis little chap had lived in my arms a good part of its small life,\nand often I could soothe away its troubles and get it to laugh\nthrough the tear-dews on its eye-lashes when even its mother couldn't.\n\nSir Launcelot, in his richest armor, came striding along the great\nhall now on his way to the stock-board; he was president of the\nstock-board, and occupied the Siege Perilous, which he had bought\nof Sir Galahad; for the stock-board consisted of the Knights of\nthe Round Table, and they used the Round Table for business purposes\nnow.  Seats at it were worth--well, you would never believe the\nfigure, so it is no use to state it.  Sir Launcelot was a bear, and\nhe had put up a corner in one of the new lines, and was just getting\nready to squeeze the shorts to-day; but what of that?  He was\nthe same old Launcelot, and when he glanced in as he was passing\nthe door and found out that his pet was sick, that was enough\nfor him; bulls and bears might fight it out their own way for all\nhim, he would come right in here and stand by little Hello-Central\nfor all he was worth.  And that was what he did.  He shied his\nhelmet into the corner, and in half a minute he had a new wick\nin the alcohol lamp and was firing up on the croup-kettle.  By this\ntime Sandy had built a blanket canopy over the crib, and everything\nwas ready.\n\nSir Launcelot got up steam, he and I loaded up the kettle with\nunslaked lime and carbolic acid, with a touch of lactic acid added\nthereto, then filled the thing up with water and inserted the\nsteam-spout under the canopy.  Everything was ship-shape now,\nand we sat down on either side of the crib to stand our watch.\nSandy was so grateful and so comforted that she charged a couple\nof church-wardens with willow-bark and sumach-tobacco for us,\nand told us to smoke as much as we pleased, it couldn't get under\nthe canopy, and she was used to smoke, being the first lady in the\nland who had ever seen a cloud blown.  Well, there couldn't be\na more contented or comfortable sight than Sir Launcelot in his\nnoble armor sitting in gracious serenity at the end of a yard\nof snowy church-warden.  He was a beautiful man, a lovely man,\nand was just intended to make a wife and children happy.  But, of\ncourse Guenever--however, it's no use to cry over what's done and\ncan't be helped.\n\nWell, he stood watch-and-watch with me, right straight through,\nfor three days and nights, till the child was out of danger; then\nhe took her up in his great arms and kissed her, with his plumes\nfalling about her golden head, then laid her softly in Sandy's\nlap again and took his stately way down the vast hall, between\nthe ranks of admiring men-at-arms and menials, and so disappeared.\nAnd no instinct warned me that I should never look upon him again\nin this world!  Lord, what a world of heart-break it is.\n\nThe doctors said we must take the child away, if we would coax\nher back to health and strength again.  And she must have sea-air.\nSo we took a man-of-war, and a suite of two hundred and sixty\npersons, and went cruising about, and after a fortnight of this we\nstepped ashore on the French coast, and the doctors thought it\nwould be a good idea to make something of a stay there.  The little\nking of that region offered us his hospitalities, and we were glad\nto accept.  If he had had as many conveniences as he lacked, we\nshould have been plenty comfortable enough; even as it was, we\nmade out very well, in his queer old castle, by the help of comforts\nand luxuries from the ship.\n\nAt the end of a month I sent the vessel home for fresh supplies,\nand for news.  We expected her back in three or four days.  She\nwould bring me, along with other news, the result of a certain\nexperiment which I had been starting.  It was a project of mine\nto replace the tournament with something which might furnish an\nescape for the extra steam of the chivalry, keep those bucks\nentertained and out of mischief, and at the same time preserve\nthe best thing in them, which was their hardy spirit of emulation.\nI had had a choice band of them in private training for some time,\nand the date was now arriving for their first public effort.\n\nThis experiment was baseball.  In order to give the thing vogue\nfrom the start, and place it out of the reach of criticism, I chose\nmy nines by rank, not capacity.  There wasn't a knight in either\nteam who wasn't a sceptered sovereign.  As for material of this\nsort, there was a glut of it always around Arthur.  You couldn't\nthrow a brick in any direction and not cripple a king.  Of course,\nI couldn't get these people to leave off their armor; they wouldn't\ndo that when they bathed.  They consented to differentiate the\narmor so that a body could tell one team from the other, but that\nwas the most they would do.  So, one of the teams wore chain-mail\nulsters, and the other wore plate-armor made of my new Bessemer\nsteel.  Their practice in the field was the most fantastic thing I\never saw.  Being ball-proof, they never skipped out of the way,\nbut stood still and took the result; when a Bessemer was at the bat\nand a ball hit him, it would bound a hundred and fifty yards\nsometimes.  And when a man was running, and threw himself on his\nstomach to slide to his base, it was like an iron-clad coming into\nport.  At first I appointed men of no rank to act as umpires, but\nI had to discontinue that.  These people were no easier to please\nthan other nines.  The umpire's first decision was usually his\nlast; they broke him in two with a bat, and his friends toted him\nhome on a shutter.  When it was noticed that no umpire ever survived\na game, umpiring got to be unpopular.  So I was obliged to appoint\nsomebody whose rank and lofty position under the government would\nprotect him.\n\nHere are the names of the nines:\n\n     BESSEMERS                   ULSTERS\n\n   KING ARTHUR.                EMPEROR LUCIUS.\n   KING LOT OF LOTHIAN.        KING LOGRIS.\n   KING OF NORTHGALIS.         KING MARHALT OF IRELAND.\n   KING MARSIL.                KING MORGANORE.\n   KING OF LITTLE BRITAIN.     KING MARK OF CORNWALL.\n   KING LABOR.                 KING NENTRES OF GARLOT.\n   KING PELLAM OF LISTENGESE.  KING MELIODAS OF LIONES.\n   KING BAGDEMAGUS.            KING OF THE LAKE.\n   KING TOLLEME LA FEINTES.    THE SOWDAN OF SYRIA.\n\n                  Umpire--CLARENCE.\n\nThe first public game would certainly draw fifty thousand people;\nand for solid fun would be worth going around the world to see.\nEverything would be favorable; it was balmy and beautiful spring\nweather now, and Nature was all tailored out in her new clothes.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLI\n\nTHE INTERDICT\n\nHowever, my attention was suddenly snatched from such matters;\nour child began to lose ground again, and we had to go to sitting\nup with her, her case became so serious.  We couldn't bear to allow\nanybody to help in this service, so we two stood watch-and-watch,\nday in and day out.  Ah, Sandy, what a right heart she had, how\nsimple, and genuine, and good she was!  She was a flawless wife\nand mother; and yet I had married her for no other particular\nreasons, except that by the customs of chivalry she was my property\nuntil some knight should win her from me in the field.  She had\nhunted Britain over for me; had found me at the hanging-bout\noutside of London, and had straightway resumed her old place at\nmy side in the placidest way and as of right.  I was a New Englander,\nand in my opinion this sort of partnership would compromise her,\nsooner or later.  She couldn't see how, but I cut argument short\nand we had a wedding.\n\nNow I didn't know I was drawing a prize, yet that was what I did\ndraw.  Within the twelvemonth I became her worshiper; and ours\nwas the dearest and perfectest comradeship that ever was.  People\ntalk about beautiful friendships between two persons of the same\nsex.  What is the best of that sort, as compared with the friendship\nof man and wife, where the best impulses and highest ideals of\nboth are the same?  There is no place for comparison between\nthe two friendships; the one is earthly, the other divine.\n\nIn my dreams, along at first, I still wandered thirteen centuries\naway, and my unsatisfied spirit went calling and harking all up\nand down the unreplying vacancies of a vanished world.  Many a\ntime Sandy heard that imploring cry come from my lips in my sleep.\nWith a grand magnanimity she saddled that cry of mine upon our\nchild, conceiving it to be the name of some lost darling of mine.\nIt touched me to tears, and it also nearly knocked me off my feet,\ntoo, when she smiled up in my face for an earned reward, and played\nher quaint and pretty surprise upon me:\n\n\"The name of one who was dear to thee is here preserved, here made\nholy, and the music of it will abide alway in our ears.  