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 four short
      handles to it, exactly like a butcher’s tray, only not hollowed
      out. By the side of the tray was a great pair of long-handled
      iron pincers, and on the other side of the fire was a similar
      pair. Somehow I did not at all like the appearance of this tray
      and the accompanying pincers. There I sat and stared at them and
      at the silent circle of the fierce moody faces of the men, and
      reflected that it was all very awful, and that we were absolutely
      in the power of this alarming people, who, to me at any rate,
      were all the more formidable because their true character was
      still very much of a mystery to us. They might be better than I
      thought them, or they might be worse. I feared that they were
      worse, and I was not wrong. It was a curious sort of a feast, I
      reflected, in appearance indeed, an entertainment of the
      Barmecide stamp, for there was absolutely nothing to eat.

      At last, just as I was beginning to feel as though I were being
      mesmerised, a move was made. Without the slightest warning, a man
      from the other side of the circle called out in a loud voice—

      “Where is the flesh that we shall eat?”

      Thereon everybody in the circle answered in a deep measured tone,
      and stretching out the right arm towards the fire as he spoke—

      “_The flesh will come._”

      “Is it a goat?” said the same man.

      “_It is a goat without horns, and more than a goat, and we shall
      slay it,_” they answered with one voice, and turning half round
      they one and all grasped the handles of their spears with the
      right hand, and then simultaneously let them go.

      “Is it an ox?” said the man again.

      “_It is an ox without horns, and more than an ox, and we shall
      slay it,_” was the answer, and again the spears were grasped, and
      again let go.

Then came a pause, and I noticed, with horror and a rising of the hair,
that the woman next to Mahomed began to fondle him, patting his cheeks
and calling him by names of endearment while her fierce eyes played up
and down his trembling form. I do not know why the sight frightened me
so, but it did frighten us all dreadfully, especially Leo. The
caressing was so snake-like, and so evidently a part of some ghastly
formula that had to be gone through.[1] I saw Mahomed turn white under
his brown skin, sickly white with fear.

 [1] We afterwards learnt that its object was to pretend to the victim
 that he was the object of love and admiration, and so to sooth his
 injured feelings, and cause him to expire in a happy and contented
 frame of mind.—L. H. H.

      “Is the meat ready to be cooked?” asked the voice, more rapidly.

      “_It is ready; it is ready._”

      “Is the pot hot to cook it?” it continued, in a sort of scream
      that echoed painfully down the great recesses of the cave.

      “_It is hot; it is hot._”

      “Great heavens!” roared Leo, “remember the writing, ‘_The people
      who place pots upon the heads of strangers._’”

      As he said the words, before we could stir, or even take the
      matter in, two great ruffians jumped up, and, seizing the long
      pincers, thrust them into the heart of the fire, and the woman
      who had been caressing Mahomed suddenly produced a fibre noose
      from under her girdle or moocha, and, slipping it over his
      shoulders, ran it tight, while the men next to him seized him by
      the legs. The two men with the pincers gave a heave, and,
      scattering the fire this way and that upon the rocky floor,
      lifted from it a large earthenware pot, heated to a white heat.
      In an instant, almost with a single movement, they had reached
      the spot where Mahomed was struggling. He fought like a fiend,
      shrieking in the abandonment of his despair, and notwithstanding
      the noose round him, and the efforts of the men who held his
      legs, the advancing wretches were for the moment unable to
      accomplish their purpose, which, horrible and incredible as it
      seems, was _to put the red-hot pot upon his head_.

      I sprang to my feet with a yell of horror, and drawing my
      revolver fired it by a sort of instinct straight at the
      diabolical woman who had been caressing Mahomed, and was now
      gripping him in her arms. The bullet struck her in the back and
      killed her, and to this day I am glad that it did, for, as it
      afterwards transpired, she had availed herself of the
      anthropophagous customs of the Amahagger to organise the whole
      thing in revenge of the slight put upon her by Job. She sank down
      dead, and as she did so, to my terror and dismay, Mahomed, by a
      superhuman effort, burst from his tormenters, and, springing high
      into the air, fell dying upon her corpse. The heavy bullet from
      my pistol had driven through the bodies of both, at once striking
      down the murderess, and saving her victim from a death a hundred
      times more horrible. It was an awful and yet a most merciful
      accident.

      For a moment there was a silence of astonishment. The Amahagger
      had never heard the report of a firearm before, and its effects
      dismayed them. But the next instant a man close to us recovered himself,
      and seized his spear preparatory to making a lunge with it at
      Leo, who was the nearest to him.

      “Run for it!” I shouted, setting the example by starting up the
      cave as hard as my legs would carry me. I would have made for the
      open air if it had been possible, but there were men in the way,
      and, besides, I had caught sight of the forms of a crowd of
      people standing out clear against the skyline beyond the entrance
      to the cave. Up the cave I went, and after me came the others,
      and after them thundered the whole crowd of cannibals, mad with
      fury at the death of the woman. With a bound I cleared the
      prostrate form of Mahomed. As I flew over him I felt the heat
      from the red-hot pot, which was lying close by, strike upon my
      legs, and by its glow saw his hands—for he was not quite
      dead—still feebly moving. At the top of the cave was a little
      platform of rock three feet or so high by about eight deep, on
      which two large lamps were placed at night. Whether this platform
      had been left as a seat, or as a raised point afterwards to be
      cut away when it had served its purpose as a standing place from
      which to carry on the excavations, I do not know—at least, I did
      not then. At any rate, we all three reached it, and, jumping on
      it, prepared to sell our lives as dearly as we could. For a few
      seconds the crowd that was pressing on our heels hung back when
      they saw us face round upon them. Job was on one side of the rock
      to the left, Leo in the centre, and I to the right. Behind us
      were the lamps. Leo bent forward, and looked down the long lane
      of shadows, terminating in the fire and lighted lamps, through
      which the quiet forms of our would-be murderers flitted to and
      fro with the faint light glinting on their spears, for even their
      fury was silent as a bulldog’s. The only other thing visible was
      the red-hot pot still glowing angrily in the gloom. There was a
      curious light in Leo’s eyes, and his handsome face was set like a
      stone. In his right hand was his heavy hunting-knife. He shifted
      its thong a little up his wrist and then put his arm round me and
      gave me a good hug.

      “Good-bye, old fellow,” he said, “my dear friend—my more than
      father. We have no chance against those scoundrels; they will
      finish us in a few minutes, and eat us afterwards, I suppose.
      Good-bye. I led you into this. I hope you will forgive me.
      Good-bye, Job.”

      “God’s will be done,” I said, setting my teeth, as I prepared for
      the end. At that moment, with an exclamation, Job lifted his
      revolver and fired, and hit a man—not the man he had aimed at, by
      the way: anything that Job shot _at_ was perfectly safe.

      On they came with a rush, and I fired too as fast as I could, and
      checked them—between us, Job and I, besides the woman, killed or
      mortally wounded five men with our pistols before they were
      emptied. But we had no time to reload, and they still came on in
      a way that was almost splendid in its recklessness, seeing that
      they did not know but that we could go on firing for ever.

      A great fellow bounded up upon the platform, and Leo struck him
      dead with one blow of his powerful arm, sending the knife right
      through him. I did the same by another, but Job missed his
      stroke, and I saw a brawny Amahagger grip him by the middle and
      whirl him off the rock. The knife not being secured by a thong
      fell from Job’s hand as he did so, and, by a most happy accident
      for him, lit upon its handle on the rock, just as the body of the
      Amahagger, who was undermost, struck upon its point and was
      transfixed upon it. What happened to Job after that I am sure I
      do not know, but my own impression is that he lay still upon the
      corpse of his deceased assailant, “playing ‘possum” as the
      Americans say. As for myself, I was soon involved in a desperate
      encounter with two ruffians, who, luckily for me, had left their
      spears behind them; and for the first time in my life the great
      physical power with which Nature has endowed me stood me in good
      stead. I had hacked at the head of one man with my hunting-knife,
      which was almost as big and heavy as a short sword, with such
      vigour, that the sharp steel had split his skull down to the
      eyes, and was held so fast by it that as he suddenly fell
      sideways the knife was twisted right out of my hand.

      Then it was that the two others sprang upon me. I saw them
      coming, and got an arm round the waist of each, and down we all
      fell upon the floor of the cave together, rolling over and over.
      They were strong men, but I was mad with rage, and that awful
      lust for slaughter which will creep into the hearts of the most
      civilised of us when blows are flying, and life and death tremble
      on the turn. My arms were round the two swarthy demons, and I
      hugged them till I heard their ribs crack and crunch up beneath
      my grip. They twisted and writhed like snakes, and clawed and
      battered at me with their fists, but I held on. Lying on my back
      there, so that their bodies might protect me from spear thrusts
      from above, I slowly crushed the life out of them, and as I did
      so, strange as it may seem, I thought of what the amiable Head of
      my College at Cambridge (who is a member of the Peace Society)
      and my brother Fellows would say if by clairvoyance they could
      see me, of all men, playing such a bloody game. Soon my
      assailants grew faint, and almost ceased to struggle, their
      breath had failed them, and they were dying, but still I dared
      not leave them, for they died very slowly. I knew that if I
      relaxed my grip they would revive. The other ruffians probably
      thought—for we were all three lying in the shadow of the
      ledge—that we were all dead together, at any rate they did not
      interfere with our little tragedy.

      I turned my head, and as I lay gasping in the throes of that
      awful struggle I could see that Leo was off the rock now, for the
      lamplight fell full upon him. He was still on his feet, but in
      the centre of a surging mass of struggling men, who were striving
      to pull him down as wolves pull down a stag. Up above them
      towered his beautiful pale face crowned with its bright curls
      (for Leo is six feet two high), and I saw that he was fighting
      with a desperate abandonment and energy that was at once splendid
      and hideous to behold. He drove his knife through one man—they
      were so close to and mixed up with him that they could not get at
      him to kill him with their big spears, and they had no knives or
      sticks. The man fell, and then somehow the knife was wrenched
      from his hand, leaving him defenceless, and I thought the end had
      come. But no; with a desperate effort he broke loose from them,
      seized the body of the man he had just slain, and lifting it high
      in the air hurled it right at the mob of his assailants, so that
      the shock and weight of it swept some five or six of them to the
      earth. But in a minute they were all up again, except one, whose
      skull was smashed, and had once more fastened upon him. And then
      slowly, and with infinite labour and struggling, the wolves bore
      the lion down. Once even then he recovered himself, and felled an
      Amahagger with his fist, but it was more than man could do to
      hold his own for long against so many, and at last he came
      crashing down upon the rock floor, falling as an oak falls, and
      bearing with him to the earth all those who clung about him. They
      gripped him by his arms and legs, and then cleared off his body.

      “A spear,” cried a voice—“a spear to cut his throat, and a vessel
      to catch his blood.”

      I shut my eyes, for I saw the man coming with a spear, and
      myself, I could not stir to Leo’s help, for I was growing weak,
      and the two men on me were not yet dead, and a deadly sickness
      overcame me.

      Then suddenly there was a disturbance, and involuntarily I opened
      my eyes again, and looked towards the scene of murder. The girl
      Ustane had thrown herself on Leo’s prostrate form, covering his
      body with her body, and fastening her arms about his neck. They
      tried to drag her from him, but she twisted her legs round his,
      and hung on like a bulldog, or rather like a creeper to a tree,
      and they could not. Then they tried to stab him in the side
      without hurting her, but somehow she shielded him, and he was
      only wounded.

      At last they lost patience.

      “Drive the spear through the man and the woman together,” said a
      voice, the same voice that had asked the questions at that
      ghastly feast, “so of a verity shall they be wed.”

      Then I saw the man with the weapon straighten himself for the
      effort. I saw the cold steel gleam on high, and once more I shut
      my eyes.

      As I did so I heard the voice of a man thunder out in tones that
      rang and echoed down the rocky ways—

      “_Cease!_”

      Then I fainted, and as I did so it flashed through my darkening
      mind that I was passing down into the last oblivion of death.




IX.
A LITTLE FOOT


      When I opened my eyes again I found myself lying on a skin mat
      not far from the fire round which we had been gathered for that
      dreadful feast. Near me lay Leo, still apparently in a swoon, and
      over him was bending the tall form of the girl Ustane, who was
      washing a deep spear wound in his side with cold water
      preparatory to binding it up with linen. Leaning against the wall
      of the cave behind her was Job, apparently uninjured, but bruised
      and trembling. On the other side of the fire, tossed about this
      way and that, as though they had thrown themselves down to sleep
      in some moment of absolute exhaustion, were the bodies of those
      whom we had killed in our frightful struggle for life. I counted
      them: there were twelve besides the woman, and the corpse of poor
      Mahomed, who had died by my hand, which, the fire-stained pot at
      its side, was placed at the end of the irregular line. To the
      left a body of men were engaged in binding the arms of the
      survivors of the cannibals behind them, and then fastening them
      two and two. The villains were submitting with a look of sulky
      indifference upon their faces which accorded ill with the baffled
      fury that gleamed in their sombre eyes. In front of these men,
      directing the operations, stood no other than our friend Billali,
      looking rather tired, but particularly patriarchal with his
      flowing beard, and as cool and unconcerned as though he were
      superintending the cutting up of an ox.

      Presently he turned, and perceiving that I was sitting up
      advanced to me, and with the utmost courtesy said that he trusted
      that I felt better. I answered that at present I scarcely knew
      how I felt, except that I ached all over.

      Then he bent down and examined Leo’s wound.

      “It is an evil cut,” he said, “but the spear has not pierced the
      entrails. He will recover.”

      “Thanks to thy arrival, my father,” I answered. “In another
      minute we should all have been beyond the reach of recovery, for
      those devils of thine would have slain us as they would have
      slain our servant,” and I pointed towards Mahomed.

      The old man ground his teeth, and I saw an extraordinary
      expression of malignity light up his eyes.

      “Fear not, my son,” he answered. “Vengeance shall be taken on
      them such as would make the flesh twist upon the bones merely to
      hear of it. To _She_ shall they go, and her vengeance shall be
      worthy of her greatness. That man,” pointing to Mahomed, “I tell
      thee that man would have died a merciful death to the death these
      hyæna-men shall die. Tell me, I pray of thee, how it came about.”

      In a few words I sketched what had happened.

      “Ah, so,” he answered. “Thou seest, my son, here there is a
      custom that if a stranger comes into this country he may be slain
      by ‘the pot,’ and eaten.”

      “It is hospitality turned upside down,” I answered feebly. “In
      our country we entertain a stranger, and give him food to eat.
      Here ye eat him, and are entertained.”

      “It is a custom,” he answered, with a shrug. “Myself I think it
      an evil one; but then,” he added by an afterthought, “I do not
      like the taste of strangers, especially after they have wandered
      through the swamps and lived on wild-fowl. When
      _She-who-must-be-obeyed_ sent orders that ye were to be saved
      alive she said naught of the black man, therefore, being hyænas,
      these men lusted after his flesh, and the woman it was, whom thou
      didst rightly slay, who put it into their evil hearts to hot-pot
      him. Well, they will have their reward. Better for them would it
      be if they had never seen the light than that they should stand
      before _She_ in her terrible anger. Happy are those of them who
      died by your hands.”

      “Ah,” he went on, “it was a gallant fight that ye fought. Knowest
      thou that, long-armed old baboon that thou art, thou hast crushed
      in the ribs of those two who are laid out there as though they
      were but as the shell on an egg? And the young one, the lion, it
      was a beautiful stand that he made—one against so many—three did
      he slay outright, and that one there”—and he pointed to a body
      that was still moving a little—“will die anon, for his head is
      cracked across, and others of those who are bound are hurt. It
      was a gallant fight, and thou and he have made a friend of me by
      it, for I love to see a well-fought fray. But tell me, my son,
      the baboon—and now I think of it thy face, too, is hairy, and
      altogether like a baboon’s—how was it that ye slew those with a
      hole in them?—Ye made a noise, they say, and slew them—they fell
      down on the faces at the noise?”

      I explained to him as well as I could, but very shortly—for I was
      terribly wearied, and only persuaded to talk at all through fear
      of offending one so powerful if I refused to do so—what were the
      properties of gunpowder, and he instantly suggested that I should
      illustrate what I said by operating on the person of one of the
      prisoners. One, he said, never would be counted, and it would not
      only be very interesting to him, but would give me the
      opportunity of an instalment of revenge. He was greatly astounded
      when I told him that it was not our custom to avenge ourselves in
      cold blood, and that we left vengeance to the law and a higher
      power, of which he knew nothing. I added, however, that when I
      recovered I would take him out shooting with us, and he should
      kill an animal for himself, and at this he was as pleased as a
      child at the promise of a new toy.

      Just then Leo opened his eyes beneath the stimulus of some brandy
      (of which we still had a little) that Job had poured down his
      throat, and our conversation came to an end.

      After this we managed to get Leo, who was in a very poor way
      indeed, and only half conscious, safely off to bed, supported by
      Job and that brave girl Ustane, to whom, had I not been afraid
      that she might resent it, I would certainly have given a kiss for
      her splendid behaviour in saving my boy’s life at the risk of her
      own. But Ustane was not the sort of young person with whom one
      would care to take liberties unless one were perfectly certain
      that they would not be misunderstood, so I repressed my
      inclinations. Then, bruised and battered, but with a sense of
      safety in my breast to which I had for some days been a stranger,
      I crept off to my own little sepulchre, not forgetting before I
      laid down in it to thank Providence from the bottom of my heart
      that it was not a sepulchre indeed, as, save for a merciful
      combination of events that I can only attribute to its
      protection, it would certainly have been for me that night. Few
      men have been nearer their end and yet escaped it than we were on
      that dreadful day.

      I am a bad sleeper at the best of times, and my dreams that night
      when at last I got to rest were not of the pleasantest. The awful
      vision of poor Mahomed struggling to escape the red-hot pot would
      haunt them, and then in the background, as it were, a veiled form
      was always hovering, which, from time to time, seemed to draw the
      coverings from its body, revealing now the perfect shape of a
      lovely blooming woman, and now again the white bones of a
      grinning skeleton, and which, as it veiled and unveiled, uttered
      the mysterious and apparently meaningless sentence:—

      “That which is alive and hath known death, and that which is dead
      yet can never die, for in the Circle of the Spirit life is naught
      and death is naught. Yea, all things live for ever, though at
      times they sleep and are forgotten.”

      The morning came at last, but when it came I found that I was too
      stiff and sore to rise. About seven Job arrived, limping
      terribly, and with his face the colour of a rotten apple, and
      told me that Leo had slept fairly, but was very weak. Two hours
      afterwards Billali (Job called him “Billy-goat,” to which,
      indeed, his white beard gave him some resemblance, or more
      familiarly, “Billy”) came too, bearing a lamp in his hand, his
      towering form reaching nearly to the roof of the little chamber.
      I pretended to be asleep, and through the cracks of my eyelids
      watched his sardonic but handsome old face. He fixed his
      hawk-like eyes upon me, and stroked his glorious white beard,
      which, by the way, would have been worth a hundred a year to any
      London barber as an advertisement.

      “Ah!” I heard him mutter (Billali had a habit of muttering to
      himself), “he is ugly—ugly as the other is beautiful—a very
      Baboon, it was a good name. But I like the man. Strange now, at
      my age, that I should like a man. What says the proverb—’Mistrust
      all men, and slay him whom thou mistrustest overmuch; and as for
      women, flee from them, for they are evil, and in the end will
      destroy thee.’ It is a good proverb, especially the last part of
      it: I think that it must have come down from the ancients.
      Nevertheless I like this Baboon, and I wonder where they taught
      him his tricks, and I trust that _She_ will not bewitch him. Poor
      Baboon! he must be wearied after that fight. I will go lest I
      should awake him.”

      I waited till he had turned and was nearly through the entrance,
      walking softly on tiptoe, and then I called after him.

      “My father,” I said, “is it thou?”

      “Yes, my son, it is I; but let me not disturb thee. I did but
      come to see how thou didst fare, and to tell thee that those who
      would have slain thee, my Baboon, are by now far on their road to
      _She_. _She_ said that ye also were to come at once, but I fear
      ye cannot yet.”

      “Nay,” I said, “not till we have recovered a little; but have me
      borne out into the daylight, I pray thee, my father. I love not
      this place.”

      “Ah, no,” he answered, “it hath a sad air. I remember when I was
      a boy I found the body of a fair woman lying where thou liest
      now, yes, on that very bench. She was so beautiful that I was
      wont to creep in hither with a lamp and gaze upon her. Had it not
      been for her cold hands, almost could I think that she slept and
      would one day awake, so fair and peaceful was she in her robes of
      white. White was she, too, and her hair was yellow and lay down
      her almost to the feet. There are many such still in the tombs at
      the place where _She_ is, for those who set them there had a way
      I know naught of, whereby to keep their beloved out of the
      crumbling hand of Decay, even when Death had slain them. Ay, day
      by day I came hither, and gazed on her till at last—laugh not at
      me, stranger, for I was but a silly lad—I learned to love that
      dead form, that shell which once had held a life that no more is.
      I would creep up to her and kiss her cold face, and wonder how
      many men had lived and died since she was, and who had loved her
      and embraced her in the days that long had passed away. And, my
      Baboon, I think I learned wisdom from that dead one, for of a
      truth it taught me of the littleness of life, and the length of
      Death, and how all things that are under the sun go down one
      path, and are for ever forgotten. And so I mused, and it seemed
      to me that wisdom flowed into me from the dead, till one day my
      mother, a watchful woman, but hasty-minded, seeing I was changed,
      followed me, and saw the beautiful white one, and feared that I
      was bewitched, as, indeed, I was. So half in dread, and half in
      anger, she took up the lamp, and standing the dead woman up
      against the wall even there, set fire to her hair, and she burnt
      fiercely, even down to the feet, for those who are thus kept burn
      excellently well.

      “See, my son, there on the roof is yet the smoke of her burning.”

      I looked up doubtfully, and there, sure enough, on the roof of
      the sepulchre, was a peculiarly unctuous and sooty mark, three
      feet or more across. Doubtless it had in the course of years been
      rubbed off the sides of the little cave, but on the roof it
      remained, and there was no mistaking its appearance.

      “She burnt,” he went on in a meditative way, “even to the feet,
      but the feet I came back and saved, cutting the burnt bone from
      them, and hid them under the stone bench there, wrapped up in a
      piece of linen. Surely, I remember it as though it were but
      yesterday. Perchance they are there, if none have found them,
      even to this hour. Of a truth I have not entered this chamber
      from that time to this very day. Stay, I will look,” and,
      kneeling down, he groped about with his long arm in the recess
      under the stone bench. Presently his face brightened, and with an
      exclamation he pulled something forth which was caked in dust;
      which he shook on to the floor. It was covered with the remains
      of a rotting rag, which he undid, and revealed to my astonished
      gaze a beautifully shaped and almost white woman’s foot, looking
      as fresh and firm as though it had but now been placed there.

      “Thou seest, my son, the Baboon,” he said, in a sad voice, “I
      spake the truth to thee, for here is yet one foot remaining. Take
      it, my son, and gaze upon it.”

      I took this cold fragment of mortality in my hand and looked at
      it in the light of the lamp with feelings which I cannot
      describe, so mixed up were they between astonishment, fear, and
      fascination. It was light, much lighter I should say than it had
      been in the living state, and the flesh to all appearance was
      still flesh, though about it there clung a faintly aromatic
      odour. For the rest it was not shrunk or shrivelled, or even
      black and unsightly, like the flesh of Egyptian mummies, but
      plump and fair, and, except where it had been slightly burnt,
      perfect as on the day of death—a very triumph of embalming.

      Poor little foot! I set it down upon the stone bench where it had
      lain for so many thousand years, and wondered whose was the
      beauty that it had upborne through the pomp and pageantry of a
      forgotten civilisation—first as a merry child’s, then as a
      blushing maid’s, and lastly as a perfect woman’s. Through what
      halls of Life had its soft step echoed, and in the end, with what
      courage had it trodden down the dusty ways of Death! To whose
      side had it stolen in the hush of night when the black slave
      slept upon the marble floor, and who had listened for its
      stealing? Shapely little foot! Well might it have been set upon
      the proud neck of a conqueror bent at last to woman’s beauty, and
      well might the lips of nobles and of kings have been pressed upon
      its jewelled whiteness.

      I wrapped up this relic of the past in the remnants of the old
      linen rag which had evidently formed a portion of its owner’s
      grave-clothes, for it was partially burnt, and put it away in my
      Gladstone bag—a strange combination, I thought. Then with
      Billali’s help I staggered off to see Leo. I found him dreadfully
      bruised, worse even than myself, perhaps owing to the excessive
      whiteness of his skin, and faint and weak with the loss of blood
      from the flesh wound in his side, but for all that cheerful as a
      cricket, and asking for some breakfast. Job and Ustane got him on
      to the bottom, or rather the sacking of a litter, which was
      removed from its pole for that purpose, and with the aid of old
      Billali carried him out into the shade at the mouth of the cave,
      from which, by the way, every trace of the slaughter of the
      previous night had now been removed, and there we all
      breakfasted, and indeed spent that day, and most of the two
      following ones.

      On the third morning Job and myself were practically recovered.
      Leo also was so much better that I yielded to Billali’s often
      expressed entreaty, and agreed to start at once upon our journey
      to Kôr, which we were told was the name of the place where the
      mysterious _She_ lived, though I still feared for its effect upon
      Leo, and especially lest the motion should cause his wound, which
      was scarcely skinned over, to break open again. Indeed, had it
      not been for Billali’s evident anxiety to get off, which led us
      to suspect that some difficulty or danger might threaten us if we
      did not comply with it, I would not have consented to go.




X.
SPECULATIONS


      Within an hour of our finally deciding to start five litters were
      brought up to the door of the cave, each accompanied by four
      regular bearers and two spare hands, also a band of about fifty
      armed Amahagger, who were to form the escort and carry the
      baggage. Three of these litters, of course, were for us, and one
      for Billali, who, I was immensely relieved to hear, was to be our
      companion, while the fifth I presumed was for the use of Ustane.

      “Does the lady go with us, my father?” I asked of Billali, as he
      stood superintending things in general.

      He shrugged his shoulders as he answered—

      “If she wills. In this country the women do what they please. We
      worship them, and give them their way, because without them the
      world could not go on; they are the source of life.”

      “Ah,” I said, the matter never having struck me quite in that
      light before.

      “We worship them,” he went on, “up to a point, till at last they
      get unbearable, which,” he added, “they do about every second
      generation.”

      “And then what do you do?” I asked, with curiosity.

      “Then,” he answered, with a faint smile, “we rise, and kill the
      old ones as an example to the young ones, and to show them that
      we are the strongest. My poor wife was killed in that way three
      years ago. It was very sad, but to tell thee the truth, my son,
      life has been happier since, for my age protects me from the
      young ones.”

      “In short,” I replied, quoting the saying of a great man whose
      wisdom has not yet lightened the darkness of the Amahagger, “thou
      hast found thy position one of greater freedom and less
      responsibility.”

      This phrase puzzled him a little at first from its vagueness,
      though I think my translation hit off its sense very well, but at
      last he saw it, and appreciated it.

      “Yes, yes, my Baboon,” he said, “I see it now, but all the
      ‘responsibilities’ are killed, at least some of them are, and
      that is why there are so few old women about just now. Well, they
      brought it on themselves. As for this girl,” he went on, in a
      graver tone, “I know not what to say. She is a brave girl, and
      she loves the Lion (Leo); thou sawest how she clung to him, and
      saved his life. Also, she is, according to our custom, wed to
      him, and has a right to go where he goes, unless,” he added
      significantly, “_She_ would say her no, for her word overrides
      all rights.”

      “And if _She_ bade her leave him, and the girl refused? What
      then?”

      “If,” he said, with a shrug, “the hurricane bids the tree to
      bend, and it will not; what happens?”

      And then, without waiting for an answer, he turned and walked to
      his litter, and in ten minutes from that time we were all well
      under way.

      It took us an hour and more to cross the cup of the volcanic
      plain, and another half-hour or so to climb the edge on the
      farther side. Once there, however, the view was a very fine one.
      Before us was a long steep slope of grassy plain, broken here and
      there by clumps of trees mostly of the thorn tribe. At the bottom
      of this gentle slope, some nine or ten miles away, we could make
      out a dim sea of marsh, over which the foul vapours hung like
      smoke about a city. It was easy going for the bearers down the
      slopes, and by midday we had reached the borders of the dismal
      swamp. Here we halted to eat our midday meal, and then, following
      a winding and devious path, plunged into the morass. Presently
      the path, at any rate to our unaccustomed eyes, grew so faint as
      to be almost indistinguishable from those made by the aquatic
      beasts and birds, and it is to this day a mystery to me how our
      bearers found their way across the marshes. Ahead of the
      cavalcade marched two men with long poles, which they now and
      again plunged into the ground before them, the reason of this
      being that the nature of the soil frequently changed from causes
      with which I am not acquainted, so that places which might be
      safe enough to cross one month would certainly swallow the
      wayfarer the next. Never did I see a more dreary and depressing
      scene. Miles on miles of quagmire, varied only by bright green
      strips of comparatively solid ground, and by deep and sullen
      pools fringed with tall rushes, in which the bitterns boomed and
      the frogs croaked incessantly: miles on miles of it without a
      break, unless the fever fog can be called a break. The only life
      in this great morass was that of the aquatic birds, and the
      animals that fed on them, of both of which there were vast
      numbers. Geese, cranes, ducks, teal, coot, snipe, and plover
      swarmed all around us, many being of varieties that were quite
      new to me, and all so tame that one could almost have knocked
      them over with a stick. Among these birds I especially noticed a
      very beautiful variety of painted snipe, almost the size of a
      woodcock, and with a flight more resembling that bird’s than an
      English snipe’s. In the pools, too, was a species of small
      alligator or enormous iguana, I do not know which, that fed,
      Billali told me, upon the waterfowl, also large quantities of a
      hideous black water-snake, of which the bite is very dangerous,
      though not, I gathered, so deadly as a cobra’s or a puff adder’s.
      The bull-frogs were also very large, and with voices
      proportionate to their size; and as for the mosquitoes—the
      “musqueteers,” as Job called them—they were, if possible, even
      worse than they had been on the river, and tormented us greatly.
      Undoubtedly, however, the worst feature of the swamp was the
      awful smell of rotting vegetation that hung about it, which was
      at times positively overpowering, and the malarious exhalations
      that accompanied it, which we were of course obliged to breathe.

      On we went through it all, till at last the sun sank in sullen
      splendour just as we reached a spot of rising ground about two
      acres in extent—a little oasis of dry in the midst of the miry
      wilderness—where Billali announced that we were to camp. The
      camping, however, turned out to be a very simple process, and
      consisted, in fact, in sitting down on the ground round a scanty
      fire made of dry reeds and some wood that had been brought with
      us. However, we made the best we could of it, and smoked and ate
      with such appetite as the smell of damp, stifling heat would
      allow, for it was very hot on this low land, and yet, oddly
      enough, chilly at times. But, however hot it was, we were glad
      enough to keep near the fire, because we found that the
      mosquitoes did not like the smoke. Presently we rolled ourselves
      up in our blankets and tried to go to sleep, but so far as I was
      concerned the bull-frogs, and the extraordinary roaring and
      alarming sound produced by hundreds of snipe hovering high in the
      air, made sleep an impossibility, to say nothing of our other
      discomforts. I turned and looked at Leo, who was next me; he was
      dozing, but his face had a flushed appearance that I did not
      like, and by the flickering fire-light I saw Ustane, who was
      lying on the other side of him, raise herself from time to time
      upon her elbow, and look at him anxiously enough.

      However, I could do nothing for him, for we had all already taken
      a good dose of quinine, which was the only preventive we had; so
      I lay and watched the stars come out by thousands, till all the
      immense arch of heaven was strewn with glittering points, and
      every point a world! Here was a glorious sight by which man might
      well measure his own insignificance! Soon I gave up thinking
      about it, for the mind wearies easily when it strives to grapple
      with the Infinite, and to trace the footsteps of the Almighty as
      he strides from sphere to sphere, or deduce His purpose from His
      works. Such things are not for us to know. Knowledge is to the
      strong, and we are weak. Too much wisdom would perchance blind
      our imperfect sight, and too much strength would make us drunk,
      and over-weight our feeble reason till it fell and we were
      drowned in the depths of our own vanity. For what is the first
      result of man’s increased knowledge interpreted from Nature’s
      book by the persistent effort of his purblind observation? Is it
      not but too often to make him question the existence of his
      Maker, or indeed of any intelligent purpose beyond his own? The
      truth is veiled, because we could no more look upon her glory
      than we can upon the sun. It would destroy us. Full knowledge is
      not for man as man is here, for his capacities, which he is apt
      to think so great, are indeed but small. The vessel is soon
      filled, and, were one-thousandth part of the unutterable and
      silent wisdom that directs the rolling of those shining spheres,
      and the Force which makes them roll, pressed into it, it would be
      shattered into fragments. Perhaps in some other place and time it
      may be otherwise, who can tell? Here the lot of man born of the
      flesh is but to endure midst toil and tribulation, to catch at
      the bubbles blown by Fate, which he calls pleasure, thankful if
      before they burst they rest a moment in his hand, and when the
      tragedy is played out, and his hour comes to perish, to pass
      humbly whither he knows not.

      Above me, as I lay, shone the eternal stars, and there at my feet
      the impish marsh-born balls of fire rolled this way and that,
      vapour-tossed and earth-desiring, and methought that in the two I
      saw a type and image of what man is, and what perchance man may
      one day be, if the living Force who ordained him and them should
      so ordain this also. Oh, that it might be ours to rest year by
      year upon that high level of the heart to which at times we
      momentarily attain! Oh, that we could shake loose the prisoned
      pinions of the soul and soar to that superior point, whence, like
      to some traveller looking out through space from Darien’s
      giddiest peak, we might gaze with spiritual eyes deep into
      Infinity!

      What would it be to cast off this earthy robe, to have done for
      ever with these earthy thoughts and miserable desires; no longer,
      like those corpse candles, to be tossed this way and that, by
      forces beyond our control; or which, if we can theoretically
      control them, we are at times driven by the exigencies of our
      nature to obey! Yes, to cast them off, to have done with the foul
      and thorny places of the world; and, like to those glittering
      points above me, to rest on high wrapped for ever in the
      brightness of our better selves, that even now shines in us as
      fire faintly shines within those lurid balls, and lay down our
      littleness in that wide glory of our dreams, that invisible but
      surrounding Good, from which all truth and beauty comes!

      These and many such thoughts passed through my mind that night.
      They come to torment us all at times. I say to torment, for,
      alas! thinking can only serve to measure out the helplessness of
      thought. What is the purpose of our feeble crying in the awful
      silences of space? Can our dim intelligence read the secrets of
      that star-strewn sky? Does any answer come out of it? Never any
      at all, nothing but echoes and fantastic visions! And yet we
      believe that there is an answer, and that upon a time a new Dawn
      will come blushing down the ways of our enduring night. We
      believe it, for its reflected beauty even now shines up
      continually in our hearts from beneath the horizon of the grave,
      and we call it Hope. Without Hope we should suffer moral death,
      and by the help of Hope we yet may climb to Heaven, or at the
      worst, if she also prove but a kindly mockery given to hold us
      from despair, be gently lowered into the abysses of eternal
      sleep.

      Then I fell to reflecting upon the undertaking on which we were
      bent, and what a wild one it was, and yet how strangely the story
      seemed to fit in with what had been written centuries ago upon
      the sherd. Who was this extraordinary woman, Queen over a people
      apparently as extraordinary as herself, and reigning amidst the
      vestiges of a lost civilisation? And what was the meaning of this
      story of the Fire that gave unending life? Could it be possible
      that any fluid or essence should exist which might so fortify
      these fleshy walls that they should from age to age resist the
      mines and batterings of decay? It was possible, though not
      probable. The infinite continuation of life would not, as poor
      Vincey said, be so marvellous a thing as the production of life
      and its temporary endurance. And if it were true, what then? The
      person who found it could no doubt rule the world. He could
      accumulate all the wealth in the world, and all the power, and
      all the wisdom that is power. He might give a lifetime to the
      study of each art or science. Well, if that were so, and this
      _She_ were practically immortal, which I did not for one moment
      believe, how was it that, with all these things at her feet, she
      preferred to remain in a cave amongst a society of cannibals?
      This surely settled the question. The whole story was monstrous,
      and only worthy of the superstitious days in which it was
      written. At any rate I was very sure that _I_ would not attempt
      to attain unending life. I had had far too many worries and
      disappointments and secret bitternesses during my forty odd years
      of existence to wish that this state of affairs should be
      continued indefinitely. And yet I suppose that my life has been,
      comparatively speaking, a happy one.

      And then, reflecting that at the present moment there was far
      more likelihood of our earthly careers being cut exceedingly
      short than of their being unduly prolonged, I at last managed to
      get to sleep, a fact for which anybody who reads this narrative,
      if anybody ever does, may very probably be thankful.

      When I woke again it was just dawning, and the guard and bearers
      were moving about like ghosts through the dense morning mists,
      getting ready for our start. The fire had died quite down, and I
      rose and stretched myself, shivering in every limb from the damp
      cold of the dawn. Then I looked at Leo. He was sitting up,
      holding his hands to his head, and I saw that his face was
      flushed and his eye bright, and yet yellow round the pupil.

      “Well, Leo,” I said, “how do you feel?”

      “I feel as though I were going to die,” he answered hoarsely. “My
      head is splitting, my body is trembling, and I am as sick as a
      cat.”

      I whistled, or if I did not whistle I felt inclined to—Leo had
      got a sharp attack of fever. I went to Job, and asked him for the
      quinine, of which fortunately we had still a good supply, only to
      find that Job himself was not much better. He complained of pains
      across the back, and dizziness, and was almost incapable of
      helping himself. Then I did the only thing it was possible to do
      under the circumstances—gave them both about ten grains of
      quinine, and took a slightly smaller dose myself as a matter of
      precaution. After that I found Billali, and explained to him how
      matters stood, asking at the same time what he thought had best
      be done. He came with me, and looked at Leo and Job (whom, by the
      way, he had named the Pig on account of his fatness, round face,
      and small eyes).

      “Ah,” he said, when we were out of earshot, “the fever! I thought
      so. The Lion has it badly, but he is young, and he may live. As
      for the Pig, his attack is not so bad; it is the ‘little fever’
      which he has; that always begins with pains across the back, it
      will spend itself upon his fat.”

      “Can they go on, my father?” I asked.

      “Nay, my son, they must go on. If they stop here they will
      certainly die; also, they will be better in the litters than on
      the ground. By to-night, if all goes well, we shall be across the
      marsh and in good air. Come, let us lift them into the litters
      and start, for it is very bad to stand still in this morning fog.
      We can eat our meal as we go.”

      This we accordingly did, and with a heavy heart I once more set
      out upon our strange journey. For the first three hours all went
      as well as could be expected, and then an accident happened that
      nearly lost us the pleasure of the company of our venerable
      friend Billali, whose litter was leading the cavalcade. We were
      going through a particularly dangerous stretch of quagmire, in
      which the bearers sometimes sank up to their knees. Indeed, it
      was a mystery to me how they contrived to carry the heavy litters
      at all over such ground as that which we were traversing, though
      the two spare hands, as well as the four regular ones, had of
      course to put their shoulders to the pole.

      Presently, as we blundered and floundered along, there was a
      sharp cry, then a storm of exclamations, and, last of all, a most
      tremendous splash, and the whole caravan halted.

      I jumped out of my litter and ran forward. About twenty yards
      ahead was the edge of one of those sullen peaty pools of which I
      have spoken, the path we were following running along the top of
      its bank, that, as it happened, was a steep one. Looking towards
      this pool, to my horror I saw that Billali’s litter was floating
      on it, and as for Billali himself, he was nowhere to be seen. To
      make matters clear I may as well explain at once what had
      happened. One of Billali’s bearers had unfortunately trodden on a
      basking snake, which had bitten him in the leg, whereon he had,
      not unnaturally, let go of the pole, and then, finding that he
      was tumbling down the bank, grasped at the litter to save
      himself. The result of this was what might have been expected.
      The litter was pulled over the edge of the bank, the bearers let
      go, and the whole thing, including Billali and the man who had
      been bitten, rolled into the slimy pool. When I got to the edge
      of the water neither of them were to be seen; indeed, the
      unfortunate bearer never was seen again. Either he struck his
      head against something, or got wedged in the mud, or possibly the
      snake-bite paralyzed him. At any rate he vanished. But though
      Billali was not to be seen, his whereabouts was clear enough from
      the agitation of the floating litter, in the bearing cloth and
      curtains of which he was entangled.

      “He is there! Our father is there!” said one of the men, but he
      did not stir a finger to help him, nor did any of the others.
      They simply stood and stared at the water.

      “Out of the way, you brutes!” I shouted in English, and throwing
      off my hat I took a run and sprang well out into the horrid
      slimy-looking pool. A couple of strokes took me to where Billali
      was struggling beneath the cloth.

      Somehow, I do not quite know how, I managed to push it free of
      him, and his venerable head all covered with green slime, like
      that of a yellowish Bacchus with ivy leaves, emerged upon the
      surface of the water. The rest was easy, for Billali was an
      eminently practical individual, and had the common sense not to
      grasp hold of me as drowning people often do, so I got him by the
      arm, and towed him to the bank, through the mud of which we were
      with difficulty dragged. Such a filthy spectacle as we presented
      I have never seen before or since, and it will perhaps give some
      idea of the almost superhuman dignity of Billali’s appearance
      when I say that, coughing, half-drowned, and covered with mud and
      green slime as he was, with his beautiful beard coming to a
      dripping point, like a Chinaman’s freshly-oiled pig-tail, he
      still looked venerable and imposing.

      “Ye dogs,” he said, addressing the bearers, as soon as he had
      sufficiently recovered to speak, “ye left me, your father, to
      drown. Had it not been for this stranger, my son the Baboon,
      assuredly I should have drowned. Well, I will remember it,” and
      he fixed them with his gleaming though slightly watery eye, in a
      way I saw that they did not like, though they tried to appear
      sulkily indifferent.

      “As for thee, my son,” the old man went on, turning towards me
      and grasping my hand, “rest assured that I am thy friend through
      good and evil. Thou hast saved my life: perchance a day may come
      when I shall save thine.”

      After that we cleaned ourselves as best we could, fished out the
      litter, and went on, _minus_ the man who had been drowned. I do
      not know if it was owing to his being an unpopular character, or
      from native indifference and selfishness of temperament, but I am
      bound to say that nobody seemed to grieve much over his sudden
      and final disappearance, unless, perhaps, it was the men who had
      to do his share of the work.




XI.
THE PLAIN OF KÔR


      About an hour before sundown we at last, to my unbounded
      gratitude, emerged from the great belt of marsh on to land that
      swelled upwards in a succession of rolling waves. Just on the
      hither side of the crest of the first wave we halted for the
      night. My first act was to examine Leo’s condition. It was, if
      anything, worse than in the morning, and a new and very
      distressing feature, vomiting, set in, and continued till dawn.
      Not one wink of sleep did I get that night, for I passed it in
      assisting Ustane, who was one of the most gentle and
      indefatigable nurses I ever saw, to wait upon Leo and Job.
      However, the air here was warm and genial without being too hot,
      and there were no mosquitoes to speak of. Also we were above the
      level of the marsh mist, which lay stretched beneath us like the
      dim smoke-pall over a city, lit up here and there by the
      wandering globes of fen fire. Thus it will be seen that we were,
      speaking comparatively, in clover.

      By dawn on the following morning Leo was quite light-headed, and
      fancied that he was divided into halves. I was dreadfully
      distressed, and began to wonder with a sort of sick fear what the
      end of the attack would be. Alas! I had heard but too much of how
      these attacks generally terminate. As I was wondering Billali
      came up and said that we must be getting on, more especially as,
      in his opinion, if Leo did not reach some spot where he could be
      quiet, and have proper nursing, within the next twelve hours, his
      life would only be a matter of a day or two. I could not but
      agree with him, so we got Leo into the litter, and started on,
      Ustane walking by his side to keep the flies off him, and see
      that he did not throw himself out on to the ground.

      Within half an hour of sunrise we had reached the top of the rise
      of which I have spoken, and a most beautiful view broke upon our
      gaze. Beneath us was a rich stretch of country, verdant with
      grass and lovely with foliage and flowers. In the background, at
      a distance, so far as I could judge, of some eighteen miles from
      where we then stood, a huge and extraordinary mountain rose
      abruptly from the plain. The base of this great mountain appeared
      to consist of a grassy slope, but rising from this, I should say,
      from subsequent observation, at a height of about five hundred
      feet above the level of the plain, was a most tremendous and
      absolutely precipitous wall of bare rock, quite twelve or fifteen
      hundred feet in height. The shape of the mountain, which was
      undoubtedly of volcanic origin, was round, and of course, as only
      a segment of its circle was visible, it was difficult to estimate
      its exact size, which was enormous. I afterwards discovered that
      it could not cover less than fifty square miles of ground.
      Anything more grand and imposing than the sight presented by this
      great natural castle, starting in solitary grandeur from the
      level of the plain, I never saw, and I suppose I never shall. Its
      very solitude added to its majesty, and its towering cliffs
      seemed to kiss the sky. Indeed, generally speaking, they were
      clothed in clouds that lay in fleecy masses upon their broad and
      level battlements.

      I sat up in my hammock and gazed out across the plain at this
      thrilling and majestic sight, and I suppose that Billali noticed
      it, for he brought his litter alongside.

      “Behold the house of ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_!’” he said. “Had
      ever a queen such a throne before?”

      “It is wonderful, my father,” I answered. “But how do we enter?
      Those cliffs look hard to climb.”

      “Thou shalt see, my Baboon. Look now at the path below us. What
      thinkest thou that it is? Thou art a wise man. Come, tell me.”

      I looked, and saw what appeared to be the line of roadway running
      straight towards the base of the mountain, though it was covered
      with turf. There were high banks on each side of it, broken here
      and there, but fairly continuous on the whole, the meaning of
      which I did not understand. It seemed so very odd that anybody
      should embank a roadway.

      “Well, my father,” I answered, “I suppose that it is a road,
      otherwise I should have been inclined to say that it was the bed
      of a river, or rather,” I added, observing the extraordinary
      directness of the cutting, “of a canal.”

