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03 - Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad · Thrilling Adventures - Daily

0:01
Speaker 1: Part one of chapter two of the Heart of Darkness.
0:05
Speaker 1: One evening, as I was lying flat on the deck
0:08
Speaker 1: of my steamboat, I heard voices approaching, and there were
0:12
Speaker 1: the nephew and the uncle strolling along the bank. I
0:16
Speaker 1: laid my head on my arm again and had nearly
0:19
Speaker 1: lost myself in a doze when somebody sat in my ear.
0:23
Speaker 1: As it were. I am as harmless as a little child.
0:27
Speaker 1: But I don't like to be dictated too. Am I
0:30
Speaker 1: the manager? Or am I not? I was ordered to
0:33
Speaker 1: send him there? It's incredible. I became aware that the
0:39
Speaker 1: two were standing on the shore alongside the fore part
0:42
Speaker 1: of the steamboat, just below my head. I did not move.
0:47
Speaker 1: It did not occur to me to move. I was sleepy.
0:52
Speaker 1: It is unpleasant, granted the uncle. He has asked the
0:56
Speaker 1: administration to be sent there, said the other, with the
0:59
Speaker 1: eye idea of showing what he could do. And I
1:02
Speaker 1: was instructed accordingly. Look at the influence that man must have.
1:07
Speaker 1: Is it not frightful? They both agreed it was frightful,
1:12
Speaker 1: then made several bizarre remarks make rain and fine weather.
1:17
Speaker 1: One man the council by the nose. Bits of absurd
1:22
Speaker 1: sentences that got the better of my drowsiness, so that
1:25
Speaker 1: I had pretty near the whole of my wits about
1:28
Speaker 1: me when the uncle said, the climate may do away
1:31
Speaker 1: with this difficulty for you. Is he alone there? Yes,
1:36
Speaker 1: answered the manager. He sent his assistant down the river
1:40
Speaker 1: with a note to me in these terms, clear this
1:43
Speaker 1: poor devil out of the country, and don't bother sending
1:46
Speaker 1: more of that sort. I had rather be alone than
1:49
Speaker 1: have the kind of men you can dispose of with me.
1:53
Speaker 1: It was more than a year ago. Can you imagine
1:56
Speaker 1: such impudence anything since? Then asked the other hoarsely. Ivory
2:03
Speaker 1: jerked the nephew. Lots of it, prime sort, lots most
2:08
Speaker 1: annoying from him, And with that questioned the heavy rumble
2:13
Speaker 1: invoice was the reply fired out, so to speak. Then
2:18
Speaker 1: silence they had been talking about Kurtz. I was broad
2:25
Speaker 1: awake by this time, but lying perfectly at ease, remained
2:30
Speaker 1: still having no inducement to change my position. How did
2:35
Speaker 1: that Ivory come all this way? Growled the elder man,
2:39
Speaker 1: who seemed very vexed. The other explained that it had
2:43
Speaker 1: come with a fleet of canoes in charge of an
2:46
Speaker 1: English half caste clerk. Kurtz had with him that Kurtz
2:50
Speaker 1: had apparently intended to return himself, the station being by
2:54
Speaker 1: that time bare of goods and stores, but after coming
2:57
Speaker 1: three hundred miles, had suddenly decided to go back, which
3:02
Speaker 1: he started to do alone in a small dugout with
3:05
Speaker 1: four paddlers, leaving the half caste to continue down the
3:08
Speaker 1: river with the ivory. The two fellows there seemed astounded
3:13
Speaker 1: at anybody attempting such a thing. They were at a
3:16
Speaker 1: loss for an adequate motive. As to me, I seemed
3:22
Speaker 1: to see Kurtz for the first time. It was a
3:25
Speaker 1: distinct glimpse, the dugout, four paddling savages, and the lone
3:31
Speaker 1: white man turning his back suddenly on the headquarters on relief,
3:35
Speaker 1: on thoughts of home, perhaps setting his face towards the
3:39
Speaker 1: depths of the wilderness, towards his empty and desolate station.
3:44
Speaker 1: I did not know the motive. Perhaps he was just
3:48
Speaker 1: simply a fine fellow who stuck to his work for
3:51
Speaker 1: its own sake. His name, you understand, had not been
3:55
Speaker 1: pronounced once. He was that man half caste, who, as
4:01
Speaker 1: far as I could see, had conducted a difficult trip
4:04
Speaker 1: with great prudence and pluck, was invariably alluded to as
4:08
Speaker 1: that scoundrel. The scoundrel had reported that the man had
4:13
Speaker 1: been very ill, had recovered imperfectly. The two below me
4:18
Speaker 1: moved away then a few paces, and strolled back and forth.
4:21
Speaker 1: At some little distance I heard military posts. Doctor two
4:27
Speaker 1: hundred miles quite alone. Now unavoidable delays, nine months, no news,
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Speaker 1: strange rumors. They approached again, just as the manager was saying,
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Speaker 1: no one, as far as I know, unless a species
4:43
Speaker 1: of wandering trader, a pestilential fellow snapping ivory from the natives.
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Speaker 1: Who was it they were talking about? Now? I gathered
4:53
Speaker 1: in snatches that this was some man supposed to be
4:56
Speaker 1: in Courts's district, and of whom the manager did not
5:00
Speaker 1: not approve. We will not be free from unfair competition
5:04
Speaker 1: till one of these fellows is hanged. For an example,
5:08
Speaker 1: he said, certainly grunted the other, get him hanged? Why
5:12
Speaker 1: not anything? Anything can be done in this country, That's
5:17
Speaker 1: what I say. Nobody here, you understand here can endanger
5:22
Speaker 1: your position, And why you stand the climate, you outlast
5:28
Speaker 1: them all. The danger is in Europe. But there before
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Speaker 1: I left, I took care to They moved off and whispered.
