Heart of Darkness Read online

  Joseph Conrad: The Heart of Darkness

  I

  The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor

  without a flutter of the sails, and was at rest. The flood

  had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound

  down the river, the only thing for it was to come to

  and wait for the turn of the tide.

  The sea-reach of the Thames stretched before us

  like the beginning of an interminable waterway. In

  the offing the sea and the sky were welded together

  without a joint, and in the luminous space the tanned

  sails of the barges drifting up with the tide seemed to

  stand still in red clusters of canvas sharply peaked,

  with gleams of varnished spirits. A haze rested on the

  low shores that ran out to sea in vanishing flatness.

  The air was dark above Gravesend, and farther back

  still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brood-

  ing motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town

  on earth.

  The Director of Companies was our captain and our

  host. We four affectionately watched his back as he

  stood in the bows looking to seaward. On the whole

  river there was nothing that looked half so nautical.

  He resembled a pilot, which to a seaman is trust-

  worthiness personified. It was difficult to realize his

  work was not out there in the luminous estuary, but

  behind him, within the brooding gloom.

  Between us there was, as I have already said some-

  where, the bond of the sea. Besides holding our hearts

  together through long periods of separation, it had

  the effect of making us tolerant of each other's yarns

  -- and even convictions. The Lawyer -- the best of old

  fellows -- had, because of his many years and many

  virtues, the only cushion on deck, and was lying on the

  only rug. The Accountant had brought out already a

  box of dominoes, and was toying architecturally with

  the bones. Marlow sat cross-legged right aft, leaning

  against the mizzenmast. He had sunken cheeks, a

  yellow complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect,

  and, with his arms dropped, the palms of hands out-

  wards, resembled an idol. The Director, satisfied the

  anchor had good hold, made his way aft and sat down

  amongst us. We exchanged a few words lazily. After-

  wards there was silence on board the yacht. For some

  reason or other we did not begin that game of domi-

  noes. We felt meditative, and fit for nothing but

  placid staring. The day was ending in a serenity of

  still and exquisite brilliance. The water shone pacifi-

  cally; the sky, without a speck, was a benign immen-

  sity of unstained light; the very mist on the Essex

  marsh was like a gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from

  the wooded rises inland, and draping the low shores

  in diaphanous folds. Only the gloom to the west,

  brooding over the upper reaches, became more sombre

  every minute, as if angered by the approach of the sun.

  And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall, the

  sun sank low, and from glowing white changed to a

  dull red without rays and without heat, as if about to

  go out suddenly, stricken to death by the touch of

  that gloom brooding over a crowd of men.

  Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the

  serenity became less brilliant but more profound. The

  old river in its broad reach rested unruffled at the

  decline of day, after ages of good service done to the

  race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil

  dignity of a waterway leading to the uttermost ends

  of the earth. We looked at the venerable stream not

  in the vivid flush of a short day that comes and departs

  for ever, but in the august light of abiding memories.

  And indeed nothing is easier for a man who has, as

  the phrase goes, "followed the sea" with reverence

  and affection, than to evoke the great spirit of the past

  upon the lower reaches of the Thames. The tidal cur-

  rent runs to and fro in its unceasing service, crowded

  with memories of men and ships it had borne to the

  rest of home or to the battles of the sea. It had known

  and served all the men of whom the nation is proud,

  from Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights

  all, titled and untitled -- the great knights-errant of

  the sea. It had borne all the ships whose names are

  like jewels flashing in the night of time, from the

  Golden Hind returning with her round flanks full of

  treasure, to be visited by the Queen's Highness and

  thus pass out of the gigantic tale, to the Erebus and

  Terror, bound on other conquests -- and that never

  returned. It had known the ships and the men. They

  had sailed from Deptford, from Greenwich, from

  Erith -- the adventurers and the settlers; kings' ships

  and the ships of men on 'Change; captains, admirals,

  the dark "interlopers" of the Eastern trade, and the

  commissioned "generals" of East India fleets. Hunters

  for gold or pursuers of fame, they all had gone out

  on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch,

  messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a

  spark from the sacred fire. What greatness had not

  floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of

  an unknown earth! . . . The dreams of men, the

  seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.

  The sun set; the dusk fell on the stream, and lights

  began to appear along the shore. The Chapman light-

  house, a three-legged thing erect on a mud-flat, shone

  strongly. Lights of ships moved in the fairway -- a

  great stir of lights going up and going down. And

  farther west on the upper reaches the place of the

  monstrous town was still marked ominously on the

  sky, a brooding gloom in sunshine, a lurid glare under

  the stars.

  "And this also," said Marlow suddenly, "has been

  one of the dark places of the earth."

  He was the only man of us who still "followed the

  sea." The worst that could be said of him was that he

  did not represent his class. He was a seaman, but he

  was a wanderer, too, while most seamen lead, if one

  may so express it, a sedentary life. Their minds are

  of the stay-at-home order, and their home is always

  with them -- the ship; and so is their country -- the sea.

