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The Little Pilgrim: Further Experiences. · Chapter 4The Land of Darkness. (2)

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The glitter of the lights, the shouts, and sounds of continual going, the endless whirl of passers-by, confused and tired me after a while. I went as far out as I could go to what seemed the out-skirts of the place, where I could by glimpses perceive a low horizon all lurid and glowing, which seemed to sweep round and round. Against it in the distance stood up the outline, black against that red glow, of other towers and house-tops, so many and great that there was evidently another town between us and the sunset, if sunset it was. I have seen a western sky like it when there were storms about, and all the colors of the sky were heightened and darkened by angry influences. The distant town rose against it, cutting the firmament so that it might have been tongues of flame flickering between the dark solid outlines; and across the waste open country which lay between the two cities, there came a distant hum like the sound of the sea, which was in reality the roar of that other multitude. The country between showed no greenness or beauty; it lay dark under the dark overhanging sky. Here and there seemed a cluster of giant trees scathed as if by lightning, their bare boughs standing up as high as the distant towers, their trunks like black columns without foliage. Openings here and there, with glimmering lights, looked like the mouths of mines; but of passengers there were scarcely any. A figure here and there flew along as if pursued, imperfectly seen, a shadow only a little darker than the space about. And in contrast with the sound of the city, here was no sound at all, except the low roar on either side, and a vague cry or two from the openings of the mine,—a scene all drawn in darkness, in variations of gloom, deriving scarcely any light at all from the red and gloomy burning of that distant evening sky.

A faint curiosity to go forwards, to see what the mines were, perhaps to get a share in what was brought up from them, crossed my mind. But I was afraid of the dark, of the wild uninhabited savage look of the landscape; though when I thought of it, there seemed no reason why a narrow stretch of country between two great towns should be alarming. But the impression was strong and above reason. I turned back to the street in which I had first alighted, and which seemed to end in a great square full of people. In the middle there was a stage erected, from which some one was delivering an oration or address of some sort. He stood beside a long table, upon which lay something which I could not clearly distinguish, except that it seemed alive, and moved, or rather writhed with convulsive twitchings, as if trying to get free of the bonds which confined it. Round the stage in front were a number of seats occupied by listeners, many of whom were women, whose interest seemed to be very great, some of them being furnished with note-books; while a great unsettled crowd coming and going, drifted round,—many, arrested for a time as they passed, proceeding on their way when the interest flagged, as is usual to such open-air assemblies. I followed two of those who pushed their way to within a short distance of the stage, and who were strong, big men, more fitted to elbow the crowd aside than I, after my rough treatment in the first place, and the agitation I had passed through, could be. I was glad, besides, to take advantage of the explanation which one was giving to the other. 'It's always fun to see this fellow demonstrate,' he said, 'and the subject to-day's a capital one. Let's get well forward, and see all that's going on.'

'Which subject do you mean?' said the other; 'the theme or the example?' And they both laughed, though I did not seize the point of the wit.

'Well, both,' said the first speaker. 'The theme is nerves; and as a lesson in construction and the calculation of possibilities, it's fine. He's very clever at that. He shows how they are all strung to give as much pain and do as much harm as can be; and yet how well it's all managed, don't you know, to look the reverse. As for the example, he's a capital one—all nerves together, lying, if you like, just on the surface, ready for the knife.'

'If they're on the surface I can't see where the fun is,' said the other.

'Metaphorically speaking. Of course they are just where other people's nerves are; but he's what you call a highly organized nervous specimen. There will be plenty of fun. Hush! he is just going to begin.'

'The arrangement of these threads of being,' said the lecturer, evidently resuming after a pause, 'so as to convey to the brain the most instantaneous messages of pain or pleasure, is wonderfully skilful and clever. I need not say to the audience before me, enlightened as it is by experiences of the most striking kind, that the messages are less of pleasure than of pain. They report to the brain the stroke of injury far more often than the thrill of pleasure; though sometimes that too, no doubt, or life could scarcely be maintained. The powers that be have found it necessary to mingle a little sweet of pleasurable sensation, else our miserable race would certainly have found some means of procuring annihilation. I do not for a moment pretend to say that the pleasure is sufficient to offer a just counterbalance to the other. None of my hearers will, I hope, accuse me of inconsistency. I am ready to allow that in a previous condition I asserted somewhat strongly that this was the case; but experience has enlightened us on that point. Our circumstances are now understood by us all in a manner impossible while we were still in a condition of incompleteness. We are all convinced that there is no compensation. The pride of the position, of bearing everything rather than give in, or making a submission we do not feel, of preserving our own will and individuality to all eternity, is the only compensation. I am satisfied with it, for my part.'

