← catalogue

She

by H. Rider Haggard · English · Gutenberg #3155 · 681,029 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of She
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: She

Author: H. Rider Haggard


        
Release date: April 6, 2006 [eBook #3155]
                Most recently updated: June 14, 2022

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3155

Credits: John Bickers, Dagny, William Kyngesburye and David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHE ***




She

by H. Rider Haggard

First Published 1886.

IN EARTH AND SKIE AND SEA
STRANGE THYNGS THER BE

_Doggerel couplet from the Sherd of Amenartas_


Contents

 INTRODUCTION
 I. MY VISITOR
 II. THE YEARS ROLL BY
 III. THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS
 IV. THE SQUALL
 V. THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN
 VI. AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY
 VII. USTANE SINGS
 VIII. THE FEAST, AND AFTER!
 IX. A LITTLE FOOT
 X. SPECULATIONS
 XI. THE PLAIN OF KÔR
 XII. “SHE”
 XIII. AYESHA UNVEILS
 XIV. A SOUL IN HELL
 XV. AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT
 XVI. THE TOMBS OF KÔR
 XVII. THE BALANCE TURNS
 XVIII. “GO, WOMAN!”
 XIX. “GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT!”
 XX. TRIUMPH
 XXI. THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET
 XXII. JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT
 XXIII. THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH
 XXIV. WALKING THE PLANK
 XXV. THE SPIRIT OF LIFE
 XXVI. WHAT WE SAW
 XXVII. WE LEAP
 XXVIII. OVER THE MOUNTAIN


I inscribe this history to
ANDREW LANG
in token of personal regard
and of
my sincere admiration
for his learning and his works




      SHE





INTRODUCTION


      In giving to the world the record of what, looked at as an
      adventure only, is I suppose one of the most wonderful and
      mysterious experiences ever undergone by mortal men, I feel it
      incumbent on me to explain what my exact connection with it is.
      And so I may as well say at once that I am not the narrator but
      only the editor of this extraordinary history, and then go on to
      tell how it found its way into my hands.

      Some years ago I, the editor, was stopping with a friend, “_vir
      doctissimus et amicus meus_,” at a certain University, which for
      the purposes of this history we will call Cambridge, and was one
      day much struck with the appearance of two persons whom I saw
      going arm-in-arm down the street. One of these gentlemen was I
      think, without exception, the handsomest young fellow I have ever
      seen. He was very tall, very broad, and had a look of power and a
      grace of bearing that seemed as native to him as it is to a wild
      stag. In addition his face was almost without flaw—a good face as
      well as a beautiful one, and when he lifted his hat, which he did
      just then to a passing lady, I saw that his head was covered with
      little golden curls growing close to the scalp.

      “Good gracious!” I said to my friend, with whom I was walking,
      “why, that fellow looks like a statue of Apollo come to life.
      What a splendid man he is!”

      “Yes,” he answered, “he is the handsomest man in the University,
      and one of the nicest too. They call him ‘the Greek god’; but
      look at the other one, he’s Vincey’s (that’s the god’s name)
      guardian, and supposed to be full of every kind of information.
      They call him ‘Charon.’” I looked, and found the older man quite
      as interesting in his way as the glorified specimen of humanity
      at his side. He appeared to be about forty years of age, and was
      I think as ugly as his companion was handsome. To begin with, he
      was shortish, rather bow-legged, very deep chested, and with
      unusually long arms. He had dark hair and small eyes, and the
      hair grew right down on his forehead, and his whiskers grew right
      up to his hair, so that there was uncommonly little of his
      countenance to be seen. Altogether he reminded me forcibly of a
      gorilla, and yet there was something very pleasing and genial
      about the man’s eye. I remember saying that I should like to know
      him.

      “All right,” answered my friend, “nothing easier. I know Vincey;
      I’ll introduce you,” and he did, and for some minutes we stood
      chatting—about the Zulu people, I think, for I had just returned
      from the Cape at the time. Presently, however, a stoutish lady,
      whose name I do not remember, came along the pavement,
      accompanied by a pretty fair-haired girl, and these two Mr.
      Vincey, who clearly knew them well, at once joined, walking off
      in their company. I remember being rather amused because of the
      change in the expression of the elder man, whose name I
      discovered was Holly, when he saw the ladies advancing. He
      suddenly stopped short in his talk, cast a reproachful look at
      his companion, and, with an abrupt nod to myself, turned and
      marched off alone across the street. I heard afterwards that he
      was popularly supposed to be as much afraid of a woman as most
      people are of a mad dog, which accounted for his precipitate
      retreat. I cannot say, however, that young Vincey showed much
      aversion to feminine society on this occasion. Indeed I remember
      laughing, and remarking to my friend at the time that he was not
      the sort of man whom it would be desirable to introduce to the
      lady one was going to marry, since it was exceedingly probable
      that the acquaintance would end in a transfer of her affections.
      He was altogether too good-looking, and, what is more, he had
      none of that consciousness and conceit about him which usually
      afflicts handsome men, and makes them deservedly disliked by
      their fellows.

      That same evening my visit came to an end, and this was the last
      I saw or heard of “Charon” and “the Greek god” for many a long
      day. Indeed, I have never seen either of them from that hour to
      this, and do not think it probable that I shall. But a month ago
      I received a letter and two packets, one of manuscript, and on
      opening the first found that it was signed by “Horace Holly,” a
      name that at the moment was not familiar to me. It ran as
      follows:—

      “—— College, Cambridge, May 1, 18—

      “My dear Sir,—You will be surprised, considering the very slight
      nature of our acquaintance, to get a letter from me. Indeed, I
      think I had better begin by reminding you that we once met, now
      some five years ago, when I and my ward Leo Vincey were
      introduced to you in the street at Cambridge. To be brief and
      come to my business. I have recently read with much interest a
      book of yours describing a Central African adventure. I take it
      that this book is partly true, and partly an effort of the
      imagination. However this may be, it has given me an idea. It
      happens, how you will see in the accompanying manuscript (which
      together with the Scarab, the ‘Royal Son of the Sun,’ and the
      original sherd, I am sending to you by hand), that my ward, or
      rather my adopted son Leo Vincey and myself have recently passed
      through a real African adventure, of a nature so much more
      marvellous than the one which you describe, that to tell the
      truth I am almost ashamed to submit it to you lest you should
      disbelieve my tale. You will see it stated in this manuscript
      that I, or rather we, had made up our minds not to make this
      history public during our joint lives. Nor should we alter our
      determination were it not for a circumstance which has recently
      arisen. We are for reasons that, after perusing this manuscript,
      you may be able to guess, going away again this time to Central
      Asia where, if anywhere upon this earth, wisdom is to be found,
      and we anticipate that our sojourn there will be a long one.
      Possibly we shall not return. Under these altered conditions it
      has become a question whether we are justified in withholding
      from the world an account of a phenomenon which we believe to be
      of unparalleled interest, merely because our private life is
      involved, or because we are afraid of ridicule and doubt being
      cast upon our statements. I hold one view about this matter, and
      Leo holds another, and finally, after much discussion, we have
      come to a compromise, namely, to send the history to you, giving
      you full leave to publish it if you think fit, the only
      stipulation being that you shall disguise our real names, and as
      much concerning our personal identity as is consistent with the
      maintenance of the _bona fides_ of the narrative.

      “And now what am I to say further? I really do not know beyond
      once more repeating that everything is described in the
      accompanying manuscript exactly as it happened. As regards _She_
      herself I have nothing to add. Day by day we gave greater
      occasion to regret that we did not better avail ourselves of our
      opportunities to obtain more information from that marvellous
      woman. Who was she? How did she first come to the Caves of Kôr,
      and what was her real religion? We never ascertained, and now,
      alas! we never shall, at least not yet. These and many other
      questions arise in my mind, but what is the good of asking them
      now?

      “Will you undertake the task? We give you complete freedom, and
      as a reward you will, we believe, have the credit of presenting
      to the world the most wonderful history, as distinguished from
      romance, that its records can show. Read the manuscript (which I
      have copied out fairly for your benefit), and let me know.

      “Believe me, very truly yours, “L. Horace Holly.[1]

      “P.S.—Of course, if any profit results from the sale of the
      writing should you care to undertake its publication, you can do
      what you like with it, but if there is a loss I will leave
      instructions with my lawyers, Messrs. Geoffrey and Jordan, to
      meet it. We entrust the sherd, the scarab, and the parchments to
      your keeping, till such time as we demand them back again. —L. H.
      H.”

 [1] This name is varied throughout in accordance with the writer’s
 request.—Editor.

      This letter, as may be imagined, astonished me considerably, but
      when I came to look at the MS., which the pressure of other work
      prevented me from doing for a fortnight, I was still more
      astonished, as I think the reader will be also, and at once made
      up my mind to press on with the matter. I wrote to this effect to
      Mr. Holly, but a week afterwards received a letter from that
      gentleman’s lawyers, returning my own, with the information that
      their client and Mr. Leo Vincey had already left this country for
      Thibet, and they did not at present know their address.

      Well, that is all I have to say. Of the history itself the reader
      must judge. I give it him, with the exception of a very few
      alterations, made with the object of concealing the identity of
      the actors from the general public, exactly as it came to me.
      Personally I have made up my mind to refrain from comments. At
      first I was inclined to believe that this history of a woman on
      whom, clothed in the majesty of her almost endless years, the
      shadow of Eternity itself lay like the dark wing of Night, was
      some gigantic allegory of which I could not catch the meaning.
      Then I thought that it might be a bold attempt to portray the
      possible results of practical immortality, informing the
      substance of a mortal who yet drew her strength from Earth, and
      in whose human bosom passions yet rose and fell and beat as in
      the undying world around her the winds and the tides rise and
      fall and beat unceasingly. But as I went on I abandoned that idea
      also. To me the story seems to bear the stamp of truth upon its
      face. Its explanation I must leave to others, and with this
      slight preface, which circumstances make necessary, I introduce
      the world to Ayesha and the Caves of Kôr.—The Editor.

      P.S.—There is on consideration one circumstance that, after a
      reperusal of this history, struck me with so much force that I
      cannot resist calling the attention of the reader to it. He will
      observe that so far as we are made acquainted with him there
      appears to be nothing in the character of Leo Vincey which in the
      opinion of most people would have been likely to attract an
      intellect so powerful as that of Ayesha. He is not even, at any
      rate to my view, particularly interesting. Indeed, one might
      imagine that Mr. Holly would under ordinary circumstances have
      easily outstripped him in the favour of _She_. Can it be that
      extremes meet, and that the very excess and splendour of her mind
      led her by means of some strange physical reaction to worship at
      the shrine of matter? Was that ancient Kallikrates nothing but a
      splendid animal loved for his hereditary Greek beauty? Or is the
      true explanation what I believe it to be—namely, that Ayesha,
      seeing further than we can see, perceived the germ and
      smouldering spark of greatness which lay hid within her lover’s
      soul, and well knew that under the influence of her gift of life,
      watered by her wisdom, and shone upon with the sunshine of her
      presence, it would bloom like a flower and flash out like a star,
      filling the world with light and fragrance?

      Here also I am not able to answer, but must leave the reader to
      form his own judgment on the facts before him, as detailed by Mr.
      Holly in the following pages.




I.
MY VISITOR


      There are some events of which each circumstance and surrounding
      detail seems to be graven on the memory in such fashion that we
      cannot forget it, and so it is with the scene that I am about to
      describe. It rises as clearly before my mind at this moment as
      though it had happened but yesterday.

      It was in this very month something over twenty years ago that I,
      Ludwig Horace Holly, was sitting one night in my rooms at
      Cambridge, grinding away at some mathematical work, I forget
      what. I was to go up for my fellowship within a week, and was
      expected by my tutor and my college generally to distinguish
      myself. At last, wearied out, I flung my book down, and, going to
      the mantelpiece, took down a pipe and filled it. There was a
      candle burning on the mantelpiece, and a long, narrow glass at
      the back of it; and as I was in the act of lighting the pipe I
      caught sight of my own countenance in the glass, and paused to
      reflect. The lighted match burnt away till it scorched my
      fingers, forcing me to drop it; but still I stood and stared at
      myself in the glass, and reflected.

      “Well,” I said aloud, at last, “it is to be hoped that I shall be
      able to do something with the inside of my head, for I shall
      certainly never do anything by the help of the outside.”

      This remark will doubtless strike anybody who reads it as being
      slightly obscure, but I was in reality alluding to my physical
      deficiencies. Most men of twenty-two are endowed at any rate with
      some share of the comeliness of youth, but to me even this was
      denied. Short, thick-set, and deep-chested almost to deformity,
      with long sinewy arms, heavy features, deep-set grey eyes, a low
      brow half overgrown with a mop of thick black hair, like a
      deserted clearing on which the forest had once more begun to
      encroach; such was my appearance nearly a quarter of a century
      ago, and such, with some modification, it is to this day. Like
      Cain, I was branded—branded by Nature with the stamp of abnormal
      ugliness, as I was gifted by Nature with iron and abnormal
      strength and considerable intellectual powers. So ugly was I that
      the spruce young men of my College, though they were proud enough
      of my feats of endurance and physical prowess, did not even care
      to be seen walking with me. Was it wonderful that I was
      misanthropic and sullen? Was it wonderful that I brooded and
      worked alone, and had no friends—at least, only one? I was set
      apart by Nature to live alone, and draw comfort from her breast,
      and hers only. Women hated the sight of me. Only a week before I
      had heard one call me a “monster” when she thought I was out of
      hearing, and say that I had converted her to the monkey theory.
      Once, indeed, a woman pretended to care for me, and I lavished
      all the pent-up affection of my nature upon her. Then money that
      was to have come to me went elsewhere, and she discarded me. I
      pleaded with her as I have never pleaded with any living creature
      before or since, for I was caught by her sweet face, and loved
      her; and in the end by way of answer she took me to the glass,
      and stood side by side with me, and looked into it.

      “Now,” she said, “if I am Beauty, who are you?” That was when I
      was only twenty.

      And so I stood and stared, and felt a sort of grim satisfaction
      in the sense of my own loneliness; for I had neither father, nor
      mother, nor brother; and as I did so there came a knock at my
      door.

      I listened before I went to open it, for it was nearly twelve
      o’clock at night, and I was in no mood to admit any stranger. I
      had but one friend in the College, or, indeed, in the
      world—perhaps it was he.

      Just then the person outside the door coughed, and I hastened to
      open it, for I knew the cough.

      A tall man of about thirty, with the remains of great personal
      beauty, came hurrying in, staggering beneath the weight of a
      massive iron box which he carried by a handle with his right
      hand. He placed the box upon the table, and then fell into an
      awful fit of coughing. He coughed and coughed till his face
      became quite purple, and at last he sank into a chair and began
      to spit up blood. I poured out some whisky into a tumbler, and
      gave it to him. He drank it, and seemed better; though his better
      was very bad indeed.

      “Why did you keep me standing there in the cold?” he asked
      pettishly. “You know the draughts are death to me.”

      “I did not know who it was,” I answered. “You are a late
      visitor.”

      “Yes; and I verily believe it is my last visit,” he answered,
      with a ghastly attempt at a smile. “I am done for, Holly. I am
      done for. I do not believe that I shall see to-morrow.”

      “Nonsense!” I said. “Let me go for a doctor.”

      He waved me back imperiously with his hand. “It is sober sense;
      but I want no doctors. I have studied medicine and I know all
      about it. No doctors can help me. My last hour has come! For a
      year past I have only lived by a miracle. Now listen to me as you
      have never listened to anybody before; for you will not have the
      opportunity of getting me to repeat my words. We have been
      friends for two years; now tell me how much do you know about
      me?”

      “I know that you are rich, and have had a fancy to come to
      College long after the age that most men leave it. I know that
      you have been married, and that your wife died; and that you have
      been the best, indeed almost the only friend I ever had.”

      “Did you know that I have a son?”

      “No.”

      “I have. He is five years old. He cost me his mother’s life, and
      I have never been able to bear to look upon his face in
      consequence. Holly, if you will accept the trust, I am going to
      leave you that boy’s sole guardian.”

      I sprang almost out of my chair. “_Me!_” I said.

“Yes, you. I have not studied you for two years for nothing. I have
known for some time that I could not last, and since I realised the
fact I have been searching for some one to whom I could confide the boy
and this,” and he tapped the iron box. “You are the man, Holly; for,
like a rugged tree, you are hard and sound at core. Listen; the boy
will be the only representative of one of the most ancient families in
the world, that is, so far as families can be traced. You will laugh at
me when I say it, but one day it will be proved to you beyond a doubt,
that my sixty-fifth or sixty-sixth lineal ancestor was an Egyptian
priest of Isis, though he was himself of Grecian extraction, and was
called Kallikrates.[1] His father was one of the Greek mercenaries
raised by Hak-Hor, a Mendesian Pharaoh of the twenty-ninth dynasty, and
his grandfather or great-grandfather, I believe, was that very
Kallikrates mentioned by Herodotus.[2] In or about the year 339 before
Christ, just at the time of the final fall of the Pharaohs, this
Kallikrates (the priest) broke his vows of celibacy and fled from Egypt
with a Princess of Royal blood who had fallen in love with him, and was
finally wrecked upon the coast of Africa, somewhere, as I believe, in
the neighbourhood of where Delagoa Bay now is, or rather to the north
of it, he and his wife being saved, and all the remainder of their
company destroyed in one way or another. Here they endured great
hardships, but were at last entertained by the mighty Queen of a savage
people, a white woman of peculiar loveliness, who, under circumstances
which I cannot enter into, but which you will one day learn, if you
live, from the contents of the box, finally murdered my ancestor
Kallikrates. His wife, however, escaped, how, I know not, to Athens,
bearing a child with her, whom she named Tisisthenes, or the Mighty
Avenger. Five hundred years or more afterwards, the family migrated to
Rome under circumstances of which no trace remains, and here, probably
with the idea of preserving the idea of vengeance which we find set out
in the name of Tisisthenes, they appear to have pretty regularly
assumed the cognomen of Vindex, or Avenger. Here, too, they remained
for another five centuries or more, till about 770 A.D., when
Charlemagne invaded Lombardy, where they were then settled, whereon the
head of the family seems to have attached himself to the great Emperor,
and to have returned with him across the Alps, and finally to have
settled in Brittany. Eight generations later his lineal representative
crossed to England in the reign of Edward the Confessor, and in the
time of William the Conqueror was advanced to great honour and power.
From that time to the present day I can trace my descent without a
break. Not that the Vinceys—for that was the final corruption of the
name after its bearers took root in English soil—have been particularly
distinguished—they never came much to the fore. Sometimes they were
soldiers, sometimes merchants, but on the whole they have preserved a
dead level of respectability, and a still deader level of mediocrity.
From the time of Charles II. till the beginning of the present century
they were merchants. About 1790 my grandfather made a considerable
fortune out of brewing, and retired. In 1821 he died, and my father
succeeded him, and dissipated most of the money. Ten years ago he died
also, leaving me a net income of about two thousand a year. Then it was
that I undertook an expedition in connection with _that_,” and he
pointed to the iron chest, “which ended disastrously enough. On my way
back I travelled in the South of Europe, and finally reached Athens.
There I met my beloved wife, who might well also have been called the
‘Beautiful,’ like my old Greek ancestor. There I married her, and
there, a year afterwards, when my boy was born, she died.”

 [1] The Strong and Beautiful, or, more accurately, the Beautiful in
 strength.

 [2] The Kallikrates here referred to by my friend was a Spartan,
 spoken of by Herodotus (Herod. ix. 72) as being remarkable for his
 beauty. He fell at the glorious battle of Platæa (September 22, B.C.
 479), when the Lacedæmonians and Athenians under Pausanias routed the
 Persians, putting nearly 300,000 of them to the sword. The following
 is a translation of the passage, “For Kallikrates died out of the
 battle, he came to the army the most beautiful man of the Greeks of
 that day—not only of the Lacedæmonians themselves, but of the other
 Greeks also. He when Pausanias was sacrificing was wounded in the side
 by an arrow; and then they fought, but on being carried off he
 regretted his death, and said to Arimnestus, a Platæan, that he did
 not grieve at dying for Greece, but at not having struck a blow, or,
 although he desired so to do, performed any deed worthy of himself.”
 This Kallikrates, who appears to have been as brave as he was
 beautiful, is subsequently mentioned by Herodotus as having been
 buried among the ἰρένες‚ (young commanders), apart from the other
 Spartans and the Helots.—L. H. H.

      He paused a while, his head sunk upon his hand, and then
      continued—

      “My marriage had diverted me from a project which I cannot enter
      into now. I have no time, Holly—I have no time! One day, if you
      accept my trust, you will learn all about it. After my wife’s
      death I turned my mind to it again. But first it was necessary,
      or, at least, I conceived that it was necessary, that I should
      attain to a perfect knowledge of Eastern dialects, especially
      Arabic. It was to facilitate my studies that I came here. Very
      soon, however, my disease developed itself, and now there is an
      end of me.” And as though to emphasise his words he burst into
      another terrible fit of coughing.

      I gave him some more whisky, and after resting he went on—

      “I have never seen my boy, Leo, since he was a tiny baby. I never
      could bear to see him, but they tell me that he is a quick and
      handsome child. In this envelope,” and he produced a letter from
      his pocket addressed to myself, “I have jotted down the course I
      wish followed in the boy’s education. It is a somewhat peculiar
      one. At any rate, I could not entrust it to a stranger. Once
      more, will you undertake it?”

      “I must first know what I am to undertake,” I answered.

      “You are to undertake to have the boy, Leo, to live with you till
      he is twenty-five years of age—not to send him to school,
      remember. On his twenty-fifth birthday your guardianship will
      end, and you will then, with the keys that I give you now” (and
      he placed them on the table) “open the iron box, and let him see
      and read the contents, and say whether or no he is willing to
      undertake the quest. There is no obligation on him to do so. Now,
      as regards terms. My present income is two thousand two hundred a
      year. Half of that income I have secured to you by will for life,
      contingently on your undertaking the guardianship—that is, one
      thousand a year remuneration to yourself, for you will have to
      give up your life to it, and one hundred a year to pay for the
      board of the boy. The rest is to accumulate till Leo is
      twenty-five, so that there may be a sum in hand should he wish to
      undertake the quest of which I spoke.”

