PELLUCIDAR
by Edgar Rice Burroughs
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
PROLOGUE
I LOST ON PELLUCIDAR
II TRAVELING WITH TERROR
III SHOOTING THE CHUTES--AND AFTER
IV FRIENDSHIP AND TREACHERY
V SURPRISES
VI A PENDENT WORLD
VII FROM PLIGHT TO PLIGHT
VIII CAPTIVE
IX HOOJA'S CUTTHROATS APPEAR
X THE RAID ON THE CAVE-PRISON
XI ESCAPE
XII KIDNAPED!
XIII RACING FOR LIFE
XIV GORE AND DREAMS
XV CONQUEST AND PEACE
PROLOGUE
SEVERAL YEARS had elapsed since I had found the op-
portunity to do any big-game hunting; for at last I
had my plans almost perfected for a return to my old
stamping-grounds in northern Africa, where in other
days I had had excellent sport in pursuit of the king
of beasts.
The date of my departure had been set; I was to
leave in two weeks. No schoolboy counting the lagging
hours that must pass before the beginning of "long
vacation" released him to the delirious joys of the sum-
mer camp could have been filled with greater im-
patience or keener anticipation.
And then came a letter that started me for Africa
twelve days ahead of my schedule.
Often am I in receipt of letters from strangers who
have found something in a story of mine to commend
or to condemn. My interest in this department of my
correspondence is ever fresh. I opened this particular
letter with all the zest of pleasurable anticipation with
which I had opened so many others. The post-mark
(Algiers) had aroused my interest and curiosity, es-
pecially at this time, since it was Algiers that was
presently to witness the termination of my coming sea
voyage in search of sport and adventure.
Before the reading of that letter was completed lions
and lion-hunting had fled my thoughts, and I was in
a state of excitement bordering upon frenzy.
It--well, read it yourself, and see if you, too, do not
find food for frantic conjecture, for tantalizing doubts,
and for a great hope.
Here it is:
DEAR SIR: I think that I have run across one of the
most remarkable coincidences in modern literature. But
let me start at the beginning:
I am, by profession, a wanderer upon the face of
the earth. I have no trade--nor any other occupation.
My father bequeathed me a competency; some remoter
ancestors lust to roam. I have combined the two
and invested them carefully and without extravagance.
I became interested in your story, At the Earth's
Core, not so much because of the probability of the
tale as of a great and abiding wonder that people
should be paid real money for writing such impossible
trash. You will pardon my candor, but it is necessary
that you understand my mental attitude toward this
particular story--that you may credit that which fol-
lows.
Shortly thereafter I started for the Sahara in search
of a rather rare species of antelope that is to be found
only occasionally within a limited area at a certain
season of the year. My chase led me far from the haunts
of man.
It was a fruitless search, however, in so far as antelope
is concerned; but one night as I lay courting sleep at
the edge of a little cluster of date-palms that surround
an ancient well in the midst of the arid, shifting sands,
I suddenly became conscious of a strange sound coming
apparently from the earth beneath my head.
It was an intermittent ticking!
No reptile or insect with which I am familiar re-
produces any such notes. I lay for an hour--listening
intently.
At last my curiosity got the better of me. I arose,
lighted my lamp and commenced to investigate.
My bedding lay upon a rug stretched directly upon
the warm sand. The noise appeared to be coming from
beneath the rug. I raised it, but found nothing--yet,
at intervals, the sound continued.
I dug into the sand with the point of my hunting-
knife. A few inches below the surface of the sand
I encountered a solid substance that had the feel of
wood beneath the sharp steel.
Excavating about it, I unearthed a small wooden box.
From this receptacle issued the strange sound that I
had heard.
How had it come here?
What did it contain?
In attempting to lift it from its burying place I dis-
covered that it seemed to be held fast by means of a
very small insulated cable running farther into the sand
beneath it.
My first impulse was to drag the thing loose by main
strength; but fortunately I thought better of this and
fell to examining the box. I soon saw that it was covered
by a hinged lid, which was held closed by a simple
screwhook and eye.
It took but a moment to loosen this and raise the
cover, when, to my utter astonishment, I discovered
an ordinary telegraph instrument clicking away within.
"What in the world," thought I, "is this thing doing here?"
That it was a French military instrument was my
first guess; but really there didn't seem much likelihood
that this was the correct explanation, when one took
into account the loneliness and remoteness of the spot.
As I sat gazing at my remarkable find, which was tick-
ing and clicking away there in the silence of the desert
night, trying to convey some message which I was
unable to interpret, my eyes fell upon a bit of paper
lying in the bottom of the box beside the instrument.
I picked it up and examined it. Upon it were written
but two letters:
D. I.
They meant nothing to me then. I was baffled.
Once, in an interval of silence upon the part of the
receiving instrument, I moved the sending-key up and
down a few times. Instantly the receiving mechanism
commenced to work frantically.
I tried to recall something of the Morse Code, with
which I had played as a little boy--but time had
obliterated it from my memory. I became almost frantic
as I let my imagination run riot among the possibilities
for which this clicking instrument might stand.
Some poor devil at the unknown other end might be
in dire need of succor. The very franticness of the
instrument's wild clashing betokened something of the
kind.
And there sat I, powerless to interpret, and so power-
less to help!
It was then that the inspiration came to me. In a flash
there leaped to my mind the closing paragraphs of the
story I had read in the club at Algiers:
Does the answer lie somewhere upon the bosom of
the broad Sahara, at the ends of two tiny wires, hidden
beneath a lost cairn?
The idea seemed preposterous. Experience and in-
telligence combined to assure me that there could be
no slightest grain of truth or possibility in your wild
tale--it was fiction pure and simple.
And yet where WERE the other ends of those wires?
What was this instrument--ticking away here in
the great Sahara--but a travesty upon the possible!
Would I have believed in it had I not seen it with
my own eyes?
And the initials--D. I.--upon the slip of paper!
David's initials were these--David Innes.
I smiled at my imaginings. I ridiculed the assumption
that there was an inner world and that these wires
led downward through the earth's crust to the surface
of Pellucidar. And yet--
Well, I sat there all night, listening to that tantalizing
clicking, now and then moving the sending-key just to
let the other end know that the instrument had been
discovered. In the morning, after carefully returning the
box to its hole and covering it over with sand, I called
my servants about me, snatched a hurried breakfast,
mounted my horse, and started upon a forced march
for Algiers.
I arrived here today. In writing you this letter I feel
that I am making a fool of myself.
There is no David Innes.
There is no Dian the Beautiful.
There is no world within a world.
Pellucidar is but a realm of your imagination--noth-
ing more.
BUT--
The incident of the finding of that buried telegraph
instrument upon the lonely Sahara is little short of
uncanny, in view of your story of the adventures of
David Innes.
I have called it one of the most remarkable coinci-
dences in modern fiction. I called it literature before,
but--again pardon my candor--your story is not.
And now--why am I writing you?
Heaven knows, unless it is that the persistent clicking
of that unfathomable enigma out there in the vast
silences of the Sahara has so wrought upon my nerves
that reason refuses longer to function sanely.
I cannot hear it now, yet I know that far away to the
south, all alone beneath the sands, it is still pounding
out its vain, frantic appeal.
It is maddening
It is your fault--I want you to release me from it.
Cable me at once, at my expense, that there was no
basis of fact for your story, At the Earth's Core.
Very respectfully yours,
COGDON NESTOR,
--and--Club,
Algiers.
June 1st,--.
Ten minutes after reading this letter I had cabled
Mr. Nestor as follows:
Story true. Await me Algiers.
As fast as train and boat would carry me, I sped
toward my destination. For all those dragging days my
mind was a whirl of mad conjecture, of frantic hope,
of numbing fear.
The finding of the telegraph-instrument practically
assured me that David Innes had driven Perry's iron
mole back through the earth's crust to the buried world
of Pellucidar; but what adventures had befallen him
since his return?
Had he found Dian the Beautiful, his half-savage
mate, safe among his friends, or had Hooja the Sly One
succeeded in his nefarious schemes to abduct her?
Did Abner Perry, the lovable old inventor and pale-
ontologist, still live?
Had the federated tribes of Pellucidar succeeded in
overthrowing the mighty Mahars, the dominant race
of reptilian monsters, and their fierce, gorilla-like sol-
diery, the savage Sagoths?
I must admit that I was in a state bordering upon
nervous prostration when I entered the -and-Club,
in Algiers, and inquired for Mr. Nestor. A moment later
I was ushered into his presence, to find myself clasping
hands with the sort of chap that the world holds only
too few of.
He was a tall, smooth-faced man of about thirty,
clean-cut, straight, and strong, and weather-tanned to
the hue of a desert Arab. I liked him immensely from
the first, and I hope that after our three months together
in the desert country--three months not entirely lack-
ing in adventure--he found that a man may be a
writer of "impossible trash" and yet have some redeem-
ing qualities.
The day following my arrival at Algiers we left for
the south, Nestor having made all arrangements in
advance, guessing, as he naturally did, that I could be
coming to Africa for but a single purpose--to hasten
at once to the buried telegraph-instrument and wrest
its secret from it.
In addition to our native servants, we took along
an English telegraph-operator named Frank Downes.
Nothing of interest enlivened our journey by rail and
caravan till we came to the cluster of date-palms about
the ancient well upon the rim of the Sahara.
It was the very spot at which I first had seen David
Innes. If he had ever raised a cairn above the telegraph
instrument no sign of it remained now. Had it not been
for the chance that caused Cogdon Nestor to throw
down his sleeping rug directly over the hidden instru-
ment, it might still be clicking there unheard--and
this story still unwritten.
