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- 5432
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- CHAPTER XL.
Of The Sorcerers In The Isle Of Minda
“Tiffin! tiffin!” cried Media; “time for tiffin! Up, comrades! and
while the mat is being spread, walk we to the bow, and inhale the
breeze for an appetite. Hark ye, Vee-Vee! forget not that calabash with
the sea-blue seal, and a round ring for a brand. Rare old stuff, that,
Mohi; older than you: the circumnavigator, I call it. My sire had a
canoe launched for the express purpose of carrying it thrice round
Mardi for a flavor. It was many moons on the voyage; the mariners never
sailed faster than three knots. Ten would spoil the best wine ever
floated.”
Tiffin over, and the blue-sealed calabash all but hid in the great
cloud raised by our pipes, Media proposed to board it in the smoke. So,
goblet in hand, we all gallantly charged, and came off victorious from
the fray.
Then seated again, and serenely puffing in a circle, the
circumnavigator meanwhile pleasantly going the rounds, Media called
upon Mohi for something entertaining.
Now, of all the old gossips in Mardi, surely our delightful old
Diodorus was furnished with the greatest possible variety of histories,
chronicles, anecdotes, memoirs, legends, traditions, and biographies.
There was no end to the library he carried. In himself, he was the
whole history of Mardi, amplified, not abridged, in one volume.
In obedience, then, to King Media’s command, Mohi regaled the company
with a narrative, in substance as follows:—
In a certain quarter of the Archipelago was an island called Minda; and
in Minda were many sorcerers, employed in the social differences and
animosities of the people of that unfortunate land. If a Mindarian
deemed himself aggrieved or insulted by a countryman, he forthwith
repaired to one of these sorcerers; who, for an adequate consideration,
set to work with his spells, keeping himself in the dark, and directing
them against the obnoxious individual. And full soon, by certain
peculiar sensations, this individual, discovering what was going on,
would straightway hie to his own professor of the sable art, who, being
well feed, in due time brought about certain counter-charms, so that in
the end it sometimes fell out that neither party was gainer or loser,
save by the sum of his fees.
But the worst of it was, that in some cases all knowledge of these
spells were at the outset hidden from the victim; who, hearing too late
of the mischief brewing, almost always fell a prey to his foe; which
calamity was held the height of the art. But as the great body of
sorcerers were about matched in point of skill, it followed that the
parties employing them were so likewise. Hence arose those interminable
contests, in which many moons were spent, both parties toiling after
their common destruction.
Indeed, to say nothing of the obstinacy evinced by their employers, it
was marvelous, the pertinacity of the sorcerers themselves. To the very
last tooth in their employer’s pouches, they would stick to their
spells; never giving over till he was financially or physically
defunct.
But much as they were vilified, no people in Minda were half so
disinterested as they. Certain indispensable conditions secured, some
of them were as ready to undertake the perdition of one man as another;
good, bad, or indifferent, it made little matter.
What wonder, then, that such abominable mercenaries should cause a
mighty deal of mischief in Minda; privately going about, inciting
peaceable folks to enmities with their neighbors; and with marvelous
alacrity, proposing themselves as the very sorcerers to rid them of the
annoyances suggested as existing.
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