Not many years had elapsed since the death of the king, his father.But the still youthful prince was no longer the bright-eyed andelastic boy who at the dawn of day had sallied out to behold thelandscapes of the neighboring isles.
Not more effeminate Sardanapalus, than he. And, at intervals, he wasthe victim of unaccountable vagaries; haunted by specters, andbeckoned to by the ghosts of his sires.
At times, loathing his vicious pursuits, which brought him no solidsatisfaction, but ever filled him with final disgust, he wouldresolve to amend his ways; solacing himself for his bitter captivity,by the society of the wise and discreet.
But brief the interval of repentance. Anew, he burst into excesses, ahundred fold more insane than ever.
Thus vacillating between virtue and vice; to neither constant, andupbraided by both; his mind, like his person in the glen, wascontinually passing and repassing between opposite extremes.
CHAPTER LXXIVAdvancing Deeper Into The Vale, They Encounter Donjalolo
From the mouth of the cavern, a broad shaded way over-arched byfraternal trees embracing in mid-air, conducted us to a cross-path,on either hand leading to the opposite cliffs, shading the twinvillages before mentioned.
Level as a meadow, was the bosom of the glen. Here, nodding withgreen orchards of the Bread-fruit and the Palm; there, flashing withgolden plantations of the Banana. Emerging from these, we came outupon a grassy mead, skirting a projection of the mountain. And soonwe crossed a bridge of boughs, spanning a trench, thickly plantedwith roots of the Tara, like alligators, or Hollanders, reveling inthe soft alluvial. Strolling on, the wild beauty of the mountainsexcited our attention. The topmost crags poured over with vines;which, undulating in the air, seemed leafy cascades; their sourcesthe upland groves.
Midway up the precipice, along a shelf of rock, sprouted themultitudinous roots of an apparently trunkless tree. Shooting fromunder the shallow soil, they spread all over the rocks below,covering them with an intricate net-work. While far aloft, greatboughs--each a copse--clambered to the very summit of the mountain;then bending over, struck anew into the soil; forming along the vergean interminable colonnade; all manner of antic architecture standingagainst the sky.
According to Mohi, this tree was truly wonderful; its seed havingbeen dropped from the moon; where were plenty more similarforests, causing the dark spots on its surface.
Here and there, the cool fluid in the veins of the mountains gushedforth in living springs; their waters received in green mossy tanks,half buried in grasses.
In one place, a considerable stream, bounding far out from a woodedheight, ere reaching the ground was dispersed in a wide misty shower,falling so far from the base of the cliff; that walking closeunderneath, you felt little moisture. Passing this fall of vapors, wespied many Islanders taking a bath.
But what is yonder swaying of the foliage? And what now issues forth,like a habitation astir? Donjalolo drawing nigh to his guests.
He came in a fair sedan; a bower, resting upon three long, parallelpoles, borne by thirty men, gayly attired; five at each pole-end.Decked with dyed tappas, and looped with garlands of newly-pluckedflowers, from which, at every step, the fragrant petals were blown;with a sumptuous, elastic motion the gay sedan came on; leavingbehind it a long, rosy wake of fluttering leaves and odors.
Drawing near, it revealed a slender, enervate youth, of pallidbeauty, reclining upon a crimson mat, near the festooned arch of thebower. His anointed head was resting against the bosom of a girl;another stirred the air, with a fan of Pintado plumes. The pupils ofhis eyes were as floating isles in the sea. In a soft low tone hemurmured "Media!"
The bearers paused; and Media advancing; the Island Kings bowed theirforeheads together.
Through tubes ignited at the end, Donjaloln's reclining attendantsnow blew an aromatic incense around him. These were composed of thestimulating leaves of the "Aina," mixed with the long yellow bladesof a sweet-scented upland grass; forming a hollow stem. In general,the agreeable fumes of the "Aina" were created by one's owninhalations; but Donjalolo deeming the solace too dearly purchased byany exertion of the royal lungs, regaled himself through those of hisattendants, whose lips were as moss-rose buds after a shower.
In silence the young prince now eyed us attentively; meanwhile gentlywaving his hand, to obtain a better view through the wreaths ofvapor. He was about to address us, when chancing to catch a glimpseof Samoa, he suddenly started; averted his glance; and wildlycommanded the warrior out of sight. Upon this, his attendants wouldhave soothed him; and Media desired the Upoluan to withdraw.