When we reached the spot and unearthed the little
box the instrument was quiet, nor did repeated attempts
upon the part of our telegrapher succeed in winning
a response from the other end of the line. After several
days of futile endeavor to raise Pellucidar, we had be-
gun to despair. I was as positive that the other end
of that little cable protruded through the surface of the
inner world as I am that I sit here today in my study--
when about midnight of the fourth day I was awakened
by the sound of the instrument.
Leaping to my feet I grasped Downes roughly by the
neck and dragged him out of his blankets. He didn't
need to be told what caused my excitement, for the
instant he was awake he, too, heard the long-hoped
for click, and with a whoop of delight pounced upon
the instrument.
Nestor was on his feet almost as soon as I. The three
of us huddled about that little box as if our lives
depended upon the message it had for us.
Downes interrupted the clicking with his sending-
key. The noise of the receiver stopped instantly.
"Ask who it is, Downes," I directed.
He did so, and while we awaited the Englishman's
translation of the reply, I doubt if either Nestor or I
breathed.
"He says he's David Innes," said Downes. "He wants
to know who we are."
"Tell him," said I; "and that we want to know how
he is--and all that has befallen him since I last saw
him."
For two months I talked with David Innes almost
every day, and as Downes translated, either Nestor or
I took notes. From these, arranged in chronological
order, I have set down the following account of the
further adventures of David Innes at the earth's core,
practically in his own words.
CHAPTER I
LOST ON PELLUCIDAR
The Arabs, of whom I wrote you at the end of my last
letter (Innes began), and whom I thought to be enemies
intent only upon murdering me, proved to be exceed-
ingly friendly--they were searching for the very band
of marauders that had threatened my existence. The
huge rhamphorhynchus-like reptile that I had brought
back with me from the inner world--the ugly Mahar
that Hooja the Sly One had substituted for my dear
Dian at the moment of my departure--filled them
with wonder and with awe.
Nor less so did the mighty subterranean prospector
which had carried me to Pellucidar and back again,
and which lay out in the desert about two miles from
my camp.
With their help I managed to get the unwieldy tons
of its great bulk into a vertical position--the nose deep
in a hole we had dug in the sand and the rest of it
supported by the trunks of date-palms cut for the
purpose.
It was a mighty engineering job with only wild Arabs
and their wilder mounts to do the work of an electric
crane--but finally it was completed, and I was ready
for departure.
For some time I hesitated to take the Mahar back
with me. She had been docile and quiet ever since she
had discovered herself virtually a prisoner aboard the
"iron mole." It had been, of course, impossible for me
to communicate with her since she had no auditory
organs and I no knowledge of her fourth-dimension,
sixth-sense method of communication.
Naturally I am kind-hearted, and so I found it beyond
me to leave even this hateful and repulsive thing alone
in a strange and hostile world. The result was that
when I entered the iron mole I took her with me.
That she knew that we were about to return to
Pellucidar was evident, for immediately her manner
changed from that of habitual gloom that had pervaded
her, to an almost human expression of contentment
and delight.
Our trip through the earth's crust was but a repetition
of my two former journeys between the inner and the
outer worlds. This time, however, I imagine that we
must have maintained a more nearly perpendicular
course, for we accomplished the journey in a few min-
utes' less time than upon the occasion of my first
journey through the five-hundred-mile crust. just a
trifle less than seventy-two hours after our departure
into the sands of the Sahara, we broke through the
surface of Pellucidar.
Fortune once again favored me by the slightest of
margins, for when I opened the door in the prospector's
outer jacket I saw that we had missed coming up
through the bottom of an ocean by but a few hundred
yards.
The aspect of the surrounding country was entirely
unfamiliar to me--I had no conception of precisely
where I was upon the one hundred and twenty-four
million square miles of Pellucidar's vast land surface.
The perpetual midday sun poured down its torrid
rays from zenith, as it had done since the beginning of
Pellucidarian time--as it would continue to do to the
end of it. Before me, across the wide sea, the weird,
horizonless seascape folded gently upward to meet the
sky until it lost itself to view in the azure depths of
distance far above the level of my eyes.
How strange it looked! How vastly different from
the flat and puny area of the circumscribed vision of
the dweller upon the outer crust!
I was lost. Though I wandered ceaselessly throughout
a lifetime, I might never discover the whereabouts of
my former friends of this strange and savage world.
Never again might I see dear old Perry, nor Ghak the
Hairy One, nor Dacor the Strong One, nor that other
infinitely precious one--my sweet and noble mate,
Dian the Beautiful!
But even so I was glad to tread once more the surface
of Pellucidar. Mysterious and terrible, grotesque and
savage though she is in many of her aspects, I can not
but love her. Her very savagery appealed to me, for
it is the savagery of unspoiled Nature.
The magnificence of her tropic beauties enthralled
me. Her mighty land areas breathed unfettered free-
dom.
Her untracked oceans, whispering of virgin wonders
unsullied by the eye of man, beckoned me out upon
their restless bosoms.
Not for an instant did I regret the world of my
nativity. I was in Pellucidar. I was home. And I was
content.
As I stood dreaming beside the giant thing that had
brought me safely through the earth's crust, my travel-
ing companion, the hideous Mahar, emerged from the
interior of the prospector and stood beside me. For
a long time she remained motionless.
What thoughts were passing through the convolutions
of her reptilian brain?
I do not know.
She was a member of the dominant race of Pel-
lucidar. By a strange freak of evolution her kind had
first developed the power of reason in that world of
anomalies.
To her, creatures such as I were of a lower order.
As Perry had discovered among the writings of her
kind in the buried city of Phutra, it was still an open
question among the Mahars as to whether man pos-
sessed means of intelligent communication or the power
of reason.
Her kind believed that in the center of all-pervading
solidity there was a single, vast, spherical cavity, which
was Pellucidar. This cavity had been left there for the
sole purpose of providing a place for the creation and
propagation of the Mahar race. Everything within it
had been put there for the uses of the Mahar.
I wondered what this particular Mahar might think
now. I found pleasure in speculating upon just what
the effect had been upon her of passing through the
earth's crust, and coming out into a world that one of
even less intelligence than the great Mahars could
easily see was a different world from her own Pel-
lucidar.
What had she thought of the outer world's tiny sun?
What had been the effect upon her of the moon and
myriad stars of the clear African nights?
How had she explained them?
With what sensations of awe must she first have
watched the sun moving slowly across the heavens to
disappear at last beneath the western horizon, leaving
in his wake that which the Mahar had never before
witnessed--the darkness of night? For upon Pellucidar
there is no night. The stationary sun hangs forever in
the center of the Pellucidarian sky--directly overhead.
Then, too, she must have been impressed by the
wondrous mechanism of the prospector which had bored
its way from world to world and back again. And that
it had been driven by a rational being must also have
occurred to her.
Too, she bad seen me conversing with other men
upon the earth's surface. She had seen the arrival of
the caravan of books and arms, and ammunition, and
the balance of the heterogeneous collection which I
had crammed into the cabin of the iron mole for trans-
portation to Pellucidar.
She had seen all these evidences of a civilization
and brain-power transcending in scientific achieve-
ment anything that her race had produced; nor once
had she seen a creature of her own kind.
There could have been but a single deduction in the
mind of the Mahar--there were other worlds than
Pellucidar, and the gilak was a rational being.
Now the creature at my side was creeping slowly
toward the near-by sea. At my hip hung a long-barreled
six-shooter--somehow I had been unable to find the
same sensation of security in the newfangled auto-
matics that had been perfected since my first departure
from the outer world--and in my hand was a heavy
express rifle.
I could have shot the Mahar with ease, for I knew
intuitively that she was escaping--but I did not.
I felt that if she could return to her own kind with
the story of her adventures, the position of the human
race within Pellucidar would be advanced immensely
at a single stride, for at once man would take his proper
place in the considerations of the reptilia.
At the edge of the sea the creature paused and
looked back at me. Then she slid sinuously into the surf.
For several minutes I saw no more of her as she
luxuriated in the cool depths.
Then a hundred yards from shore she rose and there
for another short while she floated upon the surface.
Finally she spread her giant wings, flapped them
vigorously a score of times and rose above the blue
sea. A single time she circled far aloft--and then
straight as an arrow she sped away.
I watched her until the distant haze enveloped her
and she had disappeared. I was alone.
My first concern was to discover where within Pel-
lucidar I might be--and in what direction lay the land
of the Sarians where Ghak the Hairy One ruled.
But how was I to guess in which direction lay Sari?
And if I set out to search--what then?
Could I find my way back to the prospector with its
priceless freight of books, firearms, ammunition, scien-
tific instruments, and still more books--its great library
of reference works upon every conceivable branch of ap-
plied sciences?
And if I could not, of what value was all this vast
storehouse of potential civilization and progress to be
to the world of my adoption?
Upon the other hand, if I remained here alone with
it, what could I accomplish single-handed?
Nothing.
But where there was no east, no west, no north,
no south, no stars, no moon, and only a stationary mid-
day sun, how was I to find my way back to this spot
should ever I get out of sight of it?
I didn't know.
For a long time I stood buried in deep thought, when
it occurred to me to try out one of the compasses I
had brought and ascertain if it remained steadily fixed
upon an unvarying pole. I reentered the prospector
and fetched a compass without.
Moving a considerable distance from the prospector
that the needle might not be influenced by its great
bulk of iron and steel I turned the delicate instrument
about in every direction.
Always and steadily the needle remained rigidly fixed
upon a point straight out to sea, apparently pointing
toward a large island some ten or twenty miles distant.
This then should be north.
