I
Herds of buffalo that dispute the Flaminian way with you, frightened horses running over the heath, clouds of dust that rise up—the dust of twenty peoples—a fiery sky, a terrain of darnel, with a solitary tower here and there that guards the desert, torrents buried under masses of mastic-bushes, broken aqueducts, white huts founded on black tombs; in the distance, a crumbling wall, a low gate with a death’s head in an iron cage for an escutcheon—that is Rome. Our voyagers entered it by the People’s Gate.
Already, each of them is hastening to where his inclination drives him. Turpin is going from church to church, cloister to cloister, from St. John Lateran to the Vatican. Jacques has heard the piping of the pifferari, which descends from the Sabine. Suspended on that rustic concert in the shadow of the Madonna, he has forgotten everything; he is swimming in ecstasy.
Merlin is visiting the sacred fountains, spurting in deserted squares at the foot of obelisks and ruins. He breathes, in the scent of the wallflowers of the Coliseum, the souls of the ancestors. For it seems to him, on arriving in this place, that it is enough for the living to walk over the dust of such great dead men.
Who knows how long that kind of life might have been prolonged, at the whim of our pilgrims, but for an incident easy to foresee? The voices that had been heard in the Apennines had resounded over the Tiber. The rumor spread around Rome that Merlin was a sorcerer devoted to all the practices of Hell.
As our Enchanter was picking daisies near the Baths of Caracalla, of the savage grandeur of which he was particularly fond, soldiers came to seize him. After having tied him up—for he let them do it—they took him to the Castel Sant’Angelo, a sepulcher that had become a prison.
Counting on Jacques’ well-known weakness, the judges had him seized at the same time; it was him that they interrogated first. At the sight of the pincers and the braziers, Jacques felt his faith in his master wavering. When one of the doctors asked: “Are you not Merlin’s servant?” he replied “Me, his servant? What are you talking about? I don’t know the man.”
Satisfied with that response, the doctors heaped him with caresses; that had an effect on him that terror could not have contrived. On the second day, when the judges asked him whether he had witnessed any infernal works, he replied: “I certainly think there’s a little devilry in the man, and even a distant relationship with Satan.”
On the third day, the same judge that had interrogated him told him that they needed two faggots of branches; he would render the tribunal the signal service of going to cut the necessary branches from Egeria’s wood.
“Here, take this sickle, my friend, and go.” At the same time, he indicated the route, so well that it was impossible to mistake it.
Jacques took the sickle, sharpened it and went to the indicated place; two hours later, he came back carrying two bundles of myrtle, orange and other odorant branches on his back, which he disposed in a small pyre in the Palazzo Sant-Angelo. At that moment Merlin was very pensive, leaning on his elbows at the window of his prison; he saw him pass by weighed down by his burden; he sighed, but as not astonished. It was at that moment that he said: Sancta simplicitas!
Before he had turned round, a hermit confessor with a hooded head and a girdle of rope had slipped into his prison, and was standing beside a prie-dieu.
“My son,” he said, “Hell is still coming to you, since Heaven has abandoned you.”
Merlin turned his head at that voice, having recognized his father disguised in monk’s garb.
“Quickly, quickly, my son—I can still save you. Take my hand and follow me down this slope. My horses are whinnying in the courtyard. Come on, then, obstinate soul! There’s not a moment to lose!”
“No, Father, it’s not by you that I want to be saved.”
“By whom, then?”
“Myself.”
“So you’re refusing me at this supreme moment?”
“Yes.”
“Well, so be it. I’m at least curious to see how you’ll redeem yourself by your own genius. Try, my child. Look, do you see the summit of that capital? That’s where I’ll perch. From there, I’ll see everything, hidden under the stone mask of that tenebrion with three mouths crouching at the top of the colonnette. If you need me, I’ll be there, my dear son, you hear.”
“Once again, Father, I want to save or doom myself.”
While the incubus when to sit down on top of the capital among the granite salamanders and ghouls, Merlin looked around or his harp, in order to fortify his heart at the approach of evil. It had never resounded in Rome. He thought that its echo would be more powerful here than anywhere else, in the circle of the seven hills, where the ashes of so many peoples would quiver at his voice. What would happen when the song of Arthus or that of Brut the Breton94—for he had both of them upon his lips—would enter into the tombs of Roma Vecchia? Brut would reawaken Brutus, the dust would be renewed; Marcus Tullius, Numa and the ancient sages would come under the cypress to hear the song of Merlin, which resuscitates the dead. But where was his harp, the consolation of the good? Someone had stolen it from him; perhaps it had even been broken by the wicked. Neither the jailer nor the watchmen he interrogated could tell him what had become of it. That was Merlin’s first wound.
From the height of his prison he saw the vast distant horizon whiten under the radiant steps of the morning, and every time the dust rose up on the road beneath the sunburned arcades of the aqueducts, he thought that it was the peoples, arriving out of breath, coming to his aid. How many times, too, did he think he saw the sword and chain-mail of Arthus sparkling through the Italian pines, as the king, followed by his five hundred thousand knights, was coming to liberate him. Already, in thought, he must be lodging the twelve peers in the Pantheon. Every day, in the same place, he waited, looking in the direction of France, and, his heart going out to it, he said:
“O France! Sweet France, the hallowed, is it you appearing under that verdant tree? Hurry! Will you let me perish here, you whom I loved so much? Gird the sword that I have forged and place yourself beside me. Don’t wait for the night to surround me, for death to descend upon my head and touch me with its wing; I yearn to see your flowery arbors, whose springs I have enchanted.
“Come, then, France the honored, with the handsome face and the iron breastplate; don’t leave me any longer to be wounded by the wicked and insulted by goats. See how they are rising up here against me, and I’m alone in resisting them. Although I’m a captive, don’t disdain me, for you would be disdaining yourself. It’s not here that my tomb ought to be; it’s beneath the shady forests of oaks strewn with sacred stones. If you free me, I promise to circle your head with the three crowns of Arthus.
“But if, on the contrary, you let me perish here, heartbroken, forgotten and consumed by waiting, walled up in this tomb with the specters of the Caesars, shame be upon you. From century to century your enemies will say: ‘She has left her prophet to die, pitilessly.’”
It was thus that he spoke and prayed, but in vain. Only the dust of the dead stirred in the Roman countryside. That was Merlin’s second wound.
The third was the deepest. As soon as the peoples had begun to suspect that he was not the strongest, they had become disdainful of him. As soon as they knew that he was a captive for their own cause, they believed him lost and rejected him. From all points of the horizon he saw coming against him not merely one Judas but entire populations of Judases, who were urging one another on, full of hatred, beneath the reddening sun, agitating their red hair across the plains. The human species took on, at that moment, over almost all of the earth, the face of Iscariot.
Merlin’s father roared with joy.
“See, my son, how your people remain faithful to you!”
Heaven heard; it darkened, all the way to the region of the blessed.
