EREWHON 
 REVISITED 
 
I 
 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 The Glenn Negley Collection 
 of Utopian Literature 
 
t 
 
 s 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2010 with funding from 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/erewhonrevisite01butl 
 
; i 
 
 EREWHON REVISITED 
 
 'Ex#/>os Tfip M ot Kewot o/j.u)s 'Atdao wu\r]criy 
 "os x' (Tepov jxkv Keudy ivl (ppealv, &\\o o£ dvr]' 
 
 Him do I hate even as I hate Hell fire, 
 
 Who says one thing, and hides another in his heart. 
 
 — Iliad, ix. 312, 313 
 
By the same Author 
 
 EREWHON 
 
 NINTH EDITION 
 
 6s. 
 
 This Edition has been entirely 
 revised, and has been reset with 
 much fresh matter in new type. 
 
Erewhon 
 
 Revisited 
 
 TWENTY YEARS LATER 
 
 Both by the Original Discoverer of 
 the Country and by his Son 
 
 BY 
 
 SAMUEL BUTLER 
 
 LONDON 
 
 GRANT RICHARDS 
 
 1901 
 
Printed by Rallan tynk, Hanson <Sr> Co. 
 At the Rallanlyne Pre* 
 
133 <?& 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 / forget when, but not very long after I had published 
 " Erewhon" in 1872, it occurred to me to ask my- 
 self what course events in Erewhon would probably take 
 after Mr. Higgs, as I suppose I may novo call him, had 
 made his escape in the balloon with Arowhena. Given 
 a people in the conditions supposed to exist in Erewhon, 
 and given the apparently miraculous ascent of a remark- 
 able stranger into the heavens with an earthly bride — 
 what would be the effect on the people generally ? 
 
 There was no use in trying to solve this problem 
 before, say, twenty years should have given time for 
 Erewhonian developments to assume something like per- 
 manent shape, and in 1892 / was too busy with books 
 now published to be able to attend to Erewhon. It was 
 not till the early winter of 1900, i.e. as nearly as may 
 be thirty years after the date of Higgs s escape, that I 
 found time to deal with the question above stated, and to 
 answer it, according to my lights, in the book which I 
 now lay before the public. 
 
 I have concluded, I believe rightly, that the events 
 described in Chapter XXIV. of " Erewhon " would give 
 rise to such a cataclysmic change in the old Erewhonian 
 opinions as would result in the development of a new 
 
Preface 
 
 religion. Now the development of all new religions 
 follows much the same general course. In all cases the 
 times are more or less out of joint — older faiths are 
 losing their hold upon the masses. At such times, let a 
 personality appear, strong in itself, and made to seem 
 still stronger by association with some supposed tran- 
 scendent miracle, and it will be easy to raise a Lo here ! 
 that will attract many followers. If there be a single 
 great, and apparently well-authenticated, miracle, others 
 tvill accrete round it; then, in all religions that have so 
 originated, there will follow temples, priests, rites, sincere 
 believers, and unscrupidous exploiters of public credulity. 
 To chronicle the events that followed Higgs's balloon 
 ascent without shewing that they were much as they have 
 been under like conditions in other places, would be to 
 hold the mirror up to something very wide of nature. 
 
 Analogy, however, between courses of events is one 
 thing — historic parallelisms abound ; analogy between 
 the main actors in events is a very different one, and one, 
 moreover, of which few examples can be found. The 
 development of the new ideas in Ercwhon is a familiar 
 one, but there is no more likeness between Higgs and 
 the founder of any other religion, than there is between 
 fesus Christ and Mahomet. He is a typical middle- 
 class Englishman, deeply tainted with priggishness in 
 his earlier years, but in great part freed from it by the 
 sweet uses of adversity. 
 
 If I may be allowed for a moment to speak about 
 myself, I would say that I have never ceased to profess 
 
Preface 
 
 myself a member of the more advanced wing o the 
 English Broad Church. What those who belong to this 
 wing believe, I believe. What they reject, I reject. No 
 two people think absolutely alike on any subject, but when 
 I converse with advanced Broad Churchmen I find my- 
 self in substantial harmony vrith them. I believe — and 
 should be very sorry if I did not believe — that, mutatis 
 mutandis, such men will find the advice given on pp. 
 277-281 and 287—291 of this book much what, under 
 the supposed circumstances, they would themselves give. 
 
 Lastly, I should express my great obligations to Mr. 
 R. A. Streatfcild of the British Museum, who, in 
 the absence from England of my friend Mr. H. Festing 
 fones, has kindly supervised the corrections of my book 
 as it passed through the press. 
 
 SAMUEL BUTLER. 
 
 May i, 1901. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. Up s and downs of Fortune— My father starts for 
 
 Erewhon • I 
 
 II. To the foot of the pass into Erewhon . . .18 
 
 III. My father while camping is accosted by Professors 
 
 Hanky and Panky 2 5 
 
 IV. My father overhears more of Hanky and Panky 's 
 
 conversation 39 
 
 V. My father meets a son, of whose existence he was 
 
 ignorant, and strikes a bargain with him . . 55 
 VI. Further conversation between father and son — The 
 
 Professors* hoard ...... 68 
 
 VII. Signs of the new order of things catch my father's 
 
 eye on every side ....... 77 
 
 VIII. Yram, now Mayoress, gives a dinner-party, in the 
 couise of which she is disquieted by what she 
 learns frotn Professor Hanky : site sends for her 
 son George and questions him .... 88 
 
 IX. Interview between Yram and her son . . .103 
 X. My father, fearing recognition at Sunch'ston, be- 
 takes himself to the neighbouring town of Fair- 
 mead . . ! 1 4 
 
 XI. President Gurgoyle's pamphlet " On the Physics 
 
 of Vicarious Existence' 1 '' 12; 
 
Contents 
 
 XII. George fails to find my fat he?; whereon Yram 
 
 cautions the Professors 141 
 
 XIII. A visit to the Provincial Deformatory at Fair- 
 
 mead . . . . . . . . 1 53 
 
 XIV. My father makes the acquaintance of Mr. Balmy, 
 
 and walks with him next day to Suncliston . 1 63 
 XV. The temple is dedicated to 7ny father, and certain 
 
 extracts are read from his supposed sayings . 180 
 XVI. Professor Hanky preaches a sermon, in the course 
 of which my father declares himself to be the 
 Sunchild . . . . . . . .196 
 
 XVII. George takes his father to prison, and there obtains 
 
 some useful i?iformation . . . . .212 
 
 XVIII. Yram invites Dr. Downie and Mrs. Humdrum 
 to hmcheon — A passage at arms between her 
 and Hanky is amicably arranged . . . 222 
 XIX. A council is held at the Mayor's, in the course 
 of which George turns the tables on the Pro- 
 fessors ........ 227 
 
 XX. Mrs. Humdrum and Dr. Downie propose a com- 
 promise, which, after an amendment by George, 
 
 is carried nem. con 238 
 
 XXI. Yram, on getting rid of her guests, goes to the 
 
 prison to see my father . . . . -245 
 XXII. Mainly occupied with a veracious extract from 
 
 a Sunch'stonian Journal . . . . -255 
 XXIII. My father is escorted to the Mayor's house, 
 and is introduced to a future daughter-in- 
 law 267 
 
Contents 
 
 XXIV. After dinner, Dr. Downie and the Professors 
 would be glad to know what is to be done 
 about Sunchildism . . . . . .275 
 
 XXV. George escorts my father to the statues ; the two 
 
 then part ....... 285 
 
 XXVI. My father reaches home, and dies not long 
 
 afterwards 297 
 
 XXVII. / meet my brother George at the statues, on the 
 
 top of the pass into Erewhon .... 304 
 XXVI 1 1. George and I spend a few hours together at the 
 statues, and then part — / reach home — Post- 
 script ........ 320 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 UPS AND DOWNS OF FORTUNE — MY FATHER 
 STARTS FOR EREWHON 
 
 Before telling the story of my father's second 
 visit to the remarkable country which he discovered 
 now some thirty years since, I should perhaps say 
 a few words about his career between the publi- 
 cation of his book in 1872, and his death in the 
 early summer of 1891. I shall thus touch briefly 
 on the causes that occasioned his failure to main- 
 tain that hold on the public which he had appar- 
 ently secured at first. 
 
 His book, as the reader may perhaps know, was 
 published anonymously, and my poor father used 
 to ascribe the acclamation with which it was 
 received, to the fact that no one knew who it 
 might not have been written by. Omne ignotum 
 pro magnifico, and during its month of anonymity 
 the book was a frequent topic of appreciative 
 comment in good literary circles. Almost coin- 
 cidently with the discovery that he was a mere 
 nobody, people began to feel that their admiration 
 
 A 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 had been too hastily bestowed, and before long 
 opinion turned all the more seriously against him 
 for this very reason. The subscription, to which 
 the Lord Mayor had at first given his cordial 
 support, was curtly announced as closed before it 
 had been opened a week ; it had met with so little 
 success that I will not specify the amount eventually 
 handed over, not without protest, to my father ; 
 small, however, as it was, he narrowly escaped 
 being prosecuted for trying to obtain money under 
 false pretences. 
 
 The Geographical Society, which had for a few 
 days received him with open arms, was among the 
 first to turn upon him — not, so far as I can ascer- 
 tain, on account of the mystery in which he had 
 enshrouded the exact whereabouts of Erewhon, 
 nor yet by reason of its being persistently alleged 
 that he was subject to frequent attacks of alcoholic 
 poisoning — but through his own want of tact, and 
 a highly-strung nervous state, which led him to 
 attach too much importance to his own discoveries, 
 and not enough to those of other people. This, 
 at least, was my father's version of the matter, as 
 I heard it from his own lips in the later years of 
 his life. 
 
 " I was still very young," he said to me, " and 
 my mind was more or less unhinged by the 
 strangeness and peril of my adventures." Be this 
 as it may, I fear there is no doubt that he was 
 injudicious; and an ounce of judgement is worth 
 a pound of discovery. 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 Hence, in a surprisingly short time, he found 
 himself dropped even by those who had taken 
 him up most warmly, and had done most to find 
 him that employment as a writer of religious tracts 
 on which his livelihood was then dependent. The 
 discredit, however, into which my father fell, had 
 the effect of deterring any considerable number 
 of people from trying to rediscover Erewhon, and 
 thus caused it to remain as unknown to geogra- 
 phers in general as though it had never been 
 found. A few shepherds and cadets at up-country 
 stations had, indeed, tried to follow in my father's 
 footsteps, during the time when his book was still 
 being taken seriously ; but they had most of them 
 returned, unable to face the difficulties that had 
 opposed them. Some few, however, had not re- 
 turned, and though search was made for them, 
 their bodies had not been found. When he 
 reached Erewhon on his second visit, my father 
 learned that others had attempted to visit the 
 country more recently — probably quite indepen- 
 dently of his own book ; and before he had him- 
 self been in it many hours he gathered what the 
 fate of these poor fellows doubtless was. 
 
 Another reason that made it more easy for 
 Erewhon to remain unknown, was the fact that 
 the more mountainous districts, though repeatedly 
 prospected for gold, had been pronounced non- 
 auriferous, and as there was no sheep or cattle 
 country, save a few river-bed flats above the upper 
 gorges of any of the rivers, and no game to tempt 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the sportsman, there was nothing to induce people 
 to penetrate into the fastnesses of the great snowy 
 range. No more, therefore, being heard of Ere- 
 whon, my father's book came to be regarded as 
 a mere work of fiction, and I have heard quite 
 recently of its having been seen on a second-hand 
 bookstall, marked " 6d. very readable." 
 
 Though there was no truth in the stories about 
 my father's being subject to attacks of alcoholic 
 poisoning, yet, during the first few years after his 
 return to England, his occasional fits of ungovern- 
 able excitement gave some colour to the opinion 
 that much of what he said he had seen and done 
 might be only subjectively true. I refer more 
 particularly to his interview with Chowbok in the 
 wool-shed, and his highly coloured description of 
 the statues on the top of the pass leading into 
 Erewhon. These were soon set down as forgeries 
 of delirium, and it was maliciously urged, that 
 though in his book he had only admitted having 
 taken "two or three bottles of brandy" with him, 
 he had probably taken at least a dozen ; and that 
 if on the night before he reached the statues he 
 had "only four ounces of brandy" left, he must 
 have been drinking heavily for the preceding fort- 
 night or three weeks. Those who read the follow- 
 ing pages will, I think, reject all idea that my father 
 was in a state of delirium, not without surprise 
 that any one should have ever entertained it. 
 
 It was Chowbok who, if he did not originate 
 these calumnies, did much to disseminate and 
 
 4 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 gain credence for them. He remained in England 
 for some years, and never tired of doing what he 
 could to disparage my father. The cunning crea- 
 ture had ingratiated himself with our leading reli- 
 gious societies, especially with the more evangelical 
 among them. Whatever doubt there might be 
 about his sincerity, there was none about his 
 colour, and a coloured convert in those days was 
 more than Exeter Hall could resist. Chowbok 
 saw that there was no room for him and for my 
 father, and declared my poor father's story to be 
 almost wholly false. It was true, he said, that he 
 and my father had explored the head-waters of 
 the river described in his book, but he denied that 
 my father had gone on without him, and he named 
 the river as one distant by many thousands of miles 
 from the one it really was. He said that after 
 about a fortnight he had returned in company with 
 my father, who by that time had become incapa- 
 citated for further travel. At this point he would 
 shrug his shoulders, look mysterious, and thus say 
 "alcoholic poisoning" even more effectively than 
 if he had uttered the words themselves. For a 
 man's tongue lies often in his shoulders. 
 
 Readers of my father's book will remember that 
 Chowbok had given a very different version when 
 he had returned to his employer's station ; but 
 Time and Distance afford cover under which false- 
 hood can often do truth to death securely. 
 
 I never understood why my father did not bring 
 my mother forward to confirm his story. He may 
 
 5 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 have done so while I was too young to know 
 anything about it. But when people have made 
 up their minds, they are impatient of further 
 evidence ; my mother, moreover, was of a very 
 retiring disposition. The Italians say : — 
 
 " Chi lontano va ammogliare 
 Sara ingannato, o vorra ingannare." 
 
 " If a man goes far afield for a wife, he will be 
 deceived — or means deceiving." The proverb is 
 as true for women as for men, and my mother 
 was never quite happy in her new surroundings. 
 Wilfully deceived she assuredly was not, but she 
 could not accustom herself to English modes of 
 thought ; indeed she never even nearly mastered 
 our language ; my father always talked with her 
 in Erewhonian, and so did I, for as a child she 
 had taught me to do so, and I was as fluent with 
 her language as with my father's. In this respect 
 she often told me I could pass myself off anywhere 
 in Erewhon as a native ; I shared also her personal 
 appearance, for though not wholly unlike my 
 father, I had taken more closely after my mother. 
 In mind, if I may venture to say so, I believe I 
 was more like my father. 
 
 I may as well here inform the reader that I 
 was born at the end of September 1871, and was 
 christened John, after my grandfather. From what 
 I have said above he will readily believe that 
 my earliest experiences were somewhat squalid. 
 Memories of childhood rush vividly upon me when 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 I pass through a low London alley, and catch the 
 faint sickly smell that pervades it — half paraffin, 
 half black-currants, but wholly something very 
 different. I have a fancy that we lived in Black- 
 moor Street, off Drury Lane. My father, when 
 first I knew of his doing anything at all, supported 
 my mother and myself by drawing pictures with 
 coloured chalks upon the pavement ; I used some- 
 times to watch him, and marvel at the skill with 
 which he represented fogs, floods, and fires. These 
 three " f's," he would say, were his three best friends, 
 for they were easy to do and brought in halfpence 
 freely. The return of the dove to the ark was his 
 favourite subject. Such a little ark, on such a hazy 
 morning, and such a little pigeon — the rest of the 
 picture being cheap sky, and still cheaper sea ; 
 nothing, I have often heard him say, was more 
 popular than this with his clients. He held it to 
 be his masterpiece, but would add with some 
 naivete that he considered himself a public bene- 
 factor for carrying it out in such perishable fashion. 
 u At any rate," he would say, " no one can bequeath 
 one of my many replicas to the nation." 
 
 I never learned how much my father earned by 
 his profession, but it must have been something 
 considerable, for we always had enough to eat and 
 drink ; I imagine that he did better than many a 
 struggling artist with more ambitious aims. He 
 was strictly temperate during all the time that I 
 knew anything about him, but he was not a tee- 
 totaler ; I never saw any of the fits of nervous 
 
 7 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 excitement which in his earlier years had done so 
 much to wreck him. In the evenings, and on days 
 when the state of the pavement did not permit him 
 to work, he took great pains with my education, 
 which he could very well do, for as a boy he had 
 been in the sixth form of one of our foremost 
 public schools. I found him a patient, kindly in- 
 structor, while to my mother he was a model 
 husband. Whatever others may have said about 
 him, I can never think of him without very affec- 
 tionate respect. 
 
 Things went on quietly enough, as above indi- 
 cated, till I was about fourteen, when by a freak of 
 fortune my father became suddenly affluent. A 
 brother of his father's had emigrated to Australia 
 in 185 1, and had amassed great wealth. We knew 
 of his existence, but there had been no intercourse 
 between him and my father, and we did not even 
 know that he was rich and unmarried. He died 
 intestate towards the end of 1885, and my father 
 was the only relative he had, except, of course, my- 
 self, for both my father's sisters had died young, 
 and without leaving children. 
 
 The solicitor through whom the news reached us 
 was, happily, a man of the highest integrity, and also 
 very sensible and kind. He was a Mr. Alfred Emery 
 Cathie, of 15 Clifford's Inn, E.C., and my father 
 placed himself unreservedly in his hands. I was at 
 once sent to a first-rate school, and such pains had 
 my father taken with me that I was placed in a 
 higher form than might have been expected con- 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 sidering my age. The way in which he had taught 
 me had prevented my feeling any dislike for study ; 
 I therefore stuck fairly well to my books, while not 
 neglecting the games which are so important a part 
 of healthy education. Everything went w r ell with 
 me, both as regards masters and school-fellows ; 
 nevertheless, I was declared to be of a highly ner- 
 vous and imaginative temperament, and the school 
 doctor more than once urged our headmaster not 
 to push me forward too rapidly — for which I have 
 ever since held myself his debtor. 
 
 Early in 1890, I being then home from Oxford 
 (where I had been entered in the preceding year), 
 my mother died ; not so much from active illness, 
 as from what was in reality a kind of maladie du 
 pays. All along she had felt herself an exile, and 
 though she had borne up wonderfully during my 
 father's long struggle with adversity, she began to 
 break as soon as prosperity had removed the 
 necessity for exertion on her own part. 
 
 My father could never divest himself of the feeling 
 that he had wrecked her life by inducing her to 
 share her lot with his own ; to say that he was 
 stricken with remorse on losing her is not enough ; 
 he had been so stricken almost from the first year 
 of his marriage ; on her death he was haunted by 
 the wrong he accused himself — as it seems to me 
 very unjustly — of having done her, for it was neither 
 his fault nor hers — it was Ate. 
 
 His unrest soon assumed the form of a burning 
 
 desire to revisit the country in which he and my 
 
 9 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 mother had been happier together than perhaps 
 they ever again were. I had often heard him betray 
 a hankering after a return to Erewhon, disguised so 
 that no one should recognise him ; but as long as 
 my mother lived he would not leave her. When 
 death had taken her from him, he so evidently stood 
 in need of a complete change of scene, that even 
 those friends who had most strongly dissuaded him 
 from what they deemed a madcap enterprise, 
 thought it better to leave him to himself. It would 
 have mattered little how much they tried to dissuade 
 him, for before long his passionate longing for the 
 journey became so overmastering that nothing short 
 of restraint in prison or a madhouse could have 
 stayed his going ; but we were not easy about him. 
 
 " He had better go," said Mr. Cathie to me, when 
 I was at home for the Easter vacation, "and get it 
 over. He is not well, but he is still in the prime of 
 life ; doubtless he will come back with renewed 
 health and will settle down to a quiet home life 
 again." 
 
 This, however, was not said till it had become 
 plain that in a few days my father would be on his 
 way. He had made a new will, and left an ample 
 power of attorney with Mr. Cathie — or, as we 
 always called him, Alfred — who was to supply me 
 with whatever money I wanted ; he had put all 
 other matters in order in case anything should 
 happen to prevent his ever returning, and he set 
 out on October i, 1890, more composed and cheer- 
 ful than I had seen him for some time past. 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 I had not realised how serious the danger to my 
 father would be if he were recognised while he was 
 in Erewhon, for I am ashamed to say that I had not 
 yet read his book. I had heard over and over again 
 of his flight with my mother in the balloon, and had 
 long since read his few opening chapters, but I had 
 found, as a boy naturally would, that the succeed- 
 ing pages were a little dull, and soon put the book 
 aside. My father, indeed, repeatedly urged me not 
 to read it, for he said there was much in it — more 
 especially in the earlier chapters, which I had alone 
 found interesting — that he would gladly cancel if 
 he could. " But there ! " he had said with a laugh, 
 11 what does it matter ? " 
 
 He had hardly left, before I read his book from 
 end to end, and, on having done so, not only ap- 
 preciated the risks that he would have to run, but 
 was struck with the wide difference between his 
 character as he had himself portrayed it, and the 
 estimate I had formed of it from personal know- 
 ledge. When, on his return, he detailed to me his 
 adventures, the account he gave of what he had 
 said and done corresponded with my own ideas 
 concerning him ; but I doubt not the reader will 
 see that the twenty years between his first and 
 second visit had modified him even more than so 
 long an interval might be expected to do. 
 
 I heard from him repeatedly during the first two 
 months of his absence, and was surprised to rind 
 that he had stayed for a week or ten days at more 
 than one place of call on his outward journey. On 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 November 26 he wrote from the port whence he 
 was to start for Erewhon, seemingly in good health 
 and spirits ; and on December 27, 1891, he tele- 
 graphed for a hundred pounds to be wired out to 
 him at this same port. This puzzled both Mr. 
 Cathie and myself, for the interval between Novem- 
 ber 26 and December 27 seemed too short to admit 
 of his having paid his visit to Erewhon and returned ; 
 as, moreover, he had added the words, " Coming 
 home," we rather hoped that he had abandoned his 
 intention of going there. 
 
 We were also surprised at his wanting so much 
 money, for he had taken a hundred pounds in gold, 
 which, from some fancy, he had stowed in a small 
 silver jewel-box that he had given my mother not 
 long before she died. He had also taken a hundred 
 pounds worth of gold nuggets, which he had in- 
 tended to sell in Erewhon so as to provide himself 
 with money when he got there. 
 
 I should explain that these nuggets would be 
 worth in Erewhon fully ten times as much as 
 they would in Europe, owing to the great scarcity 
 of gold in that country. The Erewhonian coinage 
 is entirely silver — which is abundant, and worth 
 much what it is in England — or copper, which is 
 also plentiful ; but what we should call five pounds' 
 worth of silver money would not buy more than 
 one of our half-sovereigns in gold. 
 
 He had put his nuggets into ten brown holland 
 bags, and he had had secret pockets made for the 
 old Erewhonian dress which he had worn when he 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 escaped, so that he need never have more than one 
 bag of nuggets accessible at a time. He was not 
 likely, therefore, to have been robbed. His passage 
 to the port above referred to had been paid before 
 he started, and it seemed impossible that a man of 
 his very inexpensive habits should have spent two 
 hundred pounds in a single month — for the nuggets 
 would be immediately convertible in an English 
 colony. There was nothing, however, to be done but 
 to cable out the money and wait my father's arrival. 
 Returning for a moment to my father's old Ere- 
 whonian dress, I should say that he had preserved 
 it simply as a memento and without any idea that 
 he should again want it. It was not the court dress 
 that had been provided for him on the occasion of 
 his visit to the king and queen, but the everyday 
 clothing that he had been ordered to wear when he 
 was put in prison, though his English coat, waist- 
 coat, and trousers had been allowed to remain in 
 his own possession. These, I had seen from his 
 book, had been presented by him to the queen (with 
 the exception of two buttons, which he had given 
 to Yram as a keepsake), and had been preserved 
 by her displayed upon a wooden dummy. The dress 
 in which he escaped had been soiled during the 
 hours that he and my mother had been in the sea, 
 and had also suffered from neglect during the years 
 of his poverty; but he wished to pass himself off as 
 a common peasant or working-man, so he preferred 
 to have it set in order as might best be done, rather 
 
 than copied. 
 
 13 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 So cautious was he in the matter of dress that he 
 took with him the boots he had worn on leaving 
 Erewhon, lest the foreign make of his English boots 
 should arouse suspicion. They were nearly new, 
 and when he had had them softened and well 
 greased, he found he could still wear them quite 
 comfortably. 
 
 But to return. He reached home late at night 
 one day at the beginning of February, and a glance 
 was enough to show that he was an altered man. 
 
 " What is the matter ? " said I, shocked at his 
 appearance. " Did you go to Erewhon, and were 
 you ill-treated there ? " 
 
 " I went to Erewhon," he said, " and I was not 
 ill-treated there, but I have been so shaken that 
 I fear I shall quite lose my reason. Do not ask 
 me more now. I will tell you about it all to- 
 morrow. Let me have something to eat, and go 
 to bed." 
 
 When we met at breakfast next morning, he 
 greeted me with all his usual warmth of affection, 
 but he was still taciturn. " I will begin to tell 
 you about it," he said, "after breakfast. Where 
 is your dear mother ? How was it that I have . . ." 
 
 Then of a sudden his memory returned, and he 
 burst into tears. 
 
 I now saw, to my horror, that his mind was gone. 
 When he recovered, he said : u It has all come 
 back again, but at times now I am a blank, and 
 every week am more and more so. I daresay I 
 shall be sensible now for several hours. We will 
 
 14 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 go into the study after breakfast, and I will talk 
 to you as long as I can do so." 
 
 Let the reader spare me, and let me spare the 
 reader any description of what we both of us felt. 
 
 When we were in the study, my father said, 
 " My dearest boy, get pen and paper and take 
 notes of what I tell you. It will be all dis- 
 jointed ; one day I shall remember this, and 
 another that, but there will not be many more days 
 on which I shall remember anything at all. I 
 cannot write a coherent page. You, when I am 
 gone, can piece what I tell you together, and tell 
 it as I should have told it if I had been still sound. 
 But do not publish it yet ; it might do harm to 
 those dear good people. Take the notes now, 
 and arrange them the sooner the better, for you 
 may want to ask me questions, and I shall not be 
 here much longer. Let publishing wait till you 
 are confident that publication can do no harm ; 
 and above all, say nothing to betray the where- 
 abouts of Erewhon, beyond admitting (which I 
 fear I have already done) that it is in the Southern 
 hemisphere." 
 
 These instructions I have religiously obeyed. 
 For the first days after his return, my father had 
 few attacks of loss of memory, and I was in hopes 
 that his former health of mind would return when 
 he found himself in his old surroundings. During 
 these days he poured forth the story of his adven- 
 tures so fast, that if I had not had a fancy for 
 acquiring shorthand, I should not have been able 
 
 15 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 to keep pace with him. I repeatedly urged him 
 not to overtax his strength, but he was oppressed 
 by the fear that if he did not speak at once, he 
 might never be able to tell me all he had to say ; 
 I had, therefore, to submit, though seeing plainly 
 enough that he was only hastening the complete 
 paralysis which he so greatly feared. 
 
 Sometimes his narrative would be coherent for 
 pages together, and he could answer any questions 
 without hesitation ; at others, he was now here and 
 now there, and if I tried to keep him to the order of 
 events he would say that he had forgotten inter- 
 mediate incidents, but that they would probably 
 come back to him, and I should perhaps be able to 
 put them in their proper places. 
 
 After about ten days he seemed satisfied that I 
 had got all the facts, and that with the help of the 
 pamphlets which he had brought with him I should 
 be able to make out a connected story. " Remem- 
 ber," he said, " that I thought I was quite well so 
 long as I was in Erewhon, and do not let me appear 
 as anything else." 
 
 When he had fully delivered himself, he seemed 
 easier in his mind, but before a month had passed 
 he became completely paralysed, and though he 
 lingered till the beginning of June, he was seldom 
 more than dimly conscious of what was going on 
 around him. 
 
 His death robbed me of one who had been a very 
 kind and upright elder brother rather than a father ; 
 and so strongly have I felt his influence still pre- 
 
 16 
 
Ups and Downs 
 
 sent, living and working, as I believe for better 
 within me, that I did not hesitate to copy the 
 epitaph which he saw in the Musical Bank at Fair- 
 mead,* and to have it inscribed on the very simple 
 monument which he desired should alone mark his 
 grave. 
 
 The foregoing was written in the summer of 
 1891 ; what I now add should be dated December 3, 
 1900. If, in the course of my work, I have misre- 
 presented my father, as I fear I may have sometimes 
 done, I would ask my readers to remember that no 
 man can tell another's story without some involun- 
 tary misrepresentation both of facts and characters. 
 They will, of course, see that " Erewhon Revisited" 
 is written by one who has far less literary skill than 
 the author of "Erewhon;" but again I would ask 
 indulgence on the score of youth, and the fact that 
 this is my first book. It was written nearly ten 
 years ago, i.e. in the months from March to August 
 1891, but for reasons already given it could not 
 then be made public. I have now received permis- 
 sion, and therefore publish the following chapters, 
 exactly, or very nearly exactly, as they were left 
 when I had finished editing my father's diaries, and 
 the notes I took down from his own mouth — with 
 the exception, of course, of these last few lines, 
 hurriedly written as I am on the point of leaving 
 England, of the additions I made in 1892, on return- 
 ing from my own three hours' stay in Erewhon, and 
 of the Postscript. 
 
 * See Chapter X. 
 
 17 B 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 TO THE FOOT OF THE PASS INTO EREWHON 
 
 When my father reached the colony for which 
 he had left England some twenty-two years pre- 
 viously, he bought a horse, and started up country 
 on the evening of the day after his arrival, which 
 was, as I have said, on one of the last days of 
 November 1890. He had taken an English saddle 
 with him, and a couple of roomy and strongly 
 made saddle-bags. In these he packed his money, 
 his nuggets, some tea, sugar, tobacco, salt, a flask 
 of brandy, matches, and as many ship's biscuits 
 as he thought he was likely to want ; he took no 
 meat, for he could supply himself from some 
 accommodation - house or sheep - station, when 
 nearing the point after which he would have to 
 begin camping out. He rolled his Erewhonian 
 dress and small toilette necessaries inside a warm 
 red blanket, and strapped the roll on to the front 
 part of his saddle. On to other D's, with which 
 his saddle was amply provided, he strapped his 
 Erewhonian boots, a tin pannikin, and a billy that 
 would hold about a quart. I should, perhaps, ex- 
 plain to English readers that a billy is a tin can, 
 the name for which (doubtless of French Canadian 
 
 origin) is derived from the words "faire bouillir." 
 
 iS 
 
To the Pass 
 
 He also took with him a pair of hobbles and a 
 small hatchet. 
 
 He spent three whole days in riding across the 
 plains, and was struck with the very small signs 
 of change that he could detect, but the fall in 
 wool, and the failure, so far, to establish a frozen 
 meat trade, had prevented any material develop- 
 ment of the resources of the country. When he 
 had got to the front ranges, he followed up the 
 river next to the north of the one that he had 
 explored years ago, and from the head waters of 
 which he had been led to discover the only practi- 
 cable pass into Erewhon. He did this, partly to 
 avoid the terribly dangerous descent on to the 
 bed of the more northern river, and partly to 
 escape being seen by shepherds or bullock-drivers 
 who might remember him. 
 
 If he had attempted to get through the gorge 
 of this river in 1870, he would have found it 
 impassable ; but a few river-bed flats had been 
 discovered above the gorge, on which there was 
 now a shepherd's hut, and on the discovery of 
 these flats a narrow horse track had been made 
 from one end of the gorge to the other. 
 
 He was hospitably entertained at the shepherd's 
 hut just mentioned, which he reached on Monday, 
 December 1. He told the shepherd in charge of it 
 that he had come to see if he could find traces 
 of a large wingless bird, whose existence had been 
 reported as having been discovered among the 
 extreme head waters of the river. 
 
 19 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 "Be careful, sir," said the shepherd; "the river 
 is very dangerous ; several people — one only about 
 a year ago — have left this hut, and though their 
 horses and their camps have been found, their 
 bodies have not. When a great fresh comes down, 
 it would carry a body out to sea in twenty-four 
 hours." 
 
 He evidently had no idea that there was a pass 
 through the ranges up the river, which might ex- 
 plain the disappearance of an explorer. 
 
 Next day my father began to ascend the river. 
 There was so much tangled growth still unburnt 
 wherever there was room for it to grow, and so 
 much swamp, that my father had to keep almost 
 entirely to the river-bed — and here there was a 
 good deal of quicksand. The stones also were 
 often large for some distance together, and he had 
 to cross and recross streams of the river more than 
 once, so that though he travelled all day with the 
 exception of a couple of hours for dinner, he had 
 not made more than some five and twenty miles 
 when he reached a suitable camping ground, where 
 he unsaddled his horse, hobbled him, and turned 
 him out to feed. The grass was beginning to seed, 
 so that though it was none too plentiful, what there 
 was of it made excellent feed. 
 
 He lit his fire, made himself some tea, ate his 
 cold mutton and biscuits, and lit his pipe, exactly 
 as he had done twenty years before. There was the 
 clear starlit sky, the rushing river, and the stunted 
 trees on the mountain-side ; the woodhens cried, 
 
To the Pass 
 
 and the "more-pork" hooted out her two mono- 
 tonous notes exactly as they had done years since ; 
 one moment, and time had so flown backwards that 
 youth came bounding back to him with the return 
 of his youth's surroundings ; the next, and the in- 
 tervening twenty years — most of them grim ones — 
 rose up mockingly before him, and the buoyancy 
 of hope yielded to the despondency of admitted 
 failure. By and by buoyancy reasserted itself, and, 
 soothed by the peace and beauty of the night, he 
 wrapped himself up in his blanket and dropped off 
 into a dreamless slumber. 
 
 Next morning, i.e. December 3, he rose soon 
 after dawn, bathed in a backwater of the river, got 
 his breakfast, found his horse on the river-bed, and 
 started as soon as he had duly packed and loaded. 
 He had now to cross streams of the river and 
 recross them more often than on the preceding 
 day, and this, though his horse took well to the 
 water, required care ; for he was anxious not to 
 wet his saddle-bags, and it was only by crossing 
 at the wide, smooth, water above a rapid, and by 
 picking places where the river ran in two or three 
 streams, that he could find fords where his practised 
 eye told him that the water would not be above his 
 horse's belly — for the river was of great volume. 
 Fortunately, there had been a late fall of snow on 
 the higher ranges, and the river was, for the summer 
 season, low. 
 
 Towards evening, having travelled, so far as he 
 could guess, some twenty or five and twenty miles 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 (for he had made another mid day halt), he reached 
 the place, which he easily recognised, as that where 
 he had camped before crossing to the pass that led 
 into Erewhon. It was the last piece of ground that 
 could be called a flat (though it was in reality only 
 the sloping delta of a stream that descended from 
 the pass) before reaching a large glacier that had 
 encroached on the river-bed, which it traversed at 
 right angles for a considerable distance. 
 
 Here he again camped, hobbled his horse, and 
 turned him adrift, hoping that he might again find 
 him some two or three months hence, for there was 
 a good deal of sweet grass here and there, with sow- 
 thistle and anise; and the coarse tussock grass would 
 be in full seed shortly, which alone would keep him 
 going for as long a time as my father expected to be 
 away. Little did he think that he should want him 
 again so shortly. 
 
 Having attended to his horse, he got his supper, 
 and while smoking his pipe congratulated himself 
 on the way in which something had smoothed away 
 all the obstacles that had so nearly baffled him on 
 his earlier journey. Was he being lured on to his 
 destruction by some malicious fiend, or befriended 
 by one who had compassion on him and wished 
 him well ? His naturally sanguine temperament 
 inclined him to adopt the friendly spirit theory, in 
 the peace of which he again laid himself down to 
 rest, and slept soundly from dark till dawn. 
 
 In the morning, though the water was somewhat 
 icy, he again bathed, and then put on his Erewhonian 
 
To the Pass 
 
 boots and dress. He stowed his European clothes, 
 with some difficulty, into his saddle-bags. Herein 
 also he left his case full of English sovereigns, his 
 spare pipes, his purse, which contained two pounds 
 in gold and seven or eight shillings, part of his stock 
 of tobacco, and whatever provision was left him, 
 except the meat — which he left for sundry hawks 
 and parrots that were eyeing his proceedings appa- 
 rently without fear of man. His nuggets he con- 
 cealed in the secret pockets of which I have already 
 spoken, keeping one bag alone accessible. 
 
 He had had his hair and beard cut short on ship- 
 board the day before he landed. These he now 
 dyed with a dye that he had brought from England, 
 and which in a few minutes turned them very nearly 
 black. He also stained his face and hands deep 
 brown. He hung his saddle and bridle, his English 
 boots, and his saddle-bags on the highest bough 
 that he could reach, and made them fairly fast with 
 strips of flax leaf, for there was some stunted flax 
 growing on the ground where he had camped. He 
 feared that, do what he might, they would not escape 
 the inquisitive thievishness of the parrots, whose 
 strong beaks could easily cut leather ; but he could 
 do nothing more. It occurs to me, though my 
 father never told me so, that it was perhaps with a 
 view to these birds that he had chosen to put his 
 English sovereigns into a metal box, with a clasp to 
 it which would defy them. 
 
 He made a roll of his blanket, and slung it over 
 his shoulder ; he also took his pipe, tobacco, a 
 
 23 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 little tea, a few ship's biscuits, and his billy and 
 pannikin ; matches and salt go without saying. 
 When he had thus ordered everything as nearly 
 to his satisfaction as he could, he looked at his 
 watch for the last time, as he believed, till many 
 weeks should have gone by, and found it to be 
 about seven o'clock. Remembering what trouble 
 it had got him into years before, he took down his 
 saddle-bags, reopened them, and put the watch 
 inside. He then set himself to climb the moun- 
 tain side, towards the saddle on which he had seen 
 the statues. 
 
 24 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MY FATHER WHILE CAMPING IS ACCOSTED 
 BY PROFESSORS HANKY AND PANKY 
 
 My father found the ascent more fatiguing than 
 he remembered it to have been. The climb, he 
 said, was steady, and took him between four and 
 five hours, as near as he could guess, now that he 
 had no watch ; but it offered nothing that could 
 be called a difficulty, and the watercourse that 
 came down from the saddle was a sufficient guide ; 
 once or twice there were waterfalls, but they did 
 not seriously delay him. 
 
 After he had climbed some three thousand feet, 
 he began to be on the alert for some sound of 
 ghostly chanting from the statues ; but he heard 
 nothing, and toiled on till he came to a sprinkling 
 of fresh snow — part of the fall which he had 
 observed on the preceding day as having whitened 
 the higher mountains ; he knew, therefore, that 
 he must now be nearing the saddle. The snow 
 grew rapidly deeper, and by the time he reached 
 the statues the ground was covered to a depth of 
 two or three inches. 
 
 He found the statues smaller than he had ex- 
 pected. He had said in his book — written many 
 months after he had seen them— that they were 
 
 25 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 about six times the size of life, but he now thought 
 that four or five times would have been enough to 
 say. Their mouths were much clogged with snow, 
 so that even though there had been a strong wind 
 (which there was not) they would not have chanted. 
 In other respects he found them not less mysteri- 
 ously impressive than at first. He walked two or 
 three times all round them, and then went on. 
 
 The snow did not continue far down, but before 
 long my father entered a thick bank of cloud, and 
 had to feel his way cautiously along the stream 
 that descended from the pass. It was some two 
 hours before he emerged into clear air, and found 
 himself on the level bed of an old lake now grassed 
 over. He had quite forgotten this feature of the 
 descent — perhaps the clouds had hung over it ; he 
 was overjoyed, however, to find that the flat ground 
 abounded with a kind of quail, larger than ours, and 
 hardly, if at all, smaller than a partridge. The abun- 
 dance of these quails surprised him, for he did 
 not remember them as plentiful anywhere on the 
 Erewhonian side of the mountains. 
 
 The Erewhonian quail, like its now nearly, if not 
 
 quite, extinct New Zealand congener, can take 
 
 three successive flights of a few yards each, but 
 
 then becomes exhausted ; hence quails are only 
 
 found on ground that is never burned, and where 
 
 there are no wild animals to molest them ; the cats 
 
 and dogs that accompany European civilisation 
 
 soon exterminate them ; my father, therefore, felt 
 
 safe in concluding that he was still far from any 
 
 26 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 village. Moreover he could see no sheep or goat's 
 dung ; and this surprised him, for he thought he 
 had found signs of pasturage much higher than 
 this. Doubtless, he said to himself, when he wrote 
 his book he had forgotten how long the descent 
 had been. But it was odd, for the grass was good 
 feed enough, and ought, he considered, to have 
 been well stocked. 
 
 Tired with his climb, during which he had not 
 rested to take food, but had eaten biscuits, as he 
 walked, he gave himself a good long rest, and when 
 refreshed, he ran down a couple of dozen quails, 
 some of which he meant to eat when he camped for 
 the night, while the others would help him out 
 of a difficulty which had been troubling him for 
 some time. 
 
 What was he to say when people asked him, as 
 they were sure to do, how he was living ? And 
 how was he to get enough Erewhonian money to 
 keep him going till he could find some safe means 
 of selling a few of his nuggets ? He had had a 
 little Erewhonian money when he went up in the 
 balloon, but had thrown it over, with everything 
 else except the clothes he wore and his MSS., when 
 the balloon was nearing the water. He had 
 nothing with him that he dared offer for sale, and 
 though he had plenty of gold, was in reality 
 penniless. 
 
 When, therefore, he saw the quails, he again felt 
 
 as though some friendly spirit was smoothing his 
 
 way before him. What more easy than to sell 
 
 27 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 them at Coldharbour (for so the name of the 
 town in which he had been imprisoned should be 
 translated), where he knew they were a delicacy, 
 and would fetch him the value of an English 
 shilling a piece ? 
 
 It took him between two and three hours to 
 catch two dozen. When he had thus got what 
 he considered a sufficient stock, he tied their legs 
 together with rushes, and ran a stout stick through 
 the whole lot. Soon afterwards he came upon a 
 wood of stunted pines, which, though there was 
 not much undergrowth, nevertheless afforded con- 
 siderable shelter and enabled him to gather wood 
 enough to make himself a good fire. This was 
 acceptable, for though the days were long, it was 
 now evening, and as soon as the sun had gone the 
 air became crisp and frosty. 
 
 Here he resolved to pass the night. He chose a 
 part where the trees were thickest, lit his fire, 
 plucked and cleaned four quails, filled his billy 
 with water from the stream hard by, made tea 
 in his pannikin, grilled two of his birds on the 
 embers, ate them, and when he had done all this, 
 he lit his pipe and began to think things over. 
 
 " So far so good," said he to himself ; but hardly 
 had the words passed through his mind before he 
 was startled by the sound of voices, still at some 
 distance, but evidently drawing towards him. 
 
 He instantly gathered up his billy, pannikin, tea, 
 biscuits, and blanket, all of which he had deter- 
 mined to discard and hide on the following morn- 
 
 28 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 ing ; everything that could betray him he carried 
 full haste into the wood some few yards off, in the 
 direction opposite to that from which the voices 
 were coming, but he let his quails lie where they 
 were, and put his pipe and tobacco in his pocket. 
 
 The voices drew nearer and nearer, and it was 
 all my father could do to get back and sit down 
 innocently by his fire, before he could hear what 
 was being said. 
 
 "Thank goodness," said one of the speakers (of 
 course in the Erewhonian language), " we seem to 
 be finding somebody at last. I hope it is not some 
 poacher ; we had better be careful." 
 
 " Nonsense ! " said the other. " It must be one 
 of the rangers. No one would dare to light a fire 
 while poaching on the King's preserves. What 
 o'clock do you make it ?" 
 
 " Half after nine." And the watch was still in 
 the speaker's hand as he emerged from darkness 
 into the glowing light of the fire. My father glanced 
 at it, and saw that it was exactly like the one he had 
 worn on entering Erewhon nearly twenty years 
 previously. 
 
 The watch, however, was a very small matter ; 
 
 the dress of these two men (for there were only 
 
 two) was far more disconcerting. They were not 
 
 in the Erewhonian costume. The one was dressed 
 
 like an Englishman or would-be Englishman, while 
 
 the other was wearing the same kind of clothes 
 
 but turned the wrong way round, so that when his 
 
 face was towards my father his body seemed to 
 
 29 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 have its back towards him, and vice versa. The 
 man's head, in fact, appeared to have been screwed 
 right round ; and yet it was plain that if he were 
 stripped he would be found built like other people. 
 
 What could it all mean ? The men were about 
 fifty years old. They were well-to-do people, well 
 clad, well fed, and were felt instinctively by my 
 father to belong to the academic classes. That one 
 of them should be dressed like a sensible English- 
 man dismayed my father as much as that the other 
 should have a watch, and look as if he had just 
 broken out of Bedlam, or as King Dagobert must 
 have looked if he had worn all his clothes as he 
 is said to have worn his breeches. Both wore 
 their clothes so easily — for he who wore them 
 reversed had evidently been measured with a view 
 to this absurd fashion — that it was plain their dress 
 was habitual. 
 
 My father was alarmed as well as astounded, 
 for he saw that what little plan of a campaign he 
 had formed must be reconstructed, and he had 
 no idea in what direction his next move should 
 be taken ; but he was a ready man, and knew 
 that when people have taken any idea into their 
 heads, a little confirmation will fix it. A first idea 
 is like a strong seedling ; it will grow if it can. 
 
 In less time than it will have taken the reader 
 to get through the last foregoing paragraphs, my 
 father took up the cue furnished him by the second 
 speaker. 
 
 " Yes," said he, going boldly up to this gentle- 
 30 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 man, " I am one of the rangers, and it is my duty 
 to ask you what you are doing here upon the 
 King's preserves." 
 
 "Quite so, my man," was the rejoinder. "We 
 have been to see the statues at the head of the 
 pass, and have a permit from the Mayor of 
 Sunch'ston to enter upon the preserves. We 
 lost ourselves in the thick fog, both going and 
 coming back." 
 
 My father inwardly blessed the fog. He did 
 not catch the name of the town, but presently 
 found that it was commonly pronounced as I 
 have written it. 
 
 "Be pleased to show it me," said my father in 
 his politest manner. On this a document was 
 handed to him. 
 
 I will here explain that I shall translate the names 
 of men and places, as well as the substance of the 
 document ; and I shall translate all names in future. 
 Indeed I have just done so in the case of Sunch'ston. 
 As an example, let me explain that the true Ere- 
 whonian names for Hanky and Panky, to whom 
 the reader will be immediately introduced, are 
 Sukoh and Sukop — names too cacophonous to be 
 read with pleasure by the English public. I must 
 ask the reader to believe that in all cases I am 
 doing my best to give the spirit of the original 
 name. 
 
 I would also express my regret that my father did 
 not either uniformly keep to the true Erewhonian 
 names, as in the cases of Senoj Nosnibor, Ydgrun, 
 
 31 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Thims, &c. — names which occur constantly in Ere- 
 whon — or else invariably invent a name, as he did 
 whenever he considered the true name impossible. 
 My poor mother's name, for example, was really 
 Nna Haras, and Mahaina's Enaj Ysteb, which he 
 dared not face. He, therefore, gave these char- 
 acters the first names that euphony suggested, 
 without any attempt at translation. Rightly or 
 wrongly, I have determined to keep consistently to 
 translation for all names not used in my father's 
 book ; and throughout, whether as regards names 
 or conversations, I shall translate with the freedom 
 without which no translation rises above construe 
 level. 
 
 Let me now return to the permit. The earlier 
 part of the document was printed, and ran as 
 follows : — 
 
 " Extracts from the Act for the afforesting of 
 certain lands lying between the town of Sunchild- 
 ston, formerly called Coldharbour, and the moun- 
 tains which bound the kingdom of Erewhon, passed 
 in the year Three, being the eighth year of the 
 reign of his Most Gracious Majesty King Well- 
 beloved the Twenty-Second. 
 
 " Whereas it is expedient to prevent any of his 
 
 Majesty's subjects from trying to cross over into 
 
 unknown lands beyond the mountains, and in like 
 
 manner to protect his Majesty's kingdom from 
 
 intrusion on the part of foreign devils, it is hereby 
 
 enacted that certain lands, more particularly de- 
 
 32 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 scribed hereafter, shall be afforested and set apart 
 as a hunting-ground for his Majesty's private use. 
 
 " It is also enacted that the Rangers and Under- 
 rangers shall be required to immediately kill with- 
 out parley any foreign devil whom they may 
 encounter coming from the other side of the 
 mountains. They are to weight the body, and 
 throw it into the Blue Pool under the waterfall 
 shown on the plan hereto annexed ; but on pain 
 of imprisonment for life they shall not reserve to 
 their own use any article belonging to the de- 
 ceased. Neither shall they divulge what they 
 have done to any one save the Head Ranger, 
 who shall report the circumstances of the case 
 fully and minutely to his Majesty. 
 
 "As regards any of his Majesty's subjects who 
 may be taken while trespassing on his Majesty's 
 preserves without a special permit signed by the 
 Mayor of Sunchildston, or any who may be con- 
 victed of poaching on the said preserves, the 
 Rangers shall forthwith arrest them and bring 
 them before the Mayor of Sunchildston, who 
 shall enquire into their antecedents, and punish 
 them with such term of imprisonment, with hard 
 labour, as he may think fit, provided that no such 
 term be of less duration than twelve calendar 
 months. 
 
 " For the further provisions of the said Act, 
 those whom it may concern are referred to the 
 Act in full, a copy of which may be seen at the 
 official residence of the Mayor of Sunchildston." 
 
 33 C 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Then followed in MS. "XIX. xii. 29. Permit 
 Professor Hanky, Royal Professor of Worldly 
 Wisdom at Bridgeford, seat of learning, city of 
 the people who are above suspicion, and Pro- 
 fessor Panky, Royal Professor of Unworldly 
 Wisdom in the said city, or either of them " [here 
 the MS. ended, the rest of the permit being in print] 
 "to pass freely during the space of forty-eight 
 hours from the date hereof, over the King's pre- 
 serves, provided, under pain of imprisonment with 
 hard labour for twelve months, that they do not 
 kill, nor cause to be killed, nor eat, if another have 
 killed, any one or more of his Majesty's quails." 
 
 The signature was such a scrawl that my father 
 could not read it, but underneath was printed, 
 " Mayor of Sunchildston, formerly called Cold- 
 harbour." 
 
 What a mass of information did not my father 
 gather as he read, but what a far greater mass did 
 he not see that he must get hold of ere he could 
 reconstruct his plans intelligently. 
 
 "The year three," indeed; and XIX. xii. 29, in 
 Roman and Arabic characters ! There were no 
 such characters when he was in Erewhon before. 
 It flashed upon him that he had repeatedly shewn 
 them to the Nosnibors, and had once even written 
 them down. It could not be that . . . No, it was 
 impossible ; and yet there was the European dress, 
 aimed at by the one Professor, and attained by 
 the other. Again "XIX." what was that? "xii." 
 might do for December, but it was now the 4th 
 
 34 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 of December not the 29th. "Afforested" too? 
 Then that was why he had seen no sheep tracks. 
 And how about the quails he had so innocently 
 killed ? What would have happened if he had 
 tried to sell them in Coldharbour ? What other 
 like fatal error might he not ignorantly commit ? 
 And why had Coldharbour become Sunchildston ? 
 
 These thoughts raced through my poor father's 
 brain as he slowly perused the paper handed to 
 him by the Professors. To give himself time he 
 feigned to be a poor scholar, but when he had 
 delayed as long as he dared, he returned it to 
 the one who had given it him. Without changing 
 a muscle he said — 
 
 "Your permit, sir, is quite regular. You can 
 either stay here the night or go on to Sunchildston 
 as you think fit. May I ask which of you two 
 gentlemen is Professor Hanky, and which Professor 
 Panky?" 
 
 " My name is Panky," said the one who had the 
 watch, who wore his clothes reversed, and who had 
 thought my father might be a poacher. 
 
 " And mine Hanky," said the other. 
 
 " What do you think, Panky," he added, turning 
 to his brother Professor, " had we not better stay 
 here till sunrise ? We are both of us tired, and this 
 fellow can make us a good fire. It is very dark, 
 and there will be no moon this two hours. We 
 are hungry, but we can hold out till we get to 
 Sunchildston ; it cannot be more than eight or nine 
 miles further down." 
 
 35 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Panky assented, but then, turning sharply to my 
 father, he said, " My man, what are you doing in 
 the forbidden dress ? Why are you not in ranger's 
 uniform, and what is the meaning of all those 
 quails ? " For his seedling idea that my father 
 was in reality a poacher was doing its best to 
 grow. 
 
 Quick as thought my father answered, "The 
 Head Ranger sent me a message this morning to 
 deliver him three dozen quails at Sunchildston by 
 to-morrow afternoon. As for the dress, we can 
 run the quails down quicker in it, and he says 
 nothing to us so long as we only wear out old 
 clothes and put on our uniforms before we near 
 the town. My uniform is in the ranger's shelter 
 an hour and a half higher up the valley." 
 
 " See what comes," said Panky, " of having a 
 whippersnapper not yet twenty years old in the 
 responsible post of Head Ranger. As for this 
 fellow, he may be speaking the truth, but I dis- 
 trust him." 
 
 "The man is all right, Panky," said Hanky, "and 
 seems to be a decent fellow enough." Then to 
 my father, " How many brace have you got ? " 
 And he looked at them a little wistfully. 
 
 " I have been at it all day, sir, and I have only 
 got eight brace. I must run down ten more brace 
 to-morrow." 
 
 " I see, I see." Then, turning to Panky, he said, 
 " Of course, they are wanted for the Mayor's ban- 
 quet on Sunday. By the way, we have not yet 
 
 36 
 
Hanky and Panky 
 
 received our invitation ; I suppose we shall find 
 it when we get back to Sunchildston." 
 
 " Sunday, Sunday, Sunday !" groaned my father 
 inwardly ; but he changed not a muscle of his face, 
 and said stolidly to Professor Hanky, " I think you 
 must be right, sir ; but there was nothing said 
 about it to me. I was only told to bring the birds." 
 
 Thus tenderly did he water the Professor's second 
 seedling. But Panky had his seedling too, and, 
 Cain-like, was jealous that Hanky's should flourish 
 while his own was withering. 
 
 " And what, pray, my man," he said somewhat 
 peremptorily to my father, " are those two plucked 
 quails doing ? Were you to deliver them plucked ? 
 And what bird did those bones belong to which I 
 see lying by the fire with the flesh all eaten off 
 them ? Are the under-rangers allowed not only to 
 wear the forbidden dress but to eat the King's quails 
 as well?" 
 
 The form in which the question was asked gave 
 my father his cue. He laughed heartily, and said, 
 " Why, sir, those plucked birds are landrails, not 
 quails, and those bones are landrail bones. Look at 
 this thigh-bone ; was there ever a quail with such a 
 bone as that ? " 
 
 I cannot say whether or no Professor Panky was 
 really deceived by the sweet effrontery with which 
 my father proffered him the bone. If he was taken 
 in, his answer was dictated simply by a donnish 
 unwillingness to allow any one to be better in- 
 formed on any subject than he was himselt. 
 
 37 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 My father, when I suggested this to him, would 
 not hear of it. " Oh no," he said ; " the man knew 
 well enough that I was lying." However this may 
 be, the Professor's manner changed. 
 
