Who cares, anyhow? Perhaps a bit sad, after all. But more fool you for being sad.
So he rushed to read the “bits.” They would make Bishop9 Latimer forget himself and his martyrdom at the stake.
“1085: The casual Digger of war-days has carried it into civvies. Sighted one of the original Tenth at the Outer Harbour (Adelaide) wharf10 last week fishing. His sinker was his 1914 Star.”
Yes, couldn’t Somers just see that forlorn Outer Harbour at Adelaide, and the digger, like some rag of sea-weed dripping over the edge of the wharf, fishing, and using his medal for a weight?
“Wilfrido: A recent advertisement for the Wellington (New Zealand) Art Gallery attracted 72 applicants12. Among them were two solicitors13 (one an Oxford14 M.A.); five sheep-farmers, on whose lands the mortgagee had foreclosed; and a multitude of clerks. The post is not exactly a sinecure15, either: it demands attendance on seven days a week at £150 p.a.”
Then a little cartoon of Ivan, the Russian workman, going for a tram-drive, and taking huge bundles of money with him, sackfuls of roubles, to pay the fare. The “Bully” was sardonic16 about Bolshevism.
“Ned Kelly: Hearing the deuce of a racket in the abo (aborigines) camp near our place, we strolled over to see what was wrong, and saw a young Binghi giving his gin a father of a hiding for making eyes at another buck17. Every respectable Binghi has the right to wallop his missis, but this one laid it on so much that he knocked her senseless. This enraged18 her relatives, and they went for him en masse, while two or three gins applied19 restoratives to the battered20 wife. She soon came round, and, seeing how things were, grabbed a waddy and went to the assistance of her lord and master. In the end the twain routed the phalanxed relations. Same old woman, whatever her line!”
Bits about bullock drivers and the biggest loads on record, about the biggest piece of land ploughed by a man in a day, recipes for mange in horses, twins, turnips21, accidents to reverend clergymen, and so on.
“Pick: In the arid22 parts out back the wild birds infallibly indicate to the wayfarer23 when the water in his bag must be vigorously conserved24. If in the early morning they descend25 in flocks to the plain, and there collect the globules of dew among the dry stalks of grass, it means that every tank, gilgal and puddle-hole within a bird’s drinking flight has gone dry.”
“Cellu Lloyd: Before you close down on mangey horses here’s a cure I’ve never known to fail. To one bullock’s gall11 add kerosene26 to make up a full pint27. Heat sufficiently28 to enable it to mix well, not forgetting, of course, that half of it is kerosene. When well mixed add one teaspoonful29 of chrysophanic acid. Bottle and shake well. Before applying take a hard scrubbing brush and thoroughly30 scrub the part with carbolic soap and hot water, and when applying the mixture use the brush again. In one case I struck a pair of buggy ponies32 that had actually bitten pieces from each other, and rubbed down a hundred yards or so of fence in trying to allay33 the burning itch34. Two months afterwards they were growing hair and gaining condition, and not a trace of mange remained. It is wonderful, however, how lightly some horse-owners treat the matter. When a horse works hard all day, and spends the night rubbing a fence flat in his itch frenzy35, he at once loses condition and usefulness; but in most cases the owner builds the fence stronger instead of giving the unfortunate animal the necessary attention.”
This recipe brought many biting comments in later issues.
Somers liked the concise36, laconic37 style. It seemed to him manly38 and without trimmings. Put ship-shape in the office, no doubt. Sometimes the drawings were good, and sometimes they weren’t.
“Lady (who has just opened door to country girl carrying suitcase): ‘I am suited. A country girl has been engaged, and I’m getting her to-morrow.’
“Girl: ‘I’m her; and you’re not. The ’ouse is too big’.”
There, thought Somers, you have the whole spirit of Australian labour.
“K. Sped: A week or two back a Mildura (Vic.) motorcyclist ran over a tiger-snake while travelling at 35 m.p.h. Ten minutes later the leg became itchy, and shortly afterwards, feeling giddy, he started back to the local hospital. He made a wobbly passage and collapsed39 at the hospital gates. He was bad for a week, and was told that if the reptile40 had not struck him on the bone he would never have reached the ward6. The snake must have doubled up when the wheel struck it, and by the merest fluke struck the rider’s leg in mid-air.”
“Fraoch: I knew another case of a white girl marrying an aboriginal42 about 20 years ago on the Northern Rivers (N.S.W.). She was rather pretty, a descendant of an English family. Binghi was a landed proprietor43, having acquired a very decent estate on the death of a former spinster employer. (Binghi must have had ’a way wid ’im’). He owned a large, well-furnished house, did himself well, and had a fair education, and was a good rough-rider. But every year the ‘call of the wild’ came to him, and he would leave his wife and kids (they had three) and take himself to an old tumble-down hut in the bush, and there for a month or two live in solitude44 on his natural tucker. Under the will of the aforesaid spinster, upon Binghi’s demise45 the estate was to revert46 to her relatives. With an optimism that was not without a pathos47 of its own, they used to trot48 out every outlaw49 in the district for their dusky friend to ride; but his neck was still intact when I left.”