Those whom Merlin had loved the most were the first to come to stone him with the debris of the round table on which he had nourished them. Others made the pilgrimage solely to mock him. They could be seen from afar swarming around their banners, on which was written: Iterum crucifigi.95
Sitting at the top of the tower in which he was imprisoned, their cries and mockeries rose up to him. They reproached him for the dew he had drunk and the wild fruits that he had eaten, as if he had starved the world. And the crowd said, in as many languages as here were on earth—for although they did not understand one another with regard to anything else, they understood one another enough to insult him:
“Can you see him?”
“I see him.”
“Here?”
“No, there.”
“How pale he is!”
“Bah! He’s afraid of dying.”
“Take aim with your arbalest, comrade!”
“Good shot! The bolt grazed his head.”
“Aim lower, comrade—there, at the heart.”
“Look, Merlin—here’s my present!”
“Where are your enchantments, false enchanter! Come down then, if you dare!”
Saying that, they would have liked to spit in his face; they even tried, but the tower was too high. They consoled themselves, thinking that they would see him burned the next day, or dismembered, or crucified. Among them, Merlin made out some of those that he had favored most: Raoul de Cambrai, Yvain d’Avalon, the pious Titurel.96 Fantasus was also among them, but curiosity seemed to be driving him even more than the fervor of repudiation.
In the rest of the world there was not one nation, or one creature, from which an insult did not reach him, like a poisoned dart. Forests of naked double-bladed swords marched against him. Among those swords he recognized those he had forged himself. That of France was the longest. It passed through the bars and he was heart-broken. Oh, how Durandal, Joyeuse and Hauteclaire were shivering to see themselves turned against the one who had forged them!97 At that sight, Merlin closed his eyes and thought about dying.
They believed that he was afraid. That was the signal for the greatest repudiation.
Some of them had, in fact, brought with them the cup of the Holy Grail, which he had given them, still half full of the sweat and blood of Calvary. They filled it with poison and put it to his lips; then, as he turned his head away, they threw it in his face, so that the blood of the Lord was once again shed upon the ground, which drank it avidly. The grass also drank, and withered in the distance. Hyssop commenced growing on the Janicule and the Palatine, as on Golgotha.
Meanwhile, they came to take him from his prison, and they wanted to make fun of him before putting him to death. That is why they led him, a halter round his neck, into the midst of the jeers, to the raised terrace of the Capitol, from which they hoped to show him in chains o the whole world.
“Triumph! Triumph to Merlin!” they cried. “Go on, Merlin, deny yourself as we have all done. This is your Sacred Path.”
Merlin sensed that they were speaking and acting thus out of cowardice and meanness rather than black wickedness. He could not hate them.
The bells sounded a knell, and dusk began to fall. Then they dragged him toward the Tarpeian rock in order to throw him off it—but the rock was too low for their taste. From there they dragged him to the sewers of Tarquin, but he purified them with a breath. From there they took him to the Coliseum; they would have liked to throw him to the lions, but the lions were sated. Seeing that, they threw him into the catacombs, where they hoped that he would be buried alive, without there being any need to kill him with their own hands. Merlin found his way in the black labyrinth; he reappeared in the daylight before the baying mob of his enemies.
And from the garden of the Palatine Hill to the Janicule, from the Viminal to the Colline Gate, everywhere he directed his eyes, he saw a freshly-dug grave. Jacques had dug one himself, whistling, to flatter the gravediggers.
“It’s too many,” his master said to him as he passed by. “Those they had dug already ought to have contented you.”
In every square he saw a blazing pyre, and Jacques had also lit one of those, larger than the others.
“For whom are all those pyres, when one alone ought to suffice?”
“For you, Merlin,” replied the crowd. You have three lives. One pyre would not be enough for you.”
At that response from the multitude, his father thought that his last hour had come; lost in the vast crowd, he drew close to him furtively.
“I’m still here, my son! I’m afraid for you. This is your last chance. Let’s go, once and for all.”
“I’m staying. I feel sorry for them!”
II
Meanwhile, the judges, doctors, sages, the great men of the continents and islands, all those who practiced the ancient art, Chaldean astrologers, Vortigern’s diviners, necromancers from Toledo, were saddened that Merlin was still alive. Fearing that the anger of the peoples might be as vain as their love, they assembled and summoned Merlin to appear before them in the Coliseum. The peoples sat on the steps, the powerful on emerald thrones, all rejoicing in advance at seeing the defeat of Merlin by the sages and his crucifixion.
They chose to contest with him the most renowned of scholars and diviners; that was Blasius, whom time had magnified.98 Without appearing to remember their old friendship, Blasius asked him where his instruments of sorcery were hidden, for no wanders or necromantic bonnets had been found in his lodgings, nor any of the things most indispensable to his art—except that the Enchanter was wearing a miter with three crowns that day.
Merlin struck his breast. “Don’t search elsewhere,” he said. “This is where the magic is.”
“Merlin, false enchanter, tell us how you domesticated the lions of the islands?”
“With justice.”
“On what did you nourish the dragons of Kylburn?”
“On light.”
“How did you extinguish the blazing pyres?”
“With the dew of hymns.”
“How did you shake the rocks of Cambria?”
“By thinking about them.”
“What do you do to calm an angry sea?”
“I contain my anger.”
“Why does that miter have three crowns?”
“Because I am the pilgrim of the three lives.”
“For what do you live?”
“For liberty.”
“And what else?”
“The future.”
“Brave king of the future, what are you doing here?”
“Braving the present.”
Then having seen the pincers that were there to torture him, Merlin finally interrupted himself in order to look at them more closely. He picked them and struck the cauldrons with them, which resounded under the colossal galleries and the vomitoria of the circus.
“Great God, what’s this?” he said. “Doubtless they’re your magic cauldrons. Show me one of your enchantments.”
“As curious as Hell!” cried Blasius, who began an exorcism in these terms: “Anima Abyssi, nomine Merlinus, retrogredere in Abyssum!”99
At the same time, the members of the crowd, rising to their feet, waved their thousand banners. They said to the seven hills and the four winds: “Render to Hell its infernal Christ.” And they burst out laughing.
The mockery of the peoples then did what their anger had not been able to do. That cold mockery cleaved Merlin’s soul better than a blade. That was his blood-sweat. Weak and dying, he sought the prophet within him, and, no longer finding him under their jeering, he cried in agony:
“Weep for me, hills of darnel, uninhabited ruins, islands and bleak shores, since the eyes of men remain dry! My spirit abandons me. For century after century, the desert future offers me no shelter.
“Who am I to recount what is not yet, which perhaps will never be, other than in my dreams?
“Who assures me that I shall dwell in the resounding palaces of the future? Who has said to me: Here are the keys; open; enter; they are yours?
“The earth has not said it to me; and when has Heaven confided its secrets to me?
“Is this the day when I am born in Hell? Is it the one when I shall descend into the gulfs of the accursed?
