The New Moon, page 24
“On your island, you do not enjoy all the benefits of the sun in their entirety, because it is situated beyond its elevation, and it only illuminates it from underneath, but that underside is not far away, and receives its rays almost horizontally—principally its vertical rays, which give the center of your island a heat almost equal to the volcanoes that we have in the center of our planet. You thus enjoy the same advantages that we possess in that regard, but it is not the same for the upper surface of your island; it is scarcely lit by the sun, but it receives from below the warmth necessary to the vegetation, which must be very beautiful. The upper part of your island receives the light of the fixed stars that are around the Sun. You have, in addition, the multitude of firebirds that surround your island and illuminate it by night, and the other multitude of glow-worms, which illuminate the countryside. Those advantages are not, without a doubt, comparable to those we possess on our planets, which all rotate on their axes and around the sun, which alone remains motionless at the center of the universe.”
Belladone, whom I shall call Belladonna, paid the closest attention to what I was saying. She did not take her eyes off me, and seemed astonished by the things I said—which she was doubtless hearing for the first time, for she uttered a profound sigh and said to me:
“Everything that you have just told me interests me a great deal and gives me the greatest pleasure. I can see that you possess a great deal of learning; perhaps it would be agreeable for you to augment it with a knowledge of the island that I inhabit.”
“That is my intention, Madame, and I propose to explore it.”
“If such is your intention,” said Belladonna, “I offer to accompany you in your research; that will give you the means to examine everything without fatigue, because we can make the little excursion in a barouche, and you will be free to stop at all the places you would like to examine. If you wish, we can go to visit Prodigium, the capital city of the island.”
“I accept your offer with great pleasure, Madame, and even with gratitude.”
We set out the following morning in a little caleche drawn by two animals of the deer genre, a kind of reindeer, very light in running.
The landscape of that island is charming; the vegetation is prodigious in the beauty, the variety and the freshness of its plants, which were all unknown to me, but nevertheless attracted my admiration. I asked Belladonna their names but she did not know them. The trees were surprising in their beauty, their fruits admirable.
We arrived at a little wood, which it was necessary to traverse. We found ourselves at a crossroads, where Belladonna proposed that we stop in order to rest our animals. We got down from the barouche, and sat down at the feet of two of the large and beautiful trees by which the crossroads was surrounded. We savored the pleasure that the soul experiences in contemplating the marvels of creation.
“Don’t you think,” I said to Belladonna, “that thoughts are sweetest when one is confronted by the works of God?”
“What do you mean by God?” he asked.
“I mean by God,” I replied, “the Sovereign Being who created everything that exists in nature: the beautiful sky that we are contemplating, the earth we inhabit, all the plants with which it is ornamented, all the animals, and these charming birds whose delightful songs sing the praises of their Creator!”
At that moment we had the harmonious concert of numerous birds that were in the trees at the feet of which we were sitting.
Belladonna took my arm and squeezed it, saying: “What you have just told me, my friend, causes me an impression that I have never felt before. And you believe that it is God, whose name you have just pronounced, that created all these beautiful things?”
“I am convinced of it, Madame, and in the 5864 years86 since he created it, everything has remained in the same state. After having created the heavens, God created the angels to announce and execute his orders; then God created the Firmament, in which he placed the Sun, and created the planets and stars in the same way. Then he created the fish and the birds. On the sixth day he created the animals and man, and concluded with the masterpiece of nature, by creating woman!
“The wisdom of God is so profound that everything he has created is subject to his supreme law. The sun is motionless at the center of the universe where God has placed it; the planets rotates around it and receive light from it, which some of them, called moons, transmit to other planets by reflection during the night.
“For humans and for animals his divine providence had foreseen and provided for their needs; for God, by his immensity, is present at all times in all the parts of the universe. That is why God sees everything, knows everything and provides everything; that is what is called Providence.
“All the animals find on land the nourishment appropriate to them. Who gives them that nourishment, if not the one that created them? The fish find their nourishment in the waters; the birds find theirs on land and in the air; the insects find it everywhere.
“The quadrupeds find it in vegetables and in animals.
“The humans who inhabit lands where agriculture is unknown receive their nourishment from flocks of birds of passage that pause over their territory, but their principal nourishment is that of synagelotic fish—which is to say, fish that swim on shoals, especially herrings, whose fecundity is prodigious.
“The peoples who take their nourishment from fish are called icthyophages; others are acridophages; they eat grasshoppers. Carnivores nourish themselves on flesh.
“The inhabitants of the kingdom of Siam, in India, nourish themselves on the flesh of raw fish. The inhabitants of the Bavis Strait, in North America, which separates Greenland from New Brittany, nourish themselves in the same way.
“Geophages are a few savage peoples whom hunger reduces to eating earth. Anthropophages are savages who eat human flesh.
“The peoples that I have just mentioned are part of the peoples known as barbaric—which is to say, uncivilized: idle, devoid of industry, sagacity and intelligence.