      Billali—who, by the way, was none the worse for his immersion of
      the day before—nodded his head sagely as he replied—

      “Thou art right, my son. It is a channel cut out by those who
      were before us in this place to carry away water. Of this I am
      sure: within the rocky circle of the mountain whither we journey
      was once a great lake. But those who were before us, by wonderful
      arts of which I know naught, hewed a path for the water through
      the solid rock of the mountain, piercing even to the bed of the
      lake. But first they cut the channel that thou seest across the
      plain. Then, when at last the water burst out, it rushed down the
      channel that had been made to receive it, and crossed this plain
      till it reached the low land behind the rise, and there,
      perchance, it made the swamp through which we have come. Then
      when the lake was drained dry, the people whereof I speak built a
      mighty city on its bed, whereof naught but ruins and the name of
      Kôr yet remaineth, and from age to age hewed the caves and
      passages that thou wilt see.”

      “It may be,” I answered; “but if so, how is it that the lake does
      not fill up again with the rains and the water of the springs?”

      “Nay, my son, the people were a wise people, and they left a
      drain to keep it clear. Seest thou the river to the right?” and
      he pointed to a fair-sized stream that wound away across the
      plain, some four miles from us. “That is the drain, and it comes
      out through the mountain wall where this cutting goes in. At
      first, perhaps, the water ran down this canal, but afterwards the
      people turned it, and used the cutting for a road.”

      “And is there then no other place where one may enter into the
      great mountain,” I asked, “except through that drain?”

      “There is a place,” he answered, “where cattle and men on foot
      may cross with much labour, but it is secret. A year mightest
      thou search and shouldst never find it. It is only used once a
      year, when the herds of cattle that have been fatting on the
      slopes of the mountain, and on this plain, are driven into the
      space within.”

      “And does _She_ live there always?” I asked, “or does she come at
      times without the mountain?”

      “Nay, my son, where she is, there she is.”

      By now we were well on to the great plain, and I was examining
      with delight the varied beauty of its semi-tropical flowers and
      trees, the latter of which grew singly, or at most in clumps of
      three or four, much of the timber being of large size, and
      belonging apparently to a variety of evergreen oak. There were
      also many palms, some of them more than one hundred feet high,
      and the largest and most beautiful tree ferns that I ever saw,
      about which hung clouds of jewelled honeysuckers and great-winged
      butterflies. Wandering about among the trees or crouching in the
      long and feathered grass were all varieties of game, from
      rhinoceroses down. I saw a rhinoceros, buffalo (a large herd),
      eland, quagga, and sable antelope, the most beautiful of all the
      bucks, not to mention many smaller varieties of game, and three
      ostriches which scudded away at our approach like white drift
      before a gale. So plentiful was the game that at last I could
      stand it no longer. I had a single barrel sporting Martini with
      me in the litter, the “Express” being too cumbersome, and espying
      a beautiful fat eland rubbing himself under one of the oak-like
      trees, I jumped out of the litter, and proceeded to creep as near
      to him as I could. He let me come within eighty yards, and then
      turned his head, and stared at me, preparatory to running away. I
      lifted the rifle, and taking him about midway down the shoulder,
      for he was side on to me, fired. I never made a cleaner shot or a
      better kill in all my small experience, for the great buck sprang
      right up into the air and fell dead. The bearers, who had all
      halted to see the performance, gave a murmur of surprise, an
      unwonted compliment from these sullen people, who never appear to
      be surprised at anything, and a party of the guard at once ran
      off to cut the animal up. As for myself, though I was longing to
      have a look at him, I sauntered back to my litter as though I had
      been in the habit of killing eland all my life, feeling that I
      had gone up several degrees in the estimation of the Amahagger,
      who looked on the whole thing as a very high-class manifestation
      of witchcraft. As a matter of fact, however, I had never seen an
      eland in a wild state before. Billali received me with
      enthusiasm.

      “It is wonderful, my son the Baboon,” he cried; “wonderful! Thou
      art a very great man, though so ugly. Had I not seen, surely I
      would never have believed. And thou sayest that thou wilt teach
      me to slay in this fashion?”

      “Certainly, my father,” I said airily; “it is nothing.”

      But all the same I firmly made up my mind that when “my father”
      Billali began to fire I would without fail lie down or take
      refuge behind a tree.

      After this little incident nothing happened of any note till
      about an hour and a half before sundown, when we arrived beneath
      the shadow of the towering volcanic mass that I have already
      described. It is quite impossible for me to describe its grim
      grandeur as it appeared to me while my patient bearers toiled
      along the bed of the ancient watercourse towards the spot where
      the rich brown-hued cliff shot up from precipice to precipice
      till its crown lost itself in a cloud. All I can say is that it
      almost awed me by the intensity of its lonesome and most solemn
      greatness. On we went up the bright and sunny slope, till at last
      the creeping shadows from above swallowed up its brightness, and
      presently we began to pass through a cutting hewn in the living
      rock. Deeper and deeper grew this marvellous work, which must, I
      should say, have employed thousands of men for many years.
      Indeed, how it was ever executed at all without the aid of
      blasting-powder or dynamite I cannot to this day imagine. It is
      and must remain one of the mysteries of that wild land. I can
      only suppose that these cuttings and the vast caves that had been
      hollowed out of the rocks they pierced were the State
      undertakings of the people of Kôr, who lived here in the dim lost
      ages of the world, and, as in the case of the Egyptian monuments,
      were executed by the forced labour of tens of thousands of
      captives, carried on through an indefinite number of centuries.
      But who were the people?

      At last we reached the face of the precipice itself, and found
      ourselves looking into the mouth of a dark tunnel that forcibly
      reminded me of those undertaken by our nineteenth-century
      engineers in the construction of railway lines. Out of this
      tunnel flowed a considerable stream of water. Indeed, though I do
      not think that I have mentioned it, we had followed this stream,
      which ultimately developed into the river I have already
      described as winding away to the right, from the spot where the
      cutting in the solid rock commenced. Half of this cutting formed
      a channel for the stream, and half, which was placed on a
      slightly higher level—eight feet perhaps—was devoted to the
      purposes of a roadway. At the termination of the cutting,
      however, the stream turned off across the plain and followed a
      channel of its own. At the mouth of the cave the cavalcade was
      halted, and, while the men employed themselves in lighting some
      earthenware lamps they had brought with them, Billali, descending
      from his litter, informed me politely but firmly that the orders
      of _She_ were that we were now to be blindfolded, so that we
      should not learn the secret of the paths through the bowels of
      the mountains. To this I, of course, assented cheerfully enough,
      but Job, who was now very much better, notwithstanding the
      journey, did not like it at all, fancying, I believe, that it was
      but a preliminary step to being hot-potted. He was, however, a
      little consoled when I pointed out to him that there were no hot
      pots at hand, and, so far as I knew, no fire to heat them in. As
      for poor Leo, after turning restlessly for hours, he had, to my
      deep thankfulness, at last dropped off into a sleep or stupor, I
      do not know which, so there was no need to blindfold him. The
      blindfolding was performed by binding a piece of the yellowish
      linen whereof those of the Amahagger who condescended to wear
      anything in particular made their dresses, tightly round the
      eyes. This linen I afterwards discovered was taken from the
      tombs, and was not, as I had at first supposed, of native
      manufacture. The bandage was then knotted at the back of the
      head, and finally brought down again and the ends bound under the
      chin to prevent its slipping. Ustane was, by the way, also
      blindfolded, I do not know why, unless it was from fear that she
      should impart the secrets of the route to us.

      This operation performed we started on once more, and soon, by
      the echoing sound of the footsteps of the bearers and the
      increased noise of the water caused by reverberation in a
      confined space, I knew that we were entering into the bowels of
      the great mountain. It was an eerie sensation, being borne along
      into the dead heart of the rock we knew not whither, but I was
      getting used to eerie sensations by this time, and by now was
      pretty well prepared for anything. So I lay still, and listened
      to the tramp, tramp of the bearers and the rushing of the water,
      and tried to believe that I was enjoying myself. Presently the
      men set up the melancholy little chant that I had heard on the
      first night when we were captured in the whaleboat, and the
      effect produced by their voices was very curious, and quite
      indescribable. After a while the air began to get exceedingly
      thick and heavy, so much so, indeed, that I felt as though I were
      going to choke, till at length the litter took a sharp turn, then
      another and another, and the sound of the running water ceased.
      After this the air was fresher again, but the turns were
      continuous, and to me, blindfolded as I was, most bewildering. I
      tried to keep a map of them in my mind in case it might ever be
      necessary for us to try and escape by this route, but, needless
      to say, failed utterly. Another half-hour or so passed, and then
      suddenly I became aware that we were once more in the open air. I
      could see the light through my bandage and feel its freshness on
      my face. A few more minutes and the caravan halted, and I heard
      Billali order Ustane to remove her bandage and undo ours. Without
      waiting for her attentions I got the knot of mine loose, and
      looked out.

      As I anticipated, we had passed right through the precipice, and
      were now on the farther side, and immediately beneath its
      beetling face. The first thing I noticed was that the cliff is
      not nearly so high here, not so high I should say by five hundred
      feet, which proved that the bed of the lake, or rather of the
      vast ancient crater in which we stood, was much above the level
      of the surrounding plain. For the rest, we found ourselves in a
      huge rock-surrounded cup, not unlike that of the first place
      where we had sojourned, only ten times the size. Indeed, I could
      only just make out the frowning line of the opposite cliffs. A
      great portion of the plain thus enclosed by nature was
      cultivated, and fenced in with walls of stone placed there to
      keep the cattle and goats, of which there were large herds about,
      from breaking into the gardens. Here and there rose great grass
      mounds, and some miles away towards the centre I thought that I
      could see the outline of colossal ruins. I had no time to observe
      anything more at the moment, for we were instantly surrounded by
      crowds of Amahagger, similar in every particular to those with
      whom we were already familiar, who, though they spoke little,
      pressed round us so closely as to obscure the view to a person
      lying in a hammock. Then all of a sudden a number of armed men
      arranged in companies, and marshalled by officers who held ivory
      wands in their hands, came running swiftly towards us, having, so
      far as I could make out, emerged from the face of the precipice
      like ants from their burrows. These men as well as their officers
      were all robed in addition to the usual leopard skin, and, as I
      gathered, formed the bodyguard of _She_ herself.

      Their leader advanced to Billali, saluted him by placing his
      ivory wand transversely across his forehead, and then asked some
      question which I could not catch, and Billali having answered him
      the whole regiment turned and marched along the side of the
      cliff, our cavalcade of litters following in their track. After
      going thus for about half a mile we halted once more in front of
      the mouth of a tremendous cave, measuring about sixty feet in
      height by eighty wide, and here Billali descended finally, and
      requested Job and myself to do the same. Leo, of course, was far
      too ill to do anything of the sort. I did so, and we entered the
      great cave, into which the light of the setting sun penetrated
      for some distance, while beyond the reach of the daylight it was
      faintly illuminated with lamps which seemed to me to stretch away
      for an almost immeasurable distance, like the gas lights of an
      empty London street. The first thing I noticed was that the walls
      were covered with sculptures in bas-relief, of a sort,
      pictorially speaking, similar to those that I have described upon
      the vases;—love-scenes principally, then hunting pictures,
      pictures of executions, and the torture of criminals by the
      placing of a, presumably, red-hot pot upon the head, showing
      whence our hosts had derived this pleasant practice. There were
      very few battle-pieces, though many of duels, and men running and
      wrestling, and from this fact I am led to believe that this
      people were not much subject to attack by exterior foes, either
      on account of the isolation of their position or because of their
      great strength. Between the pictures were columns of stone
      characters of a formation absolutely new to me; at any rate, they
      were neither Greek nor Egyptian, nor Hebrew, nor Assyrian—that I
      am sure of. They looked more like Chinese writings than any other
      that I am acquainted with. Near to the entrance of the cave both
      pictures and writings were worn away, but further in they were in
      many cases absolutely fresh and perfect as the day on which the
      sculptor had ceased work on them.

      The regiment of guards did not come further than the entrance to
      the cave, where they formed up to let us pass through. On
      entering the place itself we were, however, met by a man robed in
      white, who bowed humbly, but said nothing, which, as it
      afterwards appeared that he was a deaf mute, was not very
      wonderful.

      Running at right angles to the great cave, at a distance of some
      twenty feet from the entrance, was a smaller cave or wide
      gallery, that was pierced into the rock both to the right and to
      the left of the main cavern. In front of the gallery to our left
      stood two guards, from which circumstance I argued that it was
      the entrance to the apartments of _She_ herself. The mouth of the
      right-hand gallery was unguarded, and along it the mute indicated
      that we were to go. Walking a few yards down this passage, which
      was lighted with lamps, we came to the entrance of a chamber
      having a curtain made of some grass material, not unlike a
      Zanzibar mat in appearance, hung over the doorway. This the mute
      drew back with another profound obeisance, and led the way into a
      good-sized apartment, hewn, of course, out of the solid rock, but
      to my great relief lighted by means of a shaft pierced in the
      face of the precipice. In this room was a stone bedstead, pots
      full of water for washing, and beautifully tanned leopard skins
      to serve as blankets.

      Here we left Leo, who was still sleeping heavily, and with him
      stopped Ustane. I noticed that the mute gave her a very sharp
      look, as much as to say, “Who are you, and by whose order do you
      come here?” Then he conducted us to another similar room which
      Job took, and then to two more that were respectively occupied by
      Billali and myself.




XII.
“SHE”


      The first care of Job and myself, after seeing to Leo, was to
      wash ourselves and put on clean clothing, for what we were
      wearing had not been changed since the loss of the dhow.
      Fortunately, as I think that I have said, by far the greater part
      of our personal baggage had been packed into the whaleboat, and
      was therefore saved—and brought hither by the bearers—although
      all the stores laid in by us for barter and presents to the
      natives were lost. Nearly all our clothing was made of a
      well-shrunk and very strong grey flannel, and excellent I found
      it for travelling in these places, because though a Norfolk
      jacket, shirt, and pair of trousers of it only weighed about four
      pounds, a great consideration in a tropical country, where every
      extra ounce tells on the wearer, it was warm, and offered a good
      resistance to the rays of the sun, and best of all to chills,
      which are so apt to result from sudden changes of temperature.

      Never shall I forget the comfort of the “wash and brush-up,” and
      of those clean flannels. The only thing that was wanting to
      complete my joy was a cake of soap, of which we had none.

      Afterwards I discovered that the Amahagger, who do not reckon
      dirt among their many disagreeable qualities, use a kind of burnt
      earth for washing purposes, which, though unpleasant to the touch
      till one gets accustomed to it, forms a very fair substitute for
      soap.

      By the time that I was dressed, and had combed and trimmed my
      black beard, the previous condition of which was certainly
      sufficiently unkempt to give weight to Billali’s appellation for
      me of “Baboon,” I began to feel most uncommonly hungry. Therefore
      I was by no means sorry when, without the slightest preparatory
      sound or warning, the curtain over the entrance to my cave was
      flung aside, and another mute, a young girl this time, announced
      to me by signs that I could not misunderstand—that is, by opening
      her mouth and pointing down it—that there was something ready to
      eat. Accordingly I followed her into the next chamber, which we
      had not yet entered, where I found Job, who had also, to his
      great embarrassment, been conducted thither by a fair mute. Job
      never got over the advances the former lady had made towards him,
      and suspected every girl who came near to him of similar designs.

      “These young parties have a way of looking at one, sir,” he would
      say apologetically, “which I don’t call respectable.”

      This chamber was twice the size of the sleeping caves, and I saw
      at once that it had originally served as a refectory, and also
      probably as an embalming room for the Priests of the Dead; for I
      may as well say at once that these hollowed-out caves were
      nothing more nor less than vast catacombs, in which for tens of
      ages the mortal remains of the great extinct race whose monuments
      surrounded us had been first preserved, with an art and a
      completeness that has never since been equalled, and then hidden
      away for all time. On each side of this particular rock-chamber
      was a long and solid stone table, about three feet wide by three
      feet six in height, hewn out of the living rock, of which it had
      formed part, and was still attached to at the base. These tables
      were slightly hollowed out or curved inward, to give room for the
      knees of any one sitting on the stone ledge that had been cut for
      a bench along the side of the cave at a distance of about two
      feet from them. Each of them, also, was so arranged that it ended
      right under a shaft pierced in the rock for the admission of
      light and air. On examining them carefully, however, I saw that
      there was a difference between them that had at first escaped my
      attention, viz. that one of the tables, that to the left as we
      entered the cave, had evidently been used, not to eat upon, but
      for the purposes of embalming. That this was beyond all question
      the case was clear from five shallow depressions in the stone of
      the table, all shaped like a human form, with a separate place
      for the head to lie in, and a little bridge to support the neck,
      each depression being of a different size, so as to fit bodies
      varying in stature from a full-grown man’s to a small child’s,
      and with little holes bored at intervals to carry off fluid. And,
      indeed, if any further confirmation was required, we had but to
      look at the wall of the cave above to find it. For there,
      sculptured all round the apartment, and looking nearly as fresh
      as the day it was done, was the pictorial representation of the
      death, embalming, and burial of an old man with a long beard,
      probably an ancient king or grandee of this country.

      The first picture represented his death. He was lying upon a
      couch which had four short curved posts at the corners coming to
      a knob at the end, in appearance something like written notes of
      music, and was evidently in the very act of expiring. Gathered
      round the couch were women and children weeping, the former with
      their hair hanging down their backs. The next scene represented
      the embalmment of the body, which lay stark upon a table with
      depressions in it, similar to the one before us; probably,
      indeed, it was a picture of the same table. Three men were
      employed at the work—one superintending, one holding a funnel
      shaped exactly like a port wine strainer, of which the narrow end
      was fixed in an incision in the breast, no doubt in the great
      pectoral artery; while the third, who was depicted as standing
      straddle-legged over the corpse, held a kind of large jug high in
      his hand, and poured from it some steaming fluid which fell
      accurately into the funnel. The most curious part of this
      sculpture is that both the man with the funnel and the man who
      pours the fluid are drawn holding their noses, either I suppose
      because of the stench arising from the body, or more probably to
      keep out the aromatic fumes of the hot fluid which was being
      forced into the dead man’s veins. Another curious thing which I
      am unable to explain is that all three men were represented as
      having a band of linen tied round the face with holes in it for
      the eyes.

      The third sculpture was a picture of the burial of the deceased.
      There he was, stiff and cold, clothed in a linen robe, and laid
      out on a stone slab such as I had slept upon at our first
      sojourning-place. At his head and feet burnt lamps, and by his
      side were placed several of the beautiful painted vases that I
      have described, which were perhaps supposed to be full of
      provisions. The little chamber was crowded with mourners, and
      with musicians playing on an instrument resembling a lyre, while
      near the foot of the corpse stood a man holding a sheet, with
      which he was preparing to cover it from view.

      These sculptures, looked at merely as works of art, were so
      remarkable that I make no apology for describing them rather
      fully. They struck me also as being of surpassing interest as
      representing, probably with studious accuracy, the last rites of
      the dead as practised among an utterly lost people, and even then
      I thought how envious some antiquarian friends of my own at
      Cambridge would be if ever I found an opportunity of describing
      these wonderful remains to them. Probably they would say that I
      was exaggerating, notwithstanding that every page of this history
      must bear so much internal evidence of its truth that it would
      obviously have been quite impossible for me to have invented it.

      To return. As soon as I had hastily examined these sculptures,
      which I think I omitted to mention were executed in relief, we
      sat down to a very excellent meal of boiled goat’s-flesh, fresh
      milk, and cakes made of meal, the whole being served upon clean
      wooden platters.

      When we had eaten we returned to see how Leo was getting on,
      Billali saying that he must now wait upon _She_, and hear her
      commands. On reaching Leo’s room we found the poor boy in a very
      bad way. He had woke up from his torpor, and was altogether off
      his head, babbling about some boat-race on the Cam, and was
      inclined to be violent. Indeed, when we entered the room Ustane
      was holding him down. I spoke to him, and my voice seemed to
      soothe him; at any rate he grew much quieter, and was persuaded
      to swallow a dose of quinine.

      I had been sitting with him for an hour, perhaps—at any rate I
      know that it was getting so dark that I could only just make out
      his head lying like a gleam of gold upon the pillow we had
      extemporised out of a bag covered with a blanket—when suddenly
      Billali arrived with an air of great importance, and informed me
      that _She_ herself had deigned to express a wish to see me—an
      honour, he added, accorded to but very few. I think that he was a
      little horrified at my cool way of taking the honour, but the
      fact was that I did not feel overwhelmed with gratitude at the
      prospect of seeing some savage, dusky queen, however absolute and
      mysterious she might be, more especially as my mind was full of
      dear Leo, for whose life I began to have great fears. However, I
      rose to follow him, and as I did so I caught sight of something
      bright lying on the floor, which I picked up. Perhaps the reader
      will remember that with the potsherd in the casket was a
      composition scarabæus marked with a round O, a goose, and another
      curious hieroglyphic, the meaning of which is “Suten se Ra,” or
      “Royal Son of the Sun.” The scarab, which is a very small one,
      Leo had insisted upon having set in a massive gold ring, such as
      is generally used for signets, and it was this very ring that I
      now picked up. He had pulled it off in the paroxysm of his fever,
      at least I suppose so, and flung it down upon the rock-floor.
      Thinking that if I left it about it might get lost, I slipped it
      on my own little finger, and then followed Billali, leaving Job
      and Ustane with Leo.

      We passed down the passage, crossed the great aisle-like cave,
      and came to the corresponding passage on the other side, at the
      mouth of which the guards stood like two statues. As we came they
      bowed their heads in salutation, and then lifting their long
      spears placed them transversely across their foreheads, as the
      leaders of the troop that had met us had done with their ivory
      wands. We stepped between them, and found ourselves in an exactly
      similar gallery to that which led to our own apartments, only
      this passage was, comparatively speaking, brilliantly lighted. A
      few paces down it we were met by four mutes—two men and two
      women—who bowed low and then arranged themselves, the women in
      front and the men behind of us, and in this order we continued
      our procession past several doorways hung with curtains
      resembling those leading to our own quarters, and which I
      afterwards found opened out into chambers occupied by the mutes
      who attended on _She_. A few paces more and we came to another
      doorway facing us, and not to our left like the others, which
      seemed to mark the termination of the passage. Here two more
      white-, or rather yellow-robed guards were standing, and they too
      bowed, saluted, and let us pass through heavy curtains into a
      great antechamber, quite forty feet long by as many wide, in
      which some eight or ten women, most of them young and handsome,
      with yellowish hair, sat on cushions working with ivory needles
      at what had the appearance of being embroidery frames. These
      women were also deaf and dumb. At the farther end of this great
      lamp-lit apartment was another doorway closed in with heavy
      Oriental-looking curtains, quite unlike those that hung before
      the doors of our own rooms, and here stood two particularly
      handsome girl mutes, their heads bowed upon their bosoms and
      their hands crossed in an attitude of humble submission. As we
      advanced they each stretched out an arm and drew back the
      curtains. Thereupon Billali did a curious thing. Down he went,
      that venerable-looking old gentleman—for Billali is a gentleman
      at the bottom—down on to his hands and knees, and in this
      undignified position, with his long white beard trailing on the
      ground, he began to creep into the apartment beyond. I followed
      him, standing on my feet in the usual fashion. Looking over his
      shoulder he perceived it.

      “Down, my son; down, my Baboon; down on to thy hands and knees.
      We enter the presence of _She_, and, if thou art not humble, of a
      surety she will blast thee where thou standest.”

      I halted, and felt scared. Indeed, my knees began to give way of
      their own mere motion; but reflection came to my aid. I was an
      Englishman, and why, I asked myself, should I creep into the
      presence of some savage woman as though I were a monkey in fact
      as well as in name? I would not and could not do it, that is,
      unless I was absolutely sure that my life or comfort depended
      upon it. If once I began to creep upon my knees I should always
      have to do so, and it would be a patent acknowledgment of
      inferiority. So, fortified by an insular prejudice against
      “kootooing,” which has, like most of our so-called prejudices, a
      good deal of common sense to recommend it, I marched in boldly
      after Billali. I found myself in another apartment, considerably
      smaller than the anteroom, of which the walls were entirely hung
      with rich-looking curtains of the same make as those over the
      door, the work, as I subsequently discovered, of the mutes who
      sat in the antechamber and wove them in strips, which were
      afterwards sewn together. Also, here and there about the room,
      were settees of a beautiful black wood of the ebony tribe, inlaid
      with ivory, and all over the floor were other tapestries, or
      rather rugs. At the top end of this apartment was what appeared
      to be a recess, also draped with curtains, through which shone
      rays of light. There was nobody in the place except ourselves.

      Painfully and slowly old Billali crept up the length of the cave,
      and with the most dignified stride that I could command I
      followed after him. But I felt that it was more or less of a
      failure. To begin with, it is not possible to look dignified when
      you are following in the wake of an old man writhing along on his
      stomach like a snake, and then, in order to go sufficiently
      slowly, either I had to keep my leg some seconds in the air at
      every step, or else to advance with a full stop between each
      stride, like Mary Queen of Scots going to execution in a play.
      Billali was not good at crawling, I suppose his years stood in
      the way, and our progress up that apartment was a very long
      affair. I was immediately behind him, and several times I was
      sorely tempted to help him on with a good kick. It is so absurd
      to advance into the presence of savage royalty after the fashion
      of an Irishman driving a pig to market, for that is what we
      looked like, and the idea nearly made me burst out laughing then
      and there. I had to work off my dangerous tendency to unseemly
      merriment by blowing my nose, a proceeding which filled old
      Billali with horror, for he looked over his shoulder and made a
      ghastly face at me, and I heard him murmur, “Oh, my poor Baboon!”

      At last we reached the curtains, and here Billali collapsed flat
      on to his stomach, with his hands stretched out before him as
      though he were dead, and I, not knowing what to do, began to
      stare about the place. But presently I clearly felt that somebody
      was looking at me from behind the curtains. I could not see the
      person, but I could distinctly feel his or her gaze, and, what is
      more, it produced a very odd effect upon my nerves. I was
      frightened, I do not know why. The place was a strange one, it is
      true, and looked lonely, notwithstanding its rich hangings and
      the soft glow of the lamps—indeed, these accessories added to,
      rather than detracted from its loneliness, just as a lighted
      street at night has always a more solitary appearance than a dark
      one. It was so silent in the place, and there lay Billali like
      one dead before the heavy curtains, through which the odour of
      perfume seemed to float up towards the gloom of the arched roof
      above. Minute grew into minute, and still there was no sign of
      life, nor did the curtain move; but I felt the gaze of the
      unknown being sinking through and through me, and filling me with
      a nameless terror, till the perspiration stood in beads upon my
      brow.

      At length the curtain began to move. Who could be behind it?—some
      naked savage queen, a languishing Oriental beauty, or a
      nineteenth-century young lady, drinking afternoon tea? I had not
      the slightest idea, and should not have been astonished at seeing
      any of the three. I was getting beyond astonishment. The curtain
      agitated itself a little, then suddenly between its folds there
      appeared a most beautiful white hand (white as snow), and with
      long tapering fingers, ending in the pinkest nails. The hand
      grasped the curtain, and drew it aside, and as it did so I heard
      a voice, I think the softest and yet most silvery voice I ever
      heard. It reminded me of the murmur of a brook.

      “Stranger,” said the voice in Arabic, but much purer and more
      classical Arabic than the Amahagger talk—“stranger, wherefore art
      thou so much afraid?”

      Now I flattered myself that in spite of my inward terrors I had
      kept a very fair command of my countenance, and was, therefore, a
      little astonished at this question. Before I had made up my mind
      how to answer it, however, the curtain was drawn, and a tall
      figure stood before us. I say a figure, for not only the body,
      but also the face was wrapped up in soft white, gauzy material in
      such a way as at first sight to remind me most forcibly of a
      corpse in its grave-clothes. And yet I do not know why it should
      have given me that idea, seeing that the wrappings were so thin
      that one could distinctly see the gleam of the pink flesh beneath
      them. I suppose it was owing to the way in which they were
      arranged, either accidentally, or more probably by design.
      Anyhow, I felt more frightened than ever at this ghost-like
      apparition, and my hair began to rise upon my head as the feeling
      crept over me that I was in the presence of something that was
      not canny. I could, however, clearly distinguish that the swathed
      mummy-like form before me was that of a tall and lovely woman,
      instinct with beauty in every part, and also with a certain
      snake-like grace which I had never seen anything to equal before.
      When she moved a hand or foot her entire frame seemed to
      undulate, and the neck did not bend, it curved.

      “Why art thou so frightened, stranger?” asked the sweet voice
      again—a voice which seemed to draw the heart out of me, like the
      strains of softest music. “Is there that about me that should
      affright a man? Then surely are men changed from what they used
      to be!” And with a little coquettish movement she turned herself,
      and held up one arm, so as to show all her loveliness and the
      rich hair of raven blackness that streamed in soft ripples down
      her snowy robes, almost to her sandalled feet.

      “It is thy beauty that makes me fear, oh Queen,” I answered
      humbly, scarcely knowing what to say, and I thought that as I did
      so I heard old Billali, who was still lying prostrate on the
      floor, mutter, “Good, my Baboon, good.”

      “I see that men still know how to beguile us women with false
      words. Ah, stranger,” she answered, with a laugh that sounded
      like distant silver bells, “thou wast afraid because mine eyes
      were searching out thine heart, therefore wast thou afraid. Yet
      being but a woman, I forgive thee for the lie, for it was
      courteously said. And now tell me how came ye hither to this land
      of the dwellers among the caves—a land of swamps and evil things
      and dead old shadows of the dead? What came ye for to see? How is
      it that ye hold your lives so cheap as to place them in the
      hollow of the hand of _Hiya_, into the hand of
      ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_’? Tell me also how come ye to know the
      tongue I talk. It is an ancient tongue, that sweet child of the
      old Syriac. Liveth it yet in the world? Thou seest I dwell among
      the caves and the dead, and naught know I of the affairs of men,
      nor have I cared to know. I have lived, O stranger, with my
      memories, and my memories are in a grave that mine hands
      hollowed, for truly hath it been said that the child of man
      maketh his own path evil;” and her beautiful voice quivered, and
      broke in a note as soft as any wood-bird’s. Suddenly her eye fell
      upon the sprawling frame of Billali, and she seemed to recollect
      herself.

      “Ah! thou art there, old man. Tell me how it is that things have
      gone wrong in thine household. Forsooth, it seems that these my
      guests were set upon. Ay, and one was nigh to being slain by the
      hot-pot to be eaten of those brutes, thy children, and had not
      the others fought gallantly they too had been slain, and not even
      I could have called back the life which had been loosed from the
      body. What means it, old man? What hast thou to say that I should
      not give thee over to those who execute my vengeance?”

      Her voice had risen in her anger, and it rang clear and cold
      against the rocky walls. Also I thought I could see her eyes
      flash through the gauze that hid them. I saw poor Billali, whom I
      had believed to be a very fearless person, positively quiver with
      terror at her words.

      “Oh ‘Hiya!’ oh _She_!” he said, without lifting his white head
      from the floor. “Oh _She_, as thou art great be merciful, for I
      am now as ever thy servant to obey. It was no plan or fault of
      mine, oh _She_, it was those wicked ones who are called my
      children. Led on by a woman whom thy guest the Pig had scorned,
      they would have followed the ancient custom of the land, and
      eaten the fat black stranger who came hither with these thy
      guests the Baboon and the Lion who is sick, thinking that no word
      had come from thee about the Black one. But when the Baboon and
      the Lion saw what they would do, they slew the woman, and slew
      also their servant to save him from the horror of the pot. Then
      those evil ones, ay, those children of the Wicked One who lives
      in the Pit, they went mad with the lust of blood, and flew at the
      throats of the Lion and the Baboon and the Pig. But gallantly
      they fought. Oh _Hiya_! they fought like very men, and slew many,
      and held their own, and then I came and saved them, and the
      evildoers have I sent on hither to Kôr to be judged of thy
      greatness, oh _She_! and here they are.”

      “Ay, old man, I know it, and to-morrow will I sit in the great
      hall and do justice upon them, fear not. And for thee, I forgive
      thee, though hardly. See that thou dost keep thine household
      better. Go.”

      Billali rose upon his knees with astonishing alacrity, bowed his
      head thrice, and his white beard sweeping the ground, crawled
      down the apartment as he had crawled up it, till he finally
      vanished through the curtains, leaving me, not a little to my
      alarm, alone with this terrible but most fascinating person.




XIII.
AYESHA UNVEILS


      “There,” said _She_, “he has gone, the white-bearded old fool!
      Ah, how little knowledge does a man acquire in his life. He
      gathereth it up like water, but like water it runneth through his
      fingers, and yet, if his hands be but wet as though with dew,
      behold a generation of fools call out, ‘See, he is a wise man!’
      Is it not so? But how call they thee? ‘Baboon,’ he says,” and she
      laughed; “but that is the fashion of these savages who lack
      imagination, and fly to the beasts they resemble for a name. How
      do they call thee in thine own country, stranger?”

      “They call me Holly, oh Queen,” I answered.

      “Holly,” she answered, speaking the word with difficulty, and yet
      with a most charming accent; “and what is ‘Holly’?”

      “’Holly’ is a prickly tree,” I said.

      “So. Well, thou hast a prickly and yet a tree-like look. Strong
      art thou, and ugly, but if my wisdom be not at fault, honest at
      the core, and a staff to lean on. Also one who thinks. But stay,
      oh Holly, stand not there, enter with me and be seated by me. I
      would not see thee crawl before me like those slaves. I am aweary
      of their worship and their terror; sometimes when they vex me I
      could blast them for very sport, and to see the rest turn white,
      even to the heart.” And she held the curtain aside with her ivory
      hand to let me pass in.

      I entered, shuddering. This woman was very terrible. Within the
      curtains was a recess, about twelve feet by ten, and in the
      recess was a couch and a table whereon stood fruit and sparkling
      water. By it, at its end, was a vessel like a font cut in carved
      stone, also full of pure water. The place was softly lit with
      lamps formed out of the beautiful vessels of which I have spoken,
      and the air and curtains were laden with a subtle perfume.
      Perfume too seemed to emanate from the glorious hair and
      white-clinging vestments of _She_ herself. I entered the little
      room, and there stood uncertain.

      “Sit,” said _She_, pointing to the couch. “As yet thou hast no
      cause to fear me. If thou hast cause, thou shalt not fear for
      long, for I shall slay thee. Therefore let thy heart be light.”

      I sat down on the foot of the couch near to the font-like basin
      of water, and _She_ sank down softly on to the other end.

“Now, Holly,” she said, “how comest thou to speak Arabic? It is my own
dear tongue, for Arabian am I by my birth, even ‘al Arab al Ariba’ (an
Arab of the Arabs), and of the race of our father Yárab, the son of
Kâhtan, for in that fair and ancient city Ozal was I born, in the
province of Yaman the Happy. Yet dost thou not speak it as we used to
speak. Thy talk doth lack the music of the sweet tongue of the tribes
of Hamyar which I was wont to hear. Some of the words too seemed
changed, even as among these Amahagger, who have debased and defiled
its purity, so that I must speak with them in what is to me another
tongue.”[1]

 [1] Yárab the son of Kâhtan, who lived some centuries before the time
 of Abraham, was the father of the ancient Arabs, and gave its name
 Araba to the country. In speaking of herself as “al Arab al Ariba,”
 _She_ no doubt meant to convey that she was of the true Arab blood as
 distinguished from the naturalised Arabs, the descendants of Ismael,
 the son of Abraham and Hagar, who were known as “al Arab al
 mostáraba.” The dialect of the Koreish was usually called the clear or
 “perspicuous” Arabic, but the Hamaritic dialect approached nearer to
 the purity of the mother Syriac.—L. H. H.

      “I have studied it,” I answered, “for many years. Also the
      language is spoken in Egypt and elsewhere.”

      “So it is still spoken, and there is yet an Egypt? And what
      Pharaoh sits upon the throne? Still one of the spawn of the
      Persian Ochús, or are the Achæmenians gone, for far is it to the
      days of Ochús.”

      “The Persians have been gone from Egypt for nigh two thousand
      years, and since then the Ptolemies, the Romans, and many others
      have flourished and held sway upon the Nile, and fallen when
      their time was ripe,” I said, aghast. “What canst thou know of
      the Persian Artaxerxes?”

      She laughed, and made no answer, and again a cold chill went
      through me. “And Greece,” she said; “is there still a Greece? Ah,
      I loved the Greeks. Beautiful were they as the day, and clever,
      but fierce at heart and fickle, notwithstanding.”

      “Yes,” I said, “there is a Greece; and, just now, it is once more
      a people. Yet the Greeks of to-day are not what the Greeks of the
      old time were, and Greece herself is but a mockery of the Greece
      that was.”

      “So! The Hebrews, are they yet at Jerusalem? And does the Temple
      that the wise king built stand, and if so what God do they
      worship therein? Is their Messiah come, of whom they preached so
      much and prophesied so loudly, and doth He rule the earth?”

      “The Jews are broken and gone, and the fragments of their people
      strew the world, and Jerusalem is no more. As for the temple that
      Herod built——”

      “Herod!” she said. “I know not Herod. But go on.”

      “The Romans burnt it, and the Roman eagles flew across its ruins,
      and now Judæa is a desert.”

      “So, so! They were a great people, those Romans, and went
      straight to their end—ay, they sped to it like Fate, or like
      their own eagles on their prey!—and left peace behind them.”

      “Solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant,” I suggested.

      “Ah, thou canst speak the Latin tongue, too!” she said, in
      surprise. “It hath a strange ring in my ears after all these
      days, and it seems to me that thy accent does not fall as the
      Romans put it. Who was it wrote that? I know not the saying, but
      it is a true one of that great people. It seems that I have found
      a learned man—one whose hands have held the water of the world’s
      knowledge. Knowest thou Greek also?”

      “Yes, oh Queen, and something of Hebrew, but not to speak them
      well. They are all dead languages now.”

      She clapped her hands in childish glee. “Of a truth, ugly tree
      that thou art, thou growest the fruits of wisdom, oh Holly,” she
      said; “but of those Jews whom I hated, for they called me
      ‘heathen’ when I would have taught them my philosophy—did their
      Messiah come, and doth He rule the world?”

      “Their Messiah came,” I answered with reverence; “but He came
      poor and lowly, and they would have none of Him. They scourged
      Him, and crucified Him upon a tree, but yet His words and His
      works live on, for He was the Son of God, and now of a truth He
      doth rule half the world, but not with an Empire of the World.”

      “Ah, the fierce-hearted wolves,” she said, “the followers of
      Sense and many gods—greedy of gain and faction-torn. I can see
      their dark faces yet. So they crucified their Messiah? Well can I
      believe it. That He was a Son of the Living Spirit would be
      naught to them, if indeed He was so, and of that we will talk
      afterwards. They would care naught for any God if He came not
      with pomp and power. They, a chosen people, a vessel of Him they
      call Jehovah, ay, and a vessel of Baal, and a vessel of Astoreth,
      and a vessel of the gods of the Egyptians—a high-stomached
      people, greedy of aught that brought them wealth and power. So
      they crucified their Messiah because He came in lowly guise—and
      now are they scattered about the earth? Why, if I remember, so
      said one of their prophets that it should be. Well, let them
      go—they broke my heart, those Jews, and made me look with evil
      eyes across the world, ay, and drove me to this wilderness, this
      place of a people that was before them. When I would have taught
      them wisdom in Jerusalem they stoned me, ay, at the Gate of the
      Temple those white-bearded hypocrites and Rabbis hounded the
      people on to stone me! See, here is the mark of it to this day!”
      and with a sudden move she pulled up the gauzy wrapping on her
      rounded arm, and pointed to a little scar that showed red against
      its milky beauty.

      I shrank back, horrified.

      “Pardon me, oh Queen,” I said, “but I am bewildered. Nigh upon
      two thousand years have rolled across the earth since the Jewish
      Messiah hung upon His cross at Golgotha. How then canst thou have
      taught thy philosophy to the Jews before He was? Thou art a woman
      and no spirit. How can a woman live two thousand years? Why dost
      thou befool me, oh Queen?”

      She leaned back upon the couch, and once more I felt the hidden
      eyes playing upon me and searching out my heart.

      “Oh man!” she said at last, speaking very slowly and
      deliberately, “it seems that there are still things upon the
      earth of which thou knowest naught. Dost thou still believe that
      all things die, even as those very Jews believed? I tell thee
      that naught dies. There is no such thing as Death, though there
      be a thing called Change. See,” and she pointed to some
      sculptures on the rocky wall. “Three times two thousand years
      have passed since the last of the great race that hewed those
      pictures fell before the breath of the pestilence which destroyed
      them, yet are they not dead. E’en now they live; perchance their
      spirits are drawn towards us at this very hour,” and she glanced
      round. “Of a surety it sometimes seems to me that my eyes can see
      them.”

      “Yes, but to the world they are dead.”

“Ay, for a time; but even to the world are they born again and again.
I, yes I, Ayesha[2]—for that, stranger, is my name—I say to thee that I
wait now for one I loved to be born again, and here I tarry till he
finds me, knowing of a surety that hither he will come, and that here,
and here only, shall he greet me. Why, dost thou believe that I, who am
all-powerful, I, whose loveliness is more than the loveliness of the
Grecian Helen, of whom they used to sing, and whose wisdom is wider,
ay, far more wide and deep than the wisdom of Solomon the Wise—I, who
know the secrets of the earth and its riches, and can turn all things
to my uses—I, who have even for a while overcome Change, that ye call
Death—why, I say, oh stranger, dost thou think that I herd here with
barbarians lower than the beasts?”

 [2] Pronounced Assha.—L. H. H.

      “I know not,” I said humbly.

      “Because I wait for him I love. My life has perchance been evil,
      I know not—for who can say what is evil and what good?—so I fear
      to die even if I could die, which I cannot until mine hour comes,
      to go and seek him where he is; for between us there might rise a
      wall I could not climb, at least, I dread it. Surely easy would
      it be also to lose the way in seeking in those great spaces
      wherein the planets wander on for ever. But the day will come, it
      may be when five thousand more years have passed, and are lost
      and melted into the vault of Time, even as the little clouds melt
      into the gloom of night, or it may be to-morrow, when he, my
      love, shall be born again, and then, following a law that is
      stronger than any human plan, he shall find me _here_, where once
      he knew me, and of a surety his heart will soften towards me,
      though I sinned against him; ay, even though he knew me not
      again, yet will he love me, if only for my beauty’s sake.”

      For a moment I was dumbfounded, and could not answer. The matter
      was too overpowering for my intellect to grasp.

      “But even so, oh Queen,” I said at last, “even if we men be born
      again and again, that is not so with thee, if thou speakest
      truly.” Here she looked up sharply, and once more I caught the
      flash of those hidden eyes; “thou,” I went on hurriedly, “who
      hast never died?”

      “That is so,” she said; “and it is so because I have, half by
      chance and half by learning, solved one of the great secrets of
      the world. Tell me, stranger: life is—why therefore should not
      life be lengthened for a while? What are ten or twenty or fifty
      thousand years in the history of life? Why in ten thousand years
      scarce will the rain and storms lessen a mountain top by a span
      in thickness? In two thousand years these caves have not changed,
      nothing has changed but the beasts, and man, who is as the
      beasts. There is naught that is wonderful about the matter,
      couldst thou but understand. Life is wonderful, ay, but that it
      should be a little lengthened is not wonderful. Nature hath her
      animating spirit as well as man, who is Nature’s child, and he
      who can find that spirit, and let it breathe upon him, shall live
      with her life. He shall not live eternally, for Nature is not
      eternal, and she herself must die, even as the nature of the moon
      hath died. She herself must die, I say, or rather change and
      sleep till it be time for her to live again. But when shall she
      die? Not yet, I ween, and while she lives, so shall he who hath
      all her secret live with her. All I have it not, yet have I some,
      more perchance than any who were before me. Now, to thee I doubt
      not that this thing is a great mystery, therefore I will not
      overcome thee with it now. Another time I will tell thee more if
      the mood be on me, though perchance I shall never speak thereof
      again. Dost thou wonder how I knew that ye were coming to this
      land, and so saved your heads from the hot-pot?”

      “Ay, oh Queen,” I answered feebly.

      “Then gaze upon that water,” and she pointed to the font-like
      vessel, and then, bending forward, held her hand over it.

      I rose and gazed, and instantly the water darkened. Then it
      cleared, and I saw as distinctly as I ever saw anything in my
      life—I saw, I say, our boat upon that horrible canal. There was
      Leo lying at the bottom asleep in it, with a coat thrown over him
      to keep off the mosquitoes, in such a fashion as to hide his
      face, and myself, Job, and Mahomed towing on the bank.

      I started back, aghast, and cried out that it was magic, for I
      recognised the whole scene—it was one which had actually
      occurred.

      “Nay, nay; oh Holly,” she answered, “it is no magic, that is a
      fiction of ignorance. There is no such thing as magic, though
      there is such a thing as a knowledge of the secrets of Nature.
      That water is my glass; in it I see what passes if I will to
      summon up the pictures, which is not often. Therein I can show
      thee what thou wilt of the past, if it be anything that hath to
      do with this country and with what I have known, or anything that
      thou, the gazer, hast known. Think of a face if thou wilt, and it
      shall be reflected from thy mind upon the water. I know not all
      the secret yet—I can read nothing in the future. But it is an old
      secret; I did not find it. In Arabia and in Egypt the sorcerers
      knew it centuries gone. So one day I chanced to bethink me of
      that old canal—some twenty ages since I sailed upon it, and I was
      minded to look thereon again. So I looked, and there I saw the
      boat and three men walking, and one, whose face I could not see,
      but a youth of noble form, sleeping in the boat, and so I sent
      and saved ye. And now farewell. But stay, tell me of this
      youth—the Lion, as the old man calls him. I would look upon him,
      but he is sick, thou sayest—sick with the fever, and also wounded
      in the fray.”

      “He is very sick,” I answered sadly; “canst thou do nothing for
      him, oh Queen! who knowest so much?”

      “Of a surety I can. I can cure him; but why speakest thou so
      sadly? Dost thou love the youth? Is he perchance thy son?”

      “He is my adopted son, oh Queen! Shall he be brought in before
      thee?”