Now\nthou'lt kiss me, as knowing the name I have given the child.\"\n\nBut I didn't know it, all the same.  I hadn't an idea in the\nworld; but it would have been cruel to confess it and spoil her\npretty game; so I never let on, but said:\n\n\"Yes, I know, sweetheart--how dear and good it is of you, too!\nBut I want to hear these lips of yours, which are also mine, utter\nit first--then its music will be perfect.\"\n\nPleased to the marrow, she murmured:\n\n\"HELLO-CENTRAL!\"\n\nI didn't laugh--I am always thankful for that--but the strain\nruptured every cartilage in me, and for weeks afterward I could\nhear my bones clack when I walked.  She never found out her mistake.\nThe first time she heard that form of salute used at the telephone\nshe was surprised, and not pleased; but I told her I had given\norder for it: that henceforth and forever the telephone must\nalways be invoked with that reverent formality, in perpetual honor\nand remembrance of my lost friend and her small namesake.  This\nwas not true.  But it answered.\n\nWell, during two weeks and a half we watched by the crib, and in\nour deep solicitude we were unconscious of any world outside of\nthat sick-room.  Then our reward came: the center of the universe\nturned the corner and began to mend.  Grateful?  It isn't the term.\nThere _isn't_ any term for it.  You know that yourself, if you've\nwatched your child through the Valley of the Shadow and seen it\ncome back to life and sweep night out of the earth with one\nall-illuminating smile that you could cover with your hand.\n\nWhy, we were back in this world in one instant!  Then we looked\nthe same startled thought into each other's eyes at the same\nmoment; more than two weeks gone, and that ship not back yet!\n\nIn another minute I appeared in the presence of my train.  They\nhad been steeped in troubled bodings all this time--their faces\nshowed it.  I called an escort and we galloped five miles to a\nhilltop overlooking the sea.  Where was my great commerce that\nso lately had made these glistening expanses populous and beautiful\nwith its white-winged flocks?  Vanished, every one!  Not a sail,\nfrom verge to verge, not a smoke-bank--just a dead and empty\nsolitude, in place of all that brisk and breezy life.\n\nI went swiftly back, saying not a word to anybody.  I told Sandy\nthis ghastly news.  We could imagine no explanation that would\nbegin to explain.  Had there been an invasion? an earthquake?\na pestilence?  Had the nation been swept out of existence?  But\nguessing was profitless.  I must go--at once.  I borrowed the king's\nnavy--a \"ship\" no bigger than a steam launch--and was soon ready.\n\nThe parting--ah, yes, that was hard.  As I was devouring the child\nwith last kisses, it brisked up and jabbered out its vocabulary!\n--the first time in more than two weeks, and it made fools of us\nfor joy.  The darling mispronunciations of childhood!--dear me,\nthere's no music that can touch it; and how one grieves when it\nwastes away and dissolves into correctness, knowing it will never\nvisit his bereaved ear again.  Well, how good it was to be able\nto carry that gracious memory away with me!\n\nI approached England the next morning, with the wide highway of\nsalt water all to myself.  There were ships in the harbor, at\nDover, but they were naked as to sails, and there was no sign\nof life about them.  It was Sunday; yet at Canterbury the streets\nwere empty; strangest of all, there was not even a priest in sight,\nand no stroke of a bell fell upon my ear.  The mournfulness of\ndeath was everywhere.  I couldn't understand it.  At last, in\nthe further edge of that town I saw a small funeral procession\n--just a family and a few friends following a coffin--no priest;\na funeral without bell, book, or candle; there was a church there\nclose at hand, but they passed it by weeping, and did not enter it;\nI glanced up at the belfry, and there hung the bell, shrouded in\nblack, and its tongue tied back.  Now I knew!  Now I understood\nthe stupendous calamity that had overtaken England.  Invasion?\nInvasion is a triviality to it.  It was the INTERDICT!\n\nI asked no questions; I didn't need to ask any.  The Church had\nstruck; the thing for me to do was to get into a disguise, and\ngo warily.  One of my servants gave me a suit of clothes, and\nwhen we were safe beyond the town I put them on, and from that time\nI traveled alone; I could not risk the embarrassment of company.\n\nA miserable journey.  A desolate silence everywhere.  Even in\nLondon itself.  Traffic had ceased; men did not talk or laugh, or\ngo in groups, or even in couples; they moved aimlessly about, each\nman by himself, with his head down, and woe and terror at his heart.\nThe Tower showed recent war-scars.  Verily, much had been happening.\n\nOf course, I meant to take the train for Camelot.  Train!  Why,\nthe station was as vacant as a cavern.  I moved on.  The journey\nto Camelot was a repetition of what I had already seen.  The Monday\nand the Tuesday differed in no way from the Sunday.  I arrived\nfar in the night.  From being the best electric-lighted town in\nthe kingdom and the most like a recumbent sun of anything you ever\nsaw, it was become simply a blot--a blot upon darkness--that is\nto say, it was darker and solider than the rest of the darkness,\nand so you could see it a little better; it made me feel as if\nmaybe it was symbolical--a sort of sign that the Church was going to\n_keep_ the upper hand now, and snuff out all my beautiful civilization\njust like that.  I found no life stirring in the somber streets.\nI groped my way with a heavy heart.  The vast castle loomed black\nupon the hilltop, not a spark visible about it.  The drawbridge\nwas down, the great gate stood wide, I entered without challenge,\nmy own heels making the only sound I heard--and it was sepulchral\nenough, in those huge vacant courts.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLII\n\nWAR!\n\nI found Clarence alone in his quarters, drowned in melancholy;\nand in place of the electric light, he had reinstituted the ancient\nrag-lamp, and sat there in a grisly twilight with all curtains\ndrawn tight.  He sprang up and rushed for me eagerly, saying:\n\n\"Oh, it's worth a billion milrays to look upon a live person again!\"\n\nHe knew me as easily as if I hadn't been disguised at all.  Which\nfrightened me; one may easily believe that.\n\n\"Quick, now, tell me the meaning of this fearful disaster,\" I said.\n\"How did it come about?\"\n\n\"Well, if there hadn't been any Queen Guenever, it wouldn't have\ncome so early; but it would have come, anyway.  It would have\ncome on your own account by and by; by luck, it happened to come\non the queen's.\"\n\n\"_And_ Sir Launcelot's?\"\n\n\"Just so.\"\n\n\"Give me the details.\"\n\n\"I reckon you will grant that during some years there has been\nonly one pair of eyes in these kingdoms that has not been looking\nsteadily askance at the queen and Sir Launcelot--\"\n\n\"Yes, King Arthur's.\"\n\n\"--and only one heart that was without suspicion--\"\n\n\"Yes--the king's; a heart that isn't capable of thinking evil\nof a friend.\"\n\n\"Well, the king might have gone on, still happy and unsuspecting,\nto the end of his days, but for one of your modern improvements\n--the stock-board.  When you left, three miles of the London,\nCanterbury and Dover were ready for the rails, and also ready and\nripe for manipulation in the stock-market.  It was wildcat, and\neverybody knew it.  The stock was for sale at a give-away.  What\ndoes Sir Launcelot do, but--\"\n\n\"Yes, I know; he quietly picked up nearly all of it for a song;\nthen he bought about twice as much more, deliverable upon call;\nand he was about to call when I left.\"\n\n\"Very well, he did call.  The boys couldn't deliver.  Oh, he had\nthem--and he just settled his grip and squeezed them.  They were\nlaughing in their sleeves over their smartness in selling stock\nto him at 15 and 16 and along there that wasn't worth 10.  Well,\nwhen they had laughed long enough on that side of their mouths,\nthey rested-up that side by shifting the laugh to the other side.\nThat was when they compromised with the Invincible at 283!\"\n\n\"Good land!\"\n\n\"He skinned them alive, and they deserved it--anyway, the whole\nkingdom rejoiced.  Well, among the flayed were Sir Agravaine and\nSir Mordred, nephews to the king.  End of the first act.  Act\nsecond, scene first, an apartment in Carlisle castle, where the\ncourt had gone for a few days' hunting.  Persons present, the\nwhole tribe of the king's nephews.  Mordred and Agravaine propose\nto call the guileless Arthur's attention to Guenever and Sir\nLauncelot.  Sir Gawaine, Sir Gareth, and Sir Gaheris will have\nnothing to do with it.  A dispute ensues, with loud talk; in the\nmidst of it enter the king.  Mordred and Agravaine spring their\ndevastating tale upon him.  _Tableau_.  