brought their victuals. The Pantagruelists brought theirs. It was something more than a lunch, as it turned out. It was a real picnic on a large scale ;
PANURGE REVIVES.
everybody giving his share of the feast, and making the most of what the others brought.
After the meal Pantagruel took his officers aside, and told them that, as the ships had been strained by the storm, they should set to work to make them sound again. As soon as the people of the island heard of the trouble many offered to help. This they could easily do as they were all, more or less, carpenters, having a large forest behind three very small ports.
At Pantagruel's request the white-bearded Macreon, whose name was Macrobrius, showed him all that was strange or wonderful in the island. Leaving the harbor, he took the Giant into the dark and gloomy forest, which was found at the entrance to be full of ruined temples, obelisks, pyramids, and crumbling tombs. Over most of these were inscriptions and epitaphs, some in strange letters, none could read, not even Panurge ; others in Ionic characters ; others
THE DARK AND GLOOMY FOREST.
in the Arabic; others in the Icelandic. ' Our heroes come,' the old man explained, 'from every land on the earth.'
Macrobiua asked Pantagruel how it was that he and his fleet could have survived the awful storm and reached port, when the Macreons could see that all the air and the earth were in wild uproar. Pantagruel answered, with that simple faith of his which gives the smallest dwarf the strength
PANTAGBUEL IN 'IHE GKAVEYARD.
of the tallest giant, ' Friend, it was God's will.' After which, he asked him whether these great storms were common around their coast.
The old man then told a very sad tale.
'Pilgrim,' he said, in a broken voice, 'this poor island of ours was once rich, great, and full of young people. Now there are no young people in it, and it is only full of old men like myself, and of
THE DEMONS AND THE HEROES.
shadows that we can feel, but never can see ; shadows that we love, but never can know ; shadows that move about in yonder forest you see stretched out before you, and, when their hour comes, die in its darkest depths. No common shadow ever yet lived or ever yet died in our forest. It is the dwelling-place only of heroes and of demons.'
'Of heroes and demons?' cried Pantagruel, amazed.
'Yes, of heroes, who, after being great on earth and seeming to die there, come here to live another life, and to suffer, and to show themselves great for a final trial ; and of demons who are given power to roam the forest at will, only to mock, and laugh, and lure, if they can, the heroes to sin.'
'How do the demons lure the heroes to sin ? '
' By trying to make them forget that to be good is the only way to be great.'
'Do the heroes ever yield ? '
f Yes, pilgrim, often, too often ; and there is our great grief. If they once yield, they die at the moment of sinning, and there is neither storm at sea nor grief in the forest. We never can know when the bad heroes pass away. But ah ! it is when the true heroes, who, though tempted, will not yield, die,' and here Macrobius stretched out his hands towards the dark line of trees as though in prayer, ' that we learn of it to our sorrow. Pilgrim ! ' he cried, while the tears, dry, like the tears old men shed, trickled down his withered cheeks into his white beard, ' we were sure yesterday that we had lost another good hero.'
' And what made thee sure, good Macrobius? '
' Because we noticed that a comet, which we had seen for three days before the storm, of a sudden grew dim, and that it shines no more. Then, yesterday, when the sea was at its worst, we could hear loud cries in the forest; feel tremblings in the earth under us ; and in the air about us there were breathings and black clouds. Listen, now, the trees are calling some name, I know they are. I am old; my hearing is faint. Do you not hear voices ? '
Pantagruel listened intently ; but, even with his quick ears, could only hear a mournful sough, as though coming over the tops of the trees from a great distance.
' Not voices, but more like sobs, good old man. They may be weeping for the hero who died yesterday. Canst thou tell me his name ? '
'Ah, pilgrim, there, too, is our cross ! It is not given to us to learn the name of a hero who has died until a year after the forest has moaned, and the sea has wept, and the earth has trembled.'
'And how dost thou show him honor ? '
WE HAD LOST ANOTHEB GOOD HERO
' We place in this part of the forest which we are allowed to enter, and on the tree he best loved when alive, averse reciting his name, and saying that another hero has died, but not until the good God had given him the power to be greater than sin.'
CHAPTER XLI.
PANTAGRUEL TOUCHES AT THE WONDERFUL ISLAND OF RUACH, WHERE GIANT WIDENOSTRILS HAD FOUND THE COCKS AND HENS WHICH KILLED HIM. HOW THE PEOPLE LIVED BY WIND.
S soon as the ships had been calked and repaired, and fresh food had been taken in, James Brayer gave the word to sail; and the fleet set out, with the feeble shouts of the good old men in their ears, from the Island of Macreons.
Two days after this the fleet touched at the Island of Ruach, which Pantagruel found to be the strangest, in one thing, of any he had yet seen.
That one thino- was WIND.
In other words, the people of Ruach lived on wind. They had nothing else to live on; they ate nothing, they drank nothing, but wind. The very houses they built were always as near windmills as they could build them. In their gardens they never grew cabbages, peas, beans, radishes,—only three different kinds of anemones, or wind- flowers. When they felt hungry, and there happened to be no wind stirring, the common people of the island, to start a breeze, used fans of feathers, or of paper, or of linen, as their means allowed. As for the rich, they lived by the whirl of their windmills, — the finest and the strongest wind, they declared, they could ever eat. Whenever they had a feast, the Ruachians would spread their tables under one windmill, and, if the table was long enough, it was made to stretch under two. While they were eating, or rather drinking, in the wind from the great-winged mills, the guests would be discussing among themselves the excellence, beauty, and rarity of their various kinds of wind. One would
smack his lips, and whistle out,—they all whistled instead of talking:
' Ah ! how delightful this south-west breeze ! ' Another : ' How refreshing this south-east? ' Another : ' But do taste a little of this western, I beg you I How healthful ! '
Another : ' How choice this east-by-north ! '
