Rhadamanthus

“ The wondrous, eery voice of Drorathusa never ceased, though there were moments when those echoing voices were silent.
Look! Far away, there was a faint, ghostly flicker. Another and another. Brighter they became and brighter still, at last opalescent; soon rocks and forest, the whole weird landscape was again bathed in the mystic pearly light.
"What in the world," I said, "was it?"
"An eclipse," smiled Rhodes. "Queer place, this."
"Queer place? Can't you hit another tune? You don't have to keep telling me that this is a queer place. I am not likely to forget that fact. ”

“ For a few seconds her look rested upon Rhodes and me, and it was as though across those strange, wondrous pale eyes of hers a shadow had fallen.
As for the high priest, he had instantly, and with a fierceness that he could not bridle, turned to Drorathusa.
How Rhodes and I, as we sat there, wished that we could understand the words being spoken!
"Always, O Drorathusa," said Brendaldoombro, "has your spirit been strange and wayward. Always have you been a seeker after that which is dark and mysterious. And, of a truth, dark and mysterious is the evil which you have now brought upon Drome. ”

“ Rhodes and Drorathusa evinced an admirable nonchalance, but in the eyes of the others burned the dull light of despair. And perhaps, too, in my own. I tried to hide it, but I could not disguise it from myself—the numbing, maddening fact that I had abandoned hope.
For a time I lay watching Rhodes, who was writing, writing in his journal. How could he do it? Who could ever find the record? At any rate, even though found, it could never be read, for the finder would be a Dro-man. It made me angry to see a man doing a thing so absurd. ”

“ One of these phantoms, large, amorphous, writhing (its light so strong that it was bright in the rays of the lamps but not of the electric ones) came crawling along, swaying and shaking, straight toward us. Rhodes and I, as if by instinct, moved over so as to miss it; but Drorathusa and the others walked right into it. As they emerged from the spectral, phosphorescent cloudlet, the light clung to them like wraiths of fog, to be slowly dissipated as they advanced in little streams and eddies behind them. ”

“ Ratnodbhava became a merchant, and in the way of traffic made many long journeys by land and sea. The other sons, after their fathers' death, succeeded to their offices, according to the custom of the country. When Râjahansa had reigned some years, war broke out between him and the king of the adjoining country of Mâlwa, the haughty and ambitious Mânasâra, whom he marched to encounter with a numerous army, making the earth tremble with the tread of his elephants, and disturbing even the dwellers in the sky with the clang of kettledrums louder than the roar of the stormy ocean. ”

“ He was about sixty years of age, lean to emaciation and with the cold, hard look of the fanatic in his eyes and, indeed, in his every lineament. His face, smooth-shaven, as is the Droman custom, was like that of some cruel bird of prey. Coldly he received, and returned, the salutation of Drorathusa, and dark with malevolence had been the look which he had fixed upon Rhodes and me.
There could not be the slightest doubt that this human raptor purposed to rend us beak and talon. ”

“ Rhodes and I were greatly puzzled, for it was patent that neither the angel nor anyone else knew how they had gone astray. And, not knowing that, how could anyone tell which way to go?
"Better get it clear in that notebook," I admonished Rhodes. "It's a queer business, and I don't pretend to understand it at all."
We came along for a half-mile or so, carefully and with no little apprehension, and then, hurrah, there was a sign on the wall! The route to Drome again! But for how long?
Drorathusa quickened her pace. She was moving along now as though in confidence, certitude even. ”

“ The region was a wilderness, but soon—the day after that in which we issued from the labyrinth, in fact—we sighted our first habitation of man in this world of Drome. The next day we reached a village, where we passed the night. We were much struck by the deep respect with which Drorathusa was received. As for our own reception—well, that gave us something to think about.
Not that there was any sign of menace. It was the looks, the very mien of those Hypogeans that puzzled and worried Rhodes and myself. ”