“Sucre: Peering through her drawing-room window shortly before lunch, the benevolent50 old suburban51 lady saw a shivering man in a ruined overcoat. Not all the members of the capitalist classes are iron-souled creatures bent52 on grinding the faces of the afflicted53, yet virtuous54 poor. Taking a ten shilling note from a heavily-beaded bag, she scribbled55 on a piece of paper the words: Cheer Up, put both in an envelope, and told the maid to give it to the outcast from her. While the family was at dinner that evening a ring sounded at the front door. Argument followed in the hall between a hoarse56 male voice and that of the maid. ‘You can’t come in. They’re at dinner.’ ‘I’d rather come in, miss. Always like for to fix these things up in person.’ ‘You can’t come.’ Another moment and the needy57 wayfarer was in the dining-room. He carefully laid five filthy58 £1 notes on the table before his benefactress. ‘There you are, mum,’ he said, with a rough salute59. ‘Cheer Up won all right. I’m mostly on the corner, race days, as your cook will tell you; an’ I’d like to say that if any uv your friends—’”
Bits, bits, bits. Yet Richard Lovat read on. It was not mere41 anecdotage. It was the sheer momentaneous life of the continent. There was no consecutive60 thread. Only the laconic courage of experience.
All the better. He could have kicked himself for wanting to help mankind, join in revolutions or reforms or any of that stuff. And he kicked himself still harder thinking of his frantic61 struggles with the “soul” and the “dark god” and the “listener” and the “answerer.” Blarney—blarney—blarney! He was a preacher and a blatherer, and he hated himself for it. Damn the “soul,” damn the “dark god,” damn the “listener” and the “answerer,” and above all, damn his own interfering62, nosy63 self.
What right had he to go nosing round Kangaroo, and making up to Jaz or to Jack64? Why couldn’t he keep off it all? Let the whole show go its own gay course to hell, without Mr Richard Lovat Somers trying to show it the way it should go.
A very strong wind had got up from the west. It blew down from the dark hills in a fury, and was cold as flat ice. It blew the sea back until the great water looked like dark, ruffled65 mole-fur. It blew it back till the waves got littler and littler, and could hardly uncurl the least swish of a rat-tail of foam66.
On such a day his restlessness had driven them on a trip along the coast to Wolloona. They got to the lost little town just before mid-day, and looked at the shops. The sales were on, and prices were “smashed to bits,” “Prices Smashed to Bits,” in big labels. Harriet, of course, fascinated in the Main Street, that ran towards the sea, with the steep hills at the back. “Hitch your motor to a star.—Star Motor Company.” “Your piano is the most important article of furniture in your drawing-room. You will not be proud of your drawing-room unless your piano has a Handsome Appearance and a Beautiful Tone. Both these requisites—”
It was a wonderful Main Street, and, thank heaven, out of the wind. There were several large but rather scaring brown hotels, with balconies all round: there was a yellow stucco church with a red-painted tin steeple, like a weird67 toy: there were high roofs and low roofs, all corrugated68 iron: and you came to an opening, and there, behold69, were one or two forlorn bungalows70 inside their wooden palings, and then the void. The naked bush, sinking in a hollow to a sort of marsh71, and then down the coast some sort of “works,” brick-works or something, smoking. All as if it had tumbled haphazard72 off the pantechnicon of civilisation73 as it dragged round the edges of this wild land, and there lay, busy but not rooted in. As if none of the houses had any foundations.
Bright the sun, the air of marvellous clarity, tall stalks of cabbage palms rising in the hollow, and far off, tufted gum trees against a perfectly74 new sky, the tufts at the end of wire branches. And farther off, blue, blue hills. In the Main Street, large and expensive motor-cars and women in fuzzy fur coats; long, quiescent75 Australian men in tired-out-looking navy blue suits trotting76 on brown ponies, with a carpet-bag in one hand, doing the shopping; girls in very much-made hats, also flirtily shopping; three boys with big, magnificent bare legs, lying in a sunny corner in the dust; a lonely white pony78 hitched79 as if forever to a post at a street-corner.
“I like it,” said Harriet. “It doesn’t feel finished.”
“Not even begun,” he laughed.
But he liked it too: even the slummyness of some of the bungalows inside their wooden palings, drab-wood, decrepit80 houses, old tins, broken pots, a greeny-white pony reminding one of a mildewed81 old shoe, two half-naked babies sitting like bits of live refuse in the dirt, but with bonny, healthy bare legs: the awful place called “The Travellers’ Rest—Mrs Coddy’s Boarding Home”—a sort of blind, squalid, corner-building made of wood and tin, with flat pieces of old lace-curtain nailed inside the windows, and the green blinds hermetically drawn82. What must it have been like inside? Then an open space, and coral-trees bristling83 with red crest-flowers on their bare, cold boughs84: and the hollow space of the open country, and the marvellous blue hills of the distance.
The wind was cold enough to make you die. Harriet was disgusted at having been dragged away from home. They trailed to the sea to try and get out of it, for it blew from the land, and the sun was hot. On the bay one lone77 man flinging a line into the water, on the edge of the conch-shaped, sloping sands. Dark-blue water, ruffled like mole-fur, and flicked85 all over with froth as with bits of feather-fluff. And many white gannets turning in the air like a snow-storm and plunging86 down into the water like bombs. And fish leaped in the furry87 water, as if the wind had turned them upside-down. And the gannets dropping and exploding into the wave, and disappearing. On the sea’s horizon, so perfectly clear, a steamer like a beetle88 walking slowly along. Clear, with a non-earthly clarity.