A trap is laid for Launcelot,\nby the king's command, and Sir Launcelot walks into it.  He made\nit sufficiently uncomfortable for the ambushed witnesses--to wit,\nMordred, Agravaine, and twelve knights of lesser rank, for he\nkilled every one of them but Mordred; but of course that couldn't\nstraighten matters between Launcelot and the king, and didn't.\"\n\n\"Oh, dear, only one thing could result--I see that.  War, and\nthe knights of the realm divided into a king's party and a\nSir Launcelot's party.\"\n\n\"Yes--that was the way of it.  The king sent the queen to the\nstake, proposing to purify her with fire.  Launcelot and his\nknights rescued her, and in doing it slew certain good old friends\nof yours and mine--in fact, some of the best we ever had; to wit,\nSir Belias le Orgulous, Sir Segwarides, Sir Griflet le Fils de Dieu,\nSir Brandiles, Sir Aglovale--\"\n\n\"Oh, you tear out my heartstrings.\"\n\n\"--wait, I'm not done yet--Sir Tor, Sir Gauter, Sir Gillimer--\"\n\n\"The very best man in my subordinate nine.  What a handy right-fielder\nhe was!\"\n\n\"--Sir Reynold's three brothers, Sir Damus, Sir Priamus, Sir Kay\nthe Stranger--\"\n\n\"My peerless short-stop!  I've seen him catch a daisy-cutter in\nhis teeth.  Come, I can't stand this!\"\n\n\"--Sir Driant, Sir Lambegus, Sir Herminde, Sir Pertilope,\nSir Perimones, and--whom do you think?\"\n\n\"Rush!  Go on.\"\n\n\"Sir Gaheris, and Sir Gareth--both!\"\n\n\"Oh, incredible!  Their love for Launcelot was indestructible.\"\n\n\"Well, it was an accident.  They were simply onlookers; they were\nunarmed, and were merely there to witness the queen's punishment.\nSir Launcelot smote down whoever came in the way of his blind fury,\nand he killed these without noticing who they were.  Here is an\ninstantaneous photograph one of our boys got of the battle; it's\nfor sale on every news-stand.  There--the figures nearest the queen\nare Sir Launcelot with his sword up, and Sir Gareth gasping his\nlatest breath.  You can catch the agony in the queen's face through\nthe curling smoke.  It's a rattling battle-picture.\"\n\n\"Indeed, it is.  We must take good care of it; its historical value\nis incalculable.  Go on.\"\n\n\"Well, the rest of the tale is just war, pure and simple.  Launcelot\nretreated to his town and castle of Joyous Gard, and gathered\nthere a great following of knights.  The king, with a great host,\nwent there, and there was desperate fighting during several days,\nand, as a result, all the plain around was paved with corpses\nand cast-iron.  Then the Church patched up a peace between Arthur\nand Launcelot and the queen and everybody--everybody but Sir Gawaine.\nHe was bitter about the slaying of his brothers, Gareth and Gaheris,\nand would not be appeased.  He notified Launcelot to get him\nthence, and make swift preparation, and look to be soon attacked.\nSo Launcelot sailed to his Duchy of Guienne with his following, and\nGawaine soon followed with an army, and he beguiled Arthur to go\nwith him.  Arthur left the kingdom in Sir Mordred's hands until\nyou should return--\"\n\n\"Ah--a king's customary wisdom!\"\n\n\"Yes.  Sir Mordred set himself at once to work to make his kingship\npermanent.  He was going to marry Guenever, as a first move; but\nshe fled and shut herself up in the Tower of London.  Mordred\nattacked; the Bishop of Canterbury dropped down on him with the\nInterdict.  The king returned; Mordred fought him at Dover, at\nCanterbury, and again at Barham Down.  Then there was talk of peace\nand a composition.  Terms, Mordred to have Cornwall and Kent during\nArthur's life, and the whole kingdom afterward.\"\n\n\"Well, upon my word!  My dream of a republic to _be_ a dream, and\nso remain.\"\n\n\"Yes.  The two armies lay near Salisbury.  Gawaine--Gawaine's head\nis at Dover Castle, he fell in the fight there--Gawaine appeared to\nArthur in a dream, at least his ghost did, and warned him to\nrefrain from conflict for a month, let the delay cost what it might.\nBut battle was precipitated by an accident.  Arthur had given\norder that if a sword was raised during the consultation over\nthe proposed treaty with Mordred, sound the trumpet and fall on!\nfor he had no confidence in Mordred.  Mordred had given a similar\norder to _his_ people.  Well, by and by an adder bit a knight's heel;\nthe knight forgot all about the order, and made a slash at the\nadder with his sword.  Inside of half a minute those two prodigious\nhosts came together with a crash!  They butchered away all day.\nThen the king--however, we have started something fresh since\nyou left--our paper has.\"\n\n\"No?  What is that?\"\n\n\"War correspondence!\"\n\n\"Why, that's good.\"\n\n\"Yes, the paper was booming right along, for the Interdict made\nno impression, got no grip, while the war lasted.  I had war\ncorrespondents with both armies.  I will finish that battle by\nreading you what one of the boys says:\n\n   'Then the king looked about him, and then was he\n   ware of all his host and of all his good knights\n   were left no more on live but two knights, that\n   was Sir Lucan de Butlere, and his brother Sir\n   Bedivere: and they were full sore wounded.  Jesu\n   mercy, said the king, where are all my noble\n   knights becomen?  Alas that ever I should see this\n   doleful day.  For now, said Arthur, I am come to\n   mine end.  But would to God that I wist where were\n   that traitor Sir Mordred, that hath caused all\n   this mischief.  Then was King Arthur ware where Sir\n   Mordred leaned upon his sword among a great heap\n   of dead men.  Now give me my spear, said Arthur\n   unto Sir Lucan, for yonder I have espied the\n   traitor that all this woe hath wrought.  Sir, let\n   him be, said Sir Lucan, for he is unhappy; and if\n   ye pass this unhappy day, ye shall be right well\n   revenged upon him.  Good lord, remember ye of your\n   night's dream, and what the spirit of Sir Gawaine\n   told you this night, yet God of his great goodness\n   hath preserved you hitherto.  Therefore, for God's\n   sake, my lord, leave off by this. For blessed be\n   God ye have won the field: for here we be three\n   on live, and with Sir Mordred is none on live.\n   And if ye leave off now, this wicked day of\n   destiny is past.  Tide me death, betide me life,\n   saith the king, now I see him yonder alone, he\n   shall never escape mine hands, for at a better\n   avail shall I never have him.  God speed you well,\n   said Sir Bedivere.  Then the king gat his spear\n   in both his hands, and ran toward Sir Mordred\n   crying, Traitor, now is thy death day come.  And\n   when Sir Mordred heard Sir Arthur, he ran until\n   him with his sword drawn in his hand.  And then\n   King Arthur smote Sir Mordred under the shield,\n   with a foin of his spear throughout the body more\n   than a fathom.  And when Sir Mordred felt that he\n   had his death's wound, he thrust himself, with\n   the might that he had, up to the butt of King\n   Arthur's spear.  And right so he smote his father\n   Arthur with his sword holden in both his hands,\n   on the side of the head, that the sword pierced\n   the helmet and the brain-pan, and therewithal\n   Sir Mordred fell stark dead to the earth.  And\n   the noble Arthur fell in a swoon to the earth,\n   and there he swooned oft-times--'\"\n\n\"That is a good piece of war correspondence, Clarence; you are\na first-rate newspaper man.  Well--is the king all right?  Did\nhe get well?\"\n\n\"Poor soul, no.  He is dead.\"\n\nI was utterly stunned; it had not seemed to me that any wound\ncould be mortal to him.\n\n\"And the queen, Clarence?\"\n\n\"She is a nun, in Almesbury.\"\n\n\"What changes! and in such a short while.  It is inconceivable.\nWhat next, I wonder?\"\n\n\"I can tell you what next.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Stake our lives and stand by them!\"\n\n\"What do you mean by that?\"\n\n\"The Church is master now.  The Interdict included you with Mordred;\nit is not to be removed while you remain alive.  The clans are\ngathering.  The Church has gathered all the knights that are left\nalive, and as soon as you are discovered we shall have business\non our hands.\"\n\n\"Stuff!  With our deadly scientific war-material; with our hosts\nof trained--\"\n\n\"Save your breath--we haven't sixty faithful left!\"\n\n\"What are you saying?  Our schools, our colleges, our vast\nworkshops, our--\"\n\n\"When those knights come, those establishments will empty themselves\nand go over to the enemy.  Did you think you had educated the\nsuperstition out of those people?\"\n\n\"I certainly did think it.\"\n\n\"Well, then, you may unthink it.  They stood every strain easily\n--until the Interdict.  Since then, they merely put on a bold\noutside--at heart they are quaking.  Make up your mind to it\n--when the armies come, the mask will fall.\"\n\n\"It's hard news.  We are lost.  They will turn our own science\nagainst us.\"\n\n\"No they won't.