5:37
Speaker 1: Then their voices rose again. The extraordinary series of delays
5:42
Speaker 1: is not my fault. I did my best. The fat
5:46
Speaker 1: man sighed very sad, and the pestiferous absurdity of his
5:52
Speaker 1: talk continued. The other he bothered me enough when he
5:56
Speaker 1: was here. Each station should be like a beacon on
6:01
Speaker 1: the road towards better things, a center for trade, of course,
6:06
Speaker 1: but also for humanizing, improving, instructing. Conceive you that ass
6:13
Speaker 1: and he wants to be the manager. No, it's here.
6:17
Speaker 1: He got choked by excessive indignation, and I lifted my
6:21
Speaker 1: head the least bit. I was surprised to see how
6:26
Speaker 1: near they were right under me. I could have spat
6:30
Speaker 1: upon their hats. They were looking on the ground, absorbed
6:34
Speaker 1: in thought. The manager was switching his leg with a
6:38
Speaker 1: slender twig. His sagacious relative lifted his head. You have
6:43
Speaker 1: been well since you came out this time, he asked.
6:47
Speaker 1: The other gave a start. Who I oh, like a charm,
6:53
Speaker 1: Like a charm. But the rest, oh, my goodness, all
6:58
Speaker 1: sick that I so quick too, that I haven't the
7:01
Speaker 1: time to send them out of the country. It's incredible, HM,
7:06
Speaker 1: trust so grunted the uncle. Oh, my boy, trust to
7:12
Speaker 1: this I say trust to this. I saw him extend
7:17
Speaker 1: his short flipper of an arm for a gesture that
7:20
Speaker 1: took in the forest, the creek, the mud, the river
7:24
Speaker 1: seemed to beckon with a dishonoring flourish before the sunlit
7:27
Speaker 1: face of the land, a treacherous appeal to the lurking death,
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Speaker 1: to the hidden evil, to the profound darkness of its heart.
7:36
Speaker 1: It was so startling that I leaped to my feet
7:40
Speaker 1: and looked back at the edge of the forest, as
7:42
Speaker 1: though I had expected an answer of some sort to
7:45
Speaker 1: that black display of confidence, You know, the foolish notions
7:50
Speaker 1: that come to one sometimes. The high stillness confronted these
7:54
Speaker 1: two figures with its ominous patients, waiting for the passing
7:58
Speaker 1: away of a fantastic invasion, they swore aloud together, not
8:04
Speaker 1: of sheer fright, I believe, then, pretending not to know
8:08
Speaker 1: anything of my existence, turned back to the station. The
8:13
Speaker 1: sun was low, and leaning forward side by side, they
8:17
Speaker 1: seemed to be tugging painfully uphill their two ridiculous shadows
8:22
Speaker 1: of unequal length that trailed behind them slowly over the
8:26
Speaker 1: tall grass, without bending a single blade. In a few days,
8:32
Speaker 1: the El Dorado expedition went into the patient wilderness that
8:36
Speaker 1: closed upon it as the sea closes over a diver.
8:40
Speaker 1: Long afterwards, the news came that all the donkeys were dead.
8:44
Speaker 1: I know nothing as to the fate of the less
8:47
Speaker 1: valuable animals. They, no doubt, like the rest of us,
8:52
Speaker 1: found what they deserved. I did not inquire. I was
8:57
Speaker 1: then rather excited at the prospect of me eating courts
9:00
Speaker 1: very soon. When I say very soon, I meet it comparatively.
9:06
Speaker 1: It was just two months from the day we left
9:09
Speaker 1: the creek when we came to the bank below Kurtz's station.
9:15
Speaker 1: Going up that river was like traveling back to the
9:18
Speaker 1: earliest beginnings of the world, when vegetation rioted on the
9:22
Speaker 1: earth and big trees were kings. An empty stream, a
9:28
Speaker 1: great silence, an impenetrable forest. The air was warm, thick, heavy, sluggish.
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Speaker 1: There was no joy in the brilliance of sunshine. The
9:39
Speaker 1: long stretches of the waterway ran on, deserted into the
9:43
Speaker 1: gloom of overshadowed distances. On silvery sandbanks, hippos and alligators
9:50
Speaker 1: sunned themselves side by side. The broadening waters flowed through
9:54
Speaker 1: a mob of wooded islands. You lost your way on
9:58
Speaker 1: that river as you would in a day desert, and
10:01
Speaker 1: butted all day long against shoals, trying to find the channel,
10:05
Speaker 1: till you thought yourself bewitched and cut off forever from
10:08
Speaker 1: everything you had known once somewhere far away, in another existence.
10:15
Speaker 1: Perhaps there were moments when once past came back to one,
10:20
Speaker 1: as it will sometimes when you have not a moment
10:22
Speaker 1: to spare for yourself. But it came in the shape
10:26
Speaker 1: of an unrestful and noisy dream, remembered with wonder amongst
10:31
Speaker 1: the overwhelming realities of this strange world of plants and
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Speaker 1: water and silence. And this stillness of life did not,
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Speaker 1: in the least resemble a peace. It was the stillness
10:45
Speaker 1: of an implacable force brooding over an inscrutable intention. It
10:50
Speaker 1: looked at you with a vengeful aspect. I got used
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Speaker 1: to it. Afterwards, I did not see it any more.
10:58
Speaker 1: I had no time. I had to keep guessing at
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Speaker 1: the channel. I had to discern, mostly by inspiration, the
11:06
Speaker 1: signs of hidden banks. I watched for sunken stones. I
11:11
Speaker 1: was learning to clap my teeth smartly before my heart
11:14
Speaker 1: flew out when I shaved by a fluke, some infernal,
11:19
Speaker 1: sly old snag that would have ripped the life out
11:22
Speaker 1: of the tin pot steamboats and drowned all the pilgrims.
11:26
Speaker 1: I had to keep a look out for the signs
11:28
Speaker 1: of dead wood we could cut up in the night
11:30
Speaker 1: for next day's steaming. When you have to attend to
11:34
Speaker 1: things of that sort, to the mere incidence of the surface,
11:38
Speaker 1: the reality, the reality, I tell you, fades. The inner
11:43
Speaker 1: truth is hidden, luckily, luckily, But I felt it all
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Speaker 1: the same. I felt often its mysterious stillness watching me
11:53
Speaker 1: at my monkey tricks, just as it watches you fellows,
11:57
Speaker 1: performing on your respective tight ropes. For what is it
12:01
Speaker 1: half a crown a tumble. Try to be civil, Marlowe
12:07
Speaker 1: growled a voice, and I knew there was at least
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Speaker 1: one listener awake besides myself. I beg your pardon. I
12:16
Speaker 1: forgot the heartache which makes up the rest of the price.
