by E R Eddison
When the King was come into his high seat, with Corund and Corinius on his left and right in honour of their great deeds of arms, and La Fireez facing him in the high seat on the lower bench, the thralls made haste to set forth dishes of pickled grigs and oysters in the shell, and whilks, snails, and cockles fried in olive oil and swimming in red and white hippocras. And the feasters delayed not to fall to on these dainties, while the cupbearer bore round a mighty bowl of beaten gold filled with sparkling wine the hue of the yellow sapphire, and furnished with six golden ladles resting their handles in six half-moon shaped nicks in the rim of that great bowl. Each guest when the bowl was brought to him must brim his goblet with the ladle, and drink unto the glory of Witchland and the rulers thereof.
Somewhat greenly looked Corinius on the Prince, and whispering Heming, Corund’s son, in the ear, who sat next him, he said, ‘True it is that La Fireez is the showiest of men in all that belongeth to gear and costly array. Mark with what ridiculous excess he affecteth Demonland in the great store of jewels he flaunteth, and with what an apish insolence he sitteth at the board. Yet this lobcock liveth only by our sufferance, and I see a hath not forgot to bring with him to Witchland the price of our hand withheld from twisting of his neck.’
Now were borne round dishes of carp, pilchards, and lobsters, and thereafter store enow of meats: a fat kid roasted whole and garnished with peas on a spacious silver charger, kid pasties, plates of neats’ tongues and sweetbreads, sucking rabbits in jellies, hedgehogs baked in their skins, hogs’ haslets, carbonadoes, chitterlings, and dormouse pies. These and other luscious meats were borne round continually by thralls who moved silent on bare feet; and merry waxed the talk as the edge of hunger became blunted a little, and the cockles of men’s hearts were warmed with wine.
‘What news in Witchland?’ asked La Fireez.
‘I have heard nought newer,’ said the King, ‘than the slaying of Gaslark.’ And the King recounted the battle in the night, setting forth as in a frank and open honesty every particular of numbers, times, and comings and goings; save that none might have guessed from his tale that any of Demonland had part or interest in that battle.
La Fireez said, ‘Strange it is that he should so attack you. An enemy might smell some cause behind it.’
‘Our greatness,’ said Corinius, looking haughtily at him, ‘is a lamp whereat other moths than he have been burnt. I count it no strange matter at all.’
Prezmyra said, ‘Strange indeed, were it any but Gaslark. But sure with him no wild sudden fancy were too light but it should chariot him like thistle-down to storm heaven itself.’
‘A bubble of the air, madam: all fine colours without and empty wind within. I have known other such,’ said Corinius, still resting his gaze with studied insolence on the Prince.
Prezmyra’s eye danced. ‘O my Lord Corinius,’ said she, ‘change first thine own fashion, I pray thee, ere thou convince gay attire of inward folly, lest beholding thee we misdoubt thy precept – or thy wisdom.’
Corinius drank his cup to the drains and laughed. Somewhat reddened was his insolent handsome face about the cheeks and shaven jowl, for surely was none in that hall more richly apparelled than he. His ample chest was cased in a jerkin of untanned buckskin plated with silver scales, and he wore a collar of gold that was rough with smaragds and a long cloak of sky-blue silk brocade lined with cloth of silver. On his left wrist was a mighty ring of gold, and on his head a wreath of black bryony and sleeping nightshade. Gro whispered Corund in the ear, ‘He bibbeth it down apace, and the hour is yet early. This presageth trouble, since ever with him indiscretion treadeth hard on the heels of surliness as he waxeth drunken.’
Corund grunted assent, saying aloud, ‘To all peaks of fame might Gaslark have climbed, but for this same rashness. Nought more pitiful hath been heard to tell of than his great sending into Impland, ten years ago, when, on a sudden conceit that a should lay all Impland under him and become the greatest king in all the world, he hired Zeldornius and Helteranius and Jalcanaius Fostus—’
‘The three most notable captains found on earth,’ said La Fireez.