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Because I and a handful of the faithful have blocked that game.\nI'll tell you what I've done, and what moved me to it.  Smart as\nyou are, the Church was smarter.  It was the Church that sent\nyou cruising--through her servants, the doctors.\"\n\n\"Clarence!\"\n\n\"It is the truth.  I know it.  Every officer of your ship was\nthe Church's picked servant, and so was every man of the crew.\"\n\n\"Oh, come!\"\n\n\"It is just as I tell you.  I did not find out these things at once,\nbut I found them out finally.  Did you send me verbal information,\nby the commander of the ship, to the effect that upon his return\nto you, with supplies, you were going to leave Cadiz--\"\n\n\"Cadiz!  I haven't been at Cadiz at all!\"\n\n\"--going to leave Cadiz and cruise in distant seas indefinitely,\nfor the health of your family?  Did you send me that word?\"\n\n\"Of course not.  I would have written, wouldn't I?\"\n\n\"Naturally.  I was troubled and suspicious.  When the commander\nsailed again I managed to ship a spy with him.  I have never\nheard of vessel or spy since.  I gave myself two weeks to hear\nfrom you in.  Then I resolved to send a ship to Cadiz.  There was\na reason why I didn't.\"\n\n\"What was that?\"\n\n\"Our navy had suddenly and mysteriously disappeared!  Also, as\nsuddenly and as mysteriously, the railway and telegraph and\ntelephone service ceased, the men all deserted, poles were cut\ndown, the Church laid a ban upon the electric light!  I had to be\nup and doing--and straight off.  Your life was safe--nobody in\nthese kingdoms but Merlin would venture to touch such a magician\nas you without ten thousand men at his back--I had nothing to\nthink of but how to put preparations in the best trim against your\ncoming.  I felt safe myself--nobody would be anxious to touch\na pet of yours.  So this is what I did.  From our various works\nI selected all the men--boys I mean--whose faithfulness under\nwhatsoever pressure I could swear to, and I called them together\nsecretly and gave them their instructions.  There are fifty-two of\nthem; none younger than fourteen, and none above seventeen years old.\"\n\n\"Why did you select boys?\"\n\n\"Because all the others were born in an atmosphere of superstition\nand reared in it.  It is in their blood and bones.  We imagined\nwe had educated it out of them; they thought so, too; the Interdict\nwoke them up like a thunderclap!  It revealed them to themselves,\nand it revealed them to me, too.  With boys it was different.  Such\nas have been under our training from seven to ten years have had\nno acquaintance with the Church's terrors, and it was among these\nthat I found my fifty-two.  As a next move, I paid a private visit\nto that old cave of Merlin's--not the small one--the big one--\"\n\n\"Yes, the one where we secretly established our first great electric\nplant when I was projecting a miracle.\"\n\n\"Just so.  And as that miracle hadn't become necessary then,\nI thought it might be a good idea to utilize the plant now.  I've\nprovisioned the cave for a siege--\"\n\n\"A good idea, a first-rate idea.\"\n\n\"I think so.  I placed four of my boys there as a guard--inside,\nand out of sight.  Nobody was to be hurt--while outside; but any\nattempt to enter--well, we said just let anybody try it!  Then\nI went out into the hills and uncovered and cut the secret wires\nwhich connected your bedroom with the wires that go to the dynamite\ndeposits under all our vast factories, mills, workshops, magazines,\netc., and about midnight I and my boys turned out and connected\nthat wire with the cave, and nobody but you and I suspects where\nthe other end of it goes to.  We laid it under ground, of course, and\nit was all finished in a couple of hours or so.  We sha'n't have\nto leave our fortress now when we want to blow up our civilization.\"\n\n\"It was the right move--and the natural one; military necessity,\nin the changed condition of things.  Well, what changes _have_ come!\nWe expected to be besieged in the palace some time or other, but\n--however, go on.\"\n\n\"Next, we built a wire fence.\"\n\n\"Wire fence?\"\n\n\"Yes.  You dropped the hint of it yourself, two or three years ago.\"\n\n\"Oh, I remember--the time the Church tried her strength against\nus the first time, and presently thought it wise to wait for a\nhopefuler season.  Well, how have you arranged the fence?\"\n\n\"I start twelve immensely strong wires--naked, not insulated\n--from a big dynamo in the cave--dynamo with no brushes except\na positive and a negative one--\"\n\n\"Yes, that's right.\"\n\n\"The wires go out from the cave and fence in a circle of level\nground a hundred yards in diameter; they make twelve independent\nfences, ten feet apart--that is to say, twelve circles within\ncircles--and their ends come into the cave again.\"\n\n\"Right; go on.\"\n\n\"The fences are fastened to heavy oaken posts only three feet apart,\nand these posts are sunk five feet in the ground.\"\n\n\"That is good and strong.\"\n\n\"Yes.  The wires have no ground-connection outside of the cave.\nThey go out from the positive brush of the dynamo; there is a\nground-connection through the negative brush; the other ends of\nthe wire return to the cave, and each is grounded independently.\"\n\n\"No, no, that won't do!\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"It's too expensive--uses up force for nothing.  You don't want\nany ground-connection except the one through the negative brush.\nThe other end of every wire must be brought back into the cave\nand fastened independently, and _without_ any ground-connection.\nNow, then, observe the economy of it.  A cavalry charge hurls\nitself against the fence; you are using no power, you are spending\nno money, for there is only one ground-connection till those horses\ncome against the wire; the moment they touch it they form a\nconnection with the negative brush _through the ground_, and drop\ndead.  Don't you see?--you are using no energy until it is needed;\nyour lightning is there, and ready, like the load in a gun; but\nit isn't costing you a cent till you touch it off.  Oh, yes, the\nsingle ground-connection--\"\n\n\"Of course!  I don't know how I overlooked that.  It's not only\ncheaper, but it's more effectual than the other way, for if wires\nbreak or get tangled, no harm is done.\"\n\n\"No, especially if we have a tell-tale in the cave and disconnect\nthe broken wire.  Well, go on.  The gatlings?\"\n\n\"Yes--that's arranged.  In the center of the inner circle, on a\nspacious platform six feet high, I've grouped a battery of thirteen\ngatling guns, and provided plenty of ammunition.\"\n\n\"That's it.  They command every approach, and when the Church's\nknights arrive, there's going to be music.  The brow of the\nprecipice over the cave--\"\n\n\"I've got a wire fence there, and a gatling.  They won't drop any\nrocks down on us.\"\n\n\"Well, and the glass-cylinder dynamite torpedoes?\"\n\n\"That's attended to.  It's the prettiest garden that was ever\nplanted.  It's a belt forty feet wide, and goes around the outer\nfence--distance between it and the fence one hundred yards--kind of\nneutral ground that space is.  There isn't a single square yard\nof that whole belt but is equipped with a torpedo.  We laid them\non the surface of the ground, and sprinkled a layer of sand over\nthem.  It's an innocent looking garden, but you let a man start\nin to hoe it once, and you'll see.\"\n\n\"You tested the torpedoes?\"\n\n\"Well, I was going to, but--\"\n\n\"But what?  Why, it's an immense oversight not to apply a--\"\n\n\"Test?  Yes, I know; but they're all right; I laid a few in the\npublic road beyond our lines and they've been tested.\"\n\n\"Oh, that alters the case.  Who did it?\"\n\n\"A Church committee.\"\n\n\"How kind!\"\n\n\"Yes.  They came to command us to make submission.  You see they\ndidn't really come to test the torpedoes; that was merely an incident.\"\n\n\"Did the committee make a report?\"\n\n\"Yes, they made one.  You could have heard it a mile.\"\n\n\"Unanimous?\"\n\n\"That was the nature of it.  After that I put up some signs, for the\nprotection of future committees, and we have had no intruders since.\"\n\n\"Clarence, you've done a world of work, and done it perfectly.\"\n\n\"We had plenty of time for it; there wasn't any occasion for hurry.\"\n\nWe sat silent awhile, thinking.  Then my mind was made up, and\nI said:\n\n\"Yes, everything is ready; everything is shipshape, no detail is\nwanting.  I know what to do now.\"\n\n\"So do I; sit down and wait.\"\n\n\"No, _sir_! rise up and _strike_!\"\n\n\"Do you mean it?\"\n\n\"Yes, indeed!  The _de_fensive isn't in my line, and the _of_fensive\nis.  That is, when I hold a fair hand--two-thirds as good a hand\nas the enemy.  Oh, yes, we'll rise up and strike; that's our game.\"\n\n\"A hundred to one you are right.  When does the performance begin?