“ Then even as a flame consumeth insects, the mighty dart of Rāvana burnt up those shafts shot from the bow of Rāma. Seeing those shafts reduced to ashes and crushed on coming in contact with the dart, as they were coursing in the sky, Rāghava was transported with passion. And then waxing wondrous wroth,—Raghu's son—Rāghava—took up a javelin, liked by Vāsava himself, brought by Mātali. And on being wielded by that strong one, the javelin, resonant with bells, made the welkin blaze up, like a burning meteor on the occasion of universal rack. ”

“ Beautiful indeed was Radha, an image of golden ivory, with lips like a pomegranate bud before its sweetness is tasted, and great eyes dark as the midnight and lit by her stars. Beautiful the soft moulding of her rounded chin, and the shaping of the flower-face poised on its stem like a champak blossom that all the bees of love must seek, and the silk-soft brows and the heavy sweep of shadowy lashes. ”

“ Rhodes said, turning a quizzical look in my direction and then to the face of Drorathusa, "we must expect to find live things in that forest."
I saw Drorathusa's eyes fixed upon his face, then, a few moments after he ceased speaking, return to the clump of cycads.
"Live things?" said I. "There may be things in this place of mystery more terrible than any live thing."
"Come, Bill, come. It can't be so bad as you think it, or our Dromans wouldn't be here. I wish," he added, "I knew what that thing is that I saw." ”

“ I say we do not know for certain: we do know what Drorathusa and the others thought that it was; but that is a creature so grisly that it must (at any rate, such is the belief of Rhodes and myself) be placed amongst Chimeras, Hydras and such fabled monsters. ”

“ At length the light no longer lay in streams and rifts in the darkness, but the darkness, instead, lay in streams through the light. The Dromans quickened their already hurried pace, and there were exclamations of "Drome! Drome!"
"Drome!" echoed Milton. Rhodes. "I wonder what we are going to find."
"Something wonderful," said I, "or something worse, perhaps, than anything that we have seen."
Rhodes laughed, and I saw Drorathusa (Narkus was leading the way) turn and send a curious glance in our direction.
"Well," I added, "anything to get out of this horrible forest of fungi." ”

“ The change was magical. You should have seen those fellows! Whether it was the report of the weapon or whether it was that hole through which the water came spouting in, I do not know; but the taming of those wild men was swift and complete. As soon as they had recovered their wits, round flew the bow of their boat and away they went toward the shore. Our Dromans burst into laughter, even Drorathusa. And that was the last that we saw of those three fanatics.
But why had they done it? Wherefore were Rhodes and I the objects of a hatred so fierce and insensate? ”

“ Rhodanthe, now so common, and several unpublished plants, of new genera, the more remarkable of which are the following; viz. Lawrencella rosea,94 a most beautiful annual, resembling Rhodanthe, but handsomer, and differing in the achænia being covered with long clavate glands, and in the pappus not being plumose; from the greater part of the allies of Rhodanthe it is distinguished by the pappus being in many rows; Xyridanthe,95 another genus near Rhodanthe, from which it differs in the pappus being paleaceous and plumose, not setose: the species are annuals of no beauty ”

“ I turned my look to the Dromans with some apprehension, for I did not know what superstitious ideas they might entertain, feared that to them this aerobatic stunt of Rhodes might be sacrilege itself. My misgivings, however, were groundless. The Dromans were delighted. They burst into merry laughter; they applauded vociferously. Even Drorathusa laughed outright.
Little wonder, forsooth, for a pretty figure Rhodes made balanced up' there on the poor fellow's olfactory protuberance. A fine posture truly for one of the world's (I mean our world's) great scientists ”

“ Rādhā's feet do not touch the ground, but are upborne by lotus flowers that spring up beneath them. Thus Rādhā is very tenderly represented as divine. Every footfall finds a lotus-footstool,—which is a constant convention of Buddhist and Hindū art. The lightness of her step is also suggested.
8. Called 'water-lily' eyes "for the calm repose of their drooping lids." (Tagore, loc. cit.) .
RĀDHĀ BAYAHSANDI The Growing-up of Rādhā
XVI
3. Her eyes are elongated just when she grows up: or possibly the poet means that she then first artificially extends their length with a line of collyrium. ”

