Page:Karel Čapek - The Absolute at Large (1927).djvu/172



is a little island, practically nothing more than a rock of pliocene tufa far to the west of the Hebrides. A few stunted birches, a handful of heather and dry grass, flocks of nesting seagulls and semi-arctic butterflies of the order Polyommatus are all that lives on this lost outpost of our hemisphere, out amid the endless beating of the seas and the equally endless procession of clouds for ever laden with rain. For that matter, St. Kilda has always been uninhabited, is now, and will for ever be so.

Nevertheless it was there that His Majesty's ship Dragon dropped anchor, towards the end of autumn. Carpenters came off the ship with timbers and planks, and by evening they had built a large, low wooden house. The next day upholsterers arrived, bringing with them the finest and most comfortable furniture. On the third day stewards, cooks, and waiters emerged from the depths of the ship and carried into the building crockery, wine, preserves, and everything that civilization has provided for rich, fastidious, and powerful men.