Chapter 3 Chapter Three

"Master Horse, Master Horse," said Tirian, hastily cutting the reins from the horse, "how did these foreigners come to enslave you? Was Narnia conquered? A battle?" "No, Sire," gasped the horse, "here is Aslan. Everything is done at his orders. He has ordered--" "We're in danger, land," said Jewel.Tirian looked up, and saw the Calormenes (with some human-speaking beasts among them) beginning to run towards them from all directions.Two died without a cry, so that for a moment the rest did not know what had happened.But now they know.Most of them had unsheathed scimitars in their hands.

"Hurry up. Get on my back," said Jewel. The King flew on the back of his old friend the Unicorn, and it turned and galloped away.It changed direction two or three times, and when they were out of sight of the enemy, it crossed a stream at once, without letting up in its step, and cried out, "Where are you going, Sire? To Cair Paravel?" "Stop, friend," said Tirian, "let me down." He slid off the unicorn's back and faced it. "Jewel," said the King, "we have done a terrible thing." "We are all terribly angered," said Jewel.

"Yet they were unarmed - and we didn't challenge them - and unnoticed they pounced on them - Bah! Jewel, we're murderers. I'm forever ashamed." Jewel lowered her head.It also feels ashamed. "And," said the King, "the horse says it was done at Aslan's orders. And so does the mouse. They all say Aslan is here. But is it true?" "But, land, how did Aslan order such a terrible thing?" "Aslan is not a tame lion," said Tirian. "How do we know what Aslan will do? We, are murderers. I am determined to go back there, Jewel. I will hand over my sword, and deliver myself into the hands of the Calormenes, and ask them to bring me before Aslan. Let Aslan judge me fairly."

"Then you're going to die," Jewel said. " "Do you think I would mind if Aslan sentenced me to death?" said the king. "That would be trivial, very trivial. Rather than worry about fearing that Aslan has come, but he is not like the one we believe in." I'm afraid Aslan, whom I long for, would be better off dead. It's like the sun rising one day, but it's a dark sun." "I know," said Jewel, "or as if you drink water and it's dry. You're right, Luxia. This is the end of all things. Let's go back and surrender."

"There's no need for both of us to surrender." "If we have always loved each other, let me go with you now," said the Unicorn, "and if you die, and if Aslan is not the same Aslan, and I am left alive, and What's the point?" Weeping bitter tears, they turned and walked back together. As soon as they came to the place where the timber was being felled, the Calormenes uttered a cry, and came running towards them with weapons in their hands.But the king held out his sword with the hilt towards them, and he said: "I was King of Narnia and am a disgraced warrior, and I surrender myself to Aslan the Lion. Take me to Aslan."

"I also voluntarily surrendered." Zhenbao said. Then the dark-skinned people gathered around them in a dense crowd, smelling of garlic and onions, with white eyes gleaming horribly in brown faces.They put a rope bridle around Jewel's neck.They took the king's sword away, and tied his hands behind his back.One of the Calormenes, who wore a helmet instead of a turban, as if he were in command, snatched a gold hoop from Tirian's head, and stuffed it hastily somewhere under his coat.They took the two prisoners up the hill to a large clearing in the woods.This is what the detainees saw. /

In the middle of the clearing, at the top of the hill, was a stable-like hut with a thatched roof.The door of the house was closed.An ape sat on the grass in front of the door.Tirian and Jewel had expected to see Aslan, but they had never heard of an Ape, and they were amazed and bewildered when they saw the Ape.The Ape was Shift, of course, but, he looked, ten times uglier than when he lived by the Cauldron, because he was dressed up now.It was wearing a scarlet jacket which had been sewn for dwarfs, so it did not fit very well.It had jeweled slippers on its hind paws, and the slippers didn't fit or hold fast, because, you know, an ape's hind paws do look like human hands.It wears a hat that looks like a paper crown.There is a large pile of nuts beside it, and it keeps biting the nuts with a rattling up and down, and spits out the shells.It also kept pulling up its scarlet jacket to tickle itself.A crowd of human-speaking beasts stood facing the apes, and almost every face in the crowd looked woefully anxious and bewildered.They all moaned and whimpered when they saw who the prisoner was.