“Humans are born without industry, it’s true, but they have to profit from the ideas of God, the type of which are seen throughout nature; they can also profit from the instincts of animas, which gives them at birth an industry appropriate to them. Only humans are born without instinct and without industry; they are obliged to acquire that industry, but always by imitation; it is only after a great deal of time, toil and reflection that they have succeeded in surpassing the animals. Aerostatic inventions, hydraulic machine team engines, astronomical instruments, ships with propellers, railways, clocks, watches, the fabrication of cloths, machinery, etc., the science and the arts, prove that humans possess a portion of divine essence, the immortal soul.”
Belladonna listened to me with the greatest attention, and said: “Everything that you have told me transports me with admiration and astonishment. I admire the bounty of God, his divine Providence—but I’m astonished that he does not protect all humans equally.”
“Your remark is just, Madame, but your astonishment will cease when you know that humans, whom God created good, went astray and became wicked and ingrate toward their creator. Their iniquity became intolerable, and God resolved to annihilate them by means of the universal deluge, in the year of the world 1536 or 1606. A single man was saved with his wife and children, three of whom were sons: Shem, Japhet and Ham. The last of them was cursed by his father, along with his posterity.
“The peoples that I have mentioned to you—the barbarians, the savages—are the posterity of Ham, and were abandoned by God. However, among those men soiled with crime and iniquity, there are good ones whom God protects, for God is just and good.”
“I can easily understand what you have just told me, but I will need to be instructed and to be able to meditate profoundly on the beings and things that you have mentioned, which I only understand imperfectly. Will you be generous enough to instruct me in the knowledge that I lack?”
“Have no doubt of it, Madame; I shall do so with pleasure.”
“Thank you, my friend. Now, would you like to go to Prodigium?”
“Willingly, Madame.”
We climbed back into the little caleche and set off. I admired all the plants over which the luxury of the vegetation extended. I noticed a few animals that were unknown to me, but which were extraordinary. I decided to visit the island alone and on foot, in order to be able to draw the plants and animals.
IV
The city of Prodigium had a very bizarre, incongruous appearance, owed equally to all its aspects. All the inclined buildings were eccentric in appearance, caprice having played a greater part in their construction than taste, but that was certainly not a prodigy of art. We went into the city, where I was extremely astonished to see that all its inhabitants were lame, all having one leg shorter that the other, with the consequence that couples walking arm in arm, if they were not lame in the same leg, bruised their shoulders and their heads by virtue of their proximity. It was truly bizarre to see that unsteady movement, which often degenerated into grotesquerie, everywhere.
Belladonna stopped the caleche at the door of a beautiful house inhabited by one of her relatives, who received us cordially. We stayed there the next day and the day after that, and then we returned to Belladonna’s house.
On the way, I told her that I had the intention of traveling the island alone and on foot; what had fortified that resolution was that I had discovered in Prodigium a kind of paper and stones that I could carve into the form of crayons. But Belladonna did not want to let me depart alone, because very singular events sometimes occurred on the island.
“But I have nothing to fear, my good friend—and besides, I still have my stiletto, which I habitually carry on my person to defend myself in case of need.”
“Nonetheless,” she said, “I shall accompany you everywhere. We’ll travel the island together in the barouche; I’ll have it stop in any place you indicate; the barouche will be furnished with provisions, and in the evening we’ll come back here, to recommence the following day, if you wish. All the time that you’re occupied with your drawings, I’ll wait for you in the barouche, or remain beside you. What do you say?”
“I say that you’re as good as you’re beautiful!”
The following day we put the plan into execution; Belladonna no longer left me; we ate in the barouche, where the servant prepared everything; then I went to draw, and Belladonna remained sitting next to me watching me work. Such was our plan of campaign.
I began by drawing a few plants and small animals. Then a larger quadruped, a kind of kangaroo, arrived in front of us. I was about to sketch it when it hurled itself upon Belladonna. To draw my stiletto and strike it was the work of an eye-blink; it fell dead. Belladonna whistled for her domestic, who came running, and she ordered him to put the animal in the barouche, in order to take it away as a trophy of my victory. Belladonna was excited by the scene that had just unfolded; she squeezed my hand and kissed me. That was the first time, and for the first time, I reciprocated. The kisses were those of gratitude and the purest amity.
“You see,” I said to Belladonna, “that my precaution was not futile.”
“No,” she said, “I probably owe it to you that I was not disfigured by that vile animal.”
The next day I did not want her to get down from the barouche. I went on my own to the place where I had killed the kangaroo. Then I went a little further on, where I saw some enormous fruits similar to pumpkins. I was examining those products when I noticed that they were moving. What could be causing that movement?
In accordance with my habit of seeking the causes of effects, I wanted to know. I took out my stiletto and struck the fruit with it, making an opening, from which a thick smoke emerged. I kicked it forcefully with my foot, and it split; a hideous animal came out of it, which fixed sparkling eyes upon me and opened a menacing maw. I was still holding my stiletto, and I struck at it so effectively that black blood escaped from the wound, and soon afterwards it died in convulsions.
