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\date{}


\title{The Lost World}


\author{Sir Arthur Conan Doyle}

\maketitle
\noindent \vspace*{\stretch{1}}

\noindent This public-domain (U.S.) text was created by Judith Boss,
Omaha, Nebraska. The equipment: an IBM-compatible 486/33, a Hewlett-Packard
ScanJet IIc flatbed scanner, and a copy of Calera Recognition Systems'
TrueScanRisc OCR program donated by Calera. The Project Gutenberg
edition ({}``lostw10'') was subsequently converted to \LaTeX{} using
\textbf{GutenMark} software and modified by Ron Burkey (principally
to correct formatting problems). An illustration was restored from
a scan found at etext.lib.virginia.edu. Report problems to info@sandroid.org.
Revision A2 differs from A1 in that {}``----'' has everywhere been
replaced by {}``---''.

\noindent \begin{center}Revision: A2\\
Date: 01/30/2008\end{center}

\noindent \vspace{\stretch{1}}

\newpage

\frontmatter

\pagestyle{myheadings} {\footnotesize \tableofcontents{}}

\newpage

\vspace*{\stretch{1}}\begin{flushleft}\begin{verse}\small

I have wrought my simple plan\\*

If I give one hour of joy\\*

To the boy who's half a man,\\*

Or the man who's half a boy. 

\end{verse}\end{flushleft}\vspace{\stretch{1}}


\chapter*{FOREWARD}

\begin{quotation}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{Foreward}
\end{quotation}
\markboth{The Lost World}{Forward}

Mr.\ E.\ D.\ Malone desires to state that both the injunction for
restraint and the libel action have been withdrawn unreservedly by
Professor G.\ E.\ Challenger, who, being satisfied that no criticism
or comment in this book is meant in an offensive spirit, has guaranteed
that he will place no impediment to its publication and circulation.

\mainmatter


\chapter*{CHAPTER I. {}``There Are Heroisms All Round Us''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``There Are Heroisms All Round
Us''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``There Are Heroisms All Round Us''}

Mr.\ Hungerton, her father, really was the most tactless person upon
earth,\mbox{---}a fluffy, feathery, untidy cockatoo of a man, perfectly
good-natured, but absolutely centered upon his own silly self. If
anything could have driven me from Gladys, it would have been the
thought of such a father-in-law. I am convinced that he really believed
in his heart that I came round to the Chestnuts three days a week
for the pleasure of his company, and very especially to hear his views
upon bimetallism, a subject upon which he was by way of being an authority.

For an hour or more that evening I listened to his monotonous chirrup
about bad money driving out good, the token value of silver, the depreciation
of the rupee, and the true standards of exchange.

{}``Suppose,'' he cried with feeble violence, {}``that all the
debts in the world were called up simultaneously, and immediate payment
insisted upon,\mbox{---}what under our present conditions would
happen then?''\ 

I gave the self-evident answer that I should be a ruined man, upon
which he jumped from his chair, reproved me for my habitual levity,
which made it impossible for him to discuss any reasonable subject
in my presence, and bounced off out of the room to dress for a Masonic
meeting.

At last I was alone with Gladys, and the moment of Fate had come!
All that evening I had felt like the soldier who awaits the signal
which will send him on a forlorn hope; hope of victory and fear of
repulse alternating in his mind.

She sat with that proud, delicate profile of hers outlined against
the red curtain. How beautiful she was! And yet how aloof! We had
been friends, quite good friends; but never could I get beyond the
same comradeship which I might have established with one of my fellow-reporters
upon the \emph{Gazette},\mbox{---}perfectly frank, perfectly kindly,
and perfectly unsexual. My instincts are all against a woman being
too frank and at her ease with me. It is no compliment to a man. Where
the real sex feeling begins, timidity and distrust are its companions,
heritage from old wicked days when love and violence went often hand
in hand. The bent head, the averted eye, the faltering voice, the
wincing figure\mbox{---}these, and not the unshrinking gaze and
frank reply, are the true signals of passion. Even in my short life
I had learned as much as that\mbox{---}or had inherited it in that
race memory which we call instinct.

Gladys was full of every womanly quality. Some judged her to be cold
and hard; but such a thought was treason. That delicately bronzed
skin, almost oriental in its coloring, that raven hair, the large
liquid eyes, the full but exquisite lips,\mbox{---}all the stigmata
of passion were there. But I was sadly conscious that up to now I
had never found the secret of drawing it forth. However, come what
might, I should have done with suspense and bring matters to a head
to-night. She could but refuse me, and better be a repulsed lover
than an accepted brother.

So far my thoughts had carried me, and I was about to break the long
and uneasy silence, when two critical, dark eyes looked round at me,
and the proud head was shaken in smiling reproof. {}``I have a presentiment
that you are going to propose, Ned. I do wish you wouldn't; for things
are so much nicer as they are.''

I drew my chair a little nearer. {}``Now, how did you know that I
was going to propose?''\ I asked in genuine wonder.

{}``Don't women always know? Do you suppose any woman in the world
was ever taken unawares? But\mbox{---}oh, Ned, our friendship has
been so good and so pleasant! What a pity to spoil it! Don't you feel
how splendid it is that a young man and a young woman should be able
to talk face to face as we have talked?''\ 

{}``I don't know, Gladys. You see, I can talk face to face with\mbox{---}with
the station-master.'' I can't imagine how that official came into
the matter; but in he trotted, and set us both laughing. {}``That
does not satisfy me in the least. I want my arms round you, and your
head on my breast, and\mbox{---}oh, Gladys, I want\mbox{---}''

She had sprung from her chair, as she saw signs that I proposed to
demonstrate some of my wants. {}``You've spoiled everything, Ned,''
she said. {}``It's all so beautiful and natural until this kind of
thing comes in! It is such a pity! Why can't you control yourself?''\ 

{}``I didn't invent it,'' I pleaded. {}``It's nature. It's love.''

{}``Well, perhaps if both love, it may be different. I have never
felt it.''

{}``But you must\mbox{---}you, with your beauty, with your soul!
Oh, Gladys, you were made for love! You must love!''\ 

{}``One must wait till it comes.''

{}``But why can't you love me, Gladys? Is it my appearance, or what?''\ 

She did unbend a little. She put forward a hand\mbox{---}such a
gracious, stooping attitude it was\mbox{---}and she pressed back
my head. Then she looked into my upturned face with a very wistful
smile.

{}``No it isn't that,'' she said at last. {}``You're not a conceited
boy by nature, and so I can safely tell you it is not that. It's deeper.''

{}``My character?''\ 

She nodded severely.

{}``What can I do to mend it? Do sit down and talk it over. No, really,
I won't if you'll only sit down!''\ 

She looked at me with a wondering distrust which was much more to
my mind than her whole-hearted confidence. How primitive and bestial
it looks when you put it down in black and white!\mbox{---}and perhaps
after all it is only a feeling peculiar to myself. Anyhow, she sat
down.

{}``Now tell me what's amiss with me?''\ 

{}``I'm in love with somebody else,'' said she.

It was my turn to jump out of my chair.

{}``It's nobody in particular,'' she explained, laughing at the
expression of my face: {}``only an ideal. I've never met the kind
of man I mean.''

{}``Tell me about him. What does he look like?''\ 

{}``Oh, he might look very much like you.''

{}``How dear of you to say that! Well, what is it that he does that
I don't do? Just say the word,\mbox{---}teetotal, vegetarian, aeronaut,
theosophist, superman. I'll have a try at it, Gladys, if you will
only give me an idea what would please you.''

She laughed at the elasticity of my character. {}``Well, in the first
place, I don't think my ideal would speak like that,'' said she.
{}``He would be a harder, sterner man, not so ready to adapt himself
to a silly girl's whim. But, above all, he must be a man who could
do, who could act, who could look Death in the face and have no fear
of him, a man of great deeds and strange experiences. It is never
a man that I should love, but always the glories he had won; for they
would be reflected upon me. Think of Richard Burton! When I read his
wife's life of him I could so understand her love! And Lady Stanley!
Did you ever read the wonderful last chapter of that book about her
husband? These are the sort of men that a woman could worship with
all her soul, and yet be the greater, not the less, on account of
her love, honored by all the world as the inspirer of noble deeds.''

She looked so beautiful in her enthusiasm that I nearly brought down
the whole level of the interview. I gripped myself hard, and went
on with the argument.

{}``We can't all be Stanleys and Burtons,'' said I; {}``besides,
we don't get the chance,\mbox{---}at least, I never had the chance.
If I did, I should try to take it.''

{}``But chances are all around you. It is the mark of the kind of
man I mean that he makes his own chances. You can't hold him back.
I've never met him, and yet I seem to know him so well. There are
heroisms all round us waiting to be done. It's for men to do them,
and for women to reserve their love as a reward for such men. Look
at that young Frenchman who went up last week in a balloon. It was
blowing a gale of wind; but because he was announced to go he insisted
on starting. The wind blew him fifteen hundred miles in twenty-four
hours, and he fell in the middle of Russia. That was the kind of man
I mean. Think of the woman he loved, and how other women must have
envied her! That's what I should like to be,\mbox{---}envied for
my man.''

{}``I'd have done it to please you.''

{}``But you shouldn't do it merely to please me. You should do it
because you can't help yourself, because it's natural to you, because
the man in you is crying out for heroic expression. Now, when you
described the Wigan coal explosion last month, could you not have
gone down and helped those people, in spite of the choke-damp?''\ 

{}``I did.''

{}``You never said so.''

{}``There was nothing worth bucking about.''

{}``I didn't know.'' She looked at me with rather more interest.
{}``That was brave of you.''

{}``I had to. If you want to write good copy, you must be where the
things are.''

{}``What a prosaic motive! It seems to take all the romance out of
it. But, still, whatever your motive, I am glad that you went down
that mine.'' She gave me her hand; but with such sweetness and dignity
that I could only stoop and kiss it. {}``I dare say I am merely a
foolish woman with a young girl's fancies. And yet it is so real with
me, so entirely part of my very self, that I cannot help acting upon
it. If I marry, I do want to marry a famous man!''\ 

{}``Why should you not?''\ I cried. {}``It is women like you who
brace men up. Give me a chance, and see if I will take it! Besides,
as you say, men ought to \textit{make} their own chances, and not
wait until they are given. Look at Clive\mbox{---}just a clerk,
and he conquered India! By George! I'll do something in the world
yet!''\ 

She laughed at my sudden Irish effervescence. {}``Why not?''\ she
said. {}``You have everything a man could have,\mbox{---}youth,
health, strength, education, energy. I was sorry you spoke. And now
I am glad\mbox{---}so glad\mbox{---}if it wakens these thoughts
in you!''\ 

{}``And if I do\mbox{---}''

Her dear hand rested like warm velvet upon my lips. {}``Not another
word, Sir! You should have been at the office for evening duty half
an hour ago; only I hadn't the heart to remind you. Some day, perhaps,
when you have won your place in the world, we shall talk it over again.''

And so it was that I found myself that foggy November evening pursuing
the Camberwell tram with my heart glowing within me, and with the
eager determination that not another day should elapse before I should
find some deed which was worthy of my lady. But who\mbox{---}who
in all this wide world could ever have imagined the incredible shape
which that deed was to take, or the strange steps by which I was led
to the doing of it?

And, after all, this opening chapter will seem to the reader to have
nothing to do with my narrative; and yet there would have been no
narrative without it, for it is only when a man goes out into the
world with the thought that there are heroisms all round him, and
with the desire all alive in his heart to follow any which may come
within sight of him, that he breaks away as I did from the life he
knows, and ventures forth into the wonderful mystic twilight land
where lie the great adventures and the great rewards. Behold me, then,
at the office of the \emph{Daily Gazette}, on the staff of which I
was a most insignificant unit, with the settled determination that
very night, if possible, to find the quest which should be worthy
of my Gladys! Was it hardness, was it selfishness, that she should
ask me to risk my life for her own glorification? Such thoughts may
come to middle age; but never to ardent three-and-twenty in the fever
of his first love.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER II. {}``Try Your Luck with Professor Challenger''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``Try Your Luck with Professor
Challenger''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Try Your Luck with Professor Challenger''}

I always liked McArdle, the crabbed, old, round-backed, red-headed
news editor, and I rather hoped that he liked me. Of course, Beaumont
was the real boss; but he lived in the rarefied atmosphere of some
Olympian height from which he could distinguish nothing smaller than
an international crisis or a split in the Cabinet. Sometimes we saw
him passing in lonely majesty to his inner sanctum, with his eyes
staring vaguely and his mind hovering over the Balkans or the Persian
Gulf. He was above and beyond us. But McArdle was his first lieutenant,
and it was he that we knew. The old man nodded as I entered the room,
and he pushed his spectacles far up on his bald forehead.

{}``Well, Mr.\ Malone, from all I hear, you seem to be doing very
well,'' said he in his kindly Scotch accent.

I thanked him.

{}``The colliery explosion was excellent. So was the Southwark fire.
You have the true descreeptive touch. What did you want to see me
about?''\ 

{}``To ask a favor.''

He looked alarmed, and his eyes shunned mine. {}``Tut, tut! What
is it?''\ 

{}``Do you think, Sir, that you could possibly send me on some mission
for the paper? I would do my best to put it through and get you some
good copy.''

{}``What sort of meesion had you in your mind, Mr.\ Malone?''\ 

{}``Well, Sir, anything that had adventure and danger in it. I really
would do my very best. The more difficult it was, the better it would
suit me.''

{}``You seem very anxious to lose your life.''

{}``To justify my life, Sir.''

{}``Dear me, Mr.\ Malone, this is very\mbox{---}very exalted.
I'm afraid the day for this sort of thing is rather past. The expense
of the `special meesion' business hardly justifies the result, and,
of course, in any case it would only be an experienced man with a
name that would command public confidence who would get such an order.
The big blank spaces in the map are all being filled in, and there's
no room for romance anywhere. Wait a bit, though!''\ he added, with
a sudden smile upon his face. {}``Talking of the blank spaces of
the map gives me an idea. What about exposing a fraud\mbox{---}a
modern Munchausen\mbox{---}and making him rideeculous? You could
show him up as the liar that he is! Eh, man, it would be fine. How
does it appeal to you?''\ 

{}``Anything\mbox{---}anywhere\mbox{---}I care nothing.''

McArdle was plunged in thought for some minutes.

{}``I wonder whether you could get on friendly\mbox{---}or at least
on talking terms with the fellow,'' he said, at last. {}``You seem
to have a sort of genius for establishing relations with people\mbox{---}seempathy,
I suppose, or animal magnetism, or youthful vitality, or something.
I am conscious of it myself.''

{}``You are very good, sir.''

{}``So why should you not try your luck with Professor Challenger,
of Enmore Park?''\ 

I dare say I looked a little startled.

{}``Challenger!''\ I cried. {}``Professor Challenger, the famous
zoologist! Wasn't he the man who broke the skull of Blundell, of the
\emph{Telegraph}?''\ 

The news editor smiled grimly.

{}``Do you mind? Didn't you say it was adventures you were after?''\ 

{}``It is all in the way of business, sir,'' I answered.

{}``Exactly. I don't suppose he can always be so violent as that.
I'm thinking that Blundell got him at the wrong moment, maybe, or
in the wrong fashion. You may have better luck, or more tact in handling
him. There's something in your line there, I am sure, and the \emph{Gazette}
should work it.''

{}``I really know nothing about him,'' said I. {}``I only remember
his name in connection with the police-court proceedings, for striking
Blundell.''

{}``I have a few notes for your guidance, Mr.\ Malone. I've had
my eye on the Professor for some little time.'' He took a paper from
a drawer. {}``Here is a summary of his record. I give it you briefly:\mbox{---}

{}```Challenger, George Edward. Born: Largs, N.\ B., 1863. Educ.:
Largs Academy; Edinburgh University. British Museum Assistant, 1892.
Assistant-Keeper of Comparative Anthropology Department, 1893. Resigned
after acrimonious correspondence same year. Winner of Crayston Medal
for Zoological Research. Foreign Member of'\mbox{---}well, quite
a lot of things, about two inches of small type\mbox{---}`Societe
Belge, American Academy of Sciences, La Plata, \textit{etc}., \textit{etc}.
Ex-President Pal\ae{}ontological Society. Section H, British Association'\mbox{---}so
on, so on!\mbox{---}`Publications: {}``Some Observations Upon a
Series of Kalmuck Skulls''; {}``Outlines of Vertebrate Evolution'';
and numerous papers, including {}``The Underlying Fallacy of Weissmannism,''
which caused heated discussion at the Zoological Congress of Vienna.
Recreations: Walking, Alpine climbing. Address: Enmore Park, Kensington,
W.'

{}``There, take it with you. I've nothing more for you to-night.''

I pocketed the slip of paper.

{}``One moment, sir,'' I said, as I realized that it was a pink
bald head, and not a red face, which was fronting me. {}``I am not
very clear yet why I am to interview this gentleman. What has he done?''\ 

The face flashed back again.

{}``Went to South America on a solitary expedeetion two years ago.
Came back last year. Had undoubtedly been to South America, but refused
to say exactly where. Began to tell his adventures in a vague way,
but somebody started to pick holes, and he just shut up like an oyster.
Something wonderful happened\mbox{---}or the man's a champion liar,
which is the more probable supposeetion. Had some damaged photographs,
said to be fakes. Got so touchy that he assaults anyone who asks questions,
and heaves reporters doun the stairs. In my opinion he's just a homicidal
megalomaniac with a turn for science. That's your man, Mr.\ Malone.
Now, off you run, and see what you can make of him. You're big enough
to look after yourself. Anyway, you are all safe. Employers' Liability
Act, you know.''

A grinning red face turned once more into a pink oval, fringed with
gingery fluff; the interview was at an end.

I walked across to the Savage Club, but instead of turning into it
I leaned upon the railings of Adelphi Terrace and gazed thoughtfully
for a long time at the brown, oily river. I can always think most
sanely and clearly in the open air. I took out the list of Professor
Challenger's exploits, and I read it over under the electric lamp.
Then I had what I can only regard as an inspiration. As a Pressman,
I felt sure from what I had been told that I could never hope to get
into touch with this cantankerous Professor. But these recriminations,
twice mentioned in his skeleton biography, could only mean that he
was a fanatic in science. Was there not an exposed margin there upon
which he might be accessible? I would try.

I entered the club. It was just after eleven, and the big room was
fairly full, though the rush had not yet set in. I noticed a tall,
thin, angular man seated in an arm-chair by the fire. He turned as
I drew my chair up to him. It was the man of all others whom I should
have chosen\mbox{---}Tarp Henry, of the staff of \emph{Nature},
a thin, dry, leathery creature, who was full, to those who knew him,
of kindly humanity. I plunged instantly into my subject.

{}``What do you know of Professor Challenger?''\ 

{}``Challenger?''\ He gathered his brows in scientific disapproval.
{}``Challenger was the man who came with some cock-and-bull story
from South America.''

{}``What story?''\ 

{}``Oh, it was rank nonsense about some queer animals he had discovered.
I believe he has retracted since. Anyhow, he has suppressed it all.
He gave an interview to Reuter's, and there was such a howl that he
saw it wouldn't do. It was a discreditable business. There were one
or two folk who were inclined to take him seriously, but he soon choked
them off.''

{}``How?''\ 

{}``Well, by his insufferable rudeness and impossible behavior. There
was poor old Wadley, of the Zoological Institute. Wadley sent a message:
`The President of the Zoological Institute presents his compliments
to Professor Challenger, and would take it as a personal favor if
he would do them the honor to come to their next meeting.' The answer
was unprintable.''

{}``You don't say?''\ 

{}``Well, a bowdlerized version of it would run: `Professor Challenger
presents his compliments to the President of the Zoological Institute,
and would take it as a personal favor if he would go to the devil.'''

{}``Good Lord!''\ 

{}``Yes, I expect that's what old Wadley said. I remember his wail
at the meeting, which began: `In fifty years experience of scientific
intercourse\mbox{---}' It quite broke the old man up.''

{}``Anything more about Challenger?''\ 

{}``Well, I'm a bacteriologist, you know. I live in a nine-hundred-diameter
microscope. I can hardly claim to take serious notice of anything
that I can see with my naked eye. I'm a frontiersman from the extreme
edge of the Knowable, and I feel quite out of place when I leave my
study and come into touch with all you great, rough, hulking creatures.
I'm too detached to talk scandal, and yet at scientific \emph{conversaziones}
I \textit{have} heard something of Challenger, for he is one of those
men whom nobody can ignore. He's as clever as they make 'em\mbox{---}a
full-charged battery of force and vitality, but a quarrelsome, ill-conditioned
faddist, and unscrupulous at that. He had gone the length of faking
some photographs over the South American business.''

{}``You say he is a faddist. What is his particular fad?''\ 

{}``He has a thousand, but the latest is something about Weissmann
and Evolution. He had a fearful row about it in Vienna, I believe.''

{}``Can't you tell me the point?''\ 

{}``Not at the moment, but a translation of the proceedings exists.
We have it filed at the office. Would you care to come?''\ 

{}``It's just what I want. I have to interview the fellow, and I
need some lead up to him. It's really awfully good of you to give
me a lift. I'll go with you now, if it is not too late.''