I drew my note-book from my pocket and made
a careful topographical sketch of the locality within
the range of my vision. Due north lay the island, far
out upon the shimmering sea.
The spot I had chosen for my observations was the
top of a large, flat boulder which rose six or eight feet
above the turf. This spot I called Greenwich. The
boulder was the "Royal Observatory."
I had made a start! I cannot tell you what a sense
of relief was imparted to me by the simple fact that
there was at least one spot within Pellucidar with a
familiar name and a place upon a map.
It was with almost childish joy that I made a little
circle in my note-book and traced the word Greenwich
beside it.
Now I felt I might start out upon my search with
some assurance of finding my way back again to the
prospector.
I decided that at first I would travel directly south
in the hope that I might in that direction find some
familiar landmark. It was as good a direction as any.
This much at least might be said of it.
Among the many other things I had brought from
the outer world were a number of pedometers. I
slipped three of these into my pockets with the idea
that I might arrive at a more or less accurate mean
from the registrations of them all.
On my map I would register so many paces south,
so many east, so many west, and so on. When I was
ready to return I would then do so by any route that
I might choose.
I also strapped a considerable quantity of ammuni-
tion across my shoulders, pocketed some matches, and
hooked an aluminum fry-pan and a small stew-kettle of
the same metal to my belt.
I was ready--ready to go forth and explore a world!
Ready to search a land area of 124,110,000 square
miles for my friends, my incomparable mate, and good
old Perry!
And so, after locking the door in the outer shell
of the prospector, I set out upon my quest. Due south
I traveled, across lovely valleys thick-dotted with graz-
ing herds.
Through dense primeval forests I forced my way
and up the slopes of mighty mountains searching for
a pass to their farther sides.
Ibex and musk-sheep fell before my good old revolver,
so that I lacked not for food in the higher altitudes.
The forests and the plains gave plentifully of fruits
and wild birds, antelope, aurochsen, and elk.
Occasionally, for the larger game animals and the
gigantic beasts of prey, I used my express rifle, but
for the most part the revolver filled all my needs.
There were times, too, when faced by a mighty cave
bear, a saber-toothed tiger, or huge felis spelaea, black-
maned and terrible, even my powerful rifle seemed
pitifully inadequate--but fortune favored me so that
I passed unscathed through adventures that even the
recollection of causes the short hairs to bristle at the
nape of my neck.
How long I wandered toward the south I do not
know, for shortly after I left the prospector something
went wrong with my watch, and I was again at the
mercy of the baffling timelessness of Pellucidar, forging
steadily ahead beneath the great, motionless sun which
hangs eternally at noon.
I ate many times, however, so that days must have
elapsed, possibly months with no familiar landscape
rewarding my eager eyes.
I saw no men nor signs of men. Nor is this strange,
for Pellucidar, in its land area, is immense, while the
human race there is very young and consequently far
from numerous.
Doubtless upon that long search mine was the first
human foot to touch the soil in many places--mine
the first human eye to rest upon the gorgeous wonders
of the landscape.
It was a staggering thought. I could not but dwell
upon it often as I made my lonely way through this
virgin world. Then, quite suddenly, one day I stepped
out of the peace of manless primality into the presence
of man--and peace was gone.
It happened thus:
I had been following a ravine downward out of a
chain of lofty hills and had paused at its mouth to view
the lovely little valley that lay before me. At one side
was tangled wood, while straight ahead a river wound
peacefully along parallel to the cliffs in which the hills
terminated at the valley's edge.
Presently, as I stood enjoying the lovely scene, as
insatiate for Nature's wonders as if I had not looked
upon similar landscapes countless times, a sound of
shouting broke from the direction of the woods. That
the harsh, discordant notes rose from the throats of
men I could not doubt.
I slipped behind a large boulder near the mouth of
the ravine and waited. I could hear the crashing of
underbrush in the forest, and I guessed that whoever
came came quickly--pursued and pursuers, doubtless.
In a short time some hunted animal would break into
view, and a moment later a score of half-naked savages
would come leaping after with spears or club or great
stone-knives.
I had seen the thing so many times during my life
within Pellucidar that I felt that I could anticipate to
a nicety precisely what I was about to witness. I hoped
that the hunters would prove friendly and be able to
direct me toward Sari.
Even as I was thinking these thoughts the quarry
emerged from the forest. But it was no terrified four-
footed beast. Instead, what I saw was an old man--
a terrified old man!
Staggering feebly and hopelessly from what must
have been some very terrible fate, if one could judge
from the horrified expressions he continually cast behind
him toward the wood, he came stumbling on in my
direction.
He had covered but a short distance from the forest
when I beheld the first of his pursuers--a Sagoth, one
of those grim and terrible gorilla-men who guard the
mighty Mahars in their buried cities, faring forth from
time to time upon slave-raiding or punitive expeditions
against the human race of Pellucidar, of whom the
dominant race of the inner world think as we think
of the bison or the wild sheep of our own world.
Close behind the foremost Sagoth came others until
a full dozen raced, shouting after the terror-stricken
old man. They would be upon him shortly, that was
plain.
One of them was rapidly overhauling him, his back-
thrown spear-arm testifying to his purpose.
And then, quite with the suddenness of an unex-
pected blow, I realized a past familiarity with the gait
and carriage of the fugitive.
Simultaneously there swept over me the staggering
fact that the old man was--PERRY! That he was about
to die before my very eyes with no hope that I could
reach him in time to avert the awful catastrophe--
for to me it meant a real catastrophe!
Perry was my best friend.
Dian, of course, I looked upon as more than friend.
She was my mate--a part of me.
I had entirely forgotten the rifle in my hand and
the revolvers at my belt; one does not readily syn-
chronize his thoughts with the stone age and the
twentieth century simultaneously.
Now from past habit I still thought in the stone age,
and in my thoughts of the stone age there were no
thoughts of firearms.
The fellow was almost upon Perry when the feel of
the gun in my hand awoke me from the lethargy of
terror that had gripped me. From behind my boulder
I threw up the heavy express rifle--a mighty engine
of destruction that might bring down a cave bear or
a mammoth at a single shot--and let drive at the
Sagoth's broad, hairy breast.
At the sound of the shot he stopped stock-still. His
spear dropped from his hand.
Then he lunged forward upon his face.
The effect upon the others was little less remarkable.
Perry alone could have possibly guessed the meaning of
the loud report or explained its connection with the
sudden collapse of the Sagoth. The other gorilla-men
halted for but an instant. Then with renewed shrieks
of rage they sprang forward to finish Perry.
At the same time I stepped from behind my boul-
der, drawing one of my revolvers that I might conserve
the more precious ammunition of the express rifle.
Quickly I fired again with the lesser weapon.
Then it was that all eyes were directed toward me.
Another Sagoth fell to the bullet from the revolver;
but it did not stop his companions. They were out for
revenge as well as blood now, and they meant to have
both.
As I ran forward toward Perry I fired four more
shots, dropping three of our antagonists. Then at last
the remaining seven wavered. It was too much for
them, this roaring death that leaped, invisible, upon
them from a great distance.
As they hesitated I reached Perry's side. I have never
seen such an expression upon any man's face as that
upon Perry's when he recognized me. I have no words
wherewith to describe it. There was not time to talk
then--scarce for a greeting. I thrust the full, loaded
revolver into his hand, fired the last shot in my own,
and reloaded. There were but six Sagoths left then.
They started toward us once more, though I could
see that they were terrified probably as much by the
noise of the guns as by their effects. They never
reached us. Half-way the three that remained turned
and fled, and we let them go.
The last we saw of them they were disappearing into
the tangled undergrowth of the forest. And then Perry
turned and threw his arms about my neck and, burying
his old face upon my shoulder, wept like a child.
CHAPTER II
TRAVELING WITH TERROR
We made camp there beside the peaceful river. There
Perry told me all that had befallen him since I had
departed for the outer crust.
It seemed that Hooja had made it appear that I
had intentionally left Dian behind, and that I did not
purpose ever returning to Pellucidar. He told them
that I was of another world and that I had tired of
this and of its inhabitants.
To Dian he had explained that I had a mate in the
world to which I was returning; that I had never
intended taking Dian the Beautiful back with me; and
that she had seen the last of me.
Shortly afterward Dian had disappeared from the
camp, nor had Perry seen or heard aught of her since.
He had no conception of the time that had elapsed
since I had departed, but guessed that many years had
dragged their slow way into the past.
Hooja, too, had disappeared very soon after Dian
had left. The Sarians, under Ghak the Hairy One, and
the Amozites under Dacor the Strong One, Dian's
brother, had fallen out over my supposed defection,
for Ghak would not believe that I had thus treacher-
ously deceived and deserted them.
The result had been that these two powerful tribes
had fallen upon one another with the new weapons
that Perry and I had taught them to make and to use.
Other tribes of the new federation took sides with the
original disputants or set up petty revolutions of their
own.
The result was the total demolition of the work we
had so well started.
Taking advantage of the tribal war, the Mahars had
gathered their Sagoths in force and fallen upon one
tribe after another in rapid succession, wreaking awful
havoc among them and reducing them for the most
part to as pitiable a state of terror as that from which
we had raised them.
Alone of all the once-mighty federation the Sarians
and the Amozites with a few other tribes continued
to maintain their defiance of the Mahars; but these
tribes were still divided among themselves, nor had it
seemed at all probable to Perry when he had last been
among them that any attempt at re-amalgamation
would be made.
"And thus, your majesty," he concluded, "has faded
back into the oblivion of the Stone Age our wondrous
dream and with it has gone the First Empire of Pel-
lucidar."
