CHAPTER VIII
BELIEF
ISLE OF KHIOS, October, 18—.
I take up my journal again after three months of interruption. I left off at the description of the Carina Palace and its inhabitants,—such a minute description that it was like an architect's working drawing, or a slave merchant's inventory.
I consult my moral thermometer. I find myself very well, my head is perfectly clear, and I am cheerful and gay.
I feel as though I were dreaming when I look over the pages of my journal that I brought with me from France, and find that I used to be sad, dreamy, and melancholy.
September has just come to an end; the rainy weather which precedes the equinox has cooled the atmosphere. The west wind whistles through the long galleries of the palace. I have left the ground floor for a more cosy and comfortable apartment. I am almost deafened with noise.
Awhile ago the parrots, the peacocks, and the popinjays, showing their sagacity, and, no doubt, feeling the approaching change in temperature, all began to shriek at once in the most atrocious manner. Such a proof of their intelligence made me terribly nervous.
Why is Nature so inconsistent in her gifts? Dazzling plumage, discordant voice!
This is not all; frightened by the racket, the greyhounds began to bark furiously. Then the dwarfs came with whips and yells, and augmented the noise while trying to stop it.
I have taken refuge here, but can still hear the infernal screaming of the parrots. All these charming accessories of the scenes that surround me are lovely to look at when they are in their proper place, but I do not care for "tableaux" that shriek.
From animals let us pass to human beings; the transition will not be difficult, for the minds of my beautiful girls are not much more developed than the brains of the parrots and popinjays, and though sometimes they are as noisy as the latter, their screams have not the advantage of foretelling rainy or clear weather.
Speaking of screams, I am sorry that Noémi and Daphné have had a quarrel, but the excessive violence of those good creatures is the result of their want of education. Nevertheless, and although I am tolerant, it seems to me that stabbing one's comrade in the arm is carrying things too far, so I have given Noémi a serious scolding.
I strongly suspect Anathasia, the blonde, with her childish and innocent air, to be the cause of the quarrel, and to have slyly excited those two brave girls to fight each other like two fighting-cocks. To be sure, this was suggested to me by the wicked old Cypriote, and she detests everything that is young or pretty.
Noémi, in fact, is growing more and more ill-tempered. The other day she slapped Chloë, my gardener, violently, Chloë, who has such white teeth and such black eyes. She beat her because she brought in the fruit too late, and so my dessert was behindhand.
After all, Noémi has some good points, but she is deucedly irascible and fierce.
One thing that astonishes me is the fact that these girls are completely insensible to the beauties of nature.
Thanks to the Greek I learned at college, I am able to understand and speak modern Greek passably well, and I have often tried to awaken in these girls some poetic sentiment. All was in vain; nothing was ever more barbaric or uncultivated than their minds.
With the exception of some Greek national songs, they know nothing at all.
They can neither read nor write. Their rivalries, their jealousies, their calumnies, and a few exaggerated tales of Turkish cruelty, furnish the subjects of their usual conversation.
In other ways they are the best of girls. I remember a scene, which shows marvellously well the characters of my three favourites.
I was mounting a Syrian horse I had purchased, for the first time. He became excited, reared, and fell on me. Noémi flew at the horse, caught him by the bridle, and beat him with a whip. Daphné ran to help me up. Anathasia never moved, but burst into tears and then fainted away.
Some time ago I tried to awaken the souls of these poor girls to some remembrances of their Fatherland,—a sentiment that is so strong in half-civilised natures.
It was not without some hesitation that I made the attempt. I felt a certain remorse at the idea of awakening sad recollections.
Poor girls! They lived in slavery, and their melancholy thoughts must often turn with regret to the land of their youth. Poor caged swallows! they only awaited an opportunity of flying home to their nests.
I feared it would be cruel to raise false hopes in their breasts; still, I assembled my household, and told them that I was going to leave the island, and send them all back to their respective homes.
I must declare, and with a certain amount of satisfaction, that they immediately broke into lamentations that would have done honour to the funeral of Achilles, or the dirge of some illustrious Albanian chieftain.
Daphné wrapped her head in her veil, and sat silent and motionless on the ground, like an antique statue of grief. Noémi manifested her rage by beating one of the black dwarfs, while the fair Anathasia, falling on her knees, took my hand and kissed it; then raising her beautiful tearful eyes to mine, said, in her soft Ionian tongue:
"Oh, master! master! When you have gone, what will become of your poor Grecian girls?"
