The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader - Audiobook - Pt 5/5
Complete unabridged, read by Derek Jacobi
00:00:00 - Chapter 13, Pt 2
00:09:14 - Chapter 14
00:29:30 - Chapter 15
00:56:23 - Chapter 16
Complete unabridged, read by Derek Jacobi
00:00:00 - Chapter 13, Pt 2
00:09:14 - Chapter 14
00:29:30 - Chapter 15
00:56:23 - Chapter 16
Category
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FunTranscript
00:00:00They took some time choosing their seats at the perilous table.
00:00:09Probably everyone had the same reason, but no one said it out loud, for it was really
00:00:14a rather nasty choice.
00:00:16One could hardly bear to sit all night next to those three terrible hairy objects, which,
00:00:24if not dead, were certainly not alive in the ordinary sense.
00:00:29On the other hand, to sit at the far end, so that you would see them less and less as
00:00:34the night grew darker, and wouldn't know if they were moving, and perhaps wouldn't see
00:00:38them at all by about two o'clock—no, it was not to be thought of.
00:00:44So they sauntered round and round the table, saying,
00:00:48What about here?
00:00:50and
00:00:51Or perhaps a bit further on?
00:00:54or
00:00:55Why not on this side?
00:00:57Still at last they settled down, somewhere about the middle, but nearer to the sleepers
00:01:02than to the other end.
00:01:04It was about ten by now, and almost dark.
00:01:08Those strange new constellations burned in the east.
00:01:12Lucy would have liked it better if they had been the leopard, and the ship, and other
00:01:17old friends of the Narnian sky.
00:01:21They wrapped themselves in their sea-cloaks, and sat still and waited.
00:01:25At first there was some attempt at talk, but it didn't come to much.
00:01:30And they sat, and sat, and all the time they heard the waves breaking on the beach.
00:01:39After hours that seemed like ages, there came a moment when they all knew that they had
00:01:44been dozing a moment before, but were all suddenly wide awake.
00:01:50The stars were all in quite different positions from those they had last noticed.
00:01:55The sky was very black, except for the faintest possible grayness in the east.
00:02:01They were cold, though thirsty, and stiff, and none of them spoke, because now at last
00:02:08something was happening.
00:02:10Before them, beyond the pillars, there was the slope of a low hill, and now a door opened
00:02:17in the hillside, and light appeared in the doorway, and a figure came out, and the door
00:02:21shut behind it.
00:02:23The figure carried a light, and this light was really all that they could see distinctly.
00:02:28It came, slowly, nearer and nearer, till at last it stood right at the table opposite
00:02:36to them.
00:02:37Now they could see that it was a tall girl, dressed in a single long garment of clear
00:02:44blue which left her arms bare.
00:02:47She was bare-headed, and her yellow hair hung down her back, and when they looked at her
00:02:52they thought that they had never before known what beauty meant.
00:02:57The light which he had been carrying was a tall candle in a silver candlestick, which
00:03:01he now set upon the table.
00:03:03If there had been any wind of the sea earlier in the night it must have died down by now,
00:03:08for the flame of the candle burned as straight and still as if it were in a room with the
00:03:14windows shut and the curtains drawn.
00:03:17Gold and silver on the table shone in its light.
00:03:21She now noticed something lying lengthwise on the table which had escaped her attention
00:03:26before.
00:03:27It was a knife of stone, sharp as steel, a cruel-looking, ancient-looking thing.
00:03:35No one had yet spoken a word.
00:03:37Then Reepicheep first, and Caspian next, they all rose to their feet, because they felt
00:03:43that she was a great lady.
00:03:46"'Travelers, who have come from far to Aslan's table,' said the girl,
00:03:52"'why do you not eat and drink?'
00:03:56"'Madam,' said Caspian, "'we feared the food, because we thought it had cast our friends
00:04:02into an enchanted sleep.'
00:04:03"'They have never tasted it,' she said.
00:04:08"'Please,' said Lucy, "'what happened to them?'
00:04:14"'Seven years ago,' said the girl, "'they came here in a ship, whose sails were rags
00:04:20and her timbers ready to fall apart.
00:04:23There were a few others with them, sailors, and when they came to this table one said,
00:04:28"'Here is the good place.
00:04:30Let us set sail and reef-sail, and row no longer, but sit down and end our days in peace.'
00:04:37And the second said, "'No, let us re-embark and sail for Narnia and the West.
00:04:45It may be that Miraz is dead.'
00:04:48But the third, who was a very masterful man, leapt up and said, "'No, by heaven!
00:04:54We are men, and Telmarines, not brutes.
00:04:58What should we do but seek adventure after adventure?
00:05:02We have not long to live, in any event.
00:05:04Let us spend what is left in seeking the unpeopled world behind the sunrise.'
00:05:10And as they quarrelled, he caught up the knife of stone which lies there on the table, and
00:05:15would have fought with his comrades.
00:05:18But it is a thing not right for him to touch, and as his fingers closed upon the hilt, deep
00:05:24sleep fell upon all the three.
00:05:28Until the enchantment is undone, they will never wake."
00:05:33"'What is this knife of stone?' asked Eustace.
00:05:37"'Do none of you know it?' said the girl.
00:05:40"'I—I think,' said Lucy, "'I've seen something like it before.
00:05:46It was a knife like it that the White Witch used, when she killed Aslan at the stone table
00:05:53long ago.'
00:05:54"'It was the same,' said the girl, "'and it was brought here to be kept in honour while
00:06:02the world lasts.'"
00:06:03Edmund, who had been looking more and more uncomfortable for the last few minutes, now
00:06:09spoke.
00:06:10"'Look here,' he said, "'I hope I'm not a coward—about eating this food, I mean, and
00:06:16I'm sure I don't mean to be rude—but we have had a lot of queer adventures on this
00:06:21voyage of ours, and things aren't always what they seem.
00:06:25When I look in your face, I can't help believing all you say.
00:06:32But then, that's just what might happen with a witch, too.
00:06:35How are we to know you're a friend?'
00:06:38"'You can't know,' said the girl, "'you can only believe—or not.'"
00:06:47After a moment's pause, Weepy Cheep's small voice was heard.
00:06:51"'Sire,' he said to Caspian, "'of your courtesy, fill my cup with wine from that flagon.
00:06:59It is too big for me to lift.
00:07:02I will drink to the lady.'
00:07:05Caspian obeyed, and the mouse, standing on the table, held up a golden cup between its
00:07:11tiny paws, and said, "'Lady, I pledge you.'
00:07:17Then it fell to on cold peacock, and in a short while everyone else followed its example.
00:07:23All were very hungry, and the meal, if not quite what you wanted for a very early breakfast,
00:07:30was excellent as a very late supper.
00:07:33"'Why is it called Aslan's Table?' asked Lucy presently.
00:07:38"'It is set here by his bidding,' said the girl, "'for those who come so far.
00:07:45Some call this island the world's end, for though you can sail further, this is the beginning
00:07:51of the end.'
00:07:53"'But how does the food keep?' asked the practical Eustace.
00:07:57"'It is eaten and renewed every day,' said the girl.
00:08:02"'This you will see.'
00:08:03"'And what are we to do about the sleepers?' asked Caspian.
00:08:08"'In the world from which my friends come,' here he nodded at Eustace and the Pevensies,
00:08:13'they have a story of a prince or a king coming to a castle where all the people lay in an
00:08:19enchanted sleep.
00:08:21In that story he could not dissolve the enchantment until he had kissed the princess.'
00:08:26"'But here,' said the girl, "'it is different.
00:08:32Here he cannot kiss the princess till he has dissolved the enchantment.'
00:08:37"'Then,' said Caspian, ''in the name of Aslan, show me how to set about that work at once.'
00:08:45"'My father will teach you that,' said the girl.
00:08:48"'Your father!' said everyone.
00:08:51"'Who is he, and where?'
00:08:54"'Look,' said the girl, turning round and pointing at the door in the hillside.
00:09:00They could see it more easily now, for while they had been talking the stars had grown
00:09:05fainter and great gaps of white light were appearing in the greyness of the eastern sky.
00:09:15CHAPTER XIV THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE WORLD
00:09:22Slowly the door opened again, and out there came a figure as tall and straight as the
00:09:27girl's, but not so slender.
00:09:30It carried no light, but light seemed to come from it.
00:09:34As it came nearer Lucy saw that it was like an old man.
00:09:38His silver beard came down to his bare feet in front, and his silver hair hung down to
00:09:43his heels behind, and his robe appeared to be made from the fleece of silver sheep.
00:09:49He looked so mild and grave that once more all the travellers rose to their feet and
00:09:55stood in silence.
00:09:56But the old man came on without speaking to the travellers, and stood on the other side
00:10:01of the table opposite to his daughter.
00:10:04Then both of them held up their arms before them, and turned to face the east.