      “And suppose I were to die?” I asked.

      “Then the boy must become a ward of Chancery and take his chance.
      Only be careful that the iron chest is passed on to him by your
      will. Listen, Holly, don’t refuse me. Believe me, this is to your
      advantage. You are not fit to mix with the world—it would only
      embitter you. In a few weeks you will become a Fellow of your
      College, and the income that you will derive from that combined
      with what I have left you will enable you to live a life of
      learned leisure, alternated with the sport of which you are so
      fond, such as will exactly suit you.”

      He paused and looked at me anxiously, but I still hesitated. The
      charge seemed so very strange.

      “For my sake, Holly. We have been good friends, and I have no
      time to make other arrangements.”

      “Very well,” I said, “I will do it, provided there is nothing in
      this paper to make me change my mind,” and I touched the envelope
      he had put upon the table by the keys.

      “Thank you, Holly, thank you. There is nothing at all. Swear to
      me by God that you will be a father to the boy, and follow my
      directions to the letter.”

      “I swear it,” I answered solemnly.

      “Very well, remember that perhaps one day I shall ask for the
      account of your oath, for though I am dead and forgotten, yet I
      shall live. There is no such thing as death, Holly, only a
      change, and, as you may perhaps learn in time to come, I believe
      that even that change could under certain circumstances be
      indefinitely postponed,” and again he broke into one of his
      dreadful fits of coughing.

      “There,” he said, “I must go, you have the chest, and my will
      will be found among my papers, under the authority of which the
      child will be handed over to you. You will be well paid, Holly,
      and I know that you are honest, but if you betray my trust, by
      Heaven, I will haunt you.”

      I said nothing, being, indeed, too bewildered to speak.

      He held up the candle, and looked at his own face in the glass.
      It had been a beautiful face, but disease had wrecked it. “Food
      for the worms,” he said. “Curious to think that in a few hours I
      shall be stiff and cold—the journey done, the little game played
      out. Ah me, Holly! life is not worth the trouble of life, except
      when one is in love—at least, mine has not been; but the boy
      Leo’s may be if he has the courage and the faith. Good-bye, my
      friend!” and with a sudden access of tenderness he flung his arm
      about me and kissed me on the forehead, and then turned to go.

      “Look here, Vincey,” I said, “if you are as ill as you think, you
      had better let me fetch a doctor.”

      “No, no,” he said earnestly. “Promise me that you won’t. I am
      going to die, and, like a poisoned rat, I wish to die alone.”

      “I don’t believe that you are going to do anything of the sort,”
      I answered. He smiled, and, with the word “Remember” on his lips,
      was gone. As for myself, I sat down and rubbed my eyes, wondering
      if I had been asleep. As this supposition would not bear
      investigation I gave it up and began to think that Vincey must
      have been drinking. I knew that he was, and had been, very ill,
      but still it seemed impossible that he could be in such a
      condition as to be able to know for certain that he would not
      outlive the night. Had he been so near dissolution surely he
      would scarcely have been able to walk, and carry a heavy iron box
      with him. The whole story, on reflection, seemed to me utterly
      incredible, for I was not then old enough to be aware how many
      things happen in this world that the common sense of the average
      man would set down as so improbable as to be absolutely
      impossible. This is a fact that I have only recently mastered.
      Was it likely that a man would have a son five years of age whom
      he had never seen since he was a tiny infant? No. Was it likely
      that he could foretell his own death so accurately? No. Was it
      likely that he could trace his pedigree for more than three
      centuries before Christ, or that he would suddenly confide the
      absolute guardianship of his child, and leave half his fortune,
      to a college friend? Most certainly not. Clearly Vincey was
      either drunk or mad. That being so, what did it mean? and what
      was in the sealed iron chest?

      The whole thing baffled and puzzled me to such an extent that at
      last I could stand it no longer, and determined to sleep over it.
      So I jumped up, and having put the keys and the letter that
      Vincey had left away into my despatch-box, and stowed the iron
      chest in a large portmanteau, I turned in, and was soon fast
      asleep.

      As it seemed to me, I had only been asleep for a few minutes when
      I was awakened by somebody calling me. I sat up and rubbed my
      eyes; it was broad daylight—eight o’clock, in fact.

      “Why, what is the matter with you, John?” I asked of the gyp who
      waited on Vincey and myself. “You look as though you had seen a
      ghost!”

      “Yes, sir, and so I have,” he answered, “leastways I’ve seen a
      corpse, which is worse. I’ve been in to call Mr. Vincey, as
      usual, and there he lies stark and dead!”




II.
THE YEARS ROLL BY


      As might be expected, poor Vincey’s sudden death created a great
      stir in the College; but, as he was known to be very ill, and a
      satisfactory doctor’s certificate was forthcoming, there was no
      inquest. They were not so particular about inquests in those days
      as they are now; indeed, they were generally disliked, because of
      the scandal. Under all these circumstances, being asked no
      questions, I did not feel called upon to volunteer any
      information about our interview on the night of Vincey’s decease,
      beyond saying that he had come into my rooms to see me, as he
      often did. On the day of the funeral a lawyer came down from
      London and followed my poor friend’s remains to the grave, and
      then went back with his papers and effects, except, of course,
      the iron chest which had been left in my keeping. For a week
      after this I heard no more of the matter, and, indeed, my
      attention was amply occupied in other ways, for I was up for my
      Fellowship, a fact that had prevented me from attending the
      funeral or seeing the lawyer. At last, however, the examination
      was over, and I came back to my rooms and sank into an easy chair
      with a happy consciousness that I had got through it very fairly.

      Soon, however, my thoughts, relieved of the pressure that had
      crushed them into a single groove during the last few days,
      turned to the events of the night of poor Vincey’s death, and
      again I asked myself what it all meant, and wondered if I should
      hear anything more of the matter, and if I did not, what it would
      be my duty to do with the curious iron chest. I sat there and
      thought and thought till I began to grow quite disturbed over the
      whole occurrence: the mysterious midnight visit, the prophecy of
      death so shortly to be fulfilled, the solemn oath that I had
      taken, and which Vincey had called on me to answer to in another
      world than this. Had the man committed suicide? It looked like
      it. And what was the quest of which he spoke? The circumstances
      were uncanny, so much so that, though I am by no means nervous,
      or apt to be alarmed at anything that may seem to cross the
      bounds of the natural, I grew afraid, and began to wish I had
      nothing to do with them. How much more do I wish it now, over
      twenty years afterwards!

      As I sat and thought, there came a knock at the door, and a
      letter, in a big blue envelope, was brought in to me. I saw at a
      glance that it was a lawyer’s letter, and an instinct told me
      that it was connected with my trust. The letter, which I still
      have, runs thus:—

“Sir,—Our client, the late M. L. Vincey, Esq., who died on the 9th
instant in —— College, Cambridge, has left behind him a Will, of which
you will please find copy enclosed and of which we are the executors.
Under this Will you will perceive that you take a life-interest in
about half of the late Mr. Vincey’s property, now invested in Consols,
subject to your acceptance of the guardianship of his only son, Leo
Vincey, at present an infant, aged five. Had we not ourselves drawn up
the document in question in obedience to Mr. Vincey’s clear and precise
instructions, both personal and written, and had he not then assured us
that he had very good reasons for what he was doing, we are bound to
tell you that its provisions seem to us of so unusual a nature, that we
should have felt bound to call the attention of the Court of Chancery
to them, in order that such steps might be taken as seemed desirable to
it, either by contesting the capacity of the testator or otherwise, to
safeguard the interests of the infant. As it is, knowing that the
testator was a gentleman of the highest intelligence and acumen, and
that he has absolutely no relations living to whom he could have
confided the guardianship of the child, we do not feel justified in
taking this course.

      “Awaiting such instructions as you please to send us as regards
      the delivery of the infant and the payment of the proportion of
      the dividends due to you,

      “We remain, Sir, faithfully yours,

      “Geoffrey and Jordan.

      “Horace L. Holly, Esq.”

      I put down the letter, and ran my eye through the Will, which
      appeared, from its utter unintelligibility, to have been drawn on
      the strictest legal principles. So far as I could discover,
      however, it exactly bore out what my friend Vincey had told me on
      the night of his death. So it was true after all. I must take the
      boy. Suddenly I remembered the letter which Vincey had left with
      the chest. I fetched and opened it. It only contained such
      directions as he had already given to me as to opening the chest
      on Leo’s twenty-fifth birthday, and laid down the outlines of the
      boy’s education, which was to include Greek, the higher
      Mathematics, and _Arabic_. At the end there was a postscript to
      the effect that if the boy died under the age of twenty-five,
      which, however, he did not believe would be the case, I was to
      open the chest, and act on the information I obtained if I saw
      fit. If I did not see fit, I was to destroy all the contents. On
      no account was I to pass them on to a stranger.

      As this letter added nothing material to my knowledge, and
      certainly raised no further objection in my mind to entering on
      the task I had promised my dead friend to undertake, there was
      only one course open to me—namely, to write to Messrs. Geoffrey
      and Jordan, and express my acceptance of the trust, stating that
      I should be willing to commence my guardianship of Leo in ten
      days’ time. This done I went to the authorities of my college,
      and, having told them as much of the story as I considered
      desirable, which was not very much, after considerable difficulty
      succeeded in persuading them to stretch a point, and, in the
      event of my having obtained a fellowship, which I was pretty
      certain I had done, allow me to have the child to live with me.
      Their consent, however, was only granted on the condition that I
      vacated my rooms in college and took lodgings. This I did, and
      with some difficulty succeeded in obtaining very good apartments
      quite close to the college gates. The next thing was to find a
      nurse. And on this point I came to a determination. I would have
      no woman to lord it over me about the child, and steal his
      affections from me. The boy was old enough to do without female
      assistance, so I set to work to hunt up a suitable male
      attendant. With some difficulty I succeeded in hiring a most
      respectable round-faced young man, who had been a helper in a
      hunting-stable, but who said that he was one of a family of
      seventeen and well-accustomed to the ways of children, and
      professed himself quite willing to undertake the charge of Master
      Leo when he arrived. Then, having taken the iron box to town, and
      with my own hands deposited it at my banker’s, I bought some
      books upon the health and management of children and read them,
      first to myself, and then aloud to Job—that was the young man’s
      name—and waited.

      At length the child arrived in the charge of an elderly person,
      who wept bitterly at parting with him, and a beautiful boy he
      was. Indeed, I do not think that I ever saw such a perfect child
      before or since. His eyes were grey, his forehead was broad, and
      his face, even at that early age, clean cut as a cameo, without
      being pinched or thin. But perhaps his most attractive point was
      his hair, which was pure gold in colour and tightly curled over
      his shapely head. He cried a little when his nurse finally tore
      herself away and left him with us. Never shall I forget the
      scene. There he stood, with the sunlight from the window playing
      upon his golden curls, his fist screwed over one eye, whilst he
      took us in with the other. I was seated in a chair, and stretched
      out my hand to him to induce him to come to me, while Job, in the
      corner, was making a sort of clucking noise, which, arguing from
      his previous experience, or from the analogy of the hen, he
      judged would have a soothing effect, and inspire confidence in
      the youthful mind, and running a wooden horse of peculiar
      hideousness backwards and forwards in a way that was little short
      of inane. This went on for some minutes, and then all of a sudden
      the lad stretched out both his little arms and ran to me.

      “I like you,” he said: “you is ugly, but you is good.”

      Ten minutes afterwards he was eating large slices of bread and
      butter, with every sign of satisfaction; Job wanted to put jam on
      to them, but I sternly reminded him of the excellent works that
      we had read, and forbade it.

      In a very little while (for, as I expected, I got my fellowship)
      the boy became the favourite of the whole College—where, all
      orders and regulations to the contrary notwithstanding, he was
      continually in and out—a sort of chartered libertine, in whose
      favour all rules were relaxed. The offerings made at his shrine
      were simply without number, and I had serious difference of
      opinion with one old resident Fellow, now long dead, who was
      usually supposed to be the crustiest man in the University, and
      to abhor the sight of a child. And yet I discovered, when a
      frequently recurring fit of sickness had forced Job to keep a
      strict look-out, that this unprincipled old man was in the habit
      of enticing the boy to his rooms and there feeding him upon
      unlimited quantities of brandy-balls, and making him promise to
      say nothing about it. Job told him that he ought to be ashamed of
      himself, “at his age, too, when he might have been a grandfather
      if he had done what was right,” by which Job understood had got
      married, and thence arose the row.

      But I have no space to dwell upon those delightful years, around
      which memory still fondly hovers. One by one they went by, and as
      they passed we two grew dearer and yet more dear to each other.
      Few sons have been loved as I love Leo, and few fathers know the
      deep and continuous affection that Leo bears to me.

      The child grew into the boy, and the boy into the young man,
      while one by one the remorseless years flew by, and as he grew
      and increased so did his beauty and the beauty of his mind grow
      with him. When he was about fifteen they used to call him Beauty
      about the College, and me they nicknamed the Beast. Beauty and
      the Beast was what they called us when we went out walking
      together, as we used to do every day. Once Leo attacked a great
      strapping butcher’s man, twice his size, because he sang it out
      after us, and thrashed him, too—thrashed him fairly. I walked on
      and pretended not to see, till the combat got too exciting, when
      I turned round and cheered him on to victory. It was the chaff of
      the College at the time, but I could not help it. Then when he
      was a little older the undergraduates found fresh names for us.
      They called me Charon, and Leo the Greek god! I will pass over my
      own appellation with the humble remark that I was never handsome,
      and did not grow more so as I grew older. As for his, there was
      no doubt about its fitness. Leo at twenty-one might have stood
      for a statue of the youthful Apollo. I never saw anybody to touch
      him in looks, or anybody so absolutely unconscious of them. As
      for his mind, he was brilliant and keen-witted, but not a
      scholar. He had not the dulness necessary for that result. We
      followed out his father’s instructions as regards his education
      strictly enough, and on the whole the results, especially in the
      matters of Greek and Arabic, were satisfactory. I learnt the
      latter language in order to help to teach it to him, but after
      five years of it he knew it as well as I did—almost as well as
      the professor who instructed us both. I always was a great
      sportsman—it is my one passion—and every autumn we went away
      somewhere shooting or fishing, sometimes to Scotland, sometimes
      to Norway, once even to Russia. I am a good shot, but even in
      this he learnt to excel me.

      When Leo was eighteen I moved back into my rooms, and entered him
      at my own College, and at twenty-one he took his degree—a
      respectable degree, but not a very high one. Then it was that I,
      for the first time, told him something of his own story, and of
      the mystery that loomed ahead. Of course he was very curious
      about it, and of course I explained to him that his curiosity
      could not be gratified at present. After that, to pass the time
      away, I suggested that he should get himself called to the Bar;
      and this he did, reading at Cambridge, and only going up to
      London to eat his dinners.

      I had only one trouble about him, and that was that every young
      woman who came across him, or, if not every one, nearly so, would
      insist on falling in love with him. Hence arose difficulties
      which I need not enter into here, though they were troublesome
      enough at the time. On the whole, he behaved fairly well; I
      cannot say more than that.

      And so the time went by till at last he reached his twenty-fifth
      birthday, at which date this strange and, in some ways, awful
      history really begins.




III.
THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS


      On the day preceding Leo’s twenty-fifth birthday we both
      journeyed to London, and extracted the mysterious chest from the
      bank where I had deposited it twenty years before. It was, I
      remember, brought up by the same clerk who had taken it down. He
      perfectly remembered having hidden it away. Had he not done so,
      he said, he should have had difficulty in finding it, it was so
      covered up with cobwebs.

      In the evening we returned with our precious burden to Cambridge,
      and I think that we might both of us have given away all the
      sleep we got that night and not have been much the poorer. At
      daybreak Leo arrived in my room in a dressing-gown, and suggested
      that we should at once proceed to business. I scouted the idea as
      showing an unworthy curiosity. The chest had waited twenty years,
      I said, so it could very well continue to wait until after
      breakfast. Accordingly at nine—an unusually sharp nine—we
      breakfasted; and so occupied was I with my own thoughts that I
      regret to state that I put a piece of bacon into Leo’s tea in
      mistake for a lump of sugar. Job, too, to whom the contagion of
      excitement had, of course, spread, managed to break the handle
      off my Sèvres china tea-cup, the identical one I believe that
      Marat had been drinking from just before he was stabbed in his
      bath.

      At last, however, breakfast was cleared away, and Job, at my
      request, fetched the chest, and placed it upon the table in a
      somewhat gingerly fashion, as though he mistrusted it. Then he
      prepared to leave the room.

      “Stop a moment, Job,” I said. “If Mr. Leo has no objection, I
      should prefer to have an independent witness to this business,
      who can be relied upon to hold his tongue unless he is asked to
      speak.”

      “Certainly, Uncle Horace,” answered Leo; for I had brought him up
      to call me uncle—though he varied the appellation somewhat
      disrespectfully by calling me “old fellow,” or even “my avuncular
      relative.”

      Job touched his head, not having a hat on.

      “Lock the door, Job,” I said, “and bring me my despatch-box.”

      He obeyed, and from the box I took the keys that poor Vincey,
      Leo’s father, had given me on the night of his death. There were
      three of them; the largest a comparatively modern key, the second
      an exceedingly ancient one, and the third entirely unlike
      anything of the sort that we had ever seen before, being
      fashioned apparently from a strip of solid silver, with a bar
      placed across to serve as a handle, and leaving some nicks cut in
      the edge of the bar. It was more like a model of an antediluvian
      railway key than anything else.

      “Now are you both ready?” I said, as people do when they are
      going to fire a mine. There was no answer, so I took the big key,
      rubbed some salad oil into the wards, and after one or two bad
      shots, for my hands were shaking, managed to fit it, and shoot
      the lock. Leo bent over and caught the massive lid in both his
      hands, and with an effort, for the hinges had rusted, forced it
      back. Its removal revealed another case covered with dust. This
      we extracted from the iron chest without any difficulty, and
      removed the accumulated filth of years from it with a
      clothes-brush.

      It was, or appeared to be, of ebony, or some such close-grained
      black wood, and was bound in every direction with flat bands of
      iron. Its antiquity must have been extreme, for the dense heavy
      wood was in parts actually commencing to crumble from age.

      “Now for it,” I said, inserting the second key.

      Job and Leo bent forward in breathless silence. The key turned,
      and I flung back the lid, and uttered an exclamation, and no
      wonder, for inside the ebony case was a magnificent silver
      casket, about twelve inches square by eight high. It appeared to
      be of Egyptian workmanship, and the four legs were formed of
      Sphinxes, and the dome-shaped cover was also surmounted by a
      Sphinx. The casket was of course much tarnished and dinted with
      age, but otherwise in fairly sound condition.

      I drew it out and set it on the table, and then, in the midst of
      the most perfect silence, I inserted the strange-looking silver
      key, and pressed this way and that until at last the lock
      yielded, and the casket stood before us. It was filled to the
      brim with some brown shredded material, more like vegetable fibre
      than paper, the nature of which I have never been able to
      discover. This I carefully removed to the depth of some three
      inches, when I came to a letter enclosed in an ordinary
      modern-looking envelope, and addressed in the handwriting of my
      dead friend Vincey.

      “_To my son Leo, should he live to open this casket._”

      I handed the letter to Leo, who glanced at the envelope, and then
      put it down upon the table, making a motion to me to go on
      emptying the casket.

      The next thing that I found was a parchment carefully rolled up.
      I unrolled it, and seeing that it was also in Vincey’s
      handwriting, and headed, “Translation of the Uncial Greek Writing
      on the Potsherd,” put it down by the letter. Then followed
      another ancient roll of parchment, that had become yellow and
      crinkled with the passage of years. This I also unrolled. It was
      likewise a translation of the same Greek original, but into
      black-letter Latin, which at the first glance from the style and
      character appeared to me to date from somewhere about the
      beginning of the sixteenth century. Immediately beneath this roll
      was something hard and heavy, wrapped up in yellow linen, and
      reposing upon another layer of the fibrous material. Slowly and
      carefully we unrolled the linen, exposing to view a very large
      but undoubtedly ancient potsherd of a dirty yellow colour! This
      potsherd had in my judgment, once been a part of an ordinary
      amphora of medium size. For the rest, it measured ten and a half
      inches in length by seven in width, was about a quarter of an
      inch thick, and densely covered on the convex side that lay
      towards the bottom of the box with writing in the later uncial
      Greek character, faded here and there, but for the most part
      perfectly legible, the inscription having evidently been executed
      with the greatest care, and by means of a reed pen, such as the
      ancients often used. I must not forget to mention that in some
      remote age this wonderful fragment had been broken in two, and
      rejoined by means of cement and eight long rivets. Also there
      were numerous inscriptions on the inner side, but these were of
      the most erratic character, and had clearly been made by
      different hands and in many different ages, and of them, together
      with the writings on the parchments, I shall have to speak
      presently.

[Illustration] FACSIMILE OF THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS

     One 1/2 size

     Greatest length of the original    10½ inches
     Greatest breadth                   7 inches
     Weight                             1lb 5½ oz

[Illustration] FACSIMILE OF THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS

     One 1/2 size

      “Is there anything more?” asked Leo, in a kind of excited
      whisper.

      I groped about, and produced something hard, done up in a little
      linen bag. Out of the bag we took first a very beautiful
      miniature done upon ivory, and secondly, a small
      chocolate-coloured composition _scarabæus_, marked thus:—

[Illustration]

      symbols which, we have since ascertained, mean “Suten se Ra,”
      which is being translated the “Royal Son of Ra or the Sun.” The
      miniature was a picture of Leo’s Greek mother—a lovely, dark-eyed
      creature. On the back of it was written, in poor Vincey’s
      handwriting, “My beloved wife.”