The orator made a pause, holding his head high, and there was a certain amount of applause. The two men before me cheered vociferously. 'That is the right way to look at it,' one of them said. My eyes were upon them, with no particular motive; and I could not help starting, as I saw suddenly underneath their applause and laughter a snarl of cursing, which was the real expression of their thoughts. I felt disposed in the same way to curse the speaker, though I knew no reason why.

He went on a little farther, explaining what he meant to do; and then turning round, approached the table. An assistant, who was waiting, uncovered it quickly. The audience stirred with quickened interest, and I with consternation made a step forwards, crying out with horror. The object on the table, writhing, twitching to get free, but bound down by every limb, was a living man. The lecturer went forwards calmly, taking his instruments from their case with perfect composure and coolness. 'Now, ladies and gentlemen,' he said, and inserted the knife in the flesh, making a long clear cut in the bound arm. I shrieked out, unable to restrain myself. The sight of the deliberate wound, the blood, the cry of agony that came from the victim, the calmness of all the lookers-on, filled me with horror and rage indescribable. I felt myself clear the crowd away with a rush, and spring on the platform, I could not tell how. 'You devil!' I cried, 'let the man go! Where is the police? Where is a magistrate? Let the man go this moment! fiends in human shape! I'll have you brought to justice!' I heard myself shouting wildly, as I flung myself upon the wretched sufferer, interposing between him and the knife. It was something like this that I said. My horror and rage were delirious, and carried me beyond all attempt at control.

Through it all I heard a shout of laughter rising from everybody round. The lecturer laughed; the audience roared with that sound of horrible mockery which had driven me out of myself in my first experience. All kinds of mocking cries sounded around me. 'Let him a little blood to calm him down.' 'Let the fool have a taste of it himself, doctor.' Last of all came a voice mingled with the cries of the sufferer whom I was trying to shield, 'Take him instead; curse him! take him instead.' I was bending over the man with my arms outstretched, protecting him, when he gave vent to this cry. And I heard immediately behind me a shout of assent, which seemed to come from the two strong young men with whom I had been standing, and the sound of a rush to seize me. I looked round, half mad with terror and rage; a second more and I should have been strapped on the table too. I made one wild bound into the midst of the crowd; and struggling among the arms stretched out to catch me, amid the roar of the laughter and cries—fled—fled wildly, I knew not whither, in panic and rage and horror which no words could describe. Terror winged my feet. I flew, thinking as little of whom I met, or knocked down, or trod upon in my way, as the others did at whom I had wondered a little while ago.

No distinct impression of this headlong course remains in my mind, save the sensation of mad fear such as I had never felt before. I came to myself on the edge of the dark valley which surrounded the town. All my pursuers had dropped off before that time; and I have the recollection of flinging myself upon the ground on my face in the extremity of fatigue and exhaustion. I must have lain there undisturbed for some time. A few steps came and went, passing me; but no one took any notice, and the absence of the noise and crowding gave me a momentary respite. But in my heat and fever I got no relief of coolness from the contact of the soil. I might have flung myself upon a bed of hot ashes, so much was it unlike the dewy cool earth which I expected, upon which one can always throw one's self with a sensation of repose. Presently the uneasiness of it made me struggle up again and look around me. I was safe; at least the cries of the pursuers had died away, the laughter which made my blood boil offended my ears no more. The noise of the city was behind me, softened into an indefinite roar by distance, and before me stretched out the dreary landscape in which there seemed no features of attraction. Now that I was nearer to it, I found it not so unpeopled as I thought. At no great distance from me was the mouth of one of the mines, from which came an indication of subterranean lights; and I perceived that the flying figures which I had taken for travellers between one city and another were in reality wayfarers endeavoring to keep clear of what seemed a sort of press-gang at the openings. One of them, unable to stop himself in his flight, adopted the same expedient as myself, and threw himself on the ground close to me when he had got beyond the range of pursuit. It was curious that we should meet there, he flying from a danger which I was about to face, and ready to encounter that from which I had fled. I waited for a few minutes till he had recovered his breath, and then, 'What are you running from?' I said. 'Is there any danger there?' The man looked up at me with the same continual question in his eyes,—Who is this fool?