00:10:10In that position they began to sing.
00:10:13I wish I could write down the song, but no one who was present could remember it.
00:10:17Lucy said afterwards that it was high, almost shrill, but very beautiful.
00:10:23A cold kind of song, an early-morning kind of song.
00:10:29And as they sang, the grey clouds lifted from the eastern sky, and the white patches grew
00:10:35bigger and bigger, till it was all white, and the sea began to shine like silver.
00:10:42And long afterwards—but those two sang all the time—the east began to turn red,
00:10:49and at last, unclouded, the sun came up out of the sea, and its long level ray shot down
00:10:55the length of the table, on the gold and silver, and on the stone knife.
00:11:02Once or twice before the Narnians had wondered whether the sun at its rising did not look
00:11:07bigger in these seas than it had looked at home.
00:11:11This time they were certain, there was no mistaking it, and the brightness of its rays
00:11:16on the dew and on the table were far beyond any morning brightness they had ever seen.
00:11:23And as Edmund said afterwards, though lots of things happened on that trip which sound
00:11:28more exciting, that moment was really the most exciting.
00:11:34For now they knew that they had truly come to the beginning of the end of the world.
00:11:41Then something seemed to be flying at them, out of the very centre of the rising sun.
00:11:45But, of course, one couldn't look steadily in that direction to make sure.
00:11:50But presently the air became full of voices—voices which took up the same song that the lady
00:11:56and her father were singing, but in far wilder tones, and in a language which no one knew.
00:12:03And soon after that the owners of these voices could be seen.
00:12:07They were birds, large and white, and they came by hundreds and thousands, and alighted
00:12:14on everything—on the grass and the pavement, on the table, on your shoulders, your hands
00:12:19and your head—till it looked as if heavy snow had fallen.
00:12:23For like snow they not only made everything white, but blurred and blunted all shapes.
00:12:29But Lucy, looking out from between the wings of the birds that covered her, saw one bird
00:12:34fly to the old man with something in its beak that looked like a little fruit, unless
00:12:40it was a little live coal—which it might have been—but it was too bright to look
00:12:46at.
00:12:47And the bird laid it in the old man's mouth.
00:12:51Then the birds stopped their singing, and appeared to be very busy about the table.
00:12:55When they rose from it again, everything on the table that could be eaten or drunk had
00:12:59disappeared.
00:13:01These birds rose from their meal in their thousands and hundreds, and carried away all
00:13:06the things that could not be eaten or drunk, such as bones, rinds, and shells, and took
00:13:12their flight back to the rising sun.
00:13:15But now, because they were not singing, the whirr of their wings seemed to set the whole
00:13:21air at tremble.
00:13:23And there was the table, pecked clean and empty, and the three old lords of Narnia still
00:13:30fast asleep.
00:13:32Now, at last, the old man turned to the travellers, and bade them welcome.
00:13:39"'Sir,' said Caspian, "'will you tell us how to undo the enchantment which holds these
00:13:44three Narnian lords asleep?'
00:13:46"'I will gladly tell you that, my son,' said the old man.
00:13:51"'To break this enchantment you must sail to the world's end, or as near as you can
00:13:57come to it, and you must come back having left at least one of your company behind.'
00:14:03"'And what must happen to that one?' asked Reepicheep.
00:14:08"'He must go into the utter east and never return into the world.'
00:14:13"'That is my heart's desire,' said Reepicheep.
00:14:20"'And are we near the world's end now, sir?' asked Caspian.
00:14:24"'Have you any knowledge of the seas and lands further east than this?'
00:14:28"'I saw them long ago,' said the old man, 'but it was from a great height.
00:14:36I cannot tell you such things as sailors need to know.'
00:14:40"'Do you mean you were flying in the air?'
00:14:44Eustace blurted out.
00:14:46"'I was a long way above the air, my son,' replied the old man.
00:14:52"'I am Ramundu.
00:14:55But I see that you stared at one another and had not heard this name.
00:15:00And no wonder, for the days when I was a star had ceased long before any of you knew this
00:15:08world, and all the constellations have changed.'
00:15:12"'Golly!' said Edmund, under his breath, ''he's a retired star!'
00:15:18"'Aren't you a star any longer?' asked Lucy.
00:15:23"'I am a star at rest, my daughter,' answered Ramundu.
00:15:28"'When I set, for the last time, decrepit and old beyond all that you can reckon, I
00:15:35was carried to this island.
00:15:38I am not so old now as I was then.
00:15:41Every morning a bird brings me a fire-berry from the valleys in the sun, and each fire-berry
00:15:47takes away a little of my age.
00:15:51And when I have become as young as the child that was born yesterday, then I shall take
00:15:56my rising again, for we are at earth's eastern rim, and once more tread the great dance.
00:16:06In our world,' said Eustace, ''a star is a huge ball of flaming gas.'
00:16:12"'Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is, but only what it is made of.
00:16:21And in this world you have already met a star, for I think you have been with Coriachin.'
00:16:27"'Is he a retired star too?' said Lucy.
00:16:32"'Well, not quite the same,' said Ramundu.
00:16:36"'It was not quite as a rest that he was set to govern the Duffers.
00:16:41You might call it a punishment.
00:16:44He might have shone for thousands of years more in the southern winter sky, if all had
00:16:50gone well.'
00:16:51"'What did he do, sir?' asked Caspian.
00:16:55"'My son,' said Ramundu, "'it is not for you a son of Adam.
00:17:02To know what faults a star can commit!
00:17:06But come, we waste time in such talk.
00:17:09Are you yet resolved?
00:17:11Will you sail further east, and come again, leaving one to return no more, and so break
00:17:18the enchantment?
00:17:19Or will you sail westward?'
00:17:22"'Surely, sire,' said Reepicheep, ''there is no question about that.
00:17:28It is very plainly part of our quest to rescue these three lords from enchantment.'
00:17:32"'I think the same, Reepicheep,' replied Caspian, "'and even if it were not so, it would break
00:17:40my heart not to go as near the world's end as the dawn-treader will take us.
00:17:44But I am thinking of the crew.
00:17:47They signed on to seek the seven lords, not to reach the rim of the earth.
00:17:52If we sail east from here, we sail to find the edge, the utter east, and no one knows
00:17:58how far it is.
00:18:00They're brave fellows, but I see signs that some of them are weary of the voyage, and
00:18:05long to have our prow pointing to Narnia.
00:18:09I don't think I should take them further without their knowledge and consent.
00:18:13And then there's the poor Lord Roop.
00:18:15He's a broken man.'
00:18:16"'My son,' said the star, "'it would be no use, even though you wished it, to sail for
00:18:24the world's end with men unwilling, or men deceived.
00:18:30That is not how great unenchantments are achieved.
00:18:34They must know where they go and why.
00:18:38But who is this broken man you speak of?'
00:18:43Caspian told Ramundu the story of Roop.
00:18:45"'I can give him what he needs most,' said Ramundu.
00:18:50"'In this island there is sleep, without stint or measure, and sleep in which no faintest
00:18:57footfall of a dream was ever heard.
00:19:01Let him sit beside these other three, and drink oblivion till your return.'
00:19:07"'Oh, do let's do that, Caspian,' said Lucy.
00:19:11"'I'm sure it's just what he would love.'
00:19:15At that moment they were interrupted by the sound of many feet and voices.
00:19:19Drinian and the rest of the ship's company were approaching.
00:19:22They halted in surprise when they saw Ramundu and his daughter.
00:19:26And then, because these were obviously great people, every man uncovered his head.
00:19:32Some sailors eyed the empty dishes and flagons on the table with regret.
00:19:37"'My lord,' said the king to Drinian, "'pray send two men back to the dawn-treader with
00:19:43a message to the lord Roop.
00:19:45Tell him that the last of his old shipmates are here asleep—asleep without dreams—and
00:19:51that he can share it.'
00:19:54When this had been done, Caspian told the rest to sit down, and laid the whole situation
00:19:58before them.
00:20:00When he had finished, there was a long silence, and some whispering, until presently the master
00:20:06bowman got to his feet and said—'What some of us have been wanting to ask for a long
00:20:12time, your majesty, is how we're ever to get home, when we do turn—whether we turn here
00:20:18or somewhere else.
00:20:20It's been west and north-west winds all the way, barring an occasional calm, and if that
00:20:25doesn't change, I'd like to know what hopes we have of seeing Narnia again.
00:20:31There's not much chance of supplies lasting while we row all that way.'
00:20:36"'That's landsman's talk,' said Drinian.
00:20:39"'There's always a prevailing west wind in these seas all through the late summer, and
00:20:44it always changes after the new year.
00:20:46We'll have plenty of wind for sailing westward—more than we shall like, from all accounts.'
00:20:51"'That's true, master,' said an old sailor, who was a Galmian by birth.