12:20
Speaker 1: And indeed, what does the price matter if the trick
12:23
Speaker 1: be well done. You do your tricks very well. And
12:27
Speaker 1: I didn't do badly either, since I managed not to
12:31
Speaker 1: sink that steamboat on my first trip, it's a wonder
12:36
Speaker 1: to me. Yet, imagine a blindfolded man set to drive
12:40
Speaker 1: a van over a bad road. I sweated and shivered
12:45
Speaker 1: over that business considerably. I can tell you, after all,
12:49
Speaker 1: for a seaman to scrape the bottom of the thing
12:52
Speaker 1: that's supposed to float all the time under his care
12:55
Speaker 1: is the unpardonable sin. No one may know of it,
12:59
Speaker 1: but you never forget the thumb, pay a blow on
13:04
Speaker 1: the very heart. You remember it, you dream of it,
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Speaker 1: you wake up at night and think of it years after,
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Speaker 1: and go hot and cold all over. I don't pretend
13:16
Speaker 1: to say that steamboat floated all the time. More than
13:20
Speaker 1: once she had to wait for a bit with twenty
13:23
Speaker 1: cannibals splashing around and pushing. We had enlisted some of
13:28
Speaker 1: these chaps on the way for a crew. Fine fellows
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Speaker 1: cannibals in their place. They were men one could work with,
13:36
Speaker 1: and I am grateful to them. And after all they
13:40
Speaker 1: did not eat each other before my face. They had
13:43
Speaker 1: brought along a provision of hippo meat, which went rotten
13:47
Speaker 1: and made the mystery of the wilderness stink in my nostrils. Phuh,
13:52
Speaker 1: I can sniff it now. I had the manager on board,
13:57
Speaker 1: and three or four pilgrims with their staves all complete.
14:01
Speaker 1: Sometimes we came upon a station close by the bank,
14:05
Speaker 1: clinging to the skirts of the unknown, and the white men,
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Speaker 1: rushing out of a tumble down hovel with great gestures
14:12
Speaker 1: of joy and surprise and welcome, seemed very strange, had
14:17
Speaker 1: the appearance of being held there captive by a spell.
14:22
Speaker 1: The word ivory would ring in the air for a while.
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Speaker 1: And on we went again into the silence, along empty reaches,
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Speaker 1: round the still bends, between the high walls of our
14:33
Speaker 1: winding way, reverberating in hollow claps, the ponderous beat of
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Speaker 1: the stern wheel. Trees, trees, millions of trees, massive, immense,
14:45
Speaker 1: running up high and at their foot, hugging the bank
14:49
Speaker 1: against the stream, crept the little begrimed steamboat, like a
14:54
Speaker 1: sluggish beetle crawling on the floor of a lofty portico.
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Speaker 1: It made you feel very small, very lost, And yet
15:03
Speaker 1: it was not altogether depressing that feeling. After all, if
15:08
Speaker 1: you were small, the grimy beetle crawled on, which was
15:12
Speaker 1: just what you wanted it to do. Where the pilgrims
15:16
Speaker 1: imagined its crawl too, I don't know, to some place
15:21
Speaker 1: where they expected to get something. I bet for me,
15:25
Speaker 1: it crawled towards kurts exclusively. But when the steam pipe
15:30
Speaker 1: started leaking. We crawled very slow. The reaches opened before
15:35
Speaker 1: us and closed behind, as if the forest had stepped
15:39
Speaker 1: leisurely across the water to bar the way for our return.
15:44
Speaker 1: We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of darkness.
15:48
Speaker 1: It was very quiet there at night. Sometimes the roll
15:53
Speaker 1: of drums behind the curtain of trees would run up
15:56
Speaker 1: the river and remained sustained faintly, as if hovering in
16:01
Speaker 1: the air, high over our heads, till the first break
16:04
Speaker 1: of day. Whether it meant war, peace or prayer, we
16:09
Speaker 1: could not tell. The dawns were heralded by the descent
16:13
Speaker 1: of a chill stillness. The woodcutters slept, their fires burned low.
16:19
Speaker 1: The snapping of a twig would make you start. We
16:23
Speaker 1: were wanderers on a prehistoric earth, on an earth that
16:27
Speaker 1: wore the aspects of an unknown planet. We could have
16:31
Speaker 1: fancied ourselves the first of men, taking possession of an
16:34
Speaker 1: accursed inheritance, to be subdued at the costs of profound
16:39
Speaker 1: anguish and of excessive toil. But suddenly, as we struggled
16:44
Speaker 1: round a bend, there would be a glimpse of rush,
16:47
Speaker 1: walls of peaked grass, roofs, a burst of yells, a
16:52
Speaker 1: whirl of black limbs, a mass of hands, clapping of feet,
16:56
Speaker 1: stamping of bodies, swaying of eyes, rolling under the droop
17:02
Speaker 1: of heavy and motionless foliage. The steamer toiled along slowly
17:07
Speaker 1: on the edge of a black and incomprehensible frenzy. The
17:11
Speaker 1: prehistoric man was cursing us, praying to us, welcoming us.
17:16
Speaker 1: Who could tell we were cut off from the comprehension
17:20
Speaker 1: of our surroundings. We glided past like phantoms, wondering and
17:25
Speaker 1: secretly appalled that sane men would be before an enthusiastic
17:30
Speaker 1: outbreak in a madhouse. We could not understand because we
17:35
Speaker 1: were too far and could not remember. Because we were
17:39
Speaker 1: traveling in the night of first ages, of those ages
17:42
Speaker 1: that are gone, leaving hardly a sign and no memories,
17:49
Speaker 1: The earth seemed unearthly. We were accustomed to look upon
17:55
Speaker 1: the shackled form of a conquered monster. But there there
17:59
Speaker 1: you could look at a thing monstrous and free. It
18:03
Speaker 1: was unearthly, and the men were no they were not inhuman. Well,
18:11
Speaker 1: you know, that was the worst of it, the suspicion
18:14
Speaker 1: of their not being inhuman. It could come slowly to one.