“ I turned at the sound and saw Drorathusa, her figure and mien ineffably Sibylline and majestic, pointing out over the strange landscape, her eyes on the face of Milton Rhodes.
"Drome!" she said again.
"Drome!" echoed Milton. Then to me: "I wonder, Bill, what this Drome really is. And I have an idea that this is only the outskirts that we see. Can we at last be near our journey's end, or is that end still far away?"
"Who can tell? This place seems to be a wilderness."
"Yes; a forest primeval." ”

“ Milton Rhodes and Bill Carter penetrate the caverns beneath Mount Rainier and rescue Drorathusa, Sibylline priestess of the Dromans, from being dragged to death by an ape-bat. In company with Drorathusa and her companions, they go down into the bowels of the Earth toward the strange underground land of Drome, anti penetrate a veritable Dante's Inferno of terrible monsters—tree-octopi, loopmukes and gogrugrons. ”

“ Of a sudden there was a sharp exclamation from the lips of Drorathusa, who was some little distance in advance—an exclamation that fetched me up on the instant.
She had stopped and was pointing towards the left-hand wall, her attitude and the look upon her face such that I started and a sudden fear shot through me.
"What in the world can it be?" I said. "I see nothing but rock and shadows and blackness. What has she found?"
Milton Rhodes made no answer. He was moving forward. I followed. A moment, and he was beside the Dromans, his light turned full upon the wall.
"Look at that, Bill!" ”

“ The rich and brilliant Rhodymenia laciniata is not uncommon, and the more delicate and scarcely less beautiful Nitophyllum punctatum (See Plate V.) , with Delesseria sanguinea and sinuosa, and many other species equally attractive, occur. Some of these are it is true deep-water kinds, washed in by the tides; the first named, for example, I have never met with in a growing state; but this little bay is particularly rich in littoral species. At the bottom of the wall or quay-like edge, grow several fine tufts of those very elegant Algæ, Griffithsia corallina, and G. setacea ”

“ Rhodes laughed.
"Gogrugron!" said Drorathusa.
And I saw that horror and fear again in her eyes.
The cavern had come out high up on a broken, jagged wall, which went beetling up for hundreds of feet, up to the roof, which arched away over the landscape before us. We were fully half a thousand feet above the floor, which was a mass of luxuriant tropical forest. Glimpses were caught of a stream down to the left, perhaps the one which we had followed for so long. I judged the place to be more than a mile wide; Rhodes, however, that it was perhaps not quite a mile in the widest part. ”

“ The strong Rāghava will compass the end of what remains of thy life. Like the life of a beast tied to the sacrificial stake, thy own is incapable of being reclaimed, Should Rāma look at thee with eyes aglow with anger, thou, O Rākshasa, wouldst be consumed even as Manmatha was by Rudra. He who is able to bring down the Moon or destroy him, and to drink up the ocean dry, will surely liberate Sitā from here. Thy days are numbered, and auspiciousness hath bidden thee adieu. Thou art shorn of strength, and thy senses have been dulled. ”

“ Now Rhodanus cometh from far,
From the ends of the earth, where the portals of Night and her mansions are. {630}
Thence bursteth he forth, and divideth his stream; for the one part roareth
To the beaches of Ocean, and one to the sea Ionian poureth;
And a third to the main Sardinian, the sea-gulf limitless-vast,
Through seven mouths sendeth his flood. So from Rhodanus forth they passed,
And they drave over wintry meres wide-spread—none telleth their bound—
Over the Keltic mainland, and well-nigh there had they found
Inglorious doom: for a certain branch turns sidewards flowing
To the Ocean-gulf ”

“ As we sat there resting, the Dromans held a low and earnest colloquy. The girls, though, had but very little to say. The subject of the dialogue was an utter mystery to us. Only one thing could we tell, and that was that the matter which they were revolving was one of some gravity. Once and only once did we hear the word "Drome."
Also, it was then that we first heard the name of our angel. We could not be certain at the time that was her name, but there was no uncertainty about the name itself—Drorathusa. Ere the afternoon was far advanced, however, we saw our belief become a certitude. ”