We both had to smile at the use of my royal title,
yet I was indeed still "Emperor of Pellucidar," and
some day I meant to rebuild what the vile act of the
treacherous Hooja had torn down.
But first I would find my empress. To me she was
worth forty empires.
"Have you no clue as to the whereabouts of Dian?"
I asked.
"None whatever," replied Perry. "It was in search of
her that I came to the pretty pass in which you dis-
covered me, and from which, David, you saved me.
"I knew perfectly well that you had not intentionally
deserted either Dian or Pellucidar. I guessed that in
some way Hooja the Sly One was at the bottom of
the matter, and I determined to go to Amoz, where
I guessed that Dian might come to the protection of
her brother, and do my utmost to convince her, and
through her Dacor the Strong One, that we had all
been victims of a treacherous plot to which you were
no party.
"I came to Amoz after a most trying and terrible
journey, only to find that Dian was not among her
brother's people and that they knew naught of her
whereabouts.
"Dacor, I am sure, wanted to be fair and just, but
so great were his grief and anger over the disap-
pearance of his sister that he could not listen to reason,
but kept repeating time and again that only your return
to Pellucidar could prove the honesty of your intentions.
"Then came a stranger from another tribe, sent I am
sure at the instigation of Hooja. He so turned the
Amozites against me that I was forced to flee their
country to escape assassination.
"In attempting to return to Sari I became lost, and
then the Sagoths discovered me. For a long time I
eluded them, hiding in caves and wading in rivers to
throw them off my trail.
"I lived on nuts and fruits and the edible roots that
chance threw in my way.
"I traveled on and on, in what directions I could not
even guess; and at last I could elude them no longer
and the end came as I had long foreseen that it would
come, except that I had not foreseen that you would
be there to save me."
We rested in our camp until Perry had regained
sufficient strength to travel again. We planned much,
rebuilding all our shattered air-castles; but above all we
planned most to find Dian.
I could not believe that she was dead, yet where
she might be in this savage world, and under what
frightful conditions she might be living, I could not
guess.
When Perry was rested we returned to the prospector,
where he fitted himself out fully like a civilized human
being--under-clothing, socks, shoes, khaki jacket and
breeches and good, substantial puttees.
When I had come upon him he was clothed in rough
sadak sandals, a gee-string and a tunic fashioned from
the shaggy hide of a thag. Now he wore real clothing
again for the first time since the ape-folk had stripped
us of our apparel that long-gone day that had witnessed
our advent within Pellucidar.
With a bandoleer of cartridges across his shoulder,
two six-shooters at his hips, and a rifle in his hand
he was a much rejuvenated Perry.
Indeed he was quite a different person altogether
from the rather shaky old man who had entered the
prospector with me ten or eleven years before, for the
trial trip that had plunged us into such wondrous ad-
ventures and into such a strange and hitherto un-
dreamed-of-world.
Now he was straight and active. His muscles, almost
atrophied from disuse in his former life, had filled out.
He was still an old man of course, but instead of
appearing ten years older than he really was, as he
had when we left the outer world, he now appeared
about ten years younger. The wild, free life of Pel-
lucidar had worked wonders for him.
Well, it must need have done so or killed him, for
a man of Perry's former physical condition could not
long have survived the dangers and rigors of the primi-
tive life of the inner world.
Perry had been greatly interested in my map and
in the "royal observatory" at Greenwich. By use of the
pedometers we had retraced our way to the prospector
with ease and accuracy.
Now that we were ready to set out again we decided
to follow a different route on the chance that it might
lead us into more familiar territory.
I shall not weary you with a repetition of the count-
less adventures of our long search. Encounters with
wild beasts of gigantic size were of almost daily occur-
rence; but with our deadly express rifles we ran com-
paratively little risk when one recalls that previously
we had both traversed this world of frightful dangers
inadequately armed with crude, primitive weapons and
all but naked.
We ate and slept many times--so many that we
lost count--and so I do not know how long we
roamed, though our map shows the distances and direc-
tions quite accurately. We must have covered a great
many thousand square miles of territory, and yet we
had seen nothing in the way of a familiar landmark,
when from the heights of a mountain-range we were
crossing I descried far in the distance great masses of
billowing clouds.
Now clouds are practically unknown in the skies of
Pellucidar. The moment that my eyes rested upon
them my heart leaped. I seized Perry's arm and, point-
ing toward the horizonless distance, shouted:
"The Mountains of the Clouds!"
"They lie close to Phutra, and the country of our
worst enemies, the Mahars," Perry remonstrated.
"I know it," I replied, "but they give us a starting-point
from which to prosecute our search intelligently. They
are at least a familiar landmark.
"They tell us that we are upon the right trail and not
wandering far in the wrong direction.
"Furthermore, close to the Mountains of the Clouds
dwells a good friend, Ja the Mezop. You did not know
him, but you know all that he did for me and all that he
will gladly do to aid me.
"At least he can direct us upon the right direction
toward Sari."
"The Mountains of the Clouds constitute a mighty
range," replied Perry. "They must cover an enormous
territory. How are you to find your friend in all the great
country that is visible from their rugged flanks?"
"Easily," I answered him, "for Ja gave me minute di-
rections. I recall almost his exact words:
"'You need merely come to the foot of the highest
peak of the Mountains of the Clouds. There you will find
a river that flows into the Lural Az.
"'Directly opposite the mouth of the river you will see
three large islands far out--so far that they are barely
discernible. The one to the extreme left as you face them
from the mouth of the river is Anoroc, where I rule the
tribe of Anoroc.'"
And so we hastened onward toward the great cloud-
mass that was to be our guide for several weary marches.
At last we came close to the towering crags, Alp-like in
their grandeur.
Rising nobly among its noble fellows, one stupendous
peak reared its giant head thousands of feet above the
others. It was he whom we sought; but at its foot no
river wound down toward any sea.
"It must rise from the opposite side," suggested Perry,
casting a rueful glance at the forbidding heights that
barred our further progress. "We cannot endure the
arctic cold of those high flung passes, and to traverse the
endless miles about this interminable range might re-
quire a year or more. The land we seek must lie upon
the opposite side of the mountains."
"Then we must cross them," I insisted.
Perry shrugged.
"We can't do it, David," he repeated, "We are dressed
for the tropics. We should freeze to death among the
snows and glaciers long before we had discovered a pass
to the opposite side."
"We must cross them," I reiterated. "We will cross
them."
I had a plan, and that plan we carried out. It took
some time.
First we made a permanent camp part way up the
slopes where there was good water. Then we set out in
search of the great, shaggy cave bear of the higher
altitudes.
He is a mighty animal--a terrible animal. He is but
little larger than his cousin of the lesser, lower hills; but
he makes up for it in the awfulness of his ferocity and
in the length and thickness of his shaggy coat. It was his
coat that we were after.
We came upon him quite unexpectedly. I was trudg-
ing in advance along a rocky trail worn smooth by the
padded feet of countless ages of wild beasts. At a shoul-
der of the mountain around which the path ran I came
face to face with the Titan.
I was going up for a fur coat. He was coming down
for breakfast. Each realized that here was the very thing
he sought.
With a horrid roar the beast charged me.
At my right the cliff rose straight upward for thou-
sands of feet.
At my left it dropped into a dim, abysmal canon.
In front of me was the bear.
Behind me was Perry.
I shouted to him in warning, and then I raised my
rifle and fired into the broad breast of the creature.
There was no time to take aim; the thing was too close
upon me.
But that my bullet took effect was evident from the
howl of rage and pain that broke from the frothing
jowls. It didn't stop him, though.
I fired again, and then he was upon me. Down I went
beneath his ton of maddened, clawing flesh and bone
and sinew.
I thought my time had come. I remember feeling
sorry for poor old Perry, left all alone in this inhos-
pitable, savage world.
And then of a sudden I realized that the bear was
gone and that I was quite unharmed. I leaped to my
feet, my rifle still clutched in my hand, and looked
about for my antagonist.
I thought that I should find him farther down the trail,
probably finishing Perry, and so I leaped in the direction
I supposed him to be, to find Perry perched upon a pro-
jecting rock several feet above the trail. My cry of warn-
ing had given him time to reach this point of safety.
There he squatted, his eyes wide and his mouth ajar,
the picture of abject terror and consternation.
"Where is he?" he cried when he saw me. "Where is
he?"
"Didn't he come this way?" I asked,
"Nothing came this way," replied the old man. "But I
heard his roars--he must have been as large as an
elephant."
"He was," I admitted; "but where in the world do you
suppose he disappeared to?"
Then came a possible explanation to my mind. I re-
turned to the point at which the bear had hurled me
down and peered over the edge of the cliff into the
abyss below.
Far, far down I saw a small brown blotch near the
bottom of the canon. It was the bear.
My second shot must have killed him, and so his
dead body, after hurling me to the path, had toppled
over into the abyss. I shivered at the thought of how
close I, too, must have been to going over with him.
It took us a long time to reach the carcass, and arduous
labor to remove the great pelt. But at last the thing was
accomplished, and we returned to camp dragging the
heavy trophy behind us.
Here we devoted another considerable period to
scraping and curing it. When this was done to our
satisfaction we made heavy boots, trousers, and coats
of the shaggy skin, turning the fur in.
From the scraps we fashioned caps that came down
around our ears, with flaps that fell about our shoulders
and breasts. We were now fairly well equipped for our
search for a pass to the opposite side of the Mountains
of the Clouds.
Our first step now was to move our camp upward to
the very edge of the perpetual snows which cap this
lofty range. Here we built a snug, secure little hut,
which we provisioned and stored with fuel for its di-
minutive fireplace.
