How long that wild rush lasted I have no means of judging. It mayhave been an hour, a day, or many days, for I was throughout in a state ofsuspended animation, but presently my senses began to return and withthem a sensa- tion of lessening speed, a grateful relief to a heavy pressurewhich had held my life crushed in its grasp, without destroy- ing itcompletely. It was just that sort of sensation though more keen which,drowsy in his bunk, a traveller feels when he is aware, without specialperception, harbour is reached and a voyage comes to an end. But in mycase the slowing down was for a long time comparative. Yet thesensation served to revive my scattered senses, and just as I wasawakening to a lively sense of amazement, an incredible doubt of my ownemotions, and an eager desire to know what had happened, my strangeconveyance oscillated once or twice, undulated lightly up and down, like awood- pecker flying from tree to tree, and then grounded, bows first,rolled over several times, then steadied again, and, coming at last to rest,the next minute the infernal rug opened, quiver- ing along all its borders inits peculiar way, and humping up in the middle shot me five feet into theair like a cat tossed from a schoolboy's blanket.
As I turned over I had a dim vision of a clear light like the shine ofdawn, and solid ground sloping away below me. Upon that slope wasranged a crowd of squatting people, and a staid-looking individual with hisback turned stood nearer by. Afterwards I found he was lecturing allthose sitters on the ethics of gravity and the inherent properties of fallingbodies; at the moment I only knew he was directly in my line as Idescended, and him round the waist I seized, giddy with the light and freshair, waltzed him down the slope with the force of my impetus, and,tripping at the bottom, rolled over and over recklessly with him sheer intothe arms of the gaping crowd below. Over and over we went into thethickest mass of bodies, making a way through the people, until at last wecame to a stop in a perfect mound of writhing forms and waving legs andarms. When we had done the mass disentangled itself and I was able toraise my head from the shoulder of someone on whom I had fallen, lifting him, or her--which was it?--into a sitting posture alongside of me at thesame time, while the others rose about us like wheat-stalks after a storm,and edged shyly off, as well as they might.
Such a sleek, slim youth it was who sat up facing me, with a flush ofgentle surprise on his face, and dapper hands that felt cautiously about hisanatomy for injured places. He looked so quaintly rueful yet withal sogood- tempered that I could not help bursting into laughter in spite of myown amazement. Then he laughed too, a sedate, musical chuckle, andsaid something incomprehensible, point- ing at the same time to a cutupon my finger that was bleed- ing a little. I shook my head, meaningthereby that it was nothing, but the stranger with graceful solicitude tookmy hand, and, after examining the hurt, deliberately tore a strip of clothfrom a bright yellow toga-like garment he was wearing and bound theplace up with a woman's tenderness.
Meanwhile, as he ministered, there was time to look about me.
Where was I? It was not the Broadway; it was not Staten Island on aSaturday afternoon. The night was just over, and the sun on the point ofrising. Yet it was still shadowy all about, the air being marvellously tepidand pleasant to the senses. Quaint, soft aromas like the breath of a newworld--the fragrance of unknown flowers, and the dewy scent of never-trodden fields drifted to my nostrils; and to my ears came a sound oflaughter scarcely more human than the murmur of the wind in the trees,and a pretty undulating whisper as though a great concourse of peoplewere talking softly in their sleep. I gazed about scarcely knowing howmuch of my senses or surroundings were real and how much fanciful, untilI presently be- came aware the rosy twilight was broadening into day, andunder the increasing shine a strange scene was fashion- ing itself.
At first it was an opal sea I looked on of mist, shot along its uppersurface with the rosy gold and pinks of dawn. Then, as that soft,translucent lake ebbed, jutting hills came through it, black and crimson,and as they seemed to mount into the air other lower hills showed throughthe veil with rounded forest knobs till at last the brightening day dispelled the mist, and as the rosy-coloured gauzy fragments went slowlyfloating away a wonderfully fair country lay at my feet, with a broad sea glimmering in many arms and bays in the distance beyond. It was alldim and unreal at first, the mountains shadowy, the ocean unreal, theflowery fields be- tween it and me vacant and shadowy.
