CHAPTER IX.

How I grew weary of travel and resolved to settle down for a long rest. A quiet life however soon tires me, and I desire to set out again. Bulger’s opposition. How I deceived him. We take our departure. Encounter a terrible storm. Are shipwrecked on a beautiful Island. Made prisoners by the Round Bodies. Description of this strange people. We are condemned to die. Saved by Rōlâ-Bōlâ, the Roundbody Princess. More about the strange beings. The Princess falls in love with me. Preparations for marriage. The ceremony on the Great Plain. The sudden storm. Consternation of the Round Bodies. I lash Bulger and myself to a platform. The storm-king catches up the wooden structure and bears it away. Transported to the main land on the wings of the wind. We are gently dropped in a grain field not a thousand miles from home. Our unspeakable joy.

[Illustration: A GOOD MOTHER ROUNDBODY AMUSING HER CHILDREN.]

At this period of my life I had firmly resolved to settle down and enjoy a good, long rest.

Bulger and I both needed it. We were tired of strange sights, strange lands and strange people.

“Why should we not,” thought I, “enjoy our world-wide fame?”

From the very ends of the earth, visitors flocked in thousands to my House Wonderful to see my treasures, my extraordinary curiosities, and above all, my remarkable dog, Bulger, the sole companion of my strange and eventful life, my guide, my friend, my counsellor, my all. Scarcely, however, were the valleys green again after a long and bitterly cold winter—so cold in fact that I drank nothing but iced tea for full three months, as it was utterly impossible to carry the pot from the stove to the table quickly enough to prevent its freezing,—than my thoughts turned to the pleasures and dangers of a roving life, and I longed to be up and off again in quest of new adventures.

As I roused myself from my reverie I found Bulger sitting at my feet with his kind, lustrous eyes fixed full upon my face. He had read my thoughts as correctly and easily as I might the words of a child’s primer, and as he saw that I was wide awake and in full possession of my faculties, he seized hold of my sleeve and whined most piteously.

Dear, faithful animal! Oh, that I had heeded thy remonstrance!

But no, it was not to be.

Unwilling to fret and worry good Bulger, I now resolved to make use of a faculty which had no place in his nature—namely hypocrisy.

When he was in my presence I pretended to be perfectly happy and contented, going about laughing, singing and dancing; but the very moment he had quitted the room I set to work making ready for another journey.

At last all was ready.

When Bulger entered the house and set eyes upon boxes and packages, he lifted his head and gave one long, dismal howl of entreaty; but seeing that my purpose was fixed, like a true and faithful servitor, he bounded to my side and licked my outstretched hand, as much as to say: “Thy road is my road, thy fate is my fate!”

In a few hours we were on our way to the sea-board.

My heart was light, my spirits buoyant and gay.

“What is life?” I cried. “Am I a worm to vegetate in mold and darkness? Nay! I am a creature of intelligence, of mind, of soul; the air, the sunlight, the boundless universe, are mine; I will enjoy them.”

Luckily I had not long to wait in the seaport, for a good, staunch vessel was nearly loaded.

Learning that she was bound for the Southern ocean, I at once ordered my effects to be set on board, and before the new moon had lost its crescent I was on the high seas with my faithful Bulger by my side and a bounding heart beating joyful music in my breast.

For a while all went well.

Bulger seemed to have gotten over his strange presentiment of evil and romped about the deck with all his old-time love of mirth and jollity. But upon me, however, after our good vessel was a few days out, there came a strange feeling never experienced before.

In my dreams, light and darkness alternately oppressed me; the one more dazzling than the electric flash, the other deeper than earthly night.

Our seventh day out, at high noon, suddenly it seemed as if some mighty hand had drawn a vast and impenetrable curtain of inky blackness over the entire sky. It almost appeared as if some terrible demon of the skies had suddenly blown out the very sun itself.

Bulger, with one bound, gained my side, and, fastening his teeth in my sash, moaned piteously, as was his custom when he thought my life in danger. I stooped and stroked his head. The palm of my hand felt the hot tears that were streaming from his eyes. Just then the vessel gave a lurch, and Bulger’s weight tore his teeth from their hold in my sash, and in an instant he was separated from me. I heard his supplicating bark in a distant part of the ship.

“Bulger! Bulger!” I cried, “here! here! this way, to me, to me!” and in my desperation at thought of losing my loved companion, I darted in the direction of the barking, regardless of the black night which enveloped us, and stumbling over some object fell headlong on the deck.