Half an hour later I was seated in the newspaper office with a huge
tome in front of me, which had been opened at the article {}``Weissmann
versus Darwin,'' with the sub heading, {}``\noun{Spirited Protest
at Vienna. Lively Proceedings}.'' My scientific education having
been somewhat neglected, I was unable to follow the whole argument,
but it was evident that the English Professor had handled his subject
in a very aggressive fashion, and had thoroughly annoyed his Continental
colleagues. {}``Protests,'' {}``Uproar,'' and {}``General appeal
to the Chairman'' were three of the first brackets which caught my
eye. Most of the matter might have been written in Chinese for any
definite meaning that it conveyed to my brain.

{}``I wish you could translate it into English for me,'' I said,
pathetically, to my help-mate.

{}``Well, it is a translation.''

{}``Then I'd better try my luck with the original.''

{}``It is certainly rather deep for a layman.''

{}``If I could only get a single good, meaty sentence which seemed
to convey some sort of definite human idea, it would serve my turn.
Ah, yes, this one will do. I seem in a vague way almost to understand
it. I'll copy it out. This shall be my link with the terrible Professor.''

{}``Nothing else I can do?''\ 

{}``Well, yes; I propose to write to him. If I could frame the letter
here, and use your address it would give atmosphere.''

{}``We'll have the fellow round here making a row and breaking the
furniture.''

{}``No, no; you'll see the letter\mbox{---}nothing contentious,
I assure you.''

{}``Well, that's my chair and desk. You'll find paper there. I'd
like to censor it before it goes.''

It took some doing, but I flatter myself that it wasn't such a bad
job when it was finished. I read it aloud to the critical bacteriologist
with some pride in my handiwork.

\begin{quotation}
\noindent {}``\textit{\emph{\noun{Dear}}} \emph{\noun{}}\textit{\emph{\noun{Professor}}}
\emph{\noun{}}\textit{\emph{\noun{Challen\-g\-er}}},'' it said,
{}``As a humble student of Nature, I have always taken the most profound
interest in your speculations as to the differences between Darwin
and Weissmann. I have recently had occasion to refresh my memory by
re-reading\mbox{---}'' 
\end{quotation}
{}``You infernal liar!''\ murmured Tarp Henry.

\begin{quotation}
\noindent {}``\mbox{---}by re-reading your masterly address at
Vienna. That lucid and admirable statement seems to be the last word
in the matter. There is one sentence in it, however\mbox{---}namely:
`I protest strongly against the insufferable and entirely dogmatic
assertion that each separate id is a microcosm possessed of an historical
architecture elaborated slowly through the series of generations.'
Have you no desire, in view of later research, to modify this statement?
Do you not think that it is over-accentuated? With your permission,
I would ask the favor of an interview, as I feel strongly upon the
subject, and have certain suggestions which I could only elaborate
in a personal conversation. With your consent, I trust to have the
honor of calling at eleven o'clock the day after to-morrow (Wednesday)
morning.

{}``I remain, Sir, with assurances of profound respect, yours very
truly, \textit{\noun{{}``Edward}} \noun{D.\ }\textit{\noun{Malone}}\noun{.}'' 
\end{quotation}
{}

{}``How's that?''\ I asked, triumphantly.

{}``Well if your conscience can stand it\mbox{---}''

{}``It has never failed me yet.''

{}``But what do you mean to do?''\ 

{}``To get there. Once I am in his room I may see some opening. I
may even go the length of open confession. If he is a sportsman he
will be tickled.''

{}``Tickled, indeed! He's much more likely to do the tickling. Chain
mail, or an American football suit\mbox{---}that's what you'll want.
Well, good-bye. I'll have the answer for you here on Wednesday morning\mbox{---}if
he ever deigns to answer you. He is a violent, dangerous, cantankerous
character, hated by everyone who comes across him, and the butt of
the students, so far as they dare take a liberty with him. Perhaps
it would be best for you if you never heard from the fellow at all.''


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER III. {}``He is a Perfectly Impossible Person''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``He is a Perfectly Impossible
Person''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``He is a Perfectly Impossible Person''}

My friend's fear or hope was not destined to be realized. When I called
on Wednesday there was a letter with the West Kensington postmark
upon it, and my name scrawled across the envelope in a handwriting
which looked like a barbed-wire railing. The contents were as follows:\mbox{---}

\begin{quotation}
\begin{flushright}{}``\textit{\noun{Enmore}} \noun{}\textit{\noun{Park}}\noun{,
W}.\end{flushright}

\noindent {}``\textit{\emph{\noun{Sir}}},\mbox{---}

I have duly received your note, in which you claim to endorse my views,
although I am not aware that they are dependent upon endorsement either
from you or anyone else. You have ventured to use the word `speculation'
with regard to my statement upon the subject of Darwinism, and I would
call your attention to the fact that such a word in such a connection
is offensive to a degree. The context convinces me, however, that
you have sinned rather through ignorance and tactlessness than through
malice, so I am content to pass the matter by. You quote an isolated
sentence from my lecture, and appear to have some difficulty in understanding
it. I should have thought that only a sub-human intelligence could
have failed to grasp the point, but if it really needs amplification
I shall consent to see you at the hour named, though visits and visitors
of every sort are exceeding distasteful to me. As to your suggestion
that I may modify my opinion, I would have you know that it is not
my habit to do so after a deliberate expression of my mature views.
You will kindly show the envelope of this letter to my man, Austin,
when you call, as he has to take every precaution to shield me from
the intrusive rascals who call themselves `journalists.'\nopagebreak[4]

\noindent \hspace{\stretch{1}}{}``Yours faithfully,''\hspace{\stretch{1}}

\noindent \hspace{\stretch{1}}\textit{\emph{\noun{George}}} \emph{\noun{}}\textit{\emph{\noun{Edward
Challenger}}}
\end{quotation}
This was the letter that I read aloud to Tarp Henry, who had come
down early to hear the result of my venture. His only remark was,
{}``There's some new stuff, cuticura or something, which is better
than arnica.'' Some people have such extraordinary notions of humor.

It was nearly half-past ten before I had received my message, but
a taxicab took me round in good time for my appointment. It was an
imposing porticoed house at which we stopped, and the heavily-curtained
windows gave every indication of wealth upon the part of this formidable
Professor. The door was opened by an odd, swarthy, dried-up person
of uncertain age, with a dark pilot jacket and brown leather gaiters.
I found afterwards that he was the chauffeur, who filled the gaps
left by a succession of fugitive butlers. He looked me up and down
with a searching light blue eye.

{}``Expected?''\ he asked.

{}``An appointment.''

{}``Got your letter?''\ 

I produced the envelope.

{}``Right!''\ He seemed to be a person of few words. Following
him down the passage I was suddenly interrupted by a small woman,
who stepped out from what proved to be the dining-room door. She was
a bright, vivacious, dark-eyed lady, more French than English in her
type.

{}``One moment,'' she said. {}``You can wait, Austin. Step in here,
sir. May I ask if you have met my husband before?''\ 

{}``No, madam, I have not had the honor.''

{}``Then I apologize to you in advance. I must tell you that he is
a perfectly impossible person\mbox{---}absolutely impossible. If
you are forewarned you will be the more ready to make allowances.''

{}``It is most considerate of you, madam.''

{}``Get quickly out of the room if he seems inclined to be violent.
Don't wait to argue with him. Several people have been injured through
doing that. Afterwards there is a public scandal and it reflects upon
me and all of us. I suppose it wasn't about South America you wanted
to see him?''\ 

I could not lie to a lady.

{}``Dear me! That is his most dangerous subject. You won't believe
a word he says\mbox{---}I'm sure I don't wonder. But don't tell
him so, for it makes him very violent. Pretend to believe him, and
you may get through all right. Remember he believes it himself. Of
that you may be assured. A more honest man never lived. Don't wait
any longer or he may suspect. If you find him dangerous\mbox{---}really
dangerous\mbox{---}ring the bell and hold him off until I come.
Even at his worst I can usually control him.''

With these encouraging words the lady handed me over to the taciturn
Austin, who had waited like a bronze statue of discretion during our
short interview, and I was conducted to the end of the passage. There
was a tap at a door, a bull's bellow from within, and I was face to
face with the Professor.

He sat in a rotating chair behind a broad table, which was covered
with books, maps, and diagrams. As I entered, his seat spun round
to face me. His appearance made me gasp. I was prepared for something
strange, but not for so overpowering a personality as this. It was
his size which took one's breath away\mbox{---}his size and his
imposing presence. His head was enormous, the largest I have ever
seen upon a human being. I am sure that his top-hat, had I ever ventured
to don it, would have slipped over me entirely and rested on my shoulders.
He had the face and beard which I associate with an Assyrian bull;
the former florid, the latter so black as almost to have a suspicion
of blue, spade-shaped and rippling down over his chest. The hair was
peculiar, plastered down in front in a long, curving wisp over his
massive forehead. The eyes were blue-gray under great black tufts,
very clear, very critical, and very masterful. A huge spread of shoulders
and a chest like a barrel were the other parts of him which appeared
above the table, save for two enormous hands covered with long black
hair. This and a bellowing, roaring, rumbling voice made up my first
impression of the notorious Professor Challenger.

{}``Well?''\ said he, with a most insolent stare. {}``What now?''\ 

I must keep up my deception for at least a little time longer, otherwise
here was evidently an end of the interview.

{}``You were good enough to give me an appointment, sir,'' said
I, humbly, producing his envelope.

He took my letter from his desk and laid it out before him.

{}``Oh, you are the young person who cannot understand plain English,
are you? My general conclusions you are good enough to approve, as
I understand?''\ 

{}``Entirely, sir\mbox{---}entirely!''\ I was very emphatic.

{}``Dear me! That strengthens my position very much, does it not?
Your age and appearance make your support doubly valuable. Well, at
least you are better than that herd of swine in Vienna, whose gregarious
grunt is, however, not more offensive than the isolated effort of
the British hog.'' He glared at me as the present representative
of the beast.

{}``They seem to have behaved abominably,'' said I.

{}``I assure you that I can fight my own battles, and that I have
no possible need of your sympathy. Put me alone, sir, and with my
back to the wall. G.\ E.\ C.\ is happiest then. Well, sir, let
us do what we can to curtail this visit, which can hardly be agreeable
to you, and is inexpressibly irksome to me. You had, as I have been
led to believe, some comments to make upon the proposition which I
advanced in my thesis.''

There was a brutal directness about his methods which made evasion
difficult. I must still make play and wait for a better opening. It
had seemed simple enough at a distance. Oh, my Irish wits, could they
not help me now, when I needed help so sorely? He transfixed me with
two sharp, steely eyes. {}``Come, come!''\ he rumbled.

{}``I am, of course, a mere student,'' said I, with a fatuous smile,
{}``hardly more, I might say, than an earnest inquirer. At the same
time, it seemed to me that you were a little severe upon Weissmann
in this matter. Has not the general evidence since that date tended
to\mbox{---}well, to strengthen his position?''\ 

{}``What evidence?''\ He spoke with a menacing calm.

{}``Well, of course, I am aware that there is not any what you might
call \textit{definite} evidence. I alluded merely to the trend of
modern thought and the general scientific point of view, if I might
so express it.''

He leaned forward with great earnestness.

{}``I suppose you are aware,'' said he, checking off points upon
his fingers, {}``that the cranial index is a constant factor?''\ 

{}``Naturally,'' said I.

{}``And that telegony is still \emph{sub judice}?''\ 

{}``Undoubtedly.''

{}``And that the germ plasm is different from the parthenogenetic
egg?''\ 

{}``Why, surely!''\ I cried, and gloried in my own audacity.

{}``But what does that prove?''\ he asked, in a gentle, persuasive
voice.

{}``Ah, what indeed?''\ I murmured. {}``What does it prove?''\ 

{}``Shall I tell you?''\ he cooed.

{}``Pray do.''

{}``It proves,'' he roared, with a sudden blast of fury, {}``that
you are the damnedest imposter in London\mbox{---}a vile, crawling
journalist, who has no more science than he has decency in his composition!''\ 

He had sprung to his feet with a mad rage in his eyes. Even at that
moment of tension I found time for amazement at the discovery that
he was quite a short man, his head not higher than my shoulder\mbox{---}a
stunted Hercules whose tremendous vitality had all run to depth, breadth,
and brain.

{}``Gibberish!''\ he cried, leaning forward, with his fingers on
the table and his face projecting. {}``That's what I have been talking
to you, sir\mbox{---}scientific gibberish! Did you think you could
match cunning with me\mbox{---}you with your walnut of a brain?
You think you are omnipotent, you infernal scribblers, don't you?
That your praise can make a man and your blame can break him? We must
all bow to you, and try to get a favorable word, must we? This man
shall have a leg up, and this man shall have a dressing down! Creeping
vermin, I know you! You've got out of your station. Time was when
your ears were clipped. You've lost your sense of proportion. Swollen
gas-bags! I'll keep you in your proper place. Yes, sir, you haven't
got over G.\ E.\ C.\  There's one man who is still your master.
He warned you off, but if you \textit{will} come, by the Lord you
do it at your own risk. Forfeit, my good Mr.\ Malone, I claim forfeit!
You have played a rather dangerous game, and it strikes me that you
have lost it.''

{}``Look here, sir,'' said I, backing to the door and opening it;
{}``you can be as abusive as you like. But there is a limit. You
shall not assault me.''

{}``Shall I not?''\ He was slowly advancing in a peculiarly menacing
way, but he stopped now and put his big hands into the side-pockets
of a rather boyish short jacket which he wore. {}``I have thrown
several of you out of the house. You will be the fourth or fifth.
Three pound fifteen each\mbox{---}that is how it averaged. Expensive,
but very necessary. Now, sir, why should you not follow your brethren?
I rather think you must.'' He resumed his unpleasant and stealthy
advance, pointing his toes as he walked, like a dancing master.

I could have bolted for the hall door, but it would have been too
ignominious. Besides, a little glow of righteous anger was springing
up within me. I had been hopelessly in the wrong before, but this
man's menaces were putting me in the right.

{}``I'll trouble you to keep your hands off, sir. I'll not stand
it.''

{}``Dear me!''\ His black moustache lifted and a white fang twinkled
in a sneer. {}``You won't stand it, eh?''\ 

{}``Don't be such a fool, Professor!''\ I cried. {}``What can
you hope for? I'm fifteen stone, as hard as nails, and play center
three-quarter every Saturday for the London Irish. I'm not the man\mbox{---}''

It was at that moment that he rushed me. It was lucky that I had opened
the door, or we should have gone through it. We did a Catharine-wheel
together down the passage. Somehow we gathered up a chair upon our
way, and bounded on with it towards the street. My mouth was full
of his beard, our arms were locked, our bodies intertwined, and that
infernal chair radiated its legs all round us. The watchful Austin
had thrown open the hall door. We went with a back somersault down
the front steps. I have seen the two \textit{\emph{Macs}} attempt
something of the kind at the halls, but it appears to take some practise
to do it without hurting oneself. The chair went to matchwood at the
bottom, and we rolled apart into the gutter. He sprang to his feet,
waving his fists and wheezing like an asthmatic.

{}``Had enough?''\ he panted.

{}``You infernal bully!''\ I cried, as I gathered myself together.

Then and there we should have tried the thing out, for he was effervescing
with fight, but fortunately I was rescued from an odious situation.
A policeman was beside us, his notebook in his hand.

{}``What's all this? You ought to be ashamed,'' said the policeman.
It was the most rational remark which I had heard in Enmore Park.
{}``Well,'' he insisted, turning to me, {}``what is it, then?''\ 

{}``This man attacked me,'' said I.

{}``Did you attack him?''\ asked the policeman.

The Professor breathed hard and said nothing.

{}``It's not the first time, either,'' said the policeman, severely,
shaking his head. {}``You were in trouble last month for the same
thing. You've blackened this young man's eye. Do you give him in charge,
sir?''\ 

I relented.

{}``No,'' said I, {}``I do not.''

{}``What's that?''\ said the policeman.

{}``I was to blame myself. I intruded upon him. He gave me fair warning.''

The policeman snapped up his notebook.

{}``Don't let us have any more such goings-on,'' said he. {}``Now,
then! Move on, there, move on!''\ This to a butcher's boy, a maid,
and one or two loafers who had collected. He clumped heavily down
the street, driving this little flock before him. The Professor looked
at me, and there was something humorous at the back of his eyes.

{}``Come in!''\ said he. {}``I've not done with you yet.''

The speech had a sinister sound, but I followed him none the less
into the house. The man-servant, Austin, like a wooden image, closed
the door behind us.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER IV. {}``It's Just the Very Biggest Thing in
the World''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``It's Just the Very Biggest\\
Thing in the World''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``It's Just the Very Biggest Thing''}

Hardly was it shut when Mrs.\ Challenger darted out from the dining-room.
The small woman was in a furious temper. She barred her husband's
way like an enraged chicken in front of a bulldog. It was evident
that she had seen my exit, but had not observed my return.

{}``You brute, George!''\ she screamed. {}``You've hurt that nice
young man.''

He jerked backwards with his thumb.

{}``Here he is, safe and sound behind me.''

She was confused, but not unduly so.

{}``I am so sorry, I didn't see you.''

{}``I assure you, madam, that it is all right.''

{}``He has marked your poor face! Oh, George, what a brute you are!
Nothing but scandals from one end of the week to the other. Everyone
hating and making fun of you. You've finished my patience. This ends
it.''

{}``Dirty linen,'' he rumbled.

{}``It's not a secret,'' she cried. {}``Do you suppose that the
whole street\mbox{---}the whole of London, for that matter\mbox{---}Get
away, Austin, we don't want you here. Do you suppose they don't all
talk about you? Where is your dignity? You, a man who should have
been Regius Professor at a great University with a thousand students
all revering you. Where is your dignity, George?''\ 

{}``How about yours, my dear?''\ 

{}``You try me too much. A ruffian\mbox{---}a common brawling ruffian\mbox{---}that's
what you have become.''

{}``Be good, Jessie.''

{}``A roaring, raging bully!''\ 

{}``That's done it! Stool of penance!''\ said he.

To my amazement he stooped, picked her up, and placed her sitting
upon a high pedestal of black marble in the angle of the hall. It
was at least seven feet high, and so thin that she could hardly balance
upon it. A more absurd object than she presented cocked up there with
her face convulsed with anger, her feet dangling, and her body rigid
for fear of an upset, I could not imagine.

{}``Let me down!''\ she wailed.

{}``Say `please.'''

{}``You brute, George! Let me down this instant!''\ 

{}``Come into the study, Mr.\ Malone.''

{}``Really, sir\mbox{---}!''\ said I, looking at the lady.

{}``Here's Mr.\ Malone pleading for you, Jessie. Say `please,' and
down you come.''

{}``Oh, you brute! Please! please!''\ 

{}``You must behave yourself, dear. Mr.\ Malone is a Pressman. He
will have it all in his rag to-morrow, and sell an extra dozen among
our neighbors.\  `Strange story of high life'\mbox{---}you felt
fairly high on that pedestal, did you not? Then a sub-title, `Glimpse
of a singular \textit{m\'{e}nage}.' He's a foul feeder, is Mr.\ Malone,
a carrion eater, like all of his kind\mbox{---}\textit{porcus} \textit{ex}
\textit{gr\`{e}ge} \textit{diaboli}\mbox{---}a swine from the devil's
herd. That's it, Malone\mbox{---}what?''\ 

{}``You are really intolerable!''\ said I, hotly.

He bellowed with laughter.

{}``We shall have a coalition presently,'' he boomed, looking from
his wife to me and puffing out his enormous chest. Then, suddenly
altering his tone, {}``Excuse this frivolous family badinage, Mr.\ Malone.
I called you back for some more serious purpose than to mix you up
with our little domestic pleasantries. Run away, little woman, and
don't fret.'' He placed a huge hand upon each of her shoulders. {}``All
that you say is perfectly true. I should be a better man if I did
what you advise, but I shouldn't be quite George Edward Challenger.
There are plenty of better men, my dear, but only one G.\ E.\ C.\ 
So make the best of him.'' He suddenly gave her a resounding kiss,
which embarrassed me even more than his violence had done. {}``Now,
Mr.\ Malone,'' he continued, with a great accession of dignity,
{}``this way, if \textit{you} please.''

We re-entered the room which we had left so tumultuously ten minutes
before. The Professor closed the door carefully behind us, motioned
me into an arm-chair, and pushed a cigar-box under my nose.

{}``Real San Juan Colorado,'' he said. {}``Excitable people like
you are the better for narcotics. Heavens!\ don't bite it! Cut\mbox{---}and
cut with reverence! Now lean back, and listen attentively to whatever
I may care to say to you. If any remark should occur to you, you can
reserve it for some more opportune time.

{}``First of all, as to your return to my house after your most justifiable
expulsion''\mbox{---}he protruded his beard, and stared at me as
one who challenges and invites contradiction\mbox{---}{}``after,
as I say, your well-merited expulsion. The reason lay in your answer
to that most officious policeman, in which I seemed to discern some
glimmering of good feeling upon your part\mbox{---}more, at any
rate, than I am accustomed to associate with your profession. In admitting
that the fault of the incident lay with you, you gave some evidence
of a certain mental detachment and breadth of view which attracted
my favorable notice. The sub-species of the human race to which you
unfortunately belong has always been below my mental horizon. Your
words brought you suddenly above it. You swam up into my serious notice.
For this reason I asked you to return with me, as I was minded to
make your further acquaintance. You will kindly deposit your ash in
the small Japanese tray on the bamboo table which stands at your left
elbow.''