“Have I learned the secret of justice with the damned, in the subterranean places where there is no hope?
“Abandoned by those who have loved me, I wander among the phantoms who do not know me; above me soar the homicidal vultures that bear a golden yoke.”
On hearing him speak thus, all those who were there rejoiced. They murmured among themselves: “See how well it’s going! He’s discouraged, in despair. Now we’ll defeat him easily.”
Then Merlin said: “Where is the shadow of my orchard of golden apples in the Isles of the Blessed? How beautiful my sacred trees were, when the most beautiful of the beautiful, with the long hair and pearl-white teeth watched over them and me!”
“Good,” said the crowd. “Now he’s prophesying. Who’s that young woman with the pearly teeth he’s talking about? Some gypsy, no doubt. Dolor has certainly taken away his reason. Yes, it’s heartbreaking to see a great man raving. Listen! Listen! His mania’s gripping him again!”
“Can you hear, kings and peoples, what the birds are singing in their radiant voices in the undulating treetops of the forests?
“They’re saying: ‘Has the mountain not shed its mantle of frost?
“‘Has the hawthorn not donned its silvery florets again?’
“And me, I say after them: ‘I want to hope against all hope. I want to believe, against Heaven and Hell united.’
“My prophetic song announces the advent of Justice in the midst of the resounding trumpets of Armorica and Cambria.
“I see Morgane bearing in her right hand the forest of Caledonia, and in her left the towers of Gaul.
“She will bring equity to the earth, and peace into my heart.”
“Truly,” said the crowd,” he seems drunk on the wine of the future.”
“Does he also intend to ensorcel us?” said Master Blasius. “He’ll make a fine court jester. Laugh, then, peoples!”
The peoples the started laughing again, the stupid, hideous, servile jeering that is the prerogative of toothless skulls.
“Pity! Pity!” murmured Merlin.
“He’s begging for mercy,” the crowd replied. “No, no mercy.”
“Woe betide you!” said Merlin, in whom indignation finished reawakening the prophet. “Peoples, you are laughing at yourselves and your own hope, for it was for you and not for me that I asked for pity.
“You are laughing at the sweet song of the birds that presage iridescent days.
“Listen, then, to the roar of the lion of justice; he is leaping out of the circus, disdainful of the dust of those who do not want to be reborn.
“Like dragons devouring one another in the ruins, despair and hope are colliding in my heart.
“But you who hate me, rejoice! Hope is the weaker today, and I feel it tottering; now, it has disappeared under your homicidal laughter.
“O men, how hard you are to me, and harder still to your posterity! Your children are born orphans of justice; they shall not see its sun; blindly, they will enter into a blind universe.
“But I, on the bank of springs, without them, without you, on my own, I shall deploy the azure tent where the good, the sage, the righteous, the irreproachable Arthus will come to sit down.”
When the thunder rumbles in the sonorous forests, the great oaks are afraid. Trembling in every leaf, they whisper with the blades of grass and the pale heather lost at their feet. When Merlin had spoken, the kings bent down toward the peoples, the great toward the small; they all whispered among themselves. He completed their confusion with these words:
“If the power of charms is in my soul, if I have ever collected the mistletoe from the oak and drawn the dew of France from the golden basin, if Christ is of the family of enchanters, I order that these remain enclosed in this invisible circle.”
And with his hand he traced a circle in the air, over the assembly of the judges, the doctors and the diviners.
Their heads inclined in spite of themselves beneath Merlin’s yoke, like the bulls of the Sabine, which submit resentfully to the laborer’s yoke. They felt imprisoned in a magic circle; since that moment, none of them has emerged from the invisible enclosure in which they are captive without even seeing the barrier. Their immobility became so profound that you might have thought them petrified if their lips had not continued to murmur speech that they no longer understood. The words that tumbled from their lips belonged to the language of the dead, and no living person could respond to them. The most frightening thing of all was the resounding void of their intelligence, by virtue of which nothing gave a better idea of the sepulcher of the mind.
The mages, the diviners, the ancients of the ages and the powers of the world looked at one another and went pale at the same time. Only Doctor Blasius would not confess that he was vanquished as yet. Addressing the crowd, he cried: “Venite, populi!” The words seemed strangled, and were not understood by anyone. He then had the idea of evoking some spirit enchained in the doctors’ books. Several times he repeated the formula of invocation. The angry heavens remained closed to him. No spirit appeared, and terror seized him in his turn.
“Have no fear, Blasius,” said Merlin. “I forgive you; but leave your ancient art and practice the new one.”
With these words, he left. Without anger and without bile, he breathed on the pyres. The pyres went out. Carried by invisible wings, he skimmed the ground. As for those who wanted to block his way, they could not even crawl.
III
Meanwhile, on earth and in the heavens, all the spirits that were obedient to the Enchanter, wherever they were, had stirred at the same time to come to his aid, and, running or flying from the extremities of the world, a few even crawling, such as salamanders escaped from dolmens, they arrived in haste to make him a rampart. Water spirits came from the druidic forests of France, fire spirits from the gorges of Etna, those of the air from the heights of the Pennine Alps.
As they appeared they formed themselves into legions, camping on the Campo Vaccino, whose enclosure they had soon filled; then they overflowed into the gardens of the Palatine Hill, causing the gates to screech on their hinges. Gorgades with the faces of women and the bodies of goats formed two legions by themselves; then came after them the follet spirits, which formed more than a hundred; and they descended upon the maremma and the islands in the Tiber; then came the winged sylphs and the Scottish brownies; they sat on the steps of the Coliseum that were still empty and filed them to the top, as a swarm of bees fills a hive. The jinn also arrived from Persia; membranous wings extended, they soared momentarily over Merlin’s head and went to alight in the Baths of Diocletian, making the air resonate with the sound of their gongs. Infinite numbers of gnomes also came, which divided up the Trastevere quarter and Monte Testaccio. As for the elves and farfadets, they occupied the Porta Salaria all the way to the Ponte Lamentano, where they bathed all night in fuming streams of sulfur and bitumen.
On the Antonine and Trajan columns and on the obelisks, the kobolds stood watch. The fays of Brittany chose to lodge in the Villa Borghese, the Villa Pamphili, the cypresses of Monte Mario, the stairway of the Trinita dei Monti, the Palazzo de Venezia and numerous cloisters with little twisted and fluted colonnades, where they took pleasure in riding in their nacreous chariots, looking at the old mosaics on the walls, gleaming gold, vermilion and carmine in the sunlight. As for the stryges and witches of France, England and Germany, some established themselves in the taverns, some in the hostelries; all of them, riding on their broomsticks, made the Sabbat dance around the seven hills.
In that way, the army covered the Roman landscape; the atmosphere was obscured. Turpin forgot himself trying to count them. There was nothing but the whispering and quarreling of strange voices; some cried, some brayed, some tried to roar. Hissing, mewling, yapping, croaking, squawking and shrieking could all be heard simultaneously, with human words; all of them seemed to be looking at Merlin and saying: “Woe betide anyone who touches him!”