      “Nay. How long hath the fever taken him?”

      “This is the third day.”

      “Good; then let him lie another day. Then will he perchance throw
      it off by his own strength, and that is better than that I should
      cure him, for my medicine is of a sort to shake the life in its
      very citadel. If, however, by to-morrow night, at that hour when
      the fever first took him, he doth not begin to mend, then will I
      come to him and cure him. Stay, who nurses him?”

      “Our white servant, him whom Billali names the Pig; also,” and
      here I spoke with some little hesitation, “a woman named Ustane,
      a very handsome woman of this country, who came and embraced him
      when she first saw him, and hath stayed by him ever since, as I
      understand is the fashion of thy people, oh Queen.”

      “My people! speak not to me of my people,” she answered hastily;
      “these slaves are no people of mine, they are but dogs to do my
      bidding till the day of my deliverance comes; and, as for their
      customs, naught have I to do with them. Also, call me not Queen—I
      am weary of flattery and titles—call me Ayesha, the name hath a
      sweet sound in mine ears, it is an echo from the past. As for
      this Ustane, I know not. I wonder if it be she against whom I was
      warned, and whom I in turn did warn? Hath she—stay, I will see;”
      and, bending forward, she passed her hand over the font of water
      and gazed intently into it. “See,” she said quietly, “is that the
      woman?”

      I looked into the water, and there, mirrored upon its placid
      surface, was the silhouette of Ustane’s stately face. She was
      bending forward, with a look of infinite tenderness upon her
      features, watching something beneath her, and with her chestnut
      locks falling on to her right shoulder.

      “It is she,” I said, in a low voice, for once more I felt much
      disturbed at this most uncommon sight. “She watches Leo asleep.”

      “Leo!” said Ayesha, in an absent voice; “why, that is ‘lion’ in
      the Latin tongue. The old man hath named happily for once. It is
      very strange,” she went on, speaking to herself, “very. So
      like—but it is not possible!” With an impatient gesture she
      passed her hand over the water once more. It darkened, and the
      image vanished silently and mysteriously as it had risen, and
      once more the lamplight, and the lamplight only, shone on the
      placid surface of that limpid, living mirror.

      “Hast thou aught to ask me before thou goest, oh Holly?” she
      said, after a few moments’ reflection. “It is but a rude life
      that thou must live here, for these people are savages, and know
      not the ways of cultivated man. Not that I am troubled thereby,
      for behold my food,” and she pointed to the fruit upon the little
      table. “Naught but fruit doth ever pass my lips—fruit and cakes
      of flour, and a little water. I have bidden my girls to wait upon
      thee. They are mutes, thou knowest, deaf are they and dumb, and
      therefore the safest of servants, save to those who can read
      their faces and their signs. I bred them so—it hath taken many
      centuries and much trouble; but at last I have triumphed. Once I
      succeeded before, but the race was too ugly, so I let it die
      away; but now, as thou seest, they are otherwise. Once, too, I
      reared a race of giants, but after a while Nature would no more
      of it, and it died away. Hast thou aught to ask of me?”

      “Ay, one thing, oh Ayesha,” I said boldly; but feeling by no
      means as bold as I trust I looked. “I would gaze upon thy face.”

      She laughed out in her bell-like notes. “Bethink thee, Holly,”
      she answered; “bethink thee. It seems that thou knowest the old
      myths of the gods of Greece. Was there not one Actæon who
      perished miserably because he looked on too much beauty? If I
      show thee my face, perchance thou wouldst perish miserably also;
      perchance thou wouldst eat out thy heart in impotent desire; for
      know I am not for thee—I am for no man, save one, who hath been,
      but is not yet.”

      “As thou wilt, Ayesha,” I said. “I fear not thy beauty. I have
      put my heart away from such vanity as woman’s loveliness, that
      passeth like a flower.”

      “Nay, thou errest,” she said; “that does _not_ pass. My beauty
      endures even as I endure; still, if thou wilt, oh rash man, have
      thy will; but blame not me if passion mount thy reason, as the
      Egyptian breakers used to mount a colt, and guide it whither thou
      wilt not. Never may the man to whom my beauty has been unveiled
      put it from his mind, and therefore even with these savages do I
      go veiled, lest they vex me, and I should slay them. Say, wilt
      thou see?”

      “I will,” I answered, my curiosity overpowering me.

      She lifted her white and rounded arms—never had I seen such arms
      before—and slowly, very slowly, withdrew some fastening beneath
      her hair. Then all of a sudden the long, corpse-like wrappings
      fell from her to the ground, and my eyes travelled up her form,
      now only robed in a garb of clinging white that did but serve to
      show its perfect and imperial shape, instinct with a life that
      was more than life, and with a certain serpent-like grace that
      was more than human. On her little feet were sandals, fastened
      with studs of gold. Then came ankles more perfect than ever
      sculptor dreamed of. About the waist her white kirtle was
      fastened by a double-headed snake of solid gold, above which her
      gracious form swelled up in lines as pure as they were lovely,
      till the kirtle ended on the snowy argent of her breast, whereon
      her arms were folded. I gazed above them at her face, and—I do
      not exaggerate—shrank back blinded and amazed. I have heard of
      the beauty of celestial beings, now I saw it; only this beauty,
      with all its awful loveliness and purity, was _evil_—at least, at
      the time, it struck me as evil. How am I to describe it? I
      cannot—simply I cannot! The man does not live whose pen could
      convey a sense of what I saw. I might talk of the great changing
      eyes of deepest, softest black, of the tinted face, of the broad
      and noble brow, on which the hair grew low, and delicate,
      straight features. But, beautiful, surpassingly beautiful as they
      all were, her loveliness did not lie in them. It lay rather, if
      it can be said to have had any fixed abiding place, in a visible
      majesty, in an imperial grace, in a godlike stamp of softened
      power, which shone upon that radiant countenance like a living
      halo. Never before had I guessed what beauty made sublime could
      be—and yet, the sublimity was a dark one—the glory was not all of
      heaven—though none the less was it glorious. Though the face
      before me was that of a young woman of certainly not more than
      thirty years, in perfect health, and the first flush of ripened
      beauty, yet it had stamped upon it a look of unutterable
      experience, and of deep acquaintance with grief and passion. Not
      even the lovely smile that crept about the dimples of her mouth
      could hide this shadow of sin and sorrow. It shone even in the
      light of the glorious eyes, it was present in the air of majesty,
      and it seemed to say: “Behold me, lovely as no woman was or is,
      undying and half-divine; memory haunts me from age to age, and
      passion leads me by the hand—evil have I done, and from age to
      age evil I shall do, and sorrow shall I know till my redemption
      comes.”

      Drawn by some magnetic force which I could not resist, I let my
      eyes rest upon her shining orbs, and felt a current pass from
      them to me that bewildered and half-blinded me.

      She laughed—ah, how musically! and nodded her little head at me
      with an air of sublimated coquetry that would have done credit to
      a Venus Victrix.

      “Rash man!” she said; “like Actæon, thou hast had thy will; be
      careful lest, like Actæon, thou too dost perish miserably, torn
      to pieces by the ban-hounds of thine own passions. I too, oh
      Holly, am a virgin goddess, not to be moved of any man, save one,
      and it is not thou. Say, hast thou seen enough!”

      “I have looked on beauty, and I am blinded,” I said hoarsely,
      lifting my hand to cover up my eyes.

      “So! what did I tell thee? Beauty is like the lightning; it is
      lovely, but it destroys—especially trees, oh Holly!” and again
      she nodded and laughed.

      Suddenly she paused, and through my fingers I saw an awful change
      come over her countenance. Her great eyes suddenly fixed
      themselves into an expression in which horror seemed to struggle
      with some tremendous hope arising through the depths of her dark
      soul. The lovely face grew rigid, and the gracious willowy form
      seemed to erect itself.

      “Man,” she half whispered, half hissed, throwing back her head
      like a snake about to strike—“Man, whence hadst thou that scarab
      on thy hand? Speak, or by the Spirit of Life I will blast thee
      where thou standest!” and she took one light step towards me, and
      from her eyes there shone such an awful light—to me it seemed
      almost like a flame—that I fell, then and there, on the ground
      before her, babbling confusedly in my terror.

      “Peace,” she said, with a sudden change of manner, and speaking
      in her former soft voice. “I did affright thee! Forgive me! But
      at times, oh Holly, the almost infinite mind grows impatient of
      the slowness of the very finite, and am I tempted to use my power
      out of vexation—very nearly wast thou dead, but I remembered——.
      But the scarab—about the scarabæus!”

      “I picked it up,” I gurgled feebly, as I got on to my feet again,
      and it is a solemn fact that my mind was so disturbed that at the
      moment I could remember nothing else about the ring except that I
      had picked it up in Leo’s cave.

      “It is very strange,” she said with a sudden access of womanlike
      trembling and agitation which seemed out of place in this awful
      woman—“but once I knew a scarab like to that. It—hung round the
      neck—of one I loved,” and she gave a little sob, and I saw that
      after all she was only a woman, although she might be a very old
      one.

“There,” she went on, “it must be one like to it, and yet never did I
see one like to it, for thereto hung a history, and he who wore it
prized it much.[3] But the scarab that I knew was not set thus in the
bezel of a ring. Go now, Holly, go, and, if thou canst, try to forget
that thou hast of thy folly looked upon Ayesha’s beauty,” and, turning
from me, she flung herself on her couch, and buried her face in the
cushions.

 [3] I am informed by a renowned and learned Egyptologist, to whom I
 have submitted this very interesting and beautifully finished scarab,
 “Suten se Ra,” that he has never seen one resembling it. Although it
 bears a title frequently given to Egyptian royalty, he is of opinion
 that it is not necessarily the cartouche of a Pharaoh, on which either
 the throne or personal name of the monarch is generally inscribed.
 What the history of this particular scarab may have been we can now,
 unfortunately, never know, but I have little doubt but that it played
 some part in the tragic story of the Princess Amenartas and her lover
 Kallikrates, the forsworn priest of Isis.—Editor.

      As for me, I stumbled from her presence, and I do not remember
      how I reached my own cave.




XIV.
A SOUL IN HELL


      It was nearly ten o’clock at night when I cast myself down upon
      my bed, and began to gather my scattered wits, and reflect upon
      what I had seen and heard. But the more I reflected the less I
      could make of it. Was I mad, or drunk, or dreaming, or was I
      merely the victim of a gigantic and most elaborate hoax? How was
      it possible that I, a rational man, not unacquainted with the
      leading scientific facts of our history, and hitherto an absolute
      and utter disbeliever in all the hocus-pocus which in Europe goes
      by the name of the supernatural, could believe that I had within
      the last few minutes been engaged in conversation with a woman
      two thousand and odd years old? The thing was contrary to the
      experience of human nature, and absolutely and utterly
      impossible. It must be a hoax, and yet, if it were a hoax, what
      was I to make of it? What, too, was to be said of the figures on
      the water, of the woman’s extraordinary acquaintance with the
      remote past, and her ignorance, or apparent ignorance, of any
      subsequent history? What, too, of her wonderful and awful
      loveliness? This, at any rate, was a patent fact, and beyond the
      experience of the world. No merely mortal woman could shine with
      such a supernatural radiance. About that she had, at any rate,
      been in the right—it was not safe for any man to look upon such
      beauty. I was a hardened vessel in such matters, having, with the
      exception of one painful experience of my green and tender youth,
      put the softer sex (I sometimes think that this is a misnomer)
      almost entirely out of my thoughts. But now, to my intense
      horror, I _knew_ that I could never put away the vision of those
      glorious eyes; and alas! the very _diablerie_ of the woman,
      whilst it horrified and repelled, attracted in even a greater
      degree. A person with the experience of two thousand years at her
      back, with the command of such tremendous powers, and the
      knowledge of a mystery that could hold off death, was certainly
      worth falling in love with, if ever woman was. But, alas! it was
      not a question of whether or no she was worth it, for so far as I
      could judge, not being versed in such matters, I, a fellow of my
      college, noted for what my acquaintances are pleased to call my
      misogyny, and a respectable man now well on in middle life, had
      fallen absolutely and hopelessly in love with this white
      sorceress. Nonsense; it must be nonsense! She had warned me
      fairly, and I had refused to take the warning. Curses on the
      fatal curiosity that is ever prompting man to draw the veil from
      woman, and curses on the natural impulse that begets it! It is
      the cause of half—ay, and more than half—of our misfortunes. Why
      cannot man be content to live alone and be happy, and let the
      women live alone and be happy too? But perhaps they would not be
      happy, and I am not sure that we should either. Here is a nice
      state of affairs. I, at my age, to fall a victim to this modern
      Circe! But then she was not modern, at least she said not. She
      was almost as ancient as the original Circe.

      I tore my hair, and jumped up from my couch, feeling that if I
      did not do something I should go off my head. What did she mean
      about the scarabæus too? It was Leo’s scarabæus, and had come out
      of the old coffer that Vincey had left in my rooms nearly
      one-and-twenty years before. Could it be, after all, that the
      whole story was true, and the writing on the sherd was _not_ a
      forgery, or the invention of some crack-brained, long-forgotten
      individual? And if so, could it be that _Leo_ was the man that
      _She_ was waiting for—the dead man who was to be born again!
      Impossible! The whole thing was gibberish! Who ever heard of a
      man being born again?

      But if it were possible that a woman could exist for two thousand
      years, this might be possible also—anything might be possible. I
      myself might, for aught I knew, be a reincarnation of some other
      forgotten self, or perhaps the last of a long line of ancestral
      selves. Well, _vive la guerre!_ why not? Only, unfortunately, I
      had no recollection of these previous conditions. The idea was so
      absurd to me that I burst out laughing, and, addressing the
      sculptured picture of a grim-looking warrior on the cave wall,
      called out to him aloud, “Who knows, old fellow?—perhaps I was
      your contemporary. By Jove! perhaps I was you and you are I,” and
      then I laughed again at my own folly, and the sound of my
      laughter rang dismally along the vaulted roof, as though the
      ghost of the warrior had echoed the ghost of a laugh.

      Next I bethought me that I had not been to see how Leo was, so,
      taking up one of the lamps which was burning at my bedside, I
      slipped off my shoes and crept down the passage to the entrance
      of his sleeping cave. The draught of the night air was lifting
      his curtain to and fro gently, as though spirit hands were
      drawing and redrawing it. I slid into the vault-like apartment,
      and looked round. There was a light by which I could see that Leo
      was lying on the couch, tossing restlessly in his fever, but
      asleep. At his side, half-lying on the floor, half-leaning
      against the stone couch, was Ustane. She held his hand in one of
      hers, but she too was dozing, and the two made a pretty, or
      rather a pathetic, picture. Poor Leo! his cheek was burning red,
      there were dark shadows beneath his eyes, and his breath came
      heavily. He was very, very ill; and again the horrible fear
      seized me that he might die, and I be left alone in the world.
      And yet if he lived he would perhaps be my rival with Ayesha;
      even if he were not the man, what chance should I, middle-aged
      and hideous, have against his bright youth and beauty? Well,
      thank Heaven! my sense of right was not dead. _She_ had not
      killed that yet; and, as I stood there, I prayed to Heaven in my
      heart that my boy, my more than son, might live—ay, even if he
      proved to be the man.

      Then I went back as softly as I had come, but still I could not
      sleep; the sight and thought of dear Leo lying there so ill had
      but added fuel to the fire of my unrest. My wearied body and
      overstrained mind awakened all my imagination into preternatural
      activity. Ideas, visions, almost inspirations, floated before it
      with startling vividness. Most of them were grotesque enough,
      some were ghastly, some recalled thoughts and sensations that had
      for years been buried in the _débris_ of my past life. But,
      behind and above them all, hovered the shape of that awful woman,
      and through them gleamed the memory of her entrancing loveliness.
      Up and down the cave I strode—up and down.

      Suddenly I observed, what I had not noticed before, that there
      was a narrow aperture in the rocky wall. I took up the lamp and
      examined it; the aperture led to a passage. Now, I was still
      sufficiently sensible to remember that it is not pleasant, in
      such a situation as ours was, to have passages running into one’s
      bed-chamber from no one knows where. If there are passages,
      people can come up them; they can come up when one is asleep.
      Partly to see where it went to, and partly from a restless desire
      to be doing something, I followed the passage. It led to a stone
      stair, which I descended; the stair ended in another passage, or
      rather tunnel, also hewn out of the bed-rock, and running, so far
      as I could judge, exactly beneath the gallery that led to the
      entrance of our rooms, and across the great central cave. I went
      on down it: it was as silent as the grave, but still, drawn by
      some sensation or attraction that I cannot define, I followed on,
      my stockinged feet falling without noise on the smooth and rocky
      floor. When I had traversed some fifty yards of space, I came to
      another passage running at right angles, and here an awful thing
      happened to me: the sharp draught caught my lamp and extinguished
      it, leaving me in utter darkness in the bowels of that mysterious
      place. I took a couple of strides forward so as to clear the
      bisecting tunnel, being terribly afraid lest I should turn up it
      in the dark if once I got confused as to the direction, and then
      paused to think. What was I to do? I had no match; it seemed
      awful to attempt that long journey back through the utter gloom,
      and yet I could not stand there all night, and, if I did,
      probably it would not help me much, for in the bowels of the rock
      it would be as dark at midday as at midnight. I looked back over
      my shoulder—not a sight or a sound. I peered forward into the
      darkness: surely, far away, I saw something like the faint glow
      of fire. Perhaps it was a cave where I could get a light—at any
      rate, it was worth investigating. Slowly and painfully I crept
      along the tunnel, keeping my hand against its wall, and feeling
      at every step with my foot before I put it down, fearing lest I
      should fall into some pit. Thirty paces—there was a light, a
      broad light that came and went, shining through curtains! Fifty
      paces—it was close at hand! Sixty—oh, great heaven!

      I was at the curtains, and they did not hang close, so I could
      see clearly into the little cavern beyond them. It had all the
      appearance of being a tomb, and was lit up by a fire that burnt
      in its centre with a whitish flame and without smoke. Indeed,
      there, to the left, was a stone shelf with a little ledge to it
      three inches or so high, and on the shelf lay what I took to be a
      corpse; at any rate, it looked like one, with something white
      thrown over it. To the right was a similar shelf, on which lay
      some broidered coverings. Over the fire bent the figure of a
      woman; she was sideways to me and facing the corpse, wrapped in a
      dark mantle that hid her like a nun’s cloak. She seemed to be
      staring at the flickering flame. Suddenly, as I was trying to
      make up my mind what to do, with a convulsive movement that
      somehow gave an impression of despairing energy, the woman rose
      to her feet and cast the dark cloak from her.

      It was _She_ herself!

      She was clothed, as I had seen her when she unveiled, in the
      kirtle of clinging white, cut low upon her bosom, and bound in at
      the waist with the barbaric double-headed snake, and, as before,
      her rippling black hair fell in heavy masses down her back. But
      her face was what caught my eye, and held me as in a vice, not
      this time by the force of its beauty, but by the power of
      fascinated terror. The beauty was still there, indeed, but the
      agony, the blind passion, and the awful vindictiveness displayed
      upon those quivering features, and in the tortured look of the
      upturned eyes, were such as surpass my powers of description.

      For a moment she stood still, her hands raised high above her
      head, and as she did so the white robe slipped from her down to
      her golden girdle, baring the blinding loveliness of her form.
      She stood there, her fingers clenched, and the awful look of
      malevolence gathered and deepened on her face.

      Suddenly I thought of what would happen if she discovered me, and
      the reflection made me turn sick and faint. But, even if I had
      known that I must die if I stopped, I do not believe that I could
      have moved, for I was absolutely fascinated. But still I knew my
      danger. Supposing she should hear me, or see me through the
      curtain, supposing I even sneezed, or that her magic told her
      that she was being watched—swift indeed would be my doom.

      Down came the clenched hands to her sides, then up again above
      her head, and, as I am a living and honourable man, the white
      flame of the fire leapt up after them, almost to the roof,
      throwing a fierce and ghastly glare upon _She_ herself, upon the
      white figure beneath the covering, and every scroll and detail of
      the rockwork.

      Down came the ivory arms again, and as they did so she spoke, or
      rather hissed, in Arabic, in a note that curdled my blood, and
      for a second stopped my heart.

      “Curse her, may she be everlastingly accursed.”

      The arms fell and the flame sank. Up they went again, and the
      broad tongue of fire shot up after them; and then again they
      fell.

      “Curse her memory—accursed be the memory of the Egyptian.”

      Up again, and again down.

      “Curse her, the daughter of the Nile, because of her beauty.

      “Curse her, because her magic hath prevailed against me.

      “Curse her, because she held my beloved from me.”

      And again the flame dwindled and shrank.

      She put her hands before her eyes, and abandoning the hissing
      tone, cried aloud:—

      “What is the use of cursing?—she prevailed, and she is gone.”

      Then she recommenced with an even more frightful energy:—

      “Curse her where she is. Let my curses reach her where she is and
      disturb her rest.

      “Curse her through the starry spaces. Let her shadow be accursed.

      “Let my power find her even there.

      “Let her hear me even there. Let her hide herself in the
      blackness.

      “Let her go down into the pit of despair, because I shall one day
      find her.”

      Again the flame fell, and again she covered her eyes with her
      hands.

      “It is of no use—no use,” she wailed; “who can reach those who
      sleep? Not even I can reach them.”

      Then once more she began her unholy rites.

      “Curse her when she shall be born again. Let her be born
      accursed.

      “Let her be utterly accursed from the hour of her birth until
      sleep finds her.

      “Yea, then, let her be accursed; for then shall I overtake her
      with my vengeance, and utterly destroy her.”

      And so on. The flame rose and fell, reflecting itself in her
      agonised eyes; the hissing sound of her terrible maledictions,
      and no words of mine can convey how terrible they were, ran round
      the walls and died away in little echoes, and the fierce light
      and deep gloom alternated themselves on the white and dreadful
      form stretched upon that bier of stone.

      But at length she seemed to wear herself out and cease. She sat
      herself down upon the rocky floor, shook the dense cloud of her
      beautiful hair over her face and breast, and began to sob
      terribly in the torture of a heartrending despair.

      “Two thousand years,” she moaned—“two thousand years have I
      wanted and endured; but though century doth still creep on to
      century, and time give place to time, the sting of memory hath
      not lessened, the light of hope doth not shine more bright. Oh!
      to have lived two thousand years, with all my passion eating out
      my heart, and with my sin ever before me. Oh, that for me life
      cannot bring forgetfulness! Oh, for the weary years that have
      been and are yet to come, and evermore to come, endless and
      without end!

      “My love! my love! my love! Why did that stranger bring thee back
      to me after this sort? For five hundred years I have not suffered
      thus. Oh, if I sinned against thee, have I not wiped away the
      sin? When wilt thou come back to me who have all, and yet without
      thee have naught? What is there that I can do? What? What? What?
      And perchance she—perchance that Egyptian doth abide with thee
      where thou art, and mock my memory. Oh, why could I not die with
      thee, I who slew thee? Alas, that I cannot die! Alas! Alas!” and
      she flung herself prone upon the ground, and sobbed and wept till
      I thought her heart must burst.

      Suddenly she ceased, raised herself to her feet, rearranged her
      robe, and, tossing back her long locks impatiently, swept across
      to where the figure lay upon the stone.

      “Oh Kallikrates,” she cried, and I trembled at the name, “I must
      look upon thy face again, though it be agony. It is a generation
      since I looked upon thee whom I slew—slew with mine own hand,”
      and with trembling fingers she seized the corner of the
      sheet-like wrapping that covered the form upon the stone bier,
      and then paused. When she spoke again, it was in a kind of awed
      whisper, as though her idea were terrible even to herself.

      “Shall I raise thee,” she said, apparently addressing the corpse,
      “so that thou standest there before me, as of old? I _can_ do
      it,” and she held out her hands over the sheeted dead, while her
      whole frame became rigid and terrible to see, and her eyes grew
      fixed and dull. I shrank in horror behind the curtain, my hair
      stood up upon my head, and, whether it was my imagination or a
      fact I am unable to say, but I thought that the quiet form
      beneath the covering began to quiver, and the winding sheet to
      lift as though it lay on the breast of one who slept. Suddenly
      she withdrew her hands, and the motion of the corpse seemed to me
      to cease.

      “To what purpose?” she said gloomily. “Of what good is it to
      recall the semblance of life when I cannot recall the spirit?
      Even if thou stoodest before me thou wouldst not know me, and
      couldst but do what I bid thee. The life in thee would be _my_
      life, and not _thy_ life, Kallikrates.”

      For a moment she stood there brooding, and then cast herself down
      on her knees beside the form, and began to press her lips against
      the sheet, and weep. There was something so horrible about the
      sight of this awe-inspiring woman letting loose her passion on
      the dead—so much more horrible even than anything that had gone
      before—that I could no longer bear to look at it, and, turning,
      began to creep, shaking as I was in every limb, slowly along the
      pitch-dark passage, feeling in my trembling heart that I had seen
      a vision of a Soul in Hell.

      On I stumbled, I scarcely know how. Twice I fell, once I turned
      up the bisecting passage, but fortunately found out my mistake in
      time. For twenty minutes or more I crept along, till at last it
      occurred to me that I must have passed the little stair by which
      I had descended. So, utterly exhausted, and nearly frightened to
      death, I sank down at length there on the stone flooring, and
      sank into oblivion.

      When I came to I noticed a faint ray of light in the passage just
      behind me. I crept to it, and found it was the little stair down
      which the weak dawn was stealing. Passing up it, I gained my
      chamber in safety, and, flinging myself on the couch, was soon
      lost in slumber or rather stupor.




XV.
AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT


      The next thing that I remember was opening my eyes and perceiving
      the form of Job, who had now practically recovered from his
      attack of fever. He was standing in the ray of light that pierced
      into the cave from the outer air, shaking out my clothes as a
      makeshift for brushing them, which he could not do because there
      was no brush, and then folding them up neatly and laying them on
      the foot of the stone couch. This done, he got my travelling
      dressing-case out of the Gladstone bag, and opened it ready for
      my use. First he stood it on the foot of the couch also, then,
      being afraid, I suppose, that I should kick it off, he placed it
      on a leopard skin on the floor, and stood back a step or two to
      observe the effect. It was not satisfactory, so he shut up the
      bag, turned it on end, and, having rested it against the foot of
      the couch, placed the dressing-case on it. Next he looked at the
      pots full of water, which constituted our washing apparatus.
      “Ah!” I heard him murmur, “no hot water in this beastly place. I
      suppose these poor creatures only use it to boil each other in,”
      and he sighed deeply.

      “What is the matter, Job?” I said.

      “Beg pardon, sir,” he said, touching his hair. “I thought you
      were asleep, sir; and I am sure you seem as though you want it.
      One might think from the look of you that you had been having a
      night of it.”

      I only groaned by way of answer. I had, indeed, been having a
      night of it, such as I hope never to have again.

      “How is Mr. Leo, Job?”

      “Much the same, sir. If he don’t soon mend, he’ll end, sir; and
      that’s all about it; though I must say that that there savage,
      Ustane, do do her best for him, almost like a baptised Christian.
      She is always hanging round and looking after him, and if I
      ventures to interfere it’s awful to see her; her hair seems to
      stand on end, and she curses and swears away in her heathen
      talk—at least I fancy she must be cursing, from the look of her.”

      “And what do you do then?”

      “I make her a perlite bow, and I say, ‘Young woman, your position
      is one that I don’t quite understand, and can’t recognise. Let me
      tell you that I has a duty to perform to my master as is
      incapacitated by illness, and that I am going to perform it until
      I am incapacitated too,’ but she don’t take no heed, not she—only
      curses and swears away worse than ever. Last night she put her
      hand under that sort of night-shirt she wears and whips out a
      knife with a kind of a curl in the blade, so I whips out my
      revolver, and we walks round and round each other till at last
      she bursts out laughing. It isn’t nice treatment for a Christian
      man to have to put up with from a savage, however handsome she
      may be, but it is what people must expect as is _fools_ enough”
      (Job laid great emphasis on the “fools”) “to come to such a place
      to look for things no man is meant to find. It’s a judgment on
      us, sir—that’s my view; and I, for one, is of opinion that the
      judgment isn’t half done yet, and when it is done we shall be
      done too, and just stop in these beastly caves with the ghosts
      and the corpseses for once and all. And now, sir, I must be
      seeing about Mr. Leo’s broth, if that wild cat will let me; and,
      perhaps, you would like to get up, sir, because it’s past nine
      o’clock.”

      Job’s remarks were not of an exactly cheering order to a man who
      had passed such a night as I had; and, what is more, they had the
      weight of truth. Taking one thing with another, it appeared to me
      to be an utter impossibility that we should escape from the place
      we were. Supposing that Leo recovered, and supposing that _She_
      would let us go, which was exceedingly doubtful, and that she did
      not “blast” us in some moment of vexation, and that we were not
      hot-potted by the Amahagger, it would be quite impossible for us
      to find our way across the network of marshes which, stretching
      for scores and scores of miles, formed a stronger and more
      impassable fortification round the various Amahagger households
      than any that could be built or designed by man. No, there was
      but one thing to do—face it out; and, speaking for my own part, I
      was so intensely interested in the whole weird story that, so far
      as I was concerned, notwithstanding the shattered state of my
      nerves, I asked nothing better, even if my life paid forfeit to
      my curiosity. What man for whom physiology has charms could
      forbear to study such a character as that of this Ayesha when the
      opportunity of doing so presented itself? The very terror of the
      pursuit added to its fascination, and besides, as I was forced to
      own to myself even now in the sober light of day, she herself had
      attractions that I could not forget. Not even the dreadful sight
      which I had witnessed during the night could drive that folly
      from my mind; and alas! that I should have to admit it, it has
      not been driven thence to this hour.

      After I had dressed myself I passed into the eating, or rather
      embalming chamber, and had some food, which was as before brought
      to me by the girl mutes. When I had finished I went and saw poor
      Leo, who was quite off his head, and did not even know me. I
      asked Ustane how she thought he was; but she only shook her head
      and began to cry a little. Evidently her hopes were small; and I
      then and there made up my mind that, if it were in any way
      possible, I would get _She_ to come and see him. Surely she would
      cure him if she chose—at any rate she said she could. While I was
      in the room, Billali entered, and also shook his head.

      “He will die at night,” he said.

      “God forbid, my father,” I answered, and turned away with a heavy
      heart.

      “_She-who-must-be-obeyed_ commands thy presence, my Baboon,” said
      the old man as soon as we got to the curtain; “but, oh my dear
      son, be more careful. Yesterday I made sure in my heart that
      _She_ would blast thee when thou didst not crawl upon thy stomach
      before her. She is sitting in the great hall even now to do
      justice upon those who would have smitten thee and the Lion. Come
      on, my son; come swiftly.”

      I turned, and followed him down the passage, and when we reached
      the great central cave saw that many Amahagger, some robed, and
      some merely clad in the sweet simplicity of a leopard skin, were
      hurrying along it. We mingled with the throng, and walked up the
      enormous and, indeed, almost interminable cave. All the way its
      walls were elaborately sculptured, and every twenty paces or so
      passages opened out of it at right angles, leading, Billali told
      me, to tombs, hollowed in the rock by “the people who were
      before.” Nobody visited those tombs now, he said; and I must say
      that my heart rejoiced when I thought of the opportunities of
      antiquarian research which opened out before me.

      At last we came to the head of the cave, where there was a rock
      daïs almost exactly similar to the one on which we had been so
      furiously attacked, a fact that proved to me that these daïs must
      have been used as altars, probably for the celebration of
      religious ceremonies, and more especially of rites connected with
      the interment of the dead. On either side of this daïs were
      passages leading, Billali informed me, to other caves full of
      dead bodies. “Indeed,” he added, “the whole mountain is full of
      dead, and nearly all of them are perfect.”

      In front of the daïs were gathered a great number of people of
      both sexes, who stood staring about in their peculiar gloomy
      fashion, which would have reduced Mark Tapley himself to misery
      in about five minutes. On the daïs was a rude chair of black wood
      inlaid with ivory, having a seat made of grass fibre, and a
      footstool formed of a wooden slab attached to the framework of
      the chair.

      Suddenly there was a cry of “Hiya! Hiya!” (“_She! She!_”), and
      thereupon the entire crowd of spectators instantly precipitated
      itself upon the ground, and lay still as though it were
      individually and collectively stricken dead, leaving me standing
      there like some solitary survivor of a massacre. As it did so a
      long string of guards began to defile from a passage to the left,
      and ranged themselves on either side of the daïs. Then followed
      about a score of male mutes, then as many women mutes bearing
      lamps, and then a tall white figure, swathed from head to foot,
      in whom I recognised _She_ herself. She mounted the daïs and sat
      down upon the chair, and spoke to me in _Greek_, I suppose
      because she did not wish those present to understand what she
      said.

      “Come hither, oh Holly,” she said, “and sit thou at my feet, and
      see me do justice on those who would have slain thee. Forgive me
      if my Greek doth halt like a lame man; it is so long since I have
      heard the sound of it that my tongue is stiff, and will not bend
      rightly to the words.”

      I bowed, and, mounting the daïs, sat down at her feet.

      “How hast thou slept, my Holly?” she asked.

      “I slept not well, oh Ayesha!” I answered with perfect truth, and
      with an inward fear that perhaps she knew how I had passed the
      heart of the night.

      “So,” she said, with a little laugh; “I, too, have not slept
      well. Last night I had dreams, and methinks that thou didst call
      them to me, oh Holly.”

      “Of what didst thou dream, Ayesha?” I asked indifferently.

      “I dreamed,” she answered quickly, “of one I hate and one I
      love,” and then, as though to turn the conversation, she
      addressed the captain of her guard in Arabic: “Let the men be
      brought before me.”

      The captain bowed low, for the guard and her attendants did not
      prostrate themselves, but had remained standing, and departed
      with his underlings down a passage to the right.

      Then came a silence. _She_ leaned her swathed head upon her hand
      and appeared to be lost in thought, while the multitude before
      her continued to grovel upon their stomachs, only screwing their
      heads round a little so as to get a view of us with one eye. It
      seemed that their Queen so rarely appeared in public that they
      were willing to undergo this inconvenience, and even graver
      risks, to have the opportunity of looking on her, or rather on
      her garments, for no living man there except myself had ever seen
      her face. At last we caught sight of the waving of lights, and
      heard the tramp of men coming along the passage, and in filed the
      guard, and with them the survivors of our would-be murderers, to
      the number of twenty or more, on whose countenances a natural
      expression of sullenness struggled with the terror that evidently
      filled their savage hearts. They were ranged in front of the
      daïs, and would have cast themselves down on the floor of the
      cave like the spectators, but _She_ stopped them.

      “Nay,” she said in her softest voice, “stand; I pray you stand.
      Perchance the time will soon be when ye shall grow weary of being
      stretched out,” and she laughed melodiously.

      I saw a cringe of terror run along the rank of the doomed
      wretches, and, wicked villains as they were, I felt sorry for
      them. Some minutes, perhaps two or three, passed before anything
      fresh occurred, during which _She_ appeared from the movement of
      her head—for, of course, we could not see her eyes—to be slowly
      and carefully examining each delinquent. At last she spoke,
      addressing herself to me in a quiet and deliberate tone.

      “Dost thou, oh my guest, recognise these men?”

      “Ay, oh Queen, nearly all of them,” I said, and I saw them glower
      at me as I said it.

      “Then tell to me, and this great company, the tale whereof I have
      heard.”

      Thus adjured, I, in as few words as I could, related the history
      of the cannibal feast, and of the attempted torture of our poor
      servant. The narrative was received in perfect silence, both by
      the accused and by the audience, and also by _She_ herself. When
      I had done, Ayesha called upon Billali by name, and, lifting his
      head from the ground, but without rising, the old man confirmed
      my story. No further evidence was taken.

      “Ye have heard,” said _She_ at length, in a cold, clear voice,
      very different from her usual tones—indeed, it was one of the
      most remarkable things about this extraordinary creature that her
      voice had the power of suiting itself in a wonderful manner to
      the mood of the moment. “What have ye to say, ye rebellious
      children, why vengeance should not be done upon you?”

      For some time there was no answer, but at last one of the men, a
      fine, broad-chested fellow, well on in middle-life, with
      deep-graven features and an eye like a hawk’s, spoke, and said
      that the orders that they had received were not to harm the white
      men; nothing was said of their black servant, so, egged on
      thereto by a woman who was now dead, they proceeded to try to
      hot-pot him after the ancient and honourable custom of their
      country, with a view of eating him in due course. As for their
      sudden attack upon ourselves, it was made in an access of sudden
      fury, and they deeply regretted it. He ended by humbly praying
      that they might be banished into the swamps, to live and die as
      it might chance; but I saw it written on his face that he had but
      little hope of mercy.

      Then came a pause, and the most intense silence reigned over the
      whole scene, which, illuminated as it was by the flicker of the
      lamps striking out broad patterns of light and shadow upon the
      rocky walls, was as strange as any I ever saw, even in that
      unholy land. Upon the ground before the daïs were stretched
      scores of the corpselike forms of the spectators, till at last
      the long lines of them were lost in the gloomy background. Before
      this outstretched audience were the knots of evil-doers, trying
      to cover up their natural terrors with a brave appearance of
      unconcern. On the right and left stood the silent guards, robed
      in white and armed with great spears and daggers, and men and
      women mutes watching with hard curious eyes. Then, seated in her
      barbaric chair above them all, with myself at her feet, was the
      veiled white woman, whose loveliness and awesome power seemed to
      visibly shine about her like a halo, or rather like the glow from
      some unseen light. Never have I seen her veiled shape look more
      terrible than it did in that space, while she gathered herself up
      for vengeance.

      At last it came.

“Dogs and serpents,” _She_ began in a low voice that gradually gathered
power as she went on, till the place rang with it. “Eaters of human
flesh, two things have ye done. First, ye have attacked these
strangers, being white men, and would have slain their servant, and for
that alone death is your reward. But that is not all. Ye have dared to
disobey me. Did I not send my word unto you by Billali, my servant, and
the father of your household? Did I not bid you to hospitably entertain
these strangers, whom now ye have striven to slay, and whom, had not
they been brave and strong beyond the strength of men, ye would cruelly
have murdered? Hath it not been taught to you from childhood that the
law of _She_ is an ever fixed law, and that he who breaketh it by so
much as one jot or tittle shall perish? And is not my lightest word a
law? Have not your fathers taught you this, I say, whilst as yet ye
were but children? Do ye not know that as well might ye bid these great
caves to fall upon you, or the sun to cease its journeying, as to hope
to turn me from my courses, or make my word light or heavy, according
to your minds? Well do ye know it, ye Wicked Ones. But ye are all
evil—evil to the core—the wickedness bubbles up in you like a fountain
in the spring-time. Were it not for me, generations since had ye ceased
to be, for of your own evil way had ye destroyed each other. And now,
because ye have done this thing, because ye have striven to put these
men, my guests, to death, and yet more because ye have dared to disobey
my word, this is the doom that I doom you to. That ye be taken to the
cave of torture,[1] and given over to the tormentors, and that on the
going down of to-morrow’s sun those of you who yet remain alive be
slain, even as ye would have slain the servant of this my guest.”

 [1] “The cave of torture.” I afterwards saw this dreadful place, also
 a legacy from the prehistoric people who lived in Kôr. The only
 objects in the cave itself were slabs of rock arranged in various
 positions to facilitate the operations of the torturers. Many of these
 slabs, which were of a porous stone, were stained quite dark with the
 blood of ancient victims that had soaked into them. Also in the centre
 of the room was a place for a furnace, with a cavity wherein to heat
 the historic pot. But the most dreadful thing about the cave was that
 over each slab was a sculptured illustration of the appropriate
 torture being applied. These sculptures were so awful that I will not
 harrow the reader by attempting a description of them.—L. H. H.

      She ceased, and a faint murmur of horror ran round the cave. As
      for the victims, as soon as they realised the full hideousness of
      their doom, their stoicism forsook them, and they flung
      themselves down upon the ground, and wept and implored for mercy
      in a way that was dreadful to behold. I, too, turned to Ayesha,
      and begged her to spare them, or at least to mete out their fate
      in some less awful way. But she was hard as adamant about it.

      “My Holly,” she said, again speaking in Greek, which, to tell the
      truth, although I have always been considered a better scholar of
      the language than most men, I found it rather difficult to
      follow, chiefly because of the change in the fall of the accent.
      Ayesha, of course, talked with the accent of her contemporaries,
      whereas we have only tradition and the modern accent to guide us
      as to the exact pronunciation. “My Holly, it cannot be. Were I to
      show mercy to those wolves, your lives would not be safe among
      this people for a day. Thou knowest them not. They are tigers to
      lap blood, and even now they hunger for your lives. How thinkest
      thou that I rule this people? I have but a regiment of guards to
      do my bidding, therefore it is not by force. It is by terror. My
      empire is of the imagination. Once in a generation mayhap I do as
      I have done but now, and slay a score by torture. Believe not
      that I would be cruel, or take vengeance on anything so low. What
      can it profit me to be avenged on such as these? Those who live
      long, my Holly, have no passions, save where they have interests.
      Though I may seem to slay in wrath, or because my mood is
      crossed, it is not so. Thou hast seen how in the heavens the
      little clouds blow this way and that without a cause, yet behind
      them is the great wind sweeping on its path whither it listeth.
      So it is with me, oh Holly. My moods and changes are the little
      clouds, and fitfully these seem to turn; but behind them ever
      blows the great wind of my purpose. Nay, the men must die; and
      die as I have said.” Then, suddenly turning to the captain of the
      guard:—

      “As my word is, so be it!”




XVI.
THE TOMBS OF KÔR


      After the prisoners had been removed Ayesha waved her hand, and
      the spectators turned round, and began to crawl off down the cave
      like a scattered flock of sheep. When they were a fair distance
      from the daïs, however, they rose and walked away, leaving the
      Queen and myself alone, with the exception of the mutes and the
      few remaining guards, most of whom had departed with the doomed
      men. Thinking this a good opportunity, I asked _She_ to come and
      see Leo, telling her of his serious condition; but she would not,
      saying that he certainly would not die before the night, as
      people never died of that sort of fever except at nightfall or
      dawn. Also she said that it would be better to let the sickness
      spend its course as much as possible before she cured it.
      Accordingly, I was rising to leave, when she bade me follow her,
      as she would talk with me, and show me the wonders of the caves.

      I was too much involved in the web of her fatal fascinations to
      say her no, even if I had wished, which I did not. She rose from
      her chair, and, making some signs to the mutes, descended from
      the daïs. Thereon four of the girls took lamps, and ranged
      themselves two in front and two behind us, but the others went
      away, as also did the guards.

      “Now,” she said, “wouldst thou see some of the wonders of this
      place, oh Holly? Look upon this great cave. Sawest thou ever the
      like? Yet was it, and many more like it, hollowed by the hands of
      the dead race that once lived here in the city on the plain. A
      great and wonderful people must they have been, those men of Kôr,
      but, like the Egyptians, they thought more of the dead than of
      the living. How many men, thinkest thou, working for how many
      years, did it need to the hollowing out this cave and all the
      galleries thereof?”

      “Tens of thousands,” I answered.

      “So, oh Holly. This people was an old people before the Egyptians
      were. A little can I read of their inscriptions, having found the
      key thereto—and see thou here, this was one of the last of the
      caves that they hollowed,” and, turning to the rock behind her,
      she motioned the mutes to hold up the lamps. Carven over the daïs
      was the figure of an old man seated in a chair, with an ivory rod
      in his hand. It struck me at once that his features were
      exceedingly like those of the man who was represented as being
      embalmed in the chamber where we took our meals. Beneath the
      chair, which, by the way, was shaped exactly like the one in
      which Ayesha had sat to give judgment, was a short inscription in
      the extraordinary characters of which I have already spoken, but
      which I do not remember sufficient of to illustrate. It looked
      more like Chinese writing than any other that I am acquainted
      with. This inscription Ayesha proceeded, with some difficulty and
      hesitation, to read aloud and translate. It ran as follows:—

“In the year four thousand two hundred and fifty-nine from the founding
of the City of imperial Kôr was this cave (or burial place) completed
by Tisno, King of Kôr, the people thereof and their slaves having
laboured thereat for three generations, to be a tomb for their citizens
of rank who shall come after. May the blessings of the heaven above the
heaven rest upon their work, and make the sleep of Tisno, the mighty
monarch, the likeness of whose features is graven above, a sound and
happy sleep till the day of awakening,[1] and also the sleep of his
servants, and of those of his race who, rising up after him, shall yet
lay their heads as low.”

 [1] This phrase is remarkable, as seeming to indicate a belief in a
 future state.—Editor.

      “Thou seest, oh Holly,” she said, “this people founded the city,
      of which the ruins yet cumber the plain yonder, four thousand
      years before this cave was finished. Yet, when first mine eyes
      beheld it two thousand years ago, was it even as it is now.
      Judge, therefore, how old must that city have been! And now,
      follow thou me, and I will show thee after what fashion this
      great people fell when the time was come for it to fall,” and she
      led the way down to the centre of the cave, stopping at a spot
      where a round rock had been let into a kind of large manhole in
      the flooring, accurately filling it just as the iron plates fill
      the spaces in the London pavements down which the coals are
      thrown. “Thou seest,” she said. “Tell me, what is it?”

      “Nay, I know not,” I answered; whereon she crossed to the
      left-hand side of the cave (looking towards the entrance) and
      signed to the mutes to hold up the lamps. On the wall was
      something painted with a red pigment in similar characters to
      those hewn beneath the sculpture of Tisno, King of Kôr. This
      inscription she proceeded to translate to me, the pigment still
      being fresh enough to show the form of the letters. It ran thus:

      “I, Junis, a priest of the Great Temple of Kôr, write this upon
      the rock of the burying-place in the year four thousand eight
      hundred and three from the founding of Kôr. Kôr is fallen! No
      more shall the mighty feast in her halls, no more shall she rule
      the world, and her navies go out to commerce with the world. Kôr
      is fallen! and her mighty works and all the cities of Kôr, and
      all the harbours that she built and the canals that she made, are
      for the wolf and the owl and the wild swan, and the barbarian who
      comes after. Twenty and five moons ago did a cloud settle upon
      Kôr, and the hundred cities of Kôr, and out of the cloud came a
      pestilence that slew her people, old and young, one with another,
      and spared not. One with another they turned black and died—the
      young and the old, the rich and the poor, the man and the woman,
      the prince and the slave. The pestilence slew and slew, and
      ceased not by day or by night, and those who escaped from the
      pestilence were slain of the famine. No longer could the bodies
      of the children of Kôr be preserved according to the ancient
      rites, because of the number of the dead, therefore were they
      hurled into the great pit beneath the cave, through the hole in
      the floor of the cave. Then, at last, a remnant of this the great
      people, the light of the whole world, went down to the coast and
      took ship and sailed northwards; and now am I, the Priest Junis,
      who write this, the last man left alive of this great city of
      men, but whether there be any yet left in the other cities I know
      not. This do I write in misery of heart before I die, because Kôr
      the Imperial is no more, and because there are none to worship in
      her temple, and all her palaces are empty, and her princes and
      her captains and her traders and her fair women have passed off
      the face of the earth.”