All this he boomed forth like a professor addressing his class. He
had swung round his revolving chair so as to face me, and he sat all
puffed out like an enormous bull-frog, his head laid back and his
eyes half-covered by supercilious lids. Now he suddenly turned himself
sideways, and all I could see of him was tangled hair with a red,
protruding ear. He was scratching about among the litter of papers
upon his desk. He faced me presently with what looked like a very
tattered sketch-book in his hand.

{}``I am going to talk to you about South America,'' said he. {}``No
comments if you please. First of all, I wish you to understand that
nothing I tell you now is to be repeated in any public way unless
you have my express permission. That permission will, in all human
probability, never be given. Is that clear?''\ 

{}``It is very hard,'' said I. {}``Surely a judicious account\mbox{---}''

He replaced the notebook upon the table.

{}``That ends it,'' said he. {}``I wish you a very good morning.''

{}``No, no!''\ I cried. {}``I submit to any conditions. So far
as I can see, I have no choice.''

{}``None in the world,'' said he.

{}``Well, then, I promise.''

{}``Word of honor?''\ 

{}``Word of honor.''

He looked at me with doubt in his insolent eyes.

{}``After all, what do I know about your honor?''\ said he.

{}``Upon my word, sir,'' I cried, angrily, {}``you take very great
liberties! I have never been so insulted in my life.''

He seemed more interested than annoyed at my outbreak.

{}``Round-headed,'' he muttered. {}``Brachycephalic, gray-eyed,
black-haired, with suggestion of the negroid. Celtic, I presume?''\ 

{}``I am an Irishman, sir.''

{}``Irish Irish?''\ 

{}``Yes, sir.''

{}``That, of course, explains it. Let me see; you have given me your
promise that my confidence will be respected? That confidence, I may
say, will be far from complete. But I am prepared to give you a few
indications which will be of interest. In the first place, you are
probably aware that two years ago I made a journey to South America\mbox{---}one
which will be classical in the scientific history of the world? The
object of my journey was to verify some conclusions of Wallace and
of Bates, which could only be done by observing their reported facts
under the same conditions in which they had themselves noted them.
If my expedition had no other results it would still have been noteworthy,
but a curious incident occurred to me while there which opened up
an entirely fresh line of inquiry.

{}``You are aware\mbox{---}or probably, in this half-educated age,
you are not aware\mbox{---}that the country round some parts of
the Amazon is still only partially explored, and that a great number
of tributaries, some of them entirely uncharted, run into the main
river. It was my business to visit this little-known back-country
and to examine its fauna, which furnished me with the materials for
several chapters for that great and monumental work upon zoology which
will be my life's justification. I was returning, my work accomplished,
when I had occasion to spend a night at a small Indian village at
a point where a certain tributary\mbox{---}the name and position
of which I withhold\mbox{---}opens into the main river. The natives
were Cucama Indians, an amiable but degraded race, with mental powers
hardly superior to the average Londoner. I had effected some cures
among them upon my way up the river, and had impressed them considerably
with my personality, so that I was not surprised to find myself eagerly
awaited upon my return. I gathered from their signs that someone had
urgent need of my medical services, and I followed the chief to one
of his huts. When I entered I found that the sufferer to whose aid
I had been summoned had that instant expired. He was, to my surprise,
no Indian, but a white man; indeed, I may say a very white man, for
he was flaxen-haired and had some characteristics of an albino. He
was clad in rags, was very emaciated, and bore every trace of prolonged
hardship. So far as I could understand the account of the natives,
he was a complete stranger to them, and had come upon their village
through the woods alone and in the last stage of exhaustion.

{}``The man's knapsack lay beside the couch, and I examined the contents.
His name was written upon a tab within it\mbox{---}Maple White,
Lake Avenue, Detroit, Michigan. It is a name to which I am prepared
always to lift my hat. It is not too much to say that it will rank
level with my own when the final credit of this business comes to
be apportioned.

{}``From the contents of the knapsack it was evident that this man
had been an artist and poet in search of effects. There were scraps
of verse. I do not profess to be a judge of such things, but they
appeared to me to be singularly wanting in merit. There were also
some rather commonplace pictures of river scenery, a paint-box, a
box of colored chalks, some brushes, that curved bone which lies upon
my inkstand, a volume of Baxter's `Moths and Butterflies,' a cheap
revolver, and a few cartridges. Of personal equipment he either had
none or he had lost it in his journey. Such were the total effects
of this strange American Bohemian.

{}``I was turning away from him when I observed that something projected
from the front of his ragged jacket. It was this sketch-book, which
was as dilapidated then as you see it now. Indeed, I can assure you
that a first folio of Shakespeare could not be treated with greater
reverence than this relic has been since it came into my possession.
I hand it to you now, and I ask you to take it page by page and to
examine the contents.''

He helped himself to a cigar and leaned back with a fiercely critical
pair of eyes, taking note of the effect which this document would
produce.

I had opened the volume with some expectation of a revelation, though
of what nature I could not imagine. The first page was disappointing,
however, as it contained nothing but the picture of a very fat man
in a pea-jacket, with the legend, {}``Jimmy Colver on the Mail-boat,''
written beneath it. There followed several pages which were filled
with small sketches of Indians and their ways. Then came a picture
of a cheerful and corpulent ecclesiastic in a shovel hat, sitting
opposite a very thin European, and the inscription: {}``Lunch with
\textit{\emph{Fra}} Cristofero at Rosario.'' Studies of women and
babies accounted for several more pages, and then there was an unbroken
series of animal drawings with such explanations as {}``Manatee upon
Sandbank,'' {}``Turtles and Their Eggs,'' {}``Black Ajouti under
a Miriti Palm''\mbox{---}the matter disclosing some sort of pig-like
animal; and finally came a double page of studies of long-snouted
and very unpleasant saurians. I could make nothing of it, and said
so to the Professor.

{}``Surely these are only crocodiles?''\ 

{}``Alligators! Alligators! There is hardly such a thing as a true
crocodile in South America. The distinction between them\mbox{---}''

{}``I meant that I could see nothing unusual\mbox{---}nothing to
justify what you have said.''

He smiled serenely.

{}``Try the next page,'' said he.

I was still unable to sympathize. It was a full-page sketch of a landscape
roughly tinted in color\mbox{---}the kind of painting which an open-air
artist takes as a guide to a future more elaborate effort. There was
a pale-green foreground of feathery vegetation, which sloped upwards
and ended in a line of cliffs dark red in color, and curiously ribbed
like some basaltic formations which I have seen. They extended in
an unbroken wall right across the background. At one point was an
isolated pyramidal rock, crowned by a great tree, which appeared to
be separated by a cleft from the main crag. Behind it all, a blue
tropical sky. A thin green line of vegetation fringed the summit of
the ruddy cliff.

{}``Well?''\ he asked.

{}``It is no doubt a curious formation,'' said I {}``but I am not
geologist enough to say that it is wonderful.''

{}``Wonderful!''\ he repeated. {}``It is unique. It is incredible.
No one on earth has ever dreamed of such a possibility. Now the next.''

I turned it over, and gave an exclamation of surprise. There was a
full-page picture of the most extraordinary creature that I had ever
seen. It was the wild dream of an opium smoker, a vision of delirium.
The head was like that of a fowl, the body that of a bloated lizard,
the trailing tail was furnished with upward-turned spikes, and the
curved back was edged with a high serrated fringe, which looked like
a dozen cocks' wattles placed behind each other. In front of this
creature was an absurd mannikin, or dwarf, in human form, who stood
staring at it.

{}``Well, what do you think of that?''\ cried the Professor, rubbing
his hands with an air of triumph.

{}``It is monstrous\mbox{---}grotesque.''

{}``But what made him draw such an animal?''\ 

{}``Trade gin, I should think.''

{}``Oh, that's the best explanation you can give, is it?''\ 

{}``Well, sir, what is yours?''\ 

{}``The obvious one that the creature exists. That is actually sketched
from the life.''

I should have laughed only that I had a vision of our doing another
Catharine-wheel down the passage.

{}``No doubt,'' said I, {}``no doubt,'' as one humors an imbecile.
{}``I confess, however,'' I added, {}``that this tiny human figure
puzzles me. If it were an Indian we could set it down as evidence
of some pigmy race in America, but it appears to be a European in
a sun-hat.''

The Professor snorted like an angry buffalo. {}``You really touch
the limit,'' said he. {}``You enlarge my view of the possible. Cerebral
paresis! Mental inertia! Wonderful!''\ 

He was too absurd to make me angry. Indeed, it was a waste of energy,
for if you were going to be angry with this man you would be angry
all the time. I contented myself with smiling wearily. {}``It struck
me that the man was small,'' said I.

{}``Look here!''\ he cried, leaning forward and dabbing a great
hairy sausage of a finger on to the picture. {}``You see that plant
behind the animal; I suppose you thought it was a dandelion or a Brussels
sprout\mbox{---}what? Well, it is a vegetable ivory palm, and they
run to about fifty or sixty feet. Don't you see that the man is put
in for a purpose? He couldn't really have stood in front of that brute
and lived to draw it. He sketched himself in to give a scale of heights.
He was, we will say, over five feet high. The tree is ten times bigger,
which is what one would expect.''

{}``Good heavens!''\ I cried. {}``Then you think the beast was\mbox{---}Why,
Charing Cross station would hardly make a kennel for such a brute!''\ 

{}``Apart from exaggeration, he is certainly a well-grown specimen,''
said the Professor, complacently.

{}``But,'' I cried, {}``surely the whole experience of the human
race is not to be set aside on account of a single sketch''\mbox{---}I
had turned over the leaves and ascertained that there was nothing
more in the book\mbox{---} {}``a single sketch by a wandering American
artist who may have done it under hashish, or in the delirium of fever,
or simply in order to gratify a freakish imagination. You can't, as
a man of science, defend such a position as that.''

For answer the Professor took a book down from a shelf.

{}``This is an excellent monograph by my gifted friend, Ray Lankester!''\ 
said he. {}``There is an illustration here which would interest you.
Ah, yes, here it is! The inscription beneath it runs: `Probable appearance
in life of the Jurassic Dinosaur Stegosaurus. The hind leg alone is
twice as tall as a full-grown man.' Well, what do you make of that?''\ 

He handed me the open book. I started as I looked at the picture.
In this reconstructed animal of a dead world there was certainly a
very great resemblance to the sketch of the unknown artist.

{}``That is certainly remarkable,'' said I.

{}``But you won't admit that it is final?''\ 

{}``Surely it might be a coincidence, or this American may have seen
a picture of the kind and carried it in his memory. It would be likely
to recur to a man in a delirium.''

{}``Very good,'' said the Professor, indulgently; {}``we leave
it at that. I will now ask you to look at this bone.'' He handed
over the one which he had already described as part of the dead man's
possessions. It was about six inches long, and thicker than my thumb,
with some indications of dried cartilage at one end of it.

{}``To what known creature does that bone belong?''\ asked the
Professor.

I examined it with care and tried to recall some half-forgotten knowledge.

{}``It might be a very thick human collar-bone,'' I said.

My companion waved his hand in contemptuous deprecation.

{}``The human collar-bone is curved. This is straight. There is a
groove upon its surface showing that a great tendon played across
it, which could not be the case with a clavicle.''

{}``Then I must confess that I don't know what it is.''

{}``You need not be ashamed to expose your ignorance, for I don't
suppose the whole South Kensington staff could give a name to it.''
He took a little bone the size of a bean out of a pill-box. {}``So
far as I am a judge this human bone is the analogue of the one which
you hold in your hand. That will give you some idea of the size of
the creature. You will observe from the cartilage that this is no
fossil specimen, but recent. What do you say to that?''\ 

{}``Surely in an elephant\mbox{---}''

He winced as if in pain.

{}``Don't! Don't talk of elephants in South America. Even in these
days of Board schools\mbox{---}''

{}``Well, I interrupted, {}``any large South American animal\mbox{---}a
tapir, for example.''

{}``You may take it, young man, that I am versed in the elements
of my business. This is not a conceivable bone either of a tapir or
of any other creature known to zoology. It belongs to a very large,
a very strong, and, by all analogy, a very fierce animal which exists
upon the face of the earth, but has not yet come under the notice
of science. You are still unconvinced?''\ 

{}``I am at least deeply interested.''

{}``Then your case is not hopeless. I feel that there is reason lurking
in you somewhere, so we will patiently grope round for it. We will
now leave the dead American and proceed with my narrative. You can
imagine that I could hardly come away from the Amazon without probing
deeper into the matter. There were indications as to the direction
from which the dead traveler had come. Indian legends would alone
have been my guide, for I found that rumors of a strange land were
common among all the riverine tribes. You have heard, no doubt, of
Curupuri?''\ 

{}``Never.''

{}``Curupuri is the spirit of the woods, something terrible, something
malevolent, something to be avoided. None can describe its shape or
nature, but it is a word of terror along the Amazon. Now all tribes
agree as to the direction in which Curupuri lives. It was the same
direction from which the American had come. Something terrible lay
that way. It was my business to find out what it was.''

{}``What did you do?''\ My flippancy was all gone. This massive
man compelled one's attention and respect.

{}``I overcame the extreme reluctance of the natives\mbox{---}a
reluctance which extends even to talk upon the subject\mbox{---}and
by judicious persuasion and gifts, aided, I will admit, by some threats
of coercion, I got two of them to act as guides. After many adventures
which I need not describe, and after traveling a distance which I
will not mention, in a direction which I withhold, we came at last
to a tract of country which has never been described, nor, indeed,
visited save by my unfortunate predecessor. Would you kindly look
at this?''\ 

He handed me a photograph\mbox{---}half-plate size.

{}``The unsatisfactory appearance of it is due to the fact,'' said
he, {}``that on descending the river the boat was upset and the case
which contained the undeveloped films was broken, with disastrous
results. Nearly all of them were totally ruined\mbox{---}an irreparable
loss. This is one of the few which partially escaped. This explanation
of deficiencies or abnormalities you will kindly accept. There was
talk of faking. I am not in a mood to argue such a point.''

The photograph was certainly very off-colored. An unkind critic might
easily have misinterpreted that dim surface. It was a dull gray landscape,
and as I gradually deciphered the details of it I realized that it
represented a long and enormously high line of cliffs exactly like
an immense cataract seen in the distance, with a sloping, tree-clad
plain in the foreground.

{}``I believe it is the same place as the painted picture,'' said
I.

{}``It is the same place,'' the Professor answered. {}``I found
traces of the fellow's camp. Now look at this.''

It was a nearer view of the same scene, though the photograph was
extremely defective. I could distinctly see the isolated, tree-crowned
pinnacle of rock which was detached from the crag.

{}``I have no doubt of it at all,'' said I.

{}``Well, that is something gained,'' said he. {}``We progress,
do we not? Now, will you please look at the top of that rocky pinnacle?
Do you observe something there?''\ 

{}``An enormous tree.''

{}``But on the tree?''\ 

{}``A large bird,'' said I.

He handed me a lens.

{}``Yes,'' I said, peering through it, {}``a large bird stands
on the tree. It appears to have a considerable beak. I should say
it was a pelican.''

{}``I cannot congratulate you upon your eyesight,'' said the Professor.
{}``It is not a pelican, nor, indeed, is it a bird. It may interest
you to know that I succeeded in shooting that particular specimen.
It was the only absolute proof of my experiences which I was able
to bring away with me.''

{}``You have it, then?''\ Here at last was tangible corroboration.

{}``I had it. It was unfortunately lost with so much else in the
same boat accident which ruined my photographs. I clutched at it as
it disappeared in the swirl of the rapids, and part of its wing was
left in my hand. I was insensible when washed ashore, but the miserable
remnant of my superb specimen was still intact; I now lay it before
you.''

From a drawer he produced what seemed to me to be the upper portion
of the wing of a large bat. It was at least two feet in length, a
curved bone, with a membranous veil beneath it.

{}``A monstrous bat!''\ I suggested.

{}``Nothing of the sort,'' said the Professor, severely. {}``Living,
as I do, in an educated and scientific atmosphere, I could not have
conceived that the first principles of zoology were so little known.
Is it possible that you do not know the elementary fact in comparative
anatomy, that the wing of a bird is really the forearm, while the
wing of a bat consists of three elongated fingers with membranes between?
Now, in this case, the bone is certainly not the forearm, and you
can see for yourself that this is a single membrane hanging upon a
single bone, and therefore that it cannot belong to a bat. But if
it is neither bird nor bat, what is it?''\ 

My small stock of knowledge was exhausted.

{}``I really do not know,'' said I.

He opened the standard work to which he had already referred me.

{}``Here,'' said he, pointing to the picture of an extraordinary
flying monster, {}``is an excellent reproduction of the dimorphodon,
or pterodactyl, a flying reptile of the Jurassic period. On the next
page is a diagram of the mechanism of its wing. Kindly compare it
with the specimen in your hand.''

A wave of amazement passed over me as I looked. I was convinced. There
could be no getting away from it. The cumulative proof was overwhelming.
The sketch, the photographs, the narrative, and now the actual specimen\mbox{---}the
evidence was complete. I said so\mbox{---}I said so warmly, for
I felt that the Professor was an ill-used man. He leaned back in his
chair with drooping eyelids and a tolerant smile, basking in this
sudden gleam of sunshine.

{}``It's just the very biggest thing that I ever heard of!''\ said
I, though it was my journalistic rather than my scientific enthusiasm
that was roused. {}``It is colossal. You are a Columbus of science
who has discovered a lost world. I'm awfully sorry if I seemed to
doubt you. It was all so unthinkable. But I understand evidence when
I see it, and this should be good enough for anyone.''

The Professor purred with satisfaction.

{}``And then, sir, what did you do next?''\ 

{}``It was the wet season, Mr.\ Malone, and my stores were exhausted.
I explored some portion of this huge cliff, but I was unable to find
any way to scale it. The pyramidal rock upon which I saw and shot
the pterodactyl was more accessible. Being something of a cragsman,
I did manage to get half way to the top of that. From that height
I had a better idea of the plateau upon the top of the crags. It appeared
to be very large; neither to east nor to west could I see any end
to the vista of green-capped cliffs. Below, it is a swampy, jungly
region, full of snakes, insects, and fever. It is a natural protection
to this singular country.''

{}``Did you see any other trace of life?''\ 

{}``No, sir, I did not; but during the week that we lay encamped
at the base of the cliff we heard some very strange noises from above.''

{}``But the creature that the American drew? How do you account for
that?''\ 

{}``We can only suppose that he must have made his way to the summit
and seen it there. We know, therefore, that there is a way up. We
know equally that it must be a very difficult one, otherwise the creatures
would have come down and overrun the surrounding country. Surely that
is clear?''\ 

{}``But how did they come to be there?''\ 

{}``I do not think that the problem is a very obscure one,'' said
the Professor; {}``there can only be one explanation. South America
is, as you may have heard, a granite continent. At this single point
in the interior there has been, in some far distant age, a great,
sudden volcanic upheaval. These cliffs, I may remark, are basaltic,
and therefore plutonic. An area, as large perhaps as Sussex, has been
lifted up \emph{en bloc} with all its living contents, and cut off
by perpendicular precipices of a hardness which defies erosion from
all the rest of the continent. What is the result? Why, the ordinary
laws of Nature are suspended. The various checks which influence the
struggle for existence in the world at large are all neutralized or
altered. Creatures survive which would otherwise disappear. You will
observe that both the pterodactyl and the stegosaurus are Jurassic,
and therefore of a great age in the order of life. They have been
artificially conserved by those strange accidental conditions.''

{}``But surely your evidence is conclusive. You have only to lay
it before the proper authorities.''

{}``So in my simplicity, I had imagined,'' said the Professor, bitterly.
{}``I can only tell you that it was not so, that I was met at every
turn by incredulity, born partly of stupidity and partly of jealousy.
It is not my nature, sir, to cringe to any man, or to seek to prove
a fact if my word has been doubted. After the first I have not condescended
to show such corroborative proofs as I possess. The subject became
hateful to me\mbox{---}I would not speak of it. When men like yourself,
who represent the foolish curiosity of the public, came to disturb
my privacy I was unable to meet them with dignified reserve. By nature
I am, I admit, somewhat fiery, and under provocation I am inclined
to be violent. I fear you may have remarked it.''

I nursed my eye and was silent.

{}``My wife has frequently remonstrated with me upon the subject,
and yet I fancy that any man of honor would feel the same. To-night,
however, I propose to give an extreme example of the control of the
will over the emotions. I invite you to be present at the exhibition.''
He handed me a card from his desk. {}``You will perceive that Mr.\ Percival
Waldron, a naturalist of some popular repute, is announced to lecture
at eight-thirty at the Zoological Institute's Hall upon `The Record
of the Ages.' I have been specially invited to be present upon the
platform, and to move a vote of thanks to the lecturer. While doing
so, I shall make it my business, with infinite tact and delicacy,
to throw out a few remarks which may arouse the interest of the audience
and cause some of them to desire to go more deeply into the matter.
Nothing contentious, you understand, but only an indication that there
are greater deeps beyond. I shall hold myself strongly in leash, and
see whether by this self-restraint I attain a more favorable result.''

{}``And I may come?''\ I asked eagerly.