The eagles that emerged from the rocks of Cambria and which had sharpened their beaks on Roman tombs, thought that the last day of Christ had arrived. Full of the anger with which they had nourished the bards, they soared above the seven hills, necks extended, and they said to their young:
“Come! It’s not the flesh of dogs, ewes and pagans that you’ll have today; it’s Christian flesh.”
They got ready to fall upon the mute city. Merlin felt pity for them, and shouted to them: “Birds of prey, what do you seek?”
“The cadaver of a god.”
“It’s too soon,” the prophet replied. “When there’s an old world to devour, have no fear; I’m the one who’ll provide your fodder. I’ll distribute it to you in equal shares. Until then, return to your aeries.”
And they withdrew, confused, filling the air with their screeches, beyond the Apennines.
Then Merlin, turning to the innumerable legions of spirits that had come running to his defense from so many different worlds, filled them with astonishment by telling them that he had not evoked them, that he had no need of their support, and that he, and he alone, intended to stand up to the city and the world. He dismissed them with a gesture.
They all fled, by the thousand tortuous paths that they had taken to emerge from their retreats. Only the occasional chilly gnome from the North, suddenly infatuated with the Italian sun, remained hidden beneath the Arch of Titus.
Who had evoked them? Perhaps it was the patroness of the bards, Viviane. Several encountered her and took her for a reaper on the Sabine. Drawn in an ox-cart through the sheaves of wheat, she preceded and protected her bard. She saw him without being seen, for her head was crowned with ears of wheat. No one else opened the gates of the eternal city; but then she went up on to one of the towers isolated in the countryside; from there she seemed to be reigning in the desert.
The city and the world fell silent; the places that had thought they were seeing the reappearance of Attila’s locusts did not know yet whether they ought to rejoice or cover themselves with ashes. Emperor Max was the first to break the silence, and, turning majestically toward a man of God named Euchariste, said: “Our blades are blunted by his heart of steel. He has tamed us without fighting us. What remains for us to do?”
“Become apostles again,” said the saint. At the same time he bade the emperor farewell, took off his jewels, put down his golden cross, took up his wooden cross again and walked toward the tomb of Cecilia Metella, for he had chosen that place as his dwelling; having gone into it he became a simple hermit again, closing his door on the world forever.
As for Merlin, the disconcerted crowd dared not follow him. He left the eternal city, saying in his heart: “I shall return.”
As soon as he had crossed the threshold the desert closed around him. He turned his head once more toward the seven hills, and, thinking that the nations had denied him seven times, he wept his most bitter tears. The countryside remained desolate and mute, to the extent that to this day, no ray of spring sunlight has ever been able to console it.
IV
In the meantime, what had become of Jacques in the midst of the crowd? He accused himself of being unworthy to live, although a residue of vanity prevented him from agreeing with that. Sadly and mechanically, without saying where he was going or taking his leave of anyone, agitated and sulky, forgetting Caesar and the Pope, not even asking which was the shortest route, he set off after his master—but after having found him, he dared not approach him, much less speak to him. They both marched around the city at a distance, maintaining the same silence.
Merlin had the magnanimity not to want to humiliate his servant in the presence of other people, or even of a gnome. But when, after having passed Saint Paul Outside the Walls, it was certain that no human ear could hear, and after having sent away the curious cicadas, he stopped at the most solitary place in the locality and said in a low voice, fearful that the earth might hear:
“What have you done, Jacques! You’ve been very prompt to deny me today. Oh, how weak you are, my friend! Did you too, then, want to crucify me in Rome?”
“Mercy!”
“Wait, my friend. I thought that your education was more advanced than it is in reality. Tell me, had you no shame in surrendering the man for whom you had promised so many times to live or die? What did it require for you to decide to make me a calvary here? Ask yourself that, nothing more.”
“Calvary is in Judea.”
“Today, my son, it’s everywhere there’s a sinner. It’s you, Jacques, who dug my grave.”
“I don’t deny it,” Jacques replied. “But who wouldn’t have been deceived? Say the word and I’ll go set fire to the four quarters of that accused city—although I won’t touch the relics, of course.”
“I’m not asking you for violence, Messire Jacques.”
“Oh, the intention was good. What do you expect, Seigneur Merlin? The air goes to one’s head here. Then too, the bells, the pilgrims, the old walls—everything has taken me outside myself. Is there not some magic in these buildings and these mountains of broken pots that one finds here everywhere? I suspect that they’ve put a spell on me.”
“That’s not improbable,” replied the benevolent Merlin, casting glance at the Roma Vecchia. “One can believe that the ancient spirits that I’ve vanquished almost everywhere are lurking here in the crevices of these towers and these tombs, and emerge from these temples that you see scattered around for your instruction. I don’t doubt, my friend, that if you struck these walls with your foot, the spirits of the past would rush out in a host in the form of owls and bats; you’d see them, bewildered by the light of the living, fluttering over your head with wild cries.”
As he spoke, he taped a section of an old reticular wall in the Villa Adriani. An old magpie flew out, which went to perch on the arch of an aqueduct, crying out in a hoarse voice: “Ave Caesar!”
“Do you hear?” said Jacques, cocking an ear. “It speaks Latin!”
“It’s true,” said Merlin, “but that’s no excuse. A good man can always resist a senile magpie, even if it’s enchanted, as that one undoubtedly is. Haven’t I taught you what it’s necessary to do in such encounters?”
“I’d left your book of magic in the house, Seigneur Merlin. They must have taken the opportunity to cast a spell on me.”
“False excuses again! I’ve told you, not once but a hundred times, that if you happen to be deprived of all the instructions of our art, one good thought or a single heartbeat will suffice, Jacques. I’ve taught you that; you’ve forgotten it.”
“The fault is in the place, then, Seigneur Merlin?”
“Assuredly there’s something here too powerful for your brain, which the slightest breath shakes in opposite directions, and I shouldn’t be astonished that the spells employed here have disturbed your reason, but you can’t deny that mine are more powerful still. In any case, it wasn’t so difficult to remain the good man that I was pleased to believe that you were, until now.” Hearing a howl behind him, he added: “Ah! There’s my dog, Jacques, who remained faithful, while you surrendered me.”
These last words, pronounced with generosity, put an end to Jacques’ temporary hardening. He collapsed at his master’s feet, weeping.
“Woe betide me! Who am I, to have handed over my benefactor? At least I didn’t sell him for money.”
“Don’t even deceive yourself on that point, Jacques.”
“No, Seigneur—I didn’t receive the thirty pieces of silver.”
“Were they offered to you?”
Those words broke Jacques’ heart. He went on: “Well, yes, Seigneur Merlin: accuse me, judge me, condemn me; I deserve all that, and worse. It’s only too true that you’ll never make anything of me. I don’t know what drives me to do bad things. I can see that there’s nothing left to do but drown myself.”
