he surface in the tides of the la-goon. Its rivers are
its veins; when agonized, earthquakes are its throes; it shouts in the
thunder, and weeps in the shower; and as the body of a bison is
covered with hair, so Mardi is covered with grasses and vegetation,
among which, we parasitical things do but crawl, vexing and tormenting
the patient creature to which we cling. Nor yet, hath it recovered
from the pain of the first foundation that was laid. Mardi is alive to
its axis. When you pour water, does it not gurgle? When you strike a
pearl shell, does it not ring? Think you there is no sensation in
being a rock?--To exist, is to be; to be, is to be something: to be
something, is--"

"Go on," said Media.

"And what is it, to be something?" said Yoomy artlessly. "Bethink
yourself of what went before," said Media.

"Lose not the thread," said Mohi.

"It has snapped," said Babbalanja.

"I breathe again," said Mohi.

"But what a stepping-off place you came to then, philosopher," said
Media. "By the way, is it not old Bardianna who says, that no Mardian
should undertake to walk, without keeping one foot foremost?"

"To return to the vagueness of the notion I have of myself," said
Babbalanja.

"An appropriate theme," said Media, "proceed."

"My lord," murmured Mohi, "Is not this philosopher like a centipede?
Cut off his head, and still he crawls."

"There are times when I fancy myself a lunatic," resumed Babbalanja.

"Ah, now he's beginning to talk sense," whispered Mohi.

"Surely you forget, Babbalanja," said Media. "How many more theories
have you? First, you are possessed by a devil; then rent yourself out
to the indweller; and now turn yourself into a mad-house. You are
inconsistent."

"And for that very reason, my lord, not inconsistent; for the sum of
my inconsistencies makes up my consistency. And to be consistent to
one's self, is often to be inconsistent to Mardi. Common consistency
implies unchangeableness; but much of the wisdom here below lives in a
state of transition."

"Ah!" murmured Mold, "my head goes round again."

"Azzageddi aside, then, my lord, and also, for the nonce, the
mysterious indweller, I come now to treat of myself as a lunatic. But
this last conceit is not so much based upon the madness of particular
actions, as upon the whole drift of my ordinary and hourly ones;
those, in which I most resemble all other Mardians. It seems like
going through with some nonsensical whim-whams, dest