      I gave a sigh of astonishment—the utter desolation depicted in
      this rude scrawl was so overpowering. It was terrible to think of
      this solitary survivor of a mighty people recording its fate
      before he too went down into darkness. What must the old man have
      felt as, in ghastly terrifying solitude, by the light of one lamp
      feebly illuminating a little space of gloom, he in a few brief
      lines daubed the history of his nation’s death upon the cavern
      wall? What a subject for the moralist, or the painter, or indeed
      for any one who can think!

      “Doth it not occur to thee, oh Holly,” said Ayesha, laying her
      hand upon my shoulder, “that those men who sailed North may have
      been the fathers of the first Egyptians?”

      “Nay, I know not,” I said; “it seems that the world is very old.”

“Old? Yes, it is old indeed. Time after time have nations, ay, and rich
and strong nations, learned in the arts, been and passed away and been
forgotten, so that no memory of them remains. This is but one of
several; for Time eats up the works of man, unless, indeed, he digs in
caves like the people of Kôr, and then mayhap the sea swallows them, or
the earthquake shakes them in. Who knows what hath been on the earth,
or what shall be? There is no new thing under the sun, as the wise
Hebrew wrote long ago. Yet were not these people utterly destroyed, as
I think. Some few remained in the other cities, for their cities were
many. But the barbarians from the south, or perchance my people, the
Arabs, came down upon them, and took their women to wife, and the race
of the Amahagger that is now is a bastard brood of the mighty sons of
Kôr, and behold it dwelleth in the tombs with its fathers’ bones.[2]
But I know not: who can know? My arts cannot pierce so far into the
blackness of Time’s night. A great people were they. They conquered
till none were left to conquer, and then they dwelt at ease within
their rocky mountain walls, with their man servants and their maid
servants, their minstrels, their sculptors, and their concubines, and
traded and quarrelled, and ate and hunted and slept and made merry till
their time came. But come, I will show thee the great pit beneath the
cave whereof the writing speaks. Never shall thine eyes witness such
another sight.”

 [2] The name of the race Ama-hagger would seem to indicate a curious
 mingling of races such as might easily have occurred in the
 neighbourhood of the Zambesi. The prefix “Ama” is common to the Zulu
 and kindred races, and signifies “people,” while “hagger” is an Arabic
 word meaning a stone. —Editor.

      Accordingly I followed her to a side passage opening out of the
      main cave, then down a great number of steps, and along an
      underground shaft which cannot have been less than sixty feet
      beneath the surface of the rock, and was ventilated by curious
      borings that ran upward, I know not where. Suddenly the passage
      ended, and she halted and bade the mutes hold up the lamps, and,
      as she had prophesied, I saw a scene such as I was not likely to
      see again. We were standing in an enormous pit, or rather on the
      brink of it, for it went down deeper—I do not know how much—than
      the level on which we stood, and was edged in with a low wall of
      rock. So far as I could judge, this pit was about the size of the
      space beneath the dome of St. Paul’s in London, and when the
      lamps were held up I saw that it was nothing but one vast
      charnel-house, being literally full of thousands of human
      skeletons, which lay piled up in an enormous gleaming pyramid,
      formed by the slipping down of the bodies at the apex as fresh
      ones were dropped in from above. Anything more appalling than
      this jumbled mass of the remains of a departed race I cannot
      imagine, and what made it even more dreadful was that in this dry
      air a considerable number of the bodies had simply become
      desiccated with the skin still on them, and now, fixed in every
      conceivable position, stared at us out of the mountain of white
      bones, grotesquely horrible caricatures of humanity. In my
      astonishment I uttered an ejaculation, and the echoes of my
      voice, ringing in the vaulted space, disturbed a skull that had
      been accurately balanced for many thousands of years near the
      apex of the pile. Down it came with a run, bounding along merrily
      towards us, and of course bringing an avalanche of other bones
      after it, till at last the whole pit rattled with their movement,
      even as though the skeletons were getting up to greet us.

      “Come,” I said, “I have seen enough. These are the bodies of
      those who died of the great sickness, is it not so?” I added, as
      we turned away.

“Yea. The people of Kôr ever embalmed their dead, as did the Egyptians,
but their art was greater than the art of the Egyptians, for, whereas
the Egyptians disembowelled and drew the brain, the people of Kôr
injected fluid into the veins, and thus reached every part. But stay,
thou shalt see,” and she halted at haphazard at one of the little
doorways opening out of the passage along which we were walking, and
motioned to the mutes to light us in. We entered into a small chamber
similar to the one in which I had slept at our first stopping-place,
only instead of one there were two stone benches or beds in it. On the
benches lay figures covered with yellow linen,[3] on which a fine and
impalpable dust had gathered in the course of ages, but nothing like to
the extent that one would have anticipated, for in these deep-hewn
caves there is no material to turn to dust. About the bodies on the
stone shelves and floor of the tomb were many painted vases, but I saw
very few ornaments or weapons in any of the vaults.

 [3] All the linen that the Amahagger wore was taken from the tombs,
 which accounted for its yellow hue. It was well washed, however, and
 properly rebleached, it acquired its former snowy whiteness, and was
 the softest and best linen I ever saw.—L. H. H.

      “Uplift the cloths, oh Holly,” said Ayesha, but when I put out my
      hand to do so I drew it back again. It seemed like sacrilege,
      and, to speak the truth, I was awed by the dread solemnity of the
      place, and of the presences before us. Then, with a little laugh
      at my fears, she drew them herself, only to discover other and
      yet finer cloths lying over the forms upon the stone bench. These
      also she withdrew, and then for the first time for thousands upon
      thousands of years did living eyes look upon the face of that
      chilly dead. It was a woman; she might have been thirty-five
      years of age, or perhaps a little less, and had certainly been
      beautiful. Even now her calm clear-cut features, marked out with
      delicate eyebrows and long eyelashes which threw little lines of
      the shadow of the lamplight upon the ivory face, were wonderfully
      beautiful. There, robed in white, down which her blue-black hair
      was streaming, she slept her last long sleep, and on her arm, its
      face pressed against her breast, there lay a little babe. So
      sweet was the sight, although so awful, that—I confess it without
      shame—I could scarcely withhold my tears. It took me back across
      the dim gulf of ages to some happy home in dead Imperial Kôr,
      where this winsome lady girt about with beauty had lived and
      died, and dying taken her last-born with her to the tomb. There
      they were before us, mother and babe, the white memories of a
      forgotten human history speaking more eloquently to the heart
      than could any written record of their lives. Reverently I
      replaced the grave-cloths, and, with a sigh that flowers so fair
      should, in the purpose of the Everlasting, have only bloomed to
      be gathered to the grave, I turned to the body on the opposite
      shelf, and gently unveiled it. It was that of a man in advanced
      life, with a long grizzled beard, and also robed in white,
      probably the husband of the lady, who, after surviving her many
      years, came at the last to sleep once more for good and all
      beside her.

      We left the place and entered others. It would be too long to
      describe the many things I saw in them. Each one had its
      occupants, for the five hundred and odd years that had elapsed
      between the completion of the cave and the destruction of the
      race had evidently sufficed to fill these catacombs, numberless
      as they were, and all appeared to have been undisturbed since the
      day when they were placed there. I could fill a book with the
      description of them, but to do so would only be to repeat what I
      have said, with variations.

Nearly all the bodies, so masterfully was the art with which they had
been treated, were as perfect as on the day of death thousands of years
before. Nothing came to injure them in the deep silence of the living
rock: they were beyond the reach of heat and cold and damp, and the
aromatic drugs with which they had been saturated were evidently
practically everlasting in their effect. Here and there, however, we
saw an exception, and in these cases, although the flesh looked sound
enough externally, if one touched it it fell in, and revealed the fact
that the figure was but a pile of dust. This arose, Ayesha told me,
from these particular bodies having, either owing to haste in the
burial or other causes, been soaked in the preservative,[4] instead of
its being injected into the substance of the flesh.

 [4] Ayesha afterwards showed me the tree from the leaves of which this
 ancient preservative was manufactured. It is a low bush-like tree,
 that to this day grows in wonderful plenty upon the sides of the
 mountains, or rather upon the slopes leading up to the rocky walls.
 The leaves are long and narrow, a vivid green in colour, but turning a
 bright red in the autumn, and not unlike those of a laurel in general
 appearance. They have little smell when green, but if boiled the
 aromatic odour from them is so strong that one can hardly bear it. The
 best mixture, however, was made from the roots, and among the people
 of Kôr there was a law, which Ayesha showed me alluded to on some of
 the inscriptions, to the effect that on pain of heavy penalties no one
 under a certain rank was to be embalmed with the drugs prepared from
 the roots. The object and effect of this was, of course, to preserve
 the trees from extermination. The sale of the leaves and roots was a
 Government monopoly, and from it the Kings of Kôr derived a large
 proportion of their private revenue.—L. H. H.

      About the last tomb we visited I must, however, say one word, for
      its contents spoke even more eloquently to the human sympathies
      than those of the first. It had but two occupants, and they lay
      together on a single shelf. I withdrew the grave-cloths and
      there, clasped heart to heart, were a young man and a blooming
      girl. Her head rested on his arm, and his lips were pressed
      against her brow. I opened the man’s linen robe, and there over
      his heart was a dagger-wound, and beneath the woman’s fair breast
      was a like cruel stab, through which her life had ebbed away. On
      the rock above was an inscription in three words. Ayesha
      translated it. It was “_Wedded in Death_.”

      What was the life-story of these two, who, of a truth, were
      beautiful in their lives, and in their death were not divided?

      I closed my eyelids, and imagination, taking up the thread of
      thought, shot its swift shuttle back across the ages, weaving a
      picture on their blackness so real and vivid in its details that
      I could almost for a moment think that I had triumphed o’er the
      Past, and that my spirit’s eyes had pierced the mystery of Time.

      I seemed to see this fair girl form—the yellow hair streaming
      down her, glittering against her garments snowy white, and the
      bosom that was whiter than the robes, even dimming with its
      lustre her ornaments of burnished gold. I seemed to see the great
      cave filled with warriors, bearded and clad in mail, and, on the
      lighted daïs where Ayesha had given judgment, a man standing,
      robed, and surrounded by the symbols of his priestly office. And
      up the cave there came one clad in purple, and before him and
      behind him came minstrels and fair maidens, chanting a wedding
      song. White stood the maid against the altar, fairer than the
      fairest there—purer than a lily, and more cold than the dew that
      glistens in its heart. But as the man drew near she shuddered.
      Then out of the press and throng there sprang a dark-haired
      youth, and put his arms about this long-forgotten maid, and
      kissed her pale face in which the blood shot up like lights of
      the red dawn across the silent sky. And next there was turmoil
      and uproar, and a flashing of swords, and they tore the youth
      from her arms, and stabbed him, but with a cry she snatched the
      dagger from his belt, and drove it into her snowy breast, home to
      the heart, and down she fell, and then, with cries and wailing,
      and every sound of lamentation, the pageant rolled away from the
      arena of my vision, and once more the past shut to its book.

      Let him who reads forgive the intrusion of a dream into a history
      of fact. But it came so home to me—I saw it all so clear in a
      moment, as it were; and, besides, who shall say what proportion
      of fact, past, present, or to come, may lie in the imagination?
      What is imagination? Perhaps it is the shadow of the intangible
      truth, perhaps it is the soul’s thought.

      In an instant the whole thing had passed through my brain, and
      _She_ was addressing me.

      “Behold the lot of man,” said the veiled Ayesha, as she drew the
      winding sheets back over the dead lovers, speaking in a solemn,
      thrilling voice, which accorded well with the dream that I had
      dreamed: “to the tomb, and to the forgetfulness that hides the
      tomb, must we all come at last! Ay, even I who live so long. Even
      for me, oh Holly, thousands upon thousands of years hence;
      thousands of years after thou hast gone through the gate and been
      lost in the mists, a day will dawn whereon I shall die, and be
      even as thou art and these are. And then what will it avail that
      I have lived a little longer, holding off death by the knowledge
      that I have wrung from Nature, since at last I too must die? What
      is a span of ten thousand years, or ten times ten thousand years,
      in the history of time? It is as naught—it is as the mists that
      roll up in the sunlight; it fleeth away like an hour of sleep or
      a breath of the Eternal Spirit. Behold the lot of man! Certainly
      it shall overtake us, and we shall sleep. Certainly, too, we
      shall awake and live again, and again shall sleep, and so on and
      on, through periods, spaces, and times, from æon unto æon, till
      the world is dead, and the worlds beyond the world are dead, and
      naught liveth but the Spirit that is Life. But for us twain and
      for these dead ones shall the end of ends be Life, or shall it be
      Death? As yet Death is but Life’s Night, but out of the night is
      the Morrow born again, and doth again beget the Night. Only when
      Day and Night, and Life and Death, are ended and swallowed up in
      that from which they came, what shall be our fate, oh Holly? Who
      can see so far? Not even I!”

      And then, with a sudden change of tone and manner—

      “Hast thou seen enough, my stranger guest, or shall I show thee
      more of the wonders of these tombs that are my palace halls? If
      thou wilt, I can lead thee to where Tisno, the mightiest and most
      valorous King of Kôr, in whose day these caves were ended, lies
      in a pomp that seems to mock at nothingness, and bid the empty
      shadows of the past do homage to his sculptured vanity!”

      “I have seen enough, oh Queen,” I answered. “My heart is
      overwhelmed by the power of the present Death. Mortality is weak,
      and easily broken down by a sense of the companionship that waits
      upon its end. Take me hence, oh Ayesha!”




XVII.
THE BALANCE TURNS


      In a few minutes, following the lamps of the mutes, which, held
      out from the body as a bearer holds water in a vessel, had the
      appearance of floating down the darkness by themselves, we came
      to a stair which led us to _She’s_ ante-room, the same that
      Billali had crept up upon on all fours on the previous day. Here
      I would have bid the Queen adieu, but she would not.

      “Nay,” she said, “enter with me, oh Holly, for of a truth thy
      conversation pleaseth me. Think, oh Holly: for two thousand years
      have I had none to converse with save slaves and my own thoughts,
      and though of all this thinking hath much wisdom come, and many
      secrets been made plain, yet am I weary of my thoughts, and have
      come to loathe mine own society, for surely the food that memory
      gives to eat is bitter to the taste, and it is only with the
      teeth of hope that we can bear to bite it. Now, though thy
      thoughts are green and tender, as becometh one so young, yet are
      they those of a thinking brain, and in truth thou dost bring back
      to my mind certain of those old philosophers with whom in days
      bygone I have disputed at Athens, and at Becca in Arabia, for
      thou hast the same crabbed air and dusty look, as though thou
      hadst passed thy days in reading ill-writ Greek, and been stained
      dark with the grime of manuscripts. So draw the curtain, and sit
      here by my side, and we will eat fruit, and talk of pleasant
      things. See, I will again unveil to thee. Thou hast brought it on
      thyself, oh Holly; fairly have I warned thee—and thou shalt call
      me beautiful as even those old philosophers were wont to do. Fie
      upon them, forgetting their philosophy!”

      And without more ado she stood up and shook the white wrappings
      from her, and came forth shining and splendid like some
      glittering snake when she has cast her slough; ay, and fixed her
      wonderful eyes upon me—more deadly than any Basilisk’s—and
      pierced me through and through with their beauty, and sent her
      light laugh ringing through the air like chimes of silver bells.

      A new mood was on her, and the very colour of her mind seemed to
      change beneath it. It was no longer torture-torn and hateful, as
      I had seen it when she was cursing her dead rival by the leaping
      flames, no longer icily terrible as in the judgment-hall, no
      longer rich, and sombre, and splendid, like a Tyrian cloth, as in
      the dwellings of the dead. No, her mood now was that of Aphrodité
      triumphing. Life—radiant, ecstatic, wonderful—seemed to flow from
      her and around her. Softly she laughed and sighed, and swift her
      glances flew. She shook her heavy tresses, and their perfume
      filled the place; she struck her little sandalled foot upon the
      floor, and hummed a snatch of some old Greek epithalamium. All
      the majesty was gone, or did but lurk and faintly flicker through
      her laughing eyes, like lightning seen through sunlight. She had
      cast off the terror of the leaping flame, the cold power of
      judgment that was even now being done, and the wise sadness of
      the tombs—cast them off and put them behind her, like the white
      shroud she wore, and now stood out the incarnation of lovely
      tempting womanhood, made more perfect—and in a way more
      spiritual—than ever woman was before.

      “So, my Holly, sit there where thou canst see me. It is by thine
      own wish, remember—again I say, blame me not if thou dost wear
      away thy little span with such a sick pain at the heart that thou
      wouldst fain have died before ever thy curious eyes were set upon
      me. There, sit so, and tell me, for in truth I am inclined for
      praises—tell me, am I not beautiful? Nay, speak not so hastily;
      consider well the point; take me feature by feature, forgetting
      not my form, and my hands and feet, and my hair, and the
      whiteness of my skin, and then tell me truly, hast thou ever
      known a woman who in aught, ay, in one little portion of her
      beauty, in the curve of an eyelash even, or the modelling of a
      shell-like ear, is justified to hold a light before my
      loveliness? Now, my waist! Perchance thou thinkest it too large,
      but of a truth it is not so; it is this golden snake that is too
      large, and doth not bind it as it should. It is a wide snake, and
      knoweth that it is ill to tie in the waist. But see, give me thy
      hands—so—now press them round me, and there, with but a little
      force, thy fingers touch, oh Holly.”

      I could bear it no longer. I am but a man, and she was more than
      a woman. Heaven knows what she was—I do not! But then and there I
      fell upon my knees before her, and told her in a sad mixture of
      languages—for such moments confuse the thoughts—that I worshipped
      her as never woman was worshipped, and that I would give my
      immortal soul to marry her, which at that time I certainly would
      have done, and so, indeed, would any other man, or all the race
      of men rolled into one. For a moment she looked surprised, and
      then she began to laugh, and clap her hands in glee.

      “Oh, so soon, oh Holly!” she said. “I wondered how many minutes
      it would need to bring thee to thy knees. I have not seen a man
      kneel before me for so many days, and, believe me, to a woman’s
      heart the sight is sweet, ay, wisdom and length of days take not
      from that dear pleasure which is our sex’s only right.

      “What wouldst thou?—what wouldst thou? Thou dost not know what
      thou doest. Have I not told thee that I am not for thee? I love
      but one, and thou art not the man. Ah Holly, for all thy
      wisdom—and in a way thou art wise—thou art but a fool running
      after folly. Thou wouldst look into mine eyes—thou wouldst kiss
      me! Well, if it pleaseth thee, _look_,” and she bent herself
      towards me, and fixed her dark and thrilling orbs upon my own;
      “ay, and _kiss_ too, if thou wilt, for, thanks be given to the
      scheme of things, kisses leave no marks, except upon the heart.
      But if thou dost kiss, I tell thee of a surety wilt thou eat out
      thy breast with love of me, and die!” and she bent yet further
      towards me till her soft hair brushed my brow, and her fragrant
      breath played upon my face, and made me faint and weak. Then of a
      sudden, even as I stretched out my hands to clasp, she
      straightened herself, and a quick change passed over her.
      Reaching out her hand, she held it over my head, and it seemed to
      me that something flowed from it that chilled me back to common
      sense, and a knowledge of propriety and the domestic virtues.

      “Enough of this wanton folly,” she said with a touch of
      sternness. “Listen, Holly. Thou art a good and honest man, and I
      fain would spare thee; but, oh! it is so hard for woman to be
      merciful. I have said I am not for thee, therefore let thy
      thoughts pass by me like an idle wind, and the dust of thy
      imagination sink again into the depths—well, of despair, if thou
      wilt. Thou dost not know me, Holly. Hadst thou seen me but ten
      hours past when my passion seized me, thou hadst shrunk from me
      in fear and trembling. I am of many moods, and, like the water in
      that vessel, I reflect many things; but they pass, my Holly; they
      pass, and are forgotten. Only the water is the water still, and I
      still am I, and that which maketh the water maketh it, and that
      which maketh me maketh me, nor can my quality be altered.
      Therefore, pay no heed to what I seem, seeing that thou canst not
      know what I am. If thou troublest me again I will veil myself,
      and thou shalt behold my face no more.”

      I rose, and sank on the cushioned couch beside her, yet quivering
      with emotion, though for a moment my mad passion had left me, as
      the leaves of a tree quiver still, although the gust be gone that
      stirred them. I did not dare to tell her that I _had_ seen her in
      that deep and hellish mood, muttering incantations to the fire in
      the tomb.

      “So,” she went on, “now eat some fruit; believe me, it is the
      only true food for man. Oh, tell me of the philosophy of that
      Hebrew Messiah, who came after me, and who thou sayest doth now
      rule Rome, and Greece, and Egypt, and the barbarians beyond. It
      must have been a strange philosophy that He taught, for in my day
      the peoples would have naught of our philosophies. Revel and lust
      and drink, blood and cold steel, and the shock of men gathered in
      the battle—these were the canons of their creeds.”

      I had recovered myself a little by now, and, feeling bitterly
      ashamed of the weakness into which I had been betrayed, I did my
      best to expound to her the doctrines of Christianity, to which,
      however, with the single exception of our conception of Heaven
      and Hell, I found that she paid but scant attention, her interest
      being all directed towards the Man who taught them. Also I told
      her that among her own people, the Arabs, another prophet, one
      Mohammed, had arisen and preached a new faith, to which many
      millions of mankind now adhered.

      “Ah!” she said; “I see—two new religions! I have known so many,
      and doubtless there have been many more since I knew aught beyond
      these caves of Kôr. Mankind asks ever of the skies to vision out
      what lies behind them. It is terror for the end, and but a
      subtler form of selfishness—this it is that breeds religions.
      Mark, my Holly, each religion claims the future for its
      followers; or, at least, the good thereof. The evil is for those
      benighted ones who will have none of it; seeing the light the
      true believers worship, as the fishes see the stars, but dimly.
      The religions come and the religions pass, and the civilisations
      come and pass, and naught endures but the world and human nature.
      Ah! if man would but see that hope is from within and not from
      without—that he himself must work out his own salvation! He is
      there, and within him is the breath of life and a knowledge of
      good and evil as good and evil is to him. Thereon let him build
      and stand erect, and not cast himself before the image of some
      unknown God, modelled like his poor self, but with a bigger brain
      to think the evil thing, and a longer arm to do it.”

      I thought to myself, which shows how old such reasoning is,
      being, indeed, one of the recurring qualities of theological
      discussion, that her argument sounded very like some that I have
      heard in the nineteenth century, and in other places than the
      caves of Kôr, and with which, by the way, I totally disagree, but
      I did not care to try and discuss the question with her. To begin
      with, my mind was too weary with all the emotions through which I
      had passed, and, in the second place, I knew that I should get
      the worst of it. It is weary work enough to argue with an
      ordinary materialist, who hurls statistics and whole strata of
      geological facts at your head, whilst you can only buffet him
      with deductions and instincts and the snowflakes of faith, that
      are, alas! so apt to melt in the hot embers of our troubles. How
      little chance, then, should I have against one whose brain was
      supernaturally sharpened, and who had two thousand years of
      experience, besides all manner of knowledge of the secrets of
      Nature at her command! Feeling that she would be more likely to
      convert me than I should to convert her, I thought it best to
      leave the matter alone, and so sat silent. Many a time since then
      have I bitterly regretted that I did so, for thereby I lost the
      only opportunity I can remember having had of ascertaining what
      Ayesha _really_ believed, and what her “philosophy” was.

“Well, my Holly,” she continued, “and so those people of mine have
found a prophet, a false prophet thou sayest, for he is not thine own,
and, indeed, I doubt it not. Yet in my day was it otherwise, for then
we Arabs had many gods. Allât there was, and Saba, the Host of Heaven,
Al Uzza, and Manah the stony one, for whom the blood of victims flowed,
and Wadd and Sawâ, and Yaghûth the Lion of the dwellers in Yaman, and
Yäûk the Horse of Morad, and Nasr the Eagle of Hamyar; ay, and many
more. Oh, the folly of it all, the shame and the pitiful folly! Yet
when I rose in wisdom and spoke thereof, surely they would have slain
me in the name of their outraged gods. Well, so hath it ever been;—but,
my Holly, art thou weary of me already, that thou dost sit so silent?
Or dost thou fear lest I should teach thee my philosophy?—for know I
have a philosophy. What would a teacher be without her own philosophy?
and if thou dost vex me overmuch beware! for I will have thee learn it,
and thou shalt be my disciple, and we twain will found a faith that
shall swallow up all others. Faithless man! And but half an hour since
thou wast upon thy knees—the posture does not suit thee, Holly—swearing
that thou didst love me. What shall we do?—Nay, I have it. I will come
and see this youth, the Lion, as the old man Billali calls him, who
came with thee, and who is so sick. The fever must have run its course
by now, and if he is about to die I will recover him. Fear not, my
Holly, I shall use no magic. Have I not told thee that there is no such
thing as magic, though there is such a thing as understanding and
applying the forces which are in Nature? Go now, and presently, when I
have made the drug ready, I will follow thee.”[1]

 [1] Ayesha was a great chemist, indeed chemistry appears to have been
 her only amusement and occupation. She had one of the caves fitted up
 as a laboratory, and, although her appliances were necessarily rude,
 the results that she attained were, as will become clear in the course
 of this narrative, sufficiently surprising.—L. H. H.

      Accordingly I went, only to find Job and Ustane in a great state
      of grief, declaring that Leo was in the throes of death, and that
      they had been searching for me everywhere. I rushed to the couch,
      and glanced at him: clearly he was dying. He was senseless, and
      breathing heavily, but his lips were quivering, and every now and
      again a little shudder ran down his frame. I knew enough of
      doctoring to see that in another hour he would be beyond the
      reach of earthly help—perhaps in another five minutes. How I
      cursed my selfishness and the folly that had kept me lingering by
      Ayesha’s side while my dear boy lay dying! Alas and alas! how
      easily the best of us are lighted down to evil by the gleam of a
      woman’s eyes! What a wicked wretch was I! Actually, for the last
      half-hour I had scarcely thought of Leo, and this, be it
      remembered, of the man who for twenty years had been my dearest
      companion, and the chief interest of my existence. And now,
      perhaps, it was too late!

      I wrung my hands, and glanced round. Ustane was sitting by the
      couch, and in her eyes burnt the dull light of despair. Job was
      blubbering—I am sorry I cannot name his distress by any more
      delicate word—audibly in the corner. Seeing my eye fixed upon
      him, he went outside to give way to his grief in the passage.
      Obviously the only hope lay in Ayesha. She, and she alone—unless,
      indeed, she was an imposter, which I could not believe—could save
      him. I would go and implore her to come. As I started to do so,
      however, Job came flying into the room, his hair literally
      standing on end with terror.

      “Oh, God help us, sir!” he ejaculated in a frightened whisper,
      “here’s a corpse a-coming sliding down the passage!”

      For a moment I was puzzled, but presently, of course, it struck
      me that he must have seen Ayesha, wrapped in her grave-like
      garment, and been deceived by the extraordinary undulating
      smoothness of her walk into a belief that she was a white ghost
      gliding towards him. Indeed, at that very moment the question was
      settled, for Ayesha herself was in the apartment, or rather cave.
      Job turned, and saw her sheeted form, and then, with a convulsive
      howl of “Here it comes!” sprang into a corner, and jammed his
      face against the wall, and Ustane, guessing whose the dread
      presence must be, prostrated herself upon her face.

      “Thou comest in a good time, Ayesha,” I said, “for my boy lies at
      the point of death.”

      “So,” she said softly; “provided he be not dead, it is no matter,
      for I can bring him back to life, my Holly. Is that man there thy
      servant, and is that the method wherewith thy servants greet
      strangers in thy country?”

      “He is frightened of thy garb—it hath a death-like air,” I
      answered.

      She laughed.

      “And the girl? Ah, I see now. It is she of whom thou didst speak
      to me. Well, bid them both to leave us, and we will see to this
      sick Lion of thine. I love not that underlings should perceive my
      wisdom.”

      Thereon I told Ustane in Arabic and Job in English both to leave
      the room; an order which the latter obeyed readily enough, and
      was glad to obey, for he could not in any way subdue his fear.
      But it was otherwise with Ustane.

      “What does _She_ want?” she whispered, divided between her fear
      of the terrible Queen and her anxiety to remain near Leo. “It is
      surely the right of a wife to be near her husband when he dieth.
      Nay, I will not go, my lord the Baboon.”

      “Why doth not that woman leave us, my Holly?” asked Ayesha from
      the other end of the cave, where she was engaged in carelessly
      examining some of the sculptures on the wall.

      “She is not willing to leave Leo,” I answered, not knowing what
      to say. Ayesha wheeled round, and, pointing to the girl Ustane,
      said one word, and one only, but it was quite enough, for the
      tone in which it was said meant volumes.

      “Go!”

      And then Ustane crept past her on her hands and knees, and went.

      “Thou seest, my Holly,” said Ayesha, with a little laugh, “it was
      needful that I should give these people a lesson in obedience.
      That girl went nigh to disobeying me, but then she did not learn
      this morn how I treat the disobedient. Well, she has gone; and
      now let me see the youth,” and she glided towards the couch on
      which Leo lay, with his face in the shadow and turned towards the
      wall.

      “He hath a noble shape,” she said, as she bent over him to look
      upon his face.

      Next second her tall and willowy form was staggering back across
      the room, as though she had been shot or stabbed, staggering back
      till at last she struck the cavern wall, and then there burst
      from her lips the most awful and unearthly scream that I ever
      heard in all my life.

      “What is it, Ayesha?” I cried. “Is he dead?”

      She turned, and sprang towards me like a tigress.

      “Thou dog!” she said, in her terrible whisper, which sounded like
      the hiss of a snake, “why didst thou hide this from me?” And she
      stretched out her arm, and I thought that she was about to slay
      me.

      “What?” I ejaculated, in the most lively terror; “what?”

      “Ah!” she said, “perchance thou didst not know. Learn, my Holly,
      learn: there lies—there lies my lost Kallikrates. Kallikrates,
      who has come back to me at last, as I knew he would, as I knew he
      would;” and she began to sob and to laugh, and generally to
      conduct herself like any other lady who is a little upset,
      murmuring “Kallikrates, Kallikrates!”

      “Nonsense,” thought I to myself, but I did not like to say it;
      and, indeed, at that moment I was thinking of Leo’s life, having
      forgotten everything else in that terrible anxiety. What I feared
      now was that he should die while she was “carrying on.”

      “Unless thou art able to help him, Ayesha,” I put in, by way of a
      reminder, “thy Kallikrates will soon be far beyond thy calling.
      Surely he dieth even now.”

      “True,” she said, with a start. “Oh, why did I not come before! I
      am unnerved—my hand trembles, even mine—and yet it is very easy.
      Here, thou Holly, take this phial,” and she produced a tiny jar
      of pottery from the folds of her garment, “and pour the liquid in
      it down his throat. It will cure him if he be not dead. Swift,
      now! Swift! The man dies!”

      I glanced towards him; it was true enough, Leo was in his
      death-struggle. I saw his poor face turning ashen, and heard the
      breath begin to rattle in his throat. The phial was stoppered
      with a little piece of wood. I drew it with my teeth, and a drop
      of the fluid within flew out upon my tongue. It had a sweet
      flavour, and for a second made my head swim, and a mist gather
      before my eyes, but happily the effect passed away as swiftly as
      it had arisen.

      When I reached Leo’s side he was plainly expiring—his golden head
      was slowly turning from side to side, and his mouth was slightly
      open. I called to Ayesha to hold his head, and this she managed
      to do, though the woman was quivering from head to foot, like an
      aspen-leaf or a startled horse. Then, forcing the jaw a little
      more open, I poured the contents of the phial into his mouth.
      Instantly a little vapour arose from it, as happens when one
      disturbs nitric acid, and this sight did not increase my hopes,
      already faint enough, of the efficacy of the treatment.

      One thing, however, was certain, the death throes ceased—at first
      I thought because he had got beyond them, and crossed the awful
      river. His face turned to a livid pallor, and his heart-beats,
      which had been feeble enough before, seemed to die away
      altogether—only the eyelid still twitched a little. In my doubt I
      looked up at Ayesha, whose head-wrapping had slipped back in her
      excitement when she went reeling across the room. She was still
      holding Leo’s head, and, with a face as pale as his own, watching
      his countenance with such an expression of agonised anxiety as I
      had never seen before. Clearly she did not know if he would live
      or die. Five minutes slowly passed and I saw that she was
      abandoning hope; her lovely oval face seemed to fall in and grow
      visibly thinner beneath the pressure of a mental agony whose
      pencil drew black lines about the hollows of her eyes. The coral
      faded even from her lips, till they were as white as Leo’s face,
      and quivered pitifully. It was shocking to see her: even in my
      own grief I felt for hers.

      “Is it too late?” I gasped.

      She hid her face in her hands, and made no answer, and I too
      turned away. But as I did so I heard a deep-drawn breath, and
      looking down perceived a line of colour creeping up Leo’s face,
      then another and another, and then, wonder of wonders, the man we
      had thought dead turned over on his side.

      “Thou seest,” I said in a whisper.

      “I see,” she answered hoarsely. “He is saved. I thought we were
      too late—another moment—one little moment more—and he had been
      gone!” and she burst into an awful flood of tears, sobbing as
      though her heart would break, and yet looking lovelier than ever
      as she did it. At last she ceased.

      “Forgive me, my Holly—forgive me for my weakness,” she said.
      “Thou seest after all I am a very woman. Think—now think of it!
      This morning didst thou speak of the place of torment appointed
      by this new religion of thine. Hell or Hades thou didst call it—a
      place where the vital essence lives and retains an individual
      memory, and where all the errors and faults of judgment, and
      unsatisfied passions and the unsubstantial terrors of the mind
      wherewith it hath at any time had to do, come to mock and haunt
      and gibe and wring the heart for ever and for ever with the
      vision of its own hopelessness. Thus, even thus, have I lived for
      full two thousand years—for some six and sixty generations, as ye
      reckon time—in a Hell, as thou callest it—tormented by the memory
      of a crime, tortured day and night with an unfulfilled
      desire—without companionship, without comfort, without death, and
      led on only down my dreary road by the marsh lights of Hope,
      which, though they flickered here and there, and now glowed
      strong, and now were not, yet, as my skill told me, would one day
      lead unto my deliverer.

      “And then—think of it still, oh Holly, for never shalt thou hear
      such another tale, or see such another scene, nay, not even if I
      give thee ten thousand years of life—and thou shalt have it in
      payment if thou wilt—think: at last my deliverer came—he for whom
      I had watched and waited through the generations—at the appointed
      time he came to seek me, as I knew that he must come, for my
      wisdom could not err, though I knew not when or how. Yet see how
      ignorant I was! See how small my knowledge, and how faint my
      strength! For hours he lay there sick unto death, and I felt it
      not—I who had waited for him for two thousand years—I knew it
      not. And then at last I see him, and behold, my chance is gone
      but by a hair’s breadth even before I have it, for he is in the
      very jaws of death, whence no power of mine can draw him. And if
      he die, surely must the Hell be lived through once more—once more
      must I face the weary centuries, and wait, and wait till the time
      in its fulness shall bring my Beloved back to me. And then thou
      gavest him the medicine, and that five minutes dragged long
      before I knew if he would live or die, and I tell thee that all
      the sixty generations that are gone were not so long as that five
      minutes. But they passed at length, and still he showed no sign,
      and I knew that if the drug works not then, so far as I have had
      knowledge, it works not at all. Then thought I that he was once
      more dead, and all the tortures of all the years gathered
      themselves into a single venomed spear, and pierced me through
      and through, because again I had lost Kallikrates! And then, when
      all was done, behold! he sighed, behold! he lived, and I knew
      that he would live, for none die on whom the drug takes hold.
      Think of it now, my Holly—think of the wonder of it! He will
      sleep for twelve hours and then the fever will have left him!”

      She stopped, and laid her hand upon his golden head, and then
      bent down and kissed his brow with a chastened abandonment of
      tenderness that would have been beautiful to behold had not the
      sight cut me to the heart—for I was jealous!




XVIII.
“GO, WOMAN!”


      Then followed a silence of a minute or so, during which _She_
      appeared, if one might judge from the almost angelic rapture of
      her face—for she looked angelic sometimes—to be plunged into a
      happy ecstasy. Suddenly, however, a new thought struck her, and
      her expression became the very reverse of angelic.

      “Almost had I forgotten,” she said, “that woman, Ustane. What is
      she to Kallikrates—his servant, or——” and she paused, and her
      voice trembled.

      I shrugged my shoulders. “I understand that she is wed to him
      according to the custom of the Amahagger,” I answered; “but I
      know not.”

      Her face grew dark as a thunder-cloud. Old as she was, Ayesha had
      not outlived jealousy.

      “Then there is an end,” she said; “she must die, even now!”

      “For what crime?” I asked, horrified. “She is guilty of naught
      that thou art not guilty of thyself, oh Ayesha. She loves the
      man, and he has been pleased to accept her love: where, then, is
      her sin?”

      “Truly, oh Holly, thou art foolish,” she answered, almost
      petulantly. “Where is her sin? Her sin is that she stands between
      me and my desire. Well, I know that I can take him from her—for
      dwells there a man upon this earth, oh Holly, who could resist me
      if I put out my strength? Men are faithful for so long only as
      temptations pass them by. If the temptation be but strong enough,
      then will the man yield, for every man, like every rope, hath his
      breaking strain, and passion is to men what gold and power are to
      women—the weight upon their weakness. Believe me, ill will it go
      with mortal woman in that heaven of which thou speakest, if only
      the spirits be more fair, for their lords will never turn to look
      upon them, and their Heaven will become their Hell. For man can
      be bought with woman’s beauty, if it be but beautiful enough; and
      woman’s beauty can be ever bought with gold, if only there be
      gold enough. So was it in my day, and so it will be to the end of
      time. The world is a great mart, my Holly, where all things are
      for sale to him who bids the highest in the currency of our
      desires.”

      These remarks, which were as cynical as might have been expected
      from a woman of Ayesha’s age and experience, jarred upon me, and
      I answered, testily, that in our heaven there was no marriage or
      giving in marriage.

      “Else would it not be heaven, dost thou mean?” she put in. “Fie
      on thee, Holly, to think so ill of us poor women! Is it, then,
      marriage that marks the line between thy heaven and thy hell? but
      enough of this. This is no time for disputing and the challenge
      of our wits. Why dost thou always dispute? Art thou also a
      philosopher of these latter days? As for this woman, she must
      die; for, though I can take her lover from her, yet, while she
      lived, might he think tenderly of her, and that I cannot away
      with. No other woman shall dwell in my Lord’s thoughts; my empire
      shall be all my own. She hath had her day, let her be content;
      for better is an hour with love than a century of loneliness—now
      the night shall swallow her.”

      “Nay, nay,” I cried, “it would be a wicked crime; and from a
      crime naught comes but what is evil. For thine own sake, do not
      this deed.”

      “Is it, then, a crime, oh foolish man, to put away that which
      stands between us and our ends? Then is our life one long crime,
      my Holly, since day by day we destroy that we may live, since in
      this world none save the strongest can endure. Those who are weak
      must perish; the earth is to the strong, and the fruits thereof.
      For every tree that grows a score shall wither, that the strong
      one may take their share. We run to place and power over the dead
      bodies of those who fail and fall; ay, we win the food we eat
      from out of the mouths of starving babes. It is the scheme of
      things. Thou sayest, too, that a crime breeds evil, but therein
      thou dost lack experience; for out of crimes come many good
      things, and out of good grows much evil. The cruel rage of the
      tyrant may prove a blessing to the thousands who come after him,
      and the sweetheartedness of a holy man may make a nation slaves.
      Man doeth this, and doeth that from the good or evil of his
      heart; but he knoweth not to what end his moral sense doth prompt
      him; for when he striketh he is blind to where the blow shall
      fall, nor can he count the airy threads that weave the web of
      circumstance. Good and evil, love and hate, night and day, sweet
      and bitter, man and woman, heaven above and the earth beneath—all
      these things are necessary, one to the other, and who knows the
      end of each? I tell thee that there is a hand of fate that twines
      them up to bear the burden of its purpose, and all things are
      gathered in that great rope to which all things are needful.
      Therefore doth it not become us to say this thing is evil and
      this good, or the dark is hateful and the light lovely; for to
      other eyes than ours the evil may be the good and the darkness
      more beautiful than the day, or all alike be fair. Hearest thou,
      my Holly?”

      I felt it was hopeless to argue against casuistry of this nature,
      which, if it were carried to its logical conclusion, would
      absolutely destroy all morality, as we understand it. But her
      talk gave me a fresh thrill of fear; for what may not be possible
      to a being who, unconstrained by human law, is also absolutely
      unshackled by a moral sense of right and wrong, which, however
      partial and conventional it may be, is yet based, as our
      conscience tells us, upon the great wall of individual
      responsibility that marks off mankind from the beasts?

      But I was deeply anxious to save Ustane, whom I liked and
      respected, from the dire fate that overshadowed her at the hands
      of her mighty rival. So I made one more appeal.

      “Ayesha,” I said, “thou art too subtle for me; but thou thyself
      hast told me that each man should be a law unto himself, and
      follow the teaching of his heart. Hath thy heart no mercy towards
      her whose place thou wouldst take? Bethink thee—as thou
      sayest—though to me the thing is incredible—he whom thou desirest
      has returned to thee after many ages, and but now thou hast, as
      thou sayest also, wrung him from the jaws of death. Wilt thou
      celebrate his coming by the murder of one who loved him, and whom
      perchance he loved—one, at the least, who saved his life for thee
      when the spears of thy slaves would have made an end thereof?
      Thou sayest also that in past days thou didst grievously wrong
      this man, that with thine own hand thou didst slay him because of
      the Egyptian Amenartas whom he loved.”

      “How knowest thou that, oh stranger? How knowest thou that name?
      I spoke it not to thee,” she broke in with a cry, catching at my
      arm.

      “Perchance I dreamed it,” I answered; “strange dreams do hover
      about these caves of Kôr. It seems that the dream was, indeed, a
      shadow of the truth. What came to thee of thy mad crime?—two
      thousand years of waiting, was it not? And now wouldst thou
      repeat the history? Say what thou wilt, I tell thee that evil
      will come of it; for to him who doeth, at the least, good breeds
      good and evil evil, even though in after days out of evil cometh
      good. Offences must needs come; but woe to him by whom the
      offence cometh. So said that Messiah of whom I spoke to thee, and
      it was truly said. If thou slayest this innocent woman, I say
      unto thee that thou shalt be accursed, and pluck no fruit from
      thine ancient tree of love. Also, what thinkest thou? How will
      this man take thee red-handed from the slaughter of her who loved
      and tended him?”

      “As to that,” she answered, “I have already answered thee. Had I
      slain thee as well as her, yet should he love me, Holly, because
      he could not save himself therefrom any more than thou couldst
      save thyself from dying, if by chance I slew thee, oh Holly. And
      yet maybe there is truth in what thou dost say; for in some way
      it presseth on my mind. If it may be, I will spare this woman;
      for have I not told thee that I am not cruel for the sake of
      cruelty? I love not to see suffering, or to cause it. Let her
      come before me—quick now, before my mood changes,” and she
      hastily covered her face with its gauzy wrapping.

      Well pleased to have succeeded even to this extent, I passed out
      into the passage and called to Ustane, whose white garment I
      caught sight of some yards away, huddled up against one of the
      earthenware lamps that were placed at intervals along the tunnel.
      She rose, and ran towards me.

      “Is my lord dead? Oh, say not he is dead,” she cried, lifting her
      noble-looking face, all stained as it was with tears, up to me
      with an air of infinite beseeching that went straight to my
      heart.

      “Nay, he lives,” I answered. “_She_ hath saved him. Enter.”

      She sighed deeply, entered, and fell upon her hands and knees,
      after the custom of the Amahagger people, in the presence of the
      dread _She_.

      “Stand,” said Ayesha, in her coldest voice, “and come hither.”

      Ustane obeyed, standing before her with bowed head.

      Then came a pause, which Ayesha broke.

      “Who is this man?” she said, pointing to the sleeping form of
      Leo.

      “The man is my husband,” she answered in a low voice.

      “Who gave him to thee for a husband?”

      “I took him according to the custom of our country, oh _She_.”

      “Thou hast done evil, woman, in taking this man, who is a
      stranger. He is not a man of thine own race, and the custom
      fails. Listen: perchance thou didst this thing through ignorance,
      therefore, woman, do I spare thee, otherwise hadst thou died.
      Listen again. Go from hence back to thine own place, and never
      dare to speak to or set thine eyes upon this man again. He is not
      for thee. Listen a third time. If thou breakest this my law, that
      moment thou diest. Go.”

      But Ustane did not move.

      “Go, woman!”

      Then she looked up, and I saw that her face was torn with
      passion.

      “Nay, oh _She_. I will not go,” she answered in a choked voice:
      “the man is my husband, and I love him—I love him, and I will not
      leave him. What right hast thou to command me to leave my
      husband?”

      I saw a little quiver pass down Ayesha’s frame, and shuddered
      myself, fearing the worst.

      “Be pitiful,” I said in Latin; “it is but Nature working.”

      “I am pitiful,” she answered coldly in the same language; “had I
      not been pitiful she had been dead even now.” Then, addressing
      Ustane: “Woman, I say to thee, go before I destroy thee where
      thou art!”

