Queen of the Ansarey
AWAY, away, Cypros! I can remain no more; my heart beats so.’ ‘Sweet lady,’ replied Cypros, ‘it is surprise that agitates you.’ ‘Is it surprise, Cypros? I did not know it was surprise. Then I never was surprised before.’
‘I think they were surprised, sweet lady,’ said Cypros, smiling.
‘Hush, you are laughing very loud, my Cypros.’ ‘Is that laughter, sweet lady? I did not know it was laughter. Then I never laughed before.’
‘I would they should know nothing either of our smiles or of our sighs, my Cypros.’
She who said this was a girl of eighteen summers; her features very Greek, her complexion radiant, hair dark as night, and eyes of the colour of the violet. Her beautiful countenance, however, was at this moment nearly shrouded by her veil, although no one could possibly behold it, excepting her attendant, younger even than herself, and fresh and fair as a flower.
They were hurrying along a wooden gallery, which led, behind the upper part of the divan occupied by the travellers, to the great square central tower of the quadrangle, which we have already noticed, and as the truth must always, or at least eventually, come out, it shall not be concealed that, availing themselves of a convenient, perhaps irresistible position, the fair fugitives had peeped into the chamber, and had made even minute observations on its inhabitants with impunity. Suddenly, Fakredeen rising from his seat, a panic had seized them and they hurried away.
The gallery led to a flight of steps, and the flight of steps into the first of several chambers without decoration, and with no other furniture than an Eastern apartment always offers, the cushioned seat, which surrounds at least two-thirds of the room. At length they entered a small alcove, rudely painted in arabesque, but in a classic Ionic pattern; the alcove opened into a garden, or rather court of myrtles with a fountain. An antelope, an Angora cat, two Persian greyhounds, were basking on the sunny turf, and there were many birds about, in rude but capacious cages.
‘We are safe,’ said the lady, dropping on the divan; ‘I think we must have been seen.’
‘That was clearly impossible,’ said Cypros.
‘Well, we must be seen at last,’ said the lady. ‘Heigho! I never shall be able to receive them, if my heart beat so.’
‘I would let them wait a few days, sweet lady,’ said Cypros, ‘and then you would get more used to them.’
‘I shall never be more used to them. Besides, it is rude and inhospitable not to see them. Yesterday there was an excuse: they were wearied, or I had a right to suppose they were, with their travelling; and to-day, there ought to be an excuse for not receiving them to-day. What is it, Cypros?’
‘I dare say they will be quite content, if to-day you fix the time when you will receive them, sweet lady.’
‘But I shall not be content, Cypros. Having seen them once, I wish to see them again, and one cannot always be walking by accident in the gallery.’
‘Then I would see them to-day, sweet lady. Shall I send for the noble Keferinis?’
‘I wish I were Cypros, and you were—— Hark! what is that?’
‘’Tis only the antelope, sweet lady.’
‘I thought it was—— Now tell me, my Cypros, which of these two princes do you think is he who is one of us?’
‘Oh, really, sweet lady, I think they are both so handsome!’
‘Yet so unlike,’ said the lady.
‘Well, they are unlike,’ said Cypros, ‘and yet——’
‘And what?’
‘The fair one has a complexion almost as radiant as your own, sweet lady.’
‘And eyes as blue: no, they are too light. And so, as there is a likeness, you think he is the one?’
‘I am sure I wish they were both belonging to us,’ said Cypros.
‘Ah, me!’ said the lady, ‘’Tis not the bright-faced prince whom I hold to be one of us. No, no, my Cypros. Think awhile, sweet girl. The visage, the head of the other, have you not seen them before? Have you not seen something like them? That head so proudly placed upon the shoulders; that hair, that hyacinthine hair, that lofty forehead, that proud lip, that face so refined and yet so haughty, does it not recall anything? Think, Cypros; think!’
‘It does, sweet lady.’
‘Tell me; whisper it to me; it is a name not to be lightly mentioned.’
Cypros advanced, and bending her head, breathed a word in the ear of the lady, who instantly, blushing deeply, murmured with a faint smile, ‘Yes.’
‘It is he, then,’ said Cypros, ‘who is one of us.’
A Royal Audience
OUR travellers were speculating, not very sanguinely, on the possible resources which Gindarics might supply for the amusement of a week, when, to their great relief, they were informed by Keferinis, that the Queen had fixed noon, on this the day after their arrival, to receive them. And accordingly at that time some attendants, not accompanying, however, the chief minister, waited on Tancred and Fakredeen, and announced that they were commanded to usher them to the royal presence. Quitting their apartments, they mounted a flight of steps, which led to the wooden gallery, along which they pursued their course. At its termination were two sentries with their lances. Then they descended a corresponding flight of stairs and entered a chamber where they were received by pages; the next room, of larger size, was crowded, and here they remained for a few minutes. Then they were ushered into the presence.
The young Queen of the Ansarey could not have received them with an air more impassive had she been holding a levée at St. James’. Seated on her divan, she was clothed in a purple robe; her long dark hair descended over her shoulders, and was drawn off her white forehead, which was bound with a broad circlet of pure gold, and of great antiquity. On her right hand stood Keferinis, the captain of her guard, and a priestly-looking person with a long white beard, and then at some distance from these three personages, a considerable number of individuals, between whose appearance and that of her ordinary subjects there was little difference. On her left hand were immediately three female attendants, young and pretty; at some distance from them, a troop of female slaves; and again, at a still further distance, another body of her subjects in their white turbans and their black dresses. The chamber was spacious, and rudely painted in the Ionic style.
