Transcript of The Last Galley, Impressions and Tales
I have written Impressions and Tales upon the title page of this volume, because I have included within the same cover two styles of work which present an essential difference. The second half of the collection consists of eight stories which explain themselves. The first half is made up of a series of pictures of the past, which may be regarded as trial flights towards a larger ideal which I have long had in my mind. It has seemed to me that there is a region between actual story and actual history which has never been adequately exploited. I could imagine, for example, a work dealing with some great historical epoch, and finding its interest not in the happenings to particular individuals, their adventures, and their loves, but in the fascination of the actual facts of history themselves. These facts might be colored with the glamour which the writer of fiction can give, and fictitious characters and conversations might illustrate them. But nonetheless, the actual drama of history and not the drama of invention should claim the attention of the reader. I have been tempted sometimes to try the effect upon a larger scale, but meanwhile these short sketches, portraying various crises in the story of the human race, are to be judged as experiments in that direction. The Last Galley Mutato nomine de te Britannia fabulo narratur. It was a spring morning, 146 years before the coming of Christ. The North African coast, with its broad hem of golden sand, its green belt of feathery palm trees, and its background of barren red -scarped hills, shimmered like a dream country in the opal light. Safe for a narrow edge of snow -white surf, the Mediterranean lay blue and serene as far as the eye could reach. In all its vast expanse there was no break but for a single galley, which was slowly making its way from the direction of Sicily and heading for the distant harbour of Carthage. Seen from afar, it was a stately and beautiful vessel, deep red in colour, double banked with scarlet ores, its broad flapping sail stained with Tyrian purple, its bulwarks gleaming with brasswork, a brazen three -pronged ram projected in front, and a high golden figure of Baal, the god of the Phoenicians, children of the Phoenician, shone upon the after -deck. From the single high mast above the huge sail streamed the tiger -striped flag of Carthage. So, like some stately scarlet bird with golden beak and wings of purple, she swam upon the face of the waters, a thing of might and of beauty as seen from the distant shore. But approach and look at her now. What are these dark streaks which foul her white decks and dapple her brazen shields? Why do the long red ores move out of time, irregular, convulsive? Why are some missing from the staring portholes, some snapped with jagged yellow edges, some trailing inert against the side? Why are two prongs of