  One ship is very much like another, and the sea is

  always the same. In the immutability of their sur-

  roundings the foreign shores, the foreign faces, the

  changing immensity of life, glide past, veiled not by

  a sense of mystery but by a slightly disdainful igno-

  rance; for there is nothing mysterious to a seaman

  unless it be the sea itself, which is the mistress of his

  existence and as inscrutable as Destiny. For the rest,
/>
  after his hours of work, a casual stroll or a casual spree

  on shore suffices to unfold for him the secret of a

  whole continent, and generally he finds the secret not

  worth knowing. The yarns of seamen have a direct

  simplicity, the whole meaning of which lies within the

  shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not typical

  (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to

  him the meaning of an episode was not inside like a

  kernel but outside, enveloping the tale which brought

  it out only as a glow brings out a haze, in the likeness

  of one of these misty halos that sometimes are made

  visible by the spectral illumination of moonshine.

  His remark did not seem at all surprising. It was

  just like Marlow. It was accepted in silence. No one

  took the trouble to grunt even; and presently he said,

  very slow --

  "I was thinking of very old times, when the

  Romans first came here, nineteen hundred years ago --

  the other day.... Light came out of this river

  since -- you say Knights? Yes; but it is like a running

  blaze on a plain, like a flash of lightning in the clouds.

  We live in the flicker -- may it last as long as the old

  earth keeps rolling! But darkness was here yesterday.

  Imagine the feelings of a commander of a fine -- what

  d'ye call 'em? -- trireme in the Mediterranean, or-

  dered suddenly to the north run overland across the

  Gauls in a hurry; put in charge of one of these craft

  the legionaries -- a wonderful lot of handy men they

  must have been, too -- used to build, apparently by the

  hundred, in a month or two, if we may believe what

  we read. Imagine him here -- the very end of the

  world, a sea the colour of lead, a sky the colour of

  smoke, a kind of ship about as rigid as a concertina --

  and going up this river with stores, or orders, or what

  you like. Sand-banks, marshes, forests, savages, --

  precious little to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing but

  Thames water to drink. No Falernian wine here, no

  going ashore. Here and there a military camp lost in

  a wilderness, like a needle in a bundle of hay -- cold,

  fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death -- death skulk-

  ing in the air, in the water, in the bush. They must

  have been dying like flies here. Oh, yes -- he did it.

  Did it very well, too, no doubt, and without thinking

  much about it either, except afterwards to brag of

  what he had gone through in his time, perhaps. They

  were men enough to face the darkness. And perhaps

  he was cheered by keeping his eye on a chance of pro-

  motion to the fleet at Ravenna by and by, if he had

  good friends in Rome and survived the awful climate.

  Or think of a decent young citizen in a toga -- perhaps

  too much dice, you know -- coming out here in the

  train of some prefect, or tax-gatherer, or trader even,

  to mend his fortunes. Land in a swamp, march

  through the woods, and in some inland post feel the

  savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him --

  all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in

  the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men.

  There's no initiation either into such mysteries. He

  has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible,

  which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too,

  that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the

  abomination -- you know, imagine the growing regrets,

  the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the sur-

  render, the hate."

  He paused.

  "Mind," he began again, lifting one arm from the

  elbow, the palm of the hand outwards, so that, with

  his legs folded before him, he had the pose of a

  Buddha preaching in European clothes and without a

  lotus-flower -- "Mind, none of us would feel exactly

  like this. What saves us is efficiency -- the devotion to

  efficiency. But these chaps were not much account,

  really. They were no colonists; their administration

  was merely a squeeze, and nothing more, I suspect.

  They were conquerors, and for that you want only

  brute force -- nothing to boast of, when you have it,

  since your strength is just an accident arising from the

  weakness of others. They grabbed what they could get

  for the sake of what was to be got. It was just robbery

  with violence, aggravated murder on a great scale,

  and men going at it blind -- as is very proper for those

  who tackle a darkness. The conquest of the earth,

  which mostly means the taking it away from those

  who have a different complexion or slightly flatter

  noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you

  look into it too much. What redeems it is the idea

  only. An idea at the back of it; not a sentimental pre-

  tence but an idea; and an unselfish belief in the idea --

  something you can set up, and bow down before, and

  offer a sacrifice to..."

  He broke off. Flames glided in the river, small

  green flames, red flames, white flames, pursuing, over-

  taking, joining, crossing each other -- then separating

  slowly or hastily. The traffic of the great city went on

  in the deepening night upon the sleepless river. We

  looked on, waiting patiently -- there was nothing else

  to do till the end of the flood; but it was only after a

  long silence, when he said, in a hesitating voice, "I

  suppose you fellows remember I did once turn fresh

  water sailor for a bit," that we knew we were fated,

  before the ebb began to run, to hear about one of

  Marlow's inconclusive experiences.

