103. CHAPTER CIII.
As the canoes now glided across the lagoon, I gave myself
up to reverie; and revolving over all that the men of
Amma had rehearsed of the history of Yillah, I one by one
unriddled the mysteries, before so baffling. Now, all was
made plain: no secret remaining, but the subsequent event
of her disappearance. Yes, Hautia! enlightened I had
been—but where was Yillah?
Then I recalled that last interview with Hautia's messengers,
so full of enigmas; and wondered, whether Yoomy
had interpreted aright. Unseen, and unsolicited; still pursuing
me with omens, with taunts, and with wooings, mysterious
Hautia appalled me. Vaguely I began to fear her.
And the thought, that perhaps again and again, her heralds
would haunt me, filled me with a nameless dread, which I
almost shrank from acknowledging. Inwardly I prayed,
that never more they might appear.
While full of these thoughts, Media interrupted them by
saying, that the minstrel was about to begin one of his
chants, a thing of his own composing; and therefore, as he
himself said, all critics must be lenient; for Yoomy, at
times, not always, was a timid youth, distrustful of his own
sweet genius for poesy.
The words were about a curious hereafter, believed in by
some people in Mardi: a sort of nocturnal Paradise, where
the sun and its heat are excluded: one long, lunar day,
with twinkling stars to keep company.
THE SONG.
Far off in the sea is Marlena,
A land of shades and streams,
A land of many delights.
Dark and bold, thy shores, Marlena;
But green, and timorous, thy soft knolls,
Crouching behind the woodlands.
All shady thy hills; all gleaming thy springs,
Like eyes in the earth looking at you.
How charming thy haunts Marlena!—
Oh, the waters that flow through Onimoo:
Oh, the leaves that rustle through Ponoo:
Oh, the roses that blossom in Tarma.
Come, and see the valley of Vina:
How sweet, how sweet, the Isles from Hina:
'Tis aye afternoon of the full, full moon,
And ever the season of fruit,
And ever the hour of flowers,
And never the time of rains and gales,
All in and about Marlena.
Soft sigh the boughs in the stilly air,
Soft lap the beach the billows there;
And in the woods or by the streams,
You needs must nod in the Land of Dreams.
“Yoomy,” said old Mohi with a yawn, “you composed
that song, then, did you?”
“I did,” said Yoomy, placing his turban a little to one
side.
“Then, minstrel, you shall sing me to sleep every night,
especially with that song of Marlena; it is soporific as the
airs of Nora-Bamma.”
“Mean you, old man, that my lines, setting forth the
luxurious repose to be enjoyed hereafter, are composed with
such skill, that the description begets the reality; or would
you ironically suggest, that the song is a sleepy thing itself?”
“An important discrimination,” said Media; “which
mean you, Mohi?”
“Now, are you not a silly boy,” said Babbalanja, “when
from the ambiguity of his speech, you could so easily have
derived something flattering, thus to seek to extract unpleasantness
from it? Be wise, Yoomy; and hereafter, whenever
a remark like that seems equivocal, be sure to wrest
commendation from it, though you torture it to the quick.”
“And most sure am I, that I would ever do so; but
often I so incline to a distrust of my powers, that I am far
more keenly alive to censure, than to praise; and always
deem it the more sincere of the two; and no praise so much
elates me, as censure depresses.”