'Danger!' he said. 'Are you so new here, or such a cursed idiot, as not to know the danger of the mines? You are going across yourself, I suppose, and then you'll see.'

'But tell me,' I said; 'my experience may be of use to you afterwards, if you will tell me yours now.'

'Of use!' he cried, staring; 'who cares? Find out for yourself. If they get hold of you, you will soon understand.'

I no longer took this for rudeness, but answered in his own way, cursing him too for a fool. 'If I ask a warning I can give one; as for kindness,' I said, 'I was not looking for that.'

At this he laughed, indeed we laughed together,—there seemed something ridiculous in the thought; and presently he told me, for the mere relief of talking, that round each of these pit-mouths there was a band to entrap every passer-by who allowed himself to be caught, and send him down below to work in the mine. 'Once there, there is no telling when you may get free,' he said; 'one time or other most people have a taste of it. You don't know what hard labor is if you have never been there. I had a spell once. There is neither air nor light; your blood boils in your veins from the fervent heat; you are never allowed to rest. You are put in every kind of contortion to get at it, your limbs twisted, and your muscles strained.'

'For what?' I said.

'For gold!' he cried with a flash in his eyes—'gold! There it is inexhaustible; however hard you may work, there is always more, and more!'

'And to whom does all that belong?' I said. 'To whoever is strong enough to get hold and keep possession,—sometimes one, sometimes another. The only thing you are sure of is that it will never be you.'

Why not I as well as another? was the thought that went through my mind, and my new companion spied it with a shriek of derision.

'It is not for you nor your kind,' he cried. 'How do you think you could force other people to serve you? Can you terrify them or hurt them, or give them anything? You have not learned yet who are the masters here.'

This troubled me, for it was true. 'I had begun to think,' I said, 'that there was no authority at all,—for every man seems to do as he pleases; you ride over one, and knock another down, or you seize a living man and cut him to pieces'—I shuddered as I thought of it—'and there is nobody to interfere.'

'Who should interfere?' he said. 'Why shouldn't every man amuse himself as he can? But yet for all that we've got our masters,' he cried with a scowl, waving his clinched fist in the direction of the mines; 'you'll find it out when you get there.'

It was a long time after this before I ventured to move, for here it seemed to me that for the moment I was safe,—outside the city, yet not within reach of the dangers of that intermediate space which grew clearer before me as my eyes became accustomed to the lurid threatening afternoon light. One after another the fugitives came flying past me,—people who had escaped from the armed bands whom I could now see on the watch near the pit's mouth. I could see too the tactics of these bands,—how they retired, veiling the lights and the opening, when a greater number than usual of travellers appeared on the way, and then suddenly widening out, throwing out flanking lines, surrounded and drew in the unwary. I could even hear the cries with which their victims disappeared over the opening which seemed to go down into the bowels of the earth. By and by there came flying towards me a wretch more dreadful in aspect than any I had seen. His scanty clothes seemed singed and burned into rags; his hair, which hung about his face unkempt and uncared for, had the same singed aspect; his skin was brown and baked. I got up as he approached, and caught him and threw him to the ground, without heeding his struggles to get on. 'Don't you see,' he cried with a gasp, 'they may get me again.' He was one of those who had escaped out of the mines; but what was it to me whether they caught him again or not? I wanted to know how he had been caught, and what he had been set to do, and how he had escaped. Why should I hesitate to use my superior strength when no one else did? I kept watch over him that he should not get away.

'You have been in the mines?' I said.

'Let me go!' he cried. 'Do you need to ask?' and he cursed me as he struggled, with the most terrible imprecations. 'They may get me yet. Let me go!'

'Not till you tell me,' I cried. 'Tell me and I'll protect you. If they come near I'll let you go. Who are they, man? I must know.'

