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- 9670
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:18.539Z
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- structure-extraction-lambda
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- 9620
- text
- And in the fullness of time, this people became numerous and mighty.
And the more numerous and mighty they waxed, by so much the more did
they take pride and glory in their origin, frequently reverting to it
with manifold boastings. The proud device of their monarch was a hand
with the forefinger crooked, emblematic of the peculatory propensities
of his ancestors.
And all this, at greater length, said Mohi.
“It would seem, then, my lord,” said Babbalanja, reclining, “as if
these men of Ohonoo had canonized the derelictions of their
progenitors, though the same traits are deemed scandalous among
themselves. But it is time that makes the difference. The knave of a
thousand years ago seems a fine old fellow full of spirit and fun,
little malice in his soul; whereas, the knave of to-day seems a sour-
visaged wight, with nothing to redeem him. Many great scoundrels of our
Chronicler’s chronicles are heroes to us:—witness, Marjora the usurper.
Ay, time truly works wonders. It sublimates wine; it sublimates fame;
nay, is the creator thereof; it enriches and darkens our spears of the
Palm; enriches and enlightens the mind; it ripens cherries and young
lips; festoons old ruins, and ivies old heads; imparts a relish to old
yams, and a pungency to the Ponderings of old Bardianna; of fables
distills truths; and finally, smooths, levels, glosses, softens, melts,
and meliorates all things. Why, my lord, round Mardi itself is all the
better for its antiquity, and the more to be revered; to the
cozy-minded, more comfortable to dwell in. Ah! if ever it lay in embryo
like a green seed in the pod, what a damp, shapeless thing it must have
been, and how unpleasant from the traces of its recent creation. The
first man, quoth old Bardianna, must have felt like one going into a
new habitation, where the bamboos are green. Is there not a legend in
Maramma, that his family were long troubled with influenzas and
catarrhs?”
“Oh Time, Time, Time!” cried Yoomy—“it is Time, old midsummer Time,
that has made the old world what it is. Time hoared the old mountains,
and balded their old summits, and spread the old prairies, and built
the old forests, and molded the old vales. It is Time that has worn
glorious old channels for the glorious old rivers, and rounded the old
lakes, and deepened the old sea! It is Time—”
“Ay, full time to cease,” cried Media. “What have you to do with
cogitations not in verse, minstrel? Leave prose to Babbalanja, who is
prosy enough.”
“Even so,” said Babbalanja, “Yoomy, you have overstepped your province.
My lord Media well knows, that your business is to make the metal in
you jingle in tags, not ring in the ingot.”
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