{}``Why, surely,'' he answered, cordially. He had an enormously
massive genial manner, which was almost as overpowering as his violence.
His smile of benevolence was a wonderful thing, when his cheeks would
suddenly bunch into two red apples, between his half-closed eyes and
his great black beard. {}``By all means, come. It will be a comfort
to me to know that I have one ally in the hall, however inefficient
and ignorant of the subject he may be. I fancy there will be a large
audience, for Waldron, though an absolute charlatan, has a considerable
popular following. Now, Mr.\ Malone, I have given you rather more
of my time than I had intended. The individual must not monopolize
what is meant for the world. I shall be pleased to see you at the
lecture to-night. In the meantime, you will understand that no public
use is to be made of any of the material that I have given you.''

{}``But Mr.\ McArdle\mbox{---}my news editor, you know\mbox{---}will
want to know what I have done.''

{}``Tell him what you like. You can say, among other things, that
if he sends anyone else to intrude upon me I shall call upon him with
a riding-whip. But I leave it to you that nothing of all this appears
in print. Very good. Then the Zoological Institute's Hall at eight-thirty
to-night.'' I had a last impression of red cheeks, blue rippling
beard, and intolerant eyes, as he waved me out of the room.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER V. {}``Question!''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{{}``Question!''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Question!''}

What with the physical shocks incidental to my first interview with
Professor Challenger and the mental ones which accompanied the second,
I was a somewhat demoralized journalist by the time I found myself
in Enmore Park once more. In my aching head the one thought was throbbing
that there really was truth in this man's story, that it was of tremendous
consequence, and that it would work up into inconceivable copy for
the \emph{Gazette} when I could obtain permission to use it. A taxicab
was waiting at the end of the road, so I sprang into it and drove
down to the office. McArdle was at his post as usual.

{}``Well,'' he cried, expectantly, {}``what may it run to? I'm
thinking, young man, you have been in the wars. Don't tell me that
he assaulted you.''

{}``We had a little difference at first.''

{}``What a man it is! What did you do?''\ 

{}``Well, he became more reasonable and we had a chat. But I got
nothing out of him\mbox{---}nothing for publication.''

{}``I'm not so sure about that. You got a black eye out of him, and
that's for publication. We can't have this reign of terror, Mr.\ Malone.
We must bring the man to his bearings. I'll have a leaderette on him
to-morrow that will raise a blister. Just give me the material and
I will engage to brand the fellow for ever. Professor Munchausen\mbox{---}how's
that for an inset headline? Sir John Mandeville \emph{redivivus}\mbox{---}Cagliostro\mbox{---}all
the imposters and bullies in history. I'll show him up for the fraud
he is.''

{}``I wouldn't do that, sir.''

{}``Why not?''\ 

{}``Because he is not a fraud at all.''

{}``What!''\ roared McArdle. {}``You don't mean to say you really
believe this stuff of his about mammoths and mastodons and great sea
sairpents?''\ 

{}``Well, I don't know about that. I don't think he makes any claims
of that kind. But I do believe he has got something new.''

{}``Then for Heaven's sake, man, write it up!''\ 

{}``I'm longing to, but all I know he gave me in confidence and on
condition that I didn't.'' I condensed into a few sentences the Professor's
narrative. {}``That's how it stands.''

McArdle looked deeply incredulous.

{}``Well, Mr.\ Malone,'' he said at last, {}``about this scientific
meeting to-night; there can be no privacy about that, anyhow. I don't
suppose any paper will want to report it, for Waldron has been reported
already a dozen times, and no one is aware that Challenger will speak.
We may get a scoop, if we are lucky. You'll be there in any case,
so you'll just give us a pretty full report. I'll keep space up to
midnight.''

My day was a busy one, and I had an early dinner at the Savage Club
with Tarp Henry, to whom I gave some account of my adventures. He
listened with a sceptical smile on his gaunt face, and roared with
laughter on hearing that the Professor had convinced me.

{}``My dear chap, things don't happen like that in real life. People
don't stumble upon enormous discoveries and then lose their evidence.
Leave that to the novelists. The fellow is as full of tricks as the
monkey-house at the Zoo. It's all bosh.''

{}``But the American poet?''\ 

{}``He never existed.''

{}``I saw his sketch-book.''

{}``Challenger's sketch-book.''

{}``You think he drew that animal?''\ 

{}``Of course he did. Who else?''\ 

{}``Well, then, the photographs?''\ 

{}``There was nothing in the photographs. By your own admission you
only saw a bird.''

{}``A pterodactyl.''

{}``That's what \textit{he} says. He put the pterodactyl into your
head.''

{}``Well, then, the bones?''\ 

{}``First one out of an Irish stew. Second one vamped up for the
occasion. If you are clever and know your business you can fake a
bone as easily as you can a photograph.''

I began to feel uneasy. Perhaps, after all, I had been premature in
my acquiescence. Then I had a sudden happy thought.

{}``Will you come to the meeting?''\ I asked.

Tarp Henry looked thoughtful.

{}``He is not a popular person, the genial Challenger,'' said he.
{}``A lot of people have accounts to settle with him. I should say
he is about the best-hated man in London. If the medical students
turn out there will be no end of a rag. I don't want to get into a
bear-garden.''

{}``You might at least do him the justice to hear him state his own
case.''

{}``Well, perhaps it's only fair. All right. I'm your man for the
evening.''

When we arrived at the hall we found a much greater concourse than
I had expected. A line of electric broughams discharged their little
cargoes of white-bearded professors, while the dark stream of humbler
pedestrians, who crowded through the arched door-way, showed that
the audience would be popular as well as scientific. Indeed, it became
evident to us as soon as we had taken our seats that a youthful and
even boyish spirit was abroad in the gallery and the back portions
of the hall. Looking behind me, I could see rows of faces of the familiar
medical student type. Apparently the great hospitals had each sent
down their contingent. The behavior of the audience at present was
good-humored, but mischievous. Scraps of popular songs were chorused
with an enthusiasm which was a strange prelude to a scientific lecture,
and there was already a tendency to personal chaff which promised
a jovial evening to others, however embarrassing it might be to the
recipients of these dubious honors.

Thus, when old Doctor Meldrum, with his well-known curly-brimmed opera-hat,
appeared upon the platform, there was such a universal query of {}``Where
\textit{did} you get that tile?''\ that he hurriedly removed it,
and concealed it furtively under his chair. When gouty Professor Wadley
limped down to his seat there were general affectionate inquiries
from all parts of the hall as to the exact state of his poor toe,
which caused him obvious embarrassment. The greatest demonstration
of all, however, was at the entrance of my new acquaintance, Professor
Challenger, when he passed down to take his place at the extreme end
of the front row of the platform. Such a yell of welcome broke forth
when his black beard first protruded round the corner that I began
to suspect Tarp Henry was right in his surmise, and that this assemblage
was there not merely for the sake of the lecture, but because it had
got rumored abroad that the famous Professor would take part in the
proceedings.

There was some sympathetic laughter on his entrance among the front
benches of well-dressed spectators, as though the demonstration of
the students in this instance was not unwelcome to them. That greeting
was, indeed, a frightful outburst of sound, the uproar of the \textit{carnivora}
cage when the step of the bucket-bearing keeper is heard in the distance.
There was an offensive tone in it, perhaps, and yet in the main it
struck me as mere riotous outcry, the noisy reception of one who amused
and interested them, rather than of one they disliked or despised.
Challenger smiled with weary and tolerant contempt, as a kindly man
would meet the yapping of a litter of puppies. He sat slowly down,
blew out his chest, passed his hand caressingly down his beard, and
looked with drooping eyelids and supercilious eyes at the crowded
hall before him. The uproar of his advent had not yet died away when
Professor Ronald Murray, the chairman, and Mr.\ Waldron, the lecturer,
threaded their way to the front, and the proceedings began.

Professor Murray will, I am sure, excuse me if I say that he has the
common fault of most Englishmen of being inaudible. Why on earth people
who have something to say which is worth hearing should not take the
slight trouble to learn how to make it heard is one of the strange
mysteries of modern life. Their methods are as reasonable as to try
to pour some precious stuff from the spring to the reservoir through
a non-conducting pipe, which could by the least effort be opened.
Professor Murray made several profound remarks to his white tie and
to the water-carafe upon the table, with a humorous, twinkling aside
to the silver candlestick upon his right. Then he sat down, and Mr.\ Waldron,
the famous popular lecturer, rose amid a general murmur of applause.
He was a stern, gaunt man, with a harsh voice, and an aggressive manner,
but he had the merit of knowing how to assimilate the ideas of other
men, and to pass them on in a way which was intelligible and even
interesting to the lay public, with a happy knack of being funny about
the most unlikely objects, so that the precession of the Equinox or
the formation of a vertebrate became a highly humorous process as
treated by him.

It was a bird's-eye view of creation, as interpreted by science, which,
in language always clear and sometimes picturesque, he unfolded before
us. He told us of the globe, a huge mass of flaming gas, flaring through
the heavens. Then he pictured the solidification, the cooling, the
wrinkling which formed the mountains, the steam which turned to water,
the slow preparation of the stage upon which was to be played the
inexplicable drama of life. On the origin of life itself he was discreetly
vague. That the germs of it could hardly have survived the original
roasting was, he declared, fairly certain. Therefore it had come later.
Had it built itself out of the cooling, inorganic elements of the
globe? Very likely. Had the germs of it arrived from outside upon
a meteor? It was hardly conceivable. On the whole, the wisest man
was the least dogmatic upon the point. We could not\mbox{---}or
at least we had not succeeded up to date in making organic life in
our laboratories out of inorganic materials. The gulf between the
dead and the living was something which our chemistry could not as
yet bridge. But there was a higher and subtler chemistry of Nature,
which, working with great forces over long epochs, might well produce
results which were impossible for us. There the matter must be left.

This brought the lecturer to the great ladder of animal life, beginning
low down in molluscs and feeble sea creatures, then up rung by rung
through reptiles and fishes, till at last we came to a kangaroo-rat,
a creature which brought forth its young alive, the direct ancestor
of all mammals, and presumably, therefore, of everyone in the audience.\ 
({}``No, no,'' from a sceptical student in the back row.) If the
young gentleman in the red tie who cried {}``No, no,'' and who presumably
claimed to have been hatched out of an egg, would wait upon him after
the lecture, he would be glad to see such a curiosity.\  (Laughter.)
It was strange to think that the climax of all the age-long process
of Nature had been the creation of that gentleman in the red tie.
But had the process stopped? Was this gentleman to be taken as the
final type\mbox{---}the be-all and end-all of development? He hoped
that he would not hurt the feelings of the gentleman in the red tie
if he maintained that, whatever virtues that gentleman might possess
in private life, still the vast processes of the universe were not
fully justified if they were to end entirely in his production. Evolution
was not a spent force, but one still working, and even greater achievements
were in store.

Having thus, amid a general titter, played very prettily with his
interrupter, the lecturer went back to his picture of the past, the
drying of the seas, the emergence of the sand-bank, the sluggish,
viscous life which lay upon their margins, the overcrowded lagoons,
the tendency of the sea creatures to take refuge upon the mud-flats,
the abundance of food awaiting them, their consequent enormous growth.
{}``Hence, ladies and gentlemen,'' he added, {}``that frightful
brood of saurians which still affright our eyes when seen in the Wealden
or in the Solenhofen slates, but which were fortunately extinct long
before the first appearance of mankind upon this planet.''

{}``Question!''\ boomed a voice from the platform.

Mr.\ Waldron was a strict disciplinarian with a gift of acid humor,
as exemplified upon the gentleman with the red tie, which made it
perilous to interrupt him. But this interjection appeared to him so
absurd that he was at a loss how to deal with it. So looks the Shakespearean
who is confronted by a rancid Baconian, or the astronomer who is assailed
by a flat-earth fanatic. He paused for a moment, and then, raising
his voice, repeated slowly the words: {}``Which were extinct before
the coming of man.''

{}``Question!''\ boomed the voice once more.

Waldron looked with amazement along the line of professors upon the
platform until his eyes fell upon the figure of Challenger, who leaned
back in his chair with closed eyes and an amused expression, as if
he were smiling in his sleep.

{}``I see!''\ said Waldron, with a shrug. {}``It is my friend
Professor Challenger,'' and amid laughter he renewed his lecture
as if this was a final explanation and no more need be said.

But the incident was far from being closed. Whatever path the lecturer
took amid the wilds of the past seemed invariably to lead him to some
assertion as to extinct or prehistoric life which instantly brought
the same bulls' bellow from the Professor. The audience began to anticipate
it and to roar with delight when it came. The packed benches of students
joined in, and every time Challenger's beard opened, before any sound
could come forth, there was a yell of {}``Question!''\ from a hundred
voices, and an answering counter cry of {}``Order!''\ and {}``Shame!''\ 
from as many more. Waldron, though a hardened lecturer and a strong
man, became rattled. He hesitated, stammered, repeated himself, got
snarled in a long sentence, and finally turned furiously upon the
cause of his troubles.

{}``This is really intolerable!''\ he cried, glaring across the
platform. {}``I must ask you, Professor Challenger, to cease these
ignorant and unmannerly interruptions.''

There was a hush over the hall, the students rigid with delight at
seeing the high gods on Olympus quarrelling among themselves. Challenger
levered his bulky figure slowly out of his chair.

{}``I must in turn ask you, Mr.\ Waldron,'' he said, {}``to cease
to make assertions which are not in strict accordance with scientific
fact.''

The words unloosed a tempest. {}``Shame! Shame!'' {}``Give him
a hearing!'' {}``Put him out!'' {}``Shove him off the platform!''
{}``Fair play!''\ emerged from a general roar of amusement or execration.
The chairman was on his feet flapping both his hands and bleating
excitedly. {}``Professor Challenger\mbox{---}personal\mbox{---}views\mbox{---}later,''
were the solid peaks above his clouds of inaudible mutter. The interrupter
bowed, smiled, stroked his beard, and relapsed into his chair. Waldron,
very flushed and warlike, continued his observations. Now and then,
as he made an assertion, he shot a venomous glance at his opponent,
who seemed to be slumbering deeply, with the same broad, happy smile
upon his face.

At last the lecture came to an end\mbox{---}I am inclined to think
that it was a premature one, as the peroration was hurried and disconnected.
The thread of the argument had been rudely broken, and the audience
was restless and expectant. Waldron sat down, and, after a chirrup
from the chairman, Professor Challenger rose and advanced to the edge
of the platform. In the interests of my paper I took down his speech
verbatim.

{}``Ladies and Gentlemen,'' he began, amid a sustained interruption
from the back. {}``I beg pardon\mbox{---}Ladies, Gentlemen, and
Children\mbox{---}I must apologize, I had inadvertently omitted
a considerable section of this audience'' (tumult, during which the
Professor stood with one hand raised and his enormous head nodding
sympathetically, as if he were bestowing a pontifical blessing upon
the crowd), {}``I have been selected to move a vote of thanks to
Mr.\ Waldron for the very picturesque and imaginative address to
which we have just listened. There are points in it with which I disagree,
and it has been my duty to indicate them as they arose, but, none
the less, Mr.\ Waldron has accomplished his object well, that object
being to give a simple and interesting account of what he conceives
to have been the history of our planet. Popular lectures are the easiest
to listen to, but Mr.\ Waldron'' (here he beamed and blinked at
the lecturer) {}``will excuse me when I say that they are necessarily
both superficial and misleading, since they have to be graded to the
comprehension of an ignorant audience.'' (Ironical cheering.) {}``Popular
lecturers are in their nature parasitic.'' (Angry gesture of protest
from Mr.\ Waldron.) {}``They exploit for fame or cash the work which
has been done by their indigent and unknown brethren. One smallest
new fact obtained in the laboratory, one brick built into the temple
of science, far outweighs any second-hand exposition which passes
an idle hour, but can leave no useful result behind it. I put forward
this obvious reflection, not out of any desire to disparage Mr.\ Waldron
in particular, but that you may not lose your sense of proportion
and mistake the acolyte for the high priest.'' (At this point Mr.\ Waldron
whispered to the chairman, who half rose and said something severely
to his water-carafe.) {}``But enough of this!''\ (Loud and prolonged
cheers.) {}``Let me pass to some subject of wider interest. What
is the particular point upon which I, as an original investigator,
have challenged our lecturer's accuracy? It is upon the permanence
of certain types of animal life upon the earth. I do not speak upon
this subject as an amateur, nor, I may add, as a popular lecturer,
but I speak as one whose scientific conscience compels him to adhere
closely to facts, when I say that Mr.\ Waldron is very wrong in supposing
that because he has never himself seen a so-called prehistoric animal,
therefore these creatures no longer exist. They are indeed, as he
has said, our ancestors, but they are, if I may use the expression,
our contemporary ancestors, who can still be found with all their
hideous and formidable characteristics if one has but the energy and
hardihood to seek their haunts. Creatures which were supposed to be
Jurassic, monsters who would hunt down and devour our largest and
fiercest mammals, still exist.'' (Cries of {}``Bosh!'' {}``Prove
it!'' {}``How do \textit{you} know?'' {}``Question!'') {}``How
do I know, you ask me? I know because I have visited their secret
haunts. I know because I have seen some of them.'' (Applause, uproar,
and a voice, {}``Liar!'') {}``Am I a liar?''\ (General hearty
and noisy assent.) {}``Did I hear someone say that I was a liar?
Will the person who called me a liar kindly stand up that I may know
him?''\ (A voice, {}``Here he is, sir!''\ and an inoffensive
little person in spectacles, struggling violently, was held up among
a group of students.) {}``Did you venture to call me a liar?''\ ({}``No,
sir, no!''\ shouted the accused, and disappeared like a jack-in-the-box.)
{}``If any person in this hall dares to doubt my veracity, I shall
be glad to have a few words with him after the lecture.'' ({}``Liar!'')
{}``Who said that?''\ (Again the inoffensive one plunging desperately,
was elevated high into the air.) {}``If I come down among you\mbox{---}''
(General chorus of {}``Come, love, come!''\ which interrupted the
proceedings for some moments, while the chairman, standing up and
waving both his arms, seemed to be conducting the music. The Professor,
with his face flushed, his nostrils dilated, and his beard bristling,
was now in a proper Berserk mood.) {}``Every great discoverer has
been met with the same incredulity\mbox{---}the sure brand of a
generation of fools. When great facts are laid before you, you have
not the intuition, the imagination which would help you to understand
them. You can only throw mud at the men who have risked their lives
to open new fields to science. You persecute the prophets! Galileo!
Darwin, and I\mbox{---}'' (Prolonged cheering and complete interruption.)

All this is from my hurried notes taken at the time, which give little
notion of the absolute chaos to which the assembly had by this time
been reduced. So terrific was the uproar that several ladies had already
beaten a hurried retreat. Grave and reverend seniors seemed to have
caught the prevailing spirit as badly as the students, and I saw white-bearded
men rising and shaking their fists at the obdurate Professor. The
whole great audience seethed and simmered like a boiling pot. The
Professor took a step forward and raised both his hands. There was
something so big and arresting and virile in the man that the clatter
and shouting died gradually away before his commanding gesture and
his masterful eyes. He seemed to have a definite message. They hushed
to hear it.

{}``I will not detain you,'' he said. {}``It is not worth it. Truth
is truth, and the noise of a number of foolish young men\mbox{---}and,
I fear I must add, of their equally foolish seniors\mbox{---}cannot
affect the matter. I claim that I have opened a new field of science.
You dispute it.'' (Cheers.) {}``Then I put you to the test. Will
you accredit one or more of your own number to go out as your representatives
and test my statement in your name?''\ 

Mr.\ Summerlee, the veteran Professor of Comparative Anatomy, rose
among the audience, a tall, thin, bitter man, with the withered aspect
of a theologian. He wished, he said, to ask Professor Challenger whether
the results to which he had alluded in his remarks had been obtained
during a journey to the headwaters of the Amazon made by him two years
before.

Professor Challenger answered that they had.

Mr.\ Summerlee desired to know how it was that Professor Challenger
claimed to have made discoveries in those regions which had been overlooked
by Wallace, Bates, and other previous explorers of established scientific
repute.

Professor Challenger answered that Mr.\ Summerlee appeared to be
confusing the Amazon with the Thames; that it was in reality a somewhat
larger river; that Mr.\ Summerlee might be interested to know that
with the Orinoco, which communicated with it, some fifty thousand
miles of country were opened up, and that in so vast a space it was
not impossible for one person to find what another had missed.

Mr.\ Summerlee declared, with an acid smile, that he fully appreciated
the difference between the Thames and the Amazon, which lay in the
fact that any assertion about the former could be tested, while about
the latter it could not. He would be obliged if Professor Challenger
would give the latitude and the longitude of the country in which
prehistoric animals were to be found.

Professor Challenger replied that he reserved such information for
good reasons of his own, but would be prepared to give it with proper
precautions to a committee chosen from the audience. Would Mr.\ Summerlee
serve on such a committee and test his story in person?

Mr.\ Summerlee: {}``Yes, I will.'' (Great cheering.)

Professor Challenger: {}``Then I guarantee that I will place in your
hands such material as will enable you to find your way. It is only
right, however, since Mr.\ Summerlee goes to check my statement that
I should have one or more with him who may check his. I will not disguise
from you that there are difficulties and dangers. Mr.\ Summerlee
will need a younger colleague. May I ask for volunteers?''\ 

It is thus that the great crisis of a man's life springs out at him.
Could I have imagined when I entered that hall that I was about to
pledge myself to a wilder adventure than had ever come to me in my
dreams? But Gladys\mbox{---}was it not the very opportunity of which
she spoke? Gladys would have told me to go. I had sprung to my feet.
I was speaking, and yet I had prepared no words. Tarp Henry, my companion,
was plucking at my skirts and I heard him whispering, {}``Sit down,
Malone! Don't make a public ass of yourself.'' At the same time I
was aware that a tall, thin man, with dark gingery hair, a few seats
in front of me, was also upon his feet. He glared back at me with
hard angry eyes, but I refused to give way.