While we were yet lost in wonder at this scene, Donjalolo, with eyesclosed, fell back into the arms of his damsels. Recovering, hefetched a deep sigh, and gazed vacantly around.
It seems, that he had fancied Samoa the noon-day specter of hisancestor Marjora; the usurper having been deprived of an arm in thebattle which gained him the girdle. Poor prince: this was one ofthose crazy conceits, so puzzling to his subjects.
Media now hastened to assure Donjalolo, that Samoa, though no cherubto behold, was good flesh and blood, nevertheless. And soon the kingunconcernedly gazed; his monomania having departed as a dream.
But still suffering from the effects of an overnight feast, hepresently murmured forth a desire to be left to his women; addingthat his people would not fail to provide for the entertainment ofhis guests.
The curtains of the sedan were now drawn; and soon it disappeared inthe groves. Journeying on, ere long we arrived at the western side ofthe glen; where one of the many little arbors scattered among thetrees, was assigned for our abode. Here, we reclined to an agreeablerepast. After which, we strolled forth to view the valley at large;more especially the far-famed palaces of the prince.
CHAPTER LXXVTime And Temples
In the oriental Pilgrimage of the pious old Purchas, and in the fineold folio Voyages of Hakluyt, Thevenot, Ramusio, and De Bry, we readof many glorious old Asiatic temples, very long in erecting. Andveracious Gaudentia di Lucca hath a wondrous narration of the timeconsumed in rearing that mighty three-hundred-and-seventy-five-pillared Temple of the Year, somewhere beyond Libya; whereof, thecolumns did signify days, and all round fronted upon concentric zonesof palaces, cross-cut by twelve grand avenues symbolizing the signsof the zodiac, all radiating from the sun-dome in their midst. And inthat wild eastern tale of his, Marco Polo tells us, how the GreatMogul began him a pleasure-palace on so imperial a scale, that hisgrandson had much ado to complete it.
But no matter for marveling all this: great towers take time toconstruct.
And so of all else.
And that which long endures full-fledged, must have long lain in thegerm. And duration is not of the future, but of the past; andeternity is eternal, because it has been, and though a strong newmonument be builded to-day, it only is lasting because its blocks areold as the sun. It is not the Pyramids that are ancient, but theeternal granite whereof they are made; which had been equally ancientthough yet in the quarry. For to make an eternity, we must build witheternities; whence, the vanity of the cry for any thing alike durableand new; and the folly of the reproach--Your granite hath come fromthe old-fashioned hills. For we are not gods and creators; andthe controversialists have debated, whether indeed the All-PlasticPower itself can do more than mold. In all the universe is but oneoriginal; and the very suns must to their source for their fire; andwe Prometheuses must to them for ours; which, when had, onlyperpetual Vestal tending will keep alive.
But let us back from fire to store. No fine firm fabric ever yet grewlike a gourd. Nero's House of Gold was not raised in a day; nor theMexican House of the Sun; nor the Alhambra; nor the Escurial; norTitus's Amphitheater; nor the Illinois Mounds; nor Diana's greatcolumns at Ephesus; nor Pompey's proud Pillar; nor the Parthenon; northe Altar of Belus; nor Stonehenge; nor Solomon's Temple; norTadmor's towers; nor Susa's bastions; nor Persepolis' pediments.Round and round, the Moorish turret at Seville was not woundheavenward in the revolution of a day; and from i
ts first founding,five hundred years did circle, ere Strasbourg's great spire liftedits five hundred feet into the air. No: nor were the great grottos ofElephanta hewn out in an hour; nor did the Troglodytes dig Kentucky'sMammoth Cave in a sun; nor that of Trophonius, nor Antiparos; nor theGiant's Causeway. Nor were the subterranean arched sewers of Etruriachanneled in a trice; nor the airy arched aqueducts of Nerva thrownover their values in the ides of a month. Nor was Virginia's NaturalBridge worn under in a year; nor, in geology, were the eternalGrampians upheaved in an age. And who shall count the cycles thatrevolved ere earth's interior sedimentary strata were crystalizedinto stone. Nor Peak of Piko, nor Teneriffe, were chiseled intoobelisks in a decade; nor had Mount Athos been turned intoAlexander's statue so soon. And the bower of Artaxerxes took a wholePersian summer to grow; and the Czar's Ice Palace a long Muscovitewinter to congeal. No, no: nor was the Pyramid of Cheops masoned in amonth; though, once built, the