Harriet and Somers sat and ate sandwiches with a little sand, she dazed but still expostulating. Then they went to walk on the sea’s edge, where the sands might be firm. But the beach sloped too much, and they were not firm. The lonely fisherman held up his thin silvery line for them to pass under.
“Don’t bother,” said Somers.
“Right O!” said he.
He had a sad, beery moustache, a very cold-looking face, and, of course, a little boy, his son, no doubt, for a satellite.
There were little, exquisite89 pink shells, like Venetian pink glass with white veins90 or black veins round their sharp little steeples. Harriet loved them, among her grumbles91, and they began to gather them: “for trimmings,” said Harriet. So, in the flat-icy wind, that no life had ever softened92 and no god ever tempered, they crouched93 on the sea’s edge picking these marvellous little shells.
Suddenly, with a cry, to find the water rushing round their ankles and surging up their legs, they dragged their way wildly forward with the wave, and out and up the sand. Where immediately a stronger blast seized Lovat’s hat and sent it spinning to the sea again, and he after it like a bird. He caught it as the water lifted it, and then the waste of waters enveloped94 him. Above his knees swirled95 the green flood, there was water all around him swaying, he looked down at it in amazement96, reeling and clutching his hat.
Then once more he clambered out. Harriet had fallen on her knees on the sand in a paroxysm of laughter, and there she was doubled up like a sack, shrieking98 between her gasps99:
“His hat! His hat! He wouldn’t let it go”—shrieks100, and her head like a sand-bag flops102 to the sand—“no—not if he had to swim”—shrieks—“swim to Samoa.”
He was looking at his wet legs and chuckling103 with his inward laughter. Vivid, the blue sky: intensely clear, the dark sea, the yellow sands, the swoop104 of the bay, the low headlands: clear like a miracle. And the water bubbling in his shoes as he walked rolling up the sands.
At last she recovered enough to crawl after him. They sat in a sand-hollow under a big bush with odd red berries, and he wrung105 out his socks, and all he could of his underpants and trousers. Then he put on his socks and shoes again, and they set off for the station.
“The Pacific water,” he said, “is so very seaey, it is almost warm.”
At which, looking at his wet legs and wet hat, she went off into shrieks again. But she made him be quick, because there was a train they could catch.
However in the Main Street they thought they would buy another pair of socks. So he bought them, and changed in the shop. And they missed the train, and Harriet expostulated louder.
They went home in a motor-bus and a cloud of dust, with the heaven bluer than blue above, the hills dark and fascinating, and the land so remote seeming. Everything so clear, so very distinct, and yet so marvellously aloof106.
All the miles alongside the road tin bungalows in their paling fences: and a man on a pony, in a long black overcoat and a cold nose, driving three happy, fleecy cows: long men in jerseys107 and white kerchiefs round their necks, à la Buffalo108 Bill, riding nice slim horses; a woman riding astride top speed on the roadside grass. A motor-car at the palings of one of the bungalows. A few carts coming.
And the occupants of the ’bus bouncing and bobbing like a circus, because of the very bumpy109 road.
“Shakes your dinner down,” said the old woman with the terribly home-made hat—oh, such difficult, awful hats.
“It does, if you’ve had any,” laughed Harriet.
“Why, you’ve ’ad your dinner, ’aven’t you?”
As concerned as if Harriet was her own stomach, such a nice old woman. And a lovely little boy with the bright, wide, gentle eyes of these Australians. So alert and alive and with that lovableness that almost hurts one. Absolute trust in the “niceness” of the world. A tall, stalky, ginger110 man with the same bright eyes and a turned-up nose and long stalky legs. An elderly man with bright, friendly, elderly eyes and careless hair and careless clothing. He was Joe, and the other was Alf. Real careless Australians, careless of their appearance, careless of their speech, of their money, of everything—except of their happy-go-lucky, democratic friendliness111. Really nice, with bright, quick, willing eyes. Then a young man, perhaps a commercial traveller, with a suit-case. He was quite smartly dressed, and had fancy socks. He was one of those with the big, heavy legs, heavy thighs112 and calves113 that showed even in his trousers. And he was physically114 very self-conscious, very self-conscious of Lovat and Harriet. The driver’s face was long and deep red. He was absolutely laconic. And yet, absolutely willing, as if life held no other possibility than that of being an absolutely willing citizen. A fat man with a fat little girl waiting at one of the corners.
“Up she goes!” he said as he lifted her in.
A perpetual, unchanging willingness, and an absolute equality. The same good-humoured, right-you-are approach from everybody to everybody. “Right-you-are! Right-O!” Somers had been told so many hundreds of times, Right-he-was, Right-O!, that he almost had dropped into the way of it. It was like sleeping between blankets—so cosy115. So cosy.
They were really awfully116 nice. There was a winsome117 charm about them. They none of them seemed mean, or tight, or petty.
The young man with the fine suit and the great legs put down his money, gently and shyly as a girl, beside the driver on the little window-ledge. Then he got out and strode off, shy and quick, with his suit-case.
“Hey!”