      “That is all,” I said.

      “Very well,” answered Leo, putting down the miniature, at which
      he had been gazing affectionately; “and now let us read the
      letter,” and without further ado he broke the seal, and read
      aloud as follows:—

      “My Son Leo,—When you open this, if you ever live to do so, you
      will have attained to manhood, and I shall have been long enough
      dead to be absolutely forgotten by nearly all who knew me. Yet in
      reading it remember that I have been, and for anything you know
      may still be, and that in it, through this link of pen and paper,
      I stretch out my hand to you across the gulf of death, and my
      voice speaks to you from the silence of the grave. Though I am
      dead, and no memory of me remains in your mind, yet am I with you
      in this hour that you read. Since your birth to this day I have
      scarcely seen your face. Forgive me this. Your life supplanted
      the life of one whom I loved better than women are often loved,
      and the bitterness of it endureth yet. Had I lived I should in
      time have conquered this foolish feeling, but I am not destined
      to live. My sufferings, physical and mental, are more than I can
      bear, and when such small arrangements as I have to make for your
      future well-being are completed it is my intention to put a
      period to them. May God forgive me if I do wrong. At the best I
      could not live more than another year.”

      “So he killed himself,” I exclaimed. “I thought so.”

      “And now,” Leo went on, without replying, “enough of myself. What
      has to be said belongs to you who live, not to me, who am dead,
      and almost as much forgotten as though I had never been. Holly,
      my friend (to whom, if he will accept the trust, it is my
      intention to confide you), will have told you something of the
      extraordinary antiquity of your race. In the contents of this
      casket you will find sufficient to prove it. The strange legend
      that you will find inscribed by your remote ancestress upon the
      potsherd was communicated to me by my father on his deathbed, and
      took a strong hold in my imagination. When I was only nineteen
      years of age I determined, as, to his misfortune, did one of our
      ancestors about the time of Elizabeth, to investigate its truth.
      Into all that befell me I cannot enter now. But this I saw with
      my own eyes. On the coast of Africa, in a hitherto unexplored
      region, some distance to the north of where the Zambesi falls
      into the sea, there is a headland, at the extremity of which a
      peak towers up, shaped like the head of a negro, similar to that
      of which the writing speaks. I landed there, and learnt from a
      wandering native, who had been cast out by his people because of
      some crime which he had committed, that far inland are great
      mountains, shaped like cups, and caves surrounded by measureless
      swamps. I learnt also that the people there speak a dialect of
      Arabic, and are ruled over by a _beautiful white woman_ who is
      seldom seen by them, but who is reported to have power over all
      things living and dead. Two days after I had ascertained this the
      man died of fever contracted in crossing the swamps, and I was
      forced by want of provisions and by symptoms of an illness which
      afterwards prostrated me to take to my dhow again.

      “Of the adventures that befell me after this I need not now
      speak. I was wrecked upon the coast of Madagascar, and rescued
      some months afterwards by an English ship that brought me to
      Aden, whence I started for England, intending to prosecute my
      search as soon as I had made sufficient preparations. On my way I
      stopped in Greece, and there, for ‘Omnia vincit amor,’ I met your
      beloved mother, and married her, and there you were born and she
      died. Then it was that my last illness seized me, and I returned
      hither to die. But still I hoped against hope, and set myself to
      work to learn Arabic, with the intention, should I ever get
      better, of returning to the coast of Africa, and solving the
      mystery of which the tradition has lived so many centuries in our
      family. But I have not got better, and, so far as I am concerned,
      the story is at an end.

      “For you, however, my son, it is not at an end, and to you I hand
      on these the results of my labour, together with the hereditary
      proofs of its origin. It is my intention to provide that they
      shall not be put into your hands until you have reached an age
      when you will be able to judge for yourself whether or no you
      will choose to investigate what, if it is true, must be the
      greatest mystery in the world, or to put it by as an idle fable,
      originating in the first place in a woman’s disordered brain.

      “I do not believe that it is a fable; I believe that if it can
      only be re-discovered there is a spot where the vital forces of
      the world visibly exist. Life exists; why therefore should not
      the means of preserving it indefinitely exist also? But I have no
      wish to prejudice your mind about the matter. Read and judge for
      yourself. If you are inclined to undertake the search, I have so
      provided that you will not lack for means. If, on the other hand,
      you are satisfied that the whole thing is a chimera, then, I
      adjure you, destroy the potsherd and the writings, and let a
      cause of troubling be removed from our race for ever. Perhaps
      that will be wisest. The unknown is generally taken to be
      terrible, not as the proverb would infer, from the inherent
      superstition of man, but because it so often _is_ terrible. He
      who would tamper with the vast and secret forces that animate the
      world may well fall a victim to them. And if the end were
      attained, if at last you emerged from the trial ever beautiful
      and ever young, defying time and evil, and lifted above the
      natural decay of flesh and intellect, who shall say that the
      awesome change would prove a happy one? Choose, my son, and may
      the Power who rules all things, and who says ‘thus far shalt thou
      go, and thus much shalt thou learn,’ direct the choice to your
      own happiness and the happiness of the world, which, in the event
      of your success, you would one day certainly rule by the pure
      force of accumulated experience.— Farewell!”

      Thus the letter, which was unsigned and undated, abruptly ended.

      “What do you make of that, Uncle Holly,” said Leo, with a sort of
      gasp, as he replaced it on the table. “We have been looking for a
      mystery, and we certainly seem to have found one.”

      “What do I make of it? Why, that your poor dear father was off
      his head, of course,” I answered, testily. “I guessed as much
      that night, twenty years ago, when he came into my room. You see
      he evidently hurried his own end, poor man. It is absolute
      balderdash.”

      “That’s it, sir!” said Job, solemnly. Job was a most
      matter-of-fact specimen of a matter-of-fact class.

      “Well, let’s see what the potsherd has to say, at any rate,” said
      Leo, taking up the translation in his father’s writing, and
      commencing to read:—

“_I, Amenartas, of the Royal House of the Pharaohs of Egypt, wife of
Kallikrates (the Beautiful in Strength), a Priest of Isis whom the gods
cherish and the demons obey, being about to die, to my little son
Tisisthenes (the Mighty Avenger). I fled with thy father from Egypt in
the days of Nectanebes,_[1] _causing him through love to break the vows
that he had vowed. We fled southward, across the waters, and we
wandered for twice twelve moons on the coast of Libya (Africa) that
looks towards the rising sun, where by a river is a great rock carven
like the head of an Ethiopian. Four days on the water from the mouth of
a mighty river were we cast away, and some were drowned and some died
of sickness. But us wild men took through wastes and marshes, where the
sea fowl hid the sky, bearing us ten days’ journey till we came to a
hollow mountain, where a great city had been and fallen, and where
there are caves of which no man hath seen the end; and they brought us
to the Queen of the people who place pots upon the heads of strangers,
who is a magician having a knowledge of all things, and life and
loveliness that does not die. And she cast eyes of love upon thy
father, Kallikrates, and would have slain me, and taken him to husband,
but he loved me and feared her, and would not. Then did she take us,
and lead us by terrible ways, by means of dark magic, to where the
great pit is, in the mouth of which the old philosopher lay dead, and
showed to us the rolling Pillar of Life that dies not, whereof the
voice is as the voice of thunder; and she did stand in the flames, and
come forth unharmed, and yet more beautiful. Then did she swear to make
thy father undying even as she is, if he would but slay me, and give
himself to her, for me she could not slay because of the magic of my
own people that I have, and that prevailed thus far against her. And he
held his hand before his eyes to hide her beauty, and would not. Then
in her rage did she smite him by her magic, and he died; but she wept
over him, and bore him thence with lamentations: and being afraid, me
she sent to the mouth of the great river where the ships come, and I
was carried far away on the ships where I gave thee birth, and hither
to Athens I came at last after many wanderings. Now I say to thee, my
son, Tisisthenes, seek out the woman, and learn the secret of Life, and
if thou mayest find a way slay her, because of thy father Kallikrates;
and if thou dost fear or fail, this I say to all thy seed who come
after thee, till at last a brave man be found among them who shall
bathe in the fire and sit in the place of the Pharaohs. I speak of
those things, that though they be past belief, yet I have known, and I
lie not._”

 [1] Nekht-nebf, or Nectanebo II., the last native Pharaoh of Egypt,
 fled from Ochus to Ethiopia, B.C. 339.—Editor.

      “May the Lord forgive her for that,” groaned Job, who had been
      listening to this marvellous composition with his mouth open.

      As for myself, I said nothing: my first idea being that my poor
      friend, being demented, had composed the whole thing, though it
      scarcely seemed likely that such a story could have been invented
      by anybody. It was too original. To solve my doubts I took up the
      potsherd and began to read the close uncial Greek writing on it;
      and very good Greek of the period it is, considering that it came
      from the pen of an Egyptian born. Here is an exact transcript of
      it:—

ΑΜΕΝΑΡΤΑΣΤΟΥΒΑΣΙΛΙΚΟΥΓΕΝΟΥΣΤΟΥΑΙΓΥΠΤΙΟΥΗΤΟΥΚΑΛΛΙΚΡΑΤΟΥΣΙΣΙΔΟΣΙΕΡΕΩΣΗΝΟ
ΙΜΕΝΘΕΟΙΤΡΕΦΟΥΣΙΤΑΔΕΔΑΙΜΟΝΙΑΥΠΟΤΑΣΣΕΤΑΙΗΔΗΤΕΛΕΥΤΩΣΑΤΙΣΙΣΘΕΝΕΙΤΩΠΑΙΔΙΕΠ
ΙΣΤΕΛΛΕΙΤΑΔΕΣΥΝΕΦΥΓΟΝΓΑΡΠΟΤΕΕΚΤΗΣΑΙΓΥΠΤΙΑΣΕΠΙΝΕΚΤΑΝΕΒΟΥΜΕΤΑΤΟΥΣΟΥΠΑΤΡΟ
ΣΔΙΑΤΟΝΕΡΩΤΑΤΟΝΕΜΟΝΕΠΙΟΡΚΗΣΑΝΤΟΣΦΥΓΟΝΤΕΣΔΕΠΡΟΣΝΟΤΟΝΔΙΑΠΟΝΤΙΟΙΚΑΙΚΔΜΗΝΑ
ΣΚΑΤΑΤΑΠΑΡΑΘΑΛΑΣΣΙΑΤΗΣΛΙΒΥΗΣΤΑΠΡΟΣΗΛΙΟΥΑΝΑΤΟΛΑΣΠΛΑΝΗΘΕΝΤΕΣΕΝΘΑΠΕΡΠΕΤΡΑ
ΤΙΣΜΕΓΑΛΗΓΛΥΠΤΟΝΟΜΟΙΩΜΑΑΙΘΙΟΠΟΣΚΕΦΑΛΗΣΕΙΤΑΗΜΕΡΑΣΔΑΠΟΣΤΟΜΑΤΟΣΠΟΤΑΜΟΥΜΕΓ
ΑΛΟΥΕΚΠΕΣΟΝΤΕΣΟΙΜΕΝΚΑΤΕΠΟΝΤΙΣΘΗΜΕΝΟΙΔΕΝΟΣΩΙΑΠΕΘΑΝΟΜΕΝΤΕΛΟΣΔΕΥΠΑΓΡΙΩΝΑΝ
ΘΡΩΠΩΝΕΦΕΡΟΜΕΘΑΔΙΑΕΛΕΩΝΤΕΚΑΙΤΕΝΑΓΕΩΝΕΝΘΑΠΕΡΠΤΗΝΩΝΠΛΗΘΟΣΑΠΟΚΡΥΠΤΕΙΤΟΝΟΥ
ΡΑΝΟΝΗΜΕΡΑΣΙΕΩΣΗΛΘΟΜΕΝΕΙΣΚΟΙΛΟΝΤΙΟΡΟΣΕΝΘΑΠΟΤΕΜΕΓΑΛΗΜΕΝΠΟΛΙΣΗΝΑΝΤΡΑΔΕΑΠ
ΕΙΡΟΝΑΗΓΑΓΟΝΔΕΩΣΒΑΣΙΛΕΙΑΝΤΗΝΤΩΝΞΕΝΟΥΣΧΥΤΡΑΙΣΣΤΕΦΑΝΟΥΝΤΩΝΗΤΙΣΜΑΓΕΙΑΜΕΝΕ
ΧΡΗΤΟΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΗΔΕΠΑΝΤΩΝΚΑΙΔΗΚΑΙΚΑΛΛΟΣΚΑΙΡΩΜΗΝΑΓΗΡΩΣΗΝΗΔΕΚΑΛΛΙΚΡΑΤΟΥΣΤΟΥΣ
ΟΥΠΑΤΡΟΣΕΡΑΣΘΕΙΣΑΤΟΜΕΝΠΡΩΤΟΝΣΥΝΟΙΚΕΙΝΕΒΟΥΛΕΤΟΕΜΕΔΕΑΝΕΛΕΙΝΕΠΕΙΤΑΩΣΟΥΚΑΝ
ΕΠΕΙΘΕΝΕΜΕΓΑΡΥΠΕΡΕΦΙΛΕΙΚΑΙΤΗΝΞΕΝΗΝΕΦΟΒΕΙΤΟΑΠΗΓΑΓΕΝΗΜΑΣΥΠΟΜΑΓΕΙΑΣΚΑΘΟΔΟ
ΥΣΣΦΑΛΕΡΑΣΕΝΘΑΤΟΒΑΡΑΘΡΟΝΤΟΜΕΓΑΟΥΚΑΤΑΣΤΟΜΑΕΚΕΙΤΟΟΓΕΡΩΝΟΦΙΛΟΣΟΦΟΣΤΕΘΝΕΩΣ
ΑΦΙΚΟΜΕΝΟΙΣΔΕΔΕΙΞΕΦΩΣΤΟΥΒΙΟΥΕΥΘΥΟΙΟΝΚΙΟΝΑΕΛΙΣΣΟΜΕΝΟΝΦΩΝΗΝΙΕΝΤΑΚΑΘΑΠΕΡΒ
ΡΟΝΤΗΣΕΙΤΑΔΙΑΠΥΡΟΣΒΕΒΗΚΥΙΑΑΒΛΑΒΗΣΚΑΙΕΤΙΚΑΛΛΙΩΝΑΥΤΗΕΑΥΤΗΣΕΞΕΦΑΝΗΕΚΔΕΤΟΥ
ΤΩΝΩΜΟΣΕΚΑΙΤΟΝΣΟΝΠΑΤΕΡΑΑΘΑΝΑΤΟΝΑΠΟΔΕΙΞΕΙΝΕΙΣΥΝΟΙΚΕΙΝΟΙΒΟΥΛΟΙΤΟΕΜΕΔΕΑΝΕ
ΛΕΙΝΟΥΓΑΡΟΥΝΑΥΤΗΑΝΕΛΕΙΝΙΣΧΥΕΝΥΠΟΤΩΝΗΜΕΔΑΠΩΝΗΝΚΑΙΑΥΤΗΕΧΩΜΑΓΕΙΑΣΟΔΟΥΔΕΝΤ
ΙΜΑΛΛΟΝΗΘΕΛΕΤΩΧΕΙΡΕΤΩΝΟΜΜΑΤΩΝΠΡΟΙΣΧΩΝΙΝΑΔΗΤΟΤΗΣΓΥΝΑΙΚΟΣΚΑΛΛΟΣΜΗΟΡΩΗΕΠΕ
ΙΤΑΟΡΓΙΣΘΕΙΣΑΚΑΤΕΓΟΗΤΕΥΣΕΜΕΝΑΥΤΟΝΑΠΟΛΟΜΕΝΟΝΜΕΝΤΟΙΚΛΑΟΥΣΑΚΑΙΟΔΥΡΟΜΕΝΗΕΚ
ΕΙΘΕΝΑΠΗΝΕΓΚΕΝΕΜΕΔΕΦΟΒΩΙΑΦΗΚΕΝΕΙΣΣΤΟΜΑΤΟΥΜΕΓΑΛΟΥΠΟΤΑΜΟΥΤΟΥΝΑΥΣΙΠΟΡΟΥΠΟ
ΡΡΩΔΕΝΑΥΣΙΝΕΦΩΝΠΕΡΠΛΕΟΥΣΑΕΤΕΚΟΝΣΕΑΠΟΠΛΕΥΣΑΣΑΜΟΛΙΣΠΟΤΕΔΕΥΡΟΑΘΗΝΑΖΕΚΑΤΗΓ
ΑΓΟΜΗΝΣΥΔΕΩΤΙΣΙΣΘΕΝΕΣΩΝΕΠΙΣΤΕΛΛΩΜΗΟΛΙΓΩΡΕΙΔΕΙΓΑΡΤΗΝΓΥΝΑΙΚΑΑΝΑΖΗΤΕΙΝΗΝΠ
ΩΣΤΟΤΟΥΒΙΟΥΜΥΣΤΗΡΙΟΝΑΝΕΥΡΗΣΚΑΙΑΝΑΙΡΕΙΝΗΝΠΟΥΠΑΡΑΣΧΗΔΙΑΤΟΝΣΟΝΠΑΤΕΡΑΚΑΛΛΙ
ΚΡΑΤΗΝΕΙΔΕΦΟΒΟΥΜΕΝΟΣΗΔΙΑΑΛΛΟΤΙΑΥΤΟΣΛΕΙΠΕΙΤΟΥΕΡΓΟΥΠΑΣΙΤΟΙΣΥΣΤΕΡΟΝΑΥΤΟΤΟ
ΥΤΟΕΠΙΣΤΕΛΛΩΕΩΣΠΟΤΕΑΓΑΘΟΣΤΙΣΓΕΝΟΜΕΝΟΣΤΩΠΥΡΙΛΟΥΣΑΣΘΑΙΤΟΛΜΗΣΕΙΚΑΙΤΑΑΡΙΣΤ
ΕΙΑΕΧΩΝΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣΑΙΤΩΝΑΝΘΡΩΠΩΝΑΠΙΣΤΑΜΕΝΔΗΤΑΤΟΙΑΥΤΑΛΕΓΩΟΜΩΣΔΕΑΑΥΤΗΕΓΝΩΚΑΟ
ΥΚΕΨΕΥΣΑΜΗΝ

For general convenience in reading, I have here accurately transcribed
this inscription into the cursive character.

Ἀμενάρτας, τοῦ βασικοῦ γένους τοῦ Αἰγυπτίου, ἡ τοῦ Καλλικράτους Ἴσιδος
ἱερέως, ἣν οἱ μὲν θεοὶ τρέφουσι τὰ δὲ δαιμονια ὑποτάσσεται, ἤδη
τελευτῶσα Τισισθένει τῷ παιδὶ ἐπιστέλλει τάδε· συνέφυγον γάρ ποτε ἐκ
τῆς Αἰγυπτίας ἐπὶ Νεκτανέβου μετὰ τοῦ σοῦ πατρός, διὰ τὸν ἔρωτα τὸν
ἐμὸν ἐπιορκήσαντος. φυγόντες δὲ πρὸς νότον διαπόντιοι καὶ κʹδʹ μῆνας
κατὰ τὰ παραθαλάσσια τῆς Αιβύης τὰ πρός ἡλίου ἀνατολὰς πλανηθέντες,
ἔνθαπερ πέτρα τις μελάλη, γλυπτὸν ὁμοίωμα Αἰθίοπος κεφαλῆς, εἶτα ἡμέρας
δʹ ἀπὸ στόματος ποταμοῦ μεγάλου ἐκπεσόντες, οἱ μέν κατεποντίσθημεν, οἱ
δὲ νόσῳ ἀπεθάνομεν· τέλος δὲ ὑπ᾽ ἀλρίων ἀνθρώπων ἐφερόμεθα διὰ ἐλέων τε
καὶ τεναλέων ἔνθαπερ πτηνῶν πλῆθος ἀποκρύπτει τὸν οὐρανὸν, ἡμέρας ί,
ἕως ἤλθομεν εἰς κοῖλόν τι ὄρος, ἔνθα ποτὲ μεγάλη μὲν πόλις ἦν, ἄντρα δὲ
ἀπείρονα· ἤγαγον δὲ ὡς βασίλειαν τὴν τῶν ξένους χύτραις στεφανούντων,
ἥτις μαλεία μὲν ἐχρῆτο ἐπιστήμη δὲ πάντων καὶ δὴ καὶ κάλλός καὶ ῥώμην
ἀλήρως ἦν· ἡ δὲ Καλλικράτους τοῦ πατρὸς ἐρασθεῖδα τὸ μὲν πρῶτον
συνοικεῖν ἐβούλετο ἐμὲ δὲ ἀνελεῖν· ἔπειτα, ὡς οὐκ ἀνέπειθεν, ἐμὲ γὰρ
ὑπερεφίλει καὶ τὴν ξένην ἐφοβεῖτο, ἀπήγαγεν ἡμᾶς ὑπὸ μαγείας καθʹ ὁδοὺς
σφαλερὰς ἔνθα τὸ βάραθρον τὸ μέγα, οὗ κατὰ στόμα ἔκειτο ὁ γέρων ὁ
φιλόσοφος τεθνεώς, ἀφικομένοις δʹ ἔδειξε φῶς τοῦ βίου εὐθύ, οἷον κίονα
ἑλισσόμενον φώνην ἱέντα καθάπερ βροντῆς, εἶτα διὰ πυρὸς βεβηκυῖα
ἀβλαβὴς καὶ ἔτι καλλίων αὐτὴ ἑαυτῆς ἐξεφάνη. ἐκ δὲ τούτων ὤμοσε καὶ τὸν
σὸν πατέρα ἀθάνατον ἀποδείξειν, εἰ συνοικεῖν οἱ βούλοιτο ἐμὲ δε
ὰνελεῖν, οὐ γὰρ οὖν αὐτὴ ἀνελεῖν ἴσχυεν ὑπὸ τῶν ἡμεδαπῶν ἣν καὶ αὐτὴ
ἔχω μαγείας. ὁ δʹ οὐδέν τι μᾶλλον ἤθελε, τὼ χεῖρε τῶν ὀμμάτων προίσχων
ἵνα δὴ τὸ τῆς γυναικὸς κάλλος μὴ ὁρῴη· ἔπειτα ὀργισθεῖσα κατεγοήτευσε
μὲν αὐτόν, ἀπολόμενον μέντοι κλάουσα καὶ ὀδυρμένη ἐκεῖθεν ἀπήνεγκεν,
ἐμὲ δὲ φόβῳ ἀφῆκεν εἰς στόμα τοῦ μεγάλου ποταμοῦ τοῦ ναυσιπόρου, πόδδω
δὲ ναυσίν, ἐφʹ ὧνπερ πλέουσα ἔτεκόν σε, ἀποπλεύσασα μόλις ποτὲ δεῦρο
Ἀθηνάζε κατηγαγόν. σὺ δέ, ὦ Τισίσθενες, ὧν ἐπιστέλλω μὴ ὀλιγώρει· δεῖ
γὰρ τῆν γυναῖκα ἀναζητεῖν ἤν πως τῦ βίου μυστήριον ἀνεύρῃς, καὶ
ἀναιρεῖν, ἤν που παρασχῇ, διὰ τὸν πατέρα Καλλικράτους. εἐ δὲ φοβούμενος
ἢ διὰ ἄλλο τι αὐτὸς λείπει τοῦ ἔργου, πᾶσι τοῖς ὕστερον αὐτὸ τοῦτο
ἐπιστέλλω, ἕως ποτὲ ἀγαθός τις γενόμενος τῷ πυρὶ λούσασθαι τολμήσει καὶ
τὰ ἀριστεῖα ἔχων βασιλεῦσαι τῶν ἀνθρώπων· ἄπιστα μὲν δὴ τὰ τοιαῦτα
λέγω, ὅμως δὲ ἃ αὐτὴ ἔγνωκα οὐκ ἐψευσάμην.