I put off until the next day visiting other products. I went back to Belladonna, to whom I made a tribute of the new trophy. She was frightened by the sight of the hideous animal, and told me that she did not want me to expose myself to danger again, or else she would accompany me.
Even so, I went back the following day, and she remained in the barouche. I went to the same place and cut into another fruit, from which emerged, in the mist of blue-tinted smoke, a multitude of butterflies, with variegated wings in the most beautiful colors.
A burst of laugher that I heard behind me caused me to turn me head, and I saw Belladonna, followed by her domestic, armed with a stout staff.
“Luckily,” she said to me, “today’s hunt is more agreeable and less dangerous that yesterday’s.”
That adventure amused Belladonna and made her want to attempt another. The following day we returned to the same place, but I went alone to the location of the big fruits. I noticed one of them whose form was different from the others and I thought that it might contain different things. Its shape was an elongated cube, the top of which was slightly curved. With my stiletto I traced two fairly deep lines in a cross on the top, extended slightly along the sides.
Immediately, the surface of the fruits split into flaps of a sort, which rose up about a meter and a half, and formed a kind of aviary filled with birds, resembling canaries, warblers, linnets, nightingales, colingas with rich plumage and hummingbirds, the smallest and prettiest of all birds, with found themselves enclosed in that improvised cage.
I heard a cry of joy, and saw Belladonna a few paces away, marveling at what she saw. Her domestic was following her at a distance, still armed with his staff, in order to help me in case of need. I offered my new conquest to Belladonna, who accepted it with great pleasure. Aided by the domestic, I carried the aviary to the barouche, and we left.
Belladonna was ravishingly beautiful; the pleasure that she experienced gave her a new shine. The evening was cheerful, and we planned to return to the same place, but I begged Belladonna not to come, because it was not certain that we would have butterflies or birds to deal with.
“Nevertheless,” she said, “I’ll go, and if there’s danger, I’ll share it with you.”
It was necessary for me to consent, and the following morning, we set forth as usual. I got down alone and advised Belladonna to stay in the barouche, telling the domestic not to leave her for a moment.
I went further than usual in the area where the fruits were. I soon found myself between two banks, in the middle of which, at the bottom, a little stream was running, which gave the plants bordering it a prodigious exuberance of vegetation. Among the plants I discovered a few large fruits like those I have already mentioned. One of them attracted my attention by virtue of its enormous size. I approached it and examined it attentively; its color was a very pale yellowish green, but its stalk was surrounded by a beautiful black areola.
I experienced something singular as I contemplated that extraordinary vegetable. Finally, I wanted to know what it contained. I made a circular cut with my stiletto around the areola, which made it into a kind of lid, which separated noisily from the spherical body of the vegetable and the opening. First of all the head of a man emerged, and then the entire body, which was very tall. Then he said to me:
“Who permitted you to trouble my repose and destroy the dwelling I had chosen? Have I done you any harm? Why did you do that to me?”
“Sire,” I replied, utterly nonplussed, “My intention was not to do you any harm, but to learn all the knowledge that I might be able to acquire in these spaces.”
“I know what the motive is for your voyage in the imaginary spaces; if it were to do harm I would already have pulverized you. Zadir, whose friend I am, as well as that of Za and Zico, give you the best of recommendations. You can, therefore, count on my good offices in case of need. My name is Dizzaca.”
With those words, he disappeared. For my part, I was about to rejoin Belladonna in the barouche when I met her, coming to look for me, tormented as she was by my long absence.
I reflected during the night on the day’s events, and thought it might be prudent to abstain from all curiosity, and especially of seeking to delve into extraordinary things, for that curiosity, although innocent in itself, since it had no other motive than my instruction, was nevertheless indiscreet and blameworthy, as had been seen. To avoid any recidivism that might be unpardonable, I judged it necessary and prudent to leave the Isle of Prodigies.
Having made that decision I summoned Zico and told him that I wanted to visit the Isle of Marvels.
“That’s easy,” he said. “When do you want to leave?”
“Whenever you like.”
“Then we’ll leave tomorrow morning before sunrise, in order that you can enjoy the admirable effect that its rise produces over the old capital of the island, which is called Mirabilis.
V
The next day, my sylph and his sister having transported me to within sight of the Isle of Marvels, Zico said to me: “Look at Mirabilis, the marvelous city with which no other in the entire world can be comparable.”
I looked, and thought once again that I was the victim of an illusion; I could not believe my eyes. I rubbed them in vain; it was not an illusion; what I was seeing really was real. My astonishment as I saw, and was able to contemplate, that vast and beautiful city is comprehensible; instead of being built on the ground, all of its houses, all of its monuments and all of its edifices were suspended in mid air, sustained and supported by an atmosphere that was probably particular to them.
All those constructions formed streets or surrounded squares, but that surprising city was subject to considerable movements caused by the wind, which often changed the location of constructions and made Mirabilis, in consequence, a city that was always new.