 " You are right," he said, " I thought they were 
 landrail bones, but was not sure till I had one in my 
 hand. I see, too, that the plucked birds are land- 
 rails, but there is little light, and I have not often 
 seen them without their feathers." 
 
 "I think," said my father to me, "that Hanky 
 knew what his friend meant, for he said, ' Panky, 
 I am very hungry.' " 
 
 " Oh, Hanky, Hanky," said the other, modulating 
 his harsh voice till it was quite pleasant. " Don't 
 corrupt the poor man." 
 
 " Panky, drop that ; we are not at Bridgeford 
 now ; I am very hungry, and I believe half those 
 birds are not quails but landrails." 
 
 My father saw he was safe. He said, " Perhaps 
 some of them might prove to be so, sir, under cer- 
 tain circumstances. I am a poor man, sir." 
 
 " Come, come," said Hanky ; and he slipped a 
 sum equal to about half-a-crown into my father's 
 hand. 
 
 " I do not know what you mean, sir," said my 
 father, " and if I did, half-a-crown would not be 
 nearly enough." 
 
 " Hanky," said Panky, " you must get this fellow 
 to give you lessons." 
 
 38 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 MY FATHER OVERHEARS MORE OF HANKY AND 
 PANKY'S CONVERSATION 
 
 My father, schooled under adversity, knew that it 
 was never well to press advantage too far. He 
 took the equivalent of five shillings for three brace, 
 which was somewhat less than the birds would 
 have been worth when things were as he had 
 known them. Moreover, he consented to take a 
 shilling's worth of Musical Bank money, which (as 
 he has explained in his book) has no appreciable 
 value outside these banks. He did this because he 
 knew that it would be respectable to be seen carry- 
 ing a little Musical Bank money, and also because 
 he wished to give some of it to the British Museum, 
 where he knew that this curious coinage was un- 
 represented. But the coins struck him as being 
 much thinner and smaller than he had remembered 
 them. 
 
 It was Panky, not Hanky, who had given him 
 the Musical Bank money. Panky was the greater 
 humbug of the two, for he would humbug even 
 himself — a thing, by the way, not very hard to do ; 
 and yet he was the less successful humbug, for he 
 could humbug no one who was worth humbugging 
 — not for long. Hanky's occasional frankness put 
 
 39 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 people off their guard. He was the mere common, 
 superficial, perfunctory Professor, who, being a 
 Professor, would of course profess, but would not 
 lie more than was in the bond ; he was log-rolled 
 and log-rolling, but still, in a robust wolfish fashion, 
 human. 
 
 Panky, on the other hand, was hardly human ; 
 he had thrown himself so earnestly into his work, 
 that he had become a living lie. If he had had to 
 play the part of Othello he would have blacked 
 himself all over, and very likely smothered his 
 Desdemona in good earnest. Hanky would hardly 
 have blacked himself behind the ears, and his Des- 
 demona would have been quite safe. 
 
 Philosophers are like quails in the respect that 
 they can take two or three flights of imagination, 
 but rarely more without an interval of repose. The 
 Professors had imagined my father to be a poacher 
 and a ranger ; they had imagined the quails to be 
 wanted for Sunday's banquet ; they had imagined 
 that they imagined (at least Panky had) that they 
 were about to eat landrails ; they were now ex- 
 hausted, and cowered down into the grass of their 
 ordinary conversation, paying no more attention to 
 my father than if he had been a log. He, poor 
 man, drank in every word they said, while seem- 
 ingly intent on nothing but his quails, each one of 
 which he cut up with a knife borrowed from 
 Hanky. Two had been plucked already, so he laid 
 these at once upon the clear embers. 
 
 " I do not know what we are to do with our- 
 40 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 selves," said Hanky, "till Sunday. To-day is 
 Thursday — it is the twenty-ninth, is it not ? Yes, 
 of course it is — Sunday is the first. Besides, it is 
 on our permit. To-morrow we can rest ; what, I 
 wonder, can we do on Saturday ? But the others 
 will be here then, and we can tell them about the 
 statues." 
 
 " Yes, but mind you do not blurt out anything 
 about the landrails." 
 
 " I think we may tell Dr. Downie." 
 
 "Tell nobody," said Panky. 
 
 They then talked about the statues, concerning 
 which it was plain that nothing was known. But 
 my father soon broke in upon their conversation 
 with the first instalment of quails, which a few 
 minutes had sufficed to cook. 
 
 " What a delicious bird a quail is," said Hanky. 
 
 "Landrail, Hanky, landrail," said the other re- 
 proachfully. 
 
 Having finished the first birds in a very few 
 minutes they returned to the statues. 
 
 "Old Mrs. Nosnibor," said Panky, "says the Sun- 
 child told her they were symbolic of ten tribes who 
 had incurred the displeasure of the sun, his father." 
 
 I make no comment on my father's feelings. 
 
 "Of the sun! his fiddlesticks' ends," retorted 
 Hanky. " He never called the sun his father. 
 Besides, from all I have heard about him, I take it 
 he was a precious idiot." 
 
 " O Hanky, Hanky ! you will wreck the whole 
 thing if you ever allow yourself to talk in that way." 
 
 41 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " You are more likely to wreck it yourself, Panky, 
 by never doing so. People like being deceived, 
 but they like also to have an inkling of their own 
 deception, and you never inkle them." 
 
 "The Queen," said Panky, returning to the sta- 
 tues, " sticks to it that ..." 
 
 " Here comes another bird," interrupted Hanky ; 
 "never mind about the Queen." 
 
 The bird was soon eaten, whereon Panky again 
 took up his parable about the Queen. 
 
 "The Queen says they are connected with the 
 cult of the ancient Goddess Kiss-me-quick." 
 
 " What if they are ? But the Queen sees Kiss-me- 
 quick in everything. Another quail, if you please, 
 Mr. Ranger." 
 
 My father brought up another bird almost di- 
 rectly. Silence while it was being eaten. 
 
 "Talking of the Sunchild," said Panky; "did you 
 ever see him ? " 
 
 " Never set eyes on him, and hope I never shall." 
 
 And so on till the last bird was eaten. 
 
 "Fellow," said Panky, "fetch some more wood; 
 the fire is nearly dead." 
 
 " I can find no more, sir," said my father, who 
 was afraid lest some genuine ranger might be at- 
 tracted by the light, and was determined to let it go 
 out as soon as he had done cooking. 
 
 " Never mind," said Hanky, " the moon will be 
 up soon." 
 
 "And now, Hanky," said Panky, "tell me what 
 
 you propose to say on Sunday. I suppose you 
 
 42 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 have pretty well made up your mind about it by 
 this time." 
 
 " Pretty nearly. I shall keep it much on the 
 usual lines. I shall dwell upon the benighted state 
 from which the Sunchild rescued us, and shall show 
 how the Musical Banks, by at once taking up the 
 movement, have been the blessed means of its now 
 almost universal success. I shall talk about the 
 immortal glory shed upon Sunch'ston by the Sun- 
 child's residence in the prison, and wind up with 
 the Sunchild Evidence Society, and an earnest 
 appeal for funds to endow the canonries required 
 for the due service of the temple." 
 
 " Temple ! what temple ? " groaned my father 
 inwardly. 
 
 "And what are you going to do about the four 
 black and white horses ? " 
 
 " Stick to them, of course — unless I make them 
 six." 
 
 " I really do not see why they might not have 
 been horses." 
 
 " I dare say you do not," returned the other drily, 
 " but they were black and white storks, and you 
 know that as well as I do. Still, they have caught 
 on, and they are in the altar-piece, prancing and 
 curvetting magnificently, so I shall trot them out." 
 
 "Altar-piece! Altar-piece!" again groaned my 
 father inwardly. 
 
 He need not have groaned, for when he came to 
 see the so-called altar-piece he found that the table 
 above which it was placed had nothing in common 
 
 43 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 with the altar in a Christian church. It was a mere 
 table, on which were placed two bowls full of 
 Musical Bank coins ; two cashiers, who sat on 
 either side of it, dispensed a few of these to all 
 comers, while there was a box in front of it wherein 
 people deposited coin of the realm according to 
 their will or ability. The idea of sacrifice was not 
 contemplated, and the position of the table, as well 
 as the name given to it, was an instance of the way 
 in which the Erewhonians had caught names and 
 practices from my father, without understanding 
 what they either were or meant. So, again, when 
 Professor Hanky had spoken of canonries, he had 
 none but the vaguest idea of what a canonry is. 
 
 I may add further that as a boy my father had 
 had his Bible well drilled into him, and never for- 
 got it. Hence biblical passages and expressions 
 had been often in his mouth, as the effect of mere 
 unconscious cerebration. The Erewhonians had 
 caught many of these, sometimes corrupting them 
 so that they were hardly recognizable. Things 
 that he remembered having said were continually 
 meeting him during the few days of his second 
 visit, and it shocked him deeply to meet some 
 gross travesty of his own words, or of words more 
 sacred than his own, and yet to be unable to cor- 
 rect it. "I wonder," he said to me, "that no one 
 has ever hit on this as a punishment for the damned 
 in Hades." 
 
 Let me now return to Professor Hanky, whom 
 I fear that I have left too long. 
 
 44 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 " And of course," he continued, " I shall say all 
 sorts of pretty things about the Mayoress — for I sup- 
 pose we must not even think of her as Yram now." 
 
 "The Mayoress," replied Panky, "is a very 
 dangerous woman ; see how she stood out about 
 the way in which the Sunchild had worn his 
 clothes before they gave him the then Erewhonian 
 dress. Besides, she is a sceptic at heart, and so 
 is that precious son of hers." 
 
 " She was quite right," said Hanky, with some- 
 thing of a snort. " She brought him his dinner 
 while he was still wearing the clothes he came in, 
 and if men do not notice how a man wears his 
 clothes, women do. Besides, there are many living 
 who saw him wear them." 
 
 "Perhaps," said Panky, "but we should never 
 have talked the King over if we had not humoured 
 him on this point. Yram nearly wrecked us by 
 her obstinacy. If we had not frightened her, and 
 if your study, Hanky, had not happened to have 
 been burned . . ." 
 
 " Come, come, Panky, no more of that." 
 
 " Of course I do not doubt that it was an acci- 
 dent ; nevertheless if your study had not been 
 accidentally burned, on the very night the clothes 
 were entrusted to you for earnest, patient, careful, 
 scientific investigation — and Yram very nearly 
 burned too — we should never have carried it 
 through. See what work we had to get the King 
 to allow the way in which the clothes were worn 
 to be a matter of opinion, not dogma. What a 
 
 45 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 pity it is that the the clothes were not burned 
 before the King's tailor had copied them." 
 
 Hanky laughed heartily enough. "Yes," he said, 
 " it was touch and go. Why, I wonder, could not 
 the Queen have put the clothes on a dummy that 
 would show back from front ? As soon as it was 
 brought into the council chamber the King jumped 
 to a conclusion, and we had to bundle both dummy 
 and Yram out of the royal presence, for neither 
 she nor the King would budge an inch. 
 
 Even Panky smiled. " What could we do ? 
 The common people almost worship Yram ; and so 
 does her husband, though her fair-haired eldest son 
 was born barely seven months after marriage. The 
 people in these parts like to think that the Sun- 
 child's blood is in the country, and yet they swear 
 through thick and thin that he is the Mayor's duly 
 begotten offspring — Faugh ! Do you think they 
 would have stood his being jobbed into the ranger- 
 ship by any one else but Yram ? " 
 
 My father's feelings may be imagined, but I will 
 not here interrupt the Professors. 
 
 "Well, well," said Hanky; "for men must rob 
 
 and women must job so long as the world goes on. 
 
 I did the best I could. The King would never 
 
 have embraced Sunchildism if I had not told him 
 
 he was right ; then, when satisfied that we agreed 
 
 with him, he yielded to popular prejudice and 
 
 allowed the question to remain open. One of his 
 
 Royal Professors was to wear the clothes one way, 
 
 and the other the other." 
 
 4 6 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 " My way of wearing them," said Panky, " is much 
 the most convenient." 
 
 " Not a bit of it," said Hanky warmly. On this 
 the two Professors fell out, and the discussion grew 
 so hot that my father interfered by advising them 
 not to talk so loud lest another ranger should hear 
 them. "You know," he said, "there are a good 
 many landrail bones lying about, and it might be 
 awkward." 
 
 The Professors hushed at once. " By the way," 
 said Panky, after a pause, " it is very strange about 
 those footprints in the snow. The man had evi- 
 dently walked round the statues two or three times, 
 as though they were strange to him, and he had 
 certainly come from the other side." 
 
 " It was one of the rangers," said Hanky im- 
 patiently, " who had gone a little beyond the statues, 
 and come back again." 
 
 11 Then we should have seen his footprints as he 
 went. I am glad I measured them." 
 
 " There is nothing in it ; but what were your 
 measurements ? " 
 
 "Eleven inches by four and a half; nails on the 
 soles ; one nail missing on the right foot and two on 
 the left." Then, turning to my father quickly, he said, 
 " My man, allow me to have a look at your boots." 
 
 "Nonsense, Panky, nonsense !" 
 
 Now my father by this time was wondering 
 whether he should not set upon these two men, 
 kill them if he could, and make the best of his way 
 back, but he had still a card to play. 
 
 47 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Certainly, sir," said he, "but I should tell you 
 that they are not my boots." 
 
 He took off his right boot and handed it to 
 Panky. 
 
 " Exactly so ! Eleven inches by four and a half, 
 and one nail missing. And now, Mr. Ranger, will 
 you be good enough to explain how you became 
 possessed of that boot. You need not show me 
 the other." And he spoke like an examiner who 
 was confident that he could floor his examinee in 
 viva voce. 
 
 "You know our orders," answered my father, 
 "you have seen them on your permit. I met one 
 of those foreign devils from the other side, of 
 whom we have had more than one lately ; he came 
 from out of the clouds that hang higher up, and 
 as he had no permit and could not speak a word 
 of our language, I gripped him, flung him, and 
 strangled him. Thus far I was only obeying 
 orders, but seeing how much better his boots were 
 than mine, and finding that they would fit me, I 
 resolved to keep them. You may be sure I 
 should not have done so if I had known there 
 was snow on the top of the pass." 
 
 " He could not invent that," said Hanky ; " it is 
 plain he has not been up to the statues." 
 
 Panky was staggered. " And of course," said 
 he ironically, "you took nothing from this poor 
 wretch except his boots." 
 
 " Sir," said my father, " I will make a clean 
 
 breast of everything. I flung his body, his clothes, 
 
 4 8 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 and my own old boots into the pool ; but I kept 
 his blanket, some things he used for cooking, and 
 some strange stuff that looks like dried leaves, as 
 well as a small bag of something which I believe 
 is gold. I thought I could sell the lot to some 
 dealer in curiosities who would ask no questions." 
 
 " And what, pray, have you done with all these 
 things ? " 
 
 " They are here, sir." And as he spoke he dived 
 into the wood, returning with the blanket, billy, 
 pannikin, tea, and the little bag of nuggets, which 
 he had kept accessible. 
 
 "This is very strange," said Hanky, who was 
 beginning to be afraid of my father when he 
 learned that he sometimes killed people. 
 
 Here the Professors talked hurriedly to one 
 another in a tongue which my father could not 
 understand, but which he felt sure was the hypo- 
 thetical language of which he has spoken in his 
 
 book. 
 
 Presently Hanky said to my father quite civilly, 
 " And what, my good man, do you propose to do 
 with all these things ? I should tell you at once 
 that what you take to be gold is nothing of the 
 kind ; it is a base metal, hardly, if at all, worth more 
 than copper." 
 
 « I have had enough of them ; to-morrow morn- 
 ing I shall take them with me to the Blue Pool, 
 and drop them into it." 
 
 "It is a pity you should do that," said Hanky 
 musingly : " the things are interesting as curiosi- 
 
 49 D 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 ties, and — and — and — what will you take for 
 them?" 
 
 " I could not do it, sir," answered my father. 
 
 " I would not do it, no, not for " and he 
 
 named a sum equivalent to about five pounds of 
 our money. For he wanted Erewhonian money, 
 and thought it worth his while to sacrifice his 
 ten pounds' worth of nuggets in order to get a 
 supply of current coin. 
 
 Hanky tried to beat him down, assuring 
 him that no curiosity dealer would give half as 
 much, and my father so far yielded as to take 
 .£4, ios. in silver, which, as I have already ex- 
 plained, would not be worth more than half a 
 sovereign in gold. At this figure a bargain was 
 struck, and the Professors paid up without offering 
 him a single Musical Bank coin. They wanted 
 to include the boots in the purchase, but here my 
 father stood out. 
 
 But he could not stand out as regards another 
 matter, which caused him some anxiety. Panky 
 insisted that my father should give them a receipt 
 for the money, and there was an altercation be- 
 tween the Professors on this point, much longer 
 than I can here find space to give. Hanky argued 
 that a receipt was useless, inasmuch as it would 
 be ruin to my father ever to refer to the subject 
 again. Panky, however, was anxious, not lest 
 my father should again claim the money, but 
 (though he did not say so outright) lest Hanky 
 
 should claim the whole purchase as his own. In 
 
 So 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 the end Panky, for a wonder, carried the day, 
 and a receipt was drawn up to the effect that 
 the undersigned acknowledged to have received 
 from Professors Hanky and Panky the sum of 
 ^4, ios. (I translate the amount), as joint pur- 
 chasers of certain pieces of yellow ore, a blanket, 
 and sundry articles found without an owner in 
 the King's preserves. This paper was dated, as 
 the permit had been, XIX. xii. 29. 
 
 My father, generally so ready, was at his wits' 
 end for a name, and could think of none but 
 Mr. Nosnibor's. Happily, remembering that this 
 gentleman had also been called Senoj — a name 
 common enough in Erewhon — he signed himself 
 " Senoj, Under-ranger." 
 
 Panky was now satisfied. "We will put it in 
 the bag," he said, " with the pieces of yellow 
 ore." 
 
 u Put it where you like," said Hanky con- 
 temptuously ; and into the bag it was put. 
 
 When all was now concluded, my father laugh- 
 ingly said, " If you have dealt unfairly by me, I for- 
 give you. My motto is, ' Forgive us our trespasses, 
 as we forgive them that trespass against us.' " 
 
 " Repeat those last words," said Panky eagerly. 
 My father was alarmed at his manner, but thought 
 it safer to repeat them. 
 
 " You hear that, Hanky ? I am convinced ; I 
 have not another word to say. The man is a 
 true Erewhonian ; he has our corrupt reading of 
 the Sunchild's prayer." 
 
 51 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Please explain." 
 
 " Why, can you not see ? " said Panky, who 
 was by way of being great at conjectural emenda- 
 tions. " Can you not see how impossible it is for 
 the Sunchild, or any of the people to whom he 
 declared (as we now know provisionally) that he 
 belonged, could have made the forgiveness of his 
 own sins depend on the readiness with which 
 he forgave other people ? No man in his senses 
 would dream of such a thing. It would be asking 
 a supposed all-powerful being not to forgive his 
 sins at all, or at best to forgive them imperfectly. 
 No; Yram got it wrong. She mistook 'but do 
 not ' for ' as we.' The sound of the words is 
 very much alike ; the correct reading should 
 obviously be, ' Forgive us our trespasses, but do 
 not forgive them that trespass against us.' This 
 makes sense, and turns an impossible prayer into 
 one that goes straight to the heart of every one 
 of us." Then, turning to my father, he said, 
 " You can see this, my man, can you not, as 
 soon as it is pointed out to you ? " 
 
 My father said that he saw it now, but had always 
 heard the words as he had himself spoken them. 
 
 " Of course you have, my good fellow, and it is 
 because of this that I know they never can have 
 reached you except from an Erewhonian source." 
 
 Hanky smiled, snorted, and muttered in an under- 
 tone, " I shall begin to think that this fellow is a 
 foreign devil after all." 
 
 "And now, gentlemen," said my father, "the 
 52 
 
The Professors Converse 
 
 moon is risen. I must be after the quails at day- 
 break ; I will therefore go to the ranger's shelter " 
 (a shelter, by the way, which existed only in my 
 father's invention), "and get a couple of hours' 
 sleep, so as to be both close to the quail-ground 
 and fresh for running. You are so near the 
 boundary of the preserves that you will not want 
 your permit further ; no one will meet you, and 
 should any one do so, you need only give your 
 names and say that you have made a mistake. You 
 will have to give it up to-morrow at the Ranger's 
 office ; it will save you trouble if I collect it now, 
 and give it up when I deliver my quails. 
 
 " As regards the curiosities, hide them as you best 
 can outside the limits. I recommend you to carry 
 them at once out of the forest, and rest beyond the 
 limits rather than here. You can then recover 
 them whenever, and in whatever way, you may 
 find convenient. But I hope you will say nothing 
 about any foreign devil's having come over on to 
 this side. Any whisper to this effect unsettles 
 people's minds, and they are too much unsettled 
 already ; hence our orders to kill any one from 
 over there at once, and to tell no one but the Head 
 Ranger. I was forced by you, gentlemen, to dis- 
 obey these orders in self-defence ; I must trust your 
 generosity to keep what I have told you secret. I 
 shall, of course, report it to the Head Ranger. And 
 now, if you think proper, you can give me up your 
 permit." 
 
 All this was so plausible that the Professors gave 
 53 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 up their permit without a word but thanks. They 
 bundled their curiosities hurriedly into "the poor 
 foreign devil's " blanket, reserving a more careful 
 packing till they were out of the preserves. They 
 wished my father a very good night, and all success 
 with his quails in the morning ; they thanked him 
 again for the care he had taken of them in the 
 matter of the landrails, and Panky even went so 
 far as to give him a few Musical Bank coins, which 
 he gratefully accepted. They then started off in the 
 direction of Sunch'ston. 
 
 My father gathered up the remaining quails, some 
 of which he meant to eat in the morning, while the 
 others he would throw away as soon as he could 
 find a safe place. He turned towards the moun- 
 tains, but before he had gone a dozen yards he 
 heard a voice, which he recognised as Panky's, 
 shouting after him, and saying — 
 
 " Mind you do not forget the true reading of the 
 Sunchild's prayer." 
 
 "You are an old fool," shouted my father in 
 English, knowing that he could hardly be heard, 
 still less understood, and thankful to relieve his 
 feelings. 
 
 54 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 MY FATHER MEETS A SON, OF WHOSE EXISTENCE 
 HE WAS IGNORANT, AND STRIKES A BARGAIN 
 WITH HIM 
 
 The incidents recorded in the two last chapters had 
 occupied about two hours, so that it was nearly 
 midnight before my father could begin to retrace 
 his steps and make towards the camp that he had 
 left that morning. This was necessary, for he could 
 not go any further in a costume that he now knew 
 to be forbidden. At this hour no ranger was likely 
 to meet him before he reached the statues, and by 
 making a push for it he could return in time to 
 cross the limits of the preserves before the Pro- 
 fessors' permit had expired. If challenged, he must 
 brazen it out that he was one or other of the 
 persons therein named. 
 
 Fatigued though he was, he reached the statues, 
 as near as he could guess, at about three in the 
 morning. What little wind there had been was 
 warm, so that the tracks, which the Professors must 
 have seen shortly after he had made them, had 
 disappeared. The statues looked very weird in the 
 moonlight but they were not chanting 
 
 While ascending, he pieced together the informa- 
 tion he had picked up from the Professors. Plainly, 
 the Sunchild, or child of the sun, was none other 
 
 55 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 than himself, and the new name of Coldharbour 
 was doubtless intended to commemorate the fact 
 that this was the first town he had reached in 
 Erewhon. Plainly, also, he was supposed to be of 
 superhuman origin — his flight in the balloon having 
 been not unnaturally believed to be miraculous. 
 The Erewhonians had for centuries been effacing 
 all knowledge of their former culture ; archaeo- 
 logists, indeed, could still glean a little from 
 museums, and from volumes hard to come by, 
 and still harder to understand ; but archaeologists 
 were few, and even though they had made re- 
 searches (which they may or may not have done), 
 their labours had never reached the masses. What 
 wonder, then, that the mushroom spawn of myth, 
 ever present in an atmosphere highly charged with 
 ignorance, had germinated in a soil so favourably 
 prepared for its reception ? 
 
 He saw it all now. It was twenty years next 
 Sunday since he and my mother had eloped. 
 That was the meaning of XIX. xii. 29. They had 
 made a new era, dating from the day of his return 
 to the palace of the sun with a bride who was 
 doubtless to unite the Erewhonian nature with 
 that of the sun. The New Year, then, would date 
 from Sunday, December 7, which would therefore 
 become XX. i. 1. The Thursday, now nearly if 
 not quite over, being only two days distant from 
 the end of a month of thirty-one days, which was 
 also the last of the year, would be XIX. xii. 29, 
 
 as on the Professors' permit. 
 
 56 
 
Father and Son 
 
 I should like to explain here what will appear 
 more clearly on a later page — I mean, that the 
 Erewhonians, according to their new system, do 
 not believe the sun to be a god except as regards 
 this world and his other planets. My father had 
 told them a little about astronomy, and had assured 
 them that all the fixed stars were suns like our 
 own, with planets revolving round them, which 
 were probably tenanted by intelligent living beings, 
 however unlike they might be to ourselves. From 
 this they evolved the theory that the sun was the 
 ruler of this planetary system, and that he must 
 be personified, as they had personified the air-god, 
 the gods of time and space, hope, justice, and the 
 other deities mentioned in my father's book. They 
 retain their old belief in the actual existence of 
 these gods, but they now make them all subordi- 
 nate to the sun. The nearest approach they make 
 to our own conception of God is to say that He 
 is the ruler over all the suns throughout the uni- 
 verse — the suns being to Him much as our planets 
 and their denizens are to our own sun. They 
 deny that He takes more interest in one sun and 
 its system than in another. All the suns with 
 their attendant planets are supposed to be equally 
 His children, and He deputes to each sun the super- 
 vision and protection of its own system. Hence 
 they say that though we may pray to the air-god, 
 &c, and even to the sun, we must not pray to 
 God. We may be thankful to Him for watching 
 over the suns, but we must not go further. 
 
 57 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Going back to my father's reflections, he per- 
 ceived that the Erewhonians had not only adopted 
 our calendar, as he had repeatedly explained it to 
 the Nosnibors, but had taken our week as well, 
 and were making Sunday a high day, just as we 
 do. Next Sunday, in commemoration of the 
 twentieth year after his ascent, they were about 
 to dedicate a temple to him ; in this there was 
 to be a picture showing himself and his earthly 
 bride on their heavenward journey, in a chariot 
 drawn by four black and white horses — which, 
 however, Professor Hanky had positively affirmed 
 to have been only storks. 
 
 Here I interrupted my father. " But were there," 
 I said, " any storks ? " 
 
 " Yes," he answered. " As soon as I heard 
 Hanky's words I remembered that a flight of some 
 four or five of the large storks so common in 
 Erewhon during the summer months had been 
 wheeling high aloft in one of those aerial dances 
 that so much delight them. I had quite forgotten 
 it, but it came back to me at once that these crea- 
 tures, attracted doubtless by what they took to be 
 an unknown kind of bird, swooped down towards 
 the balloon and circled round it like so many 
 satellites to a heavenly body. 1 was fearful lest 
 they should strike at it with their long and formid- 
 able beaks, in which case all would have been soon 
 over ; either they were afraid, or they had satisfied 
 their curiosity — at any rate, they let us alone ; but 
 they kept with us till we were well away from the 
 
 58 
 
Father and Son 
 
 capital. Strange, how completely this incident had 
 escaped me." 
 
 I return to my father's thoughts as he made his 
 way back to his old camp. 
 
 As for the reversed position of Professor Panky's 
 clothes, he remembered having given his own old 
 ones to the Queen, and having thought that she 
 might have got a better dummy on which to display 
 them than the headless scarecrow, which, however, 
 he supposed was all her ladies-in-waiting could lay 
 their hands on at the moment. If that dummy had 
 never been replaced, it was perhaps not very strange 
 that the King could not at the first glance tell back 
 from front, and if he did not guess right at first, 
 there was little chance of his changing, for his first 
 ideas were apt to be his last. But he must find out 
 more about this. 
 
 Then how about the watch ? Had their views 
 about machinery also changed ? Or was there an 
 exception made about any machine that he had 
 himself carried ? 
 
 Yram too. She must have been married not 
 long after she and he had parted. So she was now 
 wife to the Mayor, and was evidently able to have 
 things pretty much her own way in Sunch'ston, as 
 he supposed he must now call it. Thank heaven 
 she was prosperous ! It was interesting to know 
 that she was at heart a sceptic, as was also her light- 
 haired son, now Head Ranger. And that son ? 
 Just twenty years of age ! Born seven months 
 after marriage ! Then the Mayor doubtless had 
 
 59 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 light hair too ; but why did not those wretches say 
 in which month Yram was married ? If she had 
 married soon after he had left, this was why he had 
 not been sent for or written to. Pray heaven it 
 was so. As for current gossip, people would talk, 
 and if the lad was well begotten, what could it 
 matter to them whose son he was ? " But," thought 
 my father, " I am glad I did not meet him on my 
 way down. I had rather have been killed by some 
 one else." 
 
 Hanky and Panky again. He remembered 
 Bridgeford as the town where the Colleges of 
 Unreason had been most rife ; he had visited it, 
 but he had forgotten that it was called "The city 
 of the people who are above suspicion." Its Pro- 
 fessors were evidently going to muster in great 
 force on Sunday ; if two of them had robbed him, 
 he could forgive them, for the information he had 
 gleaned from them had furnished him with a. pied a 
 terre. Moreover, he had got as much Erewhonian 
 money as he should want, for he had resolved to 
 retrace his steps immediately after seeing the temple 
 dedicated to himself. He knew the danger he 
 should run in returning over the preserves without 
 a permit, but his curiosity was so great that he re- 
 solved to risk it. 
 
 Soon after he had passed the statues he began to 
 descend, and it being now broad day, he did so by 
 leaps and bounds, for the ground was not preci- 
 pitous. He reached his old camp soon after five — 
 
 this, at any rate, was the hour at which he set his 
 
 60 
 
Father and Son 
 
 watch on finding that it had run down during his 
 absence. There was now no reason why he should 
 not take it with him, so he put it in his pocket. 
 The parrots had attacked his saddle-bags, saddle, 
 and bridle, as they were sure to do, but they had 
 not got inside the bags. He took out his English 
 clothes and put them on — stowing his bags of 
 gold in various pockets, but keeping his Erewhonian 
 money in the one that was most accessible. He 
 put his Erewhonian dress back into the saddle- 
 bags, intending to keep it as a curiosity ; he also 
 refreshed the dye upon his hands, face, and hair ; 
 he lit himself a fire, made tea, cooked and ate two 
 brace of quails, which he had plucked while walk- 
 ing so as to save time, and then flung himself on to 
 the ground to snatch an hour's very necessary rest. 
 When he woke he found he had slept two hours, 
 not one, which was perhaps as well, and by eight 
 he began to reascend the pass. 
 
 He reached the statues about noon, for he 
 allowed himself not a moment's rest. This time 
 there was a stiffish wind, and they were chanting 
 lustily. He passed them with all speed, and had 
 nearly reached the place where he had caught the 
 quails, when he saw a man in a dress which he 
 guessed at once to be a ranger's, but which, 
 strangely enough, seeing that he was in the King's 
 employ, was not reversed. My father's heart beat 
 fast ; he got out his permit and held it open in his 
 hand, then with a smiling face he went towards the 
 
 Ranger, who was standing his ground. 
 
 61 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " I believe you are the Head Ranger," said my 
 father, who saw that he was still smooth-faced and 
 had light hair. " I am Professor Panky, and here is 
 my permit. My brother Professor has been prevented 
 from coming with me, and, as you see, I am alone." 
 
 My father had professed to pass himself off as 
 Panky, for he had rather gathered that Hanky was 
 the better known man of the two. 
 
 While the youth was scrutinising the permit, 
 evidently with suspicion, my father took stock of 
 him, and saw his own past self in him too plainly — 
 knowing all he knew — to doubt whose son he was. 
 He had the greatest difficulty in hiding his emotion, 
 for the lad was indeed one of whom any father 
 might be proud. He longed to be able to embrace 
 him and claim him for what he was, but this, as he 
 well knew, might not be. The tears again welled 
 into his eyes when he told me of the struggle with 
 himself that he had then had. 
 
 " Don't be jealous, my dearest boy," he said to 
 me. " I love you quite as dearly as I love him, or 
 better, but he was sprung upon me so suddenly, 
 and dazzled me with his comely debonair face, so 
 full of youth, and health, and frankness. Did you 
 see him, he would go straight to your heart, for he 
 is wonderfully like you in spite of your taking so 
 much after your poor mother." 
 
 I was not jealous ; on the contrary, I longed to 
 
 see this youth, and find in him such a brother as I 
 
 had often wished to have. But let me return to my 
 
 father's story. 
 
 62 
 
Father and Son 
 
 The young man, after examining the permit, 
 declared it to be in form, and returned it to my 
 father, but he eyed him with polite disfavour. 
 
 " I suppose," he said, " you have come up, as so 
 many are doing, from Bridgeford and all over the 
 country, to the dedication on Sunday." 
 
 "Yes," said my father. "Bless me !" he added, 
 " what a wind you have up here ! How it makes 
 one's eyes water, to be sure ; " but he spoke with 
 a cluck in his throat which no wind that blows 
 can cause. 
 
 M Have you met any suspicious characters be- 
 tween here and the statues ? " asked the youth. " I 
 came across the ashes of a fire lower down ; there 
 had been three men sitting for some time round it, 
 and they had all been eating quails. Here are some 
 of the bones and feathers, which I shall keep. They 
 had not been gone more than a couple of hours, 
 for the ashes were still warm ; they are getting 
 bolder and bolder — who would have thought they 
 would dare to light a fire ? I suppose you have 
 not met any one ; but if you have seen a single 
 person, let me know." 
 
 My father said quite truly that he had met no 
 one. He then laughingly asked how the youth had 
 been able to discover as much as he had. 
 
 " There were three well-marked forms, and three 
 separate lots of quail bones hidden in the ashes. 
 One man had done all the plucking. This is 
 strange, but I dare say I shall get at it later." 
 
 After a little further conversation the Ranger said 
 63 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 he was now going down to Sunch'ston, and, though 
 somewhat curtly, proposed that he and my father 
 should walk together. 
 
 " By all means," answered my father. 
 
 Before they had gone more than a few hundred 
 yards his companion said, " If you will come with 
 me a little to the left, I can show you the Blue Pool." 
 
 To avoid the precipitous ground over which the 
 stream here fell, they had diverged to the right, 
 where they had found a smoother descent ; return- 
 ing now to the stream, which was about to enter on 
 a level stretch for some distance, they found them- 
 selves on the brink of a rocky basin, of no great 
 size, but very blue, and evidently deep. 
 
 "This," said the Ranger, "is where our orders 
 tell us to fling any foreign devil who comes over 
 from the other side. I have only been Head 
 Ranger about nine months, and have not yet had 
 to face this horrid duty ; but," and here he smiled, 
 "when I first caught sight of you I thought I 
 should have to make a beginning. I was very glad 
 when I saw you had a permit." 
 
 "And how many skeletons do you suppose are 
 lying at the bottom of this pool ?" 
 
 " I believe not more than seven or eight in all. 
 
 There were three or four about eighteen years 
 
 ago, and about the same number of late years ; 
 
 one man was flung here only about three months 
 
 before I was appointed. I have the full list, with 
 
 dates, down in my office, but the rangers never 
 
 let people in Sunch'ston know when they have 
 
 64 
 
Father and Son 
 
 Blue-Pooled any one ; it would unsettle men's 
 minds, and some of them would be coming up 
 here in the dark to drag the pool, and see whether 
 they could find anything on the body." 
 
 My father was glad to turn away from this most 
 repulsive place. After a time he said, "And what 
 do you good people hereabouts think of next 
 Sunday's grand doings ? " 
 
 Bearing in mind what he had gleaned from the 
 Professors about the Ranger's opinions, mv fat 
 gave a slightly ironical turn to his pronunciation 
 of the words "grand doings." The youth glanced 
 at him with a quick penetrative look, and laughed 
 as he said, "The doings will be grand enough.'' 
 
 "What a fine temple they have built," said my 
 father. "' I have no: yet seen the picture, but they 
 say the four black and white horses are magnifi- 
 cently painted. I saw the Sunchild ascend, but 
 I saw no horses in the sky, nor anvthing like 
 horses.'' 
 
 The youth was much interested. " Did yon 
 really see him ascend?' he asked; "and what, 
 pray, do you think it all was : " 
 
 "Whatever it was, there were no horses. " 
 
 " But there must have been, for, as you of course 
 know, they have lately found some droppings from 
 one of them, which have been miraculouslv pre- 
 served, and they are going to show them next 
 Sunday in a gold reliquary. 
 
 u I know," said my father, who, however, was 
 learning the fact for the first time. " I have not vet 
 
 °5 E 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 seen this precious relic, but I think they might have 
 found something less unpleasant." 
 
 " Perhaps they would if they could," replied the 
 youth, laughing, "but there was nothing else that 
 the horses could leave. It is only a number of 
 curiously rounded stones, and not at all like what 
 they say it is." 
 
 "Well, well," continued my father, "but relic 
 or no relic, there are many who, while they fully 
 recognise the value of the Sunchild's teaching, 
 dislike these cock and bull stories as blasphemy 
 against God's most blessed gift of reason. There 
 are many in Bridgeford who hate this story of the 
 horses." 
 
 The youth was now quite reassured. " So there 
 are here, sir," he said warmly, " and who hate the 
 Sunchild too. If there is such a hell as he used 
 to talk about to my mother, we doubt not but that 
 he will be cast into its deepest fires. See how he 
 has turned us all upside down. But we dare not 
 say what we think. There is no courage left in 
 Erewhon." 
 
 Then waxing calmer he said, " It is you Bridge- 
 ford people and your Musical Banks that have 
 done it all. The Musical Bank Managers saw that 
 the people were falling away from them. Finding 
 that the vulgar believed this foreign devil Higgs — 
 for he gave this name to my mother when he was in 
 
 prison — finding that But you know all this as 
 
 well as I do. How can you Bridgeford Professors 
 
 pretend to believe about these horses, and about 
 
 66 
 
Father and Son 
 
 the Sunchild's being son to the sun, when all the 
 time you know there is no truth in it ? " 
 
 " My son — for considering the difference in our 
 ages I may be allowed to call you so — we at Bridge- 
 ford are much like you at Sunch'ston ; we dare not 
 always say what we think. Nor would it be wise 
 to do so, when we should not be listened to. This 
 fire must burn itself out, for it has got such hold 
 that nothing can either stay or turn it. Even 
 though Higgs himself were to return and tell it 
 from the house-tops that he was a mortal — ay, 
 and a very common one — he would be killed, but 
 not believed." 
 
 " Let him come ; let him show himself, speak 
 out and die, if the people choose to kill him. In 
 that case I would forgive him, accept him for my 
 father, as silly people sometimes say he is, and 
 honour him to my dying day." 
 
 "Would that be a bargain?" said my father, 
 smiling in spite of emotion so strong that he could 
 hardly bring the words out of his mouth. 
 
 " Yes, it would," said the youth doggedly. 
 
 "Then let me shake hands with you on his be- 
 half, and let us change the conversation." 
 
 He took my father's hand, doubtfully and some- 
 what disdainfully, but he did not refuse it. 
 
 67 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 FURTHER CONVERSATION BETWEEN FATHER 
 AND SON — THE PROFESSORS* HOARD 
 
 It is one thing to desire a conversation to be 
 changed, and another to change it. After some 
 little silence my father said, " And may I ask what 
 name your mother gave you ? " 
 
 " My name," he answered, laughing, " is George, 
 and I wish it were some other, for it is the first 
 name of that arch-impostor Higgs. I hate it as I 
 hate the man who owned it." 
 
 My father said nothing, but he hid his face in his 
 hands. 
 
 " Sir," said the other, " I fear you are in some 
 distress." 
 
 " You remind me," replied my father, " of a son 
 who was stolen from me when he was a child. I 
 searched for him during many years, and at last 
 fell in with him by accident, to find him all the 
 heart of father could wish. But alas ! he did not 
 take kindly to me as I to him, and after two days 
 he left me ; nor shall I ever again see him." 
 
 "Then, sir, had I not better leave you ?" 
 
 " No, stay with me till your road takes you else- 
 where ; for though I cannot see my son, you are so 
 
 like him that I could almost fancy he is with me. 
 
 68 
 
Father and Son Part 
 
 And now — for I shall show no more weakness — 
 you say your mother knew the Sunchild, as I am 
 used to call him. Tell me what kind of a man she 
 found him." 
 
 " She liked him well enough in spite of his being 
 a little silly. She does not believe he ever called 
 himself child of the sun. He used to say he had 
 a father in heaven to whom he prayed, and who 
 could hear him ; but he said that all of us, my 
 mother as much as he, have this unseen father. 
 My mother does not believe he meant doing us 
 any harm, but only that he wanted to get himself 
 and Mrs. Nosnibor's younger daughter out of the 
 country. As for there having been anything super- 
 natural about the balloon, she will have none of it ; 
 she says that it was some machine which he knew 
 how to make, but which we have lost the art of 
 making, as we have of many another." 
 
 " This is what she says amongst ourselves, but 
 in public she confirms all that the Musical Bank 
 Managers say about him. She is afraid of them. 
 You know, perhaps, that Professor Hanky, whose 
 name I see on your permit, tried to burn her alive?" 
 
 "Thank heaven !" thought my father, "that I am 
 Panky ;" but aloud he said, "Oh, horrible ! horrible ! 
 I cannot believe this even of Hanky." 
 
 " He denies it, and we say we believe him ; he was 
 
 most kind and attentive to my mother during all 
 
 the rest of her stay in Bridgeford. He and she 
 
 parted excellent friends, but I know what she 
 
 thinks. I shall be sure to see him while he is 
 
 69 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 in Sunch'ston, better I shall have to be civil to him 
 but it makes me sick to think of it." 
 
 "When shall you see him ?" said my father, who 
 was alarmed at learning that Hanky and the Ranger 
 were likely to meet. Who could tell but that he 
 might see Panky too ? 
 
 " I have been away from home a fortnight, and 
 shall not be back till late on Saturday night. I do 
 not suppose I shall see him before Sunday." 
 
 "That will do," thought my father, who at that 
 moment deemed that nothing would matter to him 
 much when Sunday was over. Then, turning to the 
 Ranger, he said, " I gather, then, that your mother 
 does not think so badly of the Sunchild after all ? " 
 
 " She laughs at him sometimes, but if any of us 
 boys and girls say a word against him we get 
 snapped up directly. My mother turns every one 
 round her ringer. Her word is law in Sunch'ston ; 
 every one obeys her ; she has faced more than one 
 mob, and quelled them when my father could not 
 do so." 
 
 " I can believe all you say of her. What other 
 children has she besides yourself ? " 
 
 " We are four sons, of whom the youngest is now 
 fourteen, and three daughters." 
 
 " May all health and happiness attend her and 
 you, and all of you, henceforth and for ever," and 
 my father involuntarily bared his head as he spoke. 
 
 " Sir," said the youth, impressed by the fervency 
 
 of my father's manner, " I thank you, but you do 
 
 not talk as Bridgeford Professors generally do, so 
 
 70 
 
Father and Son Part 
 
 far as I have seen or heard them. Why do you 
 wish us all well so very heartily ? Is it because 
 you think I am like your son, or is there some 
 other reason ? " 
 
 " It is not my son alone that you resemble," said 
 my father tremulously, for he knew he was going 
 too far. He carried it off by adding, " You re- 
 semble all who love truth and hate lies, as I do." 
 
 " Then, sir," said the youth gravely, " you much 
 belie your reputation. And now I must leave you 
 for another part of the preserves, where I think it 
 likely that last night's poachers may now be, and 
 where I shall pass the night in watching for them. 
 You may want your permit for a few miles further, 
 so I will not take it. Neither need you give it up 
 at Sunch'ston. It is dated, and will be useless 
 after this evening." 
 
 With this he strode off into the forest, bowing 
 politely but somewhat coldly, and without encour- 
 aging my father's half proffered hand. 
 
 My father turned sad and unsatisfied away. 
 
 " It serves me right," he said to himself ; " he 
 ought never to have been my son ; and yet, if such 
 men can be brought by hook or by crook into the 
 world, surely the world should not ask questions 
 about the bringing. How cheerless everything 
 looks now that he has left me." 
 
 By this time it was three o'clock, and in another 
 few minutes my father came upon the ashes of the 
 
 7i 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 fire beside which he and the Professors had supped 
 on the preceding evening. It was only some 
 eighteen hours since they had come upon him, and 
 yet what an age it seemed ! It was well the Ranger 
 had left him, for though my father, of course, 
 would have known nothing about either fire or 
 poachers, it might have led to further falsehood, 
 and by this time he had become exhausted — not to 
 say, for the time being, sick of lies altogether. 
 
 He trudged slowly on, without meeting a soul, 
 until he came upon some stones that evidently 
 marked the limits of the preserves. When he had 
 got a mile or so beyond these, he struck a narrow 
 and not much frequented path, which he was sure 
 would lead him towards Sunch'ston, and soon after- 
 wards, seeing a huge old chestnut tree some thirty 
 or forty yards from the path itself, he made towards 
 it and flung himself on the ground beneath its 
 branches. There were abundant signs that he was 
 nearing farm lands and homesteads, but there was 
 no one about, and if any one saw him there was 
 nothing in his appearance to arouse suspicion. 
 
 He determined, therefore, to rest here till hunger 
 should wake him, and drive him into Sunch'ston, 
 which, however, he did not wish to reach till dusk 
 if he could help it. He meant to buy a valise and 
 a few toilette necessaries before the shops should 
 close, and then engage a bedroom at the least fre- 
 quented inn he could find that looked fairly clean 
 and comfortable. 
 
 He slept till nearly six, and on waking gathered 
 
 72 
 
The Professors' Hoard 
 
 his thoughts together. He could not shake his 
 newly found son from out of them, but there was 
 no good in dwelling upon him now, and he turned 
 his thoughts to the Professors. How, he wondered, 
 were they getting on, and what had they done with 
 the things they had bought from him ? 
 
 " How delightful it would be," he said to himself, 
 " if I could find where they have hidden their hoard, 
 and hide it somewhere else." 
 
 He tried to project his mind into those of the 
 Professors, as though they were a team of straying 
 bullocks whose probable action he must determine 
 before he set out to look for them. 
 
 On reflection, he concluded that the hidden 
 property was not likely to be far from the spot on 
 which he now was. The Professors would wait 
 till they had got some way down towards Sunch'- 
 ston, so as to have readier access to their property 
 when they wanted to remove it ; but when they 
 came upon a path and other signs that inhabited 
 dwellings could not be far distant, they would 
 begin to look out for a hiding-place. And they 
 would take pretty well the first that came. "Why, 
 bless my heart," he exclaimed, "this tree is hollow ; 
 
 I wonder whether " and on looking up he 
 
 saw an innocent little strip of the very tough 
 fibrous leaf commonly used while green as string, 
 or even rope, by the Erewhonians. The plant 
 that makes this leaf is so like the ubiquitous New 
 Zealand Phormium tenax, or flax, as it is there 
 called, that I shall speak of it as flax in future, as 
 
 73 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 indeed I have already done without explanation 
 on an earlier page ; for this plant grows on both 
 sides of the great range. The piece of flax, then, 
 which my father caught sight of was fastened, at 
 no great height from the ground, round the branch 
 of a strong sucker that had grown from the roots 
 of the chestnut tree, and going thence for a couple 
 of feet or so towards the place where the parent 
 tree became hollow, it disappeared into the cavity 
 below. My father had little difficulty in swarming 
 the sucker till he reached the bough on to which 
 the flax was tied, and soon found himself hauling 
 up something from the bottom of the tree. In less 
 time than it takes to tell the tale he saw his own 
 familiar red blanket begin to show above the 
 broken edge of the hollow, and in another second 
 there was a clinkum-clankum as the bundle fell 
 upon the ground. This was caused by the billy 
 and the pannikin, which were wrapped inside the 
 blanket. As for the blanket, it had been tied 
 tightly at both ends, as well as at several points 
 between, and my father inwardly complimented 
 the Professors on the neatness with which they had 
 packed and hidden their purchase. " But," he 
 said to himself with a laugh, " I think one of them 
 must have got on the other's back to reach that 
 bough." 
 
 "Of course," thought he, "they will have taken 
 the nuggets with them." And yet he had seemed 
 to hear a dumping as well as a clinkum-clankum. 
 He undid the blanket, carefully untying every knot 
 
 74 
 
The Professors' Hoard 
 
 and keeping the flax. When he had unrolled it, he 
 found to his very pleasurable surprise that the 
 pannikin was inside the billy, and the nuggets with 
 the receipt inside the pannikin. The paper con- 
 taining the tea having been torn, was wrapped up 
 in a handkerchief marked with Hanky's name. 
 
 41 Down, conscience, down ! " he exclaimed as he 
 transferred the nuggets, receipt, and handkerchief 
 to his own pocket. " Eye of my soul that you are ! 
 if you offend me I must pluck you out." His con- 
 science feared him and said nothing. As for the 
 tea, he left it in its torn paper. 
 
 He then put the billy, pannikin, and tea, back 
 again inside the blanket, which he tied neatly up, 
 tie for tie with the Professor's own flax, leaving no 
 sign of any disturbance. He again swarmed the 
 sucker, till he reached the bough to which the 
 blanket and its contents had been made fast, and 
 having attached the bundle, he dropped it back 
 into the hollow of the tree. He did everything 
 quite leisurely, for the Professors would be sure 
 to wait till nightfall before coming to fetch their 
 property away. 
 
 u If I take nothing but the nuggets," he argued, 
 " each of the Professors will suspect the other of 
 having conjured them into his own pocket while 
 the bundle was being made up. As for the hand- 
 kerchief, they must think what they like ; but it 
 will puzzle Hanky to know why Panky should have 
 been so anxious for a receipt, if he meant stealing 
 the nuggets. Let them muddle it out their own way." 
 
 75 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Reflecting further, he concluded, perhaps rightly, 
 that they had left the nuggets where he had found 
 them, because neither could trust the other not to 
 filch a few, if he had them in his own possession, 
 and they could not make a nice division without 
 a pair of scales. "At any rate," he said to himself, 
 "there will be a pretty quarrel when they find 
 them gone." 
 
 Thus charitably did he brood over things that 
 were not to happen. The discovery of the Pro- 
 fessors' hoard had refreshed him almost as much 
 as his sleep had done, and it being now past seven, 
 he lit his pipe — which, however, he smoked as 
 furtively as he had done when he was a boy at 
 school, for he knew not whether smoking had yet 
 become an Erewhonian virtue or no — and walked 
 briskly on towards Sunch'ston. 
 
 76 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 SIGNS OF THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS CATCH 
 MY FATHER'S EYE ON EVERY SIDE 
 
 He had not gone far before a turn in the path — 
 now rapidly widening — showed him two high 
 towers, seemingly some two miles off ; these he felt 
 sure must be at Sunch'ston, he therefore stepped 
 out, lest he should find the shops shut before he 
 got there. 
 
 On his former visit he had seen little of the 
 town, for he was in prison during his whole stay. 
 He had had a glimpse of it on being brought there 
 by the people of the village where he had spent 
 his first night in Erewhon — a village which he had 
 seen at some little distance on his right hand, but 
 which it would have been out of his way to visit, 
 even if he had wished to do so ; and he had seen 
 the Museum of old machines, but on leaving the 
 prison he had been blindfolded. Nevertheless he 
 felt sure that if the towers had been there he should 
 have seen them, and rightly guessed that they must 
 belong to the temple which was to be dedicated to 
 himself on Sunday. 
 
 When he had passed through the suburbs he 
 found himself in the main street. Space will not 
 allow me to dwell on more than a few of the things 
 
 77 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 which caught his eye, and assured him that the 
 change in Erewhonian habits and opinions had 
 been even more cataclysmic than he had already 
 divined. The first important building that he came 
 to proclaimed itself as the College of Spiritual 
 Athletics, and in the window of a shop that was 
 evidently affiliated to the college he saw an an- 
 nouncement that moral try-your-strengths, suitable 
 for every kind of ordinary temptation, would be 
 provided on the shortest notice. Some of those 
 that aimed at the more common kinds of tempta- 
 tion were kept in stock, but these consisted chiefly 
 of trials to the temper. On dropping, for example, 
 a penny into a slot, you could have a jet of fine 
 pepper, flour, or brickdust, whichever you might 
 prefer, thrown on to your face, and thus discover 
 whether your composure stood in need of further 
 development or no. My father gathered this from 
 the writing that was pasted on to the try-your- 
 strength, but he had no time to go inside the shop 
 and test either the machine or his own temper. 
 Other temptations to irritability required the agency 
 of living people, or at any rate living beings. 
 Crying children, screaming parrots, a spiteful 
 monkey, might be hired on ridiculously easy terms. 
 He saw one advertisement, nicely framed, which 
 ran as follows: — 
 
 " Mrs. Tantrums, Nagger, certificated by the College of 
 Spiritual Athletics. Terms for ordinary nagging, two 
 shillings and sixpence per hour. Hysterics extra." 
 
 78 
 
The New Order 
 
 Then followed a series of testimonials — for 
 example : — 
 
 " Dear Mrs. Tantrums, — I have for years been tortured 
 with a husband of unusually peevish, irritable temper, 
 who made my life so intolerable that I sometimes answered 
 him in a way that led to his using personal violence 
 towards me. After taking a course of twelve sittings from 
 you, I found my husband's temper comparatively angelic, 
 and we have ever since lived together in complete 
 harmony." 
 
 Another was from a husband : — 
 
 " Mr. presents his compliments to Mrs. Tantrums, 
 
 and begs to assure her that her extra special hysterics 
 have so far surpassed anything his wife can do, as to 
 render him callous to those attacks which he had formerly 
 found so distressing." 
 
 There were many others of a like purport, but 
 time did not permit my father to do more than 
 glance at them. He contented himself with the 
 two following, of which the first ran : — 
 
 " He did try it at last. A little correction of the right 
 kind taken at the right moment is invaluable. No more 
 swearing. No more bad language of any kind. A lamb- 
 like temper ensured in about twenty minutes, by a single 
 dose of one of our spiritual indigestion tabloids. In cases 
 of all the more ordinary moral ailments, from simple lying, 
 to homicidal mania, in cases again of tendency to hatred, 
 malice, and uncharitableness ; of atrophy or hypertrophy 
 of the conscience, of costiveness or diarrhoea of the sym- 
 pathetic instincts, &c, &c, our spiritual indigestion tabloids 
 will afford unfailing and immediate relief. 
 
 79 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " N.B. — A bottle or two of our Sunchild Cordial will 
 assist the operation of the tabloids." 
 
 The second and last that I can give was as 
 follows : — 
 
 " All else is useless. If you wish to be a social success, 
 make yourself a good listener. There is no short cut to 
 this. A would-be listener must learn the rudiments of his 
 art and go through the mill like other people. If he would 
 develop a power of suffering fools gladly, he must begin by 
 suffering them without the gladness. Professor Proser, 
 ex-straightener, certificated bore, pragmatic or coruscating, 
 with or without anecdotes, attends pupils at their own 
 houses. Terms moderate. 
 