‘It is most undoubtedly requested, and in a vein of the most condescending friendship, by the perfectly irresistible Queen, that the princes should be seated,’ said Keferinis, and accordingly Tancred occupied his allotted seat on the right of the Queen, though at some distance, and the young Emir filled his on the left. Fakredeen was dressed in Syrian splendour, a blaze of shawls and jewelled arms; but Tancred retained on this, as he had done on every other occasion, the European dress, though in the present instance it assumed a somewhat more brilliant shape than ordinary, in the dark green regimentals, the rich embroidery, and the flowing plume of the Bellamont yeomanry cavalry.
‘You are a prince of the English,’ said the Queen to Tancred.
‘I am an Englishman,’ he replied, ‘and a subject of our Queen, for we also have the good fortune to be ruled over by the young and the fair.’
‘My fathers and the House of Shehaab have been ever friends,’ she continued, turning to Fakredeen.
‘May they ever continue so!’ he replied. ‘For if the Shehaabs and the Ansarey are of one mind, Syria is no longer earth, but indeed paradise.’
‘You live much in ships?’ said the Queen, turning to Tancred.
‘We are an insular people,’ he answered, somewhat confusedly, but the perfectly-informed Keferinis came to the succour both of Tancred and of his sovereign.
‘The English live in ships only during six months of the year, principally when they go to India, the rest entirely at their country houses.’
‘Ships are required to take you to India?’ said her Majesty.
Tancred bowed assent.
‘Is your Queen about my age?’
‘She was as young as your Majesty when she began to reign.’
‘And how long has she reigned?’
‘Some seven years or so.’
‘Has she a castle?’
‘Her Majesty generally resides in a very famous castle.’
‘Very strong, I suppose?’
‘Strong enough.’
‘The Emir Bescheer remains at Stamboul?’
‘He is now, I believe, at Brusa,’ replied Fakredeen.
‘Does he like Brusa?’
‘Not as much at Stamboul.’
‘Is Stamboul the largest city in the world?’
‘I apprehend by no means,’ said Fakredeen.
‘What is larger?’
‘London is larger, the great city of the English, from which the prince comes; Paris is also larger, but not so large as London.’
‘How many persons are there in Stamboul?’
‘More than half a million.’
‘Have you seen Antakia (Antioch)?’ the Queen inquired of Tancred.
‘Not yet.’
‘You have seen Beiroot?’
‘I have.’
‘Antakia is not nearly so great a place as Beiroot,’ said the Queen; ‘yet once Antakia was much larger than Stamboul; as large, perhaps, as your great city.’
‘And far more beautiful than either,’ said Tancred.
‘Ah! you have heard of these things!’ exclaimed the Queen, with much animation. ‘Now tell me, why is Antakia no longer a great city, as great as Stamboul and the city of the English, and far more beautiful?’
‘It is a question that might perplex the wise,’ said Tancred.
‘I am not wise,’ said the Queen, looking earnestly at Tancred, ‘yet I could solve it.’
‘Would that your Majesty would deign to do so.’
‘There are things to be said, and there are things not to be said,’ was the reply, and the Queen looked at Keferinis.
‘Her Majesty has expressed herself with infinite exactitude and with condescending propriety,’ said the chief minister.
The Queen was silent for a moment, thoughtful, and then waved gracefully her hands; whereupon the chamber was immediately cleared. The princes, instructed by Keferinis, alone remained, with the exception of the minister, who, at the desire of his sovereign, now seated himself, but not on the divan. He sat opposite to the Queen on the floor.
‘Princes,’ said the Queen, ‘you are welcome to Gindarics, where nobody ever comes. For we are people who wish neither to see nor to be seen. We are not like other people, nor do we envy other people. I wish not for the ships of the Queen of the English, and my subjects are content to live as their fathers lived before them. Our mountains are wild and barren; our vales require for their cultivation unceasing toil. We have no gold or silver, no jewels; neither have we silk. But we have some beautiful and consoling thoughts, and more than thoughts, which are shared by all of us and open to all of us, and which only we can value or comprehend. When Darkush, who dwells at Damascus, and was the servant of my father, sent to us the ever-faithful messenger, and said that there were princes who wished to confer with us, he knew well it was vain to send here men who would talk of the English and the Egyptians, of the Porte and of the nations of Fran-guestan. These things to us are like the rind of fruit. Neither do we care for cottons, nor for things which are sought for in the cities of the plains, and it may be, noble Emir, cherished also in the mountains of Lebanon. This is not Lebanon, but the mountains of the Ansarey, who are as they have ever been, before the name of Turk or English was known in Syria, and who will remain as they are, unless that happens which may never happen, but which is too beautiful not to believe may arrive. Therefore I speak to you with frankness, princes of strange countries: Dar-kush, the servant of my father, and also mine, told me, by the ever-faithful messenger, that it was not of these things, which are to us like water spilt on sand, that you wished to confer, but that there were things to be said which ought to be uttered. Therefore it is I sent back the faithful messenger, saying, “Send then these princes to Gindarics, since their talk is not of things which come and go, making a noise on the coast and in the cities of the plains, and then passing away.” These we infinitely despise; but the words of truth uttered in the spirit of friendship will last, if they be grave, and on matters which authorise journeys made by princes to visit queens.’