      “I will not go! He is mine—mine!” she cried in anguish. “I took
      him, and I saved his life! Destroy me, then, if thou hast the
      power! I will not give thee my husband—never—never!”

      Ayesha made a movement so swift that I could scarcely follow it,
      but it seemed to me that she lightly struck the poor girl upon
      the head with her hand. I looked at Ustane, and then staggered
      back in horror, for there upon her hair, right across her
      bronze-like tresses, were three finger-marks _white as snow_. As
      for the girl herself, she had put her hands to her head, and was
      looking dazed.

      “Great heavens!” I said, perfectly aghast at this dreadful
      manifestation of human power; but _She_ did but laugh a little.

      “Thou thinkest, poor ignorant fool,” she said to the bewildered
      woman, “that I have not the power to slay. Stay, there lies a
      mirror,” and she pointed to Leo’s round shaving-glass that had
      been arranged by Job with other things upon his portmanteau;
      “give it to this woman, my Holly, and let her see that which lies
      across her hair, and whether or no I have power to slay.”

      I picked up the glass, and held it before Ustane’s eyes. She
      gazed, then felt at her hair, then gazed again, and then sank
      upon the ground with a sort of sob.

      “Now, wilt thou go, or must I strike a second time?” asked
      Ayesha, in mockery. “Look, I have set my seal upon thee so that I
      may know thee till thy hair is all as white as it. If I see thy
      face again, be sure, too, that thy bones shall soon be whiter
      than my mark upon thy hair.”

      Utterly awed and broken down, the poor creature rose, and, marked
      with that awful mark, crept from the room, sobbing bitterly.

      “Look not so frighted, my Holly,” said Ayesha, when she had gone.
      “I tell thee I deal not in magic—there is no such thing. ‘Tis
      only a force that thou dost not understand. I marked her to
      strike terror to her heart, else must I have slain her. And now I
      will bid my servants to bear my Lord Kallikrates to a chamber
      near mine own, that I may watch over him, and be ready to greet
      him when he wakes; and thither, too, shalt thou come, my Holly,
      and the white man, thy servant. But one thing remember at thy
      peril. Naught shalt thou say to Kallikrates as to how this woman
      went, and as little as may be of me. Now, I have warned thee!”
      and she slid away to give her orders, leaving me more absolutely
      confounded than ever. Indeed, so bewildered was I, and racked and
      torn with such a succession of various emotions, that I began to
      think that I must be going mad. However, perhaps fortunately, I
      had but little time to reflect, for presently the mutes arrived
      to carry the sleeping Leo and our possessions across the central
      cave, so for a while all was bustle. Our new rooms were situated
      immediately behind what we used to call Ayesha’s boudoir—the
      curtained space where I had first seen her. Where she herself
      slept I did not then know, but it was somewhere quite close.

      That night I passed in Leo’s room, but he slept through it like
      the dead, never once stirring. I also slept fairly well, as,
      indeed, I needed to do, but my sleep was full of dreams of all
      the horrors and wonders I had undergone. Chiefly, however, I was
      haunted by that frightful piece of _diablerie_ by which Ayesha
      left her finger-marks upon her rival’s hair. There was something
      so terrible about her swift, snake-like movement, and the
      instantaneous blanching of that threefold line, that, if the
      results to Ustane had been much more tremendous, I doubt if they
      would have impressed me so deeply. To this day I often dream of
      that awful scene, and see the weeping woman, bereaved, and marked
      like Cain, cast a last look at her lover, and creep from the
      presence of her dread Queen.

      Another dream that troubled me originated in the huge pyramid of
      bones. I dreamed that they all stood up and marched past me in
      thousands and tens of thousands—in squadrons, companies, and
      armies—with the sunlight shining through their hollow ribs. On
      they rushed across the plain to Kôr, their imperial home; I saw
      the drawbridges fall before them, and heard their bones clank
      through the brazen gates. On they went, up the splendid streets,
      on past fountains, palaces, and temples such as the eye of man
      never saw. But there was no man to greet them in the
      market-place, and no woman’s face appeared at the windows—only a
      bodiless voice went before them, calling: “_Fallen is Imperial
      Kôr!—fallen!—fallen! fallen!_” On, right through the city,
      marched those gleaming phalanxes, and the rattle of their bony
      tread echoed through the silent air as they pressed grimly on.
      They passed through the city and clomb the wall, and marched
      along the great roadway that was made upon the wall, till at
      length they once more reached the drawbridge. Then, as the sun
      was sinking, they returned again towards their sepulchre, and
      luridly his light shone in the sockets of their empty eyes,
      throwing gigantic shadows of their bones, that stretched away,
      and crept and crept like huge spiders’ legs as their armies wound
      across the plain. Then they came to the cave, and once more one
      by one flung themselves in unending files through the hole into
      the pit of bones, and I awoke, shuddering, to see _She_, who had
      evidently been standing between my couch and Leo’s, glide like a
      shadow from the room.

      After this I slept again, soundly this time, till morning, when I
      awoke much refreshed, and got up. At last the hour drew near at
      which, according to Ayesha, Leo was to awake, and with it came
      _She_ herself, as usual, veiled.

      “Thou shalt see, oh Holly,” she said; “presently shall he awake
      in his right mind, the fever having left him.”

      Hardly were the words out of her mouth, when Leo turned round and
      stretched out his arms, yawned, opened his eyes, and, perceiving
      a female form bending over him, threw his arms round her and
      kissed her, mistaking her, perhaps, for Ustane. At any rate, he
      said, in Arabic, “Hullo, Ustane, why have you tied your head up
      like that? Have you got the toothache?” and then, in English, “I
      say, I’m awfully hungry. Why, Job, you old son of a gun, where
      the deuce have we got to now—eh?”

      “I am sure I wish I knew, Mr. Leo,” said Job, edging suspiciously
      past Ayesha, whom he still regarded with the utmost disgust and
      horror, being by no means sure that she was not an animated
      corpse; “but you mustn’t talk, Mr. Leo, you’ve been very ill, and
      given us a great deal of hanxiety, and, if this lady,” looking at
      Ayesha, “would be so kind as to move, I’ll bring you your soup.”

      This turned Leo’s attention to the “lady,” who was standing by in
      perfect silence. “Hullo!” he said; “that is not Ustane—where is
      Ustane?”

      Then, for the first time, Ayesha spoke to him, and her first
      words were a lie. “She has gone from hence upon a visit,” she
      said; “and, behold, in her place am I here as thine handmaiden.”

      Ayesha’s silver notes seemed to puzzle Leo’s half-awakened
      intellect, as also did her corpse-like wrappings. However, he
      said nothing at the time, but drank off his soup greedily enough,
      and then turned over and slept again till the evening. When he
      woke for the second time he saw me, and began to question me as
      to what had happened, but I had to put him off as best I could
      till the morrow, when he awoke almost miraculously better. Then I
      told him something of his illness and of my doings, but as Ayesha
      was present I could not tell him much except that she was the
      Queen of the country, and well disposed towards us, and that it
      was her pleasure to go veiled; for, though of course I spoke in
      English, I was afraid that she might understand what we were
      saying from the expression of our faces, and besides, I
      remembered her warning.

      On the following day Leo got up almost entirely recovered. The
      flesh wound in his side was healed, and his constitution,
      naturally a vigorous one, had shaken off the exhaustion
      consequent on his terrible fever with a rapidity that I can only
      attribute to the effects of the wonderful drug which Ayesha had
      given to him, and also to the fact that his illness had been too
      short to reduce him very much. With his returning health came
      back full recollection of all his adventures up to the time when
      he had lost consciousness in the marsh, and of course of Ustane
      also, to whom I had discovered he had grown considerably
      attached. Indeed, he overwhelmed me with questions about the poor
      girl, which I did not dare to answer, for after Leo’s first
      awakening _She_ had sent for me, and again warned me solemnly
      that I was to reveal nothing of the story to him, delicately
      hinting that if I did it would be the worse for me. She also, for
      the second time, cautioned me not to tell Leo anything more than
      I was obliged about herself, saying that she would reveal herself
      to him in her own time.

      Indeed, her whole manner changed. After all that I had seen I had
      expected that she would take the earliest opportunity of claiming
      the man she believed to be her old-world lover, but this, for
      some reason of her own, which was at the time quite inscrutable
      to me, she did not do. All that she did was to attend to his
      wants quietly, and with a humility which was in striking contrast
      with her former imperious bearing, addressing him always in a
      tone of something very like respect, and keeping him with her as
      much as possible. Of course his curiosity was as much excited
      about this mysterious woman as my own had been, and he was
      particularly anxious to see her face, which I had, without
      entering into particulars, told him was as lovely as her form and
      voice. This in itself was enough to raise the expectations of any
      young man to a dangerous pitch, and, had it not been that he had
      not as yet completely shaken off the effects of illness, and was
      much troubled in his mind about Ustane, of whose affection and
      brave devotion he spoke in touching terms, I have no doubt that
      he would have entered into her plans, and fallen in love with her
      by anticipation. As it was, however, he was simply wildly
      curious, and also, like myself, considerably awed, for, though no
      hint had been given to him by Ayesha of her extraordinary age, he
      not unnaturally came to identify her with the woman spoken of on
      the potsherd. At last, quite driven into a corner by his
      continual questions, which he showered on me while he was
      dressing on this third morning, I referred him to Ayesha, saying,
      with perfect truth, that I did not know where Ustane was.
      Accordingly, after Leo had eaten a hearty breakfast, we adjourned
      into _She’s_ presence, for her mutes had orders to admit us at
      all hours.

      She was, as usual, seated in what, for want of a better term, we
      called her boudoir, and on the curtains being drawn she rose from
      her couch and, stretching out both hands, came forward to greet
      us, or rather Leo; for I, as may be imagined, was now quite left
      in the cold. It was a pretty sight to see her veiled form gliding
      towards the sturdy young Englishman, dressed in his grey flannel
      suit; for, though he is half a Greek in blood, Leo is, with the
      exception of his hair, one of the most English-looking men I ever
      saw. He has nothing of the subtle form or slippery manner of the
      modern Greek about him, though I presume that he got his
      remarkable personal beauty from his foreign mother, whose
      portrait he resembles not a little. He is very tall and
      big-chested, and yet not awkward, as so many big men are, and his
      head is set upon him in such a fashion as to give him a proud and
      vigorous air, which was well translated in his Amahagger name of
      the “Lion.”

      “Greeting to thee, my young stranger lord,” she said in her
      softest voice. “Right glad am I to see thee upon thy feet.
      Believe me, had I not saved thee at the last, never wouldst thou
      have stood upon those feet again. But the danger is done, and it
      shall be my care”—and she flung a world of meaning into the
      words—“that it doth return no more.”

      Leo bowed to her, and then, in his best Arabic, thanked her for
      all her kindness and courtesy in caring for one unknown to her.

      “Nay,” she answered softly, “ill could the world spare such a
      man. Beauty is too rare upon it. Give me no thanks, who am made
      happy by thy coming.”

      “Humph! old fellow,” said Leo aside to me in English, “the lady
      is very civil. We seem to have tumbled into clover. I hope that
      you have made the most of your opportunities. By Jove! what a
      pair of arms she has got!”

      I nudged him in the ribs to make him keep quiet, for I caught
      sight of a gleam from Ayesha’s veiled eyes, which were regarding
      me curiously.

      “I trust,” went on Ayesha, “that my servants have attended well
      upon thee; if there can be comfort in this poor place, be sure it
      waits on thee. Is there aught that I can do for thee more?”

      “Yes, oh _She_,” answered Leo hastily, “I would fain know whither
      the young lady who was looking after me has gone to.”

      “Ah,” said Ayesha: “the girl—yes, I saw her. Nay, I know not; she
      said that she would go, I know not whither. Perchance she will
      return, perchance not. It is wearisome waiting on the sick, and
      these savage women are fickle.”

      Leo looked both sulky and distressed at this intelligence.

      “It’s very odd,” he said to me in English; and then, addressing
      _She_, “I cannot understand,” he said; “the young lady and
      I—well—in short, we had a regard for each other.”

      Ayesha laughed a little very musically, and then turned the
      subject.




XIX.
“GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT!”


The conversation after this was of such a desultory order that I do not
quite recollect it. For some reason, perhaps from a desire to keep her
identity and character in reserve, Ayesha did not talk freely, as she
usually did. Presently, however, she informed Leo that she had arranged
a dance that night for our amusement. I was astonished to hear this, as
I fancied that the Amahagger were much too gloomy a folk to indulge in
any such frivolity; but, as will presently more clearly appear, it
turned out that an Amahagger dance has little in common with such
fantastic festivities in other countries, savage or civilised. Then, as
we were about to withdraw, she suggested that Leo might like to see
some of the wonders of the caves, and as he gladly assented thither we
departed, accompanied by Job and Billali. To describe our visit would
only be to repeat a great deal of what I have already said. The tombs
we entered were indeed different, for the whole rock was a honeycomb of
sepulchres,[1] but the contents were nearly always similar. Afterwards
we visited the pyramid of bones that had haunted my dreams on the
previous night, and from thence went down a long passage to one of the
great vaults occupied by the bodies of the poorer citizens of Imperial
Kôr. These bodies were not nearly so well preserved as were those of
the wealthier classes. Many of them had no linen covering on them, also
they were buried from five hundred to one thousand in a single large
vault, the corpses in some instances being thickly piled one upon
another, like a heap of slain.

 [1] For a long while it puzzled me to know what could have been done
 with the enormous quantities of rock that must have been dug out of
 these vast caves; but I afterwards discovered that it was for the most
 part built into the walls and palaces of Kôr, and also used to line
 the reservoirs and sewers.—L. H. H.

      Leo was of course intensely interested in this stupendous and
      unequalled sight, which was, indeed, enough to awake all the
      imagination a man had in him into the most active life. But to
      poor Job it did not prove attractive. His nerves—already
      seriously shaken by what he had undergone since we had arrived in
      this terrible country—were, as may be imagined, still further
      disturbed by the spectacle of these masses of departed humanity,
      whereof the forms still remained perfect before his eyes, though
      their voices were for ever lost in the eternal silence of the
      tomb. Nor was he comforted when old Billali, by way of soothing
      his evident agitation, informed him that he should not be
      frightened of these dead things, as he would soon be like them
      himself.

      “There’s a nice thing to say of a man, sir,” he ejaculated, when
      I translated this little remark; “but there, what can one expect
      of an old man-eating savage? Not but what I dare say he’s right,”
      and Job sighed.

      When we had finished inspecting the caves, we returned and had
      our meal, for it was now past four in the afternoon, and we
      all—especially Leo—needed some food and rest. At six o’clock we,
      together with Job, waited on Ayesha, who set to work to terrify
      our poor servant still further by showing him pictures on the
      pool of water in the font-like vessel. She learnt from me that he
      was one of seventeen children, and then bid him think of all his
      brothers and sisters, or as many of them as he could, gathered
      together in his father’s cottage. Then she told him to look in
      the water, and there, reflected from its stilly surface, was that
      dead scene of many years gone by, as it was recalled to our
      retainer’s brain. Some of the faces were clear enough, but some
      were mere blurs and splotches, or with one feature grossly
      exaggerated; the fact being that, in these instances, Job had
      been unable to recall the exact appearances of the individuals,
      or remembered them only by a peculiarity of his tribe, and the
      water could only reflect what he saw with his mind’s eye. For it
      must be remembered that _She’s_ power in this matter was strictly
      limited; she could apparently, except in very rare instances,
      only photograph upon the water what was actually in the mind of
      some one present, and then only by his will. But, if she was
      personally acquainted with a locality, she could, as in the case
      of ourselves and the whale-boat, throw its reflection upon the
      water, and also, it seems, the reflection of anything extraneous
      that was passing there at the time. This power, however, did not
      extend to the minds of others. For instance, she could show me
      the interior of my college chapel, as I remembered it, but not as
      it was at the moment of reflection; for, where other people were
      concerned, her art was strictly limited to the facts or memories
      present to _their_ consciousness at the moment. So much was this
      so that when we tried, for her amusement, to show her pictures of
      noted buildings, such as St. Paul’s or the Houses of Parliament,
      the result was most imperfect; for, of course, though we had a
      good general idea of their appearance, we could not recall all
      the architectural details, and therefore the minutiæ necessary to
      a perfect reflection were wanting. But Job could not be got to
      understand this, and, so far from accepting a natural explanation
      of the matter, which was after all, though strange enough in all
      conscience, nothing more than an instance of glorified and
      perfected telepathy, he set the whole thing down as a
      manifestation of the blackest magic. I shall never forget the
      howl of terror which he uttered when he saw the more or less
      perfect portraits of his long-scattered brethren staring at him
      from the quiet water, or the merry peal of laughter with which
      Ayesha greeted his consternation. As for Leo, he did not
      altogether like it either, but ran his fingers through his yellow
      curls, and remarked that it gave him the creeps.

      After about an hour of this amusement, in the latter part of
      which Job did _not_ participate, the mutes by signs indicated
      that Billali was waiting for an audience. Accordingly he was told
      to “crawl up,” which he did as awkwardly as usual, and announced
      that the dance was ready to begin if _She_ and the white
      strangers would be pleased to attend. Shortly afterwards we all
      rose, and, Ayesha having thrown a dark cloak (the same, by the
      way, that she had worn when I saw her cursing by the fire) over
      her white wrappings, we started. The dance was to be held in the
      open air, on the smooth rocky plateau in front of the great cave,
      and thither we made our way. About fifteen paces from the mouth
      of the cave we found three chairs placed, and here we sat and
      waited, for as yet no dancers were to be seen. The night was
      almost, but not quite, dark, the moon not having risen as yet,
      which made us wonder how we should be able to see the dancing.

      “Thou wilt presently understand,” said Ayesha, with a little
      laugh, when Leo asked her; and we certainly did. Scarcely were
      the words out of her mouth when from every point we saw dark
      forms rushing up, each bearing with him what we at first took to
      be an enormous flaming torch. Whatever they were, they were
      burning furiously, for the flames stood out a yard or more behind
      each bearer. On they came, fifty or more of them, carrying their
      flaming burdens and looking like so many devils from hell. Leo
      was the first to discover what these burdens were.

      “Great heaven!” he said, “they are corpses on fire!”

      I stared and stared again—he was perfectly right—the torches that
      were to light our entertainment were human mummies from the
      caves!

      On rushed the bearers of the flaming corpses, and, meeting at a
      spot about twenty paces in front of us, built their ghastly
      burdens crossways into a huge bonfire. Heavens! how they roared
      and flared! No tar barrel could have burnt as those mummies did.
      Nor was this all. Suddenly I saw one great fellow seize a flaming
      human arm that had fallen from its parent frame, and rush off
      into the darkness. Presently he stopped, and a tall streak of
      fire shot up into the air, illumining the gloom, and also the
      lamp from which it sprang. That lamp was the mummy of a woman
      tied to a stout stake let into the rock, and he had fired her
      hair. On he went a few paces and touched a second, then a third,
      and a fourth, till at last we were surrounded on all three sides
      by a great ring of bodies flaring furiously, the material with
      which they were preserved having rendered them so inflammable
      that the flames would literally spout out of the ears and mouth
      in tongues of fire a foot or more in length.

      Nero illuminated his gardens with live Christians soaked in tar,
      and we were now treated to a similar spectacle, probably for the
      first time since his day, only happily our lamps were not living
      ones.

      But, although this element of horror was fortunately wanting, to
      describe the awful and hideous grandeur of the spectacle thus
      presented to us is, I feel, so absolutely beyond my poor powers
      that I scarcely dare attempt it. To begin with, it appealed to
      the moral as well as the physical susceptibilities. There was
      something very terrible, and yet very fascinating, about the
      employment of the remote dead to illumine the orgies of the
      living; in itself the thing was a satire, both on the living and
      the dead. Cæsar’s dust—or is it Alexander’s?—may stop a bunghole,
      but the functions of these dead Cæsars of the past was to light
      up a savage fetish dance. To such base uses may we come, of so
      little account may we be in the minds of the eager multitudes
      that we shall breed, many of whom, so far from revering our
      memory, will live to curse us for begetting them into such a
      world of woe.

      Then there was the physical side of the spectacle, and a weird
      and splendid one it was. Those old citizens of Kôr burnt as, to
      judge from their sculptures and inscriptions, they had lived,
      very fast, and with the utmost liberality. What is more, there
      were plenty of them. As soon as ever a mummy had burnt down to
      the ankles, which it did in about twenty minutes, the feet were
      kicked away, and another one put in its place. The bonfire was
      kept going on the same generous scale, and its flames shot up,
      with a hiss and a crackle, twenty or thirty feet into the air,
      throwing great flashes of light far out into the gloom, through
      which the dark forms of the Amahagger flitted to and fro like
      devils replenishing the infernal fires. We all stood and stared
      aghast—shocked, and yet fascinated at so strange a spectacle, and
      half expecting to see the spirits those flaming forms had once
      enclosed come creeping from the shadows to work vengeance on
      their desecrators.

      “I promised thee a strange sight, my Holly,” laughed Ayesha,
      whose nerves alone did not seem to be affected; “and, behold, I
      have not failed thee. Also, it hath its lesson. Trust not to the
      future, for who knows what the future may bring! Therefore, live
      for the day, and endeavour not to escape the dust which seems to
      be man’s end. What thinkest thou those long-forgotten nobles and
      ladies would have felt had they known that they should one day
      flare to light the dance or boil the pot of savages? But see,
      here come the dancers; a merry crew—are they not? The stage is
      lit—now for the play.”

      As she spoke, we perceived two lines of figures, one male and the
      other female, to the number of about a hundred, each advancing
      round the human bonfire, arrayed only in the usual leopard and
      buck skins. They formed up, in perfect silence, in two lines,
      facing each other between us and the fire, and then the dance—a
      sort of infernal and fiendish cancan—began. To describe it is
      quite impossible, but, though there was a good deal of tossing of
      legs and double-shuffling, it seemed to our untutored minds to be
      more of a play than a dance, and, as usual with this dreadful
      people, whose minds seem to have taken their colour from the
      caves in which they live, and whose jokes and amusements are
      drawn from the inexhaustible stores of preserved mortality with
      which they share their homes, the subject appeared to be a most
      ghastly one. I know that it represented an attempted murder first
      of all, and then the burial alive of the victim and his
      struggling from the grave; each act of the abominable drama,
      which was carried on in perfect silence, being rounded off and
      finished with a furious and most revolting dance round the
      supposed victim, who writhed upon the ground in the red light of
      the bonfire.

      Presently, however, this pleasing piece was interrupted. Suddenly
      there was a slight commotion, and a large powerful woman, whom I
      had noted as one of the most vigorous of the dancers, came, made
      mad and drunken with unholy excitement, bounding and staggering
      towards us, shrieking out as she came:—

      “I want a Black Goat, I must have a Black Goat, bring me a Black
      Goat!” and down she fell upon the rocky floor foaming and
      writhing, and shrieking for a Black Goat, about as hideous a
      spectacle as can well be conceived.

      Instantly most of the dancers came up and got round her, though
      some still continued their capers in the background.

      “She has got a Devil,” called out one of them. “Run and get a
      black goat. There, Devil, keep quiet! keep quiet! You shall have
      the goat presently. They have gone to fetch it, Devil.”

      “I want a Black Goat, I must have a Black Goat!” shrieked the
      foaming rolling creature again.

      “All right, Devil, the goat will be here presently; keep quiet,
      there’s a good Devil!”

      And so on till the goat, taken from a neighbouring kraal, did at
      last arrive, being dragged bleating on to the scene by its horns.

      “Is it a Black One, is it a Black One?” shrieked the possessed.

      “Yes, yes, Devil, as black as night;” then aside, “keep it behind
      thee, don’t let the Devil see that it has got a white spot on its
      rump and another on its belly. In one minute, Devil. There, cut
      his throat quick. Where is the saucer?”

      “The Goat! the Goat! the Goat! Give me the blood of my black
      goat! I must have it, don’t you see I must have it? Oh! oh! oh!
      give me the blood of the goat.”

      At this moment a terrified _bah!_ announced that the poor goat
      had been sacrificed, and the next minute a woman ran up with a
      saucer full of blood. This the possessed creature, who was then
      raving and foaming her wildest, seized and _drank_, and was
      instantly recovered, and without a trace of hysteria, or fits, or
      being possessed, or whatever dreadful thing it was she was
      suffering from. She stretched her arms, smiled faintly, and
      walked quietly back to the dancers, who presently withdrew in a
      double line as they had come, leaving the space between us and
      the bonfire deserted.

      I thought that the entertainment was now over, and, feeling
      rather queer, was about to ask _She_ if we could rise, when
      suddenly what at first I took to be a baboon came hopping round
      the fire, and was instantly met upon the other side by a lion, or
      rather a human being dressed in a lion’s skin. Then came a goat,
      then a man wrapped in an ox’s hide, with the horns wobbling about
      in a ludicrous way. After him followed a blesbok, then an impala,
      then a koodoo, then more goats, and many other animals, including
      a girl sewn up in the shining scaly hide of a boa-constrictor,
      several yards of which trailed along the ground behind her. When
      all the beasts had collected they began to dance about in a
      lumbering, unnatural fashion, and to imitate the sounds produced
      by the respective animals they represented, till the whole air
      was alive with roars and bleating and the hissing of snakes. This
      went on for a long time, till, getting tired of the pantomime, I
      asked Ayesha if there would be any objection to Leo and myself
      walking round to inspect the human torches, and, as she had
      nothing to say against it, we started, striking round to the
      left. After looking at one or two of the flaming bodies, we were
      about to return, thoroughly disgusted with the grotesque
      weirdness of the spectacle, when our attention was attracted by
      one of the dancers, a particularly active leopard, that had
      separated itself from its fellow-beasts, and was whisking about
      in our immediate neighbourhood, but gradually drawing into a spot
      where the shadow was darkest, equidistant between two of the
      flaming mummies. Drawn by curiosity, we followed it, when
      suddenly it darted past us into the shadows beyond, and as it did
      so erected itself and whispered, “Come,” in a voice that we both
      recognised as that of Ustane. Without waiting to consult me Leo
      turned and followed her into the outer darkness, and I, feeling
      sick enough at heart, went after them. The leopard crawled on for
      about fifty paces—a sufficient distance to be quite beyond the
      light of the fire and torches—and then Leo came up with it, or,
      rather, with Ustane.

      “Oh, my lord,” I heard her whisper, “so I have found thee!
      Listen. I am in peril of my life from ‘_She-who-must-be-obeyed_.’
      Surely the Baboon has told thee how she drove me from thee? I
      love thee, my lord, and thou art mine according to the custom of
      the country. I saved thy life! My Lion, wilt thou cast me off
      now?”

      “Of course not,” ejaculated Leo; “I have been wondering whither
      thou hadst gone. Let us go and explain matters to the Queen.”

      “Nay, nay, she would slay us. Thou knowest not her power—the
      Baboon there, he knoweth, for he saw. Nay, there is but one way:
      if thou wilt cleave to me, thou must flee with me across the
      marshes even now, and then perchance we may escape.”

      “For Heaven’s sake, Leo,” I began, but she broke in—

      “Nay, listen not to him. Swift—be swift—death is in the air we
      breathe. Even now, mayhap, _She_ heareth us,” and without more
      ado she proceeded to back her arguments by throwing herself into
      his arms. As she did so the leopard’s head slipped from her hair,
      and I saw the three white finger-marks upon it, gleaming faintly
      in the starlight. Once more realising the desperate nature of the
      position, I was about to interpose, for I knew that Leo was not
      too strong-minded where women were concerned, when—oh! horror!—I
      heard a little silvery laugh behind me. I turned round, and there
      was _She_ herself, and with her Billali and two male mutes. I
      gasped and nearly sank to the ground, for I knew that such a
      situation must result in some dreadful tragedy, of which it
      seemed exceedingly probable to me that I should be the first
      victim. As for Ustane, she untwined her arms and covered her eyes
      with her hands, while Leo, not knowing the full terror of the
      position, merely covered up, and looked as foolish as a man
      caught in such a trap would naturally do.




XX.
TRIUMPH


      Then followed a moment of the most painful silence that I ever
      endured. It was broken by Ayesha, who addressed herself to Leo.

      “Nay, now, my lord and guest,” she said in her softest tones,
      which yet had the ring of steel about them, “look not so bashful.
      Surely the sight was a pretty one—the leopard and the lion!”

      “Oh, hang it all!” said Leo in English.

      “And thou, Ustane,” she went on, “surely I should have passed
      thee by, had not the light fallen on the white across thy hair,”
      and she pointed to the bright edge of the rising moon which was
      now appearing above the horizon. “Well! well! the dance is
      done—see, the tapers have burnt down, and all things end in
      silence and in ashes. So thou thoughtest it a fit time for love,
      Ustane, my servant—and I, dreaming not that I could be disobeyed,
      thought thee already far away.”

      “Play not with me,” moaned the wretched woman; “slay me, and let
      there be an end.”

      “Nay, why? It is not well to go so swift from the hot lips of
      love down to the cold mouth of the grave,” and she made a motion
      to the mutes, who instantly stepped up and caught the girl by
      either arm. With an oath Leo sprang upon the nearest, and hurled
      him to the ground, and then stood over him with his face set, and
      his fist ready.

      Again Ayesha laughed. “It was well thrown, my guest; thou hast a
      strong arm for one who so late was sick. But now out of thy
      courtesy I pray thee let that man live and do my bidding. He
      shall not harm the girl; the night air grows chill, and I would
      welcome her in mine own place. Surely she whom thou dost favour
      shall be favoured of me also.”

      I took Leo by the arm, and pulled him from the prostrate mute,
      and he, half bewildered, obeyed the pressure. Then we all set out
      for the cave across the plateau, where a pile of white human
      ashes was all that remained of the fire that had lit the dancing,
      for the dancers had vanished.

      In due course we gained Ayesha’s boudoir—all too soon, it seemed
      to me, having a sad presage of what was to come lying heavy on my
      heart.

      Ayesha seated herself upon her cushions, and, having dismissed
      Job and Billali, by signs bade the mutes tend the lamps and
      retire—all save one girl, who was her favourite personal
      attendant. We three remained standing, the unfortunate Ustane a
      little to the left of the rest of us.

      “Now, oh Holly,” Ayesha began, “how came it that thou who didst
      hear my words bidding this evil-doer”—and she pointed to
      Ustane—“to go hence—thou at whose prayer I did weakly spare her
      life—how came it, I say, that thou wast a sharer in what I saw
      to-night? Answer, and for thine own sake, I say, speak all the
      truth, for I am not minded to hear lies upon this matter!”

      “It was by accident, oh Queen,” I answered. “I knew naught of
      it.”

      “I do believe thee, oh Holly,” she answered coldly, “and well it
      is for thee that I do—then does the whole guilt rest upon her.”

      “I do not find any guilt therein,” broke in Leo. “She is not
      another man’s wife, and it appears that she has married me
      according to the custom of this awful place, so who is the worse?
      Any way, madam,” he went on, “whatever she has done I have done
      too, so if she is to be punished let me be punished also; and I
      tell thee,” he went on, working himself up into a fury, “that if
      thou biddest one of those deaf and dumb villains to touch her
      again I will tear him to pieces!” And he looked as though he
      meant it.

      Ayesha listened in icy silence, and made no remark. When he had
      finished, however, she addressed Ustane.

      “Hast thou aught to say, woman? Thou silly straw, thou feather,
      who didst think to float towards thy passion’s petty ends, even
      against the great wind of my will! Tell me, for I fain would
      understand. Why didst thou this thing?”

      And then I think I saw the most tremendous exhibition of moral
      courage and intrepidity that it is possible to conceive. For the
      poor doomed girl, knowing what she had to expect at the hands of
      her terrible Queen, knowing, too, from bitter experience, how
      great was her adversary’s power, yet gathered herself together,
      and out of the very depths of her despair drew materials to defy
      her.

      “I did it, oh _She_,” she answered, drawing herself up to the
      full of her stately height, and throwing back the panther skin
      from her head, “because my love is stronger than the grave. I did
      it because my life without this man whom my heart chose would be
      but a living death. Therefore did I risk my life, and, now that I
      know that it is forfeit to thine anger, yet am I glad that I did
      risk it, and pay it away in the risking, ay, because he embraced
      me once, and told me that he loved me yet.”

      Here Ayesha half rose from her couch, and then sank down again.

      “I have no magic,” went on Ustane, her rich voice ringing strong
      and full, “and I am not a Queen, nor do I live for ever, but a
      woman’s heart is heavy to sink through waters, however deep, oh
      Queen! and a woman’s eyes are quick to see—even through thy veil,
      oh Queen!

      “Listen: I know it, thou dost love this man thyself, and
      therefore wouldst thou destroy me who stand across thy path. Ay,
      I die—I die, and go into the darkness, nor know I whither I go.
      But this I know. There is a light shining in my breast, and by
      that light, as by a lamp, I see the truth, and the future that I
      shall not share unroll itself before me like a scroll. When first
      I knew my lord,” and she pointed to Leo, “I knew also that death
      would be the bridal gift he gave me—it rushed upon me of a
      sudden, but I turned not back, being ready to pay the price, and,
      behold, death is here! And now, even as I knew that, so do I,
      standing on the steps of doom, know that thou shalt not reap the
      profit of thy crime. Mine he is, and, though thy beauty shine
      like a sun among the stars, mine shall he remain for thee. Never
      here in this life shall he look thee in the eyes and call thee
      spouse. Thou too art doomed, I see”—and her voice rang like the
      cry of an inspired prophetess; “ah, I see——”

      Then came an answering cry of mingled rage and terror. I turned
      my head. Ayesha had risen, and was standing with her outstretched
      hand pointing at Ustane, who had suddenly stopped speaking. I
      gazed at the poor woman, and as I gazed there came upon her face
      that same woeful, fixed expression of terror that I had seen once
      before when she had broken out into her wild chant. Her eyes grew
      large, her nostrils dilated, and her lips blanched.

      Ayesha said nothing, she made no sound, she only drew herself up,
      stretched out her arm, and, her tall veiled frame quivering like
      an aspen leaf, appeared to look fixedly at her victim. Even as
      she did so Ustane put her hands to her head, uttered one piercing
      scream, turned round twice, and then fell backwards with a
      thud—prone upon the floor. Both Leo and myself rushed to her—she
      was stone dead—blasted into death by some mysterious electric
      agency or overwhelming will-force whereof the dread _She_ had
      command.

      For a moment Leo did not quite realise what had happened. But,
      when he did, his face was awful to see. With a savage oath he
      rose from beside the corpse, and, turning, literally sprang at
      Ayesha. But she was watching, and, seeing him come, stretched out
      her hand again, and he went staggering back towards me, and would
      have fallen, had I not caught him. Afterwards he told me that he
      felt as though he had suddenly received a violent blow in the
      chest, and, what is more, utterly cowed, as if all the manhood
      had been taken out of him.

      Then Ayesha spoke. “Forgive me, my guest,” she said softly,
      addressing him, “if I have shocked thee with my justice.”

      “Forgive thee, thou fiend,” roared poor Leo, wringing his hands
      in his rage and grief. “Forgive thee, thou murderess! By Heaven,
      I will kill thee if I can!”

      “Nay, nay,” she answered in the same soft voice, “thou dost not
      understand—the time has come for thee to learn. _Thou_ art my
      love, my Kallikrates, my Beautiful, my Strong! For two thousand
      years, Kallikrates, have I waited for _thee_, and now at length
      thou hast come back to me; and as for this woman,” pointing to
      the corpse, “she stood between me and thee, and therefore have I
      laid her in the dust, Kallikrates.”

      “It is an accursed lie!” said Leo. “My name is not Kallikrates! I
      am Leo Vincey; my ancestor was Kallikrates—at least, I believe he
      was.”

      “Ah, thou sayest it—thine ancestor was Kallikrates, and thou,
      even thou, art Kallikrates reborn, come back—and mine own dear
      lord!”

      “I am not Kallikrates, and, as for being thy lord, or having
      aught to do with thee, I had sooner be the lord of a fiend from
      hell, for she would be better than thou.”

      “Sayest thou so—sayest thou so, Kallikrates? Nay, but thou hast
      not seen me for so long a time that no memory remains. Yet am I
      very fair, Kallikrates!”

      “I hate thee, murderess, and I have no wish to see thee. What is
      it to me how fair thou art? I hate thee, I say.”

      “Yet within a very little space shalt thou creep to my knee, and
      swear that thou dost love me,” answered Ayesha, with a sweet,
      mocking laugh. “Come, there is no time like the present time,
      here before this dead girl who loved thee, let us put it to the
      proof.

      “Look now on me, Kallikrates!” and with a sudden motion she shook
      her gauzy covering from her, and stood forth in her low kirtle
      and her snaky zone, in her glorious radiant beauty and her
      imperial grace, rising from her wrappings, as it were, like Venus
      from the wave, or Galatea from her marble, or a beatified spirit
      from the tomb. She stood forth, and fixed her deep and glowing
      eyes upon Leo’s eyes, and I saw his clenched fists unclasp, and
      his set and quivering features relax beneath her gaze. I saw his
      wonder and astonishment grow into admiration, and then into
      fascination, and the more he struggled the more I saw the power
      of her dread beauty fasten on him and take possession of his
      senses, drugging them, and drawing the heart out of him. Did I
      not know the process? Had not I, who was twice his age, gone
      through it myself? Was I not going through it afresh even then,
      although her sweet and passionate gaze was not for me? Yes, alas,
      I was! Alas, that I should have to confess that at that very
      moment I was rent by mad and furious jealousy. I could have flown
      at him, shame upon me! The woman had confounded and almost
      destroyed my moral sense, as she was bound to confound all who
      looked upon her superhuman loveliness. But—I do not quite know
      how—I got the better of myself, and once more turned to see the
      climax of the tragedy.

      “Oh, great Heaven!” gasped Leo, “art thou a woman?”

      “A woman in truth—in very truth—and thine own spouse,
      Kallikrates!” she answered, stretching out her rounded ivory arms
      towards him, and smiling, ah, so sweetly!

      He looked and looked, and slowly I perceived that he was drawing
      nearer to her. Suddenly his eye fell upon the corpse of poor
      Ustane, and he shuddered and stopped.

      “How can I?” he said hoarsely. “Thou art a murderess; she loved
      me.”

      Observe, he was already forgetting that he had loved her.

      “It is naught,” she murmured, and her voice sounded sweet as the
      night-wind passing through the trees. “It is naught at all. If I
      have sinned, let my beauty answer for my sin. If I have sinned,
      it is for love of thee: let my sin, therefore, be put away and
      forgotten;” and once more she stretched out her arms and
      whispered “_Come_,” and then in another few seconds it was all
      over.

      I saw him struggle—I saw him even turn to fly; but her eyes drew
      him more strongly than iron bonds, and the magic of her beauty
      and concentrated will and passion entered into him and
      overpowered him—ay, even there, in the presence of the body of
      the woman who had loved him well enough to die for him. It sounds
      horrible and wicked enough, but he should not be too greatly
      blamed, and be sure his sin will find him out. The temptress who
      drew him into evil was more than human, and her beauty was
      greater than the loveliness of the daughters of men.

      I looked up again and now her perfect form lay in his arms, and
      her lips were pressed against his own; and thus, with the corpse
      of his dead love for an altar, did Leo Vincey plight his troth to
      her red-handed murderess—plight it for ever and a day. For those
      who sell themselves into a like dominion, paying down the price
      of their own honour, and throwing their soul into the balance to
      sink the scale to the level of their lusts, can hope for no
      deliverance here or hereafter. As they have sown, so shall they
      reap and reap, even when the poppy flowers of passion have
      withered in their hands, and their harvest is but bitter tares,
      garnered in satiety.

      Suddenly, with a snake-like motion, she seemed to slip from his
      embrace, and then again broke out into her low laugh of
      triumphant mockery.

      “Did I not tell thee that within a little space thou wouldst
      creep to my knee, oh Kallikrates? And surely the space has not
      been a great one!”

      Leo groaned in shame and misery; for though he was overcome and
      stricken down, he was not so lost as to be unaware of the depth
      of the degradation to which he had sunk. On the contrary, his
      better nature rose up in arms against his fallen self, as I saw
      clearly enough later on.

      Ayesha laughed again, and then quickly veiled herself, and made a
      sign to the girl mute, who had been watching the whole scene with
      curious startled eyes. The girl left, and presently returned,
      followed by two male mutes, to whom the Queen made another sign.
      Thereon they all three seized the body of poor Ustane by the
      arms, and dragged it heavily down the cavern and away through the
      curtains at the end. Leo watched it for a little while, and then
      covered his eyes with his hand, and it too, to my excited fancy,
      seemed to watch us as it went.

“There passes the dead past,” said Ayesha, solemnly, as the curtains
shook and fell back into their places, when the ghastly procession had
vanished behind them. And then, with one of those extraordinary
transitions of which I have already spoken, she again threw off her
veil, and broke out, after the ancient and poetic fashion of the
dwellers in Arabia,[1] into a pæan of triumph or epithalamium, which,
wild and beautiful as it was, is exceedingly difficult to render into
English, and ought by rights to be sung to the music of a cantata,
rather than written and read. It was divided into two parts—one
descriptive or definitive, and the other personal; and, as nearly as I
can remember, ran as follows:—

 [1] Among the ancient Arabians the power of poetic declamation, either
 in verse or prose, was held in the highest honour and esteem, and he
 who excelled in it was known as “Khâteb,” or Orator. Every year a
 general assembly was held at which the rival poets repeated their
 compositions, when those poems which were judged to be the best were,
 so soon as the knowledge and the art of writing became general,
 inscribed on silk in letters of gold, and publicly exhibited, being
 known as “Al Modhahabât,” or golden verses. In the poem given above by
 Mr. Holly, Ayesha evidently followed the traditional poetic manner of
 her people, which was to embody their thoughts in a series of somewhat
 disconnected sentences, each remarkable for its beauty and the grace
 of its expression. —Editor.

      Love is like a flower in the desert.

      It is like the aloe of Arabia that blooms but once and dies; it
      blooms in the salt emptiness of Life, and the brightness of its
      beauty is set upon the waste as a star is set upon a storm.

      It hath the sun above that is the Spirit, and above it blows the
      air of its divinity.

      At the echoing of a step, Love blooms, I say; I say Love blooms,
      and bends her beauty down to him who passeth by.

      He plucketh it, yea, he plucketh the red cup that is full of
      honey, and beareth it away; away across the desert, away till the
      flower be withered, away till the desert be done.

      There is only one perfect flower in the wilderness of Life.

      That flower is Love!

      There is only one fixed star in the midsts of our wandering.

      That star is Love!

      There is only one hope in our despairing night.

      That hope is Love!

      All else is false. All else is shadow moving upon water. All else
      is wind and vanity.

      Who shall say what is the weight or the measure of Love?

      It is born of the flesh, it dwelleth in the spirit. From each
      doth it draw its comfort.

      For beauty it is as a star.

      Many are its shapes, but all are beautiful, and none know where
      the star rose, or the horizon where it shall set.

      Then, turning to Leo, and laying her hand upon his shoulder, she
      went on in a fuller and more triumphant tone, speaking in
      balanced sentences that gradually grew and swelled from idealised
      prose into pure and majestic verse:—

      Long have I loved thee, oh, my love; yet has my love not
      lessened.

      Long have I waited for thee, and behold my reward is at hand—is
      here!

      Far away I saw thee once, and thou wast taken from me.

      Then in a grave sowed I the seed of patience, and shone upon it
      with the sun of hope, and watered it with tears of repentance,
      and breathed on it with the breath of my knowledge. And now, lo!
      it hath sprung up, and borne fruit. Lo! out of the grave hath it
      sprung. Yea, from among the dry bones and ashes of the dead.

      I have waited and my reward is with me.

      I have overcome Death, and Death brought back to me him that was
      dead.

      Therefore do I rejoice, for fair is the future.

      Green are the paths that we shall tread across the everlasting
      meadows.

      The hour is at hand. Night hath fled away into the valleys.

      The dawn kisseth the mountain tops.

      Soft shall we live, my love, and easy shall we go.

      Crowned shall we be with the diadem of Kings.

      Worshipping and wonder struck all peoples of the world, Blinded
      shall fall before our beauty and might.

      From time unto times shall our greatness thunder on, Rolling like
      a chariot through the dust of endless days.

      Laughing shall we speed in our victory and pomp, Laughing like
      the Daylight as he leaps along the hills.

      Onward, still triumphant to a triumph ever new!

      Onward, in our power to a power unattained!

      Onward, never weary, clad with splendour for a robe!

      Till accomplished be our fate, and the night is rushing down.

      She paused in her strange and most thrilling allegorical chant,
      of which I am, unfortunately, only able to give the burden, and
      that feebly enough, and then said—

      “Perchance thou dost not believe my word, Kallikrates—perchance
      thou thinkest that I do delude thee, and that I have not lived
      these many years, and that thou hast not been born again to me.
      Nay, look not so—put away that pale cast of doubt, for oh be sure
      herein can error find no foothold! Sooner shall the suns forget
      their course and the swallow miss her nest, than my soul shall
      swear a lie and be led astray from thee, Kallikrates. Blind me,
      take away mine eyes, and let the darkness utterly fence me in,
      and still mine ears would catch the tone of thy unforgotten
      voice, striking more loud against the portals of my sense than
      can the call of brazen-throated clarions:—stop up mine hearing
      also, and let a thousand touch me on the brow, and I would name
      thee out of all:—yea, rob me of every sense, and see me stand
      deaf and blind, and dumb, and with nerves that cannot weigh the
      value of a touch, yet would my spirit leap within me like a
      quickening child and cry unto my heart, behold Kallikrates!
      behold, thou watcher, the watches of thy night are ended! behold
      thou who seekest in the night season, thy morning Star ariseth.”

      She paused awhile and then continued, “But stay, if thy heart is
      yet hardened against the mighty truth and thou dost require a
      further pledge of that which thou dost find too deep to
      understand, even now shall it be given to thee, and to thee also,
      oh my Holly. Bear each one of you a lamp, and follow after me
      whither I shall lead you.”