      The English translation was, as I discovered on further
      investigation, and as the reader may easily see by comparison,
      both accurate and elegant.

Besides the uncial writing on the convex side of the sherd at the top,
painted in dull red, on what had once been the lip of the amphora, was
the cartouche already mentioned as being on the _scarabæus_, which we
had also found in the casket. The hieroglyphics or symbols, however,
were reversed, just as though they had been pressed on wax. Whether
this was the cartouche of the original Kallikrates,[2] or of some
Prince or Pharaoh from whom his wife Amenartas was descended, I am not
sure, nor can I tell if it was drawn upon the sherd at the same time
that the uncial Greek was inscribed, or copied on more recently from
the Scarab by some other member of the family. Nor was this all. At the
foot of the writing, painted in the same dull red, was the faint
outline of a somewhat rude drawing of the head and shoulders of a
Sphinx wearing two feathers, symbols of majesty, which, though common
enough upon the effigies of sacred bulls and gods, I have never before
met with on a Sphinx.

 [2] The cartouche, if it be a true cartouche, cannot have been that of
 Kallikrates, as Mr. Holly suggests. Kallikrates was a priest and not
 entitled to a cartouche, which was the prerogative of Egyptian
 royalty, though he might have inscribed his name or title upon an
 _oval_.—Editor.

      Also on the right-hand side of this surface of the sherd, painted
      obliquely in red on the space not covered by the uncial
      characters, and signed in blue paint, was the following quaint
      inscription:—

      IN EARTH AND SKIE AND SEA
      STRANGE THYNGES THER BE.
      HOC FECIT
      DOROTHEA VINCEY.

      Perfectly bewildered, I turned the relic over. It was covered
      from top to bottom with notes and signatures in Greek, Latin, and
      English. The first in uncial Greek was by Tisisthenes, the son to
      whom the writing was addressed. It was, “I could not go.
      Tisisthenes to his son, Kallikrates.” Here it is in fac-simile
      with its cursive equivalent:—

ΟΥΚΑΝΔΥΝΑΙΜΗΝΠΟΡΕΥΕϹΘΑΙΤΙϹΙϹΘΕΝΗϹΚΑΛΛΙΚΡΑΤΕΙΤΩΙΠΑΙΔΙ
οὐκ ἂν δυναίμην πορεύεσθαι. Τισισθένης Καλλικράτει τῷ παιδί.

      This Kallikrates (probably, in the Greek fashion, so named after
      his grandfather) evidently made some attempt to start on the
      quest, for his entry written in very faint and almost illegible
      uncial is, “I ceased from my going, the gods being against me.
      Kallikrates to his son.” Here it is also:—

ΤΩΝΘΕΩΝΑΝΤΙΣΤΑΝΤΩΝΕΠΑΥΣΑΜΗΝΤΗΣΠΟΡΕΙΑΣΑΛΛΙΚΡΑΤΗΣΤΩΙΠΑΙΔΙ
τῶν θεῶν ἀντιστάντων ἐπαυσάμην τῆς πορείας. Καλλικράτης τῷ παιδί.

      Between these two ancient writings, the second of which was
      inscribed upside down and was so faint and worn that, had it not
      been for the transcript of it executed by Vincey, I should
      scarcely have been able to read it, since, owing to its having
      been written on that portion of the tile which had, in the course
      of ages, undergone the most handling, it was nearly rubbed
      out—was the bold, modern-looking signature of one Lionel Vincey,
      “Ætate sua 17,” which was written thereon, I think, by Leo’s
      grandfather. To the right of this were the initials “J. B. V.,”
      and below came a variety of Greek signatures, in uncial and
      cursive character, and what appeared to be some carelessly
      executed repetitions of the sentence τῷ παιδί (to my son),
      showing that the relic was religiously passed on from generation
      to generation.

      The next legible thing after the Greek signatures was the word
      “Romae, A.U.C.,” showing that the family had now migrated to
      Rome. Unfortunately, however, with the exception of its
      termination (evi) the date of their settlement there is for ever
      lost, for just where it had been placed a piece of the potsherd
      is broken away.

      Then followed twelve Latin signatures, jotted about here and
      there, wherever there was a space upon the tile suitable to their
      inscription. These signatures, with three exceptions only, ended
      with the name “Vindex” or “the Avenger,” which seems to have been
      adopted by the family after its migration to Rome as a kind of
      equivalent to the Greek “Tisisthenes,” which also means an
      avenger. Ultimately, as might be expected, this Latin cognomen of
      Vindex was transformed first into De Vincey, and then into the
      plain, modern Vincey. It is very curious to observe how the idea
      of revenge, inspired by an Egyptian who lived before the time of
      Christ, is thus, as it were, embalmed in an English family name.

      A few of the Roman names inscribed upon the sherd I have actually
      since found mentioned in history and other records. They were, if
      I remember right,

MVSSIVS. VINDEX
SEX. VARIVS MARVLLVS
C. FVFIDIVS. C. F. VINDEX

and

LABERIA POMPEIANA. CONIVX. MACRINI. VINDICIS

this last being, of course, the name of a Roman lady.

      The following list, however, comprises all the Latin names upon
      the sherd:—

     C. CAECILIVS VINDEX
     M. AIMILIVS VINDEX
     SEX. VARIVS. MARVLLVS
     Q. SOSIVS PRISCVS SENECIO VINDEX
     L. VALERIVS COMINIVS VINDEX
     SEX. OTACILIVS. M. F.
     L. ATTIVS. VINDEX
     MVSSIVS VINDEX
     C. FVFIDIVS. C. F. VINDEX
     LICINIVS FAVSTVS
     LABERIA POMPEIANA CONIVX MACRINI VINDICIS
     MANILIA LVCILLA CONIVX MARVLLI VINDICIS

      After the Roman names there is evidently a gap of very many
      centuries. Nobody will ever know now what was the history of the
      relic during those dark ages, or how it came to have been
      preserved in the family. My poor friend Vincey had, it will be
      remembered, told me that his Roman ancestors finally settled in
      Lombardy, and when Charlemagne invaded it, returned with him
      across the Alps, and made their home in Brittany, whence they
      crossed to England in the reign of Edward the Confessor. How he
      knew this I am not aware, for there is no reference to Lombardy
      or Charlemagne upon the tile, though, as will presently be seen,
      there is a reference to Brittany. To continue: the next entries
      on the sherd, if I may except a long splash either of blood or
      red colouring matter of some sort, consist of two crosses drawn
      in red pigment, and probably representing Crusaders’ swords, and
      a rather neat monogram (“D. V.”) in scarlet and blue, perhaps
      executed by that same Dorothea Vincey who wrote, or rather
      painted, the doggrel couplet. To the left of this, inscribed in
      faint blue, were the initials A. V., and after them a date, 1800.

      Then came what was perhaps as curious an entry as anything upon
      this extraordinary relic of the past. It is executed in black
      letter, written over the crosses or Crusaders’ swords, and dated
      fourteen hundred and forty-five. As the best plan will be to
      allow it to speak for itself, I here give the black-letter
      fac-simile, together with the original Latin without the
      contractions, from which it will be seen that the writer was a
      fair mediæval Latinist. Also we discovered what is still more
      curious, an English version of the black-letter Latin. This, also
      written in black letter, we found inscribed on a second parchment
      that was in the coffer, apparently somewhat older in date than
      that on which was inscribed the mediæval Latin translation of the
      uncial Greek of which I shall speak presently. This I also give
      in full.

_Fac-simile of Black-Letter Inscription on the Sherd of Amenartas._

      “Iſta reliq̅ia eſt valde miſticu̅ et myrificu̅ op̅s q̅d maiores
      mei ex Armorica ſſ Brittania mi̅ore ſecu̅ co̅veheba̅t et q̅dm
      ſc̅s cleric̅s ſe̅per p̅ri meo in manu ferebat q̅d pe̅itus illvd
      deſtrueret, affirma̅s q̅d eſſet ab ipſo ſathana co̅flatu̅
      preſtigioſa et dyabolica arte q̅re p̅ter mevs co̅fregit illvd i̅
      dvas p̅tes q̅s q̅dm ego Johs̅ de Vi̅ceto ſalvas ſervavi et
      adaptavi ſicut ap̅paret die lu̅e p̅r̅ poſt feſt beate Mrie vir{g}
      anni gr̅e mccccxlv.”

_Expanded Version of the above Black-Letter Inscription._

      “Ista reliquia est valde misticum et myrificum opus, quod majores
      mei ex Armorica, scilicet Britannia Minore, secum convehebant; et
      et quidam sanctus clericus semper patri meo in manu ferebat quod
      penitus illud destrueret, affirmans quod esset ab ipso Sathana
      conflatum prestigiosa et dyabolica arte, quare pater meus
      confregit illud in duas partes, quas quidem ego Johannes de
      Vinceto salvas servavi et adaptavi sicut apparet die lune proximo
      post festum beate Marie Virginis anni gratie MCCCCXLV.”

      _Fac-simile of the Old English Black-Letter Translation of the
      above Latin Inscription from the Sherd of Amenartas found
      inscribed upon a parchment._

      “Thys rellike ys a ryghte mistycall worke & a marvaylous yᵉ
      whyche myne aunceteres afore tyme dyd conveigh hider wᵗ yᵐ ffrom
      Armoryke whᵉ ys to ſeien Britaine yᵉ leſſe & a certayne holye
      clerke ſhoulde allweyes beare my ffadir on honde yᵗ he owghte
      uttirly ffor to ffruſſhe yᵉ ſame affyrmynge yᵗ yt was ffourmyd &
      confflatyd off ſathanas hym ſelffe by arte magike & dyvellyſſhe
      wherefore my ffadir dyd take yᵉ ſame & to braſt yt yn tweyne but
      I John de Vincey dyd ſave whool yᵉ tweye p̄tes therof & topeecyd
      yᵐ togydder agayne ſoe as yee ſe on y{s} daye mondaye next
      ffolowynge after yᵉ ffeeste of ſeynte Marye yᵉ bleſſed vyrgyne yn
      yᵉ yeere of ſalvacioun ffowertene hundreth & ffyve & ffowrti.”

      _Modernised Version of the above Black-Letter Translation._

      “Thys rellike ys a ryghte mistycall worke and a marvaylous, ye
      whyche myne aunceteres aforetyme dyd conveigh hider with them
      from Armoryke which ys to seien Britaine ye Lesse and a certayne
      holye clerke should allweyes beare my fadir on honde that he
      owghte uttirly for to frusshe ye same, affyrmynge that yt was
      fourmed and conflatyed of Sathanas hym selfe by arte magike and
      dyvellysshe wherefore my fadir dyd take ye same and tobrast yt yn
      tweyne, but I, John de Vincey, dyd save whool ye tweye partes
      therof and topeecyd them togydder agayne soe as yee se, on this
      daye mondaye next followynge after ye feeste of Seynte Marye ye
      Blessed Vyrgyne yn ye yeere of Salvacioun fowertene hundreth and
      fyve and fowerti.”

      The next and, save one, last entry was Elizabethan, and dated
      1564. “A most strange historie, and one that did cost my father
      his life; for in seekynge for the place upon the east coast of
      Africa, his pinnance was sunk by a Portuguese galleon off Lorenzo
      Marquez, and he himself perished.—John Vincey.”

Then came the last entry, apparently, to judge by the style of writing,
made by some representative of the family in the middle of the
eighteenth century. It was a misquotation of the well-known lines in
Hamlet, and ran thus: “There are more things in Heaven and earth than
are dreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio.”[3]

 [3] Another thing that makes me fix the date of this entry at the
 middle of the eighteenth century is that, curiously enough, I have an
 acting copy of “Hamlet,” written about 1740, in which these two lines
 are misquoted almost exactly in the same way, and I have little doubt
 but that the Vincey who wrote them on the potsherd heard them so
 misquoted at that date. Of course, the lines really run:—

     There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
     Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.—L. H. H.

And now there remained but one more document to be examined—namely, the
ancient black-letter transcription into mediæval Latin of the uncial
inscription on the sherd. As will be seen, this translation was
executed and subscribed in the year 1495, by a certain “learned man,”
Edmundus de Prato (Edmund Pratt) by name, licentiate in Canon Law, of
Exeter College, Oxford, who had actually been a pupil of Grocyn, the
first scholar who taught Greek in England.[4] No doubt, on the fame of
this new learning reaching his ears, the Vincey of the day, perhaps
that same John de Vincey who years before had saved the relic from
destruction and made the black-letter entry on the sherd in 1445,
hurried off to Oxford to see if perchance it might avail to dissolve
the secret of the mysterious inscription. Nor was he disappointed, for
the learned Edmundus was equal to the task. Indeed his rendering is so
excellent an example of mediæval learning and latinity that, even at
the risk of sating the learned reader with too many antiquities, I have
made up my mind to give it in fac-simile, together with an expanded
version for the benefit of those who find the contractions troublesome.
The translation has several peculiarities on which this is not the
place to dwell, but I would in passing call the attention of scholars
to the passage “duxerunt autem nos ad reginam
_advenaslasaniscoronantium_,” which strikes me as a delightful
rendering of the original, “ἤγαγον δὲ ὡς βασίλειαν τὴν τῶν ξένους
χύτραις στεφανούντων.”

 [4] Grocyn, the instructor of Erasmus, studied Greek under
 Chalcondylas the Byzantine at Florence, and first lectured in the Hall
 of Exeter College, Oxford, in 1491.—Editor.

_mediæval Black-Letter Latin Translation of the Uncial Inscription on
the Sherd of Amenartas_

      Amenartas e gen. reg. Egyptii uxor Callicratis ſacerdot̅ Iſidis
      qua̅ dei fove̅t demonia atte̅du̅t filiol’ ſuo Tiſiſtheni ia̅
      moribu̅da ita ma̅dat: Effugi quo̅da̅ ex Egypto regna̅te Nectanebo
      cu̅ patre tuo, p̃pter mei amore̅ pejerato. Fugie̅tes aute̅ v’ſus
      Notu̅ trans mare et xxiiij me̅ſes p’r litora Libye v’ſus Orie̅te̅
      errant̃ ubi eſt petra queda̅ m̃gna ſculpta inſtar Ethiop̃ capit̃,
      deinde dies iiij ab oſt̃ flum̃ m̃gni eiecti p’tim ſubmerſi ſumus
      p’tim morbo mortui ſum̃: in fine aute̅ a fer̃ ho̅i̅bs portabamur
      p̃r palud̃ et vada. ubi aviu̅ m’titudo celu̅ obu̅brat dies x.
      donec advenim̃ ad cavu̅ que̅da̅ monte̅, ubi olim m̃gna urbs erat,
      caverne quoq̃ im̅e̅ſe: duxeru̅t aute̅ nos ad regina̅
      Advenaſlaſaniſcorona̅tiu̅ que magic̃ utebat̃ et peritia omniu̅
      rer̃ et ſalte̅ pulcrit̃ et vigore i̅ſe̅eſcibil’ erat. Hec m̃gno
      patr̃ tui amore p̃culſa p’mu̅ q’de̅ ei con̅ubiu̅ michi morte̅
      parabat. poſtea v’ro recuſa̅te Callicrate amore mei et timore
      regine affecto nos p̃r magica̅ abduxit p’r vias horribil’ ubi eſt
      puteus ille p̃fu̅dus, cuius iuxta aditu̅ iacebat ſenior̃
      philoſophi cadaver, et adve̅ie̅tib̃ mo̅ſtravit flam̅a̅ Vite
      erecta̅, i̅star columne voluta̅tis, voces emitte̅te̅ q̃ſi
      tonitrus: tu̅c p̃r igne̅ i̅petu nociuo expers tra̅ſiit et ia̅
      ipsa ſeſe formoſior viſa eſt.

      Quib̃ fact̃ iuravit ſe patre̅ tuu̅ quoq̃ im̅ortale̅ oſte̅ſura̅
      eſſe, ſi me prius occiſa regine co̅tuberniu̅ mallet; neq̃ eni̅
      ipſa me occidere valuit, p̃pter noſtratu̅ m̃gica̅ cuius egomet
      p̃tem habeo. Ille vero nichil huius geñ maluit, manib ante ocul̃
      paſſis ne mulier̃ formoſitate̅ adſpiceret: poſtea eu̅ m̃gica
      p̃cuſſit arte, at mortuu̅ efferebat i̅de cu̅ fletib̃ et vagitib̃,
      me p̃r timore̅ expulit ad oſtiu̅ m̃gni flumiñ veliuoli porro in
      nave in qua te peperi, uix poſt dies hvc Athenas invecta ſu̅. At
      tu, O Tiſiſtheñ, ne q’d quoru̅ ma̅do nauci fac: neceſſe eni̅ eſt
      muliere̅ exquirere ſi qva Vite myſteriu̅ i̅petres et vi̅dicare,
      qua̅tu̅ in te eſt, patre̅ tuu̅ Callierat̃ in regine morte. Sin
      timore ſue aliq̃ cavſa re̅ reli̅quis i̅fecta̅, hoc ipſu̅ oi̅b̃
      poſter̃ ma̅do du̅ bonvs q̃s inveniatur qvi ignis lauacru̅ no̅
      p̃rhorreſcet et p̃tentia digñ do̅i̅abit̃ ho̅i̅u̅.

      Talia dico incredibilia q̃de̅ at min̅e ñcta de reb̃ michi
      cognitis.

      Hec Grece scripta Latine reddidit vir doctus Edm̅ds de Prato, in
      Decretis Licenciatus e Coll. Exon: Oxon: doctiſſimi Grocyni
      quondam e pupillis, Id. Apr. Aᵒ. Dn̅i. MCCCCLXXXXV°.

_Expanded Version of the above Mediæval Latin Translation_

      Amenartas, e genere regio Egyptii, uxor Callicratis, sacerdotis
      Isidis, quam dei fovent demonia attendunt, filiolo suo Tisistheni
      jam moribunda ita mandat: Effugi quodam ex Egypto, regnante
      Nectanebo, cum patre tuo, propter mei amorem pejerato. Fugientes
      autem versus Notum trans mare, et viginti quatuor menses per
      litora Libye versus Orientem errantes, ubi est petra quedam magna
      sculpta instar Ethiopis capitis, deinde dies quatuor ab ostio
      fluminis magni ejecti partim submersi sumus partim morbo mortui
      sumus: in fine autem a feris hominibus portabamur per paludes et
      vada, ubi avium multitudo celum obumbrat, dies decem, donec
      advenimus ad cavum quendam montem, ubi olim magna urbs erat,
      caverne quoque immense; duxerunt autem nos ad reginam
      Advenaslasaniscoronantium, que magicâ utebatur et peritiá omnium
      rerum, et saltem pulcritudine et vigore insenescibilis erat. Hec
      magno patris tui amore perculsa, primum quidem ei connubium michi
      mortem parabat; postea vero, recusante Callicrate, amore mei et
      timore regine affecto, nos per magicam abduxit per vias
      horribiles ubi est puteus ille profundus, cujus juxta aditum
      jacebat senioris philosophi cadaver, et advenientibus monstravit
      flammam Vite erectam, instar columne voluntantis, voces
      emittentem quasi tonitrus: tunc per ignem impetu nocivo expers
      transiit et jam ipsa sese formosior visa est.

      Quibus factis juravit se patrem tuum quoque immortalem ostensuram
      esse, si me prius occisa regine contubernium mallet; neque enim
      ipsa me occidere valuit, propter nostratum magicam cujus egomet
      partem habeo. Ille vero nichil hujus generis malebat, manibus
      ante oculos passis, ne mulieris formositatem adspiceret: postea
      illum magica percussit arte, at mortuum efferebat inde cum
      fletibus et vagitibus, et me per timorem expulit ad ostium magni
      fluminis, velivoli, porro in nave, in qua te peperi, vix post
      dies huc Athenas vecta sum. At tu, O Tisisthenes, ne quid quorum
      mando nauci fac: necesse enim est mulierem exquirere si qua Vite
      mysterium impetres et vindicare, quautum in te est, patrem tuum
      Callieratem in regine morte. Sin timore sue aliqua causa rem
      reliquis infectam, hoc ipsum omnibus posteris mando, dum bonus
      quis inveniatur qui ignis lavacrum non perhorrescet, et potentia
      dignus dominabitur hominum.