My fall stunned me.

I rose upon my elbow and passed my hand over my eyes like a person just waking from a deep sleep.

Sulphurous flames now darted from the four quarters of the heavens, and crash upon crash of deafening thunder rattled and pealed over our heads.

A terrific blast of wind caught up our ship like a cockle shell and hurled it along through the seething, bubbling, maddened waters at such a fearful rate that every instant it seemed as if she must go to the bottom.

I know not how long we were driven along at this furious speed, for I was half dazed by the roar of the warring elements and blinded by the continuous flashing of the lightning. To my horror, the sound of terrible blows, dull but awful in their energy, now fell upon my ears.

We had struck upon the rocks, and our ship was pounding out her own life beneath my very feet.

Instinctively I called upon my faithful Bulger.

But not the voice of brazen throat and lungs could overcome the din of that tempest.

The intense darkness was now dissipated by showers of meteoric fire, which fell like ten times ten thousand bursting rockets as far as the eye could reach. And then deep rifts broke in the inky mantle of the heavens and showers of hail stones, each as large as a goose egg, rattled with the fury of musketry upon the deck.

At that moment a lurch of the vessel had rolled me under a huge copper kettle or my life would have been beaten out of me.

“Farewell, dear Bulger!” I cried, in a tear-strangled voice, “this terrible discharge from heaven’s frozen artillery will surely end thy life! Farewell, faithful dog; a long farewell!”

Gradually this terrifying shower of huge hail-stones lessened its fury, and strange to say, in doing so the falling stones drew most wonderful music from the great copper kettle which covered me like a huge buckler.

The wind moaned a deep bass and the pounding of the vessel kept time like some gigantic drum.

Although half-dead with fear, I listened with ecstatic pleasure to this awful concert played by the warring forces of nature. When it had ceased, I looked out from my hiding-place.

Not a living soul was in sight. Every seaman and officer had perished beneath the strokes of the lightning, been crushed by the fall of hail, or swept by the resistless gale into the seething ocean.

So calm did it grow that I was beginning to take heart, when with a terrific swish and whirr, as if slit by some gigantic knife, the clouds parted and from the rent rushed blinding drifts of snow with such a wild and startling sweep and whirl that my knees swote together and I fell upon my face in utter despair.

But look! Had heaven slain the monster of the storm?

The snow was blood-red.

The sight froze the very marrow of my bones.

I rolled over upon my back; my senses fled; death seemed to have overtaken me.

How long I lay in this stupor I know not, but when I awoke the storm had spent its fury, the sun was sending down its brightest rays, the air was pleasantly cool and bracing.

Slowly my strength came back to me, and I emerged from my hiding-place, crawling on my hands and feet, for I was too weak to stand upright at first. Little by little, however, I took heart, and, as I felt my blood go tingling thro’ my veins, I made an effort and rose to my feet.

Yes, my worst fears had been realized.

Not a living being had survived the storm.

As I walked upon the blood-red snow, every foot-fall brought forth most piteous sighs and groans.

“What dread warning,” thought I, “does this mysterious murmuring give me? What is the meaning of these sobs and moans which issue from these crimson crystals beneath the pressure of my feet? Am I walking upon the blood of my ancestors?”

Clinging to the frozen sheets, I crept slowly along the red-encrusted deck.

But stay!

Hark!

Are my ears playing me still more fantastic tricks?

No! I’m wholly and entirely myself now, and as sure as the blood of the Trumps’ courses through my veins, that bark came from my faithful dog!

“Bulger lives! Bulger lives!” I cried out in accents of the wildest joy; and breaking away from the hold of fear and trepidation, I rushed boldly forward, calling out “I’m coming, Bulger, I’m coming!” With reckless courage I sprang from one frozen plank to another, until I stood upon the quarter-deck. There, upon the hatch, sat, or rather lay, Bulger, for his life was almost extinct. His teeth were locked upon the straps of a life-preserver which he, ever thoughtful of my safety, was about to bring to me at the first outbreak of the storm, when its fury forced him to seek refuge under a water-cask, as his tracks on the snow indicated.

As quickly as my stiffened limbs would permit, I bounded forward, and throwing myself on my knees, in the crimson snow,—which sent forth most heart-rending groans and sighs at the pressure of my body upon its blood-red surface—I clasped Bulger in my arms and our cries of joy mingled,—our tears ran together.

All my suffering was forgotten in that moment, for Bulger was alive, his head was clasped to my breast.