With our hut as a base we sallied forth in search of a
pass across the range.
Our every move was carefully noted upon our maps
which we now kept in duplicate. By this means we were
saved tedious and unnecessary retracing of ways already
explored.
Systematically we worked upward in both directions
from our base, and when we had at last discovered what
seemed might prove a feasible pass we moved our be-
longings to a new hut farther up.
It was hard work--cold, bitter, cruel work. Not a step
did we take in advance but the grim reaper strode
silently in our tracks.
There were the great cave bears in the timber, and
gaunt, lean wolves--huge creatures twice the size of
our Canadian timber-wolves. Farther up we were as-
sailed by enormous white bears--hungry, devilish
fellows, who came roaring across the rough glacier tops
at the first glimpse of us, or stalked us stealthily by scent
when they had not yet seen us.
It is one of the peculiarities of life within Pellucidar
that man is more often the hunted than the hunter.
Myriad are the huge-bellied carnivora of this primitive
world. Never, from birth to death, are those great bellies
sufficiently filled, so always are their mighty owners
prowling about in search of meat.
Terribly armed for battle as they are, man presents
to them in his primal state an easy prey, slow of foot,
puny of strength, ill-equipped by nature with natural
weapons of defense.
The bears looked upon us as easy meat. Only our
heavy rifles saved us from prompt extinction. Poor Perry
never was a raging lion at heart, and I am convinced
that the terrors of that awful period must have caused
him poignant mental anguish.
When we were abroad pushing our trail farther and
farther toward the distant break which, we assumed,
marked a feasible way across the range, we never knew
at what second some great engine of clawed and fanged
destruction might rush upon us from behind, or lie in
wait for us beyond an ice-hummock or a jutting shoulder
of the craggy steeps.
The roar of our rifles was constantly shattering the
world-old silence of stupendous canons upon which the
eye of man had never before gazed. And when in the
comparative safety of our hut we lay down to sleep the
great beasts roared and fought without the walls, clawed
and battered at the door, or rushed their colossal frames
headlong against the hut's sides until it rocked and
trembled to the impact.
Yes, it was a gay life.
Perry had got to taking stock of our ammunition each
time we returned to the hut. It became something of an
obsession with him.
He'd count our cartridges one by one and then try to
figure how long it would be before the last was ex-
pended and we must either remain in the hut until we
starved to death or venture forth, empty, to fill the belly
of some hungry bear.
I must admit that I, too, felt worried, for our progress
was indeed snail-like, and our ammunition could not
last forever. In discussing the problem, finally we came
to the decision to burn our bridges behind us and make
one last supreme effort to cross the divide.
It would mean that we must go without sleep for a
long period, and with the further chance that when the
time came that sleep could no longer be denied we
might still be high in the frozen regions of perpetual
snow and ice, where sleep would mean certain death,
exposed as we would be to the attacks of wild beasts
and without shelter from the hideous cold.
But we decided that we must take these chances and
so at last we set forth from our hut for the last time,
carrying such necessities as we felt we could least afford
to do without. The bears seemed unusually troublesome
and determined that time, and as we clambered slowly
upward beyond the highest point to which we had
previously attained, the cold became infinitely more
intense.
Presently, with two great bears dogging our footsteps
we entered a dense fog,
We had reached the heights that are so often cloud-
wrapped for long periods. We could see nothing a few
paces beyond our noses.
We dared not turn back into the teeth of the bears
which we could hear grunting behind us. To meet them
in this bewildering fog would have been to court instant
death.
Perry was almost overcome by the hopelessness of
our situation. He flopped down on his knees and began
to pray.
It was the first time I had heard him at his old habit
since my return to Pellucidar, and I had thought that
he had given up his little idiosyncrasy; but he hadn't.
Far from it.
I let him pray for a short time undisturbed, and then
as I was about to suggest that we had better be pushing
along one of the bears in our rear let out a roar that
made the earth fairly tremble beneath our feet.
It brought Perry to his feet as if he had been stung by
a wasp, and sent him racing ahead through the blind-
ing fog at a gait that I knew must soon end in disaster
were it not checked.
Crevasses in the glacier-ice were far too frequent to
permit of reckless speed even in a clear atmosphere,
and then there were hideous precipices along the
edges of which our way often led us. I shivered as I
thought of the poor old fellow's peril.
At the top of my lungs I called to him to stop, but he
did not answer me. And then I hurried on in the di-
rection he had gone, faster by far than safety dictated.
For a while I thought I heard him ahead of me, but
at last, though I paused often to listen and to call to
him, I heard nothing more, not even the grunting of
the bears that had been behind us. All was deathly
silence--the silence of the tomb. About me lay the thick,
impenetrable fog.
I was alone. Perry was gone--gone forever, I had not
the slightest doubt.
Somewhere near by lay the mouth of a treacherous
fissure, and far down at its icy bottom lay all that was
mortal of my old friend, Abner Perry. There would his
body he preserved in its icy sepulcher for countless ages,
until on some far distant day the slow-moving river of
ice had wound its snail-like way down to the warmer
level, there to disgorge its grisly evidence of grim
tragedy, and what in that far future age, might mean
baffling mystery.
CHAPTER III
SHOOTING THE CHUTES--AND AFTER
Through the fog I felt my way along by means of my
compass. I no longer heard the bears, nor did I encoun-
ter one within the fog.
Experience has since taught me that these great
beasts are as terror-stricken by this phenomenon as a
landsman by a fog at sea, and that no sooner does a fog
envelop them than they make the best of their way to
lower levels and a clear atmosphere. It was well for me
that this was true.
I felt very sad and lonely as I crawled along the diffi-
cult footing. My own predicament weighed less heavily
upon me than the loss of Perry, for I loved the old
fellow.
That I should ever win the opposite slopes of the
range I began to doubt, for though I am naturally
sanguine, I imagine that the bereavement which had
befallen me had cast such a gloom over my spirits that I
could see no slightest ray of hope for the future.
Then, too, the blighting, gray oblivion of the cold,
damp clouds through which I wandered was distress-
ing. Hope thrives best in sunlight, and I am sure that it
does not thrive at all in a fog.
But the instinct of self-preservation is stronger than
hope. It thrives, fortunately, upon nothing. It takes root
upon the brink of the grave, and blossoms in the jaws of
death. Now it flourished bravely upon the breast of dead
hope, and urged me onward and upward in a stern
endeavor to justify its existence.
As I advanced the fog became denser. I could see
nothing beyond my nose. Even the snow and ice I trod
were invisible.
I could not see below the breast of my bearskin coat.
I seemed to be floating in a sea of vapor.
To go forward over a dangerous glacier under such
conditions was little short of madness; but I could not
have stopped going had I known positively that death
lay two paces before my nose. In the first place, it was
too cold to stop, and in the second, I should have gone
mad but for the excitement of the perils that beset each
forward step.
For some time the ground had been rougher and
steeper, until I had been forced to scale a considerable
height that had carried me from the glacier entirely. I
was sure from my compass that I was following the right
general direction, and so I kept on.
Once more the ground was level. From the wind that
blew about me I guessed that I must be upon some ex-
posed peak of ridge.
And then quite suddenly I stepped out into space.
Wildly I turned and clutched at the ground that had
slipped from beneath my feet.
Only a smooth, icy surface was there. I found nothing
to clutch or stay my fall, and a moment later so great
was my speed that nothing could have stayed me.
As suddenly as I had pitched into space, with equal
suddenness did I emerge from the fog, out of which I
shot like a projectile from a cannon into clear daylight.
My speed was so great that I could see nothing about
me but a blurred and indistinct sheet of smooth and
frozen snow, that rushed past me with express-train
velocity.
I must have slid downward thousands of feet before
the steep incline curved gently on to a broad, smooth,
snow-covered plateau. Across this I hurtled with slowly
diminishing velocity, until at last objects about me began
to take definite shape.
Far ahead, miles and miles away, I saw a great valley
and mighty woods, and beyond these a broad expanse
of water. In the nearer foreground I discerned a small,
dark blob of color upon the shimmering whiteness of the
snow.
"A bear," thought I, and thanked the instinct that had
impelled me to cling tenaciously to my rifle during the
moments of my awful tumble.
At the rate I was going it would be but a moment
before I should be quite abreast the thing; nor was it
long before I came to a sudden stop in soft snow, upon
which the sun was shining, not twenty paces from the
object of my most immediate apprehension.
It was standing upon its hind legs waiting for me. As
I scrambled to my feet to meet it, I dropped my gun
in the snow and doubled up with laughter.
It was Perry.
The expression upon his face, combined with the relief
I felt at seeing him again safe and sound, was too much
for my overwrought nerves.
"David!" be cried. "David, my boy! God has been
good to an old man. He has answered my prayer."
It seems that Perry in his mad flight had plunged over
the brink at about the same point as that at which I had
stepped over it a short time later. Chance had done for
us what long periods of rational labor had failed to
accomplish.
We had crossed the divide. We were upon the side of
the Mountains of the Clouds that we had for so long
been attempting to reach.
We looked about. Below us were green trees and
warm jungles. In the distance was a great sea.
"The Lural Az," I said, pointing toward its blue-green
surface.
Somehow--the gods alone can explain it--Perry, too,
had clung to his rifle during his mad descent of the icy
slope. For that there was cause for great rejoicing.
Neither of us was worse for his experience, so after
shaking the snow from our clothing, we set off at a great
rate down toward the warmth and comfort of the forest
and the jungle.
The going was easy by comparison with the awful
obstacles we had had to encounter upon the opposite
side of the divide. There were beasts, of course, but we
came through safely.