With that, the despairing Jacques ran to the Ponte Lamentano. He was about to leap into the Teverone when Merlin, quicker than lightning, pulled him back with a strong hand.
“Do you repent, poor Jacques? That’s all I ask of you.”
“Leave me alone, Seigneur. I’m a wretch, unworthy of seeing daylight; let me die. I no longer deserve to follow you.”
“Your fall is great, to be sure, and it’s not for me to hide that from you, but it’s not without hope; Heaven forbid that it happens again!”
“Oh, for that, I swear, cross my heart!”
“Don’t swear, even in patois, poor Jacques. Your fault has always been passing from extreme discouragement to extreme confidence.”
“Well, I tell you, there’s nothing left but drowning.”
“No, Jacques, it remains to live as an honest man who remembers evil in order to practice good. Know then, my son, that I haven’t adopted you to abandon you so soon. You’ll have need of me for a long time yet, alas. But first, let’s get out of these deserted, feverish places that aren’t good for you, and where Viviane has never resided.”
Jacques, with the facile changeability that was the basis of his character, had already wiped away his tears. Scarcely had he gone a league when he had opened his heart to boundless hopes. Merlin did not want to reduce him to tears again, and it was in silence that they traversed the Roman countryside and lost sight of St. Peter’s city.
Everything was bleak on the vast horizon, where nothing had changed since the fatal hour. You would still think today that the Enchanter had only just left, so great is the stupor. In the distance, the land has remained deserted. The pale grass still cringes under the prophet’s anger.
V
Readers who have followed the various incidents of this work thus far, if they have been paying the necessary attention, will render me the justice that I have remained scrupulously faithful to the text of the chronicles. See principally that of Monmouth, page 240, line 15 of the Halle edition. When I permit myself to add a detail or an ornament, or draw a conclusion, I have done so with the greatest reserve; it is, in any case, an indispensable liberty, without which it would be necessary to renounce the profession of historian, such as it has been exercised from the remotest antiquity to our own day. My plan is to enclose myself ever more narrowly in the sage limits that writers without restraint have too often crossed. The further I advance in life, the more I recognize that the imagination is the flail of the works of the intellect. That declaration must be made at the moment when I enter into the most historical part of my subject.
It is perfectly established today by science that in his pilgrimages, Merlin, as well as following his whims somewhat, had received a diplomatic mission from King Arthus to the Roman Emperor, who was then, if I’m not mistaken, Lucius;100 to the members of the Senate and, to say everything, to each of the dynasties of Greece and the Orient, including Epistrophius, King of Greece; Aethion, Duke of Boeotia; Palamedes, King of Messenia; Evander, Duke of Syria; Hippolytus, Duke of Crete; Pericles, Duke of Athens; Sertorius, King of Libya; Xerxes, king of the Ithurians; Pandrasus, king of Egypt; Polyctetes, Duke of Bythinia; and Aschillius, king of Dacia. For it was then the most brilliant epoch of their reign.
Inasmuch as it is possible to judge from the very rare documents of that embassy, which have been confided to me with admirable munificence, it was principally a matter of obtaining that all the empires and monarchs would promptly and unambiguously pay liege homage to the most powerful of kings, the wild boar of Gaul, Arthus of the round table; otherwise, war would be declared, the said sovereigns and princes dethroned and dispossessed, and their subjects treated as rebels. The ambassador could soften the terms, but that was the foundation and the substance of the letters that he had to transmit, while nevertheless maintaining propriety.
On arriving in Rome, Merlin had been careful not to neglect such important business. He had immediately asked about the Senate. Having been unable to discover it, however, he judged sanely that it would be better to look for it in the country; besides which, it was the hottest season of the year, the time when the great men went to shelter in their villas from the burning breath of midday.
After having traveled the Roman countryside in all directions without having seen a single human being, he ended up finding three shepherds clad in animal skins under an aqueduct, who were guarding a herd of buffalo. He approached them with precaution, because their dogs launched themselves toward him furiously—but they recalled them by whistling.
Then Merlin went up to them and said: “Here, take these few deniers and take me to the order of the Senate. You doubtless know where Caius Catellus, Marius Lepidus, Metellus Cotta and Quintus Carutius are living at present; you’re their slaves.”
“Us, their slaves!” relied one of the shepherds. “We’re the very people you seek. I’m Caius Catellus, and these others you can see are Marius Lepidus and Metellus Cotta. As for Quintus Carutius, he’s engaged for the harvest at two deniers a day.”
Merlin, slightly disconcerted by his mistake, first excused himself on the grounds of simplicity, and then immediately continued: “You’ll know what brings me here when you’ve shown me the emperor.”
“We’ll have to call him, then,” said one of the shepherds, “because he’s over there on a fragment of wall, playing his bagpipe in the midst of his buffaloes.” Then he shouted in a loud voice.
The piper arrived, stood up proudly and looked at Merlin arrogantly.
“You’re Lucius, procurator of the Republic?” said Merlin.
“Undoubtedly I am,” replied the shepherd.
“In consequence, you know the great king Arthus. His glory has reached you.”
“I’ve heard talk of him during late nights.”
“Here are letters that he has instructed me to bring you. They begin with the words: Lucio reipublicae procuratori Arthus rex Britanniae.” And he presented the document, sealed with the seal of the round table.
The emperor Lucius excused himself from receiving them on the grounds that he could not read. Without manifesting any surprise, Merlin explained the context with an admirable clarity. They gave him sustained attention, but when he arrived at the article of liege homage, the emperor and the members of the Senate declared flatly that they would never recognize masters. They were too accustomed to command to be able to obey. They hoped, on the contrary, to reconquer Britain and Gaul and all of their northern provinces.
“What!” exclaimed Merlin, astonished. “You refuse homage to the wild boar of Gaul?”
“Yes, certainly,” replied the mendicants, draping themselves in their rags.
“If that’s the case, I anticipate terrible reprisals and interminable woes.”
“Let it be thus,” replied the shepherds, whistling. “Everyone knows that the world belongs to us.”
That response did not prevent them from offering Merlin and his companion some curdled milk and a little black bread. That was all they possessed. After which, without adding another word, they withdrew to take a siesta in a tomb on the Roma-Vecchia.
Left alone, Merlin and Jacques lost themselves in reflections on the outcome of their embassy.
“Is it certain,” said Jacques “that they really are the emperor and the order of the Senate?”
“Nothing is more certain,” Merlin replied, displaying the open letters, which he was still holding in his hand.
“How, then, can an emperor who has been the master of the world be so poorly nourished?” Jacques added, as he finished eating his black bread.
“Never judge men and their condition by the manner of their nourishment. Know that the greatest men, and even a few demigods—Tages,101 for example—have only ever eaten rye bread, which certainly isn’t as good as this. Lift up your heart, Jacques; educate yourself. See how States lapse into idleness and superstition as empires finish. Reflect on what you encounter. It’s not given to everyone, as it is to you now, to see the greatest of empires fall asleep in a sepulcher with three shepherds and a bagpiper. Profit from the errors of others. Think, Jacques think—if that’s possible.”