sands left by the deluge mightnot have submerged such a pile. Nor were the broad boughs of Charles'Oak grown in a spring; though they outlived the royal dynasties ofTudor and Stuart. Nor were the parts of the great Iliad put togetherin haste; though old Homer's temple shall lift up its dome, when St.Peter's is a legend. Even man himself lives months ere his Makerdeems him fit to be born; and ere his proud shaft gains its fullstature, twenty-one long Julian years must elapse. And his wholemortal life brings not his immortal soul to maturity; nor will alleternity perfect him. Yea, with uttermost reverence, as to humanunderstanding, increase of dominion seems increase of power; and dayby day new planets are being added to elder-born Saturn, even as sixthousand years ago our own Earth made one more in this system; so, inincident, not in essence, may the Infinite himself be not less thanmore infinite now, than when old Aldebaran rolled forth from hishand. And if time was, when this round Earth, which to innumerablemortals has seemed an empire never to be wholly explored; which, inits seas, concealed all the Indies over four thousand five hundredyears; if time was, when this great quarry of Assyrias and Romes wasnot extant; then, time may have been, when the whole materialuniverse lived its Dark Ages; yea, when the Ineffable Silence,proceeding from its unimaginable remoteness, espied it as an isle inthe sea. And herein is no derogation. For the Immeasurable's altitudeis not heightened by the arches of Mahomet's heavens; and were allspace a vacuum, yet would it be a fullness; for to Himself His ownuniverse is He.
Thus deeper and deeper into Time's endless tunnel, does the wingedsoul, like a night-hawk, wend her wild way; and finds eternitiesbefore and behind; and her last limit is her everlasting beginning.
But sent over the broad flooded sphere, even Noah's dove came back,and perched on his hand. So comes back my spirit to me, and folds upher wings.
Thus, then, though Time be the mightiest of Alarics, yet is he themightiest mason of all. And a tutor, and a counselor, and aphysician, and a scribe, and a poet, and a sage, and a king.
Yea, and a gardener, as ere long will be shown.
But first must we return to the glen.
CHAPTER LXXVIA Pleasant Place For A Lounge
Whether the hard condition of their kingly state, very naturallydemanding some luxurious requital, prevailed upon the monarchs ofJuam to house themselves so delightfully as they did; whether buriedalive in their glen, they sought to center therein a secret world ofenjoyment; however it may have been, throughout the Archipelago thissaying was a proverb--"You are lodged like the king in Willamilla."Hereby was expressed the utmost sumptuousness of a palace.
A well warranted saying; for of all the bright places, where my soulloves to linger, the haunts of Donjalolo are most delicious.
In the eastern quarter of the glen was the House of the Morning. Thisfanciful palace was raised upon a natural mound, many rods square,almost completely filling up a deep recess between deep-green andprojecting cliffs, overlooking many abodes distributed in the shadowsof the groves beyond.
Now, if it indeed be, that from the time employed in itsconstruction, any just notion may be formed of the stateliness of anedifice, it must needs be determined, that this retreat of Donjalolocould not be otherwise than imposing.
Full five hundred moons was the palace in completing; for by somearchitectural arborist, its quadrangular foundations had been laid inseed-cocoanuts, requiring that period to sprout up into pillars. Infront, these were horizontally connected, by elaborately carvedbeams, of a scarlet hue, inserted into the vital wood; which,swelling out, and over lapping, firmly secured them. The beamssupported the rafters, inclining from the rear; while over thearomatic grasses covering the roof, waved the tufted tops of thePalms, green capitals to their dusky shafts.
Through and through this vibrating verdure, bright birds flitted andsang; the scented and variegated thatch seemed a hanging-garden; andbetween it and the Palm tops, was leaf-hung an arbor in the air.
Without these columns, stood a second and third colonnade, formingthe most beautiful bowers; advancing through which, you fancied thatthe palace beyond must be chambered in a fountain, or frozen in acrystal. Three sparkling rivulets flowing from the heights were ledacross its summit, through great trunks half buried in the thatch;and emptying into a sculptured channel, running along the eaves,poured over in one wide sheet, plaited and transparent. Received intoa basin beneath, they were thence conducted down the vale.