 " Mrs. Proser, whose success as a professional mind- 
 dresser is so well-known that lengthened advertisement is 
 unnecessary, prepares ladies or gentlemen with appropriate 
 remarks to be made at dinner-parties or at-homes. Mrs. P. 
 keeps herself well up to date with all the latest scandals." 
 
 " Poor, poor, straighteners ! " said my father to 
 himself. " Alas ! that it should have been my fate 
 to ruin you — for I suppose your occupation is 
 gone." 
 
 Tearing himself away from the College of Spiritual 
 
 Athletics and its affiliated shop, he passed on a few 
 
 doors, only to find himself looking in at what was 
 
 neither more nor less than a chemist's shop. In 
 
 the window there were advertisements which showed 
 
 that the practice of medicine was now legal, but my 
 
 father could not stay to copy a single one of the 
 
 fantastic announcements that a hurried glance 
 
 revealed to him. 
 
 80 
 
The New Order 
 
 It was also plain here, as from the shop already 
 more fully described, that the edicts against machines 
 had been repealed, for there were physical try-your- 
 strengths, as in the other shop there had been moral 
 ones, and such machines under the old law would 
 not have been tolerated for a moment. 
 
 My father made his purchases just as the last 
 shops were closing. He noticed that almost all of 
 them were full of articles labelled " Dedication." 
 There was Dedication gingerbread, stamped with 
 a moulded representation of the new temple ; there 
 were Dedication syrups, Dedication pocket-handker- 
 chiefs, also shewing the temple, and in one corner 
 giving a highly idealised portrait of my father him- 
 self. The chariot and the horses figured largely, 
 and in the confectioners' shops there were models 
 of the newly discovered relic — made, so my father 
 thought, with a little heap of cherries or straw- 
 berries, smothered in chocolate. Outside one 
 tailor's shop he saw a flaring advertisement which 
 can only be translated, " Try our Dedication trou- 
 sers, price ten shillings and sixpence." 
 
 Presently he passed the new temple, but it was 
 too dark for him to do more than see that it was a 
 vast fane, and must have cost an untold amount of 
 money. At every turn he found himself more and 
 more shocked, as he realised more and more fully 
 the mischief he had already occasioned, and the 
 certainty that this was small as compared with that 
 which would grow up hereafter. 
 
 "What," he said to me, very coherently and 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 quietly, " was I to do ? I had struck a bargain 
 
 with that dear fellow, though he knew not what 
 
 I meant, to the effect that I should try to undo 
 
 the harm I had done, by standing up before the 
 
 people on Sunday and saying who I was. True, 
 
 they would not believe me. They would look 
 
 at my hair and see it black, whereas it should 
 
 be very light. On this they would look no further, 
 
 but very likely tear me in pieces then and there. 
 
 Suppose that the authorities held a post-morte7ii 
 
 examination, and that many who knew me (let 
 
 alone that all my measurements and marks were 
 
 recorded twenty years ago) identified the body 
 
 as mine : would those in power admit that I 
 
 was the Sunchild ? Not they. The interests 
 
 vested in my being now in the palace of the 
 
 sun are too great to allow of my having been 
 
 torn to pieces in Sunch'ston, no matter how 
 
 truly I had been torn ; the whole thing would 
 
 be hushed up, and the utmost that could come 
 
 of it would be a heresy which would in time be 
 
 crushed. 
 
 " On the other hand, what business have I 
 
 with ' would be ' or ' would not be ? ' Should 
 
 I not speak out, come what may, when I see a 
 
 whole people being led astray by those who are 
 
 merely exploiting them for their own ends ? 
 
 Though I could do but little, ought I not to do 
 
 that little ? What did that good fellow's instinct 
 
 — so straight from heaven, so true, so healthy — 
 
 tell him ? What did my own instinct answer ? 
 
 82 
 
The New Order 
 
 What would the conscience of any honourable 
 man answer ? Who can doubt ? 
 
 "And yet, is there not reason? and is it not 
 God-given as much as instinct ? I remember 
 having heard an anthem in my young days, ' O 
 where shall wisdom be found ? the deep saith it 
 is not in me.' As the singers kept on repeating 
 the question, I kept on saying sorrowfully to my- 
 self — ' Ah, where, where, where ? ' and when the 
 triumphant answer came, 'The fear of the Lord, 
 that is wisdom, and to depart from evil is under- 
 standing,' I shrunk ashamed into myself for not 
 having foreseen it. In later life, when I have 
 tried to use this answer as a light by which I 
 could walk, I found it served but to the raising 
 of another question, ' What is the fear of the 
 Lord, and what is evil in this particular case ? ' 
 And my easy method with spiritual dilemmas 
 proved to be but a case of ignotum per ignotius. 
 
 '* If Satan himself is at times transformed into 
 an angel of light, are not angels of light sometimes 
 transformed into the likeness of Satan ? If the 
 devil is not so black as he is painted, is God 
 always so white ? And is there not another place 
 in which it is said, 'The fear of the Lord is the 
 beginning of wisdom,' as though it were not the 
 last word upon the subject ? If a man should 
 not do evil that good may come, so neither should 
 he do good that evil may come ; and though it 
 were good for me to speak out, should I not do 
 better by refraining ? 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Such were the lawless and uncertain thoughts 
 that tortured me very cruelly, so that I did what 
 I had not done for many a long year — I prayed 
 for guidance. ' Shew me Thy will, O Lord,' I 
 cried in great distress, 'and strengthen me to do 
 it when Thou hast shewn it me.' But there was 
 no answer. Instinct tore me one way and reason 
 another. Whereon I settled that I would obey 
 the reason with which God had endowed me, 
 unless the instinct He had also given me should 
 thrash it out of me. I could get no further than 
 this, that the Lord hath mercy on whom He will 
 have mercy, and whom He willeth He hardeneth ; 
 and again I prayed that I might be among those 
 on whom He would shew His mercy. 
 
 "This was the strongest internal conflict that I 
 ever remember to have felt, and it was at the end 
 of it that I perceived the first, but as yet very faint, 
 symptoms of that sickness from which I shall not 
 recover. Whether this be a token of mercy or no, 
 my Father which is in heaven knows, but I know 
 not." 
 
 From what my father afterwards told me, I do 
 not think the above reflections had engrossed him 
 for more than three or four minutes ; the giddiness 
 which had for some seconds compelled him to lay 
 hold of the first thing he could catch at in order to 
 avoid falling, passed away without leaving a trace 
 behind it, and his path seemed to become comfort- 
 ably clear before him. He settled it that the proper 
 
 thing to do would be to buy some food, start back 
 
 84 
 
The New Order 
 
 at once while his permit was still valid, help himself 
 to the property which he had sold the Professors, 
 leaving the Erewhonians to wrestle as they best 
 might with the lot that it had pleased Heaven to send 
 them. 
 
 This, however, was too heroic a course. He was 
 tired, and wanted a night's rest in a bed ; he was 
 hungry, and wanted a substantial meal ; he was 
 curious, moreover, to see the temple dedicated to 
 himself, and hear Hanky's sermon ; there was also 
 this further difficulty, he should have to take what 
 he had sold the Professors without returning them 
 their .£4, 10s., for he could not do without his 
 blanket, &c. ; and even if he left a bag of nuggets 
 made fast to the sucker, he must either place it 
 where it could be seen so easily that it would very 
 likely get stolen, or hide it so cleverly that the Pro- 
 fessors would never find it. He therefore com- 
 promised by concluding that he would sup and 
 sleep in Sunch'ston, get through the morrow as he 
 best could without attracting attention, deepen the 
 stain on his face and hair, and rely on the change 
 so made in his appearance to prevent his being re- 
 cognised at the dedication of the temple. He would 
 do nothing to disillusion the people — to do this 
 would only be making bad worse. As soon as the 
 service was over, he would set out towards the 
 preserves, and, when it was well dark, make for 
 the statues. He hoped that on such a great day 
 the rangers might be many of them in Sunch'ston ; 
 if there were any about, he must trust the moonless 
 
 85 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 night and his own quick eyes and ears to get him 
 through the preserves safely. 
 
 The shops were by this time closed, but the 
 keepers of a few stalls were trying by lamplight 
 to sell the wares they had not yet got rid of. One 
 of these was a bookstall, and, running his eye over 
 some of the volumes, my father saw one entitled — 
 
 "The Sayings of the Sunchild during his stay in 
 Erewhon, to which is added a true account of 
 his return to the palace of the sun with his 
 Erewhonian bride. This is the only version autho- 
 rised by the Presidents and Vice-Presidents of the 
 Musical Banks ; all other versions being imperfect 
 and inaccurate. — Bridgeford, XVIII. , 150 pp. 8vo. 
 Price 3s. 
 
 The reader will understand that I am giving the 
 prices as nearly as I can in their English equiva- 
 lents. Another title was — 
 
 "The Sacrament of Divorce: an Occasional Sermon 
 preached by Dr. Gurgoyle, President of the Musical 
 Banks for the Province of Sunch'ston. 8vo, 16 pp. 
 6d. 
 
 Other titles ran — 
 
 " Counsels of Imperfection." 8vo, 20 pp. 6d. 
 
 " Hygiene ; or, How to Diagnose your Doctor. 8vo, 
 10 pp. 3d. 
 
 "The Physics of Vicarious Existence," by Dr. Gur- 
 goyle, President of the Musical Banks for the Pro- 
 vince of Sunch'ston. 8vo, 20 pp. 6d. 
 
 There were many other books whose titles would 
 
 probably have attracted my father as much as those 
 
 86 
 
The New Order 
 
 that I have given, but he was too tired and hungry 
 to look at more. Finding that he could buy all the 
 foregoing for 4s. od., he bought them and stuffed 
 them into the valise that he had just bought. His 
 purchases in all had now amounted to a little over 
 £1, 10s. (silver), leaving him about .£3 (silver), in- 
 cluding the money for which he had sold the quails, 
 to carry him on till Sunday afternoon. He intended 
 to spend say £2 (silver), and keep the rest of the 
 money in order to give it to the British Museum. 
 
 He now began to search for an inn, and walked 
 about the less fashionable parts of the town till he 
 found an unpretending tavern, which he thought 
 would suit him. Here, on importunity, he was 
 given a servant's room at the top of the house, all 
 others being engaged by visitors who had come for 
 the dedication. He ordered a meal, of which he 
 stood in great need, and having eaten it, he retired 
 early for the night. But he smoked a pipe surrepti- 
 tiously up the chimney before he got into bed. 
 
 Meanwhile other things were happening, of which, 
 happily for his repose, he was still ignorant, and 
 which he did not learn till a few days later. Not 
 to depart from chronological order I will deal with 
 them in my next chapter. 
 
 87 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 YRAM, NOW MAYORESS, GIVES A DINNER-PARTY, IN THE 
 COURSE OF WHICH SHE IS DISQUIETED BY WHAT SHE 
 LEARNS FROM PROFESSOR HANKY : SHE SENDS FOR 
 HER SON GEORGE AND QUESTIONS HIM 
 
 The Professors, returning to their hotel early on 
 the Friday morning, found a note from the 
 Mayoress urging them to be her guests during 
 the remainder of their visit, and to meet other 
 friends at dinner on this same evening. They 
 accepted, and then went to bed ; for they had 
 passed the night under the tree in which they 
 had hidden their purchase, and, as may be 
 imagined, had slept but little. They rested all 
 day, and transferred themselves and their belong- 
 ings to the Mayor's house in time to dress for 
 dinner. 
 
 When they came down into the drawing-room 
 they found a brilliant company assembled, chiefly 
 Musical-Bankical like themselves. There was Dr. 
 Downie, Professor of Logomachy, and perhaps 
 the most subtle dialectician in Erewhon. He 
 could say nothing in more words than any man 
 of his generation. His text-book on the "Art of 
 Obscuring Issues " had passed through ten or 
 twelve editions, and was in the hands of all 
 
 aspirants for academic distinction. He had earned 
 
 88 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 a high reputation for sobriety of judgement by 
 resolutely refusing to have definite views on any 
 subject ; so safe a man was he considered, that 
 while still quite young he had been appointed to 
 the lucrative post of Thinker in Ordinary to the 
 Royal Family. There was Mr. Principal Crank, 
 with his sister Mrs. Quack ; Professors Gabb and 
 Bawl, with their wives and two or three erudite 
 daughters. 
 
 Old Mrs. Humdrum (of whom more anon) was 
 there of course, with her venerable white hair and 
 rich black satin dress, looking the very ideal of 
 all that a stately old dowager ought to be. In 
 society she was commonly known as Ydgrun, so 
 perfectly did she correspond with the conception 
 of this strange goddess formed by the Erewhonians. 
 She was one of those who had visited my father 
 when he was in prison twenty years earlier. When 
 he told me that she was now called Ydgrun, he 
 said, " I am sure that the Erinyes were only Mrs. 
 Humdrums, and that they were delightful people 
 when you came to know them. I do not believe 
 they did the awful things we say they did. I think, 
 but am not quite sure, that they let Orestes off ; but 
 even though they had not pardoned him, I doubt 
 whether they would have done anything more 
 dreadful to him than issue a mot dordre that he 
 was not to be asked to any more afternoon teas. 
 This, however, would be down-right torture to 
 some people. At any rate," he continued, " be 
 it the Erinyes, or Mrs. Grundy, or Ydgrun, in all 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 times and places it is woman who decides whether 
 society is to condone an offence or no." 
 
 Among the most attractive ladies present was 
 one for whose Erewhonian name I can find no 
 English equivalent, and whom I must therefore 
 call Miss La Frime. She was Lady President of 
 the principal establishment for the higher educa- 
 tion of young ladies, and so celebrated was she, that 
 pupils flocked to her from all parts of the sur- 
 rounding country. Her primer (written for the 
 Erewhonian Arts and Science Series) on the Art 
 of Man-killing, was the most complete thing of 
 the kind that had yet been done ; but ill-natured 
 people had been heard to say that she had killed 
 all her own admirers so effectually that not one 
 of them had ever lived to marry her. According 
 to Erewhonian custom the successful marriages of 
 the pupils are inscribed yearly on the oak panel- 
 ing of the cottage refectory, and a reprint from 
 these in pamphlet form accompanies all the pro- 
 spectuses that are sent out to parents. It was 
 alleged that no other ladies' seminary in Erewhon 
 could show such a brilliant record during all the 
 years of Miss La Frime's presidency. Many other 
 guests of less note were there, but the lions of the 
 evening were the two Professors whom we have 
 already met with, and more particularly Hanky, 
 who took the Mayoress in to dinner. Panky, of 
 course, wore his clothes reversed, as did Principal 
 Crank and Professor Gabb ; the others were dressed 
 
 English fashion. 
 
 90 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 Everything hung upon the hostess, for the host 
 was little more than a still handsome figure-head. 
 He had been remarkable for his good looks as a 
 young man, and Strong is the nearest approach I 
 can get to a translation of his Erewhonian name. 
 His face inspired confidence at once, but he was 
 a man of few words, and had little of that grace 
 which in his wife set every one instantly at his or her 
 ease. He knew that all would go well so long as he 
 left everything to her, and kept himself as far as 
 might be in the background. 
 
 Before dinner was announced there was the usual 
 buzz of conversation, chiefly occupied with saluta- 
 tions, good wishes for Sunday's weather, and ad- 
 miration for the extreme beauty of the Mayoress's 
 three daughters, the two elder of whom were already 
 out ; while the third, though only thirteen, might 
 have passed for a year or two older. Their mother 
 was so much engrossed with receiving her guests 
 that it was not till they were all at table that she 
 was able to ask Hanky what he thought of the 
 statues, which she had heard that he and Professor 
 Panky had been to see. She was told how much 
 interested he had been with them, and how unable 
 he had been to form any theory as to their date or 
 object. He then added, appealing to Panky, who 
 was on the Mayoress's left hand, "but we had 
 rather a strange adventure on our way down, had 
 we not, Panky ? We got lost, and were benighted 
 in the forest. Happily we fell in with one of the 
 
 rangers who had lit a fire." 
 
 91 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Do I understand, then," said Yram, as I suppose 
 we may as well call her, " that you were out all last 
 night ? How tired you must be ! But I hope you 
 had enough provisions with you ? " 
 
 " Indeed we were out all night. We staid by the 
 ranger's fire till midnight, and then tried Jo find our 
 way down, but we gave it up soon after we had got 
 out of the forest, and then waited under a large 
 chestnut tree till four or five this morning. As for 
 food, we had not so much as a mouthful from 
 about three in the afternoon till we got to our inn 
 early this morning." 
 
 " Oh, you poor, poor people ! how tired you 
 must be." 
 
 " No ; we made a good breakfast as soon as we 
 got in, and then went to bed, where we staid till it 
 was time for us to come to your house." 
 
 Here Panky gave his friend a significant look, as 
 much as to say that he had said enough. 
 
 This set Hanky on at once. " Strange to say, the 
 ranger was wearing the old Erewhonian dress. It 
 did me good to see it again after all these years. It 
 seems your son lets his men wear what few of the 
 old clothes they may still have, so long as they keep 
 well away from the town. But fancy how carefully 
 these poor fellows husband them ; why, it must be 
 seventeen years since the dress was forbidden ! " 
 
 We all of us have skeletons, large or small, in 
 some cupboard of our lives, but a well regulated 
 skeleton that will stay in its cupboard quietly does 
 
 not much matter. There are skeletons, however, 
 
 92 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 which can never be quite trusted not to open the 
 cupboard door at some awkward moment, go down 
 stairs, ring the hall-door bell, with grinning face 
 announce themselves as the skeleton, and ask 
 whether the master or mistress is at home. This 
 kind of skeleton, though no bigger than a rabbit, 
 will sometimes loom large as that of a dinotherium. 
 My father was Yram's skeleton. True, he was a 
 mere skeleton of a skeleton, for the chances were 
 thousands to one that he and my mother had 
 perished long years ago ; and even though he rang 
 at the bell, there was no harm that he either could 
 or would now do to her or hers ; still, so long as 
 she did not certainly know that he was dead, or 
 otherwise precluded from returning, she could not 
 be sure that he would not one day come back by 
 the way that he would alone know, and she had 
 rather he should not do so. 
 
 Hence, on hearing from Professor Hanky that 
 a man had been seen between the statues and 
 Sunch'ston wearing the old Erewhonian dress, she 
 was disquieted and perplexed. The excuse he had 
 evidently made to the Professors aggravated her 
 uneasiness, for it was an obvious attempt to escape 
 from an unexpected difficulty. There could be no 
 truth in it. Her son would as soon think of wear- 
 ing the old dress himself as of letting his men do so ; 
 and as for having old clothes still to wear out after 
 seventeen years, no one but a Bridgeford Professor 
 would accept this. She saw, therefore, that she 
 must keep her wits about her, and lead her guests 
 
 93 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 on to tell her as much as they could be induced 
 to do. 
 
 "My son," she said innocently, "is always con- 
 siderate to his men, and that is why they are so 
 devoted to him. I wonder which of them it was ? 
 In what part of the preserves did you fall in with 
 him ? " 
 
 Hanky described the place, and gave the best 
 idea he could of my father's appearance. 
 
 " Of course he was swarthy like the rest of 
 us?" 
 
 " I saw nothing remarkable about him, except 
 that his eyes were blue and his eyelashes nearly 
 white, which, as you know, is rare in Erewhon. 
 Indeed, I do not remember ever before to have 
 seen a man with dark hair and complexion but 
 light eyelashes. Nature is always doing something 
 unusual." 
 
 " I have no doubt," said Yram, " that he was the 
 man they call Blacksheep, but I never noticed this 
 peculiarity in him. If he was Blacksheep, I am 
 afraid you must have found him none too civil ; he 
 is a rough diamond, and you would hardly be able 
 to understand his uncouth Sunch'ston dialect." 
 
 "On the contrary, he was most kind and 
 thoughtful — even so far as to take our permit 
 from us, and thus save us the trouble of giving 
 it up at your son's office. As for his dialect, his 
 grammar was often at fault, but we could quite 
 understand him." 
 
 " I am glad to hear he behaved better than 
 
 94 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 I could have expected. Did he say in what part 
 of the preserves he had been ? " 
 
 " He had been catching quails between the place 
 where we saw him and the statues ; he was to 
 deliver three dozen to your son this afternoon for 
 the Mayor's banquet on Sunday." 
 
 This was worse and worse. She had urged her 
 son to provide her with a supply of quails for 
 Sunday's banquet, but he had begged her not to 
 insist on having them. There was no close time 
 for them in Erewhon, but he set his face against 
 their being seen at table in spring and summer. 
 During the winter, when any great occasion arose, 
 he had allowed a few brace to be provided. 
 
 " I asked my son to let me have some," said 
 Yram, who was now on full scent. She laughed 
 genially as she added, " Can you throw any light 
 upon the question whether I am likely to get my 
 three dozen ? I have had no news as yet." 
 
 "The man had taken a good many; we saw 
 them but did not count them. He started about 
 midnight for the ranger's shelter, where he said 
 he should sleep till daybreak, so as to make up his 
 full tale betimes." 
 
 Yram had heard her son complain that there 
 were no shelters on the preserves, and state his 
 intention of having some built before the winter. 
 Here too, then, the man's story must be false. 
 She changed the conversation for the moment, but 
 quietly told a servant to send high and low in 
 search of her son, and if he could be found, to 
 
 95 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 bid him come to her at once. She then returned 
 to her previous subject. 
 
 "And did not this heartless wretch, knowing 
 how hungry you must both be, let you have a 
 quail or two as an act of pardonable charity ? " 
 
 " My dear Mayoress, how can you ask such a 
 question ? We knew you would want all you 
 could get ; moreover, our permit threatened us 
 with all sorts of horrors if we so much as ate a 
 single quail. I assure you we never even allowed 
 a thought of eating one of them to cross our 
 minds." 
 
 "Then," said Yram to herself, "they gorged 
 upon them." What could she think ? A man who 
 wore the old dress, and therefore who had almost 
 certainly been in Erewhon, but had been many 
 years away from it ; who spoke the language well, 
 but whose grammar was defective — hence, again, 
 one who had spent some time in Erewhon ; who 
 knew nothing of the afforesting law now long 
 since enacted, for how else would he have dared 
 to light a fire and be seen with quails in his 
 possession ; an adroit liar, who on gleaning infor- 
 mation from the Professors had hazarded an ex- 
 cuse for immediately retracing his steps ; a man, 
 too, with blue eyes and light eyelashes. W T hat did 
 it matter about his hair being dark and his com- 
 plexion swarthy — Higgs was far too clever to 
 attempt a second visit to Erewhon without dyeing 
 his hair and staining his face and hands. And he 
 
 had got their permit out of the Professors before 
 
 96 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 he left them ; clearly, then, he meant coming back, 
 and coming back at once before the permit had 
 expired. How could she doubt ? My father, she 
 felt sure, must by this time be in Sunch'ston. He 
 would go back to change his clothes, which would 
 not be very far down on the other side the pass, 
 for he would not put on his old Erewhonian dress 
 till he was on the point of entering Erewhon ; and 
 he would hide his English dress rather than throw 
 it away, for he would want it when he went back 
 again. It would be quite possible, then, for him 
 to get through the forest before the permit was 
 void, and he would be sure to go on to Sunch'ston 
 for the night. 
 
 She chatted unconcernedly, now with one guest 
 now with another, while they in their turn chatted 
 unconcernedly with one another. 
 
 Miss La Frime to Mrs. Humdrum : " You know 
 
 how he got his professorship ? No ? I thought 
 
 every one knew that. The question the candidates 
 
 had to answer was, whether it was wiser during a 
 
 long stay at a hotel to tip the servants pretty early, 
 
 or to wait till the stay was ended. All the other 
 
 candidates took one side or the other, and argued 
 
 their case in full. Hanky sent in three lines to 
 
 the effect that the proper thing to do would be to 
 
 promise at the beginning, and go away without 
 
 giving. The King, with whom the appointment 
 
 rested, was so much pleased with this answer that 
 
 he gave Hanky the professorship without so much 
 
 as looking . . ." 
 
 97 G 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Professor Gabb to Mrs. Humdrum : " Oh no, I 
 can assure you there is no truth in it. What 
 happened was this. There was the usual crowd, 
 and the people cheered Professor after Professor, 
 as he stood before them in the great Bridgeford 
 theatre and satisfied them that a lump of butter 
 which had been put into his mouth would not melt 
 in it. When Hanky's turn came he was taken 
 suddenly unwell, and had to leave the theatre, on 
 which there was a report in the house that the 
 butter had melted ; this was at once stopped by 
 the return of the Professor. Another piece of butter 
 was put into his mouth, and on being taken out 
 after the usual time, was found to shew no signs 
 of having . . ." 
 
 Miss Bawl to Mr. Principal Crank : . . . " The 
 Manager was so tall, you know, and then there 
 was that little mite of an assistant manager — it was 
 so funny. For the assistant manager's voice was 
 ever so much louder than the . . ." 
 
 Mrs. Bawl to Professor Gabb : . . . " Live for 
 art ! If I had to choose whether I would lose either 
 art or science, I have not the smallest hesitation in 
 saying that I would lose . . ." 
 
 The Mayor and Dr. Downie : . . . "That you 
 are to be canonised at the close of the year along 
 with Professors Hanky and Panky ? " 
 
 " I believe it is his Majesty's intention that the 
 
 Professors and myself are to head the list of the 
 
 Sunchild's Saints, but we have all of us got to . . ." 
 
 And so on, and so on, buzz, buzz, buzz, over the 
 98 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 whole table. Presently Yram turned to Hanky 
 and said — 
 
 "By the way, Professor, you must have found 
 it very cold up at the statues, did you not ? But 
 I suppose the snow is all gone by this time ?" 
 
 " Yes, it was cold, and though the winter's snow 
 is melted, there had been a recent fall. Strange to 
 say, we saw fresh footprints in it, as of some one 
 who had come up from the other side. But thereon 
 hangs a tale, about which I believe I should say 
 nothing." 
 
 "Then say nothing, my dear Professor," said 
 Yram with a frank smile. "Above all," she added 
 quietly and gravely, "say nothing to the Mayor, 
 nor to my son, till after Sunday. Even a whisper 
 of some one coming over from the other side dis- 
 quiets them, and they have enough on hand for 
 the moment." 
 
 Panky, who had been growing more and more 
 restive at his friend's outspokenness, but who had 
 encouraged it more than once by vainly trying to 
 check it, was relieved at hearing his hostess do for 
 him what he could not do for himself. As for 
 Yram, she had got enough out of the Professor 
 to be now fully dissatisfied, and mentally informed 
 them that they might leave the witness-box. During 
 the rest of dinner she let the subject of their adven- 
 ture severely alone. 
 
 It seemed to her as though dinner was never 
 going to end ; but in the course of time it did so, 
 and presently the ladies withdrew. As they were 
 
 99 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 entering the drawing-room a servant told her that 
 her son had been found more easily than was ex- 
 pected, and was now in his own room dressing. 
 
 " Tell him," she said, " to stay there till I come, 
 which I will do directly." 
 
 She remained for a few minutes with her guests, 
 and then, excusing herself quietly to Mrs. Hum- 
 drum, she stepped out and hastened to her son's 
 room. She told him that Professors Hanky and 
 Panky were staying in the house, and that during 
 dinner they had told her something he ought to 
 know, but which there was no time to tell him until 
 her guests were gone. " I had rather," she said, 
 " tell you about it before you see the Professors, 
 for if you see them the whole thing will be re- 
 opened, and you are sure to let them see how 
 much more there is in it than they suspect. I 
 want everything hushed up for the moment ; do 
 not, therefore, join us. Have dinner sent to you 
 in your father's study. I will come to you about 
 midnight." 
 
 11 But, my dear mother," said George, " I have 
 seen Panky already. I walked down with him a 
 good long way this afternoon." 
 
 Yram had not expected this, but she kept her 
 countenance. " How did you know," said she, 
 " that he was Professor Panky ? Did he tell 
 you so ? " 
 
 " Certainly he did. He showed me his permit, 
 which was made out in favour of Professors Hanky 
 and Panky, or either of them. He said Hanky 
 
Yram Guesses the Truth 
 
 had been unable to come with him, and that he 
 was himself Professor Panky." 
 
 Yram again smiled very sweetly. "Then, my 
 dear boy," she said, " I am all the more anxious 
 that you should not see him now. See nobody 
 but the servants and your brothers, and wait till 
 I can enlighten you. I must not stay another 
 moment ; but tell me this much, have you seen 
 any signs of poachers lately?" 
 
 " Yes ; there were three last night." 
 
 " In what part of the preserves ? " 
 
 Her son described the place. 
 
 " You are sure they had been killing quails ? " 
 
 "Yes, and eating them — two on one side of a 
 fire they had lit, and one on the other ; this last 
 man had done all the plucking." 
 
 " Good ! " 
 
 She kissed him with more than even her usual 
 tenderness, and returned to the drawing-room. 
 
 During the rest of the evening she was engaged 
 in earnest conversation with Mrs. Humdrum, 
 leaving her other guests to her daughters and to 
 themselves. Mrs. Humdrum had been her closest 
 friend for many years, and carried more weight 
 than any one else in Sunch'ston, except, perhaps, 
 Yram herself. "Tell him everything," she said to 
 Yram at the close of their conversation ; we all 
 dote upon him ; trust him frankly, as you trusted 
 your husband before you let him marry you. No 
 lies, no reserve, no tears, and all will come right. 
 As for me, command me," and the good old lady 
 
 IOI 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 rose to take her leave with as kind a look on her 
 face as ever irradiated saint or angel. " I go early," 
 she added, "for the others will go when they see 
 me do so, and the sooner you are alone the 
 better." 
 
 By half an hour before midnight her guests had 
 gone. Hanky and Panky were given to understand 
 that they must still be tired, and had better go to 
 bed. So was the Mayor ; so were her sons and 
 daughters, except of course George, who was wait- 
 ing for her with some anxiety, for he had seen that 
 she had something serious to tell him. Then she 
 went down into the study. Her son embraced her 
 as she entered, and moved an easy chair for her, 
 but she would not have it. 
 
 " No ; I will have an upright one." Then, sit- 
 ting composedly down on the one her son placed 
 for her, she said — 
 
 " And now to business. But let me first tell you 
 that the Mayor was told, twenty years ago, all the 
 more important part of what you will now hear. 
 He does not yet know what has happened within 
 the last few hours, but either you or I will tell him 
 to-morrow." 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 INTERVIEW BETWEEN YRAM AND HER SON 
 
 " What did you think of Panky ? " 
 
 " I could not make him out. If he had not been 
 a Bridgeford Professor I might have liked him ; 
 but you know how we all of us distrust those 
 people." 
 
 " Where did you meet him ? " 
 
 "About two hours lower down than the statues." 
 
 " At what o'clock ? " 
 
 " It might be between two and half-past." 
 
 " I suppose he did not say that at that hour he 
 was in bed at his hotel in Sunch'ston. Hardly ! 
 Tell me what passed between you." 
 
 " He had his permit open before we were within 
 speaking distance. I think he feared I should 
 attack him without making sure whether he was a 
 foreign devil or no. I have told you he said he 
 was Professor Panky." 
 
 " I suppose he had a dark complexion and black 
 hair like the rest of us ?" 
 
 " Dark complexion and hair purplish rather than 
 
 black. I was surprised to see that his eyelashes 
 
 were as light as my own, and his eyes were blue 
 
 like mine — but you will have noticed this at 
 
 dinner." 
 
 103 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " No, my dear, I did not, and I think I should 
 have done so if it had been there to notice." 
 
 " Oh, but it was so indeed." 
 
 " Perhaps. Was there anything strange about 
 his way of talking ? " 
 
 " A little about his grammar, but these Bridgeford 
 Professors have often risen from the ranks. His 
 pronunciation was nearly like yours and mine." 
 
 " Was his manner friendly ? " 
 
 " Very ; more so than I could understand at 
 first. I had not, however, been with him long be- 
 fore I saw tears in his eyes, and when I asked him 
 whether he was in distress, he said I reminded him 
 of a son whom he had lost and had found after 
 many years, only to lose him almost immediately 
 for ever. Hence his cordiality towards me." 
 
 " Then," said Yram half hysterically to herself, 
 " he knew who you were. Now, how, I wonder, 
 did he find that out ? " All vestige of doubt as to 
 who the man might be had now left her. 
 
 " Certainly he knew who I was. He spoke about 
 you more than once, and wished us every kind of 
 prosperity, baring his head reverently as he spoke." 
 
 " Poor fellow ! Did he say anything about 
 Higgs?" 
 
 " A good deal, and I was surprised to find he 
 
 thought about it all much as we do. But when I 
 
 said that if I could go down into the hell of which 
 
 Higgs used to talk to you while he was in prison, I 
 
 should expect to find him in its hottest fires, he did 
 
 not like it." 
 
 104 
 
Yram and Her Son 
 
 " Possibly not, my dear. Did you tell him how 
 the other boys, when you were at school, used 
 sometimes to say you were son to this man Higgs, 
 and that the people of Sunch'ston used to say so 
 also, till the Mayor trounced two or three people 
 so roundly that they held their tongues for the 
 future ? " 
 
 "Not all that, but I said that silly people had 
 believed me to be the Sunchild's son, and what a 
 disgrace I should hold it to be son to such an im- 
 postor." 
 
 " What did he say to this ? " 
 
 " He asked whether I should feel the disgrace 
 less if Higgs were to undo the mischief he had 
 caused by coming back and shewing himself to the 
 people for what he was. But he said it would be 
 no use for him to do so, inasmuch as people would 
 kill him but would not believe him." 
 
 " And you said ?" 
 
 " Let him come back, speak out, and chance 
 what might befall him. In that case, I should 
 honour him, father or no father." 
 
 "And he?" 
 
 " He asked if that would be a bargain ; and when 
 I said it would, he grasped me warmly by the hand 
 on Higgs's behalf — though what it could matter to 
 him passes my comprehension." 
 
 " But he saw that even though Higgs were to 
 shew himself and say who he was, it would mean 
 death to himself and no good to any one else ? " 
 
 " Perfectly." 
 
 105 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 "Then he can have meant nothing by shaking 
 hands with you. It was an idle jest. And now for 
 your poachers. You do not know who they were ? 
 I will tell you. The two who sat on the one side 
 the fire were Professors Hanky and Panky from 
 the City of the People who are above Suspicion." 
 
 " No," said George vehemently. " Impossible." 
 
 " Yes, my dear boy, quite possible, and whether 
 possible or impossible, assuredly true." 
 
 "And the third man?" 
 
 "The third man was dressed in the old costume. 
 He was in possession of several brace of birds. 
 The Professors vowed they had not eaten any " 
 
 " Oh yes, but they had," blurted out George. 
 
 " Of course they had, my dear ; and a good thing 
 too. Let us return to the man in the old costume." 
 
 "That is puzzling. Who did he say he was ? " 
 
 " He said he was one of your men ; that you had 
 instructed him to provide you with three dozen 
 quails for Sunday ; and that you let your men 
 wear the old costume if they had any of it left, 
 provided " 
 
 This was too much for George ; he started to his 
 feet. " What, my dearest mother, does all this 
 mean ? You have been playing with me all 
 through. What is coming?" 
 
 " A very little more, and you shall hear. This 
 man staid with the Professors till nearly midnight, 
 and then left them on the plea that he would finish 
 the night in the Ranger's shelter " 
 
 " Ranger's shelter, indeed ! Why " 
 
 106 
 
Yram and Her Son 
 
 " Hush, my darling boy, be patient with me. He 
 said he must be up betimes, to run down the rest 
 of the quails you had ordered him to bring you. 
 But before leaving the Professors he beguiled them 
 into giving him up their permit." 
 
 "Then," said George, striding about the room 
 with his face flushed and his eyes flashing, " he was 
 the man with whom I walked down this afternoon." 
 
 " Exactly so." 
 
 " And he must have changed his dress ? " 
 
 " Exactly so." 
 
 " But where and how ? " 
 
 " At some place not very far down on the other 
 side the range, where he had hidden his old clothes." 
 
 " And who, in the name of all that we hold most 
 sacred, do you take him to have been — for I see 
 you know more than you have yet told me ? " 
 
 "My son, he was Higgs the Sunchild, father to 
 that boy whom I love next to my husband more 
 dearly than any one in the whole world." 
 
 She folded her arms about him for a second, 
 without kissing him, and left him. " And now," 
 she said, the moment she had closed the door — 
 " and now I may cry." 
 
 She did not cry for long, and having removed 
 
 all trace of tears as far as might be, she returned 
 
 to her son outwardly composed and cheerful. 
 
 " Shall I say more now," she said, seeing how 
 
 grave he looked, "or shall I leave you, and talk 
 
 further with you to-morrow ? " 
 
 107 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Now — now — now ! " 
 
 "Good! A little before Higgs came here, the 
 Mayor, as he now is, poor, handsome, generous 
 to a fault so far as he had the wherewithal, was 
 adored by all the women of his own rank in 
 Sunch'ston. Report said that he had adored many 
 of them in return, but after having known me for 
 a very few days, he asked me to marry him, pro- 
 testing that he was a changed man. I liked him, 
 as every one else did, but I was not in love with 
 him, and said so ; he said he would give me as 
 much time as I chose, if I would not point-blank 
 refuse him ; and so the matter was left. 
 
 "Within a week or so Higgs was brought to the 
 prison, and he had not been there long before I 
 found, or thought I found, that I liked him better 
 than I liked Strong. I was a fool — but there ! As 
 for Higgs, he liked, but did not love me. If I had 
 let him alone he would have done the like by me ; 
 and let each other alone we did, till the day before 
 he was taken down to the capital. On that day, 
 whether through his fault or mine I know not — we 
 neither of us meant it — it was as though Nature, 
 my dear, was determined that you should not slip 
 through her fingers — well, on that day we took it 
 into our heads that we were broken-hearted lovers 
 — the rest followed. And how, my dearest boy, as 
 I look upon you, can I feign repentance ? 
 
 " My husband, who never saw Higgs, and knew 
 
 nothing about him except the too little that I told 
 
 him, pressed his suit, and about a month after 
 
 108 
 
Yram and Her Son 
 
 Higgs had gone, having recovered my passing in- 
 fatuation for him, I took kindly to the Mayor and 
 accepted him, without telling him what I ought to 
 have told him— but the words stuck in my throat. 
 I had not been engaged to him many days before I 
 found that there was something which I should not 
 be able to hide much longer. 
 
 " You know, my dear, that my mother had been 
 long dead, and I never had a sister or any near 
 kinswoman. At my wits' end who I should consult, 
 instinct drew me to Mrs. Humdrum, then a woman 
 of about five-and-forty. She was a grand lady, 
 while I was about the rank of one of my own 
 housemaids. I had no claim on her ; I went to 
 her as a lost dog looks into the faces of people on 
 a road, and singles out the one who will most 
 surely help him. I had had a good look at her 
 once as she was putting on her gloves, and I liked 
 the way she did it. I marvel at my own boldness. 
 At any rate, I asked to see her, and told her my 
 story exactly as I have now told it to you. 
 
 " 'You have no mother ? ' she said, when she had 
 heard all. 
 
 "'No.' 
 
 "'Then, my dear, I will mother you myself. 
 Higgs is out of the question, so Strong must marry 
 you at once. We will tell him everything, and I, 
 on your behalf, will insist upon it that the engage- 
 ment is at an end. I hear good reports of him, and 
 if we are fair towards him he will be generous to- 
 wards us. Besides, I believe he is so much in love 
 
 109 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 with you that he would sell his soul to get you. 
 Send him to me. I can deal with him better than 
 you can.'" 
 
 "And what," said George, "did my father, as I 
 shall always call him, say to all this ? " 
 
 " Truth bred chivalry in him at once. ' I will 
 marry her/ he said, with hardly a moment's hesita- 
 tion, ' but it will be better that I should not be put 
 on any lower footing than Higgs was. I ought not 
 to be denied anything that has been allowed to him. 
 If I am trusted, I can trust myself to trust and think 
 no evil either of Higgs or her. They were pestered 
 beyond endurance, as I have been ere now. If I 
 am held at arm's length till I am fast bound, I shall 
 marry Yram just the same, but I doubt whether she 
 and I shall ever be quite happy.' 
 
 " ' Come to my house this evening,' said Mrs. 
 Humdrum, 'and you will find Yram there.' He 
 came, he found me, and within a fortnight we were 
 man and wife." 
 
 " How much does not all this explain," said 
 George, smiling but very gravely. " And you are 
 going to ask me to forgive you for robbing me of 
 such a father." 
 
 " He has forgiven me, my dear, for robbing him 
 of such a son. He never reproached me. From 
 that day to this he has never given me a harsh word 
 or even syllable. When you were born he took to 
 you at once, as, indeed, who could help doing ? for 
 you were the sweetest child both in looks and 
 temper that it is possible to conceive. Your having 
 
Yram and Her Son 
 
 light hair and eyes made things more difficult ; for 
 this, and your being born, almost to the day, nine 
 months after Higgs had left us, made people talk — 
 but your father kept their tongues within bounds. 
 They talk still, but they liked what little they saw of 
 Higgs, they like the Mayor and me, and they like 
 you the best of all ; so they please themselves by 
 having the thing both ways. Though, therefore, 
 you are son to the Mayor, Higgs cast some miracu- 
 lous spell upon me before he left, whereby my son 
 should be in some measure his as well as the 
 Mayor's. It was this miraculous spell that caused 
 you to be born two months too soon, and we called 
 you by Higgs's first name as though to show that 
 we took that view of the matter ourselves. 
 
 " Mrs. Humdrum, however, was very positive that 
 there was no spell at all. She had repeatedly heard 
 her father say that the Mayor's grandfather was 
 light-haired and blue-eyed, and that every third 
 generation in that family a light-haired son was 
 born. The people believe this too. Nobody dis- 
 believes Mrs. Humdrum, but they like the miracle 
 best, so that is how it has been settled. 
 
 " I never knew whether Mrs. Humdrum told her 
 husband, but I think she must ; for a place was 
 found almost immediately for my husband in Mr. 
 Humdrum's business. He made himself useful ; 
 after a few years he was taken into partnership, and 
 on Mr. Humdrum's death became head of the firm. 
 Between ourselves, he says laughingly that all his 
 success in life was due to Higgs and me." 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " I shall give Mrs. Humdrum a double dose of 
 kissing," said George thoughtfully, " next time I 
 see her." 
 
 " Oh, do, do ; she will so like it. And now, my 
 darling boy, tell your poor mother whether or no 
 you can forgive her." 
 
 He clasped her in his arms, and kissed her again 
 and again, but for a time he could find no utter- 
 ance. Presently he smiled, and said, " Of course I 
 do, but it is you who should forgive me, for was it 
 not all my fault ? " 
 
 When Yram, too, had become more calm, she 
 said, " It is late, and we have no time to lose. 
 Higgs's coming at this time is mere accident ; if he 
 had had news from Erewhon he would have known 
 much that he did not know. I cannot guess why 
 he has come — probably through mere curiosity, but 
 he will hear or have heard — yes, you and he talked 
 about it — of the temple ; being here, he will want to 
 see the dedication. From what you have told me 
 I feel sure that he will not make a fool of himself 
 by saying who he is, but in spite of his disguise he 
 may be recognised. I do not doubt that he is now 
 in Sunch'ston ; therefore, to-morrow morning 
 scour the town to find him. Tell him he is dis- 
 covered, tell him you know from me that he is your 
 father, and that I wish to see him with all good-will 
 towards him. He will come. We will then talk to 
 him, and show him that he must go back at once. 
 You can escort him to the statues ; after passing 
 them he will be safe. He will give you no trouble, 
 
Yram and Her Son 
 
 but if he does, arrest him on a charge of poaching, 
 and take him to the gaol, where we must do the 
 best we can with him — but he will give you none. 
 We need say nothing to the Professors. No one 
 but ourselves will know of his having been here." 
 
 On this she again embraced her son and left him. 
 If two photographs could have been taken of her, 
 one as she opened the door and looked fondly back 
 on George, and the other as she closed it behind 
 her, the second portrait would have seemed taken 
 ten years later than the first. 
 
 As for George, he went gravely but not unhappily 
 to his own room. " So that ready, plausible fellow," 
 he muttered to himself, " was my own father. At 
 any rate, I am not son to a fool — and he liked me." 
 
 H3 H 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 MY FATHER, FEARING RECOGNITION AT SUNCH'- 
 STON, BETAKES HIMSELF TO THE NEIGHBOUR- 
 ING TOWN OF FAIRMEAD. 
 
 I WILL now return to my father. Whether from 
 fatigue or over-excitement, he slept only by fits 
 and starts, and when awake he could not rid 
 himself of the idea that, in spite of his disguise, he 
 might be recognised, either at his inn or in the 
 town, by some one of the many who had seen 
 him when he was in prison. In this case there 
 was no knowing what might happen, but at best, 
 discovery would probably prevent his seeing the 
 temple dedicated to himself, and hearing Professor 
 Hanky's sermon, which he was particularly anxious 
 to do. 
 
 So strongly did he feel the real or fancied danger 
 he should incur by spending Saturday in Sunch'- 
 ston, that he rose as soon as he heard any one 
 stirring, and having paid his bill, walked quietly 
 out of the house, without saying where he was 
 going. 
 
 There was a town about ten miles off, not so 
 
 important as Sunch'ston, but having some 10,000 
 
 inhabitants ; he resolved to find accommodation 
 
 there for the day and night, and to walk over to 
 
 114 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 Sunch'ston in time for the dedication ceremony, 
 which he had found, on inquiry, would begin at 
 eleven o'clock. 
 
 The country between Sunch'ston and Fairmead, 
 as the town just referred to was named, was still 
 mountainous, and being well wooded as well as 
 well watered, abounded in views of singular beauty; 
 but I have no time to dwell on the enthusiasm 
 with which my father described them to me. The 
 road took him at right angles to the main road 
 down the valley from Sunch'ston to the capital, 
 and this was one reason why he had chosen Fair- 
 mead rather than Clearwater, which was the next 
 town lower down on the main road. He did not, 
 indeed, anticipate that any one would want to find 
 him, but whoever might so want would be more 
 likely to go straight down the valley than to turn 
 aside towards Fairmead. 
 
 On reaching this place, he found it pretty full of 
 people, for Saturday was market-day. There was 
 a considerable open space in the middle of the 
 town, with an arcade running round three sides of 
 it, while the fourth was completely taken up by the 
 venerable Musical Bank of the city, a building 
 which had weathered the storms of more than five 
 centuries. On the outside of the wall, abutting on 
 the market-place, were three wooden sedilia, in 
 which the Mayor and two coadjutors sate weekly 
 on market-days to give advice, redress grievances, 
 and, if necessary (which it very seldom was) to 
 administer correction. 
 
 "5 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 My father was much interested in watching the 
 proceedings in a case which he found on inquiry 
 to be not infrequent. A man was complaining to 
 the Mayor that his daughter, a lovely child of eight 
 years old, had none of the faults common to chil- 
 dren of her age, and, in fact, seemed absolutely 
 deficient in immoral sense. She never told lies, 
 had never stolen so much as a lollipop, never 
 showed any recalcitrancy about saying her prayers, 
 and by her incessant obedience had filled her poor 
 father and mother with the gravest anxiety as 
 regards her future well-being. He feared it would 
 be necessary to send her to a deformatory. 
 
 " I have generally found," said the Mayor, 
 gravely but kindly, " that the fault in these distress- 
 ing cases lies rather with the parent than the chil- 
 dren. Does the child never break anything by 
 accident ? " 
 
 " Yes," said the father. 
 
 " And you have duly punished her for it ? " 
 
 " Alas ! sir, I fear I only told her she was a 
 naughty girl, and must not do it again." 
 
 " Then how can you expect your child to learn 
 those petty arts of deception without which she 
 must fall an easy prey to any one who wishes to 
 deceive her ? How can she detect lying in other 
 people unless she has had some experience of it 
 in her own practice ? How, again, can she learn 
 when it will be well for her to lie, and when to 
 refrain from doing so, unless she has made many 
 a mistake on a small scale while at an age when 
 
 116 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 mistakes do not greatly matter ? The Sunchild 
 (and here he reverently raised his hat), as you 
 may read in chapter thirty-one of his Sayings, has 
 left us a touching tale of a little boy, who, having 
 cut down an apple tree in his father's garden, 
 lamented his inability to tell a lie. Some com- 
 mentators, indeed, have held that the evidence 
 was so strongly against the boy that no lie would 
 have been of any use to him, and that his percep- 
 tion of this fact was all that he intended to convey ; 
 but the best authorities take his simple words, ' I 
 cannot tell a lie,' in their most natural sense, as 
 being his expression of regret at the way in which 
 his education had been neglected. If that case 
 had come before me, I should have punished the 
 boy's father, unless he could show that the best 
 authorities are mistaken (as indeed they too gene- 
 rally are), and that under more favourable cir- 
 cumstances the boy would have been able to he, 
 and would have lied accordingly. 
 
 "There is no occasion for you to send your 
 child to a deformatory. I am always averse to 
 extreme measures when I can avoid them. More- 
 over, in a deformatory she would be almost certain 
 to fall in with characters as intractable as her own. 
 Take her home and whip her next time she so 
 much as pulls about the salt. If you will do this 
 whenever you get a chance, I have every hope 
 that you will have no occasion to come to me 
 again." 
 
 " Very well, sir," said the father, " I will do my 
 117 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 best, but the child is so instinctively truthful that 
 I am afraid whipping will be of little use." 
 
 There were other cases, none of them serious, 
 which in the old days would have been treated by 
 a straightener. My father had already surmised 
 that the straightener had become extinct as a 
 class, having been superseded by the Managers 
 and Cashiers of the Musical Banks, but this be- 
 came more apparent as he listened to the cases 
 that next came on. These were dealt with quite 
 reasonably, except that the magistrate always 
 ordered an emetic and a strong purge in addition 
 to the rest of his sentence, as holding that all 
 diseases of the moral sense spring from impurities 
 within the body, which must be cleansed before 
 there could be any hope of spiritual improvement. 
 If any devils were found in what passed from the 
 prisoner's body, he was to be brought up again ; 
 for in this case the rest of the sentence might very 
 possibly be remitted. 
 
 When the Mayor and his coadjutors had done 
 
 sitting, my father strolled round the Musical Bank 
 
 and entered it by the main entrance, which was 
 
 on the top of a flight of steps that went down on 
 
 to the principal street of the town. How strange 
 
 it is that, no matter how gross a superstition may 
 
 have polluted it, a holy place, if hallowed by long 
 
 veneration, remains always holy. Look at Delphi. 
 
 What a fraud it was, and yet how hallowed it 
 
 must ever remain. But letting this pass, Musical 
 
 Banks, especially when of great age, always fas- 
 
 uS 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 cinated my father, and being now tired with his 
 walk, he sat down on one of the many rush- 
 bottomed seats, and (for there was no service at 
 this hour) gave free rein to meditation. 
 
 How peaceful it all was with its droning old- 
 world smell of ancestor, dry rot, and stale incense. 
 As the clouds came and went, the grey-green, 
 cobweb-chastened, light ebbed and flowed over 
 the walls and ceiling; to watch the fitfulness of 
 its streams was a sufficient occupation. A hen laid 
 an egg outside and began to cackle— it was an 
 event of magnitude ; a peasant sharpening his 
 scythe, a blacksmith hammering at his anvil, the 
 clack of a wooden shoe upon the pavement, the 
 boom of a bumble-bee, the dripping of the 
 fountain, all these things, with such concert as 
 they kept, invited the dewy-feathered sleep that 
 visited him, and held him for the best part of an 
 hour. 
 
 My father has said that the Erewhonians never 
 put up monuments or write epitaphs for their dead, 
 and this he believed to be still true ; but it was not 
 so always, and on waking his eye was caught by a 
 monument of great beauty, which bore a date of 
 about 1550 of our era. It was to an old lady, who 
 must have been very loveable if the sweet smiling 
 face of her recumbent figure was as faithful to the 
 original as its strongly marked individuality sug- 
 gested. I need not give the earlier part of her 
 epitaph, which was conventional enough, but my 
 father was so struck with the concluding lines, that 
 
 119 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 he copied them into the note-book which he always 
 carried in his pocket. They ran : — 
 
 " I fall asleep in the full and certain hope 
 That my slumber shall not be broken ; 
 And that though I be all-forgetting, 
 Yet shall I not be all-forgotten, 
 But continue that life in the thoughts and deeds 
 Of those I loved, 
 Into which, while the power to strive was yet vouchsafed me, 
 I fondly strove to enter. 
 
 My father deplored his inability to do justice to 
 the subtle tenderness of the original, but the above 
 was the nearest he could get to it. 
 
 How different this from the opinions concerning 
 a future state which he had tried to set before the 
 Erewhonians some twenty years earlier. It all 
 came back to him, as the storks had done, now 
 that he was again in an Erewhonian environment, 
 and he particularly remembered how one youth 
 had inveighed against our European notions of 
 heaven and hell with a contemptuous flippancy 
 that nothing but youth and ignorance could even 
 palliate. 
 
 "Sir," he had said to my father, "your heaven 
 will not attract me unless I can take my clothes 
 and my luggage. Yes ; and I must lose my luggage 
 and find it again. On arriving, I must be told that 
 it has unfortunately been taken to a wrong circle, 
 and that there may be some difficulty in recovering 
 it — or it shall have been sent up to mansion 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 number five hundred thousand millions nine hun- 
 dred thousand forty six thousand eight hundred 
 and eleven, whereas it should have gone to four 
 hundred thousand millions, &c, &c. ; and am I sure 
 that I addressed it rightly ? Then, when I am just 
 getting cross enough to run some risk of being 
 turned out, the luggage shall make its appearance, 
 hat-box, umbrella, rug, golf-sticks, bicycle, and 
 everything else all quite correct, and in my delight 
 I shall tip the angel double and realise that I am 
 enjoying myself. 
 
 "Or I must have asked what I could have for 
 breakfast, and be told I could have boiled eggs, 
 or eggs and bacon, or filleted plaice. ' Filleted 
 plaice,' I shall exclaim, ' no ! not that. Have you 
 any red mullets?' And the angel will say, 'Why 
 no, sir, the gulf has been so rough that there has 
 hardly any fish come in this three days, and there 
 has been such a run on it that we have nothing 
 left but plaice." 
 
 "'Well, well,' I shall say, 'have you any 
 kidneys ?' 
 
 " ' You can have one kidney, sir,' will be the 
 answer. 
 
 '" One kidney, indeed, and you call this heaven ! 
 At any rate you will have sausages ? ' 
 
 '"Then the angel will say, 'We shall have some 
 after Sunday, sir, but we are quite out of them at 
 present.' 
 
 " And I shall say, somewhat sulkily, ' Then I 
 suppose I must have eggs and bacon.' 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " But in the morning there will come up a red 
 mullet, beautifully cooked, a couple of kidneys and 
 three sausages browned to a turn, and seasoned 
 with just so much sage and thyme as will savour 
 without overwhelming them ; and I shall eat every- 
 thing. It shall then transpire that the angel knew 
 about the luggage, and what I was to have for 
 breakfast, all the time, but wanted to give me the 
 pleasure of finding things turn out better than I 
 had expected. Heaven would be a dull place 
 without such occasional petty false alarms as 
 these." 
 
 I have no business to leave my father's story, 
 but the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn 
 should not be so closely muzzled that he cannot 
 sometimes filch a mouthful for himself ; and when 
 I had copied out the foregoing somewhat irreve- 
 rent paragraphs, which I took down (with no im- 
 portant addition or alteration) from my father's 
 lips, I could not refrain from making a few reflec- 
 tions of my own, which I will ask the reader's 
 forbearance if I lay before him. 
 