18:19
Speaker 1: They howled and leaped, and spun and made horrid faces.
18:23
Speaker 1: But what thrilled you was just the thought of their
18:26
Speaker 1: humanity like yours, the thought of your remote kinship with
18:31
Speaker 1: this wild and passionate uproar. Ugly, yes, it was ugly enough.
18:38
Speaker 1: But if you were mad enough, you would admit to
18:40
Speaker 1: yourself that there was in you just the faintest trace
18:44
Speaker 1: of a response to the terrible frankness of that noise,
18:48
Speaker 1: a dim suspicion of there being a meaning in it,
18:52
Speaker 1: which you, you so remote from the night of first Ages,
18:56
Speaker 1: could comprehend. And why not? The mind of man is
19:01
Speaker 1: capable of anything, because everything is in it, all the
19:06
Speaker 1: past as well as all the future. What was there
19:10
Speaker 1: after all? Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valor, rage. Who can
19:17
Speaker 1: tell but truth, truth stripped of its cloak of time.
19:23
Speaker 1: Let the fool gape and shudder. The man knows, and
19:28
Speaker 1: can look on without a wink. But he must at
19:32
Speaker 1: least be as much of a man as these on
19:35
Speaker 1: the shore. He must meet that truth with his own
19:38
Speaker 1: true stuff, with his own inborn strength. Principles won't do acquisitions. Clothes,
19:46
Speaker 1: pretty rags, rags that would fly off at the first
19:50
Speaker 1: good shake, no, you want a deliberate belief and appeal
19:56
Speaker 1: to me in this fiendish row? Is there very well,
20:01
Speaker 1: I hear, I admit, but I have a voice too,
20:06
Speaker 1: and for good or evil, mine is the speech that
20:09
Speaker 1: cannot be silenced. Of course, a fool, what with sheer,
20:14
Speaker 1: fright and fine sentiments, is always safe. Who's that grunting?
20:20
Speaker 1: You wonder I didn't go ashore for a howl and
20:23
Speaker 1: a dance. Well, no, I didn't. Fine sentiments, You say,
20:30
Speaker 1: fine sentiments be hanged. I had no time. I had
20:35
Speaker 1: to mess about with white lead and strips of woolen blanket,
20:39
Speaker 1: helping to put bandages on those leaky steam pipes. I
20:43
Speaker 1: tell you, I had to watch the steering and circumvent
20:47
Speaker 1: those snags, and get the tin pot along by hook
20:50
Speaker 1: or by crook. There was surface truth enough in these
20:54
Speaker 1: things to save a wiser man. And between whiles I
20:59
Speaker 1: had to look after the savage who was fireman. He
21:03
Speaker 1: was an improved specimen. He could fire up a vertical boiler.
21:08
Speaker 1: He was there below, and upon my word, to look
21:11
Speaker 1: at him was as edifying as seeing a dog in
21:14
Speaker 1: a parody of breeches and a feather hat walking on
21:17
Speaker 1: his hind legs a few months of training had done
21:21
Speaker 1: for that really fine chap. He squintered at the steam
21:25
Speaker 1: gage and at the water gage with an evident effort
21:28
Speaker 1: of intrepidity, and he filed teeth too, the poor devil,
21:33
Speaker 1: and the wool of his pate shaved into queer patterns,
21:36
Speaker 1: and three ornamental scars on each of his cheeks. He
21:40
Speaker 1: ought to have been clapping his hands and stabbing his
21:43
Speaker 1: foot on the bank, instead of which he was hard
21:46
Speaker 1: at work a thraw to strange witchcraft, full of improving knowledge.
21:52
Speaker 1: He was useful because he had been instructed. And what
21:56
Speaker 1: he knew was this, that should the water in that
22:00
Speaker 1: transparent thing disappear, the evil spirit inside the boiler would
22:05
Speaker 1: get angry through the greatness of his thirst and take
22:08
Speaker 1: a terrible vengeance. So he sweated and fired up, and
22:14
Speaker 1: watched the glass fearfully with an impromptu charm made of
22:18
Speaker 1: rags tied to his arm and a piece of polished
22:20
Speaker 1: bone as big as a watch stuck flatways through his
22:24
Speaker 1: lower lip. While the wooded bank slipped past us slowly,
22:28
Speaker 1: the short noise was left behind the interminable miles of silence,
22:34
Speaker 1: and we crept on towards kurts, but the snags were thick,
22:40
Speaker 1: the water was treacherous and shallow. The boiler seemed indeed
22:44
Speaker 1: to have a sulky devil in it, and thus neither
22:47
Speaker 1: that fireman nor I had any time to peer into
22:51
Speaker 1: our creepy thoughts. Some fifty miles below the inner station,
22:57
Speaker 1: we came upon a hut of reeds and inclined and
23:00
Speaker 1: melancholy pole, with the unrecognizable tatters of what had been
23:05
Speaker 1: a flag of some sort flying from it, and a
23:08
Speaker 1: neatly stacked wood pile. This was unexpected. We came to
23:13
Speaker 1: the bank and on the stack of firewood found a
23:16
Speaker 1: flat piece of board with some faded pencil riding on it.
23:20
Speaker 1: When deciphered, it said, would for you hurry up? Approach cautiously.
23:26
Speaker 1: There was a signature, but it was illegible, not kurtz,
23:31
Speaker 1: a much longer word, hurry up? Where up the river?
23:37
Speaker 1: Approach cautiously? We had not done so, But the warning
23:42
Speaker 1: could not have been meant for the place where it
23:44
Speaker 1: could be only found after reproach. Something was wrong above,
23:49
Speaker 1: but what and how much? That was the question. We
23:54
Speaker 1: commented adversely upon the imbecility of that telegraphic style. The
24:00
Speaker 1: bush around, said nothing, and would not let us look
24:04
Speaker 1: very far either. A torn curtain of red twill hung
24:08
Speaker 1: in the doorway of the hut and flapped sadly in
24:11
Speaker 1: our faces. The dwelling was dismantled, but we could see
24:15
Speaker 1: a white man had lived there not very long ago.