{}``I will go, Mr.\ Chairman,'' I kept repeating over and over
again.

{}``Name! Name!''\ cried the audience.

{}``My name is Edward Dunn Malone. I am the reporter of the \emph{Daily
Gazette}. I claim to be an absolutely unprejudiced witness.''

{}``What is \textit{your} name, sir?''\ the chairman asked of my
tall rival.

{}``I am Lord John Roxton. I have already been up the Amazon, I know
all the ground, and have special qualifications for this investigation.''

{}``Lord John Roxton's reputation as a sportsman and a traveler is,
of course, world-famous,'' said the chairman; {}``at the same time
it would certainly be as well to have a member of the Press upon such
an expedition.''

{}``Then I move,'' said Professor Challenger, {}``that both these
gentlemen be elected, as representatives of this meeting, to accompany
Professor Summerlee upon his journey to investigate and to report
upon the truth of my statements.''

And so, amid shouting and cheering, our fate was decided, and I found
myself borne away in the human current which swirled towards the door,
with my mind half stunned by the vast new project which had risen
so suddenly before it. As I emerged from the hall I was conscious
for a moment of a rush of laughing students\mbox{---}down the pavement,
and of an arm wielding a heavy umbrella, which rose and fell in the
midst of them. Then, amid a mixture of groans and cheers, Professor
Challenger's electric brougham slid from the curb, and I found myself
walking under the silvery lights of Regent Street, full of thoughts
of Gladys and of wonder as to my future.

Suddenly there was a touch at my elbow. I turned, and found myself
looking into the humorous, masterful eyes of the tall, thin man who
had volunteered to be my companion on this strange quest.

{}``Mr.\ Malone, I understand,'' said he. {}``We are to be companions\mbox{---}what?
My rooms are just over the road, in the Albany. Perhaps you would
have the kindness to spare me half an hour, for there are one or two
things that I badly want to say to you.''


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER VI. {}``I was the Flail of the Lord''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``I was the Flail of the Lord''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``I was the Flail of the Lord''}

Lord John Roxton and I turned down Vigo Street together and through
the dingy portals of the famous aristocratic rookery. At the end of
a long drab passage my new acquaintance pushed open a door and turned
on an electric switch. A number of lamps shining through tinted shades
bathed the whole great room before us in a ruddy radiance. Standing
in the doorway and glancing round me, I had a general impression of
extraordinary comfort and elegance combined with an atmosphere of
masculine virility. Everywhere there were mingled the luxury of the
wealthy man of taste and the careless untidiness of the bachelor.
Rich furs and strange iridescent mats from some Oriental bazaar were
scattered upon the floor. Pictures and prints which even my unpractised
eyes could recognize as being of great price and rarity hung thick
upon the walls. Sketches of boxers, of ballet-girls, and of racehorses
alternated with a sensuous Fragonard, a martial Girardet, and a dreamy
Turner. But amid these varied ornaments there were scattered the trophies
which brought back strongly to my recollection the fact that Lord
John Roxton was one of the great all-round sportsmen and athletes
of his day. A dark-blue oar crossed with a cherry-pink one above his
mantel-piece spoke of the old Oxonian and Leander man, while the foils
and boxing-gloves above and below them were the tools of a man who
had won supremacy with each. Like a dado round the room was the jutting
line of splendid heavy game-heads, the best of their sort from every
quarter of the world, with the rare white rhinoceros of the Lado Enclave
drooping its supercilious lip above them all.

In the center of the rich red carpet was a black and gold Louis Quinze
table, a lovely antique, now sacrilegiously desecrated with marks
of glasses and the scars of cigar-stumps. On it stood a silver tray
of smokables and a burnished spirit-stand, from which and an adjacent
siphon my silent host proceeded to charge two high glasses. Having
indicated an arm-chair to me and placed my refreshment near it, he
handed me a long, smooth Havana. Then, seating himself opposite to
me, he looked at me long and fixedly with his strange, twinkling,
reckless eyes\mbox{---}eyes of a cold light blue, the color of a
glacier lake.

Through the thin haze of my cigar-smoke I noted the details of a face
which was already familiar to me from many photographs\mbox{---}the
strongly-curved nose, the hollow, worn cheeks, the dark, ruddy hair,
thin at the top, the crisp, virile moustaches, the small, aggressive
tuft upon his projecting chin. Something there was of Napoleon III.,
something of Don Quixote, and yet again something which was the essence
of the English country gentleman, the keen, alert, open-air lover
of dogs and of horses. His skin was of a rich flower-pot red from
sun and wind. His eyebrows were tufted and overhanging, which gave
those naturally cold eyes an almost ferocious aspect, an impression
which was increased by his strong and furrowed brow. In figure he
was spare, but very strongly built\mbox{---}indeed, he had often
proved that there were few men in England capable of such sustained
exertions. His height was a little over six feet, but he seemed shorter
on account of a peculiar rounding of the shoulders. Such was the famous
Lord John Roxton as he sat opposite to me, biting hard upon his cigar
and watching me steadily in a long and embarrassing silence.

{}``Well,'' said he, at last, {}``we've gone and done it, young
fellah my lad.'' (This curious phrase he pronounced as if it were
all one word\mbox{---}{}``young-fellah-me-lad.'') {}``Yes, we've
taken a jump, you an' me. I suppose, now, when you went into that
room there was no such notion in your head\mbox{---}what?''\ 

{}``No thought of it.''

{}``The same here. No thought of it. And here we are, up to our necks
in the tureen. Why, I've only been back three weeks from Uganda, and
taken a place in Scotland, and signed the lease and all. Pretty goin's
on\mbox{---}what? How does it hit you?''\ 

{}``Well, it is all in the main line of my business. I am a journalist
on the \emph{Gazette}.''

{}``Of course\mbox{---}you said so when you took it on. By the
way, I've got a small job for you, if you'll help me.''

{}``With pleasure.''

{}``Don't mind takin' a risk, do you?''\ 

{}``What is the risk?''\ 

{}``Well, it's Ballinger\mbox{---}he's the risk. You've heard of
him?''\ 

{}``No.''

{}``Why, young fellah, where \textit{have} you lived? Sir John Ballinger
is the best gentleman jock in the north country. I could hold him
on the flat at my best, but over jumps he's my master. Well, it's
an open secret that when he's out of trainin' he drinks hard\mbox{---}strikin'
an average, he calls it. He got delirium on Toosday, and has been
ragin' like a devil ever since. His room is above this. The doctors
say that it is all up with the old dear unless some food is got into
him, but as he lies in bed with a revolver on his coverlet, and swears
he will put six of the best through anyone that comes near him, there's
been a bit of a strike among the serving-men. He's a hard nail, is
Jack, and a dead shot, too, but you can't leave a Grand National winner
to die like that\mbox{---}what?''\ 

{}``What do you mean to do, then?''\ I asked.

{}``Well, my idea was that you and I could rush him. He may be dozin',
and at the worst he can only wing one of us, and the other should
have him. If we can get his bolster-cover round his arms and then
'phone up a stomach-pump, we'll give the old dear the supper of his
life.''

It was a rather desperate business to come suddenly into one's day's
work. I don't think that I am a particularly brave man. I have an
Irish imagination which makes the unknown and the untried more terrible
than they are. On the other hand, I was brought up with a horror of
cowardice and with a terror of such a stigma. I dare say that I could
throw myself over a precipice, like the Hun in the history books,
if my courage to do it were questioned, and yet it would surely be
pride and fear, rather than courage, which would be my inspiration.
Therefore, although every nerve in my body shrank from the whisky-maddened
figure which I pictured in the room above, I still answered, in as
careless a voice as I could command, that I was ready to go. Some
further remark of Lord Roxton's about the danger only made me irritable.

{}``Talking won't make it any better,'' said I. {}``Come on.''

I rose from my chair and he from his. Then with a little confidential
chuckle of laughter, he patted me two or three times on the chest,
finally pushing me back into my chair.

{}``All right, sonny my lad\mbox{---}you'll do,'' said he. I looked
up in surprise.

{}``I saw after Jack Ballinger myself this mornin'. He blew a hole
in the skirt of my kimono, bless his shaky old hand, but we got a
jacket on him, and he's to be all right in a week. I say, young fellah,
I hope you don't mind\mbox{---}what? You see, between you an' me
close-tiled, I look on this South American business as a mighty serious
thing, and if I have a pal with me I want a man I can bank on. So
I sized you down, and I'm bound to say that you came well out of it.
You see, it's all up to you and me, for this old Summerlee man will
want dry-nursin' from the first. By the way, are you by any chance
the Malone who is expected to get his Rugby cap for Ireland?''\ 

{}``A reserve, perhaps.''

{}``I thought I remembered your face. Why, I was there when you got
that try against Richmond\mbox{---}as fine a swervin' run as I saw
the whole season. I never miss a Rugby match if I can help it, for
it is the manliest game we have left. Well, I didn't ask you in here
just to talk sport. We've got to fix our business. Here are the sailin's,
on the first page of the \emph{Times}. There's a Booth boat for Para
next Wednesday week, and if the Professor and you can work it, I think
we should take it\mbox{---}what? Very good, I'll fix it with him.
What about your outfit?''\ 

{}``My paper will see to that.''

{}``Can you shoot?''\ 

{}``About average Territorial standard.''

{}``Good Lord!\ as bad as that? It's the last thing you young fellahs
think of learnin'. You're all bees without stings, so far as lookin'
after the hive goes. You'll look silly, some o' these days, when someone
comes along an' sneaks the honey. But you'll need to hold your gun
straight in South America, for, unless our friend the Professor is
a madman or a liar, we may see some queer things before we get back.
What gun have you?''\ 

He crossed to an oaken cupboard, and as he threw it open I caught
a glimpse of glistening rows of parallel barrels, like the pipes of
an organ.

{}``I'll see what I can spare you out of my own battery,'' said
he.

One by one he took out a succession of beautiful rifles, opening and
shutting them with a snap and a clang, and then patting them as he
put them back into the rack as tenderly as a mother would fondle her
children.

{}``This is a Bland's .577 axite express,'' said he. {}``I got
that big fellow with it.'' He glanced up at the white rhinoceros.
{}``Ten more yards, and he'd would have added me to \textit{his}
collection. \begin{flushleft}\begin{verse}\footnotesize\ \\

\mbox{`On that conical bullet his one chance hangs,}\\*

'Tis the weak one's advantage fair.'\\

\end{verse}\end{flushleft} Hope you know your Gordon, for he's the poet of the horse and the
gun and the man that handles both. Now, here's a useful tool\mbox{---}.470,
telescopic sight, double ejector, point-blank up to three-fifty. That's
the rifle I used against the Peruvian slave-drivers three years ago.
I was the flail of the Lord up in those parts, I may tell you, though
you won't find it in any Blue-book. There are times, young fellah,
when every one of us must make a stand for human right and justice,
or you never feel clean again. That's why I made a little war on my
own. Declared it myself, waged it myself, ended it myself. Each of
those nicks is for a slave murderer\mbox{---}a good row of them\mbox{---}what?
That big one is for Pedro Lopez, the king of them all, that I killed
in a backwater of the Putomayo River. Now, here's something that would
do for you.'' He took out a beautiful brown-and-silver rifle. {}``Well
rubbered at the stock, sharply sighted, five cartridges to the clip.
You can trust your life to that.'' He handed it to me and closed
the door of his oak cabinet.

{}``By the way,'' he continued, coming back to his chair, {}``what
do you know of this Professor Challenger?''\ 

{}``I never saw him till to-day.''

{}``Well, neither did I.\  It's funny we should both sail under
sealed orders from a man we don't know. He seemed an uppish old bird.
His brothers of science don't seem too fond of him, either. How came
you to take an interest in the affair?''\ 

I told him shortly my experiences of the morning, and he listened
intently. Then he drew out a map of South America and laid it on the
table.

{}``I believe every single word he said to you was the truth,''
said he, earnestly, {}``and, mind you, I have something to go on
when I speak like that. South America is a place I love, and I think,
if you take it right through from Darien to Fuego, it's the grandest,
richest, most wonderful bit of earth upon this planet. People don't
know it yet, and don't realize what it may become. I've been up an'
down it from end to end, and had two dry seasons in those very parts,
as I told you when I spoke of the war I made on the slave-dealers.
Well, when I was up there I heard some yarns of the same kind\mbox{---}traditions
of Indians and the like, but with somethin' behind them, no doubt.
The more you knew of that country, young fellah, the more you would
understand that anythin' was possible\mbox{---}\textit{anythin}'.
There are just some narrow water-lanes along which folk travel, and
outside that it is all darkness. Now, down here in the Matto Grande''\mbox{---}he
swept his cigar over a part of the map\mbox{---} {}``or up in this
corner where three countries meet, nothin' would surprise me. As that
chap said to-night, there are fifty-thousand miles of water-way runnin'
through a forest that is very near the size of Europe. You and I could
be as far away from each other as Scotland is from Constantinople,
and yet each of us be in the same great Brazilian forest. Man has
just made a track here and a scrape there in the maze. Why, the river
rises and falls the best part of forty feet, and half the country
is a morass that you can't pass over. Why shouldn't somethin' new
and wonderful lie in such a country? And why shouldn't we be the men
to find it out? Besides,'' he added, his queer, gaunt face shining
with delight, {}``there's a sportin' risk in every mile of it. I'm
like an old golf-ball\mbox{---}I've had all the white paint knocked
off me long ago. Life can whack me about now, and it can't leave a
mark. But a sportin' risk, young fellah, that's the salt of existence.
Then it's worth livin' again. We're all gettin' a deal too soft and
dull and comfy. Give me the great waste lands and the wide spaces,
with a gun in my fist and somethin' to look for that's worth findin'.
I've tried war and steeplechasin' and aeroplanes, but this huntin'
of beasts that look like a lobster-supper dream is a brand-new sensation.''
He chuckled with glee at the prospect.

Perhaps I have dwelt too long upon this new acquaintance, but he is
to be my comrade for many a day, and so I have tried to set him down
as I first saw him, with his quaint personality and his queer little
tricks of speech and of thought. It was only the need of getting in
the account of my meeting which drew me at last from his company.
I left him seated amid his pink radiance, oiling the lock of his favorite
rifle, while he still chuckled to himself at the thought of the adventures
which awaited us. It was very clear to me that if dangers lay before
us I could not in all England have found a cooler head or a braver
spirit with which to share them.

That night, wearied as I was after the wonderful happenings of the
day, I sat late with McArdle, the news editor, explaining to him the
whole situation, which he thought important enough to bring next morning
before the notice of Sir George Beaumont, the chief. It was agreed
that I should write home full accounts of my adventures in the shape
of successive letters to McArdle, and that these should either be
edited for the \emph{Gazette} as they arrived, or held back to be
published later, according to the wishes of Professor Challenger,
since we could not yet know what conditions he might attach to those
directions which should guide us to the unknown land. In response
to a telephone inquiry, we received nothing more definite than a fulmination
against the Press, ending up with the remark that if we would notify
our boat he would hand us any directions which he might think it proper
to give us at the moment of starting. A second question from us failed
to elicit any answer at all, save a plaintive bleat from his wife
to the effect that her husband was in a very violent temper already,
and that she hoped we would do nothing to make it worse. A third attempt,
later in the day, provoked a terrific crash, and a subsequent message
from the Central Exchange that Professor Challenger's receiver had
been shattered. After that we abandoned all attempt at communication.

And now my patient readers, I can address you directly no longer.
From now onwards (if, indeed, any continuation of this narrative should
ever reach you) it can only be through the paper which I represent.
In the hands of the editor I leave this account of the events which
have led up to one of the most remarkable expeditions of all time,
so that if I never return to England there shall be some record as
to how the affair came about. I am writing these last lines in the
saloon of the Booth liner \emph{Francisca}, and they will go back
by the pilot to the keeping of Mr.\ McArdle. Let me draw one last
picture before I close the notebook\mbox{---}a picture which is
the last memory of the old country which I bear away with me. It is
a wet, foggy morning in the late spring; a thin, cold rain is falling.
Three shining mackintoshed figures are walking down the quay, making
for the gang-plank of the great liner from which the blue-peter is
flying. In front of them a porter pushes a trolley piled high with
trunks, wraps, and gun-cases. Professor Summerlee, a long, melancholy
figure, walks with dragging steps and drooping head, as one who is
already profoundly sorry for himself. Lord John Roxton steps briskly,
and his thin, eager face beams forth between his hunting-cap and his
muffler. As for myself, I am glad to have got the bustling days of
preparation and the pangs of leave-taking behind me, and I have no
doubt that I show it in my bearing. Suddenly, just as we reach the
vessel, there is a shout behind us. It is Professor Challenger, who
had promised to see us off. He runs after us, a puffing, red-faced,
irascible figure.

{}``No thank you,'' says he; {}``I should much prefer not to go
aboard. I have only a few words to say to you, and they can very well
be said where we are. I beg you not to imagine that I am in any way
indebted to you for making this journey. I would have you to understand
that it is a matter of perfect indifference to me, and I refuse to
entertain the most remote sense of personal obligation. Truth is truth,
and nothing which you can report can affect it in any way, though
it may excite the emotions and allay the curiosity of a number of
very ineffectual people. My directions for your instruction and guidance
are in this sealed envelope. You will open it when you reach a town
upon the Amazon which is called Manaos, but not until the date and
hour which is marked upon the outside. Have I made myself clear? I
leave the strict observance of my conditions entirely to your honor.
No, Mr.\ Malone, I will place no restriction upon your correspondence,
since the ventilation of the facts is the object of your journey;
but I demand that you shall give no particulars as to your exact destination,
and that nothing be actually published until your return. Good-bye,
sir. You have done something to mitigate my feelings for the loathsome
profession to which you unhappily belong. Good-bye, Lord John. Science
is, as I understand, a sealed book to you; but you may congratulate
yourself upon the hunting-field which awaits you. You will, no doubt,
have the opportunity of describing in the Field how you brought down
the rocketing dimorphodon. And good-bye to you also, Professor Summerlee.
If you are still capable of self-improvement, of which I am frankly
unconvinced, you will surely return to London a wiser man.''

So he turned upon his heel, and a minute later from the deck I could
see his short, squat figure bobbing about in the distance as he made
his way back to his train. Well, we are well down Channel now. There's
the last bell for letters, and it's good-bye to the pilot. We'll be
{}``down, hull-down, on the old trail'' from now on. God bless all
we leave behind us, and send us safely back.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER VII. {}``To-morrow We Disappear Into the Unknown''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``To-morrow We Disappear\\
Into the Unknown''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``To-morrow We Disappear''}

I will not bore those whom this narrative may reach by an account
of our luxurious voyage upon the Booth liner, nor will I tell of our
week's stay at Para (save that I should wish to acknowledge the great
kindness of the Pereira \textit{\emph{da}} \textit{\emph{Pinta}} Company
in helping us to get together our equipment). I will also allude very
briefly to our river journey, up a wide, slow-moving, clay-tinted
stream, in a steamer which was little smaller than that which had
carried us across the Atlantic. Eventually we found ourselves through
the narrows of Obidos and reached the town of Manaos. Here we were
rescued from the limited attractions of the local inn by Mr.\ Shortman,
the representative of the British and Brazilian Trading Company. In
his hospitable \textit{Fazenda} we spent our time until the day when
we were empowered to open the letter of instructions given to us by
Professor Challenger. Before I reach the surprising events of that
date I would desire to give a clearer sketch of my comrades in this
enterprise, and of the associates whom we had already gathered together
in South America. I speak freely, and I leave the use of my material
to your own discretion, Mr.\ McArdle, since it is through your hands
that this report must pass before it reaches the world.

The scientific attainments of Professor Summerlee are too well known
for me to trouble to recapitulate them. He is better equipped for
a rough expedition of this sort than one would imagine at first sight.
His tall, gaunt, stringy figure is insensible to fatigue, and his
dry, half-sarcastic, and often wholly unsympathetic manner is uninfluenced
by any change in his surroundings. Though in his sixty-sixth year,
I have never heard him express any dissatisfaction at the occasional
hardships which we have had to encounter. I had regarded his presence
as an encumbrance to the expedition, but, as a matter of fact, I am
now well convinced that his power of endurance is as great as my own.
In temper he is naturally acid and sceptical. From the beginning he
has never concealed his belief that Professor Challenger is an absolute
fraud, that we are all embarked upon an absurd wild-goose chase and
that we are likely to reap nothing but disappointment and danger in
South America, and corresponding ridicule in England. Such are the
views which, with much passionate distortion of his thin features
and wagging of his thin, goat-like beard, he poured into our ears
all the way from Southampton to Manaos. Since landing from the boat
he has obtained some consolation from the beauty and variety of the
insect and bird life around him, for he is absolutely whole-hearted
in his devotion to science. He spends his days flitting through the
woods with his shot-gun and his butterfly-net, and his evenings in
mounting the many specimens he has acquired. Among his minor peculiarities
are that he is careless as to his attire, unclean in his person, exceedingly
absent-minded in his habits, and addicted to smoking a short briar
pipe, which is seldom out of his mouth. He has been upon several scientific
expeditions in his youth (he was with Robertson in Papua), and the
life of the camp and the canoe is nothing fresh to him.

