As if with life indued,
The Car miraculous supported stood.
15.
Then Carmala brought forth two mantles, white
As the swan’s breast, and bright as mountain snow,
When from the wintry sky
The sun, late rising, shines upon the height,
And rolling vapors fill the vale below.
Not without pain the unaccustomed sight
That brightness could sustain;
For neither mortal stain,
Nor parts corruptible, remain.
Nor aught that time could touch or force destroy,
In that pure web whereof the robes were wrought;
So long had it in tenfold fires been tried,
And blanched, and to that brightness purified.
“Apparelled thus, alone,
Children of Earth,” Neroodi cried,
“In safety may ye pass to Yamen’s throne:
Thus only can your living flesh and blood
Endure the passage of the fiery flood.
16.
“Of other frame, O Son of Heaven, art thou!
Yet hast thou now to go
Through regions which thy heavenly mould will try
Glories unutterably bright, I know,
And beams intense of empyrean light,
Thine eye divine can bear; but fires of woe,
The sight of torments, and the cry
Of absolute despair,
Might not these things dismay thee on thy flight,
And thy strong pennons flag and fail thee there?
Trust not thy wings, celestial though thou art,
Nor thy good heart, which horror might assail,
And pity quail,
Pity, in these abodes of no avail;
But take thy seat this mortal pair beside,
And Carmala the infernal Car will guide.
Go, and may happy end your way betide!”
So, as he spake, the self-moved Car rolled on;
And, lo! they pass the Gate of Padalon.
XXIII. PADALON.
1.
WHOE’ER hath loved, with venturous step, to tread
The chambers dread
Of some deep cave, and seen his taper’s beam
Lost in the arch of darkness overhead,
And marked its gleam,
Playing afar upon the sunless stream,
Where from their secret bed,
And course unknown and inaccessible,
The silent waters well,
Whoe’er hath trod such caves of endless night,
He knows, when measuring back the gloomy way,
With what delight refreshed, his eye
Perceives the shadow of the light of day,
Through the far portal slanting, where it falls
Dimly reflected on the watery walls;
How heavenly seems the sky;
And how, with quickened feet, he hastens up,
Eager again to greet
The living World and blessèd sunshine there;
And drink, as from a cup
Of joy, with thirsty lips, the open air.
2.
Far other light than that of day there shone
Upon the travellers entering Padalon.
They, too, in darkness entered on their way;
But, far before the Car,
A glow, as of a fiery furnace light,
Filled all before them. ’Twas a light which made
Darkness itself appear
A thing of comfort; and the sight, dismayed,
Shrunk inward from the molten atmosphere.
Their way was through the adamantine rock
Which girt the World of Woe: on either side
Its massive walls arose, and overhead
Arched the long passage. Onward as they ride,
With stronger glare the light around them spread;
And, lo! the regions dread,
The World of Woe, before them, opening wide.
3.
There rolls the fiery fiood,
Girding the realms of Padalon around:
A sea of flame it seemed to be,
Sea without bound;
For neither mortal nor immortal sight
Could pierce across through that intensest light
A single rib of steel,
Keen as the edge of keenest cimeter,
Spanned this wide gulf of fire. The infernal Car
Rolled to the Gulf, and, on its single wheel
Self-balanced, rose upon that edge of steel.
Red-quivering float the vapors overhead;
The fiery Gulf, beneath them spread,
Tosses its billowing blaze with rush and roar:
Steady and swift the self-moved Chariot went,
Winning the long ascent;
Then, downward rolling, gains the farther shore.
4.
But, oh! what sounds and sights of woe,
What sights and sounds of fear,
Assail the mortal travellers here!
Their way was on a causey straight and wide,
Where penal vaults on either side were seen,
Ranged like the cells wherein
Those wondrous winged alchemists infold
Their stores of liquid gold.
Thick walls of adamant divide
The dungeons; and, from yonder circling flood,
Off-streams of fire through secret channels glide,
And wind among them, and in each provide
An everlasting food
Of rightful torments for the accursed brood.
5.
These were the rebel race, who, in their might
Confiding impiously, would fain have driven
The Deities supreme from highest Heaven;
But by the Suras, in celestial fight,
Opposed and put to flight,
Here, in their penal dens, the accursed crew,
Not for its crime, but for its failure, rue
Their wild ambition. Yet again they long
The contest to renew,
And wield their arms again in happier hour;
And with united power,
Following Kehama’s triumph, to press on
From World to World, and Heaven to Heaven, and Sphere
To Sphere, till Hemakoot shall be their own,
And Meru Mount, and Indra’s Swerga-Bowers,
And Brama’s region, where the heavenly Hours
Weave the vast circle of his age-long day.