      Without stopping to think—indeed, speaking for myself, I had
      almost abandoned the function in circumstances under which to
      think seemed to be absolutely useless, since thought fell hourly
      helpless against a black wall of wonder—we took the lamps and
      followed her. Going to the end of her “boudoir,” she raised a
      curtain and revealed a little stair of the sort that is so common
      in these dim caves of Kôr. As we hurried down the stair I
      observed that the steps were worn in the centre to such an extent
      that some of them had been reduced from seven and a half inches,
      at which I guessed their original height, to about three and a
      half. Now, all the other steps that I had seen in the caves were
      practically unworn, as was to be expected, seeing that the only
      traffic which ever passed upon them was that of those who bore a
      fresh burden to the tomb. Therefore this fact struck my notice
      with that curious force with which little things do strike us
      when our minds are absolutely overwhelmed by a sudden rush of
      powerful sensations; beaten flat, as it were, like a sea beneath
      the first burst of a hurricane, so that every little object on
      the surface starts into an unnatural prominence.

      At the bottom of the staircase I stood and stared at the worn
      steps, and Ayesha, turning, saw me.

      “Wonderest thou whose are the feet that have worn away the rock,
      my Holly?” she asked. “They are mine—even mine own light feet! I
      can remember when those stairs were fresh and level, but for two
      thousand years and more have I gone down hither day by day, and
      see, my sandals have worn out the solid rock!”

      I made no answer, but I do not think that anything that I had
      heard or seen brought home to my limited understanding so clear a
      sense of this being’s overwhelming antiquity as that hard rock
      hollowed out by her soft white feet. How many hundreds of
      thousands of times must she have passed up and down that stair to
      bring about such a result?

      The stair led to a tunnel, and a few paces down the tunnel was
      one of the usual curtain-hung doorways, a glance at which told me
      that it was the same where I had been a witness of that terrible
      scene by the leaping flame. I recognised the pattern of the
      curtain, and the sight of it brought the whole event vividly
      before my eyes, and made me tremble even at its memory. Ayesha
      entered the tomb (for it was a tomb), and we followed her—I, for
      one, rejoicing that the mystery of the place was about to be
      cleared up, and yet afraid to face its solution.




XXI.
THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET


      “See now the place where I have slept for these two thousand
      years,” said Ayesha, taking the lamp from Leo’s hand and holding
      it above her head. Its rays fell upon a little hollow in the
      floor, where I had seen the leaping flame, but the fire was out
      now. They fell upon the white form stretched there beneath its
      wrappings upon its bed of stone, upon the fretted carving of the
      tomb, and upon another shelf of stone opposite the one on which
      the body lay, and separated from it by the breadth of the cave.

      “Here,” went on Ayesha, laying her hand upon the rock—“here have
      I slept night by night for all these generations, with but a
      cloak to cover me. It did not become me that I should lie soft
      when my spouse yonder,” and she pointed to the rigid form, “lay
      stiff in death. Here night by night have I slept in his cold
      company—till, thou seest, this thick slab, like the stairs down
      which we passed, has worn thin with the tossing of my form—so
      faithful have I been to thee even in thy space of sleep,
      Kallikrates. And now, mine own, thou shalt see a wonderful
      thing—living, thou shalt behold thyself dead—for well have I
      tended thee during all these years, Kallikrates. Art thou
      prepared?”

      We made no answer, but gazed at each other with frightened eyes,
      the whole scene was so dreadful and so solemn. Ayesha advanced,
      and laid her hand upon the corner of the shroud, and once more
      spoke.

      “Be not affrighted,” she said; “though the thing seem wonderful
      to thee—all we who live have thus lived before; nor is the very
      shape that holds us a stranger to the sun! Only we know it not,
      because memory writes no record, and earth hath gathered in the
      earth she lent us, for none have saved our glory from the grave.
      But I, by my arts and by the arts of those dead men of Kôr which
      I have learned, have held thee back, oh Kallikrates, from the
      dust, that the waxen stamp of beauty on thy face should ever rest
      before mine eye. ‘Twas a mask that memory might fill, serving to
      fashion out thy presence from the past, and give it strength to
      wander in the habitations of my thought, clad in a mummery of
      life that stayed my appetite with visions of dead days.

      “Behold now, let the Dead and Living meet! Across the gulf of
      Time they still are one. Time hath no power against Identity,
      though sleep the merciful hath blotted out the tablets of our
      mind, and with oblivion sealed the sorrows that else would hound
      us from life to life, stuffing the brain with gathered griefs
      till it burst in the madness of uttermost despair. Still are they
      one, for the wrappings of our sleep shall roll away as
      thunder-clouds before the wind; the frozen voice of the past
      shall melt in music like mountain snows beneath the sun; and the
      weeping and the laughter of the lost hours shall be heard once
      more most sweetly echoing up the cliffs of immeasurable time.

      “Ay, the sleep shall roll away, and the voices shall be heard,
      when down the completed chain, whereof our each existence is a
      link, the lightning of the Spirit hath passed to work out the
      purpose of our being; quickening and fusing those separated days
      of life, and shaping them to a staff whereon we may safely lean
      as we wend to our appointed fate.

      “Therefore, have no fear, Kallikrates, when thou—living, and but
      lately born—shalt look upon thine own departed self, who breathed
      and died so long ago. I do but turn one page in thy Book of
      Being, and show thee what is writ thereon.

      “_Behold!_”

      With a sudden motion she drew the shroud from the cold form, and
      let the lamplight play upon it. I looked, and then shrank back
      terrified; since, say what she might in explanation, the sight
      was an uncanny one—for her explanations were beyond the grasp of
      our finite minds, and when they were stripped from the mists of
      vague esoteric philosophy, and brought into conflict with the
      cold and horrifying fact, did not do much to break its force. For
      there, stretched upon the stone bier before us, robed in white
      and perfectly preserved, was what appeared to be the body of Leo
      Vincey. I stared from Leo, standing _there_ alive, to Leo lying
      _there_ dead, and could see no difference; except, perhaps, that
      the body on the bier looked older. Feature for feature they were
      the same, even down to the crop of little golden curls, which was
      Leo’s most uncommon beauty. It even seemed to me, as I looked,
      that the expression on the dead man’s face resembled that which I
      had sometimes seen upon Leo’s when he was plunged into profound
      sleep. I can only sum up the closeness of the resemblance by
      saying that I never saw twins so exactly similar as that dead and
      living pair.

      I turned to see what effect was produced upon Leo by the sight of
      his dead self, and found it to be one of partial stupefaction. He
      stood for two or three minutes staring, and said nothing, and
      when at last he spoke it was only to ejaculate—

      “Cover it up, and take me away.”

      “Nay, wait, Kallikrates,” said Ayesha, who, standing with the
      lamp raised above her head, flooding with its light her own rich
      beauty and the cold wonder of the death-clothed form upon the
      bier, resembled an inspired Sibyl rather than a woman, as she
      rolled out her majestic sentences with a grandeur and a freedom
      of utterance which I am, alas! quite unable to reproduce.

      “Wait, I would show thee something, that no tittle of my crime
      may be hidden from thee. Do thou, oh Holly, open the garment on
      the breast of the dead Kallikrates, for perchance my lord may
      fear to touch it himself.”

      I obeyed with trembling hands. It seemed a desecration and an
      unhallowed thing to touch that sleeping image of the live man by
      my side. Presently his broad chest was bare, and there upon it,
      right over the heart, was a wound, evidently inflicted with a
      spear.

      “Thou seest, Kallikrates,” she said. “Know then that it was _I_
      who slew thee: in the Place of Life _I_ gave thee death. I slew
      thee because of the Egyptian Amenartas, whom thou didst love, for
      by her wiles she held thy heart, and her I could not smite as but
      now I smote that woman, for she was too strong for me. In my
      haste and bitter anger I slew thee, and now for all these days
      have I lamented thee, and waited for thy coming. And thou hast
      come, and none can stand between thee and me, and of a truth now
      for death I will give thee life—not life eternal, for that none
      can give, but life and youth that shall endure for thousands upon
      thousands of years, and with it pomp, and power, and wealth, and
      all things that are good and beautiful, such as have been to no
      man before thee, nor shall be to any man who comes after. And now
      one thing more, and thou shalt rest and make ready for the day of
      thy new birth. Thou seest this body, which was thine own. For all
      these centuries it hath been my cold comfort and my companion,
      but now I need it no more, for I have thy living presence, and it
      can but serve to stir up memories of that which I would fain
      forget. Let it therefore go back to the dust from which I held
      it.

      “Behold! I have prepared against this happy hour!” And going to
      the other shelf or stone ledge, which she said had served her for
      a bed, she took from it a large vitrified double-handed vase, the
      mouth of which was tied up with a bladder. This she loosed, and
      then, having bent down and gently kissed the white forehead of
      the dead man, she undid the vase, and sprinkled its contents
      carefully over the form, taking, I observed, the greatest
      precautions against any drop of them touching us or herself, and
      then poured out what remained of the liquid upon the chest and
      head. Instantly a dense vapour arose, and the cave was filled
      with choking fumes that prevented us from seeing anything while
      the deadly acid (for I presume it was some tremendous preparation
      of that sort) did its work. From the spot where the body lay came
      a fierce fizzing and cracking sound, which ceased, however,
      before the fumes had cleared away. At last they were all gone,
      except a little cloud that still hung over the corpse. In a
      couple of minutes more this too had vanished, and, wonderful as
      it may seem, it is a fact that on the stone bench that had
      supported the mortal remains of the ancient Kallikrates for so
      many centuries there was now nothing to be seen but a few
      handfuls of smoking white powder. The acid had utterly destroyed
      the body, and even in places eaten into the stone. Ayesha stooped
      down, and, taking a handful of this powder in her grasp, threw it
      into the air, saying at the same time, in a voice of calm
      solemnity—

      “Dust to dust!—the past to the past!—the dead to the
      dead!—Kallikrates is dead, and is born again!”

      The ashes floated noiselessly to the rocky floor, and we stood in
      awed silence and watched them fall, too overcome for words.

      “Now leave me,” she said, “and sleep if ye may. I must watch and
      think, for to-morrow night we go hence, and the time is long
      since I trod the path that we must follow.”

      Accordingly we bowed, and left her.

      As we passed to our own apartment I peeped into Job’s sleeping
      place, to see how he fared, for he had gone away just before our
      interview with the murdered Ustane, quite prostrated by the
      terrors of the Amahagger festivity. He was sleeping soundly, good
      honest fellow that he was, and I rejoiced to think that his
      nerves, which, like those of most uneducated people, were far
      from strong, had been spared the closing scenes of this dreadful
      day. Then we entered our own chamber, and here at last poor Leo,
      who, ever since he had looked upon that frozen image of his
      living self, had been in a state not far removed from
      stupefaction, burst out into a torrent of grief. Now that he was
      no longer in the presence of the dread _She_, his sense of the
      awfulness of all that had happened, and more especially of the
      wicked murder of Ustane, who was bound to him by ties so close,
      broke upon him like a storm, and lashed him into an agony of
      remorse and terror which was painful to witness. He cursed
      himself—he cursed the hour when we had first seen the writing on
      the sherd, which was being so mysteriously verified, and bitterly
      he cursed his own weakness. Ayesha he dared not curse—who dared
      speak evil of such a woman, whose consciousness, for aught we
      knew, was watching us at the very moment?

      “What am I to do, old fellow?” he groaned, resting his head
      against my shoulder in the extremity of his grief. “I let her be
      killed—not that I could help that, but within five minutes I was
      kissing her murderess over her body. I am a degraded brute, but I
      cannot resist that” (and here his voice sank)—“that awful
      sorceress. I know I shall do it again to-morrow; I know that I am
      in her power for always; if I never saw her again I should never
      think of anybody else during all my life; I must follow her as a
      needle follows a magnet; I would not go away now if I could; I
      could not leave her, my legs would not carry me, but my mind is
      still clear enough, and in my mind I hate her—at least, I think
      so. It is all so horrible; and that—that body! What can I make of
      it? It was _I_! I am sold into bondage, old fellow, and she will
      take my soul as the price of herself!”

      Then, for the first time, I told him that I was in a but very
      little better position; and I am bound to say that,
      notwithstanding his own infatuation, he had the decency to
      sympathise with me. Perhaps he did not think it worth while being
      jealous, realising that he had no cause so far as the lady was
      concerned. I went on to suggest that we should try to run away,
      but we soon rejected the project as futile, and, to be perfectly
      honest, I do not believe that either of us would really have left
      Ayesha even if some superior power had suddenly offered to convey
      us from these gloomy caves and set us down in Cambridge. We could
      no more have left her than a moth can leave the light that
      destroys it. We were like confirmed opium-eaters: in our moments
      of reason we well knew the deadly nature of our pursuit, but we
      certainly were not prepared to abandon its terrible delights.

      No man who once had seen _She_ unveiled, and heard the music of
      her voice, and drunk in the bitter wisdom of her words, would
      willingly give up the sight for a whole sea of placid joys. How
      much more, then, was this likely to be so when, as in Leo’s case,
      to put myself out of the question, this extraordinary creature
      declared her utter and absolute devotion, and gave what appeared
      to be proofs of its having lasted for some two thousand years?

      No doubt she was a wicked person, and no doubt she had murdered
      Ustane when she stood in her path, but then she was very
      faithful, and by a law of nature man is apt to think but lightly
      of a woman’s crimes, especially if that woman be beautiful, and
      the crime be committed for the love of him.

And then, for the rest, when had such a chance ever come to a man
before as that which now lay in Leo’s hand? True, in uniting himself to
this dread woman, he would place his life under the influence of a
mysterious creature of evil tendencies,[1] but then that would be
likely enough to happen to him in any ordinary marriage. On the other
hand, however, no ordinary marriage could bring him such awful
beauty—for awful is the only word that can describe it—such divine
devotion, such wisdom, and command over the secrets of nature, and the
place and power that they must win, or, lastly, the royal crown of
unending youth, if indeed she could give that. No, on the whole, it is
not wonderful that, though Leo was plunged in bitter shame and grief,
such as any gentleman would have felt under the circumstances, he was
not ready to entertain the idea of running away from his extraordinary
fortune.

 [1] After some months of consideration of this statement I am bound to
 confess that I am not quite satisfied of its truth. It is perfectly
 true that Ayesha committed a murder, but I shrewdly suspect that, were
 we endowed with the same absolute power, and if we had the same
 tremendous interest at stake, we would be very apt to do likewise
 under parallel circumstances. Also, it must be remembered that she
 looked on it as an execution for disobedience under a system which
 made the slightest disobedience punishable by death. Putting aside
 this question of the murder, her evil-doing resolves itself into the
 expression of views and the acknowledgment of motives which are
 contrary to our preaching if not to our practice. Now at first sight
 this might be fairly taken as a proof of an evil nature, but when we
 come to consider the great antiquity of the individual it becomes
 doubtful if it was anything more than the natural cynicism which
 arises from age and bitter experience, and the possession of
 extraordinary powers of observation. It is a well known fact that very
 often, putting the period of boyhood out of the question, the older we
 grow the more cynical and hardened we get; indeed many of us are only
 saved by timely death from utter moral petrifaction if not moral
 corruption. No one will deny that a young man is on the average better
 than an old one, for he is without that experience of the order of
 things that in certain thoughtful dispositions can hardly fail to
 produce cynicism, and that disregard of acknowledged methods and
 established custom which we call evil. Now the oldest man upon the
 earth was but a babe compared to Ayesha, and the wisest man upon the
 earth was not one-third as wise. And the fruit of her wisdom was this,
 that there was but one thing worth living for, and that was Love in
 its highest sense, and to gain that good thing she was not prepared to
 stop at trifles. This is really the sum of her evil doings, and it
 must be remembered, on the other hand, that, whatever may be thought
 of them, she had some virtues developed to a degree very uncommon in
 either sex—constancy, for instance.—L. H. H.

      My own opinion is that he would have been mad if he had done so.
      But then I confess that my statement on the matter must be
      accepted with qualifications. I am in love with Ayesha myself to
      this day, and I would rather have been the object of her
      affection for one short week than that of any other woman in the
      world for a whole lifetime. And let me add that, if anybody who
      doubts this statement, and thinks me foolish for making it, could
      have seen Ayesha draw her veil and flash out in beauty on his
      gaze, his view would exactly coincide with my own. Of course, I
      am speaking of any _man_. We never had the advantage of a lady’s
      opinion of Ayesha, but I think it quite possible that she would
      have regarded the Queen with dislike, would have expressed her
      disapproval in some more or less pointed manner, and ultimately
      have got herself blasted.

      For two hours or more Leo and I sat with shaken nerves and
      frightened eyes, and talked over the miraculous events through
      which we were passing. It seemed like a dream or a fairy tale,
      instead of the solemn, sober fact. Who would have believed that
      the writing on the potsherd was not only true, but that we should
      live to verify its truth, and that we two seekers should find her
      who was sought, patiently awaiting our coming in the tombs of
      Kôr? Who would have thought that in the person of Leo this
      mysterious woman should, as she believed, discover the being whom
      she awaited from century to century, and whose former earthly
      habitation she had till this very night preserved? But so it was.
      In the face of all we had seen it was difficult for us as
      ordinary reasoning men any longer to doubt its truth, and
      therefore at last, with humble hearts and a deep sense of the
      impotence of human knowledge, and the insolence of its assumption
      that denies that to be possible which it has no experience of, we
      laid ourselves down to sleep, leaving our fates in the hands of
      that watching Providence which had thus chosen to allow us to
      draw the veil of human ignorance, and reveal to us for good or
      evil some glimpse of the possibilities of life.




XXII.
JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT


      It was nine o’clock on the following morning when Job, who still
      looked scared and frightened, came in to call me, and at the same
      time breathe his gratitude at finding us alive in our beds, which
      it appeared was more than he had expected. When I told him of the
      awful end of poor Ustane he was even more grateful at our
      survival, and much shocked, though Ustane had been no favourite
      of his, or he of hers, for the matter of that. She called him
      “pig” in bastard Arabic, and he called her “hussy” in good
      English, but these amenities were forgotten in the face of the
      catastrophe that had overwhelmed her at the hands of her Queen.

      “I don’t want to say anything as mayn’t be agreeable, sir,” said
      Job, when he had finished exclaiming at my tale, “but it’s my
      opinion that that there _She_ is the old gentleman himself, or
      perhaps his wife, if he has one, which I suppose he has, for he
      couldn’t be so wicked all by himself. The Witch of Endor was a
      fool to her, sir: bless you, she would make no more of raising
      every gentleman in the Bible out of these here beastly tombs than
      I should of growing cress on an old flannel. It’s a country of
      devils, this is, sir, and she’s the master one of the lot; and if
      ever we get out of it it will be more than I expect to do. I
      don’t see no way out of it. That witch isn’t likely to let a fine
      young man like Mr. Leo go.”

      “Come,” I said, “at any rate she saved his life.”

      “Yes, and she’ll take his soul to pay for it. She’ll make him a
      witch, like herself. I say it’s wicked to have anything to do
      with those sort of people. Last night, sir, I lay awake and read
      in my little Bible that my poor old mother gave me about what is
      going to happen to sorceresses and them sort, till my hair stood
      on end. Lord, how the old lady would stare if she saw where her
      Job had got to!”

      “Yes, it’s a queer country, and a queer people too, Job,” I
      answered, with a sigh, for, though I am not superstitious like
      Job, I admit to a natural shrinking (which will not bear
      investigation) from the things that are above Nature.

      “You are right, sir,” he answered, “and if you won’t think me
      very foolish, I should like to say something to you now that Mr.
      Leo is out of the way”—(Leo had got up early and gone for a
      stroll)—“and that is that I know it is the last country as ever I
      shall see in this world. I had a dream last night, and I dreamed
      that I saw my old father with a kind of night-shirt on him,
      something like these folks wear when they want to be in
      particular full-dress, and a bit of that feathery grass in his
      hand, which he may have gathered on the way, for I saw lots of it
      yesterday about three hundred yards from the mouth of this
      beastly cave.

      “’Job,’ he said to me, solemn like, and yet with a kind of
      satisfaction shining through him, more like a Methody parson when
      he has sold a neighbour a marked horse for a sound one and
      cleared twenty pounds by the job than anything I can think
      on—’Job, time’s up, Job; but I never did expect to have to come
      and hunt you out in this ‘ere place, Job. Such ado as I have had
      to nose you up; it wasn’t friendly to give your poor old father
      such a run, let alone that a wonderful lot of bad characters hail
      from this place Kôr.’”

      “Regular cautions,” I suggested.

      “Yes, sir—of course, sir, that’s just what he said they
      was—’cautions, downright scorchers’—sir, and I’m sure I don’t
      doubt it, seeing what I know of them, and their hot-potting
      ways,” went on Job sadly. “Anyway, he was sure that time was up,
      and went away saying that we should see more than we cared for of
      each other soon, and I suppose he was a-thinking of the fact that
      father and I never could hit it off together for longer nor three
      days, and I daresay that things will be similar when we meet
      again.”

      “Surely,” I said, “you don’t think that you are going to die
      because you dreamed you saw your old father; if one dies because
      one dreams of one’s father, what happens to a man who dreams of
      his mother-in-law?”

      “Ah, sir, you’re laughing at me,” said Job; “but, you see, you
      didn’t know my old father. If it had been anybody else—my Aunt
      Mary, for instance, who never made much of a job—I should not
      have thought so much of it; but my father was that idle, which he
      shouldn’t have been with seventeen children, that he would never
      have put himself out to come here just to see the place. No, sir;
      I know that he meant business. Well, sir, I can’t help it; I
      suppose every man must go some time or other, though it is a hard
      thing to die in a place like this, where Christian burial isn’t
      to be had for its weight in gold. I’ve tried to be a good man,
      sir, and do my duty honest, and if it wasn’t for the supercilus
      kind of way in which father carried on last night—a sort of
      sniffing at me as it were, as though he hadn’t no opinion of my
      references and testimonials—I should feel easy enough in my mind.
      Any way, sir, I’ve been a good servant to you and Mr. Leo, bless
      him!—why, it seems but the other day that I used to lead him
      about the streets with a penny whip;—and if ever you get out of
      this place—which, as father didn’t allude to you, perhaps you
      may—I hope you will think kindly of my whitened bones, and never
      have anything more to do with Greek writing on flower-pots, sir,
      if I may make so bold as to say so.”

      “Come, come, Job,” I said seriously, “this is all nonsense, you
      know. You mustn’t be silly enough to go getting such ideas into
      your head. We’ve lived through some queer things, and I hope that
      we may go on doing so.”

      “No, sir,” answered Job, in a tone of conviction that jarred on
      me unpleasantly, “it isn’t nonsense. I’m a doomed man, and I feel
      it, and a wonderful uncomfortable feeling it is, sir, for one
      can’t help wondering how it’s going to come about. If you are
      eating your dinner you think of poison and it goes against your
      stomach, and if you are walking along these dark rabbit-burrows
      you think of knives, and Lord, don’t you just shiver about the
      back! I ain’t particular, sir, provided it’s sharp, like that
      poor girl, who, now that she’s gone, I am sorry to have spoke
      hard on, though I don’t approve of her morals in getting married,
      which I consider too quick to be decent. Still, sir,” and poor
      Job turned a shade paler as he said it, “I do hope it won’t be
      that hot-pot game.”

      “Nonsense,” I broke in angrily, “nonsense!”

      “Very well, sir,” said Job, “it isn’t my place to differ from
      you, sir, but if you happen to be going anywhere, sir, I should
      be obliged if you could manage to take me with you, seeing that I
      shall be glad to have a friendly face to look at when the time
      comes, just to help one through, as it were. And now, sir, I’ll
      be getting the breakfast,” and he went, leaving me in a very
      uncomfortable state of mind. I was deeply attached to old Job,
      who was one of the best and honestest men I have ever had to do
      with in any class of life, and really more of a friend than a
      servant, and the mere idea of anything happening to him brought a
      lump into my throat. Beneath all his ludicrous talk I could see
      that he himself was quite convinced that something was going to
      happen, and though in most cases these convictions turn out to be
      utter moonshine—and this particular one especially was to be
      amply accounted for by the gloomy and unaccustomed surroundings
      in which its victim was placed—still it did more or less carry a
      chill to my heart, as any dread that is obviously a genuine
      object of belief is apt to do, however absurd the belief may be.
      Presently the breakfast arrived, and with it Leo, who had been
      taking a walk outside the cave—to clear his mind, he said—and
      very glad I was to see both, for they gave me a respite from my
      gloomy thoughts. After breakfast we went for another walk, and
      watched some of the Amahagger sowing a plot of ground with the
      grain from which they make their beer. This they did in
      scriptural fashion—a man with a bag made of goat’s hide fastened
      round his waist walking up and down the plot and scattering the
      seed as he went. It was a positive relief to see one of these
      dreadful people do anything so homely and pleasant as sow a
      field, perhaps because it seemed to link them, as it were, with
      the rest of humanity.

      As we were returning Billali met us, and informed us that it was
      _She’s_ pleasure that we should wait upon her, and accordingly we
      entered her presence, not without trepidation, for Ayesha was
      certainly an exception to the rule. Familiarity with her might
      and did breed passion and wonder and horror, but it certainly did
      _not_ breed contempt.

      We were as usual shown in by the mutes, and after these had
      retired Ayesha unveiled, and once more bade Leo embrace her,
      which, notwithstanding his heart-searchings of the previous
      night, he did with more alacrity and fervour than in strictness
      courtesy required.

      She laid her white hand on his head, and looked him fondly in the
      eyes. “Dost thou wonder, my Kallikrates,” she said, “when thou
      shalt call me all thine own, and when we shall of a truth be for
      one another and to one another? I will tell thee. First, must
      thou be even as I am, not immortal indeed, for that I am not, but
      so cased and hardened against the attacks of Time that his arrows
      shall glance from the armour of thy vigorous life as the sunbeams
      glance from water. As yet I may not mate with thee, for thou and
      I are different, and the very brightness of my being would burn
      thee up, and perchance destroy thee. Thou couldst not even endure
      to look upon me for too long a time lest thine eyes should ache,
      and thy senses swim, and therefore” (with a little nod) “shall I
      presently veil myself again.” (This by the way she did not do.)
      “No: listen, thou shalt not be tried beyond endurance, for this
      very evening, an hour before the sun goes down, shall we start
      hence, and by to-morrow’s dark, if all goes well, and the road is
      not lost to me, which I pray it may not be, shall we stand in the
      place of Life, and thou shalt bathe in the fire, and come forth
      glorified, as no man ever was before thee, and then, Kallikrates,
      shalt thou call me wife, and I will call thee husband.”

      Leo muttered something in answer to this astonishing statement, I
      do not know what, and she laughed a little at his confusion, and
      went on.

      “And thou, too, oh Holly; on thee also will I confer this boon,
      and then of a truth shalt thou be evergreen, and this will I
      do—well, because thou hast pleased me, Holly, for thou art not
      altogether a fool, like most of the sons of men, and because,
      though thou hast a school of philosophy as full of nonsense as
      those of the old days, yet hast thou not forgotten how to turn a
      pretty phrase about a lady’s eyes.”

      “Hulloa, old fellow!” whispered Leo, with a return of his old
      cheerfulness, “have you been paying compliments? I should never
      have thought it of you!”

      “I thank thee, oh Ayesha,” I replied, with as much dignity as I
      could command, “but if there be such a place as thou dost
      describe, and if in this strange place there may be found a fiery
      virtue that can hold off Death when he comes to pluck us by the
      hand, yet would I none of it. For me, oh Ayesha, the world has
      not proved so soft a nest that I would lie in it for ever. A
      stony-hearted mother is our earth, and stones are the bread she
      gives her children for their daily food. Stones to eat and bitter
      water for their thirst, and stripes for tender nurture. Who would
      endure this for many lives? Who would so load up his back with
      memories of lost hours and loves, and of his neighbour’s sorrows
      that he cannot lessen, and wisdom that brings not consolation?
      Hard is it to die, because our delicate flesh doth shrink back
      from the worm it will not feel, and from that unknown which the
      winding-sheet doth curtain from our view. But harder still, to my
      fancy, would it be to live on, green in the leaf and fair, but
      dead and rotten at the core, and feel that other secret worm of
      recollection gnawing ever at the heart.”

      “Bethink thee, Holly,” she said; “yet doth long life and strength
      and beauty beyond measure mean power and all things that are dear
      to man.”

      “And what, oh Queen,” I answered, “are those things that are dear
      to man? Are they not bubbles? Is not ambition but an endless
      ladder by which no height is ever climbed till the last
      unreachable rung is mounted? For height leads on to height, and
      there is no resting-place upon them, and rung doth grow upon
      rung, and there is no limit to the number. Doth not wealth
      satiate, and become nauseous, and no longer serve to satisfy or
      pleasure, or to buy an hour’s peace of mind? And is there any end
      to wisdom that we may hope to reach it? Rather, the more we
      learn, shall we not thereby be able only to better compass out
      our ignorance? Did we live ten thousand years could we hope to
      solve the secrets of the suns, and of the space beyond the suns,
      and of the Hand that hung them in the heavens? Would not our
      wisdom be but as a gnawing hunger calling our consciousness day
      by day to a knowledge of the empty craving of our souls? Would it
      not be but as a light in one of these great caverns, that, though
      bright it burn, and brighter yet, doth but the more serve to show
      the depths of the gloom around it? And what good thing is there
      beyond that we may gain by length of days?”

      “Nay, my Holly, there is love—love which makes all things
      beautiful, and doth breathe divinity into the very dust we tread.
      With love shall life roll gloriously on from year to year, like
      the voice of some great music that hath power to hold the
      hearer’s heart poised on eagles’ wings above the sordid shame and
      folly of the earth.”

      “It may be so,” I answered; “but if the loved one prove a broken
      reed to pierce us, or if the love be loved in vain—what then?
      Shall a man grave his sorrows upon a stone when he hath but need
      to write them on the water? Nay, oh _She_, I will live my day,
      and grow old with my generation, and die my appointed death, and
      be forgotten. For I do hope for an immortality to which the
      little span that perchance thou canst confer will be but as a
      finger’s length laid against the measure of the great world; and,
      mark this! the immortality to which I look, and which my faith
      doth promise me, shall be free from the bonds that here must tie
      my spirit down. For, while the flesh endures, sorrow and evil and
      the scorpion whips of sin must endure also; but when the flesh
      hath fallen from us, then shall the spirit shine forth clad in
      the brightness of eternal good, and for its common air shall
      breathe so rare an ether of most noble thoughts that the highest
      aspiration of our manhood, or the purest incense of a maiden’s
      prayer, would prove too earthly gross to float therein.”

      “Thou lookest high,” answered Ayesha, with a little laugh, “and
      speakest clearly as a trumpet and with no uncertain sound. And
      yet methinks that but now didst thou talk of ‘that Unknown’ from
      which the winding-sheet doth curtain us. But perchance, thou
      seest with the eye of Faith, gazing on that brightness, that is
      to be, through the painted-glass of thy imagination. Strange are
      the pictures of the future that mankind can thus draw with this
      brush of faith and this many-coloured pigment of imagination!
      Strange, too, that no one of them doth agree with another! I
      could tell thee—but there, what is the use? why rob a fool of his
      bauble? Let it pass, and I pray, oh Holly, that when thou dost
      feel old age creeping slowly toward thyself, and the confusion of
      senility making havoc in thy brain, thou mayest not bitterly
      regret that thou didst cast away the imperial boon I would have
      given to thee. But so it hath ever been; man can never be content
      with that which his hand can pluck. If a lamp be in his reach to
      light him through the darkness, he must needs cast it down
      because it is no star. Happiness danceth ever apace before him,
      like the marsh-fires in the swamps, and he must catch the fire,
      and he must hold the star! Beauty is naught to him, because there
      are lips more honey-sweet; and wealth is naught, because others
      can weigh him down with heavier shekels; and fame is naught,
      because there have been greater men than he. Thyself thou saidst
      it, and I turn thy words against thee. Well, thou dreamest that
      thou shalt pluck the star. I believe it not, and I think thee a
      fool, my Holly, to throw away the lamp.”

      I made no answer, for I could not—especially before Leo—tell her
      that since I had seen her face I knew that it would always be
      before my eyes, and that I had no wish to prolong an existence
      which must always be haunted and tortured by her memory, and by
      the last bitterness of unsatisfied love. But so it was, and so,
      alas, is it to this hour!

      “And now,” went on _She_, changing her tone and the subject
      together, “tell me, my Kallikrates, for as yet I know it not, how
      came ye to seek me here? Yesternight thou didst say that
      Kallikrates—him whom thou sawest—was thine ancestor. How was it?
      Tell me—thou dost not speak overmuch!”

      Thus adjured, Leo told her the wonderful story of the casket and
      of the potsherd that, written on by his ancestress, the Egyptian
      Amenartas, had been the means of guiding us to her. Ayesha
      listened intently, and, when he had finished, spoke to me.

      “Did I not tell thee one day, when we did talk of good and evil,
      oh Holly—it was when my beloved lay so ill—that out of good came
      evil, and out of evil good—that they who sowed knew not what the
      crop should be, nor he who struck where the blow should fall?
      See, now: this Egyptian Amenartas, this royal child of the Nile
      who hated me, and whom even now I hate, for in a way she did
      prevail against me—see, now, she herself hath been the very means
      to bring her lover to mine arms! For her sake I slew him, and
      now, behold, through her he hath come back to me! She would have
      done me evil, and sowed her seeds that I might reap tares, and
      behold she hath given me more than all the world can give, and
      there is a strange square for thee to fit into thy circle of good
      and evil, oh Holly!

      “And so,” she went on, after a pause—“and so she bade her son
      destroy me if he might, because I slew his father. And thou, my
      Kallikrates, art the father, and in a sense thou art likewise the
      son; and wouldst thou avenge thy wrong, and the wrong of that
      far-off mother of thine, upon me, oh Kallikrates? See,” and she
      slid to her knees, and drew the white corsage still farther down
      her ivory bosom—“see, here beats my heart, and there by thy side
      is a knife, heavy, and long, and sharp, the very knife to slay an
      erring woman with. Take it now, and be avenged. Strike, and
      strike home!—so shalt thou be satisfied, Kallikrates, and go
      through life a happy man, because thou hast paid back the wrong,
      and obeyed the mandate of the past.”

      He looked at her, and then stretched out his hand and lifted her
      to her feet.

      “Rise, Ayesha,” he said sadly; “well thou knowest that I cannot
      strike thee, no, not even for the sake of her whom thou slewest
      but last night. I am in thy power, and a very slave to thee. How
      can I kill thee?—sooner should I slay myself.”

      “Almost dost thou begin to love me, Kallikrates,” she answered,
      smiling. “And now tell me of thy country—’tis a great people, is
      it not? with an empire like that of Rome! Surely thou wouldst
      return thither, and it is well, for I mean not that thou shouldst
      dwell in these caves of Kôr. Nay, when once thou art even as I
      am, we will go hence—fear not but that I shall find a path—and
      then shall we journey to this England of thine, and live as it
      becometh us to live. Two thousand years have I waited for the day
      when I should see the last of these hateful caves and this
      gloomy-visaged folk, and now it is at hand, and my heart bounds
      up to meet it like a child’s towards its holiday. For thou shalt
      rule this England——”

      “But we have a queen already,” broke in Leo, hastily.

      “It is naught, it is naught,” said Ayesha; “she can be
      overthrown.”

      At this we both broke out into an exclamation of dismay, and
      explained that we should as soon think of overthrowing ourselves.

      “But here is a strange thing,” said Ayesha, in astonishment; “a
      queen whom her people love! Surely the world must have changed
      since I dwelt in Kôr.”

      Again we explained that it was the character of monarchs that had
      changed, and that the one under whom we lived was venerated and
      beloved by all right-thinking people in her vast realms. Also, we
      told her that real power in our country rested in the hands of
      the people, and that we were in fact ruled by the votes of the
      lower and least educated classes of the community.

      “Ah,” she said, “a democracy—then surely there is a tyrant, for I
      have long since seen that democracies, having no clear will of
      their own, in the end set up a tyrant, and worship him.”

      “Yes,” I said, “we have our tyrants.”

      “Well,” she answered resignedly, “we can at any rate destroy
      these tyrants, and Kallikrates shall rule the land.”

      I instantly informed Ayesha that in England “blasting” was not an
      amusement that could be indulged in with impunity, and that any
      such attempt would meet with the consideration of the law and
      probably end upon a scaffold.

      “The law,” she laughed with scorn—“the law! Canst thou not
      understand, oh Holly, that I am above the law, and so shall my
      Kallikrates be also? All human law will be to us as the north
      wind to a mountain. Does the wind bend the mountain, or the
      mountain the wind?”

      “And now leave me, I pray thee, and thou too, my own Kallikrates,
      for I would get me ready against our journey, and so must ye
      both, and your servant also. But bring no great quantity of
      things with thee, for I trust that we shall be but three days
      gone. Then shall we return hither, and I will make a plan whereby
      we can bid farewell for ever to these sepulchres of Kôr. Yea,
      surely thou mayst kiss my hand!”

So we went, I, for one, meditating deeply on the awful nature of the
problem that now opened out before us. The terrible _She_ had evidently
made up her mind to go to England, and it made me absolutely shudder to
think what would be the result of her arrival there. What her powers
were I knew, and I could not doubt but that she would exercise them to
the full. It might be possible to control her for a while, but her
proud, ambitious spirit would be certain to break loose and avenge
itself for the long centuries of its solitude. She would, if necessary,
and if the power of her beauty did not unaided prove equal to the
occasion, blast her way to any end she set before her, and, as she
could not die, and for aught I knew could not even be killed,[1] what
was there to stop her? In the end she would, I had little doubt, assume
absolute rule over the British dominions, and probably over the whole
earth, and, though I was sure that she would speedily make ours the
most glorious and prosperous empire that the world has ever seen, it
would be at the cost of a terrible sacrifice of life.

 [1] I regret to say that I was never able to ascertain if _She_ was
 invulnerable against the ordinary accidents of life. Presumably this
 was so, else some misadventure would have been sure to put an end to
 her in the course of so many centuries. True, she offered to let Leo
 slay her, but very probably this was only an experiment to try his
 temper and mental attitude towards her. Ayesha never gave way to
 impulse without some valid object.—L. H. H.

      The whole thing sounded like a dream or some extraordinary
      invention of a speculative brain, and yet it was a fact—a
      wonderful fact—of which the whole world would soon be called on
      to take notice. What was the meaning of it all? After much
      thinking I could only conclude that this marvellous creature,
      whose passion had kept her for so many centuries chained as it
      were, and comparatively harmless, was now about to be used by
      Providence as a means to change the order of the world, and
      possibly, by the building up of a power that could no more be
      rebelled against or questioned than the decrees of Fate, to
      change it materially for the better.




XXIII.
THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH


      Our preparations did not take us very long. We put a change of
      clothing apiece and some spare boots into my Gladstone bag, also
      we took our revolvers and an express rifle each, together with a
      good supply of ammunition, a precaution to which, under
      Providence, we subsequently owed our lives over and over again.
      The rest of our gear, together with our heavy rifles, we left
      behind us.

      A few minutes before the appointed time we once more attended in
      Ayesha’s boudoir, and found her also ready, her dark cloak thrown
      over her winding-sheetlike wrappings.

      “Are ye prepared for the great venture?” she said.

      “We are,” I answered, “though for my part, Ayesha, I have no
      faith in it.”

      “Ah, my Holly,” she said, “thou art of a truth like those old
      Jews—of whom the memory vexes me so sorely—unbelieving, and hard
      to accept that which they have not known. But thou shalt see; for
      unless my mirror beyond lies,” and she pointed to the font of
      crystal water, “the path is yet open as it was of old time. And
      now let us start upon the new life which shall end—who knoweth
      where?”

      “Ah,” I echoed, “who knoweth where?” and we passed down into the
      great central cave, and out into the light of day. At the mouth
      of the cave we found a single litter with six bearers, all of
      them mutes, waiting, and with them I was relieved to see our old
      friend Billali, for whom I had conceived a sort of affection. It
      appeared that, for reasons not necessary to explain at length,
      Ayesha had thought it best that, with the exception of herself,
      we should proceed on foot, and this we were nothing loth to do,
      after our long confinement in these caves, which, however
      suitable they might be for sarcophagi—a singularly inappropriate
      word, by the way, for these particular tombs, which certainly did
      not consume the bodies given to their keeping—were depressing
      habitations for breathing mortals like ourselves. Either by
      accident or by the orders of _She_, the space in front of the
      cave where we had beheld that awful dance was perfectly clear of
      spectators. Not a soul was to be seen, and consequently I do not
      believe that our departure was known to anybody, except perhaps
      the mutes who waited on _She_, and they were, of course, in the
      habit of keeping what they saw to themselves.

      In a few minutes’ time we were stepping out sharply across the
      great cultivated plain or lake bed, framed like a vast emerald in
      its setting of frowning cliff, and had another opportunity of
      wondering at the extraordinary nature of the site chosen by these
      old people of Kôr for their capital, and at the marvellous amount
      of labour, ingenuity, and engineering skill that must have been
      brought into requisition by the founders of the city to drain so
      huge a sheet of water, and to keep it clear of subsequent
      accumulations. It is, indeed, so far as my experience goes, an
      unequalled instance of what man can do in the face of nature, for
      in my opinion such achievements as the Suez Canal or even the
      Mont Cenis Tunnel do not approach this ancient undertaking in
      magnitude and grandeur of conception.

When we had been walking for about half an hour, enjoying ourselves
exceedingly in the delightful cool which about this time of the day
always appeared to descend upon the great plain of Kôr, and which in
some degree atoned for the want of any land or sea breeze—for all wind
was kept off by the rocky mountain wall—we began to get a clear view of
what Billali had informed us were the ruins of the great city. And even
from that distance we could see how wonderful those ruins were, a fact
which with every step we took became more evident. The town was not
very large if compared to Babylon or Thebes, or other cities of remote
antiquity; perhaps its outer wall contained some twelve square miles of
ground, or a little more. Nor had the walls, so far as we could judge
when we reached them, been very high, probably not more than forty
feet, which was about their present height where they had not through
the sinking of the ground, or some such cause, fallen into ruin. The
reason of this, no doubt, was that the people of Kôr, being protected
from any outside attack by far more tremendous ramparts than any that
the hand of man could rear, only required them for show and to guard
against civil discord. But on the other hand they were as broad as they
were high, built entirely of dressed stone, hewn, no doubt, from the
vast caves, and surrounded by a great moat about sixty feet in width,
some reaches of which were still filled with water. About ten minutes
before the sun finally sank we reached this moat, and passed down and
through it, clambering across what evidently were the piled-up
fragments of a great bridge in order to do so, and then with some
little difficulty over the slope of the wall to its summit. I wish that
it lay within the power of my pen to give some idea of the grandeur of
the sight that then met our view. There, all bathed in the red glow of
the sinking sun, were miles upon miles of ruins—columns, temples,
shrines, and the palaces of kings, varied with patches of green bush.
Of course, the roofs of these buildings had long since fallen into
decay and vanished, but owing to the extreme massiveness of the style
of building, and to the hardness and durability of the rock employed,
most of the party walls and great columns still remained standing.[1]

 [1] In connection with the extraordinary state of preservation of
 these ruins after so vast a lapse of time— at least six thousand
 years—it must be remembered that Kôr was not burnt or destroyed by an
 enemy or an earthquake, but deserted, owing to the action of a
 terrible plague. Consequently the houses were left unharmed; also the
 climate of the plain is remarkably fine and dry, and there is very
 little rain or wind; as a result of which these relics have only to
 contend against the unaided action of time, that works but slowly upon
 such massive blocks of masonry. —L. H. H.

Straight before us stretched away what had evidently been the main
thoroughfare of the city, for it was very wide, wider than the Thames
Embankment, and regular, being, as we afterwards discovered, paved, or
rather built, throughout of blocks of dressed stone, such as were
employed in the walls, it was but little overgrown even now with grass
and shrubs that could get no depth of soil to live in. What had been
the parks and gardens, on the contrary, were now dense jungle. Indeed,
it was easy even from a distance to trace the course of the various
roads by the burnt-up appearance of the scanty grass that grew upon
them. On either side of this great thoroughfare were vast blocks of
ruins, each block, generally speaking, being separated from its
neighbour by a space of what had once, I suppose, been garden-ground,
but was now dense and tangled bush. They were all built of the same
coloured stone, and most of them had pillars, which was as much as we
could make out in the fading light as we passed swiftly up the main
road, that I believe I am right in saying no living foot had pressed
for thousands of years.[2]

 [2] Billali told me that the Amahagger believe that the site of the
 city is haunted, and could not be persuaded to enter it upon any
 consideration. Indeed, I could see that he himself did not at all like
 doing so, and was only consoled by the reflection that he was under
 the direct protection of _She_. It struck Leo and myself as very
 curious that a people which has no objection to living amongst the
 dead, with whom their familiarity has perhaps bred contempt, and even
 using their bodies for purposes of fuel, should be terrified at
 approaching the habitations that these very departed had occupied when
 alive. After all, however, it is only a savage inconsistency.—L. H. H.

      Presently we came to an enormous pile, which we rightly took to
      be a temple covering at least eight acres of ground, and
      apparently arranged in a series of courts, each one enclosing
      another of smaller size, on the principle of a Chinese nest of
      boxes, the courts being separated one from the other by rows of
      huge columns. And, while I think of it, I may as well state a
      remarkable thing about the shape of these columns, which
      resembled none that I have ever seen or heard of, being fashioned
      with a kind of waist at the centre, and swelling out above and
      below. At first we thought that this shape was meant to roughly
      symbolise or suggest the female form, as was a common habit
      amongst the ancient religious architects of many creeds. On the
      following day, however, as we went up the slopes of the mountain,
      we discovered a large quantity of the most stately looking palms,
      of which the trunks grew exactly in this shape, and I have now no
      doubt but that the first designer of those columns drew his
      inspiration from the graceful bends of those very palms, or
      rather of their ancestors, which then, some eight or ten thousand
      years ago, as now, beautified the slopes of the mountain that had
      once formed the shores of the volcanic lake.

      At the _façade_ of this huge temple, which, I should imagine, is
      almost as large as that of El-Karnac, at Thebes, some of the
      largest columns, which I measured, being between eighteen to
      twenty feet in diameter at the base, by about seventy feet in
      height, our little procession was halted, and Ayesha descended
      from her litter.