The sides of the palace were hedged by Diomi bushes bearing a flower,from its perfume, called Lenora, or Sweet Breath; and within theseodorous hedges, were heavy piles of mats, richly dyed and embroidered.
Here lounging of a glowing noon, the plaited cascade playing, theverdure waving, and the birds melodious, it was hard to say, whetheryou were an inmate of a garden in the glen, or a grotto in the sea.
But enough for the nonce, of the House of the Morning. Cross we thehollow, to the House of the Afternoon.
CHAPTER LXXVIIThe House Of The Afternoon
For the most part, the House of the Afternoon was but a wing builtagainst a mansion wrought by the hand of Nature herself; a grottorunning into the side of the mountain. From high over the mouth ofthis grotto, sloped a long arbor, supported by great blocks of stone,rudely chiseled into the likeness of idols, each bearing a carvedlizard on its chest: a sergeant's guard of the gods condescendinglydoing duty as posts.
From the grotto thus vestibuled, issued hilariously forth the mostconsiderable stream of the glen; which, seemingly overjoyed to finddaylight in Willamilla, sprang into the arbor with a cheery, whitebound. But its youthful enthusiasm was soon repressed; its watersbeing caught in a large stone basin, scooped out of the natural rock;whence, staid and decorous, they traversed sundry moats; at lastmeandering away, to join floods with the streams trained to doservice at the other end of the vale.
Truant streams: the livelong day wending their loitering path to thesubterraneous outlet, flowing into which, they disappeared. But nowonder they loitered; passing such ravishing landscapes. Thus withlife: man bounds out of night; runs and babbles in the sun; thenreturns to his darkness again; though, peradventure, once more toemerge.
But the grotto was not a mere outlet to the stream. Flowing through adark flume in the rock, on both sides it left a dry, elevated shelf,to which you ascend from the arbor by three artificially-wroughtsteps, sideways disposed, to avoid the spray of the rejoicingcataract. Mounting these, and pursuing the edge of the flume, thegrotto gradually expands and heightens; your way lighted by rays inthe inner distance. At last you come to a lofty subterraneous dome,lit from above by a cleft in the mountain; while full before you, inthe opposite wall, from a low, black arch, midway up, andinaccessible, the stream, with a hollow ring and a dash, falls in along, snowy column into a bottomless pool, whence, after many an eddyand whirl, it entered the flume, and away with a rush. Half hiddenfrom view by an overhanging brow of the rock, the white fall lookedlike the sheeted ghost of the grotto.
Yet gallantly bedecked was the cave, as any old armorial hall hunground with banners and arras. Streaming from the cleft, vines swungin the air; or crawled
along the rocks, wherever a tendril could befixed. High up, their leaves were green; but lower down, they wereshriveled; and dyed of many colors; and tattered and torn with muchrustling; as old banners again; sore raveled with much triumphing.
In the middle of this hall in the hill was incarcerated the stoneimage of one Demi, the tutelar deity of Willamina. All green and oozylike a stone under water, poor Demi looked as if sore harassed withsciatics and lumbagos.
But he was cheered from aloft, by the promise of receiving a garlandall blooming on his crown; the Dryads sporting in the woodlandsabove, forever peeping down the cleft, and essaying to drop him acoronal.
Now, the still, panting glen of Willamilla, nested so close by themountains, and a goodly green mark for the archer in the sun, wouldhave been almost untenable were it not for the grotto. Hereby, itbreathed the blessed breezes of Omi; a mountain promontorybuttressing the island to the east, receiving the cool stream of theupland Trades; much pleasanter than the currents beneath.
At all times, even in the brooding noon-day, a gush of cool air camehand-in-hand with the cool waters, that burst with a shout into thepalace of Donjalolo. And as, after first refreshing the king, as inloyalty bound, the stream flowed at large through the glen, andbathed its verdure; so, the blessed breezes of Omi, not only madepleasant the House of the Afternoon; but finding ample outlet in itswide, open front, blew forth upon the bosom of all Willamilla.
"Come let us take the air of Omi," was a very common saying in theglen. And the speaker would hie with his comrade toward the grotto;and flinging himself on the turf, pass his hand through his locks,and recline; making a joy and a business of breathing; for truly thebreezes of Omi were as air-wine to the lungs.