      Talia dico incredibilia quidem at minime ficta de rebus michi
      cognitis.

      Hec Grece scripta Latine reddidit vir doctus Edmundus de Prato,
      in Descretis Licenciatus, e Collegio Exoniensi Oxoniensi
      doctissimi Grocyni quondam e pupillis, Idibus Aprilis Anno Domini
      MCCCCLXXXXV°.

      “Well,” I said, when at length I had read out and carefully
      examined these writings and paragraphs, at least those of them
      that were still easily legible, “that is the conclusion of the
      whole matter, Leo, and now you can form your own opinion on it. I
      have already formed mine.”

      “And what is it?” he asked, in his quick way.

      “It is this. I believe that potsherd to be perfectly genuine, and
      that, wonderful as it may seem, it has come down in your family
      from since the fourth century before Christ. The entries
      absolutely prove it, and therefore, however improbable it may
      seem, it must be accepted. But there I stop. That your remote
      ancestress, the Egyptian princess, or some scribe under her
      direction, wrote that which we see on the sherd I have no doubt,
      nor have I the slightest doubt but that her sufferings and the
      loss of her husband had turned her head, and that she was not
      right in her mind when she did write it.”

      “How do you account for what my father saw and heard there?”
      asked Leo.

      “Coincidence. No doubt there are bluffs on the coast of Africa
      that look something like a man’s head, and plenty of people who
      speak bastard Arabic. Also, I believe that there are lots of
      swamps. Another thing is, Leo, and I am sorry to say it, but I do
      not believe that your poor father was quite right when he wrote
      that letter. He had met with a great trouble, and also he had
      allowed this story to prey on his imagination, and he was a very
      imaginative man. Anyway, I believe that the whole thing is the
      most unmitigated rubbish. I know that there are curious things
      and forces in nature which we rarely meet with, and, when we do
      meet them, cannot understand. But until I see it with my own
      eyes, which I am not likely to, I never will believe that there
      is any means of avoiding death, even for a time, or that there is
      or was a white sorceress living in the heart of an African swamp.
      It is bosh, my boy, all bosh!—What do you say, Job?”

      “I say, sir, that it is a lie, and, if it is true, I hope Mr. Leo
      won’t meddle with no such things, for no good can’t come of it.”

      “Perhaps you are both right,” said Leo, very quietly. “I express
      no opinion. But I say this. I am going to set the matter at rest
      once and for all, and if you won’t come with me I will go by
      myself.”

      I looked at the young man, and saw that he meant what he said.
      When Leo means what he says he always puts on a curious look
      about the mouth. It has been a trick of his from a child. Now, as
      a matter of fact, I had no intention of allowing Leo to go
      anywhere by himself, for my own sake, if not for his. I was far
      too attached to him for that. I am not a man of many ties or
      affections. Circumstances have been against me in this respect,
      and men and women shrink from me, or at least, I fancy that they
      do, which comes to the same thing, thinking, perhaps, that my
      somewhat forbidding exterior is a key to my character. Rather
      than endure this, I have, to a great extent, secluded myself from
      the world, and cut myself off from those opportunities which with
      most men result in the formation of relations more or less
      intimate. Therefore Leo was all the world to me—brother, child,
      and friend—and until he wearied of me, where he went there I
      should go too. But, of course, it would not do to let him see how
      great a hold he had over me; so I cast about for some means
      whereby I might let myself down easy.

      “Yes, I shall go, Uncle; and if I don’t find the ‘rolling Pillar
      of Life,’ at any rate I shall get some first-class shooting.”

      Here was my opportunity, and I took it.

      “Shooting?” I said. “Ah! yes; I never thought of that. It must be
      a very wild stretch of country, and full of big game. I have
      always wanted to kill a buffalo before I die. Do you know, my
      boy, I don’t believe in the quest, but I do believe in big game,
      and really on the whole, if, after thinking it over, you make up
      your mind to go, I will take a holiday, and come with you.”

      “Ah,” said Leo, “I thought that you would not lose such a chance.
      But how about money? We shall want a good lot.”

      “You need not trouble about that,” I answered. “There is all your
      income that has been accumulating for years, and besides that I
      have saved two-thirds of what your father left to me, as I
      consider, in trust for you. There is plenty of cash.”

      “Very well, then, we may as well stow these things away and go up
      to town to see about our guns. By the way, Job, are you coming
      too? It’s time you began to see the world.”

      “Well, sir,” answered Job, stolidly, “I don’t hold much with
      foreign parts, but if both you gentlemen are going you will want
      somebody to look after you, and I am not the man to stop behind
      after serving you for twenty years.”

      “That’s right, Job,” said I. “You won’t find out anything
      wonderful, but you will get some good shooting. And now look
      here, both of you. I won’t have a word said to a living soul
      about this nonsense,” and I pointed to the potsherd. “If it got
      out, and anything happened to me, my next of kin would dispute my
      will on the ground of insanity, and I should become the laughing
      stock of Cambridge.”

      That day three months we were on the ocean, bound for Zanzibar.




IV.
THE SQUALL


      How different is the scene that I have now to tell from that
      which has just been told! Gone are the quiet college rooms, gone
      the wind-swayed English elms, the cawing rooks, and the familiar
      volumes on the shelves, and in their place there rises a vision
      of the great calm ocean gleaming in shaded silver lights beneath
      the beams of the full African moon. A gentle breeze fills the
      huge sail of our dhow, and draws us through the water that
      ripples musically against her sides. Most of the men are sleeping
      forward, for it is near midnight, but a stout swarthy Arab,
      Mahomed by name, stands at the tiller, lazily steering by the
      stars. Three miles or more to our starboard is a low dim line. It
      is the Eastern shore of Central Africa. We are running to the
      southward, before the North East Monsoon, between the mainland
      and the reef that for hundreds of miles fringes this perilous
      coast. The night is quiet, so quiet that a whisper can be heard
      fore and aft the dhow; so quiet that a faint booming sound rolls
      across the water to us from the distant land.

      The Arab at the tiller holds up his hand, and says one
      word:—“_Simba_ (lion)!”

      We all sit up and listen. Then it comes again, a slow, majestic
      sound, that thrills us to the marrow.

      “To-morrow by ten o’clock,” I say, “we ought, if the Captain is
      not out in his reckoning, which I think very probable, to make
      this mysterious rock with a man’s head, and begin our shooting.”

      “And begin our search for the ruined city and the Fire of Life,”
      corrected Leo, taking his pipe from his mouth, and laughing a
      little.

      “Nonsense!” I answered. “You were airing your Arabic with that
      man at the tiller this afternoon. What did he tell you? He has
      been trading (slave-trading, probably) up and down these
      latitudes for half of his iniquitous life, and once landed on
      this very ‘man’ rock. Did he ever hear anything of the ruined
      city or the caves?”

      “No,” answered Leo. “He says that the country is all swamp
      behind, and full of snakes, especially pythons, and game, and
      that no man lives there. But then there is a belt of swamp all
      along the East African coast, so that does not go for much.”

      “Yes,” I said, “it does—it goes for malaria. You see what sort of
      an opinion these gentry have of the country. Not one of them will
      go with us. They think that we are mad, and upon my word I
      believe that they are right. If ever we see old England again I
      shall be astonished. However, it does not greatly matter to me at
      my age, but I am anxious for you, Leo, and for Job. It’s a Tom
      Fool’s business, my boy.”

      “All right, Uncle Horace. So far as I am concerned, I am willing
      to take my chance. Look! What is that cloud?” and he pointed to a
      dark blotch upon the starry sky, some miles astern of us.

      “Go and ask the man at the tiller,” I said.

      He rose, stretched his arms, and went. Presently he returned.

      “He says it is a squall, but it will pass far on one side of us.”

      Just then Job came up, looking very stout and English in his
      shooting-suit of brown flannel, and with a sort of perplexed
      appearance upon his honest round face that had been very common
      with him since he got into these strange waters.

      “Please, sir,” he said, touching his sun hat, which was stuck on
      to the back of his head in a somewhat ludicrous fashion, “as we
      have got all those guns and things in the whale-boat astern, to
      say nothing of the provisions in the lockers, I think it would be
      best if I got down and slept in her. I don’t like the looks”
      (here he dropped his voice to a portentous whisper) “of these
      black gentry; they have such a wonderful thievish way about them.
      Supposing now that some of them were to slip into the boat at
      night and cut the cable, and make off with her? That would be a
      pretty go, that would.”

      The whale-boat, I may explain, was one specially built for us at
      Dundee, in Scotland. We had brought it with us, as we knew that
      this coast was a network of creeks, and that we might require
      something to navigate them with. She was a beautiful boat,
      thirty-feet in length, with a centre-board for sailing,
      copper-bottomed to keep the worm out of her, and full of
      water-tight compartments. The Captain of the dhow had told us
      that when we reached the rock, which he knew, and which appeared
      to be identical with the one described upon the sherd and by
      Leo’s father, he would probably not be able to run up to it on
      account of the shallows and breakers. Therefore we had employed
      three hours that very morning, whilst we were totally becalmed,
      the wind having dropped at sunrise, in transferring most of our
      goods and chattels to the whale-boat, and placing the guns,
      ammunition, and preserved provisions in the water-tight lockers
      specially prepared for them, so that when we did sight the fabled
      rock we should have nothing to do but step into the boat, and run
      her ashore. Another reason that induced us to take this
      precautionary step was that Arab captains are apt to run past the
      point that they are making, either from carelessness or owing to
      a mistake in its identity. Now, as sailors know, it is quite
      impossible for a dhow which is only rigged to run before the
      monsoon to beat back against it. Therefore we got our boat ready
      to row for the rock at any moment.

      “Well, Job,” I said, “perhaps it would be as well. There are lots
      of blankets there, only be careful to keep out of the moon, or it
      may turn your head or blind you.”

      “Lord, sir! I don’t think it would much matter if it did; it is
      that turned already with the sight of these blackamoors and their
      filthy, thieving ways. They are only fit for muck, they are; and
      they smell bad enough for it already.”

      Job, it will be perceived, was no admirer of the manners and
      customs of our dark-skinned brothers.

      Accordingly we hauled up the boat by the tow-rope till it was
      right under the stern of the dhow, and Job bundled into her with
      all the grace of a falling sack of potatoes. Then we returned and
      sat down on the deck again, and smoked and talked in little gusts
      and jerks. The night was so lovely, and our brains were so full
      of suppressed excitement of one sort and another, that we did not
      feel inclined to turn in. For nearly an hour we sat thus, and
      then, I think, we both dozed off. At least I have a faint
      recollection of Leo sleepily explaining that the head was not a
      bad place to hit a buffalo, if you could catch him exactly
      between the horns, or send your bullet down his throat, or some
      nonsense of the sort.

      Then I remember no more; till suddenly—a frightful roar of wind,
      a shriek of terror from the awakening crew, and a whip-like sting
      of water in our faces. Some of the men ran to let go the
      haulyards and lower the sail, but the parrel jammed and the yard
      would not come down. I sprang to my feet and hung on to a rope.
      The sky aft was dark as pitch, but the moon still shone brightly
      ahead of us and lit up the blackness. Beneath its sheen a huge
      white-topped breaker, twenty feet high or more, was rushing on to
      us. It was on the break—the moon shone on its crest and tipped
      its foam with light. On it rushed beneath the inky sky, driven by
      the awful squall behind it. Suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye,
      I saw the black shape of the whale-boat cast high into the air on
      the crest of the breaking wave. Then—a shock of water, a wild
      rush of boiling foam, and I was clinging for my life to the
      shroud, ay, swept straight out from it like a flag in a gale.

      We were pooped.

      The wave passed. It seemed to me that I was under water for
      minutes—really it was seconds. I looked forward. The blast had
      torn out the great sail, and high in the air it was fluttering
      away to leeward like a huge wounded bird. Then for a moment there
      was comparative calm, and in it I heard Job’s voice yelling
      wildly, “Come here to the boat.”

      Bewildered and half-drowned as I was, I had the sense to rush
      aft. I felt the dhow sinking under me—she was full of water.
      Under her counter the whale-boat was tossing furiously, and I saw
      the Arab Mahomed, who had been steering, leap into her. I gave
      one desperate pull at the tow-rope to bring the boat alongside.
      Wildly I sprang also, Job caught me by the arm and I rolled into
      the bottom of the boat. Down went the dhow bodily, and as she did
      so Mahomed drew his curved knife and severed the fibre-rope by
      which we were fast to her, and in another second we were driving
      before the storm over the place where the dhow had been.

      “Great God!” I shrieked, “where is Leo? _Leo! Leo!_”

      “He’s gone, sir, God help him!” roared Job into my ear; and such
      was the fury of the squall that his voice sounded like a whisper.

      I wrung my hands in agony. Leo was drowned, and I was left alive
      to mourn him.

      “Look out,” yelled Job; “here comes another.”

      I turned; a second huge wave was overtaking us. I half hoped that
      it would drown me. With a curious fascination I watched its awful
      advent. The moon was nearly hidden now by the wreaths of the
      rushing storm, but a little light still caught the crest of the
      devouring breaker. There was something dark on it—a piece of
      wreckage. It was on us now, and the boat was nearly full of
      water. But she was built in air-tight compartments—Heaven bless
      the man who invented them!—and lifted up through it like a swan.
      Through the foam and turmoil I saw the black thing on the wave
      hurrying right at me. I put out my right arm to ward it from me,
      and my hand closed on another arm, the wrist of which my fingers
      gripped like a vice. I am a very strong man, and had something to
      hold to, but my arm was nearly torn from its socket by the strain
      and weight of the floating body. Had the rush lasted another two
      seconds I might either have let go or gone with it. But it
      passed, leaving us up to our knees in water.

      “Bail out! bail out!” shouted Job, suiting the action to the
      word.

      But I could not bail just then, for as the moon went out and left
      us in total darkness, one faint, flying ray of light lit upon the
      face of the man I had gripped, who was now half lying, half
      floating in the bottom of the boat.

      It was Leo. Leo brought back by the wave—back, dead or alive,
      from the very jaws of Death.

      “Bail out! bail out!” yelled Job, “or we shall founder.”

      I seized a large tin bowl with a handle to it, which was fixed
      under one of the seats, and the three of us bailed away for dear
      life. The furious tempest drove over and round us, flinging the
      boat this way and that, the wind and the storm wreaths and the
      sheets of stinging spray blinded and bewildered us, but through
      it all we worked like demons with the wild exhilaration of
      despair, for even despair can exhilarate. One minute! three
      minutes! six minutes! The boat began to lighten, and no fresh
      wave swamped us. Five minutes more, and she was fairly clear.
      Then, suddenly, above the awful shriekings of the hurricane came
      a duller, deeper roar. Great Heavens! It was the voice of
      breakers!

      At that moment the moon began to shine forth again—this time
      behind the path of the squall. Out far across the torn bosom of
      the ocean shot the ragged arrows of her light, and there, half a
      mile ahead of us, was a white line of foam, then a little space
      of open-mouthed blackness, and then another line of white. It was
      the breakers, and their roar grew clearer and yet more clear as
      we sped down upon them like a swallow. There they were, boiling
      up in snowy spouts of spray, smiting and gnashing together like
      the gleaming teeth of hell.

      “Take the tiller, Mahomed!” I roared in Arabic. “We must try and
      shoot them.” At the same moment I seized an oar, and got it out,
      motioning to Job to do likewise.

      Mahomed clambered aft, and got hold of the tiller, and with some
      difficulty Job, who had sometimes pulled a tub upon the homely
      Cam, got out his oar. In another minute the boat’s head was
      straight on to the ever-nearing foam, towards which she plunged
      and tore with the speed of a racehorse. Just in front of us the
      first line of breakers seemed a little thinner than to the right
      or left—there was a cap of rather deeper water. I turned and
      pointed to it.

      “Steer for your life, Mahomed!” I yelled. He was a skilful
      steersman, and well acquainted with the dangers of this most
      perilous coast, and I saw him grip the tiller, bend his heavy
      frame forward, and stare at the foaming terror till his big round
      eyes looked as though they would start out of his head. The send
      of the sea was driving the boat’s head round to starboard. If we
      struck the line of breakers fifty yards to starboard of the gap
      we must sink. It was a great field of twisting, spouting waves.
      Mahomed planted his foot against the seat before him, and,
      glancing at him, I saw his brown toes spread out like a hand with
      the weight he put upon them as he took the strain of the tiller.
      She came round a bit, but not enough. I roared to Job to back
      water, whilst I dragged and laboured at my oar. She answered now,
      and none too soon.

      Heavens, we were in them! And then followed a couple of minutes
      of heart-breaking excitement such as I cannot hope to describe.
      All that I remember is a shrieking sea of foam, out of which the
      billows rose here, there, and everywhere like avenging ghosts
      from their ocean grave. Once we were turned right round, but
      either by chance, or through Mahomed’s skilful steering, the
      boat’s head came straight again before a breaker filled us. One
      more—a monster. We were through it or over it—more through than
      over—and then, with a wild yell of exultation from the Arab, we
      shot out into the comparative smooth water of the mouth of sea
      between the teeth-like lines of gnashing waves.

      But we were nearly full of water again, and not more than half a
      mile ahead was the second line of breakers. Again we set to and
      bailed furiously. Fortunately the storm had now quite gone by,
      and the moon shone brightly, revealing a rocky headland running
      half a mile or more out into the sea, of which this second line
      of breakers appeared to be a continuation. At any rate, they
      boiled around its foot. Probably the ridge that formed the
      headland ran out into the ocean, only at a lower level, and made
      the reef also. This headland was terminated by a curious peak
      that seemed not to be more than a mile away from us. Just as we
      got the boat pretty clear for the second time, Leo, to my immense
      relief, opened his eyes and remarked that the clothes had tumbled
      off the bed, and that he supposed it was time to get up for
      chapel. I told him to shut his eyes and keep quiet, which he did
      without in the slightest degree realizing the position. As for
      myself, his reference to chapel made me reflect, with a sort of
      sick longing, on my comfortable rooms at Cambridge. Why had I
      been such a fool as to leave them? This is a reflection that has
      several times recurred to me since, and with an ever-increasing
      force.

      But now again we were drifting down on the breakers, though with
      lessened speed, for the wind had fallen, and only the current or
      the tide (it afterwards turned out to be the tide) was driving
      us.

      Another minute, and with a sort of howl to Allah from the Arab, a
      pious ejaculation from myself, and something that was not pious
      from Job, we were in them. And then the whole scene, down to our
      final escape, repeated itself, only not quite so violently.
      Mahomed’s skilful steering and the air-tight compartments saved
      our lives. In five minutes we were through, and drifting—for we
      were too exhausted to do anything to help ourselves except keep
      her head straight—with the most startling rapidity round the
      headland which I have described.

      Round we went with the tide, until we got well under the lee of
      the point, and then suddenly the speed slackened, we ceased to
      make way, and finally appeared to be in dead water. The storm had
      entirely passed, leaving a clean-washed sky behind it; the
      headland intercepted the heavy sea that had been occasioned by
      the squall, and the tide, which had been running so fiercely up
      the river (for we were now in the mouth of a river), was sluggish
      before it turned, so we floated quietly, and before the moon went
      down managed to bail out the boat thoroughly and get her a little
      ship-shape. Leo was sleeping profoundly, and on the whole I
      thought it wise not to wake him. It was true he was sleeping in
      wet clothes, but the night was now so warm that I thought (and so
      did Job) that they were not likely to injure a man of his
      unusually vigorous constitution. Besides, we had no dry ones at
      hand.

      Presently the moon went down, and left us floating on the waters,
      now only heaving like some troubled woman’s breast, with leisure
      to reflect upon all that we had gone through and all that we had
      escaped. Job stationed himself at the bow, Mahomed kept his post
      at the tiller, and I sat on a seat in the middle of the boat
      close to where Leo was lying.

      The moon went slowly down in chastened loveliness; she departed
      like some sweet bride into her chamber, and long veil-like
      shadows crept up the sky through which the stars peeped shyly
      out. Soon, however, they too began to pale before a splendour in
      the east, and then the quivering footsteps of the dawn came
      rushing across the new-born blue, and shook the high stars from
      their places. Quieter and yet more quiet grew the sea, quiet as
      the soft mist that brooded on her bosom, and covered up her
      troubling, as the illusive wreaths of sleep brood upon a
      pain-racked mind, causing it to forget its sorrow. From the east
      to the west sped the angels of the Dawn, from sea to sea, from
      mountain-top to mountain-top, scattering light with both their
      hands. On they sped out of the darkness, perfect, glorious, like
      spirits of the just breaking from the tomb; on, over the quiet
      sea, over the low coastline, and the swamps beyond, and the
      mountains above them; over those who slept in peace and those who
      woke in sorrow; over the evil and the good; over the living and
      the dead; over the wide world and all that breathes or has
      breathed thereon.

      It was a wonderfully beautiful sight, and yet sad, perhaps, from
      the very excess of its beauty. The arising sun; the setting sun!
      There we have the symbol and the type of humanity, and all things
      with which humanity has to do. The symbol and the type, yes, and
      the earthly beginning, and the end also. And on that morning this
      came home to me with a peculiar force. The sun that rose to-day
      for us had set last night for eighteen of our
      fellow-voyagers!—had set everlastingly for eighteen whom we knew!

      The dhow had gone down with them, they were tossing about among
      the rocks and seaweed, so much human drift on the great ocean of
      Death! And we four were saved. But one day a sunrise will come
      when we shall be among those who are lost, and then others will
      watch those glorious rays, and grow sad in the midst of beauty,
      and dream of Death in the full glow of arising Life!

      For this is the lot of man.