 Let heaven and hell alone, but think of Hades, 
 with Tantalus, Sisyphus, Tityus, and all the rest 
 of them. How futile were the attempts of the old 
 Greeks and Romans to lay before us any plausible 
 conception of eternal torture. What were the 
 Danaids doing but that which each one of us has 
 to do during his or her whole life ? What are 
 our bodies if not sieves that we are for ever trying 
 to fill, but which we must refill continually with- 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 out hope of being able to keep them full for long 
 together ? Do we mind this ? Not so long as 
 we can get the wherewithal to fill them ; and the 
 Danaids never seem to have run short of water. 
 They would probably ere long take to clearing out 
 any obstruction in their sieves if they found them 
 getting choked. What could it matter to them 
 whether the sieves got full or no ? They were 
 not paid for filling them. 
 
 Sisyphus, again ! Can any one believe that he 
 would go on rolling that stone year after year and 
 seeing it roll down again unless he liked seeing it ? 
 We are not told that there was a dragon which 
 attacked him whenever he tried to shirk. If he 
 had greatly cared about getting his load over the 
 last pinch, experience would have shown him some 
 way of doing so. The probability is that he got 
 to enjoy the downward rush of his stone, and very 
 likely amused himself by so timing it as to cause 
 the greatest scare to the greatest number of the 
 shades that were below. 
 
 What though Tantalus found the water shun 
 him and the fruits fly from him when he tried to 
 seize them ? The writer of the " Odyssey " gives us 
 no hint that he was dying of thirst or hunger. 
 The pores of his skin would absorb enough water 
 to prevent the first, and we may be sure that he 
 got fruit enough, one way or another, to keep him 
 going. 
 
 Tityus, as an effort after the conception of an 
 eternity of torture, is not successful. What could 
 
 123 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 an eagle matter on the liver of a man whose body 
 covered nine acres ? Before long he would find 
 it an agreeable stimulant. If, then, the greatest 
 minds of antiquity could invent nothing that 
 should carry better conviction of eternal torture, 
 is it likely that the conviction can be carried at 
 all? 
 
 Methought I saw Jove sitting on the topmost ridges 
 of Olympus and confessing failure to Minerva. " I 
 see, my dear," he said, " that there is no use in 
 trying to make people very happy or very miser- 
 able for long together. Pain, if it does not soon 
 kill, consists not so much in present suffering as 
 in the still recent memory of a time when there 
 was less, and in the fear that there will soon be 
 more ; and so happiness lies less in immediate 
 pleasure than in lively recollection of a worse time 
 and lively hope of better." 
 
 As for the young gentleman above referred to, 
 my father met him with the assurance that there 
 had been several cases in which living people had 
 been caught up into heaven or carried down into 
 hell, and been allowed to return to earth and re- 
 port what they had seen ; while to others visions 
 had been vouchsafed so clearly that thousands of 
 authentic pictures had been painted of both states. 
 All incentive to good conduct, he had then alleged, 
 was found to be at once removed from those who 
 doubted the fidelity of these pictures. 
 
 This at least was what he had then said, but I 
 
 hardly think he would have said it at the time of 
 
 124 
 
Flight to Fairmead 
 
 which I am now writing. As he continued to sit 
 in the Musical Bank, he took from his valise the 
 pamphlet on "The Physics of Vicarious Existence," 
 by Dr. Gurgoyle, which he had bought on the pre- 
 ceding evening, doubtless being led to choose this 
 particular work by the tenor of the old lady's 
 epitaph. 
 
 The second title he found to run, " Being Stric- 
 tures on Certain Heresies concerning a Future 
 State that have been Engrafted on the Sunchild's 
 Teaching." 
 
 My father shuddered as he read this title. " How 
 long," he said to himself, " will it be before they 
 are at one another's throats ? " 
 
 On reading the pamphlet, he found it added little 
 to what the epitaph had already conveyed ; but it 
 interested him, as showing that, however cata- 
 clysmic a change of national opinions may appear 
 to be, people will find means of bringing the new 
 into more or less conformity with the old. 
 
 Here it is a mere truism to say that many con- 
 tinue to live a vicarious life long after they have 
 ceased to be aware of living. This view is as old 
 as the non omnis mortar of Horace, and we may be 
 sure some thousands of years older. It is only, 
 therefore, with much diffidence that I have decided 
 to give a resume oi opinions many of which those 
 whom I alone wish to please will have laid to heart 
 from their youth upwards. In brief, Dr. Gurgoyle's 
 contention comes to little more than saying that 
 the quick are more dead, and the dead more quick, 
 
 125 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 than we commonly think. To be alive, according 
 to him, is only to be unable to understand how 
 dead one is, and to be dead is only to be invincibly 
 ignorant concerning our own livingness — for the 
 dead would be as living as the living if we could 
 only get them to believe it. 
 
 126 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 PRESIDENT GURGOYLE'S PAMPHLET " ON THE 
 PHYSICS OF VICARIOUS EXISTENCE" 
 
 Belief, like any other moving body, follows the 
 path of least resistance, and this path had led Dr. 
 Gurgoyle to the conviction, real or feigned, that 
 my father was son to the sun, probably by the 
 moon, and that his ascent into the sky with an 
 earthly bride was due to the sun's interference 
 with the laws of nature. Nevertheless he was 
 looked upon as more or less of a survival, and was 
 deemed lukewarm, if not heretical, by those who 
 seemed to be the pillars of the new system. 
 
 My father soon found that not even Panky could 
 manipulate his teaching more freely than the 
 Doctor had done. My father had taught that 
 when a man was dead there was an end of him, 
 until he should rise again in the flesh at the last 
 day, to enter into eternity either of happiness or 
 misery. He had, indeed, often talked of the im- 
 mortality which some achieve even in this world ; 
 but he had cheapened this, declaring it to be an 
 unsubstantial mockery, that could give no such 
 comfort in the hour of death as was unquestionably 
 given by belief in heaven and hell. 
 
 Dr. Gurgoyle, however, had an equal horror, on 
 127 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the one hand, of anything involving resumption 
 of life by the body when it was once dead, and 
 on the other, of the view that life ended with the 
 change which we call death. He did not, indeed, 
 pretend that he could do much to take away the 
 sting from death, nor would he do this if he could, 
 for if men did not fear death unduly, they would 
 often court it unduly. Death can only be belauded 
 at the cost of belittling life ; but he held that a 
 reasonable assurance of fair fame after death is a 
 truer consolation to the dying, a truer comfort to 
 surviving friends, and a more real incentive to good 
 conduct in this life, than any of the consolations 
 or incentives falsely fathered upon the Sunchild. 
 
 He began by setting aside every saying ascribed, 
 however truly, to my father, if it made against his 
 views, and by putting his own glosses on all that 
 he could gloze into an appearance of being in his 
 favour. I will pass over his attempt to combat the 
 rapidly spreading belief in a heaven and hell such 
 as we accept, and will only summarise his conten- 
 tion that, of our two lives — namely, the one we live 
 in our own persons, and that other life which we 
 live in other people both before our reputed death 
 and after it — the second is as essential a factor of 
 our complete life as the first is, and sometimes 
 more so. 
 
 Life, he urged, lies not in bodily organs, but in 
 
 the power to use them, and in the use that is made 
 
 of them — that is to say, in the work they do. As 
 
 the essence of a factory is not in the building 
 
 128 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 wherein the work is done, nor yet in the imple- 
 ments used in turning it out, but in the will-power 
 of the master and in the goods he makes ; so the 
 true life of a man is in his will and work, not in 
 his body. "Those," he argued, "who make the 
 life of a man reside within his body, are like one 
 who should mistake the carpenter's tool-box for 
 the carpenter." 
 
 He maintained that this had been my father's 
 teaching, for which my father heartily trusts that 
 he may be forgiven. 
 
 He went on to say that our will-power is not 
 wholly limited to the working of its own special 
 system of organs, but under certain conditions can 
 work and be worked upon by other will-powers 
 like itself : so that if, for example, A's will-power 
 has got such hold on B's as to be able, through B, 
 to work B's mechanism, what seems to have been 
 B's action will in reality have been more A's than 
 B's, and this in the same real sense as though the 
 physical action had been effected through A's own 
 mechanical system — A, in fact, will have been living 
 in B. The universally admitted maxim that he who 
 does this or that by the hand of an agent does it 
 himself, shews that the foregoing view is only a 
 roundabout way of stating what common sense 
 treats as a matter of course. 
 
 Hence, though A's individual will-power must be 
 held to cease when the tools it works with are de- 
 stroyed or out of gear, yet, so long as any survivors 
 
 were so possessed by it while it was still efficient, or, 
 
 129 1 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 again, become so impressed by its operation on 
 them through work that he has left, as to act in 
 obedience to his will-power rather than their own, 
 A has a certain amount of bond fide life still remain- 
 ing. His vicarious life is not affected by the dis- 
 solution of his body ; and in many cases the sum 
 total of a man's vicarious action and of its outcome 
 exceeds to an almost infinite extent the sum total 
 of those actions and works that were effected 
 through the mechanism of his own physical organs. 
 In these cases his vicarious life is more truly his life 
 than any that he lived in his own person. 
 
 "True," continued the Doctor, "while living 
 in his own person, a man knows, or thinks he 
 knows, what he is doing, whereas we have no 
 reason to suppose such knowledge on the part of 
 one whose body is already dust ; but the conscious- 
 ness of the doer has less to do with the livingness 
 of the deed than people generally admit. We know 
 nothing of the power that sets our heart beating, 
 nor yet of the beating itself so long as it is normal. 
 We know nothing of our breathing or of our diges- 
 tion, of the all-important work we achieved as 
 embryos, nor of our growth from infancy to man- 
 hood. No one will say that these were not actions 
 of a living agent, but the more normal, the healthier, 
 and thus the more truly living, the agent is, the less 
 he will know or have known of his own action. 
 The part of our bodily life that enters into our con- 
 sciousness is very small as compared with that of 
 
 which we have no consciousness. What completer 
 
 130 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 proof can we have that livingness consists in deed 
 rather than in consciousness of deed ? 
 
 "The foregoing remarks are not intended to 
 apply so much to vicarious action in virtue, we will 
 say, of a settlement, or testamentary disposition 
 that cannot be set aside. Such action is apt to be 
 too unintelligent, too far from variation and quick 
 change to rank as true vicarious action ; indeed it 
 is not rarely found to effect the very opposite of 
 what the person who made the settlement or will 
 desired. They are meant to apply to that more 
 intelligent and versatile action engendered by 
 affectionate remembrance. Nevertheless, even the 
 compulsory vicarious action taken in consequence 
 of a will, and indeed the very name " will " itself, 
 shews that though we cannot take either flesh or 
 money with us, we can leave our will-power behind 
 us in very efficient operation. 
 
 "This vicarious life (on which I have insisted, 
 I fear at unnecessary length, for it is so obvious that 
 none can have failed to realise it) is lived by every 
 one of us before death as well as after it, and is 
 little less important to us than that of which we 
 are to some extent conscious in our own persons. 
 A man, we will say, has written a book which 
 delights or displeases thousands of whom he knows 
 nothing, and who know nothing of him. The 
 book, we will suppose, has considerable, or at any 
 rate some influence on the action of these people. 
 Let us suppose the writer fast asleep while others 
 are enjoying his work, and acting in consequence of 
 
 131 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 it, perhaps at long distances from him. Which is 
 his truest life — the one he is leading in them, or 
 that equally unconscious life residing in his own 
 sleeping body ? Can there be a doubt that the 
 vicarious life is the more efficient ? 
 
 " Or when we are waking, how powerfully does 
 not the life we are living in others pain or delight 
 us, according as others think ill or well of us ? 
 How truly do we not recognise it as part of our 
 own existence, and how great an influence does not 
 the fear of a present hell in men's bad thoughts, 
 and the hope of a present heaven in their good 
 ones, influence our own conduct ? Have we not 
 here a true heaven and a true hell, as compared 
 with the efficiency of which these gross material 
 ones so falsely engrafted on to the Sunchild's 
 teaching are but as the flint implements of a 
 prehistoric race ? ' If a man/ said the Sunchild, 
 'fear not man, whom he hath seen, neither will 
 he fear God, whom he hath not seen.' " 
 
 My father again assures me that he never said 
 this. Returning to Dr. Gurgoyle, he continued : — 
 
 " It may be urged that on a man's death one of 
 
 the great factors of his life is so annihilated that 
 
 no kind of true life can be any further conceded 
 
 to him. For to live is to be influenced, as well as 
 
 to influence ; and when a man is dead how can 
 
 he be influenced ? He can haunt, but he cannot 
 
 any more be haunted. He can come to us, but 
 
 we cannot go to him. On ceasing, therefore, to be 
 
 impressionable, so great a part of that wherein his 
 
 132 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 life consisted is removed, that no true life can be 
 conceded to him. 
 
 " I do not pretend that a man is as fully alive 
 after his so-called death as before it. He is not. 
 All I contend for is, that a considerable amount 
 of efficient life still remains to some of us, and 
 that a little life remains to all of us, after what we 
 commonly regard as the complete cessation of life. 
 In answer, then, to those who have just urged that 
 the destruction of one of the two great factors of life 
 destroys life altogether, I reply that the same must 
 hold good as regards death. 
 
 " If to live is to be influenced and to influence, 
 and if a man cannot be held as living when he 
 can no longer be influenced, surely to die is to be 
 no longer able either to influence or be influenced, 
 and a man cannot be held dead until both these 
 two factors of death are present. If failure of the 
 power to be influenced vitiates life, presence of 
 the power to influence vitiates death. And no 
 one will deny that a man can influence for many 
 a long year after he is vulgarly reputed as dead. 
 
 " It seems, then, that there is no such thing as 
 either absolute life without any alloy of death, nor 
 absolute death without any alloy of life, until, that 
 is to say, all posthumous power to influence has 
 faded away. And this, perhaps, is what the Sun- 
 child meant by saying that in the midst of life we 
 are in death, and so also that in the midst of death 
 we are in life. 
 
 "And there is this, too. No man can influence 
 i33 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 fully until he can no more be influenced — that is 
 to say, till after his so-called death. Till then, his 
 * he ' is still unsettled. We know not what other in- 
 fluences may not be brought to bear upon him that 
 may change the character of the influence he will 
 exert on ourselves. Therefore, he is not fully living 
 till he is no longer living. He is an incomplete 
 work, which cannot have full effect till finished. 
 And as for his vicarious life — which we have seen 
 to be very real — this can be, and is, influenced by 
 just appreciation, undue praise or calumny, and is 
 subject, it may be, to secular vicissitudes of good 
 and evil fortune. 
 
 " If this is not true, let us have no more talk 
 about the immortality of great men and women. 
 The Sunchild was never weary of talking to us 
 (as we then sometimes thought, a little tediously) 
 about a great poet of that nation to which it pleased 
 him to feign that he belonged. How plainly can 
 we not now see that his words were spoken for 
 our learning — for the enforcement of that true 
 view of heaven and hell on which I am feebly 
 trying to insist ? The poet's name, he said, was 
 Shakespeare. Whilst he was alive, very few people 
 understood his greatness ; whereas now, after some 
 three hundred years, he is deemed the greatest poet 
 that the world has ever known. ' Can this man,' he 
 asked, ' be said to have been truly born till many 
 a long year after he had been reputed as truly 
 dead ? While he was in the flesh, was he more 
 than a mere embryo growing towards birth into 
 
 *34 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 that life of the world to come in which he now 
 shines so gloriously ? What a small thing was 
 that flesh and blood life, of which he was alone 
 conscious, as compared with that fleshless life 
 which he lives but knows not in the lives of 
 millions, and which, had it ever been fully re- 
 vealed even to his imagination, we may be sure 
 that he could not have reached ?' 
 
 "These were the Sunchild's words, as repeated 
 to me by one of his chosen friends while he was 
 yet amongst us. Which, then, of this man's two 
 lives should we deem best worth having, if we 
 could choose one or other, but not both ? The 
 felt or the unfelt ? Who would not go cheerfully 
 to block or stake if he knew that by doing so he 
 could win such life as this poet lives, though he 
 also knew that on having won it he could know 
 no more about it ? Does not this prove that in 
 our heart of hearts we deem an unfelt life, in the 
 heaven of men's loving thoughts, to be better worth 
 having than any we can reasonably hope for and 
 still feel ? 
 
 " And the converse of this is true ; many a man 
 has unhesitatingly laid down his felt life to escape 
 unfelt infamy in the hell of men's hatred and con- 
 tempt. As body is the sacrament, or outward 
 and visible sign, of mind ; so is posterity the sacra- 
 ment of those who live after death. Each is 
 the mechanism through which the other becomes 
 effective. 
 
 " I grant that many live but a short time when 
 i3S 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the breath is out of them. Few seeds germinate 
 as compared with those that rot or are eaten, and 
 most of this world's denizens are little more than 
 still-born as regards the larger life, while none are 
 immortal to the end of time. But the end of time 
 is not worth considering ; not a few live as many 
 centuries as either they or we need think about, 
 and surely the world, so far as we can guess its 
 object, was made rather to be enjoyed than to last. 
 ' Come and go ' pervades all things of which we 
 have knowledge, and if there was any provision 
 made, it seems to have been for a short life and 
 a merry one, with enough chance of extension 
 beyond the grave to be worth trying for, rather 
 than for the perpetuity even of the best and 
 noblest. 
 
 " Granted, again, that few live after death as 
 long or as fully as they had hoped to do, while 
 many, when quick, can have had none but the 
 faintest idea of the immortality that awaited them ; 
 it is nevertheless true that none are so still-born 
 on death as not to enter into a life of some sort, 
 however short and humble. A short life or a long 
 one can no more be bargained for in the unseen 
 world than in the seen ; as, however, care on the 
 part of parents can do much for the longer life 
 and greater well-being of their offspring in this 
 world, so the conduct of that offspring in this 
 world does much both to secure for itself longer 
 tenure of life in the next, and to determine whether 
 
 that life shall be one of reward or punishment. 
 
 136 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 " ' Reward or punishment,' some reader will per- 
 haps exclaim ; ' what mockery, when the essence 
 of reward and punishment lies in their being felt 
 by those who have earned them.' I can do nothing 
 with those who either cry for the moon, or deny 
 that it has two sides, on the ground that we can 
 see but one. Here comes in faith, of which the 
 Sunchild said, that though we can do little with 
 it, we can do nothing without it. Faith does not 
 consist, as some have falsely urged, in believing 
 things on insufficient evidence ; this is not faith, 
 but faithlessness to all that we should hold most 
 faithfully. Faith consists in holding that the in- 
 stincts of the best men and women are in them- 
 selves an evidence which may not be set aside 
 lightly ; and the best men and women have ever 
 held that death is better than dishonour, and 
 desirable if honour is to be won thereby. 
 
 " It follows, then, that though our conscious 
 flesh and blood life is the only one that we can 
 fully apprehend, yet we do also indeed move, even 
 here, in an unseen world, wherein, when our 
 palpable life is ended, we shall continue to live 
 for a shorter or longer time — reaping roughly, 
 though not infallibly, much as we have sown. 
 Of this unseen world the best men and women 
 will be almost as heedless while in the flesh as 
 they will be when their life in flesh is over ; for, 
 as the Sunchild often said, 'The Kingdom of 
 Heaven cometh not by observation.' It will be 
 all in all to them, and at the same time nothing, 
 
 i37 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 for the better people they are, the less they will 
 think of anything but this present life. 
 
 "What an ineffable contradiction in terms have 
 we not here. What a reversal, is it not, of all 
 this world's canons, that we should hold even the 
 best of all that we can know or feel in this life 
 to be a poor thing as compared with hopes the 
 fulfilment of which we can never either feel or 
 know. Yet we all hold this, however little we 
 may admit it to ourselves. For the world at heart 
 despises its own canons." 
 
 I cannot quote further from Dr. Gurgoyle's pam- 
 phlet ; suffice it that he presently dealt with those 
 who say that it is not right of any man to aim 
 at thrusting himself in among the living when he 
 has had his day. " Let him die," say they, " and 
 let die as his fathers before him." He argued that 
 as we had a right to pester people till we got our- 
 selves born, so also we have a right to pester 
 them for extension of life beyond the grave. Life, 
 whether before the grave or afterwards, is like love 
 — all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct 
 for it. Instinct on such matters is the older and 
 safer guide ; no one, therefore, should seek to efface 
 himself as regards the next world more than as 
 regards this. If he is to be effaced, let others efface 
 him ; do not let him commit suicide. Freely we 
 have received ; freely, therefore, let us take as much 
 more as we can get, and let it be a stand-up fight 
 between ourselves and posterity to see whether it 
 
 can get rid of us or no. If it can, let it ; if it 
 
 138 
 
Vicarious Existence 
 
 cannot, it must put up with us. It can better care 
 for itself than we can for ourselves when the breath 
 is out of us. 
 
 Not the least important duty, he continued, of 
 posterity towards itself lies in passing righteous 
 judgement on the forbears who stand up before it. 
 They should be allowed the benefit of a doubt, and 
 peccadilloes should be ignored ; but when no 
 doubt exists that a man was engrainedly mean and 
 cowardly, his reputation must remain in the Pur- 
 gatory of Time for a term varying from, say, a 
 hundred to two thousand years. After a hundred 
 years it may generally come down, though it will 
 still be under a cloud. After two thousand years it 
 may be mentioned in any society without holding 
 up of hands in horror. Our sense of moral guilt 
 varies inversely as the squares of its distance in 
 time and space from ourselves. 
 
 Not so with heroism ; this loses no lustre through 
 time and distance. Good is gold ; it is rare, but 
 it will not tarnish. Evil is like dirty water — 
 plentiful and foul, but it will run itself clear of 
 taint. 
 
 The Doctor having thus expatiated on his own 
 opinions concerning heaven and hell, concluded 
 by tilting at those which all right-minded people 
 hold among ourselves. I shall adhere to my deter- 
 mination not to reproduce his arguments ; suffice 
 it that though less flippant than those of the young 
 student whom I have already referred to, they were 
 more plausible ; and though I could easily demolish 
 
 i39 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 them, the reader will probably prefer that I should 
 not set them up for the mere pleasure of knock- 
 ing them down. Here, then, I take my leave of 
 good Dr. Gurgoyle and his pamphlet ; neither can 
 I interrupt my story further by saying anything 
 about the other two pamphlets purchased by my 
 father. 
 
 140 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 GEORGE FAILS TO FIND MY FATHER, WHEREON 
 YRAM CAUTIONS THE PROFESSORS 
 
 On the morning after the interview with her son 
 described in a foregoing chapter, Yram told her 
 husband what she had gathered from the Pro- 
 fessors, and said that she was expecting Higgs 
 every moment, inasmuch as she was confident that 
 George would soon find him. 
 
 " Do what you like, my dear," said the Mayor. 
 " I shall keep out of the way, for you will manage 
 him better without me. You know what I think 
 of you." 
 
 He then went unconcernedly to his breakfast, 
 at which the Professors found him somewhat taci- 
 turn. Indeed they set him down as one of the 
 dullest and most uninteresting people they had 
 ever met. 
 
 When George returned and told his mother that 
 though he had at last found the inn at which my 
 father had slept, my father had left and could not 
 be traced, she was disconcerted, but after a few 
 minutes she said — 
 
 " He will come back here for the dedication, 
 
 but there will be such crowds that we may not see 
 
 him till he is inside the temple, and it will save 
 
 141 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 trouble if we can lay hold on him sooner. There- 
 fore, ride either to Clearwater or Fairmead, and 
 see if you can find him. Try Fairmead first ; it is 
 more out of the way. If you cannot hear of him 
 there, come back, get another horse, and try Clear- 
 water. If you fail here too, we must give him up, 
 and look out for him in the temple to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 " Are you going to say anything to the Pro- 
 fessors ? " 
 
 " Not if you can bring Higgs here before night- 
 fall. If you cannot do this I must talk it over with 
 my husband ; I shall have some hours in which 
 to make up my mind. Now go — the sooner the 
 better." 
 
 It was nearly eleven, and in a few minutes 
 George was on his way. By noon he was at Fair- 
 mead, where he tried all the inns in vain for news 
 of a person answering the description of my father 
 — for not knowing what name my father might 
 choose to give, he could trust only to description. 
 He concluded that since my father could not be 
 heard of in Fairmead by one o'clock (as it nearly 
 was by the time he had been round all the inns) 
 he must have gone somewhere else ; he therefore 
 rode back to Sunch'ston, made a hasty lunch, got 
 a fresh horse, and rode to Clearwater, where he 
 met with no better success. At all the inns both 
 at Fairmead and Clearwater he left word that if 
 the person he had described came later in the day, 
 
 he was to be told that the Mayoress particularly 
 
 142 
 
A Vain Search 
 
 begged him to return at once to Sunch'ston, and 
 come to the Mayor's house. 
 
 Now all the time that George was at Fairmead 
 my father was inside the Musical Bank, which he 
 had entered before going to any inn. Here he had 
 been sitting for nearly a couple of hours, resting, 
 dreaming, and reading Bishop Gurgoyle's pamphlet. 
 If he had left the Bank five minutes earlier, he 
 would probably have been seen by George in the 
 main street of Fairmead — as he found out on reach- 
 ing the inn which he selected and ordering dinner. 
 
 He had hardly got inside the house before the 
 waiter told him that young Mr. Strong, the Ranger 
 from Sunch'ston, had been enquiring for him and 
 had left a message for him, which was duly de- 
 livered. 
 
 My father, though in reality somewhat disquieted, 
 showed no uneasiness, and said how sorry he was 
 to have missed seeing Mr. Strong. "But," he added, 
 " it does not much matter ; I need not go back this 
 afternoon, for I shall be at Sunch'ston to-morrow 
 morning and will go straight to the Mayor's." 
 
 He had no suspicion that he was discovered, but 
 he was a good deal puzzled. Presently he inclined 
 to the opinion that George, still believing him to be 
 Professor Panky, had wanted to invite him to the 
 banquet on the following day — for he had no idea 
 that Hanky and Panky were staying with the Mayor 
 and Mayoress. Or perhaps the Mayor and his wife 
 did not like so distinguished a man's having been 
 unable to find a lodging in Sunch'ston, and wanted 
 
 143 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 him to stay with them. Ill satisfied as he was with 
 any theory he could form, he nevertheless reflected 
 that he could not do better than stay where he was 
 for the night, inasmuch as no one would be likely 
 to look for him a second time at Fairmead. He 
 therefore ordered his room at once. 
 
 It was nearly seven before George got back to 
 Sunch'ston. In the meantime Yram and the Mayor 
 had considered the question whether anything was 
 to be said to the Professors or no. They were con- 
 fident that my father would not commit himself — 
 why, indeed, should he have dyed his hair and 
 otherwise disguised himself, if he had not intended 
 to remain undiscovered ? Oh no ; the probability 
 was that if nothing was said to the Professors now, 
 nothing need ever be said, for my father might be 
 escorted back to the statues by George on the Sun- 
 day evening and be told that he was not to return. 
 Moreover, even though something untoward were 
 to happen after all, the Professors would have no 
 reason for thinking that their hostess had known of 
 the Sunchild's being in Sunch'ston. 
 
 On the other hand, they were her guests, and it 
 would not be handsome to keep Hanky, at any 
 rate, in the dark, when the knowledge that the Sun- 
 child was listening to every word he said might 
 make him modify his sermon not a little. It might 
 or it might not, but that was a matter for him, not 
 her. The only question for her was whether or no 
 it would be sharp practice to know what she knew 
 
 and say nothing about it. Her husband hated 
 
 144 
 
A Vain Search 
 
 finesse as much as she did, and they settled it that 
 though the question was a nice one, the more 
 proper thing to do would be to tell the Professors 
 what it might so possibly concern one or both of 
 them to know. 
 
 On George's return without news of my father, 
 they found he thought just as they did ; so it was 
 arranged that they should let the Professors dine in 
 peace, but tell them about the Sunchild's being 
 again in Erewhon as soon as dinner was over. 
 
 "Happily," said George, "they will do no harm. 
 They will wish Higgs's presence to remain unknown 
 as much as we do, and they will be glad that he 
 should be got out of the country immediately." 
 
 " Not so, my dear," said Yram. " ' Out of the 
 country' will not do for those people. Nothing 
 short of ' out of the world ' will satisfy them." 
 
 " That," said George promptly, " must not be." 
 
 " Certainly not, my dear, but that is what they 
 will want. I do not like having to tell them, but I 
 am afraid we must." 
 
 " Never mind," said the Mayor, laughing. " Tell 
 them, and let us see what happens." 
 
 They then dressed for dinner, where Hanky and 
 Panky were the only guests. When dinner was 
 over Yram sent away her other children, George 
 alone remaining. He sat opposite the Professors, 
 while the Mayor and Yram were at the two ends of 
 the table. 
 
 " I am afraid, dear Professor Hanky," said Yram, 
 11 that I was not quite open with you last night, but 
 
 145 K 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 I wanted time to think things over, and I know you 
 will forgive me when you remember what a number 
 of guests I had to attend to." She then referred to 
 what Hanky had told her about the supposed ranger, 
 and shewed him how obvious it was that this man 
 was a foreigner, who had been for some time in 
 Erewhon more than seventeen years ago, but had 
 had no communication with it since then. Having 
 pointed sufficiently, as she thought, to the Sunchild, 
 she said, " You see who I believe this man to have 
 been. Have I said enough, or shall I say more ?" 
 
 " I understand you," said Hanky, " and I agree 
 with you that the Sunchild will be in the temple to- 
 morrow. It is a serious business, but I shall not 
 alter my sermon. He must listen to what I may 
 choose to say, and I wish I could tell him what a 
 fool he was for coming here. If he behaves himself, 
 well and good : your son will arrest him quietly 
 after service, and by night he will be in the Blue 
 Pool. Your son is bound to throw him there as a 
 foreign devil, without the formality of a trial. It 
 would be a most painful duty to me, but unless I 
 am satisfied that that man has been thrown into the 
 Blue Pool, I shall have no option but to report the 
 matter at headquarters. If, on the other hand, 
 the poor wretch makes a disturbance, I can set 
 the crowd on to tear him in pieces." 
 
 George was furious, but he remained quite calm, 
 and left everything to his mother. 
 
 " I have nothing to do with the Blue Pool," said 
 
 Yram drily. " My son, I doubt not, will know how 
 
 146 
 
Yram Warns Hanky 
 
 to do his duty ; but if you let the people kill this 
 man, his body will remain, and an inquest must be 
 held, for the matter will have been too notorious to 
 be hushed up. All Higgs's measurements and all 
 marks on his body were recorded, and these alone 
 would identify him. My father, too, who is still 
 master of the gaol, and many another, could swear 
 to him. Should the body prove, as no doubt it 
 would, to be that of the Sunchild, what is to become 
 of Sunchildism ? " 
 
 Hanky smiled. " It would not be proved. The 
 measurements of a man of twenty or thereabouts 
 would not correspond with this man's. All we 
 Professors should attend the inquest, and half 
 Bridgeford is now in Sunch'ston. No matter 
 though nine -tenths of the marks and measure- 
 ments corresponded, so long as there is a tenth 
 that does not do so, we should not be flesh and 
 blood if we did not ignore the nine points and 
 insist only on the tenth. After twenty years we 
 shall find enough to serve our turn. Think of 
 what all the learning of the country is committed 
 to ; think of the change in all our ideas and insti- 
 tutions ; think of the King and of Court influence. 
 I need not enlarge. We shall not permit the body 
 to be the Sunchild's. No matter what evidence 
 you may produce, we shall sneer it down, and say 
 we must have more before you can expect us to 
 take you seriously ; if you bring more, we shall pay 
 no attention ; and the more you bring the more we 
 shall laugh at you. No doubt those among us who 
 
 147 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 are by way of being candid will admit that your 
 arguments ought to be considered, but you must 
 not expect that it will be any part of their duty to 
 consider them. 
 
 "And even though we admitted that the body 
 had been proved up to the hilt to be the Sunchild's, 
 do you think that such a trifle as that could affect 
 Sunchildism ? Hardly. Sunch'ston is no match 
 for Bridgeford and the King ; our only difficulty 
 would lie in settling which was the most plausible 
 way of the many plausible ways in which the death 
 could be explained. We should hatch up twenty 
 theories in less than twenty hours, and the last state 
 of Sunchildism would be stronger than the first. 
 For the people want it, and so long as they want 
 it they will have it. At the same time the supposed 
 identification of the body, even by some few ignorant 
 people here, might lead to a local heresy that is as 
 well avoided, and it will be better that your son 
 should arrest the man before the dedication, if he 
 can be found, and throw him into the Blue Pool 
 without any one but ourselves knowing that he has 
 been here at all." 
 
 I need not dwell on the deep disgust with which 
 this speech was listened to, but the Mayor, and 
 Yram, and George said not a word. 
 
 " But, Mayoress," said Panky, who had not 
 
 opened his lips so far, " are you sure that you are 
 
 not too hasty in believing this stranger to be the 
 
 Sunchild ? People are continually thinking that 
 
 such and such another is the Sunchild come down 
 
 148 
 
Yram Warns Hanky 
 
 again from the sun's palace and going to and fro 
 among us. How many such stories, sometimes 
 very plausibly told, have we not had during the last 
 twenty years ? They never take root, and die out of 
 themselves as suddenly as they spring up. That 
 the man is a poacher can hardly be doubted ; I 
 thought so the moment I saw him ; but I think I 
 can also prove to you that he is not a foreigner, 
 and, therefore, that he is not the Sunchild. He 
 quoted the Sunchild's prayer with a corruption 
 that can have only reached him from an Ere- 
 whonian source " 
 
 Here Hanky interrupted him somewhat brusquely. 
 
 " The man, Panky," said he, " was the Sunchild ; 
 and he was not a poacher, for he had no idea that 
 he was breaking the law ; nevertheless, as you say, 
 Sunchildism on the brain has been a common form 
 of mania for several years. Several persons have 
 even believed themselves to be the Sunchild. We 
 must not forget this, if it should get about that 
 Higgs has been here." 
 
 Then, turning to Yram, he said sternly, " But 
 come what may, your son must take him to the 
 Blue Pool at nightfall." 
 
 ", Sir," said George, with perfect suavity, " you 
 have spoken as though you doubted my readiness 
 to do my duty. Let me assure you very solemnly 
 that when the time comes for me to act, I shall act 
 as duty may direct." 
 
 " I will answer for him," said Yram, with even 
 
 more than her usual quick, frank smile, "that he 
 
 149 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 will fulfil his instructions to the letter, unless," she 
 added, " some black and white horses come down 
 from heaven and snatch poor Higgs out of his 
 grasp. Such things have happened before now." 
 
 " I should advise your son to shoot them if they 
 do," said Hanky drily and sub-defiantly. 
 
 Here the conversation closed ; but it was useless 
 trying to talk of anything else, so the Professors 
 asked Yram to excuse them if they retired early, in 
 view of the fact that they had a fatiguing day before 
 them. This excuse their hostess readily accepted. 
 
 " Do not let us talk any more now," said Yram 
 as soon as they had left the room. " It will be 
 quite time enough when the dedication is over. 
 But I rather think the black and white horses will 
 come." 
 
 " I think so too, my dear," said the Mayor 
 laughing. 
 
 " They shall come," said George gravely ; " but 
 we have not yet got enough to make sure of bring- 
 ing them. Higgs will perhaps be able to help me 
 to-morrow." 
 
 " Now what," said Panky as they went upstairs, 
 " does that woman mean — for she means some- 
 thing ? Black and white horses indeed ! " 
 
 " I do not know what she means to do," said 
 the other, " but I know that she thinks she can 
 best us." 
 
 " I wish we had not eaten those quails." 
 
 " Nonsense, Panky ; no one saw us but Higgs, 
 150 
 
Yram Warns Hanky 
 
 and the evidence of a foreign devil, in such straits 
 as his, could not stand for a moment. We did not 
 eat them. No, no ; she has something that she 
 thinks better than that. Besides, it is absolutely 
 impossible that she should have heard what hap- 
 pened. What I do not understand is, why she 
 should have told us about the Sunchild's being 
 here at all. Why not have left us to find it out or 
 to know nothing about it ? I do not understand it." 
 
 So true is it, as Euclid long since observed, that 
 the less cannot comprehend that which is the 
 greater. True, however, as this is, it is also some- 
 times true that the greater cannot comprehend the 
 less. Hanky went musing to his own room and 
 threw himself into an easy chair to think the posi- 
 tion over. After a few minutes he went to a table 
 on which he saw pen, ink, and paper, and wrote a 
 short letter ; then he rang the bell. 
 
 When the servant came he said, " I want to send 
 this note to the manager of the new temple, and it 
 is important that he should have it to-night. Be 
 pleased, therefore, to take it to him and deliver it 
 into his own hands ; but I had rather you said 
 nothing about it to the Mayor or Mayoress, nor to 
 any of your fellow-servants. Slip out unperceived 
 if you can. When you have delivered the note, ask 
 for an answer at once, and bring it to me." 
 
 So saying, he slipped a sum equal to about five 
 shillings into the man's hand. 
 
 The servant returned in about twenty minutes, 
 for the temple was quite near, and gave a note to 
 
 151 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Hanky, which ran, " Your wishes shall be attended 
 to without fail." 
 
 "Good '."said Hanky to the man. " No one in 
 the house knows of your having run this errand 
 for me ? " 
 
 " No one, sir." 
 
 " Thank you ! I wish you a very good night." 
 
 '52 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 A VISIT TO THE PROVINCIAL DEFORMATORY 
 AT FAIRMEAD 
 
 Having finished his early dinner, and not fearing 
 that he should be either recognised at Fairmead 
 or again enquired after from Sunch'ston, my father 
 went out for a stroll round the town, to see what 
 else he could find that should be new and strange 
 to him. He had not gone far before he saw a 
 large building with an inscription saying that it was 
 the Provincial Deformatory for Boys. Underneath 
 the larger inscription there was a smaller one — one 
 of those corrupt versions of my father's sayings, 
 which, on dipping into the Sayings of the Sunchild, 
 he had found to be so vexatiously common. The 
 inscription ran : — 
 
 " When the righteous man turneth away from the 
 righteousness that he hath committed, and doeth that 
 which is a little naughty and wrong, he will generally be 
 found to have gained in amiability what he has lost in 
 righteousness." — Sunchild Sayings, chap. xxii. v. 15. 
 
 The case of the little girl that he had watched 
 earlier in the day had filled him with a great desire 
 to see the working of one of these curious institu- 
 tions ; he therefore resolved to call on the head- 
 master (whose name he found to be Turvey), and 
 
 153 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 enquire about terms, alleging that he had a boy 
 whose incorrigible rectitude was giving him much 
 anxiety. The information he had gained in the 
 forenoon would be enough to save him from 
 appearing to know nothing of the system. On 
 having rung the bell, he announced himself to the 
 servant as a Mr. Senoj, and asked if he could see 
 the Principal. 
 
 Almost immediately he was ushered into the 
 presence of a beaming, dapper-looking, little old 
 gentleman, quick of speech and movement, in spite 
 of some little portliness. 
 
 "Ts, ts, ts," he said, when my father had enquired 
 about terms and asked whether he might see the 
 system at work. " How unfortunate that you 
 should have called on a Saturday afternoon. We 
 always have a half-holiday. But stay — yes — that 
 will do very nicely ; I will send for them into school 
 as a means of stimulating their refractory system." 
 
 He called his servant and told him to ring the 
 boys into school. Then, turning to my father he 
 said, " Stand here, sir, by the window ; you will 
 see them all come trooping in. H'm, h'm, I am 
 sorry to see them still come back as soon as they 
 hear the bell. I suppose I shall ding some recalci- 
 trancy into them some day, but it is uphill work. 
 Do you see the head-boy — the third of those that 
 are coming up the path ? I shall have to get rid 
 of him. Do you see him ? he is going back to whip 
 up the laggers — and now he has boxed a boy's ears : 
 that boy is one of the most hopeful under my care. 
 
 154 
 
A Deformatory 
 
 I feel sure he has been using improper language, 
 and my head-boy has checked him instead of en- 
 couraging him." And so on till the boys were all 
 in school. 
 
 " You see, my dear sir," he said to my father, 
 " we are in an impossible position. We have to 
 obey instructions from the Grand Council of 
 Education at Bridgeford, and they have established 
 these institutions in consequence of the Sunchild's 
 having said that we should aim at promoting the 
 greatest happiness of the greatest number. This, 
 no doubt, is a sound principle, and the greatest 
 number are by nature somewhat dull, conceited, 
 and unscrupulous. They do not like those who 
 are quick, unassuming, and sincere ; how, then, 
 consistently with the first principles either of 
 morality or political economy as revealed to us 
 by the Sunchild, can we encourage such people 
 if we can bring sincerity and modesty fairly home 
 to them ? We cannot do so. And we must correct 
 the young as far as possible from forming habits 
 which, unless indulged in with the greatest modera- 
 tion, are sure to ruin them. 
 
 11 I cannot pretend to consider myself very suc- 
 cessful. I do my best, but I can only aim at 
 making my school a reflection of the outside world. 
 In the outside world we have to tolerate much 
 that is prejudicial to the greatest happiness of the 
 greatest number, partly because we cannot always 
 discover in time who may be let alone as being 
 genuinely insincere, and who are in reality masking 
 
 i55 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 sincerity under a garb of flippancy, and partly also 
 because we wish to err on the side of letting the 
 guilty escape, rather than of punishing the inno- 
 cent. Thus many people who are perfectly well 
 known to belong to the straightforward classes are 
 allowed to remain at large, and may be even seen 
 hobnobbing with the guardians of public im- 
 morality. Indeed it is not in the public interest 
 that straightforwardness should be extirpated root 
 and branch, for the presence of a small modicum 
 of sincerity acts as a wholesome irritant to the 
 academicism of the greatest number, stimulating 
 it to consciousness of its own happy state, and 
 giving it something to look down upon. More- 
 over, we hold it useful to have a certain number 
 of melancholy examples, whose notorious failure 
 shall serve as a warning to those who neglect culti- 
 vating that power of immoral self-control which 
 shall prevent them from saying, or even thinking, 
 anything that shall not immediately and palpably 
 minister to the happiness, and hence meet the ap- 
 proval, of the greatest number." 
 
 By this time the boys were all in school. "There 
 is not one prig in the whole lot," said the head- 
 master sadly. " I wish there was, but only those 
 boys come here who are notoriously too good to 
 become current coin in the world unless they are 
 hardened with an alloy of vice. I should have 
 liked to show you our gambling, book-making, 
 and speculation class, but the assistant-master who 
 
 attends to this branch of our curriculum is gone 
 
 156 
 
A Deformatory 
 
 to Sunch'ston this afternoon. He has friends who 
 have asked him to see the dedication of the new 
 temple, and he will not be back till Monday. I 
 really do not know what I can do better for you 
 than examine the boys in Counsels of Imperfection. 
 
 So saying, he went into the schoolroom, over 
 the fireplace of which my father's eye caught an 
 inscription, " Resist good, and it will fly from you. 
 Sunchild's Sayings, xvii. 2." Then, taking down a 
 copy of the work just named from a shelf above 
 his desk, he ran his eye over a few of its pages. 
 
 He called up a class of about twenty boys. 
 
 "Now, my boys,' 1 he said, "Why is it so neces- 
 sary to avoid extremes of truthfulness ? " 
 
 " It is not necessary, sir," said one youngster, 
 " and the man who says that it is so is a scoundrel." 
 
 "Come here, my boy, and hold out your hand." 
 When he had done so, Mr. Turvey gave him two 
 sharp cuts with a cane. "There now, go down 
 to the bottom of the class and try not to be so 
 extremely truthful in future." Then, turning to 
 my father, he said, " I hate caning them, but it is 
 the only way to teach them. I really do believe 
 that boy will know better than to say what he 
 thinks another time." 
 
 He repeated his question to the class, and the 
 head-boy answered, " Because, sir, extremes meet, 
 and extreme truth will be mixed with extreme 
 falsehood." 
 
 " Quite right, my boy. Truth is like religion ; it 
 
 has only two enemies — the too much and the too 
 
 i57 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 little. Your answer is more satisfactory than some 
 of your recent conduct had led me to expect." 
 
 " But, sir, you punished me only three weeks ago 
 for telling you a lie." 
 
 " Oh yes ; why, so I did ; I had forgotten. But 
 then you overdid it. Still it was a step in the right 
 direction." 
 
 " And now, my boy," he said to a very frank and 
 ingenuous youth about half way up the class, " and 
 how is truth best reached ? " 
 
 " Through the falling out of thieves, sir." 
 
 " Quite so. Then it will be necessary that the 
 more earnest, careful, patient, self-sacrificing, en- 
 quirers after truth should have a good deal of the 
 thief about them, though they are very honest 
 people at the same time. Now what does the man " 
 (who on enquiry my father found to be none other 
 than Mr. Turvey himself) " say about honesty ? " 
 
 " He says, sir, that honesty does not consist in 
 never stealing, but in knowing how and where it 
 will be safe to do so." 
 
 u Remember," said Mr. Turvey to my father, 
 " how necessary it is that we should have a plentiful 
 supply of thieves, if honest men are ever to come 
 by their own." 
 
 He spoke with the utmost gravity, evidently quite 
 
 easy in his mind that his scheme was the only one 
 
 by which truth could be successfully attained. 
 
 " But pray let me have any criticism you may feel 
 
 inclined to make." 
 
 " I have none," said my father. " Your system 
 158 
 
A Deformatory 
 
 commends itself to common sense ; it is the one 
 adopted in the law courts, and it lies at the very 
 foundation of party government. If your academic 
 bodies can supply the country with a sufficient 
 number of thieves — which I have no doubt they 
 can — there seems no limit to the amount of truth 
 that may be attained. If, however, I may suggest 
 the only difficulty that occurs to me, it is that 
 academic thieves shew no great alacrity in falling 
 out, but incline rather to back each other up 
 through thick and thin." 
 
 "Ah, yes," said Mr. Turvey, "there is that 
 difficulty ; nevertheless circumstances from time 
 to time arise to get them by the ears in spite of 
 themselves. But from whatever point of view you 
 may look at the question, it is obviously better to 
 aim at imperfection than perfection ; for if we 
 aim steadily at imperfection, we shall probably 
 get it within a reasonable time, whereas to the 
 end of our days we should never reach perfection. 
 Moreover, from a worldly point of view, there is 
 no mistake so great as that of being always right." 
 He then turned to his class and said — 
 
 "And now tell me what did the Sunchild tell us 
 about God and Mammon ? " 
 
 The head-boy answered : " He said that we must 
 serve both, for no man can serve God well and 
 truly who does not serve Mammon a little also ; 
 and no man can serve Mammon effectually unless 
 he serve God largely at the same time." 
 
 " What were his words ? " 
 '59 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " He said, ' Cursed be they that say, "Thou shalt 
 not serve God and Mammon," for it is the whole 
 duty of man to know how to adjust the conflicting 
 claims of these two deities.' " 
 
 Here my father interposed. " I knew the Sun- 
 child ; and I more than once heard him speak of 
 God and Mammon. He never varied the form of 
 the words he used, which were to the effect that a 
 man must serve either God or Mammon, but that 
 he could not serve both." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Mr. Turvey, " that no doubt was his 
 exoteric teaching, but Professors Hanky and Panky 
 have assured me most solemnly that his esoteric 
 teaching was as I have given it. By the way, these 
 gentlemen are both, I understand, at Sunch'ston, 
 and I think it quite likely that I shall have a visit 
 from them this afternoon. If you do not know 
 them I should have great pleasure in introducing you 
 to them ; I was at Bridgeford with both of them." 
 
 " I have had the pleasure of meeting them 
 already," said my father, "and as you are by no 
 means certain that they will come, I will ask you to 
 let me thank you for all that you have been good 
 enough to shew me, and bid you good-afternoon. 
 I have a rather pressing engagement " 
 
 " My dear sir, you must please give me five 
 
 minutes more. I shall examine the boys in the 
 
 Musical Bank Catechism." He pointed to one of 
 
 them and said, " Repeat your duty towards your 
 
 neighbour." 
 
 " My duty towards my neighbour," said the boy, 
 160 
 
A Deformatory 
 
 " is to be quite sure that he is not likely to borrow 
 money of me before I let him speak to me at all, 
 and then to have as little to do with him as " 
 
 At this point there was a loud ring at the door 
 bell. " Hanky and Panky come to see me, no 
 doubt," said Mr. Turvey. " I do hope it is so. You 
 must stay and see them." 
 
 " My dear sir," said my father, putting his handker- 
 chief up to his face, " I am taken suddenly unwell and 
 must positively leave you." He said this in so per- 
 emptory a tone that Mr. Turvey had to yield. My 
 father held his handkerchief to his face as he went 
 through the passage and hall, but when the servant 
 opened the door he took it down, for there was no 
 Hanky or Panky — no one,in fact,but a poor, wizened 
 old man who had come, as he did every other Satur- 
 day afternoon, to wind up the Deformatory clocks. 
 
 Nevertheless, he had been scared, and was in a 
 
 very wicked-fleeth-when-no-man-pursueth frame of 
 
 mind. He went to his inn, and shut himself up in 
 
 his room for some time, taking notes of all that had 
 
 happened to him in the last three days. But even at 
 
 his inn he no longer felt safe. How did he know 
 
 but that Hanky and Panky might have driven over 
 
 from Sunch'ston to see Mr. Turvey, and might put 
 
 up at this very house ? or they might even be 
 
 going to spend the night here. He did not venture 
 
 out of his room till after seven by which time he 
 
 had made rough notes of as much of the foregoing 
 
 chapters as had come to his knowledge so far. 
 
 Much of what I have told as nearly as I could in 
 
 161 L 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the order in which it happened, he did not learn till 
 later. After giving the merest outline of his inter- 
 view with Mr. Turvey, he wrote a note as follows : — 
 
 " I suppose I must have held forth about the 
 greatest happiness of the greatest number, but 
 I had quite forgotten it, though I remember re- 
 peatedly quoting my favourite proverb, ' Every 
 man for himself, and the devil take the hindmost.' 
 To this they have paid no attention." 
 
 By seven his panic about Hanky and Panky 
 ended, for if they had not come by this time, they 
 were not likely to do so. Not knowing that they 
 were staying at the Mayor's, he had rather settled 
 it that they would now stroll up to the place where 
 they had left their hoard and bring it down as soon 
 as night had fallen. And it is quite possible that 
 they might have found some excuse for doing this, 
 when dinner was over, if their hostess had not 
 undesignedly hindered them by telling them about 
 the Sunchild. When the conversation recorded in 
 the preceding chapter was over, it was too late for 
 them to make any plausible excuse for leaving the 
 house ; we may be sure, therefore, that much more 
 had been said than Yram and George were able to 
 remember and report to my father. 
 
 After another stroll about Fairmead, during which 
 
 he saw nothing but what on a larger scale he had 
 
 already seen at Sunch'ston, he returned to his inn 
 
 at about half-past eight, and ordered supper in a 
 
 public room that corresponded with the coffee-room 
 
 of an English hotel. 
 
 162 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 my father makes the acquaintance of mr. 
 balmy, and walks with him next day to 
 sunch'ston. 
 
 Up to this point, though he had seen enough to 
 shew him the main drift of the great changes that 
 had taken place iri Erewhonian opinions, my father 
 had not been able to glean much about the history 
 of the transformation. He could see that it had all 
 grown out of the supposed miracle of his balloon 
 ascent, and he could understand that the ignorant 
 masses had been so astounded by an event so con- 
 trary to all their experience, that their faith in 
 experience was utterly routed and demoralised. If 
 a man and a woman might rise from the earth and 
 disappear into the sky, what else might not happen ? 
 If they had been wrong in thinking such a thing 
 impossible, in how much else might they not be 
 mistaken also ? The ground was shaken under 
 their very feet. 
 
 It w r as not as though the thing had been done 
 in a corner. Hundreds of people had seen the 
 ascent ; and even if only a small number had 
 been present, the disappearance of the balloon, of 
 my mother, and of my father himself, would have 
 confirmed their story. My father, then, could 
 
 163 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 understand that a single incontrovertible miracle 
 of the first magnitude should uproot the hedges of 
 caution in the minds of the common people, but he 
 could not understand how such men as Hanky and 
 Panky, who evidently did not believe that there had 
 been any miracle at all, had been led to throw 
 themselves so energetically into a movement so 
 subversive of all their traditions, when, as it seemed 
 to him, if they had held out they might have pricked 
 the balloon bubble easily enough, and maintained 
 everything in statu quo. 
 
 How, again, had they converted the King — if they 
 had converted him ? The Queen had had full 
 knowledge of all the preparations for the ascent. 
 The King had had everything explained to him. 
 The workmen and workwomen who had made the 
 balloon and the gas could testify that none but 
 natural means had been made use of — means which, 
 if again employed any number of times, would 
 effect a like result. How could it be that when the 
 means of resistance were so ample and so easy, the 
 movement should nevertheless have been irresis- 
 tible ? For had it not been irresistible, was it to be 
 believed that astute men like Hanky and Panky 
 would have let themselves be drawn into it ? 
 
 What then had been its inner history ? My father 
 
 had so fully determined to make his way back on 
 
 the following evening, that he saw no chance of 
 
 getting to know the facts — unless, indeed, he should 
 
 be able to learn something from Hanky's sermon ; 
 
 he was therefore not sorry to find an elderly gentle- 
 
 164 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 man of grave but kindly aspect seated opposite to 
 him when he sat down to supper. 
 
 The expression on this man's face was much like 
 that of the early Christians as shewn in the S. 
 Giovanni Laterano bas-reliefs at Rome, and again, 
 though less aggressively self-confident, like that on 
 the faces of those who have joined the Salvation 
 Army. If he had been in England, my father would 
 have set him down as a Swedenborgian ; this being 
 impossible, he could only note that the stranger 
 bowed his head, evidently saying a short grace 
 before he began to eat, as my father had always 
 done when he was in Erewhon before. I will not 
 say that my father had never omitted to say grace 
 during the whole of the last twenty years, but he 
 said it now, and unfortunately forgetting himself, he 
 said it in the English language, not loud, but never- 
 theless audibly. 
 
 My father was alarmed at what he had done, but 
 there was no need, for the stranger immediately 
 said, " I hear, sir, that you have the gift of tongues. 
 The Sunchild often mentioned it to us, as having 
 been vouchsafed long since to certain of the people, 
 to whom, for our learning, he saw fit to feign that 
 he belonged. He thus foreshadowed prophetically 
 its manifestation also among ourselves. All which, 
 however, you must know as well as I do. Can you 
 interpret ?" 
 
 My father was much shocked, but he remem- 
 bered having frequently spoken of the power of 
 
 speaking in unknown tongues which was possessed 
 
 165 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 by many of the early Christians, and he also re- 
 membered that in times of high religious enthusi- 
 asm this power had repeatedly been imparted, or 
 supposed to be imparted, to devout believers in the 
 middle ages. It grated upon him to deceive one 
 who was so obviously sincere, but to avoid imme- 
 diate discomfiture he fell in with what the stranger 
 had said. 
 
 " Alas ! sir," said he, " that rarer and more pre- 
 cious gift has been withheld from me ; nor can I 
 speak in an unknown tongue, unless as it is borne 
 in upon me at the moment. I could not even re- 
 peat the words that have just fallen from me." 
 
 "That," replied the stranger, "is almost invari- 
 ably the case. These illuminations of the spirit are 
 beyond human control. You spoke in so low a 
 tone that I cannot interpret what you have just 
 said, but should you receive a second inspiration 
 later, I shall doubtless be able to interpret it for you. 
 I have been singularly gifted in this respect — more 
 so, perhaps, than any other interpreter in Erewhon." 
 