00:20:58"'You get some ugly weather rolling up from the east in January and February, and by your
00:21:04leave, sire, if I was in command of this ship, I'd say to winter here, and begin the
00:21:09voyage home in March.'
00:21:11"'What did you eat while you were wintering here?' asked Eustace.
00:21:16"'This table,' said Ramundu, 'will be filled with a king's feast every day at sunset.'
00:21:23"'Now you're talking,' said several sailors.
00:21:29"'Your Majesties and gentlemen and ladies all,' said Rynelf, 'there's just one thing
00:21:35I want to say.
00:21:37There's not one of us chaps as was pressed on this journey.
00:21:41We're volunteers, and there's some here that are looking very hard at that table and thinking
00:21:46about king's feasts, who were talking very loud about adventures on the day we sailed
00:21:52from Caer Parabel, and swearing they wouldn't come home till we'd found the end of the world.
00:22:00And there were some, standing on the quay, who would have given all they had to come
00:22:03with us.
00:22:05It was thought a finer thing than to have a cabin-boy's berth on the dawn-treader than
00:22:09to wear a knight's belt.
00:22:11I don't know if you get the hang of what I'm saying, but what I mean is that I think chaps
00:22:16who set out like us will look as silly as—as those dufflepuds, if we come home and say
00:22:23we got to the beginning of the world's end, and hadn't a heart to go further."
00:22:29Some of the sailors cheered at this, but some said that that was all very well.
00:22:35"'This isn't going to be much fun,' whispered Edmund to Caspian.
00:22:40"'What are we to do if half those fellows hang back?'
00:22:44"'Wait,' Caspian whispered back, 'I've still got a card to play.'
00:22:49"'Aren't you going to say anything, Reap?'
00:22:52whispered Lucy.
00:22:54"'No.
00:22:55Why should Your Majesty expect it?'
00:22:58answered Reapercheap, in a voice that most people heard.
00:23:02"'My own plans are made.
00:23:04While I can, I shall sail east in the dawn-treader.
00:23:08When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle.
00:23:12When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws.
00:23:16And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Asland's country,
00:23:21or shot over the edge of the world in some vast cataract,
00:23:25I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise,
00:23:28and Peepycheek will be head of the talking mice in Narnia.'
00:23:32"'Hear, hear!' said a sailor.
00:23:35"'I'll say the same, barring the bit about the coracle, which wouldn't bear me.'
00:23:41He added, in a lower voice,
00:23:43"'I'm not going to be outdone by a mouse.'
00:23:46At this point Caspian jumped to his feet.
00:23:49"'Friends,' he said,
00:23:51"'I think you have not quite understood our purpose.
00:23:54You talk as if we had come to you with our hat in our hand,
00:23:57begging for shipmates.
00:23:59It isn't like that at all.
00:24:01We, and our royal brother and sister, and their kinsman,
00:24:04and Sir Reapercheap, the good knight, and the Lord Drinian,
00:24:07have an errand to the world's edge.
00:24:10It is our pleasure to choose from among such of you as are willing
00:24:15those who we deem worthy of so high an enterprise.
00:24:18We have not said that any can come for the asking.
00:24:22That is why we shall now command the Lord Drinian and Master Rince
00:24:26to consider carefully what men among you are the hardest in battle,
00:24:30the most skilled seamen, the purest in blood,
00:24:33the most loyal to our person,
00:24:35and the cleanest of life and manners,
00:24:38and to give their names to us in a schedule.'
00:24:41He paused, and went on in a quicker voice.
00:24:44"'As Landsmane!' he exclaimed.
00:24:47"'Do you think that the privilege of seeing the last things
00:24:49is to be bought for a song?
00:24:51Why, every man that comes with us
00:24:53shall be queethed the title of Dawn Treader to all his descendants,
00:24:57and when we land at Caer Parabel on the homeward voyage
00:25:00he shall have either gold or land enough
00:25:03to make him rich all his life.
00:25:06Now scatter over the island, all of you.
00:25:09In half an hour's time I shall receive the names
00:25:11that Lord Drinian brings me.'
00:25:14There was rather a sheepish silence,
00:25:17and then the crew made their bows and moved away,
00:25:21one in this direction and one in that,
00:25:23but mostly in little knots or bunches, talking.
00:25:28"'And now for the Lord Roop,' said Caspian.
00:25:34But turning to the head of the table,
00:25:36he saw that Roop was already there.
00:25:39He had arrived, silent and unnoticed,
00:25:42while the discussion was going on,
00:25:44and was seated beside the Lord Argos.
00:25:47The daughter of Ramundu stood beside him,
00:25:49as if she had just helped him into his chair.
00:25:52Ramundu stood behind him,
00:25:54and laid both his hands on Roop's grey head.
00:25:58Even in daylight a faint silver light
00:26:01came from the hands of the star.
00:26:04There was a smile on Roop's haggard face.
00:26:07He held out one of his hands to Lucy
00:26:09and the other to Caspian.
00:26:11For a moment it looked as if he were going to say something.
00:26:15Then his smile brightened
00:26:17as if he were feeling some delicious sensation.
00:26:21A long sigh of contentment came from his lips.
00:26:25His head fell forward, and he slept.
00:26:29"'Poor Roop,' said Lucy.
00:26:32"'I am glad. He must have had terrible times.'
00:26:37"'Don't let's even think of it,' said Eustace."
00:26:42Meanwhile, Caspian's speech,
00:26:45helped perhaps by some magic of the island,
00:26:48was having just the effect he intended.
00:26:51A good many, who had been anxious enough to get out of the voyage,
00:26:54felt quite differently about being left out of it.
00:26:58And, of course, whenever any one sailor announced
00:27:01that he had made up his mind to ask for permission to sail,
00:27:04the ones who hadn't said this felt that they were getting fewer
00:27:07and more uncomfortable,
00:27:09so that, before the half-hour was nearly over,
00:27:12several people were positively sucking up to Drinian and Rince
00:27:16—at least, that was what they called it at my school—
00:27:19to get a good report.
00:27:21And soon there were only three left who didn't want to go,
00:27:25and those three were trying very hard
00:27:28to persuade others to stay with them,
00:27:30and very shortly after that there was only one left,
00:27:33and in the end he began to be afraid of being left behind
00:27:37all on his own, and changed his mind.
00:27:41At the end of the half-hour they all came trooping back
00:27:44to Aslan's table, and stood at one end
00:27:47while Drinian and Rince went and sat down with Caspian
00:27:50and made their report.
00:27:52And Caspian accepted all the men,
00:27:55but the one who had changed his mind at the last moment.
00:28:00His name was Pittencreme,
00:28:02and he stayed on the Island of the Star
00:28:05all the time the others were away,
00:28:07looking for the world's end,
00:28:09and he very much wished he had gone with them.
00:28:12He wasn't the sort of man who could enjoy talking
00:28:15to Ramundu and Ramundu's daughter,
00:28:17nor they to him,
00:28:19and it rained a good deal.
00:28:22And though there was a wonderful feast on the table every night,
00:28:25he didn't very much enjoy it.
00:28:27He said it gave him the creeps sitting there alone,
00:28:30and in the rain, as likely as not,
00:28:32with those four lords asleep at the end of the table.
00:28:36And when the others returned he felt so out of things
00:28:39that he deserted on the voyage home at the Lone Islands,
00:28:42and went and lived in Calumet,
00:28:44where he told wonderful stories about his adventures
00:28:47at the end of the world,
00:28:49until at last he came to believe them himself.
00:28:52So you may say, in a sense,
00:28:54that he lived happily ever after,
00:28:57but he could never bear mice.
00:29:01That night they all ate and drank together
00:29:04at the great table between the pillars,
00:29:06where the feast was magically renewed.
00:29:09And the next morning the dawn-treader set sail once more,
00:29:13just when the great birds had come and gone again.
00:29:17"'Lady,' said Caspian,
00:29:19"'I hope to speak with you again when I have broken the enchantments.'
00:29:23And Ramundu's daughter looked at him and smiled.
00:29:30CHAPTER XVI THE VERY END OF THE WORLD
00:29:36Rebichiep was the only person on board,
00:29:39besides Drinian and the two Pevensies,
00:29:41who had noticed the Sea-People.
00:29:43He had dived in at once when he saw the Sea-King shaking his spear,
00:29:47for he regarded this as a sort of threat or challenge,
00:29:50and wanted to have the matter out there and then.
00:29:53The excitement of discovering that the water was now fresh
00:29:57had distracted his attention,
00:29:59and before he remembered the Sea-People again,
00:30:01Lucy and Drinian had taken him aside
00:30:04and warned him not to mention what he had seen.
00:30:08As things turned out, they need hardly have bothered,
00:30:11for by this time the dawn-treader was gliding over a part of the sea
00:30:15which seemed to be uninhabited.
00:30:17No one, except Lucy, saw anything more of the people,
00:30:20and even she had only one short glimpse.