V.
THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN


      At length the heralds and forerunners of the royal sun had done
      their work, and, searching out the shadows, had caused them to
      flee away. Then up he came in glory from his ocean-bed, and
      flooded the earth with warmth and light. I sat there in the boat
      listening to the gentle lapping of the water and watched him
      rise, till presently the slight drift of the boat brought the
      odd-shaped rock, or peak, at the end of the promontory which we
      had weathered with so much peril, between me and the majestic
      sight, and blotted it from my view. I still continued, however,
      to stare at the rock, absently enough, till presently it became
      edged with the fire of the growing light behind it, and then I
      started, as well I might, for I perceived that the top of the
      peak, which was about eighty feet high by one hundred and fifty
      feet thick at its base, was shaped like a negro’s head and face,
      whereon was stamped a most fiendish and terrifying expression.
      There was no doubt about it; there were the thick lips, the fat
      cheeks, and the squat nose standing out with startling clearness
      against the flaming background. There, too, was the round skull,
      washed into shape perhaps by thousands of years of wind and
      weather, and, to complete the resemblance, there was a scrubby
      growth of weeds or lichen upon it, which against the sun looked
      for all the world like the wool on a colossal negro’s head. It
      certainly was very odd; so odd that now I believe it is not a
      mere freak of nature but a gigantic monument fashioned, like the
      well-known Egyptian Sphinx, by a forgotten people out of a pile
      of rock that lent itself to their design, perhaps as an emblem of
      warning and defiance to any enemies who approached the harbour.
      Unfortunately we were never able to ascertain whether or not this
      was the case, inasmuch as the rock was difficult of access both
      from the land and the waterside, and we had other things to
      attend to. Myself, considering the matter by the light of what we
      afterwards saw, I believe that it was fashioned by man, but
      whether or not this is so, there it stands, and sullenly stares
      from age to age out across the changing sea—there it stood two
      thousand years and more ago, when Amenartas, the Egyptian
      princess, and the wife of Leo’s remote ancestor Kallikrates,
      gazed upon its devilish face—and there I have no doubt it will
      still stand when as many centuries as are numbered between her
      day and our own are added to the year that bore us to oblivion.

      “What do you think of that, Job?” I asked of our retainer, who
      was sitting on the edge of the boat, trying to get as much
      sunshine as possible, and generally looking uncommonly wretched,
      and I pointed to the fiery and demoniacal head.

      “Oh Lord, sir,” answered Job, who now perceived the object for
      the first time, “I think that the old gentleman must have been
      sitting for his portrait on them rocks.”

      I laughed, and the laugh woke up Leo.

      “Hullo,” he said, “what’s the matter with me? I am all
      stiff—where is the dhow? Give me some brandy, please.”

      “You may be thankful that you are not stiffer, my boy,” I
      answered. “The dhow is sunk, everybody on board her is drowned
      with the exception of us four, and your own life was only saved
      by a miracle”; and whilst Job, now that it was light enough,
      searched about in a locker for the brandy for which Leo asked, I
      told him the history of our night’s adventure.

      “Great Heavens!” he said faintly; “and to think that we should
      have been chosen to live through it!”

      By this time the brandy was forthcoming, and we all had a good
      pull at it, and thankful enough we were for it. Also the sun was
      beginning to get strength, and warm our chilled bones, for we had
      been wet through for five hours or more.

      “Why,” said Leo, with a gasp as he put down the brandy bottle,
      “there is the head the writing talks of, the ‘rock carven like
      the head of an Ethiopian.’”

      “Yes,” I said, “there it is.”

      “Well, then,” he answered, “the whole thing is true.”

      “I don’t see at all that that follows,” I answered. “We knew this
      head was here: your father saw it. Very likely it is not the same
      head that the writing talks of; or if it is, it proves nothing.”

      Leo smiled at me in a superior way. “You are an unbelieving Jew,
      Uncle Horace,” he said. “Those who live will see.”

      “Exactly so,” I answered, “and now perhaps you will observe that
      we are drifting across a sandbank into the mouth of the river.
      Get hold of your oar, Job, and we will row in and see if we can
      find a place to land.”

The river mouth which we were entering did not appear to be a very wide
one, though as yet the long banks of steaming mist that clung about its
shores had not lifted sufficiently to enable us to see its exact
measure. There was, as is the case with nearly every East African
river, a considerable bar at the mouth, which, no doubt, when the wind
was on shore and the tide running out, was absolutely impassable even
for a boat drawing only a few inches. But as things were it was
manageable enough, and we did not ship a cupful of water. In twenty
minutes we were well across it, with but slight assistance from
ourselves, and being carried by a strong though somewhat variable
breeze well up the harbour. By this time the mist was being sucked up
by the sun, which was getting uncomfortably hot, and we saw that the
mouth of the little estuary was here about half a mile across, and that
the banks were very marshy, and crowded with crocodiles lying about on
the mud like logs. About a mile ahead of us, however, was what appeared
to be a strip of firm land, and for this we steered. In another quarter
of an hour we were there, and making the boat fast to a beautiful tree
with broad shining leaves, and flowers of the magnolia species, only
they were rose-coloured and not white,[1] which hung over the water, we
disembarked. This done we undressed, washed ourselves, and spread our
clothes, together with the contents of the boat, in the sun to dry,
which they very quickly did. Then, taking shelter from the sun under
some trees, we made a hearty breakfast off a “Paysandu” potted tongue,
of which we had brought a good quantity with us, congratulating
ourselves loudly on our good fortune in having loaded and provisioned
the boat on the previous day before the hurricane destroyed the dhow.
By the time that we had finished our meal our clothes were quite dry,
and we hastened to get into them, feeling not a little refreshed.
Indeed, with the exception of weariness and a few bruises, none of us
were the worse for the terrifying adventure which had been fatal to all
our companions. Leo, it is true, had been half-drowned, but that is no
great matter to a vigorous young athlete of five-and-twenty.

 [1] There is a known species of magnolia with pink flowers. It is
 indigenous in Sikkim, and known as _Magnolia Campbellii_.—Editor.

      After breakfast we started to look about us. We were on a strip
      of dry land about two hundred yards broad by five hundred long,
      bordered on one side by the river, and on the other three by
      endless desolate swamps, that stretched as far as the eye could
      reach. This strip of land was raised about twenty-five feet above
      the plain of the surrounding swamps and the river level: indeed
      it had every appearance of having been made by the hand of man.

      “This place has been a wharf,” said Leo, dogmatically.

      “Nonsense,” I answered. “Who would be stupid enough to build a
      wharf in the middle of these dreadful marshes in a country
      inhabited by savages—that is, if it is inhabited at all?”

      “Perhaps it was not always marsh, and perhaps the people were not
      always savage,” he said drily, looking down the steep bank, for
      we were standing by the river. “Look there,” he went on, pointing
      to a spot where the hurricane of the previous night had torn up
      one of the magnolia trees by the roots, which had grown on the
      extreme edge of the bank just where it sloped down to the water,
      and lifted a large cake of earth with them. “Is not that
      stonework? If not, it is very like it.”

      “Nonsense,” I said again, but we clambered down to the spot, and
      got between the upturned roots and the bank.

      “Well?” he said.

      But I did not answer this time. I only whistled. For there, laid
      bare by the removal of the earth, was an undoubted facing of
      solid stone laid in large blocks and bound together with brown
      cement, so hard that I could make no impression on it with the
      file in my shooting-knife. Nor was this all; seeing something
      projecting through the soil at the bottom of the bared patch of
      walling, I removed the loose earth with my hands, and revealed a
      huge stone ring, a foot or more in diameter, and about three
      inches thick. This fairly staggered me.

      “Looks rather like a wharf where good-sized vessels have been
      moored, does it not, Uncle Horace?” said Leo, with an excited
      grin.

      I tried to say “Nonsense” again, but the word stuck in my
      throat—the ring spoke for itself. In some past age vessels _had_
      been moored there, and this stone wall was undoubtedly the
      remnant of a solidly constructed wharf. Probably the city to
      which it had belonged lay buried beneath the swamp behind it.

      “Begins to look as though there were something in the story after
      all, Uncle Horace,” said the exultant Leo; and reflecting on the
      mysterious negro’s head and the equally mysterious stonework, I
      made no direct reply.

“A country like Africa,” I said, “is sure to be full of the relics of
long dead and forgotten civilisations. Nobody knows the age of the
Egyptian civilisation, and very likely it had offshoots. Then there
were the Babylonians and the Phœnicians, and the Persians, and all
manner of people, all more or less civilised, to say nothing of the
Jews whom everybody ‘wants’ nowadays. It is possible that they, or any
one of them, may have had colonies or trading stations about here.
Remember those buried Persian cities that the consul showed us at
Kilwa.”[2]

 [2] Near Kilwa, on the East Coast of Africa, about 400 miles south of
 Zanzibar, is a cliff which has been recently washed by the waves. On
 the top of this cliff are Persian tombs known to be at least seven
 centuries old by the dates still legible upon them. Beneath these
 tombs is a layer of _débris_ representing a city. Farther down the
 cliff is a second layer representing an older city, and farther down
 still a third layer, the remains of yet another city of vast and
 unknown antiquity. Beneath the bottom city were recently found some
 specimens of glazed earthenware, such as are occasionally to be met
 with on that coast to this day. I believe that they are now in the
 possession of Sir John Kirk.—Editor.

      “Quite so,” said Leo, “but that is not what you said before.”

      “Well, what is to be done now?” I asked, turning the
      conversation.

      As no answer was forthcoming we walked to the edge of the swamp,
      and looked over it. It was apparently boundless, and vast flocks
      of every sort of waterfowl flew from its recesses, till it was
      sometimes difficult to see the sky. Now that the sun was getting
      high it drew thin sickly looking clouds of poisonous vapour from
      the surface of the marsh and from the scummy pools of stagnant
      water.

      “Two things are clear to me,” I said, addressing my three
      companions, who stared at this spectacle in dismay: “first, that
      we can’t go across there” (I pointed to the swamp), “and,
      secondly, that if we stop here we shall certainly die of fever.”

      “That’s as clear as a haystack, sir,” said Job.

      “Very well, then; there are two alternatives before us. One is to
      ‘bout ship, and try and run for some port in the whale-boat,
      which would be a sufficiently risky proceeding, and the other to
      sail or row on up the river, and see where we come to.”

      “I don’t know what you are going to do,” said Leo, setting his
      mouth, “but I am going up that river.”

      Job turned up the whites of his eyes and groaned, and the Arab
      murmured “Allah,” and groaned also. As for me, I remarked sweetly
      that as we seemed to be between the devil and the deep sea, it
      did not much matter where we went. But in reality I was as
      anxious to proceed as Leo. The colossal negro’s head and the
      stone wharf had excited my curiosity to an extent of which I was
      secretly ashamed, and I was prepared to gratify it at any cost.
      Accordingly, having carefully fitted the mast, restowed the boat,
      and got out our rifles, we embarked. Fortunately the wind was
      blowing on shore from the ocean, so we were able to hoist the
      sail. Indeed, we afterwards found out that as a general rule the
      wind set on shore from daybreak for some hours, and off shore
      again at sunset, and the explanation that I offer of this is,
      that when the earth is cooled by the dew and the night the hot
      air rises, and the draught rushes in from the sea till the sun
      has once more heated it through. At least that appeared to be the
      rule here.

      Taking advantage of this favouring wind, we sailed merrily up the
      river for three or four hours. Once we came across a school of
      hippopotami, which rose, and bellowed dreadfully at us within ten
      or a dozen fathoms of the boat, much to Job’s alarm, and, I will
      confess, to my own. These were the first hippopotami that we had
      ever seen, and, to judge by their insatiable curiosity, I should
      judge that we were the first white men that they had ever seen.
      Upon my word, I once or twice thought that they were coming into
      the boat to gratify it. Leo wanted to fire at them, but I
      dissuaded him, fearing the consequences. Also, we saw hundreds of
      crocodiles basking on the muddy banks, and thousands upon
      thousands of water-fowl. Some of these we shot, and among them
      was a wild goose, which, in addition to the sharp-curved spurs on
      its wings, had a spur about three-quarters of an inch long
      growing from the skull just between the eyes. We never shot
      another like it, so I do not know if it was a “sport” or a
      distinct species. In the latter case this incident may interest
      naturalists. Job named it the Unicorn Goose.

      About midday the sun grew intensely hot, and the stench drawn up
      by it from the marshes which the river drains was something too
      awful, and caused us instantly to swallow precautionary doses of
      quinine. Shortly afterwards the breeze died away altogether, and
      as rowing our heavy boat against stream in the heat was out of
      the question, we were thankful enough to get under the shade of a
      group of trees—a species of willow—that grew by the edge of the
      river, and lie there and gasp till at length the approach of
      sunset put a period to our miseries. Seeing what appeared to be
      an open space of water straight ahead of us, we determined to row
      there before settling what to do for the night. Just as we were
      about to loosen the boat, however, a beautiful waterbuck, with
      great horns curving forward, and a white stripe across the rump,
      came down to the river to drink, without perceiving us hidden
      away within fifty yards under the willows. Leo was the first to
      catch sight of it, and, being an ardent sportsman, thirsting for
      the blood of big game, about which he had been dreaming for
      months, he instantly stiffened all over, and pointed like a
      setter dog. Seeing what was the matter, I handed him his express
      rifle, at the same time taking my own.

      “Now then,” I whispered, “mind you don’t miss.”

      “Miss!” he whispered back contemptuously; “I could not miss it if
      I tried.”

      He lifted the rifle, and the roan-coloured buck, having drunk his
      fill, raised his head and looked out across the river. He was
      standing right against the sunset sky on a little eminence, or
      ridge of ground, which ran across the swamp, evidently a
      favourite path for game, and there was something very beautiful
      about him. Indeed, I do not think that if I live to a hundred I
      shall ever forget that desolate and yet most fascinating scene;
      it is stamped upon my memory. To the right and left were wide
      stretches of lonely death-breeding swamp, unbroken and unrelieved
      so far as the eye could reach, except here and there by ponds of
      black and peaty water that, mirror-like, flashed up the red rays
      of the setting sun. Behind us and before stretched the vista of
      the sluggish river, ending in glimpses of a reed-fringed lagoon,
      on the surface of which the long lights of the evening played as
      the faint breeze stirred the shadows. To the west loomed the huge
      red ball of the sinking sun, now vanishing down the vapoury
      horizon, and filling the great heaven, high across whose arch the
      cranes and wildfowl streamed in line, square, and triangle, with
      flashes of flying gold and the lurid stain of blood. And then
      ourselves—three modern Englishmen in a modern English
      boat—seeming to jar upon and look out of tone with that
      measureless desolation; and in front of us the noble buck limned
      out upon a background of ruddy sky.

      _Bang!_ Away he goes with a mighty bound. Leo has missed him.
      _Bang!_ right under him again. Now for a shot. I must have one,
      though he is going like an arrow, and a hundred yards away and
      more. By Jove! over and over and over! “Well, I think I’ve wiped
      your eye there, Master Leo,” I say, struggling against the
      ungenerous exultation that in such a supreme moment of one’s
      existence will rise in the best-mannered sportsman’s breast.

      “Confound you, yes,” growled Leo; and then, with that quick smile
      that is one of his charms lighting up his handsome face like a
      ray of light, “I beg your pardon, old fellow. I congratulate you;
      it was a lovely shot, and mine were vile.”

      We got out of the boat and ran to the buck, which was shot
      through the spine and stone dead. It took us a quarter of an hour
      or more to clean it and cut off as much of the best meat as we
      could carry, and, having packed this away, we had barely light
      enough to row up into the lagoon-like space, into which, there
      being a hollow in the swamp, the river here expanded. Just as the
      light vanished we cast anchor about thirty fathoms from the edge
      of the lake. We did not dare to go ashore, not knowing if we
      should find dry ground to camp on, and greatly fearing the
      poisonous exhalations from the marsh, from which we thought we
      should be freer on the water. So we lighted a lantern, and made
      our evening meal off another potted tongue in the best fashion
      that we could, and then prepared to go to sleep, only, however,
      to find that sleep was impossible. For, whether they were
      attracted by the lantern, or by the unaccustomed smell of a white
      man for which they had been waiting for the last thousand years
      or so, I know not; but certainly we were presently attacked by
      tens of thousands of the most blood-thirsty, pertinacious, and
      huge mosquitoes that I ever saw or read of. In clouds they came,
      and pinged and buzzed and bit till we were nearly mad. Tobacco
      smoke only seemed to stir them into a merrier and more active
      life, till at length we were driven to covering ourselves with
      blankets, head and all, and sitting to slowly stew and
      continually scratch and swear beneath them. And as we sat,
      suddenly rolling out like thunder through the silence came the
      deep roar of a lion, and then of a second lion, moving among the
      reeds within sixty yards of us.

      “I say,” said Leo, sticking his head out from under his blanket,
      “lucky we ain’t on the bank, eh, Avuncular?” (Leo sometimes
      addressed me in this disrespectful way.) “Curse it! a mosquito
      has bitten me on the nose,” and the head vanished again.

      Shortly after this the moon came up, and notwithstanding every
      variety of roar that echoed over the water to us from the lions
      on the banks, we began, thinking ourselves perfectly secure, to
      gradually doze off.

      I do not quite know what it was that made me poke my head out of
      the friendly shelter of the blanket, perhaps because I found that
      the mosquitoes were biting right through it. Anyhow, as I did so
      I heard Job whisper, in a frightened voice—

      “Oh, my stars, look there!”

      Instantly we all of us looked, and this was what we saw in the
      moonlight. Near the shore were two wide and ever-widening circles
      of concentric rings rippling away across the surface of the
      water, and in the heart and centre of the circles were two dark
      moving objects.

      “What is it?” asked I.

      “It is those damned lions, sir,” answered Job, in a tone which
      was an odd mixture of a sense of personal injury, habitual
      respect, and acknowledged fear, “and they are swimming here to
      _heat_ us,” he added, nervously picking up an “h” in his
      agitation.

      I looked again: there was no doubt about it; I could catch the
      glare of their ferocious eyes. Attracted either by the smell of
      the newly killed waterbuck meat or of ourselves, the hungry
      beasts were actually storming our position.

      Leo already had his rifle in his hand. I called to him to wait
      till they were nearer, and meanwhile grabbed my own. Some fifteen
      feet from us the water shallowed on a bank to the depth of about
      fifteen inches, and presently the first of them—it was the
      lioness—got on to it, shook herself, and roared. At that moment
      Leo fired, the bullet went right down her open mouth and out at
      the back of her neck, and down she dropped, with a splash, dead.
      The other lion—a full-grown male—was some two paces behind her.
      At this second he got his forepaws on to the bank, when a strange
      thing happened. There was a rush and disturbance of the water,
      such as one sees in a pond in England when a pike takes a little
      fish, only a thousand times fiercer and larger, and suddenly the
      lion gave a most terrific snarling roar and sprang forward on to
      the bank, dragging something black with him.

      “Allah!” shouted Mahomed, “a crocodile has got him by the leg!”
      and sure enough he had. We could see the long snout with its
      gleaming lines of teeth and the reptile body behind it.

      And then followed an extraordinary scene indeed. The lion managed
      to get well on to the bank, the crocodile half standing and half
      swimming, still nipping his hind leg. He roared till the air
      quivered with the sound, and then, with a savage, shrieking
      snarl, turned round and clawed hold of the crocodile’s head. The
      crocodile shifted his grip, having, as we afterwards discovered,
      had one of his eyes torn out, and slightly turned over; instantly
      the lion got him by the throat and held on, and then over and
      over they rolled upon the bank struggling hideously. It was
      impossible to follow their movements, but when next we got a
      clear view the tables had turned, for the crocodile, whose head
      seemed to be a mass of gore, had got the lion’s body in his iron
      jaws just above the hips, and was squeezing him and shaking him
      to and fro. For his part, the tortured brute, roaring in agony,
      was clawing and biting madly at his enemy’s scaly head, and
      fixing his great hind claws in the crocodile’s, comparatively
      speaking, soft throat, ripping it open as one would rip a glove.

      Then, all of a sudden, the end came. The lion’s head fell forward
      on the crocodile’s back, and with an awful groan he died, and the
      crocodile, after standing for a minute motionless, slowly rolled
      over on to his side, his jaws still fixed across the carcase of
      the lion, which, we afterwards found, he had bitten almost in
      halves.

      This duel to the death was a wonderful and a shocking sight, and
      one that I suppose few men have seen—and thus it ended.

      When it was all over, leaving Mahomed to keep a look out, we
      managed to spend the rest of the night as quietly as the
      mosquitoes would allow.




VI.
AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY


      Next morning, at the earliest light of dawn, we rose, performed
      such ablutions as circumstances would allow, and generally made
      ready to start. I am bound to say that when there was sufficient
      light to enable us to see each other’s faces I, for one, burst
      out into a roar of laughter. Job’s fat and comfortable
      countenance was swollen out to nearly twice its natural size from
      mosquito bites, and Leo’s condition was not much better. Indeed,
      of the three I had come off much the best, probably owing to the
      toughness of my dark skin, and to the fact that a good deal of it
      was covered by hair, for since we had started from England I had
      allowed my naturally luxuriant beard to grow at its own sweet
      will. But the other two were, comparatively speaking, clean
      shaved, which of course gave the enemy a larger extent of open
      country to operate on, though in Mahomed’s case the mosquitoes,
      recognising the taste of a true believer, would not touch him at
      any price. How often, I wonder, during the next week or so did we
      wish that we were flavoured like an Arab!

      By the time that we had done laughing as heartily as our swollen
      lips would allow, it was daylight, and the morning breeze was
      coming up from the sea, cutting lanes through the dense marsh
      mists, and here and there rolling them before it in great balls
      of fleecy vapour. So we set our sail, and having first taken a
      look at the two dead lions and the alligator, which we were of
      course unable to skin, being destitute of means of curing the
      pelts, we started, and, sailing through the lagoon, followed the
      course of the river on the farther side. At midday, when the
      breeze dropped, we were fortunate enough to find a convenient
      piece of dry land on which to camp and light a fire, and here we
      cooked two wild-ducks and some of the waterbuck’s flesh—not in a
      very appetising way, it is true, but still sufficiently. The rest
      of the buck’s flesh we cut into strips and hung in the sun to dry
      into “biltong,” as, I believe, the South African Dutch call flesh
      thus prepared. On this welcome patch of dry land we stopped till
      the following dawn, and, as before, spent the night in warfare
      with the mosquitoes, but without other troubles. The next day or
      two passed in similar fashion, and without noticeable adventures,
      except that we shot a specimen of a peculiarly graceful hornless
      buck, and saw many varieties of water-lily in full bloom, some of
      them blue and of exquisite beauty, though few of the flowers were
      perfect, owing to the prevalence of a white water-maggot with a
      green head that fed upon them.