Lord John Roxton has some points in common with Professor Summerlee,
and others in which they are the very antithesis to each other. He
is twenty years younger, but has something of the same spare, scraggy
physique. As to his appearance, I have, as I recollect, described
it in that portion of my narrative which I have left behind me in
London. He is exceedingly neat and prim in his ways, dresses always
with great care in white drill suits and high brown mosquito-boots,
and shaves at least once a day. Like most men of action, he is laconic
in speech, and sinks readily into his own thoughts, but he is always
quick to answer a question or join in a conversation, talking in a
queer, jerky, half-humorous fashion. His knowledge of the world, and
very especially of South America, is surprising, and he has a whole-hearted
belief in the possibilities of our journey which is not to be dashed
by the sneers of Professor Summerlee. He has a gentle voice and a
quiet manner, but behind his twinkling blue eyes there lurks a capacity
for furious wrath and implacable resolution, the more dangerous because
they are held in leash. He spoke little of his own exploits in Brazil
and Peru, but it was a revelation to me to find the excitement which
was caused by his presence among the riverine natives, who looked
upon him as their champion and protector. The exploits of the Red
Chief, as they called him, had become legends among them, but the
real facts, as far as I could learn them, were amazing enough.

These were that Lord John had found himself some years before in that
no-man's-land which is formed by the half-defined frontiers between
Peru, Brazil, and Columbia. In this great district the wild rubber
tree flourishes, and has become, as in the Congo, a curse to the natives
which can only be compared to their forced labor under the Spaniards
upon the old silver mines of Darien. A handful of villainous half-breeds
dominated the country, armed such Indians as would support them, and
turned the rest into slaves, terrorizing them with the most inhuman
tortures in order to force them to gather the india-rubber, which
was then floated down the river to Para. Lord John Roxton expostulated
on behalf of the wretched victims, and received nothing but threats
and insults for his pains. He then formally declared war against Pedro
Lopez, the leader of the slave-drivers, enrolled a band of runaway
slaves in his service, armed them, and conducted a campaign, which
ended by his killing with his own hands the notorious half-breed and
breaking down the system which he represented.

No wonder that the ginger-headed man with the silky voice and the
free and easy manners was now looked upon with deep interest upon
the banks of the great South American river, though the feelings he
inspired were naturally mixed, since the gratitude of the natives
was equaled by the resentment of those who desired to exploit them.
One useful result of his former experiences was that he could talk
fluently in the Lingoa Geral, which is the peculiar talk, one-third
Portuguese and two-thirds Indian, which is current all over Brazil.

I have said before that Lord John Roxton was a South Americomaniac.
He could not speak of that great country without ardor, and this ardor
was infectious, for, ignorant as I was, he fixed my attention and
stimulated my curiosity. How I wish I could reproduce the glamour
of his discourses, the peculiar mixture of accurate knowledge and
of racy imagination which gave them their fascination, until even
the Professor's cynical and sceptical smile would gradually vanish
from his thin face as he listened. He would tell the history of the
mighty river so rapidly explored (for some of the first conquerors
of Peru actually crossed the entire continent upon its waters), and
yet so unknown in regard to all that lay behind its ever-changing
banks.

{}``What is there?''\ he would cry, pointing to the north. {}``Wood
and marsh and unpenetrated jungle. Who knows what it may shelter?
And there to the south? A wilderness of swampy forest, where no white
man has ever been. The unknown is up against us on every side. Outside
the narrow lines of the rivers what does anyone know? Who will say
what is possible in such a country? Why should old man Challenger
not be right?''\ At which direct defiance the stubborn sneer would
reappear upon Professor Summerlee's face, and he would sit, shaking
his sardonic head in unsympathetic silence, behind the cloud of his
briar-root pipe.

So much, for the moment, for my two white companions, whose characters
and limitations will be further exposed, as surely as my own, as this
narrative proceeds. But already we have enrolled certain retainers
who may play no small part in what is to come. The first is a gigantic
\textit{\emph{negro}} named Zambo, who is a black Hercules, as willing
as any horse, and about as intelligent. Him we enlisted at Para, on
the recommendation of the steamship company, on whose vessels he had
learned to speak a halting English.

It was at Para also that we engaged Gomez and Manuel, two half-breeds
from up the river, just come down with a cargo of redwood. They were
swarthy fellows, bearded and fierce, as active and wiry as panthers.
Both of them had spent their lives in those upper waters of the Amazon
which we were about to explore, and it was this recommendation which
had caused Lord John to engage them. One of them, Gomez, had the further
advantage that he could speak excellent English. These men were willing
to act as our personal servants, to cook, to row, or to make themselves
useful in any way at a payment of fifteen dollars a month. Besides
these, we had engaged three \textit{\emph{Mojo}} Indians from Bolivia,
who are the most skilful at fishing and boat work of all the river
tribes. The chief of these we called \textit{\emph{Mojo}}, after his
tribe, and the others are known as Jose and Fernando. Three white
men, then, two half-breeds, one \textit{\emph{negro}}, and three Indians
made up the personnel of the little expedition which lay waiting for
its instructions at Manaos before starting upon its singular quest.

At last, after a weary week, the day had come and the hour. I ask
you to picture the shaded sitting-room of the \textit{Fazenda} \textit{\emph{St}}\emph{.}\ Ignatio,
two miles inland from the town of Manaos. Outside lay the yellow,
brassy glare of the sunshine, with the shadows of the palm trees as
black and definite as the trees themselves. The air was calm, full
of the eternal hum of insects, a tropical chorus of many octaves,
from the deep drone of the bee to the high, keen pipe of the mosquito.
Beyond the veranda was a small cleared garden, bounded with cactus
hedges and adorned with clumps of flowering shrubs, round which the
great blue butterflies and the tiny humming-birds fluttered and darted
in crescents of sparkling light. Within we were seated round the cane
table, on which lay a sealed envelope. Inscribed upon it, in the jagged
handwriting of Professor Challenger, were the words:\mbox{---}

\begin{quote}
{}``\noun{Instructions to Lord John Roxton and party. To be opened
at Manaos upon July 15th, at 12 o'clock precisely}.''
\end{quote}
Lord John had placed his watch upon the table beside him.

{}``We have seven more minutes,'' said he. {}``The old dear is
very precise.''

Professor Summerlee gave an acid smile as he picked up the envelope
in his gaunt hand.

{}``What can it possibly matter whether we open it now or in seven
minutes?''\ said he. {}``It is all part and parcel of the same
system of quackery and nonsense, for which I regret to say that the
writer is notorious.''

{}``Oh, come, we must play the game accordin' to rules,'' said Lord
John. {}``It's old man Challenger's show and we are here by his good
will, so it would be rotten bad form if we didn't follow his instructions
to the letter.''

{}``A pretty business it is!''\ cried the Professor, bitterly.
{}``It struck me as preposterous in London, but I'm bound to say
that it seems even more so upon closer acquaintance. I don't know
what is inside this envelope, but, unless it is something pretty definite,
I shall be much tempted to take the next down-river boat and catch
the Bolivia at Para. After all, I have some more responsible work
in the world than to run about disproving the assertions of a lunatic.
Now, Roxton, surely it is time.''

{}``Time it is,'' said Lord John. {}``You can blow the whistle.''
He took up the envelope and cut it with his penknife. From it he drew
a folded sheet of paper. This he carefully opened out and flattened
on the table. It was a blank sheet. He turned it over. Again it was
blank. We looked at each other in a bewildered silence, which was
broken by a discordant burst of derisive laughter from Professor Summerlee.

{}``It is an open admission,'' he cried. {}``What more do you want?
The fellow is a self-confessed humbug. We have only to return home
and report him as the brazen imposter that he is.''

{}``Invisible ink!''\ I suggested.

{}``I don't think!''\ said Lord Roxton, holding the paper to the
light. {}``No, young fellah my lad, there is no use deceiving yourself.
I'll go bail for it that nothing has ever been written upon this paper.''

{}``May I come in?''\ boomed a voice from the veranda.

The shadow of a squat figure had stolen across the patch of sunlight.
That voice! That monstrous breadth of shoulder! We sprang to our feet
with a gasp of astonishment as Challenger, in a round, boyish straw-hat
with a colored ribbon\mbox{---}Challenger, with his hands in his
jacket-pockets and his canvas shoes daintily pointing as he walked\mbox{---}appeared
in the open space before us. He threw back his head, and there he
stood in the golden glow with all his old Assyrian luxuriance of beard,
all his native insolence of drooping eyelids and intolerant eyes.

{}``I fear,'' said he, taking out his watch, {}``that I am a few
minutes too late. When I gave you this envelope I must confess that
I had never intended that you should open it, for it had been my fixed
intention to be with you before the hour. The unfortunate delay can
be apportioned between a blundering pilot and an intrusive sandbank.
I fear that it has given my colleague, Professor Summerlee, occasion
to blaspheme.''

{}``I am bound to say, sir,'' said Lord John, with some sternness
of voice, {}``that your turning up is a considerable relief to us,
for our mission seemed to have come to a premature end. Even now I
can't for the life of me understand why you should have worked it
in so extraordinary a manner.''

Instead of answering, Professor Challenger entered, shook hands with
myself and Lord John, bowed with ponderous insolence to Professor
Summerlee, and sank back into a basket-chair, which creaked and swayed
beneath his weight.

{}``Is all ready for your journey?''\ he asked.

{}``We can start to-morrow.''

{}``Then so you shall. You need no chart of directions now, since
you will have the inestimable advantage of my own guidance. From the
first I had determined that I would myself preside over your investigation.
The most elaborate charts would, as you will readily admit, be a poor
substitute for my own intelligence and advice. As to the small ruse
which I played upon you in the matter of the envelope, it is clear
that, had I told you all my intentions, I should have been forced
to resist unwelcome pressure to travel out with you.''

{}``Not from me, sir!''\ exclaimed Professor Summerlee, heartily.
{}``So long as there was another ship upon the Atlantic.''

Challenger waved him away with his great hairy hand.

{}``Your common sense will, I am sure, sustain my objection and realize
that it was better that I should direct my own movements and appear
only at the exact moment when my presence was needed. That moment
has now arrived. You are in safe hands. You will not now fail to reach
your destination. From henceforth I take command of this expedition,
and I must ask you to complete your preparations to-night, so that
we may be able to make an early start in the morning. My time is of
value, and the same thing may be said, no doubt, in a lesser degree
of your own. I propose, therefore, that we push on as rapidly as possible,
until I have demonstrated what you have come to see.''

Lord John Roxton has chartered a large steam launch, the \emph{Esmeralda},
which was to carry us up the river. So far as climate goes, it was
immaterial what time we chose for our expedition, as the temperature
ranges from seventy-five to ninety degrees both summer and winter,
with no appreciable difference in heat. In moisture, however, it is
otherwise; from December to May is the period of the rains, and during
this time the river slowly rises until it attains a height of nearly
forty feet above its low-water mark. It floods the banks, extends
in great lagoons over a monstrous waste of country, and forms a huge
district, called locally the Gapo, which is for the most part too
marshy for foot-travel and too shallow for boating. About June the
waters begin to fall, and are at their lowest at October or November.
Thus our expedition was at the time of the dry season, when the great
river and its tributaries were more or less in a normal condition.

The current of the river is a slight one, the drop being not greater
than eight inches in a mile. No stream could be more convenient for
navigation, since the prevailing wind is south-east, and sailing boats
may make a continuous progress to the Peruvian frontier, dropping
down again with the current. In our own case the excellent engines
of the \emph{Esmeralda} could disregard the sluggish flow of the stream,
and we made as rapid progress as if we were navigating a stagnant
lake. For three days we steamed north-westwards up a stream which
even here, a thousand miles from its mouth, was still so enormous
that from its center the two banks were mere shadows upon the distant
skyline. On the fourth day after leaving Manaos we turned into a tributary
which at its mouth was little smaller than the main stream. It narrowed
rapidly, however, and after two more days' steaming we reached an
Indian village, where the Professor insisted that we should land,
and that the \emph{Esmeralda} should be sent back to Manaos. We should
soon come upon rapids, he explained, which would make its further
use impossible. He added privately that we were now approaching the
door of the unknown country, and that the fewer whom we took into
our confidence the better it would be. To this end also he made each
of us give our word of honor that we would publish or say nothing
which would give any exact clue as to the whereabouts of our travels,
while the servants were all solemnly sworn to the same effect. It
is for this reason that I am compelled to be vague in my narrative,
and I would warn my readers that in any map or diagram which I may
give the relation of places to each other may be correct, but the
points of the compass are carefully confused, so that in no way can
it be taken as an actual guide to the country. Professor Challenger's
reasons for secrecy may be valid or not, but we had no choice but
to adopt them, for he was prepared to abandon the whole expedition
rather than modify the conditions upon which he would guide us.

It was August 2nd when we snapped our last link with the outer world
by bidding farewell to the \emph{Esmeralda}. Since then four days
have passed, during which we have engaged two large canoes from the
Indians, made of so light a material (skins over a bamboo framework)
that we should be able to carry them round any obstacle. These we
have loaded with all our effects, and have engaged two additional
Indians to help us in the navigation. I understand that they are the
very two\mbox{---}Ataca and Ipetu by name\mbox{---}who accompanied
Professor Challenger upon his previous journey. They appeared to be
terrified at the prospect of repeating it, but the chief has patriarchal
powers in these countries, and if the bargain is good in his eyes
the clansman has little choice in the matter.

So to-morrow we disappear into the unknown. This account I am transmitting
down the river by canoe, and it may be our last word to those who
are interested in our fate. I have, according to our arrangement,
addressed it to you, my dear Mr.\ McArdle, and I leave it to your
discretion to delete, alter, or do what you like with it. From the
assurance of Professor Challenger's manner\mbox{---}and in spite
of the continued scepticism of Professor Summerlee\mbox{---}I have
no doubt that our leader will make good his statement, and that we
are really on the eve of some most remarkable experiences.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER VIII. {}``The Outlying Pickets of the New
World''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``The Outlying Pickets of the
New World''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``The Outlying Pickets of the New World''}

Our friends at home may well rejoice with us, for we are at our goal,
and up to a point, at least, we have shown that the statement of Professor
Challenger can be verified. We have not, it is true, ascended the
plateau, but it lies before us, and even Professor Summerlee is in
a more chastened mood. Not that he will for an instant admit that
his rival could be right, but he is less persistent in his incessant
objections, and has sunk for the most part into an observant silence.
I must hark back, however, and continue my narrative from where I
dropped it. We are sending home one of our local Indians who is injured,
and I am committing this letter to his charge, with considerable doubts
in my mind as to whether it will ever come to hand.

When I wrote last we were about to leave the Indian village where
we had been deposited by the \emph{Esmeralda}. I have to begin my
report by bad news, for the first serious personal trouble (I pass
over the incessant bickerings between the Professors) occurred this
evening, and might have had a tragic ending. I have spoken of our
English-speaking half-breed, Gomez\mbox{---}a fine worker and a
willing fellow, but afflicted, I fancy, with the vice of curiosity,
which is common enough among such men. On the last evening he seems
to have hid himself near the hut in which we were discussing our plans,
and, being observed by our huge \textit{\emph{negro}} \textit{\emph{Zambo}},
who is as faithful as a dog and has the hatred which all his race
bear to the half-breeds, he was dragged out and carried into our presence.
Gomez whipped out his knife, however, and but for the huge strength
of his captor, which enabled him to disarm him with one hand, he would
certainly have stabbed him. The matter has ended in reprimands, the
opponents have been compelled to shake hands, and there is every hope
that all will be well. As to the feuds of the two learned men, they
are continuous and bitter. It must be admitted that Challenger is
provocative in the last degree, but Summerlee has an acid tongue,
which makes matters worse. Last night Challenger said that he never
cared to walk on the Thames Embankment and look up the river, as it
was always sad to see one's own eventual goal. He is convinced, of
course, that he is destined for Westminster Abbey. Summerlee rejoined,
however, with a sour smile, by saying that he understood that Millbank
Prison had been pulled down. Challenger's conceit is too colossal
to allow him to be really annoyed. He only smiled in his beard and
repeated {}``Really! Really!''\ in the pitying tone one would use
to a child. Indeed, they are children both\mbox{---}the one wizened
and cantankerous, the other formidable and overbearing, yet each with
a brain which has put him in the front rank of his scientific age.
Brain, character, soul\mbox{---}only as one sees more of life does
one understand how distinct is each.

The very next day we did actually make our start upon this remarkable
expedition. We found that all our possessions fitted very easily into
the two canoes, and we divided our personnel, six in each, taking
the obvious precaution in the interests of peace of putting one Professor
into each canoe. Personally, I was with Challenger, who was in a beatific
humor, moving about as one in a silent ecstasy and beaming benevolence
from every feature. I have had some experience of him in other moods,
however, and shall be the less surprised when the thunderstorms suddenly
come up amidst the sunshine. If it is impossible to be at your ease,
it is equally impossible to be dull in his company, for one is always
in a state of half-tremulous doubt as to what sudden turn his formidable
temper may take.

For two days we made our way up a good-sized river some hundreds of
yards broad, and dark in color, but transparent, so that one could
usually see the bottom. The affluents of the Amazon are, half of them,
of this nature, while the other half are whitish and opaque, the difference
depending upon the class of country through which they have flowed.
The dark indicate vegetable decay, while the others point to clayey
soil. Twice we came across rapids, and in each case made a portage
of half a mile or so to avoid them. The woods on either side were
primeval, which are more easily penetrated than woods of the second
growth, and we had no great difficulty in carrying our canoes through
them. How shall I ever forget the solemn mystery of it? The height
of the trees and the thickness of the boles exceeded anything which
I in my town-bred life could have imagined, shooting upwards in magnificent
columns until, at an enormous distance above our heads, we could dimly
discern the spot where they threw out their side-branches into Gothic
upward curves which coalesced to form one great matted roof of verdure,
through which only an occasional golden ray of sunshine shot downwards
to trace a thin dazzling line of light amidst the majestic obscurity.
As we walked noiselessly amid the thick, soft carpet of decaying vegetation
the hush fell upon our souls which comes upon us in the twilight of
the Abbey, and even Professor Challenger's full-chested notes sank
into a whisper. Alone, I should have been ignorant of the names of
these giant growths, but our men of science pointed out the cedars,
the great silk cotton trees, and the redwood trees, with all that
profusion of various plants which has made this continent the chief
supplier to the human race of those gifts of Nature which depend upon
the vegetable world, while it is the most backward in those products
which come from animal life. Vivid orchids and wonderful colored lichens
smoldered upon the swarthy tree-trunks and where a wandering shaft
of light fell full upon the golden allamanda, the scarlet star-clusters
of the tacsonia, or the rich deep blue of ipomaea, the effect was
as a dream of fairyland. In these great wastes of forest, life, which
abhors darkness, struggles ever upwards to the light. Every plant,
even the smaller ones, curls and writhes to the green surface, twining
itself round its stronger and taller brethren in the effort. Climbing
plants are monstrous and luxuriant, but others which have never been
known to climb elsewhere learn the art as an escape from that somber
shadow, so that the common nettle, the jasmine, and even the jacitara
palm tree can be seen circling the stems of the cedars and striving
to reach their crowns. Of animal life there was no movement amid the
majestic vaulted aisles which stretched from us as we walked, but
a constant movement far above our heads told of that multitudinous
world of snake and monkey, bird and sloth, which lived in the sunshine,
and looked down in wonder at our tiny, dark, stumbling figures in
the obscure depths immeasurably below them. At dawn and at sunset
the howler monkeys screamed together and the parakeets broke into
shrill chatter, but during the hot hours of the day only the full
drone of insects, like the beat of a distant surf, filled the ear,
while nothing moved amid the solemn vistas of stupendous trunks, fading
away into the darkness which held us in. Once some bandy-legged, lurching
creature, an ant-eater or a bear, scuttled clumsily amid the shadows.
It was the only sign of earth life which I saw in this great Amazonian
forest.

And yet there were indications that even human life itself was not
far from us in those mysterious recesses. On the third day out we
were aware of a singular deep throbbing in the air, rhythmic and solemn,
coming and going fitfully throughout the morning. The two boats were
paddling within a few yards of each other when first we heard it,
and our Indians remained motionless, as if they had been turned to
bronze, listening intently with expressions of terror upon their faces.

{}``What is it, then?''\ I asked.

{}``Drums,'' said Lord John, carelessly; {}``war drums. I have
heard them before.''

{}``Yes, sir, war drums,'' said Gomez, the half-breed. {}``Wild
Indians, \emph{bravos}, not \emph{mansos}; they watch us every mile
of the way; kill us if they can.''

{}``How can they watch us?''\ I asked, gazing into the dark, motionless
void.

The half-breed shrugged his broad shoulders.

{}``The Indians know. They have their own way. They watch us. They
talk the drum talk to each other. Kill us if they can.''