The young man turned at the driver’s summons, and came back.
“Did yer pay me?”
The question was put briskly, good-humouredly, with a touch even of tenderness. The young man pointed118 to the money. The driver glanced round and saw it.
“Oh! Right you are! Right-O!”
A faint little smile of almost tender understanding, and the young man turned again. And the driver bustled119 to carry out some goods. The way he stooped to pick up the heavy wooden box in his arms; so willing to stoop to burdens. So long, of course, as his Rights of Man were fully7 recognised. You musn’t try any superior tricks with him.
Of course these were not government servants. Government servants have another sort of feeling. They feel their office, even in N.S.W.—even a railway-clerk. Oh, yes.
So nice, so nice, so gentle. The strange, bright-eyed gentleness. Of course, really rub him the wrong way, and you’ve got a Tartar. But not before you’ve asked for one. Gentle as a Kangaroo, or a wallaby, with that wide-eyed, bright-eyed, alert, responsible gentleness Somers had never known in Europe. It had a great beauty. And at the same time it made his spirits sink.
It made him feel so sad underneath121, or uneasy, like an impending122 disaster. Such a charm. He was so tempted123 to commit himself to this strange continent and its strange people. It was so fascinating. It seemed so free, an absence of any form of stress whatsoever124. No strain in any way, once you could accept it.
He was so tempted, save for a sense of impending disaster at the bottom of his soul. And there a voice kept saying: “No, no. No, no. It won’t do. You’ve got to have a reversion. You can’t carry this mode any further. You’ve got to have a recognition of the innate125, sacred separateness.”
So when they were walking home in a whirl of the coldest, most flat-edged wind they had ever known, he stopped in front of her to remark:
“Of course you can’t go on with a soft, oh-so-friendly life like this here. You’ve got to have an awakening126 of the old recognition of the aristocratic principle, the innate difference between people.”
“Aristocratic principle!” she shrieked127 on the wind. “You should have seen yourself, flying like a feather into the sea after your hat. Aristocratic principle!” She shrieked again with laughter.
“There you are, you see,” he said to himself. “I’m at it again.” And he laughed too.
The wind blew them home. He made a big fire, and changed, and they drank coffee made with milk, and ate buns.
“Thank heaven for a home,” he said, as they sat in the dark, big rooms at Coo-ee, and ate their buns, and looked out of the windows and saw here as well a whirl of gannets like a snowstorm, and a dark sea littered with white fluffs. The wind roared in the chimney, and for the first time the sea was inaudible.
“You see,” she said, “how thankful you are for a home.”
“Chilled to the bone!” she said. “I’m chilled to the bone with my day’s pleasure-outing.”
So they drew up the couch before the fire, and he piled rugs on her and jarrah chunks128 on the fire, and at last it was toastingly warm. He sat on a little barrel which he had discovered in the shed, and in which he kept the coal for the fire. He had been at a loss for a lid to this barrel, till he had found a big tin-lid thrown out on the waste lot. And now the wee barrel with the slightly rusty129 tin lid was his perch130 when he wanted to get quite near the fire. Harriet hated it, and had moments when she even carried the lid to the cliff to throw it in the sea. But she brought it back, because she knew he would be so indignant. She reviled131 him however.
“Shameful! Hideous132! Old tin lids! How you can sit on it. How you can bring yourself to sit on such a thing, and not feel humiliated133. Is that your aristocratic principle?”
“I put a cushion on it,” he said.
As he squatted134 on his tub this evening in the fire-corner, she suddenly turned from her book and cried:
“There he is, on his throne! Sitting on his aristocratic principle!” And again she roared with laughter.
He, however, shook some coal out of the little tub on to the fire, replaced the tin lid and the cushion, and resumed his thoughts. The fire was very warm. She lay stretched in front of it on the sofa, covered with an eider-down, and reading a Nat Gould novel, to get the real tang of Australia.
“Of course,” he said, “this land always gives me the feeling that it doesn’t want to be touched, it doesn’t want men to get hold of it.”
She looked up from her Nat Gould.
“Yes,” she admitted slowly. “And my ideal has always been a farm. But I know now. The farms don’t really belong to the land. They only scratch it and irritate it, and are never at one with it.”
Whereupon she returned to her Nat Gould, and there was silence save for the hollow of the wind. When she had finished her paper-backed book she said:
“It’s just like them—just like they think they are.”
“But, bah!” she added, “they make me sick. So absolutely dull—worse than an ‘At Home’ in the middle classes.”
“Like a flying-fish! Like a flying-fish dashing into the waves! Dashing into the waves after his hat—”
“Fancy, that I’m here in Coo-ee after my day’s outing! I can’t believe it. I shall call you the flying-fish. It’s hard to believe that one was so many things in one day. Suddenly the water! Won’t you go now and do the tailor? Twenty to eight! The bold buccaneer!”
The tailor was a fish that had cost a shilling, and which he was to prepare for supper.
“Globe: There can’t be much telepathy about bullocks, anyhow. In Gippsland (Vic.) last season a score of them were put into a strange paddock, and the whole 20 were found drowned in a hole next morning. Tracks showed that they had gone each on his own along a path, overbalanced one after the other, and were unable to clamber up the rocky banks.”
