Practically at the mercy of the doctor, I made up my mind to be civil to him whether that suited me or not. I rather expected he would come to meet me, perhaps help me to chair, and I wondered how, in my ignorance of German, I should contrive to answer his questions.
But I need not have worried. I did not even see him. He had left by the back door, and the orderly washed the wound and changed my bandages. That was all. There was no charge for the bandages, and the orderly was gentle now that his master's back was turned.
"Didn't he leave word when he would see me?" I asked.
"Habandh!" he answered—meaning, "He did not—there is not—there is nothing doing!"
CHAPTER EIGHT
IPSOS CUSTODES
We were an ignorant people. Out of a gloom we came
Hungering, striving, feasting—vanishing into the same.
Came to us your foreloopers, told us the gloom was bad,
Spoke of the Light that might be—simply it could be had—
Knowledge and wealth and freedom, plenty and peace and play,
And at all the price of obedience. "Listen and learn and obey,"
We were told, "and the gloom shall be lifted. Ignorance surely
is shame."
We listened to your foreloopersy till presently Cadis* came.
We were an ignorant people. Our law was "an eye for an eye,"
And he who wronged should right the wrong, and he who stole should die—
Bad law the Cadis told us, based on the fall of man;
And they set us to building law-courts on the Pangermanic plan—
Courts where the gloom of ages should be pierced, said they, with Light
And scientific theory displace wrong views of Right.
The Cadis' law was writ in books that only they could read,
But what should we know of the strings to that? 'Twas gloom when
we agreed.
We were an ignorant people. The Offizieren came
To lend to law eye, tooth, and claw and so enforce the same.
Now nought are the tribal customs; free speech is under ban;
Displaced are misconceptions that were based on fallen man,
And our gloom has gone in darkness of the risen German's night,
Nor is there salt of mercy lest it sap the hold of Might.
They strike—we may not answer, nor dare we ask them why.
We sold ourselves to supermen. If we rebel, we die.
————————- * Cadi—judge. ————————-