      It was on the fifth day of our journey, when we had travelled, so
      far as we could reckon, about one hundred and thirty-five to a
      hundred and forty miles westwards from the coast, that the first
      event of any real importance occurred. On that morning the usual
      wind failed us about eleven o’clock, and after pulling a little
      way we were forced to halt, more or less exhausted, at what
      appeared to be the junction of our stream with another of a
      uniform width of about fifty feet. Some trees grew near at
      hand—the only trees in all this country were along the banks of
      the river, and under these we rested, and then, the land being
      fairly dry just here, walked a little way along the edge of the
      river to prospect, and shoot a few waterfowl for food. Before we
      had gone fifty yards we perceived that all hopes of getting
      further up the stream in the whale-boat were at an end, for not
      two hundred yards above where we had stopped were a succession of
      shallows and mudbanks, with not six inches of water over them. It
      was a watery _cul de sac_.

      Turning back, we walked some way along the banks of the other
      river, and soon came to the conclusion, from various indications,
      that it was not a river at all, but an ancient canal, like the
      one which is to be seen above Mombasa, on the Zanzibar coast,
      connecting the Tana River with the Ozy, in such a way as to
      enable the shipping coming down the Tana to cross to the Ozy, and
      reach the sea by it, and thus avoid the very dangerous bar that
      blocks the mouth of the Tana. The canal before us had evidently
      been dug out by man at some remote period of the world’s history,
      and the results of his digging still remained in the shape of the
      raised banks that had no doubt once formed towing-paths. Except
      here and there, where they had been hollowed out by the water or
      fallen in, these banks of stiff binding clay were at a uniform
      distance from each other, and the depth of the stream also
      appeared to be uniform. Current there was little or none, and, as
      a consequence, the surface of the canal was choked with vegetable
      growth, intersected by little paths of clear water, made, I
      suppose, by the constant passage of waterfowl, iguanas, and other
      vermin. Now, as it was evident that we could not proceed up the
      river, it became equally evident that we must either try the
      canal or else return to the sea. We could not stop where we were,
      to be baked by the sun and eaten up by the mosquitoes, till we
      died of fever in that dreary marsh.

      “Well, I suppose that we must try it,” I said; and the others
      assented in their various ways—Leo, as though it were the best
      joke in the world; Job, in respectful disgust; and Mahomed, with
      an invocation to the Prophet, and a comprehensive curse upon all
      unbelievers and their ways of thought and travel.

      Accordingly, as soon as the sun got low, having little or nothing
      more to hope for from our friendly wind, we started. For the
      first hour or so we managed to row the boat, though with great
      labour; but after that the weeds got too thick to allow of it,
      and we were obliged to resort to the primitive and most
      exhausting resource of towing her. For two hours we laboured,
      Mahomed, Job, and I, who was supposed to be strong enough to pull
      against the two of them, on the bank, while Leo sat in the bow of
      the boat, and brushed away the weeds which collected round the
      cutwater with Mahomed’s sword. At dark we halted for some hours
      to rest and enjoy the mosquitoes, but about midnight we went on
      again, taking advantage of the comparative cool of the night. At
      dawn we rested for three hours, and then started once more, and
      laboured on till about ten o’clock, when a thunderstorm,
      accompanied by a deluge of rain, overtook us, and we spent the
      next six hours practically under water.

      I do not know that there is any necessity for me to describe the
      next four days of our voyage in detail, further than to say that
      they were, on the whole, the most miserable that I ever spent in
      my life, forming one monotonous record of heavy labour, heat,
      misery, and mosquitoes. All that dreary way we passed through a
      region of almost endless swamp, and I can only attribute our
      escape from fever and death to the constant doses of quinine and
      purgatives which we took, and the unceasing toil which we were
      forced to undergo. On the third day of our journey up the canal
      we had sighted a round hill that loomed dimly through the vapours
      of the marsh, and on the evening of the fourth night, when we
      camped, this hill seemed to be within five-and-twenty or thirty
      miles of us. We were by now utterly exhausted, and felt as though
      our blistered hands could not pull the boat a yard farther, and
      that the best thing that we could do would be to lie down and die
      in that dreadful wilderness of swamp. It was an awful position,
      and one in which I trust no other white man will ever be placed;
      and as I threw myself down in the boat to sleep the sleep of
      utter exhaustion, I bitterly cursed my folly in ever having been
      a party to such a mad undertaking, which could, I saw, only end
      in our death in this ghastly land. I thought, I remember, as I
      slowly sank into a doze, of what the appearance of the boat and
      her unhappy crew would be in two or three months’ time from that
      night. There she would lie, with gaping seams and half filled
      with fœtid water, which, when the mist-laden wind stirred her,
      would wash backwards and forwards through our mouldering bones,
      and that would be the end of her, and of those in her who would
      follow after myths and seek out the secrets of Nature.

      Already I seemed to hear the water rippling against the
      desiccated bones and rattling them together, rolling my skull
      against Mahomed’s, and his against mine, till at last Mahomed’s
      stood straight up upon its vertebræ, and glared at me through its
      empty eyeholes, and cursed me with its grinning jaws, because I,
      a dog of a Christian, disturbed the last sleep of a true
      believer. I opened my eyes, and shuddered at the horrid dream,
      and then shuddered again at something that was not a dream, for
      two great eyes were gleaming down at me through the misty
      darkness. I struggled up, and in my terror and confusion
      shrieked, and shrieked again, so that the others sprang up too,
      reeling, and drunken with sleep and fear. And then all of a
      sudden there was a flash of cold steel, and a great spear was
      held against my throat, and behind it other spears gleamed
      cruelly.

      “Peace,” said a voice, speaking in Arabic, or rather in some
      dialect into which Arabic entered very largely; “who are ye who
      come hither swimming on the water? Speak or ye die,” and the
      steel pressed sharply against my throat, sending a cold chill
      through me.

      “We are travellers, and have come hither by chance,” I answered
      in my best Arabic, which appeared to be understood, for the man
      turned his head, and, addressing a tall form that towered up in
      the background, said, “Father, shall we slay?”

      “What is the colour of the men?” said a deep voice in answer.

      “White is their colour.”

      “Slay not,” was the reply. “Four suns since was the word brought
      to me from ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_,’ ‘White men come; if white
      men come, slay them not.’ Let them be brought to the house of
      ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_.’ Bring forth the men, and let that
      which they have with them be brought forth also.”

      “Come,” said the man, half leading and half dragging me from the
      boat, and as he did so I perceived other men doing the same kind
      office to my companions.

      On the bank were gathered a company of some fifty men. In that
      light all I could make out was that they were armed with huge
      spears, were very tall, and strongly built, comparatively light
      in colour, and nude, save for a leopard skin tied round the
      middle.

      Presently Leo and Job were bundled out and placed beside me.

      “What on earth is up?” said Leo, rubbing his eyes.

      “Oh, Lord! sir, here’s a rum go,” ejaculated Job; and just at
      that moment a disturbance ensued, and Mahomed came tumbling
      between us, followed by a shadowy form with an uplifted spear.

      “Allah! Allah!” howled Mahomed, feeling that he had little to
      hope from man, “protect me! protect me!”

      “Father, it is a black one,” said a voice. “What said
      ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_’ about the black one?”

      “She said naught; but slay him not. Come hither, my son.”

      The man advanced, and the tall shadowy form bent forward and
      whispered something.

      “Yes, yes,” said the other, and chuckled in a rather
      blood-curdling tone.

      “Are the three white men there?” asked the form.

      “Yes, they are there.”

      “Then bring up that which is made ready for them, and let the men
      take all that can be brought from the thing which floats.”

      Hardly had he spoken when men came running up, carrying on their
      shoulders neither more nor less than palanquins—four bearers and
      two spare men to a palanquin—and in these it was promptly
      indicated we were expected to stow ourselves.

      “Well!” said Leo, “it is a blessing to find anybody to carry us
      after having to carry ourselves so long.”

      Leo always takes a cheerful view of things.

      There being no help for it, after seeing the others into theirs I
      tumbled into my own litter, and very comfortable I found it. It
      appeared to be manufactured of cloth woven from grass-fibre,
      which stretched and yielded to every motion of the body, and,
      being bound top and bottom to the bearing pole, gave a grateful
      support to the head and neck.

      Scarcely had I settled myself when, accompanying their steps with
      a monotonous song, the bearers started at a swinging trot. For
      half an hour or so I lay still, reflecting on the very remarkable
      experiences that we were going through, and wondering if any of
      my eminently respectable fossil friends down at Cambridge would
      believe me if I were to be miraculously set at the familiar
      dinner-table for the purpose of relating them. I do not want to
      convey any disrespectful notion or slight when I call those good
      and learned men fossils, but my experience is that people are apt
      to fossilise even at a University if they follow the same paths
      too persistently. I was getting fossilised myself, but of late my
      stock of ideas has been very much enlarged. Well, I lay and
      reflected, and wondered what on earth would be the end of it all,
      till at last I ceased to wonder, and went to sleep.

      I suppose I must have slept for seven or eight hours, getting the
      first real rest that I had had since the night before the loss of
      the dhow, for when I woke the sun was high in the heavens. We
      were still journeying on at a pace of about four miles an hour.
      Peeping out through the mist-like curtains of the litter, which
      were ingeniously fixed to the bearing pole, I perceived to my
      infinite relief that we had passed out of the region of eternal
      swamp, and were now travelling over swelling grassy plains
      towards a cup-shaped hill. Whether or not it was the same hill
      that we had seen from the canal I do not know, and have never
      since been able to discover, for, as we afterwards found out,
      these people will give little information upon such points. Next
      I glanced at the men who were bearing me. They were of a
      magnificent build, few of them being under six feet in height,
      and yellowish in colour. Generally their appearance had a good
      deal in common with that of the East African Somali, only their
      hair was not frizzed up, but hung in thick black locks upon their
      shoulders. Their features were aquiline, and in many cases
      exceedingly handsome, the teeth being especially regular and
      beautiful. But notwithstanding their beauty, it struck me that,
      on the whole, I had never seen a more evil-looking set of faces.
      There was an aspect of cold and sullen cruelty stamped upon them
      that revolted me, and which in some cases was almost uncanny in
      its intensity.

      Another thing that struck me about them was that they never
      seemed to smile. Sometimes they sang the monotonous song of which
      I have spoken, but when they were not singing they remained
      almost perfectly silent, and the light of a laugh never came to
      brighten their sombre and evil countenances. Of what race could
      these people be? Their language was a bastard Arabic, and yet
      they were not Arabs; I was quite sure of that. For one thing they
      were too dark, or rather yellow. I could not say why, but I know
      that their appearance filled me with a sick fear of which I felt
      ashamed. While I was still wondering another litter came up
      alongside of mine. In it—for the curtains were drawn—sat an old
      man, clothed in a whitish robe, made apparently from coarse
      linen, that hung loosely about him, who, I at once jumped to the
      conclusion, was the shadowy figure that had stood on the bank and
      been addressed as “Father.” He was a wonderful-looking old man,
      with a snowy beard, so long that the ends of it hung over the
      sides of the litter, and he had a hooked nose, above which
      flashed out a pair of eyes as keen as a snake’s, while his whole
      countenance was instinct with a look of wise and sardonic humour
      impossible to describe on paper.

      “Art thou awake, stranger?” he said in a deep and low voice.

      “Surely, my father,” I answered courteously, feeling certain that
      I should do well to conciliate this ancient Mammon of
      Unrighteousness.

      He stroked his beautiful white beard, and smiled faintly.

      “From whatever country thou camest,” he said, “and by the way it
      must be from one where somewhat of our language is known, they
      teach their children courtesy there, my stranger son. And now
      wherefore comest thou unto this land, which scarce an alien foot
      has pressed from the time that man knoweth? Art thou and those
      with thee weary of life?”

      “We came to find new things,” I answered boldly. “We are tired of
      the old things; we have come up out of the sea to know that which
      is unknown. We are of a brave race who fear not death, my very
      much respected father—that is, if we can get a little information
      before we die.”

      “Humph!” said the old gentleman, “that may be true; it is rash to
      contradict, otherwise I should say that thou wast lying, my son.
      However, I dare to say that ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_’ will meet
      thy wishes in the matter.”

      “Who is ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_’?” I asked, curiously.

      The old man glanced at the bearers, and then answered, with a
      little smile that somehow sent my blood to my heart—

      “Surely, my stranger son, thou wilt learn soon enough, if it be
      her pleasure to see thee at all in the flesh.”

      “In the flesh?” I answered. “What may my father wish to convey?”

      But the old man only laughed a dreadful laugh, and made no reply.

      “What is the name of my father’s people?” I asked.

      “The name of my people is Amahagger” (the People of the Rocks).

      “And if a son might ask, what is the name of my father?”

      “My name is Billali.”

      “And whither go we, my father?”

      “That shalt thou see,” and at a sign from him his bearers started
      forward at a run till they reached the litter in which Job was
      reposing (with one leg hanging over the side). Apparently,
      however, he could not make much out of Job, for presently I saw
      his bearers trot forward to Leo’s litter.

      And after that, as nothing fresh occurred, I yielded to the
      pleasant swaying motion of the litter, and went to sleep again. I
      was dreadfully tired. When I woke I found that we were passing
      through a rocky defile of a lava formation with precipitous
      sides, in which grew many beautiful trees and flowering shrubs.

      Presently this defile took a turn, and a lovely sight unfolded
      itself to my eyes. Before us was a vast cup of green from four to
      six miles in extent, in the shape of a Roman amphitheatre. The
      sides of this great cup were rocky, and clothed with bush, but
      the centre was of the richest meadow land, studded with single
      trees of magnificent growth, and watered by meandering brooks. On
      this rich plain grazed herds of goats and cattle, but I saw no
      sheep. At first I could not imagine what this strange spot could
      be, but presently it flashed upon me that it must represent the
      crater of some long-extinct volcano which had afterwards been a
      lake, and was ultimately drained in some unexplained way. And
      here I may state that from my subsequent experience of this and a
      much larger, but otherwise similar spot, which I shall have
      occasion to describe by-and-by, I have every reason to believe
      that this conclusion was correct. What puzzled me, however, was,
      that although there were people moving about herding the goats
      and cattle, I saw no signs of any human habitation. Where did
      they all live? I wondered. My curiosity was soon destined to be
      gratified. Turning to the left the string of litters followed the
      cliffy sides of the crater for a distance of about half a mile,
      or perhaps a little less, and then halted. Seeing the old
      gentleman, my adopted “father,” Billali, emerge from his litter,
      I did the same, and so did Leo and Job. The first thing I saw was
      our wretched Arab companion, Mahomed, lying exhausted on the
      ground. It appeared that he had not been provided with a litter,
      but had been forced to run the entire distance, and, as he was
      already quite worn out when we started, his condition now was one
      of great prostration.

      On looking round we discovered that the place where we had halted
      was a platform in front of the mouth of a great cave, and piled
      upon this platform were the entire contents of the whale-boat,
      even down to the oars and sail. Round the cave stood groups of
      the men who had escorted us, and other men of a similar stamp.
      They were all tall and all handsome, though they varied in their
      degree of darkness of skin, some being as dark as Mahomed, and
      some as yellow as a Chinese. They were naked, except for the
      leopard-skin round the waist, and each of them carried a huge
      spear.

      There were also some women among them, who, instead of the
      leopard-skin, wore a tanned hide of a small red buck, something
      like that of the oribé, only rather darker in colour. These women
      were, as a class, exceedingly good-looking, with large, dark
      eyes, well-cut features, and a thick bush of curling hair—not
      crisped like a negro’s—ranging from black to chestnut in hue,
      with all shades of intermediate colour. Some, but very few of
      them, wore a yellowish linen garment, such as I have described as
      worn by Billali, but this, as we afterwards discovered, was a
      mark of rank, rather than an attempt at clothing. For the rest,
      their appearance was not quite so terrifying as that of the men,
      and they sometimes, though rarely, smiled. As soon as we had
      alighted they gathered round us and examined us with curiosity,
      but without excitement. Leo’s tall, athletic form and clear-cut
      Grecian face, however, evidently excited their attention, and
      when he politely lifted his hat to them, and showed his curling
      yellow hair, there was a slight murmur of admiration. Nor did it
      stop there; for, after regarding him critically from head to
      foot, the handsomest of the young women—one wearing a robe, and
      with hair of a shade between brown and chestnut—deliberately
      advanced to him, and, in a way that would have been winning had
      it not been so determined, quietly put her arm round his neck,
      bent forward, and kissed him on the lips.

      I gave a gasp, expecting to see Leo instantly speared; and Job
      ejaculated, “The hussy—well, I never!” As for Leo, he looked
      slightly astonished; and then, remarking that we had clearly got
      into a country where they followed the customs of the early
      Christians, deliberately returned the embrace.

      Again I gasped, thinking that something would happen; but, to my
      surprise, though some of the young women showed traces of
      vexation, the older ones and the men only smiled slightly. When
      we came to understand the customs of this extraordinary people
      the mystery was explained. It then appeared that, in direct
      opposition to the habits of almost every other savage race in the
      world, women among the Amahagger are not only upon terms of
      perfect equality with the men, but are not held to them by any
      binding ties. Descent is traced only through the line of the
      mother, and while individuals are as proud of a long and superior
      female ancestry as we are of our families in Europe, they never
      pay attention to, or even acknowledge, any man as their father,
      even when their male parentage is perfectly well known. There is
      but one titular male parent of each tribe, or, as they call it,
      “Household,” and he is its elected and immediate ruler, with the
      title of “Father.” For instance, the man Billali was the father
      of this “household,” which consisted of about seven thousand
      individuals all told, and no other man was ever called by that
      name. When a woman took a fancy to a man she signified her
      preference by advancing and embracing him publicly, in the same
      way that this handsome and exceedingly prompt young lady, who was
      called Ustane, had embraced Leo. If he kissed her back it was a
      token that he accepted her, and the arrangement continued until
      one of them wearied of it. I am bound, however, to say that the
      change of husbands was not nearly so frequent as might have been
      expected. Nor did quarrels arise out of it, at least among the
      men, who, when their wives deserted them in favour of a rival,
      accepted the whole thing much as we accept the income-tax or our
      marriage laws, as something not to be disputed, and as tending to
      the good of the community, however disagreeable they may in
      particular instances prove to the individual.

      It is very curious to observe how the customs of mankind on this
      matter vary in different countries, making morality an affair of
      latitude, and what is right and proper in one place wrong and
      improper in another. It must, however, be understood that, since
      all civilised nations appear to accept it as an axiom that
      ceremony is the touchstone of morality, there is, even according
      to our canons, nothing immoral about this Amahagger custom,
      seeing that the interchange of the embrace answers to our
      ceremony of marriage, which, as we know, justifies most things.




VII.
USTANE SINGS


      When the kissing operation was finished—by the way, none of the
      young ladies offered to pet me in this fashion, though I saw one
      hovering round Job, to that respectable individual’s evident
      alarm—the old man Billali advanced, and graciously waved us into
      the cave, whither we went, followed by Ustane, who did not seem
      inclined to take the hints I gave her that we liked privacy.

      Before we had gone five paces it struck me that the cave that we
      were entering was none of Nature’s handiwork, but, on the
      contrary, had been hollowed by the hand of man. So far as we
      could judge it appeared to be about one hundred feet in length by
      fifty wide, and very lofty, resembling a cathedral aisle more
      than anything else. From this main aisle opened passages at a
      distance of every twelve or fifteen feet, leading, I supposed, to
      smaller chambers. About fifty feet from the entrance of the cave,
      just where the light began to get dim, a fire was burning, which
      threw huge shadows upon the gloomy walls around. Here Billali
      halted, and asked us to be seated, saying that the people would
      bring us food, and accordingly we squatted ourselves down upon
      the rugs of skins which were spread for us, and waited. Presently
      the food, consisting of goat’s flesh boiled, fresh milk in an
      earthenware pot, and boiled cobs of Indian corn, was brought by
      young girls. We were almost starving, and I do not think that I
      ever in my life before ate with such satisfaction. Indeed, before
      we had finished we literally ate up everything that was set
      before us.

      When we had done, our somewhat saturnine host, Billali, who had
      been watching us in perfect silence, rose and addressed us. He
      said that it was a wonderful thing that had happened. No man had
      ever known or heard of white strangers arriving in the country of
      the People of the Rocks. Sometimes, though rarely, black men had
      come here, and from them they had heard of the existence of men
      much whiter than themselves, who sailed on the sea in ships, but
      for the arrival of such there was no precedent. We had, however,
      been seen dragging the boat up the canal, and he told us frankly
      that he had at once given orders for our destruction, seeing that
      it was unlawful for any stranger to enter here, when a message
      had come from “_She-who-must-be-obeyed_,” saying that our lives
      were to be spared, and that we were to be brought hither.

      “Pardon me, my father,” I interrupted at this point; “but if, as
      I understand, ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_’ lives yet farther off,
      how could she have known of our approach?”

      Billali turned, and seeing that we were alone—for the young lady,
      Ustane, had withdrawn when he had begun to speak—said, with a
      curious little laugh—

      “Are there none in your land who can see without eyes and hear
      without ears? Ask no questions; _She_ knew.”

      I shrugged my shoulders at this, and he proceeded to say that no
      further instructions had been received on the subject of our
      disposal, and this being so he was about to start to interview
      “_She-who-must-be-obeyed_,” generally spoken of, for the sake of
      brevity, as “Hiya” or _She_ simply, who he gave us to understand
      was the Queen of the Amahagger, and learn her wishes.