\"\n\n\"_Now!_  We'll proclaim the Republic.\"\n\n\"Well, that _will_ precipitate things, sure enough!\"\n\n\"It will make them buzz, I tell you!  England will be a hornets'\nnest before noon to-morrow, if the Church's hand hasn't lost its\ncunning--and we know it hasn't.  Now you write and I'll dictate thus:\n\n                      \"PROCLAMATION\n\n                           ---\n\n   \"BE IT KNOWN UNTO ALL.  Whereas the king having died\n   and left no heir, it becomes my duty to continue the\n   executive authority vested in me, until a government\n   shall have been created and set in motion.  The\n   monarchy has lapsed, it no longer exists.  By\n   consequence, all political power has reverted to its\n   original source, the people of the nation.  With the\n   monarchy, its several adjuncts died also; wherefore\n   there is no longer a nobility, no longer a privileged\n   class, no longer an Established Church; all men are\n   become exactly equal; they are upon one common\n   level, and religion is free.  _A Republic is hereby\n   proclaimed_, as being the natural estate of a nation\n   when other authority has ceased.  It is the duty of\n   the British people to meet together immediately,\n   and by their votes elect representatives and deliver\n   into their hands the government.\"\n\nI signed it \"The Boss,\" and dated it from Merlin's Cave.\nClarence said--\n\n\"Why, that tells where we are, and invites them to call right away.\"\n\n\"That is the idea.  We _strike_--by the Proclamation--then it's\ntheir innings.  Now have the thing set up and printed and posted,\nright off; that is, give the order; then, if you've got a couple\nof bicycles handy at the foot of the hill, ho for Merlin's Cave!\"\n\n\"I shall be ready in ten minutes.  What a cyclone there is going\nto be to-morrow when this piece of paper gets to work!...  It's a\npleasant old palace, this is; I wonder if we shall ever again\n--but never mind about that.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIII\n\nTHE BATTLE OF THE SAND BELT\n\nIn Merlin's Cave--Clarence and I and fifty-two fresh, bright,\nwell-educated, clean-minded young British boys.  At dawn I sent\nan order to the factories and to all our great works to stop\noperations and remove all life to a safe distance, as everything\nwas going to be blown up by secret mines, \"_and no telling at what\nmoment--therefore, vacate at once_.\"  These people knew me, and\nhad confidence in my word.  They would clear out without waiting\nto part their hair, and I could take my own time about dating the\nexplosion.  You couldn't hire one of them to go back during the\ncentury, if the explosion was still impending.\n\nWe had a week of waiting.  It was not dull for me, because I was\nwriting all the time.  During the first three days, I finished\nturning my old diary into this narrative form; it only required\na chapter or so to bring it down to date.  The rest of the week\nI took up in writing letters to my wife.  It was always my habit\nto write to Sandy every day, whenever we were separate, and now\nI kept up the habit for love of it, and of her, though I couldn't\ndo anything with the letters, of course, after I had written them.\nBut it put in the time, you see, and was almost like talking;\nit was almost as if I was saying, \"Sandy, if you and Hello-Central\nwere here in the cave, instead of only your photographs, what\ngood times we could have!\"  And then, you know, I could imagine\nthe baby goo-gooing something out in reply, with its fists in its\nmouth and itself stretched across its mother's lap on its back,\nand she a-laughing and admiring and worshipping, and now and then\ntickling under the baby's chin to set it cackling, and then maybe\nthrowing in a word of answer to me herself--and so on and so on\n--well, don't you know, I could sit there in the cave with my pen,\nand keep it up, that way, by the hour with them.  Why, it was\nalmost like having us all together again.\n\nI had spies out every night, of course, to get news.  Every report\nmade things look more and more impressive.  The hosts were gathering,\ngathering; down all the roads and paths of England the knights were\nriding, and priests rode with them, to hearten these original\nCrusaders, this being the Church's war.  All the nobilities, big\nand little, were on their way, and all the gentry.  This was all\nas was expected.  We should thin out this sort of folk to such\na degree that the people would have nothing to do but just step\nto the front with their republic and--\n\nAh, what a donkey I was!  Toward the end of the week I began to get\nthis large and disenchanting fact through my head: that the mass\nof the nation had swung their caps and shouted for the republic for\nabout one day, and there an end!  The Church, the nobles, and\nthe gentry then turned one grand, all-disapproving frown upon them\nand shriveled them into sheep!  From that moment the sheep had\nbegun to gather to the fold--that is to say, the camps--and offer\ntheir valueless lives and their valuable wool to the \"righteous\ncause.\"  Why, even the very men who had lately been slaves were\nin the \"righteous cause,\" and glorifying it, praying for it,\nsentimentally slabbering over it, just like all the other commoners.\nImagine such human muck as this; conceive of this folly!\n\nYes, it was now \"Death to the Republic!\" everywhere--not a dissenting\nvoice.  All England was marching against us!  Truly, this was more\nthan I had bargained for.\n\nI watched my fifty-two boys narrowly; watched their faces, their\nwalk, their unconscious attitudes: for all these are a language\n--a language given us purposely that it may betray us in times of\nemergency, when we have secrets which we want to keep.  I knew\nthat that thought would keep saying itself over and over again\nin their minds and hearts, _All England is marching against us!_\nand ever more strenuously imploring attention with each repetition,\never more sharply realizing itself to their imaginations, until\neven in their sleep they would find no rest from it, but hear\nthe vague and flitting creatures of the dreams say, _All England_\n--ALL ENGLAND!--_is marching against you_!  I knew all this would\nhappen; I knew that ultimately the pressure would become so great\nthat it would compel utterance; therefore, I must be ready with an\nanswer at that time--an answer well chosen and tranquilizing.\n\nI was right.  The time came.  They HAD to speak.  Poor lads, it\nwas pitiful to see, they were so pale, so worn, so troubled.  At\nfirst their spokesman could hardly find voice or words; but he\npresently got both.  This is what he said--and he put it in the\nneat modern English taught him in my schools:\n\n\"We have tried to forget what we are--English boys!  We have tried\nto put reason before sentiment, duty before love; our minds\napprove, but our hearts reproach us.  While apparently it was\nonly the nobility, only the gentry, only the twenty-five or thirty\nthousand knights left alive out of the late wars, we were of one\nmind, and undisturbed by any troubling doubt; each and every one\nof these fifty-two lads who stand here before you, said, 'They\nhave chosen--it is their affair.'  But think!--the matter is\naltered--_All England is marching against us_!  Oh, sir, consider!\n--reflect!--these people are our people, they are bone of our bone,\nflesh of our flesh, we love them--do not ask us to destroy our nation!\"\n\nWell, it shows the value of looking ahead, and being ready for\na thing when it happens.  If I hadn't foreseen this thing and been\nfixed, that boy would have had me!--I couldn't have said a word.\nBut I was fixed.  I said:\n\n\"My boys, your hearts are in the right place, you have thought the\nworthy thought, you have done the worthy thing.  You are English\nboys, you will remain English boys, and you will keep that name\nunsmirched.  Give yourselves no further concern, let your minds be\nat peace.  Consider this: while all England is marching against\nus, who is in the van?  Who, by the commonest rules of war, will\nmarch in the front?  Answer me.\"\n\n\"The mounted host of mailed knights.\"\n\n\"True.  They are thirty thousand strong.  Acres deep they will march.\nNow, observe: none but _they_ will ever strike the sand-belt!  Then\nthere will be an episode!  Immediately after, the civilian multitude\nin the rear will retire, to meet business engagements elsewhere.\nNone but nobles and gentry are knights, and _none but these_ will\nremain to dance to our music after that episode.  It is absolutely\ntrue that we shall have to fight nobody but these thirty thousand\nknights.  Now speak, and it shall be as you decide.  Shall we\navoid the battle, retire from the field?\"\n\n\"NO!!!\"\n\nThe shout was unanimous and hearty.\n\n\"Are you--are you--well, afraid of these thirty thousand knights?