CHAPTER XVIII
MEDDLA
IT was not far in the afternoon when my companion, taking a look ahead, gave a long, low whistle and laughed. He had recognised some feature of the land we were now approaching. “You will have some fun here,” he said. “We shall have to bridge our way over the lunatic asylum of the archipelago. It is a series of islets on which we have classified and quarantined our cranks for many ages. Anyone ridden by a fixed idea or habit is shipped off to those of his own kin. So we keep our communities clear of quixotism and crazy eccentricity. You will see each for yourself, for we cannot get to Figlefia unless by passing over every one of these islets in order to provision our canoe for each voyage across the passages between them. We call the group Loonarie; but each has its own special and grandiloquent name to distinguish it, for they have a supreme contempt for one another.”
We paddled and drifted with considerable rapidity, and the features of an island grew more and more distinct; for the current which bore us evidently ran close inshore. The beach swarmed with people as we approached; their fantastic dresses made a brilliant but grotesque scene; everyone seemed to have tried to produce as loud and individual an effect as possible by the colour and shape of his garments and the slovenly way in which he had pitchforked them on. It was not the colours of the rainbow, but a complete diapason of discordant colours. As we got nearer they seemed to have chosen garments by lottery. Their lean, lank forms showed like May-poles in the loose finery; and their sharp faces and small red heads almost disappeared in the enormous beribboned turbans they wore. They all looked preternaturally solemn and wise. There was much buttonholing amongst them, and most confidential communications were evidently passing from lip to ear.
I feared some sinister purpose with regard to ourselves. But Sneekape laughed when I mentioned the idea. “They only wish to convert you to their way of thinking, and each is getting ready for the assault. One soul gained to their side, they say, is one soul saved. Propaganda is their passion.”
We beached our canoe amid much dignified fussing that really delayed us instead of helping us. I thought the efforts they made to do us a service would have landed us all in the surf—a matter of little consequence to us in our rags, but somewhat serious to them and their ill-harmonised finery. We were like to be torn into fragments by the candidates for our friendship when we had got our feet on the sand. They were all eager to clothe us. Sneekape rescued me from a dozen who clutched at my rags; and we followed the most dignified personage in the crowd and got re-clothed. I had imagined that it was in pure charity they had been eager to substitute something better for our rags. But it turned out that we had to pay most handsomely for our new and gorgeous garments, and that they were the uniform of a party. The benevolence lay in taking the custom to a shop owned by one of the party, and perhaps in saving our souls by giving us the badge of that party.
The majestic ribbon-pole who had captured us entered into conversation with me in Aleofanian. He had seen me in Aleofane when he was there on a mission to the heathen; and he had yearned to save my soul from the baneful influence of men who had not the true faith—faith in altruism. He asked me if I knew that I had landed in one of the noblest countries in the universe, Meddla, the Isle of Philanthropy. Here was the true centre of the universal fire of love. Here lived those who yearned to save the souls of their neighbours, who cared not what became of themselves, if only other men were saved. Had I thought over the momentous question of the true harmony of colours? Of course a man of experience such as I was had thought it out and decided that green and blue were the divine mixture, were indicative of the noblest qualities that God had conferred on human character. I looked down and saw that my new garments were a motley of green and blue; and of course I knew that black and yellow were the colours of the principle of evil. Ah, if only men knew how much the difference meant to their souls and to the destiny of the world, they would not trifle with the question! It was the deadliest poison, the rankest sin to wear black and yellow. All moral evils went with this mixture. And if I knew how serious a thing life was, I would join them in their crusade against this diabolism in colour, would put forth every effort to suppress it and prevent the world being lost.
I would have burst into a roar of laughter, but that I caught a warning glance in Sneekape’s eye. I kept serious and he helped to rescue me from the enthusiast and devotee of green and blue, by whispering something in his ear that spread a radiant smile over the meagre face.
He had not left us many minutes, when I was pounced upon by another May-pole, who thrust his little head into my face and addressing me in Aleofanian wished to know what I thought of Meddla. Was it not the greatest community on the globe? Had it not reached the acme of civilisation? Did not its fundamental principle of anxiety for the souls of others make it the centre of the universe?