“We followed them bewildered, as they led us inland with shouts of joy. But we had not gone far towards their city when a larger troop was encountered, evidently still more formidable in their doctrinal dislikes and means of conversion, for our conductors slunk away. Again were we flooded with oratory, and again Blastemo managed the affair with delicacy and success, as it seemed to us at the time. The same type of incident occurred half a dozen times before we reached the town gates. Our last troop of soul-captors was the largest of all, but dissension broke out in their midst. It seemed that several understood Aleofanian, and each of these declared that their orator misstated their creed and gave us only his special shade of it. They kept whispering to one another, till at last discontent broke out into a general mêlée. To make matters worse, most of the bands that had been forced to steal off and let their convertites slip from their grasp had evidently come to an understanding and discovered that they had all been deceived by Blastemo. They united their forces and came down upon us and our convoy, just at the moment that they were rent with dissensions and ready to come to blows. In the confusion Blastemo smuggled us into the city, and out again by another gate, leaving the two parties to fight it out. When we had got near to our boats he saved us again. We saw the whole mob of pigmies hurrying over the beach. A few minutes were all we needed to embark and escape. He uttered words that seemed to paralyse them. It was a curse upon the most fundamental and sacred part of their creed, a point on which they had agreed to sink differences. But it was only a momentary paralysis. They recovered and rushed on again. Again he hurled amongst them words that we did not understand. The effect was as strange. They divided up into two hostile groups that set upon each other with the greatest violence. Before they had seen that it was a ruse of his and had checked their dissentient fury, we had got far enough from the shore to be out of reach of their missiles, which now began to rain into the sea.
“The phrase that had saved us was one on which the island was equally divided; one set accepted it as the saving part of their creed; the other abhorred it as the very poison of the soul. Blastemo explained to us the fundamental difference between the two forces of ‘babbyclootsy’; but none of us could grasp it, or, if we did, we forgot it at once; it was far too fine for translation through two languages. We abandoned the effort. So did we the other niceties of creed that split the Coxurians up into units. At various stages in their history they had succeeded in attaining unanimity of opinion for a short time; one party through greater procreative power or missionary zeal got the upper hand in numbers and annihilated the minority by what they called “acts of faith,” processes of slow torture that ended in most cases in death, but it was only for a short time. They divided up again into two main sects; within, each was rent almost into units by fierce differences of opinions; but the differences were sunk in hatred of the opposition. This same history repeated itself every second generation. Every decade or so the majority wiped out the dissentient few by the usual process of faith, and then split up, only to re-coalesce into two almost equal bodies for temporary belligerent purposes.
“They are very lazy except with their tongues; and so they are very prolific, as nature almost unaided supplies them with plenty of food. Their numbers are constantly recruited, too, with outcasts from the other islands, exiled on account of their passion for religious dogmatism. But through the ages the Coxurians had gradually grown smaller and smaller in size, more wizened in countenance, and more venomous in feelings. Their perpetual internecine feuds would soon have wiped the miserable imps off the face of the earth but for two provisions of nature; the arrival of new immigrants made them at times quicksilver into two masses in order to save the souls of the newcomers; at other times the exceptional force of will in one or more individuals produced militant organisation that obliterated minor hatreds. It was a good thing for the archipelago that there were ever a surviving few, amongst whom might be placed all the doctrinomaniacs of their various communities, in order to give issue to the poisonous theological blood. These exiles would never remain if the island were deserted; as it was they were welcomed and made much of by the two parties, that their souls might be saved.”
CHAPTER XXXIII
HACIOCRAM
“ONE group of islands we were warned to avoid was that of the Rasolola, or theomaniacs. Hither had been deported from the chief countries all who allowed their peculiar religious ideas to outrun common-sense or the permissible limits of worship or theological belief. A storm, however, drove us close to the small archipelago, and we had to anchor off Haciocram, or the Isle of Prophets. We had no sooner come to rest than there was raised on a signal-board above a lofty tower on the island an inscription in enormous letters. We got our guide to translate it. It did not remove our perplexity to learn that it was only a number, 1999. What could it mean? He could not enlighten us; but there was a provoking smile on his face. Before we could question him further, we saw a canoe put off from shore. Its occupant reaching us bounced on board, with fiery eyes standing out of his head, and his long hair on end like a mop. He was the inspired messenger of the inspired high-priest of the island, and he came to ask us if we accepted that (and he pointed to the sign-board) as the true number of the beast; if we did not, we might just as well be gone at once; for we would not be allowed to land. I wanted to know what beast it was; I knew a good many beasts, both human and inhuman; and I should like to know which one it was he meant. What! Did I not know what the beast was? the man of sin? the foul creature that was to creep forth and pollute the world at its end? The true number of him had but that day been revealed, and the whole world must accept it. For the sake of peace, I indicated my acceptance of it, though I was no more clear as to its meaning than before.
“Blastemo explained how the Haciocrammers had taken the sacred books of the islands with them as the sole consolation of their exile, and had worked out from them the most extraordinary theories of the constitution, history, and fate of the world. But, as they took, some of them the words, and others the letters of the words, of the book as inspired, whilst one section accepted its Thribbaty form and another its Slapyak form as the true, there had been the bitterest dissension amongst them. At one time the dominant section converted the others by great physical pressure brought to bear on the thumb, then considered the seat of the soul; at another it was the great toe that was the point of attack in conversion crusades; if the conversion could not be accomplished thus, then were the recalcitrants purified by fire as the only means left of saving their souls. Sometimes the dissentients pretended to give up the errors of their way, and when strong enough rose in rebellion and overturned the dominant set. This had occurred again and again, till it was difficult to tell from month to month, or now even week to week, which sect was in power. There were as many sects as there were symmetrical combinations of numbers, and they were all, when in power, equally fierce in persecution of the others. Their experience as victims taught them no lesson of tolerance, but only filled their hearts with a furious passion for revenge, that was ultimately blended and confused with a passion for conversion.
“But had not the long series of mutual persecutions cleared out most of the population? No; not one in a generation suffered the purification by fire. Either the thumb or the great-toe persuasion was usually quite sufficient. What had resulted from the perpetual conversions by pressure was one of the most treacherous dispositions in the whole archipelago. Cunning had become an ingrained instinct as strong as their fanaticism in these numeromaniacs. When they were not dragooning and oppressing, they were busy protecting themselves from persecution by pretending to assume the colour of the persecutors. Alternately victim and fanatic oppressor, the Haciocrammer had become one of the most singular mongrels in creation. He was bold as a lion to-day, and confident in his own inspiration and infallibility; to-morrow he was cringing and supple and obsequious as the veriest slave. This creature who had just brought the order from the ruling high-priest, whose eye was all fire and fanaticism, would, after the next revolution to-morrow or the following day, be ready to lick the dust beneath your feet, whilst his eye would be full of mute and stupid appeal; you would not believe him to be the same being, his nature would be so thoroughly turned inside out.