‘Nothing is more true,’ said Corund. ‘These he hired, and brought ’em ships and soldiers and horses and such a clutter of engines of war as hath not been seen these hundred years, and sent ’em – whither? To the rich and pleasant lands of Beshtria? No. To Demonland? Not a whit. To this Witchland, where with a twentieth part the power a hath now risked all and suffered death and doom? No! But to yonder hell-besmitten wilderness of Upper Impland, treeless, waterless, not a soul to pay him tribute had he laid it under him save wandering bands of savage Imps, with more bugs on their bodies than pence in their purses, I warrant you. Or was he minded to be king among the divels of the air, ghosts, and hob-thrushes that be found in that desert?’
‘Without controversy there be seventeen several sorts of divels on the Moruna,’ said Corsus, very loud and sudden, so that all turned to look on him; ‘fiery divels, divels of the air, terrestrial divels, as you may say, and watery divels, and subterranean divels. Without controversy there be seven seen sorts, seventeen several sorts of hob-thrushes, and several sorts of divels, and if the humour took me I could name them all by rote.’
Wondrous solemn was the heavy face of Corsus, his eyes, baggy underneath and somewhat bloodshed, his pendulous cheeks, thick blubber upper-lip, and bristly grey moustachios and whiskers. He had eaten, mainly to provoke thirst, pickled olives, capers, salted almonds, anchovies, fumadoes, and pilchards fried with mustard, and now awaited the salt chine of beef to be a pillow and a resting place for new potations.
The Lady Zenambria asked, ‘Knoweth any for certain what fate befell Jalcanaius and Helteranius and Zeldornius and their armies?’
‘Heard I not,’ said Prezmyra, ‘that they were led by Will-o’-the-Wisps to the regions Hyperborean, and there made kings?’
‘Told thee by the madge-howlet, I fear me, sister,’ said La Fireez. ‘Whenas I fared through Impland the More, six years ago, there was many a wild tale told me hereof, but nought within credit.’
Now was the chine served in amid shallots on a great dish of gold, borne by four serving men, so weighty was the dish and its burden. Some light there glowed in the dull eye of Corsus to see it come, and Corund rose up with brimming goblet, and the Witches cried, ‘The song of the chine, O Corund!’ Great as a neat stood Corund in his russet velvet kirtle, girt about with a broad belt of crocodile hide edged with gold. From his shoulders hung a cloak of wolf’s skin with the hair inside, the outside tanned and diapered with purple silk. Daylight was nigh gone, and through a haze of savours rising from the feast the flamboys shone on his bald head set about with thick grizzled curls, and on his keen grey eyes, and his long and bushy beard. He cried, ‘Give me a rouse, my lords! and if any fail to bear me out in the refrain, I’ll ne’er love him more.’ And he sang this song of the chine in a voice like the sounding of a gong; and all they roared in the refrain till the piled dishes on the service tables rang:
Bring out the Old Chyne, the Cold Chyne to me,
And how lie charge him come and see,
Brawn tusked, Brawn well sowst and fine,
With a precious cup of Muscadine:
How shall I sing, how shall I look,
In honour of the Master-Cook?
The Pig shall turn round and answer me,
Canst thou spare me a shoulder? A wy, a wy,
The Duck, Goose, and Capon, good fellows all three,
Shall dance thee an antick, so shall the Turkey:
But O! the Cold Chyne, the Cold Chyne for me:
How shall I sing, how shall I look,
In honour of the Master-Cook?
With brewis Ile noynt thee from head to th’ heel,
Shal make thee run nimbler than the new oyld wheel;
With Pye-crust wee’l make thee
The eighth wise man to be;
But O! the Old Chyne, the Cold Chyne for me:
How shall
I sing, how shall I look,
In honour of the Master-Cook?
When the chine was carved and the cups replenished, the King issued command saying, ‘Call hither my dwarf, and let him act his antick gestures before us.’
Therewith came the dwarf into the hall, mopping and mowing, clad in a sleeveless jerkin of striped yellow and red mockado. And his long and nerveless tail dragged on the floor behind him.
‘Somewhat fulsome is this dwarf,’ said La Fireez.
‘Speak within door, Prince,’ said Corinius. ‘Know’st not his quality? A hath been envoy extraordinary from King Gorice XI of memory ever glorious unto Lord Juss in Galing and the lords of Demonland. And ’twas the greatest courtesy we could study to do them, to send ’em this looby for our ambassador.’
