CHAPTER I

THE TABLES OF HANNO

Plato, the Sage of classical Greece, speaks in his writings of a strange continent which, if historians and geologists are to be believed, must have lain somewhere between the island of St. Helena and the coast of Africa. The poets and philosophers of antiquity called it Atlantis, Oceania, or the Fortunate Islands.

In those days the earth was still a divinity to whom man raised altars. In those days men had not arrived at the overpowering conviction that the whole globe was nothing more than a wretched mite of a ball, which the sun, out of regard for the equilibrium of the universe, or, perhaps for the mere fun of the thing, twirls round and round. They had no idea that you could sail completely round it; measure it; weigh it and calculate exactly how long it has lasted and how much longer it is likely to last. No! The Earth still retained the nimbus of divinity; was still regarded as immeasurable, infinite, incomprehensible; and the sun, moon, and stars were popularly supposed to be his vassals.

Above the earth was heaven; below the earth was the Styx, and the dwellers on the earth lived in intimate relations with them both. No one had an inkling that the blue expanse above was only the reflection of the sun's rays refracted through the vapours of the earth, and that neither the gods, nor the blessed, could endure to live up there for the intense cold. No one knew that only the upper rind of the earth was solid, and that in the depths below the heat was so intense that the devil himself could only exist there in a molten condition.

In those days the earth was still an unappropriated domain. The poet could picture to himself bright fairy worlds beyond the continents already known, and the popular imagination was free to people the uninhabited wilds with all manner of marvels and monsters.

The wondrous thoughts of a poetic spirit betray themselves in these ideas and guesses. The spirit of invention three thousand years ago spoke of two gates which the then known world was said to have. One of these gates lay in the far north-east, between the snow and ice-clad Altai mountains, which set bounds to the wanderings of the nations. Beyond this mountain chain it was said you could hear the din of Gog and Magog, whom the mighty conqueror Alexander had thrust out of the world behind gates of bronze, and who ever since have been baring and blasting rock and mountain, and digging subterraneous ways in order to escape from their prison. Woe betide the world and all that dwells therein if ever they succeed in forcing their way through the woody Imaus and appear, with their hairy faces, angular heads, unknown tongues, arms, and clothing, and deluge the world from end to end like the stroke of a great spirit paint-brush, which, after filling its canvas with mighty nations, splendid cities, and world-renowned conquerors, should suddenly wipe them off again at a single sweep in order to paint fresh subjects.

At the opposite end of the world, in the warm south-west, where the gaze of the dreamer loses itself in the endless blue mirror of ocean, the poet pictured to himself that happier world which sprang from the rapturous embrace of heaven and earth; a world where the air is balmier, where love is sweeter, where man is more valiant and woman more faithful; where the light knows no shadow, joy no grief, and the flower no fading; where everything--herbs, trees, and the hearts of men--rejoices in an eternal youth.

It is an odd phenomenon in the psychology of nations, that popular fancy should always have painted the North with the pale and sombre hues of fear and terror, whilst she looked for the fulfilment of her unattainable hopes to the equally dim and impenetrable South, and constantly sent her dreams and her sighs in that direction.

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In the days when Rome, still in her first bloom, had begun to be the mistress of those regions which the geographers of antiquity called the known world, there arose another young city on the opposite seashore, almost over against that great boot which we call Italy, and which, when once it had a good strong foot inside it, was to conquer the world with such rapid strides.

The new metropolis sprang from the ground as rapidly as Rome herself. The legend still lives of its imperious foundress, who purchased from the strange king as much land for her fugitive people as could be covered with an oxhide, and now that plot of land, once meted out by a buffalo-skin cut into strips, was already the seat of a great empire, and of all the coast land round about, and might perhaps have won the dominion of the whole world besides--if Rome had not chanced to be in that very world at that very time. Two centres the world cannot have; round two axles the earth cannot revolve.

This young city was called Carthage.

Men counted 330 years from the foundation of Carthage, which time Christians call 550 B.C., when the following event took place in the city of Carthage.

The captain of a merchant vessel, who very often touched the African coasts in the way of business, had been absent from his native land so long that his funeral feast had been held; his wife had wedded a second time, and another had succeeded to his office. Suddenly, when no one ever expected to see him again, he reappeared at the entrance of the great double harbour, which shut out the sea by means of huge chains, and had not its equal in the whole world, not even in Tyre itself, the oldest of all trading cities.

The mariner's name was Hanno. The whole city knew all about him, and every one now said how wonderful it was that Hanno should have come back again, after remaining away so long.

And he brought back with him treasures and curiosities such as no man had ever seen before, not even in dreams.

It was the custom at Carthage for the merchants who traversed distant lands to record the sum and substance of their experiences on marble tables, which tables were then preserved in the Temple of Kronos, which was in the heart of the city, near to the circumvallated Byrza. That the God of Time also possessed a temple there proves that, even in those early days, the fact that time is the greatest of all treasures, that time is money, was generally recognized at Carthage.