Before we halted to eat or rest, we stood beside a
little mountain brook beneath the wondrous trees of the
primeval forest in an atmosphere of warmth and com-
fort. It reminded me of an early June day in the Maine
Woods.
We fell to work with our short axes and cut enough
small trees to build a rude protection from the fiercer
beasts. Then we lay down to sleep.
How long we slept I do not know. Perry says that
inasmuch as there is no means of measuring time within
Pellucidar, there can be no such thing as time here, and
that we may have slept an outer earthly year, or we
may have slept but a second.
But this I know. We had stuck the ends of some of the
saplings into the ground in the building of our shelter,
first stripping the leaves and branches from them, and
when we awoke we found that many of them had thrust
forth sprouts.
Personally, I think that we slept at least a month; but
who may say? The sun marked midday when we closed
our eyes; it was still in the same position when we
opened them; nor had it varied a hair's breadth in the
interim.
It is most baffling, this question of elapsed time within
Pellucidar.
Anyhow, I was famished when we awoke. I think that
it was the pangs of hunger that awoke me. Ptarmigan
and wild boar fell before my revolver within a dozen
moments of my awakening. Perry soon had a roaring fire
blazing by the brink of the little stream.
It was a good and delicious meal we made. Though
we did not eat the entire boar, we made a very large
hole in him, while the ptarmigan was but a mouthful.
Having satisfied our hunger, we determined to set forth
at once in search of Anoroc and my old friend, Ja the
Mezop. We each thought that by following the little
stream downward, we should come upon the large river
which Ja had told me emptied into the Lural Az op-
posite his island.
We did so; nor were we disappointed, for at last after
a pleasant journey--and what journey would not be
pleasant after the hardships we had endured among the
peaks of the Mountains of the Clouds--we came upon a
broad flood that rushed majestically onward in the di-
rection of the great sea we had seen from the snowy
slopes of the mountains.
For three long marches we followed the left bank of
the growing river, until at last we saw it roll its mighty
volume into the vast waters of the sea. Far out across the
rippling ocean we described three islands. The one to
the left must be Anoroc.
At last we had come close to a solution of our problem
--the road to Sari.
But how to reach the islands was now the foremost
question in our minds. We must build a canoe.
Perry is a most resourceful man. He has an axiom
which carries the thought-kernel that what man has
done, man can do, and it doesn't cut any figure with
Perry whether a fellow knows how to do it or not.
He set out to make gunpowder once, shortly after our
escape from Phutra and at the beginning of the con-
federation of the wild tribes of Pellucidar. He said that
some one, without any knowledge of the fact that such a
thing might be concocted, had once stumbled upon it by
accident, and so he couldn't see why a fellow who knew
all about powder except how to make it couldn't do as
well.
He worked mighty hard mixing all sorts of things
together, until finally he evolved a substance that looked
like powder. He had been very proud of the stuff, and
had gone about the village of the Sarians exhibiting it to
every one who would listen to him, and explaining what
its purpose was and what terrific havoc it would work,
until finally the natives became so terrified at the stuff
that they wouldn't come within a rod of Perry and his
invention.
Finally, I suggested that we experiment with it and
see what it would do, so Perry built a fire, after placing
the powder at a safe distance, and then touched a glow-
ing ember to a minute particle of the deadly explosive.
It extinguished the ember.
Repeated experiments with it determined me that in
searching for a high explosive, Perry had stumbled upon
a fire-extinguisher that would have made his fortune
for him back in our own world.
So now he set himself to work to build a scientific
canoe. I had suggested that we construct a dugout, but
Perry convinced me that we must build something
more in keeping with our positions of supermen in this
world of the Stone Age.
"We must impress these natives with our superiority,"
he explained. "You must not forget, David, that you are
emperor of Pellucidar. As such you may not with dignity
approach the shores of a foreign power in so crude a
vessel as a dugout."
I pointed out to Perry that it wasn't much more in-
congruous for the emperor to cruise in a canoe, than it
was for the prime minister to attempt to build one with
his own hands.
He had to smile at that; but in extenuation of his act
he assured me that it was quite customary for prime
ministers to give their personal attention to the building
of imperial navies; "and this," he said, "is the imperial
navy of his Serene Highness, David I, Emperor of the
Federated Kingdoms of Pellucidar."
I grinned; but Perry was quite serious about it. It had
always seemed rather more or less of a joke to me that I
should be addressed as majesty and all the rest of it.
Yet my imperial power and dignity had been a very real
thing during my brief reign.
Twenty tribes had joined the federation, and their
chiefs had sworn eternal fealty to one another and to me.
Among them were many powerful though savage na-
tions. Their chiefs we had made kings; their tribal lands
kingdoms.
We had armed them with bows and arrows and
swords, in addition to their own more primitive weapons.
I had trained them in military discipline and in so much
of the art of war as I had gleaned from extensive read-
ing of the campaigns of Napoleon, Von Moltke, Grant,
and the ancients.
We had marked out as best we could natural bounda-
ries dividing the various kingdoms. We had warned
tribes beyond these boundaries that they must not
trespass, and we had marched against and severely
punished those who had.
We had met and defeated the Mahars and the
Sagoths. In short, we had demonstrated our rights to
empire, and very rapidly were we being recognized and
heralded abroad when my departure for the outer world
and Hooja's treachery had set us back.
But now I had returned. The work that fate had
undone must be done again, and though I must need
smile at my imperial honors, I none the less felt the
weight of duty and obligation that rested upon my
shoulders.
Slowly the imperial navy progressed toward com-
pletion. She was a wondrous craft, but I had my doubts
about her. When I voiced them to Perry, he reminded
me gently that my people for many generations had
been mine-owners, not ship-builders, and consequently I
couldn't be expected to know much about the matter.
I was minded to inquire into his hereditary fitness to
design battleships; but inasmuch as I already knew that
his father had been a minister in a back-woods village far
from the coast, I hesitated lest I offend the dear old
fellow.
He was immensely serious about his work, and I must
admit that in so far as appearances went he did ex-
tremely well with the meager tools and assistance at his
command. We had only two short axes and our hunting-
knives; yet with these we hewed trees, split them into
planks, surfaced and fitted them.
The "navy" was some forty feet in length by ten feet
beam. Her sides were quite straight and fully ten feet
high--"for the purpose," explained Perry, "of adding
dignity to her appearance and rendering it less easy for
an enemy to board her."
As a matter of fact, I knew that he had had in mind
the safety of her crew under javelin-fire--the lofty sides
made an admirable shelter. Inside she reminded me of
nothing so much as a floating trench. There was also
some slight analogy to a huge coffin.
Her prow sloped sharply backward from the water-
line--quite like a line of battleship. Perry had designed
her more for moral effect upon an enemy, I think, than
for any real harm she might inflict, and so those parts
which were to show were the most imposing.
Below the water-line she was practically non-existent.
She should have had considerable draft; but, as the
enemy couldn't have seen it, Perry decided to do away
with it, and so made her flat-bottomed. It was this that
caused my doubts about her.
There was another little idiosyncrasy of design that
escaped us both until she was about ready to launch--
there was no method of propulsion. Her sides were far
too high to permit the use of sweeps, and when Perry
suggested that we pole her, I remonstrated on the
grounds that it would be a most undignified and awk-
ward manner of sweeping down upon the foe, even if
we could find or wield poles that would reach to the
bottom of the ocean.
Finally I suggested that we convert her into a sailing
vessel. When once the idea took hold Perry was most
enthusiastic about it, and nothing would do but a four-
masted, full-rigged ship.
Again I tried to dissuade him, but he was simply
crazy over the psychological effect which the appearance
of this strange and mighty craft would have upon the
natives of Pellucidar. So we rigged her with thin hides
for sails and dried gut for rope.
Neither of us knew much about sailing a full-rigged
ship; but that didn't worry me a great deal, for I was
confident that we should never be called upon to do so,
and as the day of launching approached I was positive of
it.
We had built her upon a low bank of the river close
to where it emptied into the sea, and just above high
tide. Her keel we had laid upon several rollers cut from
small trees, the ends of the rollers in turn resting upon
parallel tracks of long saplings. Her stern was toward the
water.
A few hours before we were ready to launch her she
made quite an imposing picture, for Perry had insisted
upon setting every shred of "canvas." I told him that I
didn't know much about it, but I was sure that at launch-
ing the hull only should have been completed, every-
thing else being completed after she had floated safely.
At the last minute there was some delay while we
sought a name for her. I wanted her christened the
Perry in honor both of her designer and that other great
naval genius of another world, Captain Oliver Hazard
Perry, of the United States Navy. But Perry was too
modest; he wouldn't hear of it.
We finally decided to establish a system in the naming
of the fleet. Battle-ships of the first-class should bear the
names of kingdoms of the federation; armored cruisers
the names of kings; cruisers the names of cities, and so
on down the line. Therefore, we decided to name the
first battle-ship Sari, after the first of the federated
kingdoms.
The launching of the Sari proved easier than I con-
templated. Perry wanted me to get in and break some-
thing over the bow as she floated out upon the bosom of
the river, but I told him that I should feel safer on dry
land until I saw which side up the Sari would float.
I could see by the expression of the old man's face
that my words had hurt him; but I noticed that he didn't
offer to get in himself, and so I felt less contrition than
I might otherwise.
When we cut the ropes and removed the blocks that
held the Sari in place she started for the water with a
lunge. Before she hit it she was going at a reckless
speed, for we had laid our tracks quite down to the
water, greased them, and at intervals placed rollers all
ready to receive the ship as she moved forward with
stately dignity. But there was no dignity in the Sari.
