Read Online Once & Future King 05 - The Book of Merlyn by T. H. White - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: T. H. White
Ads: Link
at present describe it."
Merlyn said: "It is because one likes to tinker with things, to play with possibilities."
The hedgehog gave the best reason, which was simply: "Whoy shouldernt *un?"
Then they fell silent, musing on the flames.
"Perhaps I have painted a dark picture of the humans," said Merlyn doubtfully, "not very dark, but it might have been a shade lighter. It was because I wanted you to understand about looking at the animals. I did not want you to think that man was too grand to do that. In the course of a long experience of the human race, I have learned that you can never make them understand anything, unless you rub it in."
"You are wanting me to find something out, by learning from the beasts." 59
"Yes. At last we are getting to the object of your visit. There are two creatures which I forgot to shew you when you were small, and, unless you see them now, we shall get no further."
"I will do what you like."
"They are the Ant and the Wild Goose. We want you to meet them tonight. Of course it will be only one kind of ant, out of many hundreds, but it is a kind which we want you to see."
"Very well," said the king. "I am ready and willing."
"Have you the Sanguinea-spell at hand, my badger?"
The wretched animal immediately began to rummage in its chair, searching inside the seams, lifting the corner of the carpet, and turning up slips of paper covered with Merlyn's handwriting in all directions.
The first slip was headed More Hubris Under Victoria. It said: "Dr. John of Gaddesden, court physician to Edward II, claimed to have cured the king's son of small-pox by wrapping the patient up in red cloth, putting red curtains on the windows, and seeing that all the hangings of the room were red. This raised a merry Victorian guffaw at the expense of mediaeval simplicity, until it was discovered by Dr. Niels Finsen of Copenhagen in the twentieth century that red and infra-red light really did affect the pustules of small-pox, even helping in the cure of the disease."
The next slip said briefly: "Half a rose noble each way on Golden Miller."
The third, which smelt strongly of Quelques Fleurs, and was not in Merlyn's hand, said: "Queen Philippa's monument at Charing Cross, seven-thirty, under the spire." There were a lot of kisses on the bottom of it, and, on the back, some notes for a poem to be addressed to the sender. These were in Merlyn's writing, and said: Hooey? Coue? Chop-suey? The poem itself, which began Cooee Nimue, was erased.
Another slip was headed: "Other Races, Victorian Condescension to, as well as to Own Ancestors, Animals, etc." It said: "Colonel Wood-Martin, the Antiquarian, writing in 1895, observes with a giggle that 'one of the most-depraved of all races, the now extinct Tasmanians, believed that stones, especially certain kinds of quartz crystals, could be used as mediums, or as means of communication... with living persons at a distance!* Within a few years of this note, wireless was imported into the western hemisphere. I prefer to conjecture that these depraved people were a million years in front of the colonel, along the same foul road, and that they had become extinct by constantly listening to swing-music on their crystal sets."
"Here we are," said badger. "I think this is it."
He handed over a strip on which was written: "Formicaest exemplo magnilaboris* Dative of the Purpose."
It proved ineffectual.
At last everybody was commanded to stand up, search on their chairs, look in their pockets, etc. The hedgehog, producing a tattered fragment covered with dry mud and crumbled leaves, on which he had been sitting, asked: "Be 'un thic?" After it had been wiped, flapped and dusted, it was found to read: Dragguls uoht, Tna eht ot og, and Merlyn said it was the one they wanted.
So a couple of ants' nests were fetched from the meat-safe, where they stood supported in saucers of water. They were placed on a table in the middle of the room, while the animals sat down to watch, for you
Merlyn said: "It is because one likes to tinker with things, to play with possibilities."
The hedgehog gave the best reason, which was simply: "Whoy shouldernt *un?"
Then they fell silent, musing on the flames.
"Perhaps I have painted a dark picture of the humans," said Merlyn doubtfully, "not very dark, but it might have been a shade lighter. It was because I wanted you to understand about looking at the animals. I did not want you to think that man was too grand to do that. In the course of a long experience of the human race, I have learned that you can never make them understand anything, unless you rub it in."
"You are wanting me to find something out, by learning from the beasts." 59
"Yes. At last we are getting to the object of your visit. There are two creatures which I forgot to shew you when you were small, and, unless you see them now, we shall get no further."
"I will do what you like."
"They are the Ant and the Wild Goose. We want you to meet them tonight. Of course it will be only one kind of ant, out of many hundreds, but it is a kind which we want you to see."
"Very well," said the king. "I am ready and willing."
"Have you the Sanguinea-spell at hand, my badger?"
The wretched animal immediately began to rummage in its chair, searching inside the seams, lifting the corner of the carpet, and turning up slips of paper covered with Merlyn's handwriting in all directions.
The first slip was headed More Hubris Under Victoria. It said: "Dr. John of Gaddesden, court physician to Edward II, claimed to have cured the king's son of small-pox by wrapping the patient up in red cloth, putting red curtains on the windows, and seeing that all the hangings of the room were red. This raised a merry Victorian guffaw at the expense of mediaeval simplicity, until it was discovered by Dr. Niels Finsen of Copenhagen in the twentieth century that red and infra-red light really did affect the pustules of small-pox, even helping in the cure of the disease."
The next slip said briefly: "Half a rose noble each way on Golden Miller."
The third, which smelt strongly of Quelques Fleurs, and was not in Merlyn's hand, said: "Queen Philippa's monument at Charing Cross, seven-thirty, under the spire." There were a lot of kisses on the bottom of it, and, on the back, some notes for a poem to be addressed to the sender. These were in Merlyn's writing, and said: Hooey? Coue? Chop-suey? The poem itself, which began Cooee Nimue, was erased.
Another slip was headed: "Other Races, Victorian Condescension to, as well as to Own Ancestors, Animals, etc." It said: "Colonel Wood-Martin, the Antiquarian, writing in 1895, observes with a giggle that 'one of the most-depraved of all races, the now extinct Tasmanians, believed that stones, especially certain kinds of quartz crystals, could be used as mediums, or as means of communication... with living persons at a distance!* Within a few years of this note, wireless was imported into the western hemisphere. I prefer to conjecture that these depraved people were a million years in front of the colonel, along the same foul road, and that they had become extinct by constantly listening to swing-music on their crystal sets."
"Here we are," said badger. "I think this is it."
He handed over a strip on which was written: "Formicaest exemplo magnilaboris* Dative of the Purpose."
It proved ineffectual.
At last everybody was commanded to stand up, search on their chairs, look in their pockets, etc. The hedgehog, producing a tattered fragment covered with dry mud and crumbled leaves, on which he had been sitting, asked: "Be 'un thic?" After it had been wiped, flapped and dusted, it was found to read: Dragguls uoht, Tna eht ot og, and Merlyn said it was the one they wanted.
So a couple of ants' nests were fetched from the meat-safe, where they stood supported in saucers of water. They were placed on a table in the middle of the room, while the animals sat down to watch, for you
Similar Books
It's Always Darkest Before the Fridge Door Opens: Enjoying the Fruits of Middle Age
Phil Callaway, Martha O. Bolton
