Jurgen
A Comedy of Justice:
Electronic Edition
Cabell, James Branch, 1879-1958
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First edition, 1998
ca. 700K
Academic Affairs Library, UNC-CH
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
1998.
© This work is the property of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text.
Call number PS 3505 .A153 J8 1922 (Davis Library, UNC-CH)
The electronic edition is
a part of the UNC-CH
digitization project, Documenting
the American South, or, The Southern Experience in
19th-century America.
Library of Congress Subject Headings,
21st edition, 1998
By
"Of
JURGEN eke they maken mencioun,
Copyright, 1919, by
Before
each tarradiddle,
"Our
gods are good," they tell us;
So
this, your JURGEN, travels
"Others, with better moderation, do either
entertain the vulgar history of Jurgen as a
fabulous addition unto the true and authentic
story of St. Iurgenius of Poictesme, or else we
conceive the literal acception to be a
misconstruction of the symbolical expression:
apprehending a veritable history, in an emblem or
piece of Christian poesy. And this emblematical
construction hath been received by men
not forward to extenuate the acts of saints."
- PHILIP BORSDALE.
"A
forced construction is very idle. If
readers of The High History of Jurgen do
not meddle with the allegory, the allegory
will not meddle with them. Without minding
it at all, the whole is as plain as a pikestaff.
It might as well be pretended that we cannot
see Poussin's pictures without first being told
the allegory, as that the allegory aids us in
understanding Jurgen."
- E. NOEL CODMAN.
"Too urbane to advocate delusion, too hale
for the bitterness of irony, this fable of Jurgen
is, as the world itself, a book wherein each
man will find what his nature enables him
to see; which gives us back each his own
image; and which teaches us each the lesson
that each of us desires to learn."
- JOHN FREDERICK LEWISTAM.
Equally in reading hereinafter will the judicious
waive all allegorical interpretation, if merely because
the suggestions hitherto advanced are inconveniently
various. Thus Verville finds the Nessus shirt a symbol
of retribution, where Bülg, with rather wide divergence,
would have it represent the dangerous gift of genius.
Then it may be remembered that Dr. Codman says,
without any hesitancy, of Mother Sereda: "This
Mother Middle is the world generally (an obvious
anagram of Erda es), and this Sereda rules not merely the
middle of the working-days but the midst of everything.
She is the factor of middleness, of mediocrity, of an
avoidance of extremes, of the eternal compromise
begotten by use and wont. She is the Mrs. Grundy of the
Léshy; she is Comstockery: and her shadow is
common-sense." Yet Codman speaks with certainly no more
authority than Prote, when the latter, in his Origins of
Fable, declares this epos is "a parable of . . .
man's vain journeying in search of that rationality
and justice which his nature craves, and discovers
nowhere in the universe: and the shirt is an emblem of
this instinctive craving, as . . . the shadow symbolizes
conscience. Sereda typifies a surrender to life as
it is, a giving up of man's rebellious self-centredness
and selfishness: the anagram being se dare."
Thus do interpretations throng and clash, and neatly
equal the commentators in number. Yet possibly each
one of these unriddlings, with no doubt a host of others,
is conceivable: so that wisdom will dwell upon none of
them very seriously.
With the origin and the occult meaning of the folklore
of Poictesme this book at least is in no wise concerned:
its unambitious aim has been merely to familiarize
English readers with the Jurgen epos for the tale's
sake. And this tale of old years is one which, by rare
fortune, can be given to English readers almost
unabridged, in view of the singular delicacy and
pure-mindedness of the Jurgen mythos: in all, not more than
a half-dozen deletions have seemed expedient (and have
been duly indicated) in order to remove such sparse and
unimportant outcroppings of medieval frankness as
might conceivably offend the squeamish.
Since this volume is presented simply as a story to be
read for pastime, neither morality nor symbolism is
hereinafter educed, and no "parallels" and "authorities"
are quoted. Even the gaps are left unbridged by
guesswork: whereas the historic and mythological problems
perhaps involved are relinquished to those really
thoroughgoing scholars whom erudition qualifies to deal
with such topics, and tedium does not deter . . . .
In such terms, and thus far, ran the Foreword to the
first issues of this book, whose later fortunes have made
necessary the lengthening of the Foreword with a postscript.
The needed addition - this much at least chiming
with good luck - is brief. It is just that fragment which
some scholars, since the first appearance of this volume,
have asserted - upon what perfect frankness must
describe as not indisputable grounds - to be a portion of the
thirty-second chapter of the complete form of
La Haulte
Histoire de Jurgen.
And in reply to what these scholars assert, discretion
says nothing. For this fragment was, of course, unknown
when the High History was first put into English,
and there in consequence appears, here, little to be won
either by endorsing or denying its claims to authenticity.
Rather, does discretion prompt the appending, without
any gloss or scholia, of this fragment, which deals with
The Judging of Jurgen.
Now a court was held by the Philistines to decide
whether or no King Jurgen should be relegated to limbo.
And when the judges were prepared for judging, there
came into the court a great tumblebug, rolling in front of
him his loved and properly housed young ones. With the
creature came pages, in black and white, bearing a sword,
a staff and a lance.
This insect looked at Jurgen, and its pincers rose erect
in horror. The bug cried to the three judges, "Now, by
St. Anthony! this Jurgen must forthwith be relegated to
limbo, for he is offensive and lewd and lascivious and
indecent."
"And how can that be?" says Jurgen.
"You are offensive," the bug replied, "because this page
has a sword which I choose to say is not a sword. You
are lewd because that page has a lance which I prefer to
think is not a lance. You are lascivious because yonder
page has a staff which I elect to declare is not a staff.
And finally, you are indecent for reasons of which a
description would be objectionable to me, and which
therefore I must decline to reveal to anybody."
"Well, that sounds logical," says Jurgen, "but still, at
the same time, it would be no worse for an admixture
of common-sense. For you gentlemen can see for
yourselves, by considering these pages fairly and as a whole,
that these pages bear a sword and a lance and a staff,
and nothing else whatever; and you will deduce, I
hope, that all the lewdness is in the insectival mind of
him who itches to be calling these things by other names."
The judges said nothing as yet. But they that guarded
Jurgen, and all the other Philistines, stood to this side
and to that side with their eyes shut tight, and all these
said: "We decline to look at the pages fairly and as a
whole, because to look might seem to imply a doubt of
what the tumblebug has decreed. Besides, as long as the
tumblebug has reasons which he declines to reveal, his
reasons stay unanswerable, and you are plainly a prurient
rascal who are making trouble for yourself."
"To the contrary," says Jurgen, "I am a poet, and I
make literature."
"But in Philistia to make literature and to make trouble
for yourself are synonyms," the tumblebug explained.
"I know, for already we of Philistia have been pestered
by three of these makers of literature. Yes, there was
Edgar, whom I starved and hunted until I was tired of it:
then I chased him up a back alley one night, and knocked
out those annoying brains of his. And there was Walt,
whom I chivvied and battered from place to place, and
made a paralytic of him: and him, too, I labelled offensive
and lewd and lascivious and indecent. Then later there
was Mark, whom I frightened into disguising himself in
a clown's suit, so that nobody might suspect him to be a
maker of literature: indeed, I frightened him so that he
hid away the greater part of what he had made until after
he was dead, and I could not get at him. That was a
disgusting trick to play on me, I consider. Still, these are
the only three detected makers of literature that have ever
infested Philistia, thanks be to goodness and my vigilance,
but for both of which we might have been no more free
from makers of literature than are the other countries."
"Now, but these three," cried Jurgen, "are the glory of
Philistia: and of all that Philistia has produced, it is these
three alone, whom living ye made least of, that to-day are
honored wherever art is honored, and where nobody
bothers one way or the other about Philistia."
"What is art to me and my way of living?" replied
the tumblebug, wearily. "I have no concern with art and
letters and the other lewd idols of foreign nations. I have
in charge the moral welfare of my young, whom I roll
here before me, and trust with St. Anthony's aid to raise
in time to be God-fearing tumblebugs like me, delighting
in what is proper to their nature. For the rest, I have
never minded dead men being well-spoken-of. No, no, my
lad: once whatever I may do means nothing to you, and
once you are really rotten, you will find the tumblebug
friendly enough. Meanwhile I am paid to protest that
living persons are offensive and lewd and lascivious and
indecent, and one must live."
Then the Philistines who stood to this side and to that
side said in indignant unison: "And we, the reputable
citizenry of Philistia, are not at all in sympathy with
those who would take any protest against the tumblebug
as a justification of what they are pleased to call art. The
harm done by the tumblebug seems to us very slight,
whereas the harm done by the self-styled artist may be
very great."
Jurgen now looked more attentively at this queer creature:
and he saw that the tumblebug was malodorous,
certainly, but at bottom honest and well-meaning; and this
seemed to Jurgen the saddest thing he had found among
the Philistines. For the tumblebug was sincere in his
insane doings, and all Philistia honored him sincerely, so
that there was nowhere any hope for this people.
Therefore King Jurgen addressed himself, as his need
was, to submit to the strange customs of the Philistines.
"Now do you judge me fairly," cried Jurgen to his judges,
"if there be any justice in this mad country. And if
there be none, do you relegate me to limbo or to any other
place, so long as in that place this tumblebug is not
omnipotent and sincere and insane."
And Jurgen waited . . . .
They tell, also, that in the old days, after putting up
the shop-windows for the night, Jurgen was passing the
Cistercian Abbey, on his way home: and one of the monks
had tripped over a stone in the roadway. He was cursing
the devil who had placed it there.
"Fie, brother!" says Jurgen, "and have not the devils
enough to bear as it is?"
"I never held with Origen," replied the monk; "and
besides, it hurt my great-toe confoundedly."
"None the less," observes Jurgen, "it does not behoove
God-fearing persons to speak with disrespect of the
divinely appointed Prince of Darkness. To your further
confusion, consider this monarch's industry! day and
night you may detect him toiling at the task Heaven set
him. That is a thing can be said of few communicants
and of no monks. Think, too, of his fine artistry, as
evidenced in all the perilous and lovely snares of this world,
which it is your business to combat, and mine to lend
money upon. Why, but for him we would both be
vocationless! Then, too, consider his philanthropy! and
deliberate how insufferable would be our case if you and I,
and all our fellow parishioners, were to-day hobnobbing
with other beasts in the Garden which we pretend to
desiderate on Sundays! To arise with swine and lie down
with the hyena? - oh, intolerable!"
Thus he ran on, devising reasons for not thinking too
harshly of the Devil. Most of it was an abridgement of
some verses Jurgen had composed, in the shop when
business was slack.
