Mór Jókai

“ From the dizzy heights of the cavern wall leaps a stream, that is transformed to iridescent spray before it reaches the valley, there to pursue its sinuous course amid the fields, gardens, and tiny white dwellings upon which we looked down as through a misty veil.
"That is our future home," whispered Madus. "Our life-prison from which there is no escape. To this island garden is banished all those haidemaken who prove too tender-hearted for their cruel trade, or tire of their adventurous life; also those who refuse to desert the women they love. ”

“ If I refused to repeat the vows I should have to confess that I had come to the manor for Marinka's sake, then the old noble would fetch his musket and send me straightway to paradise. If, on the other hand, I repeated the vows, then I was sure to journey to hades. Which was I to choose?
Should I elect to travel by extra-post, direct, without stopping, into the kingdom of heaven, or should I journey leisurely by a circuitous route, with frequent halts, to hades?
I was a mere lad; I was sorry for my pretty curly head—I chose the latter alternative! ”

“ On very, very hot days, when the native farmers trudge along the high-road (the high caste native never travels on foot, nor appears in public at midday) the dust rising from their feet looks like a fiery mist, and makes one think he is looking on the damned in hades walking amid the flames!
And there too the soil is so different from ours. There the plants we grow in pots in our hot houses thrive and luxuriate under the open sky, and form a wilderness, the lurking place of tigers and lions, in which the fragrance of the very air is intoxicating as wine. ”

“ Then he turned toward the musketeers, who were waiting matches in readiness above the priming-pans, and said earnestly:
"Comrades, I beg you, when you shoot me, try also to kill the raven which is fluttering on my shoulder"—he glanced furtively toward his shoulder and added joyfully: "No! No! it is not the raven—it is my white dove—my precious white dove! She has come to bear my soul to the land wherein she now dwells! My good angel!—My Madus—my only love!"
Twelve musket shots rang out on the silent air, and the white dove soared away with the released soul. ”

“ I kept looking back from time to time, so long as the entrance remained in sight. My Madus stood, looking after me, in the circular opening of the rocky wall; she seemed like a saint encompassed by a halo of light, and as the corridor grew darker and more gloomy the radiant image at my back increased in brilliance until a sudden turn hid the beautiful vision from my sight.
That same evening we set out for Berdiczov—four-hundred haidemaken, with the culverin. ”

“ When I have emptied it into my stomach, I fly direct to paradise—not the one described by our holy men, where all the men are old, and all the women pious; where there is neither eating nor drinking and where there are no amusements save harp-playing and psalm singing—no, I fly straightway to the improved paradise of the Mohammedans, where there is wine to drink and women to admire. ”

“ With a ragged mantle on my back, a crutch in my hand, an iron band about my neck, and the white dove on my shoulder, where could I have gone?—even had I wished to leave the forest.
The rags and the crutch were fitting equipment for a beggar; but what should I have replied had anyone asked me why I wore the iron band on my neck? I was disgusted with the world and its wickedness.
Overwhelmed with remorse for the sins I had committed, I resolved to become a hermit and do penance—I would remain in the forest and adopt the rigorous life of an ascetic. ”

“ With these words the noble fellow drew his sword, severed his head from his body and laid it before us.
"Did you eat any of him?"
"I was starving, your honor."
"That establishes your crime. The punishment for eating a body endowed with a human soul is death at the stake, you—"
"Hold," interposed the prince. "What portion of the Spaniard's body did you consume, prisoner?"
"His foot, your highness."
"Has the human foot a soul?"
"Why, certainly," answered the chair. "How frequently do we hear: 'His sense or his courage are in his knees'—sense and courage cannot exist without a soul. ”

“ True, those whom the haidemaken sent to the valley had already become tender-hearted, or, weary of the wild life of the robbers; but, no matter what the life of a man had been before he became a member of the little community in the island garden, there he would forget the entire world, become an entirely new being.
I speak from experience, for I, who have enjoyed a full share of this world's pleasures—everything that can rejoice the king in his palace, and the dreams of the prisoner in his dungeon—I never was truly happy until I went to dwell with my beloved Madus in the Viszpa Ogrod. ”

