Post by mayweed on Jul 15, 2006 9:33:29 GMT -5
From my heart, Sirs and Madams, to yours, I’ll speak and tell of how an humble gnome, skinny once but fatter now, battered once but healthier now, lonely once but befriended now, of how that gnome, born deep within the looming shade of Gnomeregan, came by routes diverse and difficult, secret and strange, Sirs and Madams, all the way to a joyous meeting with Charming Celera and to a gathering of tried, trusted and true friends, in this place which is here and called the Defenders Hall; that’s what I’ll tell in my own simple way, if you’ll listen.
Well then, Sirs (and not forgetting Madams), I’ll begin…
Whichever way a gnome approaches Gnomeregan, whether straight from the east or through circuitous routes from the west, the hills rise up formidably into peaks and gullies, deep caves and darkening dank shades, in which brown-stained rivers race, slurp, and suck to death all living things that fall, slide, or are pushed into them.
Dark, dank, desolate, unvisited, forsaken, terrible, corrupting of gnome’s spirit, a place of desertion and death, and the last place a gnome would choose to live. Once into them, a gnome soon feels he may never get out again. Yet, Magical Madams and Serious Sirs, gnome did live there and found paltry and pitiful means to nibble, nurture and nourish. There on these slippery slopes did he eke out a living, delving into the rock for pitiful, puny-yet-precious metals which he would then sell in the village to purchase much needed items for his family.
Yes, this gnome not only had himself for which to care, heed and keep vigilance, but also other hungry mouths, needy mouths, noisy mouths. What was his name, you may ask, Mystified Madams and Stupefied Sirs? His name is most meaningful and I tell you it now with reverence: Durham Uffington.
This goodly and grand gnome was a prince and paragon of parents. Teaching all that he knew of the world, listening not only with one ear but with two, he had a mirthful and mellifluous laugh that could make a gloomy day bright as a sunlit vale, eyes that danced with vitality and vivification, and a heart which seemed six times as large as a gnome! As was his want and whim, he taught all members of the family to delve and mine so that, as they grew, there was more to sell. They prospered and flourished until the day the puny and puppish gnomes grew and built their own places to live and love.
Or so the story might have ended, Captivated Sirs and Enthralled Madams, if not for one fateful and fearful day…
It was a gloomy and gusty day, a day of blustery winds and hard-driving rains, where the not-so-copious trees would be so over-burdened that they would bend, flop and twist until their tops would be hitting and bashing at the unforgiving ground. Silty, dirty rivulets would pour over the rocks and seep through the crevices and cracks of the stones.
This was not the first of such days that I relate to your wondering ears, Depressed Sirs and Dashed Madams, no no no no no. This gnashing and wailing of the earth had been in continuance for a fortnight, and Desperate Durham, gallant and great gnome, happy once but sorrowful now, prosperous once (by his own counting) but destitute now, that brave and dauntless gnome felt driven and compelled to take his family out from the safety of their home and sought passage through the gale to the cave where they had but recently found a large vein.
He led them, battered and bashed by gusting gales, whipped and worn by rushing rain, on into that cave of relative and supposed safety, and there began to delve into the rock to acquire that life-maintaining metal. And so the family hacked and hammered at the vein, paying little-but-needing-to-be-much-more attention to the water that seeped and soaked about their feet, and the distant sound of water running and dripping.
Deeper and deeper into the dreadful tunnel they went, a wet and slippery slurry surging across their path in places. There was an air of imminent crushing, drowning, muddy slumping. On and on they delved, Durham leading, the mother Lorren behind, followed dutifully by little Ferris and Clayne and a so-very-small-and-insignificant gnome in the rear, making his not-so-strong-but-trying-very-hard best to keep up.
By now the distant roar had grown louder, and daring, beloved Durham was forced to notice that merely dripping water had turned to ominous oozing of mud, and sounds, dreadful and frightening, of sucking and slumping in the tunnel about them. Now Durham, brave father, noble gnome cried out, “We must go! Hurry now, hurry!” and turned his family about, pushing and encouraging them to move more quickly as a lowering darkness descended about them all.