That, thought Richard at the close of the day, is a sufficient comment on herd-unity, equality, domestication137, and civilisation. He felt he would have liked to climb down into that hole in which the bullocks were drowning and beat them all hard before they expired, for being such mechanical logs of life.
Telepathy! Think of the marvellous vivid communication of the huge sperm138 whales. Huge, grand, phallic beasts! Bullocks! Geldings! Men! R. L. wished he could take to the sea and be a whale, a great surge of living blood: away from these all-too-white people, who ought all to be called Cellu Lloyd, not only the horse-mange man.
Man is a thought-adventurer. Man is more, he is a life-adventurer. Which means he is a thought-adventurer, an emotion-adventurer, and a discoverer of himself and of the outer universe. A discoverer.
“I am a fool,” said Richard Lovat, which was the most frequent discovery he made. It came, moreover, every time with a new shock of surprise and chagrin139. Every time he climbed a new mountain range and looked over, he saw, not only a new world, but a big anticipatory140 fool on this side of it, namely, himself.
Now a novel is supposed to be a mere record of emotion-adventures, flounderings in feelings. We insist that a novel is, or should be, also a thought-adventure, if it is to be anything at all complete.
“I am a fool,” thought Richard to himself, “to imagine that I can flounder in a sympathetic universe like a fly in the ointment141.” We think of ourselves, we think of the ointment, but we do not consider the fly. It fell into the ointment, crying: “Ah, here is a pure and balmy element in which all is unalloyed goodness. Here is attar of roses without a thorn.” Hence the fly in the ointment: embalmed142 in balm. And our repugnance143.
“I am a fool,” said Richard to himself, “to be floundering round in this easy, cosy, all-so-friendly world. I feel like a fly in the ointment. For heaven’s sake let me get out. I suffocate144.”
Where to? If you’re going to get out you must have something to get out on to. Stifling145 in unctuous146 sympathy of a harmless humanity.
“Oh,” cried the stifling R. “Where is my Rock of Ages?”
He knew well enough. It was where it always has been: in the middle of him.
“Let me get back to my own self,” he panted, “hard and central in the centre of myself. I am drowning in this merge147 of harmlessness, this sympathetic humanity. Oh, for heaven’s sake let me crawl out of the sympathetic smear148, and get myself clean again.”
“Everything,” said R. to himself, in one of those endless conversations with himself which were his chief delight, “everything is relative.”
“Not quite,” he gasped151, as he crawled out. “Let me drag my isolate152 and absolute individual self out of this mess.”
Which is the history of relativity in man. All is relative as we go flop into the ointment: or the treacle153 or the flame. But as we crawl out, or flutter out with a smell of burning, the absolute holds us spellbound. Oh to be isolate and absolute, and breathe clear.
So that even relativity is only relative. Relative to the absolute.
I am sorry to have to stand, a sorry sight, preening154 my wings on the brink155 of the ointment-pot, thought Richard. But from this vantage ground let me preach to myself. He preached, and the record was taken down for this gramophone of a novel.
No, the self is absolute. It may be relative to everything else in the universe. But to itself it is an absolute.
Back to the central self, the isolate, absolute self.
“Now,” thought Richard to himself, waving his front paws with gratification: “I must sound the muezzin and summon all men back to their central, isolate selves.”
So he drew himself up, when—urch!! He was sluthering over the brim of the ointment pot into the balm of humanity once more.
“Oh, Lord, I nearly did it again,” he thought as he clambered out with a sick heart. “I shall do it once too often. The bulk of mankind haven’t got any central selves: haven’t got any. They’re all bits.”
Nothing but his fright would have struck this truth out of him. So he crouched still, like a fly very tired with crawling out of the ointment, to think about it.
“The bulk of people haven’t got any central selves. They’re all bits.”
He knew it was true, and he felt rather sick of the sweet odour of the balm of human beatitudes, in which he had been so nearly lost.
“It takes how many thousand facets156 to make the eye of a fly—or a spider?” he asked himself, being rather hazy157 scientifically. “Well, all these people are just facets: just bits, that fitted together make a whole. But you can fit the bits together time after time, yet it won’t bring the bug31 to life.”
The people of this terrestial sphere are all bits. Isolate one of them, and he is still only a bit. Isolate your man in the street, and he is just a rudimentary fragment. Supposing you have the misfortune to have your little toe cut off. That little toe won’t at once rear on its hind158 legs and begin to announce: “I’m an isolated159 individual with an immortal160 soul.” It won’t. But your man in the street will. And he is a liar161. He’s only a bit, and he’s only got a minute share of the collective soul. Soul of his own he has none: and never will have. Just a share in the collective soul, no more. Never a thing by himself.
Damn the man in the street, said Richard to himself. Damn the collective soul, it’s a dead rat in a hole. Let humanity scratch its own lice.
Now I’ll sound my muezzin again. The man by himself. “Allah bismallah! God is God and man is man and has a soul of his own. Each man to himself! Each man back to his own soul! Alone, alone, with his own soul alone. God is God and man is man and the man in the street is a louse.”
Whatever your relativity, that’s the starting point and the finishing point: a man alone with his own soul: and the dark God beyond him.
A man by himself.
Begin then.
Let the men in the street—ugh, horrid162 millions, crawl the face of the earth like lice or ants or some other ignominy.