By the afternoon of that day\mbox{---}my pocket diary shows me that
it was Tuesday, August 18th\mbox{---}at least six or seven drums
were throbbing from various points. Sometimes they beat quickly, sometimes
slowly, sometimes in obvious question and answer, one far to the east
breaking out in a high staccato rattle, and being followed after a
pause by a deep roll from the north. There was something indescribably
nerve-shaking and menacing in that constant mutter, which seemed to
shape itself into the very syllables of the half-breed, endlessly
repeated, {}``We will kill you if we can. We will kill you if we
can.'' No one ever moved in the silent woods. All the peace and soothing
of quiet Nature lay in that dark curtain of vegetation, but away from
behind there came ever the one message from our fellow-man. {}``We
will kill you if we can,'' said the men in the east. {}``We will
kill you if we can,'' said the men in the north.

All day the drums rumbled and whispered, while their menace reflected
itself in the faces of our colored companions. Even the hardy, swaggering
half-breed seemed cowed. I learned, however, that day once for all
that both Summerlee and Challenger possessed that highest type of
bravery, the bravery of the scientific mind. Theirs was the spirit
which upheld Darwin among the \textit{gauchos} of the Argentine or
Wallace among the head-hunters of Malaya. It is decreed by a merciful
Nature that the human brain cannot think of two things simultaneously,
so that if it be steeped in curiosity as to science it has no room
for merely personal considerations. All day amid that incessant and
mysterious menace our two Professors watched every bird upon the wing,
and every shrub upon the bank, with many a sharp wordy contention,
when the snarl of Summerlee came quick upon the deep growl of Challenger,
but with no more sense of danger and no more reference to drum-beating
Indians than if they were seated together in the smoking-room of the
Royal Society's Club in St. James's Street. Once only did they condescend
to discuss them.

{}``Miranha or Amajuaca cannibals,'' said Challenger, jerking his
thumb towards the reverberating wood.

{}``No doubt, sir,'' Summerlee answered. {}``Like all such tribes,
I shall expect to find them of polysynthetic speech and of Mongolian
type.''

{}``Polysynthetic certainly,'' said Challenger, indulgently. {}``I
am not aware that any other type of language exists in this continent,
and I have notes of more than a hundred. The Mongolian theory I regard
with deep suspicion.''

{}``I should have thought that even a limited knowledge of comparative
anatomy would have helped to verify it,'' said Summerlee, bitterly.

Challenger thrust out his aggressive chin until he was all beard and
hat-rim. {}``No doubt, sir, a limited knowledge would have that effect.
When one's knowledge is exhaustive, one comes to other conclusions.''
They glared at each other in mutual defiance, while all round rose
the distant whisper, {}``We will kill you\mbox{---}we will kill
you if we can.''

That night we moored our canoes with heavy stones for anchors in the
center of the stream, and made every preparation for a possible attack.
Nothing came, however, and with the dawn we pushed upon our way, the
drum-beating dying out behind us. About three o'clock in the afternoon
we came to a very steep rapid, more than a mile long\mbox{---}the
very one in which Professor Challenger had suffered disaster upon
his first journey. I confess that the sight of it consoled me, for
it was really the first direct corroboration, slight as it was, of
the truth of his story. The Indians carried first our canoes and then
our stores through the brushwood, which is very thick at this point,
while we four whites, our rifles on our shoulders, walked between
them and any danger coming from the woods. Before evening we had successfully
passed the rapids, and made our way some ten miles above them, where
we anchored for the night. At this point I reckoned that we had come
not less than a hundred miles up the tributary from the main stream.

It was in the early forenoon of the next day that we made the great
departure. Since dawn Professor Challenger had been acutely uneasy,
continually scanning each bank of the river. Suddenly he gave an exclamation
of satisfaction and pointed to a single tree, which projected at a
peculiar angle over the side of the stream.

{}``What do you make of that?''\ he asked.

{}``It is surely an Assai palm,'' said Summerlee.

{}``Exactly. It was an Assai palm which I took for my landmark. The
secret opening is half a mile onwards upon the other side of the river.
There is no break in the trees. That is the wonder and the mystery
of it. There where you see light-green rushes instead of dark-green
undergrowth, there between the great cotton woods, that is my private
gate into the unknown. Push through, and you will understand.''

It was indeed a wonderful place. Having reached the spot marked by
a line of light-green rushes, we poled our two canoes through them
for some hundreds of yards, and eventually emerged into a placid and
shallow stream, running clear and transparent over a sandy bottom.
It may have been twenty yards across, and was banked in on each side
by most luxuriant vegetation. No one who had not observed that for
a short distance reeds had taken the place of shrubs, could possibly
have guessed the existence of such a stream or dreamed of the fairyland
beyond.

For a fairyland it was\mbox{---}the most wonderful that the imagination
of man could conceive. The thick vegetation met overhead, interlacing
into a natural pergola, and through this tunnel of verdure in a golden
twilight flowed the green, pellucid river, beautiful in itself, but
marvelous from the strange tints thrown by the vivid light from above
filtered and tempered in its fall. Clear as crystal, motionless as
a sheet of glass, green as the edge of an iceberg, it stretched in
front of us under its leafy archway, every stroke of our paddles sending
a thousand ripples across its shining surface. It was a fitting avenue
to a land of wonders. All sign of the Indians had passed away, but
animal life was more frequent, and the tameness of the creatures showed
that they knew nothing of the hunter. Fuzzy little black-velvet monkeys,
with snow-white teeth and gleaming, mocking eyes, chattered at us
as we passed. With a dull, heavy splash an occasional cayman plunged
in from the bank. Once a dark, clumsy tapir stared at us from a gap
in the bushes, and then lumbered away through the forest; once, too,
the yellow, sinuous form of a great puma whisked amid the brushwood,
and its green, baleful eyes glared hatred at us over its tawny shoulder.
Bird life was abundant, especially the wading birds, stork, heron,
and ibis gathering in little groups, blue, scarlet, and white, upon
every log which jutted from the bank, while beneath us the crystal
water was alive with fish of every shape and color.

For three days we made our way up this tunnel of hazy green sunshine.
On the longer stretches one could hardly tell as one looked ahead
where the distant green water ended and the distant green archway
began. The deep peace of this strange waterway was unbroken by any
sign of man.

{}``No Indian here. Too much afraid. Curupuri,'' said Gomez.

{}``Curupuri is the spirit of the woods,'' Lord John explained.
{}``It's a name for any kind of devil. The poor beggars think that
there is something fearsome in this direction, and therefore they
avoid it.''

On the third day it became evident that our journey in the canoes
could not last much longer, for the stream was rapidly growing more
shallow. Twice in as many hours we stuck upon the bottom. Finally
we pulled the boats up among the brushwood and spent the night on
the bank of the river. In the morning Lord John and I made our way
for a couple of miles through the forest, keeping parallel with the
stream; but as it grew ever shallower we returned and reported, what
Professor Challenger had already suspected, that we had reached the
highest point to which the canoes could be brought. We drew them up,
therefore, and concealed them among the bushes, blazing a tree with
our axes, so that we should find them again. Then we distributed the
various burdens among us\mbox{---}guns, ammunition, food, a tent,
blankets, and the rest\mbox{---}and, shouldering our packages, we
set forth upon the more laborious stage of our journey.

An unfortunate quarrel between our pepper-pots marked the outset of
our new stage. Challenger had from the moment of joining us issued
directions to the whole party, much to the evident discontent of Summerlee.
Now, upon his assigning some duty to his fellow-Professor (it was
only the carrying of an aneroid barometer), the matter suddenly came
to a head.

{}``May I ask, sir,'' said Summerlee, with vicious calm, {}``in
what capacity you take it upon yourself to issue these orders?''\ 

Challenger glared and bristled.

{}``I do it, Professor Summerlee, as leader of this expedition.''

{}``I am compelled to tell you, sir, that I do not recognize you
in that capacity.''

{}``Indeed!''\ Challenger bowed with unwieldy sarcasm. {}``Perhaps
you would define my exact position.''

{}``Yes, sir. You are a man whose veracity is upon trial, and this
committee is here to try it. You walk, sir, with your judges.''

{}``Dear me!''\ said Challenger, seating himself on the side of
one of the canoes. {}``In that case you will, of course, go on your
way, and I will follow at my leisure. If I am not the leader you cannot
expect me to lead.''

Thank heaven that there were two sane men\mbox{---}Lord John Roxton
and myself\mbox{---}to prevent the petulance and folly of our learned
Professors from sending us back empty-handed to London. Such arguing
and pleading and explaining before we could get them mollified! Then
at last Summerlee, with his sneer and his pipe, would move forwards,
and Challenger would come rolling and grumbling after. By some good
fortune we discovered about this time that both our savants had the
very poorest opinion of Dr.\ Illingworth of Edinburgh. Thenceforward
that was our one safety, and every strained situation was relieved
by our introducing the name of the Scotch zoologist, when both our
Professors would form a temporary alliance and friendship in their
detestation and abuse of this common rival.

Advancing in single file along the bank of the stream, we soon found
that it narrowed down to a mere brook, and finally that it lost itself
in a great green morass of sponge-like mosses, into which we sank
up to our knees. The place was horribly haunted by clouds of mosquitoes
and every form of flying pest, so we were glad to find solid ground
again and to make a circuit among the trees, which enabled us to outflank
this pestilent morass, which droned like an organ in the distance,
so loud was it with insect life.

On the second day after leaving our canoes we found that the whole
character of the country changed. Our road was persistently upwards,
and as we ascended the woods became thinner and lost their tropical
luxuriance. The huge trees of the alluvial Amazonian plain gave place
to the Phoenix and coco palms, growing in scattered clumps, with thick
brushwood between. In the damper hollows the Mauritia palms threw
out their graceful drooping fronds. We traveled entirely by compass,
and once or twice there were differences of opinion between Challenger
and the two Indians, when, to quote the Professor's indignant words,
the whole party agreed to {}``trust the fallacious instincts of undeveloped
savages rather than the highest product of modern European culture.''
That we were justified in doing so was shown upon the third day, when
Challenger admitted that he recognized several landmarks of his former
journey, and in one spot we actually came upon four fire-blackened
stones, which must have marked a camping-place.

The road still ascended, and we crossed a rock-studded slope which
took two days to traverse. The vegetation had again changed, and only
the vegetable ivory tree remained, with a great profusion of wonderful
orchids, among which I learned to recognize the rare \emph{Nuttonia
Vexillaria} and the glorious pink and scarlet blossoms of Cattleya
and odontoglossum. Occasional brooks with pebbly bottoms and fern-draped
banks gurgled down the shallow gorges in the hill, and offered good
camping-grounds every evening on the banks of some rock-studded pool,
where swarms of little blue-backed fish, about the size and shape
of English trout, gave us a delicious supper.

On the ninth day after leaving the canoes, having done, as I reckon,
about a hundred and twenty miles, we began to emerge from the trees,
which had grown smaller until they were mere shrubs. Their place was
taken by an immense wilderness of bamboo, which grew so thickly that
we could only penetrate it by cutting a pathway with the \textit{\emph{machetes}}
and billhooks of the Indians. It took us a long day, traveling from
seven in the morning till eight at night, with only two breaks of
one hour each, to get through this obstacle. Anything more monotonous
and wearying could not be imagined, for, even at the most open places,
I could not see more than ten or twelve yards, while usually my vision
was limited to the back of Lord John's cotton jacket in front of me,
and to the yellow wall within a foot of me on either side. From above
came one thin knife-edge of sunshine, and fifteen feet over our heads
one saw the tops of the reeds swaying against the deep blue sky. I
do not know what kind of creatures inhabit such a thicket, but several
times we heard the plunging of large, heavy animals quite close to
us. From their sounds Lord John judged them to be some form of wild
cattle. Just as night fell we cleared the belt of bamboos, and at
once formed our camp, exhausted by the interminable day.

Early next morning we were again afoot, and found that the character
of the country had changed once again. Behind us was the wall of bamboo,
as definite as if it marked the course of a river. In front was an
open plain, sloping slightly upwards and dotted with clumps of tree-ferns,
the whole curving before us until it ended in a long, whale-backed
ridge. This we reached about midday, only to find a shallow valley
beyond, rising once again into a gentle incline which led to a low,
rounded sky-line. It was here, while we crossed the first of these
hills, that an incident occurred which may or may not have been important.

Professor Challenger, who with the two local Indians was in the van
of the party, stopped suddenly and pointed excitedly to the right.
As he did so we saw, at the distance of a mile or so, something which
appeared to be a huge gray bird flap slowly up from the ground and
skim smoothly off, flying very low and straight, until it was lost
among the tree-ferns.

{}``Did you see it?''\ cried Challenger, in exultation. {}``Summerlee,
did you see it?''\ 

His colleague was staring at the spot where the creature had disappeared.

{}``What do you claim that it was?''\ he asked.

{}``To the best of my belief, a pterodactyl.''

Summerlee burst into derisive laughter {}``A pter\mbox{---}fiddlestick!''\ 
said he. {}``It was a stork, if ever I saw one.''

Challenger was too furious to speak. He simply swung his pack upon
his back and continued upon his march. Lord John came abreast of me,
however, and his face was more grave than was his wont. He had his
Zeiss glasses in his hand.

{}``I focused it before it got over the trees,'' said he. {}``I
won't undertake to say what it was, but I'll risk my reputation as
a sportsman that it wasn't any bird that ever I clapped eyes on in
my life.''

So there the matter stands. Are we really just at the edge of the
unknown, encountering the outlying pickets of this lost world of which
our leader speaks? I give you the incident as it occurred and you
will know as much as I do. It stands alone, for we saw nothing more
which could be called remarkable.

And now, my readers, if ever I have any, I have brought you up the
broad river, and through the screen of rushes, and down the green
tunnel, and up the long slope of palm trees, and through the bamboo
brake, and across the plain of tree-ferns. At last our destination
lay in full sight of us. When we had crossed the second ridge we saw
before us an irregular, palm-studded plain, and then the line of high
red cliffs which I have seen in the picture. There it lies, even as
I write, and there can be no question that it is the same. At the
nearest point it is about seven miles from our present camp, and it
curves away, stretching as far as I can see. Challenger struts about
like a prize peacock, and Summerlee is silent, but still sceptical.
Another day should bring some of our doubts to an end. Meanwhile,
as Jose, whose arm was pierced by a broken bamboo, insists upon returning,
I send this letter back in his charge, and only hope that it may eventually
come to hand. I will write again as the occasion serves. I have enclosed
with this a rough chart of our journey, which may have the effect
of making the account rather easier to understand.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER IX. {}``Who Could Have Foreseen it?''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``Who Could Have Foreseen it?''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Who Could Have Foreseen it?''}

A dreadful thing has happened to us. Who could have foreseen it? I
cannot foresee any end to our troubles. It may be that we are condemned
to spend our whole lives in this strange, inaccessible place. I am
still so confused that I can hardly think clearly of the facts of
the present or of the chances of the future. To my astounded senses
the one seems most terrible and the other as black as night.

No men have ever found themselves in a worse position; nor is there
any use in disclosing to you our exact geographical situation and
asking our friends for a relief party. Even if they could send one,
our fate will in all human probability be decided long before it could
arrive in South America.

We are, in truth, as far from any human aid as if we were in the moon.
If we are to win through, it is only our own qualities which can save
us. I have as companions three remarkable men, men of great brain-power
and of unshaken courage. There lies our one and only hope. It is only
when I look upon the untroubled faces of my comrades that I see some
glimmer through the darkness. Outwardly I trust that I appear as unconcerned
as they. Inwardly I am filled with apprehension.

Let me give you, with as much detail as I can, the sequence of events
which have led us to this catastrophe.

When I finished my last letter I stated that we were within seven
miles from an enormous line of ruddy cliffs, which encircled, beyond
all doubt, the plateau of which Professor Challenger spoke. Their
height, as we approached them, seemed to me in some places to be greater
than he had stated\mbox{---}running up in parts to at least a thousand
feet\mbox{---}and they were curiously striated, in a manner which
is, I believe, characteristic of basaltic upheavals. Something of
the sort is to be seen in Salisbury Crags at Edinburgh. The summit
showed every sign of a luxuriant vegetation, with bushes near the
edge, and farther back many high trees. There was no indication of
any life that we could see.

That night we pitched our camp immediately under the cliff\mbox{---}a
most wild and desolate spot. The crags above us were not merely perpendicular,
but curved outwards at the top, so that ascent was out of the question.
Close to us was the high thin pinnacle of rock which I believe I mentioned
earlier in this narrative. It is like a broad red church spire, the
top of it being level with the plateau, but a great chasm gaping between.
On the summit of it there grew one high tree. Both pinnacle and cliff
were comparatively low\mbox{---}some five or six hundred feet, I
should think.

{}``It was on that,'' said Professor Challenger, pointing to this
tree, {}``that the pterodactyl was perched. I climbed half-way up
the rock before I shot him. I am inclined to think that a good mountaineer
like myself could ascend the rock to the top, though he would, of
course, be no nearer to the plateau when he had done so.''

As Challenger spoke of his pterodactyl I glanced at Professor Summerlee,
and for the first time I seemed to see some signs of a dawning credulity
and repentance. There was no sneer upon his thin lips, but, on the
contrary, a gray, drawn look of excitement and amazement. Challenger
saw it, too, and reveled in the first taste of victory.

{}``Of course,'' said he, with his clumsy and ponderous sarcasm,
{}``Professor Summerlee will understand that when I speak of a pterodactyl
I mean a stork\mbox{---}only it is the kind of stork which has no
feathers, a leathery skin, membranous wings, and teeth in its jaws.''
He grinned and blinked and bowed until his colleague turned and walked
away.

In the morning, after a frugal breakfast of coffee and manioc\mbox{---}we
had to be economical of our stores\mbox{---}we held a council of
war as to the best method of ascending to the plateau above us.

Challenger presided with a solemnity as if he were the Lord Chief
Justice on the Bench. Picture him seated upon a rock, his absurd boyish
straw hat tilted on the back of his head, his supercilious eyes dominating
us from under his drooping lids, his great black beard wagging as
he slowly defined our present situation and our future movements.

Beneath him you might have seen the three of us\mbox{---}myself,
sunburnt, young, and vigorous after our open-air tramp; Summerlee,
solemn but still critical, behind his eternal pipe; Lord John, as
keen as a razor-edge, with his supple, alert figure leaning upon his
rifle, and his eager eyes fixed eagerly upon the speaker. Behind us
were grouped the two swarthy half-breeds and the little knot of Indians,
while in front and above us towered those huge, ruddy ribs of rocks
which kept us from our goal.

{}``I need not say,'' said our leader, {}``that on the occasion
of my last visit I exhausted every means of climbing the cliff, and
where I failed I do not think that anyone else is likely to succeed,
for I am something of a mountaineer. I had none of the appliances
of a rock-climber with me, but I have taken the precaution to bring
them now. With their aid I am positive I could climb that detached
pinnacle to the summit; but so long as the main cliff overhangs, it
is vain to attempt ascending that. I was hurried upon my last visit
by the approach of the rainy season and by the exhaustion of my supplies.
These considerations limited my time, and I can only claim that I
have surveyed about six miles of the cliff to the east of us, finding
no possible way up. What, then, shall we now do?''\ 

{}``There seems to be only one reasonable course,'' said Professor
Summerlee. {}``If you have explored the east, we should travel along
the base of the cliff to the west, and seek for a practicable point
for our ascent.''

{}``That's it,'' said Lord John. {}``The odds are that this plateau
is of no great size, and we shall travel round it until we either
find an easy way up it, or come back to the point from which we started.''

{}``I have already explained to our young friend here,'' said Challenger
(he has a way of alluding to me as if I were a school child ten years
old), {}``that it is quite impossible that there should be an easy
way up anywhere, for the simple reason that if there were the summit
would not be isolated, and those conditions would not obtain which
have effected so singular an interference with the general laws of
survival. Yet I admit that there may very well be places where an
expert human climber may reach the summit, and yet a cumbrous and
heavy animal be unable to descend. It is certain that there is a point
where an ascent is possible.''

{}``How do you know that, sir?''\ asked Summerlee, sharply.

{}``Because my predecessor, the American Maple White, actually made
such an ascent. How otherwise could he have seen the monster which
he sketched in his notebook?''\ 

{}``There you reason somewhat ahead of the proved facts,'' said
the stubborn Summerlee. {}``I admit your plateau, because I have
seen it; but I have not as yet satisfied myself that it contains any
form of life whatever.''

{}``What you admit, sir, or what you do not admit, is really of inconceivably
small importance. I am glad to perceive that the plateau itself has
actually obtruded itself upon your intelligence.'' He glanced up
at it, and then, to our amazement, he sprang from his rock, and, seizing
Summerlee by the neck, he tilted his face into the air. {}``Now sir!''\ 
he shouted, hoarse with excitement. {}``Do I help you to realize
that the plateau contains some animal life?''\ 

I have said that a thick fringe of green overhung the edge of the
cliff. Out of this there had emerged a black, glistening object. As
it came slowly forth and overhung the chasm, we saw that it was a
very large snake with a peculiar flat, spade-like head. It wavered
and quivered above us for a minute, the morning sun gleaming upon
its sleek, sinuous coils. Then it slowly drew inwards and disappeared.

Summerlee had been so interested that he had stood unresisting while
Challenger tilted his head into the air. Now he shook his colleague
off and came back to his dignity.

{}``I should be glad, Professor Challenger,'' said he, {}``if you
could see your way to make any remarks which may occur to you without
seizing me by the chin. Even the appearance of a very ordinary rock
python does not appear to justify such a liberty.''