 My father mentally vowed that no second inspira- 
 tion should be vouchsafed to him, but presently 
 remembering how anxious he was for information 
 on the points touched upon at the beginning of this 
 chapter, and seeing that fortune had sent him the 
 kind of man who would be able to enlighten him, 
 he changed his mind ; nothing, he reflected, would 
 be more likely to make the stranger talk freely with 
 him, than the affording him an opportunity for 
 
 showing off his skill as an interpreter. 
 
 1 66 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 Something, therefore, he would say, but what ? 
 No one could talk more freely when the train of his 
 thoughts, or the conversation of others, gave him 
 his cue, but when told to say an unattached " some- 
 thing," he could not even think of " How do you do 
 this morning ? it is a very fine day ; " and the more 
 he cudgelled his brains for " something," the more 
 they gave no response. He could not even con- 
 verse further with the stranger beyond plain " yes " 
 and " no " ; so he went on with his supper, and in 
 thinking of what he was eating and drinking for the 
 moment forgot to ransack his brain. No sooner 
 had he left off ransacking it, than it suggested some- 
 thing — not, indeed, a very brilliant something, but 
 still something. On having grasped it, he laid down 
 his knife and fork, and with the air of one distraught 
 he said — 
 
 " My name is Norval, on the Grampian Hills 
 My father feeds his flock — a frugal swain." 
 
 " I heard you," exclaimed the stranger, " and I 
 can interpret every word of what you have said, but 
 it would not become me to do so, for you have con- 
 veyed to me a message more comforting than I can 
 bring myself to repeat even to him who has con- 
 veyed it." 
 
 Having said this he bowed his head, and re- 
 mained for some time wrapped in meditation. 
 My father kept a respectful silence, but after a 
 little time he ventured to say in a low tone, how 
 
 glad he was to have been the medium through 
 
 167 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 whom a comforting assurance had been conveyed. 
 Presently, on finding himself encouraged to renew 
 the conversation, he threw out a deferential feeler 
 as to the causes that might have induced Mr. 
 Balmy to come to Fairmead. " Perhaps," he 
 said, "you, like myself, have come to these parts 
 in order to see the dedication of the new temple ; 
 I could not get a lodging in Sunch'ston, so I 
 walked down here this morning." 
 
 This, it seemed, had been Mr. Balmy's own case, 
 except that he had not yet been to Sunch'ston. 
 Having heard that it was full to overflowing, he 
 had determined to pass the night at Fairmead, 
 and walk over in the morning — starting soon after 
 seven, so as to arrive in good time for the dedica- 
 tion ceremony. When my father heard this, he 
 proposed that they should walk together, to which 
 Mr. Balmy gladly consented ; it was therefore 
 arranged that they should go to bed early, break- 
 fast soon after six, and then walk to Sunch'ston. 
 My father then went to his own room, where 
 he again smoked a surreptitious pipe up the 
 chimney. 
 
 Next morning the two men breakfasted to- 
 gether, and set out as the clock was striking 
 seven. The day was lovely beyond the power 
 of words, and still fresh — for Fairmead was some 
 2500 feet above the sea, and the sun did not get 
 above the mountains that overhung it on the east 
 side, till after eight o'clock. Many persons were 
 
 also starting for Sunch'ston, and there was a pro- 
 
 168 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 cession got up by the Musical Bank Managers 
 of the town, who walked in it, robed in rich 
 dresses of scarlet and white embroidered with 
 much gold thread. There was a banner display- 
 ing an open chariot in which the Sunchild and 
 his bride were seated, beaming with smiles, and 
 in attitudes suggesting that they were bowing to 
 people who were below them. The chariot was, of 
 course, drawn by the four black and white horses 
 of which the reader has already heard, and the 
 balloon had been ignored. Readers of my father's 
 book will perhaps remember that my mother was 
 not seen at all — she was smuggled into the car 
 of the balloon along with sundry rugs, under which 
 she lay concealed till the balloon had left the 
 earth. All this went for nothing. It has been 
 said that though God cannot alter the past, 
 historians can ; it is perhaps because they can be 
 useful to Him in this respect that He tolerates 
 their existence. Painters, my father now realised, 
 can do all that historians can, with even greater 
 effect. 
 
 Women headed the procession — the younger 
 ones dressed in white, with veils and chaplets of 
 roses, blue cornflower, and pheasant's eye Nar- 
 cissus, while the older women were more soberly 
 attired. The Bank Managers and the banner 
 headed the men, who were mostly peasants, but 
 among them were a few who seemed to be of 
 higher rank, and these, for the most part, though 
 
 by no means all of them, wore their clothes re- 
 
 169 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 versed — as I have forgotten to say was done also 
 by Mr. Balmy. Both men and women joined 
 in singing a litany the words of which my father 
 could not catch ; the tune was one he had been 
 used to play on his apology for a flute when he 
 was in prison, being, in fact, none other than 
 " Home, Sweet Home." There was no harmony ; 
 they never got beyond the first four bars, but 
 these they must have repeated, my father thought, 
 at least a hundred times between Fairmead and 
 Sunch'ston. "Well," said he to himself, "how- 
 ever little else I may have taught them, I at any 
 rate gave them the diatonic scale." 
 
 He now set himself to exploit his fellow-traveller, 
 for they soon got past the procession. 
 
 " The greatest miracle," said he, " in connection 
 with this whole matter, has been — so at least it 
 seems to me — not the ascent of the Sunchild with 
 his bride, but the readiness with which the people 
 generally acknowledged its miraculous character. 
 I was one of those that witnessed the ascent, but I 
 saw no signs that the crowd appreciated its signifi- 
 cance. They were astounded, but they did not fall 
 down and worship." 
 
 "Ah," said the other, "but you forget the long 
 drought and the rain that the Sunchild immediately 
 prevailed on the air-god to send us. He had an- 
 nounced himself as about to procure it for us ; it 
 was on this ground that the King assented to the 
 preparation of those material means that were neces- 
 sary before the horses of the sun could attach them- 
 
 170 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 selves to the chariot into which the balloon was 
 immediately transformed. Those horses might not 
 be defiled by contact with this gross earth. I too 
 witnessed the ascent ; at the moment, I grant yon, 
 I saw neither chariot nor horses, and almost all 
 those present shared my own temporary blindness ; 
 the whole action from the moment when the balloon 
 left the earth, moved so rapidly, that we were flus- 
 tered, and hardly knew what it was that we were 
 really seeing. It was not till two or three years 
 later that I found the scene presenting itself to my 
 soul's imaginary sight in the full splendour which 
 was no doubt witnessed, but not apprehended, by 
 my bodily vision." 
 
 " There," said my father, " you confirm an opinion 
 that I have long held. — Nothing is so misleading as 
 the testimony of eye-witnesses." 
 
 " A spiritual enlightenment from within," returned 
 Mr. Balmy, " is more to be relied on than any 
 merely physical affluence from external objects. 
 Now, when I shut my eyes, I see the balloon 
 ascend a little way, but almost immediately the 
 heavens open, the horses descend, the balloon is 
 transformed, and the glorious pageant careers on- 
 ward till it vanishes into the heaven of heavens. 
 Hundreds with whom I have conversed assure me 
 that their experience has been the same as mine. 
 Has yours been different ? " 
 
 " Oh no, not at all ; but I always see some storks 
 
 circling round the balloon before I see any horses." 
 
 " How strange ! I have heard others also say 
 171 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 that they saw the storks you mention ; but let me 
 do my utmost I cannot force them into my mental 
 image of the scene. This shows, as you were saying 
 just now, how incomplete the testimony of an eye- 
 witness often is. It is quite possible that the storks 
 were there, but the horses and the chariot have im- 
 pressed themselves more vividly on my mind than 
 anything else has." 
 
 " Quite so ; and I am not without hope that even 
 at this late hour some further details may yet be 
 revealed to us." 
 
 " It is possible, but we should be as cautious in 
 accepting any fresh details as in rejecting them. 
 Should some heresy obtain wide acceptance, visions 
 will perhaps be granted to us that may be useful in 
 refuting it, but otherwise I expect nothing more." 
 
 " Neither do I, but I have heard people say that 
 inasmuch as the Sunchild said he was going to 
 interview the air-god in order to send us rain, he 
 was more probably son to the air-god than to the 
 sun. Now here is a heresy which " 
 
 " But, my dear sir," said Mr. Balmy, interrupting 
 him with great warmth, " he spoke of his father in 
 heaven as endowed with attributes far exceeding 
 any that can be conceivably ascribed to the air- 
 god. The power of the air-god does not extend 
 beyond our own atmosphere." 
 
 " Pray believe me," said my father, who saw by 
 
 the ecstatic gleam in his companion's eye that there 
 
 was nothing to be done but to agree with him, 
 
 "that I accept " 
 
 172 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 " Hear me to the end," replied Mr. Balmy. " Who 
 ever heard the Sunchild claim relationship with the 
 air-god ? He could command the air-god, and 
 evidently did so, halting no doubt for this bene- 
 ficent purpose on his journey towards his ultimate 
 destination. Can we suppose that the air-god, 
 who had evidently intended withholding the rain 
 from us for an indefinite period, should have so 
 immediately relinquished his designs against us at 
 the intervention of any less exalted personage than 
 the sun's own offspring ? Impossible ! " 
 
 " I quite agree with you," exclaimed my father, 
 " it is out of the " 
 
 "Let me finish what I have to say. When the 
 rain came so copiously for days, even those who 
 had not seen the miraculous ascent found its con- 
 sequences come so directly home to them, that 
 they had no difficulty in accepting the report of 
 others. There was not a farmer or cottager in the 
 land but heaved a sigh of relief at rescue from 
 impending ruin, and they all knew it was the 
 Sunchild who had promised the King that he 
 would make the air-god send it. So abundantly, 
 you will remember, did it come, that we had to 
 pray to him to stop it, which in his own good 
 time he was pleased to do." 
 
 " I remember," said my father, who was at last 
 able to edge in a word, " that it nearly flooded me 
 out of house and home. And yet, in spite of all 
 this, I hear that there are many at Bridgeford who 
 are still hardened unbelievers." 
 
 173 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Alas ! you speak too truly. Bridgeford and the 
 Musical Banks for the first three years fought tooth 
 and nail to blind those whom it was their first duty 
 to enlighten. I was a Professor of the hypothetical 
 language, and you may perhaps remember how I 
 was driven from my chair on account of the fear- 
 lessness with which I expounded the deeper mys- 
 teries of Sunchildism." 
 
 "Yes, I remember well how cruelly " but my 
 
 father was not allowed to get beyond " cruelly." 
 
 " It was I who explained why the Sunchild had 
 represented himself as belonging to a people in 
 many respects analogous to our own, when no 
 such people can have existed. It was I who de- 
 tected that the supposed nation spoken of by the 
 Sunchild was an invention designed in order to 
 give us instruction by the light of which we might 
 more easily remodel our institutions. I have some- 
 times thought that my gift of interpretation was 
 vouchsafed to me in recognition of the humble 
 services that I was hereby allowed to render. By 
 the way, you have received no illumination this 
 morning, have you ? " 
 
 " I never do, sir, when I am in the company of 
 one whose conversation I find supremely inter- 
 esting. But you were telling me about Bridge- 
 ford : I live hundreds of miles from Bridgeford, 
 and have never understood the suddenness, and 
 completeness, with which men like Professors 
 Hanky and Panky and Dr. Downie changed front. 
 
 Do they believe as you and I do, or did they 
 
 i74 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 merely go with the times ? I spent a couple of 
 hours with Hanky and Panky only two evenings ago, 
 and was not so much impressed as I could have 
 wished with the depth of their religious fervour." 
 
 "They are sincere now— more especially Hanky 
 —but I cannot think I am judging them harshly, 
 if I say that they were not so at first. Even now, 
 I fear, that they are more carnally than spiritually 
 minded. See how they have fought for the ag- 
 grandisement of their own order. It is mainly 
 their doing that the Musical Banks have usurped 
 the spiritual authority formerly exercised by the 
 straighteners." 
 
 " But the straighteners," said my father, " could 
 not co-exist with Sunchildism, and it is hard to see 
 how the claims of the Banks can be reasonably 
 gainsaid." 
 
 "Perhaps; and after all the Banks are our 
 main bulwark against the evils that I fear will 
 follow from the repeal of the laws against machi- 
 nery. This has already led to the development 
 of a materialism which minimizes the miraculous 
 element in the Sunchild's ascent, as our own people 
 minimize the material means that were the neces- 
 sary prologue to the miraculous." 
 
 Thus did they converse ; but I will not pursue 
 their conversation further. It will be enough to 
 say that in further floods of talk Mr. Balmy con- 
 firmed what George had said about the Banks 
 having lost their hold upon the masses. That hold 
 was weak even in the time of my father's first visit ; 
 
 i75 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 but when the people saw the hostility of the Banks 
 to a movement which far the greater number of 
 them accepted, it seemed as though both Bridge- 
 ford and the Banks were doomed, for Bridgeford 
 was heart and soul with the Banks. Hanky, it 
 appeared, though under thirty, and not yet a Pro- 
 fessor, grasped the situation, and saw that Bridge- 
 ford must either move with the times, or go. He 
 consulted some of the most sagacious Heads of 
 Houses and Professors, with the result that a 
 committee of enquiry was appointed, which in due 
 course reported that the evidence for the Sunchild's 
 having been the only child of the sun was conclu- 
 sive. It was about this time — that is to say some 
 three years after his ascent — that " Higgsism," as it 
 had been hitherto called, became " Sunchildism," 
 and " Higgs " the " Sunchild." 
 
 My father also learned the King's fury at his 
 escape (for he would call it nothing else) with my 
 mother. This was so great that though he had 
 hitherto been, and had ever since proved himself 
 to be, a humane ruler, he ordered the instant exe- 
 cution of all who had been concerned in making 
 either the gas or the balloon ; and his cruel orders 
 were carried out within a couple of hours. At the 
 same time he ordered the destruction by fire of the 
 Queen's workshops, and of all remnants of any 
 materials used in making the balloon. It is said 
 the Queen was so much grieved and outraged 
 (for it was her doing that the material ground- 
 work, so to speak, had been provided for the miracle) 
 
 176 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 that she wept night and day without ceasing three 
 whole months, and never again allowed her hus- 
 band to embrace her, till he had also embraced 
 Sunchildism. 
 
 When the rain came, public indignation at the 
 King's action was raised almost to revolution pitch, 
 and the King was frightened at once by the arrival 
 of the promised downfall and the displeasure of his 
 subjects. But he still held out, and it was only 
 after concessions on the part of the Bridgeford 
 committee, that he at last consented to the absorp- 
 tion of Sunchildism into the Musical Bank system, 
 and to its establishment as the religion of the 
 country. The far-reaching changes in Erewhonian 
 institutions with which the reader is already ac- 
 quainted followed as a matter of course. 
 
 " I know the difficulty," said my father presently, 
 " with which the King was persuaded to allow the 
 way in which the Sunchild's dress should be worn 
 to be a matter of opinion, not dogma. I see we have 
 adopted different fashions. Have you any decided 
 opinions upon the subject ? " 
 
 " I have ; but I will ask you not to press me for 
 them. Let this matter remain as the King has 
 left it." 
 
 My father thought that he might now venture on 
 a shot. So he said, " I have always understood, 
 too, that the King forced the repeal of the laws 
 against machinery on the Bridgeford committee, as 
 another condition of his assent ?" 
 
 "Certainly. He insisted on this, partly to gratify 
 177 M 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the Queen, who had not yet forgiven him, and who 
 had set her heart on having a watch, and partly 
 because he expected that a development of the 
 country's resources, in consequence of a freer use 
 of machinery, would bring more money into his 
 exchequer. Bridgeford fought hard and wisely 
 here, but they had gained so much by the Musical 
 Bank Managers being recognised as the authorised 
 exponents of Sunchildism, that they thought it 
 wise to yield — apparently with a good grace — and 
 thus gild the pill which his Majesty was about to 
 swallow. But even then they feared the conse- 
 quences that are already beginning to appear, and 
 which, if I mistake not, will assume far more serious 
 proportions in the future." 
 
 " See," said my father suddenly, " we are coming 
 to another procession, and they have got some 
 banners ; let us walk a little quicker and over- 
 take it." 
 
 "Horrible!" replied Mr. Balmy fiercely. "You 
 must be short-sighted, or you could never have 
 called my attention to it. Let us get it behind us 
 as fast as possible, and not so much as look at it." 
 
 " Oh yes, yes," said my father, " it is indeed hor- 
 rible, I had not seen what it was." 
 
 He had not the faintest idea what the matter 
 
 was, but he let Mr. Balmy walk a little ahead of 
 
 him, so that he could see the banners, the most 
 
 important of which he found to display a balloon 
 
 pure and simple, with one figure in the car. True, 
 
 at the top of the banner there was a smudge which 
 
 178 
 
Mr. Balmy 
 
 might be taken for a little chariot, and some very 
 little horses, but the balloon was the only thing in- 
 sisted on. As for the procession, it consisted entirely 
 of men, whom a smaller banner announced to be 
 workmen from the Fairmead iron and steel works. 
 There was a third banner, which said, " Science as 
 well as Sunchildism." 
 
 179 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE TEMPLE IS DEDICATED TO MY FATHER, AND 
 CERTAIN EXTRACTS ARE READ FROM HIS SUP- 
 POSED SAYINGS. 
 
 " It is enough to break one's heart," said Mr. Balmy 
 when he had outstripped the procession, and my 
 father was again beside him. " ' As well as,' indeed ! 
 We know what that means. Wherever there is a 
 factory there is a hot -bed of unbelief. 'As well 
 as' ! Why it is a defiance." 
 
 "What, I wonder," said my father innocently, 
 " must the Sunchild's feelings be, as he looks down 
 on this procession. For there can be little doubt 
 that he is doing so." 
 
 "There can be no doubt at all," replied Mr. 
 Balmy, "that he is taking note of it, and of all else 
 that is happening this day in Erewhon. Heaven 
 grant that he be not so angered as to chastise the 
 innocent as well as the guilty." 
 
 " I doubt," said my father, " his being so angry 
 even with this procession, as you think he is." 
 
 Here, fearing an outburst of indignation, he 
 found an excuse for rapidly changing the conver- 
 sation. Moreover he was angry with himself for 
 playing upon this poor good creature. He had 
 
 not done so of malice prepense ; he had begun to 
 
 1 80 
 
The Dedication 
 
 deceive him, because he believed himself to be in 
 danger if he spoke the truth ; and though he knew 
 the part to be an unworthy one, he could not 
 escape from continuing to play it, if he was to 
 discover things that he was not likely to discover 
 otherwise. 
 
 Often, however, he had checked himself. It had 
 been on the tip of his tongue to be illuminated with 
 the words, 
 
 Sukoh and Sukop were two pretty men, 
 They lay in bed till the clock struck ten, 
 
 and to follow it up with, 
 
 Now with the drops of this most Yknarc time 
 My love looks fresh, 
 
 in order to see how Mr. Balmy would interpret the 
 
 assertion here made about the Professors, and what 
 
 statement he would connect with his own Ere- 
 
 whonian name ; but he had restrained himself. 
 
 The more he saw, and the more he heard, the 
 
 the more shocked he was at the mischief he had 
 
 done. See how he had unsettled the little mind 
 
 this poor, dear, good gentleman had ever had, till 
 
 he was now a mere slave to preconception. And 
 
 how many more had he not in like manner brought 
 
 to the verge of idiocy ? How many again had he 
 
 not made more corrupt than they were before, even 
 
 though he had not deceived them — as for example, 
 
 Hanky and Panky. And the young ? how could 
 
 such a lie as that a chariot and four horses came 
 
 181 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 down out of the clouds enter seriously into the life 
 of any one, without distorting his mental vision, if 
 not ruining it ? 
 
 And yet, the more he reflected, the more he also 
 saw that he could do no good by saying who he 
 was. Matters had gone so far that though he spoke 
 with the tongues of men and angels he would not 
 be listened to ; and even if he were, it might easily 
 prove that he had added harm to that which he had 
 done already. No. As soon as he had heard 
 Hanky's sermon, he would begin to work his way 
 back, and if the Professors had not yet removed 
 their purchase, he would recover it ; but he would 
 pin a bag containing about five pounds worth of 
 nuggets on to the tree in which they had hidden 
 it, and, if possible, he would find some way of send- 
 ing the rest to George. 
 
 He let Mr. Balmy continue talking, glad that this 
 
 gentleman required little more than monosyllabic 
 
 answers, and still more glad, in spite of some 
 
 agitation, to see that they were now nearing 
 
 Sunch'ston, towards which a great concourse of 
 
 people was hurrying from Clearwater, and more 
 
 distant towns on the main road. Many whole 
 
 families were coming, — the fathers and mothers 
 
 carrying the smaller children, and also their own 
 
 shoes and stockings, which they would put on 
 
 when nearing the town. Most of the pilgrims 
 
 brought provisions with them. All wore European 
 
 costumes, but only a few of them wore it reversed, 
 
 and these were almost invariably of higher social 
 
 182 
 
The Dedication 
 
 status than the great body of the people, who were 
 mainly peasants. 
 
 When they reached the town, my father was 
 relieved at finding that Mr. Balmy had friends on 
 whom he wished to call before going to the temple. 
 He asked my father to come with him, but my father 
 said that he too had friends, and would leave him 
 for the present, while hoping to meet him again 
 later in the day. The two, therefore, shook hands 
 with great effusion, and went their several ways. 
 My father's way took him first into a confectioner's 
 shop, where he bought a couple of Sunchild buns, 
 which he put into his pocket, and refreshed himself 
 with a bottle of Sunchild cordial and water. All 
 shops except those dealing in refreshments were 
 closed, and the town was gaily decorated with flags 
 and flowers, often festooned into words or em- 
 blems proper for the occasion. 
 
 My father, it being now a quarter to eleven, 
 made his way towards the temple, and his heart 
 was clouded with care as he walked along. Not 
 only was his heart clouded, but his brain also was 
 oppressed, and he reeled so much on leaving the 
 confectioner's shop, that he had to catch hold of 
 some railings till the faintness and giddiness left 
 him. He knew the feeling to be the same as what 
 he had felt on the Friday evening, but he had no 
 idea of the cause, and as soon as the giddiness left 
 him he thought there was nothing the matter with 
 him. 
 
 Turning down a side street that led into the main 
 183 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 square of the town, he found himself opposite the 
 west end of the temple, with its two lofty towers 
 that flanked the richly decorated main entrance. 
 I will not attempt to describe the architecture, for 
 my father could give me little information on this 
 point. He only saw the west front for two or 
 three minutes, and was not impressed by it, save 
 in so far as it was richly ornamented — evidently at 
 great expense — and very large. Even if he had 
 had a longer look, I doubt whether I should have 
 got more out of him, for he knew nothing of archi- 
 tecture, and I fear his test whether a building was 
 good or bad, was whether it looked old and 
 weather-beaten or no. No matter what a building 
 was, if it was three or four hundred years old he 
 liked it, whereas, if it was new, he would look to 
 nothing but whether it kept the rain out. Indeed 
 I have heard him say that the mediaeval sculpture 
 on some of our great cathedrals often only pleases 
 us because time and weather have set their seals 
 upon it, and that if we could see it as it was when 
 it left the mason's hands, we should find it no 
 better than much that is now turned out in the 
 Euston Road. 
 
 The ground plan here given will help the reader 
 to understand the few following pages more easily. 
 
 The building was led up to by a flight of steps 
 
 (M), and on entering it my father found it to consist 
 
 of a spacious nave, with two aisles and an apse 
 
 which was raised some three feet above the nave 
 
 and aisles. There were no transepts. In the apse 
 
 184 
 

 
 d 
 
 ft* 
 
 ) 
 
 E 
 
 | 
 
 0' 
 
 \\l 
 
 c 
 
 )' 
 
 
 o' 
 o' 
 d 
 
 
 
 
 k I ' 
 
 
 
 
 o' 
 d 
 d 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 =D= 
 
 =ft= 
 
 
 
 B 
 
 c 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 o'. 
 
 sL 
 
 h 
 
 K 
 
 :jvl 
 
 Table with cashier's seat on 
 either side , and al ms-box in 
 front. The picture is ex- 
 hibited on a scaffolding be- 
 hind it. 
 
 The reliquary. 
 
 The President's chair. 
 
 Pulpit and lectern. 
 
 Side doors. 
 
 i. Vram's seat. 
 
 k. Seats of George and the Sun- 
 child. 
 
 o' Pillars. 
 
 A,B,C, D, E,F,G, H, blocks 
 of seats. 
 
 /. Steps leading from the apse 
 to the nave. 
 
 K and L. Towers. 
 
 M. Steps and main en- 
 trance. 
 
 N. Robing-room. 
 
 i8 S 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 there was the table (a), with the two bowls of 
 Musical Bank money mentioned on an earlier 
 page, as also the alms-box in front of it. 
 
 At some little distance in front of the table stood 
 the President's chair (c), or I might almost call it 
 throne. It was so placed that his back would be 
 turned towards the table, which fact again shews 
 that the table was not regarded as having any 
 greater sanctity than the rest of the temple. 
 
 Behind the table, the picture already spoken of 
 was raised aloft. There was no balloon ; some 
 clouds that hung about the lower part of the 
 chariot served to conceal the fact that the painter 
 was uncertain whether it ought to have wheels or 
 no. The horses were without driver, and my 
 father thought that some one ought to have had 
 them in hand, for they were in far too excited a 
 state to be left safely to themselves. They had 
 hardly any harness, but what little there was was 
 enriched with gold bosses. My mother was in 
 Erewhonian costume, my father in European, but 
 he wore his clothes reversed. Both he and my 
 mother seemed to be bowing graciously to an un- 
 seen crowd beneath them, and in the distance, near 
 the bottom of the picture, was a fairly accurate re- 
 presentation of the Sunch'ston new temple. High 
 up, on the right hand, was a disc, raised and gilt, to 
 represent the sun ; on it, in low relief, there was an 
 indication of a gorgeous palace, in which, no doubt, 
 the sun was supposed to live ; though how they 
 
 made it all out my father could not conceive. 
 
 186 
 
The Dedication 
 
 On the right of the table there was a reliquary {b) 
 of glass, much adorned with gold, or more probably 
 gilding, for gold was so scarce in Erewhon that 
 gilding would be as expensive as a thin plate of 
 gold would be in Europe : but there is no knowing. 
 The reliquary was attached to a portable stand 
 some five feet high, and inside it was the relic 
 already referred to. The crowd was so great that 
 my father could not get near enough to see what 
 it contained, but I may say here, that when, two 
 days later, circumstances compelled him to have a 
 close look at it, he saw that it consisted of about 
 a dozen fine coprolites, deposited by some ante- 
 diluvian creature or creatures, which, whatever else 
 they may have been, were certainly not horses. 
 
 In the apse there were a few cross benches (G 
 and H) on either side, with an open space between 
 them, which was partly occupied by the President's 
 seat already mentioned. Those on the right, as 
 one looked towards the apse, were for the Managers 
 and Cashiers of the Bank, while those on the left 
 were for their wives and daughters. 
 
 In the centre of the nave, only a few feet in front 
 
 of the steps leading to the apse, was a handsome 
 
 pulpit and lectern (d). The pulpit was raised some 
 
 feet above the ground, and was so roomy that the 
 
 preacher could walk about in it. On either side of 
 
 it there were cross benches with backs (E and F) ; 
 
 those on the right were reserved for the Mayor, 
 
 civic functionaries, and distinguished visitors, while 
 
 those on the left were for their wives and daughters. 
 
 187 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Benches with backs (A, B, C, D) were placed 
 about half-way down both nave and aisles — those 
 in the nave being divided so as to allow a free 
 passage between them. The rest of the temple was 
 open space, about which people might walk at 
 their will. There were side doors (e, g } and/*, Ji) at 
 the upper and lower end of each aisle. Over the 
 main entrance was a gallery in which singers were 
 placed. 
 
 As my father was worming his way among the 
 crowd, which was now very dense, he was startled 
 at finding himself tapped lightly on the shoulder, 
 and turning round in alarm was confronted by 
 the beaming face of George. 
 
 " How do you do, Professor Panky ? " said the 
 youth — who had decided thus to address him. 
 "What are you doing here among the common 
 people ? Why have you not taken your place in 
 one of the seats reserved for our distinguished 
 visitors ? I am afraid they must be all full by 
 this time, but I will see what I can do for you. 
 Come with me." 
 
 "Thank you," said my father. His heart beat 
 so fast that this was all he could say, and he 
 followed meek as a lamb. 
 
 With some difficulty the two made their way to 
 
 the right-hand corner seats of block C, for every 
 
 seat in the reserved block was taken. The places 
 
 which George wanted for my father and for himself 
 
 were already occupied by two young men of about 
 
 eighteen and nineteen, both of them well-grown, and 
 
 188 
 
The Dedication 
 
 of prepossessing appearance. My father saw by 
 the truncheons they carried that they were special 
 constables, but he took no notice of this, for 
 there were many others scattered about the crowd. 
 George whispered a few words to one of them, 
 and to my father's surprise they both gave up 
 their seats, which appear on the plan as {k). 
 
 It afterwards transpired that these two young 
 men were George's brothers, who by his desire 
 had taken the seats some hours ago, for it was here 
 that George had determined to place himself and 
 my father if he could find him. He chose these 
 places because they would be near enough to let 
 his mother (who was at z, in the middle of the front 
 row of block E, to the left of the pulpit) see my 
 father without being so near as to embarrass him ; 
 he could also see and be seen by Hanky, and 
 hear every word of his sermon ; but perhaps his 
 chief reason had been the fact that they were not 
 far from the side-door at the upper end of the right- 
 hand aisle, while there was no barrier to interrupt 
 rapid egress should this prove necessary. 
 
 It was now high time that they should sit down, 
 which they accordingly did. George sat at the 
 end of the bench, and thus had my father on his 
 left. My father was rather uncomfortable at seeing 
 the young men whom they had turned out, stand- 
 ing against a column close by, but George said 
 that this was how it was to be, and there was 
 nothing to be done but to submit. The young 
 men seemed quite happy, which puzzled my father, 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 who of course had no idea that their action was 
 preconcerted. 
 
 Panky was in the first row of block F, so that 
 my father could not see his face except sometimes 
 when he turned round. He was sitting on the 
 Mayor's right hand, while Dr. Downie was on his 
 left ; he looked at my father once or twice in a 
 puzzled way, as though he ought to have known 
 him, but my father did not think he recognised 
 him. Hanky was still with President Gurgoyle and 
 others in the robing-room, N ; Yram had already 
 taken her seat : my father knew her in a moment, 
 though he pretended not to do so when George 
 pointed her out to him. Their eyes met for a 
 second ; Yram turned hers quickly away, and my 
 father could not see a trace of recognition in her 
 face. At no time during the whole ceremony did 
 he catch her looking at him again. 
 
 "Why, you stupid man," she said to him later on 
 in the clay with a quick, kindly smile, " I was looking at 
 you all the time. As soon as the President or Hanky 
 began to talk about you I knew you would stare 
 at him, and then I could look. As soon as they 
 left off talking about you I knew you would be 
 looking at me, unless you went to sleep — and as 
 I did not know which you might be doing, I waited 
 till they began to talk about you again." 
 
 My father had hardly taken note of his surround- 
 ings when the choir began singing, accompanied by 
 a few feeble flutes and lutes, or whatever the name 
 
 of the instrument should be, but with no violins, 
 
 190 
 
The Dedication 
 
 for he knew nothing of the violin, and had not been 
 able to teach the Erewhonians anything about it. 
 The voices were all in unison, and the tune they 
 sang was one which my father had taught Yram to 
 sing ; but he could not catch the words. 
 
 As soon as the singing began, a procession, 
 headed by the venerable Dr. Gurgoyle, President 
 of the Musical Banks of the province, began to 
 issue from the robing-room, and move towards the 
 middle of the apse. The President was sumptuously 
 dressed, but he wore no mitre, nor anything to sug- 
 gest an English or European Bishop. The Vice- 
 President, Head Manager, Vice-Manager, and some 
 Cashiers of the Bank, now ranged themselves on 
 either side of him, and formed an impressive group 
 as they stood, gorgeously arrayed, at the top of the 
 steps leading from the apse to the nave. Here they 
 waited till the singers left off singing. 
 
 When the litany, or hymn, or whatever it should 
 
 be called, was over, the Head Manager left the 
 
 President's side and came down to the lectern in 
 
 the nave, where he announced himself as about to 
 
 read some passages from the Sunchild's Sayings. 
 
 Perhaps because it was the first day of the year 
 
 according to their new calendar, the reading began 
 
 with the first chapter, the whole of which was read. 
 
 My father told me that he quite well remembered 
 
 having said the last verse, which he still held as 
 
 true ; hardly a word of the rest was ever spoken by 
 
 him, though he recognised his own influence in 
 
 almost all of it. The reader paused, with good 
 
 191 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 effect, for about five seconds between each para- 
 graph, and read slowly and very clearly. The 
 chapter was as follows : — 
 
 These are the words of the Sunchild about God and 
 man. He said — 
 
 i. God is the baseless basis of all thoughts, things, and 
 deeds. 
 
 2. So that those who say that there is a God, lie, 
 unless they also mean that there is no God ; and those who 
 say that there is no God, lie, unless they also mean that 
 there is a God. 
 
 3. It is very true to say that man is made after the 
 likeness of God ; and yet it is very untrue to say this. 
 
 4. God lives and moves in every atom throughout the 
 universe. Therefore it is wrong to think of Him as ' Him ' 
 and ' He,' save as by the clutching of a drowning man at a 
 straw. 
 
 5. God is God to us only so long as we cannot see 
 Him. When we are near to seeing Him He vanishes, and 
 we behold Nature in His stead. 
 
 6. We approach Him most nearly when we think of 
 Him as our expression for Man's highest conception, 
 of goodness, wisdom, and power. But we cannot rise to 
 Him above the level of our own highest selves. 
 
 7. We remove ourselves most far from Him when we 
 invest Him with human form and attributes. 
 
 8. My father the sun, the earth, the moon, and all 
 planets that roll round my father, are to God but as a 
 single cell in our bodies to ourselves. 
 
 9. He is as much above my father, as my father is 
 above men and women. 
 
 10. The universe is instinct with the mind of God. 
 
 The mind of God is in all that has mind throughout all 
 
 192 
 
The Dedication 
 
 worlds. There is no God but the Universe, and man, in 
 this world is His prophet. 
 
 ii. God's conscious life, nascent, so far as this world 
 is concerned, in the infusoria, adolescent in the higher 
 mammals, approaches maturity on this earth in man. All 
 these living beings are members one of another, and of God. 
 
 12. Therefore, as man cannot live without God in the 
 world, so neither can God live in this world without mankind. 
 
 13. If we speak ill of God in our ignorance it may be 
 forgiven us ; but if we speak ill of His Holy Spirit indwell- 
 ing in good men and women it may not be forgiven us." 
 
 The Head Manager now resumed his place by 
 President Gurgoyle's side, and the President in the 
 name of his Majesty the King declared the temple 
 to be hereby dedicated to the contemplation of the 
 Sunchild and the better exposition of his teaching. 
 This was all that was said. The reliquary was then 
 brought forward and placed at the top of the steps 
 leading from the apse to the nave ; but the original 
 intention of carrying it round the temple was aban- 
 doned for fear of accidents through the pressure 
 round it of the enormous multitudes who were 
 assembled. More singing followed of a simple but 
 impressive kind ; during this I am afraid I must 
 own that my father, tired with his walk, dropped 
 off into a refreshing slumber, from which he did 
 not wake till George nudged him and told him 
 not to snore, just as the Vice-Manager was going 
 towards the lectern to read another chapter of the 
 Sunchild's Sayings — which was as follows : — 
 
 The Sunchild also spoke to us a parable about the 
 unwisdom of the children yet unborn, who though they 
 
 i93 N 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 know so much, yet do not know as much as they think 
 they do. 
 
 He said : — 
 
 "The unborn have knowledge of one another so long 
 as they are unborn, and this without impediment from 
 walls or material obstacles. The unborn children in any 
 city form a population apart, who talk with one another 
 and tell each other about their developmental pro- 
 gress. 
 
 "They have no knowledge, and cannot even conceive 
 the existence of anything that is not such as they are 
 themselves. Those who have been born are to them what 
 the dead are to us. They can see no life in them, and 
 know no more about them than they do of any stage in 
 their own past development other than the one through 
 which they are passing at the moment. They do not even 
 know that their mothers are alive — much less that their 
 mothers were once as they now are. To an embryo, its 
 mother is simply the environment, and is looked upon 
 much as our inorganic surroundings are by ourselves. 
 
 "The great terror of their lives is the fear of birth, — 
 that they shall have to leave the only thing that they can 
 think of as life, and enter upon a dark unknown which is 
 to them tantamount to annihilation. 
 
 "Some, indeed, among them have maintained that 
 birth is not the death which they commonly deem it, 
 but that there is a life beyond the womb of which they 
 as yet know nothing, and which is a million fold more 
 truly life than anything they have yet been able even to 
 imagine. But the greater number shake their yet un- 
 fashioned heads and say they have no evidence for this 
 that will stand a moment's examination. 
 
 " ' Nay,' answer the others, 'so much work, so elaborate, 
 so wondrous as that whereon we are now so busily en- 
 
 '94 
 
The Dedication 
 
 gaged must have a purpose, though the purpose is beyond 
 our grasp.' 
 
 "'Never,' reply the first speakers; 'our pleasure in the 
 work is sufficient justification for it. Who has ever par- 
 taken of this life you speak of, and re-entered into the 
 womb to tell us of it? Granted that some few have 
 pretended to have done this, but how completely have 
 their stories broken down when subjected to the tests of 
 sober criticism. No. When we are born we are born, and 
 there is an end of us.' 
 
 " But in the hour of birth, when they can no longer 
 re-enter the womb and tell the others, Behold ! they find 
 that it is not so." 
 
 Here the reader again closed his book and re- 
 sumed his place in the apse. 
 
 '95 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 PROFESSOR HANKY PREACHES A SERMON, IN THE 
 COURSE OF WHICH MY FATHER DECLARES HIM- 
 SELF TO BE THE SUNCHILD 
 
 Professor Hanky then went up into the pulpit, 
 richly but soberly robed in vestments the exact 
 nature of which I cannot determine. His carriage 
 was dignified, and the harsh lines on his face gave 
 it a strong individuality, which, though it did not 
 attract, conveyed an impression of power that 
 could not fail to interest. As soon as he had 
 given attention time to fix itself upon him, he 
 began his sermon without text or preliminary 
 matter of any kind, and apparently without notes. 
 He spoke clearly and very quietly, especially at 
 the beginning ; he used action whenever it could 
 point his meaning, or give it life and colour, but 
 there was no approach to staginess or even orato- 
 rical display. In fact, he spoke as one who meant 
 what he was saying, and desired that his hearers 
 should accept his meaning, fully confident in his 
 good faith. His use of pause was effective. After 
 the word " mistake," at the end of the opening 
 sentence, he held up his half-bent hand and 
 paused for full three seconds, looking intently at 
 
 his audience as he did so. Every one felt the 
 
 196 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 idea to be here enounced that was to dominate 
 the sermon. 
 
 The sermon— so much of it as I can find room 
 for — was as follows : — 
 
 " My friends, let there be no mistake. At such a 
 time, as this, it is well we should look back upon the 
 path by which we have travelled, and forward to 
 the goal towards which we are tending. As it was 
 necessary that the material foundations of this 
 building should be so sure that there shall be no 
 subsidence in the superstructure, so is it not less 
 necessary to ensure that there shall be no subsid- 
 ence in the immaterial structure that we have 
 raised in consequence of the Sunchild's sojourn 
 among us. Therefore, my friends, I again say, ' Let 
 there be no mistake.' Each stone that goes towards 
 the uprearing of this visible fane, each human soul 
 that does its part in building the invisible temple of 
 our national faith, is bearing witness to, and lending 
 its support to, that which is either the truth of 
 truths, or the baseless fabric of a dream. 
 
 " My friends, this is the only possible alternative. 
 He in whose name we are here assembled, is either 
 worthy of more reverential honour than we can ever 
 pay him, or he is worthy of no more honour than 
 any other honourable man among ourselves. There 
 can be no halting between these two opinions. 
 The question of questions is, was he the child of 
 the tutelary god of this world— the sun, and is it to 
 the palace of the sun that he returned when he left 
 
 us, or was he, as some amongst us still do not 
 
 197 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 hesitate to maintain, a mere man, escaping by un- 
 usual but strictly natural means to some part of 
 this earth with which we are unacquainted. My 
 friends, either we are on a right path or on a very 
 wrong one, and in a matter of such supreme im- 
 portance — there must be no mistake. 
 
 " I need not remind those of you whose privilege 
 it is to live in Sunch'ston, of the charm attendant 
 on the Sunchild's personal presence and conversa- 
 tion, nor of his quick sympathy, his keen intellect, 
 his readiness to adapt himself to the capacities of 
 all those who came to see him while he was in 
 prison. He adored children, and it was on them 
 that some of his most conspicuous miracles were 
 performed. Many a time when a child had fallen 
 and hurt itself, was he known to make the place 
 well by simply kissing it. Nor need I recall to 
 your minds the spotless purity of his life — so spot- 
 less that not one breath of slander has ever dared 
 to visit it. I was one of the not very many who 
 had the privilege of being admitted to the inner 
 circle of his friends during the later weeks that he 
 was amongst us. I loved him dearly, and it will 
 ever be the proudest recollection of my life that 
 he deigned to return me no small measure of 
 affection." 
 
 My father, furious as he was at finding himself 
 
 dragged into complicity with this man's imposture, 
 
 could not resist a smile at the effrontery with which 
 
 he lowered his tone here, and appeared unwilling 
 
 to dwell on an incident which he could not recall 
 
 198 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 without being affected almost to tears, and mere 
 allusion to which, had involved an apparent self- 
 display that was above all things repugnant to him. 
 What a difference between the Hanky of Thursday 
 evening with its " never set eyes on him and hope 
 I never shall," and the Hanky of Sunday morning, 
 who now looked as modest as Cleopatra might 
 have done had she been standing godmother to a 
 little blue-eyed girl — Bellerophon's first-born baby. 
 
 Having recovered from his natural, but promptly 
 repressed, emotion, the Professor continued : — 
 
 " I need not remind you of the purpose for which 
 so many of us, from so many parts of our kingdom, 
 are here assembled. We know what we have come 
 hither to do : we are come each one of us to sign 
 and seal by his presence the bond of his assent 
 to those momentous changes, which have found 
 their first great material expression in the temple 
 that you see around you. 
 
 " You all know how, in accordance with the ex- 
 pressed will of the Sunchild, the Presidents and 
 Vice-Presidents of the Musical Banks began as soon 
 as he had left us to examine, patiently, carefully, 
 earnestly, and without bias of any kind, firstly the 
 evidences in support of the Sunchild's claim to be 
 the son of the tutelar deity of this world, and 
 secondly the precise nature of his instructions as 
 regards the future position and authority of the 
 Musical Banks. 
 
 " My friends, it is easy to understand why the 
 
 Sunchild should have given us these instructions. 
 
 199 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 With that foresight which is the special character- 
 istic of divine, as compared with human, wisdom, 
 he desired that the evidences in support of his 
 superhuman character should be collected, sifted, 
 and placed on record, before anything was either 
 lost through the death of those who could alone 
 substantiate it, or unduly supplied through the en- 
 thusiasm of over-zealous visionaries. The greater 
 any true miracle has been, the more certainly will 
 false ones accrete round it ; here, then, we find 
 the explanation of the command the Sunchild gave 
 to us to gather, verify, and record, the facts of his 
 sojourn here in Erewhon. For above all things 
 he held it necessary to ensure that there should be 
 neither mistake, nor even possibility of mistake. 
 
 " Consider for a moment what differences of 
 opinion would infallibly have arisen, if the evidences 
 for the miraculous character of the Sunchild's 
 mission had been conflicting — if they had rested 
 on versions each claiming to be equally authorita- 
 tive, but each hopelessly irreconcilable on vital 
 points with every single other. What would future 
 generations have said in answer to those who bade 
 them fling all human experience to the winds, on 
 the strength of records written they knew not cer- 
 tainly by whom, nor how long after the marvels 
 that they recorded, and of which all that could be 
 certainly said was that no two of them told the same 
 story ? 
 
 " Who that believes either in God or man — who 
 with any self-respect, or respect for the gift of 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 reason with which God had endowed him, either 
 would, or could, believe that a chariot and four 
 horses had come down from heaven, and gone back 
 again with human or quasi-human occupants, un- 
 less the evidences for the fact left no loophole for 
 escape ? If a single loophole were left him, he 
 would be unpardonable, not for disbelieving the 
 story, but for believing it. The sin against God 
 would lie not in want of faith, but in faith. 
 
 u My friends, there are two sins in matters of 
 belief. There is that of believing on too little 
 evidence, and that of requiring too much before 
 we are convinced. The guilt of the latter is in- 
 curred, alas ! by not a few amongst us at the 
 present day, but if the testimony to the truth of 
 the wondrous event so faithfully depicted on the 
 picture that confronts you had been less contempo- 
 raneous, less authoritative, less unanimous, future 
 generations — and it is for them that we should now 
 provide — would be guilty of the first-named, and 
 not less heinous sin if they believed at all. 
 
 "Small wonder, then, that the Sunchild, having 
 come amongst us for our advantage, not his own, 
 would not permit his beneficent designs to be 
 endangered by the discrepancies, mythical develop- 
 ments, idiosyncracies, and a hundred other defects 
 inevitably attendant on amateur and irresponsible 
 recording. Small wonder, then, that he should 
 have chosen the officials of the Musical Banks, 
 from the Presidents and Vice-Presidents down- 
 wards to be the authoritative exponents of his 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 teaching, the depositaries of his traditions, and his 
 representatives here on earth till he shall again see 
 fit to visit us. For he will come. Nay it is even 
 possible that he may be here amongst us at this 
 very moment, disguised so that none may know 
 him, and intent only on watching our devotion 
 towards him. If this be so, let me implore him, in 
 the name of the sun his father, to reveal himself." 
 
 Now Hanky had already given my father more 
 than one look that had made him uneasy. He had 
 evidently recognised him as the supposed ranger 
 of last Thursday evening. Twice he had run his 
 eye like a searchlight over the front benches 
 opposite to him, and when the beam had reached 
 my father there had been no more searching. It 
 was beginning to dawn upon my father that George 
 might have discovered that he was not Professor 
 Panky ; was it for this reason that these two young 
 special constables, though they gave up their 
 places, still kept so close to him ? Was George 
 only waiting his opportunity to arrest him — not of 
 course even suspecting who he was — but as a 
 foreign devil who had tried to pass himself off as 
 Professor Panky ? Had this been the meaning of 
 his having followed him to Fairmead ? And should 
 he have to be thrown into the Blue Pool by George 
 after all ? " It would serve me," said he to himself, 
 " richly right." 
 
 These fears which had been taking shape for 
 some few minutes were turned almost to certain- 
 ties by the half-contemptuous glance Hanky threw 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 towards him as he uttered what was obviously 
 intended as a challenge. He saw that all was 
 over, and was starting to his feet to declare him- 
 self, and thus fall into the trap that Hanky was 
 laying for him, when George gripped him tightly by 
 the knee and whispered, " Don't — you are in great 
 danger." And he smiled kindly as he spoke. 
 
 My father sank back dumbfounded. "You know 
 me ?" he whispered in reply. 
 
 " Perfectly. So does Hanky, so does my mother ; 
 say no more," and he again smiled. 
 
 George, as my father afterwards learned, had 
 hoped that he would reveal himself, and had deter- 
 mined in spite of his mother's instructions, to give 
 him an opportunity of doing so. It was for this 
 reason that he had not arrested him quietly, as 
 he could very well have done, before the service 
 began. He wished to discover what manner of 
 man his father was, and was quite happy as soon 
 as he saw that he would have spoken out if he had 
 not been checked. He had not yet caught Hanky's 
 motive in trying to goad my father, but on seeing 
 that he was trying to do this, he knew that a trap 
 was being laid, and that my father must not be 
 allowed to speak. 
 
 Almost immediately, however, he perceived that 
 while his eyes had been turned on Hanky, two 
 burly vergers had wormed their way through the 
 crowd and taken their stand close to his two bro- 
 thers. Then he understood, and understood also 
 
 how to frustrate. 
 
 203 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 As for my father, George's ascendancy over him 
 — quite felt by George — was so absolute that he 
 could think of nothing now but the exceeding great 
 joy of finding his fears groundless, and of deliver- 
 ing himself up to his son's guidance in the assur- 
 ance that the void in his heart was filled, and that 
 his wager not only would be held as won, but was 
 being already paid. How they had found out, why 
 he was not to speak as he would assuredly have 
 done — for he was in a white heat of fury — what did 
 it all matter now that he had found that which he 
 had feared he should fail to find ? He gave George 
 a puzzled smile, and composed himself as best he 
 could to hear the continuation of Hanky's sermon, 
 which was as follows : — 
 
 " Who could the Sunchild have chosen, even 
 though he had been gifted with no more than 
 human sagacity, but the body of men whom he 
 selected ? It becomes me but ill to speak so 
 warmly in favour of that body of whom I am the 
 least worthy member, but what other is there in 
 Erewhon so above all suspicion of slovenliness, 
 self-seeking, preconceived bias, or bad faith ? If 
 there was one set of qualities more essential than 
 another for the conduct of the investigations en- 
 trusted to us by the Sunchild, it was those that 
 turn on meekness and freedom from all spiritual 
 pride. I believe I can say quite truly that these 
 are the qualities for which Bridgeford is more espe- 
 cially renowned. The readiness of her Professors 
 
 to learn even from those who at first sight may 
 
 204 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 seem least able to instruct them — the gentleness 
 with which they correct an opponent if they feel 
 it incumbent upon them to do so, the promptitude 
 with which they acknowledge error when it is 
 pointed out to them and quit a position no matter 
 how deeply they have been committed to it, at the 
 first moment in which they see that they cannot 
 hold it righteously, their delicate sense of honour, 
 their utter immunity from what the Sunchild used 
 to call log-rolling or intrigue, the scorn with 
 which they regard anything like hitting below the 
 belt — these I believe I may truly say are the 
 virtues for which Bridgeford is pre-eminently re- 
 nowned." 
 
 The Professor went on to say a great deal more 
 about the fitness of Bridgeford and the Musical 
 Bank managers for the task imposed on them by the 
 Sunchild, but here my father's attention flagged — 
 nor, on looking at the verbatim report of the 
 sermon that appeared next morning in the leading 
 Sunch'ston journal, do I see reason to reproduce 
 Hanky's words on this head. It was all to shew 
 that there had been no possibility of mistake. 
 
 Meanwhile George was writing on a scrap of 
 paper as though he was taking notes of the sermon. 
 Presently he slipped this into my father's hand. 
 It ran : — 
 
 "You see those vergers standing near my 
 
 brothers, who gave up their seats to us. Hanky 
 
 tried to goad you into speaking that they might 
 
 arrest you, and get you into the Bank prisons. If 
 
 205 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 you fall into their hands you are lost. I must 
 arrest you instantly on a charge of poaching on the 
 King's preserves, and make you my prisoner. Let 
 those vergers catch sight of the warrant which I 
 shall now give you. Read it and return it to me. 
 Come with me quietly after service. I think you 
 had better not reveal yourself at all." 
 
 As soon as he had given my father time to read 
 the foregoing, George took a warrant out of his 
 pocket. My father pretended to read it and re- 
 turned it. George then laid his hand on his 
 shoulder, and in an undertone arrested him. He 
 then wrote on another scrap of paper and passed 
 it on to the elder of his two brothers. It was to 
 the effect that he had now arrested my father, and 
 that if the vergers attempted in any way to interfere 
 between him and his prisoner, his brothers were to 
 arrest both of them, which, as special constables, 
 they had power to do. 
 
 Yram had noted Hanky's attempt to goad my 
 
 father, and had not been prepared for his stealing a 
 
 march upon her by trying to get my father arrested 
 
 by Musical Bank officials, rather than by her son. 
 
 On the preceding evening this last plan had been 
 
 arranged on ; and she knew nothing of the note 
 
 that Hanky had sent an hour or two later to the 
 
 Manager of the temple — the substance of which 
 
 the reader can sufficiently guess. When she had 
 
 heard Hanky's words and saw the vergers, she 
 
 was for a few minutes seriously alarmed, but she 
 
 was reassured when she saw George give my father 
 
 206 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 the warrant, and her two sons evidently explaining 
 the position to the vergers. 
 
 Hanky had by this time changed his theme, and 
 was warning his hearers of the dangers that would 
 follow on the legalization of the medical profession, 
 and the repeal of the edicts against machines. 
 Space forbids me to give his picture of the horrible 
 tortures that future generations would be put to by 
 medical men, if these were not duly kept in check 
 by the influence of the Musical Banks ; the horrors 
 of the inquisition in the middle ages are nothing to 
 what he depicted as certain to ensue if medical men 
 were ever to have much money at their command. 
 The only people in whose hands money might be 
 trusted safely were those who presided over the 
 Musical Banks. This tirade was followed by one 
 not less alarming about the growth of materialistic 
 tendencies among the artisans employed in the 
 production of mechanical inventions. My father, 
 though his eyes had been somewhat opened by the 
 second of the two processions he had seen on his 
 way to Sunch'ston, was not prepared to find that in 
 spite of the superficially almost universal acceptance 
 of the new faith, there was a powerful, and it 
 would seem growing, undercurrent of scepticism, 
 with a desire to reduce his escape with my mother 
 to a purely natural occurence. 
 
 " It is not enough," said Hanky, " that the 
 Sunchild should have ensured the preparation 
 of authoritative evidence of his supernatural char- 
 acter. The evidences happily exist in overwhelm- 
 
 207 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 ing strength, but they must be brought home to 
 minds that as yet have stubbornly refused to 
 receive them. During the last five years there has 
 been an enormous increase in the number of those 
 whose occupation in the manufacture of machines 
 inclines them to a materialistic explanation even 
 of the most obviously miraculous events, and the 
 growth of this class in our midst constituted, and 
 still constitutes, a grave danger to the state. 
 
 " It was to meet this that the society was formed 
 on behalf of which I appeal fearlessly to your 
 generosity. It is called, as most of you doubtless 
 know, the Sunchild Evidence Society ; and his 
 Majesty the King graciously consented to become 
 its Patron. This society not only collects additional 
 evidences — indeed it is entirely due to its labours 
 that the precious relic now in this temple was dis- 
 covered — but it is its beneficent purpose to lay those 
 that have been authoritatively investigated before 
 men who, if left to themselves, would either neglect 
 them altogether, or worse still reject them. 
 
 " For the first year or two the efforts of the 
 society met with but little success among those 
 for whose benefit they were more particularly in- 
 tended, but during the present year the working 
 classes in some cities and towns (stimulated very 
 much by the lectures of my illustrious friend Pro- 
 fessor Panky) have shewn a most remarkable and 
 zealous interest in Sunchild evidences, and have 
 formed themselves into local branches for the study 
 
 and defence of Sunchild truth. 
 
 308 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 " Yet in spite of all this need — of all this patient 
 labour and really very gratifying success — the sub- 
 scriptions to the society no longer furnish it with 
 its former very modest income — an income which 
 is deplorably insufficient if the organization is to be 
 kept effective, and the work adequately performed. 
 In spite of the most rigid economy, the committee 
 have been compelled to part with a considerable 
 portion of their small reserve fund (provided by a 
 legacy) to tide over difficulties. But this method 
 of balancing expenditure and income is very un- 
 satisfactory, and cannot be long continued. 
 