24:18
Speaker 1: There remained a rude table, a plank on two posts,
24:22
Speaker 1: a heap of rubbish reposed in a dark corner, and
24:25
Speaker 1: by the door. I picked up a book, but had
24:28
Speaker 1: lost its covers, and the pages had been thumbed into
24:31
Speaker 1: a state of extremely dirty softness. But the back had
24:35
Speaker 1: been lovingly stitched afresh with white cotton thread, which looked clean.
24:40
Speaker 1: Yet it was an extraordinary find. Its title was an
24:46
Speaker 1: Inquiry into some points of Seamanship by a man Towsered tousand,
24:52
Speaker 1: some such name, master in his Majesty's Navy. The matter
24:57
Speaker 1: looked dreary reading enough, with illustrative diagrams and repulsive tables
25:02
Speaker 1: of figures, and the copy was sixty years old. I
25:07
Speaker 1: handled the amazing antiquity with the greatest possible tenderness, lest
25:12
Speaker 1: it should dissolve in my hands. Within towsand Or Towser
25:18
Speaker 1: was inquiring earnestly into the breaking strain of ships, chains
25:21
Speaker 1: and tackle, and other such matters. Not a very enthralling book,
25:27
Speaker 1: but at the first glance you could see there was
25:30
Speaker 1: a singleness of intention, an honest concern for the right
25:33
Speaker 1: way of going to work, which made these humble pages,
25:38
Speaker 1: thought out so many years ago, luminous with another than
25:41
Speaker 1: a professional light. The simple old sailor, with his talk
25:46
Speaker 1: of chains and purchases, made me forget the jungle and
25:50
Speaker 1: the pilgrims in a delicious sensation of having come upon
25:53
Speaker 1: something unmistakably real. Such a book being there was wonderful enough.
25:59
Speaker 1: But still more astounding were the notes penciled in the
26:03
Speaker 1: margin and plainly referring to the text. I couldn't believe
26:08
Speaker 1: my eyes. They were in cipher. Yes, it looked like cipher.
26:14
Speaker 1: Fancy a man lugging with him a book of that
26:16
Speaker 1: description into this nowhere and studying it and making notes
26:21
Speaker 1: in cipher at that it was an extravagant mystery. I
26:27
Speaker 1: had been dimly aware for some time of a worrying noise,
26:30
Speaker 1: And when I lifted my eyes, I saw the woodpile
26:34
Speaker 1: was gone, and the manager, aided by all the pilgrims,
26:37
Speaker 1: was shouting at me from the river side. I slipped
26:41
Speaker 1: the book into my pocket. I assure you that to
26:44
Speaker 1: leave off reading was like tearing myself away from the
26:48
Speaker 1: shelter of an old and solid friendship. I started the
26:53
Speaker 1: lame engine ahead. There must be this miserable trader, this intruder,
26:58
Speaker 1: exclaimed the manager, looking back malevolently at the place we
27:02
Speaker 1: had left. He must be English. I said, it will
27:07
Speaker 1: not save him from getting into trouble if he is
27:09
Speaker 1: not careful, muttered the manager darkly. I observed, with assumed innocence,
27:15
Speaker 1: that no man was safe from trouble in this world.
27:20
Speaker 1: The current was more rapid now. The steamer seemed at
27:23
Speaker 1: her last gasp. The stern wheel flopped languidly, and I
27:27
Speaker 1: caught myself listening on tiptoe for the next beat of
27:31
Speaker 1: the boat. For in sober truth, I expected the wretched
27:35
Speaker 1: thing to give up every moment. It was like watching
27:39
Speaker 1: the last flickers of a life. But still we crawled.
27:45
Speaker 1: Sometimes I would pick out a tree a little way
27:47
Speaker 1: ahead to measure our progress towards kurtz By, but I
27:51
Speaker 1: lost it invariably before we got abreast. To keep the
27:55
Speaker 1: eye so long on one thing was too much for
27:58
Speaker 1: human patience, The manager displayed a beautiful resignation. I fretted
28:05
Speaker 1: and fumed, and took to arguing with myself whether or
28:09
Speaker 1: no I would talk openly with Kurtz. But before I
28:13
Speaker 1: could come to any conclusion, it occurred to me that
28:16
Speaker 1: my speech, or my silence, indeed any action of mine,
28:20
Speaker 1: would be a mere futility. What did it matter what
28:24
Speaker 1: anyone knew or ignored, What did it matter who was manager?
28:30
Speaker 1: One gets sometimes such a flash of insight. The essentials
28:35
Speaker 1: of this affair lay deep under the surface, beyond my
28:39
Speaker 1: reach and beyond my power of meddling. Towards the evening
28:44
Speaker 1: of the second day, we judged ourselves about eight miles
28:47
Speaker 1: from Kurtz's station. I wanted to push on, but the
28:51
Speaker 1: manager looked grave and told me the navigation up there
28:55
Speaker 1: was so dangerous that it would be advisable, the sun
28:58
Speaker 1: being very low already, to wait where we were till
29:02
Speaker 1: next morning. Moreover, he pointed out that if the warning
29:06
Speaker 1: to approach cautiously were to be followed, we must approach
29:10
Speaker 1: in daylight, not at dusk or in the dark. This
29:15
Speaker 1: was sensible enough. Eight miles met nearly three hours of
29:19
Speaker 1: steaming for us, and I could also see suspicious ripples
29:23
Speaker 1: at the upper end of the reach. Nevertheless, I was
29:27
Speaker 1: annoyed beyond expression at the delay, and most unreasonably too,
29:33
Speaker 1: since one night more could not matter much after so
29:36
Speaker 1: many months, as we had plenty of wood, and caution
29:41
Speaker 1: was the word I brought up in the middle of
29:43
Speaker 1: the stream. The reach was narrow, straight, with high sides,
29:47
Speaker 1: like a railway cutting. The dusk came gliding into it
29:52
Speaker 1: long before the sun had set. The current ran smooth
29:55
Speaker 1: and swift, but a dumb immobility sat on the banks.
