The rude blows of the day before, the extraordinary fatigues of the night, the mental troubles of all kinds which I had undergone during the past three days, rendered that sleep which I hastened to enjoy under the tamarind trees that grew between the sea and the more wooded part of the island, most welcome to me. My eyes closed with an unspeakable pleasure. My drowsiness resembled the calm of an aërial voyage. The sea-breeze passed in long gusts through my hair, after having swept over my body, and refreshed and revivified all my limbs. The mixture of the strong vegetable odours by which I was surrounded with the salt air of the sea, charged, as it was, with all the mysterious exhalations of the Indian Ocean, formed a perfume, at once so agreeable and so intoxicating, that I was conscious of its influence even in my sleep.
I must have slept for a long time, since the sun, which was at his zenith when I laid down, was precisely at the same point of the heavens when I awoke, so that I had slept for four-and-twenty hours. My awakening will never be effaced from my remembrance as long as I live, owing to a circumstance which I recollect with sorrow and regret, and with some degree of remorse.
CHAPTER IV.
I have a very agitated dream.—During my waking moments I unconsciously commit a murder.—At night time I encounter a strange apparition in the middle of the forest.—A great light illumines the air.—I advance towards it, buoyed up with hope.—It suddenly disappears.—The dawn discloses to me a most singular sight.—I witness the proceedings of a court-martial the members composing which have each four hands.—Disgraceful corruption of justice.—Ridiculous parody on the manners and institutions of the human race.
I had a dream during my sleep. In this dream I found myself in the midst of those same horrid apes from whom I had so miraculously escaped the day before. I was still in their power! Nothing seemed changed, neither the scene nor the actors. The lake lay spread before me; the trees rose up and waved upon its banks; the leaves and fruit, which had been broken off by the stones, covered the ground. My two redoubtable ourang-outangs had not left me; one was still at my feet, the other at my head. They continued those persecutions of which my unfortunate garments were the theatre. After having torn them in pieces through tugging at them and attempting to pull them off the wrong way, they had uncovered my breast; and, after a minute examination of my skin, directed their attention to my ribs, which they evidently wished to force apart so as to see what they inclosed. With the view of solving this problem each of them possessed himself of a large stone, and made preparations to break me open, a proceeding to which they usually have recourse when they desire to devour the inside of a tortoise or cocoa-nut. Two large stones were already suspended over my breast; self-preservation before everything, thought I, and fired at one of the two ourang-outangs and killed him; I am about to fire at the other, when the noise of the first shot woke me up. On awakening, I find myself in a perfect rage, almost mad with anger, and with a pistol grasped in my hand. A group of apes are by my side; I point my pistol, touch the trigger, one of them is hit, and falls. May the Almighty, in His goodness, ever preserve me and mine from another night like this! The poor ape, who was no terrible ourang-outang like that of my dream, but a peaceful vervet, dragged himself bleeding to my feet. He was mortally wounded a little below the heart. Not wishing to prolong his sufferings, I seized him by the tail, and, swinging him round like a stone in a sling, dashed his head against a tree. The unfortunate vervet was still alive. With what a touching glance he appealed to me as he licked my hands, as though begging me not to put him to death, and prayed to me with low, plaintive cries which I can still hear! In order to put him the quicker out of his misery, I ran with him to the beach and plunged him into the sea till he was suffocated. During this time, which appeared to me as long as if I were undergoing the same tortures myself, his poor little eyes continued to follow mine; his dying looks were at once a reproach and a prayer. Were I to live a hundred years, this picture, in which suffering had elevated the instinct of the brute to the level of the cruel intelligence of man, would never be effaced from my memory. And these lines, which I have written with an aching heart, are some kind of punishment for my needless crime, for this poor ape had done no harm whatever to me.
Later I remembered what Buffon says of the vervet, “that it is one of the most lively and amusing of apes; is scarcely as large as a cat; and has a brown body, with flesh-coloured face and ears. The vervets are fantastic in their tastes and affections, appearing to have a strong inclination for some persons and a great aversion to others.”