The man by himself.
That was one of the names of Erasmus of Rotterdam.
The man by himself.
That is the beginning and end, the alpha and the omega, the one absolute: the man alone by himself, alone with his own soul, alone with his eyes on the darkness which is the dark god of life. Alone like a pythoness on her tripod, like the oracle163 alone above the fissure164 into the unknown. The oracle, the fissure down into the unknown, the strange exhalations from the dark, the strange words that the oracle must utter. Strange, cruel, pregnant words: the new term of consciousness.
This is the innermost symbol of man: alone in the darkness of the cavern165 of himself, listening to soundlessness of inflowing fate. Inflowing fate, inflowing doom166, what does it matter? The man by himself—that is the absolute—listening—that is the relativity—for the influx167 of his fate, or doom.
The man by himself. The listener.
But most men can’t listen any more. The fissure is closed up. There is no soundless voice. They are deaf and dumb, ants, scurrying168 ants.
That is their doom. It is a new kind of absolute. Like riff-raff, which has fallen out of living relativity, on to the teeming169 absolute of the dust-heap, or the ant-heap. Sometimes the dust-heap becomes huge, huge, huge, and covers nearly all the world. Then it turns into a volcano, and all starts again.
“It has nothing to do with me,” said Richard to himself. I hope, dear reader, you like plenty of conversation in a novel: it makes it so much lighter170 and brisker.
“It has nothing to do with me,” said Richard to himself. “They do as they like. But since, after all, I am a kind-hearted dear creature, I will just climb the minaret171 of myself and sound my muezzin.”
“God is God and man is man; and every man by himself. Every man by himself, alone with his own soul. Alone as if he were dead. Dead to himself. He is dead and alone. He is dead; alone. His soul is alone. Alone with God, with the dark God. God is God.”
But if he likes to shout muezzins, instead of hawking173 fried fish or newspapers or lottery174 tickets, let him.
Poor dear, it was rather an anomalous175 call: “Listen to me, and be alone.” Yet he felt called upon to call it.
To be alone, to be alone, and to rest on the unknown God alone.
The God must be unknown. Once you have defined him or described him, he is the most chummy of pals176, as you’ll know if you listen to preachers. And once you’ve chummed up with your God, you’ll never be alone again, poor you. For that’s the end of you. You and your God chumming it through time and eternity177.
Poor Richard saw himself in funny situations.
“Oh, Mr Somers, I should love to, if you’d hold my hand.”
“There is a gulf179,” growing sterner, “surrounds each solitary180 soul. A gulf surrounds you—a gulf surrounds me—”
“I’m falling!” shrieks and flings her arms around his neck. Or Kangaroo.
“Why am I so beastly to Kangaroo?” said Richard to himself. “For beastly I am. I am a detestable little brat181 to them all round.”
A detestable little brat he felt.
But Kangaroo wanted to be queen-bee of another hive, with all the other bees clustering on him like some huge mulberry. Sickening! Why couldn’t he be alone? At least for once. For once withdraw entirely182.
And a queen-bee buzzing with beatitudes. Beatitudes, beatitudes. Bee attitudes or any other attitudes, it made Richard feel tired. More benevolence183, more nauseating184 benevolence. “Charity suffereth long.”
Yet one cannot live a life of entire loneliness, like a monkey on a stick, up and down one’s own obstacle. There’s got to be meeting: even communion. Well, then, let us have the other communion. “This is thy body which I take from thee and eat” as the priest, also the God, says in the ritual of blood sacrifice. The ritual of supreme185 responsibility, and offering. Sacrifice to the dark God, and to the men in whom the dark God is manifest. Sacrifice to the strong, not to the weak. In awe186, not in dribbling187 love. The communion in power, the assumption into glory. La gloire.