      “There was a spot here, Kallikrates,” she said to Leo, who had
      run up to help her down, “where one might sleep. Two thousand
      years ago did thou and I and that Egyptian asp rest therein, but
      since then have I not set foot here, nor any man, and perchance
      it has fallen,” and, followed by the rest of us, she passed up a
      vast flight of broken and ruined steps into the outer court, and
      looked round into the gloom. Presently she seemed to recollect,
      and, walking a few paces along the wall to the left, halted.

“It is here,” she said, and at the same time beckoned to the two mutes,
who were loaded with provisions and our little belongings, to advance.
One of them came forward, and, producing a lamp, lit it from his
brazier (for the Amahagger when on a journey nearly always carried with
them a little lighted brazier, from which to provide fire). The tinder
of this brazier was made of broken fragments of mummy carefully damped,
and, if the admixture of moisture was properly managed, this unholy
compound would smoulder away for hours.[3] As soon as the lamp was lit
we entered the place before which Ayesha had halted. It turned out to
be a chamber hollowed in the thickness of the wall, and, from the fact
of there still being a massive stone table in it, I should think that
it had probably served as a living-room, perhaps for one of the
door-keepers of the great temple.

 [3] After all we are not much in advance of the Amahagger in these
 matters. “Mummy,” that is pounded ancient Egyptian, is, I believe, a
 pigment much used by artists, and especially by those of them who
 direct their talents to the reproduction of the works of the old
 masters.—Editor.

      Here we stopped, and after cleaning the place out and making it
      as comfortable as circumstances and the darkness would permit, we
      ate some cold meat, at least Leo, Job and I did, for Ayesha, as I
      think I have said elsewhere, never touched anything except cakes
      of flour, fruit and water. While we were still eating, the moon,
      which was at her full, rose above the mountain-wall, and began to
      flood the place with silver.

      “Wot ye why I have brought you here to-night, my Holly?” said
      Ayesha, leaning her head upon her hand and watching the great orb
      as she rose, like some heavenly queen, above the solemn pillars
      of the temple. “I brought you—nay, it is strange, but knowest
      thou, Kallikrates, that thou liest at this moment upon the very
      spot where thy dead body lay when I bore thee back to those caves
      of Kôr so many years ago? It all returns to my mind now. I can
      see it, and horrible is it to my sight!” and she shuddered.

      Here Leo jumped up and hastily changed his seat. However the
      reminiscence might affect Ayesha, it clearly had few charms for
      him.

      “I brought you,” went on Ayesha presently, “that ye might look
      upon the most wonderful sight that ever the eye of man beheld—the
      full moon shining over ruined Kôr. When ye have done your
      eating—I would that I could teach you to eat naught but fruit,
      Kallikrates, but that will come after thou hast laved in the
      fire. Once I, too, ate flesh like a brute beast. When ye have
      done we will go out, and I will show you this great temple and
      the God whom men once worshipped therein.”

      Of course we got up at once, and started. And here again my pen
      fails me. To give a string of measurements and details of the
      various courts of the temple would only be wearisome, supposing
      that I had them, and yet I know not how I am to describe what we
      saw, magnificent as it was even in its ruin, almost beyond the
      power of realisation. Court upon dim court, row upon row of
      mighty pillars—some of them (especially at the gateways)
      sculptured from pedestal to capital—space upon space of empty
      chambers that spoke more eloquently to the imagination than any
      crowded streets. And over all, the dead silence of the dead, the
      sense of utter loneliness, and the brooding spirit of the Past!
      How beautiful it was, and yet how drear! We did not dare to speak
      aloud. Ayesha herself was awed in the presence of an antiquity
      compared to which even her length of days was but a little thing;
      we only whispered, and our whispers seemed to run from column to
      column, till they were lost in the quiet air. Bright fell the
      moonlight on pillar and court and shattered wall, hiding all
      their rents and imperfections in its silver garment, and clothing
      their hoar majesty with the peculiar glory of the night. It was a
      wonderful sight to see the full moon looking down on the ruined
      fane of Kôr. It was a wonderful thing to think for how many
      thousands of years the dead orb above and the dead city below had
      gazed thus upon each other, and in the utter solitude of space
      poured forth each to each the tale of their lost life and
      long-departed glory. The white light fell, and minute by minute
      the quiet shadows crept across the grass-grown courts like the
      spirits of old priests haunting the habitations of their
      worship—the white light fell, and the long shadows grew till the
      beauty and grandeur of each scene and the untamed majesty of its
      present Death seemed to sink into our very souls, and speak more
      loudly than the shouts of armies concerning the pomp and
      splendour that the grave had swallowed, and even memory had
      forgotten.

      “Come,” said Ayesha, after we had gazed and gazed, I know not for
      how long, “and I will show you the stony flower of Loveliness and
      Wonder’s very crown, if yet it stands to mock time with its
      beauty and fill the heart of man with longing for that which is
      behind the veil,” and, without waiting for an answer, she led us
      through two more pillared courts into the inner shrine of the old
      fane.

      And there, in the centre of the inmost court, that might have
      been some fifty yards square, or a little more, we stood face to
      face with what is perhaps the grandest allegorical work of Art
      that the genius of her children has ever given to the world. For
      in the exact centre of the court, placed upon a thick square slab
      of rock, was a huge round ball of dark stone, some twenty feet in
      diameter, and standing on the ball was a colossal winged figure
      of a beauty so entrancing and divine that when I first gazed upon
      it, illuminated and shadowed as it was by the soft light of the
      moon, my breath stood still, and for an instant my heart ceased
      its beating.

      The statue was hewn from marble so pure and white that even now,
      after all those ages, it shone as the moonbeams danced upon it,
      and its height was, I should say, a trifle over twenty feet. It
      was the winged figure of a woman of such marvellous loveliness
      and delicacy of form that the size seemed rather to add to than
      to detract from its so human and yet more spiritual beauty. She
      was bending forward and poising herself upon her half-spread
      wings as though to preserve her balance as she leant. Her arms
      were outstretched like those of some woman about to embrace one
      she dearly loved, while her whole attitude gave an impression of
      the tenderest beseeching. Her perfect and most gracious form was
      naked, save—and here came the extraordinary thing—the face, which
      was thinly veiled, so that we could only trace the marking of her
      features. A gauzy veil was thrown round and about the head, and
      of its two ends one fell down across her left breast, which was
      outlined beneath it, and one, now broken, streamed away upon the
      air behind her.

      “Who is she?” I asked, as soon as I could take my eyes off the
      statue.

      “Canst thou not guess, oh Holly?” answered Ayesha. “Where then is
      thy imagination? It is Truth standing on the World, and calling
      to its children to unveil her face. See what is writ upon the
      pedestal. Without doubt it is taken from the book of Scriptures
      of these men of Kôr,” and she led the way to the foot of the
      statue, where an inscription of the usual Chinese-looking
      hieroglyphics was so deeply graven as to be still quite legible,
      at least to Ayesha. According to her translation it ran thus:—

      “Is there no man that will draw my veil and look upon my face,
      for it is very fair? Unto him who draws my veil shall I be, and
      peace will I give him, and sweet children of knowledge and good
      works.”

      And a voice cried, “Though all those who seek after thee desire
      thee, behold! Virgin art thou, and Virgin shalt thou go till Time
      be done. No man is there born of woman who may draw thy veil and
      live, nor shall be. By Death only can thy veil be drawn, oh
      Truth!”

      And Truth stretched out her arms and wept, because those who
      sought her might not find her, nor look upon her face to face.

      “Thou seest,” said Ayesha, when she had finished translating,
      “Truth was the Goddess of the people of old Kôr, and to her they
      built their shrines, and her they sought; knowing that they
      should never find, still sought they.”

      “And so,” I added sadly, “do men seek to this very hour, but they
      find out; and, as this Scripture saith, nor shall they; for in
      Death only is Truth found.”

      Then with one more look at this veiled and spiritualised
      loveliness—which was so perfect and so pure that one might almost
      fancy that the light of a living spirit shone through the marble
      prison to lead man on to high and ethereal thoughts—this poet’s
      dream of beauty frozen into stone, which I shall never forget
      while I live, we turned and went back through the vast moonlit
      courts to the spot whence we had started. I never saw the statue
      again, which I the more regret, because on the great ball of
      stone representing the World whereon the figure stood, lines were
      drawn, that probably, had there been light enough, we should have
      discovered to be a map of the Universe as it was known to the
      people of Kôr. It is at any rate suggestive of some scientific
      knowledge that these long-dead worshippers of Truth had
      recognised the fact that the globe is round.




XXIV.
WALKING THE PLANK


      Next day the mutes woke us before the dawn; and by the time that
      we had got the sleep out of our eyes, and gone through a
      perfunctory wash at a spring which still welled up into the
      remains of a marble basin in the centre of the North quadrangle
      of the vast outer court, we found _She_ standing by the litter
      ready to start, while old Billali and the two bearer mutes were
      busy collecting the baggage. As usual, Ayesha was veiled like the
      marble Truth (by the way, I wonder if she originally got the idea
      of covering up her beauty from that statue?). I noticed, however,
      that she seemed very depressed, and had none of that proud and
      buoyant bearing which would have betrayed her among a thousand
      women of the same stature, even if they had been veiled like
      herself. She looked up as we came—for her head was bowed—and
      greeted us. Leo asked her how she had slept.

      “Ill, my Kallikrates,” she answered, “ill. This night have
      strange and hideous dreams come creeping through my brain, and I
      know not what they may portend. Almost do I feel as though some
      evil overshadowed me; and yet how can evil touch me? I wonder,”
      she went on with a sudden outbreak of womanly tenderness, “I
      wonder if, should aught happen to me, so that I slept awhile and
      left thee waking, thou wouldst think gently of me? I wonder, my
      Kallikrates, if thou wouldst tarry till I came again, as for so
      many centuries I have tarried for thy coming?”

      Then, without waiting for an answer, she went on: “Come, let us
      be setting forth, for we have far to go, and before another day
      is born in yonder blue should we stand in the place of Life.”

      In five minutes we were once more on our way through the vast
      ruined city, which loomed at us on either side in the grey
      dawning in a way that was at once grand and oppressive. Just as
      the first ray of the rising sun shot like a golden arrow athwart
      this storied desolation we gained the further gateway of the
      outer wall, and having given one more glance at the hoar and
      pillared majesty through which we had journeyed, and (with the
      exception of Job, for whom ruins had no charms) breathed a sigh
      of regret that we had not had more time to explore it, passed
      through the great moat, and on to the plain beyond.

      As the sun rose so did Ayesha’s spirits, till by breakfast-time
      they had regained their normal level, and she laughingly set down
      her previous depression to the associations of the spot where she
      had slept.

      “These barbarians swear that Kôr is haunted,” she said, “and of a
      truth I do believe their saying, for never did I know so ill a
      night save one. I remember it now. It was on that very spot when
      thou didst lie dead at my feet, Kallikrates. Never will I visit
      it again; it is a place of evil omen.”

      After a very brief halt for breakfast we pressed on with such
      good will that by two o’clock in the afternoon we were at the
      foot of the vast wall of rock that formed the lip of the volcano,
      and which at this point towered up precipitously above us for
      fifteen hundred or two thousand feet. Here we halted, certainly
      not to my astonishment, for I did not see how it was possible
      that we should go any farther.

      “Now,” said Ayesha, as she descended from her litter, “doth our
      labour but commence, for here do we part with these men, and
      henceforward must we bear ourselves;” and then, addressing
      Billali, “do thou and these slaves remain here, and abide our
      coming. By to-morrow at the midday shall we be with thee—if not,
      wait.”

      Billali bowed humbly, and said that her august bidding should be
      obeyed if they stopped there till they grew old.

      “And this man, oh Holly,” said _She_, pointing to Job; “best is
      it that he should tarry also, for if his heart be not high and
      his courage great, perchance some evil might overtake him. Also,
      the secrets of the place whither we go are not fit for common
      eyes.”

      I translated this to Job, who instantly and earnestly entreated
      me, almost with tears in his eyes, not to leave him behind. He
      said he was sure that he could see nothing worse than he had
      already seen, and that he was terrified to death at the idea of
      being left alone with those “dumb folk,” who, he thought, would
      probably take the opportunity to hot-pot him.

      I translated what he said to Ayesha, who shrugged her shoulders,
      and answered, “Well, let him come, it is naught to me; on his own
      head be it, and he will serve to bear the lamp and this,” and she
      pointed to a narrow plank, some sixteen feet in length, which had
      been bound above the long bearing-pole of her hammock, as I had
      thought to make curtains spread out better, but, as it now
      appeared, for some unknown purpose connected with our
      extraordinary undertaking.

      Accordingly, the plank, which, though tough, was very light, was
      given to Job to carry, and also one of the lamps. I slung the
      other on to my back, together with a spare jar of oil, while Leo
      loaded himself with the provisions and some water in a kid’s
      skin. When this was done _She_ bade Billali and the six bearer
      mutes to retreat behind a grove of flowering magnolias about a
      hundred yards away, and remain there under pain of death till we
      had vanished. They bowed humbly, and went, and, as he departed,
      old Billali gave me a friendly shake of the hand, and whispered
      that he had rather that it was I than he who was going on this
      wonderful expedition with “_She-who-must-be-obeyed_,” and upon my
      word I felt inclined to agree with him. In another minute they
      were gone, and then, having briefly asked us if we were ready,
      Ayesha turned, and gazed up the towering cliff.

      “Goodness me, Leo,” I said, “surely we are not going to climb
      that precipice!”

      Leo shrugged his shoulders, being in a condition of
      half-fascinated, half-expectant mystification, and as he did so,
      Ayesha with a sudden move began to climb the cliff, and of course
      we had to follow her. It was perfectly marvellous to see the ease
      and grace with which she sprang from rock to rock, and swung
      herself along the ledges. The ascent was not, however, so
      difficult as it seemed, although there were one or two nasty
      places where it did not do to look behind you, the fact being
      that the rock still sloped here, and was not absolutely
      precipitous as it was higher up. In this way we, with no great
      labour, mounted to the height of some fifty feet above our last
      standing-place, the only really troublesome thing to manage being
      Job’s board, and in doing so drew some fifty or sixty paces to
      the left of our starting-point, for we went up like a crab,
      sideways. Presently we reached a ledge, narrow enough at first,
      but which widened as we followed it, and moreover sloped inwards
      like the petal of a flower, so that as we followed it we
      gradually got into a kind of rut or fold of rock, that grew
      deeper and deeper, till at last it resembled a Devonshire lane in
      stone, and hid us perfectly from the gaze of anybody on the slope
      below, if there had been anybody to gaze. This lane (which
      appeared to be a natural formation) continued for some fifty or
      sixty paces, and then suddenly ended in a cave, also natural,
      running at right angles to it. I am sure it was a natural cave,
      and not hollowed by the hand of man, because of its irregular and
      contorted shape and course, which gave it the appearance of
      having been blown bodily in the mountain by some frightful
      eruption of gas following the line of the least resistance. All
      the caves hollowed by the ancients of Kôr, on the contrary, were
      cut out with the most perfect regularity and symmetry. At the
      mouth of this cave Ayesha halted, and bade us light the two
      lamps, which I did, giving one to her and keeping the other
      myself. Then, taking the lead, she advanced down the cavern,
      picking her way with great care, as indeed it was necessary to
      do, for the floor was most irregular—strewn with boulders like
      the bed of a stream, and in some places pitted with deep holes,
      in which it would have been easy to break one’s leg.

      This cavern we pursued for twenty minutes or more, it being, so
      far as I could form a judgment—owing to its numerous twists and
      turns no easy task—about a quarter of a mile long.

      At last, however, we halted at its farther end, and whilst I was
      still trying to pierce the gloom a great gust of air came tearing
      down it, and extinguished both the lamps.

      Ayesha called to us, and we crept up to her, for she was a little
      in front, and were rewarded with a view that was positively
      appalling in its gloom and grandeur. Before us was a mighty chasm
      in the black rock, jagged and torn and splintered through it in a
      far past age by some awful convulsion of Nature, as though it had
      been cleft by stroke upon stroke of the lightning. This chasm,
      which was bounded by a precipice on the hither, and presumably,
      though we could not see it, on the farther side also, may have
      measured any width across, but from its darkness I do not think
      it can have been very broad. It was impossible to make out much
      of its outline, or how far it ran, for the simple reason that the
      point where we were standing was so far from the upper surface of
      the cliff, at least fifteen hundred or two thousand feet, that
      only a very dim light struggled down to us from above. The mouth
      of the cavern that we had been following gave on to a most
      curious and tremendous spur of rock, which jutted out in mid air
      into the gulf before us, for a distance of some fifty yards,
      coming to a sharp point at its termination, and resembling
      nothing that I can think of so much as the spur upon the leg of a
      cock in shape. This huge spur was attached only to the parent
      precipice at its base, which was, of course, enormous, just as
      the cock’s spur is attached to its leg. Otherwise it was utterly
      unsupported.

      “Here must we pass,” said Ayesha. “Be careful lest giddiness
      overcome you, or the wind sweep you into the gulf beneath, for of
      a truth it hath no bottom;” and, without giving us any further
      time to get scared, she started walking along the spur, leaving
      us to follow her as best we might. I was next to her, then came
      Job, painfully dragging his plank, while Leo brought up the rear.
      It was a wonderful sight to see this intrepid woman gliding
      fearlessly along that dreadful place. For my part, when I had
      gone but a very few yards, what between the pressure of the air
      and the awful sense of the consequences that a slip would entail,
      I found it necessary to go down on my hands and knees and crawl,
      and so did the other two.

      But Ayesha never condescended to this. On she went, leaning her
      body against the gusts of wind, and never seeming to lose her
      head or her balance.

      In a few minutes we had crossed some twenty paces of this awful
      bridge, which got narrower at every step, and then all of a
      sudden a great gust came tearing along the gorge. I saw Ayesha
      lean herself against it, but the strong draught got under her
      dark cloak, and tore it from her, and away it went down the wind
      flapping like a wounded bird. It was dreadful to see it go, till
      it was lost in the blackness. I clung to the saddle of rock, and
      looked round, while, like a living thing, the great spur vibrated
      with a humming sound beneath us. The sight was a truly awesome
      one. There we were poised in the gloom between earth and heaven.
      Beneath us were hundreds upon hundreds of feet of emptiness that
      gradually grew darker, till at last it was absolutely black, and
      at what depth it ended is more than I can guess. Above was space
      upon space of giddy air, and far, far away a line of blue sky.
      And down this vast gulf upon which we were pinnacled the great
      draught dashed and roared, driving clouds and misty wreaths of
      vapour before it, till we were nearly blinded, and utterly
      confused.

      The whole position was so tremendous and so absolutely unearthly,
      that I believe it actually lulled our sense of terror, but to
      this hour I often see it in my dreams, and at its mere phantasy
      wake up covered with cold sweat.

      “On! on!” cried the white form before us, for now the cloak had
      gone, _She_ was robed in white, and looked more like a spirit
      riding down the gale than a woman; “On, or ye will fall and be
      dashed to pieces. Keep your eyes fixed upon the ground, and
      closely hug the rock.”

      We obeyed her, and crept painfully along the quivering path,
      against which the wind shrieked and wailed as it shook it,
      causing it to murmur like a vast tuning-fork. On we went, I do
      not know for how long, only gazing round now and again, when it
      was absolutely necessary, until at last we saw that we were on
      the very tip of the spur, a slab of rock, little larger than an
      ordinary table, that throbbed and jumped like any over-engined
      steamer. There we lay, clinging to the ground, and looked about
      us, while Ayesha stood leaning out against the wind, down which
      her long hair streamed, and, absolutely heedless of the hideous
      depth that yawned beneath, pointed before her. Then we saw why
      the narrow plank had been provided, which Job and I had painfully
      dragged along between us. Before us was an empty space, on the
      other side of which was something, as yet we could not see what,
      for here—either owing to the shadow of the opposite cliff, or
      from some other cause—the gloom was that of night.

      “We must wait awhile,” called Ayesha; “soon there will be light.”

      At the moment I could not imagine what she meant. How could more
      light than there was ever come to this dreadful spot? While I was
      still wondering, suddenly, like a great sword of flame, a beam
      from the setting sun pierced the Stygian gloom, and smote upon
      the point of rock whereon we lay, illumining Ayesha’s lovely form
      with an unearthly splendour. I only wish I could describe the
      wild and marvellous beauty of that sword of fire, laid across the
      darkness and rushing mist-wreaths of the gulf. How it got there I
      do not to this moment know, but I presume that there was some
      cleft or hole in the opposing cliff, through which it pierced
      when the setting orb was in a direct line therewith. All I can
      say is, that the effect was the most wonderful that I ever saw.
      Right through the heart of the darkness that flaming sword was
      stabbed, and where it lay there was the most surpassingly vivid
      light, so vivid that even at a distance we could see the grain of
      the rock, while, outside of it—yes, within a few inches of its
      keen edge—was naught but clustering shadows.

      And now, by this ray of light, for which _She_ had been waiting,
      and timed our arrival to meet, knowing that at this season for
      thousands of years it had always struck thus at sunset, we saw
      what was before us. Within eleven or twelve feet of the very tip
      of the tongue-like rock whereon we stood there arose, presumably
      from the far bottom of the gulf, a sugarloaf-shaped cone, of
      which the summit was exactly opposite to us. But had there been a
      summit only it would not have helped us much, for the nearest
      point of its circumference was some forty feet from where we
      were. On the lip of this summit, however, which was circular and
      hollow, rested a tremendous flat boulder, something like a
      glacier stone—perhaps it was one, for all I know to the
      contrary—and the end of this boulder approached to within twelve
      feet or so of us. This huge rock was nothing more or less than a
      gigantic rocking-stone, accurately balanced upon the edge of the
      cone or miniature crater, like a half-crown on the rim of a
      wine-glass; for, in the fierce light that played upon it and us,
      we could see it oscillating in the gusts of wind.

      “Quick!” said Ayesha; “the plank—we must cross while the light
      endures; presently it will be gone.”

      “Oh, Lord, sir!” groaned Job, “surely she don’t mean us to walk
      across that there place on that there thing,” as in obedience to
      my direction he pushed the long board towards me.

      “That’s it, Job,” I halloaed in ghastly merriment, though the
      idea of walking the plank was no pleasanter to me than to him.

      I pushed the board on to Ayesha, who deftly ran it across the
      gulf so that one end of it rested on the rocking-stone, the other
      remaining on the extremity of the trembling spur. Then placing
      her foot upon it to prevent it from being blown away, she turned
      to me.

      “Since I was last here, oh Holly,” she called, “the support of
      the moving stone hath lessened somewhat, so that I am not certain
      if it will bear our weight or no. Therefore will I cross the
      first, because no harm will come unto me,” and, without further
      ado, she trod lightly but firmly across the frail bridge, and in
      another second was standing safe upon the heaving stone.

      “It is safe,” she called. “See, hold thou the plank! I will stand
      on the farther side of the stone so that it may not overbalance
      with your greater weights. Now, come, oh Holly, for presently the
      light will fail us.”

      I struggled to my knees, and if ever I felt terrified in my life
      it was then, and I am not ashamed to say that I hesitated and
      hung back.

      “Surely thou art not afraid,” this strange creature called in a
      lull of the gale, from where she stood poised like a bird on the
      highest point of the rocking-stone. “Make way then for
      Kallikrates.”

      This settled me; it is better to fall down a precipice and die
      than be laughed at by such a woman; so I clenched my teeth, and
      in another instant I was on that horrible, narrow, bending plank,
      with bottomless space beneath and around me. I have always hated
      a great height, but never before did I realise the full horrors
      of which such a position is capable. Oh, the sickening sensation
      of that yielding board resting on the two moving supports. I grew
      dizzy, and thought that I must fall; my spine _crept_; it seemed
      to me that I was falling, and my delight at finding myself
      sprawling upon that stone, which rose and fell beneath me like a
      boat in a swell, cannot be expressed in words. All I know is that
      briefly, but earnestly enough, I thanked Providence for
      preserving me so far.

      Then came Leo’s turn, and though he looked rather queer, he came
      across like a rope-dancer. Ayesha stretched out her hand to clasp
      his own, and I heard her say, “Bravely done, my love—bravely
      done! The old Greek spirit lives in thee yet!”

      And now only poor Job remained on the farther side of the gulf.
      He crept up to the plank, and yelled out, “I can’t do it, sir. I
      shall fall into that beastly place.”

      “You must,” I remember saying with inappropriate
      facetiousness—“you must, Job, it’s as easy as catching flies.” I
      suppose that I must have said it to satisfy my conscience,
      because although the expression conveys a wonderful idea of
      facility, as a matter of fact I know no more difficult operation
      in the whole world than catching flies—that is, in warm weather,
      unless, indeed, it is catching mosquitoes.

      “I can’t, sir—I can’t, indeed.”

      “Let the man come, or let him stop and perish there. See, the
      light is dying! In a moment it will be gone!” said Ayesha.

      I looked. She was right. The sun was passing below the level of
      the hole or cleft in the precipice through which the ray reached
      us.

      “If you stop there, Job, you will die alone,” I called; “the
      light is going.”

      “Come, be a man, Job,” roared Leo; “it’s quite easy.”

      Thus adjured, the miserable Job, with a most awful yell,
      precipitated himself face downwards on the plank—he did not dare,
      small blame to him, to try to walk it, and commenced to draw
      himself across in little jerks, his poor legs hanging down on
      either side into the nothingness beneath.

      His violent jerks at the frail board made the great stone, which
      was only balanced on a few inches of rock, oscillate in a most
      dreadful manner, and, to make matters worse, when he was half-way
      across the flying ray of lurid light suddenly went out, just as
      though a lamp had been extinguished in a curtained room, leaving
      the whole howling wilderness of air black with darkness.

      “Come on, Job, for God’s sake!” I shouted in an agony of fear,
      while the stone, gathering motion with every swing, rocked so
      violently that it was difficult to hang on to it. It was a truly
      awful position.

      “Lord have mercy on me!” cried poor Job from the darkness. “Oh,
      the plank’s slipping!” and I heard a violent struggle, and
      thought that he was gone.

      But at that moment his outstretched hand, clasping in agony at
      the air, met my own, and I hauled—ah, how I did haul, putting out
      all the strength that it has pleased Providence to give me in
      such abundance—and to my joy in another minute Job was gasping on
      the rock beside me. But the plank! I felt it slip, and heard it
      knock against a projecting knob of rock, and it was gone.

      “Great heavens!” I exclaimed. “How are we going to get back?”

      “I don’t know,” answered Leo, out of the gloom. “’Sufficient to
      the day is the evil thereof,’ I am thankful enough to be here.”

      But Ayesha merely called to me to take her hand and creep after
      her.




XXV.
THE SPIRIT OF LIFE


      I did as I was bid, and in fear and trembling felt myself guided
      over the edge of the stone. I sprawled my legs out, but could
      touch nothing.

      “I am going to fall!” I gasped.

      “Nay, let thyself go, and trust to me,” answered Ayesha.

      Now, if the position is considered, it will be easily understood
      that this was a greater demand upon my confidence than was
      justified by my knowledge of Ayesha’s character. For all I knew
      she might be in the very act of consigning me to a horrible doom.
      But in life we sometimes have to lay our faith upon strange
      altars, and so it was now.

      “Let thyself go!” she cried, and, having no choice, I did.

      I felt myself slide a pace or two down the sloping surface of the
      rock, and then pass into the air, and the thought flashed through
      my brain that I was lost. But no! In another instant my feet
      struck against a rocky floor, and I felt that I was standing upon
      something solid, and out of reach of the wind, which I could hear
      singing away overhead. As I stood there thanking Heaven for these
      small mercies, there was a slip and a scuffle, and down came Leo
      alongside of me.

      “Hulloa, old fellow!” he called out, “are you there? This is
      getting interesting, is it not?”

      Just then, with a terrific yell, Job arrived right on the top of
      us, knocking us both down. By the time we had struggled to our
      feet again Ayesha was standing among us, and bidding us light the
      lamps, which fortunately remained uninjured, as also did the
      spare jar of oil.

      I got out my box of wax matches, and they struck as merrily,
      there, in that awful place, as they could have done in a London
      drawing-room.

      In a couple of minutes both the lamps were alight and revealed a
      curious scene. We were huddled together in a rocky chamber, some
      ten feet square, and scared enough we looked; that is, except
      Ayesha, who was standing calmly with her arms folded, and waiting
      for the lamps to burn up. The chamber appeared to be partly
      natural, and partly hollowed out of the top of the cone. The roof
      of the natural part was formed of the swinging stone, and that of
      the back part of the chamber, which sloped downwards, was hewn
      from the live rock. For the rest, the place was warm and dry—a
      perfect haven of rest compared to the giddy pinnacle above, and
      the quivering spur that shot out to meet it in mid-air.

      “So!” said _She_, “safely have we come, though once I feared that
      the rocking stone would fall with you, and precipitate you into
      the bottomless depths beneath, for I do believe that the cleft
      goeth down to the very womb of the world. The rock whereon the
      stone resteth hath crumbled beneath the swinging weight. And now
      that he,” nodding towards Job, who was sitting on the floor,
      feebly wiping his forehead with a red cotton pocket-handkerchief,
      “whom they rightly call the ‘Pig,’ for as a pig is he stupid,
      hath let fall the plank, it will not be easy to return across the
      gulf, and to that end must I make a plan. But now rest a while,
      and look upon this place. What think ye that it is?”

      “We know not,” I answered.

      “Wouldst thou believe, oh Holly, that once a man did choose this
      airy nest for a daily habitation, and did here endure for many
      years; leaving it only but one day in every twelve to seek food
      and water and oil that the people brought, more than he could
      carry, and laid as an offering in the mouth of the tunnel through
      which we passed hither?”

      We looked up wonderingly, and she continued—

      “Yet so it was. There was a man—Noot, he named himself—who,
      though he lived in the latter days, had of the wisdom of the sons
      of Kôr. A hermit was he, and a philosopher, and greatly skilled
      in the secrets of Nature, and he it was who discovered the Fire
      that I shall show you, which is Nature’s blood and life, and also
      that he who bathed therein, and breathed thereof, should live
      while Nature lives. But like unto thee, oh Holly, this man, Noot,
      would not turn his knowledge to account. ‘Ill,’ he said, ‘was it
      for man to live, for man was born to die.’ Therefore did he tell
      his secret to none, and therefore did he come and live here,
      where the seeker after Life must pass, and was revered of the
      Amahagger of the day as holy, and a hermit. And when first I came
      to this country—knowest thou how I came, Kallikrates? Another
      time I will tell thee, for it is a strange tale—I heard of this
      philosopher, and waited for him when he came to fetch his food,
      and returned with him hither, though greatly did I fear to tread
      the gulf. Then did I beguile him with my beauty and my wit, and
      flatter him with my tongue, so that he led me down and showed me
      the Fire, and told me the secrets of the Fire, but he would not
      suffer me to step therein, and, fearing lest he should slay me, I
      refrained, knowing that the man was very old, and soon would die.
      And I returned, having learned from him all that he knew of the
      wonderful Spirit of the World, and that was much, for the man was
      wise and very ancient, and by purity and abstinence, and the
      contemplations of his innocent mind, had worn thin the veil
      between that which we see and the great invisible truths, the
      whisper of whose wings at times we hear as they sweep through the
      gross air of the world. Then—it was but a very few days after, I
      met thee, my Kallikrates, who hadst wandered hither with the
      beautiful Egyptian Amenartas, and I learned to love for the first
      and last time, once and for ever, so that it entered into my mind
      to come hither with thee, and receive the gift of Life for thee
      and me. Therefore came we, with that Egyptian who would not be
      left behind, and, behold, we found the old man Noot lying but
      newly dead. _There_ he lay, and his white beard covered him like
      a garment,” and she pointed to a spot near where I was sitting;
      “but surely he hath long since crumbled into dust, and the wind
      hath borne his ashes hence.”

      Here I put out my hand and felt in the dust, and presently my
      fingers touched something. It was a human tooth, very yellow, but
      sound. I held it up and showed it to Ayesha, who laughed.

“Yes,” she said, “it is his without a doubt. Behold what remaineth of
Noot, and the wisdom of Noot—one little tooth! And yet that man had all
life at his command, and for his conscience’ sake would have none of
it. Well, he lay there newly dead, and we descended whither I shall
lead you, and then, gathering up all my courage, and courting death
that I might perchance win so glorious a crown of life, I stepped into
the flames, and behold! life such as ye can never know until ye feel it
also, flowed into me, and I came forth undying, and lovely beyond
imagining. Then did I stretch out mine arms to thee, Kallikrates, and
bid thee take thine immortal bride, and behold, as I spoke, thou,
blinded by my beauty, didst turn from me, and throw thine arms about
the neck of Amenartas. And then a great fury filled me, and made me
mad, and I seized the javelin that thou didst bear, and stabbed thee,
so that there, at my very feet, in the place of Life, thou didst groan
and go down into death. I knew not then that I had strength to slay
with mine eyes and by the power of my will, therefore in my madness
slew I with the javelin.[1]

 [1] It will be observed that Ayesha’s account of the death of
 Kallikrates differs materially from that written on the potsherd by
 Amenartas. The writing on the sherd says, “Then in her rage did she
 smite him _by her magic_, and he died.” We never ascertained which was
 the correct version, but it will be remembered that the body of
 Kallikrates had a spear- wound in the breast, which seems conclusive,
 unless, indeed, it was inflicted after death. Another thing that we
 never ascertained was _how_ the two women—_She_ and the Egyptian
 Amenartas—were able to bear the corpse of the man they both loved
 across the dread gulf and along the shaking spur. What a spectacle the
 two distracted creatures must have presented in their grief and
 loveliness as they toiled along that awful place with the dead man
 between them! Probably however the passage was easier then.—L. H. H.

      “And when thou wast dead, ah! I wept, because I was undying and
      thou wast dead. I wept there in the place of Life so that had I
      been mortal any more my heart had surely broken. And she, the
      swart Egyptian—she cursed me by her gods. By Osiris did she curse
      me and by Isis, by Nephthys and by Anubis, by Sekhet, the
      cat-headed, and by Set, calling down evil on me, evil and
      everlasting desolation. Ah! I can see her dark face now lowering
      o’er me like a storm, but she could not hurt me, and I—I know not
      if I could hurt her. I did not try; it was naught to me then; so
      together we bore thee hence. And afterwards I sent her—the
      Egyptian—away through the swamps, and it seems that she lived to
      bear a son and to write the tale that should lead thee, her
      husband, back to me, her rival and thy murderess.

      “Such is the tale, my love, and now is the hour at hand that
      shall set a crown upon it. Like all things on the earth, it is
      compounded of evil and of good—more of evil than of good,
      perchance; and writ in letters of blood. It is the truth; naught
      have I hidden from thee, Kallikrates. And now one thing before
      the final moment of thy trial. We go down into the presence of
      Death, for Life and Death are very near together, and—who
      knoweth?—that might happen which should separate us for another
      space of waiting. I am but a woman, and no prophetess, and I
      cannot read the future. But this I know—for I learned it from the
      lips of the wise man Noot—that my life is but prolonged and made
      more bright. It cannot live for aye. Therefore, before we go,
      tell me, oh Kallikrates, that of a truth thou dost forgive me,
      and dost love me from thy heart. See, Kallikrates: much evil have
      I done—perchance it was evil but two nights ago to strike that
      girl who loved thee cold in death—but she disobeyed me and
      angered me, prophesying misfortune to me, and I smote. Be careful
      when power comes to thee also, lest thou too shouldst smite in
      thine anger or thy jealousy, for unconquerable strength is a sore
      weapon in the hands of erring man. Yea, I have sinned—out of the
      bitterness born of a great love have I sinned—but yet do I know
      the good from the evil, nor is my heart altogether hardened. Thy
      love, Kallikrates, shall be the gate of my redemption, even as
      aforetime my passion was the path down which I ran to evil. For
      deep love unsatisfied is the hell of noble hearts and a portion
      of the accursed, but love that is mirrored back more perfect from
      the soul of our desired doth fashion wings to lift us above
      ourselves, and make us what we might be. Therefore, Kallikrates,
      take me by the hand, and lift my veil with no more fear than
      though I were some peasant girl, and not the wisest and most
      beauteous woman in this wide world, and look me in the eyes, and
      tell me that thou dost forgive me with all thine heart, and that
      will all thine heart thou dost worship me.”

      She paused, and the strange tenderness in her voice seemed to
      hover round us like a memory. I know that the sound of it moved
      me more even than her words, it was so very human—so very
      womanly. Leo, too, was strangely touched. Hitherto he had been
      fascinated against his better judgment, something as a bird is
      fascinated by a snake, but now I think that all this passed away,
      and he realised that he really loved this strange and glorious
      creature, as, alas! I loved her also. At any rate, I saw his eyes
      fill with tears, and he stepped swiftly to her and undid the
      gauzy veil, and then took her by the hand, and, gazing into her
      deep eyes, said aloud—

      “Ayesha, I love thee with all my heart, and so far as forgiveness
      is possible I forgive thee the death of Ustane. For the rest, it
      is between thee and thy Maker; I know naught of it. I only know
      that I love thee as I never loved before, and that I will cleave
      to thee to the end.”

      “Now,” answered Ayesha, with proud humility—“now when my lord
      doth speak thus royally and give with so free a hand, it cannot
      become me to lag behind in words, and be beggared of my
      generosity. Behold!” and she took his hand and placed it upon her
      shapely head, and then bent herself slowly down till one knee for
      an instant touched the ground—“Behold! in token of submission do
      I bow me to my lord! Behold!” and she kissed him on the lips, “in
      token of my wifely love do I kiss my lord. Behold!” and she laid
      her hand upon his heart, “by the sin I sinned, by my lonely
      centuries of waiting wherewith it was wiped out, by the great
      love wherewith I love, and by the Spirit—the Eternal Thing that
      doth beget all life, from whom it ebbs, to whom it doth return
      again—I swear:—

      “I swear, even in this most holy hour of completed Womanhood,
      that I will abandon Evil and cherish Good. I swear that I will be
      ever guided by thy voice in the straightest path of Duty. I swear
      that I will eschew Ambition, and through all my length of endless
      days set Wisdom over me as a guiding star to lead me unto Truth
      and a knowledge of the Right. I swear also that I will honour and
      will cherish thee, Kallikrates, who hast been swept by the wave
      of time back into my arms, ay, till the very end, come it soon or
      late. I swear—nay, I will swear no more, for what are words? Yet
      shalt thou learn that Ayesha hath no false tongue.

      “So I have sworn, and thou, my Holly, art witness to my oath.
      Here, too, are we wed, my husband, with the gloom for bridal
      canopy—wed till the end of all things; here do we write our
      marriage vows upon the rushing winds which shall bear them up to
      heaven, and round and continually round this rolling world.

      “And for a bridal gift I crown thee with my beauty’s starry
      crown, and enduring life, and wisdom without measure, and wealth
      that none can count. Behold! the great ones of the earth shall
      creep about thy feet, and its fair women shall cover up their
      eyes because of the shining glory of thy countenance, and its
      wise ones shall be abased before thee. Thou shalt read the hearts
      of men as an open writing, and hither and thither shalt thou lead
      them as thy pleasure listeth. Like that old Sphinx of Egypt shalt
      thou sit aloft from age to age, and ever shall they cry to thee
      to solve the riddle of thy greatness that doth not pass away, and
      ever shalt thou mock them with thy silence!

      “Behold! once more I kiss thee, and by that kiss I give to thee
      dominion over sea and earth, over the peasant in his hovel, over
      the monarch in his palace halls, and cities crowned with towers,
      and those who breathe therein. Where’er the sun shakes out his
      spears, and the lonesome waters mirror up the moon, where’er
      storms roll, and Heaven’s painted bows arch in the sky—from the
      pure North clad in snows, across the middle spaces of the world,
      to where the amorous South, lying like a bride upon her blue
      couch of seas, breathes in sighs made sweet with the odour of
      myrtles—there shall thy power pass and thy dominion find a home.
      Nor sickness, nor icy-fingered fear, nor sorrow, and pale waste
      of form and mind hovering ever o’er humanity, shall so much as
      shadow thee with the shadow of their wings. As a God shalt thou
      be, holding good and evil in the hollow of thy hand, and I, even
      I, I humble myself before thee. Such is the power of Love, and
      such is the bridal gift I give unto thee, Kallikrates, my Lord
      and Lord of All.

      “And now it is done; now for thee I loose my virgin zone; and
      come storm, come shine, come good, come evil, come life, come
      death, it never, never can be undone. For, of a truth, that which
      is, is, and, being done, is done for aye, and cannot be altered.
      I have said—Let us hence, that all things may be accomplished in
      their order;” and, taking one of the lamps, she advanced towards
      the end of the chamber that was roofed in by the swaying stone,
      where she halted.

      We followed her, and perceived that in the wall of the cone there
      was a stair, or, to be more accurate, that some projecting knobs
      of rock had been so shaped as to form a good imitation of a
      stair. Down this Ayesha began to climb, springing from step to
      step, like a chamois, and after her we followed with less grace.
      When we had descended some fifteen or sixteen steps we found that
      they ended in a tremendous rocky slope, running first outwards
      and then inwards—like the slope of an inverted cone, or tunnel.
      The slope was very steep, and often precipitous, but it was
      nowhere impassable, and by the light of the lamps we went down it
      with no great difficulty, though it was gloomy work enough
      travelling on thus, no one of us knew whither, into the dead
      heart of a volcano. As we went, however, I took the precaution of
      noting our route as well as I could; and this was not so very
      difficult, owing to the extraordinary and most fantastic shape of
      the rocks that were strewn about, many of which in that dim light
      looked more like the grim faces carven upon mediæval gargoyles
      than ordinary boulders.

      For a long time we travelled on thus, half an hour I should say,
      till, after we had descended for many hundreds of feet, I
      perceived that we were reaching the point of the inverted cone.
      In another minute we were there, and found that at the very apex
      of the funnel was a passage, so low and narrow that we had to
      stoop as we crept along it in Indian file. After some fifty yards
      of this creeping, the passage suddenly widened into a cave, so
      huge that we could see neither the roof nor the sides. We only
      knew that it was a cave by the echo of our tread and the perfect
      quiet of the heavy air. On we went for many minutes in absolute
      awed silence, like lost souls in the depths of Hades, Ayesha’s
      white and ghost-like form flitting in front of us, till once more
      the place ended in a passage which opened into a second cavern
      much smaller than the first. Indeed, we could clearly make out
      the arch and stony banks of this second cave, and, from their
      rent and jagged appearance, discovered that, like the first long
      passage down which we had passed through the cliff before we
      reached the quivering spur, it had, to all appearance, been torn
      in the bowels of the rock by the terrific force of some explosive
      gas. At length this cave ended in a third passage, through which
      gleamed a faint glow of light.

      I heard Ayesha give a sigh of relief as this light dawned upon
      us.

      “It is well,” she said; “prepare to enter the very womb of the
      Earth, wherein she doth conceive the Life that ye see brought
      forth in man and beast—ay, and in every tree and flower.”

      Swiftly she sped along, and after her we stumbled as best we
      might, our hearts filled like a cup with mingled dread and
      curiosity. What were we about to see? We passed down the tunnel;
      stronger and stronger the light beamed, reaching us in great
      flashes like the rays from a lighthouse, as one by one they are
      thrown wide upon the darkness of the waters. Nor was this all,
      for with the flashes came a soul-shaking sound like that of
      thunder and of crashing trees. Now we were through it, and—oh
      heavens!

      We stood in a third cavern, some fifty feet in length by perhaps
      as great a height, and thirty wide. It was carpeted with fine
      white sand, and its walls had been worn smooth by the action of I
      know not what. The cavern was not dark like the others, it was
      filled with a soft glow of rose-coloured light, more beautiful to
      look on than anything that can be conceived. But at first we saw
      no flashes, and heard no more of the thunderous sound. Presently,
      however, as we stood in amaze, gazing at the marvellous sight,
      and wondering whence the rosy radiance flowed, a dread and
      beautiful thing happened. Across the far end of the cavern, with
      a grinding and crashing noise—a noise so dreadful and
      awe-inspiring that we all trembled, and Job actually sank to his
      knees—there flamed out an awful cloud or pillar of fire, like a
      rainbow many-coloured, and like the lightning bright. For a
      space, perhaps forty seconds, it flamed and roared thus, turning
      slowly round and round, and then by degrees the terrible noise
      ceased, and with the fire it passed away—I know not where—leaving
      behind it the same rosy glow that we had first seen.

      “Draw near, draw near!” cried Ayesha, with a voice of thrilling
      exultation. “Behold the very Fountain and Heart of Life as it
      beats in the bosom of the great world. Behold the substance from
      which all things draw their energy, the bright Spirit of the
      Globe, without which it cannot live, but must grow cold and dead
      as the dead moon. Draw near, and wash you in the living flames,
      and take their virtue into your poor frames in all its virgin
      strength—not as it now feebly glows within your bosoms, filtered
      thereto through all the fine strainers of a thousand intermediate
      lives, but as it is here in the very fount and seat of earthly
      Being.”

      We followed her through the rosy glow up to the head of the cave,
      till at last we stood before the spot where the great pulse beat
      and the great flame passed. And as we went we became sensible of
      a wild and splendid exhilaration, of a glorious sense of such a
      fierce intensity of Life that the most buoyant moments of our
      strength seemed flat and tame and feeble beside it. It was the
      mere effluvium of the flame, the subtle ether that it cast off as
      it passed, working on us, and making us feel strong as giants and
      swift as eagles.

      We reached the head of the cave, and gazed at each other in the
      glorious glow, and laughed aloud—even Job laughed, and he had not
      laughed for a week—in the lightness of our hearts and the divine
      intoxication of our brains. I know that I felt as though all the
      varied genius of which the human intellect is capable had
      descended upon me. I could have spoken in blank verse of
      Shakesperian beauty, all sorts of great ideas flashed through my
      mind; it was as though the bonds of my flesh had been loosened
      and left the spirit free to soar to the empyrean of its native
      power. The sensations that poured in upon me are indescribable. I
      seemed to live more keenly, to reach to a higher joy, and sip the
      goblet of a subtler thought than ever it had been my lot to do
      before. I was another and most glorified self, and all the
      avenues of the Possible were for a space laid open to the
      footsteps of the Real.

