Part 27 (2/2)

”n.o.body knows,” replied the doctor.

A silence now followed, which was at last broken by Oxenden.

”After all,” said he, ”these monsters and marvels of nature form the least interesting feature in the land of the Kosekin. To me the people themselves are the chief subject of interest. Where did they get that strange, all-pervading love of death, which is as strong in them as love of life is in us?”

”Why, they got it from the imagination of the writer of the ma.n.u.script,” interrupted Melick.

”Yes, it's easy to answer it from your point of view; yet from my point of view it is more difficult. I sometimes think that it may be the strong spirituality of the Semitic race, carried out under exceptionally favorable circ.u.mstances to the ultimate results; for the Semitic race more than all others thought little of this life, and turned their affections to the life that lives beyond this. The Kosekin may thus have had a spiritual development of their own, which ended in this.

”Yet there may be another reason for it, and I sometimes think that the Kosekin may be nearer to the truth than we are. We have by nature a strong love of life--it is our dominant feeling--but yet there is in the minds of all men a deep underlying conviction of the vanity of life, and the worthlessness. In all ages and among all races the best, the purest, and the wisest have taught this truth--that human life is not a blessing; that the evil predominates over the good; and that our best hope is to gain a spirit of acquiescence with its inevitable ills. All philosophy and all religions teach us this one solemn truth, that in this life the evil surpa.s.ses the good. It has always been so.

Suffering has been the lot of all living things, from the giant of the primeval swamps down to the smallest zoophyte. It is far more so with man. Some favored cla.s.ses in every age may furnish forth a few individuals who may perhaps lead lives of self-indulgence and luxury; but to the ma.s.s of mankind life has ever been, and must ever be, a prolonged scene of labor intermingled with suffering. The great Indian religions, whether Brahmanic or Buddhistic, teach as their cardinal doctrine that life is an evil. Buddhism is more p.r.o.nounced in this, for it teaches more emphatically than even the Kosekin that the chief end of man is to get rid of the curse of life and gain the bliss of Nirvana, or annihilation. True, it does not take so practical a form as among the Kosekin, yet it is believed by one-third of the human race as the foundation of the religion in which they live and die. We need not go to the Kosekin, however, for such maxims as these. The intelligent Hindoos, the Chinese, the j.a.panese, with many other nations, all cling firmly to this belief. Sakyamoum Gautama Buddha, the son and heir of a mighty monarch, penetrated with the conviction of the misery of life, left his throne, embraced a life of voluntary poverty, want, and misery, so that he might find his way to a better state--the end before him being this, that he might ultimately escape from the curse of existence. He lived till old age, gained innumerable followers, and left to them as a solemn legacy the maxim that not to exist is better than to exist; that death is better than life. Since his day millions of his followers have upheld his principles and lived his life. Even among the joyous Greeks we find this feeling at times bursting forth it comes when we least expect it, and not even a Kosekin poet could express this view more forcibly than Sophocles in the OEdipus at Colonus:

”'Not to be born surpa.s.ses every lot; And the next best lot by far, when one is born Is to go back whence he came as soon as possible; For while youth is present bringing vain follies, What woes does it not have, what ills does it not bear-- Murders, factions, strife, war, envy, But the extreme of misery is attained by loathsome old age-- Old age, strengthless, unsociable, friendless, Where all evils upon evils dwell together.'”

”I'll give you the words of a later poet,” said Melick, ”who takes a different view of the case. I think I'll sing them, with your permission.”

Melick swallowed a gla.s.s of wine and then sang the following:

”'They may rail at this life: from the hour I began it I found it a life full of kindness and bliss, And until they can show me some happier planet, More social and bright, I'll content me with this.

As long as the world has such lips and such eyes As before me this moment enraptured I see, They may say what they will of their orbs in the skies, But this earth is the planet for you, love, and me.'

”What a pity it is,” continued Melick, ”that the writer of this ma.n.u.script had not the philological, theological, sociological, geological, palaeological, ontological, ornithological, and all the other logical attainments of yourself and the doctor! He could then have given us a complete view of the nature of the Kosekin, morally and physically; he could have treated of the geology of the soil, the ethnology of the people, and could have unfolded before us a full and comprehensive view of their philosophy and religion, and could have crammed his ma.n.u.script with statistics. I wonder why he didn't do it even as it was. It must have been a strong temptation.”

”More,” said Oxenden, with deep impressiveness, ”was a simple-minded though somewhat emotional sailor, and merely wrote in the hope that his story might one day meet the eyes of his father. I certainly should like to find some more accurate statements about the science, philosophy, and religion of the Kosekin; yet, after all, such things could not be expected.”

”Why not?” said Melick; ”it was easy enough for him.”

”How?” asked Oxenden.

”Why, he had only to step into the British Museum, and in a couple of hours he could have crammed up on all those points in science, philosophy, ethnology, and theology, about which you are so anxious to know.”

”Well,” said Featherstone, ”suppose we continue our reading? I believe it is my turn now. I sha'n't be able to hold out so long as you did, Oxenden, but I'll do what I can.”

Saying this, Featherstone took the ma.n.u.script and went on to read.

CHAPTER XXVIII

IN PRISON

It was with hearts full of the gloomiest forebodings that we returned to the amir, and these we soon found to be fully justified. The athalebs descended at that point from which they had risen--namely, on the terrace immediately in front of the cavern where they had been confined. We then dismounted, and Layelah with the Kosekin guards accompanied us to our former chambers. There she left us, saying that a communication would be sent to us.

We were now left to our own conjectures.

”I wonder what they will do to us?” said I.

”It is impossible to tell,” said Almah.

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