      I asked him how long he proposed to be away, and he said that by
      travelling hard he might be back on the fifth day, but there were
      many miles of marsh to cross before he came to where _She_ was.
      He then said that every arrangement would be made for our comfort
      during his absence, and that, as he personally had taken a fancy
      to us, he sincerely trusted that the answer he should bring from
      _She_ would be one favourable to the continuation of our
      existence, but at the same time he did not wish to conceal from
      us that he thought this doubtful, as every stranger who had ever
      come into the country during his grandmother’s life, his mother’s
      life, and his own life, had been put to death without mercy, and
      in a way he would not harrow our feelings by describing; and this
      had been done by the order of _She_ herself, at least he supposed
      that it was by her order. At any rate, she never interfered to
      save them.

      “Why,” I said, “but how can that be? You are an old man, and the
      time you talk of must reach back three men’s lives. How therefore
      could _She_ have ordered the death of anybody at the beginning of
      the life of your grandmother, seeing that herself she would not
      have been born?”

      Again he smiled—that same faint, peculiar smile, and with a deep
      bow departed, without making any answer; nor did we see him again
      for five days.

      When he had gone we discussed the situation, which filled me with
      alarm. I did not at all like the accounts of this mysterious
      Queen, “_She-who-must-be-obeyed_,” or more shortly _She_, who
      apparently ordered the execution of any unfortunate stranger in a
      fashion so unmerciful. Leo, too, was depressed about it, but
      consoled himself by triumphantly pointing out that this _She_ was
      undoubtedly the person referred to in the writing on the potsherd
      and in his father’s letter, in proof of which he advanced
      Billali’s allusions to her age and power. I was by this time too
      overwhelmed with the whole course of events that I had not even
      the heart left to dispute a proposition so absurd, so I suggested
      that we should try to go out and get a bath, of which we all
      stood sadly in need.

Accordingly, having indicated our wish to a middle-aged individual of
an unusually saturnine cast of countenance, even among this saturnine
people, who appeared to be deputed to look after us now that the Father
of the hamlet had departed, we started in a body—having first lit our
pipes. Outside the cave we found quite a crowd of people evidently
watching for our appearance, but when they saw us come out smoking they
vanished this way and that, calling out that we were great magicians.
Indeed, nothing about us created so great a sensation as our tobacco
smoke—not even our firearms.[1] After this we succeeded in reaching a
stream that had its source in a strong ground spring, and taking our
bath in peace, though some of the women, not excepting Ustane, showed a
decided inclination to follow us even there.

 [1] We found tobacco growing in this country as it does in every other
 part of Africa, and, although they were so absolutely ignorant of its
 other blessed qualities, the Amahagger use it habitually in the form
 of snuff and also for medicinal purposes.—L. H. H.

      By the time that we had finished this most refreshing bath the
      sun was setting; indeed, when we got back to the big cave it had
      already set. The cave itself was full of people gathered round
      fires—for several more had now been lighted—and eating their
      evening meal by their lurid light, and by that of various lamps
      which were set about or hung upon the walls. These lamps were of
      a rude manufacture of baked earthenware, and of all shapes, some
      of them graceful enough. The larger ones were formed of big red
      earthenware pots, filled with clarified melted fat, and having a
      reed wick stuck through a wooden disk which filled the top of the
      pot. This sort of lamp required the most constant attention to
      prevent its going out whenever the wick burnt down, as there were
      no means of turning it up. The smaller hand lamps, however, which
      were also made of baked clay, were fitted with wicks manufactured
      from the pith of a palm-tree, or sometimes from the stem of a
      very handsome variety of fern. This kind of wick was passed
      through a round hole at the end of the lamp, to which a sharp
      piece of hard wood was attached wherewith to pierce and draw it
      up whenever it showed signs of burning low.

      For a while we sat down and watched this grim people eating their
      evening meal in silence as grim as themselves, till at length,
      getting tired of contemplating them and the huge moving shadows
      on the rocky walls, I suggested to our new keeper that we should
      like to go to bed.

      Without a word he rose, and, taking me politely by the hand,
      advanced with a lamp to one of the small passages that I had
      noticed opening out of the central cave. This we followed for
      about five paces, when it suddenly widened out into a small
      chamber, about eight feet square, and hewn out of the living
      rock. On one side of this chamber was a stone slab, about three
      feet from the ground, and running its entire length like a bunk
      in a cabin, and on this slab he intimated that I was to sleep.
      There was no window or air-hole to the chamber, and no furniture;
      and, on looking at it more closely, I came to the disturbing
      conclusion (in which, as I afterwards discovered, I was quite
      right) that it had originally served for a sepulchre for the dead
      rather than a sleeping-place for the living, the slab being
      designed to receive the corpse of the departed. The thought made
      me shudder in spite of myself; but, seeing that I must sleep
      somewhere, I got over the feeling as best I might, and returned
      to the cavern to get my blanket, which had been brought up from
      the boat with the other things. There I met Job, who, having been
      inducted to a similar apartment, had flatly declined to stop in
      it, saying that the look of the place gave him the horrors, and
      that he might as well be dead and buried in his grandfather’s
      brick grave at once, and expressed his determination of sleeping
      with me if I would allow him. This, of course, I was only too
      glad to do.

      The night passed very comfortably on the whole. I say on the
      whole, for personally I went through a most horrible nightmare of
      being buried alive, induced, no doubt, by the sepulchral nature
      of my surroundings. At dawn we were aroused by a loud trumpeting
      sound, produced, as we afterwards discovered, by a young
      Amahagger blowing through a hole bored in its side into a
      hollowed elephant tusk, which was kept for the purpose.

      Taking the hint, we got up and went down to the stream to wash,
      after which the morning meal was served. At breakfast one of the
      women, no longer quite young, advanced and publicly kissed Job. I
      think it was in its way the most delightful thing (putting its
      impropriety aside for a moment) that I ever saw. Never shall I
      forget the respectable Job’s abject terror and disgust. Job, like
      myself, is a bit of a misogynist—I fancy chiefly owing to the
      fact of his having been one of a family of seventeen—and the
      feelings expressed upon his countenance when he realised that he
      was not only being embraced publicly, and without authorisation
      on his own part, but also in the presence of his masters, were
      too mixed and painful to admit of accurate description. He sprang
      to his feet, and pushed the woman, a buxom person of about
      thirty, from him.

      “Well, I never!” he gasped, whereupon probably thinking that he
      was only coy, she embraced him again.

      “Be off with you! Get away, you minx!” he shouted, waving the
      wooden spoon, with which he was eating his breakfast, up and down
      before the lady’s face. “Beg your pardon, gentlemen, I am sure I
      haven’t encouraged her. Oh, Lord! she’s coming for me again. Hold
      her, Mr. Holly! please hold her! I can’t stand it; I can’t,
      indeed. This has never happened to me before, gentlemen, never.
      There’s nothing against my character,” and here he broke off, and
      ran as hard as he could go down the cave, and for once I saw the
      Amahagger laugh. As for the woman, however, she did not laugh. On
      the contrary, she seemed to bristle with fury, which the mockery
      of the other women about only served to intensify. She stood
      there literally snarling and shaking with indignation, and,
      seeing her, I wished Job’s scruples had been at Jericho, forming
      a shrewd guess that his admirable behaviour had endangered our
      throats. Nor, as the sequel shows, was I wrong.

      The lady having retreated, Job returned in a great state of
      nervousness, and keeping his weather eye fixed upon every woman
      who came near him. I took an opportunity to explain to our hosts
      that Job was a married man, and had had very unhappy experiences
      in his domestic relations, which accounted for his presence here
      and his terror at the sight of women, but my remarks were
      received in grim silence, it being evident that our retainer’s
      behaviour was considered as a slight to the “household” at large,
      although the women, after the manner of some of their most
      civilised sisters, made merry at the rebuff of their companion.

      After breakfast we took a walk and inspected the Amahagger herds,
      and also their cultivated lands. They have two breeds of cattle,
      one large and angular, with no horns, but yielding beautiful
      milk; and the other, a red breed, very small and fat, excellent
      for meat, but of no value for milking purposes. This last breed
      closely resembles the Norfolk red-pole strain, only it has horns
      which generally curve forward over the head, sometimes to such an
      extent that they have to be cut to prevent them from growing into
      the bones of the skull. The goats are long-haired, and are used
      for eating only, at least I never saw them milked. As for the
      Amahagger cultivation, it is primitive in the extreme, being all
      done by means of a spade made of iron, for these people smelt and
      work iron. This spade is shaped more like a big spear-head than
      anything else, and has no shoulder to it on which the foot can be
      set. As a consequence, the labour of digging is very great. It
      is, however, all done by the men, the women, contrary to the
      habits of most savage races, being entirely exempt from manual
      toil. But then, as I think I have said elsewhere, among the
      Amahagger the weaker sex has established its rights.

      At first we were much puzzled as to the origin and constitution
      of this extraordinary race, points upon which they were
      singularly uncommunicative. As the time went on—for the next four
      days passed without any striking event—we learnt something from
      Leo’s lady friend Ustane, who, by the way, stuck to that young
      gentleman like his own shadow. As to origin, they had none, at
      least, so far as she was aware. There were, however, she informed
      us, mounds of masonry and many pillars, near the place where
      _She_ lived, which was called Kôr, and which the wise said had
      once been houses wherein men lived, and it was suggested that
      they were descended from these men. No one, however, dared go
      near these great ruins, because they were haunted: they only
      looked on them from a distance. Other similar ruins were to be
      seen, she had heard, in various parts of the country, that is,
      wherever one of the mountains rose above the level of the swamp.
      Also the caves in which they lived had been hollowed out of the
      rocks by men, perhaps the same who built the cities. They
      themselves had no written laws, only custom, which was, however,
      quite as binding as law. If any man offended against the custom,
      he was put to death by order of the Father of the “Household.” I
      asked how he was put to death, and she only smiled and said that
      I might see one day soon.

      They had a Queen, however. _She_ was their Queen, but she was
      very rarely seen, perhaps once in two or three years, when she
      came forth to pass sentence on some offenders, and when seen was
      muffled up in a big cloak, so that nobody could look upon her
      face. Those who waited upon her were deaf and dumb, and therefore
      could tell no tales, but it was reported that she was lovely as
      no other woman was lovely, or ever had been. It was rumoured also
      that she was immortal, and had power over all things, but she,
      Ustane, could say nothing of all that. What she believed was that
      the Queen chose a husband from time to time, and as soon as a
      female child was born, this husband, who was never again seen,
      was put to death. Then the female child grew up and took the
      place of the Queen when its mother died, and had been buried in
      the great caves. But of these matters none could speak with
      certainty. Only _She_ was obeyed throughout the length and
      breadth of the land, and to question her command was instant
      death. She kept a guard, but had no regular army, and to disobey
      her was to die.

      I asked what size the land was, and how many people lived in it.
      She answered that there were ten “Households,” like this that she
      knew of, including the big “Household,” where the Queen was, that
      all the “Households” lived in caves, in places resembling this
      stretch of raised country, dotted about in a vast extent of
      swamp, which was only to be threaded by secret paths. Often the
      “Households” made war on each other until _She_ sent word that it
      was to stop, and then they instantly ceased. That and the fever
      which they caught in crossing the swamps prevented their numbers
      from increasing too much. They had no connection with any other
      race, indeed none lived near them, or were able to thread the
      vast swamps. Once an army from the direction of the great river
      (presumably the Zambesi) had attempted to attack them, but they
      got lost in the marshes, and at night, seeing the great balls of
      fire that move about there, tried to come to them, thinking that
      they marked the enemy camp, and half of them were drowned. As for
      the rest, they soon died of fever and starvation, not a blow
      being struck at them. The marshes, she told us, were absolutely
      impassable except to those who knew the paths, adding, what I
      could well believe, that we should never have reached this place
      where we then were had we not been brought thither.

      These and many other things we learnt from Ustane during the four
      days’ pause before our real adventures began, and, as may be
      imagined, they gave us considerable cause for thought. The whole
      thing was exceedingly remarkable, almost incredibly so, indeed,
      and the oddest part of it was that so far it did more or less
      correspond to the ancient writing on the sherd. And now it
      appeared that there was a mysterious Queen clothed by rumour with
      dread and wonderful attributes, and commonly known by the
      impersonal, but, to my mind, rather awesome title of _She_.
      Altogether, I could not make it out, nor could Leo, though of
      course he was exceedingly triumphant over me because I had
      persistently mocked at the whole thing. As for Job, he had long
      since abandoned any attempt to call his reason his own, and left
      it to drift upon the sea of circumstance. Mahomed, the Arab, who
      was, by the way, treated civilly indeed, but with chilling
      contempt, by the Amahagger, was, I discovered, in a great fright,
      though I could not quite make out what he was frightened about.
      He would sit crouched up in a corner of the cave all day long,
      calling upon Allah and the Prophet to protect him. When I pressed
      him about it, he said that he was afraid because these people
      were not men or women at all, but devils, and that this was an
      enchanted land; and, upon my word, once or twice since then I
      have been inclined to agree with him. And so the time went on,
      till the night of the fourth day after Billali had left, when
      something happened.

      We three and Ustane were sitting round a fire in the cave just
      before bedtime, when suddenly the woman, who had been brooding in
      silence, rose, and laid her hand upon Leo’s golden curls, and
      addressed him. Even now, when I shut my eyes, I can see her
      proud, imperial form, clothed alternately in dense shadow and the
      red flickering of the fire, as she stood, the wild centre of as
      weird a scene as I ever witnessed, and delivered herself of the
      burden of her thoughts and forebodings in a kind of rhythmical
      speech that ran something as follows:—

Thou art my chosen—I have waited for thee from the beginning!
Thou art very beautiful. Who hath hair like unto thee, or skin so
white?
Who hath so strong an arm, who is so much a man?
Thine eyes are the sky, and the light in them is the stars.
Thou art perfect and of a happy face, and my heart turned itself
towards thee.
Ay, when mine eyes fell upon thee I did desire thee,—
Then did I take thee to me—oh, thou Beloved,
And hold thee fast, lest harm should come unto thee.
Ay, I did cover thine head with mine hair, lest the sun should strike
it;
And altogether was I thine, and thou wast altogether mine.
And so it went for a little space, till Time was in labour with an evil
Day;
And then what befell on that day? Alas! my Beloved, I know not!
But I, I saw thee no more—I, I was lost in the blackness.
And she who is stronger did take thee; ay, she who is fairer than
Ustane.
Yet didst thou turn and call upon me, and let thine eyes wander in the
darkness.
But, nevertheless, she prevailed by Beauty, and led thee down horrible
places,
And then, ah! then my Beloved——

      Here this extraordinary woman broke off her speech, or chant,
      which was so much musical gibberish to us, for all that we
      understood of what she was talking about, and seemed to fix her
      flashing eyes upon the deep shadow before her. Then in a moment
      they acquired a vacant, terrified stare, as though they were
      striving to realise some half-seen horror. She lifted her hand
      from Leo’s head, and pointed into the darkness. We all looked,
      and could see nothing; but she saw something, or thought she did,
      and something evidently that affected even her iron nerves, for,
      without another sound, down she fell senseless between us.

      Leo, who was growing really attached to this remarkable young
      person, was in a great state of alarm and distress, and I, to be
      perfectly candid, was in a condition not far removed from
      superstitious fear. The whole scene was an uncanny one.

      Presently, however, she recovered, and sat up with an
      extraordinary convulsive shudder.

      “What didst thou mean, Ustane?” asked Leo, who, thanks to years
      of tuition, spoke Arabic very prettily.

      “Nay, my chosen,” she answered, with a little forced laugh. “I
      did but sing unto thee after the fashion of my people. Surely, I
      meant nothing. How could I speak of that which is not yet?”

      “And what didst thou see, Ustane?” I asked, looking her sharply
      in the face.

      “Nay,” she answered again, “I saw naught. Ask me not what I saw.
      Why should I fright ye?” And then, turning to Leo with a look of
      the most utter tenderness that I ever saw upon the face of a
      woman, civilised or savage, she took his head between her hands,
      and kissed him on the forehead as a mother might.

      “When I am gone from thee, my chosen,” she said; “when at night
      thou stretchest out thine hand and canst not find me, then
      shouldst thou think at times of me, for of a truth I love thee
      well, though I be not fit to wash thy feet. And now let us love
      and take that which is given us, and be happy; for in the grave
      there is no love and no warmth, nor any touching of the lips.
      Nothing perchance, or perchance but bitter memories of what might
      have been. To-night the hours are our own, how know we to whom
      they shall belong to-morrow?”




VIII.
THE FEAST, AND AFTER!


      On the day following this remarkable scene—a scene calculated to
      make a deep impression upon anybody who beheld it, more because
      of what it suggested and seemed to foreshadow than of what it
      revealed—it was announced to us that a feast would be held that
      evening in our honour. I did my best to get out of it, saying
      that we were modest people, and cared little for feasts, but my
      remarks being received with the silence of displeasure, I thought
      it wisest to hold my tongue.

      Accordingly, just before sundown, I was informed that everything
      was ready, and, accompanied by Job, went into the cave, where I
      met Leo, who was, as usual, followed by Ustane. These two had
      been out walking somewhere, and knew nothing of the projected
      festivity till that moment. When Ustane heard of it I saw an
      expression of horror spring up upon her handsome features.
      Turning she caught a man who was passing up the cave by the arm,
      and asked him something in an imperious tone. His answer seemed
      to reassure her a little, for she looked relieved, though far
      from satisfied. Next she appeared to attempt some remonstrance
      with the man, who was a person in authority, but he spoke angrily
      to her, and shook her off, and then, changing his mind, led her
      by the arm, and sat her down between himself and another man in
      the circle round the fire, and I perceived that for some reason
      of her own she thought it best to submit.

      The fire in the cave was an unusually big one that night, and in
      a large circle round it were gathered about thirty-five men and
      two women, Ustane and the woman to avoid whom Job had played the
      _rôle_ of another Scriptural character. The men were sitting in
      perfect silence, as was their custom, each with his great spear
      stuck upright behind him, in a socket cut in the rock for that
      purpose. Only one or two wore the yellowish linen garment of
      which I have spoken, the rest had nothing on except the leopard’s
      skin about the middle.

      “What’s up now, sir,” said Job, doubtfully. “Bless us and save
      us, there’s that woman again. Now, surely, she can’t be after me,
      seeing that I have given her no encouragement. They give me the
      creeps, the whole lot of them, and that’s a fact. Why look, they
      have asked Mahomed to dine, too. There, that lady of mine is
      talking to him in as nice and civil a way as possible. Well, I’m
      glad it isn’t me, that’s all.”

      We looked up, and sure enough the woman in question had risen,
      and was escorting the wretched Mahomed from his corner, where,
      overcome by some acute prescience of horror, he had been seated,
      shivering, and calling on Allah. He appeared unwilling enough to
      come, if for no other reason perhaps because it was an
      unaccustomed honour, for hitherto his food had been given to him
      apart. Anyway I could see that he was in a state of great terror,
      for his tottering legs would scarcely support his stout, bulky
      form, and I think it was rather owing to the resources of
      barbarism behind him, in the shape of a huge Amahagger with a
      proportionately huge spear, than to the seductions of the lady
      who led him by the hand, that he consented to come at all.

      “Well,” I said to the others, “I don’t at all like the look of
      things, but I suppose we must face it out. Have you fellows got
      your revolvers on? because, if so, you had better see that they
      are loaded.”

      “I have, sir,” said Job, tapping his Colt, “but Mr. Leo has only
      got his hunting knife, though that is big enough, surely.”

      Feeling that it would not do to wait while the missing weapon was
      fetched, we advanced boldly, and seated ourselves in a line, with
      our backs against the side of the cave.

      As soon as we were seated, an earthenware jar was passed round
      containing a fermented fluid, of by no means unpleasant taste,
      though apt to turn upon the stomach, made from crushed grain—not
      Indian corn, but a small brown grain that grows upon its stem in
      clusters, not unlike that which in the southern part of Africa is
      known by the name of Kafir corn. The vase which contained this
      liquor was very curious, and as it more or less resembled many
      hundreds of others in use among the Amahagger I may as well
      describe it. These vases are of a very ancient manufacture, and
      of all sizes. None such can have been made in the country for
      hundreds, or rather thousands, of years. They are found in the
      rock tombs, of which I shall give a description in their proper
      place, and my own belief is that, after the fashion of the
      Egyptians, with whom the former inhabitants of this country may
      have had some connection, they were used to receive the viscera
      of the dead. Leo, however, is of opinion that, as in the case of
      Etruscan amphoræ, they were placed there for the spiritual use of
      the deceased. They are mostly two-handled, and of all sizes, some
      being nearly three feet in height, and running from that down to
      as many inches. In shape they vary, but all are exceedingly
      beautiful and graceful, being made of a very fine black ware, not
      lustrous, but slightly rough. On this groundwork are inlaid
      figures much more graceful and lifelike than any others that I
      have seen on antique vases. Some of these inlaid pictures
      represent love-scenes with a childlike simplicity and freedom of
      manner which would not commend itself to the taste of the present
      day. Others again give pictures of maidens dancing, and yet
      others of hunting-scenes. For instance, the very vase from which
      we were then drinking had on one side a most spirited drawing of
      men, apparently white in colour, attacking a bull-elephant with
      spears, while on the reverse was a picture, not quite so well
      done, of a hunter shooting an arrow at a running antelope, I
      should say from the look of it either an eland or a koodoo.

      This is a digression at a critical moment, but it is not too long
      for the occasion, for the occasion itself was very long. With the
      exception of the periodical passing of the vase, and the movement
      necessary to throw fuel on to the fire, nothing happened for the
      best part of a whole hour. Nobody spoke a word. There we all sat
      in perfect silence, staring at the glare and glow of the large
      fire, and at the shadows thrown by the flickering earthenware
      lamps (which, by the way, were not ancient). On the open space
      between us and the fire lay a large wooden tray, with fou

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/3155