  "I don't want to bother you much with what hap-

  pened to me personally," he began, showing in this

  remark the weakness of many tellers of tales who

  seem so often unaware of what their audience would

  best like to hear; "yet to understand the effect of it on

  me you ought to know how I got out there, what I

  saw, how I went up that river to the place where I

  first met the poor chap. It was the farthest point of

  navigation and the culminating point of my experi-

  ence. It seemed somehow to throw a kind of light on

  everything about me -- and into my thoughts. It was

  sombre enough, too -- and pitiful -- not extraordinary

  in any way -- not very clear either. No, not very clear.

  And yet it seemed to throw a kind of light.

  "I had then, as you remember, just returned to

  London after a lot of Indian Ocean, Pacific, China

  Seas a regular dose of the East -- six years or so, and

  I was loafing about, hindering you fellows in your

  work and invading your homes, just as though I had

  got a heavenly mission to civilize you. It was very fine

  for a time, but after a bit I did get tired of resting.

  Then I began to look for a ship -- I should think the

  hardest work on earth. But the ships wouldn't even

  look at me. And I got tired of that game, too.

  "Now when I was a little chap I had a passion for

  map
s. I would look for hours at South America, or

  Africa, or Australia, and lose myself in all the glories

  of exploration. At that time there were many blank

  spaces on the earth, and when I saw one that looked

  particularly inviting on a map (but they all look that)

  I would put my finger on it and say, 'When I grow

  up I will go there.' The North Pole was one of these

  places, I remember. Well, I haven't been there yet,

  and shall not try now. The glamour's off. Other places

  were scattered about the Equator, and in every sort of

  latitude all over the two hemispheres. I have been in

  some of them, and . . . well, we won't talk about

  that. But there was one yet -- the biggest, the most

  blank, so to speak -- that I had a hankering after.

  "True, by this time it was not a blank space any

  more. It had got filled since my boyhood with rivers

  and lakes and names. It had ceased to be a blank space

  of delightful mystery -- a white patch for a boy to

  dream gloriously over. It had become a place of dark-

  ness. But there was in it one river especially, a mighty

  big river, that you could see on the map, resembling

  an immense snake uncoiled, with its head in the sea, its

  body at rest curving afar over a vast country, and its

  tail lost in the depths of the land. And as I looked at

  the map of it in a shop-window, it fascinated me as a

  snake would a bird -- a silly little bird. Then I remem-

  bered there was a big concern, a Company for trade

  on that river. Dash it all! I thought to myself, they

  can't trade without using some kind of craft on that lot

  of fresh water -- steamboats! Why shouldn't I try to

  get charge of one? I went on along Fleet Street, but

  could not shake off the idea. The snake had charmed

  me.

  "You understand it was a Continental concern, that

  Trading society; but I have a lot of relations living on

  the Continent, because it's cheap and not so nasty as it

  looks, they say.

  "I am sorry to own I began to worry them. This

  was already a fresh departure for me. I was not used

  to get things that way, you know. I always went my

  own road and on my own legs where I had a mind to

  go. I wouldn't have believed it of myself; but, then --

  you see -- I felt somehow I must get there by hook or

  by crook. So I worried them. The men said 'My dear

  fellow,' and did nothing. Then -- would you believe

  it? -- I tried the women. I, Charlie Marlow, set the

  women to work -- to get a job. Heavens! We]l, you

  see, the notion drove me. I had an aunt, a dear enthu-

  siastic soul. She wrote: 'It will be delightful. I am

  ready to do anything, anything for you. It is a glorious

  idea. I know the wife of a very high personage in the

  Administration, and also a man who has lots of influ-

  ence with,' etc., etc. She was determined to make no

  end of fuss to get me appointed skipper of a river

  steamboat, if such was my fancy.

  "I got my appointment -- of course; and I got it

  very quick. It appears the Company had received news

  that one of their captains had been killed in a scuffle

  with the natives. This was my chance, and it made me

  the more anxious to go. It was only months and

  months afterwards, when I made the attempt to re-

  cover what was left of the body, that I heard the

  original quarrel arose from a misunderstanding about

  some hens. Yes, two black hens. Fresleven -- that was

  the fellow's name, a Dane -- thought himself wronged

  somehow in the bargain, so he went ashore and started

  to hammer the chief of the village with a stick. Oh,

  it didn't surprise me in the least to hear this, and at the

  same time to be told that Fresleven was the gentlest,

  quietest creature that ever walked on two legs. No

  doubt he was; but he had been a couple of years al-

  ready out there engaged in the noble cause, you know,

  and he probably felt the need at last of asserting his

  self-respect in some way. Therefore he whacked the

  old nigger mercilessly, while a big crowd of his people

  watched him, thunderstruck, till some man -- I was

  told the chief's son -- in desperation at hearing the old

  chap yell, made a tentative jab with a spear at the

  white man -- and of course it went quite easy between

  the shoulder-blades. Then the whole population

  cleared into the forest, expecting all kinds of calamities

  to happen, while, on the other hand, the steamer Fres-

  leven commanded left also in a bad panic, in charge of

  the engineer, I believe. Afterwards nobody seemed to

  trouble much about Fresleven's remains, till I got out