A PRETTY TALE.
“Then he related a tradition among his people, reciting that in the far distant past—at a time probably when the polar regions were rather temperate, and most of the human race were yet in barbarism—a small tribe of peacefully disposed people inhabited a fertile region in an open world, where the horizon stretched away alike in all directions.
Mr. T. E. Donne, Superintendent of Tourist and Health Resorts; Secretary of Department of Industry and Commerce; Secretary for New Zealand Commercial Intelligence Department of the British Board of Trade; Representative St. Louis Exposition. By his industry, ability and modest candour, and the merits of his “enterprise,” Mr. Donne is becoming one of the best known Tourist Agents on the globe, and he is one of the most competent and trusted of Sir Joseph Ward’s carefully selected staff.
“The chief of these amiable people was an attractive and commanding personality named Olif. This Olif had a most beautiful daughter, whose mother, while gathering flowers for her child, had been strangled by the orders of an envious and childless queen. The name of the daughter was Eurania, which means “Sunbeam.” But as she grew to womanhood she so strongly resembled her father, and was so constantly at his side, that the two beings seemed a double—but a single soul—and soon the people idolised the damsel under the name of Oliffa. Olif and Oliffa, the chief and his daughter, as guardian spirits, held supreme authority.
“At a great festival, in which many kindred tribes and nations met to celebrate an historic event, a grim chieftain of a warlike tribe became enamoured of Oliffa. He demanded her as one of his wives. Oliffa declined—there was a rush to arms, and many of Olif’s people were slain.
“The great King Oonah took sides with his warlike chief. Oliffa was taken by force, she was led to an altar in sight of her people, her ankles were loaded with fetters, her whole tribe were condemned to extinction, and preparations were being made for the general massacre. When the King, beholding Oliffa that she was stately, beautiful, and wise withal, said:
“‘Let not Olif and his tribe be slain, but banished—banished; for ‘tis not well that so goodly a people should perish from the earth. I have spoken.’
“But Olif and his followers gathered themselves together, and the warriors, joining in one defiant voice, answered:
“‘While we may not hope to resist the force of your savage chieftains who would expel us, we will fight here until we all die, under the gaze of Oliffa; and,’ said they in thunderous tones, ‘we have spoken.’
“Oliffa, heroic in her despair, raised herself to her full height, and, lifting her hands imploringly to the National Gods, in a clear and earnest voice that made the chieftain quail, said:
“‘No, my father and my people, die not, but live for Oliffa—save a remnant of the tribe of Olif. I am Oliffa—human virtue is greater than kings or death. Go to the north, dwell in the hollow of my hand, and, in the fulness of time, thou shalt return to embrace me.’ She had finished.
“With bowed head and in sorrow, Olif and his followers withdrew, and slowly wended their way towards the unknown regions of the north. But a party, with the angry chief Sawara, pursued, and coming to the verge of the land, Olif and his band took refuge on what seemed to be a small island. Here they repelled their pursuers, and soon they saw the channel that separated them from the mainland widen, and they thanked their deities for their deliverance.
“But, alas! they soon discovered that they were on an ice-floe, and were moving north toward the open sea. Provisions soon gave out, they prayed to their gods, they floated and suffered, and as the weaker perished, cannibalism was resorted to—for madness possessed the despairing party. Days and weeks passed, an impenetrable fog enveloped them, and they gave themselves up to utter hopelessness.
“However, soon the atmosphere became milder, the distant breakers were heard, the fog rose like a curtain, and behold! land was near. Nearer yet they floated. Night came, the full moon shone, but it moved not up from, but along the rim of the horizon. Morning came, bright and balmy. The floe had entered a strange harbor, and soon the shores were reached. It seemed a ‘goodly land’ with fertile soil and genial climate.
“‘But a remnant of the peaceful tribe of Olif,’ he said, ‘were saved—nine men, thirteen women and five children. They cut boughs and built an habitation, and they said: “This shall be our dwelling place. Our city shall be called Eurania, in honor of our lost one, and here we will tarry until we return to the goddess Oliffa.”’
“‘This country,’ said Oseba, ‘was Cavitorus. These people were the ancestors of my people, the Shadowas, and on the banks of a charming harbour they built the City of Eurania, the most beautiful to-day on this planet.’
“‘Through all the ages, from barbarism to the present,’ said Oseba, ‘there has been a lingering tale, a faint tradition among the people as related, and a vague idea that they dwelt in a shadow, in the hollow of a hand, and that some time in after ages, or in after life, they would return to an upper world, called in nursery tales and by the superstitious, Oliffa, where the inhabitants are called Outeroos—because they dwell on the outer world.’