Her Majesty ceased, and looked at Keferinis, who bowed profound approbation. Tancred and Fakre-deen, also exchanged glances, but the Emir waved his hand, signifying his wish that Tancred should reply, who, after a moment’s hesitation, with an air of great deference, thus ventured to express himself:
‘It seems to me and to my friend, the Prince of the Lebanon, that we have listened to the words of wisdom. They are in every respect just. We know not, ourselves, Darkush, but he was rightly informed when he apprised your Majesty that it was not upon ordinary topics, either political or commercial, that we desired to visit Gindarics. Nor was it out of such curiosity as animates travellers. For we are not travellers, but men who have a purpose which we wish to execute. The world, that, since its creation, has owned the spiritual supremacy of Asia, which is but natural, since Asia is the only portion of the world which the Creator of that world has deigned to visit, and in which he has ever conferred with man, is unhappily losing its faith in those ideas and convictions that hitherto have governed the human race. We think, therefore, the time has arrived when Asia should make one of its periodical and appointed efforts to reassert that supremacy. But though we are acting, as we believe, under a divine impulse, it is our duty to select the most fitting human agents to accomplish a celestial mission. We have thought, therefore, that it should devolve on Syria and Arabia, countries in which our God has even dwelt, and with which he has been from the earliest days in direct and regular communication, to undertake the solemn task. Two races of men, alike free, one inhabiting the desert, the other the mountains, untainted by any of the vices of the plains, and the virgin vigour of their intelligence not dwarfed by the conventional superstitions of towns and cities, one prepared at once to supply an unrivalled cavalry, the other an army ready equipped of intrepid foot-soldiers, appear to us to be indicated as the natural and united conquerors of the world. We wish to conquer that world, with angels at our head, in order that we may establish the happiness of man by a divine dominion, and crushing the political atheism that is now desolating existence, utterly extinguish the grovelling tyranny of self-government.’
The Queen of the Ansarey listened with deep and agitated attention to Tancred. When he had concluded, she said, after a moment’s pause, ‘I believe also in the necessity of the spiritual supremacy of our Asia. And since it has ceased, it seems not to me that man and man’s life have been either as great or as beautiful as heretofore. What you have said assures me that it is well that you have come hither. But when you speak of Arabia, of what God is it you speak?’
‘I speak of the only God, the Creator of all things, the God who spoke on the Arabian Mount Sinai, and expiated our sins upon the Syrian Mount Calvary.’
‘There is also Mount Olympus,’ said the Queen, ‘which is in Anatolia. Once the gods dwelt there.’—‘The gods of poets,’ said Tancred. ‘No; the gods of the people; who loved the people, and whom the people loved.’
There was a pause, broken by the Queen, who, looking at her minister, said, ‘Noble Keferinis, the thoughts of these princes are divine, and in every respect becoming celestial things. Is it not well that the gates of the beautiful and the sacred should not be closed?’
‘In every sense, irresistible Queen, it is well that the gates of the beautiful and the sacred should not be closed.’
‘Then let them bring garlands. Princes,’ the Queen continued, ‘what the eye of no stranger has looked upon, you shall now behold. This also is Asian and divine.’
Immediately the chamber again filled. The Queen, looking at the two princes and bowing, rose from her seat. They instantly followed her example. One came forward, offering to the Queen, and then to each of them, a garland. Garlands were also taken by Keferinis and a few others. Cypros and her companions walked first, then Keferinis and one who had stood near the royal divan; the Queen, between her two guests, followed, and after her a small and ordered band.
They stopped before a lofty portal of bronze, evidently of ancient art.’ This opened into a covered and excavated way, in some respects similar to that which had led them directly to the castle of Gin-darics; but, although obscure, not requiring artificial light, yet it was of no inconsiderable length. It emerged upon a platform cut out of the natural rock; on all sides were steep cliffs, above them the bright blue sky. The ravine appeared to be closed on every side.
The opposite cliff, at the distance of several hundred yards, reached by a winding path, presented, at first, the appearance of the front of an ancient temple; and Tancred, as he approached it, perceived that the hand of art had assisted the development of an imitation of nature: a pediment, a deep portico, supported by Ionic columns, and a flight of steps, were carved out of the cliff, and led into vast caverns, which art also had converted into lofty and magnificent chambers. When they had mounted the steps, the Queen and her companions lifted their garlands to the skies, and joined in a chorus, solemn and melodious, but which did not sound as the language of Syria. Passing through the portico, Tancred found himself apparently in a vast apartment, where he beheld a strange spectacle.
At the first glance it seemed that, ranged on blocks of the surrounding mountains, were a variety of sculptured figures of costly materials and exquisite beauty; forms of heroic majesty and ideal grace; and, themselves serene and unimpassioned, filling the minds of the beholders with awe and veneration. It was not until his eye was accustomed to the atmosphere, and his mind had in some degree recovered from the first strange surprise, that Tancred gradually recognised the fair and famous images over which his youth had so long and so early pondered. Stole over his spirit the countenance august, with the flowing beard and the lordly locks, sublime on his ivory throne, in one hand the ready thunderbolt, in the other the cypress sceptre; at his feet the watchful eagle with expanded wings: stole over the spirit of the gazing pilgrim, each shape of that refined and elegant hierarchy made for the worship of clear skies and sunny lands; goddess and god, genius and nymph, and faun, all that the wit and heart of man can devise and create, to represent his genius and his passion, all that the myriad developments of a beautiful nature can require for their personification. A beautiful and sometimes flickering light played over the sacred groups and figures, softening the ravages of time, and occasionally investing them with, as it were, a celestial movement.
‘The gods of the Greeks!’ exclaimed Tancred.
‘The gods of the Ansarey,’ said the Queen; ‘the gods of my fathers!’
‘I am filled with a sweet amazement,’ murmured Tancred. ‘Life is stranger than I deemed. My soul is, as it were, unsphered.’
‘Yet you know them to be gods,’ said the Queen; ‘and the Emir of the Lebanon does not know them to be gods?’
