- end_line
- 11386
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:09.931Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 11323
- text
- night: and sit and chirp over your Burgundy, till the morning larks
join your crickets, and wed matins to vespers;—far otherwise, with us
plebeian mortals. From our dinners, we must hie to our anvils: and the
last jolly jorum evaporates in a cark and a care.”
“Methinks he relapses,” said Abrazza.
“It waxes late,” said Mohi; “your Highnesses, is it not time to break
up?”
“No, no!”, cried Abrazza; “let the day break when it will: but no
breakings for us. It’s only midnight. This way with the wine; pass it
along, my dear Media. We are young yet, my sweet lord; light hearts and
heavy purses; short prayers and long rent-rolls. Pass round the Tokay!
We demi-gods have all our old age for a dormitory. Come!—Round and
round with the flagons! Let them disappear like mile-stones on a
race-course!”
“Ah!” murmured Babbalanja, holding his full goblet at arm’s length on
the board, “not thus with the hapless wight, born with a hamper on his
back, and blisters in his palms.—Toil and sleep—sleep and toil, are his
days and his nights; he goes to bed with a lumbago, and wakes with the
rheumatics;—I know what it is;—he snatches lunches, not dinners, and
makes of all life a cold snack! Yet praise be to Oro, though to such
men dinners are scarce worth the eating; nevertheless, praise Oro
again, a good supper is something. Off jack-boots; nay, off shirt, if
you will, and go at it. Hurrah! the fagged day is done: the last blow
is an echo. Twelve long hours to sunrise! And would it were an
Antarctic night, and six months to to-morrow! But, hurrah! the very
bees have their hive, and after a day’s weary wandering, hie home to
their honey. So they stretch out their stiff legs, rub their lame
elbows, and putting their tired right arms in a sling, set the others
to fetching and carrying from dishes to dentals, from foaming flagon to
the demijohn which never pours out at the end you pour in. Ah! after
all, the poorest devil in Mardi lives not in vain. There’s a soft side
to the hardest oak-plank in the world!”
“Methinks I have heard some such sentimental gabble as this before from
my slaves, my lord,” said Abrazza to Media. “It has the old gibberish
flavor.”
“Gibberish, your Highness? Gibberish? I’m full of it—I’m a gibbering
ghost, my right worshipful lord! Here, pass your hand through me— here,
_here_, and scorch it where I most burn. By Oro! King! but I will gibe
and gibber at thee, till thy crown feels like another skull clapped on
thy own. Gibberish? ay, in hell we’ll gibber in concert, king! we’ll
howl, and roast, and hiss together!”
“Devil that thou art, begone! Ho, guards! seize him!”
“Back, curs!” cried Media. “Harm not a hair of his head. I crave
pardon, King Abrazza, but no violence must be done Babbalanja.”
“Trumpets there!” said Abrazza; “so: the banquet is done—lights for
King Media! Good-night, my lord!”
Now, thus, for the nonce, with good cheer, we close. And after many
fine dinners and banquets—through light and through shade; through
mirth, sorrow, and all—drawing nigh to the evening end of these
wanderings wild—meet is it that all should be regaled with a supper.
- title
- Chunk 5