When she touched the surface of the river she must
have been going twenty or thirty miles an hour. Her
momentum carried her well out into the stream, until
she came to a sudden halt at the end of the long line
which we had had the foresight to attach to her bow and
fasten to a large tree upon the bank.
The moment her progress was checked she promptly
capsized. Perry was overwhelmed. I didn't upbraid him,
nor remind him that I had "told him so."
His grief was so genuine and so apparent that I didn't
have the heart to reproach him, even were I inclined to
that particular sort of meanness.
"Come, come, old man!" I cried. "It's not as bad as it
looks. Give me a hand with this rope, and we'll drag her
up as far as we can; and then when the tide goes out
we'll try another scheme. I think we can make a go of
her yet."
Well, we managed to get her up into shallow water.
When the tide receded she lay there on her side in the
mud, quite a pitiable object for the premier battle-ship
of a world--"the terror of the seas" was the way Perry
had occasionally described her.
We had to work fast; but before the tide came in
again we had stripped her of her sails and masts, righted
her, and filled her about a quarter full of rock ballast. If
she didn't stick too fast in the mud I was sure that she
would float this time right side up.
I can tell you that it was with palpitating hearts that
we sat upon the river-bank and watched that tide come
slowly in. The tides of Pellucidar don't amount to much
by comparison with our higher tides of the outer world,
but I knew that it ought to prove ample to float the Sari.
Nor was I mistaken. Finally we had the satisfaction
of seeing the vessel rise out of the mud and float slowly
upstream with the tide. As the water rose we pulled her
in quite close to the bank and clambered aboard.
She rested safely now upon an even keel; nor did she
leak, for she was well calked with fiber and tarry pitch.
We rigged up a single short mast and light sail, fastened
planking down over the ballast to form a deck, worked
her out into midstream with a couple of sweeps, and
dropped our primitive stone anchor to await the turn
of the tide that would bear us out to sea.
While we waited we devoted the time to the con-
struction of an upper deck, since the one immediately
above the ballast was some seven feet from the gunwale.
The second deck was four feet above this. In it was a
large, commodious hatch, leading to the lower deck. The
sides of the ship rose three feet above the upper deck,
forming an excellent breastwork, which we loopholed at
intervals that we might lie prone and fire upon an
enemy.
Though we were sailing out upon a peaceful mission
in search of my friend Ja, we knew that we might meet
with people of some other island who would prove
unfriendly.
At last the tide turned. We weighed anchor. Slowly
we drifted down the great river toward the sea.
About us swarmed the mighty denizens of the prim-
eval deep--plesiosauri and ichthyosauria with all their
horrid, slimy cousins whose names were as the names of
aunts and uncles to Perry, but which I have never been
able to recall an hour after having heard them.
At last we were safely launched upon the journey to
which we had looked forward for so long, and the results
of which meant so much to me.
CHAPTER IV
FRIENDSHIP AND TREACHERY
The Sari proved a most erratic craft. She might have
done well enough upon a park lagoon if safely anchored,
but upon the bosom of a mighty ocean she left much
to be desired.
Sailing with the wind she did her best; but in quarter-
ing or when close-hauled she drifted terribly, as a
nautical man might have guessed she would. We
couldn't keep within miles of our course, and our
progress was pitifully slow.
Instead of making for the island of Anoroc, we bore far
to the right, until it became evident that we should have
to pass between the two right-hand islands and attempt
to return toward Anoroc from the opposite side.
As we neared the islands Perry was quite overcome
by their beauty. When we were directly between two
of them he fairly went into raptures; nor could I blame
him.
The tropical luxuriance of the foliage that dripped
almost to the water's edge and the vivid colors of the
blooms that shot the green made a most gorgeous
spectacle.
Perry was right in the midst of a flowery panegyric on
the wonders of the peaceful beauty of the scene when a
canoe shot out from the nearest island. There were a
dozen warriors in it; it was quickly followed by a second
and third.
Of course we couldn't know the intentions of the
strangers, but we could pretty well guess them.
Perry wanted to man the sweeps and try to get away
from them, but I soon convinced him that any speed of
which the Sari was capable would be far too slow to
outdistance the swift, though awkward, dugouts of the
Mezops.
I waited until they were quite close enough to hear
me, and then I hailed them. I told them that we were
friends of the Mezops, and that we were upon a visit to
Ja of Anoroc, to which they replied that they were at
war with Ja, and that if we would wait a minute they'd
board us and throw our corpses to the azdyryths.
I warned them that they would get the worst of it if
they didn't leave us alone, but they only shouted in
derision and paddled swiftly toward us. It was evident
that they were considerably impressed by the appear-
ance and dimensions of our craft, but as these fellows
know no fear they were not at all awed.
Seeing that they were determined to give battle, I
leaned over the rail of the Sari and brought the im-
perial battle-squadron of the Emperor of Pellucidar into
action for the first time in the history of a world. In other
and simpler words, I fired my revolver at the nearest
canoe.
The effect was magical. A warrior rose from his knees,
threw his paddle aloft, stiffened into rigidity for an
instant, and then toppled overboard.
The others ceased paddling, and, with wide eyes,
looked first at me and then at the battling sea-things
which fought for the corpse of their comrade. To them it
must have seemed a miracle that I should be able to
stand at thrice the range of the most powerful javelin-
thrower and with a loud noise and a smudge of smoke
slay one of their number with an invisible missile.
But only for an instant were they paralyzed with
wonder. Then, with savage shouts, they fell once more
to their paddles and forged rapidly toward us.
Again and again I fired. At each shot a warrior sank
to the bottom of the canoe or tumbled overboard.
When the prow of the first craft touched the side of
the Sari it contained only dead and dying men. The
other two dugouts were approaching rapidly, so I turned
my attention toward them.
I think that they must have been commencing to have
some doubts--those wild, naked, red warriors--for when
the first man fell in the second boat, the others stopped
paddling and commenced to jabber among themselves.
The third boat pulled up alongside the second and its
crews joined in the conference. Taking advantage of the
lull in the battle, I called out to the survivors to return
to their shore.
"I have no fight with you," I cried, and then I told
them who I was and added that if they would live in
peace they must sooner or later join forces with me.
"Go back now to your people," I counseled them, "and
tell them that you have seen David I, Emperor of the
Federated Kingdoms of Pellucidar, and that single-
handed he has overcome you, just as be intends over-
coming the Mahars and the Sagoths and any other
peoples of Pellucidar who threaten the peace and wel-
fare of his empire."
Slowly they turned the noses of their canoes toward
land. It was evident that they were impressed; yet
that they were loath to give up without further con-
testing my claim to naval supremacy was also apparent,
for some of their number seemed to be exhorting the
others to a renewal of the conflict.
However, at last they drew slowly away, and the Sari,
which had not decreased her snail-like speed during this,
her first engagement, continued upon her slow, uneven
way.
Presently Perry stuck his head up through the hatch
and hailed me.
"Have the scoundrels departed?" he asked. "Have you
killed them all?"
"Those whom I failed to kill have departed, Perry," I
replied.
He came out on deck and, peering over the side,
descried the lone canoe floating a short distance astern
with its grim and grisly freight. Farther his eyes wan-
dered to the retreating boats.
"David," said he at last, "this is a notable occasion. It
is a great day in the annals of Pellucidar. We have won
a glorious victory.
"Your majesty's navy has routed a fleet of the enemy
thrice its own size, manned by ten times as many men.
Let us give thanks."
I could scarce restrain a smile at Perry's use of the
pronoun "we," yet I was glad to share the rejoicing with
him as I shall always be glad to share everything with
the dear old fellow.
Perry is the only male coward I have ever known
whom I could respect and love. He was not created for
fighting; but I think that if the occasion should ever arise
where it became necessary he would give his life cheer-
fully for me--yes, I KNOW it.
It took us a long time to work around the islands and
draw in close to Anoroc. In the leisure afforded we took
turns working on our map, and by means of the compass
and a little guesswork we set down the shoreline we had
left and the three islands with fair accuracy.
Crossed sabers marked the spot where the first great
naval engagement of a world had taken place. In a note-
book we jotted down, as had been our custom, details
that would be of historical value later.
Opposite Anoroc we came to anchor quite close to
shore. I knew from my previous experience with the
tortuous trails of the island that I could never find my
way inland to the hidden tree-village of the Mezop
chieftain, Ja; so we remained aboard the Sari, firing our
express rifles at intervals to attract the attention of the
natives.
After some ten shots had been fired at considerable
intervals a body of copper-colored warriors appeared
upon the shore. They watched us for a moment and then
I hailed them, asking the whereabouts of my old friend
Ja.
They did not reply at once, but stood with their heads
together in serious and animated discussion. Continually
they turned their eyes toward our strange craft. It was
evident that they were greatly puzzled by our appear-
ance as well as unable to explain the source of the loud
noises that had attracted their attention to us. At last one
of the warriors addressed us.
"Who are you who seek Ja?" he asked. "What would
you of our chief?"
"We are friends," I replied. "I am David. Tell Ja that
David, whose life be once saved from a sithic, has come
again to visit him.
"If you will send out a canoe we will come ashore. We
cannot bring our great warship closer in."
Again they talked for a considerable time. Then two
of them entered a canoe that several dragged from its
hiding-place in the jungle and paddled swiftly toward us.
They were magnificent specimens of manhood. Perry
had never seen a member of this red race close to be-
fore. In fact, the dead men in the canoe we had left
astern after the battle and the survivors who were
paddling rapidly toward their shore were the first he
ever had seen. He had been greatly impressed by their
physical beauty and the promise of superior intelligence
which their well-shaped skulls gave.