‘I feel that they are such,’ said Fakredeen.
‘How is this, then?’ said the Queen. ‘How is it that you, the child of a northern isle——’
‘Should recognise the Olympian Jove,’ said Tancred. ‘It seems strange; but from my earliest youth I learnt these things.’
‘Ah, then,’ murmured the Queen to herself, and with an expression of the greatest satisfaction, ‘Dar-kush was rightly informed; he is one of us.’
‘I behold then, at last, the gods of the Ansarey,’ said Fakredeen.
‘All that remains of Antioch, noble Emir; of Anti-och the superb, with its hundred towers, and its sacred groves and fanes of flashing beauty.’
‘Unhappy Asia!’ exclaimed the Emir; ‘thou hast indeed fallen!’
‘When all was over,’ said the Queen; ‘when the people refused to sacrifice, and the gods, indignant, quitted earth, I hope not for ever, the faithful few fled to these mountains with the sacred images, and we have cherished them. I told you we had beautiful and consoling thoughts, and more than thoughts. All else is lost, our wealth, our arts, our luxury, our invention, all have vanished. The niggard earth scarcely yields us a subsistence; we dress like Kurds, feed hardly as well; but if we were to quit these mountains, and wander like them on the plains with our ample flocks, we should lose our sacred images, all the traditions that we yet cherish in our souls, that in spite of our hard lives preserve us from being barbarians; a sense of the beautiful and the lofty, and the divine hope that, when the rapidly consummating degradation of Asia has been fulfilled, mankind will return again to those gods who made the earth beautiful and happy; and that they, in their celestial mercy, may revisit that world which, without them, has become a howling wilderness.’
‘Lady,’ said Tancred, with much emotion, ‘we must, with your permission, speak of these things. My heart is at present too full.’
‘Come hither,’ said the Queen, in a voice of great softness; and she led Tancred away.
They entered a chamber of much smaller dimensions, which might be looked upon as a chapel annexed to the cathedral or Pantheon which they had quitted. At each end of it was a statue. They paused before one. It was not larger than life, of ivory and gold; the colour purer than could possibly have been imagined, highly polished, and so little injured, that at a distance the general effect was not in the least impaired.
‘Do you know that?’ asked the Queen, as she looked at the statue, and then she looked at Tancred.
‘I recognise the god of poetry and light,’ said Tancred; ‘Phoebus Apollo.’
‘Our god: the god of Antioch, the god of the sacred grove! Who could look upon him, and doubt his deity!’
‘Is this indeed the figure,’ murmured Tancred, ‘before which a hundred steers have bled? before which libations of honeyed wine were poured from golden goblets? that lived in a heaven of incense?’
‘Ah! you know all.’
‘Angels watch over us!’ said Tancred, ‘or my brain will turn. And who is this?’
‘One before whom the pilgrims of the world once kneeled. This is the Syrian goddess; the Venus of our land, but called among us by a name which, by her favour, I also bear, Astarte.’
Fakredeen’s Plots
AND when did men cease from worshipping them?’ asked Fakredeen of Tancred; ‘before the Prophet?’ ‘When truth descended from Heaven in the person of Christ Jesus.’
‘But truth had descended from Heaven before Jesus,’ replied Fakredeen; ‘since, as you tell me, God spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, and since then to many of the prophets and the princes of Israel.’
‘Of whom Jesus was one,’ said Tancred; ‘the descendant of King David as well as the Son of God. But through this last and greatest of their princes it was ordained that the inspired Hebrew mind should mould and govern the world. Through Jesus God spoke to the Gentiles, and not to the tribes of Israel only. That is the great worldly difference between Jesus and his inspired predecessors. Christianity is Judaism for the multitude, but still it is Judaism, and its development was the death-blow of the Pagan idolatry.’
‘Gentiles,’ murmured Fakredeen; ‘Gentiles! you are a Gentile, Tancred?’
‘Alas! I am,’ he answered, ‘sprung from a horde of Baltic pirates, who never were heard of during the greater annals of the world, a descent which I have been educated to believe was the greatest of honours. What we should have become, had not the Syro-Arabian creeds formed our minds, I dare not contemplate. Probably we should have perished in mutual destruction. However, though rude and modern Gentiles, unknown to the Apostles, we also were in time touched with the sacred symbol, and originally endowed with an organisation of a high class, for our ancestors wandered from Caucasus; we have become kings and princes.’
‘What a droll thing is history,’ said Fakredeen. ‘Ah! if I were only acquainted with it, my education would be complete. Should you call me a Gentile?’
‘I have great doubts whether such an appellation could be extended to the descendants of Ishmael. I always look upon you as a member of the sacred race. It is a great thing for any man; for you it may tend to empire.’
‘Was Julius Cæsar a Gentile?’
‘Unquestionably.’
‘And Iskander?’ (Alexander of Macedon.)
‘No doubt; the two most illustrious Gentiles that ever existed, and representing the two great races on the shores of the Mediterranean, to which the apostolic views were first directed.’
‘Well, their blood, though Gentile, led to empire,’ said Fakredeen.
‘But what are their conquests to those of Jesus Christ?’ said Tancred, with great animation. ‘Where are their dynasties? where their subjects? They were both deified: who burns incense to them now? Their descendants, both Greek and Roman, bow before the altars of the house of David. The house of David is worshipped at Rome itself, at every seat of great and growing empire in the world, at London, at St. Petersburg, at New York. Asia alone is faithless to the Asian; but Asia has been overrun by Turks and Tatars. For nearly five hundred years the true Oriental mind has been enthralled. Arabia alone has remained free and faithful to the divine tradition. From its bosom we shall go forth and sweep away the moulding remnants of the Tataric system; and then, when the East has resumed its indigenous intelligence, when angels and prophets again mingle with humanity, the sacred quarter of the globe will recover its primeval and divine supremacy; it will act upon the modern empires, and the faint-hearted faith of Europe, which is but the shadow of a shade, will become as vigorous as befits men who are in sustained communication with the Creator.’