"I consider that to be stuff and nonsense," was the
monk's glose.
"No doubt your notion is sensible," observed the
pawnbroker: "but mine is the prettier."
Then Jurgen passed the Cistercian Abbey, and was
approaching Bellegarde, when he met a black gentleman,
who saluted him and said:
"Thanks, Jurgen, for your good word."
"Who are you, and why do you thank me?" asks Jurgen.
"My name is no great matter. But you have a kind
heart, Jurgen. May your life be free from care!"
"Save us from hurt and harm, friend, but I am already married."
"Eh, sirs, and a fine clever poet like you!"
"Yet it is a long while now since I was a practising poet."
"Why, to be sure! You have the artistic temperament,
which is not exactly suited to the restrictions of domestic
life. Then I suppose your wife has her own personal
opinion about poetry, Jurgen."
"Indeed, sir, her opinion would not bear repetition, for
I am sure you are unaccustomed to such language."
"This is very sad. I am afraid your wife does not quite
understand you, Jurgen."
"Sir," says Jurgen, astounded, "do you read people's
inmost thoughts?"
The black gentleman seemed much dejected. He
pursed his lips, and fell to counting upon his fingers: as
they moved his sharp nails glittered like flame-points.
"Now but this is a very deplorable thing," says the
black gentleman, "to have befallen the first person I have
found ready to speak a kind word for evil. And in all
these centuries, too! Dear me, this is a most regrettable
instance of mismanagement! No matter, Jurgen, the
morning is brighter than the evening. How I will reward
you, to be sure!"
So Jurgen thanked the simple old creature politely.
And when Jurgen reached home his wife was nowhere to
be seen. He looked on all sides and questioned everyone,
but to no avail. Dame Lisa had vanished in the midst of
getting supper ready - suddenly, completely and inexplicably,
just as (in Jurgen's figure) a windstorm passes and
leaves behind it a tranquillity which seems, by contrast,
uncanny. Nothing could explain the mystery, short of
magic: and Jurgen on a sudden recollected the black
gentleman's queer promise. Jurgen crossed himself.
"How unjustly now," says Jurgen, "do some people get
an ill name for gratitude! And now do I perceive how
wise I am, always to speak pleasantly of everybody, in
this world of tale-bearers."
Then Jurgen prepared his own supper, went to bed, and
slept soundly.
"I have implicit confidence," says he, "in Lisa. I have
particular confidence in her ability to take care of herself
in any surroundings."
That was all very well: but time passed, and presently
it began to be rumored that Dame Lisa walked on
Morven. Her brother, who was a grocer and a member
of the town-council, went thither to see about this report.
And sure enough, there was Jurgen's wife walking in the
twilight and muttering incessantly.
"Fie, sister!" says the town-councillor, "this is very
unseemly conduct for a married woman, and a thing
likely to be talked about."
"Follow me!" replied Dame Lisa. And the town-councillor
followed her a little way in the dusk, but when she
came to Amneran Heath and still went onward, he knew
better than to follow.
Next evening the elder sister of Dame Lisa went to
Morven. This sister had married a notary, and was a
shrewd woman. In consequence, she took with her this
evening a long wand of peeled willow-wood. And there
was Jurgen's wife walking in the twilight and muttering
incessantly.
"Fie, sister!" says the notary's wife, who was a shrewd
woman, "and do you not know that all this while Jurgen
does his own sewing, and is once more making eyes at
Countess Dorothy?"
Dame Lisa shuddered; but she only said, "Follow me!"
And the notary's wife followed her to Amneran Heath,
and across the heath, to where a cave was. This was a
place of abominable repute. A lean hound came to meet
them there in the twilight, lolling his tongue: but the notary's
wife struck thrice with her wand, and the silent
beast left them. And Dame Lisa passed silently into the
cave, and her sister fumed and went home to her children,
weeping.
So the next evening Jurgen himself came to Morven,
because all his wife's family assured him this was the
manly thing to do. Jurgen left the shop in charge of
Urien Villemarche, who was a highly efficient clerk.
Jurgen followed his wife across Amneran Heath until they
reached the cave. Jurgen would willingly have been elsewhere.
For the hound squatted upon his haunches, and seemed
to grin at Jurgen; and there were other creatures abroad,
that flew low in the twilight, keeping close to the ground
like owls; but they were larger than owls and were more
discomforting. And, moreover, all this was just after
sunset upon Walburga's Eve, when almost anything is rather
more than likely to happen.
So Jurgen said, a little peevishly: "Lisa, my dear, if you
go into the cave I will have to follow you, because it is
the manly thing to do. And you know how easily I take cold."
The voice of Dame Lisa, now, was thin and wailing,
a curiously changed voice. "There is a cross about your
neck. You must throw that away."
Jurgen was wearing such a cross, through motives of
sentiment, because it had once belonged to his dead
mother. But now, to pleasure his wife, he removed the
trinket, and hung it on a barberry bush; and with the
reflection that this was likely to prove a deplorable business,
he followed Dame Lisa into the cave.
Certainly they were curious to look at: for here was
the body of a fine bay horse, and rising from its shoulders,
the sun-burnt body of a young fellow who regarded Jurgen
with grave and not unfriendly eyes. The Centaur
was lying beside a fire of cedar and juniper wood: near
him was a platter containing a liquid with which he was
anointing his hoofs. This stuff, as the Centaur rubbed
it in with his fingers, turned the appearance of his hoofs
to gold.
"Hail, friend," says Jurgen, "if you be the work of God."
"Your protasis is not good Greek," observed the
Centaur, "because in Hellas we did not make such
reservations. Besides, it is not so much my origin as my
destination which concerns you."
"Well, friend, and whither are you going?"
"To the garden between dawn and sunrise, Jurgen."
"Surely, now, but that is a fine name for a garden! and
it is a place I would take joy to be seeing."
"Up upon my back, Jurgen, and I will take you
thither," says the Centaur, and heaved to his feet. Then
said the Centaur, when the pawnbroker hesitated:
"Because, as you must understand, there is no other way.
For this garden does not exist, and never did exist, in
what men humorously called real life; so that of course
only imaginary creatures such as I can enter it."
"That sounds very reasonable," Jurgen estimated: "but
as it happens, I am looking for my wife, whom I suspect
to have been carried off by a devil, poor fellow!"
And Jurgen began to explain to the Centaur what had befallen.
The Centaur laughed. "It may be for that reason I
am here. There is, in any event, only one remedy in this
matter. Above all devils - and above all gods, they tell
me, but certainly above all centaurs - is the power of
Koshchei the Deathless, who made things as they are."
"It is not always wholesome," Jurgen submitted, "to
speak of Koshchei. It seems especially undesirable in a
dark place like this."
"None the less, I suspect it is to him you must go for justice."
"I would prefer not doing that," said Jurgen, with
unaffected candor.
"You have my sympathy: but there is no question of
preference where Koshchei is concerned. Do you think,
for example, that I am frowzing in this underground
place by my own choice? and knew your name by
accident?"
Jurgen was frightened, a little. "Well, well! but it is
usually the deuce and all, this doing of the manly thing.
How, then, can I come to Koshchei?"
"Roundabout," says the Centaur. "There is never any
other way."
"And is the road to this garden roundabout?"
"Oh, very much so, inasmuch as it circumvents both
destiny and common-sense."
"Needs must, then," says Jurgen: "at all events, I am
willing to taste any drink once."
"You will be chilled, though, traveling as you are. For
you and I are going a queer way, in search of justice,
over the grave of a dream and through the malice of time.
So you had best put on this shirt above your other clothing."
"Indeed it is a fine snug shining garment, with curious
figures on it. I accept such raiment gladly. And whom
shall I be thanking for his kindness, now?"
"My name," said the Centaur, "is Nessus."
"Well, then, friend Nessus, I am at your service."
And in a trice Jurgen was on the Centaur's back, and
the two of them had somehow come out of the cave, and
were crossing Amneran Heath. So they passed into a
wooded place, where the light of sunset yet lingered,
rather unaccountably. Now the Centaur went westward.
And now about the pawnbroker's shoulders and upon his
breast and over his lean arms glittered like a rainbow the
many-colored shirt of Nessus.
For a while they went through the woods, which were
composed of big trees standing a goodish distance from
one another, with the Centaur's gilded hoofs rustling and
sinking in a thick carpet of dead leaves, all gray and
brown, in level stretches that were unbroken by any
undergrowth. And then they came to a white roadway that
extended due west, and so were done with the woods.
Now happened an incredible thing in which Jurgen would
never have believed had he not seen it with his own eyes:
for now the Centaur went so fast that he gained a little
by a little upon the sun, thus causing it to rise in the west
a little by a little; and these two sped westward in the
glory of a departed sunset. The sun fell full in Jurgen's
face as he rode straight toward the west, so that he
blinked and closed his eyes, and looked first toward this
side, then the other. Thus it was that the country about
him, and the persons they were passing, were seen by him
in quick bright flashes, like pictures suddenly transmuted
into other pictures; and all his memories of this shining
highway were, in consequence, always confused and
incoherent.
He wondered that there seemed to be so many young
women along the road to the garden. Here was a slim
girl in white teasing a great brown and yellow dog that
leaped about her clumsily; here a girl sat in the branches
of a twisted and gnarled tree, and back of her was a
broad muddied river, copper-colored in the sun; and here
shone the fair head of a tall girl on horseback, who
seemed to wait for someone: in fine, the girls along the
way were numberless, and Jurgen thought he recollected
one or two of them.
But the Centaur went so swiftly that Jurgen could not
be sure.
This was a wonderful garden: yet nothing therein was
strange. Instead, it seemed that everything hereabouts
was heart-breakingly familiar and very dear to Jurgen.
For he had come to a broad lawn which slanted northward
to a well-remembered brook: and multitudinous
maples and locust-trees stood here and there, irregularly,
and were being played with very lazily by an irresolute
west wind, so that foliage seemed to toss and ripple everywhere
like green spray: but autumn was at hand, for the
locust-trees were dropping a Danaë's shower of small
round yellow leaves. Around the garden was an unforgotten
circle of blue hills. And this was a place of lucent
twilight, unlit by either sun or stars, and with no shadows
anywhere in the diffused faint radiancy that revealed this
garden, which is not visible to any man except in the brief
interval between dawn and sunrise.
"Why, but it is Count Emmerick's garden at Storisende,"
says Jurgen, "where I used to be having such
fine times when I was a lad."
"I will wager," said Nessus, "that you did not use to
walk alone in this garden."
"Well, no; there was a girl."
