Century after century they had had a splendid judicial preserve in the remnant of an aboriginal race that had developed a genius for finance and subtlety. Whatever laws the Palindicians might pass, these aliens were so astute that in all their financial triumphs they could avoid breaking them. It was one of the patriotic amusements of the citizens to get up a periodical battue and hunt one or another of these unfortunates into the legal nest; self-defence or retaliation generally led him at last to commit some crime, treason or assault or slander, against a citizen; and thus a first-class criminal was manufactured for their unemployed law-courts, and, as he was baited by witnesses false or true from court to court, he fell deeper and deeper into genuine criminality; by developing new phases and working up new issues, they could husband the case for a long period.
But too frequent battues had thinned the game in this legal preserve, and the proclamation of a close season had not sufficed to restore the old numbers, or even make them commensurate with the Palindician passion for justice. They were driven at last to use up any strangers that landed on their shores. Unfortunately most of these were criminals from the other islands, and they had always made better material for the bench than for the dock. In fact, it had become the custom for the Palindicians to use them as judges; for who could dispense justice so well as the guilty? Who more experienced than the criminal in finding out crime? The culprits of the archipelago were so convinced of the rightness of Palindician judgment that they fled at once to the island, unless the cruel despotism of law retained them in their own. It was with regret then that these devotees of justice were driven by failure of the natural supply to change their policy and put them in the dock. There they were anything but satisfactory, and were convicted too easily and rapidly.
The Palindicians had grown sad as they reflected over the mysterious workings of Providence; for here were they with all this passion and genius for justice; and yet this new supply ran short. The criminals of the archipelago had ceased to believe in Palindician justice, and preferred in their blindness to take refuge in some other paradise; and it looked as if the inhabitants of this unfortunate island would either have to find subjects for their judicial talent in their own ranks or abandon its refinement and power through want of practice. Such a dilemma never had any people had to face.
And where would justice find a home, if they were driven to the latter alternative? Would not the world mourn the greatest of virtues perished, if once she were banished from her last refuge? No, rather would they resort to the trivial contests of civil litigation than permit such a catastrophe; rather would they manufacture their criminals out of the guiltless in their own ranks than let Palindicia cease to be the jewel of justice. Not one of them but would sacrifice his dearest friend rather than allow the genius for judgment to vanish from the earth.
It was prattle like this that made me forget the malodorous state of the narrator. Sneekape knew that he had to do something in order to withdraw my energies from my olfactory nerves; and he succeeded. His entertainment, when it ended, left me again a prey to the thought of the commanding odours that rayed out from him. But rest and freedom were near; for night fell and mesmerised our faculties.
CHAPTER XXV
KLORIOLE
THE gauntlet of stenches that we had run stifled us into deep and long sleep. The sun was far up the sky when we awakened, and its heat seemed somehow to have subdued the traces of Awdyoo to a faint, though pungent and offensive, odour. We looked ahead and astern. The current was much slower; some undercurrent in the opposite direction must have been dragging it back. All trace of land had vanished behind us. But there was either a cloud or the top of some hill on the sky-rim to which the canoe was drifting. We fell into stupor again; and, when I stirred to life, the stars were keen as stiletto points above us. I lay staring at them till they became eyes that spoke to me of the deep night and the infinite abysses wherein they were moved to tears. A warm breath softened the distance between us and soothed my senses.