30:00
Speaker 1: The living trees lashed together by the creepers, and every
30:03
Speaker 1: living bush of the undergrowth might have been changed into stone,
30:07
Speaker 1: even to the slenderest twig, to the lightest leaf. It
30:12
Speaker 1: was not sleep. It seemed unnatural, like a state of
30:17
Speaker 1: trans Not the faintest sound of any kind could be heard.
30:22
Speaker 1: You looked on amazed and began to suspect yourself of
30:26
Speaker 1: being deaf. Then the night came suddenly and struck you
30:30
Speaker 1: blind as well. About three in the morning, some large
30:35
Speaker 1: fish leaped, and the loud splash made me jump as
30:39
Speaker 1: though a gun had been fired. When the sun rose,
30:42
Speaker 1: there was a white fog, very warm and clamming, and
30:46
Speaker 1: more blinding than the night. It did not shift or drive.
30:52
Speaker 1: It was just there standing all round you, like something
30:56
Speaker 1: solid that eight or nine. Perhaps it lifted as a
31:01
Speaker 1: shutter lifts. We had a glimpse of the towering multitude
31:05
Speaker 1: of trees, of the immense mattered jungle, with the blazing
31:09
Speaker 1: little ball of the sun hanging over it, all perfectly still.
31:14
Speaker 1: And then the white shudder came down again, smoothly, as
31:19
Speaker 1: if sliding and greased grooves. I ordered the chain which
31:24
Speaker 1: we had begun to heave in to be paid out
31:26
Speaker 1: again before it stopped running with a muffled rattle. A cry,
31:32
Speaker 1: a very loud cry as of infinite desolation, soared slowly
31:37
Speaker 1: in the opaque air. It ceased. A complaining clamor modulated
31:42
Speaker 1: in savage discords filled our ears. The sheer unexpectedness of
31:48
Speaker 1: it made my hair stir under my cap. I don't
31:52
Speaker 1: know how it struck the others. To me, it seemed
31:55
Speaker 1: as though the mist itself had screamed so suddenly, and
31:59
Speaker 1: apparently from all all sides at once, to this tumultuous
32:02
Speaker 1: and mournful uproar arise. It culminated in a hairried outbreak
32:08
Speaker 1: of almost intolerably excessive shrieking, which stopped short, leaving us
32:13
Speaker 1: stiffened in a variety of silly attitudes and obstinately listening
32:17
Speaker 1: to the nearly as appalling an excessive silence. Good God,
32:23
Speaker 1: what is the meaning? Stammered at my elbow. One of
32:26
Speaker 1: the pilgrims, a little fat man with sandy hair and
32:30
Speaker 1: red whiskers, who wore side spring boots and pink pajamas
32:34
Speaker 1: tucked into his socks. Two others remained open mouthed a
32:38
Speaker 1: whole minute, then dashed into the little cabin to rush
32:42
Speaker 1: out incontinently and stand darting scared glances with winchesters at
32:48
Speaker 1: ready in their hands. What we could see was just
32:53
Speaker 1: the steamer we were on, her outlines blurred as though
32:56
Speaker 1: she had been on the point of dissolving, and a
32:59
Speaker 1: misty strip of water perhaps two feet broad around her.
33:03
Speaker 1: And that was all. The rest of the world was nowhere,
33:08
Speaker 1: as far as our eyes and ears were concerned, just nowhere, gone, disappeared,
33:15
Speaker 1: swept off without leaving a whisper or a shadow behind.
33:20
Speaker 1: I went forward and ordered the chain to be hauled
33:23
Speaker 1: in short so as to be ready to trip the anchor,
33:26
Speaker 1: and move the steamboat at once. If necessary, will they attack,
33:31
Speaker 1: whispered an awed voice. We will all be butchered in
33:35
Speaker 1: this fog, murmured another. The faces twitched with a strain,
33:41
Speaker 1: the hands trembled slightly, the eyes forgot to wink. It
33:46
Speaker 1: was very curious to see the contrast of expressions of
33:49
Speaker 1: the white men and of the black fellows of our crew,
33:52
Speaker 1: who were as much strange as to that part of
33:54
Speaker 1: the river as we, though their homes were only eight
33:57
Speaker 1: hundred miles away. The white, of course, greatly discomposed, had
34:02
Speaker 1: besides a curious look of being painfully shot by such
34:06
Speaker 1: an outrageous row. The others had an alert, naturally interested expression,
34:13
Speaker 1: but their faces were essentially quiet, even those of the
34:17
Speaker 1: one or two who grinned as they hauled out the chain.
34:21
Speaker 1: Several exchanged short, grunting phrases, which seemed to settle the
34:25
Speaker 1: matter to their satisfaction. Their headman, a young, broad chested black,
34:31
Speaker 1: severely draped in dark blue fringed claws with fierce nostrils,
34:36
Speaker 1: and his hair all done up artfully in oily ringlets,
34:39
Speaker 1: stood near me. Aha, I said, just for a good
34:44
Speaker 1: fellowship's sake, catch him he snapped, with a blood shot
34:48
Speaker 1: widening of his eyes and a flash of sharp teeth.
34:52
Speaker 1: Catch him, give him to us, to you, eh, I asked,
34:57
Speaker 1: And what would you do with him? Eat em? He
35:01
Speaker 1: said curtly, and leaning his elbow on the rail, looked
35:05
Speaker 1: out into the fog in a dignified and profoundly pensive attitude.