The winds had now fallen, the sea had grown calm again, and I determined at once to quit the wreck if possible, for the setting sun revealed to me the shores of a beautiful land at the mouth of a small but extremely picturesque river, whose banks were rich in palm-trees, fruit-trees and flowering shrubs.

I lost no time in lowering one of the boats which had happily escaped with slight injuries, and being an expert seaman, I found no difficulty in rigging a tackle and lowering first, Bulger, and then myself into the boat, and paddling leisurely towards the shore.

Here I drew the boat high and dry on the beach, and calling out gayly to faithful Bulger to follow me, I clambered up the bank and pushed boldly forward to survey the fair land upon which a strange fate had set our feet.

Now, for the first, I became conscious of the terrible hunger that was gnawing at my vitals—a fact which proved to me that I must have lain in an unconscious state beneath the huge kettle for at least two days if not more.

Bulger raised his kind eyes to me, and then bounding off to one of the fruit trees, ran around it, barking joyfully.

I shook one of the branches and the ripe fruit fell in abundance to the ground.

Its odor was so delicious that although it was unknown to me, I had no hesitation in partaking of it most freely, Bulger following my example, a fact which convinced me that it could not be otherwise than wholesome. A long, deep draught from a limpid spring refreshed us both greatly; but as the sun was sinking rapidly, and as I now began to feel the effects of the rack, strain and weariness resulting from the terrible experience of the past day or so, I called out to Bulger:

“Come, dear, faithful fellow, let us seek out a fit place to pass the night; some nook shielded by wide-spreading branches, where there is plenty of soft boughs to make a bed with.”

As the country was quite level, I sighted a grove at some distance, and thither we directed our steps.

It had now grown quite dark. We quickened our pace, for I was too prudent a traveler to care to expose myself to the night dew.

As we drew near the grove there appeared to be a low wall on one side of it.

“This way, Bulger,” said I, “this long line of boulders will protect us from the night winds, if any should rise. Let us creep under its edge and lay our tired limbs down on the soft grass.” He looked up with softened gaze and gave one or two consenting wags to his tail.

Nestling close under the edges of several of the largest of the boulders, at a point where they formed a sort of sheltered nook, we soon fell into a deep sleep, I sitting half upright and Bulger pillowing his head upon my lap.

Once or twice in the course of the night I awoke to find my brow beaded with perspiration. I put my hand on Bulger; he too was awake, and his tongue was lolling from his mouth. Both of us seemed to have been seized with a strange fever. The direst forebodings took possession of me. Had we landed upon a shore along which lurked some deadly miasm? Possibly we might not live to see the light of another day. It required all my self-control to banish such terrible thoughts from my mind. But so tired was I to the very bone that I soon fell asleep again, reassured as I was by the example set me by Bulger. It was, however, a fitful slumber, for the heat of our bodies had now become so great that the very ground upon which we were lying felt warm to my touch. At length, to my joy, I caught the first, faint glimpse of the dawn. I was now in a perfect glow from head to foot. And so was Bulger. Suddenly it burst upon my mind that possibly we might have lain down in a volcanic region; that, mayhap, fierce, subterranean fires were raging beneath our very heads. I rose to my knees with a bound, and placed both of my hands upon the nearest boulder. Fancy my horror upon feeling that its surface was not only hot, but that it yielded to the pressure of my hands, and gave forth groans, hissings and rumblings. In an instant I was on my feet. Bulger did not wait to be called. Determined to verify my suspicions,—for discretion was always a reasonable part of my valor, I hastened from one boulder to another within the circle where we had been lying, and pressed my hands upon them with all my strength. Deep, rumbling and hissing sounds came forth from the ground everywhere about me, and seemed to awaken responsive cries far and near, as if one giant tossing in his sleep disturbed the slumbers of his fellows.

“Bulger!” I cried, “we stand upon the ground of death; this is but the outer wall of a crater, it is aglow with subterranean heat; only the merest shell—so thin that it yields to my pressure—is between us and destruction. Fly, fly, faithful dog!”

The morning sun now burst forth with a flood of golden light.

As far as my eye could reach, extended this same boulder-like parapet, shutting out my gaze from the abyss through which the volcano was now about to spout its liquid fire; for all at once the boulders began to rock from side to side, giving forth such dreadful rumblings that I knew the eruption was to be preceded by an earthquake.

A sickening fear seized hold of me; my legs bent like pipe stems, beneath the weight of my body.

Bulger saw that his loved master was chai