In the Wrong Paradise, and Other Stories Read online

  III. THE PROPHECY.

  The priest and the man with the gold circlet, whom I took to be a chief,now met, and, fixing their eyes on me, held a conversation of which,naturally, I understood nothing. I maintained an unmoved demeanour, and,by way of showing my indifference, and also of impressing the nativeswith the superiority of our civilization, I took out and wound up mywatch, which, I was glad to find, had not been utterly ruined by the saltwater. Meanwhile the priest was fumbling in his casket, whence heproduced a bundle of very ragged and smoky old bits of parchment andscraps of potsherds. These he placed in the hands of his attendants, whoreceived them kneeling. From the very bottom of the casket he extractedsome thin plates of a greyish metal, lead, I believe, all mouldy,stained, and ragged. Over these he pored and puzzled for some time,trying, as I guessed, to make out something inscribed on this curioussubstitute for writing-paper. I had now recovered my presence of mind,and, thinking at once to astonish and propitiate, I drew from my pocket,wiped, and presented to him my spectacles, indicating, by example, themanner of their employment. No sooner did he behold these commonarticles of every-day use, than the priest's knees began to knocktogether, and his old hands trembled so that he could scarcely fix thespectacles on his nose. When he had managed this it was plain that hefound much less difficulty with his documents. He now turned themrapidly over, and presently discovered one thin sheet of lead, from whichhe began to read, or rather chant, in a slow measured tone, every now andthen pausing and pointing to me, to my hat, and to the spectacles whichhe himself wore at the moment. The chief listened to him gravely, andwith an expression of melancholy that grew deeper and sadder till theend. It was a strange scene.

  I afterwards heard the matter of the prophecy, as it proved to be, whichwas thus delivered. I have written it down in the language of thenatives, spelling it as best I might, and I give the translation which Imade when I became more or less acquainted with their very difficultdialect. {23a} It will be seen that the prophecy, whatever its origin,was strangely fulfilled. Perhaps the gods of this people were not mereidols, but evil spirits, permitted, for some wise purpose, to deludetheir unhappy worshippers. {23b} This, doubtless, they might best do byoccasionally telling the truth, as in my instance. But thistheory--namely, that the gods of the heathen are perhaps evil andwandering spirits--is, for reasons which will afterwards appear, verypainful to me, personally reminding me that I may have sinned as few havedone since the days of the early Christians. But I trust this will notbe made a reproach to me in our Connection, especially as I have been thehumble instrument of so blessed a change in the land of the heathen,there being no more of them left. But, to return to the prophecy, it isgiven roughly here in English. It ran thus:--"But when a man, having achimney pot on his head, and four eyes, appears, and when a sail-lessship also comes, sailing without wind and breathing smoke, then willdestruction fall upon the Scherian island." Perhaps, from this and otherexpressions to be offered in a later chapter, the learned will be able todetermine whether the speech is of the Polynesian or the Papuan family,or whether, as I sometimes suspect, it is of neither, but of a characterquite isolated and peculiar.

  The effect produced on the mind of the chief by the prophecy amazed me,as he looked, for a native, quite a superior and intelligent person. Noneof them, however, as I found, escaped the influence of their banefulsuperstitions. Approaching me, he closely examined myself, my dress, andthe spectacles which the old priest now held in his hands. The two menthen had a hurried discussion, and I have afterwards seen reason tosuppose that the chief was pointing out the absence of certain importantelements in the fulfilment of the prophecy. Here was I, doubtless, "aman bearing a chimney on his head" (for in this light they regarded myhat), and having "four eyes," that is, including my spectacles, aconvenience with which they had hitherto been unacquainted. It wasundeniable that a prophecy written by a person not accustomed to theresources of civilization, could not more accurately have described meand my appearance. But the "ship without sails" was still lacking to thecompletion of what had been foretold, as the chief seemed to indicate bywaving his hand towards the sea. For the present, therefore, they mighthope that the worst would not come to the worst. Probably thisconclusion brought a ray of hope into the melancholy face of the chief,and the old priest himself left off trembling. They even smiled, and, intheir conversation, which assumed a lighter tone, I caught and recordedin pencil on my shirt-cuff, for future explanation, words which soundedlike aiskistos aneer, farmakos, catharma, and Thargeelyah. {25} Finallythe aged priest hobbled back into his temple, and the chief, beckoning meto follow, passed within the courtyard of his house.