“I’ll try, Monsieur.”
“Also,” our hero added, “I imagine that the dynasties of Greece won’t give us a reception any different from these children of the she-wolf, for there’s no denying that they’ve shown us the milk with which they nourish themselves. I’m in the greatest imaginable haste to hand my letters to Epistrophius, king of Greece. Make preparations for the voyage and let’s set forth on the first vessel that we come across on the coast, provided that it’s carrying good sail.
“I’ll look out for one,” Jacques replied, as they approached the port of Ostia, following the maremma.
VI
There was a little Levantine felucca in the harbor, which, after its cargo of olives had been sold at a reasonable price, was getting ready to return to the Estates of Epistrophius, king of Greece. Merlin and his companion made sure that they did not miss out on such a rare opportunity. The price of the passage having been fixed at sixty deniers—very moderate, given the extreme rarity of ships carrying the flag of Epistrophius—our voyagers embarked on a flat sea, with a mild north-western breeze, all sails unfurled except for the topgallant, which was kept in reserve by virtue of an excess of prudence. The course was set for the Duchy of Messenia.102
Save for a squall in the face of the roses of Paestum, the crossing was fortunate. Merlin took advantage of it to read his Homer all in one go, for before visiting a nation he informed himself exactly of its mores, the degree of its wealth and luxury, and the least of its customs. So, when the anchor was dropped in the immense harbor of Pylos, he was perfectly enlightened with regard to the institutions of the kingdoms that were about to be offered to him. He was not taking the risk of letting any surprise show, which is the sign of a lack of education, something blameworthy on the part of all people, and particularly risible and deadly in an ambassador.
Having disembarked on a sandy beach, they saw four men emerging from a cave, semi-clad in fustanellas, their waist surrounded by tattered girdles and sheepskins over their shoulders. It was Epistrophius, king of Greece, accompanied by his two best friends, Aethion, Duke of Boeotia and Hippolytus, Duke of Crete, and also, I believe, Auguselus, king of Albania. They were all smiling as they walked with a light step that left hardly any trace on the sand. They were murmuring a faint song, which they alone could hear.
Light, smiling, immortal dynasties, historians have allowed you to fall into oblivion; you are fortunate when they have not reproached you for being imaginary. They have not consecrated a single line to you, because you did not fill the earth with the blood of murders. Only the flowers that grow in the ruins, the bees of Candia, the nightingales of Colonna, the choirs of cicadas that reside at Sunium or the foot of Mount Ithome, or in the heaths of Arcadia, know your annals. You have reigned without noise and without scandal, as the centenarian tree reigns in the forest.
Personally, I shall endeavor here to extract from forgetfulness at least one page of your past. What is a page, to be sure? Nothing, or almost nothing—but the authentic monuments have not permitted me to hear any more. The route that I am opening here, through regions where no human has penetrated before me, someone else will follow, in order to complete it. Whoever he might be, I salute him in advance.
As soon as Merlin had complimented the king, he told him his name and made him party to his message.
“My dear Merlin,” Epistrophius replied, smiling. “If you’re agreeable, we won’t occupy ourselves with any serious business before I’ve shown you around my capital and my kingdom.”
“I’m burning to see the noble Ithome,” Merlin said, “for I’ve heard marvels said of it in my Homer.”
“We call it Vourcano nowadays, and as for Messene, we have given it the name of Mavromati, which is certainly more agreeable to the ear than the former.”103
“That’s true, sire king,” said Merlin, who had already become something of a courtier.
Such were the discussions in which they whiled away the time agreeably, while waiting for the horses that someone had gone to fetch from the marsh. They finally arrived. They were small, pale horses with long manes, with neither saddles nor bridles. On the other hand, they carried wooden pack-saddles, and two ropes serving as stirrups, not to mention a third, which, passed under the lower jaw, substituted for reins. These details are indispensable for an exact knowledge of mores, an objective of which I am not losing sight for a moment.
At a signal from the king, everyone, the Dukes, the Enchanter and the servants, mounted up and began to trot, sometimes along the sea shore, sometimes going up into the mountains dotted with arbutus, chaste trees and Indian figs with mud-colored leaves. In the split trunks of old oaks, shepherds stood like statutes in ebony niches. A few tortoises crawled over the ground, accompanied by snakes had torn apart by eagles. I have made observations of the nature of the soil of Sparta and Athens; it is, in general, calcareous and friable; it is somewhat lacking in grease; the ashes of heroes, better tended, might have held it together, but time flies and space expands before me, and I’m forced to abridge.
The first day they stopped at Coron, the second at Nisi, the third at Messene. As they dismounted, Epistrophius had a moment of legitimate pride. He said to Merlin: “My dear Merlin, you’re doubtless delighted by the beauty of this capital. Well, know that my intention is to put at your disposal everything that it contains. Yes, I repeat, there is nothing here that is not yours. First, choose your palace, your temple.”
Merlin, utterly astonished by what he heard, and even more so by what he saw, stood motionless his eyes attached to Epistrophius’ domains. He perceived nothing but fallen columns and broken stumps hidden in the grass. Not one roof, not one building. That astonishment, and perhaps also the fear of giving displeasure, left him tongue-tied.
“Since discretion prevents you from replying,” the king went on, “and night is drawing near, my servants will take you to rest in the most delightful palace I possess. Go, Merlin, you and your servant; the greatest joy for me is to give hospitality to those who pass by. What would I not do for the envoy of the noble Arthus?”
Merlin and Jacques followed the servants, who led them to a deserted field where two steps of a theater still rose above ground level not far from the fountain of the Clepsydra. A little stream bathed the ruins, murmuring like an actor rehearsing his role.
“Here,” said the servants, “is the most noble palace in the land.” At the same time they heaped up a little brushwood, with which they made a kind of mattress, which they placed on one of the steps.
“Lord,” they said to Merlin, as they retired, “your bed is prepared. As for your servant’s, we assume that it will be on the lower step. May the gods, if there are any, protect you from prowling wolves and jackals.”
Soon, fatigue constrained Merlin and his servant to lie down on their marble beds, but it was impossible for them to sleep. Jacques, after having turned over a hundred times without being able to close an eyelid, was the first to break the silence.
“Alas, why have we quit the emperor Lucius and the order of the Senate? We’ll perish here of hunger and lack of sleep.”
“I confess,” said Merlin gravely, “that everything I see here gives me a great deal to think about; without wanting to make a reckless judgment on the basis of a few words I’ve overheard, which appear to me to be true sophisms, I believe that we’re voyaging here in the company of the spirits of ruins. I don’t know whether you’ve noticed that our hosts have a muted tone of voice that fully befits debris, and the precise turn of thought—empty, subtle, sophisticated and Byzantine—that is generally attributed to the spirits of decadence. But if that’s true, and we are, in fact, dealing with the spirits of ruins, you need to remember that they’re no less veritable majesties, as legitimate as any others, worthy of your respect. Be careful of failing in that respect in any way, for these dynasties are all the more venerable for having fallen, especially when they support adversity with a smile, as we saw just now.