"But your aged fathers! Your poor old mothers! Your brave brothers and your handsome lovers!" I exclaimed. "Do you never think of them, forgetful creatures that you are?"
Feeling sure that such magical words would have an effect, I drew my cloak around me with a majestic air.
But the crying and sobbing only grew the louder, and they all cried out, in what I thought a threatening way:
"We will never leave the roof of the good Frank; we are happy at Khios; we will stay at Khios with the good Frank."
Though I was their "good Frank," I could not help having but a poor idea of their patriotism; the preference they gave me over their native soil and its accessories was certainly flattering.
I resolved to make another attempt, and told them that I would give each of them two thousand piastres and their clothes, and let them go wherever they wished, for I meant to leave the island.
The screams and curses that were the result of my innocent proposition so alarmed me, that for a moment I feared I should share the fate of Orpheus.
Letting go of her dwarf, Noémi sprang towards me like a tigress, seized my yellak, for I wore the Albanian costume, and said to me, her eyes blazing with anger:
"If you try to go away, and leave us here, we will set the palace on fire, and, holding you in our arms, we will all be burned together."
The majority of the rebels seemed to be delighted with such an idea, for they screamed out louder than ever:
"Yes, yes, let us take the good Frank in our arms, and all perish with him in the flames of his palace."
I observed a trait that was worthy of La Bruyère. The gentle Anathasia was one of the most ferocious of the incendiary party.
Although this threatened mode of death was worthy of Sardanapalus, I preferred to live as I was, and being now quite convinced that I was adored by my household, I told them that I renounced my projects of departure.
My modesty forbids me saying with what effusion, what transports of joy, my decision was welcomed by those good girls.
The whole twelve of them took hold of each other's hands, and formed a circle. Noémi, as the antique theorist, improvised these simple words, which her companions repeated to the air of their national hymn, "The Swallows."
"At Khios we remain,
Dance, sisters, dance,
At Khios we remain,
We stay with the good Frank.
"He never beats us, he treats us well,
Dance, sisters, dance,
We will always have beautiful fezzes,
Beautiful embroidered yellaks,
Beautiful silk sashes.
"We will eat tender roasted kids,
Fat partridges and quails,
Honey from Hymettus, wine from Scyros.
Dance, sisters, dance,
The good Frank lets us stay.
"Dance, sisters, dance,
We till the soil no more,
No more we mend the roads,
Dance, sisters, dance.
"We will bathe beneath the sycamores,
We will not work at all,
Only pluck fruit and flowers for him,
The good Frank who keeps us."
If I had been blinded by any conceit, I should have had my self-respect somewhat wounded on learning that the roast kid, fat partridges, Scyros wine, beautiful clothes, and idleness, were prominent features in the intense affection these simple creatures bore me.
But, fortunately, I am wiser than that, and can see through their devotion. Formerly I had some doubts as to my powers of attraction, but now, how can I help believing in the charm with which I was invested if it can attach these slaves to me so devotedly?
My charms are easily understood, they are the fat partridges, the roasted kids, the golden belts, and embroidered yellaks.
Oh, happy future! As long as there are any embroiderers and silk weavers in the Isle of Khios, I will be sure of admiration.
I, who until now could never believe in disinterested affection, am obliged to have blind faith in the love I inspire.
It is surely easy to believe these truthful creatures, when they tell me that they love to be elegantly clothed, well fed, and not beaten. I cannot accuse them of duplicity when they say that they like to do nothing harder than pick fruit and flowers, or bathe in the marble pool, in the shade of the plane-trees.
In order to create doubt in my mind, they would have to tell me that they preferred to give up an indolent life for one of hardship, to abandon the sensual life they live here, and return to their household avocations.
Have they ever told me that it would be a joy to them to go back to their homes, and till the soil, or mend the roads?—manly occupations that the women of Albania perform admirably.
No, they have energetically declared their willingness to be burnt alive with me in my palace, at the first proposal I made them to give up silk for homespun, the far-niente of idleness for hard work, a life of pleasure for household duties.
They have innocently expressed their preference for remaining with the good Frank, and I believe them. When we consider their reasons for staying here, how can we doubt their truth?
This time selfish motives are so apparent, that I shall have no occasion to torment myself with doubts.
But what do I hear? It is a salute from a ship, the sound of a cannon!
What does it mean?