THE KING IN YELLOW
BY
ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
______________________________________
Original publication date: 1895
THE KING IN YELLOW
IS DEDICATED
TO
MY BROTHER
Along the shore the cloud waves break,
The twin suns sink beneath the lake,
The shadows lengthen
In Carcosa.
Strange is the night where black stars rise,
And strange moons circle through the skies
But stranger still is
Lost Carcosa.
Songs that the Hyades shall sing,
Where flap the tatters of the King,
Must die unheard in
Dim Carcosa.
Song of my soul, my voice is dead;
Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed
Shall dry and die in
Lost Carcosa.
Cassilda's Song in "The King in Yellow," Act i, Scene 2.
THE REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS
I
"Ne raillons pas les fous; leur folie dure plus longtemps que
la notre.... Voila toute la difference."
Toward the end of the year 1920 the Government of the United States had
practically completed the programme, adopted during the last months of
President Winthrop's administration. The country was apparently tranquil.
Everybody knows how the Tariff and Labour questions were settled. The war
with Germany, incident on that country's seizure of the Samoan Islands,
had left no visible scars upon the republic, and the temporary occupation
of Norfolk by the invading army had been forgotten in the joy over
repeated naval victories, and the subsequent ridiculous plight of General
Von Gartenlaube's forces in the State of New Jersey. The Cuban and
Hawaiian investments had paid one hundred per cent and the territory of
Samoa was well worth its cost as a coaling station. The country was in a
superb state of defence. Every coast city had been well supplied with land
fortifications; the army under the parental eye of the General Staff,
organized according to the Prussian system, had been increased to 300,000
men, with a territorial reserve of a million; and six magnificent
squadrons of cruisers and battle-ships patrolled the six stations of the
navigable seas, leaving a steam reserve amply fitted to control home
waters. The gentlemen from the West had at last been constrained to
acknowledge that a college for the training of diplomats was as necessary
as law schools are for the training of barristers; consequently we were no
longer represented abroad by incompetent patriots. The nation was
prosperous; Chicago, for a moment paralyzed after a second great fire, had
risen from its ruins, white and imperial, and more beautiful than the white
city which had been built for its plaything in 1893. Everywhere good
architecture was replacing bad, and even in New York, a sudden craving for
decency had swept away a great portion of the existing horrors. Streets
had been widened, properly paved and lighted, trees had been planted,
squares laid out, elevated structures demolished and underground roads
built to replace them. The new government buildings and barracks were fine
bits of architecture, and the long system of stone quays which completely
surrounded the island had been turned into parks which proved a god-send
to the population. The subsidizing of the state theatre and state opera
brought its own reward. The United States National Academy of Design was
much like European institutions of the same kind. Nobody envied the
Secretary of Fine Arts, either his cabinet position or his portfolio. The
Secretary of Forestry and Game Preservation had a much easier time, thanks
to the new system of National Mounted Police. We had profited well by the
latest treaties with France and England; the exclusion of foreign-born
Jews as a measure of self-preservation, the settlement of the new
independent negro state of Suanee, the checking of immigration, the new
laws concerning naturalization, and the gradual centralization of power in
the executive all contributed to national calm and prosperity. When the
Government solved the Indian problem and squadrons of Indian cavalry
scouts in native costume were substituted for the pitiable organizations
tacked on to the tail of skeletonized regiments by a former Secretary of
War, the nation drew a long sigh of relief. When, after the colossal
Congress of Religions, bigotry and intolerance were laid in their graves
and kindness and charity began to draw warring sects together, many
thought the millennium had arrived, at least in the new world which after
all is a world by itself.