00:30:23All morning on the following day they sailed in fairly shallow water,
00:30:28and the bottom was weedy.
00:30:30Just before midday Lucy saw a large shoal of fishes grazing on the weed.
00:30:35They were all eating steadily, and all moving in the same direction.
00:30:39Just like a flock of sheep, thought Lucy.
00:30:43Suddenly she saw a little sea-girl of about her own age in the middle of them,
00:30:48a quiet, lonely-looking girl with a sort of crook in her hand.
00:30:53Lucy felt sure that this girl must be a shepherdess,
00:30:57or perhaps a fish-er-dess,
00:31:00and that the shoal was really a flock at pasture.
00:31:04Both the fishes and the girl were quite close to the surface,
00:31:07and just as the girl, gliding in the shallow water,
00:31:10and Lucy, leaning over the bulwark, came opposite to one another,
00:31:13the girl looked up and stared straight into Lucy's face.
00:31:18Neither could speak to the other, and in a moment the sea-girl dropped to stern.
00:31:22But Lucy will never forget her face.
00:31:25It did not look frightened or angry like the other sea-people.
00:31:30Lucy had liked that girl, and she felt certain the girl had liked her.
00:31:35In that one moment they had somehow become friends.
00:31:39There does not seem to be much chance of their meeting again in that world,
00:31:43or any other, but if ever they do,
00:31:46they will rush together with their hands held out.
00:31:50After that, for many days,
00:31:53without wind in her shrouds or foam at her bows,
00:31:57across a waveless sea, the dawn-treader glided smoothly east.
00:32:02Every day and every hour the light became more brilliant,
00:32:06and still they could bear it.
00:32:09No one ate or slept, and no one wanted to,
00:32:12but they drew buckets of dazzling water from the sea,
00:32:15stronger than wine, and somehow wetter, more liquid than ordinary water,
00:32:21and pledged to one another silently in deep draughts of it.
00:32:25And one or two of the sailors, who had been oldish men when the voyage began,
00:32:30now grew younger every day.
00:32:33Every one on board was filled with joy and excitement,
00:32:37but not an excitement that made one talk.
00:32:40The further they sailed, the less they spoke,
00:32:43and then, almost in a whisper,
00:32:45the stillness of that last sea laid hold on them.
00:32:50"'My lord,' said Caspian to Drinian one day,
00:32:54"'what do you see ahead?'
00:32:56"'Sire,' said Drinian,
00:32:58"'I see whiteness,
00:33:01all along the horizon from north to south,
00:33:04as far as my eyes can reach.'
00:33:07"'That is what I see too,' said Caspian,
00:33:11"'and I cannot imagine what it is.'
00:33:14"'If we were in higher latitude, your majesty,' said Drinian,
00:33:19"'I would say it was ice.
00:33:21But it can't be that, not here.
00:33:24All the same, we'd better get men to the oars,
00:33:28and hold the ship back against the current.
00:33:31Whatever the stuff is, we don't want to crash into it at this speed.'
00:33:35They did as Drinian said, and so continued to go slower and slower.
00:33:41The whiteness did not get any less mysterious as they approached it.
00:33:45If it was land, it must be very strange land,
00:33:49for it seemed just as smooth as the water,
00:33:52and on the same level with it.
00:33:54When they got very close to it,
00:33:56Drinian put the helm hard over,
00:33:58and turned the dawn-treader south,
00:34:00so that she was broadside on to the current,
00:34:03and rode a little way southward along the edge of the whiteness.
00:34:07In so doing, they accidentally made the important discovery
00:34:11that the current was only about forty feet wide,
00:34:14and the rest of the sea as still as a pond.
00:34:18This was good news for the crew,
00:34:20who had already begun to think that the return journey to Ramundu's land,
00:34:24rowing against stream all the way,
00:34:26would be pretty poor sport.
00:34:28It also explained why the shepherd girl had dropped so quickly astern.
00:34:34She was not in the current.
00:34:36If she had been, she would have been moving east at the same speed as the ship.
00:34:41And still no one could make out what the white stuff was.
00:34:46Then the boat was lowered, and it put off to investigate.
00:34:49Those who remained on the dawn-treader
00:34:51could see that the boat pushed right in among the whiteness.
00:34:55Then they could hear the voices of the party in the boat,
00:34:57clear across the still water,
00:34:59talking in a shrill and surprised way.
00:35:02Then there was a pause,
00:35:04while Ranulf, in the bows of the boat, took a sounding.
00:35:08And when, after that, the boat came rowing back,
00:35:11there seemed to be plenty of the white stuff inside her.
00:35:14Everyone crowded to the side to hear the news.
00:35:18"'Lilies, Your Majesty!' shouted Ranulf, standing up in the bows.
00:35:23"'What did you say?' asked Caspian.
00:35:26"'Blooming lilies, Your Majesty!' said Ranulf.
00:35:30"'Same as in a pool or in a garden at home!'
00:35:34"'Look!' said Lucy, who was in the stern of the boat.
00:35:38She held up her wet arms, full of white petals and broad, flat leaves.
00:35:44"'What's the depth, Ranulf?' asked Rinian.
00:35:48"'That's the funny thing, Captain,' said Ranulf.
00:35:51"'It's still deep. Three and a half fathoms clear.
00:35:55"'They can't be real lilies. Not what we call lilies,' said Eustace.
00:36:03"'Probably they were not. But they were very like them.
00:36:06"'And when, after some consultation, the dawn-treader turned back into the current
00:36:11"'and began to glide eastward through the Lily Lake or the Silver Sea—
00:36:16"'they tried both these names, but it was the Silver Sea that stuck,
00:36:20"'and is now on Caspian's map—the strangest part of their travels began.
00:36:25"'Very soon the open sea which they were leaving
00:36:28"'was only a thin rim of blue on the western horizon.
00:36:32"'Whiteness, shot with faintest colour of gold, spread round them on every side,
00:36:38"'except just a stern, where their passage had thrust the lilies apart
00:36:42"'and left an open lane of water that shone like dark green glass.
00:36:47"'To look at this last sea was very like the Arctic,
00:36:51"'and if their eyes had not by now grown as strong as eagles,
00:36:55"'the sun, or all that whiteness, especially at early morning
00:36:59"'when the sun was hugest, would have been unbearable.
00:37:03"'And every evening the same whiteness made the daylight last longer.
00:37:08"'There seemed no end to the lilies.
00:37:12"'Day after day, from all those miles and leaves of flowers,
00:37:16"'there rose a smell which Lucy found very hard to describe.
00:37:21"'Sweet, yes, but not at all sleepy or overpowering.
00:37:26"'A fresh, wild, lonely smell, that seemed to get into your brain
00:37:32"'and make you feel that you could go up mountains at a run
00:37:35"'or wrestle with an elephant.
00:37:38"'She and Caspian said to one another,
00:37:40"'I feel that I can't stand much more of this, yet I don't want it to stop.'
00:37:47"'They took soundings very often, but it was only several days later
00:37:51"'that the water became shallower.
00:37:53"'After that it went on getting shallower.
00:37:57"'There came a day when they had to row out of the current
00:38:00"'and feel their way forward at a snail's pace, rowing.
00:38:04"'And soon it was cleared that the dawn-treader could sail no farther east.
00:38:09"'Indeed, it was only by very clever handling that they saved her from grounding.
00:38:15"'Lower the boat,' cried Caspian,
00:38:17"'and then call the men aft, I must speak to them.'
00:38:20"'What's he going to do?' whispered Eustace to Edmund.
00:38:24"'There's a queer look in his eyes.'
00:38:27"'I think we probably all look the same,' said Edmund.
00:38:32"'They joined Caspian on the poop,
00:38:34"'and soon all the men were crowded together at the foot of the ladder
00:38:37"'to hear the king's speech.
00:38:40"'Friends,' said Caspian,
00:38:43"'we have now fulfilled the quest on which you embarked.
00:38:46"'The seven lords are all accounted for,
00:38:49"'and as Sir Reefy Cheep has sworn never to return,
00:38:52"'when you reach Ramandu's land you will doubtless find
00:38:55"'the lords Revillian, and Argos, and Mavramorn awake.
00:38:59"'To you, my lord Drinian, I entrust this ship,
00:39:02"'bidding you sail to Narnia with all the speed you may,
00:39:06"'and, above all, not to land on the Island of Death-water.
00:39:10"'And instruct my regent, the dwarf Trumpkin,
00:39:13"'to give to all these my shipmates the rewards I promised them.
00:39:17"'They have been earned well, and if I come not again,
00:39:21"'it is my will that the regent, and Master Cornelius,
00:39:24"'and Truffle Hunter the badger, and the lord Drinian,
00:39:28"'choose a king of Narnia, with the consent—'
00:39:31"'But, sire,' interrupted Drinian,
00:39:34"'are you abdicating?'
