CHAPTER XX.
Peter goes to his father's—Traverses the Black Mountain—Takes a flight to Mount Alkoe—Gains the miners—Overcomes the governor's troops—Proclaims Georigetti king—Seizes the governor—Returns him the government—Peter makes laws with the consent of the people, and returns to Brandleguarp with deputies.
NO further project being ripe for execution, I took a journey home with my father to Arndrumnstake, and he would take all the children with him. Youwarkee and I stayed about six weeks, leaving all the children with my father.
Upon my return, I frequently talked with Maleck about his country; who they originally were, and how long it had been inhabited, and what other countries bordered thereon, and how they lay. He told me his countrymen looked upon themselves to be very ancient, but they were not very numerous; for the old stock was almost worn out by the hardships they had undergone; that about three hundred years before, he said, as he had it from good report, there were a people from beyond the sea, or, as they called themselves, from the Little Lands, had strangely overrun them; and he had heard say they would have overrun this country too, but they thought it would not answer. He said, "when those people first came, they began to turn up the earth to a prodigious depth; and now," says he, "bringing some nasty hard earth of several sorts, they put it into great fires till it runs about like water, and then beat it about with great heavy things into several shapes; and some of it, sir," says he, "looks just like that stuff that lay at the bottom of your ship, and some almost white, and some red; for when I was a boy I was to have been sent to work amongst them, as my father did; but it having killed him, I came hither, as many more have done, to avoid it."—"And what do they do with it," says I, "when they have beat it about as you say?"—"Then," says he, "they carry it a long way to the sea."—"What then?" says I.—"Why, then the Little-landers take it, and swim over the sea with it."—"And what do they do with it?" says I.—"Why," says he, "there are other people who take it from them, and go away with it."—"Why do they let them take it?" says I.—"Because," says he, "they give them clothes for it."—"Do they want clothes," says I, "more than you?" He told me they had no graundee.—"And what other countries have you hereabout?"— "There is one country," says he, "north of Alkoe, where they say there is just such another people as the Little-landers, and they get some of the things from Mount Alkoe."—"What do they do with them?" says I.—"I don't know," says he; "they fetch a great deal; but they won't let anybody come into their country."—"Is there nobody inhabits between the Mountain Alkoe and the sea?" He told me no, the Little-landers would not let them.
Having got what information I could from Maleck, and also from a countryman or two of his he had brought to me, I considered it all over; And, thinks I, if I could but get Mount Alkoe to submit (for they had told me they were only governed by a deputy from the Little Lands) to see the work done, I might, by intercepting the trade to the sea, turn the profit of the country my own way, and make it pass through our hands.
I next inquired of those who brought the fruits from the Great Forest, what sort of land they had there, and found, by their description, it was a light mould, and in many places well covered with grass and herbs; and by all the report I could hear, must be a fruitful country, well managed; and being a flat country and not encompassed on that side with the Black Mountain, was much higher than Doorpt Swangeanti. This news put me upon searching the truth of it; and I made the tour of the Black Mountain and the Great Forest, alighting often to make my observations.
The forest is a little world of wood without end, with here and there a fine lawn very grassy; and indeed the wood-grounds bear it very well, the trees not standing in crowds, but at a healthy distance from each other. I went abundantly farther than any one had before been, but saw no variation in the woody scene; and coming round westward home, I had a view of hoximo; which is nothing but a narrow cleft in the earth, on the top of the Black Mountain, of a most extraordinary depth; for upon dropping a stone down, you shall hear it strike and hum for a long time before all is quiet again; and laying my ear over the cleft, whilst I ordered one of my attendants to throw a large stone down, after the usual thumps and humming, I imagined I heard it dash in water, so that it is not impossible it may reach to the sea; which is at least six or seven miles below it. Into this hole all dead bodies are precipitated, from the king to the beggar; for four glumms holding by the ankles and wrists of the deceased, fly with them to hoximo and throw them down, whilst the air is filled with the lamentations of the relations of the deceased, and of such others as are induced to follow the corpse for the sake of the wines, on such occasions plentifully distributed to all comers by the gentry, and in the best proportion they are able by even the meanest amongst them.
After a stay of about fourteen days at home, I fixed my next trip for Mount Alkoe; and having told Maleck my design, he said he would go with me with all his heart, but feared I should get no Brandleguarpine to bear me; for he told me they had an old tradition that Mindrack lived there, and would not go for all the world; which has been the greatest security that country has had, for this would have devoured them else, says he.
I spoke to the king, to Nasgig, and the ragans, and found them all unanimous that the mountain Alkoe was the habitation of Mindrack, and that the noises which had been heard there were his servants beating bad men. Says I to myself, Here is one of the usefullest projects upon earth spoiled by an unaccountable prepossession; what must be done to overcome this prejudice?