Yet were they vacant? As my eyes cleared and day brightened stillmore, and I turned my head this way and that, it presently dawned uponme all the meadow cop- pices and terraces northwards of where I lay, allthat blue and spacious ground I had thought to be bare and vacant, werealive with a teeming city of booths and tents; now I came to look moreclosely there was a whole town upon the slope, built as might be in a nightof boughs and branches still unwithered, the streets and ways of that cityin the shadows thronged with expectant people moving in groups andshifting to and fro in lively streams--chatting at the stalls and clusteringround the tent doors in soft, gauzy, parti-coloured crowds in a way bothfascinating and per-plexing.
I stared about me like a child at its first pantomime, dimlyunderstanding all I saw was novel, but more allured to the colour and lifeof the picture than concerned with its exact meaning; and while I staredand turned my finger was bandaged, and my new friend had been lispingaway to me without getting anything in turn but a shake of the head.
This made him thoughtful, and thereon followed a curious incident whichI cannot explain. I doubt even whether you will believe it; but what am Ito do in that case? You have already accepted the episode of my coming, or you would have shut the covers before arriving at this page of mymodest narrative, and this emboldens me. I may strengthen my claim onyour credulity by pointing out the extraordinary marvels which science isteaching you even on our own little world. To quote a single instance: Ifany one had declared ten years ago that it would shortly be practicable andeasy for two persons to converse from shore to shore across the Atlanticwithout any intervening medium, he would have been laughed at as apossibly amusing but certainly extravagant romancer. Yet that picturesque lie of yesterday is amongst the accomplished facts of today!
Therefore I am encouraged to ask your in- dulgence, in the name of yourprevious errors, for the following and any other instances in which I mayappear to trifle with strict veracity. There is no such thing as the impossible in our universe!
When my friendly companion found I could not under- stand him, helooked serious for a minute or two, then shortened his brilliant yellow toga,as though he had ar- rived at some resolve, and knelt down directly infront of me. He next took my face between his hands, and putting hisnose within an inch of mine, stared into my eyes with all his might. Atfirst I was inclined to laugh, but before long the most curious sensationstook hold of me. They commenced with a thrill which passed all up mybody, and next all feeling save the consciousness of the loud beating of myheart ceased. Then it seemed that boy's eyes were inside my head andnot outside, while along with them an intangible something pervaded mybrain. The sensation at first was like the application of ether to the skin--acool, numbing emotion. It was followed by a curious tingling feeling, assome dormant cells in my mind answered to the thought-transfer, and werefilled and fertil- ised! My other brain-cells most distinctly felt thevitalising of their companions, and for about a minute I experi- encedextreme nausea and a headache such as comes from over-study, thoughboth passed swiftly off. I presume that in the future we shall all obtainknowledge in this way. The Professors of a later day will perhaps keepshops for the sale of miscellaneous information, and we shall drop in andbe inflated with learning just as the bicyclist gets his tire pumped up, orthe motorist is recharged with electricity at so much per unit.
Examinations will then become matters of capacity in the real meaning ofthat word, and we shall be tempted to invest our pocket-money byadvertisements of "A cheap line in Astrology," "Try our double-strength,two- minute course of Classics," "This is remnant day for Trig- onometryand Metaphysics," and so on.
My friend did not get as far as that. With him the process did nottake more than a minute, but it was startling in its results, and reduced meto an extraordinary state of hypnotic receptibility. When it was over myinstructor tapped with a finger on my lips, uttering aloud as he did so thewords-"Know none; know some; know little; know morel" again and again;and the strangest part of it is that as he spoke I did know at first a little, then more, and still more, by swift accumulation, of his speech andmeaning. In fact, when pre- sently he suddenly laid a hand over my eyesand then let go of my head with a pleasantly put question as to how I felt, Ihad no difficulty whatever in answering him in his own tongue, and rosefrom the ground as one gets from a hair-dresser's chair, with a vague ideaof looking round for my hat and offering him his fee.
