“You are now reaching that state of man which reveals the futility of all knowledge, since you are awakened to desires which no knowledge can satisfy. Rest assured that in the world your case would be no better, but rather would be aggravated by opportunity and failure. You are, at any rate, spared the tragedy of your father whose love destroyed the object of his desire and reduced him to a morbid condition in which your healthy wish for knowledge was more than he could bear. It is right to wish for knowledge, because only through that can we recognise our ignorance, and see the humour of our position. If you can see that you can be happy and glad that you have lived.”
Poor Ultimus tried hard to do so, but he often retired from their conversations to weep, and Siebenhaar would find him sitting in the water consoling himself with music. The unhappy youth became a prey to boredom and wearied of the arts and sciences and discussions with which they filled the day. They had long ago arrived at the conclusion that there was no God, no ascertainable purpose in the universe, and nothing in life but the fun or nuisance of living. He became romantic and plagued Siebenhaar for stories, love-stories, bawdy experiences, the tale of his meeting with George, and the deathless fable of the love of George and Arabella. From that he came to delight in the idea of war, and Siebenhaar explained to him how wars came about: how in the first place men were obsessed by superstitions about God, each community believing itself to be specially favoured and inspired by the unseen powers, and ignoring all the evidence to the contrary, as poverty, disease, corruption, bad art, inefficiency, and domestic unhappiness. As a consequence each community was jealous of every other, and supported its claims to moral superiority and divine favour with a great show of force, of armed ships on the sea and trained men on the land.
To illustrate his remarks Siebenhaar concocted explosives and Ultimus found such great amusement in them and was so busy destroying the houses he had built, the statues he had made, the engines he had contrived, that the philosopher was forced to change his theory of war and to see that it has its roots in boredom.
Thereafter Ultimus was alternately busy with the arts and sciences and with destroying all his works when he was bored with them and could not help recognising their futility. As his explosives upset Siebenhaar’s nerves and the tranquillity he required for his contemplation, they made an arrangement that Ultimus should give notice of his destructive intentions when he felt them coming on. Then Siebenhaar would retire to the other side of the island and leave him to it.
The boy made a careful study of explosives and experimented with them until he could send huge palm trees hundreds of feet into the air. It became his ambition to blow up the mountain. He made several attempts, but could not succeed. He blew great holes in it and discovered mines of gold and diamonds and platinum and various new earths which, when mixed with his explosive, increased its power. But the mountain seemed to be capable of absorbing any shock. He had just given up his experiments in despair when Siebenhaar came rushing over in a great state of excitement to say that the island had moved a degree and a half.
The two men looked at each other incredulously, not daring to believe in what was thumping in both their minds. They prepared a new charge, took their bearings, exploded it, and found that they were moving at the rate of twenty-three knots an hour, N.N.W. The next charge they placed so that the island moved W.N.W.
They could then navigate and go whither they pleased. They embraced, danced, killed a goat, and drank heavily to celebrate their triumph.
III: CIVILISATION
The north point of the island was a rocky headland, a precipice hundreds of feet above the sea-level. Beyond it jutted three jagged rocks. One morning Siebenhaar found on one of these rocks the hull of a vessel, and when he looked closer he saw a man sitting disconsolate upon it. He fetched Ultimus, who threw stones to attract the man’s attention. It was impossible to make him hear. They gesticulated to tell him to swim to his right, and at last he caught their meaning, stripped and plunged into the sea. They had already stopped the island, which was now making only a gentle way, so that there was no danger of his being run down.
By the time they reached the shore the man was already sitting on the sands drying himself and eating a cocoa-nut. He was above middle age, and had a little fat belly and long thin legs. Siebenhaar addressed him in Fattish, and the man said he was a Rear-Admiral in the Fattish Navy and would like to know what in hell they meant by ruining his battle in which he had got the Fatters fairly on the run.