Chapter 64 - Page 2

wild
provinces, may be the march of Mind; but not the march of Love."

"Thou, Bello!" cried Yoomy, "would'st wrest the crook from Alma's
hand, and place in it a spear. But vain to make a conqueror of him,
who put off the purple when he came to Mardi; and declining gilded
miters, entered the nations meekly on an ass."

"Oh curse of commerce!" cried Babbalanja, "that it barters souls for
gold. Bello! with opium, thou wouldst drug this land, and murder it in
sleep!--And what boot thy conquests here? Seed sown by spears but
seldom springs; and harvests reaped thereby, are poisoned by the
sickle's edge."

Yet on, and on we coasted; counting not the days.

"Oh, folds and flocks of nations! dusky tribes innumerable!" cried
Yoomy, "camped on plains and steppes; on thousand mountains,
worshiping the stars; in thousand valleys, offering up first-fruits,
till all the forests seem in flames;--where, in fire, the widow's
spirit mounts to meet her lord!--Oh, Orienda, in thee 'tis vain to
seek our Yillah!"

"How dark as death the night!" said Mohi, shaking the dew from his
braids, "the Heavens blaze not here with stars, as over Dominora's
land, and broad Vivenza."

One only constellation was beheld; but every star was brilliant as the
one, that promises the morning. That constellation was the Crux-
Australis,--the badge, and type of Alma.

And now, southwest we steered, till another island vast, was reached;
--Hamora! far trending toward the Antarctic Pole.

Coasting on by barbarous beaches, where painted men, with spears,
charged on all attempts to land, at length we rounded a mighty bluff,
lit by a beacon; and heard a bugle call:--Bello's! hurrying to their
quarters, the World-End's garrison.

Here, the sea rolled high, in mountain surges: mid which, we toiled
and strained, as if ascending cliffs of Caucasus.

But not long thus. As when from howling Rhoetian heights, the traveler
spies green Lombardy below, and downward rushes toward that pleasant
plain; so, sloping from long rolling swells, at last we launched upon
the calm lagoon.

But as we northward sailed, once more the storm-trump blew, and
charger-like, the seas ran mustering to the call; and in battalions
crouched before a towering rock, far distant from the main. No moon,
eclipsed in Egypt's skies, looked half so lone. But from out that
darkness, on the loftiest peak, Bello's standard waved.

"Oh rifled tomb!" cried Babbalanja. "Wherein lay the Mars and
Moloch of our times, whose constellated crown, was gemmed with
diadems. Thou god of war! who didst seem the devouring Beast of the
Apocalypse;