      Then, suddenly, whilst I rejoiced in this splendid vigour of a
      new-found self, from far, far away there came a dreadful
      muttering noise, that grew and grew to a crash and a roar, which
      combined in itself all that is terrible and yet splendid in the
      possibilities of sound. Nearer it came, and nearer yet, till it
      was close upon us, rolling down like all the thunder-wheels of
      heaven behind the horses of the lightning. On it came, and with
      it came the glorious blinding cloud of many-coloured light, and
      stood before us for a space, turning, as it seemed to us, slowly
      round and round, and then, accompanied by its attendant pomp of
      sound, passed away I know not whither.

      So astonishing was the wondrous sight that one and all of us,
      save _She_, who stood up and stretched her hands towards the
      fire, sank down before it, and hid our faces in the sand.

      When it was gone, Ayesha spoke.

      “Now, Kallikrates,” she said, “the mighty moment is at hand. When
      the great flame comes again thou must stand in it. First throw
      aside thy garments, for it will burn them, though thee it will
      not hurt. Thou must stand in the flame while thy senses will
      endure, and when it embraces thee suck the fire down into thy
      very heart, and let it leap and play around thy every part, so
      that thou lose no moiety of its virtue. Hearest thou me,
      Kallikrates?”

      “I hear thee, Ayesha,” answered Leo, “but, of a truth—I am no
      coward—but I doubt me of that raging flame. How know I that it
      will not utterly destroy me, so that I lose myself and lose thee
      also? Nevertheless will I do it,” he added.

      Ayesha thought for a minute, and then said—

      “It is not wonderful that thou shouldst doubt. Tell me,
      Kallikrates: if thou seest me stand in the flame and come forth
      unharmed, wilt thou enter also?”

      “Yes,” he answered, “I will enter even if it slay me. I have said
      that I will enter now.”

      “And that will I also,” I cried.

      “What, my Holly!” she laughed aloud; “methought that thou wouldst
      naught of length of days. Why, how is this?”

      “Nay, I know not,” I answered, “but there is that in my heart
      that calleth me to taste of the flame and live.”

      “It is well,” she said. “Thou art not altogether lost in folly.
      See now, I will for the second time bathe me in this living bath.
      Fain would I add to my beauty and my length of days if that be
      possible. If it be not possible, at the least it cannot harm me.

      “Also,” she continued, after a momentary pause, “is there another
      and a deeper cause why I would once again dip me in the flame.
      When first I tasted of its virtue full was my heart of passion
      and of hatred of that Egyptian Amenartas, and therefore, despite
      my strivings to be rid thereof, have passion and hatred been
      stamped upon my soul from that sad hour to this. But now it is
      otherwise. Now is my mood a happy mood, and filled am I with the
      purest part of thought, and so would I ever be. Therefore,
      Kallikrates, will I once more wash and make me pure and clean,
      and yet more fit for thee. Therefore also, when thou dost in turn
      stand in the fire, empty all thy heart of evil, and let soft
      contentment hold the balance of thy mind. Shake loose thy
      spirit’s wings, and take thy stand upon the utter verge of holy
      contemplation; ay, dream upon thy mother’s kiss, and turn thee
      towards the vision of the highest good that hath ever swept on
      silver wings across the silence of thy dreams. For from the germ
      of what thou art in that dread moment shall grow the fruit of
      what thou shalt be for all unreckoned time.

      “Now prepare thee, prepare! even as though thy last hour were at
      hand, and thou wast to cross to the Land of Shadows, and not
      through the Gates of Glory into the realms of Life made
      beautiful. Prepare, I say!”




XXVI.
WHAT WE SAW


      Then came a few moments’ pause, during which Ayesha seemed to be
      gathering up her strength for the fiery trial, while we clung to
      each other, and waited in utter silence.

      At last, from far far away, came the first murmur of sound, that
      grew and grew till it began to crash and bellow in the distance.
      As she heard it, Ayesha swiftly threw off her gauzy wrapping,
      loosened the golden snake from her kirtle, and then, shaking her
      lovely hair about her like a garment, beneath its cover slipped
      the kirtle off and replaced the snaky belt around her and outside
      the masses of her falling hair. There she stood before us as Eve
      might have stood before Adam, clad in nothing but her abundant
      locks, held round her by the golden band; and no words of mine
      can tell how sweet she looked—and yet how divine. Nearer and
      nearer came the thunder-wheels of fire, and as they came she
      pushed one ivory arm through the dark masses of her hair and
      flung it round Leo’s neck.

      “Oh, my love, my love!” she murmured, “wilt thou ever know how I
      have loved thee?” and she kissed him on the forehead, and then
      went and stood in the pathway of the flame of Life.

      There was, I remember, to my mind something very touching about
      her words and that embrace upon the forehead. It was like a
      mother’s kiss, and seemed to convey a benediction with it.

      On came the crashing, rolling noise, and the sound of it was as
      the sound of a forest being swept flat by a mighty wind, and then
      tossed up like so much grass, and thundered down a mountain-side.
      Nearer and nearer it came; now flashes of light, forerunners of
      the revolving pillar of flame, were passing like arrows through
      the rosy air; and now the edge of the pillar itself appeared.
      Ayesha turned towards it, and stretched out her arms to greet it.
      On it came very slowly, and lapped her round with flame. I saw
      the fire run up her form. I saw her lift it with both hands as
      though it were water, and pour it over her head. I even saw her
      open her mouth and draw it down into her lungs, and a dread and
      wonderful sight it was.

      Then she paused, and stretched out her arms, and stood there
      quite still, with a heavenly smile upon her face, as though she
      were the very Spirit of the Flame.

      The mysterious fire played up and down her dark and rolling
      locks, twining and twisting itself through and around them like
      threads of golden lace; it gleamed upon her ivory breast and
      shoulder, from which the hair had slipped aside; it slid along
      her pillared throat and delicate features, and seemed to find a
      home in the glorious eyes that shone and shone, more brightly
      even than the spiritual essence.

      Oh, how beautiful she looked there in the flame! No angel out of
      heaven could have worn a greater loveliness. Even now my heart
      faints before the recollection of it, as she stood and smiled at
      our awed faces, and I would give half my remaining time upon this
      earth to see her once like that again.

      But suddenly—more suddenly than I can describe—a kind of change
      came over her face, a change which I could not define or explain,
      but none the less a change. The smile vanished, and in its place
      there came a dry, hard look; the rounded face seemed to grow
      pinched, as though some great anxiety were leaving its impress
      upon it. The glorious eyes, too, lost their light, and, as I
      thought, the form its perfect shape and erectness.

      I rubbed my eyes, thinking that I was the victim of some
      hallucination, or that the refraction from the intense light
      produced an optical delusion; and, as I did so, the flaming
      pillar slowly twisted and thundered off whithersoever it passes
      to in the bowels of the great earth, leaving Ayesha standing
      where it had been.

      As soon as it was gone, she stepped forward to Leo’s side—it
      seemed to me that there was no spring in her step—and stretched
      out her hand to lay it on his shoulder. I gazed at her arm. Where
      was its wonderful roundness and beauty? It was getting thin and
      angular. And her face—by Heaven!—_her face was growing old before
      my eyes!_ I suppose that Leo saw it also; certainly he recoiled a
      step or two.

      “What is it, my Kallikrates?” she said, and her voice—what was
      the matter with those deep and thrilling notes? They were quite
      high and cracked.

      “Why, what is it—what is it?” she said confusedly. “I feel dazed.
      Surely the quality of the fire hath not altered. Can the
      principle of Life alter? Tell me, Kallikrates, is there aught
      wrong with my eyes? I see not clear,” and she put her hand to her
      head and touched her hair—and oh, _horror of horrors!_—it all
      fell upon the floor.

      “Oh, _look!—look!—look!_” shrieked Job, in a shrill falsetto of
      terror, his eyes nearly dropping out of his head, and foam upon
      his lips. “_Look!—look!—look!_ she’s shrivelling up! she’s
      turning into a monkey!” and down he fell upon the ground, foaming
      and gnashing in a fit.

      True enough—I faint even as I write it in the living presence of
      that terrible recollection—she _was_ shrivelling up; the golden
      snake that had encircled her gracious form slipped over her hips
      and to the ground; smaller and smaller she grew; her skin changed
      colour, and in place of the perfect whiteness of its lustre it
      turned dirty brown and yellow, like an old piece of withered
      parchment. She felt at her head: the delicate hand was nothing
      but a claw now, a human talon like that of a badly-preserved
      Egyptian mummy, and then she seemed to realise what kind of
      change was passing over her, and she shrieked—ah, she
      shrieked!—she rolled upon the floor and shrieked!

      Smaller she grew, and smaller yet, till she was no larger than a
      monkey. Now the skin was puckered into a million wrinkles, and on
      the shapeless face was the stamp of unutterable age. I never saw
      anything like it; nobody ever saw anything like the frightful age
      that was graven on that fearful countenance, no bigger now than
      that of a two-months’ child, though the skull remained the same
      size, or nearly so, and let all men pray they never may, if they
      wish to keep their reason.

      At last she lay still, or only feebly moving. She, who but two
      minutes before had gazed upon us the loveliest, noblest, most
      splendid woman the world has ever seen, she lay still before us,
      near the masses of her own dark hair, no larger than a big
      monkey, and hideous—ah, too hideous for words. And yet, think of
      this—at that very moment I thought of it—it was the _same_ woman!

      She was dying: we saw it, and thanked God—for while she lived she
      could feel, and what must she have felt? She raised herself upon
      her bony hands, and blindly gazed around her, swaying her head
      slowly from side to side as a tortoise does. She could not see,
      for her whitish eyes were covered with a horny film. Oh, the
      horrible pathos of the sight! But she could still speak.

      “Kallikrates,” she said in husky, trembling notes. “Forget me
      not, Kallikrates. Have pity on my shame; I shall come again, and
      shall once more be beautiful, I swear it—it is true! _Oh—h—h—_”
      and she fell upon her face, and was still.

      On the very spot where more than twenty centuries before she had
      slain Kallikrates the priest, she herself fell down and died.

      I know not how long we remained thus. Many hours, I suppose. When
      at last I opened my eyes, the other two were still outstretched
      upon the floor. The rosy light yet beamed like a celestial dawn,
      and the thunder-wheels of the Spirit of Life yet rolled upon
      their accustomed track, for as I awoke the great pillar was
      passing away. There, too, lay the hideous little monkey frame,
      covered with crinkled yellow parchment, that once had been the
      glorious _She_. Alas! it was no hideous dream—it was an awful and
      unparalleled fact!

      What had happened to bring this shocking change about? Had the
      nature of the life-giving Fire changed? Did it, perhaps, from
      time to time send forth an essence of Death instead of an essence
      of Life? Or was it that the frame once charged with its
      marvellous virtue could bear no more, so that were the process
      repeated—it mattered not at what lapse of time—the two
      impregnations neutralised each other, and left the body on which
      they acted as it was before it ever came into contact with the
      very essence of Life? This, and this alone, would account for the
      sudden and terrible ageing of Ayesha, as the whole length of her
      two thousand years took effect upon her. I have not the slightest
      doubt myself but that the frame now lying before me was just what
      the frame of a woman would be if by any extraordinary means life
      could be preserved in her till she at length died at the age of
      two-and-twenty centuries.

      But who can tell what had happened? There was the fact. Often
      since that awful hour I have reflected that it requires no great
      imagination to see the finger of Providence in the matter. Ayesha
      locked up in her living tomb waiting from age to age for the
      coming of her lover worked but a small change in the order of the
      World. But Ayesha strong and happy in her love, clothed in
      immortal youth and goddess beauty, and the wisdom of the
      centuries, would have revolutionised society, and even perchance
      have changed the destiny of Mankind. Thus she opposed herself
      against the eternal law, and, strong though she was, by it was
      swept back to nothingness—swept back with shame and hideous
      mockery!

      For some minutes I lay faintly turning these terrors over in my
      mind, while my physical strength came back to me, which it
      quickly did in that buoyant atmosphere. Then I bethought me of
      the others, and staggered to my feet, to see if I could arouse
      them. But first I took up Ayesha’s kirtle and the gauzy scarf
      with which she had been wont to hide her dazzling loveliness from
      the eyes of men, and, averting my head so that I might not look
      upon it, covered up that dreadful relic of the glorious dead,
      that shocking epitome of human beauty and human life. I did this
      hurriedly, fearing lest Leo should recover, and see it again.

      Then, stepping over the perfumed masses of dark hair that lay
      upon the sand, I stooped down by Job, who was lying upon his
      face, and turned him over. As I did so his arm fell back in a way
      that I did not like, and which sent a chill through me, and I
      glanced sharply at him. One look was enough. Our old and faithful
      servant was dead. His nerves, already shattered by all he had
      seen and undergone, had utterly broken down beneath this last
      dire sight, and he had died of terror, or in a fit brought on by
      terror. I had only to look at his face to see it.

      It was another blow; but perhaps it may help people to understand
      how overwhelmingly awful was the experience through which we had
      passed—we did not feel it much at the time. It seemed quite
      natural that the poor fellow should be dead. When Leo came to
      himself, which he did with a groan and trembling of the limbs
      about ten minutes afterwards, and I told him that Job was dead,
      he merely said, “_Oh!_” And, mind you, this was from no
      heartlessness, for he and Job were much attached to each other;
      and he often talks of him now with the deepest regret and
      affection. It was only that his nerves would bear no more. A harp
      can give out but a certain quantity of sound, however heavily it
      is smitten.

      Well, I set myself to recovering Leo, who, to my infinite relief,
      I found was not dead, but only fainting, and in the end I
      succeeded, as I have said, and he sat up; and then I saw another
      dreadful thing. When we entered that awful place his curling hair
      had been of the ruddiest gold, now it was turning grey, and by
      the time we reached the outer air it was snow white. Besides, he
      looked twenty years older.

      “What is to be done, old fellow?” he said in a hollow, dead sort
      of voice, when his mind had cleared a little, and a recollection
      of what had happened forced itself upon it.

      “Try and get out, I suppose,” I answered; “that is, unless you
      would like to go in there,” and I pointed to the column of fire
      that was once more rolling by.

      “I would go in if I were sure that it would kill me,” he said
      with a little laugh. “It was my cursed hesitation that did this.
      If I had not been doubtful she might never have tried to show me
      the road. But I am not sure. The fire might have the opposite
      effect upon me. It might make me immortal; and, old fellow, I
      have not the patience to wait a couple of thousand years for her
      to come back again as she did for me. I had rather die when my
      hour comes—and I should fancy that it isn’t far off either—and go
      my ways to look for her. Do you go in if you like.”

      But I merely shook my head, my excitement was as dead as
      ditch-water, and my distaste for the prolongation of my mortal
      span had come back upon me more strongly than ever. Besides, we
      neither of us knew what the effects of the fire might be. The
      result upon _She_ had not been of an encouraging nature, and of
      the exact causes that produced that result we were, of course,
      ignorant.

      “Well, my boy,” I said, “we cannot stop here till we go the way
      of those two,” and I pointed to the little heap under the white
      garment and to the stiffening corpse of poor Job. “If we are
      going we had better go. But, by the way, I expect that the lamps
      have burnt out,” and I took one up and looked at it, and sure
      enough it had.

      “There is some more oil in the vase,” said Leo indifferently—“if
      it is not broken, at least.”

      I examined the vessel in question—it was intact. With a trembling
      hand I filled the lamps—luckily there was still some of the linen
      wick unburnt. Then I lit them with one of our wax matches. While
      I did so we heard the pillar of fire approaching once more as it
      went on its never-ending journey, if, indeed, it was the same
      pillar that passed and repassed in a circle.

      “Let’s see it come once more,” said Leo; “we shall never look
      upon its like again in this world.”

      It seemed a bit of idle curiosity, but somehow I shared it, and
      so we waited till, turning slowly round upon its own axis, it had
      flamed and thundered by; and I remember wondering for how many
      thousands of years this same phenomenon had been taking place in
      the bowels of the earth, and for how many more thousands it would
      continue to take place. I wondered also if any mortal eyes would
      ever again mark its passage, or any mortal ears be thrilled and
      fascinated by the swelling volume of its majestic sound. I do not
      think that they will. I believe that we are the last human beings
      who will ever see that unearthly sight. Presently it had gone,
      and we too turned to go.

      But before we did so we each took Job’s cold hand in ours and
      shook it. It was a rather ghastly ceremony, but it was the only
      means in our power of showing our respect to the faithful dead
      and of celebrating his obsequies. The heap beneath the white
      garment we did not uncover. We had no wish to look upon that
      terrible sight again. But we went to the pile of rippling hair
      that had fallen from her in the agony of that hideous change
      which was worse than a thousand natural deaths, and each of us
      drew from it a shining lock, and these locks we still have, the
      sole memento that is left to us of Ayesha as we knew her in the
      fulness of her grace and glory. Leo pressed the perfumed hair to
      his lips.

      “She called to me not to forget her,” he said hoarsely; “and
      swore that we should meet again. By Heaven! I never will forget
      her. Here I swear that if we live to get out of this, I will not
      for all my days have anything to say to another living woman, and
      that wherever I go I will wait for her as faithfully as she
      waited for me.”

“Yes,” I thought to myself, “if she comes back as beautiful as we knew
her. But supposing she came back _like that!_”[1]

 [1] What a terrifying reflection it is, by the way, that nearly all
 our deep love for women who are not our kindred depends—at any rate,
 in the first instance—upon their personal appearance. If we lost them,
 and found them again dreadful to look on, though otherwise they were
 the very same, should we still love them? —L. H. H.

      Well, and then we went. We went, and left those two in the
      presence of the very well and spring of Life, but gathered to the
      cold company of Death. How lonely they looked as they lay there,
      and how ill assorted! That little heap had been for two thousand
      years the wisest, loveliest, proudest creature—I can hardly call
      her woman—in the whole universe. She had been wicked, too, in her
      way; but, alas! such is the frailty of the human heart, her
      wickedness had not detracted from her charm. Indeed, I am by no
      means certain that it did not add to it. It was after all of a
      grand order, there was nothing mean or small about Ayesha.

      And poor Job too! His presentiment had come true, and there was
      an end of him. Well, he has a strange burial-place—no Norfolk
      hind ever had a stranger, or ever will; and it is something to
      lie in the same sepulchre as the poor remains of the imperial
      _She_.

      We looked our last upon them and the indescribable rosy glow in
      which they lay, and then with hearts far too heavy for words we
      left them, and crept thence broken-down men—so broken down that
      we even renounced the chance of practically immortal life,
      because all that made life valuable had gone from us, and we knew
      even then that to prolong our days indefinitely would only be to
      prolong our sufferings. For we felt—yes, both of us—that having
      once looked Ayesha in the eyes, we could not forget her for ever
      and ever while memory and identity remained. We both loved her
      now and for all time, she was stamped and carven on our hearts,
      and no other woman or interest could ever raze that splendid die.
      And I—there lies the sting—I had and have no right to think thus
      of her. As she told me, I was naught to her, and never shall be
      through the unfathomed depths of Time, unless, indeed, conditions
      alter, and a day comes at last when two men may love one woman,
      and all three be happy in the fact. It is the only hope of my
      broken-heartedness, and a rather faint one. Beyond it I have
      nothing. I have paid down this heavy price, all that I am worth
      here and hereafter, and that is my sole reward. With Leo it is
      different, and often and often I bitterly envy him his happy lot,
      for if _She_ was right, and her wisdom and knowledge did not fail
      her at the last, which, arguing from the precedent of her own
      case, I think most unlikely, he has some future to look forward
      to. But I have none, and yet—mark the folly and the weakness of
      the human heart, and let him who is wise learn wisdom from it—yet
      I would not have it otherwise. I mean that I am content to give
      what I have given and must always give, and take in payment those
      crumbs that fall from my mistress’s table, the memory of a few
      kind words, the hope one day in the far undreamed future of a
      sweet smile or two of recognition, a little gentle friendship,
      and a little show of thanks for my devotion to her—and Leo.

      If that does not constitute true love, I do not know what does,
      and all I have to say is that it is a very bad state of affairs
      for a man on the wrong side of middle age to fall into.




XXVII.
WE LEAP


      We passed through the caves without trouble, but when we came to
      the slope of the inverted cone two difficulties stared us in the
      face. The first of these was the laborious nature of the ascent,
      and the next the extreme difficulty of finding our way. Indeed,
      had it not been for the mental notes that I had fortunately taken
      of the shape of various rocks, I am sure that we never should
      have managed it at all, but have wandered about in the dreadful
      womb of the volcano—for I suppose it must once have been
      something of the sort—until we died of exhaustion and despair. As
      it was we went wrong several times, and once nearly fell into a
      huge crack or crevasse. It was terrible work creeping about in
      the dense gloom and awful stillness from boulder to boulder, and
      examining it by the feeble light of the lamps to see if I could
      recognise its shape. We rarely spoke, our hearts were too heavy
      for speech, we simply stumbled about, falling sometimes and
      cutting ourselves, in a rather dogged sort of way. The fact was
      that our spirits were utterly crushed, and we did not greatly
      care what happened to us. Only we felt bound to try and save our
      lives whilst we could, and indeed a natural instinct prompted us
      to it. So for some three or four hours, I should think—I cannot
      tell exactly how long, for we had no watch left that would go—we
      blundered on. During the last two hours we were completely lost,
      and I began to fear that we had got into the funnel of some
      subsidiary cone, when at last I suddenly recognised a very large
      rock which we had passed in descending but a little way from the
      top. It is a marvel that I should have recognised it, and,
      indeed, we had already passed it going at right angles to the
      proper path, when something about it struck me, and I turned back
      and examined it in an idle sort of way, and, as it happened, this
      proved our salvation.

      After this we gained the rocky natural stair without much further
      trouble, and in due course found ourselves back in the little
      chamber where the benighted Noot had lived and died.

      But now a fresh terror stared us in the face. It will be
      remembered that owing to Job’s fear and awkwardness, the plank
      upon which we had crossed from the huge spur to the rocking-stone
      had been whirled off into the tremendous gulf below.

      How were we to cross without the plank?

      There was only one answer—we must try and _jump_ it, or else stop
      there till we starved. The distance in itself was not so very
      great, between eleven and twelve feet I should think, and I have
      seen Leo jump over twenty when he was a young fellow at college;
      but then, think of the conditions. Two weary, worn-out men, one
      of them on the wrong side of forty, a rocking-stone to take off
      from, a trembling point of rock some few feet across to land
      upon, and a bottomless gulf to be cleared in a raging gale! It
      was bad enough, God knows, but when I pointed out these things to
      Leo, he put the whole matter in a nutshell, by replying that,
      merciless as the choice was, we must choose between the certainty
      of a lingering death in the chamber and the risk of a swift one
      in the air. Of course, there was no arguing against this, but one
      thing was clear, we could not attempt that leap in the dark; the
      only thing to do was to wait for the ray of light which pierced
      through the gulf at sunset. How near to or how far from sunset we
      might be, neither of us had the faintest notion; all we did know
      was, that when at last the light came it would not endure more
      than a couple of minutes at the outside, so that we must be
      prepared to meet it. Accordingly, we made up our minds to creep
      on to the top of the rocking-stone and lie there in readiness. We
      were the more easily reconciled to this course by the fact that
      our lamps were once more nearly exhausted—indeed, one had gone
      out bodily, and the other was jumping up and down as the flame of
      a lamp does when the oil is done. So, by the aid of its dying
      light, we hastened to crawl out of the little chamber and clamber
      up the side of the great stone.

      As we did so the light went out.

      The difference in our position was a sufficiently remarkable one.
      Below, in the little chamber, we had only heard the roaring of
      the gale overhead—here, lying on our faces on the swinging stone,
      we were exposed to its full force and fury, as the great draught
      drew first from this direction and then from that, howling
      against the mighty precipice and through the rocky cliffs like
      ten thousand despairing souls. We lay there hour after hour in
      terror and misery of mind so deep that I will not attempt to
      describe it, and listened to the wild storm-voices of that
      Tartarus, as, set to the deep undertone of the spur opposite
      against which the wind hummed like some awful harp, they called
      to each other from precipice to precipice. No nightmare dreamed
      by man, no wild invention of the romancer, can ever equal the
      living horror of that place, and the weird crying of those voices
      of the night, as we clung like shipwrecked mariners to a raft,
      and tossed on the black, unfathomed wilderness of air.
      Fortunately the temperature was not a low one; indeed, the wind
      was warm, or we should have perished. So we clung and listened,
      and while we were stretched out upon the rock a thing happened
      which was so curious and suggestive in itself, though doubtless a
      mere coincidence, that, if anything, it added to, rather than
      deducted from, the burden on our nerves.

      It will be remembered that when Ayesha was standing on the spur,
      before we crossed to the stone, the wind tore her cloak from her,
      and whirled it away into the darkness of the gulf, we could not
      see whither. Well—I hardly like to tell the story; it is so
      strange. As we lay there upon the rocking-stone, this very cloak
      came floating out of the black space, like a memory from the
      dead, and fell on Leo—so that it covered him nearly from head to
      foot. We could not at first make out what it was, but soon
      discovered by its feel, and then poor Leo, for the first time,
      gave way, and I heard him sobbing there upon the stone. No doubt
      the cloak had been caught upon some pinnacle of the cliff, and
      was thence blown hither by a chance gust; but still, it was a
      most curious and touching incident.

      Shortly after this, suddenly, without the slightest previous
      warning, the great red knife of light came stabbing the darkness
      through and through—struck the swaying stone on which we were,
      and rested its sharp point upon the spur opposite.

      “Now for it,” said Leo, “now or never.”

      We rose and stretched ourselves, and looked at the cloud-wreaths
      stained the colour of blood by that red ray as they tore through
      the sickening depths beneath, and then at the empty space between
      the swaying stone and the quivering rock, and, in our hearts,
      despaired, and prepared for death. Surely we could not clear
      it—desperate though we were.

      “Who is to go first?” said I.

      “Do you, old fellow,” answered Leo. “I will sit upon the other
      side of the stone to steady it. You must take as much run as you
      can, and jump high; and God have mercy on us, say I.”

      I acquiesced with a nod, and then I did a thing I had never done
      since Leo was a little boy. I turned and put my arm round him,
      and kissed him on the forehead. It sounds rather French, but as a
      fact I was taking my last farewell of a man whom I could not have
      loved more if he had been my own son twice over.

      “Good-bye, my boy,” I said, “I hope that we shall meet again,
      wherever it is that we go to.”

      The fact was I did not expect to live another two minutes.

      Next I retreated to the far side of the rock, and waited till one
      of the chopping gusts of wind got behind me, and then I ran the
      length of the huge stone, some three or four and thirty feet, and
      sprang wildly out into the dizzy air. Oh! the sickening terrors
      that I felt as I launched myself at that little point of rock,
      and the horrible sense of despair that shot through my brain as I
      realised that I had _jumped short!_ but so it was, my feet never
      touched the point, they went down into space, only my hands and
      body came in contact with it. I gripped at it with a yell, but
      one hand slipped, and I swung right round, holding by the other,
      so that I faced the stone from which I had sprung. Wildly I
      stretched up with my left hand, and this time managed to grasp a
      knob of rock, and there I hung in the fierce red light, with
      thousands of feet of empty air beneath me. My hands were holding
      to either side of the under part of the spur, so that its point
      was touching my head. Therefore, even if I could have found the
      strength, I could not pull myself up. The most that I could do
      would be to hang for about a minute, and then drop down, down
      into the bottomless pit. If any man can imagine a more hideous
      position, let him speak! All I know is that the torture of that
      half-minute nearly turned my brain.

      I heard Leo give a cry, and then suddenly saw him in mid air
      springing up and out like a chamois. It was a splendid leap that
      he took under the influence of his terror and despair, clearing
      the horrible gulf as if it were nothing, and, landing well on to
      the rocky point, he threw himself upon his face, to prevent his
      pitching off into the depths. I felt the spur above me shake
      beneath the shock of his impact, and as it did so I saw the huge
      rocking-stone, that had been violently depressed by him as he
      sprang, fly back when relieved of his weight till, for the first
      time during all these centuries, it got beyond its balance, fell
      with a most awful crash right into the rocky chamber which had
      once served the philosopher Noot for a hermitage, and, I have no
      doubt, for ever sealed the passage that leads to the Place of
      Life with some hundreds of tons of rock.

      All this happened in a second, and curiously enough,
      notwithstanding my terrible position, I noted it involuntarily,
      as it were. I even remember thinking that no human being would go
      down that dread path again.

      Next instant I felt Leo seize me by the right wrist with both
      hands. By lying flat on the point of rock he could just reach me.

      “You must let go and swing yourself clear,” he said in a calm and
      collected voice, “and then I will try and pull you up, or we will
      both go together. Are you ready?”

      By way of answer I let go, first with my left hand and then with
      the right, and, as a consequence, swayed out clear of the
      overshadowing rock, my weight hanging upon Leo’s arms. It was a
      dreadful moment. He was a very powerful man, I knew, but would
      his strength be equal to lifting me up till I could get a hold on
      the top of the spur, when owing to his position he had so little
      purchase?

      For a few seconds I swung to and fro, while he gathered himself
      for the effort, and then I heard his sinews cracking above me,
      and felt myself lifted up as though I were a little child, till I
      got my left arm round the rock, and my chest was resting on it.
      The rest was easy; in two or three more seconds I was up, and we
      were lying panting side by side, trembling like leaves, and with
      the cold perspiration of terror pouring from our skins.

      And then, as before, the light went out like a lamp.

      For some half-hour we lay thus without speaking a word, and then
      at length began to creep along the great spur as best we might in
      the dense gloom. As we drew towards the face of the cliff,
      however, from which the spur sprang out like a spike from a wall,
      the light increased, though only a very little, for it was night
      overhead. After that the gusts of wind decreased, and we got
      along rather better, and at last reached the mouth of the first
      cave or tunnel. But now a fresh trouble stared as in the face:
      our oil was gone, and the lamps were, no doubt, crushed to powder
      beneath the fallen rocking-stone. We were even without a drop of
      water to stay our thirst, for we had drunk the last in the
      chamber of Noot. How were we to see to make our way through this
      last boulder-strewn tunnel?

      Clearly all that we could do was to trust to our sense of
      feeling, and attempt the passage in the dark, so in we crept,
      fearing that if we delayed to do so our exhaustion would overcome
      us, and we should probably lie down and die where we were.

      Oh, the horrors of that last tunnel! The place was strewn with
      rocks, and we fell over them, and knocked ourselves up against
      them till we were bleeding from a score of wounds. Our only guide
      was the side of the cavern, which we kept touching, and so
      bewildered did we grow in the darkness that we were several times
      seized with the terrifying thought that we had turned, and were
      travelling the wrong way. On we went, feebly, and still more
      feebly, for hour after hour, stopping every few minutes to rest,
      for our strength was spent. Once we fell asleep, and, I think,
      must have slept for some hours, for, when we woke, our limbs were
      quite stiff, and the blood from our blows and scratches had
      caked, and was hard and dry upon our skin. Then we dragged
      ourselves on again, till at last, when despair was entering into
      our hearts, we once more saw the light of day, and found
      ourselves outside the tunnel in the rocky fold on the outer
      surface of the cliff that, it will be remembered, led into it.

      It was early morning—that we could tell by the feel of the sweet
      air and the look of the blessed sky, which we had never hoped to
      see again. It was, so near as we knew, an hour after sunset when
      we entered the tunnel, so it followed that it had taken us the
      entire night to crawl through that dreadful place.

      “One more effort, Leo,” I gasped, “and we shall reach the slope
      where Billali is, if he hasn’t gone. Come, don’t give way,” for
      he had cast himself upon his face. He rose, and, leaning on each
      other, we got down that fifty feet or so of cliff—somehow, I have
      not the least notion how. I only remember that we found ourselves
      lying in a heap at the bottom, and then once more began to drag
      ourselves along on our hands and knees towards the grove where
      _She_ had told Billali to wait her re-arrival, for we could not
      walk another foot. We had not gone fifty yards in this fashion
      when suddenly one of the mutes emerged from the trees on our
      left, through which, I presume, he had been taking a morning
      stroll, and came running up to see what sort of strange animals
      we were. He stared, and stared, and then held up his hands in
      horror, and nearly fell to the ground. Next, he started off as
      hard as he could for the grove some two hundred yards away. No
      wonder that he was horrified at our appearance, for we must have
      been a shocking sight. To begin, Leo, with his golden curls
      turned a snowy white, his clothes nearly rent from his body, his
      worn face and his hands a mass of bruises, cuts, and
      blood-encrusted filth, was a sufficiently alarming spectacle, as
      he painfully dragged himself along the ground, and I have no
      doubt that I was little better to look on. I know that two days
      afterwards when I inspected my face in some water I scarcely
      recognised myself. I have never been famous for beauty, but there
      was something beside ugliness stamped upon my features that I
      have never got rid of until this day, something resembling that
      wild look with which a startled person wakes from deep sleep more
      than anything else that I can think of. And really it is not to
      be wondered at. What I do wonder at is that we escaped at all
      with our reason.

      Presently, to my intense relief, I saw old Billali hurrying
      towards us, and even then I could scarcely help smiling at the
      expression of consternation on his dignified countenance.

      “Oh, my Baboon! my Baboon!” he cried, “my dear son, is it indeed
      thee and the Lion? Why, his mane that was ripe as corn is white
      like the snow. Whence come ye? and where is the Pig, and where
      too _She-who-must-be-obeyed_?”

      “Dead, both dead,” I answered; “but ask no questions; help us,
      and give us food and water, or we too shall die before thine
      eyes. Seest thou not that our tongues are black for want of
      water? How, then, can we talk?”

      “Dead!” he gasped. “Impossible. _She_ who never dies—dead, how
      can it be?” and then, perceiving, I think, that his face was
      being watched by the mutes who had come running up, he checked
      himself, and motioned to them to carry us to the camp, which they
      did.

      Fortunately when we arrived some broth was boiling on the fire,
      and with this Billali fed us, for we were too weak to feed
      ourselves, thereby I firmly believe saving us from death by
      exhaustion. Then he bade the mutes wash the blood and grime from
      us with wet cloths, and after that we were laid down upon piles
      of aromatic grass, and instantly fell into the dead sleep of
      absolute exhaustion of mind and body.




XXVIII.
OVER THE MOUNTAIN


The next thing I recollect is a feeling of the most dreadful stiffness,
and a sort of vague idea passing through my half-awakened brain that I
was a carpet that had just been beaten. I opened my eyes, and the first
thing they fell on was the venerable countenance of our old friend
Billali, who was seated by the side of the improvised bed upon which I
was sleeping, and thoughtfully stroking his long beard. The sight of
him at once brought back to my mind a recollection of all that we had
recently passed through, which was accentuated by the vision of poor
Leo lying opposite to me, his face knocked almost to a jelly, and his
beautiful crowd of curls turned from yellow to white,[1] and I shut my
eyes again and groaned.

 [1] Curiously enough, Leo’s hair has lately been to some extent
 regaining its colour—that is to say, it is now a yellowish grey, and I
 am not without hopes that it will in time come quite right.—L. H. H.

      “Thou hast slept long, my Baboon,” said old Billali.

      “How long, my father?” I asked.

      “A round of the sun and a round of the moon, a day and a night
      hast thou slept, and the Lion also. See, he sleepeth yet.”

      “Blessed is sleep,” I answered, “for it swallows up
      recollection.”

      “Tell me,” he said, “what hath befallen you, and what is this
      strange story of the death of Her who dieth not. Bethink thee, my
      son: if this be true, then is thy danger and the danger of the
      Lion very great—nay, almost is the pot red wherewith ye shall be
      potted, and the stomachs of those who shall eat ye are already
      hungry for the feast. Knowest thou not that these Amahagger, my
      children, these dwellers in the caves, hate ye? They hate ye as
      strangers, they hate ye more because of their brethren whom _She_
      put to the torment for your sake. Assuredly, if once they learn
      that there is naught to fear from Hiya, from the terrible
      One-who-must-be-obeyed, they will slay ye by the pot. But let me
      hear thy tale, my poor Baboon.”

      Thus adjured, I set to work and told him—not everything, indeed,
      for I did not think it desirable to do so, but sufficient for my
      purpose, which was to make him understand that _She_ was really
      no more, having fallen into some fire, and, as I put it—for the
      real thing would have been incomprehensible to him—been burnt up.
      I also told him some of the horrors we had undergone in effecting
      our escape, and these produced a great impression on him. But I
      clearly saw that he did not believe in the report of Ayesha’s
      death. He believed indeed that we thought that she was dead, but
      his explanation was that it had suited her to disappear for a
      while. Once, he said, in his father’s time, she had done so for
      twelve years, and there was a tradition in the country that many
      centuries back no one had seen her for a whole generation, when
      she suddenly reappeared, and destroyed a woman who had assumed
      the position of Queen. I said nothing to this, but only shook my
      head sadly. Alas! I knew too well that Ayesha would appear no
      more, or at any rate that Billali would never see her again.

      “And now,” concluded Billali, “what wouldst thou do, my Baboon?”

      “Nay,” I said, “I know not, my father. Can we not escape from
      this country?”

      He shook his head.

      “It is very difficult. By Kôr ye cannot pass, for ye would be
      seen, and as soon as those fierce ones found that ye were alone,
      well,” and he smiled significantly, and made a movement as though
      he were placing a hat on his head. “But there is a way over the
      cliff whereof I once spake to thee, where they drive the cattle
      out to pasture. Then beyond the pastures are three days’ journey
      through the marshes, and after that I know not, but I have heard
      that seven days’ journey from thence is a mighty river, which
      floweth to the black water. If ye could come thither, perchance
      ye might escape, but how can ye come thither?”

      “Billali,” I said, “once, thou knowest, I did save thy life. Now
      pay back the debt, my father, and save me mine and my friend’s,
      the Lion’s. It shall be a pleasant thing for thee to think of
      when thine hour comes, and something to set in the scale against
      the evil doing of thy days, if perchance thou hast done any evil.
      Also, if thou be right, and if _She_ doth but hide herself,
      surely when she comes again she shall reward thee.”

      “My son the Baboon,” answered the old man, “think not that I have
      an ungrateful heart. Well do I remember how thou didst rescue me
      when those dogs stood by to see me drown. Measure for measure
      will I give thee, and if thou canst be saved, surely I will save
      thee. Listen: by dawn to-morrow be prepared, for litters shall be
      here to bear ye away across the mountains, and through the
      marshes beyond. This will I do, saying that it is the word of
      _She_ that it be done, and he who obeyeth not the word of _She_
      food is he for the hyænas. Then when ye have crossed the marshes,
      ye must strike with your own hands, so that perchance, if good
      fortune go with you, ye may live to come to that black water
      whereof ye told me. And now, see, the Lion wakes, and ye must eat
      the food I have made ready for you.”

      Leo’s condition when once he was fairly aroused proved not to be
      so bad as might have been expected from his appearance, and we
      both of us managed to eat a hearty meal, which indeed we needed
      sadly enough. After this we limped down to the spring and bathed,
      and then came back and slept again till evening, when we once
      more ate enough for five. Billali was away all that day, no doubt
      making arrangements about litters and bearers, for we were
      awakened in the middle of the night by the arrival of a
      considerable number of men in the little camp.

      At dawn the old man himself appeared, and told us that he had by
      using _She’s_ dreadful name, though with some difficulty,
      succeeded in getting the necessary men and two guides to conduct
      us across the swamps, and that he urged us to start at once, at
      the same time announcing his intention of accompanying us so as
      to protect us against treachery. I was much touched by this act
      of kindness on the part of that wily old barbarian towards two
      utterly defenceless strangers. A three—or in his case, for he
      would have to return, six—days’ journey through those deadly
      swamps was no light undertaking for a man of his age, but he
      consented to do it cheerfully in order to promote our safety. It
      shows that even among those dreadful Amahagger—who are certainly
      with their gloom and their devilish and ferocious rites by far
      the most terrible savages that I ever heard of—there are people
      with kindly hearts. Of course, self-interest may have had
      something to do with it. He may have thought that _She_ would
      suddenly reappear and demand an account of us at his hands, but
      still, allowing for all deductions, it was a great deal more than
      we could expect under the circumstances, and I can only say that
      I shall for as long as I live cherish a most affectionate
      remembrance of my nominal parent, old Billali.

      Accordingly, after swallowing some food, we started in the
      litters, feeling, so far as our bodies went, wonderfully like our
      old selves after our long rest and sleep. I must leave the
      condition of our minds to the imagination.

      Then came a terrible pull up the cliff. Sometimes the ascent was
      more natural, more often it was a zig-zag roadway cut, no doubt,
      in the first instance by the old inhabitants of Kôr. The
      Amahagger say they drive their spare cattle over it once a year
      to pasture outside; all I know is that those cattle must be
      uncommonly active on their feet. Of course the litters were
      useless here, so we had to walk.

      By midday, however, we reached the great flat top of that mighty
      wall of rock, and grand enough the view was from it, with the
      plain of Kôr, in the centre of which we could clearly make out
      the pillared ruins of the Temple of Truth to the one side, and
      the boundless and melancholy marsh on the other. This wall of
      rock, which had no doubt once formed the lip of the crater, was
      about a mile and a half thick, and still covered with clinker.
      Nothing grew there, and the only thing to relieve our eyes were
      occasional pools of rain-water (for rain had lately fallen)
      wherever there was a little hollow. Over the flat crest of this
      mighty rampart we went, and then came the descent, which, if not
      so difficult a matter as the getting up, was still sufficiently
      break-neck, and took us till sunset. That night, however, we
      camped in safety upon the mighty slopes that rolled away to the
      marsh beneath.

      On the following morning, about eleven o’clock, began our dreary
      journey across those awful seas of swamps which I have already
      described.

      For three whole days, through stench and mire, and the
      all-prevailing flavour of fear, did our bearers struggle along,
      till at length we came to open rolling ground quite uncultivated,
      and mostly treeless, but covered with game of all sorts, which
      lies beyond that most desolate, and without guides utterly
      impracticable, district. And here on the following morning we
      bade farewell, not without some regret, to old Billali, who
      stroked his white beard and solemnly blessed us.

      “Farewell, my son the Baboon,” he said, “and farewell to thee
      too, oh Lion. I can do no more to help you. But if ever ye come
      to your country, be advised, and venture no more into lands that
      ye know not, lest ye come back no more, but leave your white
      bones to mark the limit of your journeyings. Farewell once more;
      often shall I think of you, nor wilt thou forget me, my Baboon,
      for though thy face is ugly thy heart is true.” And then he
      turned and went, and with him went the tall and sullen-looking
      bearers, and that was the last that we saw of the Amahagger. We
      watched them winding away with the empty litters like a
      procession bearing dead men from a battle, till the mists from
      the marsh gathered round them and hid them, and then, left
      utterly desolate in the vast wilderness, we turned and gazed
      round us and at each other.

      Three weeks or so before four men had entered the marshes of Kôr,
      and now two of us were dead, and the other two had gone through
      adventures and experiences so strange and terrible that death
      himself hath not a more fearful countenance. Three weeks—and only
      three weeks! Truly time should be measured by events, and not by
      the lapse of hours. It seemed like thirty years since we saw the
      last of our whale-boat.

      “We must strike out for the Zambesi, Leo,” I said, “but God knows
      if we shall ever get there.”

      Leo nodded. He had become very silent of late, and we started
      with nothing but the clothes we stood in, a compass, our
      revolvers and express rifles, and about two hundred rounds of
      ammunition, and so ended the history of our visit to the ancient
      ruins of mighty and imperial Kôr.

      As for the adventures that subsequently befell us, strange and
      varied as they were, I have, after deliberation, determined not
      to record them here. In these pages I have only tried to give a
      short and clear account of an occurrence which I believe to be
      unprecedented, and this I have done, not with a view to immediate
      publication, but merely to put on paper while they are yet fresh
      in our memories the details of our journey and its result, which
      will, I believe, prove interesting to the world if ever we
      determine to make them public. This, as at present advised, we do
      not intend should be done during our joint lives.

      For the rest, it is of no public interest, resembling as it does
      the experience of more than one Central African traveller.
      Suffice it to say, that we did, after incredible hardships and
      privations, reach the Zambesi, which proved to be about a hundred
      and seventy miles south of where Billali left us. There we were
      for six months imprisoned by a savage tribe, who believed us to
      be supernatural beings, chiefly on account of Leo’s youthful face
      and snow-white hair. From these people we ultimately escaped,
      and, crossing the Zambesi, wandered off southwards, where, when
      on the point of starvation, we were sufficiently fortunate to
      fall in with a half-caste Portuguese elephant-hunter who had
      followed a troop of elephants farther inland than he had ever
      been before. This man treated us most hospitably, and ultimately
      through his assistance we, after innumerable sufferings and
      adventures, reached Delagoa Bay, more than eighteen months from
      the time when we emerged from the marshes of Kôr, and the very
      next day managed to catch one of the steamboats that run round
      the Cape to England. Our journey home was a prosperous one, and
      we set our foot on the quay at Southampton exactly two years from
      the date of our departure upon our wild and seemingly ridiculous
      quest, and I now write these last words with Leo leaning over my
      shoulder in my old room in my college, the very same into which
      some two-and-twenty years ago my poor friend Vincey came
      stumbling on the memorable night of his death, bearing the iron
      chest with him.

      And that is the end of this history so far as it concerns science
      and the outside world. What its end will be as regards Leo and
      myself is more than I can guess at. But we feel that is not
      reached yet. A story that began more than two thousand years ago
      may stretch a long way into the dim and distant future.

      Is Leo really a reincarnation of the ancient Kallikrates of whom
      the inscription tells? Or was Ayesha deceived by some strange
      hereditary resemblance? The reader must form his own opinion on
      this as on many other matters. I have mine, which is that she
      made no such mistake.

      Often I sit alone at night, staring with the eyes of the mind
      into the blackness of unborn time, and wondering in what shape
      and form the great drama will be finally developed, and where the
      scene of its next act will be laid. And when that _final_
      development ultimately occurs, as I have no doubt it must and
      will occur, in obedience to a fate that never swerves and a
      purpose that cannot be altered, what will be the part played
      therein by that beautiful Egyptian Amenartas, the Princess of the
      royal race of the Pharaohs, for the love of whom the Priest
      Kallikrates broke his vows to Isis, and, pursued by the
      inexorable vengeance of the outraged Goddess, fled down the coast
      of Libya to meet his doom at Kôr?