The two who now paddled out received us into their
canoe with dignified courtesy. To my inquiries relative
to Ja they explained that he had not been in the village
when our signals were heard, but that runners had been
sent out after him and that doubtless he was already
upon his way to the coast.
One of the men remembered me from the occasion of
my former visit to the island; he was extremely agree-
able the moment that he came close enough to recognize
me. He said that Ja would be delighted to welcome me,
and that all the tribe of Anoroc knew of me by repute,
and had received explicit instructions from their chief-
tain that if any of them should ever come upon me to
show me every kindness and attention.
Upon shore we were received with equal honor. While
we stood conversing with our bronze friends a tall
warrior leaped suddenly from the jungle.
It was Ja. As his eyes fell upon me his face lighted
with pleasure. He came quickly forward to greet me
after the manner of his tribe.
Toward Perry he was equally hospitable. The old
man fell in love with the savage giant as completely as
had I. Ja conducted us along the maze-like trail to his
strange village, where he gave over one of the tree-
houses for our exclusive use.
Perry was much interested in the unique habitation,
which resembled nothing so much as a huge wasp's nest
built around the bole of a tree well above the ground.
After we had eaten and rested Ja came to see us with
a number of his head men. They listened attentively to
my story, which included a narrative of the events lead-
ing to the formation of the federated kingdoms, the
battle with the Mahars, my journey to the outer world,
and my return to Pellucidar and search for Sari and my
mate.
Ja told me that the Mezops had heard something of
the federation and had been much interested in it. He
had even gone so far as to send a party of warriors
toward Sari to investigate the reports, and to arrange
for the entrance of Anoroc into the empire in case it ap-
peared that there was any truth in the rumors that one
of the aims of the federation was the overthrow of the
Mahars.
The delegation had met with a party of Sagoths. As
there had been a truce between the Mahars and the
Mezops for many generations, they camped with these
warriors of the reptiles, from whom they learned that
the federation had gone to pieces. So the party returned
to Anoroc.
When I showed Ja our map and explained its purpose
to him, he was much interested. The location of Anoroc,
the Mountains of the Clouds, the river, and the strip of
seacoast were all familiar to him.
He quickly indicated the position of the inland sea
and close beside it, the city of Phutra, where one of the
powerful Mahar nations had its seat. He likewise showed
us where Sari should be and carried his own coast-line as
far north and south as it was known to him.
His additions to the map convinced us that Green-
wich lay upon the verge of this same sea, and that it
might be reached by water more easily than by the
arduous crossing of the mountains or the dangerous ap-
proach through Phutra, which lay almost directly in line
between Anoroc and Greenwich to the northwest.
If Sari lay upon the same water then the shore-line
must bend far back toward the southwest of Greenwich
--an assumption which, by the way, we found later to
be true. Also, Sari was upon a lofty plateau at the
southern end of a mighty gulf of the Great Ocean.
The location which Ja gave to distant Amoz puzzled
us, for it placed it due north of Greenwich, apparently
in mid-ocean. As Ja had never been so far and knew
only of Amoz through hearsay, we thought that he must
be mistaken; but he was not. Amoz lies directly north
of Greenwich across the mouth of the same gulf as that
upon which Sari is.
The sense of direction and location of these primitive
Pellucidarians is little short of uncanny, as I have had
occasion to remark in the past. You may take one of
them to the uttermost ends of his world, to places of
which he has never even heard, yet without sun or
moon or stars to guide him, without map or compass, he
will travel straight for home in the shortest direction.
Mountains, rivers, and seas may have to be gone
around. but never once does his sense of direction fail
him--the homing instinct is supreme.
In the same remarkable way they never forget the
location of any place to which they have ever been, and
know that of many of which they have only heard from
others who have visited them.
In short, each Pellucidarian is a walking geography of
his own district and of much of the country contiguous
thereto. It always proved of the greatest aid to Perry and
me; nevertheless we were anxious to enlarge our map,
for we at least were not endowed with the homing
instinct.
After several long councils it was decided that, in
order to expedite matters, Perry should return to the
prospector with a strong party of Mezops and fetch the
freight I had brought from the outer world. Ja and his
warriors were much impressed by our firearms, and were
also anxious to build boats with sails.
As we had arms at the prospector and also books on
boat-building we thought that it might prove an ex-
cellent idea to start these naturally maritime people
upon the construction of a well built navy of staunch
sailing-vessels. I was sure that with definite plans to go
by Perry could oversee the construction of an adequate
flotilla.
I warned him, however, not to be too ambitious, and
to forget about dreadnoughts and armored cruisers for a
while and build instead a few small sailing-boats that
could be manned by four or five men.
I was to proceed to Sari, and while prosecuting my
search for Dian attempt at the same time the rehabili-
tation of the federation. Perry was going as far as possible
by water, with the chances that the entire trip might be
made in that manner, which proved to be the fact.
With a couple of Mezops as companions I started for
Sari. In order to avoid crossing the principal range of
the Mountains of the Clouds we took a route that passed
a little way south of Phutra. We had eaten four times
and slept once, and were, as my companions told me,
not far from the great Mahar city, when we were sud-
denly confronted by a considerable band of Sagoths.
They did not attack us, owing to the peace which
exists between the Mahars and the Mezops, but I could
see that they looked upon me with considerable sus-
picion. My friends told them that I was a stranger from
a remote country, and as we had previously planned
against such a contingency I pretended ignorance of
the language which the human beings of Pellucidar em-
ploy in conversing with the gorilla-like soldiery of the
Mahars.
I noticed, and not without misgivings, that the leader
of the Sagoths eyed me with an expression that be-
tokened partial recognition. I was sure that he had seen
me before during the period of my incarceration in
Phutra and that he was trying to recall my identity.
It worried me not a little. I was extremely thankful
when we bade them adieu and continued upon our
journey.
Several times during the next few marches I became
acutely conscious of the sensation of being watched by
unseen eyes, but I did not speak of my suspicions to my
companions. Later I had reason to regret my reticence,
for--
Well, this is how it happened:
We had killed an antelope and after eating our fill I
had lain down to sleep. The Pellucidarians, who seem
seldom if ever to require sleep, joined me in this instance,
for we had had a very trying march along the northern
foothills of the Mountains of the Clouds, and now with
their bellies filled with meat they seemed ready for
slumber.
When I awoke it was with a start to find a couple of
huge Sagoths astride me. They pinioned my arms and
legs, and later chained my wrists behind my back. Then
they let me up.
I saw my companions; the brave fellows lay dead
where they had slept, javelined to death without a
chance at self-defense.
I was furious. I threatened the Sagoth leader with all
sorts of dire reprisals; but when he heard me speak the
hybrid language that is the medium of communication
between his kind and the human race of the inner world
he only grinned, as much as to say, "I thought so!"
They had not taken my revolvers or ammunition away
from me because they did not know what they were;
but my heavy rifle I had lost. They simply left it where
it had lain beside me.
So low in the scale of intelligence are they, that they
had not sufficient interest in this strange object even to
fetch it along with them.
I knew from the direction of our march that they
were taking me to Phutra. Once there I did not need
much of an imagination to picture what my fate would
be. It was the arena and a wild thag or fierce tarag for
me--unless the Mahars elected to take me to the pits.
In that case my end would be no more certain, though
infinitely more horrible and painful, for in the pits I
should be subjected to cruel vivisection. From what I
had once seen of their methods in the pits of Phutra I
knew them to be the opposite of merciful, whereas in
the arena I should be quickly despatched by some
savage beast.
Arrived at the underground city, I was taken im-
mediately before a slimy Mahar. When the creature
had received the report of the Sagoth its cold eyes
glistened with malice and hatred as they were turned
balefully upon me.
I knew then that my identity had been guessed. With
a show of excitement that I had never before seen
evinced by a member of the dominant race of Pellucidar,
the Mahar hustled me away, heavily guarded, through
the main avenue of the city to one of the principal
buildings.
Here we were ushered into a great hall where
presently many Mahars gathered.
In utter silence they conversed, for they have no oral
speech since they are without auditory nerves. Their
method of communication Perry has likened to the pro-
jection of a sixth sense into a fourth dimension, where it
becomes cognizable to the sixth sense of their audience.
Be that as it may, however, it was evident that I was
the subject of discussion, and from the hateful looks
bestowed upon me not a particularly pleasant subject.
How long I waited for their decision I do not know,
but it must have been a very long time. Finally one of
the Sagoths addressed me. He was acting as interpreter
for his masters.
"The Mahars will spare your life," he said, "and re-
lease you on one condition."
"And what is that condition?" I asked, though I could
guess its terms.
"That you return to them that which you stole from
the pits of Phutra when you killed the four Mahars and
escaped," he replied.
I had thought that that would be it. The great secret
upon which depended the continuance of the Mahar
race was safely hid where only Dian and I knew.
I ventured to imagine that they would have given me
much more than my liberty to have it safely in their
keeping again; but after that--what?
Would they keep their promises?
I doubted it. With the secret of artificial propagation
once more in their hands their numbers would soon be
made so to overrun the world of Pellucidar that there
could be no hope for the eventual supremacy of the
human race, the cause for which I so devoutly hoped,
for which I had consecrated my life, and for which I
was not willing to give my life.
Yes! In that moment as I stood before the heartless
tribunal I felt that my life would be a very little thing to
give could it save to the human race of Pellucidar the
chance to come into its own by insuring the eventual
extinction of the hated, powerful Mahars.
"Come!" exclaimed the Sagoths. "The mighty Mahars
await your reply."
"You may say to them," I answered, "that I shall not
tell them where the great secret is hid."
When this