He struggled up from the ground, clearing his hot eyes from the ashes that were in them, and putting aside his singed hair. He gave me a glance of hatred and impotent resistance (for I was stronger than he), and then cast a wild terrified look back. The skirmishers did not seem to remark that anybody had escaped, and he became gradually a little more composed. 'Who are they?' he said hoarsely. 'They're cursed wretches like you and me; and there are as many bands of them as there are mines on the road; and you'd better turn back and stay where you are. You are safe here.'

'I will not turn back,' I said.

'I know well enough: you can't. You've got to go the round like the rest,' he said with a laugh which was like a sound uttered by a wild animal rather than a human voice. The man was in my power, and I struck him, miserable as he was. It seemed a relief thus to get rid of some of the fury in my mind. 'It's a lie,' I said; 'I go because I please. Why shouldn't I gather a band of my own if I please, and fight those brutes, not fly from them like you?'

He chuckled and laughed below his breath, struggling and cursing and crying out, as I struck him again, 'You gather a band! What could you offer them? Where would you find them? Are you better than the rest of us? Are you not a man like the rest? Strike me you can, for I'm down. But make yourself a master and a chief—you!'

'Why not I?' I shouted again, wild with rage and the sense that I had no power over him, save to hurt him. That passion made my hands tremble; he slipped from me in a moment, bounded from the ground like a ball, and with a yell of derision escaped, and plunged into the streets and the clamor of the city from which I had just flown. I felt myself rage after him, shaking my fists with a consciousness of the ridiculous passion of impotence that was in me, but no power of restraining it; and there was not one of the fugitives who passed, however desperate he might be, who did not make a mock at me as he darted by. The laughing-stock of all those miserable objects, the sport of fate, afraid to go forwards, unable to go back, with a fire in my veins urging me on! But presently I grew a little calmer out of mere exhaustion, which was all the relief that was possible to me. And by and by, collecting all my faculties, and impelled by this impulse, which I seemed unable to resist, I got up and went cautiously on.

Fear can act in two ways: it paralyzes, and it renders cunning. At this moment I found it inspire me. I made my plans before I started, how to steal along under the cover of the blighted brushwood which broke the line of the valley here and there. I set out only after long thought, seizing the moment when the vaguely perceived band were scouring in the other direction intercepting the travellers. Thus, with many pauses, I got near to the pit's mouth in safety. But my curiosity was as great as, almost greater than my terror. I had kept far from the road, dragging myself sometimes on hands and feet over broken ground, tearing my clothes and my flesh upon the thorns; and on that farther side all seemed so silent and so dark in the shadow cast by some disused machinery, behind which the glare of the fire from below blazed upon the other side of the opening, that I could not crawl along in the darkness, and pass, which would have been the safe way, but with a breathless hot desire to see and know, dragged myself to the very edge to look down. Though I was in the shadow, my eyes were nearly put out by the glare on which I gazed. It was not fire; it was the lurid glow of the gold, glowing like flame, at which countless miners were working. They were all about like flies,—some on their knees, some bent double as they stooped over their work, some lying cramped upon shelves and ledges. The sight was wonderful, and terrible beyond description. The workmen seemed to consume away with the heat and the glow, even in the few minutes I gazed. Their eyes shrank into their heads; their faces blackened. I could see some trying to secret morsels of the glowing metal, which burned whatever it touched, and some who were being searched by the superiors of the mines, and some who were punishing the offenders, fixing them up against the blazing wall of gold. The fear went out of my mind, so much absorbed was I in this sight. I gazed, seeing farther and farther every moment into crevices and seams of the glowing metal, always with more and more slaves at work, and the entire pantomime of labor and theft, and search and punishment, going on and on,—the baked faces dark against the golden glare, the hot eyes taking a yellow reflection, the monotonous clamor of pick and shovel, and cries and curses, and all the indistinguishable sound of a multitude of human creatures. And the floor below, and the low roof which overhung whole myriads within a few inches of their faces, and the irregular walls all breached and shelved, were every one the same, a pandemonium of gold,—gold everywhere. I had loved many foolish things in my life, but never this; which was perhaps why I gazed and kept my sight, though there rose out of it a blast of heat which scorched the brain.