"Speaker of Aslan, Lord Shift," said the chief of the Calormenes, "we send the prisoner, and by our skill and valor, and by the word of the great god Tash, we bring these two desperate murderers Caught alive." "Give me the man's sword," said the Ape.So they took the king's sword and gave it to the ape with its belt.The Ape, with his sword and sword belt round his neck, looked very foolish and ignorant. "These two will be dealt with later," said the Ape, spitting the husks at the two prisoners. "I have other things to do first. They might as well wait. Now, listen to me. I will first It's about the nuts. There's the leader of the squirrels."

"Here, my lord," said a red squirrel, stepping forward and bowing nervously. "Oh, you are, is that you?" said the Ape, with a disgusting look on his face. "Now pay attention to my orders. I want--meaning that Aslan wants--Aslan also wants some nuts .The nuts you have already sent are not enough. Double the quantity. They must be here tomorrow at sunset. Not one bad or one small." The other squirrels let out a frightened grunt, and the leader squirrel summoned up his courage and said, " "Excuse me, can Aslan speak to us about this himself? If we are allowed to see the Lion—"

"You can't," said the Ape, "perhaps the Lion King is very kind (though most of you don't deserve it) and will come out for a few minutes tonight. Then you can all have a look. But the Lion King won't let you People crowded around him, pestering him with all sorts of questions, and whatever you wanted to say to the Lion, you had to report to the Lion through me, if I thought it worth bothering the Lion. In the meantime, all you squirrels, you'd better get nuts. Make sure you get the nuts here tomorrow night, or you're going to suffer. I'll tell you, I can say one thing and two things of!"