\"\n\nThat joke brought out a good laugh, the boys' troubles vanished\naway, and they went gaily to their posts.  Ah, they were a darling\nfifty-two!  As pretty as girls, too.\n\nI was ready for the enemy now.  Let the approaching big day come\nalong--it would find us on deck.\n\nThe big day arrived on time.  At dawn the sentry on watch in the\ncorral came into the cave and reported a moving black mass under\nthe horizon, and a faint sound which he thought to be military\nmusic.  Breakfast was just ready; we sat down and ate it.\n\nThis over, I made the boys a little speech, and then sent out\na detail to man the battery, with Clarence in command of it.\n\nThe sun rose presently and sent its unobstructed splendors over\nthe land, and we saw a prodigious host moving slowly toward us,\nwith the steady drift and aligned front of a wave of the sea.\nNearer and nearer it came, and more and more sublimely imposing\nbecame its aspect; yes, all England was there, apparently.  Soon\nwe could see the innumerable banners fluttering, and then the sun\nstruck the sea of armor and set it all aflash.  Yes, it was a fine\nsight; I hadn't ever seen anything to beat it.\n\nAt last we could make out details.  All the front ranks, no telling\nhow many acres deep, were horsemen--plumed knights in armor.\nSuddenly we heard the blare of trumpets; the slow walk burst into\na gallop, and then--well, it was wonderful to see!  Down swept\nthat vast horse-shoe wave--it approached the sand-belt--my breath\nstood still; nearer, nearer--the strip of green turf beyond the\nyellow belt grew narrow--narrower still--became a mere ribbon in\nfront of the horses--then disappeared under their hoofs.  Great\nScott!  Why, the whole front of that host shot into the sky with\na thunder-crash, and became a whirling tempest of rags and fragments;\nand along the ground lay a thick wall of smoke that hid what was\nleft of the multitude from our sight.\n\nTime for the second step in the plan of campaign!  I touched\na button, and shook the bones of England loose from her spine!\n\nIn that explosion all our noble civilization-factories went up in\nthe air and disappeared from the earth.  It was a pity, but it\nwas necessary.  We could not afford to let the enemy turn our own\nweapons against us.\n\nNow ensued one of the dullest quarter-hours I had ever endured.\nWe waited in a silent solitude enclosed by our circles of wire,\nand by a circle of heavy smoke outside of these.  We couldn't\nsee over the wall of smoke, and we couldn't see through it.  But\nat last it began to shred away lazily, and by the end of another\nquarter-hour the land was clear and our curiosity was enabled\nto satisfy itself.  No living creature was in sight!  We now\nperceived that additions had been made to our defenses.  The\ndynamite had dug a ditch more than a hundred feet wide, all around\nus, and cast up an embankment some twenty-five feet high on both\nborders of it.  As to destruction of life, it was amazing.  Moreover,\nit was beyond estimate.  Of course, we could not _count_ the dead,\nbecause they did not exist as individuals, but merely as homogeneous\nprotoplasm, with alloys of iron and buttons.\n\nNo life was in sight, but necessarily there must have been some\nwounded in the rear ranks, who were carried off the field under\ncover of the wall of smoke; there would be sickness among the\nothers--there always is, after an episode like that.  But there\nwould be no reinforcements; this was the last stand of the chivalry\nof England; it was all that was left of the order, after the recent\nannihilating wars.  So I felt quite safe in believing that the\nutmost force that could for the future be brought against us\nwould be but small; that is, of knights.  I therefore issued a\ncongratulatory proclamation to my army in these words:\n\n   SOLDIERS, CHAMPIONS OF HUMAN LIBERTY AND EQUALITY:\n   Your General congratulates you!  In the pride of his\n   strength and the vanity of his renown, an arrogant\n   enemy came against you.  You were ready.  The conflict\n   was brief; on your side, glorious.  This mighty\n   victory, having been achieved utterly without loss,\n   stands without example in history.  So long as the\n   planets shall continue to move in their orbits, the\n   BATTLE OF THE SAND-BELT will not perish out of the\n   memories of men.\n\n                                THE BOSS.\n\nI read it well, and the applause I got was very gratifying to me.\nI then wound up with these remarks:\n\n\"The war with the English nation, as a nation, is at an end.\nThe nation has retired from the field and the war.  Before it can\nbe persuaded to return, war will have ceased.  This campaign is\nthe only one that is going to be fought.  It will be brief\n--the briefest in history.  Also the most destructive to life,\nconsidered from the standpoint of proportion of casualties to\nnumbers engaged.  We are done with the nation; henceforth we deal\nonly with the knights.  English knights can be killed, but they\ncannot be conquered.  We know what is before us.  While one of\nthese men remains alive, our task is not finished, the war is not\nended.  We will kill them all.\"  [Loud and long continued applause.]\n\nI picketed the great embankments thrown up around our lines by\nthe dynamite explosion--merely a lookout of a couple of boys\nto announce the enemy when he should appear again.\n\nNext, I sent an engineer and forty men to a point just beyond\nour lines on the south, to turn a mountain brook that was there,\nand bring it within our lines and under our command, arranging\nit in such a way that I could make instant use of it in an emergency.\nThe forty men were divided into two shifts of twenty each, and\nwere to relieve each other every two hours.  In ten hours the\nwork was accomplished.\n\nIt was nightfall now, and I withdrew my pickets.  The one who\nhad had the northern outlook reported a camp in sight, but visible\nwith the glass only.  He also reported that a few knights had been\nfeeling their way toward us, and had driven some cattle across our\nlines, but that the knights themselves had not come very near.\nThat was what I had been expecting.  They were feeling us, you\nsee; they wanted to know if we were going to play that red terror\non them again.  They would grow bolder in the night, perhaps.\nI believed I knew what project they would attempt, because it was\nplainly the thing I would attempt myself if I were in their places\nand as ignorant as they were.  I mentioned it to Clarence.\n\n\"I think you are right,\" said he; \"it is the obvious thing for\nthem to try.\"\n\n\"Well, then,\" I said, \"if they do it they are doomed.\"\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"They won't have the slightest show in the world.\"\n\n\"Of course they won't.\"\n\n\"It's dreadful, Clarence.  It seems an awful pity.\"\n\nThe thing disturbed me so that I couldn't get any peace of mind\nfor thinking of it and worrying over it.  So, at last, to quiet\nmy conscience, I framed this message to the knights:\n\n   TO THE HONORABLE THE COMMANDER OF THE INSURGENT\n   CHIVALRY OF ENGLAND: YOU fight in vain.  We know\n   your strength--if one may call it by that name.\n   We know that at the utmost you cannot bring\n   against us above five and twenty thousand knights.\n   Therefore, you have no chance--none whatever.\n   Reflect: we are well equipped, well fortified, we\n   number 54.  Fifty-four what?  Men?  No, MINDS--the\n   capablest in the world; a force against which\n   mere animal might may no more hope to prevail than\n   may the idle waves of the sea hope to prevail\n   against the granite barriers of England.  Be advised.\n   We offer you your lives; for the sake of your\n   families, do not reject the gift.  We offer you\n   this chance, and it is the last: throw down your\n   arms; surrender unconditionally to the Republic,\n   and all will be forgiven.\n\n                          (Signed) THE BOSS.\n\nI read it to Clarence, and said I proposed to send it by a flag\nof truce.  He laughed the sarcastic laugh he was born with, and said:\n\n\"Somehow it seems impossible for you to ever fully realize what\nthese nobilities are.  Now let us save a little time and trouble.\nConsider me the commander of the knights yonder.  Now, then,\nyou are the flag of truce; approach and deliver me your message,\nand I will give you your answer.\"\n\nI humored the idea.  I came forward under an imaginary guard of\nthe enemy's soldiers, produced my paper, and read it through.\nFor answer, Clarence struck the paper out of my hand, pursed up\na scornful lip and said with lofty disdain:\n\n\"Dismember me this animal, and return him in a basket to the\nbase-born knave who sent him; other answer have I none!\"\n\nHow empty is theory in presence of fact!  And this was just fact,\nand nothing else.  It was the thing that would have happened,\nthere was no getting around that.  I tore up the paper and granted\nmy mistimed sentimentalities a permanent rest.