The Voyage of Captain PopanillaDisraeli, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield
General
The Voyage of Captain Popanilla
Disraeli, Benjamin, Earl of Beaconsfield
Utopias -- Fiction
Popanilla having consented to become an author upon these terms,
the publisher asked him to dine with him, and introduced him to an
intelligent individual. This intelligent individual listened attentively
to all Popanilla’s adventures. The Captain concealed nothing. He began
with the eternal lock of hair, and showed how wonderfully this world was
constituted, that even the loss of a thing was not useless; from which
it was clear that Utility was Providence. After drinking some capital
wine, the intelligent individual told Popanilla that he was wrong in
supposing Fantaisie to be an island; that, on the contrary, it was a
great continent; that this was proved by the probable action of the
tides in the part of the island which had not yet been visited; that the
consequence of these tides would be that, in the course of a season
or two, Fantaisie would become a great receptacle for icebergs, and be
turned into the North Pole; that, therefore, the seasons throughout the
world would be changed; that this year, in Vraibleusia, the usual winter
would be omitted, and that when the present summer was finished the
dog-days would again commence. Popanilla took his leave highly delighted
with this intelligent individual and with the bookseller’s wine.
Owing to the competition which existed between the publishers, the
printers, and the engravers of the city of Hubbabub, and the great
exertions of the intelligent individual, the Narrative of Captain
Popanilla’s Voyage was brought out in less than a week, and was
immediately in everybody’s hand. The work contained a detailed account
of everything which took place daring the whole of the three days, and
formed a quarto volume. The plates were numerous and highly interesting,
There was a line engraving of Alligator Mountain and a mezzotint of
Seaweed Island; a view of the canoe N.E.; a view of the canoe N.W.;
a view of the canoe S.E.; a view of the canoe S.W. There were
highly-finished coloured drawings of the dried fish and the breadfruit,
and an exquisitely tinted representation of the latter in a mouldy
state. But the chef-d’oeuvre was the portrait of the Author himself. He
was represented trampling on the body of a boa constrictor of the first
quality, in the skin of which he was dressed; at his back were his bow
and arrows; his right hand rested on an uprooted pine-tree; he stood in
a desert between two volcanoes; at his feet was a lake of magnitude;
the distance lowered with an approaching tornado; but a lucky flash of
lightning revealed the range of the Andes and both oceans. Altogether he
looked the most dandified of savages, and the most savage of dandies. It
was a sublime lithograph, and produced scarcely less important effects
upon Popanilla’s fortune than that lucky ‘lock of hair;’ for no sooner
was the portrait published than Popanilla received a ticket for the
receptions of a lady of quality. On showing it to Skindeep, he was told
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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