“ I will not enter into a league with him."
"No, I am not Satan; I am the leader of the Bocksritter. If you will join us, you shall be corporal, and in time you may become the leader."
"Thank you," said I, "but I think I should prefer to remain simply a private. I have heard that the man who leagues himself with the 'satyrs,' binds his body to pain and death; and that he who becomes their leader must bond his soul to the devil—and that I will never do."
"Very well," he growled in response; "I regret to hear so brave a lad decide thus. Then bind yourself only to pain and death." ”

“ While I ate, he examined in turn each of the vessels I had taken from the bag and placed on the table, exclaiming over every piece, and making a peculiar noise with his tongue against the inside of his upper teeth:
"A baptismal basin! Tse-tse-tse! How could you dare to take this? A censer! tse-tse-tse! Young man, did it never occur to you that you were defying Satan when you put this into your bag? A communion-cup! tse-tse-tse! I should think your soul would be oppressed with its weight of sin! And—actually!—the Holy Virgin's diadem! Woe-woe-woe, to you, miserable sinner!" ”

“ But, my dear son, you don't know what a terrible creature the moo-calf is. It has become even more terrible and ferocious since the Jews have multiplied to such numbers in Hamburg. These Spanish Jews understand all sorts of witch-craft. It was they who discovered that if a young calf is fed on human blood instead of milk, it will become savage as a lion. This is the sort of moo-calf they have turned loose in the Hamberger Berg. It roams through the streets at night, terrifying to death every person it meets, and scatters the watchmen in all directions. ”

“ Nebuchadnezzar now began to ladle out the burning liquor into goblets which he passed to the rest of the company. The flame dispensing king, with his four horns, the fire-sipping forms around him, their faces blanched to a death-like pallor by the green-blue light of the burning brandy, formed a group that excelled in hideousness every illustration I had yet seen of the danse macabre. ”

“ But, if one king kills another one, it cannot be called regicide, but ordinary homicide, which, in the prisoner's case, was justifiable manslaughter—"
"I knew it!" exclaimed the chair. "I knew the rascal would talk himself out of the three capital crimes: idolatry, bigamy, regicide, and prove himself as innocent as St. Susanna!"
But, continued the prisoner, even had I not been robbed of my wealth, of what use would it have been to me? I had come to India to win the rank of captain—not to become a rajah. It is a deal better to be a pensioned captain than a deposed king. ”

“ Besides, I entertained a sort of affection for him; we had been good comrades, and had not drank each other's blood for nothing.
"Well," said I, after deliberating a moment, "what brings you here?—here, where nothing is to be got but fiery bullets."
"I came to ask you to exchange bodies."
"Why do you wish to exchange?"
"The leader has ordered it."
"Do you still belong to the satyrs?"
"Yes—and so do you. It is not a disease from which one can recover; nor an office one may resign. It is not a garment one may cast aside; nor a wife one may divorce. In a word, once a satyr, always a satyr." ”

“ If I remained in the forest how could I perform the good deed Madus had told me was necessary in order to win paradise? If I passed all my days in the hollow tree beside the brook, where no human being ever came near me, how was I to benefit my fellow creatures? How win the "God will reward you"—the open sesame to paradise? ”

“ He had deposed the Begum as he had threatened, had laid chains on her—the heroic deliverer of her people—and this he had been able to accomplish because he had become an adherent of the religion of Buddha, and because the Begum had become a worshipper of Siva—
"The like of that never could have happened in Europe," interpolated the prince.
My rage and fury were boundless. In one brief moment to lose my kingdom and my bride; to be robbed of power and love; to be forced to look on helpless while a cowardly knave stole my treasures, chief of which was my beautiful Zeib Alnissa! ”