"Just so," assented Nessus. "It is a local by-law: and
here are those who comply with it."
For now had come toward them, walking together in
the dawn, a handsome boy and girl. And the girl was
incredibly beautiful, because everybody in the garden saw
her with the vision of the boy who was with her.
"I am Rudolph," said this boy, "and she is Anne."
"And are you happy here?" asked Jurgen.
"Oh, yes, sir, we are tolerably happy: but Anne's father
is very rich, and my mother is poor, so that we cannot be
quite happy until I have gone into foreign lands and come
back with a great many lakhs of rupees and pieces of eight."
"And what will you do with all this money, Rudolph?"
"My duty, sir, as I see it. But I inherit defective eyesight."
"God speed to you, Rudolph!" said Jurgen, "for many
others are in your plight."
Then came to Jurgen and the Centaur another boy
with the small blue-eyed person in whom he took delight.
And this fat and indolent looking boy informed them that
he and the girl who was with him were walking in the
glaze of the red mustard jar, which Jurgen thought was
gibberish and the fat boy said that he and the girl had
decided never to grow any older, which Jurgen said was
excellent good sense if only they could manage it.
"Oh, I can manage that," said this fat boy, reflectively,
"if only I do not find the managing of it uncomfortable."
Jurgen for a moment regarded him, and then gravely
shook hands.
"I feel for you," said Jurgen, "for I perceive that you,
too, are a monstrous clever fellow: so life will get the best
of you."
"But is not cleverness the main thing, sir?"
"Time will show you, my lad," says Jurgen, a little
sorrowfully. "And God speed to you, for many others
are in your plight."
And a host of boys and girls did Jurgen see in the
garden. And all the faces that Jurgen saw were young
and glad and very lovely and quite heart-breakingly
confident, as young persons beyond numbering came toward
Jurgen and passed him there, in the first glow of dawn:
so they all went exulting in the glory of their youth, and
foreknowing life to be a puny antagonist from whom one
might take very easily anything which one desired. And
all passed in couples - "as though they came from the
Ark," said Jurgen. But the Centaur said they followed
a precedent which was far older than the Ark.
"For in this garden," said the Centaur, "each man that
ever lived has sojourned for a little while, with no
company save his illusions. I must tell you again that in this
garden are encountered none but imaginary creatures.
And stalwart persons take their hour of recreation here,
and go hence unaccompanied, to become aldermen and
respected merchants and bishops, and to be admired as
captains upon prancing horses, or even as kings upon tall
thrones; each in his station thinking not at all of the
garden ever any more. But now and then come timid
persons, Jurgen, who fear to leave this garden without an
escort: so these must need go hence with one or another
imaginary creature, to guide them about alleys and bypaths,
because imaginary creatures find little nourishment
in the public highways, and shun them. Thus must these
timid persons skulk about obscurely with their diffident
and skittish guides, and they do not ever venture willingly
into the thronged places where men get horses and build thrones."
"And what becomes of these timid persons, Centaur?"
"Why, sometimes they spoil paper, Jurgen, and
sometimes they spoil human lives."
"Then are these accursed persons," Jurgen considered.
"You should know best," replied the Centaur.
"Oh, very probably," said Jurgen. "Meanwhile here
is one who walks alone in this garden, and I wonder to
see the local by-laws thus violated."
Now Nessus looked at Jurgen for a while without
speaking: and in the eyes of the Centaur was so much
of comprehension and compassion that it troubled Jurgen.
For somehow it made Jurgen fidget and consider this an
unpleasantly personal way of looking at anybody.
"Yes, certainly," said the Centaur, "this woman walks
alone. But there is no help for her loneliness, since the
lad who loved this woman is dead."
"Nessus, I am willing to be reasonably sorry about it.
Still, is there any need of pulling quite such a portentously
long face? After all, a great many other persons have
died, off and on: and for anything I can say to the
contrary, this particular young fellow may have been no
especial loss to anybody."
Again the Centaur said, "You should know best."
Jurgen remembered that: for Jurgen saw this was
Count Emmerick's second sister, Dorothy la Désirée,
whom Jurgen very long ago (a many years before he met
Dame Lisa and set up in business as a pawnbroker) had
hymned in innumerable verses as Heart's Desire.
"And this is the only woman whom I ever loved," Jurgen
remembered, upon a sudden. For people cannot
always be thinking of these matters.
So he saluted her, with such deference as is due to a
countess from a tradesman, and yet with unforgotten
tremors waking in his staid body. But the strangest was
yet to be seen, for he noted now that this was not a
handsome woman in middle life but a young girl.
"I do not understand," he said, aloud: "for you are
Dorothy. And yet it seems to me that you are not the
Countess Dorothy who is Heitman Michael's wife."
And the girl tossed her fair head, with that careless
lovely gesture which the Countess had forgotten.
"Heitman Michael is well enough, for a nobleman, and my
brother is at me day and night to marry the man: and
certainly Heitman Michael's wife will go in satin and
diamonds at half the courts of Christendom, with many
lackeys to attend her. But I am not to be thus purchased."
"So you told a boy that I remember, very long ago.
Yet you married Heitman Michael, for all that, and in the
teeth of a number of other fine declarations."
"Oh, no, not I," said this Dorothy, wondering. "I
never married anybody. And Heitman Michael has
never married anybody, either, old as he is. For he is
twenty-eight, and looks every day of it! But who are
you, friend, that have such curious notions about me?"
"That question I will answer, just as though it were put
reasonably. For surely you perceive I am Jurgen."
"I never knew but one Jurgen. And he is a young man,
barely come of age - " Then as she paused in speech,
whatever was the matter upon which this girl now meditated,
her cheeks were tenderly colored by the thought of
it, and in her knowledge of this thing her eyes took infinite joy.
And Jurgen understood. He had come back somehow
to the Dorothy whom he had loved: but departed, and past
overtaking by the fleet hoofs of centaurs, was the boy who
had once loved this Dorothy, and who had rhymed of her
as his Heart's Desire: and in the garden there was of this
boy no trace. Instead, the girl was talking to a staid and
paunchy pawnbroker, of forty-and-something.
So Jurgen shrugged, and looked toward the Centaur:
but Nessus had discreetly wandered away from them, in
search of four-leafed clovers. Now the east had grown
brighter, and its crimson began to be colored with gold.
"Yes, I have heard of this other Jurgen," says the
pawnbroker. "Oh, Madame Dorothy, but it was he that
loved you!"
"No more than I loved him. Through a whole summer
have I loved Jurgen."
And the knowledge that this girl spoke a wondrous
truth was now to Jurgen a joy that was keen as pain.
And he stood motionless for a while, scowling and biting
his lips.
"I wonder how long the poor devil loved you! He
also loved for a whole summer, it may be. And yet again,
it may be that he loved you all his life. For twenty years
and for more than twenty years I have debated the
matter: and I am as well informed as when I started."
"But, friend, you talk in riddles."
"Is not that customary when age talks with youth?
For I am an old fellow, in my forties: and you, as I
know now, are near eighteen, - or rather, four months
short of being eighteen, for it is August. Nay, more, it
is the August of a year I had not looked ever to see again;
and again Dom Manuel reigns over us, that man of iron
whom I saw die so horribly. All this seems very improbable."
Then Jurgen meditated for a while. He shrugged.
"Well, and what could anybody expect me to do about
it? Somehow it has befallen that I, who am but the
shadow of what I was, now walk among shadows, and we
converse with the thin intonations of dead persons. For,
Madame Dorothy, you who are not yet eighteen, in this
same garden there was once a boy who loved a girl, with
such love as it puzzles me to think of now. I believe that
she loved him. Yes, certainly it is a cordial to the tired
and battered heart which nowadays pumps blood for me,
to think that for a little while, for a whole summer, these
two were as brave and comely and clean a pair of
sweethearts as the world has known."
Thus Jurgen spoke. But his thought was that this was
a girl whose equal for loveliness and delight was not to
be found between two oceans. Long and long ago that
doubtfulness of himself which was closer to him than his
skin had fretted Jurgen into believing the Dorothy he had
loved was but a piece of his imaginings. But certainly
this girl was real. And sweet she was, and innocent she
was, and light of heart and feet, beyond the reach of any
man's inventiveness. No, Jurgen had not invented her;
and it strangely contented him to know as much.
"Tell me your story, sir," says she, "for I love all romances."
"Ah, my dear child, but I cannot tell you very well of
just what happened. As I look back, there is a blinding
glory of green woods and lawns and moonlit nights and
dance music and unreasonable laughter. I remember her
hair and eyes, and the curving and the feel of her red
mouth, and once when I was bolder than ordinary - But
that is hardly worth raking up at this late day. Well, I
see these things in memory as plainly as I now seem to
see your face: but I can recollect hardly anything she
said. Perhaps, now I think of it, she was not very intelligent,
and said nothing worth remembering. But the boy
loved her, and was happy, because her lips and heart were
his, and he, as the saying is, had plucked a diamond from
the world's ring. True, she was a count's daughter and
the sister of a count: but in those days the boy quite
firmly intended to become a duke or an emperor or
something of that sort, so the transient discrepancy did not
worry them."
"I know. Why, Jurgen is going to be a duke, too,"
says she, very proudly, "though he did think, a great while
ago, before he knew me, of being a cardinal, on account
of the robes. But cardinals are not allowed to marry, you
see - And I am forgetting your story, too! What happened then?"
"They parted in September - with what vows it hardly
matters now - and the boy went into Gâtinais, to win his
spurs under the old Vidame de Soyecourt. And presently
- oh, a good while before Christmas! - came the news
that Dorothy la Désirée had married rich Heitman Michael."
"But that is what I am called! And as you know,
there is a Heitman Michael who is always plaguing me.
Is that not strange! for you tell me all this happened a
great while ago."
"Indeed, the story is very old, and old it was when
Methuselah was teething. There is no older and more
common story anywhere. As the sequel, it would be
heroic to tell you this boy's life was ruined. But I do
not think it was. Instead, he had learned all of a sudden
that which at twenty-one is heady knowledge. That was
the hour which taught him sorrow and rage, and sneering,
too, for a redemption. Oh, it was armor that hour
brought him, and a humor to use it, because no woman
now could hurt him very seriously. No, never any more!"
"Ah, the poor boy!" she said, divinely tender, and
smiling as a goddess smiles, not quite in mirth.