Even over Vishnu’s empyreal seat
They trust the Rajah shall extend their sway;
And that the seven-headed Snake, whereon
The strong Preserver sets his conquering feet,
Will rise, and shake him headlong from his throne,
When, in their irresistible array,
Amid the Milky Sea they force their way.
Even higher yet their frantic thoughts aspire;
Yea, on their beds of torment as they lie,
The highest, holiest Siva they defy,
And tell him they shall have anon their day,
When they will storm his realm, and seize Mount Calasay.
6.
Such impious hopes torment
Their raging hearts, impious and impotent;
And now, with unendurable desire
And lust of vengeance, that, like inward fire,
Doth aggravate their punishment, they rave
Upon Kehama; him the accursed rout
Acclaim; with furious cries and maddening shout
They call on him to save:
“Kehama!” they exclaim;
Thundering the dreadful echo rolls about,
And Hell’s whole vault repeats Kehama’s name.
7.
Over these dens of punishment, the host
Of Padalon maintain eternal guard,
Keeping upon the walls their vigilant ward.
At every angle stood
/> A watch-tower, the decurion Demon’s post,
Where, raised on high, he viewed with sleepless eye
His trust, that all was well. And over these,
Such was the perfect discipline of Hell,
Captains of fifties and of hundreds held
Authority, each in his loftier tower;
And chiefs of legions over them had power;
And thus all Hell with towers was girt around.
Aloft the brazen turrets shone
In the red light of Padalon;
And on the walls between,
Dark moving, the infernal Guards were seen,
Gigantic Demons, pacing to and fro;
Who ever and anon,
Spreading their crimson pennons, plunged below,
Faster to rivet down the Asuras’ chains,
And, with the snaky scourge and fiercer pains,
Repress their rage rebellious. Loud around,
In mingled sound, the echoing lash, the clash
Of chains, the ponderous hammer’s iron stroke,
With execrations, groans, and shrieks and cries,
Combined in one wild dissonance, arise;
And through the din there broke,
Like thunder heard through all the warring winds,
The dreadful name. “Kehama,” still they rave,
“Hasten and save!
Now, now, Deliverer! now, Kehama, now!
Earthly Almighty, wherefore tarriest thou?”
8.
Oh! if that name abhorred,
Thus uttered, could well-nigh
Dismay the Powers of Hell, and daunt their Lord,
How fearfully to Kailyal’s ear it came!
She, as the Car rolled on its rapid way,
Bent down her head, and closed her eyes for dread;
And deafening, with strong effort from within,
Her ears against the din,
Covered and pressed them close with both her hands.
Sure, if the mortal Maiden had not fed
On heavenly food, and long been strengthened
With heavenly converse for such end vouchsafed,
Her human heart had failed, and she had died
Beneath the horrors of this awful hour.
But Heaven supplied a power
Beyond her earthly nature, to the measure
Of need infusing strength;
And Fate, whose secret and unerring pleasure
Appointed all, decreed
An ample meed and recompense at length.
High-fated Maid, the righteous hour is nigh!
The all-embracing Eye
Of Retribution still beholdeth thee;
Bear onward to the end, O Maid! courageously.
9.
On rolled the Car; and, lo! afar
Upon its height the towers of Yamenpur
Rise on the astonished sight.
Behold the Infernal City, Yamen’s seat
Of empire, in the midst of Padalon,
Where the eight causeys meet!
There, on a rock of adamant, it stood,
Resplendent far and wide,
Itself of solid diamond edified,
And all around it rolled the fiery flood.
Eight bridges arched the stream; huge piles of brass
Magnificent, such structures as beseem
The Seat and Capital of such great God,
Worthy of Yamen’s own august abode.
A brazen tower and gateway at each end
Of each was raised, where Giant Wardens stood,
Stationed in arms the passage to defend,
That never foe might cross the fiery flood.
10.
Oh, what a gorgeous sight it was to see
The Diamond City blazing on its height,
With more than mid-sun splendor, by the light
Of its own fiery river! —
Its towers and domes and pinnacles and spires,
Turrets and battlements, that flash and quiver
Through the red, restless atmosphere for ever;
And, hovering overhead,
The smoke and vapors of all Padalon,
Fit firmament for such a world, were spread,
With surge and swell and everlasting motion,
Heaving and opening like tumultuous ocean.