The dwarf practised before them to the great content of the lords of Witchland and their guests, save for his japing upon Corinius and the Prince, calling them two peacocks, so like in their bright plumage that none might tell either from other; which somewhat galled them both.
And now was the King’s heart waxen glad with wine, and he pledged Gro, saying, ‘Be merry, Gro, and doubt not that I will fulfil my word I spake unto thee, and make thee king in Zajë Zaculo.’
‘Lord, I am yours for ever,’ answered Gro. ‘But methinks I am little fitted to be a king. Methinks I was ever a better steward of other men’s fortunes than of mine own.’
Whereat the Duke Corsus, that was sprawled on the table well nigh asleep, cried out in a great voice but husky withal, ‘A brace of divels broil me if thou sayest not sooth! If thine own fortunes come off but bluely, care not a rush. Give me some wine, a full weeping goblet. Ha! Ha! Whip i’ away! Ha! Ha! Witchland! When wear you the crown of Demonland, O King?’
‘How now, Corsus,’ said the King, ‘art thou drunk?’
But La Fireez said, ‘Ye sware peace with the Demons in the Foliot Isles, and by mighty oaths are ye bound to put by for ever your claims of lordship over Demonland. I hoped your quarrels were ended.’
‘Why so they are,’ said the King.
Corsus chuckled weakly. ‘Ye say well: very well, O King, very well, La Fireez. Our quarrels are ended. No room for more. For, look you, Demonland is a ripe fruit ready to drop me thus in our mouth.’ Leaning back he gaped his mouth wide open, suspending by one leg above it an hortolan basted with its own dripping. The bird slipped through his fingers, and fell against his cheek, and so on to his bosom, and so on the floor, and his brazen byrny and the sleeves of his pale green kirtle were splashed with the gravy.
Whereat Corinius let fly a great peal of laughter; but La Fireez flushed with anger and said, scowling, ‘Drunkenness, my lord, is a jest for thralls to laugh at.’
‘Then sit thou mum, Prince,’ said Corinius, ‘lest thy quality be called in question. For my part I laugh at my thoughts, and they be very choice.’
But Corsus wiped his face and fell a-singing:
Whene’er I bib the wine down,
Asleepe drop all my cares.
A fig for fret,
A fig for sweat,
A fig care I for cares.
Sith death must come, though I say nay,
Why grieve my life’s days with affaires?
Come, bib we then the wine down
Of Bacchus faire to see;
For alway while we bibbing be,
Asleepe drop all our cares.
With that, Corsus sank heavily forward again on the table. And the dwarf, whose japes all else in that company had taken well even when themselves were the mark thereof, leaped up and down, crying, ‘Hear a wonder! This pudding singeth. When with two platters, thralls! ye have served it o’ the board without a dish. One were too little to contain so vast a deal of bullock’s blood and lard. Swift, and carve it ere the vapours burst the skin.’
‘I will carve thee, filth,’ said Corsus, lurching to his feet; and catching the dwarf by the wrist with one hand he gave him a great box on the ear with the other. The dwarf squealed and bit Corsus’s thumb to the bone, so that he loosed his hold; and the dwarf fled from the hall, while the company laughed pleasantly.
‘So flieth folly before wisdom which is in wine,’ said the King. ‘The night is young: bring me botargoes, and caviare and toast. Drink, Prince. The red Thramnian wine that is thick like honey wooeth the soul to divine philosophy. How vain a thing is ambition. This was Gaslark’s bane, whose enterprises of such pitch and moment have ended thus, in a kind of nothing. Or what thinkest thou, Gro, thou which art a philosopher?’
‘Alas, poor Gaslark,’ said Gro. ‘Had all grown to his mind, and had he ’gainst all expectation gotten us overthrown, even so had he been no nearer to his heart’s desire than when he first set forth. For he had of old in Zajë Zaculo eating and drinking and gardens and treasure and musicians and a fair wife, all soft ease and contentment all his days. And at the last, howsoe’er we shape our course, cometh the poppy that abideth all of us by the harbour of oblivion hard to cleanse. Dry withered leaves of laurel or of cypress tree, and a little dust. Nought else remaineth.’
‘With a sad brow I say it,’ said the King: ‘I hold him wise that resteth happy, even as the Red Foliot, and tempteth not the Gods by over-mounting ambition to his dejection.’
