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- 2026-01-30T20:48:09.927Z
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- superstition, divided councils, domestic feuds, ignorance, temerity;
she wills, but does not; her East is one black storm-cloud, that never
bursts; her utmost fight is a defiance; she showers reproaches, where
she should rain down blows. She stands a mastiff baying at the moon.”
“Tropes on tropes!” said. Media. “Let me tell the tale,—straight-
forward like a line. Verdanna is a lunatic—”
“A trope! my lord,” cried Babbalanja.
“My tropes are not tropes,” said Media, “but yours are.—Verdanna is a
lunatic, that after vainly striving to cut another’s throat, grimaces
before a standing pool and threatens to cut his own. And is such a
madman to be intrusted with himself? No; let another govern him, who is
ungovernable to himself Ay, and tight hold the rein; and curb, and rasp
the bit. Do I exaggerate?—Mohi, tell me, if, save one lucid interval,
Verdanna, while independent of Dominora, ever discreetly conducted her
affairs? Was she not always full of fights and factions? And what first
brought her under the sway of Bello’s scepter? Did not her own Chief
Dermoddi fly to Bello’s ancestor for protection against his own
seditious subjects? And thereby did not her own king unking himself?
What wonder, then, and where the wrong, if Henro, Bello’s conquering
sire, seized the diadem?”
“What my lord cites is true,” said Mohi, “but cite no more, I pray;
lest, you harm your cause.”
“Yet for all this, Babbalanja,” said Media, “Bello but holds lunatic
Verdanna’s lands in trust.”
“And may the guardian of an estate also hold custody of the ward, my
lord?”
“Ay, if he can. What _can_ be done, may be: that’s the Greed of demi-
gods.”
“Alas, alas!” cried Yoomy, “why war with words over this poor,
suffering land. See! for all her bloom, her people starve; perish her
yams, ere taken from the soil; the blight of heaven seems upon them.”
“Not so,” said Media. “Heaven sends no blights. Verdanna will not
learn. And if from one season’s rottenss, rottenness they sow again,
rottenness must they reap. But Yoomy, you seem earnest in this
matter;—come: on all hands it is granted that evils exist in Verdanna;
now sweet Sympathizer, what must the royal Bello do to mend them?”
“I am no sage,” said Yoomy, “what would my lord Media do?”
“What would _you_ do, Babbalanja,” said Media.
“Mohi, what you?” asked the philosopher.
“And what would the company do?” added Mohi.
“Now, though these evils pose us all,” said Babbalanja, “there lately
died in Verdanna, one, who set about curing them in a humane and
peaceable way, waving war and bloodshed. That man was Konno. Under a
huge caldron, he kept a roaring fire.”
“Well, Azzageddi, how could that answer his purpose?” asked Media.
“Nothing better, my lord. His fire boiled his bread-fruit; and so
convinced were his countrymen, that he was well employed, that they
almost stripped their scanty orchards to fill his caldron.”
“Konno was a knave,” said Mohi.
“Your pardon, old man, but that is only known to his ghost, not to us.
At any rate he was a great man; for even assuming he cajoled his
country, no common man could have done it.”
“Babbalanja,” said Mohi, “my lord has been pleased to pronounce
Verdanna crazy; now, may not her craziness arise from the irritating,
tantalizing practices of Dominora?”
“Doubtless, Braid-Beard, many of the extravagances of Verdanna, are in
good part to be ascribed to the cause you mention; but, to be
impartial, none the less does Verdanna essay to taunt and provoke
Dominora; yet not with the like result. Perceive you, Braid-Beard, that
the trade-wind blows dead across this strait from Dominora, and not
from Verdanna? Hence, when King Bello’s men fling gibes and insults,
every missile hits; but those of Verdanna are blown back in its teeth:
her enemies jeering her again and again.”
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