‘But suppose,’ said Fakredeen, in a captious tone that was unusual with him, ‘suppose, when the Tataric system is swept away, Asia reverts to those beautiful divinities that we beheld this morning?’
More than once, since they quitted the presence of Astarte, had Fakredeen harped upon this idea. From that interview the companions had returned moody and unusually silent. Strange to say, there seemed a tacit understanding between them to converse little on that subject which mainly engrossed their minds. Their mutual remarks on Astarte were few and constrained; a little more diffused upon the visit to the temple; but they chiefly kept up the conventional chat of companionship by rather commonplace observations on Keferinis and other incidents and persons comparatively of little interest and importance.
After their audience, they dined with the minister, not exactly in the manner of Downing Street, nor even with the comparative luxury of Canobia; but the meal was an incident, and therefore agreeable. A good pilaff was more acceptable than some partridges dressed with oil and honey: but all Easterns are temperate, and travel teaches abstinence to the Franks. Neither Fakredeen nor Tancred were men who criticised a meal: bread, rice, and coffee, a bird or a fish, easily satisfied them. The Emir affected the Moslem when the minister offered him the wine of the mountains, which was harsh and rough after the delicious Vino d’Oro of Lebanon; but Tancred contrived to drink the health of Queen Astarte without any wry expression of countenance.
‘I believe,’ said Keferinis, ‘that the English, in their island of London, drink only to women; the other natives of Franguestan chiefly pledge men; we look upon both as barbarous.’
‘At any rate, you worship the god of wine,’ remarked Tancred, who never attempted to correct the self-complacent minister. ‘I observed to-day the statue of Bacchus.’
‘Bacchus!’ said Keferinis, with a smile, half of inquiry, half of commiseration. ‘Bacchus: an English name, I apprehend! All our gods came from the ancient Antakia before either the Turks or the English were heard of. Their real names are in every respect sacred; nor will they be uttered, even to the Ansarey, until after the divine initiation has been performed in the perfectly admirable and inexpressibly delightful mysteries,’ which meant, in simpler tongue, that Keferinis was entirely ignorant of the subject on which he was talking.
After their meal, Keferinis, proposing that in the course of the day they should fly one of the Queen’s hawks, left them, when the conversation, of which we have given a snatch, occurred. Yet, as we have observed, they were on the whole moody and unusually silent. Fakredeen in particular was wrapped in reverie, and when he spoke, it was always in reference to the singular spectacle of the morning. His musing forced him to inquiry, having never before heard of the Olympian heirarchy, nor of the woods of Daphne, nor of the bright lord of the silver bow.
Why were they moody and silent?
With regard to Lord Montacute, the events of the morning might sufficiently account for the gravity of his demeanour, for he was naturally of a thoughtful and brooding temperament. This unexpected introduction to Olympus was suggestive of many reflections to one so habituated to muse over divine influences. Nor need it be denied that the character of the Queen greatly interested him. Her mind was already attuned to heavenly thoughts. She already believed that she was fulfilling a sacred mission. Tancred could not be blind to the importance of such a personage as Astarte in the great drama of divine regeneration, which was constantly present to his consideration. Her conversion might be as weighty as ten victories. He was not insensible to the efficacy of feminine influence in the dissemination of religious truth, nor unaware how much the greatest development of the Arabian creeds, in which the Almighty himself deigned to become a personal actor, was assisted by the sacred spell of woman. It is not the Empress Hélène alone who has rivalled, or rather surpassed, the exploits of the most illustrious apostles. The three great empires of the age, France, England, and Russia, are indebted for their Christianity to female lips. We all remember the salutary influence of Clotilde and Bertha which bore the traditions of the Jordan to the Seine and the Thames: it should not be forgotten that to the fortunate alliance of Waldimir, the Duke of Moscovy, with the sister of the Greek Emperor Basil, is to be ascribed the remarkable circumstance, that the intellectual development of all the Russias has been conducted on Arabian principles. It was the fair Giselle, worthy successor of the softhearted women of Galilee, herself the sister of the Emperor Henry the Second, who opened the mind of her husband, the King of Hungary, to the deep wisdom of the Hebrews, to the laws of Moses and the precepts of Jesus. Poland also found an apostle and a queen in the sister of the Duke of Bohemia, and who revealed to the Sarmatian Micislas the ennobling mysteries of Sinai and of Calvary.
Sons of Israel, when you recollect that you created Christendom, you may pardon the Christians even theirautos da fè!