"Well, women, as he knew by experience now, were the
pleasantest of playfellows. So he began to play. Rampaging
through the world he went in the pride of his
youth and in the armor of his hurt. And songs he made
for the pleasure of kings, and sword-play he made for the
pleasure of men, and a whispering he made for the
pleasure of women, in places where renown was, and
where he trod boldly, giving pleasure to everybody, in
those fine days. But the whispering, and all that followed
the whispering, was his best game, and the game
he played for the longest while, with many brightly
colored playmates who took the game more seriously than
he did. And their faith in the game's importance, and
in him and his high-sounding nonsense, he very often
found amusing: and in their other chattels too he took
his natural pleasure. Then, when he had played sufficiently,
he held a consultation with divers waning appetites;
and he married the handsome daughter of an estimable
pawnbroker in a fair line of business. And he
lived with his wife very much as two people customarily
live together. So, all in all, I would not say his life
was ruined."
"Why, then, it was," said Dorothy. She stirred uneasily,
with an impatient sigh; and you saw that she was
vaguely puzzled. "Oh, but somehow I think you are a
very horrible old man: and you seem doubly horrible in
that glittering queer garment you are wearing."
"No woman ever praised a woman's handiwork, and
each of you is particularly severe upon her own. But you
are interrupting the saga."
"I do not see" - and those large bright eyes of which
the color was so indeterminable and so dear to Jurgen,
seemed even larger now - "but I do not see how there
could well be any more."
"Still, human hearts survive the benediction of the
priest, as you may perceive any day. This man, at least,
inherited his father-in-law's business, and found it, quite
as he had anticipated, the fittest of vocations for a
cashiered poet. And so, I suppose, he was content. Ah,
yes; but after a while Heitman Michael returned from
foreign parts, along with his lackeys, and plate, and chest
upon chest of merchandise, and his fine horses, and his
wife. And he who had been her lover could see her
now, after so many years, whenever he liked. She was
a handsome stranger. That was all. She was rather
stupid. She was nothing remarkable, one way or another.
This respectable pawnbroker saw that quite
plainly: day by day he writhed under the knowledge.
Because, as I must tell you, he could not retain composure
in her presence, even now. No, he was never able
to do that."
The girl somewhat condensed her brows over this
information. "You mean that he still loved her. Why, but
of course!"
"My child," says Jurgen, now with a reproving forefinger,
"you are an incurable romanticist. The man disliked
her and despised her. At any event, he assured
himself that he did. Well, even so, this handsome stupid
stranger held his eyes, and muddled his thoughts, and put
errors into his accounts: and when he touched her hand
he did not sleep that night as he was used to sleep. Thus
he saw her, day after day. And they whispered that this
handsome and stupid stranger had a liking for young
men who aided her artfully to deceive her husband: but
she never showed any such favor to the respectable
pawnbroker. For youth had gone out of him, and it seemed
that nothing in particular happened. Well, that was his
saga. About her I do not know. And I shall never
know! But certainly she got the name of deceiving Heitman
Michael with two young men, or with five young
men it might be, but never with a respectable pawnbroker."
"I think that is an exceedingly cynical and stupid
story," observed the girl. "And so I shall be off to
look for Jurgen. For he makes love very amusingly,"
says Dorothy, with the sweetest, loveliest meditative smile
that ever was lost to heaven.
And a madness came upon Jurgen, there in the garden
between dawn and sunrise, and a disbelief in such
injustice as now seemed incredible.
"No, Heart's Desire," he cried, "I will not let you go.
For you are dear and pure and faithful, and all my evil
dream, wherein you were a wanton and befooled me, was
not true. Surely, mine was a dream that can never be
true so long as there is any justice upon earth. Why,
there is no imaginable God who would permit a boy to be
robbed of that which in my evil dream was taken from me!"
"And still I cannot understand your talking, about this
dream of yours - !"
"Why, it seemed to me I had lost the most of myself;
and there was left only a brain which played with ideas,
and a body that went delicately down pleasant ways. And
I could not believe as my fellows believed, nor could I love
them, nor could I detect anything in aught they said or did
save their exceeding folly: for I had lost their cordial
common faith in the importance of what use they made
of half-hours and months and years; and because a
jill-flirt had opened my eyes so that they saw too much, I
had lost faith in the importance of my own actions, too.
There was a little time of which the passing might be
made endurable; beyond gaped unpredictable darkness:
and that was all there was of certainty anywhere. Now
tell me, Heart's Desire, but was not that a foolish dream?
For these things never happened. Why, it would not be
fair if these things ever happened!"
And the girl's eyes were wide and puzzled and a little
frightened. "I do not understand what you are saying:
and there is that about you which troubles me unspeakably.
For you call me by the name which none but Jurgen
used, and it seems to me that you are Jurgen; and
yet you are not Jurgen."
"But I am truly Jurgen. And look you, I have done
what never any man has done before! For I have won
back to that first love whom every man must lose, no
matter whom he marries. I have come back again,
passing very swiftly, over the grave of a dream and
through the malice of time, to my Heart's Desire! And
how strange it seems that I did not know this thing was
inevitable!"
"Still, friend, I do not understand you."
"Why, but I yawned and fretted in preparation for
some great and beautiful adventure which was to befall
me by and by, and dazedly I toiled forward. Whereas
behind me all the while was the garden between dawn
and sunrise, and therein you awaited me! Now assuredly,
the life of every man is a quaintly builded tale, in
which the right and proper ending comes first. Thereafter
time runs forward, not as schoolmen fable in a
straight line, but in a vast closed curve, returning to the
place of its starting. And it is by a dim foreknowledge
of this, by some faint prescience of justice and reparation
being given them by and by, that men have heart to
live. For I know now that I have always known this
thing. What else was living good for unless it brought
me back to you?"
But the girl shook her small glittering head, very sadly.
"I do not understand you, and I fear you. For you talk
foolishness and in your face I see the face of Jurgen as
one might see the face of a dead man drowned in muddy
water."
"Yet am I truly Jurgen, and, as it seems to me, for
the first time since we were parted. For I am strong and
admirable - even I, who sneered and played so long,
because I thought myself a thing of no worth at all. That
which has been since you and I were young together is
as a mist that passes: and I am strong and admirable, and
all my being is one vast hunger for you, my dearest, and
I will not let you go, for you, and you alone, are my
Heart's Desire."
Now the girl was looking at him very steadily, with a
small puzzled frown, and with her vivid young soft lips
a little parted. And all her tender loveliness was glorified
by the light of a sky that had turned to dusty palpitating gold.
"Ah, but you say that you are strong and admirable:
and I can only marvel at such talking. For I see that
which all men see."
And then Dorothy showed him the little mirror which
was attached to the long chain of turquoise matrix about
her neck: and Jurgen studied the frightened foolish aged
face that he found in the mirror.
Thus drearily did sanity return to Jurgen: and his
flare of passion died, and the fever and storm and the
impetuous whirl of things was ended, and the man was
very weary. And in the silence he heard the piping cry
of a bird that seemed to seek for what it could not find.
"Well, I am answered," said the pawnbroker: "and
yet I know that this is not the final answer. Dearer than
any hope of heaven was that moment when awed surmises
first awoke as to the new strange loveliness which I
had seen in the face of Dorothy. It was then I noted the
new faint flush suffusing her face from chin to brow so
often as my eyes encountered and found new lights in the
shining eyes which were no longer entirely frank in meeting
mine. Well, let that be, for I do not love Heitman
Michael's wife.
"It is a grief to remember how we followed love, and
found his service lovely. It is bitter to recall the sweetness
of those vows which proclaimed her mine eternally,
- vows that were broken in their making by prolonged
and unforgotten kisses. We used to laugh at Heitman
Michael then; we used to laugh at everything. Thus for
a while, for a whole summer, we were as brave and
comely and clean a pair of sweethearts as the world has
known. But let that be, for I do not love Heitman
Michael's wife.
"Our love was fair but short-lived. There is none
that may revive him since the small feet of Dorothy trod
out this small love's life. Yet when this life of ours too
is over - this parsimonious life which can allow us no
more love for anybody, - must we not win back, somehow,
to that faith we vowed against eternity? and be content
again, in some fair-colored realm? Assuredly I
think this thing will happen. Well, but let that be, for I
do not love Heitman Michael's wife."
"Why, this is excellent hearing," observed Dorothy,
"because I see that you are converting your sorrow into
the raw stuff of verses. So I shall be off to look for
Jurgen, since he makes love quite otherwise and far more
amusingly."
And again, whatever was the matter upon which this
girl now meditated, her cheeks were tenderly colored by
the thought of it, and in her knowledge of this thing her
eyes took infinite joy.
Thus it was for a moment only: for she left Jurgen
now, with the friendliest light waving of her hand; and
so passed from him, not thinking of this old fellow any
longer, as he could see, even in the instant she turned
from him. And she went toward the dawn, in search of
that young Jurgen whom she, who was perfect in all
things, had loved, though only for a little while, not
undeservedly.
"Good and evil keep very exact accounts," replied the
Centaur, "and the face of every man is their ledger.
Meanwhile the sun rises, it is already another workday:
and when the shadows of those two who come to take
possession fall full upon the garden, I warn you, there
will be astounding changes brought about by the requirements
of bread and butter. You have not time to revive
old memories by chatting with the others to whom you
babbled aforetime in this garden."
"Ah, Centaur, in the garden between dawn and sunrise
there was never any other save Dorothy la Désirée."
The Centaur shrugged. "It may be you forget; it is
certain that you underestimate the local population.
Some of the transient visitors you have seen, and in
addition hereabouts dwell the year round all manner of
imaginary creatures. The fairies live just southward,
and the gnomes too. To your right is the realm of the
Valkyries: the Amazons and the Cynocephali are their
allies: all three of these nations are continually at loggerheads
with their neighbors, the Baba-Yagas, whom
Morfei cooks for, and whose monarch is Oh, a person
very dangerous to name. Northward dwell the Lepracauns
and the Men of Hunger, whose king is Clobhair.
My people, who are ruled by Chiron, live even further to
the north. The Sphinx pastures on yonder mountain;
and now the Chimera is old and generally derided, they
say that Cerberus visits the Sphinx at twilight, although
I was never the person to disseminate scandal - "
"Centaur," said Jurgen, "and what is Dorothy doing here?"
"Why, all the women that any man has ever loved live
here," replied the Centaur, "for very obvious reasons."
"That is a hard saying, friend."
Nessus tapped with his forefinger upon the back of
Jurgen's hand. "Worm's-meat! this is the destined food,
do what you will, of small white worms. This by and
by will be a struggling pale corruption, like seething
milk. That too is a hard saying, Jurgen. But it is a
true saying."
"And was that Dorothy whom I loved in youth an
imaginary creature?"