“ I remembered what Persida had said to me. And yet, the sin I shared with her was the very one that most oppressed my soul.
The father noticed my hesitation, and said:
"My son, you are keeping back something. You have not told me everything. It is not likely that a stately young gentleman like yourself lives only on caraway-soup! There are many handsome women in this city; every one of them confesses her foibles—you, surely, are not the only saint about here! Remember, if you withhold but a single transgression, your tortures in purgatory will be the same as for nine-hundred and ninety-nine." ”

“ When I came up with them, hobbling on one leg and leaning on my crutch, they broke into loud laughter:
"What the devil is the matter with you?" queried the leader.
"I am all used up!" I groaned. "I killed an old Turk, whose lame leg prevented him from running away with the rest of them; and before he gave up the ghost he cursed me and prayed that I might be compelled to hobble along on a crutch for the rest of my life. He had hardly got the words out of his throat before my leg became as you see it, and I can't straighten it." ”

“ If I could not be a hermit, I could become a beggar—begging was also a way to gain a livelihood, and I possessed the necessary equipment for it.
In Poland, no one who can say: "Give me bread," needs die of hunger. The iron band on my neck might, after all, be of advantage to me; it would give me a sort of superiority over other mendicants. If I were asked how I came by it, I should say that it had been forged on my neck by the Saracens, who took me captive when I was in the Holy Land, and because I had made my escape through a miracle, I continued to wear the band as a penance. ”

“ Inch by inch the unfortunate victim is swallowed—as is the dove in the jaws of the serpent. Not until he has sunk to his waist, does despair seize him, and he realizes that escape is impossible. Every effort to extricate himself is futile—he only sinks the deeper into the treacherous sand. ”

“ The proof that I am not lying may easily be obtained, if your honor will send a deputation to India, to make inquiries concerning the truth of my statements, if it turns out that a single one of them is lacking in truth, then your honor may disbelieve all the rest."
"Oho!" sneered the chair, "you would like to postpone this trial for a year or more, while a searching commission travelled to the end of the world and back—wouldn't you? We prefer to believe that living creatures also hang on trees like fruits."
"And so they do!" responded the prisoner. ”

“ They banished from my mind all thought of making myself known as the long-lost Hugo, and the determination to keep my identity a strict secret was strengthened by the drummer who, at every beat he inflicted on the cracked calf-skin, exclaimed: "The rascal!" "The vagabond!" "The gallows-bird!" and similar titles of honor!
I deemed it wise to join him in execrating the reprobate, whose evil conduct had forced the honest old tanner to end his life on the green branch over our heads.
The bloody deed I had committed in Hamburg had driven my poor father to a suicide's grave. ”

“ The robbers had been mowed down like grain; only the leader and a few of his men had escaped by the skin of their teeth; their field-gun had been captured and the gunner hanged on one of the tallest trees—your honors may guess that I took good care not to deny this statement!
I praised the duke's heroism, and listened attentively to his tales about the terrible haidemaken, as if I had never heard of them before.
At last, one fine day, the pilgrims returned from Berdiczov; and the joyous sound of women's voices was heard in the palace. Master and man hastened to welcome the fair ones. ”

“ Haven't I been with her, and given her my lingam?"
"Yes, but she has not yet given you anything. Until I have her written consent in my hands, I dare not repeat Bazawa's blessing," was Zeib Alnissa's smiling reply.
"And I shall have to wait at the gates of paradise, content myself with inhaling the perfume of the flowers within the walls, until our messenger has twice traversed the ocean between India and Holland?"
"He will need to cross only once. I ordered him to take with him several doves, the species with green feathers known as bridegroom's doves. ”

“ I soon found the kerchief, which I tied about my neck, amid the acclamations and cheers of my comrades, which were multiplied by the echoing walls to the most infernal roaring. The torches held over the mouth of the abyss gleamed through the darkness like a blood-red star in the firmament of hades. ”

“ Forests, fields, houses, human beings, at times take on an ocherous hue, as if the world were dead; and [Pg 245] when a rain falls, it is a deluge of fire from a sky of brass. And sometimes, the cloud-burst will be like a rain of blood, and the whole earth will glow with the most brilliant crimson hue. ”