35:10
Speaker 1: I would no doubt have been properly horrified had it
35:14
Speaker 1: not occurred to me that he and his chaps must
35:17
Speaker 1: be very hungry, that they must have been growing increasingly
35:20
Speaker 1: hungry for at least this month past. They had been
35:24
Speaker 1: engaged for six months. I don't think a single one
35:28
Speaker 1: of them had any clear idea of time, as we
35:30
Speaker 1: at the end of countless ages have they still belonged
35:34
Speaker 1: to the beginnings of time, had no inherited experience to
35:38
Speaker 1: teach them as it were. And of course, as long
35:42
Speaker 1: as there was a piece of paper written over in
35:44
Speaker 1: accordance with some farcical law or other made down the river,
35:49
Speaker 1: it didn't enter anybody's head to trouble how they would live.
35:53
Speaker 1: Certainly they had brought with them some rotten hippo meat,
35:57
Speaker 1: which couldn't have lasted very long anyway, even if the
36:00
Speaker 1: pilgrims hadn't, in the midst of a shocking hullabaloo, thrown
36:03
Speaker 1: a considerable quantity of it overboard. It looked like a
36:08
Speaker 1: high handed proceeding, but it was really a case of
36:12
Speaker 1: legitimate self defense. You can't breathe dead, hippo, waking, sleeping,
36:17
Speaker 1: and eating and at the same time keep your precarious
36:21
Speaker 1: grip on existence. Besides that, they had given them every
36:26
Speaker 1: week three pieces of brass wire, each about nine inches long,
36:30
Speaker 1: and the theory was they were to buy their provisions
36:33
Speaker 1: with that currency in riverside villages. You can see how
36:38
Speaker 1: that worked. There were either no villages, or the people
36:43
Speaker 1: were hostile, or the director, who like the rest of us,
36:46
Speaker 1: fed out of tins with an occasional old he goat
36:49
Speaker 1: thrown in, didn't want to stop the steamer for some
36:53
Speaker 1: more or less recondite reason. So unless they swallowed the
36:58
Speaker 1: wire itself or made loop of it to snare the
37:01
Speaker 1: fishes with, I don't see what good their extravagant salary
37:05
Speaker 1: could be to them. I must say it was paid
37:08
Speaker 1: with a regularity worthy of a large and honorable tracking company.
37:13
Speaker 1: For the rest the only thing to eat, though it
37:16
Speaker 1: didn't look eatable. In the least I saw in their
37:18
Speaker 1: possession were a few lumps of some stuff, like half
37:22
Speaker 1: cooked dough of a dirty lavender color. They kept wrapped
37:26
Speaker 1: in leaves, and now and then swallowed a piece of
37:29
Speaker 1: but so small that it seemed done more for the
37:32
Speaker 1: looks of the thing than for any serious purpose of sustenance.
37:37
Speaker 1: Why in the name of all the gnawing devils of
37:40
Speaker 1: hunger they didn't go for us. They were thirty to
37:44
Speaker 1: five and have a good tuck in for once. Amazes
37:47
Speaker 1: me now when I think of it. They were big,
37:51
Speaker 1: powerful men, with not much capacity to weigh the consequences
37:55
Speaker 1: with courage, with strength. Even yet, though their skins were
37:59
Speaker 1: no longer glossy and their muscles no longer hard, and
38:03
Speaker 1: I saw that something restraining, one of those human secrets
38:07
Speaker 1: that baffle probability, had come into play there. I looked
38:13
Speaker 1: at them with a swift quickening of interest, not because
38:16
Speaker 1: it occurred to me I might be eaten by them
38:19
Speaker 1: before very long, though I owned to you that just
38:22
Speaker 1: then I perceived in a new light, as it were,
38:26
Speaker 1: how unwholesome the pilgrims looked. And I hoped, yes, I
38:30
Speaker 1: positively hoped that my aspect was not so what shall
38:35
Speaker 1: I say, so unappetizing, a touch of fantastic vanity, which
38:41
Speaker 1: fitted well with the dream sensation that pervaded all my
38:45
Speaker 1: days at the time. Perhaps I had a little fever too.
38:51
Speaker 1: One can't live with one's finger everlastingly on one's pulse.
38:55
Speaker 1: I had often a little fever, or a little touch
38:58
Speaker 1: of other things, the playful paw strokes of the wilderness,
39:02
Speaker 1: the preliminary trifling before the more serious onslaught, which came
39:06
Speaker 1: in due course. Yes, I looked at them as you
39:10
Speaker 1: would on any human being, with a curiosity of their impulses, motives, capacities, weaknesses,
39:17
Speaker 1: when brought to the test of an inexorable physical necessity, restraint,
39:23
Speaker 1: What possible restraint was it? Superstition, disgust, patience, fear, or
39:32
Speaker 1: some kind of primitive honor. No fear can stand up
39:37
Speaker 1: to hunger, no patience can wear it out. Disgust simply
39:41
Speaker 1: does not exist where hunger is. And as to superstition, beliefs,
39:46
Speaker 1: and what you may call principles, they are less than
39:50
Speaker 1: chaff in a breeze. Don't you know the devilry of
39:54
Speaker 1: lingering starvation, its exasperating torment, its black thoughts, somber and
40:00
Speaker 1: brooding ferocity. Well, I do. It takes a man all
40:06
Speaker 1: his inborn strength to fight hunger properly. It's really easier
40:10
Speaker 1: to face bereavement, dishonor, and the perdition of one's soul
40:15
Speaker 1: than this kind of prolonged hunger. Sad but true, And
40:20
Speaker 1: these chaps too, had no earthly reason for any kind
40:24
Speaker 1: of scruple restraint. I would just as soon have expected
40:28
Speaker 1: restraint from a hyena prowling amongst the corpses of a battlefield.
40:33
Speaker 1: But there was the fact facing me, the fact dazzling
40:37
Speaker 1: to be seen, like the foam on the depths of
40:40
Speaker 1: a sea, like a ripple on the unfathomable enigma, A
40:44
Speaker 1: mystery greater when I thought of it, than the curious,
40:48
Speaker 1: inexplicable note of desperate grief in this savage clamor that
40:53
Speaker 1: had swept bias on the river bank. Behind the blind
40:57
Speaker 1: whiteness of the fog, two pilgrims were quarreling in hurried
41:03
Speaker 1: whispers as to which bank left. No, No, how can
41:08
Speaker 1: you right? Right? Of course, it is very serious, said
41:12
Speaker 1: the manager's voice behind me. I would be desolated if
41:16
Speaker 1: anything should happen to mister Kurtz. Before we came up.