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收听单词发音
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1
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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2
stuffiness
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| n.不通风，闷热；不通气 | |
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3
loathsome
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| adj.讨厌的，令人厌恶的 | |
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4
stuffy
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| adj.不透气的，闷热的 | |
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straightforwardness
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| n.坦白，率直 | |
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6
ward
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| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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8
dowdy
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| adj.不整洁的；过旧的 | |
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bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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10
wharf
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| n.码头，停泊处 | |
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11
gall
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| v.使烦恼，使焦躁，难堪；n.磨难 | |
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12
applicants
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| 申请人，求职人( applicant的名词复数 ) | |
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solicitors
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| 初级律师( solicitor的名词复数 ) | |
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14
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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15
sinecure
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| n.闲差事，挂名职务 | |
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16
sardonic
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| adj.嘲笑的，冷笑的，讥讽的 | |
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17
buck
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| n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃 | |
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18
enraged
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| 使暴怒( enrage的过去式和过去分词 )； 歜； 激愤 | |
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19
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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battered
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| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
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21
turnips
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| 芜青( turnip的名词复数 )； 芜菁块根； 芜菁甘蓝块根； 怀表 | |
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22
arid
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| adj.干旱的；(土地)贫瘠的 | |
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23
wayfarer
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| n.旅人 | |
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24
conserved
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| v.保护，保藏，保存( conserve的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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25
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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26
kerosene
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| n.(kerosine)煤油，火油 | |
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27
pint
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| n.品脱 | |
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sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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29
teaspoonful
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| n.一茶匙的量；一茶匙容量 | |
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30
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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31
bug
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| n.虫子；故障；窃听器；vt.纠缠；装窃听器 | |
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32
ponies
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| 矮种马，小型马( pony的名词复数 )； ￡25 25 英镑 | |
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33
allay
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| v.消除，减轻(恐惧、怀疑等) | |
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34
itch
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| n.痒，渴望，疥癣；vi.发痒，渴望 | |
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35
frenzy
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| n.疯狂，狂热，极度的激动 | |
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36
concise
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| adj.简洁的，简明的 | |
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37
laconic
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| adj.简洁的；精练的 | |
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38
manly
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| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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39
collapsed
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| adj.倒塌的 | |
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40
reptile
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| n.爬行动物；两栖动物 | |
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41
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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42
aboriginal
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| adj.（指动植物）土生的，原产地的，土著的 | |
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43
proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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44
solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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45
demise
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| n.死亡；v.让渡，遗赠，转让 | |
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46
revert
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| v.恢复，复归，回到 | |
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47
pathos
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| n.哀婉，悲怆 | |
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48
trot
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| n.疾走，慢跑；n.老太婆；现成译本；(复数）trots:腹泻（与the 连用）；v.小跑，快步走，赶紧 | |
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49
outlaw
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| n.歹徒，亡命之徒；vt.宣布…为不合法 | |
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50
benevolent
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| adj.仁慈的，乐善好施的 | |
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51
suburban
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| adj.城郊的，在郊区的 | |
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52
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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53
afflicted
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| 使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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54
virtuous
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| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
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55
scribbled
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| v.潦草的书写( scribble的过去式和过去分词 )；乱画；草草地写；匆匆记下 | |
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56
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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57
needy
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| adj.贫穷的，贫困的，生活艰苦的 | |
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58
filthy
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| adj.卑劣的；恶劣的，肮脏的 | |
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59
salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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60
consecutive
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| adj.连续的，联贯的，始终一贯的 | |
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61
frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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62
interfering
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| adj. 妨碍的 动词interfere的现在分词 | |
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63
nosy
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| adj.鼻子大的，好管闲事的，爱追问的；n.大鼻者 | |
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64
jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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65
ruffled
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| adj. 有褶饰边的, 起皱的 动词ruffle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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66
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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67
weird
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| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
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68
corrugated
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| adj.波纹的；缩成皱纹的；波纹面的；波纹状的v.（使某物）起皱褶(corrugate的过去式和过去分词) | |
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69
behold
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| v.看，注视，看到 | |
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70
bungalows
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| n.平房( bungalow的名词复数 )；单层小屋，多于一层的小屋 | |
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71
marsh
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| n.沼泽，湿地 | |
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72
haphazard
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| adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的 | |
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civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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74
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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75
quiescent
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| adj.静止的，不活动的，寂静的 | |
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76
trotting
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| 小跑，急走( trot的现在分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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77
lone
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| adj.孤寂的，单独的；唯一的 | |
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78
pony
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| adj.小型的；n.小马 | |
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79
hitched
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| （免费）搭乘他人之车( hitch的过去式和过去分词 )； 搭便车； 攀上； 跃上 | |
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80
decrepit
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| adj.衰老的，破旧的 | |
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81
mildewed
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| adj.发了霉的，陈腐的，长了霉花的v.（使）发霉，（使）长霉( mildew的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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82
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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83
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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84
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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85
flicked
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| （尤指用手指或手快速地）轻击( flick的过去式和过去分词 )； （用…）轻挥； （快速地）按开关； 向…笑了一下（或瞥了一眼等） | |
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86
plunging
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| adj.跳进的，突进的v.颠簸( plunge的现在分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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87
furry
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| adj.毛皮的；似毛皮的；毛皮制的 | |
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88
beetle
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| n.甲虫，近视眼的人 | |
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89
exquisite
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| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
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90
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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91
grumbles
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| 抱怨( grumble的第三人称单数 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
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92
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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93
crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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94
enveloped
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| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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95
