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- earnestly engaged in overseeing the tumult; though not a word did he
say. Occasionally, however, he was regarded by those present with a
mysterious sort of deference; and when they chanced to pass between him
and the crazy man, they invariably did so in a stooping position;
probably to elude the atmospheric grape and cannister, continually
flying from the mouth of the lunatic.
“What mob is this?” cried Media.
“’Tis the grand council of Vivenza,” cried a bystander. “Hear ye not
Alanno?” and he pointed to the lunatic.
Now coming close to Alanno, we found, that with incredible volubility,
he was addressing the assembly upon some all-absorbing subject
connected with King Bello, and his presumed encroachments toward the
northwest of Vivenza.
One hand smiting his hip, and the other his head, the lunatic thus
proceeded; roaring like a wild beast, and beating the air like a
windmill:—
“I have said it! the thunder is flashing, the lightning is crashing!
already there’s an earthquake in Dominora! Full soon will old Bello
discover that his diabolical machinations against this ineffable land
must soon come to naught. Who dare not declare, that we are not
invincible? I repeat it, we are. Ha! ha! Audacious Bello must bite the
dust! Hair by hair, we will trail his gory gray beard at the end of our
spears! Ha, ha! I grow hoarse; but would mine were a voice like the
wild bulls of Bullorom, that I might be heard from one end of this
great and gorgeous land to its farthest zenith; ay, to the uttermost
diameter of its circumference. Awake! oh Vivenza. The signs of the
times are portentous; nay, extraordinary; I hesitate not to add,
peculiar! Up! up! Let us not descend to the bathos, when we should soar
to the climax! Does not all Mardi wink and look on? Is the great sun
itself a frigid spectator? Then let us double up our mandibles to the
deadly encounter. Methinks I see it now. Old Bello is crafty, and his
oath is recorded to obliterate us! Across this wide lagoon he casts his
serpent eyes; whets his insatiate bill; mumbles his barbarous tusks;
licks his forked tongues; and who knows when we shall have the shark in
our midst? Yet be not deceived; for though as yet, Bello has forborn
molesting us openly, his emissaries are at work; his infernal sappers,
and miners, and wet-nurses, and midwives, and grave- diggers are busy!
His canoe-yards are all in commotion! In navies his forests are being
launched upon the wave; and ere long typhoons, zephyrs, white-squalls,
balmy breezes, hurricanes, and besoms will be raging round us!”
His philippic concluded, Alanno was conducted from the place; and being
now quite exhausted, cold cobble-stones were applied to his temples,
and he was treated to a bath in a stream.
This chieftain, it seems, was from a distant western valley, called
Hio-Hio, one of the largest and most fertile in Vivenza, though but
recently settled. Its inhabitants, and those of the vales adjoining,— a
right sturdy set of fellows,—were accounted the most dogmatically
democratic and ultra of all the tribes in Vivenza; ever seeking to push
on their brethren to the uttermost; and especially were they bitter
against Bello. But they were a fine young tribe, nevertheless. Like
strong new wine they worked violently in becoming clear. Time, perhaps,
would make them all right.
An interval of greater uproar than ever now ensued; during which, with
his tomahawk, the white-headed old man repeatedly thumped and pounded
the seat where he sat, apparently to augment the din, though he looked
anxious to suppress it.
- title
- Chunk 3