Fakredeen Shehaab, Emir of Canobia, and lineal descendant of the standard-bearer of the Prophet, had not such faith in Arabian principles as to dream of converting the Queen of the Ansarey. Quite the reverse; the Queen of the Ansarey had converted him. From the first moment he beheld Astarte, she had exercised over him that magnetic influence of which he was peculiarly susceptible, and by which Tancred at once attracted and controlled him. But Astarte added to this influence a power to which the Easterns in general do not very easily bow: the influence of sex. With the exception of Eva, woman had never guided the spirit or moulded the career of Fakredeen; and, in her instance, the sovereignty had been somewhat impaired by that acquaintance of the cradle, which has a tendency to enfeeble the ideal, though it may strengthen the affections. But Astarte rose upon him commanding and complete, a star whose gradual formation he had not watched, and whose unexpected brilliancy might therefore be more striking even than the superior splendour which he had habitually contemplated. Young, beautiful, queenly, impassioned, and eloquent, surrounded by the accessories that influence the imagination, and invested with fascinating mystery, Fakredeen, silent and enchanted, had yielded his spirit to Astarte, even before she revealed to his unaccustomed and astonished mind the godlike forms of her antique theogony. Eva and Tancred had talked to him of gods; Astarte had shown them to him. All visible images of their boasted divinities of Sinai and of Calvary with which he was acquainted were enshrined over the altars of the convents of Lebanon. He contrasted those representations without beauty or grace, so mean, and mournful, and spiritless, or if endued with attributes of power, more menacing than majestic, and morose rather than sublime, with those shapes of symmetry, those visages of immortal beauty, serene yet full of sentiment, on which he had gazed that morning with a holy rapture. The Queen had said that, besides Mount Sinai and Mount Calvary, there was also Mount Olympus. It was true; even Tancred had not challenged her assertion. And the legends of Olympus were as old as, nay, older than, those of the convent or the mosques.
This was no mythic fantasy of the beautiful Astarte; the fond tradition of a family, a race, even a nation. These were not the gods merely of the mountains: they had been, as they deserved to be, the gods of a great world, of great nations, and of great men. They were the gods of Alexander and of Caius Julius; they were the gods under whose divine administration Asia had been powerful, rich, luxurious and happy. They were the gods who had covered the coasts and plains with magnificent cities, crowded the midland ocean with golden galleys, and filled the provinces that were now a chain of wilderness and desert with teeming and thriving millions. No wonder the Ansarey were faithful to such deities. The marvel was why men should ever have deserted them. But man had deserted them, and man was unhappy. All, Eva, Tancred, his own consciousness, the surrounding spectacles of his life, assured him that man was unhappy, degraded, or discontented; at all events, miserable. He was not surprised that a Syrian should be unhappy, even a Syrian prince, for he had no career; he was not surprised that the Jews were unhappy, because they were the most persecuted of the human race, and in all probability, very justly so, for such an exception as Eva proved nothing; but here was an Englishman, young, noble, very rich, with every advantage of nature and fortune, and he had come out to Syria to tell them that all Europe was as miserable as themselves. What if their misery had been caused by their deserting those divinities who had once made them so happy?
A great question; Fakredeen indulged in endless combinations while he smoked countless nargilehs. If religion were to cure the world, suppose they tried this ancient and once popular faith, so very popular in Syria. The Queen of the Ansarey could command five-and-twenty thousand approved warriors, and the Emir of the Lebanon could summon a host, if not as disciplined, far more numerous. Fakredeen, in a frenzy of reverie, became each moment more practical. Asian supremacy, cosmopolitan regeneration, and theocratic equality, all gradually disappeared. An independent Syrian kingdom, framed and guarded by a hundred thousand sabres, rose up before him; an established Olympian religion, which the Druses, at his instigation, would embrace, and toleration for the Maronites till he could bribe Bishop Nicodemus to arrange a general conformity, and convert his great principal from the Patriarch into the Pontiff of Antioch. The Jews might remain, provided they negotiated a loan which should consolidate the Olympian institutions and establish the Gentile dynasty of Fakredeen and Astarte.
Astarte is Jealous
WHEN Fakredeen bade Tancred as usual good-night, his voice was different from its accustomed tones; he had replied to Tancred with asperity several times during the evening; and when he was separated from his companion, he felt relieved. All unconscious of these changes and symptoms was the heir of Bellamont.
Though grave, one indeed who never laughed and seldom smiled, Tancred was blessed with the rarest of all virtues, a singularly sweet temper. He was grave, because he was always thinking, and thinking of great deeds. But his heart was soft, and his nature most kind, and remarkably regardful of the feelings of others. To wound them, however unintentionally, would occasion him painful disturbance. Though naturally rapid in the perception of character, his inexperience of life, and the self-examination in which he was so frequently absorbed, tended to blunt a little his observation of others. With a generous failing, which is not uncommon, he was prepared to give those whom he loved credit for the virtues which he himself possessed, and the sentiments which he himself extended to them. Being profound, steadfast, and most loyal in his feelings, he was incapable of suspecting that his elected friend could entertain sentiments towards him less deep, less earnest, and less faithful. The change in the demeanour of the Emir was, therefore, unnoticed by him. And what might be called the sullen irritability of Fakredeen was encountered with the usual gentleness and total disregard of self which always distinguished the behaviour of Lord Montacute.
The next morning they were invited by Astarte to a hawking party, and, leaving the rugged ravines, they descended into a softer and more cultivated country, where they found good sport. Fakredeen was an accomplished falconer, and loved to display his skill before the Queen. Tancred was quite unpractised, but Astarte seemed resolved that he should become experienced in the craft among her mountains, which did not please the Emir, as he caracoled in sumptuous dress on a splendid steed, with the superb falcon resting on his wrist.
The princes dined again with Keferinis; that, indeed, was to be their custom during their stay; afterwards, accompanied by the minister, they repaired to the royal divan, where they had received a general invitation. Here they found Astarte alone, with the exception of Cypros and her companions, who worked with their spindles apart; and here, on the pretext of discussing the high topics on which they had repaired to Gindarics, there was much conversation on many subjects. Thus passed one, two, and even three days; thus, in general, would their hours be occupied at Gindarics. In the morning the hawks, or a visit to some green valley, which was blessed with a stream and beds of oleander, and groves of acacia or sycamore. Fakredeen had no cause to complain of the demeanour of Astarte towards him, for it was most gracious and encouraging. Indeed, he pleased her; and she was taken, as many had been, by the ingenuous modesty, the unaffected humility, the tender and touching deference of his manner; he seemed to watch her every glance, and hang upon her every accent: his sympathy with her was perfect; he agreed with every sentiment and observation that escaped her. Blushing, boyish, unsophisticated, yet full of native grace, and evidently gifted with the most amiable disposition, it was impossible not to view with interest, and even regard, one so young and so innocent.