\n\nThen, to business.  I tested the electric signals from the gatling\nplatform to the cave, and made sure that they were all right;\nI tested and retested those which commanded the fences--these\nwere signals whereby I could break and renew the electric current\nin each fence independently of the others at will.  I placed the\nbrook-connection under the guard and authority of three of my\nbest boys, who would alternate in two-hour watches all night and\npromptly obey my signal, if I should have occasion to give it\n--three revolver-shots in quick succession.  Sentry-duty was discarded\nfor the night, and the corral left empty of life; I ordered that\nquiet be maintained in the cave, and the electric lights turned\ndown to a glimmer.\n\nAs soon as it was good and dark, I shut off the current from all\nthe fences, and then groped my way out to the embankment bordering\nour side of the great dynamite ditch.  I crept to the top of it\nand lay there on the slant of the muck to watch.  But it was\ntoo dark to see anything.  As for sounds, there were none.  The\nstillness was deathlike.  True, there were the usual night-sounds\nof the country--the whir of night-birds, the buzzing of insects,\nthe barking of distant dogs, the mellow lowing of far-off kine\n--but these didn't seem to break the stillness, they only intensified\nit, and added a grewsome melancholy to it into the bargain.\n\nI presently gave up looking, the night shut down so black, but\nI kept my ears strained to catch the least suspicious sound, for\nI judged I had only to wait, and I shouldn't be disappointed.\nHowever, I had to wait a long time.  At last I caught what you\nmay call in distinct glimpses of sound dulled metallic sound.\nI pricked up my ears, then, and held my breath, for this was the\nsort of thing I had been waiting for.  This sound thickened, and\napproached--from toward the north.  Presently, I heard it at my\nown level--the ridge-top of the opposite embankment, a hundred\nfeet or more away.  Then I seemed to see a row of black dots appear\nalong that ridge--human heads?  I couldn't tell; it mightn't be\nanything at all; you can't depend on your eyes when your imagination\nis out of focus.  However, the question was soon settled.  I heard\nthat metallic noise descending into the great ditch.  It augmented\nfast, it spread all along, and it unmistakably furnished me this\nfact: an armed host was taking up its quarters in the ditch.  Yes,\nthese people were arranging a little surprise party for us.  We\ncould expect entertainment about dawn, possibly earlier.\n\nI groped my way back to the corral now; I had seen enough.  I went\nto the platform and signaled to turn the current on to the two\ninner fences.  Then I went into the cave, and found everything\nsatisfactory there--nobody awake but the working-watch.  I woke\nClarence and told him the great ditch was filling up with men,\nand that I believed all the knights were coming for us in a body.\nIt was my notion that as soon as dawn approached we could expect\nthe ditch's ambuscaded thousands to swarm up over the embankment\nand make an assault, and be followed immediately by the rest\nof their army.\n\nClarence said:\n\n\"They will be wanting to send a scout or two in the dark to make\npreliminary observations.  Why not take the lightning off the\nouter fences, and give them a chance?\"\n\n\"I've already done it, Clarence.  Did you ever know me to be\ninhospitable?\"\n\n\"No, you are a good heart.  I want to go and--\"\n\n\"Be a reception committee?  I will go, too.\"\n\nWe crossed the corral and lay down together between the two inside\nfences.  Even the dim light of the cave had disordered our eyesight\nsomewhat, but the focus straightway began to regulate itself and\nsoon it was adjusted for present circumstances.  We had had to feel\nour way before, but we could make out to see the fence posts now.\nWe started a whispered conversation, but suddenly Clarence broke\noff and said:\n\n\"What is that?\"\n\n\"What is what?\"\n\n\"That thing yonder.\"\n\n\"What thing--where?\"\n\n\"There beyond you a little piece--dark something--a dull shape\nof some kind--against the second fence.\"\n\nI gazed and he gazed.  I said:\n\n\"Could it be a man, Clarence?\"\n\n\"No, I think not.  If you notice, it looks a lit--why, it _is_\na man!--leaning on the fence.\"\n\n\"I certainly believe it is; let us go and see.\"\n\nWe crept along on our hands and knees until we were pretty close,\nand then looked up.  Yes, it was a man--a dim great figure in armor,\nstanding erect, with both hands on the upper wire--and, of course,\nthere was a smell of burning flesh.  Poor fellow, dead as a\ndoor-nail, and never knew what hurt him.  He stood there like a\nstatue--no motion about him, except that his plumes swished about\na little in the night wind.  We rose up and looked in through\nthe bars of his visor, but couldn't make out whether we knew him\nor not--features too dim and shadowed.\n\nWe heard muffled sounds approaching, and we sank down to the ground\nwhere we were.  We made out another knight vaguely; he was coming\nvery stealthily, and feeling his way.  He was near enough now for\nus to see him put out a hand, find an upper wire, then bend and\nstep under it and over the lower one.  Now he arrived at the\nfirst knight--and started slightly when he discovered him.  He\nstood a moment--no doubt wondering why the other one didn't move\non; then he said, in a low voice, \"Why dreamest thou here, good\nSir Mar--\" then he laid his hand on the corpse's shoulder--and just\nuttered a little soft moan and sunk down dead.  Killed by a dead\nman, you see--killed by a dead friend, in fact.  There was something\nawful about it.\n\nThese early birds came scattering along after each other, about\none every five minutes in our vicinity, during half an hour.\nThey brought no armor of offense but their swords; as a rule,\nthey carried the sword ready in the hand, and put it forward and\nfound the wires with it.  We would now and then see a blue spark\nwhen the knight that caused it was so far away as to be invisible\nto us; but we knew what had happened, all the same; poor fellow,\nhe had touched a charged wire with his sword and been electrocuted.\nWe had brief intervals of grim stillness, interrupted with piteous\nregularity by the clash made by the falling of an iron-clad; and\nthis sort of thing was going on, right along, and was very creepy\nthere in the dark and lonesomeness.\n\nWe concluded to make a tour between the inner fences.  We elected\nto walk upright, for convenience's sake; we argued that if discerned,\nwe should be taken for friends rather than enemies, and in any case\nwe should be out of reach of swords, and these gentry did not seem\nto have any spears along.  Well, it was a curious trip.  Everywhere\ndead men were lying outside the second fence--not plainly visible,\nbut still visible; and we counted fifteen of those pathetic\nstatues--dead knights standing with their hands on the upper wire.\n\nOne thing seemed to be sufficiently demonstrated: our current\nwas so tremendous that it killed before the victim could cry out.\nPretty soon we detected a muffled and heavy sound, and next moment\nwe guessed what it was.  It was a surprise in force coming! I whispered\nClarence to go and wake the army, and notify it to wait in silence\nin the cave for further orders.  He was soon back, and we stood\nby the inner fence and watched the silent lightning do its awful\nwork upon that swarming host.  One could make out but little of\ndetail; but he could note that a black mass was piling itself up\nbeyond the second fence.  That swelling bulk was dead men!  Our\ncamp was enclosed with a solid wall of the dead--a bulwark,\na breastwork, of corpses, you may say.  One terrible thing about\nthis thing was the absence of human voices; there were no cheers,\nno war cries; being intent upon a surprise, these men moved as\nnoiselessly as they could; and always when the front rank was near\nenough to their goal to make it proper for them to begin to get\na shout ready, of course they struck the fatal line and went down\nwithout testifying.\n\nI sent a current through the third fence now; and almost immediately\nthrough the fourth and fifth, so quickly were the gaps filled up.\nI believed the time was come now for my climax; I believed that\nthat whole army was in our trap.  Anyway, it was high time to find\nout.  So I touched a button and set fifty electric suns aflame\non the top of our precipice.\n\nLand, what a sight!  We were enclosed in three walls of dead men!\nAll the other fences were pretty nearly filled with the living,\nwho were stealthily working their way forward through the wires.\nThe sudden glare paralyzed this host, petrified them, you may say,\nwith astonishment; there was just one instant for me to utilize\ntheir immobility in, and I didn't lose the chance.  