"My poor Jurgen, you who were once a poet! she was
your masterpiece. For there was only a shallow, stupid
and airy, high-nosed and light-haired miss, with no
remarkable good looks, - and consider what your ingenuity
made from such poor material! You should be proud of yourself."
"No, Centaur, I cannot very well be proud of my
folly: yet I do not regret it. I have been befooled by a
bright shadow of my own raising, you tell me, and I
concede it to be probable. No less, I served a lovely
shadow; and my heart will keep the memory of that
loveliness until life ends, in a world where other men
follow pantingly after shadows which are not even pretty."
"There is something in that, Jurgen: there is also
something in an old tale we used to tell in Thessaly,
about a fox and certain grapes."
"Well, but look you, Nessus, there is an emperor that
reigns now in Constantinople and occasionally does
business with me. Yes, and I could tell you tales of by
what shifts he came to the throne - "
"Men's hands are by ordinary soiled in climbing,"
quoth the Centaur.
"And 'Jurgen,' this emperor says to me, not many
months ago, as he sat in his palace, crowned and dreary
and trying to cheat me out of my fair profit on some
emeralds, - 'Jurgen, I cannot sleep of nights, because of
that fool Alexius, who comes into my room with staring
eyes and the bowstring still about his neck. And my
Varangians must be in league with that silly ghost,
because I constantly order them to keep Alexius out of my
bedchamber, and they do not obey me, Jurgen. To be
King of the East is not to the purpose, Jurgen, when one
must submit to such vexations.' Yes, it was Cæsar
Pharamond himself said this to me: and I deduce the
shadow of a crown has led him into an ugly pickle, for
all that he is the mightiest monarch in the world. And
I would not change with Caesar Pharamond, not I who
am a respectable pawnbroker, with my home in fee and
my bit of tilled land. Well, this is a queer world, to
be sure: and this garden is visited by no stranger things
than pop into a man's mind sometimes, without his
knowing how."
"Ah, but you must understand that the garden is
speedily to be remodeled. Yonder you may observe the
two whose requirements are to rid the place of all fantastic
unremunerative notions; and who will develop the
natural resources of this garden according to generally
approved methods."
And from afar Jurgen could see two figures coming
out of the east, so tall that their heads rose above the
encircling hills and glistened in the rays of a sun which
was not yet visible. One was a white pasty-looking
giant, with a crusty expression: he walked with the aid
of a cane. The other was of a pale yellow color: his
face was oily, and he rode on a vast cow that was
called Ædhumla.
"Make way there, brother, with your staff of life," says
the yellow giant, "for there is much to do hereabouts."
"Ay, brother, this place must be altered a deal before
it meets with our requirements," the other grumbled.
"May I be toasted if I know where to begin!"
Then as the giants turned dull and harsh faces toward
the garden, the sun came above the circle of blue hills,
so that the mingled shadows of these two giants fell
across the garden. For an instant Jurgen saw the place
oppressed by that attenuated mile-long shadow, as in
heraldry you may see a black bar painted sheer across
some brightly emblazoned shield. Then the radiancy of
everything twitched and vanished, as a bubble bursts.
And Jurgen was standing in the midst of a field, very
neatly plowed, but with nothing as yet growing in it.
And the Centaur was with him still, it seemed, for there
were the creature's hoofs, but all the gold had been
washed or rubbed away from them in traveling with Jurgen.
"See, Nessus!" Jurgen cried, "the garden is made desolate.
Oh, Nessus, was it fair that so much loveliness
should be thus wasted!"
"Nay," said the Centaur, "nay!" Long and wailingly
he whinneyed, "Nay!"
And when Jurgen raised his eyes he saw that his companion
was not a centaur, but only a strayed riding-horse.
"Were you the animal, then," says Jurgen, "and was
it a quite ordinary animal, that conveyed me to the garden
between dawn and sunrise?" And Jurgen laughed
disconsolately. "At all events, you have clothed me in a
curious fine shirt. And, now I look your bridle is
marked with a coronet. So I will return you to the
castle at Bellegarde, and it may be that Heitman Michael
will reward me."
Then Jurgen mounted this horse and rode away from
the plowed field wherein nothing grew as yet. As they
left the furrows they came to a signboard with writing
on it, in a peculiar red and yellow lettering.
Jurgen paused to decipher this.
"Read me!" was written on the signboard: "read me,
and judge if you understand! So you stopped in your
journey because I called, scenting something unusual,
something droll. Thus, although I am nothing, and even
less, there is no one that sees me but lingers here.
Stranger, I am a law of the universe. Stranger, render
the law what is due the law!"
Jurgen felt cheated. "A very foolish signboard, indeed!
for how can it be 'a law of the universe', when
there is no meaning to it!" says Jurgen. "Why, for
any law to be meaningless would not be fair."
"Forward, then!" he said, "in the name of Koshchei."
And thereafter Jurgen permitted the horse to choose its
own way.
Thus Jurgen came through a forest, wherein he saw
many things not salutary to notice, to a great stone
house like a prison, and he sought shelter there. But he
could find nobody about the place, until he came to a
large hall, newly swept. This was a depressing apartment,
in its chill neat emptiness, for it was unfurnished
save for a bare deal table, upon which lay a yardstick
and a pair of scales. Above this table hung a wicker
cage containing a blue bird, and another wicker cage
containing three white pigeons. And in this hall a woman,
no longer young, dressed all in blue, and wearing a white
towel by way of head-dress was assorting curiously
colored cloths.
She had very bright eyes, with wrinkled lids; and now
as she looked up at Jurgen her shrunk jaws quivered.
"Ah," says she, "I have a visitor. Good day to you,
in your glittering shirt. It is a garment I seem to recognize."
"Good day, grandmother! I am looking for my wife,
whom I suspect to have been carried off by a devil, poor
fellow! Now, having lost my way, I have come to pass
the night under your roof."
"Very good: but few come seeking Mother Sereda of
their own accord."
Then Jurgen knew with whom he talked: and inwardly
he was perturbed, for all the Léshy are unreliable in
their dealings.
So when he spoke it was very civilly. "And what
do you do here, grandmother?"
"I bleach. In time I shall bleach that garment you
are wearing. For I take the color out of all things.
Thus you see these stuffs here, as they are now. Clotho
spun the glowing threads, and Lachesis wove them, as
you observe, in curious patterns, very marvelous to see:
but when I am done with these stuffs there will be no
more color or beauty or strangeness anywhere apparent
than in so many dishclouts."
"Now I
preceive," says Jurgen, "that your power and
dominion is more great than any other power which is
in the world."
He made a song of this, in praise of the Léshy and
their Days, but more especially in praise of the might
of Mother Sereda and of the ruins that have fallen on
Wednesday. To Chetverg and Utornik and Subbota he
gave their due. Pyatinka and Nedelka also did Jurgen
commend for such demolishments as have enregistered
their names in the calendar of saints, no less. Ah, but
there was none like Mother Sereda: hers was the centre
of that power which is the Léshy's. The others did but
nibble at temporal things, like furtive mice: she devastated,
like a sandstorm, so that there were many dustheaps
where Mother Sereda had passed, but nothing else.
And so on, and so on. The song was no masterpiece,
and would not be bettered by repetition. But it was all
untrammeled eulogy, and the old woman beat time to
it with her lean hands: and her shrunk jaws quivered,
and she nodded her white-wrapped head this way and
that way, with a rolling motion, and on her thin lips was
a very proud and foolish smile.
"That is a good song," says she; "oh, yes, an excellent
song! But you report nothing of my sister Pandelis who
controls the day of the Moon."
"Monday!" says Jurgen: "yes, I neglected Monday,
perhaps because she is the oldest of you, but in part
because of the exigencies of my rhyme scheme. We must
let Pandelis go unhymned. How can I remember everything
when I consider the might of Sereda?"
"Why, but," says Mother Sereda, "Pandelis may not
like it, and she may take holiday from her washing some
day to have a word with you. However, I repeat, that is
an excellent song. And in return for your praise of me,
I will tell you that, if your wife has been carried off by
a devil, your affair is one which Koshchei alone can
remedy. Assuredly, I think it is to him you must go for justice."
"But how may I come to him, grandmother?"
"Oh, as to that, it does not matter at all which road
you follow. All highways, as the saying is, lead roundabout
to Koshchei. The one thing needful is not to stand
still. This much I will tell you also for your song's sake,
because that was an excellent song, and nobody ever
made a song in praise of me before to-day."
Now Jurgen wondered to see what a simple old
creature was this Mother Sereda, who sat before him
shaking and grinning and frail as a dead leaf, with her
head wrapped in a common kitchen-towel, and whose
power was so enormous.
"To think of it," Jurgen reflected, "that the world I
inhabit is ordered by beings who are not one-tenth so
clever as I am! I have often suspected as much, and it
is decidedly unfair. Now let me see if I cannot make
something out of being such a monstrous clever fellow."
Jurgen said aloud: "I do not wonder that no practising
poet ever presumed to make a song of you. You are too
majestical. You frighten these rhymesters, who feel
themselves to be unworthy of so great a theme. So it
remained for you to be appreciated by a pawnbroker,
since it is we who handle and observe the treasures of
this world after you have handled them."
"Do you think so?" says she, more pleased than ever.
"Now, may be that was the way of it. But I wonder
that you who are so fine a poet should ever have become a
pawnbroker."
"Well, and indeed, Mother Sereda, your wonder seems
to me another wonder: for I can think of no profession
better suited to a retired poet. Why, there is the variety
of company! for high and low and even the genteel are
pressed sometimes for money: then the plowman slouches
into my shop, and the duke sends for me privately. So
the people I know, and the bits of their lives I pop into,
give me a deal to romance about."
"Ah, yes, indeed," says Mother Sereda, wisely, "that
well may be the case. But I do not hold with romance, myself."
"Moreover, sitting in my shop, I wait there quiet-like
while tribute comes to me from the ends of earth: everything
which men and women have valued anywhere comes
sooner or later to me: and jewels and fine knickknacks
that were the pride of queens they bring me, and wedding
rings, and the baby's cradle with his little tooth marks
on the rim of it, and silver coffin-handles, or it may be
an old frying-pan, they bring me, but all comes to Jurgen.
So that just to sit there in my dark shop quiet-like, and
wonder about the history of my belongings and how they
were made mine, is poetry, and is the deep and high and
ancient thinking of a god who is dozing among what time
has left of a dead world, if you understand me, Mother Sereda."
"I understand: oho, I understand that which pertains
to gods, for a sufficient reason."
