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- 10838
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- 2026-01-30T20:48:09.931Z
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- 10756
- text
- BABBALANJA.—Call it as you will, Yoomy, it was a sort of sleep- walking
of the mind. Lombardo never threw down his pen: it dropped from him;
and then, he sat disenchanted: rubbing his eyes; staring; and feeling
faint—sometimes, almost unto death.
MEDIA—But pray, Babbalanja, tell us how he made acquaintance with some
of those rare worthies, he introduces us to, in his Koztanza.
BABBALANJA—He first met them in his reveries; they were walking about
in him, sour and moody: and for a long time, were shy of his advances;
but still importuned, they at last grew ashamed of their reserve;
stepped forward; and gave him their hands. After that, they were frank
and friendly. Lombardo set places for them at his board; when he died,
he left them something in his will.
MEDIA—What! those imaginary beings?
ABRAZZA—Wondrous witty! infernal fine!
MEDIA—But, Babbalanja; after all, the Koztanza found no favor in the
eyes of some Mardians.
ABRAZZA—Ay: the arch-critics Verbi and Batho denounced it.
BABBALANJA—Yes: on good authority, Verbi is said to have detected a
superfluous comma; and Batho declared that, with the materials he could
have constructed a far better world than Lombardo’s. But, didst ever
hear of his laying his axis?
ABRAZZA—But the unities; Babbalanja, the unities! they are wholly
wanting in the Koztanza.
BABBALANJA—Your Highness; upon that point, Lombardo was frank. Saith
he, in his autobiography: “For some time, I endeavored to keep in the
good graces of those nymphs; but I found them so captious, and
exacting; they threw me into such a violent passion with their
fault-findings; that, at last, I renounced them.”
ABRAZZA—Very rash!
BABBALANJA—No, your Highness; for though Lombardo abandoned all
monitors from without; he retained one autocrat within—his crowned and
sceptered instinct. And what, if he pulled down one gross world, and
ransacked the etherial spheres, to build up something of his own—a
composite:—what then? matter and mind, though matching not, are mates;
and sundered oft, in his Koztanza they unite:—the airy waist, embraced
by stalwart arms.
MEDIA—Incoherent again! I thought we were to have no more of this!
BABBALANJA—My lord Media, there are things infinite in the finite; and
dualities in unities. Our eyes are pleased with the redness of the
rose, but another sense lives upon its fragrance. Its redness you must
approach, to view: its invisible fragrance pervades the field. So, with
the Koztanza. Its mere beauty is restricted to its form: its expanding
soul, past Mardi does embalm. Modak is Modako; but fogle-foggle is not
fugle-fi.
MEDIA (_to Abrazza_)—My lord, you start again; but ’tis only another
phase of Azzageeddi; sometimes he’s quite mad. But all this you must
needs overlook.
ABRAZZA—I will, my dear prince; what one can not see through, one must
needs look over, as you say.
YOOMY—But trust me, your Highness, some of those strange things fall
far too melodiously upon the ear, to be wholly deficient in meaning.
ABRAZZA—Your gentle minstrel, _this_ must be, my lord. But Babbalanja,
the Koztanza lacks cohesion; it is wild, unconnected, all episode.
BABBALANJA—And so is Mardi itself:—nothing but episodes; valleys and
hills; rivers, digressing from plains; vines, roving all over; boulders
and diamonds; flowers and thistles; forests and thickets; and, here and
there, fens and moors. And so, the world in the Koztanza.
ABRAZZA—Ay, plenty of dead-desert chapters there; horrible sands to
wade through.
MEDIA—Now, Babbalanja, away with your tropes; and tell us of the work,
directly it was done. What did Lombardo then? Did he show it to any one
for an opinion?
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