"My word, sir!" I said, in lisping Martian, as I pulled down my cuffsand put my cravat straight, "that was a quick process. I once heard of aman who learnt a language in the moments he gave each day to having hisboots blacked; but this beats all. I trust I was a docile pupil?""Oh, fairly, sir," answered the soft, musical voice of the strange beingby me; "but your head is thick and your brain tough. I could have taughtanother in half the time.""Curiously enough," was my response, "those are almost the verywords with which my dear old tutor dismissed me the morning I leftcollege. Never mind, the thing is done. Shall I pay you anything?""I do not understand.""Any honorarium, then? Some people understand one word and notthe other." But the boy only shook his head in answer.
Strangely enough, I was not greatly surprised all this time either at thenovelty of my whereabouts or at the hypnotic instruction in a newlanguage just received. Per- haps it was because my head still spun toogiddily with that flight in the old rug for much thought; perhaps be- causeI did not yet fully realise the thing that had happened. But, anyhow, thereis the fact, which, like so many others in my narrative, must, alas! remainunexplained for the moment. The rug, by the way, had completely disappeared, my friend comforting me on this score, however, by saying he hadseen it rolled up and taken away by one whom he knew.
"We are very tidy people here, stranger," he said, "and everythingfound Lying about goes back to the Palace store- rooms. You will laughto see the lumber there, for few of us ever take the trouble to reclaim ourproperty."Heaven knows I was in no laughing mood when I saw that enchantedweb again!
When I had lain and watched the brightening scene for a time, I got up,and having stretched and shaken my clothes into some sort of order, westrolled down the hill and joined the light-hearted crowds that twinedacross the plain and through the streets of their city of booths. They werethe prettiest, daintiest folk ever eyes looked upon, well-formed and like tous as could be in the main, but slender and willowy, so dainty and light,both the men and the women, so pretty of cheek and hair, so mild of aspect,I felt, as I strode amongst them, I could have plucked them like flowersand bound them up in bunches with my belt. And yet somehow I likedthem from the first minute; such a happy, careless, light-hearted race,again I say, never was seen before. There was not a stain of thought orcare on a single one of those white foreheads that eddied round me undertheir peaked, blossom-like caps, the perpetual smile their faces wore neversuffered rebuke anywhere; their very movements were graceful and slow,their laughter was low and musical, there was an odour of friendly,slothful happiness about them that made me admire whether I would orno.
Unfortunately I was not able to live on laughter, as they appeared to be,so presently turning to my acquaintance, who had told me his name wasthe plain monosyllabic An, and clapping my hand on his shoulder as hestood lost in sleepy reflection, said, in a good, hearty way, "Hullo, friendYellow-jerkin! If a stranger might set himself athwart the cheerfulcurrent of your meditations, may such a one ask how far 'tis to the nearestwine-shop or a booth where a thirsty man may get a mug of ale at amoderate reckoning?"That gilded youth staggered under my friendly blow as though thehammer of Thor himself had suddenly lit upon his shoulder, and ruefullyrubbing his tender skin, he turned on me mild, handsome eyes, answeringafter a moment, dur-ing which his native mildness struggled with the painI had unwittingly given him-"If your thirst be as emphatic as your greeting, friend Heavy-fist, itwill certainly be a kindly deed to lead you to the drinking-place. Myshoulder tingles with your good- fellowship," he added, keeping twoarms'-lengths clear of me. "Do you wish," he said, "merely to cleanse a dusty throat, or for blue or pink oblivion?""Why," I answered laughingly, "I have come a longish journey sinceyesterday night--a journey out of count of all reasonable mileage--and Imight fairly plead a dusty throat as excuse for a beginning; but as to theother things mentioned, those tinted forgetfulnesses, I do not even knowwhat you mean.""Undoubtedly you are a stranger," said the friendly youth, eyeing mefrom top to toe with renewed wonder, "and by your unknown garb onefrom afar.""From how far no man can say--not even I--but from very far, in truth.