While I stooped over, intent on the sight, some one who had come up by my side to gaze too was caught by the fumes (as I suppose), for suddenly I was aware of a dark object falling prone into the glowing interior with a cry and crash which brought back my first wild panic. He fell in a heap, from which his arms shot forth wildly as he reached the bottom, and his cry was half anguish yet half desire. I saw him seized by half a dozen eager watchers, and pitched upon a ledge just under the roof, and tools thrust into his hands. I held on by an old shaft, trembling, unable to move. Perhaps I cried too in my horror,—for one of the overseers who stood in the centre of the glare looked up. He had the air of ordering all that was going on, and stood unaffected by the blaze, commanding the other wretched officials, who obeyed him like dogs. He seemed to me, in my terror, like a figure of gold, the image perhaps of wealth or Pluto, or I know not what, for I suppose my brain began to grow confused, and my hold on the shaft to relax. I had strength enough, however (for I cared not for the gold), to fling myself back the other way upon the ground, where I rolled backwards, downwards, I knew not how, turning over and over upon sharp ashes and metallic edges, which tore my hair and beard.—and for a moment I knew no more.

This fall saved me. I came to myself after a time, and heard the press-gang searching about. I had sense to lie still among the ashes thrown up out of the pit, while I heard their voices. Once I gave myself up for lost. The glitter of a lantern flashed in my eyes, a foot passed, crashing among the ashes so close to my cheek that the shoe grazed it. I found the mark after, burned upon my flesh; but I escaped notice by a miracle. And presently I was able to drag myself up and crawl away; but how I reached the end of the valley I cannot tell. I pushed my way along mechanically on the dark side. I had no further desire to see what was going on in the openings of the mines. I went on, stumbling and stupid, scarcely capable even of fear, conscious only of wretchedness and weariness, till at last I felt myself drop across the road within the gateway of the other town, and lay there with no thought of anything but the relief of being at rest.

When I came to myself, it seemed to me that there was a change in the atmosphere and the light. It was less lurid, paler, gray, more like twilight than the stormy afternoon of the other city. A certain dead serenity was in the sky,—black paleness, whiteness, everything faint in it. This town was walled, but the gates stood open, and I saw no defences of troops or other guardians. I found myself lying across the threshold, but pushed to one side, so that the carriages which went and came should not be stopped or I injured by their passage. It seemed to me that there was some thoughtfulness and kindness in this action, and my heart sprang up in a reaction of hope. I looked back as if upon a nightmare on the dreadful city which I had left, on its tumults and noise, the wild racket of the streets, the wounded wretches who sought refuge in the corners, the strife and misery that were abroad, and, climax of all, the horrible entertainment which had been going on in the square, the unhappy being strapped upon the table. How, I said to myself, could such things be? Was it a dream? Was it a nightmare? Was it something presented to me in a vision,—a strong delusion to make me think that the old fables which had been told concerning the end of mortal life were true? When I looked back it appeared like an allegory, so that I might have seen it in a dream; and still more like an allegory were the gold mines in the valley, and the myriads who labored there. Was it all true, or only a reflection from the old life mingling with the strange novelties which would most likely elude understanding on the entrance into this new? I sat within the shelter of the gateway on my awakening, and thought over all this. My heart was calm,—almost, in the revulsion from the terrors I had been through, happy. I persuaded myself that I was but now beginning; that there had been no reality in these latter experiences, only a curious succession of nightmares, such as might so well be supposed to follow a wonderful transformation like that which must take place between our mortal life and—the world to come. The world to come! I paused and thought of it all, until the heart began to beat loud in my breast. What was this where I lay? Another world,—a world which was not happiness, not bliss? Oh, no; perhaps there was no world of bliss save in dreams. This, on the other hand, I said to myself, was not misery; for was not I seated here, with a certain tremulousness about me, it was true, after all the experiences which, supposing them even to have been but dreams, I had come through,—a tremulousness very comprehensible, and not at all without hope?

I will not say that I believed even what I tried to think. Something in me lay like a dark shadow in the midst of all my theories; but yet I succeeded to a great degree in convincing myself that the hope in me was real, and that I was but now beginning—beginning with at least a possibility that all might be well. In this half conviction, and after all the troubles that were over (even though they might only have been imaginary troubles), I felt a certain sweetness in resting there within the gateway, with my back against it. I was unwilling to get up again, and bring myself in contact with reality. I felt that there was pleasure in being left alone. Carriages rolled past me occasionally, and now and then some people on foot; but they did not kick me out of the way or interfere with my repose.