“Truly,” Jacques replied, “all that I’ve remarked in these dynasties is that they neither eat nor drink. If King Epistrophius at least treated us as Emperor Lucius did, and gave us a little black bread, I wouldn’t complain. But no! Without a few mulberries that I picked from the bushes, I’d have died miserably of starvation.”
“I confess, friend, that I’ve done the same, but secretly and with more discretion. I’ll even go so far as to say that I wouldn’t be sorry to make a frugal meal at this advanced hour of the night.”
“That’s just what I was thinking,” said Jacques.
“In that case, I advise you to get busy right away, while it’s still dark, for if beings such as our hosts, assuming that they are immaterial, catch us eating and drinking, they might perhaps feel great pity for us, and will certainly find us quite ridiculous.”
This advice was immediately followed by Jacques, who started searching the vicinity by moonlight. He soon brought back a lamb, watercress from the fountain of the Clepsydra and some almonds. The brushwood mattress served to light an ardent fire on which the meat did not take long to roast. A few moments later, our two voyagers began to eat, as if they had never done so before in their lives.
They had not finished when King Epistrophius appeared unexpectedly before them at daybreak, followed by his cortege.
On seeing them eating, he could not help bursting into laughter.
“Ah!” cried the king. “This is very pleasant! You suffer from hunger and thirst, then?”
“Sometimes,” said Merlin, humiliated.
“Excuse me,” said Epistrophius. “I should have thought of that. For ourselves, we scarcely live on anything but the blond rays on sunlight, and a little nocturnal dew—which is very abundant hereabouts, as you’ve been able to see.”
“That’s true,” Merlin replied, showing his cloak dampened by the nocturnal humidity.
Epistrophius sent the troupe of his courtiers away then, and, having taken Merlin by the hand, talked to him with the utmost familiarity, for he knew that, as Merlin was only passing through, that familiarity would have no consequences for others.
“Tel me please, Sire,” Merlin said to him, “by what secret you conserve such a magnanimous serenity in the midst of a State in ruins. I have not yet surprised a sigh on your lips, even in the time when we have been treading underfoot the debris and the dust of your empire. Undoubtedly, you conserve the hope of reviving these fallen walls and collapsed towers; in that case, the help of Merlin and his king will not be lacking. But tell me, I beg you, what remedies allow you to support such an immense adversity so lightly. For I confess, such a serenity is beyond even my wisdom.”
“Your astonishment doesn’t surprise me,” King Epsitrophius relied. “Sage as you are, my dear Merlin, you’re human, as I can see. You’re yielding at this moment to human prejudice. Know then that, for being such as us, nothing is more scandalous and more odious than a new city. Without any exaggeration, we would stifle there. Every new edifice is a prison for us, unless it is falling apart. If we should happen to build, it’s uniquely to have the pleasure of demolition.
“My joy, Merlin, is to march without obstacles over a plain strewn with nameless debris, even including a few bones whitening in the nettles. I sit down, I dream, I sense then that I reign in liberty over time itself, which becomes my subject, my workman, my slave. Assuredly, I have reason to be satisfied with my palaces at Mavromati, Sparta and Megalopolis. No fragment of wall interrupts, saddens or limits my gaze.
“However, I hear that my brother Evander, Duke of Syria, my father-in-law Micipsa, King of Babylon, and Polyctetes, Duke of Bythinia, are still better lodged than I am. The work in their homelands is more advanced, progress much more rapid, civilization more perfect. For the very trace of edifices has disappeared under the feet of goats, a result for which we are all ambitious, but which only a few of us have been able to attain.”
“Is that what you call progress, Sire? Don’t you fear that it’s rather a decadence of your empire?”
“Decadence!” interjected Epistrophius, vehemently, with a hint of bitterness. “You talk about that very casually. Let’s reason a little, if you please. It’s very evident that States are made to be ruined; that’s their goal; they hasten toward it. We should, therefore, be glad when they are reduced to an impalpable dust like that which whitens the wings of butterflies. Can you deny that?”
“As you wish, Sire,” Merlin relied, bowing. “Nevertheless, I have a great desire to see your people flourish in abundance. I don’t doubt that you’d gain a great deal by augmenting their numbers, for, if I dare confess it to you, your subjects appear to me to be starving, and already reduced to imperceptible numbers.”
“Another error, good Merlin. Do you always measure others by yourself? Once, it’s true, immense peoples, who were said to have been very beautiful, were abundant in these cities. But also, just Heaven, what a source of troubles and anxieties, what noise, what uncomfortable crowding, what anarchy! The clamor rose up to the clouds. Not a day without tumult, even the night full of tempests. Today, on the contrary, what truly sacred peace! What concord! What religious silence! There still remain for me to rule a few goat-herds, whom you can count from where we stand. They don’t importune me with their rumors. I don’t have to meditate on laws, nor fear violent revolutions. My empire is not disputed by anyone. The only event in my court is a falling stone, and I date the epochs by those falls. All the kings of my family do the same. We live as brothers, without wars or quarrels. But let’s leave this profound conversation; let’s go and rest on that lovely sarcophagus whitening over there beneath that clump of arbutus.”
VII
Merlin judged that King Euphronius wanted to be alone. He parted from him and thought the moment propitious for visiting the surroundings. As he wandered through the countryside he encountered, lying in the grass, several statues that were all resplendent with an extraordinary beauty. The most marvelous thing was—would you believe it?—the faces, with the majesty, the naivety and even a little of the coldness of Viviane.
That encounter, so unexpected, threw our hero into an inexpressible perplexity. What hands, he thought, what artists, have had the unique privilege of reproducing her features? Has Viviane been in this place, then? But when? On what occasion? Accompanied by whom? That’s what escapees me entirely, for she never mentioned this distant voyage to me.
Then, as he considered the statues strewing the ground more closely, the majority of which were mutilated, he thought: Yes, those are, assuredly, her incorruptible features. Look how she wore her hair in tresses knotted behind the head in those days. Where was I? What was I doing? Why have I not seen her thus, crowned in that fashion?
After a moment’s silence, he went on, with a sigh: All that’s lacking here is an imponderable flame. It’s easy to see that in those days, she had not yet loved. Doubtless her days were spent with her godmother, in a tranquil indifference. Who am I to complain about that?
In that ecstasy of sorts, one thing filled him with both surprise and confusion. That was seeing that the statues of Viviane were, to tell the truth, as naked as a new-born child. The most veiled only had a light tunic that still seemed to be stirring.