But while the Emir had no cause to be dissatisfied with the demeanour of Astarte to himself, he could not be unaware that her carriage to Tancred was different, and he doubted whether the difference was in his favour. He hung on the accents of Astarte, but he remarked that the Queen hung upon the accents of Tancred, who, engrossed with great ideas, and full of a great purpose, was unconscious of what did not escape the lynx-like glance of his companion. However, Fakredeen was not, under any circumstances, easily disheartened; in the present case, there were many circumstances to encourage him. This was a great situation; there was room for combinations. He felt that he was not unfavoured by Astarte; he had confidence, and a just confidence, in his power of fascination. He had to combat a rival, who was, perhaps, not thinking of conquest; at any rate, who was unconscious of success. Even had he the advantage, which Fakredeen was not now disposed to admit, he might surely be baffled by a competitor with a purpose, devoting his whole intelligence to his object, and hesitating at no means to accomplish it.
Fakredeen became great friends with Keferinis. He gave up his time and attentions much to that great personage; anointed him with the most delicious flattery, most dexterously applied; consulted him on great affairs which had no existence; took his advice on conjunctures which never could occur; assured Keferinis that, in his youth, the Emir Bescheer had impressed on him the importance of cultivating the friendly feelings and obtaining the support of the distinguished minister of the Ansarey; gave him some jewels, and made him enormous promises.
On the fourth day of the visit, Fakredeen found himself alone with Astarte, at least, without the presence of Tancred, whom Keferinis had detained in his progress to the royal apartment. The young Emir had pushed on, and gained an opportunity which he had long desired.
They were speaking of the Lebanon; Fakredeen had been giving Astarte, at her request, a sketch of Canobia, and intimating his inexpressible gratification were she to honour his castle with a visit; when, somewhat abruptly, in a suppressed voice, and in a manner not wholly free from embarrassment, Astarte said, ‘What ever surprises me is, that Darkush, who is my servant at Damascus, should have communicated, by the faithful messenger, that one of the princes seeking to visit Gindarics was of our beautiful and ancient faith; for the Prince of England has assured me that nothing was more unfounded or indeed impossible; that the faith, ancient and beautiful, never prevailed in the land of his fathers; and that the reason why he was acquainted with the god-like forms is, that in his country it is the custom (custom to me most singular, and indeed incomprehensible) to educate the youth by teaching them the ancient poems of the Greeks, poems quite lost to us, but in which are embalmed the sacred legends.’
‘We ought never to be surprised at anything that is done by the English,’ observed Fakredeen; ‘who are, after all, in a certain sense, savages. Their country produces nothing; it is an island, a mere rock, larger than Malta, but not so well fortified. Everything they require is imported from other countries; they get their corn from Odessa, and their wine from the ports of Spain. I have been assured at Beiroot that they do not grow even their own cotton, but that I can hardly believe. Even their religion is an exotic; and as they are indebted for that to Syria, it is not surprising that they should import their education from Greece.’
‘Poor people!’ exclaimed the Queen; ‘and yet they travel; they wish to improve themselves?’
‘Darkush, however,’ continued Fakredeen, without noticing the last observation of Astarte, ‘was not wrongly informed.’
‘Not wrongly informed?’
‘No: one of the princes who wished to visit Gindarics was, in a certain sense, of the ancient and beautiful faith, but it was not the Prince of the English.’
‘What are these pigeons that you are flying without letters!’ exclaimed Astarte, looking very perplexed.
‘Ah! beautiful Astarte,’ said Fakredeen, with a sigh; ‘you did not know my mother.’
‘How should I know your mother, Emir of the castles of Lebanon? Have I ever left these mountains, which are dearer to me than the pyramids of Egypt to the great Pasha? Have I ever looked upon your women, Maronite or Druse, walking in white sheets, as if they were the children of ten thousand ghouls; with horns on their heads, as if they were the wild horses of the desert?’
‘Ask Keferinis,’ said Fakredeen, still sighing; ‘he has been at Bteddeen, the court of the Emir Bescheer. He knew my mother, at least by memory. My mother, beautiful Astarte, was an Ansarey.’
‘Your mother was an Ansarey!’ repeated Astarte, in a tone of infinite surprise; ‘your mother an Ansarey? Of what family was she a child?’
‘Ah!’ replied Fakredeen, ‘there it is; that is the secret sorrow of my life. A mystery hangs over my mother, for I lost both my parents in extreme childhood; I was at her heart,’ he added, in a broken voice, ‘and amid outrage, tumult, and war. Of whom was my mother the child? I am here to discover that, if possible. Her race and her beautiful religion have been the dream of my life. All I have prayed for has been to recognise her kindred and to behold her gods.’
‘It is very interesting,’ murmured the Queen.
‘It is more than interesting,’ sighed Fakredeen. ‘Ah! beautiful Astarte! if you knew all, if you could form even the most remote idea of what I have suffered for this unknown faith;’ and a passionate tear quivered on the radiant cheek of the young prince.
‘And yet you came here to preach the doctrines of another,’ said Astarte.
