"Thrice cursed flames!" cried Media. "Is Mardi to be one conflagration? How it crackles, forks, and roars!--Is this our funeral pyre?"

"Recline, recline, my lord," said Babbalanja. "Fierce flames are ever brief--a song, sweet Yoomy! Your pipe, old Mohi! Greater fires than this have ere now blazed in Mardi. Let us be calm;--the isles were made to burn;--Braid-Beard! hereafter, in some quiet cell, of this whole scene you will but make one chapter;--come, digest it now."

"My face is scorched," cried Media.

"The last, last day!" cried Mohi.

"Not so, old man," said Babbalanja, "when that day dawns, 'twill dawn serene. Be calm, be calm, my potent lord."

"Talk not of calm brows in storm-time!" cried Media fiercely. "See!

how the flames blow over upon Dominora!"

"Yet the fires they kindle there are soon extinguished," said Babbalanja. "No, no; Dominora ne'er can burn with Franko's fires; only those of her own kindling may consume her."

"Away! Away!" cried Media. "We may not touch Porpheero now.--Up sails!

and westward be our course."

So dead before the blast, we scudded.

Morning broke, showing no sign of land.

"Hard must it go with Franko's king," said Media, "when his people rise against him with the red volcanoes. Oh, for a foot to crush them!

Hard, too, with all who rule in broad Porpheero. And may she we seek, survive this conflagration!"

"My lord," said Babbalanja, "where'ere she hide, ne'er yet did Yillah lurk in this Porpheero; nor have we missed the maiden, n.o.ble Taji! in not touching at its sh.o.r.es."

"This fire must make a desert of the land," said Mohi; "burn up and bury all her tilth."

"Yet, Mohi, vineyards flourish over buried villages," murmured Yoomy.

"True, minstrel," said Babbalanja, "and prairies are purified by fire.

Ashes breed loam. Nor can any skill make the same surface forever fruitful. In all times past, things have been overlaid; and though the first fruits of the marl are wild and poisonous, the palms at last spring forth; and once again the tribes repose in shade. My lord, if calms breed storms, so storms calms; and all this dire commotion must eventuate in peace. It may be, that Perpheero's future has been cheaply won."

CHAPTER L Wherein King Media Celebrates The Glories Of Autumn, The Minstrel, The Promise Of Spring

"Ho, now!" cried Media, "across the wide waters, for that New Mardi, Vivenza! Let us indeed see, whether she who eludes us elsewhere, he at last found in Vivenza's vales."

"There or nowhere, n.o.ble Taji," said Yoomy.

"Be not too sanguine, gentle Yoomy," said Babbalanja.

"Does Yillah choose rather to bower in the wild wilderness of Vivenza, than in the old vineyards of Porpheero?" said Braid-Beard.

Sang Yoomy:-- Her bower is not of the vine, But the wild, wild eglantine!

Not climbing a moldering arch, But upheld by the fir-green larch.

Old ruins she flies: To new valleys she hies:-- Not the h.o.a.r, moss-wood, Ivied trees each a rood-- Not in Maramma she dwells, Hollow with hermit cells.

'Tis a new, new isle!

An infant's its smile, Soft-rocked by the sea.

Its bloom all in bud; No tide at its flood, In that fresh-born sea!

Spring! Spring! where she dwells, In her sycamore dells, Where Mardi is young and new: Its verdure all eyes with dew.

There, there! in the bright, balmy morns, The young deer sprout their horns, Deep-tangled in new-branching groves, Where the Red-Rover Robin roves,--

Stooping his crest, To his molting breast-- Rekindling the flambeau there!

Spring! Spring! where she dwells, In her sycamore dells:-- Where, fulfilling their fates, All creatures seek mates-- The thrush, the doe, and the hare!

"Thou art most musical, sweet Yoomy," said Media. "concerning this spring-land Vivenza. But are not the old autumnal valleys of Porpheero more glorious than those of vernal Vivenza? Vivenza shows no trophies of the summer time, but Dominora's full-blown rose hangs blushing on her garden walls; her autumn groves are glory-dyed."

"My lord, autumn soon merges in winter, but the spring has all the seasons before. The full-blown rose is nearer withering than the bud.

The faint morn is a blossom: the crimson sunset the flower."

CHAPTER LI In Which Azzageddi Seems To Use Babbalanja For A Mouth-Piece

Porpheero far astern, the spirits of the company rose. Once again, old Mohi serenely unbraided, and rebraided his beard; and sitting Turk- wise on his mat, my lord Media smoking his gonfalon, diverted himself with the wild songs of Yoomy, the wild chronicles of Mohi, or the still wilder speculations of Babbalanja; now and then, as from pitcher to pitcher, pouring royal old wine down his soul.

Among other things, Media, who at times turned over Babbalanja for an encyclopaedia, however unreliable, demanded information upon the subject of neap tides and their alleged slavish va.s.salage to the moon.

When true to his cyclopaediatic nature, Babbalanja quoted from a still older and better authority than himself; in brief, from no other than eternal Bardianna. It seems that that worthy essayist had discussed the whole matter in a chapter thus headed: "On Seeing into Mysteries through Mill-Stones;" and throughout his disquisitions he evinced such a profundity of research, though delivered in a style somewhat equivocal, that the company were much struck by the erudition displayed.

"Babbalanja, that Bardianna of yours must have been a wonderful student," said Media after a pause, "no doubt he consumed whole thickets of rush-lights."

"Not so, my lord.--'Patience, patience, philosophers,' said Bardianna; 'blow out your tapers, bolt not your dinners, take time, wisdom will be plenty soon.'"

"A notable hint! Why not follow it, Babbalanja?"

"Because, my lord, I have overtaken it, and pa.s.sed on."

"True to your nature, Babbalanja; you stay nowhere."

"Ay, keep moving is my motto; but speaking of hard students, did my lord ever hear of Midni the ontologist and entomologist?"

"No."

"Then, my lord, you shall hear of him now. Midni was of opinion that day-light was vulgar; good enough for taro-planting and traveling; but wholly unadapted to the sublime ends of study. He toiled by night; from sunset to sunrise poring over the works of the old logicans. Like most philosophers, Midni was an amiable man; but one thing invariably put him out. He read in the woods by glow-worm light; insect in hand, tracing over his pages, line by line. But glow-worms burn not long: and in the midst of some calm intricate thought, at some imminent comma, the insect often expired, and Midni groped for a meaning. Upon such an occasion, 'Ho, Ho,' he cried; 'but for one instant of sun- light to see my way to a period!' But sun-light there was none; so Midni sprang to his feet, and parchment under arm, raced about among the sloughs and bogs for another glow-worm. Often, making a rapid descent with his turban, he thought he had caged a prize; but nay.

Again he tried; yet with no better succcess. Nevertheless, at last he secured one; but hardly had he read three lines by its light, when out it went. Again and again this occurred. And thus he forever went halting and stumbling through his studies, and plunging through his quagmires after a glim."

At this ridiculous tale, one of our silliest paddlers burst into uncontrollable mirth. Offended at which breach of decorum, Media sharply rebuked him.

But he protested he could not help laughing.

Again Media was about to reprimand him, when Babbalanja begged leave to interfere.