swirled
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| v.旋转，打旋( swirl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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96
amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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97
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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98
shrieking
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| v.尖叫( shriek的现在分词 ) | |
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99
gasps
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| v.喘气( gasp的第三人称单数 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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100
shrieks
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| n.尖叫声( shriek的名词复数 )v.尖叫( shriek的第三人称单数 ) | |
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101
flop
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| n.失败(者)，扑通一声；vi.笨重地行动，沉重地落下 | |
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102
flops
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| n.失败( flop的名词复数 )v.（指书、戏剧等）彻底失败( flop的第三人称单数 )；（因疲惫而）猛然坐下；（笨拙地、不由自主地或松弛地）移动或落下；砸锅 | |
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103
chuckling
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 ) | |
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104
swoop
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| n.俯冲，攫取；v.抓取，突然袭击 | |
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105
wrung
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| 绞( wring的过去式和过去分词 )； 握紧（尤指别人的手）； 把（湿衣服）拧干； 绞掉（水） | |
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106
aloof
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| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
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107
jerseys
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| n.运动衫( jersey的名词复数 ) | |
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108
buffalo
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| n.(北美)野牛；(亚洲)水牛 | |
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109
bumpy
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| adj.颠簸不平的，崎岖的 | |
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110
ginger
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| n.姜，精力，淡赤黄色；adj.淡赤黄色的；vt.使活泼，使有生气 | |
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111
friendliness
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| n.友谊，亲切，亲密 | |
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112
thighs
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| n.股，大腿( thigh的名词复数 )；食用的鸡（等的）腿 | |
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113
calves
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| n.(calf的复数)笨拙的男子，腓；腿肚子( calf的名词复数 )；牛犊；腓；小腿肚v.生小牛( calve的第三人称单数 )；（冰川）崩解；生（小牛等），产（犊）；使（冰川）崩解 | |
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114
physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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115
cosy
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| adj.温暖而舒适的，安逸的 | |
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116
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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117
winsome
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| n.迷人的，漂亮的 | |
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118
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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119
bustled
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| 闹哄哄地忙乱，奔忙( bustle的过去式和过去分词 )； 催促 | |
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120
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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121
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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122
impending
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| a.imminent, about to come or happen | |
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123
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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124
whatsoever
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| adv.（用于否定句中以加强语气）任何；pron.无论什么 | |
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125
innate
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| adj.天生的，固有的，天赋的 | |
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126
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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127
shrieked
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| v.尖叫( shriek的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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128
chunks
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| 厚厚的一块( chunk的名词复数 )； （某物）相当大的数量或部分 | |
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129
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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130
perch
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| n.栖木，高位，杆；v.栖息，就位，位于 | |
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131
reviled
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| v.辱骂，痛斥( revile的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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132
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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133
humiliated
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| 感到羞愧的 | |
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134
squatted
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| v.像动物一样蹲下( squat的过去式和过去分词 )；非法擅自占用（土地或房屋）；为获得其所有权；而占用某片公共用地。 | |
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135
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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136
giggled
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| v.咯咯地笑( giggle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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137
domestication
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| n.驯养，驯化 | |
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138
sperm
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| n.精子，精液 | |
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139
chagrin
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| n.懊恼；气愤；委屈 | |
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140
anticipatory
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| adj.预想的，预期的 | |
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141
ointment
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| n.药膏，油膏，软膏 | |
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142
embalmed
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| adj.用防腐药物保存（尸体）的v.保存（尸体）不腐( embalm的过去式和过去分词 )；使不被遗忘；使充满香气 | |
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143
repugnance
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| n.嫌恶 | |
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144
suffocate
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| vt.使窒息，使缺氧，阻碍；vi.窒息，窒息而亡，阻碍发展 | |
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145
stifling
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| a.令人窒息的 | |
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146
unctuous
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| adj.油腔滑调的，大胆的 | |
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merge
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| v.(使)结合，(使)合并，(使)合为一体 | |
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148
smear
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| v.涂抹；诽谤，玷污；n.污点；诽谤，污蔑 | |
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149
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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150
recoil
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| vi.退却，退缩，畏缩 | |
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151
gasped
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| v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要 | |
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152
isolate
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| vt.使孤立，隔离 | |
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153
treacle
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| n.糖蜜 | |
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154
preening
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| v.（鸟）用嘴整理（羽毛）( preen的现在分词 ) | |
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155
brink
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| n.(悬崖、河流等的)边缘，边沿 | |
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156
facets
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| n.（宝石或首饰的）小平面( facet的名词复数 )；（事物的）面；方面 | |
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157
hazy
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| adj.有薄雾的，朦胧的；不肯定的，模糊的 | |
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hind
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| adj.后面的，后部的 | |
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159
isolated
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| adj.与世隔绝的 | |
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160
immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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161
liar
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| n.说谎的人 | |
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162
horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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163
oracle
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| n.神谕，神谕处，预言 | |
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164
fissure
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| n.裂缝；裂伤 | |
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165
cavern
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| n.洞穴，大山洞 | |
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166
doom
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| n.厄运，劫数；v.注定，命定 | |
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167
influx
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| n.流入，注入 | |
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168
scurrying
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| v.急匆匆地走( scurry的现在分词 ) | |
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169
teeming
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| adj.丰富的v.充满( teem的现在分词 )；到处都是；（指水、雨等）暴降；倾注 | |
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170
lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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171
minaret
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| n.（回教寺院的）尖塔 | |
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172
pinnacle
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| n.尖塔，尖顶，山峰；(喻)顶峰 | |
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173
hawking
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| 利用鹰行猎 | |
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174
lottery
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| n.抽彩；碰运气的事，难于算计的事 | |
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175
anomalous
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| adj.反常的；不规则的 | |
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176
pals
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| n.朋友( pal的名词复数 )；老兄；小子；（对男子的不友好的称呼）家伙 | |
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177
eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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178
entreat
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| v.恳求，恳请 | |
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179
gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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180
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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181
brat
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| n.孩子；顽童 | |
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182
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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183
benevolence
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| n.慈悲，捐助 | |
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184
nauseating
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| adj.令人恶心的，使人厌恶的v.使恶心，作呕( nauseate的现在分词 ) | |
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185
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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186
awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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187
dribbling
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| n.（燃料或油从系统内）漏泄v.流口水( dribble的现在分词 )；（使液体）滴下或作细流；运球，带球 | |
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