00:39:37"'I am going with Reefy Cheep, to see the world's end,' said Caspian.
00:39:42A low murmur of dismay ran through the sailors.
00:39:47"'We will take the boat,' said Caspian.
00:39:49"'You will have no need of it in these gentle seas,
00:39:52"'and you must build a new one in Ramundu's island.
00:39:55"'And now—'
00:39:57"'Caspian!' said Edmund, suddenly and sternly.
00:40:00"'You can't do this!'
00:40:02"'Most certainly,' said Reefy Cheep.
00:40:05"'His Majesty cannot!'
00:40:07"'No, indeed!' said Drinian.
00:40:11"'Can't!' said Caspian, sharply,
00:40:14"'looking for a moment not unlike his uncle, Miraz.
00:40:18"'Begging your Majesty's pardon,' said Ranelf, from the deck below,
00:40:23"'but if one of us did the same, it would be called deserting.'
00:40:28"'You presume too much on your long service, Ranelf,' said Caspian.
00:40:34"'No, sire, he's perfectly right,' said Drinian.
00:40:39"'By the mane of Aslan,' said Caspian,
00:40:42"'I had thought you were all my subjects here, not my schoolmasters.'
00:40:47"'I'm not,' said Edmund,
00:40:49"'and I say you cannot do this.'
00:40:53"'Can't again?' said Caspian.
00:40:56"'What do you mean?'
00:40:58"'If it please your Majesty, we mean.
00:41:01"'Shall not!' said Reefy Cheep, with a very low bow.
00:41:05"'You are the King of Narnia.
00:41:07"'You break faith with all your subjects,
00:41:09"'and especially Trumkin, if you do not return.
00:41:13"'You shall not please yourself with adventures
00:41:15"'as if you were a private person.
00:41:17"'And if your Majesty will not hear reason,
00:41:20"'it will be the truest loyalty of every man on board
00:41:23"'to follow me in disarming and binding you
00:41:26"'till you come to your senses.'
00:41:29"'Quite right,' said Edmund,
00:41:31"'like they did with Ulysses when he wanted to go near the sirens.'
00:41:35"'Caspian's hand had gone to his sword-hilt,
00:41:38"'when Lucy said,
00:41:40"'And you've almost promised Ramundu's daughter to go back?'
00:41:46"'Caspian paused.
00:41:48"'Well, yes, there is that,' he said.
00:41:54"'He stood irresolute for a moment,
00:41:56"'and then shouted out to the ship in general.
00:41:59"'Well, have your way.
00:42:02"'The quest is ended. We all return.
00:42:04"'Get the boat up again.'
00:42:07"'Sire,' said Reepicheep,
00:42:09"'we do not all return.
00:42:12"'I, as I explained before—'
00:42:15"'Silence!' thundered Caspian.
00:42:19"'I've been lessened, but I'll not be baited.
00:42:22"'Will no one silence that mouse?'
00:42:26"'Your Majesty promised,' said Reepicheep,
00:42:29"'to be a good lord to the talking beasts of Narnia.'
00:42:33"'Talking beasts, yes,' said Caspian.
00:42:36"'I said nothing about beasts that never stop talking.'
00:42:39"'And he flung down the ladder in a temper,
00:42:42"'and went into the cabin, slamming the door.
00:42:45"'But when the others rejoined him a little later,
00:42:48"'they found him changed.
00:42:50"'He was white, and there were tears in his eyes.
00:42:54"'It's no good,' he said.
00:42:57"'I might as well have behaved decently
00:42:59"'for all the good I did with my temper and swagger.
00:43:03"'Aslan has spoken to me.
00:43:05"'No, I don't mean he was actually here.
00:43:08"'He wouldn't fit into the cabin, for one thing.
00:43:11"'But that gold lion's head on the wall
00:43:13"'came to life and spoke to me.
00:43:15"'It was terrible.
00:43:17"'His eyes!
00:43:19"'Not that he was at all rough with me,
00:43:21"'only a bit stern at first.
00:43:23"'But it was terrible all the same.
00:43:25"'And he said—'
00:43:27"'He said,
00:43:28"'Oh, I can't bear it!
00:43:31"'The worst thing he could have said.
00:43:34"'You're to go on,
00:43:36"'Reap and Edmund and Lucy and Eustace,
00:43:39"'and I'm to go back,
00:43:42"'alone and at once.
00:43:45"'And what is the good of anything?'
00:43:49"'Caspian, dear,' said Lucy,
00:43:52"'you knew we'd have to go back
00:43:54"'to our own world sooner or later.'
00:43:57"'Yes,' said Caspian with a sob.
00:44:01"'But this is sooner!'
00:44:05"'You'll feel better
00:44:07"'when you get back to Ramandoo's Island,'
00:44:10"'said Lucy.
00:44:12"'He cheered up a little later on,
00:44:14"'but it was a grievous parting on both sides,
00:44:17"'and I will not dwell on it.
00:44:19"'About two o'clock in the afternoon,
00:44:22"'well-bittled and watered,
00:44:24"'though they thought they would need
00:44:26"'neither food nor drink,
00:44:28"'and with Reapy Cheep's coracle on board,
00:44:30"'the boat pulled away from the dawn-treader
00:44:33"'to row through the endless carpet of lilies.
00:44:36"'The dawn-treader flew all her flags
00:44:39"'and hung out her shields to honour their departure.
00:44:42"'Tall and big and home-like she looked
00:44:45"'from their low position,
00:44:47"'with the lilies all round them,
00:44:49"'and before she was out of sight
00:44:51"'they saw her turn
00:44:53"'and begin rowing slowly westward.
00:44:56"'Yet, though Lucy shed a few tears,
00:44:59"'she could not feel it as much as you might have expected.
00:45:02"'The light, the silence,
00:45:04"'the tingling smell of the silver sea,
00:45:07"'even in some odd way the loneliness itself,
00:45:11"'were too exciting.
00:45:13"'There was no need to row,
00:45:15"'for the current drifted them steadily to the east.
00:45:18"'None of them slept or ate.
00:45:21"'All that night and all next day
00:45:23"'they glided eastward,
00:45:25"'and when the third day dawned,
00:45:27"'with a brightness you or I could not bear,
00:45:30"'even if we had dark glasses on,
00:45:32"'they saw a wonder ahead.
00:45:35"'It was as if a wall stood up
00:45:38"'between them and the sky,
00:45:40"'a greenish-grey-trembling-shimmering wall.
00:45:44"'Then up came the sun,
00:45:46"'and at its first rising
00:45:48"'they saw it through the wall,
00:45:51"'and it turned into wonderful rainbow colours.
00:45:54"'Then they knew that the wall
00:45:56"'was really a long, tall wave,
00:46:00"'a wave endlessly fixed in one place,
00:46:04"'as you may often see at the edge of a waterfall.
00:46:07"'It seemed to be about thirty feet high,
00:46:09"'and the current was gliding them swiftly towards it.
00:46:13"'You might have supposed they would have thought of their danger.
00:46:16"'They didn't.
00:46:17"'I don't think anyone could have in their position,
00:46:20"'for now they saw something
00:46:22"'not only behind the wave,
00:46:24"'but behind the sun.
00:46:26"'They could not have seen even the sun
00:46:28"'if their eyes had not been strengthened
00:46:30"'by the water of the last sea,
00:46:32"'but now they could look at the rising sun
00:46:35"'and see it clearly,
00:46:37"'and see things beyond it.
00:46:39"'What they saw,
00:46:41"'eastward beyond the sun,
00:46:43"'was a range of mountains.
00:46:45"'It was so high
00:46:47"'that either they never saw the top of it,
00:46:49"'or they forgot it.
00:46:51"'None of them remembers seeing any sky
00:46:54"'in that direction,
00:46:55"'and the mountains must really have been
00:46:57"'outside the world.
00:46:59"'For any mountains,
00:47:00"'even a quarter of a twentieth of that height,
00:47:03"'ought to have had ice and snow on them.
00:47:05"'But these were warm and green
00:47:07"'and full of forests and waterfalls,
00:47:09"'however high you looked.
00:47:12"'And suddenly there came a breeze from the east,
00:47:15"'tossing the top of the wave into foamy shapes
00:47:18"'and ruffling the smooth water all around them.
00:47:21"'It lasted only a second or so,
00:47:23"'but what it brought them in that second,
00:47:25"'none of these three children will ever forget.
00:47:29"'It brought both a smell and a sound,
00:47:33"'a musical sound.
00:47:35"'Edmund and Eustace would never talk about it afterwards.
00:47:39"'Lucy could only say,
00:47:41"'It would break your heart.'
00:47:44"'Why?' said I.
00:47:46"'Was it so sad?'
00:47:48"'Sad?'
00:47:50"'No,' said Lucy.
