“Again, this vulgar vice of curiosity? I thought you were exempt from it by this time.”
“Nay, but hear me, El-Râmi”—said Féraz eagerly, distressed at the anger in his brother’s eyes—“It is not curiosity,—it is something else,—something that I can hardly explain, except. ... Oh, you will only laugh at me if I tell you. ... but yet——”
“But what?” demanded El-Râmi sternly.
“It is as if a voice called me,”—answered Féraz dreamily—“a voice from those upper chambers, which you keep closed, and of which only Zaroba has the care—a voice that asks for freedom and for peace. It is such a sorrowful voice,—but sweet,—more sweet than any singing. True, I hear it but seldom,—only, when I do, it haunts me for hours and hours. I know you are at some great work up there,—but can you make such voices ring from a merely scientific laboratory? Now you are angered!”
His large soft brilliant eyes rested appealingly upon his brother, whose features had grown pale and rigid.
“Angered!” he echoed, speaking as it seemed with some effort,—“Am I ever angered at your—your fancies? For fancies they are, Féraz,—the voice you hear is like the imagined home in that distant star you speak of,—an image and an echo on your brain—no more. My ‘great work,’ as you call it, would have no interest for you;—it is nothing but a test-experiment, which, if it fails, then I fail with it, and am no more El-Râmi-Zarânos, but the merest fool that ever clamoured for the moon.” He said this more to himself than to his brother, and seemed for the moment to have forgotten where he was,—till suddenly rousing himself with a start he forced a smile.
“Farewell for the present, gentle visionary!” he said kindly,—“You are happier with your dreams than I with my facts,—do not seek out sorrow for yourself by rash and idle questioning.”
With a parting nod he went out, and Féraz, closing the door after him, remained in the hall for a few moments in a sort of vague reverie. How silent the house seemed, he thought with a half-sigh. The very atmosphere of it was depressing, and even his favourite occupation, music, had just now no attraction for him. He turned listlessly into his brother’s study,—he determined to read for an hour or so, and looked about in search of some entertaining volume. On the table he found a book open,—a manuscript, written on vellum in Arabic, with curious uncanny figures and allegorical designs on the headings and margins. El-Râmi had left it there by mistake,—it was a particularly valuable treasure which he generally kept under lock and key. Féraz sat down in front of it, and, resting his head on his two hands, began to read at the page where it lay open. Arabic was his native tongue,—yet he had some difficulty in making out this especial specimen of the language, because the writing was anything but distinct, and some of the letters had a very odd way of vanishing before his eyes, just as he had fixed them on a word. This was puzzling as well as irritating,—he must have something the matter with his sight or his brain, he concluded, as these vanishing letters always came into position again after a little. Worried by the phenomenon, he seized the book and carried it to the full light of the open window, and there succeeded in making out the meaning of one passage which was quite sufficient to set him thinking. It ran as follows:—
“Wherefore, touching illusions and impressions, as also strong emotions of love, hatred, jealousy, or revenge, these nerve and brain sensations are easily conveyed from one human subject to another by Suggestion. The first process is to numb the optic nerve. This is done in two ways—I. By causing the subject to fix his eyes steadily on a round shining case containing a magnet, while you shall count two hundred beats of time. II. By wilfully making your own eyes the magnet, and fixing your subject thereto. Either of these operations will temporarily paralyse the optic nerves, and arrest the motion of the blood in the vessels pertaining. Thus the brain becomes insensible to external impressions, and is only awake to internal suggestions, which you may make as many and as devious as you please. Your subject will see exactly what you choose him to see, hear what you wish him to hear, do what you bid him do, so long as you hold him by your power, which if you understand the laws of light, sound, and air-vibrations, you may be able to retain for an indefinite period. The same force applies to the magnetising of a multitude as of a single individual.”[1]
Féraz read this over and over again,—then, returning to the table, laid the book upon it with a deeply engrossed air. It had given him unpleasant matter for reflection.