How, continued our Enchanter, was such inadvertence possible? It’s very evident that Viviane would not have lent herself voluntarily to such an indiscreet art, unless, of course, someone abused her extreme innocence. It must be the case, therefore, that the artists, to whom nothing is sacred, had perceived her while she was bathing at dusk in some silvery stream, veiled by plane trees, as they are hereabouts, or perhaps while she was sleeping, as she was accustomed to do on warm night, under the guard of the stars, whose vigilance mutt have been deceived on that occasion. It’s no less certain that that’s her swan-like neck, her ivory shoulders. At any rate, I can’t bear it that, under the pretext of art or divine beauty, Viviane should be delivered thus any longer to the indiscreet gazes of Epistrophius’ subjects, and perhaps his own.
The truth is that the sage Merlin ended up falling victim to a strange fit of jealousy, at the stones, which seemed to palpitate before his eyes. Without losing a moment, he hid them in the densest part of the woods. Not content with that, he even covered them with earth.
When he returned, the noble Epistrophius recognized by his distressed expression that he was emerging from a keen emotion; he asked him what had caused it. Merlin for whom nothing more uncomfortable than dissimulation, confessed what he had just done, even though he action might offend the king.
“Have no fear,” Epistrophius replied. “Nothing is more in accordance with the intentions of my reign. I’ll give orders to all my subjects that statues that resemble Viviane should be hidden from the gaze under ten or twenty feet of earth. Is that enough, Merlin? Trust my people to do the rest.”
The order given by Epistrophius was immediately obeyed throughout his vast empire; Merlin saw to that personally. At the very most, the tip of a finger or a foot sometimes protruded from the ground—never anything more. Those who passed by were astonished no longer to see all the beauties that had once delighted hem.
“Doubtless the gods have taken them away.”
The following day, they had forgotten them.
At least the good Merlin was satisfied; his jealousy had passed. Thus was conserved for posterity the face of Viviane in her early adolescence, even before she had fallen in love with our Enchanter.
VIII
Since it had become impossible for Merlin to doubt the character of Epistrophius’ royalty, and he could see clearly that the society into which fate had thrown him was that of the spirits of ruins, his curiosity had only increased. He never lost an opportunity to observe such a strange people, and whether he was in the presence of Epistrophius or his courtiers, he informed himself incessantly about the institutions the laws, the customs, and principally the religion, of the spirits of the ruins.
“What do you believe? What is your faith?” Such was the question that returned incessantly to his lips. To which the good Epistrophius usually replied, in an indirect manner, with words such as these:
“That is, in truth, a delicate question. It requires a great deal of time; I fear that we don’t have enough today, for we have to sow an entire field of heather in the confines of a temple.”
“Precisely,” Merlin said. “I’m asking what your religion is. Of what do your rites consist? Have you many dogmas? How do you speak to the imagination of the greatest number?”
“Listen, my dear Merlin, to the song of the owl that is waking,” replied the king. “Let’s not trouble its religious hymn. It is, as you know, our sacred bird. I’m going to bring its food.”
With that, searching the Void, he left. The courtiers reminded our hero then that it was not permissible to interrogate the king.
“You, at least,” Merlin said to them, “What is your dogma? Your sacred book? In what do your ceremonies consist?”
“Ceremonies!” replied the courtiers. “We have more of them than anyone else. Everything among us is ceremony, even sweeping the dust.” Then they withdrew in their turn.
Left alone, Merlin was approached by a man who, to judge by his appearance, seemed to be a foreign slave of the people of the ruins. The man, seeing that his masters had gone, came to him and said hastily, in a convulsive voice:
“Don’t listen to them, Merlin. They’re deceiving you. They’re all traitors, enemies of the plebeian. They pretend to want to knock everything down, to the level of the ground. Don’t believe a word of it. If you knew them better you’d see that they each have the indignity of allowing something to subsist.—one the stump of a column to lean on while sleeping, another a fragment of wall, a third the debris of a tomb; this one a shard of pottery, that one…what do I know? Half a brick or a royal medallion. There’s only me who values anything here, for I even resent the ash and dust of sepulchers.
“Are you envious, my friend?” said Merlin. “Don’t take umbrage at a pinch of ash. It’s our common lot, alas, we who are formed therefrom. They retain, you say, a little dust in the hollow of their hands? Be indulgent to that mania.”
“What are you calling a mania?” said the slave of the spirits of the ruins. “Know that it’s the most shocking privilege, and that I’m dying of rage just thinking about it.”
“If you love your brothers…,” Merlin replied. He was about to continue when he perceived that the person he was addressing was already some distance away.
A little time sufficed for him to discover that, in agriculture, the spirits of the ruins held darnel in the highest esteem; in iron, rust. Commerce was prohibited, with the exception of a little balm to embalm heroes. With regard to laws, they had a great many, which all contradicted one another.
Merlin asked to see the public libraries; they were shown to him; they were kept by a very short spirit named Griffopoulos, who showed him around with an inexhaustible complaisance. It was from him that he learned that the law forbade the expression of any clear and definite idea in a work, on any subject whatsoever, regarding them all as deadly.
“What! Even eulogizing ruins is forbidden?”
“Yes, if the eulogy is made in a certain tone. We fear to express that which might recall life. We’re so glad to have lost the habit of it.”
“Have you any philosophy?” asked Merlin.
“Of course,” replied the librarian, presenting him with a scroll of extensively worm-eaten papyrus. “We have a national philosophy. We call it sophistic. It is reborn from one age to the next without ever running out.”
“And your criticism?”
“Very rich. That’s where we shine. We mock everything that doesn’t amuse us.”
Merlin opened a few volumes and perceived that they were effaced, from the first line to the last. “Are the others like this?”
“All of them.”
“That’s a strange literature, scratched out and erased from generation to generation!”
The librarian adopted a sober tone: “I’ve heard it said by our greatest minds that it’s their torture. Whenever they’ve found some capital, bold truth, such as two and two make four, another generation arrives, which promptly effaces, in Indian ink, what they’ve done—and even intelligence itself is effaced. Then everything has to begin again, and there’s never any lack of material for fine works—for it’s necessary to be ingenious again, to compile, to analyze, to compromise oneself and one’s family, to ruin oneself body and soul, to risk jail, exile, death, in order to demonstrate, but this time more modestly, that perhaps, if he ancients can be believed, but without too much assurance, nor wanting to offend anyone, everything in any case remaining to by decided by the powerful, that it might be the case that two and two make four.”
“Oh, my friend, a strange torture for a mind that wishes to advance! A squirrel in its iron cage makes more progress in an hour than those in a lifetime. And your gods?”
“More often than not, our gods are ourselves.”
That last response threw Merlin into the blackest melancholy. That society, deprived of Heaven, appeared to him in all its sadness. The very grace of the spirits of the ruins weighed more heavily on him every day. He felt a need to respire on sacred summits.
Without communicating his plan to anyone, he made a vow to go on a pilgrimage in search of the lost gods—which he executed the following day, taking advantage of the moment when Epistrophius was taking his siesta, as you will see in the next book, which commences with an inspiration that I drew from Mount Lykaon itself.