00:47:54"'No one in that boat doubted
00:47:57"'that they were seeing beyond the end of the world
00:48:01"'into Aslan's country.
00:48:04"'At that moment, with a crunch,
00:48:06"'the boat ran aground.
00:48:08"'The water was too shallow now for it.
00:48:11"'This,' said Reepy Cheep,
00:48:13"'is where I go on alone.'
00:48:16"'They did not even try to stop him,
00:48:19"'for everything now felt as if it had been fated
00:48:22"'or had happened before.
00:48:24"'They helped him to lower his little coracle.
00:48:26"'Then he took off his sword.
00:48:28"'I shall need it no more,' he said,
00:48:32"'and flung it far away across the Lillid Sea.
00:48:35"'Where it fell, it stood upright,
00:48:38"'with the hilt above the surface.
00:48:40"'Then he bade them good-bye,
00:48:42"'trying to be sad for their sakes,
00:48:45"'but he was quivering with happiness.
00:48:48"'Lucy, for the first and last time,
00:48:52"'did what she had always wanted to do,
00:48:55"'taking him in her arms and caressing him.
00:48:58"'Then, hastily, he got into his coracle
00:49:01"'and took his paddle, and the current caught it,
00:49:04"'and away he went, very black against the lilies.
00:49:08"'But no lilies grew on the wave.
00:49:11"'It was a smooth green slope.
00:49:14"'The coracle went more and more quickly,
00:49:16"'and beautifully it rushed up the wave's side.
00:49:19"'For one split second they saw its shape
00:49:22"'and Reepicheep's on the very top.
00:49:24"'Then it vanished.
00:49:26"'And since that moment no one can truly claim
00:49:29"'to have seen Reepicheep the Mouse.
00:49:32"'But my belief is that he came safe to Aslan's country
00:49:36"'and is alive there to this day.'
00:49:39"'As the sun rose, the sight of those mountains
00:49:42"'outside the world faded away.
00:49:45"'The wave remained, but there was only blue sky behind it.
00:49:51"'The children got out of the boat and waded,
00:49:54"'not towards the wave, but southward,
00:49:57"'with the wall of water on their left.
00:49:59"'They could not have told you why they did this.
00:50:02"'It was their fate.
00:50:04"'And though they had felt, and been,
00:50:06"'very grown up on the dawn-treader,
00:50:09"'they now felt just the opposite
00:50:11"'and held hands as they waded through the lilies.
00:50:15"'They never felt tired.
00:50:17"'The water was warm, and all the time it got shallower.
00:50:21"'At last they were on dry sand,
00:50:23"'and then on grass, a huge plain of very fine short grass,
00:50:28"'almost level with the Silber Sea,
00:50:30"'and spreading in every direction,
00:50:33"'without so much as a mole-hill.
00:50:36"'And, of course, as it always does
00:50:38"'in a perfectly flat place without trees,
00:50:41"'it looked as if the sky came down
00:50:43"'to meet the grass in front of them.
00:50:46"'But as they went on, they got the strangest impression
00:50:49"'that here at last the sky really did come down
00:50:53"'and join the earth, a blue wall,
00:50:56"'very bright, but real and solid,
00:50:59"'more like glass than anything else,
00:51:02"'and soon they were quite sure of it.
00:51:05"'It was very near now.
00:51:07"'But between them and the foot of the sky
00:51:09"'there was something so white on the green grass
00:51:12"'that even with their eagle's eyes
00:51:14"'they could hardly look at it.
00:51:16"'They came on and saw that it was a lamb.
00:51:20"'Come and have breakfast,' said the lamb,
00:51:24"'in its sweet milky voice.
00:51:26"'Then they noticed for the first time
00:51:29"'that there was a fire lit on the grass
00:51:32"'and fish roasting on it.
00:51:34"'They sat down and ate the fish,
00:51:36"'hungry now, for the first time for many days,
00:51:40"'and it was the most delicious food they had ever tasted.
00:51:44"'Please, lamb,' said Lucy,
00:51:47"'is this the way to Aslan's country?'
00:51:50"'Not for you,' said the lamb.
00:51:53"'For you the door into Aslan's country
00:51:57"'is from your own world.'
00:52:00"'What?' said Edmund.
00:52:02"'Is there a way into Aslan's country from our world, too?'
00:52:06"'There is a way into my country from all the worlds,'
00:52:11"'said the lamb.
00:52:13"'But as he spoke, his snowy white flushed into tawny gold,
00:52:17"'and his size changed, and it was Aslan himself,
00:52:22"'towering above them and scattering light from his mane.
00:52:26"'Oh, Aslan,' said Lucy,
00:52:29"'will you tell us how to get into your country from our world?'
00:52:34"'I shall be telling you all the time,' said Aslan,
00:52:40"'but I will not tell you how long or short the way will be,
00:52:46"'only that it lies across a river.
00:52:50"'But do not fear that,
00:52:53"'for I am the great bridge-builder.
00:52:56"'And now come, I will open the door in the sky
00:53:02"'and send you to your own land.'
00:53:05"'Please, Aslan,' said Lucy,
00:53:08"'before we go, will you tell us when we can come back to Narnia again?
00:53:13"'Please.
00:53:15"'And, oh, do, do, do make it soon!'
00:53:20"'Dearest,' said Aslan, very gently,
00:53:25"'you and your brother will never come back to Narnia.'
00:53:32"'Oh, Aslan!' said Edmund and Lucy, both together, in despairing voices.
00:53:41"'You are too old, children,' said Aslan,
00:53:48"'and you must begin to come close to your own world now.'
00:53:53"'It isn't Narnia, you know,' sobbed Lucy.
00:53:58"'It's you.
00:54:00"'We shan't meet you there.
00:54:02"'And how can we live, never meeting you?'
00:54:06"'But you shall meet me, dear one,' said Aslan.
00:54:11"'Are you there too, sir?' said Edmund.
00:54:16"'I am,' said Aslan.
00:54:19"'But there I have another name.
00:54:23"'You must learn to know me by that name.
00:54:27"'This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia,
00:54:31"'that by knowing me here for a little you may know me better there.'
00:54:37"'And is Eustace never to come back here either?' said Lucy.
00:54:42"'Child,' said Aslan,
00:54:45"'do you really need to know that?
00:54:49"'Come, I am opening the door in the sky.'
00:54:54Then, all in one moment, there was a rending of the blue wall,
00:54:58like a curtain being torn, and a terrible white light from beyond the sky,
00:55:04and the feel of Aslan's mane, and a lion's kiss on their foreheads,
00:55:08and then the back bedroom in Aunt Alberta's home in Cambridge.
00:55:16Only two more things need to be told.
00:55:19One is that Caspian and his men all came safely back to Ramundu's island,
00:55:24and the three lords woke from their sleep.
00:55:28Caspian married Ramundu's daughter, and they all reached Narnia in the end,
00:55:32and she became a great queen, and the mother and grandmother of great kings.
00:55:39The other is that back in our own world everyone soon started saying
00:55:43how Eustace had improved, and how you'd never know him for the same boy.
00:55:51Everyone except Aunt Alberta, who said he had become very commonplace and tiresome,
00:55:59and it must have been the influence of those Pevensey children.
00:56:05Chapter 15 The Wonders of the Last Sea
00:56:30Very soon after they had left Ramundu's country,
00:56:33they began to feel that they had already sailed beyond the world.
00:56:37All was different.
00:56:39For one thing, they all found that they were needing less sleep.
00:56:43One did not want to go to bed, nor to eat much, nor even to talk, except in low voices.
00:56:51Another thing was the light.
00:56:53There was too much of it.
00:56:55The sun, when it came up each morning, looked twice, if not three times, its usual size.
00:57:01And every morning, which gave Lucy the strangest feeling of all,
00:57:06the huge white birds, singing their song with human voices in a language no one knew,
00:57:13streamed overhead and vanished astern on their way to their breakfast at Aslan's table.
00:57:19A little later they came flying back and vanished into the east.
00:57:24How beautifully clear the water is, said Lucy to herself,
00:57:29as she leant over the port side early in the afternoon of the second day.
00:57:33And it was.
00:57:35The first thing that she noticed was a little black object about the size of a shoe
00:57:41travelling along at the same speed as the ship.
00:57:44For a moment she thought it was something floating on the surface,
00:57:47but then there came floating past a bit of stale bread,
00:57:52which the cook had just thrown out of the galley,
00:57:54and the bit of bread looked as if it were going to collide with the black thing.
00:57:59But it didn't.
00:58:00It passed above it.
00:58:02And Lucy now saw that the black thing could not be on the surface.
00:58:07Then the black thing suddenly got very much bigger
00:58:10and flicked back to normal size a moment later.
00:58:14Now Lucy knew she had seen something just like that happen somewhere else.
00:58:20If only she could remember where!