 " I am led to plead for the society with especial 
 insistence at the present time, inasmuch as more 
 than one of those whose unblemished life has made 
 them fitting recipients of such a signal favour, have 
 recently had visions informing them that the Sun- 
 child will again shortly visit us. We know not 
 when he will come, but when he comes, my friends, 
 let him not find us unmindful of, nor ungrateful for, 
 the inestimable services he has rendered us. For 
 come he surely will. Either in winter, what time 
 icicles hang by the wall and milk comes frozen home 
 in the pail — or in summer when days are at their 
 longest and the mowing grass is about — there will 
 be an hour, either at morn, or eve, or in the middle 
 day, when he will again surely come. May it be 
 mine to be among those who are then present to 
 receive him." 
 
 Here he again glared at my father, whose blood 
 
 was boiling. George had not positively forbidden 
 
 209 O 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 him to speak out ; he therefore sprang to his feet, 
 " You lying hound," he cried, " I am the Sunchild, 
 and you know it." 
 
 George, who knew that he had my father in his 
 own hands, made no attempt to stop him, and 
 was delighted that he should have declared himself 
 though he had felt it his duty to tell him not to 
 do so. Yram turned pale. Hanky roared out, 
 "Tear him in pieces — leave not a single limb on 
 his body. Take him out and burn him alive." 
 The vergers made a dash for him — but George's 
 brothers seized them. The crowd seemed for a 
 moment inclined to do as Hanky bade them, but 
 Yram rose from her place, and held up her hand 
 as one who claimed attention. She advanced to- 
 wards George and my father as unconcernedly 
 as though she were merely walking out of church, 
 but she still held her hand uplifted. All eyes 
 were turned on her, as well as on George and my 
 father, and the icy calm of her self-possession 
 chilled those who were inclined for the moment 
 to take Hanky's words literally. There was not 
 a trace of fluster in her gait, action, or words, as 
 she said — 
 
 " My friends, this temple, and this day, must not 
 be profaned with blood. My son will take this 
 poor madman to the prison. Let him be judged 
 and punished according to law. Make room, that 
 he and my son may pass." 
 
 Then, turning to my father, she said, " Go quietly 
 with the Ranger." 
 
Prof. Hanky's Sermon 
 
 Having so spoken, she returned to her seat as 
 unconcernedly as she had left it. 
 
 Hanky for a time continued to foam at the mouth 
 and roar out, " Tear him to pieces ! burn him 
 alive ! " but when he saw that there was no further 
 hope of getting the people to obey him, he collapsed 
 on to a seat in his pulpit, mopped his bald head, 
 and consoled himself with a great pinch of a powder 
 which corresponds very closely to our own snuff. 
 
 George led my father out by the side door at the 
 north end of the western aisle ; the people eyed 
 him intently, but made way for him without de- 
 monstration. One voice alone was heard to cry 
 out, " Yes, he is the Sunchild ! " My father glanced 
 at the speaker, and saw that he was the interpreter 
 who had taught him the Erewhonian language 
 when he was in prison. 
 
 George, seeing a special constable close by, told 
 him to bid his brothers release the vergers, and let 
 them arrest the interpreter — this the vergers, foiled 
 as they had been in the matter of my father's arrest, 
 were very glad to do. So the poor interpreter, to 
 his dismay, was lodged at once in one of the Bank 
 prison-cells, where he could do no further harm. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 GEORGE TAKES HIS FATHER TO PRISON, AND THERE 
 OBTAINS SOME USEFUL INFORMATION 
 
 By this time George had got my father into the open 
 square, where he was surprised to find that a large 
 bonfire had been made and lighted. There had 
 been nothing of the kind an hour before ; the 
 wood, therefore, must have been piled and lighted 
 while people had been in church. He had no time 
 at the moment to enquire why this had been done, 
 but later on he discovered that on the Sunday 
 morning the Manager of the new temple had ob- 
 tained leave from the Mayor to have the wood 
 piled in the square, representing that this was 
 Professor Hanky's contribution to the festivities 
 of the day. There had, it seemed, been no inten- 
 tion of lighting it until nightfall ; but it had acci- 
 dentally caught fire through the carelessness of a 
 workman, much about the time when Hanky began 
 to preach. No one for a moment believed that 
 there had been any sinister intention, or that Pro- 
 fessor Hanky when he urged the crowd to burn 
 my father alive, even knew that there was a pile 
 of wood in the square at all — much less that it had 
 been lighted — for he could hardly have supposed 
 that the wood had been got together so soon. 
 
In Prison 
 
 Nevertheless both George and my father, when 
 they knew all that had passed, congratulated them- 
 selves on the fact that my father had not fallen into 
 the hands of the vergers, who would probably have 
 tried to utilise the accidental fire, though in no case 
 is it likely they would have succeeded. 
 
 As soon as they were inside the gaol, the old 
 Master recognised my father. " Bless my heart — 
 what ? You here, again, Mr. Higgs ? Why, I 
 thought you were in the palace of the sun of your 
 father." 
 
 " I wish I was," answered my father, shaking 
 hands with him, but he could say no more. 
 
 "You are as safe here as if you were," said 
 George laughing, "and safer." Then turning to 
 his grandfather, he said, " You have the record of 
 Mr. Higgs's marks and measurements ? I know 
 you have : take him to his old cell ; it is the best 
 in the prison ; and then please bring me the 
 record." 
 
 The old man took George and my father to the 
 cell which he had occupied twenty years earlier — 
 but I cannot stay to describe his feelings on find- 
 ing himself again within it. The moment his 
 grandfather's back was turned, George said to my 
 father, " And now shake hands also with your son." 
 
 As he spoke he took my father's hand and 
 pressed it warmly between both his own. 
 
 "Then you know you are my son," said my 
 father as steadily as the strong emotion that 
 mastered him would permit. 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 " But you did not know this when I was walking 
 with you on Friday ? " 
 
 " Of course not. I thought you were Professor 
 Panky ; if I had not taken you for one of the 
 two persons named in your permit, I should have 
 questioned you closely, and probably ended by 
 throwing you into the Blue Pool." He shuddered 
 as he said this. 
 
 " But you knew who I was when you called me 
 Panky in the temple ? " 
 
 " Quite so. My mother told me everything on 
 Friday evening." 
 
 "And that is why you tried to find me at Fair- 
 mead ?" 
 
 " Yes, but where in the world were you ? " 
 
 " I was inside the Musical Bank of the town, 
 resting and reading." 
 
 George laughed, and said, " On purpose to 
 hide ? " 
 
 " Oh no ; pure chance. But on Friday even- 
 ing ? How could your mother have found out 
 by that time that I was in Erewhon ? Am I on 
 my head or my heels ?" 
 
 " On your heels, my father, which shall take you 
 back to your own country as soon as we can get 
 you out of this." 
 
 "What have I done to deserve so much good- 
 will ? I have done you nothing but harm ? " Again 
 he was quite overcome. 
 
 George patted him gently on the hand, and said, 
 214 
 
In Prison 
 
 "You made a bet and you won it. During the 
 very short time that we can be together, you shall 
 be paid in full, and may heaven protect us both." 
 
 As soon as my father could speak he said, " But 
 how did your mother find out that I was in Ere- 
 whon ? " 
 
 " Hanky and Panky were dining with her, and 
 they told her some things that she thought strange. 
 She cross-questioned them, put two and two to- 
 gether, learned that you had got their permit out 
 of them, saw that you intended to return on 
 Friday, and concluded that you would be sleeping 
 in Sunch'ston. She sent for me, told me all, bade 
 me scour Sunch'ston to find you, intending that 
 you should be at once escorted safely over the 
 preserves by me. I found your inn, but you had 
 given us the slip. I tried first Fairmead and then 
 Clearwater, but did not find you till this morning. 
 For reasons too long to repeat, my mother warned 
 Hanky and Panky that you would be in the temple ; 
 whereon Hanky tried to get you into his clutches. 
 Happily he failed, but if I had known what he was 
 doing I should have arrested you before the ser- 
 vice. I ought to have done this, but I wanted you 
 to win your wager, and I shall get you safely away 
 in spite of them. My mother will not like my 
 having let you hear Hanky's sermon and declare 
 yourself." 
 
 "You half told me not to say who I was." 
 
 u Yes, but I was delighted when you disobeyed 
 me." 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " I did it very badly. I never rise to great occa- 
 sions, I always fall to them, but these things must 
 come as they come." 
 
 " You did it as well as it could be done, and good 
 will come of it." 
 
 "And now," he continued, "describe exactly all 
 that passed between you and the Professors. On 
 which side of Panky did Hanky sit, and did they 
 sit north and south or east and west ? How did 
 
 you get oh yes, I know that — you told them it 
 
 would be of no further use to them. Tell me all 
 else you can." 
 
 My father said that the Professors were sitting 
 pretty well east and west, so that Hanky, who was 
 on the east side, nearest the mountains, had Panky, 
 who was on the Sunch'ston side, on his right hand. 
 George made a note of this. My father then told 
 what the reader already knows, but when he came 
 to the measurement of the boots, George said, 
 "Take your boots off," and began taking off his 
 own. " Foot for foot," said he, "we are not father 
 and son, but brothers. Yours will fit me ; they are 
 less worn than mine, but I daresay you will not 
 mind that." 
 
 On this George ex abundanti cauteld knocked a 
 
 nail out of the right boot that he had been wearing 
 
 and changed boots with my father ; but he thought 
 
 it more plausible not to knock out exactly the same 
 
 nail that was missing on my father's boot. When 
 
 the change was made, each found — or said he found 
 
 — the other's boots quite comfortable. 
 
 216 
 
In Prison 
 
 My father all the time felt as though he were a 
 basket given to a dog. The dog had got him, was 
 proud of him, and no one must try to take him away. 
 The promptitude with which George took to him, 
 the obvious pleasure he had in "running" him, 
 his quick judgement, verging as it should towards 
 rashness, his confidence that my father trusted him 
 without reserve, the conviction of perfect openness 
 that was conveyed by the way in which his eyes 
 never budged from my father's when he spoke to 
 him, his genial, kindly, manner, perfect physical 
 health, and the air he had of being on the best 
 possible terms with himself and every one else — 
 the combination of all this so overmastered my 
 poor father (who indeed had been sufficiently 
 mastered before he had been five minutes in 
 George's company) that he resigned himself as 
 gratefully to being a basket, as George had cheer- 
 fully undertaken the task of carrying him. 
 
 In passing I may say that George could never 
 get his own boots back again, though he tried more 
 than once to do so. My father always made some 
 excuse. They were the only memento of George 
 that he brought home with him ; I wonder that he 
 did not ask for a lock of his hair, but he did not. 
 He had the boots put against a wall in his bed- 
 room, where he could see them from his bed, and 
 during his illness, while consciousness yet remained 
 with him, I saw his eyes continually turn towards 
 them. George, in fact, dominated him as long as 
 
 anything in this world could do so. Nor do I 
 
 217 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 wonder ; on the contrary, I love his memory the 
 better ; for I too, as will appear later, have seen 
 George, and whatever little jealousy I may have 
 felt, vanished on my finding him almost instan- 
 taneously gain the same ascendancy over me his 
 brother, that he had gained over his and my father. 
 But of this no more at present. Let me return to 
 the gaol in Sunchfston. 
 
 "Tell me more," said George, "about the Pro- 
 fessors." 
 
 My father told him about the nuggets, the sale 
 of his kit, the receipt he had given for the money, 
 and how he had got the nuggets back from a tree, 
 the position of which he described. 
 
 "I know the tree; have you got the nuggets here?" 
 
 " Here they are, with the receipt, and the pocket 
 handkerchief marked with Hanky's name. The 
 pocket handkerchief was found wrapped round 
 some dried leaves that we call tea, but I have not 
 got these with me." As he spoke he gave every- 
 thing to George, who showed the utmost delight 
 in getting possession of them. 
 
 " I suppose the blanket and the rest of the kit 
 are still in the tree ? " 
 
 " Unless Hanky and Panky have got them away, 
 or some one has found them." 
 
 "This is not likely. I will now go to my office, 
 
 but I will come back very shortly. My grandfather 
 
 shall bring you something to eat at once. I will 
 
 tell him to send enough for two" — which he 
 
 accordingly did. 
 
 218 
 
In Prison 
 
 On reaching the office, he told his next brother 
 (whom he had made an under-ranger) to go to the 
 tree he described, and bring back the bundle he 
 should find concealed therein. "You can go there 
 and back," he said, " in an hour and a half, and I 
 shall want the bundle by that time." 
 
 The brother, whose name I never rightly caught, 
 set out at once. As soon as he was gone, George 
 took from a drawer the feathers and bones of 
 quails, that he had shown my father on the 
 morning when he met him. He divided them in 
 half, and made them into two bundles, one of 
 which he docketed, " Bones of quails eaten, XIX. 
 xii. 29, by Professor Hanky, P.O.W.W., &c." And 
 he labelled Panky's quail bones in like fashion. 
 
 Having done this, he returned to the gaol, but on 
 his way he looked in at the Mayor's, and left a note 
 saying that he should be at the gaol, where any 
 message would reach him, but that he did not wish 
 to meet Professors Hanky and Panky for another 
 couple of hours. It was now about half-past 
 twelve, and he caught sight of a crowd coming 
 quietly out of the temple, whereby he knew that 
 Hanky would soon be at the Mayor's house. 
 
 Dinner was brought in almost at the moment 
 when George returned to the gaol. As soon as it 
 was over George said : — 
 
 " Are you quite sure you have made no mistake 
 
 about the way in which you got the permit out of 
 
 the Professors ?" 
 
 " Quite sure. I told them they would not want 
 219 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 it, and said I could save them trouble if they gave 
 it me. They never suspected why I wanted it. 
 Where do you think I may be mistaken ?" 
 
 "You sold your nuggets for rather less than a 
 twentieth part of their value, and you threw in 
 some curiosities, that would have fetched about 
 half as much as you got for the nuggets. You 
 say you did this because you wanted money to 
 keep you going till you could sell some of your 
 nuggets. This sounds well at first, but the sacrifice 
 is too great to be plausible when considered. It 
 looks more like a case of good honest manly 
 straightforward corruption." 
 
 " But surely you believe me ? " 
 
 "Of course I do. I believe every syllable that 
 comes from your mouth, but I shall not be able to 
 make out that the story was as it was not, unless I 
 am quite certain what it really was." 
 
 " It was exactly as I have told you." 
 
 "That is enough. And now, may I tell my 
 mother that you will put yourself in her, and the 
 Mayor's, and my, hands, and will do whatever 
 we tell you ? " 
 
 " I will be obedience itself — but you will not ask 
 me to do anything that will make your mother or 
 you think less well of me ? " 
 
 " If we tell you what you are to do, we shall not 
 think any the worse of you for doing it. Then I 
 may say to my mother that you will be good and 
 give no trouble — not even though we bid you shake 
 hands with Hanky and Panky ?" 
 
In Prison 
 
 " I will embrace them and kiss them on both 
 cheeks, if you and she tell me to do so. But what 
 about the Mayor ? " 
 
 "He has known everything, and condoned every- 
 thing, these last twenty years. He will leave every- 
 thing to my mother and me." 
 
 "Shall I have to see him?" 
 
 "Certainly. You must be brought up before 
 him to-morrow morning." 
 
 " How can I look him in the face ? " 
 
 "As you would me, or any one else. It is under- 
 stood among us that nothing happened. Things 
 may have looked as though they had happened, 
 but they did not happen." 
 
 " And you are not yet quite twenty ? " 
 
 " No, but I am son to my mother — and," he 
 added, "to one who can stretch a point or two 
 in the way of honesty as well as other people." 
 
 Having said this with a laugh, he again took my 
 father's hand between both his, and went back to 
 his office — where he set himself to think out the 
 course he intended to take when dealing with the 
 Professors. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 YRAM INVITES DR. DOWNIE AND MRS. HUMDRUM 
 TO LUNCHEON — A PASSAGE AT ARMS BETWEEN 
 HER AND HANKY IS AMICABLY ARRANGED 
 
 The disturbance caused by my father's outbreak 
 was quickly suppressed, for George got him out 
 of the temple almost immediately ; it was bruited 
 about, however, that the Sunchild had come down 
 from the palace of the sun, but had disappeared 
 as soon as any one had tried to touch him. In 
 vain did Hanky try to put fresh life into his sermon ; 
 its back had been broken, and large numbers left 
 the church to see what they could hear outside, 
 or failing information, to discourse more freely 
 with one another. 
 
 Hanky did his best to quiet his hearers when 
 he found that he could not infuriate them, — 
 
 "This poor man," he said, "is already known to 
 me, as one of those who have deluded themselves 
 into believing that they are the Sunchild. I have 
 known of his so declaring himself, more than once, 
 in the neighbourhood of Bridgeford, and others 
 have not infrequently done the same. I did not at 
 first recognize him, and regret that the shock of 
 horror his words occasioned me should have 
 prompted me to suggest violence against him. Let 
 
 222 
 
After Service 
 
 this unfortunate affair pass from your minds, and 
 let me again urge upon you the claims of the 
 Sunchild Evidence Society." 
 
 The audience on hearing that they were to be 
 told more about the Sunchild Evidence Society 
 melted away even more rapidly than before, and 
 the sermon fizzled out to an ignominious end quite 
 unworthy of its occasion. 
 
 About half-past twelve, the service ended, and 
 Hanky went to the robing-room to take off his 
 vestments. Yram, the Mayor, and Panky, waited 
 for him at the door opposite to that through which 
 my father had been taken ; while waiting, Yram 
 scribbled off two notes in pencil, one to Dr. Downie, 
 and another to Mrs. Humdrum, begging them to 
 come to lunch at once — for it would be one o'clock 
 before they could reach the Mayor's. She gave 
 these notes to the Mayor, and bade him bring both 
 the invited guests along with him. 
 
 The Mayor left just as Hanky was coming to- 
 wards her. "This, Mayoress," he said with some 
 asperity, " is a very serious business. It has ruined 
 my collection. Half the people left the temple 
 without giving anything at all. You seem," he 
 added in a tone the significance of which could not 
 be mistaken, "to be very fond, Mayoress, of this 
 Mr. Higgs." 
 
 " Yes," said Yram, "I am ; I always liked him, 
 
 and I am sorry for him ; but he is not the person 
 
 I am most sorry for at this moment — he, poor man, 
 
 is not going to be horsewhipped within the next 
 
 223 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 twenty minutes." And she spoke the " he " in 
 italics. 
 
 " I do not understand you, Mayoress." 
 
 " My husband will explain, as soon as I have 
 seen him." 
 
 " Hanky," said Panky, "you must withdraw, and 
 apologise at once." 
 
 Hanky was not slow to do this, and when he 
 had disavowed everything, withdrawn everything, 
 apologised for everything, and eaten humble pie 
 to Yram's satisfaction, she smiled graciously, and 
 held out her hand, which Hanky was obliged to 
 take. 
 
 " And now, Professor," she said, " let me return 
 to your remark that this is a very serious business, 
 and let me also claim a woman's privilege of being 
 listened to whenever she chooses to speak. I pro- 
 pose, then, that we say nothing further about this 
 matter till after luncheon. I have asked Dr. Downie 
 and Mrs. Humdrum to join us " 
 
 "Why Mrs. Humdrum?" interrupted Hanky 
 none too pleasantly, for he was still furious about 
 the duel that had just taken place between himself 
 and his hostess. 
 
 " My dear Professor," said Yram good-humouredly, 
 " pray say all you have to say and I will continue." 
 
 Hanky was silent. 
 
 " I have asked," resumed Yram, " Dr. Downie 
 
 and Mrs. Humdrum to join us, and after luncheon 
 
 we can discuss the situation or no as you may think 
 
 proper. Till then let us say no more. Luncheon 
 
 224 
 
After Service 
 
 will be over by two o'clock or soon after, and the 
 banquet will not begin till seven, so we shall have 
 plenty of time." 
 
 Hanky looked black and said nothing. As for 
 Panky he was morally in a state of collapse, and 
 did not count. 
 
 Hardly had they reached the Mayor's house 
 when the Mayor also arrived with Dr. Downie and 
 Mrs. Humdrum, both of whom had seen and recog- 
 nised my father in spite of his having dyed his hair. 
 Dr. Downie had met him at supper in Mr. Thims's 
 rooms when he had visited Bridgeford, and naturally 
 enough had observed him closely. Mrs. Humdrum, 
 as I have already said, had seen him more than once 
 when he was in prison. She and Dr. Downie were 
 talking earnestly over the strange reappearance of 
 one whom they had believed long since dead, but 
 Yram imposed on them the same silence that she 
 had already imposed on the Professors. 
 
 " Professor Hanky," said she to Mrs. Humdrum, 
 in Hanky's hearing, " is a little alarmed at my having 
 asked you to join our secret conclave. He is not 
 married, and does not know how well a woman can 
 hold her tongue when she chooses. I should have 
 told you all that passed, for I mean to follow your 
 advice, so I thought you had better hear everything 
 yourself." 
 
 Hanky still looked black, but he said nothing. 
 
 Luncheon was promptly served, and done justice to 
 
 in spite of much preoccupation ; for if there is one 
 
 thing that gives a better appetite than another, it is 
 
 225 P 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 a Sunday morning's service with a charity sermon 
 to follow. As the guests might not talk on the sub- 
 ject they wanted to talk about, and were in no 
 humour to speak of anything else, they gave their 
 whole attention to the good things that were before 
 them, without so much as a thought about reserving 
 themselves for the evening's banquet. Neverthe- 
 less, when luncheon was over, the Professors were 
 in no more genial, manageable, state of mind than 
 they had been when it began. 
 
 When the servants had left the room, Yram said 
 to Hanky, "You saw the prisoner, and he was the 
 man you met on Thursday night ?" 
 
 " Certainly, he was wearing the forbidden dress 
 and he had many quails in his possession. There 
 is no doubt also that he was a foreign devil." 
 
 At this point, it being now nearly half-past two, 
 George came in, and took a seat next to Mrs. Hum- 
 drum — between her and his mother — who of course 
 sat at the head of the table with the Mayor opposite 
 to her. On one side of the table sat the Professors, 
 and on the other Dr. Downie, Mrs. Humdrum, and 
 George, who had heard the last few words that 
 Hanky had spoken. 
 
 226 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 A COUNCIL IS HELD AT THE MAYOR'S, IN THE 
 COURSE OF WHICH GEORGE TURNS THE TABLES 
 ON THE PROFESSORS 
 
 "Now who," said Yram, "is this unfortunate 
 creature to be, when he is brought up to-morrow 
 morning, on the charge of poaching ? " 
 
 " It is not necessary," said Hanky severely, " that 
 he should be brought up for poaching. He is a 
 foreign devil, and as such your son is bound to 
 fling him without trial into the Blue Pool. Why 
 bring a smaller charge when you must inflict the 
 death penalty on a more serious one ? I have 
 already told you that I shall feel it my duty to 
 report the matter at headquarters, unless I am 
 satisfied that the death penalty has been inflicted." 
 
 "Of course," said George, "we must all of us 
 do our duty, and I shall not shrink from mine — 
 but I have arrested this man on a charge of poach- 
 ing, and must give my reasons ; the case cannot 
 be dropped, and it must be heard in public. Am 
 I, or am I not, to have the sworn depositions of 
 both you gentlemen to the fact that the prisoner 
 is the man you saw with quails in his possession ? 
 If you can depose to this he will be convicted, 
 
 for there can be no doubt he killed the birds him- 
 
 227 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 self. The least penalty my father can inflict is 
 twelve months' imprisonment with hard labour ; 
 and he must undergo this sentence before I can 
 Blue-Pool him. 
 
 "Then comes the question whether or no he 
 is a foreign devil. I may decide this in private, 
 but I must have depositions on oath before I do 
 so, and at present I have nothing but hearsay. 
 Perhaps you gentlemen can give me the evidence 
 I shall require, but the case is one of such import- 
 ance that were the prisoner proved never so clearly 
 to be a foreign devil, I should not Blue-Pool him 
 till I had taken the King's pleasure concerning him. 
 I shall rejoice, therefore, if you gentlemen can 
 help me to sustain the charge of poaching, and 
 thus give me legal standing-ground for deferring 
 action which the King might regret, and which once 
 taken cannot be recalled." 
 
 Here Yram interposed. "These points," she 
 said, " are details. Should we not first settle, not 
 what, but who, we shall allow the prisoner to be, 
 when he is brought up to-morrow morning ? Settle 
 this, and the rest will settle itself. He has declared 
 himself to be the Sunchild, and will probably do 
 so again. I am prepared to identify him, so is 
 Dr. Downie, so is Mrs. Humdrum, the interpreter, 
 and doubtless my father. Others of known respec- 
 tability will also do so, and his marks and measure- 
 ments are sure to correspond quite sufficiently. 
 The question is, whether all this is to be allowed 
 
 to appear on evidence, or whether it is to be estab- 
 
 228 
 
A Council 
 
 lished, as it easily may, if we give our minds to it, 
 that he is not the Sunchild." 
 
 "Whatever else he is," said Hanky, "he must 
 not be the Sunchild. He must, if the charge of 
 poaching cannot be dropped, be a poacher and a 
 foreign devil. I was doubtless too hasty when I 
 said that I believed I recognized the man as one 
 who had more than once declared himself to be 
 the Sunchild " 
 
 "But, Hanky," interrupted Panky, "are you 
 sure that you can swear to this man's being the 
 man we met on Thursday night ? We only saw 
 him by firelight, and I doubt whether I should feel 
 justified in swearing to him." 
 
 "Well, well : on second thoughts I am not sure, 
 Panky, but what you may be right after all ; it is 
 possible that he may be what I said he was in my 
 sermon." 
 
 " I rejoice to hear you say so," said George, " for 
 in this case the charge of poaching will fall through. 
 There will be no evidence against the prisoner. 
 And I rejoice also to think that I shall have nothing 
 to warrant me in believing him to be a foreign 
 devil. For if he is not to be the Sunchild, and 
 not to be your poacher, he becomes a mere mono- 
 maniac. If he apologises for having made a dis- 
 turbance in the temple, and promises not to offend 
 again, a fine, and a few days' imprisonment, will 
 meet the case, and he may be discharged." 
 
 " I see, I see," said Hanky very angrily. " You 
 
 are determined to get this man off if you can." 
 
 229 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " i shall act," said George, " in accordance with 
 sworn evidence, and not otherwise. Choose whether 
 you will have the prisoner to be your poacher or 
 no : give me your sworn depositions one way or 
 the other, and I shall know how to act. If you 
 depose on oath to the identity of the prisoner and 
 your poacher, he will be convicted and imprisoned. 
 As to his being a foreign devil, if he is the Sun- 
 child, of course he is one ; but otherwise I cannot 
 Blue-Pool him even when his sentence is expired, 
 without testimony deposed to me on oath in pri- 
 vate, though no open trial is required. A case for 
 suspicion was made out in my hearing last night, 
 but I must have depositions on oath to all the 
 leading facts before I can decide what my duty is. 
 What will you swear to ? " 
 
 "All this," said Hanky, in a voice husky with 
 passion, "shall be reported to the King." 
 
 " I intend to report every word of it ; but that is 
 not the point : the question is what you gentlemen 
 will swear to ? " 
 
 "Very well. I will settle it thus. We will swear 
 that the prisoner is the poacher we met on Thurs- 
 day night, and that he is also a foreign devil : his 
 wearing the forbidden dress ; his foreign accent ; 
 the foot-tracks we found in the snow, as of one 
 coming over from the other side ; his obvious 
 ignorance of the Afforesting Act, as shown by his 
 having lit a fire and making no effort to conceal 
 his quails till our permit shewed him his blunder ; 
 
 the cock-and-bull story he told us about your 
 
 230 
 
A Council 
 
 orders, and that other story about his having killed 
 a foreign devil — if these facts do not satisfy you, 
 they will satisfy the King that the prisoner is a 
 foreign devil as well as a poacher." 
 
 " Some of these facts," answered George, " are 
 new to me. How do you know that the foot-tracks 
 were made by the prisoner ? " 
 
 Panky brought out his note-book and read the 
 details he had noted. 
 
 " Did you examine the man's boots ?" 
 
 " One of them, the right foot ; this, with the mea- 
 surements, was quite enough." 
 
 " Hardly. Please to look at both soles of my 
 own boots ; you will find that those tracks were 
 mine. I will have the prisoner's boots examined ; 
 in the meantime let me tell you that I was up at 
 the statues on Thursday morning, walked three or 
 four hundred yards beyond them, over ground 
 where there was less snow, returned over the 
 snow, and went two or three times round them, 
 as it is the Ranger's duty to do once a year in 
 order to see that none of them are beginning to 
 lean." 
 
 He showed the soles of his boots, and the Pro- 
 fessors were obliged to admit that the tracks were 
 his. He cautioned them as to the rest of the points 
 on which they relied. Might they not be as mis- 
 taken, as they had just proved to be about the 
 tracks ? He could not, however, stir them from 
 sticking to it that there was enough evidence to 
 prove my father to be a foreign devil, and declaring 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 their readiness to depose to the facts on oath. In 
 the end Hanky again fiercely accused him of trying 
 to shield the prisoner. 
 
 " You are quite right," said George, " and you 
 will see my reasons shortly." 
 
 " I have no doubt," said Hanky significantly, 
 " that they are such as would weigh with any man 
 of ordinary feeling." 
 
 " I understand, then," said George, appearing to 
 take no notice of Hanky's innuendo, "that you will 
 swear to the facts as you have above stated them ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 "Then kindly wait while I write them on the 
 form that I have brought with me ; the Mayor can 
 administer the oath and sign your depositions. I 
 shall then be able to leave you, and proceed with 
 getting up the case against the prisoner." 
 
 So saying, he went to a writing-table in another 
 part of the room, and made out the depositions. 
 
 Meanwhile the Mayor, Mrs. Humdrum, and Dr. 
 Downie (who had each of them more than once 
 vainly tried to take part in the above discussion) 
 conversed eagerly in an undertone among them- 
 selves. Hanky was blind with rage, for he had a 
 sense that he was going to be outwitted ; the Mayor, 
 Yram, and Mrs. Humdrum had already seen that 
 George thought he had all the trumps in his own 
 hand, but they did not know more. Dr. Downie 
 was frightened, and Panky so muddled as to be 
 hors de combat. 
 
 George now rejoined the Professors, and read 
 232 
 
A Council 
 
 the depositions : the Mayor administered the oath 
 according to Erewhonian custom ; the Professors 
 signed without a word, and George then handed 
 the document to his father to countersign. 
 
 The Mayor examined it, and almost immediately 
 said, " My dear George, you have made a mistake ; 
 these depositions are on a form reserved for depo- 
 nents who are on the point of death." 
 
 " Alas ! " answered George, " there is no help for 
 it. I did my utmost to prevent their signing. I 
 knew that those depositions were their own death 
 warrant, and that is why, though I was satisfied 
 that the prisoner is a foreign devil, I had hoped to 
 be able to shut my eyes. I can now no longer do 
 so, and as the inevitable consequence, I must Blue- 
 Pool both the Professors before midnight. What 
 man of ordinary feeling would not under these 
 circumstances have tried to dissuade them from 
 deposing as they have done ? " 
 
 By this time the Professors had started to their 
 feet, and there was a look of horrified astonishment 
 on the faces of all present, save that of George, who 
 seemed quite happy. 
 
 " What monstrous absurdity is this ? " shouted 
 Hanky ; " do you mean to murder us ? " 
 
 " Certainly not. But you have insisted that I 
 should do my duty, and I mean to do it. You 
 gentlemen have now been proved to my satisfaction 
 to have had traffic with a foreign devil ; and under 
 section 37 of the Afforesting Act, I must at once 
 Blue-Pool any such persons without public trial." 
 233 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " Nonsense, nonsense, there was nothing of the 
 kind on our permit, and as for trafficking with this 
 foreign devil, we spoke to him, but we neither 
 bought nor sold. Where is the Act ?" 
 
 " Here. On your permit you were referred to cer- 
 tain other clauses not set out therein, which might 
 be seen at the Mayor's office. Clause 37 is as 
 follows : — 
 
 " It is furthermore enacted that should any of his 
 Majesty's subjects be found, after examination by the Head 
 Ranger, to have had traffic of any kind by way of sale or 
 barter with any foreign devil, the said Ranger, on being 
 satisfied that such traffic has taken place, shall forthwith, 
 with or without the assistance of his under-rangers, convey 
 such subjects of his Majesty to the Blue Pool, bind them, 
 weight them, and fling them into it, without the formality 
 of a trial, and shall report the circumstances of the case to 
 his Majesty." 
 
 " But we never bought anything from the prisoner. 
 What evidence can you have of this but the word of 
 a foreign devil in such straits that he would swear 
 to anything ? " 
 
 "The prisoner has nothing to do with it. I am 
 convinced by this receipt in Professor Panky's 
 handwriting which states that he and you jointly 
 purchased his kit from the prisoner, and also this bag 
 of gold nuggets worth about ^100 in silver, for the 
 absurdly small sum of .£4, 10s. in silver. I am 
 further convinced by this handkerchief marked with 
 Professor Panky's name, in which was found a 
 broken packet of dried leaves that are now at my 
 office with the rest of the prisoner's kit." 
 
 234 
 
A Council 
 
 "Then we were watched and dogged," said 
 Hanky, " on Thursday evening." 
 
 "That, sir," replied George, "is my business, not 
 yours." 
 
 Here Panky laid his arms on the table, buried 
 his head in them, and burst into tears. Every one 
 seemed aghast, but the Mayor, Yram, and Mrs. 
 Humdrum saw that George was enjoying it all 
 far too keenly to be serious. Dr. Downie was still 
 frightened (for George's surface manner was Rhada- 
 manthine) and did his utmost to console Panky. 
 George pounded away ruthlessly at his case. 
 
 " I say nothing about your having bought quails 
 from the prisoner and eaten them. As you justly 
 remarked just now, there is no object in preferring 
 a smaller charge when one must inflict the death 
 penalty on a more serious one. Still, Professor 
 Hanky, these are bones of the quails you ate as 
 you sate opposite the prisoner on the side of the 
 fire nearest Sunch'ston ; these are Professor Panky's 
 bones, with which I need not disturb him. This is 
 your permit, which was found upon the prisoner, 
 and which there can be no doubt you sold him, 
 having been bribed by the offer of the nuggets 
 for " 
 
 " Monstrous, monstrous ! Infamous falsehood ! 
 Who will believe such a childish trumped up 
 story ! " 
 
 "Who, sir, will believe anything else? You 
 will hardly contend that you did not know the 
 nuggets were gold, and no one will believe you 
 
 235 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 mean enough to have tried to get this poor man's 
 property out of him for a song — you knowing its 
 value, and he not knowing the same. No one will 
 believe that you did not know the man to be a 
 foreign devil, or that he could hoodwink two such 
 learned Professors so cleverly as to get their per- 
 mit out of them. Obviously he seduced you into 
 selling him your permit, and — I presume because 
 he wanted a little of our money — he made you 
 pay him for his kit. I am satisfied that you have 
 not only had traffic with a foreign devil, but traffic 
 of a singularly atrocious kind, and this being so, 
 I shall Blue-Pool both of you as soon as I can 
 get you up to the Pool itself. The sooner we 
 start the better. I shall gag you, and drive you 
 up in a close carriage as far as the road goes ; 
 from that point you can walk up, or be dragged 
 up as you may prefer, but you will probably find 
 walking more comfortable." 
 
 " But," said Hanky, " come what may, I must be 
 at the banquet. I am set down to speak." 
 
 "The Mayor will explain that you have been 
 taken somewhat suddenly unwell." 
 
 Here Yram, who had been talking quietly with 
 her husband, Dr. Downie, and Mrs. Humdrum, 
 motioned her son to silence. 
 
 "I feared," she said, "that difficulties might 
 arise, though I did not foresee how seriously 
 they would affect my guests. Let Mrs. Humdrum 
 on our side, and Dr. Downie on that of the Pro- 
 fessors, go into the next room and talk the matter 
 
 236 
 
A Council 
 
 quietly over ; let us then see whether we cannot 
 agree to be bound by their decision. I do not 
 doubt but they will find some means of averting 
 any catastrophe more serious — No,Professor Hanky, 
 the doors are locked — than a little perjury in 
 which we shall all share and share alike." 
 
 " Do what you like," said Hanky, looking for all 
 the world like a rat caught in a trap. As he spoke 
 he seized a knife from the table, whereon George 
 pulled a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and 
 slipped them on to his wrists before he well knew 
 what was being done to him. 
 
 "George," said the Mayor, "this is going too 
 far. Do you mean to Blue-Pool the Professors 
 or no?" 
 
 "Not if they will compromise. If they will be 
 reasonable, they will not be Blue- Pooled ; if they 
 think they can have everything their own way, the 
 eels will be at them before morning." 
 
 A voice was heard from the head of Panky which 
 he had buried in his arms upon the table. "Co — 
 co — co — co — compromise," it said ; and the effect 
 was so comic that every one except Hanky smiled. 
 Meanwhile Yram had conducted Dr. Downie and 
 Mrs. Humdrum into an adjoining room. 
 
 237 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 MRS. HUMDRUM AND DR. DOWNIE PROPOSE A COM- 
 PROMISE, WHICH, AFTER AN AMENDMENT BY 
 GEORGE, IS CARRIED NEM. CON. 
 
 They returned in about ten minutes, and Dr. 
 Downie asked Mrs. Humdrum to say what they 
 had agreed to recommend. 
 
 " We think," said she very demurely, " that the 
 strict course would be to drop the charge of poach- 
 ing, and Blue-Pool both the Professors and the 
 prisoner without delay. 
 
 " We also think that the proper thing would be 
 to place on record that the prisoner is the Sunchild 
 — about which neither Dr. Downie nor I have a 
 shadow of doubt. 
 
 " These measures we hold to be the only legal 
 ones, but at the same time we do not recommend 
 them. We think it would offend the public con- 
 science if it came to be known, as it certainly 
 would, that the Sunchild was violently killed, on 
 the very day that had seen us dedicate a temple in 
 his honour, and perhaps at the very hour when 
 laudatory speeches were being made about him at 
 the Mayor's banquet ; we think also that we should 
 strain a good many points rather than Blue-Pool 
 
 the Professors. 
 
 238 
 
The Compromise 
 
 " Nothing is perfect, and Truth makes her mis- 
 takes like other people ; when she goes wrong and 
 reduces herself to such an absurdity as she has here 
 done, those who love her must save her from her- 
 self, correct her, and rehabilitate her. 
 
 " Our conclusion, therefore, is this : — 
 
 "The prisoner must recant on oath his statement 
 that he is the Sunchild. The interpreter must 
 be squared, or convinced of his mistake. The 
 Mayoress, Dr. Downie, I, and the gaoler (with the 
 interpreter if we can manage him), must depose 
 on oath that the prisoner is not Higgs. This must 
 be our contribution to the rehabilitation of Truth. 
 
 " The Professors must contribute as follows : 
 They must swear that the prisoner is not the man 
 they met with quails in his possession on Thursday 
 night. They must further swear that they have one 
 or both of them known him, off and on, for many 
 years past, as a monomaniac with Suncbildism on 
 the brain but otherwise harmless. If they will do 
 this, no proceedings are to be taken against them. 
 
 " The Mayor's contribution shall be to reprimand 
 the prisoner, and order him to repeat his recanta- 
 tion in the new temple before the Manager and 
 Head Cashier, and to confirm his statement on 
 oath by kissing the reliquary containing the newly 
 found relic. 
 
 "The Ranger and the Master of the Gaol must 
 contribute that the prisoner's measurements, and 
 the marks found on his body, negative all possi- 
 bility of his identity with the Sunchild, and that all 
 
 239 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the hair on the covered as well as the uncovered 
 parts of his body was found to be jet black. 
 
 " We advise further that the prisoner should have 
 his nuggets and his kit returned to him, and that 
 the receipt given by the Professors together with 
 Professor Hanky's handkerchief be given back to 
 the Professors. 
 
 " Furthermore, seeing that we should all of us 
 like to have a quiet evening with the prisoner, we 
 should petition the Mayor and Mayoress to ask him 
 to meet all here present at dinner to-morrow even- 
 ing, after his discharge, on the plea that Professors 
 Hanky and Panky and Dr. Downie may give him 
 counsel, convince him of his folly, and if possible 
 free him henceforth from the monomania under 
 which he now suffers. 
 
 " The prisoner shall give his word of honour, 
 never to return to Erewhon, nor to encourage any 
 of his countrymen to do so. After the dinner to 
 which we hope the Mayoress will invite us, the 
 Ranger, if the night is fair, shall escort the prisoner 
 as far as the statues, whence he will find his own 
 way home. 
 
 " Those who are in favour of this compromise 
 hold up their hands." 
 
 The Mayor and Yram held up theirs. " Will you 
 hold up yours, Professor Hanky," said George, " if 
 I release you ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Hanky with a gruff laugh, whereon 
 
 George released him and he held up both his 
 
 hands. 
 
 240 
 
The Compromise 
 
 Panky did not hold up his, whereon Hanky said, 
 " Hold up your hands, Panky, can't you ? We are 
 really very well out of it." 
 
 Panky, hardly lifting his head, sobbed out, " I 
 think we ought to have our f-f-fo-fo-four pounds 
 ten returned to us." 
 
 " I am afraid, sir," said George, " that the prisoner 
 must have spent the greater part of this money." 
 
 Every one smiled, indeed it was all George could 
 do to prevent himself from laughing outright. The 
 Mayor brought out his purse, counted the money, 
 and handed it good-humouredly to Panky, who 
 gratefully received it, and said he would divide it 
 with Hanky. He then held up his hands, "But," 
 he added, turning to his brother Professor, " so 
 long as I live, Hanky, I will never go out anywhere 
 again with you." 
 
 George then turned to Hanky and said, "I am 
 afraid I must now trouble you and Professor Panky 
 to depose on oath to the facts which Mrs. Hum- 
 drum and Dr. Downie propose you should swear 
 to in open court to-morrow. I knew you would 
 do so, and have brought an ordinary form, duly 
 filled up, which declares that the prisoner is not 
 the poacher you met on Thursday ; and also, that 
 he has been long known to both of you as a 
 harmless monomaniac." 
 
 As he spoke he brought out depositions to the 
 above effect which he had just written in his office ; 
 he shewed the Professors that the form was this 
 time an innocent one, whereon they made no 
 
 2 4 I Q 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 demur to signing and swearing in the presence of 
 the Mayor, who attested. 
 
 "The former depositions," said Hanky, "had 
 better be destroyed at once." 
 
 "That," said George, "may hardly be, but so 
 long as you stick to what you have just sworn to, 
 they will not be used against you." 
 
 Hanky scowled, but knew that he was powerless 
 and said no more. 
 
 The knowledge of what ensued did not reach 
 me from my father. George and his mother, 
 seeing how ill he looked, and what a shock the 
 events of the last few days had given him, resolved 
 that he should not know of the risk that George was 
 about to run ; they therefore said nothing to him 
 about it. What I shall now tell, I learned on the 
 occasion already referred to when I had the happi- 
 ness to meet George. I am in some doubt whether 
 it is more fitly told here, or when I come to the 
 interview between him and me ; on the whole, 
 however, I suppose chronological order is least 
 outraged by dealing with it here. 
 
 As soon as the Professors had signed the second 
 depositions, George said, " I have not yet held up 
 my hands, but I will hold them up if Mrs. Hum- 
 drum and Dr. Downie will approve of what I 
 propose. Their compromise does not go far 
 enough, for swear as we may, it is sure to get 
 
 noised abroad, with the usual exaggerations, that 
 
 242 
 
The Compromise 
 
 the Sunchild has been here, and that he has been 
 spirited away either by us, or by the sun his father. 
 For one person whom we know of as having 
 identified him, there will be five, of whom we 
 know nothing, and whom we cannot square. 
 Reports will reach the King sooner or later, and 
 I shall be sent for. Meanwhile the Professors 
 will be living in fear of intrigue on my part, and 
 I, however unreasonably, shall fear the like on 
 theirs. This should not be. I mean, therefore, on 
 the day following my return from escorting the 
 prisoner, to set out for the capital, see the King, 
 and make a clean breast of the whole matter. To 
 this end I must have the nuggets, the prisoner's 
 kit, his receipt, Professor Hanky's handkerchief, 
 and, of course, the two depositions just sworn to 
 by the Professors. I hope and think that the 
 King will pardon us all round ; but whatever he 
 may do I shall tell him everything." 
 
 Hanky was up in arms at once. " Sheer mad- 
 ness," he exclaimed. Yram and the Mayor looked 
 anxious ; Dr. Downie eyed George as though he 
 were some curious creature, which he heard of 
 but had never seen, and was rather disposed to 
 like. Mrs. Humdrum nodded her head approv- 
 ingly. 
 
 "Quite right, George," said she, "tell his Majesty 
 everything." 
 
 Dr. Downie then said, " Your son, Mayoress, is 
 a very sensible fellow. I will go with him, and 
 with the Professors — for they had better come too : 
 
 243 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 each will hear what the other says, and we will 
 tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
 truth. I am, as you know, a persona grata at Court ; 
 I will say that I advised your son's action. The 
 King has liked him ever since he was a boy, and 
 I am not much afraid about what he will do. In 
 public, no doubt we had better hush things up, but 
 in private the King must be told." 
 
 Hanky fought hard for some time, but George 
 told him that it did not matter whether he agreed 
 or no. " You can come," he said, " or stop away, 
 just as you please. If you come, you can hear and 
 speak ; if you do not, you will not hear, but these 
 two depositions will speak for you. Please your- 
 self." 
 
 "Very well," he said at last, " I suppose we had 
 better go." 
 
 Every one having now understood what his or 
 her part was to be, Yram said they had better 
 shake hands all round and take a couple of hours' 
 rest before getting ready for the banquet. George 
 said that the Professors did not shake hands with 
 him very cordially, but the farce was gone through. 
 When the hand-shaking was over, Dr. Downie and 
 Mrs. Humdrum left the house, and the Professors 
 retired grumpily to their own room. 
 
 I will say here that no harm happened either to 
 George or the Professors in consequence of his 
 having told the King, but will reserve particulars 
 for my concluding chapter. 
 
 244 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 YRAM, ON GETTING RID OF HER GUESTS, GOES 
 TO THE PRISON TO SEE MY FATHER 
 
 Yram did not take the advice she had given her 
 
 guests, but set about preparing a basket of the best 
 
 cold dainties she could find, including a bottle of 
 
 choice wine that she knew my father would like ; 
 
 thus loaded she went to the gaol, which she entered 
 
 by her father's private entrance. 
 
 It was now about half-past four, so that much 
 
 more must have been said and done after luncheon 
 
 at the Mayor's than ever reached my father. The 
 
 wonder is that he was able to collect so much. 
 
 He, poor man, as soon as George left him, flung 
 
 himself on to the bed that was in his cell and lay 
 
 there wakeful, but not unquiet, till near the time 
 
 when Yram reached the gaol. 
 
 The old gaoler came to tell him that she had 
 
 come and would be glad to see him ; much as he 
 
 dreaded the meeting there was no avoiding it, and 
 
 in a few minutes Yram stood before him. 
 
 Both were agitated, but Yram betrayed less of 
 
 what she felt than my father. He could only bow 
 
 his head and cover his face with his hands. Yram 
 
 said, " We are old friends ; take your hands from 
 
 your face and let me see you. There ! That is well." 
 
 245 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 She took his right hand between both hers, 
 looked at him with eyes full of kindness, and said 
 softly — 
 
 " You are not much changed, but you look 
 haggard, worn, and ill ; I am uneasy about you. 
 Remember, you are among friends, who will see 
 that no harm befalls you. There is a look in your 
 eyes that frightens me." 
 
 As she spoke she took the wine out of her basket, 
 and poured him out a glass, but rather to give him 
 some little thing to distract his attention, than be- 
 cause she expected him to drink it — which he could 
 not do. 
 
 She never asked him whether he found her 
 altered, or turned the conversation ever such a 
 little on to herself ; all was for him ; to soothe and 
 comfort him, not in words alone, but in look, 
 manner, and voice. My father knew that he could 
 thank her best by controlling himself, and letting 
 himself be soothed and comforted — at any rate so 
 far as he could seem to be. 
 
 Up to this time they had been standing, but now 
 Yram, seeing my father calmer, said, " Enough, let 
 us sit down." 
 
 So saying she seated herself at one end of the 
 
 small table that was in the cell, and motioned my 
 
 father to sit opposite to her. "The light hurts 
 
 you ? " she said, for the sun was coming into the 
 
 room. " Change places with me, I am a sun 
 
 worshipper. No, we can move the table, and we 
 
 can then see each other better." 
 
 246 
 
Yram Visits My Father 
 
 This done, she said, still very softly, " And now 
 tell me what it is all about. Why have you come 
 here?" 
 
 "Tell me first," said my father, "what befell you 
 after I had been taken away. Why did you not 
 send me word when you found what had happened ? 
 or come after me ? You know I should have 
 married you at once, unless they bound me in 
 fetters." 
 
 " I know you would ; but you remember Mrs. 
 Humdrum ? Yes, I see you do. I told her every- 
 thing ; it was she who saved me. We thought of 
 you, but she saw that it would not do. As I was to 
 marry Mr. Strong, the more you were lost sight of 
 the better, but with George ever with me I have not 
 been able to forget you. I might have been very 
 happy with you, but I could not have been happier 
 than I have been ever since that short dreadful time 
 was over. George must tell you the rest. I cannot 
 do so. All is well. I love my husband with my 
 whole heart and soul, and he loves me with his. 
 As between him and me, he knows everything ; 
 George is his son, not yours ; we have settled it so, 
 though we both know otherwise ; as between you 
 and me, for this one hour, here, there is no use in 
 pretending that you are not George's father. I 
 have said all I need say. Now, tell me what I 
 asked you — Why are you here ? " 
 
 " I fear," said my father, set at rest by the sweet- 
 ness of Yram's voice and manner — he told me he 
 
 had never seen any one to compare with her 
 
 247 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 except my mother — " I fear, to do as much harm 
 now as I did before, and with as little wish to do 
 any harm at all." 
 
 He then told her all that the reader knows, and 
 explained how he had thought he could have gone 
 about the country as a peasant, and seen how she 
 herself had fared, without her, or any one, even 
 suspecting that he was in the country. 
 
 "You say your wife is dead, and that she left 
 you with a son — is he like George ? " 
 
 " In mind and disposition, wonderfully ; in ap- 
 pearance, no ; he is dark and takes after his mother, 
 and though he is handsome, he is not so good- 
 looking as George." 
 
 " No one," said George's mother, " ever was, or 
 ever will be, and he is as good as he looks." 
 
 " I should not have believed you if you had said 
 he was not." 
 
 "That is right. I am glad you are proud of 
 him. He irradiates the lives of every one of us." 
 
 "And the mere knowledge that he exists will 
 irradiate the rest of mine." 
 
 " Long may it do so. Let us now talk about this 
 morning — did you mean to declare yourself ? " 
 
 " I do not know what I meant ; what I most 
 cared about was the doing what I thought George 
 would wish to see his father do." 
 
 " You did that ; but he says he told you not to 
 say who you were." 
 
 " So he did, but I knew what he would think right. 
 
 He was uppermost in my thoughts all the time." 
 
 248 
 
Yram Visits My Father 
 
 Yram smiled, and said, "George is a dangerous 
 person ; you were both of you very foolish ; one 
 as bad as the other." 
 
 " I do not know. I do not know anything. It 
 is beyond me ; but I am at peace about it, and 
 hope I shall do the like again to-morrow before 
 the Mayor." 
 
 " I heartily hope you will do nothing of the kind. 
 George tells me you have promised ^him to be good 
 and to do as we bid you." 
 
 " So I will ; but he will not tell me to say that 
 I am not what I am." 
 
 " Yes, he will, and I will tell you why. If we 
 permit you to be Higgs the Sunchild, he must 
 either throw his own father into the Blue Pool — 
 which he will not do — or run great risk of being 
 thrown into it himself, for not having Blue-Pooled 
 a foreigner. I am afraid we shall have to make 
 you do a good deal that neither you nor we shall 
 like." 
 
 She then told him briefly of what had passed 
 
 after luncheon at her house, and what it had been 
 
 settled to do, leaving George to tell the details 
 
 while escorting him towards the statues on the 
 
 following evening. She said that every one would 
 
 be so completely in every one else's power that 
 
 there was no fear of any one's turning traitor. 
 
 But she said nothing about George's intention of 
 
 setting out for the capital on Wednesday morning 
 
 to tell the whole story to the King. 
 
 " Now," she said, when she had told him as 
 249 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 much as was necessary, " be good, and do as you 
 said you would." 
 
 " I will. I will deny myself, not once, nor twice, 
 but as often as is necessary. I will kiss the reliquary, 
 and when I meet Hanky and Panky at your table, 
 I will be sworn brother to them — so long, that is, 
 as George is out of hearing ; for I cannot lie well 
 to them when he is listening." 
 
 " Oh yes, you can. He will understand all about 
 it ; he enjoys falsehood as well as we all do, and 
 has the nicest sense of when to lie and when not to 
 do so." 
 
 " What gift can be more invaluable ? " 
 
 My father, knowing that he might not have an- 
 other chance of seeing Yram alone, now changed 
 the conversation. 
 
 " I have something," he said, "for George, but he 
 must know nothing about it till after I am gone." 
 
 As he spoke, he took from his pockets the nine 
 small bags of nuggets that remained to him. 
 
 " But this," said Yram, " being gold, is a large 
 sum : can you indeed spare it, and do you really 
 wish George to have it all ? " 
 
 " I shall be very unhappy if he does not, but 
 he must know nothing about it till I am out of 
 Erewhon." 
 
 My father then explained to her that he was now 
 very rich, and would have brought ten times as 
 much, if he had known of George's existence. 
 
 " Then," said Yram, musing, " if you are rich, I 
 
 accept and thank you heartily on his behalf. I can 
 
 250 
 
Yram Visits My Father 
 
 see a reason for his not knowing what you are 
 giving him at present, but it is too long to tell." 
 
 The reason was, that if George knew of this gold 
 before he saw the King, he would be sure to tell 
 him of it, and the King might claim it, for George 
 would never explain that it was a gift from father 
 to son ; whereas if the King had once pardoned 
 him, he would not be so squeamish as to open up 
 the whole thing again with a postscript to his con- 
 fession. But of this she said not a word. 
 
 My father then told her of the box of sovereigns 
 that he had left in his saddle-bags. " They are 
 coined," he said, " and George will have to melt 
 them down, but he will find some way of doing 
 this. They will be worth rather more than these 
 nine bags of nuggets." 
 
 " The difficulty will be to get him to go down 
 
 and fetch them, for it is against his oath to go far 
 
 beyond the statues. If you could be taken faint 
 
 and say you wanted help, he would see you to your 
 
 camping ground without a word, but he would be 
 
 angry if he found he had been tricked into breaking 
 
 his oath in order that money might be given him. 
 
 It would never do. Besides, there would not be 
 
 time, for he must be back here on Tuesday night. 
 