“Hurry now, my dears! Run, run!” but his words were lost to the smallest of them in the rumble and sudden rush and, growing, surging and huge, dreadful walls of mud and water and crushing stone, bearing massively down, coming faster and faster with what seemed like the cries of the lost and forlorn, overtaking him, turning him over and under, choking, reaching desperately for something, anything to grasp, turning and turning, crushed and battered, not knowing where was up and where down, mud at his mouth and in his nose, desperate for air, and he wanted to breathe, needed to breathe, and mud and stone was everywhere…
Suddenly, with a gulping gasp and a riotous retching he was free. Scrabbling and scraping, he pulled his torn and tattered body up to higher ground, where he sat and stared down at a sea of mud and rock where the cave had been. Stones, rocks and bodies churned within that muddy mess. Gnomes once lively now perished, once dancing now defunct, once joyous now inanimate.
And then a gnomish begrimed hand moved and he saw that it was connected to that right and wondrous Durham, the marvelous gnome who fathered him, but the movement caused the murky mud to pull and suck back at him. He did not falter, but strove ever to reach his son and the firmness of ground, but he was worn and weak, not able to stop himself from sinking.
“No!” the smallest of gnomes cried and tried to reach for him. He stretched into the mud-water again and again, his very-small-and-insignificant self vainly reaching for that most fabulous of fathers, watching in horror and growing despair as the mud oozed over Dauntless Durham, over his head, sucking, seeping, suffocating.
That smallest of gnomes tried everything in his power, yet it was all for naught. Weary and exhausted, the place where he sat, rain crashing down and blustery winds driving against him, his wrecked, battered and torn body filled the vale with the sobbing of gnome, from shock and from loss.
*falls silent, staring into the air. A tear glistens at the corner of his eye and he wipes it with his broken and disfigured hand*
Well, and not ill, Subdued Sirs and Mute Madams, this gnome, whom you may have figured is me, myself, Mayweed, stayed up in the hills near Gnomeregan, doing his best to let his body heal, but knowing nothing of the healing arts. Watched as his sores grew infected, his hair fall out, his body waste away, and his hand become almost useless. When he had the strength and stamina, he strove to continue his father’s work, delving and digging as best he could and, once his sores had healed and his scabs had cleared, began the journey to the village to sell what he had mined. But he was so disfigured, paltry and pathetic, scabby and scratched, that none wished to look upon him. They mocked at him, jeered at him, called him nasty names until his head hung low with shame and humiliation.
Lonely and dejected, isolated and desolate, he left the hills on a journey to Kharanos, and there he met the Sunny Celera, the first to not look upon him with horror, Satisfied Sirs and Marveling Madams, with whom he chatted and conversed, and through whom he has now met so many fabulous friends that Mayweed, sad once but happy now, solitary once but acquainted now, cannot but jump for joy!
Well then, Sirs (and not forgetting Madams), I’ll begin…
Whichever way a gnome approaches Gnomeregan, whether straight from the east or through circuitous routes from the west, the hills rise up formidably into peaks and gullies, deep caves and darkening dank shades, in which brown-stained rivers race, slurp, and suck to death all living things that fall, slide, or are pushed into them.
Dark, dank, desolate, unvisited, forsaken, terrible, corrupting of gnome’s spirit, a place of desertion and death, and the last place a gnome would choose to live. Once into them, a gnome soon feels he may never get out again. Yet, Magical Madams and Serious Sirs, gnome did live there and found paltry and pitiful means to nibble, nurture and nourish. There on these slippery slopes did he eke out a living, delving into the rock for pitiful, puny-yet-precious metals which he would then sell in the village to purchase much needed items for his family.
Yes, this gnome not only had himself for which to care, heed and keep vigilance, but also other hungry mouths, needy mouths, noisy mouths. What was his name, you may ask, Mystified Madams and Stupefied Sirs? His name is most meaningful and I tell you it now with reverence: Durham Uffington.
This goodly and grand gnome was a prince and paragon of parents. Teaching all that he knew of the world, listening not only with one ear but with two, he had a mirthful and mellifluous laugh that could make a gloomy day bright as a sunlit vale, eyes that danced with vitality and vivification, and a heart which seemed six times as large as a gnome! As was his want and whim, he taught all members of the family to delve and mine so that, as they grew, there was more to sell. They prospered and flourished until the day the puny and puppish gnomes grew and built their own places to live and love.
Or so the story might have ended, Captivated Sirs and Enthralled Madams, if not for one fateful and fearful day…
It was a gloomy and gusty day, a day of blustery winds and hard-driving rains, where the not-so-copious trees would be so over-burdened that they would bend, flop and twist until their tops would be hitting and bashing at the unforgiving ground. Silty, dirty rivulets would pour over the rocks and seep through the crevices and cracks of the stones.