"And then another thing, you do not need any turn
for business: people are glad to get whatever you choose
to offer, for they would not come otherwise. So you get
the shining and rough-edged coins that you can feel the
proud king's head on, with his laurel-wreath like millet
seed under your fingers; and you get the flat and greenish
coins that are smeared with the titles and the chins and
hooked noses of emperors whom nobody remembers or
cares about any longer: all just by waiting there quiet-like,
and making a favor of it to let customers give you
their belongings for a third of what they are worth. And
that is easy labor, even for a poet."
"I understand: I understand all labor."
"And people treat you a deal more civilly than any real
need is, because they are ashamed of trafficking with you
at all: I dispute if a poet could get such civility shown him
in any other profession. And finally, there is the long
idleness between business interviews, with nothing to do
save sit there quiet-like and think about the queerness of
things in general: and that is always rare employment for
a poet, even without the tatters of so many lives and
homes heaped up about him like spillikins. So that I
would say in all, Mother Sereda, there is certainly no
profession better suited to an old poet than the profession
of pawnbroking."
"Certainly, there may be something in what you tell
me," observes Mother Sereda. "I know what the Little
Gods are, and I know what work is, but I do not think
about these other matters, nor about anything else. I bleach."
"Ah, and a great deal more I could be saying, too,
godmother, but for the fear of wearying you. Nor would
I have run on at all about my private affairs were it not
that we two are so close related. And kith makes kind,
as people say."
"But how can you and I be kin?"
"Why, heyday, and was I not born upon a Wednesday?
That makes you my godmother, does it not?"
"I do not know, dearie, I am sure. Nobody ever cared
to claim kin with Mother Sereda before this," says she,
pathetically.
"There can be no doubt, though, on the point, no
possible doubt. Sabellius states it plainly. Artemidorus
Minor, I grant you, holds the question debatable, but his
reasons for doing so are tolerably notorious. Besides,
what does all his flimsy sophistry avail against Nicanor's
fine chapter on this very subject? Crushing, I consider
it. His logic is final and irrefutable. What can anyone
say against Sævius Nicanor? - ah, what indeed?"
demanded Jurgen.
And he wondered if there might not have been perchance
some such persons somewhere, after all. Their
names, in any event, sounded very plausible to Jurgen.
"Ah, dearie, I was never one for learning. It may be
as you say."
"You say 'it may be', godmother. That embarrasses
me, rather, because I was about to ask for my christening
gift, which in the press of other matters you overlooked
some forty years back. You will readily conceive that
your negligence, however unintentional, might possibly
give rise to unkindly criticism: and so I felt I ought to
mention it, in common fairness to you."
"As for that, dearie, ask what you will within the
limits of my power. For mine are all the sapphires and
turquoises and whatever else in this dusty world is blue;
and mine likewise are all the Wednesdays that have ever
been or ever will be: and any one of these will I freely
give you in return for your fine speeches and your tender heart."
"Ah, but, godmother, would it be quite just for you to
accord me so much more than is granted to other persons?"
"Why, no: but what have I to do with justice? I
bleach. Come now, then, do you make a choice! for I
can assure you that my sapphires are of the first water,
and that many of my oncoming Wednesdays will be well
worth seeing."
"No, godmother, I never greatly cared for jewelry:
and the future is but dressing and undressing, and
shaving, and eating, and computing percentage, and so
on; the future does not interest me now. So I shall
modestly content myself with a second-hand Wednesday,
with one that you have used and have no further need
of: and it will be a Wednesday in the August of such and
such a year."
Mother Sereda agreed to this. "But there are certain
rules to be observed," says she, "for one must have system."
As she spoke, she undid the towel about her head, and
she took a blue comb from her white hair: and she
showed Jurgen what was engraved on the comb. It
frightened Jurgen, a little: but he nodded assent.
"First, though," says Mother Sereda, "here is the blue
bird. Would you not rather have that, dearie, than your
Wednesday? Most people would."
"Ah, but, godmother," he replied, "I am Jurgen. No,
it is not the blue bird I desire."
So Mother Sereda took from the wall the wicker cage
containing the three white pigeons: and going before him,
with small hunched shoulders, and shuffling her feet along,
the flagstones, she led the way into a courtyard, where,
sure enough, they found a tethered he-goat. Of a dark
blue color this beast was, and his eyes were wiser than the
eyes of a beast.
Then Jurgen set about that which Mother Sereda said
was necessary.
As it chanced, the first person he encountered was his
mother Azra, whom Coth had loved very greatly but not
long. And Jurgen talked with Azra of what clothes he
would be likely to need in Gâtinais, and of how often he
would write to her. She disparaged the new shirt he was
wearing, as was to be expected, since Azra had always
preferred to select her son's clothing rather than trust to
Jurgen's taste. His new horse she admitted to be a
handsome animal; and only hoped he had not stolen it from
anybody who would get him into trouble. For Azra, it
must be recorded, had never any confidence in her son;
and was the only woman, Jurgen felt, who really
understood him.
And now as his beautiful young mother impartially
petted and snapped at him, poor Jurgen thought of that
very real dissension and severance which in the oncoming
years was to arise between them; and of how she would
die without his knowing of her death for two whole
months; and of how his life thereafter would be changed,
somehow, and the world would become an unstable place
in which you could no longer put cordial faith. And he
foreknew all the remorse he was to shrug away, after the
squandering of so much pride and love. But these things
were not yet: and besides, these things were inevitable.
"And yet that these things should be inevitable is
decidedly not fair," said Jurgen.
So it was with all the persons he encountered. The
people whom he loved when at his best as a fine young
fellow were so very soon, and through petty causes, to
become nothing to him, and he himself was to be converted
into a commonplace tradesman. And living seemed to
Jurgen a wasteful and inequitable process.
Then Jurgen left the home of his youth, and rode
toward Bellegarde, and tethered his horse upon the heath,
and went into the castle. Thus Jurgen came to Dorothy.
She was lovely and dear, and yet, by some odd turn, not
quite so lovely and dear as the Dorothy he had seen in
the garden between dawn and sunrise. And Dorothy, like
everybody else, praised Jurgen's wonderful new shirt.
"It is designed for such festivals," said Jurgen,
modestly - "a little notion of my own. A bit extreme,
some persons might consider it, but there is no pleasing
everybody. And I like a trifle of color."
For there was a masque that night at the castle of
Bellegarde: and wildly droll and sad it was to Jurgen to
remember what was to befall so many of the participants.
Jurgen had not forgotten this Wednesday, this ancient
Wednesday upon which Messire de Montors had brought
the Confraternity of St. Médard from Brunbelois, to
enact a masque of The Birth of Hercules, as the vagabonds
were now doing, to hilarious applause. Jurgen
remembered it was the day before Bellegarde discovered
that Count Emmerick's guest, the Vicomte de Puysange,
was in reality the notorious outlaw, Perion de la Forêt.
Well, yonder the yet undetected impostor was talking
very earnestly with Dame Melicent: and Jurgen knew all
that was in store for this pair of lovers.
Meanwhile, as Jurgen reflected, the real Vicomte de
Puysange was at this moment lying in a delirium, yonder
at Benoit's: to-morrow the true Vicomte would be recognized,
and within the year the Vicomte would have
married Félise de Soyecourt, and later Jurgen would meet
her, in the orchard; and Jurgen knew what was to happen
then also.
And Messire de Montors was watching Dame Melicent,
sidewise, while he joked with little Ettarre, who was this
night permitted to stay up later than usual, in honor of
the masque: and Jurgen knew that this young bishop was
to become Pope of Rome, no less; and that the child he
joked with was to become the woman for possession of
whom Guiron des Rocques and the surly-looking small
boy yonder, Maugis d'Aigremont, would contend with
each other until the country hereabouts had been
devastated, and the castle wherein Jurgen now was had
been besieged, and this part of it burned. And wildly
droll and sad it was to Jurgen thus to remember all
that was going to happen to these persons, and to all
the other persons who were frolicking in the shadow
of their doom and laughing at this trivial masque.
For here - with so much of ruin and failure impending,
and with sorrow prepared so soon to smite a many of
these repellers in ways foreknown to Jurgen; and with
death resistlessly approaching so soon to make an end
of almost all this company in some unlovely fashion that
Jurgen foreknew exactly, - here laughter seemed
unreasonable and ghastly. Why, but Reinault yonder, who
laughed so loud, with his cropped head flung back: would
Reinault be laughing in quite this manner if he knew the
round strong throat he thus exposed was going to be cut
like the throat of a calf, while three Burgundians held
him? Jurgen knew this thing was to befall Reinault
Vinsauf before October was out. So he looked at Reinault's
throat, and shudderingly drew in his breath between
set teeth.
"And he is worth a score of me, this boy!" thought
Jurgen: "and it is I who am going to live to be an old
fellow, with my bit of land in fee, years after dirt clogs
those bright generous eyes, and years after this fine
big-hearted boy is wasted! And I shall forget all about him,
too. Marion l'Edol, that very pretty girl behind him, is
to become a blotched and toothless haunter of alleys, a
leering plucker at men's sleeves! And blue-eyed Colin
here, with his baby mouth, is to be hanged for that matter
of coin-clipping - let me recall, now, - yes, within six
years of to-night! Well, but in a way, these people are
blessed in lacking foresight. For they laugh, and I cannot
laugh, and to me their laughter is more terrible than
weeping. Yes, they may be very wise in not glooming
over what is inevitable; and certainly I cannot go so far
as to say they are wrong: but still, at the same time - !
And assuredly, living seems to me in everything a
wasteful and inequitable process."
Thus Jurgen, while the others passed a very pleasant
evening.
And presently, when the masque was over, Dorothy
and Jurgen went out upon the terrace, to the east of
Bellegarde, and so came to an unforgotten world of
moonlight. They sat upon a bench of carved stone near
the balustrade which overlooked the highway: and the
boy and the girl gazed wistfully beyond the highway, over
luminous valleys and tree-tops. Just so they had sat
there, as Jurgen perfectly remembered, when Mother
Sereda first used this Wednesday.
"My Heart's Desire," says Jurgen,"I am sad to-night.
For I am thinking of what life will do to us, and what
offal the years will make of you and me."
"My own sweetheart," says she, "and do we not know
very well what is to happen?" And Dorothy began to
talk of all the splendid things that Jurgen was to do, and
of the happy life which was to be theirs together.
"It is horrible," he said: "for we are more fine than
we shall ever be hereafter. We have a splendor for which
the world has no employment. It will be wasted. And
such wastage is not fair."
"But presently you will be so and so," says she: and
fondly predicts all manner of noble exploits which, as
Jurgen remembered, had once seemed very plausible to
him also. Now he had clearer knowledge as to the
capacities of the boy of whom he had thought so well.