You see, in\nanother instant they would have recovered their faculties, then\nthey'd have burst into a cheer and made a rush, and my wires\nwould have gone down before it; but that lost instant lost them\ntheir opportunity forever; while even that slight fragment of time\nwas still unspent, I shot the current through all the fences and\nstruck the whole host dead in their tracks!  _There_ was a groan\nyou could _hear_!  It voiced the death-pang of eleven thousand men.\nIt swelled out on the night with awful pathos.\n\nA glance showed that the rest of the enemy--perhaps ten thousand\nstrong--were between us and the encircling ditch, and pressing\nforward to the assault.  Consequently we had them _all!_ and had\nthem past help.  Time for the last act of the tragedy.  I fired\nthe three appointed revolver shots--which meant:\n\n\"Turn on the water!\"\n\nThere was a sudden rush and roar, and in a minute the mountain\nbrook was raging through the big ditch and creating a river a\nhundred feet wide and twenty-five deep.\n\n\"Stand to your guns, men!  Open fire!\"\n\nThe thirteen gatlings began to vomit death into the fated ten\nthousand.  They halted, they stood their ground a moment against\nthat withering deluge of fire, then they broke, faced about and\nswept toward the ditch like chaff before a gale.  A full fourth\npart of their force never reached the top of the lofty embankment;\nthe three-fourths reached it and plunged over--to death by drowning.\n\nWithin ten short minutes after we had opened fire, armed resistance\nwas totally annihilated, the campaign was ended, we fifty-four were\nmasters of England.  Twenty-five thousand men lay dead around us.\n\nBut how treacherous is fortune!  In a little while--say an hour\n--happened a thing, by my own fault, which--but I have no heart\nto write that.  Let the record end here.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XLIV\n\nA POSTSCRIPT BY CLARENCE\n\nI, Clarence, must write it for him.  He proposed that we two\ngo out and see if any help could be accorded the wounded.  I was\nstrenuous against the project.  I said that if there were many,\nwe could do but little for them; and it would not be wise for us to\ntrust ourselves among them, anyway.  But he could seldom be turned\nfrom a purpose once formed; so we shut off the electric current\nfrom the fences, took an escort along, climbed over the enclosing\nramparts of dead knights, and moved out upon the field.  The first\nwounded mall who appealed for help was sitting with his back\nagainst a dead comrade.  When The Boss bent over him and spoke\nto him, the man recognized him and stabbed him.  That knight was\nSir Meliagraunce, as I found out by tearing off his helmet.  He\nwill not ask for help any more.\n\nWe carried The Boss to the cave and gave his wound, which was\nnot very serious, the best care we could.  In this service we had\nthe help of Merlin, though we did not know it.  He was disguised\nas a woman, and appeared to be a simple old peasant goodwife.\nIn this disguise, with brown-stained face and smooth shaven, he\nhad appeared a few days after The Boss was hurt and offered to cook\nfor us, saying her people had gone off to join certain new camps\nwhich the enemy were forming, and that she was starving.  The Boss\nhad been getting along very well, and had amused himself with\nfinishing up his record.\n\nWe were glad to have this woman, for we were short handed.  We\nwere in a trap, you see--a trap of our own making.  If we stayed\nwhere we were, our dead would kill us; if we moved out of our\ndefenses, we should no longer be invincible.  We had conquered;\nin turn we were conquered.  The Boss recognized this; we all\nrecognized it.  If we could go to one of those new camps and\npatch up some kind of terms with the enemy--yes, but The Boss\ncould not go, and neither could I, for I was among the first that\nwere made sick by the poisonous air bred by those dead thousands.\nOthers were taken down, and still others.  To-morrow--\n\n_To-morrow._  It is here.  And with it the end.  About midnight\nI awoke, and saw that hag making curious passes in the air about\nThe Boss's head and face, and wondered what it meant.  Everybody\nbut the dynamo-watch lay steeped in sleep; there was no sound.\nThe woman ceased from her mysterious foolery, and started tip-toeing\ntoward the door.  I called out:\n\n\"Stop!  What have you been doing?\"\n\nShe halted, and said with an accent of malicious satisfaction:\n\n\"Ye were conquerors; ye are conquered!  These others are perishing\n--you also.  Ye shall all die in this place--every one--except _him_.\nHe sleepeth now--and shall sleep thirteen centuries.  I am Merlin!\"\n\nThen such a delirium of silly laughter overtook him that he reeled\nabout like a drunken man, and presently fetched up against one\nof our wires.  His mouth is spread open yet; apparently he is still\nlaughing.  I suppose the face will retain that petrified laugh until\nthe corpse turns to dust.\n\nThe Boss has never stirred--sleeps like a stone.  If he does not\nwake to-day we shall understand what kind of a sleep it is, and\nhis body will then be borne to a place in one of the remote recesses\nof the cave where none will ever find it to desecrate it.  As for\nthe rest of us--well, it is agreed that if any one of us ever\nescapes alive from this place, he will write the fact here, and\nloyally hide this Manuscript with The Boss, our dear good chief,\nwhose property it is, be he alive or dead.\n\n\n\nTHE END OF THE MANUSCRIPT\n\n\n\n\n\nFINAL P.S. BY M.T.\n\nThe dawn was come when I laid the Manuscript aside.  The rain\nhad almost ceased, the world was gray and sad, the exhausted storm\nwas sighing and sobbing itself to rest.  I went to the stranger's\nroom, and listened at his door, which was slightly ajar.  I could\nhear his voice, and so I knocked.  There was no answer, but I still\nheard the voice.  I peeped in.  The man lay on his back in bed,\ntalking brokenly but with spirit, and punctuating with his arms,\nwhich he thrashed about, restlessly, as sick people do in delirium.\nI slipped in softly and bent over him.  His mutterings and\nejaculations went on.  I spoke--merely a word, to call his attention.\nHis glassy eyes and his ashy face were alight in an instant with\npleasure, gratitude, gladness, welcome:\n\n\"Oh, Sandy, you are come at last--how I have longed for you!  Sit\nby me--do not leave me--never leave me again, Sandy, never again.\nWhere is your hand?--give it me, dear, let me hold it--there\n--now all is well, all is peace, and I am happy again--_we_ are happy\nagain, isn't it so, Sandy?  You are so dim, so vague, you are but\na mist, a cloud, but you are _here_, and that is blessedness sufficient;\nand I have your hand; don't take it away--it is for only a little\nwhile, I shall not require it long....  Was that the child?...\nHello-Central!... she doesn't answer.  Asleep, perhaps?  Bring her\nwhen she wakes, and let me touch her hands, her face, her hair,\nand tell her good-bye....  Sandy!  Yes, you are there.  I lost\nmyself a moment, and I thought you were gone....  Have I been\nsick long?  It must be so; it seems months to me.  And such dreams!\nsuch strange and awful dreams, Sandy!  Dreams that were as real\nas reality--delirium, of course, but _so_ real!  Why, I thought\nthe king was dead, I thought you were in Gaul and couldn't get\nhome, I thought there was a revolution; in the fantastic frenzy\nof these dreams, I thought that Clarence and I and a handful of\nmy cadets fought and exterminated the whole chivalry of England!\nBut even that was not the strangest.  I seemed to be a creature\nout of a remote unborn age, centuries hence, and even _that_ was\nas real as the rest!  Yes, I seemed to have flown back out of that\nage into this of ours, and then forward to it again, and was set\ndown, a stranger and forlorn in that strange England, with an\nabyss of thirteen centuries yawning between me and you! between\nme and my home and my friends! between me and all that is dear\nto me, all that could make life worth the living!  It was awful\n--awfuler than you can ever imagine, Sandy.  Ah, watch by me, Sandy\n--stay by me every moment--_don't_ let me go out of my mind again;\ndeath is nothing, let it come, but not with those dreams, not with\nthe torture of those hideous dreams--I cannot endure _that_ again....\nSandy?...\"\n\nHe lay muttering incoherently some little time; then for a time he\nlay silent, and apparently sinking away toward death.  Presently\nhis fingers began to pick busily at the coverlet, and by that sign\nI knew that his end was at hand with the first suggestion of the\ndeath-rattle in his throat he started up slightly, and seemed\nto listen: then he said:\n\n\"A bugle?...  It is the king!  The drawbridge, there!  Man the\nbattlements!--turn out the--\"\n\nHe was getting up his last \"effect\"; but he never finished it."