The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: The End of the World

The final chapter of The Voyage of the DawnTreader (Book 5 of The Chronicles of Narnia series by C. S. Lewis) brings the ship to the end of the world.  In order to awaken the sleeping Lords for which the quest had launched, the ship must reach the end of the world and one passenger cross over to Aslan’s country.  Reepicheap, the brave and noble mouse, volunteers to be that sacrificial person. 

 

The ship goes as far as it can navigate, and Reepicheap, Edmund, Lucy and Eustace embark on a boat to the end.  Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace will only go so far as to reach the portal to cross back from Narnia to Earth, but Reepicheap will cross the end of the world into Aslan’s country.  Caspian had wanted to go, but as King he could not abdicate his throne.  So he stays behind.  This is such a wonderful passage. 

 

He Caspian] cheered up a little later on, but it was a grievous parting on both sides and I will not dwell on it. About two o'clock in the afternoon, well victualled and watered (though they thought they would need neither food nor drink) and with Reepicheep's coracle on board, the boat pulled away from the Dawn Treader to row through the endless carpet of lilies. The Dawn Treader flew all her flags and hung out her shields to honour their departure. Tall and big and homelike she looked from their low position with the lilies all round them. And even before she was out of sight they saw her turn and begin rowing slowly westward. Yet though Lucy shed a few tears she could not feel it as much as you might have expected. The light, the silence, the tingling smell of the Silver Sea, even (in some odd way) the loneliness itself, were too exciting.

 

There was no need to row, for the current drifted them steadily to the east. None of them slept nor ate. All that night and all next day they glided eastward, and when the third day dawned—with a brightness you or I could not bear even if we had dark glasses on—they saw a wonder ahead. It was as if a wall stood up between them and the sky, a greenish-grey, trembling, shimmering wall. Then up came the sun, and at its first rising they saw it through the wall and it turned into wonderful rainbow colours. Then they knew that the wall was really a long, tall wave—a wave endlessly fixed in one place as you may often see at the edge of a waterfall. It seemed to be about thirty feet high, and the current was gliding them swiftly towards it. You might have supposed they would have thought of their danger. They didn't. I don't think anyone could have in their position. For now they saw something not only behind the wave but behind the sun. They could not have seen even the sun if their eyes had not been strengthened by the water of the Last Sea. But now they could look at the rising sun and see it clearly and see things beyond it. What they saw—eastward, beyond the sun—was a range of mountains. It was so high that either they never saw the top of it or they forgot it. None of them remembers seeing any sky in that direction. And the mountains must really have been outside the world. For any mountains even a quarter or a twentieth of that height ought to have had ice and snow on them. But these were warm and green and full of forests and waterfalls however high you looked. And suddenly there came a breeze from the east, tossing the top of the wave into foamy shapes and ruffling the smooth water all round them. It lasted only a second or so but what it brought them in that second none of those three children will ever forget. It brought both a smell and a sound, a musical sound. Edmund and Eustace would never talk about it afterwards. Lucy could only say, "It would break your heart." "Why," said I, "was it so sad?" "Sad!! No," said Lucy.

 

No one in that boat doubted that they were seeing beyond the End of the World into Aslan's country.

 

At that moment, with a crunch, the boat ran aground. The water was too shallow now even for it. "This," said Reepicheep, "is where I go on alone."

 

They did not even try to stop him, for everything now felt as if it had been fated or had happened before. They helped him to lower his little coracle. Then he took off his sword ("I shall need it no more," he said) and flung it far away across the lilied sea. Where it fell it stood upright with the hilt above the surface. Then he bade them good-bye, trying to be sad for their sakes; but he was quivering with happiness. Lucy, for the first and last time, did what she had always wanted to do, taking him in her arms and caressing him. Then hastily he got into his coracle and took his paddle, and the current caught it and away he went, very black against the lilies. But no lilies grew on the wave; it was a smooth green slope. The coracle went more and more quickly, and beautifully it rushed up the wave's side. For one split second they saw its shape and Reepicheep's on the very top. Then it vanished, and since that moment no one can truly claim to have seen Reepicheep the Mouse. But my belief is that he came safe to Aslan's country and is alive there to this day.

 

As the sun rose the sight of those mountains outside the world faded away. The wave remained but there was only blue sky behind it.

Of course this is allegorical.  Aslan is God and Aslan’s country is paradise, located at the farthest east possible.  I was not familiar with the term, “coracle.”  From Wikipedia: “A coracle is a small, rounded, lightweight boat of the sort traditionally used in Wales, and also in parts of the west of Ireland and also particularly on the River Boyne, and in Scotland, particularly the River Spey.”   Reepicheap rides the wave and just suddenly disappears, almost as if he’s assumed into heaven.