11.
Nor were there wanting there
Such glories as beseemed such region well;
For though with our blue heaven and genial air
The firmament of Hell might not compare,
As little might our earthly tempests vie
With the dread storms of that infernal sky,
Whose clouds of all metallic elements
Sublimed were full. For, when its thunder broke,
Not all the united World’s artillery,
In one discharge, could equal that loud stroke;
And though the Diamond Towers and Battlements
Stood firm upon their adamantine rock,
Yet, while it volleyed round the vault of Hell,
Earth’s solid arch was shaken with the shock,
And Cities in one mighty ruin fell.
Through the red sky terrific meteors scour;
Huge stones come hailing down; or sulphur-shower,
Floating amid the lurid air like snow,
Kindles in its descent,
And with blue fire-drops rains on all below.
At times the whole supernal element,
Igniting, burst in one vast sheet of flame,
And roared as with the sound
Of rushing winds, above, below, around;
Anon the flame was spent, and overhead
A heavy cloud of moving darkness spread.
12.
Straight to the brazen bridge and gate
The self-moved Chariot bears its mortal load.
At sight of Carmala,
On either side the Giant Guards divide,
And give the Chariot way.
Up yonder winding road it rolls along,
Swift as the bittern soars on spiral wing;
And, lo, the Palace of the Infernal King!
13.
Two forms inseparable in unity
Hath Yamen; even as with hope or fear
The Soul regardeth him doth he appear;
For hope and fear,
At that dread hour, from ominous conscience spring,
And err not in their bodings. Therefore some,
They who polluted with offences come,
Behold him as the King
Of Terrors, black of aspect, red of eye,
Reflecting back upon the sinful mind,
Heightened with vengeance and with wrath divine,
Its own inborn deformity.
But, to the righteous Spirit, how benign
His awful countenance,
Where, tempering justice with parental love,
Goodness, and heavenly grace,
And sweetest mercy, shine! Yet is he still
Himself the same, — one form, one face, one will;
And these his twofold aspects are but one;
And change is none
In him, for change in Yamen could not be:
The Immutable is he.
14.
He sate upon a marble sepulchre,
Massive and huge, where, at the Monarch’s feet,
The righteous Baly had his Judgment-seat.
A Golden Throne before them vacant stood;
Three human forms sustained its ponderous weight,
With lifted hands outspread, and shoulders bowed
Bending beneath the load.
A fourth was wanting. They were of the hue
Of coals of fire; yet were they flesh and blood,
And living breath they drew;
And their red eyeballs rolled with ghastly stare,
As thus, for their misdeeds, they stood tormented there.
15.
On steps of gold
those living Statues stood,
Who bore the Golden Throne. A cloud behind
Immovable was spread; not all the light
Of all the flames and fires of Padalon
Could pierce its depth of night.
There Azyoruca veiled her awful form
In those eternal shadows; there she sate,
And as the trembling Souls, who crowd around
The Judgment-seat, receive the doom of fate,
Her giant arms, extending from the clouds
Drew them within the darkness. Moving out
To grasp and bear away the innumerous rout,
For ever and for ever thus were seen
The thousand mighty arms of that dread Queen.
16.
Here, issuing from the Car, the Glendoveer
Did homage to the God, then raised his head.
“Suppliants we come,” he said;
“I need not tell thee by what wrongs oppressed,
For nought can pass on earth to thee unknown;
Sufferers from tyranny, we seek for rest,
And Siva bade us go to Yamen’s throne;
Here, he hath said, all wrongs shall be redressed.”
Yamen replied, “Even now the hour draws near,
When Fate its hidden ways will manifest.
Not for light purpose would the Wisest send
His suppliants here, when we, in doubt and fear,
The awful issue of the hour attend:
Wait ye in patience and in faith the end!”
XXIV. THE AMREETA.
1.
So spake the King of Padalon; when, lo!
The voice of lamentation ceased in Hell.
And sudden silence all around them fell,
Silence more wild and terrible
Than all the infernal dissonance before.
Through that portentous stillness, far away,
Unwonted sounds were heard, advancing on,
And deepening on their way;
For now the inexorable hour
Was come, and in the fulness of his power,
Now that the dreadful rites had all been done.
Kehama from the Swerga hastened down
To seize upon the throne of Padalon.
2.
He came in all his might and majesty,
With all his terrors clad, and all his pride;
And by the attribute of Deity,
Which he had won from Heaven, self-multiplied,
Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southey Page 155