Let that stay your curiosity for the time. And now to bench and ale-mug,on good fellow!--the short- est way. I was never so thirsty as this sinceour water-butts went overboard when I sailed the southern seas as a trampapprentice, and for three days we had to damp our black tongues with thepuddles the night-dews left in the lift of our mainsail."Without more words, being a little awed of me, I thought, the boy ledme through the good-humoured crowd to where, facing the main road tothe town, but a little sheltered by a thicket of trees covered with giganticpink blossoms, stood a drinking-place--a cluster of tables set round anopen grass-plot. Here he brought me a platter of some light inefficientcakes which merely served to make hunger more self-conscious, and somefine aromatic wine contained in a triple-bodied flask, each divisioncontaining vintage of a separate hue. We broke our biscuits, sipped thatmysterious wine, and talked of many things until at last something set uson the subject of astronomy, a study I found my dapper gallant had someknowledge of-- which was not to be wondered at seeing he dwelt underskies each night set thick above his curly head with tawny planets, andglittering constellations sprinkled through space like flowers in Maymeadows. He knew what worlds went round the sun, larger or lesser, andseeing this I be- gan to question him, for I was uneasy in my innermostmind and, you will remember, so far had no certain knowledge of where Iwas, only a dim, restless suspicion that I had come beyond the ken of allmen's knowledge.
Therefore, sweeping clear the board with my sleeve, and breaking the wafer cake I was eating, I set down one central piece for the sun, and, "Seehere!" I said, "good fel- low! This morsel shall stand for that sun youhave just been welcoming back with quaint ritual. Now stretch yourstarry knowledge to the utmost, and put down that tankard for a moment.
If this be yonder sun and this lesser crumb be the outermost one of ourrevolving system, and this the next within, and this the next, and so on;now if this be so tell me which of these fragmentary orbs is ours--which ofall these crumbs from the hand of the primordial would be that we standupon?" And I waited with an anxiety a light manner thinly hid, to hearhis answer.
It came at once. Laughing as though the question were too trivial,and more to humour my wayward fancy than aught else, that boy circledhis rosy thumb about a minute and brought it down on the planet Mars!
I started and stared at him; then all of a tremble cried, "You trifle withme! Choose again--there, see, I will set the symbols and name them toyou anew. There now, on your soul tell me truly which this planet is, theone here at our feet?" And again the boy shook his head, wondering atmy eagerness, and pointed to Mars, saying gently as he did so the fact wascertain as the day above us, nothing was marvellous but my questioning.
Mars! oh, dreadful, tremendous, unexpected! With a cry of affright,and bringing my fist down on the table till all the cups upon it leapt, I toldhim he lied--lied like a simpleton whose astronomy was as rotten as hiswit-- smote the table and scowled at him for a spell, then turned away andlet my chin fall upon my breast and my hands upon my lap.
And yet, and yet, it might be so! Everything about me was new andstrange, the crisp, thin air I breathed was new; the lukewarm sunshine new;the sleek, long, ivory faces of the people new! Yesterday--was ityesterday?--I was back there--away in a world that pines to know of otherworlds, and one fantastic wish of mine, backed by a hideous, infernalchance, had swung back the doors of space and shot me--if that boy spoketrue--into the outer void where never living man had been before: all mywits about me, all the horrible bathos of my earthly clothing on me, all myterrestrial hungers in my veins!
I sprang to my feet and swept my hands across my eyes. Was that a dream, or this? No, no, both were too real. The hum of my faraway citystill rang in my ears: a swift vision of the girl I had loved; of the men I hadhated; of the things I had hoped for rose before me, still dazing my innereye. And these about me were real people, too; it was real earth; realskies, trees, and rocks--had the infernal gods indeed heard, I asked myself,the foolish wish that started from my lips in a moment of fierce discontent,and swept me into another sphere, another existence? I looked at the boyas though he could answer that question, but there was nothing in his facebut vacuous wonder; I clapped my hands together and beat my breast; itwas true; my soul within me said it was true; the boy had not lied; thedjins had heard; I was just in the flesh I had; my common human hungersstill unsatisfied where never mortal man had hungered before; andscarcely knowing whether I feared or not, whether to laugh or cry, butwith all the wonder and terror of that great remove sweeping suddenlyupon me I staggered back to my seat, and dropping my arms upon thetable, leant my head heavily upon them and strove to choke back thepassion which beset me.