 No ; if he breaks his oath he must do it with his 
 
 eyes open — and he will do it later on — or I will go 
 
 and fetch the money for him myself. He is in love 
 
 with a grand-daughter of Mrs. Humdrum's, and this 
 
 sum, together with what you are now leaving with 
 
 me, will make him a well-to-do man. I have always 
 
 251 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 been unhappy about his having any of the Mayor's 
 money, and his salary was not quite enough for 
 him to marry on. What can I say to thank you ? " 
 
 " Tell me, please, about Mrs. Humdrum's grand- 
 daughter. You like her as a wife for George ? " 
 
 "Absolutely. She is just such another as her 
 grandmother must have been. She and George 
 have been sworn lovers ever since he was ten, and 
 she eight. The only drawback is that her mother, 
 Mrs. Humdrum's second daughter, married for love, 
 and there are many children, so that there will be 
 no money with her ; but what you are leaving will 
 make everything quite easy, for he will sell the gold 
 at once. I am so glad about it." 
 
 " Can you ask Mrs. Humdrum to bring her 
 grand-daughter with her to-morrow evening ? " 
 
 " I am afraid not, for we shall want to talk freely 
 at dinner, and she must not know that you are the 
 Sunchild ; she shall come to my house in the after- 
 noon and you can see her then. You will be quite 
 happy about her, but of course she must not know 
 that you are her father-in-law that is to be." 
 
 " One thing more. As George must know no- 
 thing about the sovereigns, I must tell you how I will 
 hide them. They are in a silver box, which I will 
 bind to the bough of some tree close to my camp ; 
 or if I can find a tree with a hole in it I will drop 
 the box into the hole. He cannot miss my camp ; 
 he has only to follow the stream that runs down 
 from the pass till it gets near a large river, and on a 
 
 small triangular patch of flat ground, he will see the 
 
 252 
 
Yram Visits My Father 
 
 ashes of my camp fire, a few yards away from the 
 stream on his right hand as he descends. In what- 
 ever tree I may hide the box, I will strew wood 
 ashes for some yards in a straight line towards it. 
 I will then light another fire underneath, and blaze 
 the tree with a knife that I have left at my camping 
 ground. He is sure to find it." 
 
 Yram again thanked him, and then my father, 
 to change the conversation, asked whether she 
 thought that George really would have Blue-Pooled 
 the Professors. 
 
 " There is no knowing," said Yram. " He is the 
 gentlest creature living till some great provocation 
 rouses him, and I never saw him hate and despise 
 any one as he does the Professors. Much of what 
 he said was merely put on, for he knew the Pro- 
 fessors must yield. I do not like his ever having 
 to throw any one into that horrid place, no 
 more does he, but the Rangership is exactly the 
 sort of thing to suit him, and the opening was 
 too good to lose. I must now leave you, and get 
 ready for the Mayor's banquet. We shall meet 
 again to-morrow evening. Try and eat what I 
 have brought you in this basket. I hope you will 
 like the wine." She put out her hand, which my 
 father took, and in another moment she was gone, 
 for she saw a look in his face as though he would 
 fain have asked her to let him once more press his 
 lips to hers. Had he done this, without thinking 
 about it, it is likely enough she would not have been 
 
 ill pleased. But who can say ? 
 
 253 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 For the rest of the evening my father was left 
 very much to his own not too comfortable reflec- 
 tions. He spent part of it in posting up the notes 
 from which, as well as from his own mouth, my 
 story is in great part taken. The good things that 
 Yram had left with him, and his pipe, which she 
 had told him he might smoke quite freely, occupied 
 another part, and by ten o'clock he went to bed. 
 
 254 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 MAINLY OCCUPIED WITH A VERACIOUS EXTRACT 
 FROM A SUNCH'STONIAN JOURNAL 
 
 While my father was thus wiling away the hours 
 in his cell, the whole town was being illuminated in 
 his honour, and not more than a couple of hundred 
 yards off, at the Mayor's banquet, he was being 
 extolled as a superhuman being. 
 
 The banquet, which was at the town hall, was 
 indeed a very brilliant affair, but the little space 
 that is left me forbids my saying more than that 
 Hanky made what was considered the speech of 
 the evening, and betrayed no sign of ill effects from 
 the bad quarter of an hour which he had spent 
 so recently. Not a trace was to be seen of any 
 desire on his part to change his tone as regards 
 Sunchildism — as, for example, to minimize the im- 
 portance of the relic, or to remind his hearers that 
 though the chariot and horses had undoubtedly 
 come down from the sky and carried away my 
 father and mother, yet that the earlier stage of 
 the ascent had been made in a balloon. It almost 
 seemed, so George told my father, as though he 
 had resolved that he would speak lies, all lies, and 
 nothing but lies. 
 
 Panky, who was also to have spoken, was ex- 
 255 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 cused by the Mayor on the ground that the great 
 heat and the excitement of the day's proceedings 
 had quite robbed him of his voice. 
 
 Dr. Downie had a jumping cat before his mental 
 vision. He spoke quietly and sensibly, dwelling 
 chiefly on the benefits that had already accrued to 
 the kingdom through the abolition of the edicts 
 against machinery, and the great developments 
 which he foresaw as probable in the near future. 
 He held up the Sunchild's example, and his ethical 
 teaching, to the imitation and admiration of his 
 hearers, but he said nothing about the miraculous 
 element in my father's career, on which he de- 
 clared that his friend Professor Hanky had already 
 so eloquently enlarged as to make further allusion 
 to it superfluous. 
 
 The reader knows what was to happen on the 
 following morning. The programme concerted at 
 the Mayor's was strictly adhered to. The following 
 account, however, which appeared in the Sunch'- 
 ston bi-weekly newspaper two days after my father 
 had left, was given me by George a year later, on 
 the occasion of that interview to which I have 
 already more than once referred. There were 
 other accounts in other papers, but the one I am 
 giving departs the least widely from the facts. It 
 ran : — 
 
 " The close of a disagreeable incident. — Our readers 
 
 will remember that on Sunday last during the 
 
 solemn inauguration of the temple now dedicated 
 
 to the Sunchild, an individual on the front bench 
 
 256 
 
The Sunch'stonian Version 
 
 of those set apart for the public suddenly inter- 
 rupted Professor Hanky's eloquent sermon by 
 declaring himself to be the Sunchild, and saying 
 that he had come down from the sun to sanctify 
 by his presence the glorious fane which the piety 
 of our fellow-citizens and others has erected in his 
 honour. 
 
 " Wild rumours obtained credence throughout 
 the congregation to the effect that this person was 
 none other than the Sunchild himself, and in spite 
 of the fact that his complexion and the colour of 
 his hair showed this to be impossible, more than 
 one person was carried away by the excitement of 
 the moment, and by some few points of resem- 
 blance between the stranger and the Sunchild. 
 Under the influence of this belief, they were pre- 
 paring to give him the honour which they sup- 
 posed justly due to him, when to the surprise of 
 every one he was taken into custody by the de- 
 servedly popular Ranger of the King's preserves, 
 and in the course of the afternoon it became gener- 
 ally known that he had been arrested on the charge 
 of being one of a gang of poachers who have been 
 known for some time past to be making much 
 havoc among the quails on the preserves. 
 
 "This offence, at all times deplored by those 
 who desire that his Majesty should enjoy good 
 sport when he honours us with a visit, is doubly 
 deplorable during the season when, on the higher 
 parts of the preserves, the young birds are not yet 
 able to shift for themselves ; the Ranger, therefore, 
 
 257 R 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 is indefatigable in his efforts to break up the gang, 
 and with this end in view, for the last fortnight has 
 been out night and day on the remoter sections of 
 the forest — little suspecting that the marauders 
 would venture so near Sunch'ston as it now seems 
 they have done. It is to his extreme anxiety to 
 detect and punish these miscreants that we must 
 ascribe the arrest of a man, who, however foolish, 
 and indeed guilty, he is in other respects, is in- 
 nocent of the particular crime imputed to him. 
 The circumstances that led to his arrest have 
 reached us from an exceptionally well-informed 
 source, and are as follows : — 
 
 " Our distinguished guests, Professors Hanky and 
 Panky, both of them justly celebrated archaeo- 
 logists, had availed themselves of the opportunity 
 afforded them by their visit to Sunch'ston, to in- 
 spect the mysterious statues at the head of the 
 stream that comes down near this city, and which 
 have hitherto baffled all those who have tried to 
 ascertain their date and purpose. 
 
 " On their descent after a fatiguing day the Pro- 
 fessors were benighted, and lost their way. Seeing 
 the light of a small fire among some trees near 
 them, they made towards it, hoping to be directed 
 rightly, and found a man, respectably dressed, 
 sitting by the fire with several brace of quails beside 
 him, some of them plucked. Believing that in 
 spite of his appearance, which would not have led 
 them to suppose that he was a poacher, he must 
 
 unquestionably be one, they hurriedly enquired 
 
 258 
 
The Sunch'stonian Version 
 
 their way, intending to leave him as soon as they 
 had got their answer ; he, however, attacked them, 
 or made as though he would do so, and said he 
 would show them a way which they should be in 
 no fear of losing, whereon Professor Hanky, with 
 a well-directed blow, felled him to the ground. 
 The two Professors, fearing that other poachers 
 might come to his assistance, made off as nearly 
 as they could guess in the direction of Sunch'ston. 
 When they had gone a mile or two onward at 
 haphazard, they sat down under a large tree, and 
 waited till day began to break ; they then resumed 
 their journey, and before long struck a path which 
 led them to a spot from which they could see the 
 towers of the new temple. 
 
 " Fatigued though they were, they waited before 
 taking the rest of which they stood much in need, 
 till they had reported their adventure at the 
 Ranger's office. The Ranger was still out on the 
 preserves, but immediately on his return on Satur- 
 day morning he read the description of the 
 poacher's appearance and dress, about which last, 
 however, the only remarkable feature was that it 
 was better than a poacher might be expected to 
 possess, and gave an air of respectability to the 
 wearer that might easily disarm suspicion. 
 
 "The Ranger made enquiries at all the inns in 
 
 Sunch'ston, and at length succeeded in hearing of 
 
 a stranger who appeared to correspond with the 
 
 poacher whom the Professors had seen ; but the 
 
 man had already left, and though the Ranger did 
 
 259 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 his best to trace him he did not succeed. On 
 Sunday morning, however, he observed the pris- 
 oner, and found that he answered the description 
 given by the Professors ; he therefore arrested 
 him quietly in the temple, but told him that he 
 should not take him to prison till the service was 
 over. The man said he would come quietly inas- 
 much as he should easily be able to prove his 
 innocence. In the meantime, however, he pro- 
 fessed the utmost anxiety to hear Professor Hanky's 
 sermon, which he said he believed would concern 
 him nearly. The Ranger paid no attention to this, 
 and was as much astounded as the rest of the 
 congregation were, when immediately after one 
 of Professor Hanky's most eloquent passages, the 
 man started up and declared himself to be the 
 Sunchild. On this the Ranger took him away at 
 once, and for the man's own protection hurried 
 him off to prison. 
 
 " Professor Hanky was so much shocked at such 
 outrageous conduct, that for the moment he failed 
 to recognise the offender ; after a few seconds, 
 however, he grasped the situation, and knew him 
 to be one who on previous occasions, near Bridge- 
 ford, had done what he was now doing. It seems 
 that he is notorious in the neighbourhood of 
 Bridgeford, as a monomaniac who is so deeply 
 impressed with the beauty of the Sunchild's charac- 
 ter — and we presume also of his own — as to believe 
 that he is himself the Sunchild. 
 
 " Recovering almost instantly from the shock the 
 
 260 
 
The Sunch'stonian Version 
 
 interruption had given him, the learned Professor 
 calmed his hearers by acquainting them with the 
 facts of the case, and continued his sermon to the 
 delight of all who heard it. We should say, how- 
 ever, that the gentleman who twenty years ago 
 instructed the Sunchild in the Erewhonian lan- 
 guage, was so struck with some few points of re- 
 semblance between the stranger and his former 
 pupil, that he acclaimed him, and was removed 
 forcibly by the vergers. 
 
 "On Monday morning the prisoner was brought 
 up before the Mayor. We cannot say whether it 
 was the sobering effect of prison walls, or whether 
 he had been drinking before he entered the temple, 
 and had now had time enough to recover himself 
 — at any rate for some reason or other he was 
 abjectly penitent when his case came on for hear- 
 ing. The charge of poaching was first gone into, 
 but was immediately disposed of by the evidence 
 of the two Professors, who stated that the prisoner 
 bore no resemblance to the poacher they had seen, 
 save that he was about the same height and age, 
 and was respectably dressed. 
 
 "The charge of disturbing the congregation by 
 
 declaring himself the Sunchild was then proceeded 
 
 with, and unnecessary as it may appear to be, it 
 
 was thought advisable to prevent all possibility of 
 
 the man's assertion being accepted by the ignorant 
 
 as true, at some later date, when those who could 
 
 prove its falsehood were no longer living. The 
 
 prisoner, therefore, was removed to his cell, and 
 
 261 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 there measured by the Master of the Gaol, and the 
 Ranger in the presence of the Mayor, who attested 
 the accuracy of the measurements. Not one single 
 one of them corresponded with those recorded of 
 the Sunchild himself, and a few marks such as 
 moles, and permanent scars on the Sunchild's body 
 were not found on the prisoner's. Furthermore 
 the prisoner was shaggy-breasted, with much coarse 
 jet black hair on the fore-arms and from the knees 
 downwards, whereas the Sunchild had little hair 
 save on his head, and what little there was, was 
 fine, and very light in colour. 
 
 " Confronted with these discrepancies, the gentle- 
 man who had taught the Sunchild our language 
 was convinced of his mistake, though he still main- 
 tained that there was some superficial likeness 
 between his former pupil and the prisoner. Here 
 he was confirmed by the Master of the Gaol, the 
 Mayoress, Mrs. Humdrum, and Professors Hanky 
 and Panky, who all of them could see what the 
 interpreter meant, but denied that the prisoner 
 could be mistaken for the Sunchild for more than 
 a few seconds. No doubt the prisoner's unhappy 
 delusion has been fostered, if not entirely caused, 
 by his having been repeatedly told that he was like 
 the Sunchild. The celebrated Dr. Downie, who 
 well remembers the Sunchild, was also examined, 
 and gave his evidence with so much convincing 
 detail as to make it unnecessary to call further 
 witnesses. 
 
 " It having been thus once for all officially and 
 262 
 
The Sunch'stonian Version 
 
 authoritatively placed on record that the prisoner 
 was not the Sunchild, Professors Hanky and Panky 
 then identified him as a well known monomaniac 
 on the subject of Sunchildism, who in other re- 
 spects was harmless. We withhold his name and 
 place of abode, out of consideration for the well 
 known and highly respectable family to which he 
 belongs. The prisoner admitted with much con- 
 trition that he had made a disturbance in the 
 temple, but pleaded that he had been carried away 
 by the eloquence of Professor Hanky ; he promised 
 to avoid all like offence in future, and threw him- 
 self on the mercy of the court. 
 
 "The Mayor, unwilling that Sunday's memorable 
 ceremony should be the occasion of a serious 
 punishment to any of those who took part in it, 
 reprimanded the prisoner in a few severe but not 
 unkindly words, inflicted a fine of forty shillings, 
 and ordered that the prisoner should be taken 
 directly to the temple, where he should confess his 
 folly to the Manager and Head Cashier, and con- 
 firm his words by kissing the reliquary in which 
 the newly found relic has been placed. The 
 prisoner being unable to pay the fine, some of 
 the ladies and gentlemen in court kindly raised 
 the amount amongst them, in pity for the poor 
 creature's obvious contrition, rather than see him 
 sent to prison for a month in default of payment. 
 
 "The prisoner was then conducted to the temple, 
 
 followed by a considerable number of people. 
 
 Strange to say, in spite of the overwhelming evi- 
 
 263 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 dence that they had just heard, some few among 
 the followers, whose love of the marvellous over- 
 powered their reason, still maintained that the 
 prisoner was the Sunchild. Nothing could be more 
 decorous than the prisoner's behaviour when, after 
 hearing the recantation that was read out to him 
 by the Manager, he signed the document with his 
 name and address, which we again withhold, and 
 kissed the reliquary in confirmation of his words. 
 
 "The Mayor then declared the prisoner to be at 
 liberty. When he had done so he said, ' I strongly 
 urge you to place yourself under my protection for 
 the present, that you may be freed from the im- 
 pertinent folly and curiosity of some whose infatua- 
 tion might lead you from that better mind to which 
 I believe you are now happily restored. I wish you 
 to remain for some few hours secluded in the 
 privacy of my own study, where Dr. Downie and 
 the two excellent Professors will administer that 
 ghostly counsel to you, which will be likely to 
 protect you from any return of your unhappy 
 delusion.' 
 
 " The man humbly bowed assent, and was taken 
 by the Mayor's younger sons to the Mayor's own 
 house, where he was duly cared for. About mid- 
 night, when all was quiet, he was conducted to 
 the outskirts of the town towards Clearwater, and 
 furnished with enough money to provide for his 
 more pressing necessities till he could reach some 
 relatives who reside three or four days' walk down 
 
 on the road towards the capital. He desired the 
 
 264 
 
The Sunch'stonian Version 
 
 man who accompanied him to repeat to the Mayor 
 his heartfelt thanks for the forbearance and gene- 
 rosity with which he had been treated. The 
 remembrance of this, he said, should be ever 
 present with him, and he was confident would 
 protect him if his unhappy monomania shewed 
 any signs of returning. 
 
 " Let us now, however, remind our readers that 
 the poacher who threatened Professors Hanky and 
 Panky's life on Thursday evening last is still at 
 large. He is evidently a man of desperate char- 
 acter, and it is to be hoped that our fellow-citizens 
 will give immediate information at the Ranger's 
 office if they see any stranger in the neighbourhood 
 of the preserves whom they may have reasonable 
 grounds for suspecting. 
 
 " P.S. — As we are on the point of going to press 
 
 we learn that a dangerous lunatic, who has been 
 
 for some years confined in the Clearwater asylum, 
 
 succeeded in escaping on the night of Wednesday 
 
 last, and it is surmised with much probability, that 
 
 this was the man who threatened the two Professors 
 
 on Thursday evening. His being alone, his having 
 
 dared to light a fire, probably to cook quails which 
 
 he had been driven to kill from stress of hunger, 
 
 the respectability of his dress, and the fury with 
 
 which he would have attacked the two Professors 
 
 single-handed, but for Professor Hanky's presence 
 
 of mind in giving him a knock-down blow, all 
 
 point in the direction of thinking that he was no 
 
 true poacher, but, what is even more dangerous — a 
 
 265 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 madman at large. We have not received any par- 
 ticulars as to the man's appearance, nor the clothes 
 he was wearing, but we have little doubt that these 
 will confirm the surmise to which we now give 
 publicity. If it is correct it becomes doubly incum- 
 bent on all our fellow-citizens to be both on the 
 watch, and on their guard. 
 
 " We may add that the man was fully believed to 
 have taken the direction towards the capital ; hence 
 no attempts were made to look for him in the 
 neighbourhood of Sunch'ston, until news of the 
 threatened attack on the Professors led the keeper 
 of the asylum to feel confident that he had hitherto 
 been on a wrong scent." 
 
 266 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 MY FATHER IS ESCORTED TO THE MAYOR'S HOUSE, 
 AND IS INTRODUCED TO A FUTURE DAUGHTER- 
 IN-LAW. 
 
 My father said he was followed to the Mayor's 
 house by a good many people, whom the Mayor's 
 sons in vain tried to get rid of. One or two of 
 these still persisted in saying he was the Sunchild 
 — whereon another said, " But his hair is black." 
 
 " Yes," was the answer, " but a man can dye his 
 hair, can he not ? look at his blue eyes and his eye- 
 lashes ? " 
 
 My father was doubting whether he ought not to 
 
 again deny his identity out of loyalty to the Mayor 
 
 and Yram, when George's next brother said, " Pay 
 
 no attention to them, but step out as fast as you 
 
 can." This settled the matter, and in a few minutes 
 
 they were at the Mayor's, where the young men 
 
 took him into the study ; the elder said with a 
 
 smile, " We should like to stay and talk to you, but 
 
 my mother said we were not to do so." Whereon 
 
 they left him much to his regret, but he gathered 
 
 rightly that they had not been officially told who 
 
 he was, and were to be left to think what they liked, 
 
 at any rate for the present. 
 
 In a few minutes the Mayor entered, and going 
 267 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 straight up to my father shook him cordially by the 
 hand. 
 
 " I have brought you this morning's paper," said 
 he. " You will find a full report of Professor 
 Hanky's sermon, and of the speeches at last night's 
 banquet. You see they pass over your little inter- 
 ruption with hardly a word, but I dare say they will 
 have made up their minds about it all by Thurs- 
 day's issue." 
 
 He laughed as he produced the paper — which my 
 father brought home with him, and without which 
 I should not have been able to report Hanky's 
 sermon as fully as I have done. But my father 
 could not let things pass over thus lightly. 
 
 " I thank you," he said, " but I have much more 
 to thank you for, and know not how to do it." 
 
 " Can you not trust me to take everything as 
 said ? " 
 
 " Yes, but I cannot trust myself not to be haunted 
 if I do not say — or at any rate try to say — some 
 part of what I ought to say." 
 
 " Very well ; then I will say something myself. I 
 
 have a small joke, the only one I ever made, which 
 
 I inflict periodically upon my wife. You, and I 
 
 suppose George, are the only two other people in 
 
 the world to whom it can ever be told ; let me see, 
 
 then, if I cannot break the ice with it. It is this. 
 
 Some men have twin sons ; George in this topsy 
 
 turvey world of ours has twin fathers — you by luck, 
 
 and me by cunning. I see you smile ; give me your 
 
 hand." 
 
 268 
 
At the Mayor's House 
 
 My father took the Mayor's hand between both 
 his own. " Had I been in your place," he said, 
 " I should be glad to hope that I might have done 
 as you did." 
 
 "And I," said the Mayor, more readily than 
 might have been expected of him, " fear that if I 
 had been in yours — I should have made it the 
 proper thing for you to do. There ! The ice is 
 well broken, and now for business. You will lunch 
 with us, and dine in the evening. I have given it 
 out that you are of good family, so there is nothing 
 odd in this. At lunch you will not be the Sun- 
 child, for my younger children will be there ; at 
 dinner all present will know who you are, so we 
 shall be free as soon as the servants are out of 
 the room. 
 
 " I am sorry, but I must send you away with 
 George as soon as the streets are empty — say at 
 midnight — for the excitement is too great to allow 
 of your staying longer. We must keep your rug 
 and the things you cook with, but my wife will 
 find you what will serve your turn. There is no 
 moon, so you and George will camp out as soon 
 as you get well on to the preserves ; the weather 
 is hot, and you will neither of you take any harm. 
 To-morrow by mid-day you will be at the statues, 
 where George must bid you good-bye, for he must 
 be at Sunch'ston to-morrow night. You will doubt- 
 less get safely home ; I wish with all my heart that 
 I could hear of your having done so, but this, I fear, 
 
 may not be." 
 
 269 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " So be it," replied my father, " but there is 
 something I should yet say. The Mayoress has no 
 doubt told you of some gold, coined and uncoined, 
 that I am leaving for George. She will also have 
 told you that I am rich ; this being so, I should 
 have brought him much more, if I had known that 
 there was any such person. You have other chil- 
 dren ; if you leave him anything, you will be taking 
 it away from your own flesh and blood ; if you 
 leave him nothing, it will be a slur upon him. I 
 must therefore send you enough gold, to provide 
 for George as your other children will be provided 
 for ; you can settle it upon him at once, and make 
 it clear that the settlement is instead of provision 
 for him by will. The difficulty is in the getting the 
 gold into Erewhon, and until it is actually here, 
 he must know nothing about it." 
 
 I have no space for the discussion that followed. 
 In the end it was settled that George was to have 
 .£2000 in gold, which the Mayor declared to be 
 too much, and my father too little. Both, how- 
 ever, were agreed that Erewhon would before long 
 be compelled to enter into relations with foreign 
 countries, in which case the value of gold would 
 decline so much as to make ^2000 worth little 
 more than it would be in England. The Mayor 
 proposed to buy land with it, which he would hand 
 over to George as a gift from himself, and this my 
 father at once acceded to. All sorts of questions 
 such as will occur to the reader were raised and 
 
 settled, but I must beg him to be content with 
 
 270 
 
At the Mayor's House 
 
 knowing that everything was arranged with the 
 good sense that two such men were sure to bring 
 to bear upon it. 
 
 The getting the gold into Erewhon was to be 
 managed thus. George was to know nothing, but 
 a promise was to be got from him that at noon on 
 the following New Year's day, or whatever day 
 might be agreed upon, he would be at the statues, 
 where either my father or myself would meet him, 
 spend a couple of hours with him, and then return. 
 Whoever met George was to bring the gold as 
 though it were for the Mayor, and George could 
 be trusted to be human enough to bring it down, 
 when he saw that it would be left where it was if 
 he did not do so. 
 
 "He will kick a good deal," said the Mayor, "at 
 first, but he will come round in the end." 
 
 Luncheon was now announced. My father was 
 feeling faint and ill ; more than once during the 
 forenoon he had had a return of the strange giddiness 
 and momentary loss of memory which had already 
 twice attacked him, but he had recovered in each 
 case so quickly that no one had seen he was unwell. 
 He, poor man, did not yet know what serious brain 
 exhaustion these attacks betokened, and rinding 
 himself in his usual health as soon as they passed 
 away, set them down as simply effects of fatigue 
 and undue excitement. 
 
 George did not lunch with the others. Yram 
 
 explained that he had to draw up a report which 
 
 would occupy him till dinner time. Her three 
 
 271 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 other sons, and her three lovely daughters, were 
 there. My father was delighted with all of them, 
 for they made friends with him at once. He had 
 feared that he would have been disgraced in their 
 eyes, by his having just come from prison, but 
 whatever they may have thought, no trace of any- 
 thing but a little engaging timidity on the girls' part 
 was to be seen. The two elder boys — or rather 
 young men, for they seemed fully grown, though, 
 like George, not yet bearded — treated him as already 
 an old acquaintance, while the youngest, a lad of 
 fourteen, walked straight up to him, put out his 
 hand, and said, " How do you do, sir ? " with a 
 pretty blush that went straight to my father's 
 heart. 
 
 "These boys," he said to Yram aside, "who 
 have nothing to blush for — see how the blood 
 mantles into their young cheeks, while I, who 
 should blush at being spoken to by them, cannot 
 do so." 
 
 " Do not talk nonsense," said Yram, with mock 
 severity. 
 
 But it was no nonsense to my poor father. He 
 
 was awed at the goodness and beauty with which 
 
 he found himself surrounded. His thoughts were 
 
 too full of what had been, what was, and what was 
 
 yet to be, to let him devote himself to these young 
 
 people as he would dearly have liked to do. He 
 
 could only look at them, wonder at them, fall in 
 
 love with them, and thank heaven that George had 
 
 been brought up in such a household. 
 
 272 
 
At the Mayor's House 
 
 When luncheon was over, Yram said, " I will 
 now send you to a room where you can lie down 
 and go to sleep for a few hours. You will be out 
 late to-night, and had better rest while you can. 
 Do you remember the drink you taught us to 
 make of corn parched and ground ? You used to 
 say you liked it. A cup shall be brought to your 
 room at about five, for you must try and sleep 
 till then. If you notice a little box on the dressing- 
 table of your room, you will open it or no as you 
 like. About half-past five there will be a visitor, 
 whose name you can guess, but I shall not let 
 her stay long with you. Here comes the servant 
 to take you to your room." On this she smiled, 
 and turned somewhat hurriedly away. 
 
 My father on reaching his room went to the 
 dressing-table, where he saw a small unpretending 
 box, which he immediately opened. On the top 
 was a paper with the words, " Look — say nothing 
 — forget." Beneath this was some cotton wool, 
 and then — the two buttons and the lock of his 
 own hair, that he had given Yram when he said 
 good-bye to her. 
 
 The ghost of the lock that Yram had then given 
 him, rose from the dead, and smote him as with a 
 whip across the face. On what dust-heap had it 
 not been thrown how many long years ago ? 
 Then she had never forgotten him ? to have been 
 remembered all these years by such a woman as 
 that, and never to have heeded it — never to have 
 found out what she was though he had seen her 
 
 273 s 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 day after day for months. Ah ! but she was then 
 still budding. That was no excuse. If a loveable 
 woman — aye, or any woman — has loved a man, even 
 though he cannot marry her, or even wish to do so, 
 at any rate let him not forget her — and he had 
 forgotten Yram as completely until the last few 
 days, as though he had never seen her. He took 
 her little missive, and under " Look," he wrote, " I 
 have ; " under " Say nothing," " I will ; " under 
 "forget," "never." "And I never shall," he said 
 to himself, as he replaced the box upon the table. 
 He then lay down to rest upon the bed, but he 
 could get no sleep. 
 
 When the servant brought him his imitation 
 coffee — an imitation so successful that Yram made 
 him a packet of it to replace the tea that he must 
 leave behind him — he rose and presently came 
 downstairs into the drawing-room, where he found 
 Yram and Mrs. Humdrum's grand-daughter, of 
 whom I will say nothing, for I have never seen 
 her, and know nothing about her, except that my 
 father found her a sweet-looking girl, of graceful 
 figure and very attractive expression. He was 
 quite happy about her, but she was too young 
 and shy to make it possible for him to do more 
 than admire her appearance, and take Yram's word 
 for it that she was as good as she looked. 
 
 274 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 AFTER DINNER, DR. DOWNIE AND THE PROFESSORS 
 WOULD BE GLAD TO KNOW WHAT IS TO BE 
 DONE ABOUT SUNCHILDISM 
 
 It was about six when George's fiancee left the 
 house, and as soon as she had done so, Yram 
 began to see about the rug and the best substi- 
 tutes she could find for the billy and pannikin. 
 She had a basket packed with all that my father and 
 George would want to eat and drink while on the 
 preserves, and enough of everything, except meat, 
 to keep my father going till he could reach the 
 shepherd's hut of which I have already spoken. 
 Meat would not keep, and my father could get 
 plenty of flappers — i.e. ducks that cannot yet fly 
 — when he was on the river-bed down below. 
 
 The above preparations had not been made very 
 long, before Mrs. Humdrum arrived, followed pre- 
 sently by Dr. Downie and in due course by the 
 Professors, who were still staying in the house. 
 My father remembered Mrs. Humdrum's good 
 honest face, but could not bring Dr. Downie to 
 his recollection till the Doctor told him when and 
 where they had met, and then he could only very 
 uncertainly recall him, though he vowed that he 
 
 could now do so perfectly well. 
 
 275 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 "At any rate," said Hanky, advancing towards 
 him with his best Bridgeford manner, " you will 
 not have forgotten meeting my brother Professor 
 and myself." 
 
 " It has been rather a forgetting sort of a morn- 
 ing," said my father demurely, " but I can remem- 
 ber that much, and am delighted to renew my 
 acquaintance with both of you." 
 
 As he spoke he shook hands with both Pro- 
 fessors. 
 
 George was a little late, but when he came, dinner 
 was announced. My father sat on Yram's right- 
 hand, Dr. Downie on her left. George was next 
 my father, with Mrs. Humdrum opposite to him. 
 The Professors sat one on either side of the Mayor. 
 During dinner the conversation turned almost 
 entirely on my father's flight, his narrow escape 
 from drowning, and his adventures on his return 
 to England ; about these last my father was very 
 reticent, for he said nothing about his book, and 
 antedated his accession of wealth by some fifteen 
 years, but as he walked up towards the statues 
 with George he told him everything. 
 
 My father repeatedly tried to turn the conversa- 
 tion from himself, but Mrs. Humdrum and Yram 
 wanted to know about Nna Haras, as they per- 
 sisted in calling my mother — how she endured her 
 terrible experiences in the balloon, when she and 
 my father were married, all about my unworthy 
 self, and England generally. No matter how often 
 
 he began to ask questions about the Nosnibors 
 
 276 
 
What about Sunchildism ? 
 
 and other old acquaintances, both the ladies soon 
 went back to his own adventures. He succeeded, 
 however, in learning that Mr. Nosnibor was dead, 
 and Zulora, an old maid of the most unattractive 
 kind, who had persistently refused to accept Sun- 
 childism, while Mrs. Nosnibor was the recipient of 
 honours hardly inferior to those conferred by the 
 people at large on my father and mother, with 
 whom, indeed, she believed herself to have frequent 
 interviews by way of visionary revelations. So 
 intolerable were these revelations to Zulora, that 
 a separate establishment had been provided for 
 her. George said to my father quietly — " Do you 
 know I begin to think that Zulora must be rather a 
 nice person." 
 
 " Perhaps," said my father grimly, " but my wife 
 and I did not find it out." 
 
 When the ladies left the room, Dr. Downie took 
 Yram's seat, and Hanky Dr. Downie's ; the Mayor 
 took Mrs. Humdrum's, leaving my father, George, 
 and Panky, in their old places. Almost imme- 
 diately, Dr. Downie said, " And now, Mr. Higgs, 
 tell us, as a man of the world, what we are to do 
 about Sunchildism ? " 
 
 My father smiled at this. " You know, my dear 
 
 sir, as well as I do, that the proper thing would be 
 
 to put me back in prison, and keep me there till you 
 
 can send me down to the capital. You should eat 
 
 your oaths of this morning, as I would eat mine ; 
 
 tell every one here who I am ; let them see that my 
 
 hair has been dyed ; get all who knew me when I 
 
 277 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 was here before to come and see me ; appoint an 
 unimpeachable committee to examine the record 
 of my marks and measurements, and compare it 
 with those of my own body. You should let me 
 be seen in every town at which I lodged on my 
 way down, and tell people that you had made a 
 mistake. When you get to the capital, hand me 
 over to the King's tender mercies and say that our 
 oaths were only taken this morning to prevent a 
 ferment in the town. I will play my part very 
 willingly. The King can only kill me, and I should 
 die like a gentleman." 
 
 " They will not do it," said George quietly to my 
 father, " and I am glad of it." 
 
 He was right. "This," said Dr. Dovvnie, "is a 
 counsel of perfection. Things have gone too far, 
 and we are flesh and blood. What would those 
 who in your country come nearest to us Musical 
 Bank Managers do, if they found they had made 
 such a mistake as we have, and dared not own it ? " 
 
 " Do not ask me," said my father ; " the story is 
 too long, and too terrible." 
 
 " At any rate, then, tell us what you would have 
 us do that is within our reach." 
 
 " I have done you harm enough, and if I preach, 
 as likely as not I shall do more." 
 
 Seeing, however, that Dr. Downie was anxious to 
 hear what he thought, my father said — 
 
 " Then I must tell you. Our religion sets before 
 
 us an ideal which we all cordially accept, but it also 
 
 tells us of marvels like your chariot and horses, 
 
 278 
 
What about Sunchildism ? 
 
 which we most of us reject. Our best teachers 
 insist on the ideal, and keep the marvels in the 
 background. If they could say outright that our 
 age has outgrown them, they would say so, but this 
 they may not do ; nevertheless they contrive to let 
 their opinions be sufficiently well known, and their 
 hearers are content with this. 
 
 " We have others who take a very different course, 
 but of these I will not speak. Roughly, then, if you 
 cannot abolish me altogether, make me a peg on 
 which to hang all your own best ethical and 
 spiritual conceptions. If you will do this, and 
 wriggle out of that wretched relic, with that not less 
 wretched picture — if you will make me out to be 
 much better and abler than I was, or ever shall be, 
 Sunchildism may serve your turn for many a long 
 year to come. Otherwise it will tumble about your 
 heads before you think it will. 
 
 " Am I to go on or stop ? " 
 
 " Go on," said George softly. That was enough 
 for my father, so on he went. 
 
 " You are already doing part of what I wish. I 
 
 was delighted with the two passages I heard on 
 
 Sunday, from what you call the Sunchild's Sayings. 
 
 I never said a word of either passage ; I wish I had ; 
 
 I wish I could say anything half so good. And I 
 
 have read a pamphlet by President Gurgoyle, which 
 
 I liked extremely ; but I never said what he says I 
 
 did. Again, I wish I had. Keep to this sort of 
 
 thing, and I will be as good a Sunchildist as any 
 
 of you. But you must bribe some thief to steal 
 
 279 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 that relic, and break it up to mend the roads with ; 
 and — for I believe that here as elsewhere fires some- 
 times get lighted through the carelessness of a work- 
 man — set the most careless workman you can find 
 to do a plumbing job near that picture." 
 
 Hanky looked black at this, and George trod 
 lightly on my father's toe, but he told me that my 
 father's face was innocence itself. 
 
 "These are hard sayings," said Dr. Downie. 
 
 " I know they are," replied my father, " and I do 
 not like saying them, but there is no royal road to 
 unlearning, and you have much to unlearn. Still, 
 you Musical Bank people bear witness to the fact 
 that beyond the kingdoms of this world there is 
 another, within which the writs of this world's 
 kingdoms do not run. This is the great service 
 which our church does for us in England, and 
 hence many of us uphold it, though we have no 
 sympathy with the party now dominant within it. 
 ' Better,' we think, ' a corrupt church than none at 
 all.' Moreover, those who in my country would 
 step into the church's shoes are as corrupt as the 
 church, and more exacting. They are also more 
 dangerous, for the masses distrust the church, and 
 are on their guard against aggression, whereas they 
 do not suspect the doctrinaires and faddists, who, 
 if they could, would interfere in every concern of 
 our lives. 
 
 " Let me return to yourselves. You Musical 
 Bank Managers are very much such a body of 
 
 men as your country needs — but when I was here 
 
 280 
 
What about Sunchildism ? 
 
 before you had no figurehead ; I have unwittingly 
 supplied you with one, and it is perhaps because 
 you saw this, that you good people of Bridgeford 
 took up with me. Sunchildism is still young and 
 plastic ; if you will let the cock-and-bull stories 
 about me tacitly drop, and invent no new ones, 
 beyond saying what a delightful person I was, I 
 really cannot see why I should not do for you as 
 well as any one else. 
 
 "There. What I have said is nine-tenths of it 
 rotten and wrong, but it is the most practicable 
 rotten and wrong that I can suggest, seeing into 
 what a rotten and wrong state of things you have 
 drifted. And now, Mr. Mayor, do you not think 
 we may join the Mayoress and Mrs. Humdrum ? " 
 
 "As you please, Mr. Higgs," answered the 
 Mayor. 
 
 "Then let us go, for I have said too much 
 already, and your son George tells me that we 
 must be starting shortly." 
 
 As they were leaving the room Panky sidled up 
 to my father and said, "There is a point, Mr. Higgs, 
 which you can settle for me, though I feel pretty 
 certain how you will settle it. I think that a cor- 
 ruption has crept into the text of the very beauti- 
 ful " 
 
 At this moment, as my father, who saw what 
 
 was coming, was wondering what in the world he 
 
 could say, George came up to him and said, " Mr. 
 
 Higgs, my mother wishes me to take you down 
 
 into the store-room, to make sure that she has put 
 
 281 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 everything for you as you would like it." On this 
 my father said he would return directly and answer 
 what he knew would be Panky's question. 
 
 When Yram had shewn what she had prepared 
 — all of it, of course, faultless — she said, " And now, 
 Mr. Higgs, about our leave-taking. Of course we 
 shall both of us feel much. I shall ; I know you 
 will ; George will have a few more hours with you 
 than the rest of us, but his time to say good-bye 
 will come, and it will be painful to both of you. 
 I am glad you came — I am glad you have seen 
 George, and George you, and that you took to one 
 another. I am glad my husband has seen you ; he 
 has spoken to me about you very warmly, for he 
 has taken to you much as George did. I am very, 
 very glad to have seen you myself, and to have 
 learned what became of you — and of your wife. I 
 know you wish well to all of us ; be sure that we 
 all of us wish most heartily well to you and yours. 
 I sent for you and George, because I could not say 
 all this unless we were alone ; it is all I can do," 
 she said, with a smile, " to say it now." 
 
 Indeed it was, for the tears were in her eyes all 
 the time, as they were also in my father's. 
 
 " Let this," continued Yram, " be our leave-taking 
 — for we must have nothing like a scene upstairs. 
 Just shake hands with us all, say the usual conven- 
 tional things, and make it as short as you can ; but 
 I could not bear to send you away without a few 
 warmer words than I could have said when others 
 
 were in the room." 
 
 282 
 
What about Sunchildism ? 
 
 " May heaven bless you and yours," said my 
 father, " for ever and ever." 
 
 "That will do," said George gently. " Now, both 
 of you shake hands, and come upstairs with me." 
 
 When all three of them had got calm, for George 
 had been moved almost as much as his father and 
 mother, they went upstairs, and Panky came for 
 his answer. " You are very possibly right," said 
 my father — "the version you hold to be corrupt 
 is the one in common use amongst ourselves, but 
 it is only a translation, and very possibly only a 
 translation of a translation, so that it may perhaps 
 have been corrupted before it reached us." 
 
 "That," said Panky, "will explain everything," 
 and he went contentedly away. 
 
 My father talked a little aside with Mrs. Humdrum 
 about her grand-daughter and George, for Yram 
 had told him that she knew all about the attach- 
 ment, and then George, who saw that my father 
 found the greatest difficulty in maintaining an out- 
 ward calm, said, " Mr. Higgs, the streets are empty; 
 we had better go." 
 
 My father did as Yram had told him ; shook 
 
 hands with every one, said all that was usual and 
 
 proper as briefly as he could, and followed George 
 
 out of the room. The Mayor saw them to the 
 
 door, and saved my father from embarrassment by 
 
 saying, " Mr. Higgs, you and I understand one 
 
 another too well to make it necessary for us to say 
 
 283 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 so. Good-bye to you, and may no ill befall you ere 
 you get home." 
 
 My father grasped his hand in both his own. 
 " Again," he said, " I can say no more than that I 
 thank you from the bottom of my heart." 
 
 As he spoke he bowed his head, and went out 
 with George into the night. 
 
 284 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 GEORGE ESCORTS MY FATHER TO THE STATUES ; 
 THE TWO THEN PART 
 
 The streets were quite deserted as George had said 
 they would be, and very dark, save for an occa- 
 sional oil lamp. 
 
 "As soon as we can get within the preserves," 
 said George, "we had better w T ait till morning. I 
 have a rug for myself as well as for you." 
 
 " I saw you had two," answered my father ; " you 
 must let me carry them both ; the provisions are 
 much the heavier load. 
 
 George fought as hard as a dog would do, till my 
 father said that they must not quarrel during the 
 very short time they had to be together. On this 
 George gave up one rug meekly enough, and my 
 father yielded about the basket, and the other rug. 
 
 It was about half-past eleven when they started, 
 and it was after one before they reached the pre- 
 serves. For the first mile from the town they were 
 not much hindered by the darkness, and my father 
 told George about his book and many another 
 matter ; he also promised George to say nothing 
 about this second visit. Then the road became 
 more rough, and when it dwindled away to be a 
 
 mere lane — becoming presently only a foot track — 
 
 285 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 they had to mind their footsteps, and got on but 
 slowly. The night was starlit, and warm, consider- 
 ing that they were more than three thousand feet 
 above the sea, but it was very dark, so that my 
 father was well enough pleased when George 
 showed him the white stones that marked the 
 boundary, and said they had better soon make 
 themselves as comfortable as they could till 
 morning. 
 
 "We can stay here," he said, "till half-past three, 
 there will be a little daylight then ; we will rest 
 half an hour for breakfast at about five, and by 
 noon we shall be at the statues, where we will 
 dine." 
 
 This being settled, George rolled himself up in 
 his rug, and in a few minutes went comfortably 
 off to sleep. Not so my poor father. He wound 
 up his watch, wrapped his rug round him, and 
 lay down ; but he could get no sleep. After such 
 a day, and such an evening, how could any one 
 have slept ? 
 
 About three the first signs of dawn began to 
 show, and half an hour later my father could see 
 the sleeping face of his son — whom it went to his 
 heart to wake. Nevertheless he woke him, and in 
 a few minutes the two were on their way — George 
 as fresh as a lark — my poor father intent on no- 
 thing so much as on hiding from George how ill 
 and unsound in body and mind he was feeling. 
 
 They walked on, saying but little, till at five by 
 
 my father's watch George proposed a halt for 
 
 286 
 
Back to the Statues 
 
 breakfast. The spot he chose was a grassy 
 oasis among the trees, carpeted with subalpine 
 flowers, now in their fullest beauty, and close to 
 a small stream that here came down from a side 
 valley. The freshness of the morning air, the 
 extreme beauty of the place, the lovely birds that 
 flitted from tree to tree, the exquisite shapes and 
 colours of the flowers, still dew-bespangled, and 
 above all, the tenderness with which George treated 
 him, soothed my father, and when he and George 
 had lit a fire and made some hot corn-coffee — 
 with a view to which Yram had put up a bottle 
 of milk — he felt so much restored as to look for- 
 ward to the rest of his journey without alarm. 
 Moreover he had nothing to carry, for George 
 had left his own rug at the place where they had 
 slept, knowing that he should find it on his return ; 
 he had therefore insisted on carrying my father's. 
 My father fought as long as he could, but he had 
 to give in. 
 
 " Now tell me," said George, glad to change the 
 subject, " what will those three men do about what 
 you said to them last night ? Will they pay any 
 attention to it ? " 
 
 My father laughed. "My dear George, what a 
 question — I do not know them well enough." 
 
 "Oh yes, you do. At any rate say what you 
 think most likely." 
 
 " Very well. I think Dr. Downie will do much 
 
 as I said. He will not throw the whole thing 
 
 over, through fear of schism, loyalty to a party 
 
 287 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 from which he cannot well detach himself, and 
 because he does not think that the public is quite 
 tired enough of its toy. He will neither preach 
 nor write against it, but he will live lukewarmly 
 against it, and this is what the Hankys hate. 
 They can stand either hot or cold, but they are 
 afraid of lukewarm. In England Dr. Downie would 
 be a Broad Churchman." 
 
 " Do you think we shall ever get rid of Sun- 
 childism altogether ? " 
 
 " If they stick to the cock-and-bull stories they 
 are telling now, and rub them in, as Hanky did 
 on Sunday, it may go, and go soon. It has taken 
 root too quickly and easily ; and its top is too 
 heavy for its roots ; still there are so many chances 
 in its favour that it may last a long time." 
 
 " And how about Hanky ? " 
 
 " He will brazen it out, relic, chariot, and all : 
 and he will welcome more relics and more cock- 
 and-bull stories ; his single eye will be upon 
 his own aggrandisement and that of his order. 
 Plausible, unscrupulous, heartless scoundrel that 
 he is, he will play for the queen and the women 
 of the court, as Dr. Downie will play for the king 
 and the men. He and his party will sleep neither 
 night nor day, but they will have one redeeming 
 feature — whoever they may deceive, they will not 
 deceive themselves. They believe every one else 
 to be as bad as they are, and see no reason why 
 they should not push their own wares in the way 
 
 of business. Hanky is everything that we in Eng- 
 
 288 
 
Back to the Statues 
 
 land rightly or wrongly believe a typical Jesuit 
 to be." 
 
 "And Panky— what about him ?" 
 
 " Panky must persuade himself of his own lies, 
 before he is quite comfortable about telling them to 
 other people. Hanky keeps Hanky well out of it ; 
 Panky must have a base of operations in Panky. 
 Hanky will lead him by the nose, bit by bit, for his 
 is the master spirit. In England Panky would be 
 what we call an extreme ritualist." 
 
 " Then the real battle will be between Hanky and 
 Dr. Downie. Which will carry the day ? " 
 
 " For the present, probably Hanky. He is the 
 more vigilant, and energetic ; in this case Sun- 
 childism will have to go, and I am afraid your 
 whole Musical Bank system will be swept away 
 along with it." 
 
 " And why not ? " 
 
 " Because, my dear boy, though false in the 
 letter, if good counsels prevail, it may be made true 
 enough in spirit. If it were to go, its place would 
 be soon filled by men who would be as false in 
 letter as the others were, and much more false in 
 spirit. You want a heart to check your head, and 
 a head to check your heart. As in our English 
 body politic there are two parties opposed to one 
 another, neither of which can thrive if the other is 
 unduly weakened, so in our spiritual and intellec- 
 tual world two parties more or less antagonistic are 
 equally necessary. Those who are at the head of 
 
 science provide us with the one party ; those whom 
 
 289 j 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 we call our churchmen are the other. Both are 
 corrupt, but we can spare neither, for each checks 
 as far as it can the corruptions of the other." 
 
 " Then you would have us uphold Sunchildism, 
 knowing it to be untrue ? " 
 
 " Do what you will, you will not get perfect truth. 
 And if you can follow the lead which I believe Dr. 
 Downie will give you, that is to say, get rid of cock- 
 and-bull stories, idealise my unworthy self, and, as 
 I said last night, make me a peg on which to hang 
 your own best thoughts — Sunchildism will be as 
 near truth as anything you are likely to get. But 
 if Hankyism triumphs, come what may you must 
 get rid of it, for he and his school will tamper with 
 the one sure and everlasting word of God revealed 
 to us by human experience. He who plays fast 
 and loose with this is as one who would forge 
 God's signature to a cheque drawn on God's own 
 bank." 
 
 " Are we to foster the belief that it was indeed 
 the Sunchild who interrupted Hanky's sermon ?" 
 
 " Yes, where you safely can, but not otherwise ; 
 and commit the facts to writing as soon as you can 
 find time. Do nothing to jeopardise your own 
 safety ; you can do more by perfunctory acquies- 
 cence than by open dissent. And tell those friends 
 whom you can trust, what these my parting words 
 to you have been. But above all I charge you 
 solemnly, do nothing to jeopardise your own safety ; 
 you cannot play into Hanky's hands more certainly 
 
 than by risking this. Think how he and Panky 
 
 290 
 
Back to the Statues 
 
 would rejoice, and how Dr. Downie would grieve. 
 Be wise and wary ; bide your time ; do what you 
 prudently can, and you will find you can do much ; 
 try to do more, and you will do nothing. Be guided 
 by the Mayor, by your mother — and by that dear 
 old lady whose grandson you will " 
 
 "Then they have told you," interrupted the youth 
 blushing scarlet. 
 
 " My dearest boy, of course they have, and I have 
 seen her, and am head over ears in love with her 
 myself." 
 
 He was all smiles and blushes, and vowed for a 
 few minutes that it was a shame of them to tell me, 
 but presently he said — 
 
 "Then you like her." 
 
 " Rather ! " said my father vehemently, and shak- 
 ing George by the hand. But he said nothing about 
 the nuggets and the sovereigns, knowing that Yram 
 did not wish him to do so. Neither did George say 
 anything about his determination to start for the 
 capital in the morning, and make a clean breast of 
 everything to the King. So soon does it become 
 necessary even for those who are most cordially 
 attached to hide things from one another. My 
 father, however, was made comfortable by receiv- 
 ing a promise from the youth that he would take 
 no step of which the persons he had named would 
 disapprove. 
 
 When once Mrs. Humdrum's grand-daughter had 
 
 been introduced there was no more talking about 
 
 Hanky and Panky ; for George began to bubble 
 
 291 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 over with the subject that was nearest his heart, 
 and how much he feared that it would be some 
 time yet before he could be married. Many a 
 story did he tell of his early attachment and of its 
 course for the last ten years, but my space will not 
 allow me to inflict one of them on the reader. 
 My father saw that the more he listened and 
 sympathised and encouraged, the fonder George 
 became of him, and this was all he cared about. 
 
 Thus did they converse hour after hour. They 
 passed the Blue Pool, without seeing it or even 
 talking about it for more than a minute. George 
 kept an eye on the quails and declared them fairly 
 plentiful and strong on the wing, but nothing now 
 could keep him from pouring out his whole heart 
 about Mrs. Humdrum's grand-daughter, until to- 
 wards noon they caught sight of the statues, and a 
 halt was made which gave my father the first pang 
 he had felt that morning, for he knew that the 
 statues would be the beginning of the end. 
 
 There was no need to light a fire, for Yram had 
 
 packed for them two bottles of a delicious white 
 
 wine, something like White Capri, which went 
 
 admirably with the many more solid good things 
 
 that she had provided for them. As soon as they 
 
 had finished a hearty meal my father said to 
 
 George, u You must have my watch for a keepsake ; 
 
 I see you are not wearing my boots. I fear you 
 
 did not find them comfortable, but I am glad you 
 
 have not got them on, for I have set my heart on 
 
 keeping yours." 
 
 292 
 
Back to the Statues 
 
 " Let us settle about the boots first. I rather 
 fancied that that was why you put me off when I 
 wanted to get my own back again ; and then I 
 thought I should like yours for a keepsake, so I 
 put on another pair last night, and they are no- 
 thing like so comfortable as yours were." 
 
 " Now I wonder," said my father to me, " whether 
 this was true, or whether it was only that dear 
 fellow's pretty invention ; but true or false I was 
 as delighted as he meant me to be." 
 
 I asked George about this when I saw him, and 
 he confessed with an ingenuous blush that my 
 father's boots had hurt him, and that he had never 
 thought of making a keepsake of them, till my 
 father's words stimulated his invention. 
 
 As for the watch, which was only a silver one, 
 but of the best make, George protested for a time, 
 but when he had yielded, my father could see that 
 he was overjoyed at getting it ; for watches, though 
 now permitted, were expensive and not in common 
 use. 
 
 Having thus bribed him, my father broached 
 the possibility of his meeting him at the statues 
 on that day twelvemonth, but of course saying 
 nothing about why he was so anxious that he 
 should come. 
 
 " I will come," said my father, " not a yard 
 farther than the statues, and if I cannot come I 
 will send your brother. And I will come at noon ; 
 but it is possible that the river down below may 
 be in fresh, and I may not be able to hit off the 
 
 293 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 day, though I will move heaven and earth to do 
 so. Therefore if I do not meet you on the day 
 appointed, do your best to come also at noon on 
 the following day. I know how inconvenient this 
 will be for you, and will come true to the day if it 
 is possible." 
 
 To my father's surprise, George did not raise so 
 many difficulties as he had expected. He said it 
 might be done, if neither he nor my father were 
 to go beyond the statues. " And difficult as it 
 will be for you," said George, "you had better 
 come a second day if necessary, as I will, for who 
 can tell what might happen to make the first day 
 impossible ?" 
 
 "Then," said my father, "we shall be spared 
 that horrible feeling that we are parting without 
 hope of seeing each other again. I find it hard 
 enough to say good-bye even now, but I do not 
 know how I could have faced it if you had not 
 agreed to our meeting again." 
 
 "The day fixed upon will be our XXI. i. 3, and 
 the hour noon as near as may be ? " 
 
 "So. Let me write it down : 'XXI. i. 3, i.e. our 
 December 9, 1891, I am to meet George at the 
 statues, at twelve o'clock, and if he does not come, 
 I am to be there again on the following day.' " 
 
 In like manner, George wrote down what he was 
 to do: " XXI. i. 3, or failing this XXI. i. 4. Statues. 
 Noon." 
 
 "This," he said, "is a solemn covenant, is it 
 
 not ? " 
 
 294 
 
Back to the Statues 
 
 "Yes," said my father, "and may all good omens 
 attend it ! " 
 
 The words were not out of his mouth before a 
 mountain bird, something like our jackdaw, but 
 smaller and of a bluer black, flew out of the hollow 
 mouth of one of the statues, and with a hearty 
 chuckle perched on the ground at his feet, attracted 
 doubtless by the scraps of food that were lying 
 about. With the fearlessness of birds in that 
 country, it looked up at him and George, gave 
 another hearty chuckle, and flew back to its statue 
 with the largest fragment it could find. 
 
 They settled that this was an omen so propitious 
 that they could part in good hope. " Let us finish 
 the wine," said my father, " and then, do what 
 must be done." 
 