00:58:23She held her hand to her head and screwed up her face
00:58:26and put out her tongue in the effort to remember.
00:58:31At last she did!
00:58:33Of course!
00:58:35It was like what you saw from a train on a bright sunny day.
00:58:39You saw the black shadow of your own coach running along the fields
00:58:43at the same pace as the train.
00:58:45Then you went into a cutting,
00:58:47and immediately the same shadow flicked close up to you
00:58:50and got big, racing along the grass of the cutting bank.
00:58:54Then you came out of the cutting and flick!
00:58:57Once more the black shadow had gone back to its normal size
00:59:00and was running along the fields.
00:59:02It's our shadow!
00:59:04The shadow of the Dawn Treader, said Lucy.
00:59:08Our shadow running along the bottom of the sea.
00:59:11That time when it got bigger it went over a hill.
00:59:15But in that case, the water must be clearer than I thought.
00:59:20Good gracious!
00:59:22I must be seeing the bottom of the sea!
00:59:25Fathoms and fathoms down!
00:59:29As soon as she had said this,
00:59:31she realized that the great silvery expanse which she had been seeing,
00:59:36without noticing, for some time,
00:59:39was really the sand on the sea-bed,
00:59:43and that all sorts of darker or brighter patches
00:59:46were not lights and shadows on the surface,
00:59:48but real things on the bottom.
00:59:51At present, for instance,
00:59:53they were passing over a mass of soft purpley-green,
00:59:56with a broad, winding strip of pale grey in the middle of it.
01:00:00But now that she knew it was on the bottom,
01:00:03she saw it much better.
01:00:05She could see that bits of the dark stuff
01:00:07were much higher than other bits,
01:00:09and were waving gently.
01:00:11"'Just like trees in a wind,' said Lucy.
01:00:15"'And I do believe that's what they are.
01:00:18"'It's a submarine forest.'
01:00:21They passed on above it,
01:00:23and presently the pale streak was joined by another pale streak.
01:00:28"'If I was down there,' thought Lucy,
01:00:32"'that streak would be just like a road through the wood,
01:00:36"'and that place where it joins the other would be a crossroads.
01:00:40"'Oh, I do wish I was.
01:00:44"'Hello, the forest is coming to an end,
01:00:47"'and I do believe the streak really was a road.
01:00:51"'I can still see it going on across the open sand.
01:00:55"'It's a different colour,
01:00:57"'and it's marked out with something at the edges,
01:01:01"'dotted lines.
01:01:03"'Perhaps they are stones.
01:01:05"'And now it's getting wider.'
01:01:08But it was not really getting wider.
01:01:11It was getting nearer.
01:01:13She realised this because of the way in which the shadow of the ship
01:01:16came rushing up towards her,
01:01:18and the road, she felt sure it was a road now,
01:01:21began to go in zigzags.
01:01:23Obviously it was climbing up a steep hill,
01:01:27and when she held her head sideways and looked back,
01:01:31what she saw was very like what you see
01:01:34when you look down a winding road from the top of a hill.
01:01:37She could even see the shafts of sunlight
01:01:40falling through the deep water on to the wooded valley,
01:01:43and in the extreme distance,
01:01:46everything melting away into a dim greenness.
01:01:50But some places, the sunny ones, she thought,
01:01:54were ultramarine blue.
01:01:57She could not, however, spend much time looking back.
01:02:00What was coming into view in the forward direction was too exciting.
01:02:04The road had apparently now reached the top of the hill,
01:02:07and ran straight forward.
01:02:09Little specks were moving to and fro on it,
01:02:12and now something most wonderful,
01:02:15fortunately in full sunlight,
01:02:17or as full as it can be when it falls through fathoms of water,
01:02:21flashed into sight.
01:02:23It was knobbly, and jagged,
01:02:26and of a pearly or perhaps an ivory colour.
01:02:30She was so nearly straight above it
01:02:33that at first she could hardly make out what it was.
01:02:36But everything became plain when she noticed its shadow.
01:02:40The sunlight was falling across Lucy's shoulders,
01:02:43so the shadow of the thing lay stretched out on the sand behind it,
01:02:47and by its shape she saw clearly
01:02:51that it was a shadow of towers,
01:02:54and pinnacles, minarets, and domes.
01:02:58Why, it's a city, or a huge castle, said Lucy to herself.
01:03:04But I wonder why they built it on top of a high mountain.
01:03:10Long afterwards, when she was back in England,
01:03:14and talked all these adventures over with Edmund,
01:03:17they thought of a reason,
01:03:19and I'm pretty sure it is the true one.
01:03:22In the sea, the deeper you go,
01:03:25the darker and colder it gets,
01:03:28and it is down there, in the dark and cold,
01:03:31that dangerous things live,
01:03:33the squid, and the sea-serpent, and the kraken.
01:03:37The valleys are the wild, unfriendly places.
01:03:40The sea-people feel about their valleys as we do about the mountains,
01:03:44and feel about their mountains as we feel about valleys.
01:03:48It is on the heights, or, as we would say, in the shallows,
01:03:53that there is warmth and peace.
01:03:56The reckless hunters and brave knights of the sea
01:03:59go down into the depths on quests and adventures,
01:04:03but return home to the heights for rest and peace,
01:04:07courtesy and counsel, the sports, the dances, and the songs.
01:04:12They had passed the city, and the seabed was still rising.
01:04:16It was only a few hundred feet below the ship now.
01:04:19The road had disappeared.
01:04:21They were sailing above an open, park-like country,
01:04:24dotted with little groves of brightly coloured vegetation.
01:04:28And then, Lucy nearly squealed aloud with excitement,
01:04:33she had seen people!
01:04:36There were between fifteen and twenty of them,
01:04:40and all mounted on sea-horses,
01:04:43not the tiny little sea-horses which you may have seen in museums,
01:04:46but horses rather bigger than themselves.
01:04:50They must be noble and lordly people, Lucy thought,
01:04:54for she could catch the gleam of gold on some of their foreheads,
01:04:57and streamers of emerald or orange-coloured stuff
01:05:01fluttered from their shoulders in the current.
01:05:04Then,
01:05:06"'Oh, bother these fish!' said Lucy,
01:05:10for a whole shoal of small, fat fish,
01:05:13swimming quite close to the surface,
01:05:15had come between her and the sea-people.
01:05:18But though this spoiled her view,
01:05:20it led to the most interesting thing of all.
01:05:23Suddenly, a fierce little fish,
01:05:26of a kind she had never seen before,
01:05:28came darting up from below,
01:05:30snapped, grabbed, and sank rapidly
01:05:33with one of the fat fish in its mouth.
01:05:36And all the sea-people were sitting on their horses,
01:05:38staring up at what had happened.
01:05:40They seemed to be talking and laughing.
01:05:42And before the hunting-fish had got back to them with its prey,
01:05:45another of the same kind came up from the sea-people.
01:05:48And Lucy was almost certain
01:05:51that one big sea-man,
01:05:53who sat on his seahorse in the middle of the party,
01:05:55had sent it, or released it,
01:05:57as if he had been holding it back till then,
01:05:59in his hand, or on his wrist.
01:06:02"'Why, I do declare,' said Lucy,
01:06:06"'it's a hunting-party,
01:06:08or more like a hawking-party, yes, that's it.
01:06:11They ride out with these little fierce fish on their wrists,
01:06:14just as we used to ride out with falcons on our wrists
01:06:17when we were kings and queens at Caer Panabell long ago.
01:06:20And then they fly them,
01:06:22or I suppose I should say swim them,
01:06:26at the others.'
01:06:28"'How?'
01:06:29She stopped suddenly,
01:06:31because the scene was changing.
01:06:33The sea-people had noticed the dawn-treader.
01:06:37The shoal of fish had scattered in every direction.
01:06:40The people themselves were coming up
01:06:42to find out the meaning of this big black thing
01:06:45which had come between them and the sun.
01:06:47And now they were so close to the surface
01:06:50that, if they had been in air instead of water,
01:06:53Lucy could have spoken to them.
01:06:55They were men and women both.
01:06:57All wore coronets of some kind,
01:07:00and many had chains of pearls.
01:07:03They wore no other clothes.
01:07:05Their bodies were the colour of old ivory,
01:07:08their hair dark purple.
01:07:11The king, in the centre,
01:07:13no one could mistake him for anything but the king,
01:07:16looked proudly and fiercely into Lucy's face
01:07:19and shook a spear in his hand.
01:07:21His knights did the same.
01:07:23The faces of the ladies were filled with astonishment.
01:07:27Lucy felt sure they had never seen a ship
01:07:30or a human before.
01:07:32And how should they?
01:07:34In seas beyond the world's end,
01:07:36where no ships ever came?'
01:07:40"'What are you staring at, Lou?' said a voice close beside her.