This was not the first of such days that I relate to your wondering ears, Depressed Sirs and Dashed Madams, no no no no no. This gnashing and wailing of the earth had been in continuance for a fortnight, and Desperate Durham, gallant and great gnome, happy once but sorrowful now, prosperous once (by his own counting) but destitute now, that brave and dauntless gnome felt driven and compelled to take his family out from the safety of their home and sought passage through the gale to the cave where they had but recently found a large vein.
He led them, battered and bashed by gusting gales, whipped and worn by rushing rain, on into that cave of relative and supposed safety, and there began to delve into the rock to acquire that life-maintaining metal. And so the family hacked and hammered at the vein, paying little-but-needing-to-be-much-more attention to the water that seeped and soaked about their feet, and the distant sound of water running and dripping.
Deeper and deeper into the dreadful tunnel they went, a wet and slippery slurry surging across their path in places. There was an air of imminent crushing, drowning, muddy slumping. On and on they delved, Durham leading, the mother Lorren behind, followed dutifully by little Ferris and Clayne and a so-very-small-and-insignificant gnome in the rear, making his not-so-strong-but-trying-very-hard best to keep up.
By now the distant roar had grown louder, and daring, beloved Durham was forced to notice that merely dripping water had turned to ominous oozing of mud, and sounds, dreadful and frightening, of sucking and slumping in the tunnel about them. Now Durham, brave father, noble gnome cried out, “We must go! Hurry now, hurry!” and turned his family about, pushing and encouraging them to move more quickly as a lowering darkness descended about them all.
“Hurry now, my dears! Run, run!” but his words were lost to the smallest of them in the rumble and sudden rush and, growing, surging and huge, dreadful walls of mud and water and crushing stone, bearing massively down, coming faster and faster with what seemed like the cries of the lost and forlorn, overtaking him, turning him over and under, choking, reaching desperately for something, anything to grasp, turning and turning, crushed and battered, not knowing where was up and where down, mud at his mouth and in his nose, desperate for air, and he wanted to breathe, needed to breathe, and mud and stone was everywhere…
Suddenly, with a gulping gasp and a riotous retching he was free. Scrabbling and scraping, he pulled his torn and tattered body up to higher ground, where he sat and stared down at a sea of mud and rock where the cave had been. Stones, rocks and bodies churned within that muddy mess. Gnomes once lively now perished, once dancing now defunct, once joyous now inanimate.
And then a gnomish begrimed hand moved and he saw that it was connected to that right and wondrous Durham, the marvelous gnome who fathered him, but the movement caused the murky mud to pull and suck back at him. He did not falter, but strove ever to reach his son and the firmness of ground, but he was worn and weak, not able to stop himself from sinking.
“No!” the smallest of gnomes cried and tried to reach for him. He stretched into the mud-water again and again, his very-small-and-insignificant self vainly reaching for that most fabulous of fathers, watching in horror and growing despair as the mud oozed over Dauntless Durham, over his head, sucking, seeping, suffocating.
That smallest of gnomes tried everything in his power, yet it was all for naught. Weary and exhausted, the place where he sat, rain crashing down and blustery winds driving against him, his wrecked, battered and torn body filled the vale with the sobbing of gnome, from shock and from loss.
*falls silent, staring into the air. A tear glistens at the corner of his eye and he wipes it with his broken and disfigured hand*
Well, and not ill, Subdued Sirs and Mute Madams, this gnome, whom you may have figured is me, myself, Mayweed, stayed up in the hills near Gnomeregan, doing his best to let his body heal, but knowing nothing of the healing arts. Watched as his sores grew infected, his hair fall out, his body waste away, and his hand become almost useless. When he had the strength and stamina, he strove to continue his father’s work, delving and digging as best he could and, once his sores had healed and his scabs had cleared, began the journey to the village to sell what he had mined. But he was so disfigured, paltry and pathetic, scabby and scratched, that none wished to look upon him. They mocked at him, jeered at him, called him nasty names until his head hung low with shame and humiliation.
Lonely and dejected, isolated and desolate, he left the hills on a journey to Kharanos, and there he met the Sunny Celera, the first to not look upon him with horror, Satisfied Sirs and Marveling Madams, with whom he chatted and conversed, and through whom he has now met so many fabulous friends that Mayweed, sad once but happy now, solitary once but acquainted now, cannot but jump for joy!