"No, Heart's Desire: no, I shall be quite otherwise."
" - and to think how proud I shall be of you! 'But
then I always knew it', I shall tell everybody, very
condescendingly - "
"No, Heart's Desire: for you will not think of me at all."
"Ah, sweetheart! and can you really believe that I shall
ever care a snap of my fingers for anybody but you?"
Then Jurgen laughed a little; for Heitman Michael
came now across the lonely terrace, in search of Madame
Dorothy: and Jurgen foreknew this was the man to whom
within two months of this evening Dorothy was to give
her love and all the beauty that was hers, and with whom
she was to share the ruinous years which lay ahead.
But the girl did not know this, and Dorothy gave a little
shrugging gesture. "I have promised to dance with him,
and so I must. But the old fellow is a great plague."
For Heitman Michael was nearing thirty, and this to
Dorothy and Jurgen was an age that bordered upon senility.
"Now, by heaven," said Jurgen, "wherever Heitman
Michael does his next dancing it will not be hereabouts."
Jurgen had decided what he must do.
And then Heitman Michael saluted them civilly. "But
I fear I must rob you of this fair lady, Master Jurgen,"
says he.
Jurgen remembered that the man had said precisely
this a score of years ago; and that Jurgen had mumbled
polite regrets, and had stood aside while Heitman Michael
bore off Dorothy to dance with him. And this dance had
been the beginning of intimacy between Heitman Michael
and Dorothy.
"Heitman," says Jurgen, "the bereavement which you
threaten is very happily spared me, since, as it happens.
the next dance is to be mine."
"We can but leave it to the lady," says Heitman
Michael, laughing.
"Not I," says Jurgen. "For I know too well what
would come of that. I intend to leave my destiny to no one."
"Your conduct, Master Jurgen, is somewhat strange,"
observed Heitman Michael.
"Ah, but I will show you a thing yet stranger. For,
look you, there seem to be three of us here on this
terrace. Yet I can assure you there are four."
"Read me the riddle, my boy, and have done."
"The fourth of us, Heitman, is a goddess that wears
a speckled garment and has black wings. She can boast
of no temples, and no priests cry to her anywhere,
because she is the only deity whom no prayers can move
or any sacrifices placate. I allude, sir, to the eldest
daughter of Nox and Erebus."
"You speak of death, I take it."
"Your apprehension, Heitman, is nimble. Even so, it
is not quick enough, I fear, to forerun the whims of
goddesses. Indeed, what person could have foreseen that
this implacable lady would have taken such a strong fancy
for your company."
"Ah, my young bantam," replies Heitman Michael, "it
is quite true that she and I are acquainted. I may even
boast of having despatched one or two stout warriors to
serve her underground. Now, as I divine your meaning,
you plan that I should decrease her obligation by sending
her a whippersnapper."
"My notion, Heitman, is that since this dark goddess is
about to leave us, she should not, in common gallantry,
be permitted to go hence unaccompanied. I propose
therefore, that we forthwith decide who is to be her escort."
Now Heitman Michael had drawn his sword. "You
are insane. But you extend an invitation which I have
never yet refused."
"Heitman," cries Jurgen, in honest gratitude and
admiration, "I bear you no ill-will. But it is highly necessary
you die to-night, in order that my soul may not
perish too many years before my body."
With that he too whipped out his sword.
So they fought. Now Jurgen was a very acceptable
swordsman, but from the start he found in Heitman
Michael his master. Jurgen had never reckoned upon
that, and he considered it annoying. If Heitman Michael
perforated Jurgen the future would be altered, certainly,
but not quite as Jurgen had decided it ought to be
remodeled. So this unlooked-for complication seemed
preposterous, and Jurgen began to be irritated by the
suspicion that he was getting himself killed for nothing at all.
Meanwhile his unruffled tall antagonist seemed but to
play with Jurgen, so that Jurgen was steadily forced back
toward the balustrade. And presently Jurgen's sword
was twisted from his hand, and sent flashing over the
balustrade, into the public highway.
"So now, Master Jurgen," says Heitman Michael, "that
is the end of your nonsense. Why, no, there is not any
occasion to posture like a statue. I do not intend to kill
you. Why the devil's name, should I? To do so would
only get me an ill name with your parents: and besides
it is infinitely more pleasant to dance with this lady, just
as I first intended." And he turned gaily toward Madame
Dorothy.
But Jurgen found this outcome of affairs insufferable.
This man was stronger than he, this man was of the sort
that takes and uses gallantly all the world's prizes which
mere poets can but respectfully admire. All was to do
again: Heitman Michael, in his own hateful phrase,
would act just as he had first intended, and Jurgen would
be brushed aside by the man's brute strength. This man
would take away Dorothy, and leave the life of Jurgen to
become a business which Jurgen remembered with
distaste. It was unfair.
So Jurgen snatched out his dagger, and drove it deep
into the undefended back of Heitman Michael. Three
times young Jurgen stabbed and hacked the burly soldier,
just underneath the left ribs. Even in his fury Jurgen
remembered to strike on the left side.
It was all very quickly done. Heitman Michael's arms
jerked upward, and in the moonlight his fingers spread
and clutched. He made curious gurgling noises. Then
the strength went from his knees, so that he toppled
backward. His head fell upon Jurgen's shoulder, resting there
for an instant fraternally; and as Jurgen shuddered away
from the abhorred contact, the body of Heitman Michael
collapsed. Now he lay staring upward, dead at the feet
of his murderer. He was horrible looking, but he was
quite dead.
"What will become of you?" Dorothy whispered, after
a while. "Oh, Jurgen, it was foully done, that which you
did was infamous! What will become of you, my dear?"
"I will take my doom," says Jurgen, "and without
whimpering, so that I get justice. But I shall certainly
insist upon justice." Then Jurgen raised his face to the
bright heavens. "The man was stronger than I and
wanted what I wanted. So I have compromised with
necessity, in the only way I could make sure of getting
that which was requisite to me. I cry for justice to the
power that gave him strength and gave me weakness, and
gave to each of us his desires. That which I have done, I
have done. Now judge!"
Then Jurgen tugged and shoved the heavy body of
Heitman Michael, until it lay well out of sight, under
the bench upon which Jurgen and Dorothy had been
sitting. "Rest there, brave sir, until they find you. Come
to me now, my Heart's Desire. Good, that is excellent.
Here I sit with my true love, upon the body of my enemy.
Justice is satisfied, and all is quite as it should be. For
you must understand that I have fallen heir to a fine
steed, whose bridle is marked with a coronet, - prophetically,
I take it, - and upon this steed you will ride pillion
with me to Lisuarte. There we will find a priest to marry
us. We will go together into Gâtinais. Meanwhile, there
is a bit of neglected business to be attended to." And
he drew the girl close to him.
For Jurgen was afraid of nothing now. And Jurgen thought:
"Oh, that I could detain the moment! that I could make
some fitting verses to preserve this moment in my own
memory! Could I but get into words the odor and the
thick softness of this girl's hair as my hands, that are
a-quiver in every nerve of them, caress her hair; and get
into enduring words the glitter and the cloudy shadowings
of her hair in this be-drenching moonlight! For I shall
forget all this beauty, or at best I shall remember this
moment very dimly."
"You have done very wrong - " says Dorothy.
Says Jurgen, to himself: "Already the moment passes
this miserably happy moment wherein once more life
shudders and stands heart-stricken at the height of bliss!
it passes, and I know even as I lift this girl's soft face
to mine, and mark what faith and submissiveness and
expectancy is in her face, that whatever the future holds
for us, and whatever of happiness we two may know
hereafter, we shall find no instant happier than this, which
passes from us irretrievably while I am thinking about
it, poor fool, in place of rising to the issue."
" - And heaven only knows what will become of you
Jurgen - "
Says Jurgen, still to himself: "Yes, something must
remain to me of all this rapture, though it be only guilt
and sorrow: something I mean to wrest from this high
moment which was once wasted fruitlessly. Now I am
wiser: for I know there is not any memory with less
satisfaction in it than the memory of some temptation we
resisted. So I will not waste the one real passion I have
known, nor leave unfed the one desire which ever caused
me for a heart-beat to forget to think about Jurgen's
welfare. And thus, whatever happens, I shall not always
regret that I did not avail myself of this girl's love before
it was taken from me."
So Jurgen made such advances as seemed good to him.
And he noted, with amusing memories of how much
afraid he had once been of shocking his Dorothy's notions
of decorum, that she did not repulse him very vigorously.
"Here, over a dead body! Oh, Jurgen, this is horrible!
Now, Jurgen, remember that somebody may come any
minute! And I thought I could trust you! Ah, and is
this all the respect you have for me!" This much she
said in duty. Meanwhile the eyes of Dorothy were
dilated and very tender.
"Faith, I take no chances, this second time. And so
whatever happens, I shall not always regret that which I
left undone."
Now upon his lips was laughter, and his arms were
about the submissive girl. And in his heart was an unnamable
depression and a loneliness, because it seemed to
him that this was not the Dorothy whom he had seen in
the garden between dawn and sunrise. For in my arms
now there is just a very pretty girl who is not over-careful
in her dealings with young men, thought Jurgen, as
their lips met. Well, all life is a compromise; and a
pretty girl is something tangible, at any rate. So he
laughed, triumphantly, and prepared for the sequel.
But as Jurgen laughed triumphantly, with his arm beneath
the head of Dorothy, and with the tender face of
Dorothy passive beneath his lips, and with unreasonable
wistfulness in his heart, the castle bell tolled midnight.
What followed was curious: for as Wednesday passed,
the face of Dorothy altered, her flesh roughened under
his touch, and her cheeks fell away, and fine lines came
about her eyes, and she became the Countess Dorothy
whom Jurgen remembered as Heitman Michael's wife.
There was no doubt about it, in that be-drenching moonlight:
and she was leering at him, and he was touching
her everywhere, this horrible lascivious woman, who was
certainly quite old enough to know better than to permit
such liberties. And her breath was sour and nauseous.
Jurgen drew away from her, with a shiver of loathing,
and he closed his eyes, to shut away that sensual face.
"No," he said; "it would not be fair to what we owe to
others. In fact, it would be a very heinous sin. We
should weigh such considerations occasionally, madame."
Then Jurgen left his temptress, with simple dignity.
"I go to search for my dear wife, madame, in a frame of
mind which I would strongly advise you to adopt toward
your husband."
And he went straightway down the terraces of Bellegarde,
and turned southward to where his horse was
tethered upon Amneran Heath: and Jurgen was feeling
very virtuous.