 They finished the wine to each other's good 
 health ; George drank also to mine, and said he 
 hoped my father would bring me with him, while 
 my father drank to Yram, the Mayor, their chil- 
 dren, Mrs. Humdrum, and above all to Mrs. Hum- 
 drum's grand-daughter. They then re-packed all 
 that could be taken away ; my father rolled his 
 rug to his liking, slung it over his shoulder, gripped 
 George's hand, and said, "My dearest boy, when 
 we have each turned our backs upon one another, 
 let us walk our several ways as fast as we can, and 
 try not to look behind us." 
 
 So saying he loosed his grip of George's hand, 
 bared his head, lowered it, and turned away. 
 
 George burst into tears, and followed him after 
 29s 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 he had gone two paces ; he threw his arms round 
 him, hugged him, kissed him on his lips, cheeks, 
 and forehead, and then turning round, strode full 
 speed towards Sunch'ston. My father never took 
 his eyes off him till he was out of sight, but the 
 boy did not look round. When he could see him 
 no more, my father with faltering gait, and feeling 
 as though a prop had suddenly been taken from 
 under him, began to follow the stream down to- 
 wards his old camp. 
 
 296 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 MY FATHER REACHES HOME, AND DIES NOT LONG 
 AFTERWARDS 
 
 My father could walk but slowly, for George's boots 
 
 had blistered his feet, and it seemed to him that the 
 
 river-bed, of which he caught glimpses now and 
 
 again, never got any nearer ; but all things come 
 
 to an end, and by seven o'clock on the night of 
 
 Tuesday, he was on the spot which he had left on 
 
 the preceding Friday morning. Three entire days 
 
 had intervened, but he felt that something, he knew 
 
 not what, had seized him, and that whereas before 
 
 these three days life had been one thing, what little 
 
 might follow them, would be another — and a very 
 
 different one. 
 
 He soon caught sight of his horse which had 
 
 strayed a mile lower down the river-bed, and in 
 
 spite of his hobbles had crossed one ugly stream 
 
 that my father dared not ford on foot. Tired 
 
 though he was, he went after him, bridle in hand, 
 
 and when the friendly creature saw him, it recrossed 
 
 the stream, and came to him of its own accord — 
 
 either tired of his own company, or tempted by 
 
 some bread my father held out towards him. My 
 
 father took off the hobbles, and rode him bare- 
 
 297 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 backed to the camping ground, where he rewarded 
 him with more bread and biscuit, and then hobbled 
 him again for the night. 
 
 " It was here," he said to me on one of the first 
 days after his return, " that I first knew myself to 
 be a broken man. As for meeting George again, I 
 felt sure that it would be all I could do to meet his 
 brother ; and though George was always in my 
 thoughts, it was for you and not him that I was 
 now yearning. When I gave George my watch, 
 how glad I was that I had left my gold one at 
 home, for that is yours, and I could not have 
 brought myself to give it him." 
 
 " Never mind that, my dear father," said I, " but 
 tell me how you got down the river, and thence 
 home again." 
 
 " My very dear boy," he said, " I can hardly 
 remember, and I had no energy to make any more 
 notes. I remember putting a scrap of paper into 
 the box of sovereigns, merely sending George my 
 love along with the money ; I remember also drop- 
 ping the box into a hole in a tree, which I blazed, 
 and towards which I drew a line of wood-ashes. 
 I seem to see a poor unhinged creature gazing 
 moodily for hours into a fire which he heaps up 
 now and again with wood. There is not a breath 
 of air ; Nature sleeps so calmly that she dares not 
 even breathe for fear of waking ; the very river has 
 hushed his flow. Without, the starlit calm of a 
 summer's night in a great wilderness ; within, a 
 
 hurricane of wild and incoherent thoughts battling 
 
 298 
 
The Homeward Journey 
 
 with one another in their fury to fall upon him and 
 rend him — and on the other side the great wall of 
 mountain, thousands of children praying at their 
 mother's knee to this poor dazed thing. I suppose 
 this half delirious wretch must have been myself. 
 But I must have been more ill when I left England 
 than I thought I was, or Erewhon would not have 
 broken me down as it did." 
 
 No doubt he was right. Indeed it was because 
 Mr. Cathie and his doctor saw that he was out of 
 health and in urgent need of change, that they left 
 off opposing his wish to travel. There is no use, 
 however, in talking about this now. 
 
 I never got from him how he managed to reach 
 the shepherd's hut, but I learned some little from the 
 shepherd, when I stayed with him both on going 
 towards Erewhon, and on returning. 
 
 " He did not seem to have drink in him," said 
 the shepherd, " when he first came here ; but he 
 must have been pretty full of it, or he must have 
 had some bottles in his saddle-bags ; for he was 
 awful when he came back. He had got them 
 worse than any man I ever saw, only that he was 
 not awkward. He said there was a bird flying 
 out of a giant's mouth and laughing at him, and 
 he kept muttering about a blue pool, and hanky- 
 panky of all sorts, and he said he knew it was all 
 hanky-panky, at least I thought he said so, but it 
 was no use trying to follow him, for it was all 
 nothing but horrors. He said I was to stop the 
 
 people from trying to worship him. Then he said 
 
 299 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the sky opened and he could see the angels going 
 about and singing ' Hallelujah.' " 
 
 " How long did he stay with you ?" I asked. 
 
 " About ten days, but the last three he was 
 himself again, only too weak to move. He thought 
 he was cured except for weakness." 
 
 " Do you know how he had been spending the last 
 two days or so before he got down to your hut?" 
 
 I said two days, because this was the time I 
 supposed he would take to descend the river. 
 
 " I should say drinking all the time. He said he 
 had fallen off his horse two or three times, till he 
 took to leading him. If he had had any other 
 horse than old Doctor he would have been a dead 
 man. Bless you, I have known that horse ever 
 since he was foaled, and I never saw one like him 
 for sense. He would pick fords better than that 
 gentleman could, I know, and if the gentleman 
 fell off him he would just stay stock still. He was 
 badly bruised, poor man, when he got here. I saw 
 him through the gorge when he left me, and he 
 gave me a sovereign ; he said he had only one 
 other left to take him down to the port, or he 
 would have made it more." 
 
 "He was my father," said I, "and he is dead, 
 but before he died he told me to give you five 
 pounds which I have brought you. I think you 
 are wrong in saying that he had been drinking." 
 
 " That is what they all say ; but I take it very 
 
 kind of him to have thought of me." 
 
 My father's illness for the first three weeks after 
 300 
 
The Homeward Journey 
 
 his return played with him as a cat plays with a 
 mouse ; now and again it would let him have a 
 day or two's run, during which he was so cheerful 
 and unclouded that his doctor was quite hopeful 
 about him. At various times on these occasions 
 I got from him that when he left the shepherd's 
 hut, he thought his illness had run itself out, and 
 that he should now reach the port from which he 
 was to sail for S. Francisco without misadventure. 
 This he did, and he was able to do all he had to 
 do at the port, though frequently attacked with 
 passing fits of giddiness. I need not dwell upon 
 his voyage to S. Francisco, and thence home ; it 
 is enough to say that he was able to travel by 
 himself in spite of gradually, but continually, in- 
 creasing failure. 
 
 "When," he said, "I reached the port, I tele- 
 graphed as you know, for more money. How 
 puzzled you must have been. I sold my horse to 
 the man from whom I bought it, at a loss of only 
 about ;£io, and I left with him my saddle, saddle- 
 bags, small hatchet, my hobbles, and in fact 
 everything that I had taken with me, except 
 what they had impounded in Erewhon. Yram's 
 rug I dropped into the river when I knew that 
 I should no longer need it — as also her substi- 
 tutes for my billy and pannikin ; and I burned 
 her basket. The shepherd would have asked me 
 questions. You will find an order to deliver 
 everything up to bearer. You need therefore take 
 
 nothing from England." 
 
 301 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 At another time he said, "When you go, for it 
 is plain I cannot, and go one or other of us must, 
 try and get the horse I had : he will be nine years 
 old, and he knows all about the rivers : if you 
 leave everything to him, you may shut your eyes, 
 but do not interfere with him. Give the shepherd 
 what I said and he will attend to you, but go a 
 day or two too soon, for the margin of one day 
 was not enough to allow in case of a fresh in 
 the river ; if the water is discoloured you must 
 not cross it — not even with Doctor. I could not 
 ask George to come up three days running from 
 Sunch'ston to the statues and back." 
 
 Here he became exhausted. Almost the last 
 coherent string of sentences I got from him was 
 as follows : — 
 
 "About George's money if I send him ^2000 
 you will still have nearly .£150,000 left, and Mr. 
 Cathie will not let you try to make it more. I 
 know you would give him four or five thousand, 
 but the Mayor and I talked it over, and settled that 
 -£2000 in gold would make him a rich man. Con- 
 sult our good friend Alfred " (meaning, of course, 
 Mr. Cathie) "about the best way of taking the 
 money. I am afraid there is nothing for it but 
 gold, and this will be a great weight for you to 
 carry — about, I believe 36 lbs. Can you do this ? 
 I really think that if you lead your horse you . . . 
 no — there will be the getting him down again " 
 
 " Don't worry about it, my dear father," said I, 
 
 " I can do it easily if I stow the load rightly, and 
 
 302 
 
The Homeward Journey 
 
 I will see to this. I shall have nothing else to 
 carry, for I shall camp down below both morning 
 and evening. But would you not like to send 
 some present to the Mayor, Yram, their other 
 children, and Mrs. Humdrum's grand-daughter ? " 
 
 "Do what you can," said my father. And these 
 were the last instructions he gave me about those 
 adventures with which alone this work is con- 
 cerned. 
 
 The day before he died, he had a little flicker of 
 intelligence, but all of a sudden his face became 
 clouded as with great anxiety ; he seemed to see 
 some horrible chasm in front of him which he had 
 to cross, or which he feared that I must cross, for 
 he gasped out words, which, as near as I could 
 catch them, were, " Look out ! John ! Leap ! Leap ! 
 Le . . ." but he could not say all that he was try- 
 ing to say and closed his eyes, having, as I then 
 deemed, seen that he was on the brink of that 
 gulf which lies between life and death ; I took it 
 that in reality he died at that moment ; for there 
 was neither struggle, nor hardly movement of any 
 kind afterwards — nothing but a pulse which for 
 the next several hours grew fainter and fainter so 
 gradually, that it was not till some time after it had 
 ceased to beat that we were certain of its having 
 done so. 
 
 303 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 I MEET MY BROTHER GEORGE AT THE STATUES, 
 ON THE TOP OF THE PASS INTO EREWHON 
 
 This book has already become longer than I in- 
 tended, but I will ask the reader to have patience 
 while I tell him briefly of my own visit to the 
 threshold of that strange country of which I fear 
 that he may be already beginning to tire. 
 
 The winding-up of my father's estate was a very 
 simple matter, and by the beginning of September 
 1891 I should have been free to start ; but about 
 that time I became engaged, and naturally enough 
 I did not want to be longer away than was neces- 
 sary. I should not have gone at all if I could have 
 helped it. I left, however, a fortnight later than 
 my father had done. 
 
 Before starting I bought a handsome gold re- 
 peater for the Mayor, and a brooch for Yram, of 
 pearls and diamonds set in gold, for which I paid 
 -£200. For Yram's three daughters and for Mrs. 
 Humdrum's grand-daughter I took four brooches 
 each of which cost about .£15, 15s., and for the 
 boys I got three ten-guinea silver watches. For 
 George I only took a strong English knife of the 
 best make, and the two thousand pounds worth 
 of uncoined gold, which for convenience' sake I 
 
 304 
 
I Meet George 
 
 had had made into small bars. I also had a knap- 
 sack made that would hold these and nothing 
 else — each bar being strongly sewn into its place, 
 so that none of them could shift. Whenever I went 
 on board ship, or went on shore, I put this on my 
 back, so that no one handled it except myself — and 
 I can assure the reader that I did not find it a light 
 weight to handle. I ought to have taken something 
 for old Mrs. Humdrum, but I am ashamed to say 
 that I forgot her. 
 
 I went as directly as I could to the port of 
 which my father had told me, and reached it on 
 November 27, one day later than he had done in 
 the preceding year. 
 
 On the following day, which was a Saturday, I 
 went to the livery stables from which my father 
 had bought his horse, and found to my great de- 
 light that Doctor could be at my disposal, for, as 
 it seemed to me, the very reasonable price of fifteen 
 shillings a day. I shewed the owner of the stables 
 my father's order, and all the articles he had left 
 were immediately delivered to me. I was still wear- 
 ing crape round one arm, and the horse-dealer, 
 whose name was Baker, said he was afraid the other 
 gentleman might be dead. 
 
 " Indeed, he is so," said I, "and a great grief it is 
 to me ; he was my father." 
 
 " Dear, dear," answered Mr. Baker, " that is a very 
 serious thing for the poor gentleman. He seemed 
 quite unfit to travel alone, and I feared he was not 
 long for this world, but he was bent on going." 
 
 30s u 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 I had nothing now to do but to buy a blanket, 
 pannikin, and billy, with some tea, tobacco, two 
 bottles of brandy, some ship's biscuits, and whatever 
 other few items were down on the list of requisites 
 which my father had dictated to me. Mr. Baker, see- 
 ing that I was what he called a new chum, shewed 
 me how to pack my horse, but I kept my knapsack 
 full of gold on my back, and though I could see 
 that it puzzled him, he asked no questions. There 
 was no reason why I should not set out at once 
 for the principal town of the colony, which was 
 some ten miles inland; I, therefore, arranged at 
 my hotel that the greater part of my luggage should 
 await my return, and set out to climb the high 
 hills that back the port. From the top of these I 
 had a magnificent view of the plains that I should 
 have to cross, and of the long range of distant 
 mountains which bounded them north and south 
 as far as the eye could reach. On some of the 
 mountains 1 could still see streaks of snow, but 
 my father had explained to me that the ranges I 
 should here see, were not those dividing the 
 English colony from Erewhon. I also saw, some 
 nine miles or so out upon the plains, the more 
 prominent buildings of a large town which seemed 
 to be embosomed in trees, and this I reached in 
 about an hour and a half ; for I had to descend 
 at a foot's pace, and Doctor's many virtues did not 
 comprise a willingness to go beyond an amble. 
 
 At the town above referred to I spent the night, 
 
 and began to strike across the plains on the fol- 
 
 306 
 
I Meet George 
 
 lowing morning. I might have crossed these in 
 three days at twenty-five miles a day, but I had 
 too much time on my hands, and my load of 
 gold was so uncomfortable that I was glad to stay 
 at one accommodation house after another, aver- 
 aging about eighteen miles a day. I have no doubt 
 that if I had taken advice, I could have stowed my 
 load more conveniently, but I could not unpack it, 
 and made the best of it as it was. 
 
 On the evening of Wednesday, December 2, I 
 reached the river which I should have to follow up ; 
 it was here nearing the gorge through which it had to 
 pass before the country opened out again at the back 
 of the front range. I came upon it quite suddenly 
 on reaching the brink of a great terrace, the bank 
 of which sloped almost precipitously down towards 
 it, but was covered with grass. The terrace was 
 some three hundred feet above the river, and faced 
 another similar one, which was from a mile and 
 a half to two miles distant. At the bottom of this 
 huge yawning chasm, rolled the mighty river, and 
 I shuddered at the thought of having to cross and 
 recross it. For it was angry, muddy, evidently in 
 heavy fresh, and filled bank and bank for nearly a 
 mile with a flood of seething waters. 
 
 I followed along the northern edge of the ter- 
 race, till I reached the last accommodation house 
 that could be said to be on the plains — which, by 
 the way, were here some eight or nine hundred 
 feet above sea level. When I reached this house, 
 I was glad to learn that the river was not likely 
 
 307 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 to remain high for more than a day or two, and 
 that if what was called a Southerly Burster came 
 up, as it might be expected to do at any moment, 
 it would be quite low again before three days were 
 over. 
 
 At this house I stayed the night, and in the 
 course of the evening a stray dog — a retriever, 
 hardly full grown, and evidently very much down 
 on his luck — took up with me ; when I inquired 
 about him, and asked if I might take him with me, 
 the landlord said he wished I would, for he knew 
 nothing about him and was trying to drive him 
 from the house. Knowing what a boon the com- 
 panionship of this poor beast would be to me 
 when I was camping out alone, I encouraged 
 him, and next morning he followed me as a matter 
 of course. 
 
 In the night the Southerly Burster which my host 
 
 anticipated had come up, cold and blustering, but 
 
 invigorating after the hot, dry, wind that had been 
 
 blowing hard during the daytime as I had crossed 
 
 the plains. A mile or two higher up I passed a large 
 
 sheep-station, but did not stay there. One or two 
 
 men looked at me with surprise, and asked me 
 
 where I was going, whereon I said I was in search 
 
 of rare plants and birds for the Museum of the 
 
 town at which I had slept the night after my arrival. 
 
 This satisfied their curiosity, and I ambled on 
 
 accompanied by the dog. In passing I may say 
 
 that I found Doctor not to excel at any pace except 
 
 an amble, but for a long journey, especially for one 
 
 308 
 
I Meet George 
 
 who is carrying a heavy, awkward load, there is no 
 pace so comfortable ; and he ambled fairly fast. 
 
 I followed the horse track which had been* cut 
 through the gorge, and in many places I disliked it 
 extremely, for the river, still in fresh, was raging 
 furiously; twice, for some few yards, where & the 
 gorge was wider and the stream less rapid, it 
 covered the track, and I had no confidence that it 
 might not have washed it away ; on these occasions 
 Doctor pricked his ears towards the water, and 
 was evidently thinking exactly what his rider' was. 
 He decided, however, that all would be sound, and 
 took to the water without any urging on my part. 
 Seeing his opinion, I remembered my father's 
 advice, and let him do what he liked, but in one 
 place for three or four yards the water came nearly 
 up to his belly, and I was in great fear for the 
 watches that were in my saddle-bags. As for the 
 dog, I feared I had lost him, but after a time he re- 
 joined me, though how he contrived to do so I 
 cannot say. 
 
 Nothing could be grander than the sight of this 
 great river pent into a narrow compass, and occa- 
 sionally becoming more like an immense waterfall 
 than a river, but I was in continual fear of coming 
 to more places where the water would be over the 
 track, and perhaps of finding myself unable to get 
 any farther. I therefore failed to enjoy what 
 was really far the most impressive sight in its way 
 that I had ever seen. "Give me," I said to myself 
 " the Thames at Richmond," and right thankful was 
 
 309 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 I, when at about two o'clock I found that I was 
 through the gorge and in a wide valley, the greater 
 part of which, however, was still covered by the 
 river. It was here that I heard for the first time 
 the curious sound of boulders knocking against 
 each other underneath the great body of water that 
 kept rolling them round and round. 
 
 I now halted, and lit a fire, for there was much 
 dead scrub standing that had remained after the 
 ground had been burned for the first time some 
 years previously. I made myself some tea, and 
 turned Doctor out for a couple of hours to feed. I 
 did not hobble him, for my father had told me 
 that he would always come for bread. When I had 
 dined, and smoked, and slept for a couple of hours 
 or so, I reloaded Doctor and resumed my journey 
 towards the shepherd's hut, which I caught sight 
 of about a mile before I reached it. When nearly 
 half a mile off it, I dismounted, and made a written 
 note of the exact spot at which I did so. I then 
 turned for a couple of hundred yards to my right, 
 at right angles to the track, where some huge rocks 
 were lying — fallen ages since from the mountain 
 that flanked this side of the valley. Here I de- 
 posited my knapsack in a hollow underneath some 
 of the rocks, and put a good sized stone in front of 
 it, for I meant spending a couple of days with the 
 shepherd to let the river go down. Moreover, as it 
 was now only December 3, I had too much time on 
 my hands, but I had not dared to cut things finer. 
 
 I reached the hut at about six o'clock, and intro- 
 310 
 
I Meet George 
 
 duced myself to the shepherd, who was a nice, 
 kind old man, commonly called Harris, but his real 
 name he told me was Horace — Horace Taylor. I 
 had the conversation with him of which I have 
 already told the reader, adding that my father had 
 been unable to give a coherent account of what 
 he had seen, and that I had been sent to get the 
 information he had failed to furnish. 
 
 The old man said that I must certainly wait a 
 couple of days before I went higher up the river. 
 He had made himself a nice garden, in which he 
 took the greatest pride, and which supplied him 
 with plenty of vegetables. He was very glad to 
 have company, and to receive the newspapers 
 which I had taken care to bring him. He had a 
 real genius for simple cookery, and fed me excel- 
 lently. My father's £$, and the ration of brandy 
 which I nightly gave him, made me a welcome 
 guest, and though I was longing to be at any rate 
 as far as the foot of the pass into Erewhon, I 
 amused myself very well in an abundance of ways 
 with which I need not trouble the reader. 
 
 One of the first things that Harris said to me 
 was, " I wish I knew what your father did with the 
 nice red blanket he had with him when he went 
 up the river. He had none when he came down 
 again ; I have no horse here, but I borrowed one 
 from a man who came up one day from down 
 below, and rode to a place where I found what I 
 am sure were the ashes of the last fire he made, but 
 I could find neither the blanket nor the billy and 
 
 3" 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 pannikin he took away with him. He said he sup- 
 posed he must have left the things there, but he 
 could remember nothing about it." 
 
 " I am afraid," said I, " that I cannot help you." 
 
 " At any rate," continued the shepherd, " I did 
 not have my ride for nothing, for as I was coming 
 back I found this rug half covered with sand on the 
 river-bed." 
 
 As he spoke he pointed to an excellent warm 
 rug, on the spare bunk in his hut. " It is none of 
 our make," said he ; "I suppose some foreign 
 digger has come over from the next river down 
 south and got drowned, for it had not been very 
 long where I found it, at least I think not, for it 
 was not much fly-blown, and no one had passed 
 here to go up the river since your father." 
 
 I knew what it was, but I held my tongue beyond 
 saying that the rug was a very good one. 
 
 The next day, December 4, was lovely, after a 
 night that had been clear and cold, with frost to- 
 wards early morning. When the shepherd had 
 gone for some three hours in the forenoon to see 
 his sheep (that were now lambing), I walked down 
 to the place where I had left my knapsack, and 
 carried it a good mile above the hut, where I again 
 hid it. I could see the great range from one place, 
 and the thick new fallen snow assured me that the 
 river would be quite normal shortly. Indeed, by 
 evening it was hardly at all discoloured, but I waited 
 another day, and set out on the morning of Sunday, 
 
 December 6. The river was now almost as low as 
 
 312 
 
I Meet George 
 
 in winter, and Harris assured me that if I used my 
 eyes I could not miss finding a ford over one stream 
 or another every half mile or so. I had the greatest 
 difficulty in preventing him from accompanying 
 me on foot for some little distance, but I got rid of 
 him in the end ; he came with me beyond the place 
 where I had hidden my knapsack, but when he had 
 left me long enough, I rode back and got it. 
 
 I see I am dwelling too long upon my own small 
 adventures. Suffice it that, accompanied by my 
 dog, I followed the north bank of the river till I 
 found I must cross one stream before I could get 
 any farther. This place would not do, and I had 
 to ride half a mile back before I found one that 
 seemed as if it might be safe. I fancy my father 
 must have done just the same thing, for Doctor 
 seemed to know the ground, and took to the water 
 the moment I brought him to it. It never reached 
 his belly, but I confess I did not like it. By and 
 by I had to recross, and so on, off and on, till at 
 noon I camped for dinner. Here the dog found 
 me a nest of young ducks, nearly fledged, from 
 which the parent birds tried with great success to 
 decoy me. I fully thought I was going to catch 
 them, but the dog knew better and made straight 
 for the nest, from which he returned immediately 
 with a fine young duck in his mouth, which he laid 
 at my feet, wagging his tail and barking. I took 
 another from the nest and left two for the old 
 birds. 
 
 The afternoon was much as the morning and 
 313 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 towards seven I reached a place which suggested 
 itself as a good camping ground. I had hardly 
 fixed on it and halted, before I saw a few pieces of 
 charred wood, and felt sure that my father must 
 have camped at this very place before me. I 
 hobbled Doctor, unloaded, plucked and singed a 
 duck, and gave the dog some of the meat with 
 which Harris had furnished me ; I made tea, laid 
 my duck on the embers till it was cooked, smoked, 
 gave myself a nightcap of brandy and water, and 
 by and by rolled myself round in my blanket, with 
 the dog curled up beside me. I will not dwell 
 upon the strangeness of my feelings — nor the ex- 
 treme beauty of the night. But for the dog, and 
 Doctor, I should have been frightened, but I knew 
 that there were no savage creatures or venomous 
 snakes in the country, and both the dog and Doctor 
 were such good companionable creatures, that I 
 did not feel so much oppressed by the solitude as I 
 had feared I should be. But the night was cold, 
 and my blanket was not enough to keep me com- 
 fortably warm. 
 
 The following day was delightfully warm as soon 
 as the sun got to the bottom of the valley, and the 
 fresh fallen snow disappeared so fast from the 
 snowy range that I was afraid it would raise the 
 river — which, indeed, rose in the afternoon and 
 became slightly discoloured, but it cannot have 
 been more than three or four inches deeper, for it 
 never reached the bottom of my saddle-bags. I 
 believe Doctor knew exactly where I was going, 
 
 314 
 
I Meet George 
 
 for he wanted no guidance. I halted again at mid- 
 day, got two more ducks, crossed and recrossed 
 the river, or some of its streams, several times, and 
 at about six, caught sight, after a bend in the valley, 
 of the glacier descending on to the river-bed. This 
 I knew to be close to the point at which I was to 
 camp for the night, and from which I was to ascend 
 the mountain. After another hour's slow progress 
 over the increasing roughness of the river-bed, I saw 
 the triangular delta of which my father had told 
 me, and the stream that had formed it, bounding 
 down the mountain side. Doctor went right up to 
 the place where my father's fire had been, and I 
 again found many pieces of charred wood and 
 ashes. 
 
 As soon as I had unloaded Doctor and hobbled 
 him, I went to a tree hard by, on which I could see 
 the mark of a blaze, and towards which I thought 
 I could see a line of wood ashes running. There I 
 found a hole in which some bird had evidently 
 been wont to build, and surmised correctly that it 
 must be the one in which my father had hidden his 
 box of sovereigns. There was no box in the hole 
 now, and I began to feel that I was at last within 
 measureable distance of Erewhon and the Ere- 
 whonians. 
 
 I camped for the night here, and again found my 
 single blanket insufficient. The next day, i.e. Tues- 
 day, December 8, 1 had to pass as I best could, and it 
 occurred to me that as I should find the gold a great 
 weight, I had better take it some three hours up the 
 
 3i5 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 mountain side and leave it there, so as to make 
 the following day less fatiguing, and this I did, 
 returning to my camp for dinner ; but I was panic- 
 stricken all the rest of the day lest I should not have 
 hidden it safely, or lest I should be unable to find 
 it next day — conjuring up a hundred absurd fancies 
 as to what might befall it. And after all, heavy 
 though it was, I could have carried it all the way. 
 In the afternoon I saddled Doctor and rode him up 
 to the glaciers, which were indeed magnificent, and 
 then I made the few notes of my journey from which 
 this chapter has been taken. I made excuses for 
 turning in early, and at daybreak rekindled my fire 
 and got my breakfast. All the time the companion- 
 ship of the dog was an unspeakable comfort to me. 
 It was now the day my father had fixed for my 
 meeting with George, and my excitement (with 
 which I have not yet troubled the reader, though 
 it had been consuming me ever since I had left 
 Harris's hut) was beyond all bounds, so much so 
 that I almost feared I was in a fever which would 
 prevent my completing the little that remained of 
 my task ; in fact, I was in as great a panic as I had 
 been about the gold that I had left. My hands 
 trembled as I took the watches, and the brooches 
 for Yram and her daughters from my saddle-bags, 
 which I then hung, probably on the very bough on 
 which my father had hung them. Needless to say, 
 I also hung my saddle and bridle along with the 
 saddle-bags. 
 
 It was nearly seven before I started, and about ten 
 316 
 
I Meet George 
 
 before I reached the hiding-place of my knapsack. 
 I found it, of course, quite easily, shouldered it, 
 and toiled on towards the statues. At a quarter 
 before twelve I reached them, and almost beside 
 myself as I was, could not refrain from some dis- 
 appointment at finding them a good deal smaller 
 than I expected. My father, correcting the measure- 
 ment he had given in his book, said he thought 
 that they were about four or five times the size of 
 life ; but really I do not think they were more than 
 twenty feet high, any one of them. In other re- 
 spects my father's description of them is quite 
 accurate. There was no wind, and as a matter 
 of course, therefore, they were not chanting. I 
 wiled away the quarter of an hour before the time 
 when George became due, with wondering at them, 
 and in a way admiring them, hideous though they 
 were ; but all the time I kept looking towards the 
 part from which George should come. 
 
 At last my watch pointed to noon, but there 
 was no George. A quarter past twelve, but no 
 George. Half-past, still no George. One o'clock, 
 and all the quarters till three o'clock, but still 
 no George. I tried to eat some of the ship's 
 biscuits I had brought with me, but I could not. 
 My disappointment was now as great as my excite- 
 ment had been all the forenoon ; at three o'clock 
 I fairly cried, and for half an hour could only fling 
 myself on the ground and give way to all the un- 
 reasonable spleen that extreme vexation could sug- 
 gest. True, I kept telling myself that for aught 
 
 317 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 I knew George might be dead, or down with a 
 fever ; but this would not do ; for in this last 
 case he should have sent one of his brothers to 
 meet me, and it was not likely that he was dead. 
 I am afraid I thought it most probable that he 
 had been casual — of which unworthy suspicion I 
 have long since been heartily ashamed. 
 
 I put the brooches inside my knapsack, and hid 
 it in a place where I was sure no one would find 
 it ; then, with a heavy heart, I trudged down again 
 to my camp — broken in spirit, and hopeless for the 
 morrow. 
 
 I camped again, but it was some hours before 
 I got a wink of sleep ; and when sleep came it 
 was accompanied by a strange dream. I dreamed 
 that I was by my father's bedside, watching his 
 last flicker of intelligence, and vainly trying to catch 
 the words that he was not less vainly trying to 
 utter. All of a sudden the bed seemed to be at 
 my camping ground, and the largest of the statues 
 appeared, quite small, high up the mountain side, 
 but striding down like a giant in seven league boots 
 till it stood over me and my father, and shouted out 
 "Leap, John, leap." In the horror of this vision 
 I woke with a loud cry that woke my dog also, 
 and made him shew such evident signs of fear, 
 that it seemed to me as though he too must have 
 shared my dream. 
 
 Shivering with cold I started up in a frenzy, but 
 there was nothing, save a night of such singular 
 beauty that I did not even try to go to sleep again. 
 
 318 
 
I Meet George 
 
 Naturally enough, on trying to keep awake I dropped 
 asleep before many minutes were over. 
 
 In the morning I again climbed up to the statues, 
 without, to my surprise, being depressed with the 
 idea that George would again fail to meet me. On 
 the contrary, without rhyme or reason, I had a 
 strong presentiment that he would come. And 
 sure enough, as soon as I caught sight of the 
 statues, which I did about a quarter to twelve, I 
 saw a youth coming towards me, with a quick 
 step, and a beaming face that had only to be seen 
 to be fallen in love with. 
 
 "You are my brother," said he to me. " Is my 
 father with you ? " 
 
 I pointed to the crape on my arm, and to the 
 ground, but said nothing. 
 
 He understood me, and bared his head. Then 
 he flung his arms about me and kissed my fore- 
 head according to Erewhonian custom. I was a 
 little surprised at his saying nothing to me about 
 the way in which he had disappointed me on the 
 preceding day ; I resolved, however, to wait for 
 the explanation that I felt sure he would give me 
 presently. 
 
 319 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 GEORGE AND I SPEND A FEW HOURS TOGETHER 
 AT THE STATUES, AND THEN PART — I REACH 
 HOME — POSTSCRIPT 
 
 I HAVE said on an earlier page that George gained 
 an immediate ascendancy over me, but ascendancy 
 is not the word — he took me by storm ; how, or 
 why, I neither know nor want to know, but before 
 I had been with him more than a few minutes I 
 felt as though I had known and loved him all my 
 life. And the dog fawned upon him as though he 
 felt just as I did. 
 
 " Come to the statues," said he, as soon as he 
 had somewhat recovered from the shock of the 
 news I had given him. " We can sit down there on 
 the very stone on which our father and I sat a year 
 ago. I have brought a basket, which my mother 
 packed for — for — him and me. Did he talk to you 
 about me ? " 
 
 " He talked of nothing so much, and he thought 
 of nothing so much. He had your boots put 
 where he could see them from his bed until he 
 died." 
 
 Then followed the explanation about these boots, 
 
 of which the reader has already been told. This 
 
 320 
 
Conclusion 
 
 made us both laugh, and from that moment we 
 were cheerful. 
 
 I say nothing about our enjoyment of the 
 luncheon with which Yram had provided us, and 
 if I were to detail all that I told George about 
 my father, and all the additional information that 
 I got from him — (many a point did he clear up for 
 me that I had not fully understood) — I should fill 
 several chapters, whereas I have left myself only 
 one. Luncheon being over I said — 
 
 "And are you married ?" 
 
 "Yes" (with a blush), "and are you ?" 
 
 I could not blush. Why should I ? And yet 
 young people — especially the most ingenuous 
 among them — are apt to flush up on being asked 
 if they are, or are going, to be married. If I could 
 have blushed, I would. As it was I could only say 
 that I was engaged and should marry as soon as I 
 got back. 
 
 "Then you have come all this way for me, when 
 you were wanting to get married ? " 
 
 " Of course I have. My father on his death-bed 
 told me to do so, and to bring you something that 
 I have brought you." 
 
 "What trouble I have given ! How can I thank 
 you ? " 
 
 " Shake hands with me." 
 
 Whereon he gave my hand a stronger grip than 
 I had quite bargained for. 
 
 "And now," said I, "before I tell you what I 
 
 have brought, you must promise me to accept it. 
 
 321 x 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 Your father said I was not to leave you till you had 
 done so, and I was to say that he sent it with his 
 dying blessing." 
 
 After due demur George gave his promise, and 
 I took him to the place where I had hidden my 
 knapsack. 
 
 " I brought it up yesterday," said I. 
 
 " Yesterday ? but why ? " 
 
 " Because yesterday — was it not ? — was the first 
 of the two days agreed upon between you and our 
 father ? " 
 
 "No — surely to-day is the first day — I was to 
 come XXI. i. 3, which would be your December 9." 
 
 " But yesterday was December 9 with us — to-day 
 is December 10." 
 
 " Strange ! What day of the week do you make 
 it?" 
 
 "To-day is Thursday, December 10." 
 
 " This is still stranger — we make it Wednesday ; 
 yesterday was Tuesday." 
 
 Then I saw it. The year XX. had been a leap 
 year with the Erewhonians, and 1891 in England 
 had not. This, then, was what had crossed my 
 father's brain in his dying hours, and what he had 
 vainly tried to tell me. It was also what my un- 
 conscious self had been struggling to tell my con- 
 scious one, during the past night, but which my 
 conscious self had been too stupid to understand. 
 And yet my conscious self had caught it in an 
 imperfect sort of a way after all, for from the 
 
 moment that my dream had left me I had been 
 
 322 
 
Conclusion 
 
 composed, and easy in my mind that all would be 
 well. I wish some one would write a book about 
 dreams and parthenogenesis — for that the two are 
 part and parcel of the same story — a brood of folly 
 without father bred — I cannot doubt. 
 
 I did not trouble George with any of this rubbish, 
 but only shewed him how the mistake had arisen. 
 When we had laughed sufficiently over my mistake 
 — for it was I who had come up on the wrong day, 
 not he — I fished my knapsack out of its hiding- 
 place. 
 
 " Do not unpack it," said I, " beyond taking out 
 the brooches, or you will not be able to pack it so 
 well ; but you can see the ends of the bars of gold, 
 and you can feel the weight ; my father sent them 
 for you. The pearl brooch is for your mother, the 
 smaller brooches are for your sisters, and your 
 wife." 
 
 I then told him how much gold there was, and 
 from my pockets brought out the watches and the 
 English knife. 
 
 "This last," I said, "is the only thing that I am 
 giving you ; the rest is all from our father. I have 
 many many times as much gold myself, and this is 
 legally your property as much as mine is mine." 
 
 George was aghast, but he was powerless alike to 
 express his feelings, or to refuse the gold. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that my father left me this 
 by his will ? " 
 
 "Certainly he did," said I, inventing a pious 
 fraud. 
 
 323 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 " It is all against my oath," said he, looking grave. 
 
 "Your oath be hanged," said I. "You must give 
 the gold to the Mayor, who knows that it was 
 coming, and it will appear to the world, as though 
 he were giving it you now instead of leaving you 
 anything." 
 
 " But it is ever so much too much ! " 
 
 " It is not half enough. You and the Mayor 
 must settle all that between you. He and our 
 father talked it all over, and this was what they 
 settled." 
 
 " And our father planned all this, without saying 
 a word to me about it while we were on our way 
 up here ? " 
 
 " Yes. There might have been some hitch in the 
 gold's coming. Besides the Mayor told him not 
 to tell you." 
 
 "And he never said anything about the other 
 money he left for me — which enabled me to marry 
 at once ? Why was this ? " 
 
 "Your mother said he was not to do so." 
 
 " Bless my heart, how they have duped me all 
 round. But why would not my mother let your 
 father tell me ? Oh yes — she was afraid I should 
 tell the King about it, as I certainly should, when I 
 told him all the rest." 
 
 "Tell the King?" said I, "what have you been 
 telling the King ? " 
 
 " Everything ; except about the nuggets and the 
 
 sovereigns, of which I knew nothing ; and I have 
 
 felt myself a blackguard ever since for not telling 
 
 324 
 
Conclusion 
 
 him about these when he came up here last 
 autumn — but I let the Mayor and my mother talk 
 me over, as I am afraid they will do again." 
 
 " When did you tell the King ? " 
 
 Then followed all the details that I have told in 
 the latter part of Chapter XXI. When I asked how 
 the King took the confession, George said — 
 
 " He was so much flattered at being treated like 
 a reasonable being, and Dr. Downie, who was chief 
 spokesman, played his part so discreetly, without 
 attempting to obscure even the most compromising 
 issues, that though his Majesty made some show of 
 displeasure at first, it was plain that he was heartily 
 enjoying the whole story. 
 
 " Dr. Downie shewed very well. He took on 
 himself the onus of having advised our action, and 
 he gave me all the credit of having proposed that 
 we should make a clean breast of everything. 
 
 " The King, too, behaved with truly royal polite- 
 ness ; he was on the point of asking why I had not 
 taken our father to the Blue Pool at once, and flung 
 him into it on the Sunday afternoon, when some- 
 thing seemed to strike him : he gave me a search- 
 ing look, on which he said in an undertone, 'Oh 
 yes,' and did not go on with his question. He 
 never blamed me for anything, and when I begged 
 him to accept my resignation of the Rangership, 
 he said — 
 
 " ' No. Stay where you are till I lose confidence 
 in you, which will not, I think, be very soon. I 
 will come and have a few days' shooting about the 
 
 325 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 middle of March, and if I have good sport I shall 
 order your salary to be increased. If any more 
 foreign devils come over, do not Blue-Pool them ; 
 send them down to me, and I will see what I think 
 of them ; I am much disposed to encourage a few 
 of them to settle here.' 
 
 " I am sure," continued George, " that he said 
 this because he knew I was half a foreign devil 
 myself. Indeed he won my heart not only by the 
 delicacy of his consideration, but by the obvious 
 good will he bore me. I do not know what he did 
 with the nuggets, but he gave orders that the 
 blanket and the rest of my father's kit should be 
 put in the great Erewhonian Museum. As regards 
 my father's receipt, and the Professors' two depo- 
 sitions, he said he would have them carefully pre- 
 served in his secret archives. ' A document,' he 
 said somewhat enigmatically, ' is a document — but, 
 Professor Hanky, you can have this' — and as he 
 spoke he handed him back his pocket-handker- 
 chief. 
 
 " Hanky during the whole interview was furious, 
 
 at having to play so undignified a part, but even 
 
 more so, because the King while he paid marked 
 
 attention to Dr. Downie, and even to myself, 
 
 treated him with amused disdain. Nevertheless, 
 
 angry though he was, he was impenitent, unabashed, 
 
 and brazened it out at Bridgeford, that the King 
 
 had received him with open arms, and had snubbed 
 
 Dr. Downie and myself. But for his (Hanky's) 
 
 intercession, I should have been dismissed then 
 
 326 
 
Conclusion 
 
 and there from the Rangership. And so forth. 
 Panky never opened his mouth. 
 
 " Returning to the King, his Majesty said to Dr. 
 Dovvnie, ' I am afraid I shall not be able to canonize 
 any of you gentlemen just yet. We must let this 
 affair blow over. Indeed I am in half a mind to 
 have this Sunchild bubble pricked ; I never liked it, 
 and am getting tired of it ; you Musical Bank gen- 
 tlemen are overdoing it. I will talk it over with her 
 Majesty. As for Professor Hanky, I do not see 
 how I can keep one who has been so successfully 
 hoodwinked, as my Professor of Worldly Wisdom ; 
 but I will consult her Majesty about this point also. 
 Perhaps I can find another post for him. If I 
 decide on having Sunchildism pricked, he shall 
 apply the pin. You may go.' 
 
 " And glad enough," said George, "we all of us 
 were to do so." 
 
 "But did he," I asked, "try to prick the bubble 
 of Sunchildism ? " 
 
 " Oh no. As soon as he said he would talk it 
 over with her Majesty, I knew the whole thing 
 would end in smoke, as indeed to all outward 
 appearance it shortly did ; for Dr. Downie advised 
 him not to be in too great a hurry, and whatever he 
 did to do it gradually. He therefore took no further 
 action than to show marked favour to practical 
 engineers and mechanicians. Moreover he started 
 an aeronautical society, which made Bridgeford 
 furious ; but so far, I am afraid it has done us no 
 good, for the first ascent was disastrous, involving 
 
 327 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 the death of the poor fellow who made it, and since 
 then no one has ventured to ascend. I am afraid 
 we do not get on very fast." 
 
 " Did the King," I asked, " increase your salary ? " 
 
 "Yes. He doubled it." 
 
 " And what do they say in Sunch'ston about our 
 father's second visit ? " 
 
 George laughed, and shewed me the newspaper 
 extract which I have already given. I asked who 
 wrote it. 
 
 " I did," said he, with a demure smile ; " I wrote 
 it at night after I returned home, and before start- 
 ing for the capital next morning. I called myself 
 ' the deservedly popular Ranger/ to avert suspicion. 
 No one found me out ; you can keep the extract ; 
 I brought it here on purpose." 
 
 " It does you great credit. Was there ever any 
 lunatic, and was he found ?" 
 
 "Oh yes. That part was true, except that he 
 had never been up our way." 
 
 " Then the poacher is still at large ? " 
 
 " It is to be feared so." 
 
 "And were Dr. Downie and the Professors 
 canonized after all." 
 
 " Not yet ; but the Professors will be next month 
 — for Hanky is still Professor. Dr. Downie backed 
 out of it. He said it was enough to be a Sun- 
 childist without being a Sunchild Saint. He wor- 
 ships the jumping cat as much as the others, but 
 he keeps his eye better on the cat, and sees sooner 
 
 both when it will jump, and where it will jump to. 
 
 328 
 
Conclusion 
 
 Then, without disturbing any one, he insinuates 
 himself into the place which will be best when the 
 jump is over. Some say that the cat knows him and 
 follows him ; at all events when he makes a move the 
 cat generally jumps towards him soon afterwards." 
 
 " You give him a very high character." 
 
 "Yes, but I have my doubts about his doing 
 much in this matter ; he is getting old, and Hanky 
 burrows like a mole night and day. There is no 
 knowing how it will all end." 
 
 "And the people at Sunch'ston ? Has it got well 
 about among them, in spite of your admirable 
 article, that it was the Sunchild himself who inter- 
 rupted Hanky ? " 
 
 " It has, and it has not. Many of us know the 
 truth, but a story came down from Bridgeford that 
 it was an evil spirit who had assumed the Sun- 
 child's form, intending to make people sceptical 
 about Sunchildism ; Hanky and Panky cowed this 
 spirit, otherwise it would never have recanted. 
 Many people swallow this." 
 
 " But Hanky and Panky swore that they knew 
 the man." 
 
 "That does not matter." 
 
 "And now please, how long have you been 
 married ?" 
 
 "About ten months." 
 
 "Any family ? " 
 
 "One boy about a fortnight old. Do come 
 down to Sunch'ston and see him — he is your own 
 nephew. You speak Erewhonian so perfectly that 
 
 329 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 no human being would suspect you were a foreigner, 
 and you look one of us from head to foot. I can 
 smuggle you through quite easily, and my mother 
 would so like to see you." 
 
 I should dearly have liked to have gone, but it 
 was out of the question. I had nothing with me 
 but the clothes I stood in ; moreover I was longing 
 to be back in England, and when once I was in 
 Erewhon there was no knowing when I should be 
 able to get away again ; but George fought hard 
 before he gave in. 
 
 It was now nearing the time when this strange 
 
 meeting between two brothers — as strange a one 
 
 as the statues can ever have looked down upon — 
 
 must come to an end. I shewed George what the 
 
 repeater would do, and what it would expect of its 
 
 possessor. I gave him six good photographs, of 
 
 my father and myself — three of each. He had 
 
 never seen a photograph, and could hardly believe 
 
 his eyes as he looked at those I shewed him. I 
 
 also gave him three envelopes addressed to myself, 
 
 care of Alfred Emery Cathie, Esq., 15 Clifford's 
 
 Inn, London, and implored him to write to me if 
 
 he could ever find means of getting a letter over 
 
 the range as far as the shepherd's hut. At this he 
 
 shook his head, but he promised to write if he 
 
 could. I also told him that I had written a full 
 
 account of my father's second visit to Erewhon, 
 
 but that it should never be published till I heard 
 
 from him — at which he again shook his head, but 
 
 added, " And yet who can tell ? For the King 
 
 330 
 
Conclusion 
 
 may have the country opened up to foreigners 
 some day after all." 
 
 Then he thanked me a thousand times over, 
 shouldered the knapsack, embraced me as he had 
 my father, and caressed the dog, embraced me 
 again, and made no attempt to hide the tears that 
 ran down his cheeks. 
 
 "There," he said ; " I shall wait here till you are 
 out of sight." 
 
 I turned away, and did not look back till I reached 
 the place at which I knew that I should lose the 
 statues. I then turned round, waved my hand — as 
 also did George, and went down the mountain side, 
 full of sad thoughts, but thankful that my task had 
 been so happily accomplished, and aware that my 
 life henceforward had been enriched by something 
 that I could never lose. 
 
 For I had never seen, and felt as though I never 
 could see, George's equal. His absolute uncon- 
 sciousness of self, the unhesitating way in which he 
 took me to his heart, his fearless frankness, the 
 happy genial expression that played on his face, 
 and the extreme sweetness of his smile — these were 
 the things that made me say to myself that the 
 "blazon of beauty's best" could tell me nothing 
 better than what I had found and lost within the 
 last three hours. How small, too, I felt by com- 
 parison ! If for no other cause, yet for this, that I, 
 who had wept so bitterly over my own disappoint- 
 ment the day before, could meet this dear fellow's 
 tears with no tear of my own. 
 
 33i 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 But let this pass. I got back to Harris's hut with- 
 out adventure. When there, in the course of the 
 evening, I told Harris that I had a fancy for the rug 
 he had found on the river-bed, and that if he would 
 let me have it, I would give him my red one and ten 
 shillings to boot. The exchange was so obviously 
 to his advantage that he made no demur, and next 
 morning I strapped Yram's rug on to my horse, 
 and took it gladly home to England, where I keep 
 it on my own bed next to the counterpane, so that 
 with care it may last me out my life. I wanted him 
 to take the dog and make a home for him, but he 
 had two collies already, and said that a retriever 
 would be of no use to him. So I took the poor 
 beast on with me to the port, where I was glad to 
 find that Mr. Baker liked him and accepted him 
 from me, though he was not mine to give. He had 
 been such an unspeakable comfort to me when I 
 was alone, that he would have haunted me unless 
 I had been able to provide for him where I knew 
 he would be well cared for. As for Doctor, I was 
 sorry to leave him, but I knew he was in good 
 hands. 
 
 " I see you have not brought your knapsack back, 
 sir," said Mr. Baker. 
 
 " No," said I, " and very thankful was I when I had 
 handed it over to those for whom it was intended." 
 
 " I have no doubt you were, sir, for I could see it 
 was a desperate heavy load for you." 
 
 " Indeed it was." But at this point I brought the 
 
 discussion to a close. 
 
 332 
 
Postscript 
 
 Two days later I sailed, and reached home early 
 in February 1892. I was married three weeks later, 
 and when the honeymoon was over, set about 
 making the necessary, and some, I fear, unnecessary 
 additions to this book — by far the greater part of 
 which had been written, as I have already said, 
 many months earlier. I now leave it, at any rate 
 for the present, April 22, 1892. 
 
 Postscript. — On the last day of November 1900, I 
 received a letter addressed in Mr. Alfred Cathie's 
 familiar handwriting, and on opening it found that 
 it contained another, addressed to me in my own, 
 and unstamped. For the moment I was puzzled, 
 but immediately knew that it must be from George. 
 I tore it open, and found eight closely written pages, 
 which I devoured as I have seldom indeed devoured 
 so long a letter. It was dated XXIX. vii. 1, and, as 
 nearly as I can translate it was as follows ; — 
 
 " Twice, my dearest brother, have I written to 
 you, and twice in successive days in successive 
 years, have I been up to the statues on the chance 
 that you could meet me, as I proposed in my letters. 
 Do not think I went all the way back to Sunch'ston 
 — there is a ranger's shelter now only an hour and 
 a half below the statues, and here I passed the 
 night. I knew you had got neither of my letters, 
 for if you had got them and could not come your- 
 self, you would have sent some one whom you could 
 
 333 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 trust with a letter. I know you would, though I 
 do not know how you would have contrived to 
 do it. 
 
 " I sent both letters through Bishop Kahabuka 
 (or, as his inferior clergy call him, 'Chowbok'), 
 head of the Christian Mission to Erewhemos, 
 which, as your father has doubtless told you, is 
 the country adjoining Erewhon, but inhabited by 
 a coloured race having no affinity with our own. 
 Bishop Kahabuka has penetrated at times into 
 Erewhon, and the King, wishing to be on good 
 terms with his neighbours, has permitted him to 
 establish two or three mission stations in the 
 western parts of Erewhon. Among the mission- 
 aries are some few of your own countrymen. 
 None of us like them, but one of them is teaching 
 me English, which I find quite easy. 
 
 "As I wrote in the letters that have never 
 reached you, I am no longer Ranger. The King, 
 after some few years (in the course of which I 
 told him of your visit, and what you had brought 
 me), declared that I was the only one of his ser- 
 vants whom he could trust, and found high office 
 for me, which kept me in close confidential com- 
 munication with himself. 
 
 "About three years ago, on the death of his 
 Prime Minister, he appointed me to fill his place ; 
 and it was on this, that so many possibilities oc- 
 curred to me concerning which I dearly longed 
 for your opinion, that I wrote and asked you if 
 you could to meet me personally or by proxy at 
 
 334 
 
Postscript 
 
 the statues, which I could reach on the occasion 
 of my annual visit to my mother — yes — and father 
 — at Sunch'ston. 
 
 " I sent both letters by way of Erewhemos, con- 
 fiding them to Bishop Kahabuka, who is just such 
 another as St. Hanky. He tells me that our 
 father was a very old and dear friend of his — but 
 of course I did not say anything about his being 
 my own father. I only inquired about a Mr. 
 Higgs, who was now worshipped in Erewhon as 
 a supernatural being. The Bishop said it was, 
 " Oh, so very dreadful," and he felt it all the more 
 keenly, for the reason that he had himself been the 
 means of my father's going to Erewhon, by giving 
 him the information that enabled him to find the 
 pass over the range that bounded the country. 
 
 " I did not like the man, but I thought I could 
 trust him with a letter, which it now seems I 
 could not do. This third letter I have given him 
 with a promise of a hundred pounds in silver for 
 his new Cathedral, to be paid as soon as I get an 
 answer from you. 
 
 " We are all well at Sunch'ston ; so are my wife 
 and eight children — five sons and three daughters 
 — but the country is at sixes and sevens. St. 
 Panky is dead, but his son Pocus is worse. Dr. 
 Downie has become very lethargic. I can do less 
 against St. Hankyism than when I was a private 
 man. A little indiscretion on my part would 
 plunge the country in civil war. Our engineers 
 and so-called men of science are sturdily begging 
 
 335 
 
Erewhon Revisited 
 
 for endowments, and steadily claiming to have a 
 hand in every pie that is baked from one end of 
 the country to the other. The missionaries are 
 buying up all our silver, and a change in the 
 relative values of gold and silver is in progress of 
 which none of us foresee the end. 
 
 " The King and I both think that annexation by 
 England, or a British Protectorate, would be the 
 saving of us, for we have no army worth the name, 
 and if you do not take us over some one else soon 
 will. The King has urged me to send for you. If 
 you come (do ! do ! do !) you had better come by 
 way of Erewhemos, which is now in monthly com- 
 munication with Southampton. If you ;will write 
 me that you are coming I will meet you at the port, 
 and bring you with me to our own capital, where 
 the King will be overjoyed to see you." 
 
 The rest of the letter was filled with all sorts of 
 news which interested me, but would require 
 chapters of explanation before they could become 
 interesting to the reader. 
 
 The letter wound up : — 
 
 " You may publish now whatever you like, when- 
 ever you like. 
 
 ''Write to me by way of Erewhemos, care of the 
 Right Reverend the Lord Bishop, and say which 
 way you will come. If you prefer the old road, we 
 are bound to be in the neighbourhood of the 
 statues by the beginning of March. My next 
 brother is now Ranger, and could meet you at the 
 
 33 6 
 
Postscript 
 
 statues with permit and luncheon, and more of that 
 white wine than ever you will be able to drink. 
 Only let me know what you will do. 
 
 " I should tell you that the old railway which 
 used to run from Clearwater to the capital, and 
 which, as you know, was allowed to go to ruin, has 
 been reconstructed at an outlay far less than might 
 have been expected — for the bridges had been main- 
 tained for ordinary carriage traffic. The journey, 
 therefore, from Sunch'ston to the capital can now 
 be done in less than forty hours. On the whole, 
 however, I recommend you to come by way of 
 Erewhemos. If you start, as I think possible, with- 
 out writing from England, Bishop Kahabuka's 
 palace is only eight miles from the port, and he 
 will give you every information about your further 
 journey — a distance of less than a couple of hundred 
 miles. But I should prefer to meet you myself. 
 
 " My dearest brother, I charge you by the me- 
 mory of our common father, and even more by 
 that of those three hours that linked you to me for 
 ever, and which I would fain hope linked me also 
 to yourself — come over, if by any means you can 
 do so — come over and help us. 
 
 "George Strong." 
 
 " My dear," said I to my wife who was at the 
 other end of the breakfast table, " I shall have to 
 translate this letter to you, and then you will have 
 to help me to begin packing ; for I have none too 
 much time. I must see Alfred, and give him a 
 
 337 Y 
 
Postscript 
 
 power of attorney. He will arrange with some 
 publisher about my book, and you can correct the 
 press. Break the news gently to the children ; and 
 get along without me, my dear, for six months as 
 well as you can." 
 
 I write this at Southampton, from which port 
 I sail to-morrow — i.e. November 15, 1900 — for 
 Erewhemos. 
 
 THE END 
 
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