Leo Bergin soliloquizes:—
“What astounding folly! and yet, I am on my way over the limitless fields of ice and snow and dead men’s bones, to this phantom city, Eurania. Courage! who knows, for—
‘There are more things in heaven, and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’”
“‘Well,’ said Oseba, ‘these few people were of an amiable race, and a common danger, and a common sorrow, had made them brethren. Then the animals of this country were many, strong, amiable, and easily tamed; the mountains were accessible, the climate genial, and the soil so fruitful that there was nothing to suggest savagery. All nature smiled, and man progressed peacefully.’
“‘The people,’ he continued, ‘increased, they were prosperous and happy. They had no foes—so war was unknown. The animals of the chase were tamed, and agriculture became an early occupation.’
“Traditions had been broken; back of the people there were but dead walls. Interminable ice and snow, as well as time, separated them from the past. With prosperous industry the population increased. Colonies were planted along the interior sea shores, and commerce was developed. There were no despots to despoil, no superstition to blight, no wars to devastate, no idleness to waste, and wealth, such as the Outeroos never dreamed of, followed as a result.
“The lands were held for the people, but the lands were limited, and as the centuries came and went, and went and came, the population became very dense. Civilisation and Science had come, but the population began to press upon the means of subsistence. Opulent nations arose, accumulated wealth was great, but room was becoming scarce. For a time, inventive genius helped to solve the problem, but the sorrows multiplied as the struggle was made more easy. Soon necessities suggested remedies for growing evils, which not to use meant universal destruction.
“The population crowded and the weak and deformed were ‘removed.’ The remedy was but tentative, and gradually the pressure grew still stronger. As the centuries passed, all the weak, the worthless, and the unfit were sterilised. The pressure still increased. The State then provided for taking charge of all the children, and only the most fit were allowed to become parents.
“Under this policy, and under wise management, the State became the ‘universal mother.’ Parents knew not their offspring, nor the offspring their parents, and the love of humanity and public duty became the inspiring motives of human action. Under this policy, too, have the leading nations of Cavitorus, with the Shadowas in the lead, developed their present civilisation. Under such a policy they have been able to adjust the population to the possibilities of the land, and thus while they have been building their opulent present, they have developed the finest type of people mentally, morally and physically, that ever inhabited this planet.
“Oseba explained the quickness of the soil in Cavitorus, the length of the seasons and of the days, with their peculiar irregularities. He described the movements of the sun, its appearance at various seasons of the year, and why it was never entirely dark in those regions.
“Then he recited a further tradition, relating that at the time the people reached Cavitorus, the bright star Oree was the ‘Pole Star,’ that it had moved gradually away, but that in about twenty thousand years it was to return to its old position. Further, that on the return of Oree—the tradition ran—the Shadowas would be released from their seeming isolation, and be reunited with their brethren of the outer world to the presence, or on the surface of, Oliffa.
“‘You see,’ said Oseba, ‘in the development of all people their myths and their heroes are strongly allied to, if they are not the actual forces of, Nature, and all have a seasoning of truth as a basis.
“‘The people had watched Oree; were waiting his return, and were alert for signs of the coming change, or, as they put it, for a “deliverer.” They believed from this tradition, that they had been in Cavitorus twenty thousand years, and a confidence in their future deliverance was a deep-seated superstition, a real faith and hope.
“‘Well, Oree, as seen from the spot where the first “pilgrims landed,” as indicated by a peak on a distant mountain, appeared some twenty-five years ago, and, as on the very night the observations were taken a portion of a wrecked vessel was cast upon our shores, no wonder the long-deferred hope found expression in a movement for inquiry and exploration.
“‘Later, a tame dog with a brass collar on his neck was taken from an ice-floe. Later still, by a few months, a small box and a snow-shoe drifted ashore. In your year 1890, the corpse of a white man, clothed in furs, was found on the beach, and the next morning two bodies of what are now known to have been Esquimaux, were found. As we lived on the ocean front, we knew whence these came. At this the State took up the work, made an appropriation, organised a party, and, well,’ said he, ‘they abundantly equipped an expedition, put me in charge, and I am here on my return to Cavitorus, after a five years’ tour, covering the countries of all the outer globe.’”
What masterly logic! What skill in the marshalling of details!
“Well,” adds Leo Bergin, soliloquizing, “if it is true, and it must be, for I am going there, how much stranger than fiction!”
The notes continue:—
“The captain inquired about the harbors along the coast of Cavitorus; the Boston man inquired if there were any gold mines; the parson, how high the Shadowas built their church spires; and the engineer, what motive power was used in their transportation.
“To these Mr. Oseba answered: ‘I fear, if I should tell you one half the truth about these things we should be “discovered,” to our sorrow.’
“The hour was late, and as all seemed dazed by the recital, the party dispersed, to bed,—
‘To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub.’”