"Well, well," he said, "now that my Wednesday is done
with, and I am again a reputable pawnbroker, let us
remember the advisability of sometimes doing the manly
thing! It was into this cave that Lisa went. So into this
cave go I, for the second time, rather than home to my
unsympathetic relatives-in-law. Or at least, I think I am
going - "
"Ay," said a squeaking voice, "this is the time. A ab
hur hus!"
"High time!"
"Oh, more than time!"
"Look, the man in the oak!"
"Oho, the fire-drake!"
Thus many voices screeched and wailed confusedly.
But Jurgen, staring about him, could see nobody: and all
the tiny voices seemed to come from far overhead, where
nothing was visible save the clouds which of a sudden
were gathering; for a wind was rising, and already the
moon was overcast. Now for a while that noise high in
the air became like a wrangling of sparrows, wherein no
words were distinguishable.
Then said a small shrill voice distinctly: "Note now,
sweethearts, how high we pass over the wind-vexed
heath, where the gallows' burden creaks and groans
swaying to and fro in the night! Now the rain breaks
loose as a hawk from the fowler, and grave Queen Holda
draws her tresses over the moon's bright shield. Now
the bed is made, and the water drawn, and we the bride's
maids seek for the lass who will be bride to Sclaug."
Said another: "Oh, search for a maid with golden
hair, who is perfect, tender and pure, and fit for a king
who is old as love, with no trace of love in him. Even
now our grinning dusty master wakes from sleep, and his
yellow fingers shake to think of her flower-soft lips who
comes to-night to his lank embrace and warms the ribs
that our eyes have seen. Who will be bride to Sclaug?"
And a third said: "The wedding-gown we have
brought with us, we that a-questing ride: and a maid will
go hence on Phorgemon in Cleopatra's shroud. Hah,
Will o'the Wisp will marry the couple - "
"No, no! let Brachyotus!"
"No, be it Kitt with the candle-stick!"
"Eman hetan, a fight, a fight!"
"Oho, Tom Tumbler, 'ware of Stadlin!"
"Hast thou the marmaritin, Tib?"
"A ab hur hus!"
"Come, Bembo, come away!"
So they all fell to screeching and whistling and wrangling
high over Jurgen's head, and Jurgen was not pleased
with his surroundings.
"For these are the witches of Amneran about some
deviltry or another in which I prefer to take no part. I
now regret that I flung away a cross in this neighborhood
so very recently, and trust the action was understood. If
my wife had not made a point of it, and had not positively
insisted upon it, I would never have thought of doing
such a thing. I intended no reflection upon anybody.
Even so, I consider this heath to be unwholesome. And
upon the whole, I prefer to seek whatever I may
encounter in this cave."
So in went Jurgen, for the second time.
And the tale tells that all was dark there, and Jurgen
could see no one. But the cave stretched straight forward,
and downward, and at the far end was a glow of
light. Jurgen went on and on, and so came to the place
where he had found the Centaur. This part of the cave
was now vacant. But behind where Nessus had lain in
wait for Jurgen was an opening in the cave's wall, and
through this opening streamed the light. Jurgen stooped
and crawled through the orifice.
He stood erect. He caught his breath sharply. Here
at his feet was, of all things, a tomb carved with the
recumbent effigy of a woman. Now this part of the cave
was lighted by lamps upon tall iron stands, so that everything
was clearly visible, even to Jurgen, whose eyesight
had of late years failed him. This was certainly a low
flat tombstone such as Jurgen had seen in many churches:
but the tinted effigy thereupon was curious, somehow
Jurgen looked more closely. He touched the thing.
Then he recoiled, because there is no mistaking the feel
of dead flesh. The effigy was not colored stone: it was
the body of a dead woman. More unaccountable still, it
was the body of Félise de Puysange, whom Jurgen had
loved very long ago in Gâtinais, a great many years
before he set up in business as a pawnbroker.
Very strange it was to Jurgen again to see her face. He
had often wondered what had become of this large brown
woman; had wondered if he were really the first man for
whom she had put a deceit upon her husband; and had
wondered what sort of person Madame Félise de
Puysange had been in reality.
"Two months it was that we played at intimacy, was
it not, Félise? You comprehend, my dear, I really
remember very little about you. But I recall quite clearly
the door left just a-jar, and how as I opened it gently I
would see first of all the lamp upon your dressing-table,
turned down almost to extinction, and the glowing dust
upon its glass shade. Is it not strange that our exceeding
wickedness should have resulted in nothing save the
memory of dust upon a lamp chimney? Yet you were
very handsome, Félise. I dare say I would have liked
you if I had ever known you. But when you told me of
the child you had lost, and showed me his baby picture,
I took a dislike to you. It seemed to me you were betraying
that child by dealing over-generously with me:
and always between us afterward was his little ghost.
Yet I did not at all mind the deceits you put upon your
husband. It is true I knew your husband rather intimately
- . Well, and they tell me the good Vicomte
was vastly pleased by the son you bore him some months
after you and I had parted. So there was no great harm
done, after all - "
Then Jurgen saw there was another woman's body
lying like an effigy upon another low flat tomb, and
beyond that another, and then still others. And Jurgen
whistled.
"What, all of them!" he said. "Am I to be confronted
with every pound of tender flesh I have embraced? Yes,
here is Graine, and Rosamond, and Marcouève, and
Elinor. This girl, though, I do not remember at all. And
this one is, I think, the little Jewess I purchased from
Hassan Bey in Sidon, but how can one be sure? Still,
this is certainly Judith, and this is Myrina. I have half
a mind to look again for that mole, but I suppose it
would be indecorous. Lord, how one's women do add
up! There must be several scores of them in all. It is
the sort of spectacle that turns a man to serious thinking.
Well, but it is a great comfort to reflect that I dealt
f
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Jurgen
A Comedy of
JusticeJAMES BRANCH CABELL
That
of an old wyf gat his youthe agoon,
And
gat himselfe a shirte as bright as fyre
Wherein
to jape, yet gat not his desire
In
any countrie ne condicioun."
NEW YORK
ROBERT M. McBRIDE & COMPANY
1922
JAMES BRANCH CABELL.
Printed in
The United States of America
Second Edition, November, 1919
Third Edition, December, 1919
Fourth Edition, October, 1922
Fifth Edition, November, 1922
Sixth Edition, November, 1922
Seventh Edition, November, 1922
Eighth Printing November, 1922
Published, September 1919
TO
BURTON RASCOE
Uncowed by sciolists,
Robuster persons twiddle
Tremendously big fists.
"Nor will our gods defer
Remission of rude fellows'
Ability to err."
Content to compromise
Ordainments none unravels
Explicitly . . . and sighs.
Contents
Page 1
A FOREWORD
"Nescio
quid certè est: et Hylax in limine latrat."
A Foreword: Which Asserts Nothing
IN Continental periodicals not more than a dozen
articles in all would seem to have given accounts
or partial translations of the Jurgen legends. No
thorough investigation of this epos can be said to have
appeared in print, anywhere, prior to the publication, in
1913, of the monumental Synopses
of Aryan Mythology
by Angelo de Ruiz. It is unnecessary to observe that
in this exhaustive digest Professor de Ruiz has given
(VII, p. 415 et sequentia) a summary of the greater
part of these legends as contained in the collections of
Verville and Bülg; and has discussed at length and with
much learning the esoteric meaning of these folk-stories
and their bearing upon questions to which the "solar
theory" of myth explanation has given rise. To his
volumes, and to the pages of Mr. Lewistam's Key to the
Popular Tales of Poictesme, must be referred all those
who may elect to think of Jurgen as the resplendent,
journeying and procreative sun.
Page 2
Page 3
Page 4
Page 5
Page 6
Page 7
JURGEN
. . . . amara lento temperet risu
Page 91.
Why Jurgen Did the Manly Thing
IT is a tale which they narrate in Poictesme, saying:
In the old days lived a pawnbroker named Jurgen;
but what his wife called him was very often much
worse than that. She was a high-spirited woman, with
no especial gift for silence. Her name, they say, was
Adelais, but people by ordinary called her Dame Lisa.
Page 10
Page 11
Page 12
Page 13
Page 142.
Assumption of a Noted Garment
THE tale tells that all was dark there, and Jurgen
could see no one. But the cave stretched straight
forward, and downward, and at the far end was a
glow of light. Jurgen went on and on, and so came
presently to a centaur: and this surprised him not a little,
because Jurgen knew that centaurs were imaginary
creatures.
Page 15
Page 16
Page 17
Page 183.
The Garden between Dawn and Sunrise
THUS it was that Jurgen and the Centaur came to
the garden between dawn and sunrise, entering this
place in a fashion which it is not convenient to
record. But as they passed over the bridge three fled
before them, screaming. And when the life had been
trampled out of the small furry bodies which these three
had misused, there was none to oppose the Centaur’s
entry into the garden between dawn and sunrise.
Page 19
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Page 21
Page 224.
The Dorothy Who Did Not Understand
FOR now had come to Jurgen and the Centaur a
gold-haired woman, clothed all in white, and walking
alone. She was tall, and lovely and tender to regard:
and hers was not the red and white comeliness of many
ladies that were famed for beauty, but rather it had the
even glow of ivory. Her nose was large and high in the
bridge, her flexible mouth was not of the smallest: and yet
whatever other persons might have said, to Jurgen this
woman's countenance was in all things perfect. Perhaps
this was because he never saw her as she was. For certainly
the color of her eyes stayed a matter never revealed
to him: gray, blue or green, there was no saying: they
varied as does the sea; but always these eyes were lovely
and friendly and perturbing.
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Page 345.
Requirements of Bread and Butter
"NESSUS," says Jurgen, "and am I so changed?
For that Dorothy whom I loved in youth did
not know me."
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Page 37
Page 38
Page 396.
Showing that Sereda Is Feminine
THEN, having snapped his fingers at that foolish
signboard, Jurgen would have turned easterly,
toward Bellegarde: but his horse resisted. The
pawnbroker decided to accept this as an omen.
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Page 46
Page 477.
Of Compromises on a Wednesday
SO it was that, riding upon a horse whose bridle was
marked with a coronet, the pawnbroker returned to
a place, and to a moment, which he remembered.
It was rather queer to be a fine young fellow again, and
to foresee all that was to happen for the next twenty years.
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Page 59
Page 608.
Old Toys and a New Shadow
JURGEN had behaved with conspicuous nobility,
Jurgen reflected: but he had committed himself. "I
go in search of my dear wife," he had stated, in the
exaltation of virtuous sentiments. And now Jurgen found
himself alone in a world of moonlight just where he had
last seen his wife.
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