‘I came here to preach the doctrines of another!’ replied Fakredeen, with an expression of contempt; his nostril dilated, his lip curled with scorn. ‘This mad Englishman came here to preach the doctrines of another creed, and one with which it seems to me, he has as little connection as his frigid soil has with palm trees. They produce them, I am told, in houses of glass, and they force their foreign faith in the same manner; but, though they have temples, and churches, and mosques, they confess they have no miracles; they admit that they never produced a prophet; they own that no God ever spoke to their people, or visited their land; and yet this race, so peculiarly favoured by celestial communication, aspire to be missionaries!’
‘I have much misapprehended you,’ said Astarte; ‘I thought you were both embarked in a great cause.’
‘Ah, you learnt that from Darkush!’ quickly replied Fakredeen. ‘You see, beautiful Astarte, that I have no personal acquaintance with Darkush. It was the intendant of my companion who was his friend; and it is through him that Darkush has learnt anything that he has communicated. The mission, the project, was not mine; but when I found my comrade had the means, which had hitherto evaded me, of reaching Gindarics, I threw no obstacles in his crotchety course. On the contrary, I embraced the opportunity even with fervour, and far from discouraging my friend from views to which I know he is fatally, even ridiculously, wedded, I looked forward to this expedition as the possible means of diverting his mind from some opinions, and, I might add, some influences, which I am persuaded can eventually entail upon him nothing but disappointment and disgrace.’ And here Fakredeen shook his head, with that air of confidential mystery which so cleverly piques curiosity.
‘Whatever may be his fate,’ said Astarte, in a tone of seriousness, ‘the English prince does not seem to me to be a person who could ever experience disgrace.’
‘No, no,’ quickly replied his faithful friend; ‘of course I did not speak of personal dishonour. He is extremely proud and rash, and not in any way a practical man; but he is not a person who ever would do anything to be sent to the bagnio or the galleys. What I mean by disgrace is, that he is mixed up with transactions, and connected with persons who will damage, cheapen, in a worldly sense dishonour him, destroy all his sources of power and influence. For instance, now, in his country, in England, a Jew is never permitted to enter England; they may settle in Gibraltar, but in England, no. Well, it is perfectly well known among all those who care about these affairs, that this enterprise of his, this religious-politico-military adventure, is merely undertaken because he happens to be desperately enamoured of a Jewess at Damascus, whom he cannot carry home as his bride.’
‘Enamoured of a Jewess at Damascus!’ said Astarte, turning pale.
‘To folly, to frenzy; she is at the bottom of the whole of this affair; she talks Cabala to him, and he Nazareny to her; and so, between them, they have invented this grand scheme, the conquest of Asia, perhaps the world, with our Syrian sabres, and we are to be rewarded for our pains by eating passover cakes.’
‘What are they?’
‘Festival bread of the Hebrews, made in the new moon, with the milk of he-goats.’
‘What horrors!’
‘What a reward for conquest!’
‘Will the Queen of the English let one of her princes marry a Jewess?’
‘Never; he will be beheaded, and she will be burnt alive, eventually; but, in the meantime, a great deal of mischief may occur, unless we stop it.’
‘It certainly should be stopped.’
‘What amuses me most in this affair,’ continued Fakredeen, ‘is the cool way in which this Englishman comes to us for our assistance. First, he is at Canobia, then at Gindarics; we are to do the business, and Syria is spoken of as if it were nothing. Now the fact is, Syria is the only practical feature of the case. There is no doubt that, if we were all agreed, if Lebanon and the Ansarey were to unite, we could clear Syria of the Turks, conquer the plain, and carry the whole coast in a campaign, and no one would ever interfere to disturb us. Why should they? The Turks could not, and the natives of Fran-guestan would not. Leave me to manage them. There is nothing in the world I so revel in as hocus-sing Guizot and Aberdeen. You never heard of Guizot and Aberdeen? They are the two Reis Effendis of the King of the French and the Queen of the English. I sent them an archbishop last year, one of my fellows, Archbishop Murad, who led them a pretty dance. They nearly made me King of the Lebanon, to put an end to disturbances which never existed except in the venerable Murad’s representations.’
‘These are strange things! Has she charms, this Jewess? Very beautiful, I suppose?’
‘The Englishman vows so; he is always raving of her; talks of her in his sleep.’
‘As you say, it would indeed be strange to draw our sabres for a Jewess. Is she dark or fair?’
‘I think, when he writes verses to her, he always calls her a moon or a star; that smacks nocturnal and somewhat sombre.’
‘I detest the Jews; but I have heard their women are beautiful.’
‘We will banish them all from our kingdom of Syria,’ said Fakredeen, looking at Astarte earnestly.
‘Why, if we are to make a struggle, it should be for something. There have been Syrian kingdoms.’
‘And shall be, beauteous Queen, and you shall rule them. I believe now the dream of my life will be realised.’
‘Why, what’s that?’
‘My mother’s last aspiration, the dying legacy of her passionate soul, known only to me, and never breathed to human being until this moment.’
‘Then you recollect your mother?’
‘It was my nurse, long since dead, who was the depositary of the injunction, and in due time conveyed it to me.’
‘And what was it?’
‘To raise, at Deir el Kamar, the capital of our district, a marble temple to the Syrian goddess.’
‘Beautiful idea!’
‘It would have drawn back the mountain to the ancient faith; the Druses are half-prepared, and wait only my word.’
‘But the Nazareny bishops,’ said the Queen, ‘whom you find so useful, what will they say?’
‘What did the priests and priestesses of the Syrian goddess say, when Syria became Christian? They turned into bishops and nuns. Let them turn back again.’