La Fireez had thrown himself back in his high seat with his elbows resting on its lofty arms and his hands dangling idly on either side. With head held high and incredulous smile he harkened to the words of Gorice the King.
Gro said in Corund’s ear, ‘The King hath found strange kindness in the cup.’
‘I think thou and I be clean out o’ fashion,’ answered Corund, whispering, ‘that we be not yet drunken; the cause whereof is that thou drinkest within measure, which is good, and me this amethyst at my belt keepeth sober, were I never so surfeit-swelled with wine.’
La Fireez said, ‘You are pleased to jest, O King. For my part, I had as lief have this musk-million on my shoulders as a head so blockish as to want ambition.’
‘If thou wert not our princely guest,’ said Corinius, ‘I had called that spoke in the right fashion of a little man. Witchland affecteth not such vaunts, but can afford to speak as our Lord the King in proud humility. Turkey cocks do strut and gobble; not so the eagle, who holdeth the world at his discretion.’
‘Pity on thee,’ cried the Prince, ‘if this cheap victory turn thee so giddy. Goblins!’
Corinius scowled. Corsus chuckled, saying to himself but loud enough for all to hear, ‘Goblins, quotha? They were small game had they been all. Ay, there it is: had they been all.’
The King’s brow was like a foul black cloud. The women held their breath. But Corsus, blandly insensible of these gathering thunders, beat time on the table with his cup, drowsily chanting to a most mournful air:
When birds in water deepe do lie,
And fishes in the air doe flie,
When water burns and fire doth freeze,
And oysters grow as fruits on trees—
A resounding hecup brought him to a full close.
The talk had died down, the lords of Witchland, ill at ease, studying to wear their faces to the bent of the King’s looks. But Prezmyra spake, and the music of her voice came like a refreshing shower. ‘This song of my Lord Corsus,’ she said, ‘made me hopeful for an answer to a question in philosophy; but Bacchus, you see, hath ta’en his soul into Elysium for a season, and I fear me nor truth nor wisdom cometh from his mouth tonight. And this was my question, whether it be true that all animals of the land are in their kind in the sea? My Lord Corinius, or thou, my princely brother, can you resolve me?’
‘Why, so it is received, madam,’ said La Fireez. ‘And inquiry will show thee many pretty instances: as the sea-frog, the sea-fox, the sea-dog, the sea-horse, the sea-lion, the sea-bear. And I have known the barbarous people of Esamocia eat of a conserve of sea-mice mashed and brayed in a mortar with the flesh of that beast named bos marinus, seasoned with salt and garlic.’
‘Foh! Speak to me somewhat quick
ly,’ cried the Lady Sriva, ‘ere in imagination I taste such nasty meat. Prithee, yonder gold peaches and raisins of the sun as an antidote.’
‘Lord Gro will instruct thee better than I,’ said La Fireez. ‘For my part, albeit I think nobly of philosophy, yet have I little leisure to study it. Oft have I hunted the badger, yet never answered that question of the doctors whether he hath the legs of one side shorter than of the other. Neither know I, for all the lampreys I have eat, how many eyes the lamprey hath, whether it be nine or two.’
Prezmyra smiled: ‘O my brother, thou art too too smoored, I fear me, in the dust of action and the field to be at accord with these nice searchings. But be there birds under the sea, my Lord Gro?’
Gro made answer, ‘In rivers, certainly, though it be but birds of the air sojourning for a season. As I myself have found them in Outer Impland, asleep in winter time at the bottom of lakes and rivers, two together, mouth to mouth, wing to wing. But in the spring they revive again, and by and by are the woods full of their singing. And for the sea, there be true sea-cuckows, sea-thrushes, and sea-sparrows, and many more.’
‘It is passing strange,’ said Zenambria.
Corsus sang:
When sorcerers do leave their charme,
When spiders do the fly no harme.
Prezmyra turned to Corund saying, ‘Was there not a merry dispute betwixt you, my lord, concerning the toad and the spider, thou maintaining that they do poisonously destroy one another, and my Lord Gro that he would show thee to the contrary?’
‘’Twas even so, lady,’ said Corund, ‘and it is yet in controversy.’