The poor squirrels all ran away in a panic, as if a dog were chasing them.This new order is dire news for them.The nuts which they had carefully hid for the winter were now nearly all eaten, and from what little remained they had given to the Apes far more than they could save. . Then a deep sound—that of a gigantic shaggy boar with tusks—came from another part of the crowd. "Why can't we see and talk to Aslan in a dignified manner?" it said. "In the old days, Aslan was often seen in Narnia, and everyone could talk to him face to face." "Don't believe that," said the Ape, "even if it were true, times have changed. Aslan said he was too gentle with you before, do you understand? Oh, he never He will be gentle. This time, he will make you look good. If you think he is a talkative lion, he will teach you severely." But there was a low moaning and moaning among the beasts; and after that a deathly silence, which was even more tragic. ; "There is one other thing you should know now," said the Ape. "I have heard some of you say that I am an Ape. I tell you, I am not an Ape. I am a Man. If I look Like an ape, it's because I'm old and old, and I'm hundreds and thousands of years old. And, because I'm so old, I'm so smart. And because I'm so smart, Aslan has been Talk to me alone. Aslan is impatient to talk to many stupid animals. He'll tell me what you have to do, and I'll tell the rest of you. Take my advice, and take care to use double to get things done as quickly as possible, because the Lion has no intention of putting up with nonsense." There was a dead silence, save for the cry of a little bird and the sound of its mother trying to tell it not to cry. "There's one more thing," continued the Ape, stuffing a new nut into his mouth, "I heard some horses say, let's hurry up and get this log job out of the way." Get it done as quickly as you can, and we'll be free again. Oh, get that out of your minds at once. And it's not just horses that gotta get that out of the way. Anything that can work will be called it in the future Go to work. Aslan and the king of Calormene have come to an agreement on this matter, and our black-faced friends, the Calormenes, call this king 'Tithrock'. All horses, bulls, Donkeys, etc., are to be sent to Calormene to work and earn a living--to drag and drag and all the things that horses in other countries do. All digging animals, like moles and squirrels and dwarfs, etc., All to work in the mines of Tithrock. And—" "No, no, no," wailed the beasts, "this cannot be true. Aslan will never sell us as slaves to King Calormene."; "Don't do this Don't make any noise! growled the Ape, "who said you were going to be a slave?"You will not be slaves.You'll get paid--good wages anyway.That is to say, all your wages will go to Aslan's treasury, and Aslan will use all the money to benefit everyone. "The Ape looked at the Calormene chief, almost winking at him. The Calormene answered with a bow, all Calormene flamboyance. "The wisest and wisest speaker of the Lion of Aslan, Tithrok (may he live forever) agrees with His Excellency in this prudent and wise plan." "There! Look!" said the Ape. "It's all arranged. It's all for your benefit. With the money you earn, we can use it to transform Narnia into a place worth living in." Country. Chairs and bananas will come in abundance - and build roads, big cities, schools, office buildings, whips, muzzles, saddles, cages, kennels, prisons - ah, build everything." "But we don't want all these things," said an old bear, "we want to be free, and we want to hear Aslan speak himself.". "Don't start an argument," said the Ape, "because I can't stand it. I'm a man, and you're just a fat, stupid old bear. What do you know about freedom? You think freedom means doing whatever you like." What? Tell you, you're wrong. That's not true freedom. True freedom means doing what I tell you to do." "Hey-en-en-he." The old bear muttered resentfully, scratching his head, feeling that this kind of question was really hard to understand. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," said the high-pitched voice of a downy lamb, so childish that it dared to speak so boldly that everyone was amazed: . "What kind of opinion is that?" said the Ape. "Speak!" "I'm sorry," said the lamb, "I don't understand. What have we to do with the Calormenes? We belong to Aslan. They belong to Tash. They have a god called Tash. It is said that the god Tash has four An arm, and an eagle's head. They kill on the altar of the god Tash. I don't believe there is such a thing as Tash. But if there is, how can Aslan be friends with him?" All the beasts raised their heads obliquely, and all their bright eyes were fixed on the ape.They know it's the biggest problem anyone hasn't asked yet. The ape jumped up and spit at the lamb. "Baby!" hissed the Ape, "foolish little lamb! Go home to your mother and suckle. What do you know about such things? But you other beasts listen to Tash as nothing more than Another name for Aslan. All the old notions that we are right and the Calormenes are wrong are all nonsense. Now we understand better. The Calormenes use different words, but we mean They all mean the same thing. Tash and Aslan are just two different names, and you know who they refer to. So there was never any quarrel between them. You stupid beasts, keep this in mind : Tash is Aslan, and Aslan is Tash." You know how sad your own dog can look sometimes.Think of the faces of domestic dogs, and then of these human-speaking beasts—all the honest, humble, bewildered faces of birds, bears, canines, squirrels, rats, etc., far from Much sadder than a domestic dog's face.Every tail is drooping, every whisker is limp.When you see their faces, you feel sympathy for them and your heart breaks.Only one brute didn't look unhappy at all. It was a ginger cat--a great big tomcat in his prime.He sat upright in front of all beasts, with his tail wrapped around his toes.He kept his eyes fixed on the Ape and the Calormene, and never blinked. , "Excuse me," said the Tomcat, very politely, "but I'm interested in that question. Does your friend from Calormene say the same?" "Relax yourself," said the Calormene chief, "the Enlightened Ape—I mean Man—says rightly that Aslan means Tash, neither more nor less." "Especially Aslan doesn't mean better than Tash." "Not at all," said the Calormene chief, his eyes fixed on the tomcat's face. "Ginger Cat, is it more than enough to answer you with these words?" said the Ape. "Oh, of course," said Ginger Cat coldly, "thank you very much. I'm just trying to figure it out. I think I'm starting to get it." Up to this moment neither King nor Jewel had said anything; they were waiting for the Ape to call them to talk, because they felt it was useless to intervene.But now Tirian looked around at the miserable faces of the Beasts of Narnia, and saw that they would all believe that Aslan and Tash were one and two, and two were one, and Tirian could bear it no longer. "Ape," cried the King, "you lie. You lie viciously. You lie like Calormenus, you lie like an Ape." He wanted to go on, he wanted to ask: How could the terrible god Tash, who drank the blood of the people, and the good Lion, who saved all Narnia with his own blood, be the same god? ?Had he been allowed to speak, the reign of the Ape might have ended that day, and the beasts might have seen the truth and overthrew the Ape.Before he could say another word, however, two Calormenes struck him on the mouth with all their might, and another Calormene kicked his feet behind his back.As he fell, the Ape screamed in anger and terror: "Take him away, take him away. Take him to a place where he can't hear us and we can't hear him. Tie him to a tree there. Then I'm going to—I mean It's Aslan who's going to—judge him."