Read Online In the Land of Time by Alfred Dunsany - Free Book Online Page B

gifts; only in their homes after the falling of the night would they pray again with reverence to Mung. But Mung said: “Shall a man curse a god?” And Mung went forth amid the cities to glean the lives of the People.
    And still Mung came not nigh to YÅ«n-Ilāra as he cried his curses against Mung from his tower towards the sea.
    And Sish throughout the Worlds hurled Time away, and slew the Hours that had served him well, and called up more out of the timeless waste that lieth beyond the Worlds, and drave 7 them forth to assail all things. And Sish cast a whiteness over the hairs of YÅ«n-Ilāra, and ivy about his tower, and weariness over his limbs, for Mung passed by him still.
    And when Sish became a god less durable to YÅ«n-Ilāra than ever Mung hath been he ceased at last to cry from his tower’s top his curses against Mung whenever the sun went down, till there came the day when weariness of the gift of Kib fell heavily upon YÅ«n-Ilāra.
    Then from the Tower of the Ending of Days did YÅ«n-Ilāra cry out thus to Mung, crying: “O Mung! O loveliest of the gods! O Mung, most dearly to be desired! thy gift of Death is the heritage of Man, with ease and rest and silence and returning to the Earth. Kib giveth but toil and trouble; and Sish, he sendeth regrets with each of his hours wherewith he assails the World. Yoharneth-Lahai cometh nigh no more. I can no longer be glad with Limpang-Tung. When the other gods forsake him a man hath only Mung.”
    But Mung said: “Shall a man curse a god?”
    And every day and all night long did YÅ«n-Ilāra cry aloud: “Ah, now for the hour of the mourning of many, and the pleasant garlands of flowers and the tears, and the moist, dark earth. Ah, for repose down underneath the grass, where the firm feet of the trees grip hold upon the world, where never shall come the wind that now blows through my bones, and the rain shall come warm and trickling, not driven by storm, where is the easeful falling asunder of bone from bone in the dark.” Thus prayed YÅ«n-Ilāra, who had cursed in his folly and youth, while never heeded Mung.
    Still from a heap of bones that are YÅ«n-Ilāra still, lying about the ruined base of the tower that once he builded, goes up a shrill voice with the wind crying out for the mercy of Mung, if any such there be.

OF HOW THE GODS WHELMED SIDITH
    There was dole in the valley of Sidith.
    For three years there had been pestilence, and in the last of the three a famine; moreover, there was imminence of war.
    Throughout all Sidith men died night and day, and night and day within the Temple of All the gods save One (for none may pray to MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI) did the priests of the gods pray hard.
    For they said: “For a long while a man may hear the droning of little insects and yet not be aware that he hath heard them, so may the gods not hear our prayers at first until they have been very oft repeated. But when our praying has troubled the silence long it may be that some god as he strolls in Pegāna’s glades may come on one of our lost prayers, that flutters like a butterfly tossed in storm when all its wings are broken; then if the gods be merciful They may ease our fears in Sidith, or else They may crush us, being petulant gods, and so we shall see trouble in Sidith no longer, with its pestilence and dearth and fears of war.”
    But in the fourth year of the pestilence and in the second year of the famine, and while still there was imminence of war, came all the people of Sidith to the door of the Temple of All the gods save One, where none may enter but the priests—but only leave gifts and go.
    And there the people cried out: “O High Prophet of All the gods save One, Priest of Kib, Priest of Sish, and Priest of Mung, Teller of the mysteries of Dorozhand, Receiver of the gifts of the People, and Lord of Prayer, what doest thou within the Temple of All the gods save One?”
    And