So Hanno's tables were placed on the altar of Kronos. These tables the people were not allowed to see. The inspection thereof was solely reserved for the Council of Elders, the grey Senators whose business it was to calculate how the information thus acquired could be turned to the profit of the fatherland.

The very next day after Hanno's tables had been placed on the altar, he was summoned to the dwelling of the Governor, which stood on a little island, midway between the two havens, exactly opposite the Gate of Elephants. At that time Carthage had already 260 gates and 650,000 inhabitants. A wall 180 feet high encircled the city on the land side; the cupolas of her palaces sparkled with gold; and, high above all her palaces, towered a temple whose walls were of black marble, whose columns were of alabaster with silver capitals, and from the top of whose domed roof rose a huge golden cupola, surmounted by four silver wings.

The Archon led Hanno over the scarlet, asphalted bridge, and, stopping short midway in front of the huge statue of Baalti, bade him survey the streets and public places of the huge city, along which a motley tide of human beings was ebbing and flowing, while whole armies of elephants, with heavy loads and gaily painted towers on their backs, were striding along the thoroughfares.

"Look, Hanno! Dost thou not see how great the city hath grown during thy absence, and how the number of the people hath increased in like measure?"

"It hath indeed become as great again," replied the mariner.

"Wouldst thou not be sad at heart if these palaces were one day to fall to the ground, if nothing but bats and serpents were to dwell in the place of these busy crowds, so that the stranger who heard tell of Carthage must needs ask: 'But where, then, is this great city? Who is there that can tell me anything about it?'"

"God forbid."

"And if one were then to make answer to the stranger, and say: 'That city once ruled half the world, and her fall dates from the day when a certain seafarer, called Hanno, returned from a long voyage,' wouldst thou have that come to pass?"

"Astarte and all the good gods preserve me from such a thought."

"Then guard thy lips, and take heed to what thou sayest before the Council."

Soon afterwards Hanno stood in the council chamber. The elders of the city sat round about the walls, and Hierkas, the eldest of the Senators, with a white beard reaching down to his girdle, held in his lap the large stone tables on which Hanno's experiences were recorded.

"Hanno," said the eldest of the elders to the seafarer, "thou hast been absent for years from thy native land; we waited for thee and thou camest not. In thy native land palaces, treasures, beautiful gardens, fruitful fields were thine; at home thou hadst a lovely wife and beloved slaves, and yet thou couldst find it in thy heart to remain away so long. Are the things true which thou hast recorded on these marble tables?"

"True every whit, and nought added thereto."

"Is it true that thou wast tossed by tempests on to a great continent in the far west, a continent larger than all the rest of the known world put together?"

"It is even so as I have said."

"Is it true that the winter there is as warm as the summer here, the grass as high as trees are with us, and the beasts as wise as men?"

"So it is in very truth."

"Is it true that there the women are fairer and fonder, and the men braver and mightier than with us; that there the very air is a healing balm, which heals the sick and makes the coward valiant, and the ill-favoured comely?"

"I have said it."

"Is it true that gold abounds there like sand, that precious stones are to be found on the mountain-tops, and pearls and purple on the seashore?"

"So have I found it."

"Thou hast said that thou didst see a plant, the roots whereof yield fruit sweeter than bread; that thou didst find a reed which yields honey, bushes which furnish wool white as fallen snow, and a tree from the pierced bark whereof flows streams of wine, while vessels full of milk grow beneath its crown?"

"All this have I seen, and to prove it I have brought of them all back with me."

"Hast thou not also brought back with thee a wonder-working bird with human speech and man's understanding?"

"I have it on my ship."

"Hast thou spoken with others of these things?"

"Only on the marble tables are my secrets recorded."

"Thy sailors have not yet been in the town, then?"

"None of them have left the harbour."

"Then, Hanno, return to thy ship."

They led the mariner back to his ship. Late the same evening the vessel was escorted by four men-of-war into the open sea, where, after stripping her of boats, sails, and helm, they deluged her on all four sides with what was known long afterwards as Greek fire. In an instant the inextinguishable flames had ignited the planks, and there, on the open sea, Hanno's ship, with its owner, its crew, and the gold-dust, the bread-fruit, the sugar-canes, the cocoa-nuts, and the talking-bird which they had brought back with them, were utterly consumed. The fire burned everything down to the very water's edge.

And a proclamation went forth in the streets of Carthage, that whoever presumed to say a word about Hanno's happy land should be instantly offered up to the goddess Astarte, and if a Senator should dare to betray a word of what was written on Hanno's marble tables, he should be stoned at the entrance of the harbour, and his bones strewn in the sea.

For if the men of Carthage had but learned that such a happy land existed anywhere under the sun, they would have quitted their native land in troops, the palaces would have fallen to pieces from decay, bats and serpents would have dwelt within the gates, and thus the day would have come when the stranger, on hearing the name of Carthage mentioned, would have asked: "But where, then, is the site of that great city?"