01:07:44Lucy had been so absorbed in what she was seeing
01:07:47that she started at the sound,
01:07:49and when she turned she found that her arm
01:07:52had gone dead from leaning so long on the rail
01:07:55in one position.
01:07:57Drinian and Edmund were beside her.
01:07:59"'Look,' she said.
01:08:02They both looked.
01:08:04But almost at once Drinian said in a low voice,
01:08:07"'Turn round at once, your majesties.
01:08:10That's right, with your backs to the sea.
01:08:13And don't look as if you were talking about anything important.'
01:08:18"'Why, what's the matter?' said Lucy, as she obeyed.
01:08:22"'It'll never do for the sailors to see all that,' said Drinian.
01:08:27"'We'll have men falling in love with a sea-woman,
01:08:31or falling in love with the undersea country itself
01:08:34and jumping overboard.
01:08:36I've heard of that kind of thing happening before in strange seas.
01:08:40It's always unlucky to see these people.'
01:08:45"'But we used to know them,' said Lucy.
01:08:48"'In the old days at Caer Parabel,
01:08:50when my brother Peter was High King,
01:08:52they came to the surface and sang at our coronation.'
01:08:56"'I think that must have been a different kind, Lou,' said Edmund.
01:09:02"'They could live in the air as well as under water.
01:09:05I rather think these can't.
01:09:07By the look of them they'd have surfaced
01:09:09and started attacking us long ago if they could.
01:09:12They seemed very fierce.'
01:09:14"'At any rate,' said Drinian.
01:09:17But at that moment two sounds were heard.
01:09:21One was a plop.
01:09:23The other was a voice from the fighting-top shouting,
01:09:27"'Man overboard!'
01:09:29Then everyone was busy.
01:09:31Some of the sailors had it aloft to take in the sails,
01:09:34others hurried below to get out the oars,
01:09:36and Rince, who was on duty on the poop,
01:09:38began to put the helm hard over,
01:09:40so as to come round and back to the man who had gone overboard.
01:09:44But by now everyone knew that it wasn't strictly a man.
01:09:50It was Reepycheep.'
01:09:52"'Drat that mouse!' said Drinian.
01:09:55"'He's more trouble than all the rest of the ship's company put together.
01:09:59If there is any scrape to be got into, in he will get.
01:10:03He ought to be put in irons, keel-hored, marooned, have his whiskers cut off.
01:10:07Can any one see the little blighter?'
01:10:10"'All this didn't mean that Drinian really disliked Reepycheep.
01:10:14On the contrary, he liked him very much,
01:10:16and was therefore frightened about him.
01:10:19And being frightened put him in a bad temper,
01:10:22just as your mother is much angrier with you for running out into the road
01:10:25in front of a car than a stranger would be.
01:10:28No one, of course, was afraid of Reepycheep's drowning,
01:10:31for he was an excellent swimmer.
01:10:33But the three who knew what was going on below the water
01:10:37were afraid of those long cruel spears in the hands of the sea-people.
01:10:43In a few minutes the dawn-treader had come round
01:10:46and everyone could see the black blob in the water which was Reepycheep.
01:10:50He was chattering with the greatest excitement,
01:10:53but as his mouth kept on getting filled with water
01:10:55nobody could understand what he was saying.
01:10:58"'You'll blurt the whole thing out if we don't shut him up!' cried Drinian.
01:11:02To prevent this he rushed to the side and lowered a rope himself,
01:11:07shouting to the sailors,
01:11:08"'All right, all right, back to your places!
01:11:11I hope I can heave a mouse up without help!'
01:11:14And as Reepycheep began climbing up the rope,
01:11:17not very nimbly, because his wet fur made him heavy,
01:11:21Drinian leant over and whispered to him,
01:11:24"'Don't tell! Not a word!'
01:11:29And when the dripping mouse had reached the deck
01:11:32he turned out not to be at all interested in the sea-people.
01:11:35"'Sweet!' he cheeped.
01:11:38"'Sweet! Sweet!'
01:11:40"'What are you talking about?' asked Drinian crossly.
01:11:45"'And you needn't shake yourself all over me, either!'
01:11:49"'I tell you the water's sweet!' said the mouse.
01:11:53"'It isn't fresh! It isn't salt!'
01:11:56For a moment no one quite took in the importance of this,
01:12:00but then Reepycheep once more repeated the old prophecy,
01:12:05"'Where the waves grow sweet, doubt not, Reepycheep,
01:12:10there is the utter east!'
01:12:14Then at last everyone understood.
01:12:18"'Let me have a bucket, Rhinelph,' said Drinian.
01:12:22It was handed him, and he lowered it, and up it came again.
01:12:26The water shone in it like glass.
01:12:29"'Perhaps your Majesty would like to taste it first,'
01:12:33said Drinian to Caspian.
01:12:35The king took the bucket in both hands, raised it to his lips,
01:12:39sipped, then drank deeply and raised his head.
01:12:43His face was changed, not only his eyes,
01:12:47but everything about him seemed to be brighter.
01:12:50"'Yes!' he said.
01:12:53"'It is sweet! That's real water, that!
01:12:57I'm not sure that it isn't going to kill me,
01:13:00but it is the death I would have chosen,
01:13:03if I'd known about it till now!'
01:13:06"'What do you mean?' asked Edmund.
01:13:09"'It's like light, more than anything else,' said Caspian.
01:13:16"'That is what it is,' said Reepycheep.
01:13:20"'Drinkable light!
01:13:22We must be very near the end of the world now!'
01:13:26There was a moment's silence, and then Lucy
01:13:29knelt down on the deck and drank from the bucket.
01:13:32"'It's the loveliest thing I have ever tasted,' she said,
01:13:37with a kind of gasp.
01:13:39"'Oh, it's strong!
01:13:42We shan't need to eat anything now!'
01:13:46And one by one everybody on board drank,
01:13:50and for a long time they were all silent.
01:13:53They felt almost too well and strong to bear it,
01:13:57and presently they began to notice another result.
01:14:00As I have said before, there had been too much light
01:14:03ever since they left the island of Ramandoo,
01:14:06the sun too large, though not too hot,
01:14:10the sea too bright, the air too shining.
01:14:14Now the light grew no less, if anything it increased,
01:14:20but they could bear it.
01:14:23They could look straight up at the sun without blinking.
01:14:26They could see more light than they had ever seen before,
01:14:30and the deck and the sail and their own faces and bodies
01:14:34became brighter and brighter, and every rope shone.
01:14:38And the next morning, when the sun rose,
01:14:40now five or six times its old size,
01:14:43they stared hard into it and could see the very feathers
01:14:48of the birds that came flying from it.
01:14:51Hardly a word was spoken on board all that day,
01:14:55till about dinner-time.
01:14:57No one wanted any dinner, the water was enough for them.
01:15:00When Drinian said,
01:15:02I can't understand this, there is not a breath of wind.
01:15:07The sail hangs dead, the sea is as flat as a pond,
01:15:11and yet we drive on as fast as if there were a gale behind us.
01:15:17I've been thinking that too, said Caspian.
01:15:20We must be caught in some strong current.
01:15:23Mm, said Edmund, that's not so nice if the world really has an edge
01:15:29and we're getting near it.
01:15:31You mean, said Caspian, that we might be just, well, poured over it?
01:15:38Yes, yes, said Weepy Cheep, clapping his paws together.
01:15:42That's how I've always imagined it, the world like a great round table,
01:15:48and the waters of all the oceans endlessly pouring over the edge.
01:15:52The ship will tip up, stand on her head,
01:15:55for one moment we shall see over the edge,
01:15:58and then down, down, the rush, the speed.
01:16:04And what do you think will be waiting for us at the bottom, eh? said Drinian.
01:16:09Hasland's country, perhaps, said the Mouse, his eyes shining.
01:16:14Or perhaps there isn't any bottom, perhaps it goes down for ever and ever,
01:16:20but whatever it is, won't it be worth anything
01:16:23just to have looked for one moment beyond the edge of the world?
01:16:28But look here, said Eustace, this is all rot.
01:16:33The world's round, I mean round like a ball, not like a table.
01:16:39Our world is, said Edmund, but is this?
01:16:44Do you mean to say, asked Caspian, that you three come from a round world,
01:16:50round like a ball, and you've never told me?
01:16:53It's really too bad of you.
01:16:56Because we have fairy tales in which there are round worlds,
01:16:59and I always loved them, I never believed there were any real ones.
01:17:03But I've always wished there were, and I've always longed to live in one.
01:17:08Oh, I'd give anything.
01:17:11I wonder why you can get into our world, and we never get into yours.
01:17:17If only I had the chance!
01:17:20It must be exciting to live on a thing like a ball.
01:17:24Have you ever been to the parts where people walk about upside down?
01:17:28Edmund shook his head.
01:17:30And it isn't like that, he added.
01:17:33There's nothing particularly exciting about a round world, when you're there.