41:20
Speaker 1: I looked at him and had not the slightest doubt
41:23
Speaker 1: he was sincere. He was just the kind of man
41:26
Speaker 1: who would wish to preserve appearances. That was his restraint.
41:32
Speaker 1: But when he muttered something about going on at once,
41:36
Speaker 1: I did not even take the trouble to answer him.
41:39
Speaker 1: I knew, and he knew, that it was impossible. Were
41:43
Speaker 1: we to let go our hold of the bottom, we
41:46
Speaker 1: would be absolutely in the air in space. We wouldn't
41:50
Speaker 1: be able to tell where we were going to, whether
41:53
Speaker 1: up or down stream or a cross till we fetched
41:57
Speaker 1: against one bank or the other, and then we wouldn't
42:00
Speaker 1: know at first which it was. Of course, I had
42:04
Speaker 1: no move I had no mind for a smash up.
42:08
Speaker 1: You couldn't imagine a more deadly place for a shipwreck.
42:12
Speaker 1: Whether we drowned at once or not, we were sure
42:15
Speaker 1: to perry speedily in one way or another. I authorize
42:19
Speaker 1: you to take all the risks, he said, after a
42:22
Speaker 1: short silence. I refuse to take any, I said shortly,
42:28
Speaker 1: which was just the answer he expected, though its tone
42:31
Speaker 1: might have surprised him. Well, I must defer to your judgment.
42:37
Speaker 1: You are captain he said, with a marked civility. I
42:42
Speaker 1: turned my shoulder to him in a sign of my appreciation,
42:45
Speaker 1: and looked into the fog. How long would it last?
42:50
Speaker 1: It was the most hopeless look out the approach to this,
42:55
Speaker 1: Kurt's grubbing for ivory and the wretched bush was beset
42:58
Speaker 1: by as many dangers as though he had been an
43:01
Speaker 1: enchanted princess sleeping in a fabulous castle. Will they attack,
43:06
Speaker 1: do you think? Asked the manager in a confidential tone.
43:11
Speaker 1: I did not think they would attack, for several obvious reasons.
43:16
Speaker 1: The thick fog was one. If they left the bank
43:20
Speaker 1: and their canoes, they would get lost in it, as
43:22
Speaker 1: we would be if we attempted to move Still. I
43:27
Speaker 1: had also judged the jungle of both banks quite impenetrable,
43:30
Speaker 1: and yet eyes were in it, eyes that had seen us.
43:35
Speaker 1: The riverside bushes were certainly very thick, but the undergrowth
43:40
Speaker 1: behind was evidently penetrable. However, during the short lift, I
43:45
Speaker 1: had seen no canoes anywhere in the reach, certainly not
43:49
Speaker 1: abreast of the steamer. But what made the idea of
43:52
Speaker 1: attack inconceivable to me was the nature of the noise
43:56
Speaker 1: of the cries we had heard. They had not the
44:00
Speaker 1: fierce character boding immediate hostile intention. Unexpected, wild and violent
44:05
Speaker 1: as they had been, they had given me an irresistible
44:09
Speaker 1: impression of sorrow. The glimpse of the steamboats had for
44:13
Speaker 1: some reason filled those savages with unrestrained grief. The danger,
44:19
Speaker 1: if any, I expounded, was from the proximity to a
44:23
Speaker 1: great human passion let loose. Even extreme grief may ultimately
44:29
Speaker 1: vent itself in violence, but more generally takes the form
44:33
Speaker 1: of apathy. You should have seen the pilgrims stare. They
44:39
Speaker 1: had no heart to grin or even to revile me.
44:42
Speaker 1: But I believe they thought me gone mad with fright.
44:46
Speaker 1: Maybe I delivered a regular lecture, my dear boys. It
44:51
Speaker 1: was no good bothering keep a lookouts. Well, you may guess.
44:57
Speaker 1: I watched the fog for the signs of lifting as
44:59
Speaker 1: a cat watches a mouse, but for anything else. Our
45:03
Speaker 1: eyes were of no more use to us than if
45:05
Speaker 1: we had been buried miles deep in a heap of
45:08
Speaker 1: cotton wool. I felt like it too, choking, warm, stifling. Besides,
45:15
Speaker 1: all I said, though it sounded extravagant, was absolutely true
45:20
Speaker 1: to fact. What we afterwards alluded to as an attack
45:24
Speaker 1: was really an attempt to repulse. The action was very
45:29
Speaker 1: far from being aggressive. It was not even defensive in
45:33
Speaker 1: the usual sense. It was undertaken under the stress of desperation,
45:38
Speaker 1: and in its essence was purely protective. It developed itself,
45:44
Speaker 1: I should say, two hours after the fog lifted, and
45:47
Speaker 1: its commencement was at a spot roughly speaking, about a
45:51
Speaker 1: mile and a half below Kurtz's station. We had just
45:55
Speaker 1: floundered and flopped round a bend when I saw an island,
45:59
Speaker 1: a mere grass hummock of bright green in the middle
46:02
Speaker 1: of the stream. It was the only thing of the kind.
46:05
Speaker 1: But as we opened the reach more I perceived it
46:08
Speaker 1: was the head of a long sand bank, or rather
46:11
Speaker 1: of a chain of shallow patches stretching down the middle
46:14
Speaker 1: of the river. They were discolored, just a wash, and
46:18
Speaker 1: the whole lot was seen just under the water, exactly
46:22
Speaker 1: as a man's backbone is seen running down the middle
46:25
Speaker 1: of his back under the skin. Now, as far as
46:29
Speaker 1: I did see, I could go to the right or
46:31
Speaker 1: to the left of this, I didn't know either channel.
46:35
Speaker 1: Of course, the banks looked pretty well alike. The depth
46:39
Speaker 1: appeared the same, But as I had been informed the
46:42
Speaker 1: station was on the west side, I naturally headed for
46:47
Speaker 1: the western passage. End of part one of Chapter two