{}``But there is life upon the plateau all the same,'' his colleague
replied in triumph. {}``And now, having demonstrated this important
conclusion so that it is clear to anyone, however prejudiced or obtuse,
I am of opinion that we cannot do better than break up our camp and
travel to westward until we find some means of ascent.''

The ground at the foot of the cliff was rocky and broken so that the
going was slow and difficult. Suddenly we came, however, upon something
which cheered our hearts. It was the site of an old encampment, with
several empty Chicago meat tins, a bottle labeled {}``Brandy,''
a broken tin-opener, and a quantity of other travelers' debris. A
crumpled, disintegrated newspaper revealed itself as the Chicago \emph{Democrat},
though the date had been obliterated.

{}``Not mine,'' said Challenger. {}``It must be Maple White's.''

Lord John had been gazing curiously at a great tree-fern which overshadowed
the encampment. {}``I say, look at this,'' said he. {}``I believe
it is meant for a sign-post.''

A slip of hard wood had been nailed to the tree in such a way as to
point to the westward.

{}``Most certainly a sign-post,'' said Challenger. {}``What else?
Finding himself upon a dangerous errand, our pioneer has left this
sign so that any party which follows him may know the way he has taken.
Perhaps we shall come upon some other indications as we proceed.''

We did indeed, but they were of a terrible and most unexpected nature.
Immediately beneath the cliff there grew a considerable patch of high
bamboo, like that which we had traversed in our journey. Many of these
stems were twenty feet high, with sharp, strong tops, so that even
as they stood they made formidable spears. We were passing along the
edge of this cover when my eye was caught by the gleam of something
white within it. Thrusting in my head between the stems, I found myself
gazing at a fleshless skull. The whole skeleton was there, but the
skull had detached itself and lay some feet nearer to the open.

With a few blows from the \textit{\emph{machetes}} of our Indians
we cleared the spot and were able to study the details of this old
tragedy. Only a few shreds of clothes could still be distinguished,
but there were the remains of boots upon the bony feet, and it was
very clear that the dead man was a European. A gold watch by Hudson,
of New York, and a chain which held a stylographic pen, lay among
the bones. There was also a silver cigarette-case, with {}``J.\ C.,
from A.\ E.\ S.,'' upon the lid. The state of the metal seemed
to show that the catastrophe had occurred no great time before.

{}``Who can he be?''\ asked Lord John. {}``Poor devil! every bone
in his body seems to be broken.''

{}``And the bamboo grows through his smashed ribs,'' said Summerlee.
{}``It is a fast-growing plant, but it is surely inconceivable that
this body could have been here while the canes grew to be twenty feet
in length.''

{}``As to the man's identity,'' said Professor Challenger, {}``I
have no doubt whatever upon that point. As I made my way up the river
before I reached you at the \textit{fazenda} I instituted very particular
inquiries about Maple White. At Para they knew nothing. Fortunately,
I had a definite clew, for there was a particular picture in his sketch-book
which showed him taking lunch with a certain ecclesiastic at Rosario.
This priest I was able to find, and though he proved a very argumentative
fellow, who took it absurdly amiss that I should point out to him
the corrosive effect which modern science must have upon his beliefs,
he none the less gave me some positive information. Maple White passed
Rosario four years ago, or two years before I saw his dead body. He
was not alone at the time, but there was a friend, an American named
James Colver, who remained in the boat and did not meet this ecclesiastic.
I think, therefore, that there can be no doubt that we are now looking
upon the remains of this James Colver.''

{}``Nor,'' said Lord John, {}``is there much doubt as to how he
met his death. He has fallen or been chucked from the top, and so
been impaled. How else could he come by his broken bones, and how
could he have been stuck through by these canes with their points
so high above our heads?''\ 

A hush came over us as we stood round these shattered remains and
realized the truth of Lord John Roxton's words. The beetling head
of the cliff projected over the cane-brake. Undoubtedly he had fallen
from above. But had he fallen? Had it been an accident? Or\mbox{---}already
ominous and terrible possibilities began to form round that unknown
land.

We moved off in silence, and continued to coast round the line of
cliffs, which were as even and unbroken as some of those monstrous
Antarctic ice-fields which I have seen depicted as stretching from
horizon to horizon and towering high above the mast-heads of the exploring
vessel.

In five miles we saw no rift or break. And then suddenly we perceived
something which filled us with new hope. In a hollow of the rock,
protected from rain, there was drawn a rough arrow in chalk, pointing
still to the westwards.

{}``Maple White again,'' said Professor Challenger. {}``He had
some presentiment that worthy footsteps would follow close behind
him.''

{}``He had chalk, then?''\ 

{}``A box of colored chalks was among the effects I found in his
knapsack. I remember that the white one was worn to a stump.''

{}``That is certainly good evidence,'' said Summerlee. {}``We can
only accept his guidance and follow on to the westward.''

We had proceeded some five more miles when again we saw a white arrow
upon the rocks. It was at a point where the face of the cliff was
for the first time split into a narrow cleft. Inside the cleft was
a second guidance mark, which pointed right up it with the tip somewhat
elevated, as if the spot indicated were above the level of the ground.

It was a solemn place, for the walls were so gigantic and the slit
of blue sky so narrow and so obscured by a double fringe of verdure,
that only a dim and shadowy light penetrated to the bottom. We had
had no food for many hours, and were very weary with the stony and
irregular journey, but our nerves were too strung to allow us to halt.
We ordered the camp to be pitched, however, and, leaving the Indians
to arrange it, we four, with the two half-breeds, proceeded up the
narrow gorge.

It was not more than forty feet across at the mouth, but it rapidly
closed until it ended in an acute angle, too straight and smooth for
an ascent. Certainly it was not this which our pioneer had attempted
to indicate. We made our way back\mbox{---}the whole gorge was not
more than a quarter of a mile deep\mbox{---}and then suddenly the
quick eyes of Lord John fell upon what we were seeking. High up above
our heads, amid the dark shadows, there was one circle of deeper gloom.
Surely it could only be the opening of a cave.

The base of the cliff was heaped with loose stones at the spot, and
it was not difficult to clamber up. When we reached it, all doubt
was removed. Not only was it an opening into the rock, but on the
side of it there was marked once again the sign of the arrow. Here
was the point, and this the means by which Maple White and his ill-fated
comrade had made their ascent.

We were too excited to return to the camp, but must make our first
exploration at once. Lord John had an electric torch in his knapsack,
and this had to serve us as light. He advanced, throwing his little
clear circlet of yellow radiance before him, while in single file
we followed at his heels.

The cave had evidently been water-worn, the sides being smooth and
the floor covered with rounded stones. It was of such a size that
a single man could just fit through by stooping. For fifty yards it
ran almost straight into the rock, and then it ascended at an angle
of forty-five. Presently this incline became even steeper, and we
found ourselves climbing upon hands and knees among loose rubble which
slid from beneath us. Suddenly an exclamation broke from Lord Roxton.

{}``It's blocked!''\ said he.

Clustering behind him we saw in the yellow field of light a wall of
broken basalt which extended to the ceiling.

{}``The roof has fallen in!''\ 

In vain we dragged out some of the pieces. The only effect was that
the larger ones became detached and threatened to roll down the gradient
and crush us. It was evident that the obstacle was far beyond any
efforts which we could make to remove it. The road by which Maple
White had ascended was no longer available.

Too much cast down to speak, we stumbled down the dark tunnel and
made our way back to the camp.

One incident occurred, however, before we left the gorge, which is
of importance in view of what came afterwards.

We had gathered in a little group at the bottom of the chasm, some
forty feet beneath the mouth of the cave, when a huge rock rolled
suddenly downwards\mbox{---}and shot past us with tremendous force.
It was the narrowest escape for one or all of us. We could not ourselves
see whence the rock had come, but our half-breed servants, who were
still at the opening of the cave, said that it had flown past them,
and must therefore have fallen from the summit. Looking upwards, we
could see no sign of movement above us amidst the green jungle which
topped the cliff. There could be little doubt, however, that the stone
was aimed at us, so the incident surely pointed to humanity\mbox{---}and
malevolent humanity\mbox{---}upon the plateau.

We withdrew hurriedly from the chasm, our minds full of this new development
and its bearing upon our plans. The situation was difficult enough
before, but if the obstructions of Nature were increased by the deliberate
opposition of man, then our case was indeed a hopeless one. And yet,
as we looked up at that beautiful fringe of verdure only a few hundreds
of feet above our heads, there was not one of us who could conceive
the idea of returning to London until we had explored it to its depths.

On discussing the situation, we determined that our best course was
to continue to coast round the plateau in the hope of finding some
other means of reaching the top. The line of cliffs, which had decreased
considerably in height, had already begun to trend from west to north,
and if we could take this as representing the arc of a circle, the
whole circumference could not be very great. At the worst, then, we
should be back in a few days at our starting-point.

We made a march that day which totaled some two-and-twenty miles,
without any change in our prospects. I may mention that our aneroid
shows us that in the continual incline which we have ascended since
we abandoned our canoes we have risen to no less than three thousand
feet above sea-level. Hence there is a considerable change both in
the temperature and in the vegetation. We have shaken off some of
that horrible insect life which is the bane of tropical travel. A
few palms still survive, and many tree-ferns, but the Amazonian trees
have been all left behind. It was pleasant to see the convolvulus,
the passion-flower, and the begonia, all reminding me of home, here
among these inhospitable rocks. There was a red begonia just the same
color as one that is kept in a pot in the window of a certain villa
in Streatham\mbox{---}but I am drifting into private reminiscence.

That night\mbox{---}I am still speaking of the first day of our
circumnavigation of the plateau\mbox{---}a great experience awaited
us, and one which for ever set at rest any doubt which we could have
had as to the wonders so near us.

You will realize as you read it, my dear Mr.\ McArdle, and possibly
for the first time that the paper has not sent me on a wild-goose
chase, and that there is inconceivably fine copy waiting for the world
whenever we have the Professor's leave to make use of it. I shall
not dare to publish these articles unless I can bring back my proofs
to England, or I shall be hailed as the journalistic Munchausen of
all time. I have no doubt that you feel the same way yourself, and
that you would not care to stake the whole credit of the \emph{Gazette}
upon this adventure until we can meet the chorus of criticism and
scepticism which such articles must of necessity elicit. So this wonderful
incident, which would make such a headline for the old paper, must
still wait its turn in the editorial drawer.

And yet it was all over in a flash, and there was no sequel to it,
save in our own convictions.

What occurred was this. Lord John had shot an ajouti\mbox{---}which
is a small, pig-like animal\mbox{---}and, half of it having been
given to the Indians, we were cooking the other half upon our fire.
There is a chill in the air after dark, and we had all drawn close
to the blaze. The night was moonless, but there were some stars, and
one could see for a little distance across the plain. Well, suddenly
out of the darkness, out of the night, there swooped something with
a swish like an aeroplane. The whole group of us were covered for
an instant by a canopy of leathery wings, and I had a momentary vision
of a long, snake-like neck, a fierce, red, greedy eye, and a great
snapping beak, filled, to my amazement, with little, gleaming teeth.
The next instant it was gone\mbox{---}and so was our dinner. A huge
black shadow, twenty feet across, skimmed up into the air; for an
instant the monster wings blotted out the stars, and then it vanished
over the brow of the cliff above us. We all sat in amazed silence
round the fire, like the heroes of Virgil when the Harpies came down
upon them. It was Summerlee who was the first to speak.

{}``Professor Challenger,'' said he, in a solemn voice, which quavered
with emotion, {}``I owe you an apology. Sir, I am very much in the
wrong, and I beg that you will forget what is past.''

It was handsomely said, and the two men for the first time shook hands.
So much we have gained by this clear vision of our first pterodactyl.
It was worth a stolen supper to bring two such men together.

But if prehistoric life existed upon the plateau it was not superabundant,
for we had no further glimpse of it during the next three days. During
this time we traversed a barren and forbidding country, which alternated
between stony desert and desolate marshes full of many wild-fowl,
upon the north and east of the cliffs. From that direction the place
is really inaccessible, and, were it not for a hardish ledge which
runs at the very base of the precipice, we should have had to turn
back. Many times we were up to our waists in the slime and blubber
of an old, semi-tropical swamp. To make matters worse, the place seemed
to be a favorite breeding-place of the Jaracaca snake, the most venomous
and aggressive in South America. Again and again these horrible creatures
came writhing and springing towards us across the surface of this
putrid bog, and it was only by keeping our shot-guns for ever ready
that we could feel safe from them. One funnel-shaped depression in
the morass, of a livid green in color from some lichen which festered
in it, will always remain as a nightmare memory in my mind. It seems
to have been a special nest of these vermins, and the slopes were
alive with them, all writhing in our direction, for it is a peculiarity
of the Jaracaca that he will always attack man at first sight. There
were too many for us to shoot, so we fairly took to our heels and
ran until we were exhausted. I shall always remember as we looked
back how far behind we could see the heads and necks of our horrible
pursuers rising and falling amid the reeds. Jaracaca Swamp we named
it in the map which we are constructing.

The cliffs upon the farther side had lost their ruddy tint, being
chocolate-brown in color; the vegetation was more scattered along
the top of them, and they had sunk to three or four hundred feet in
height, but in no place did we find any point where they could be
ascended. If anything, they were more impossible than at the first
point where we had met them. Their absolute steepness is indicated
in the photograph which I took over the stony desert.

{}``Surely,'' said I, as we discussed the situation, {}``the rain
must find its way down somehow. There are bound to be water-channels
in the rocks.''

{}``Our young friend has glimpses of lucidity,'' said Professor
Challenger, patting me upon the shoulder.

{}``The rain must go somewhere,'' I repeated.

{}``He keeps a firm grip upon actuality. The only drawback is that
we have conclusively proved by ocular demonstration that there are
no water channels down the rocks.''

{}``Where, then, does it go?''\ I persisted.

{}``I think it may be fairly assumed that if it does not come outwards
it must run inwards.''

{}``Then there is a lake in the center.''

{}``So I should suppose.''

{}``It is more than likely that the lake may be an old crater,''
said Summerlee. {}``The whole formation is, of course, highly volcanic.
But, however that may be, I should expect to find the surface of the
plateau slope inwards with a considerable sheet of water in the center,
which may drain off, by some subterranean channel, into the marshes
of the Jaracaca Swamp.''

{}``Or evaporation might preserve an equilibrium,'' remarked Challenger,
and the two learned men wandered off into one of their usual scientific
arguments, which were as comprehensible as Chinese to the layman.

On the sixth day we completed our first circuit of the cliffs, and
found ourselves back at the first camp, beside the isolated pinnacle
of rock. We were a disconsolate party, for nothing could have been
more minute than our investigation, and it was absolutely certain
that there was no single point where the most active human being could
possibly hope to scale the cliff. The place which Maple White's chalk-marks
had indicated as his own means of access was now entirely impassable.

What were we to do now? Our stores of provisions, supplemented by
our guns, were holding out well, but the day must come when they would
need replenishment. In a couple of months the rains might be expected,
and we should be washed out of our camp. The rock was harder than
marble, and any attempt at cutting a path for so great a height was
more than our time or resources would admit. No wonder that we looked
gloomily at each other that night, and sought our blankets with hardly
a word exchanged. I remember that as I dropped off to sleep my last
recollection was that Challenger was squatting, like a monstrous bull-frog,
by the fire, his huge head in his hands, sunk apparently in the deepest
thought, and entirely oblivious to the good-night which I wished him.

But it was a very different Challenger who greeted us in the morning\mbox{---}a
Challenger with contentment and self-congratulation shining from his
whole person. He faced us as we assembled for breakfast with a deprecating
false modesty in his eyes, as who should say, {}``I know that I deserve
all that you can say, but I pray you to spare my blushes by not saying
it.'' His beard bristled exultantly, his chest was thrown out, and
his hand was thrust into the front of his jacket. So, in his fancy,
may he see himself sometimes, gracing the vacant pedestal in Trafalgar
Square, and adding one more to the horrors of the London streets.

{}``Eureka!''\ he cried, his teeth shining through his beard. {}``Gentlemen,
you may congratulate me and we may congratulate each other. The problem
is solved.''

{}``You have found a way up?''\ 

{}``I venture to think so.''

{}``And where?''\ 

For answer he pointed to the spire-like pinnacle upon our right.

Our faces\mbox{---}or mine, at least\mbox{---}fell as we surveyed
it. That it could be climbed we had our companion's assurance. But
a horrible abyss lay between it and the plateau.

{}``We can never get across,'' I gasped.

{}``We can at least all reach the summit,'' said he. {}``When we
are up I may be able to show you that the resources of an inventive
mind are not yet exhausted.''

After breakfast we unpacked the bundle in which our leader had brought
his climbing accessories. From it he took a coil of the strongest
and lightest rope, a hundred and fifty feet in length, with climbing
irons, clamps, and other devices. Lord John was an experienced mountaineer,
and Summerlee had done some rough climbing at various times, so that
I was really the novice at rock-work of the party; but my strength
and activity may have made up for my want of experience.

It was not in reality a very stiff task, though there were moments
which made my hair bristle upon my head. The first half was perfectly
easy, but from there upwards it became continually steeper until,
for the last fifty feet, we were literally clinging with our fingers
and toes to tiny ledges and crevices in the rock. I could not have
accomplished it, nor could Summerlee, if Challenger had not gained
the summit (it was extraordinary to see such activity in so unwieldy
a creature) and there fixed the rope round the trunk of the considerable
tree which grew there. With this as our support, we were soon able
to scramble up the jagged wall until we found ourselves upon the small
grassy platform, some twenty-five feet each way, which formed the
summit.

The first impression which I received when I had recovered my breath
was of the extraordinary view over the country which we had traversed.
The whole Brazilian plain seemed to lie beneath us, extending away
and away until it ended in dim blue mists upon the farthest sky-line.
In the foreground was the long slope, strewn with rocks and dotted
with tree-ferns; farther off in the middle distance, looking over
the saddle-back hill, I could just see the yellow and green mass of
bamboos through which we had passed; and then, gradually, the vegetation
increased until it formed the huge forest which extended as far as
the eyes could reach, and for a good two thousand miles beyond.

I was still drinking in this wonderful panorama when the heavy hand
of the Professor fell upon my shoulder.

{}``This way, my young friend,'' said he; {}``\emph{vestigia} \textit{nulla}
\textit{retrorsum}. Never look rearwards, but always to our glorious
goal.''

The level of the plateau, when I turned, was exactly that on which
we stood, and the green bank of bushes, with occasional trees, was
so near that it was difficult to realize how inaccessible it remained.
At a rough guess the gulf was forty feet across, but, so far as I
could see, it might as well have been forty miles. I placed one arm
round the trunk of the tree and leaned over the abyss. Far down were
the small dark figures of our servants, looking up at us. The wall
was absolutely precipitous, as was that which faced me.

{}``This is indeed curious,'' said the creaking voice of Professor
Summerlee.

I turned, and found that he was examining with great interest the
tree to which I clung. That smooth bark and those small, ribbed leaves
seemed familiar to my eyes. {}``Why,'' I cried, {}``it's a beech!''\ 

{}``Exactly,'' said Summerlee. {}``A fellow-countryman in a far
land.''

{}``Not only a fellow-countryman, my good sir,'' said Challenger,
{}``but also, if I may be allowed to enlarge your simile, an ally
of the first value. This beech tree will be our saviour.''

{}``By George!''\ cried Lord John, {}``a bridge!''\ 

{}``Exactly, my friends, a bridge! It is not for nothing that I expended
an hour last night in focusing my mind upon the situation. I have
some recollection of once remarking to our young friend here that
G.\ E.\ C.\ is at his best when his back is to the wall. Last night
you will admit that all our backs were to the wall. But where will-power
and intellect go together, there is always a way out. A drawbridge
had to be found which could be dropped across the abyss. Behold it!''\ 

It was certainly a brilliant idea. The tree was a good sixty feet
in height, and if it only fell the right way it would easily cross
the chasm. Challenger had slung the camp axe over his shoulder when
he ascended. Now he handed it to me.

{}``Our young friend has the thews and sinews,'' said he. {}``I
think he will be the most useful at this task. I must beg, however,
that you will kindly refrain from thinking for yourself, and that
you will do exactly what you are told.''

Under his direction I cut such gashes in the sides of the trees as
would ensure that it should fall as we desired. It had already a strong,
natural tilt in the direction of the plateau, so that the matter was
not difficult. Finally I set to work in earnest upon the trunk, taking
turn and turn with Lord John. In a little over an hour there was a
loud crack, the tree swayed forward, and then crashed over, burying
its branches among the bushes on the farther side. The severed trunk
rolled to the very edge of our platform, and for one terrible second
we all thought it was over. It balanced itself, however, a few inches
from the edge, and there was our bridge to the unknown.

All of us, without a word, shook hands with Professor Challenger,
who raised his straw hat and bowed deeply to each in turn.

{}``I claim the honor,'' said he, {}``to be the first to cross
to the unknown land\mbox{---}a fitting subject, no doubt, for some
future historical painting.''

He had approached the bridge when Lord John laid his hand upon his
coat.

{}``My dear chap,'' said he, {}``I really cannot allow it.''

{}``Cannot allow it, sir!''\ The head went back and the beard forward.

{}``When it is a matter of science, don't you know, I follow your
lead because you are by way of bein' a man of science. But it's up
to you to follow me when you come into my department.''

{}``Your department, sir?''\ 

{}``We all have our professions, and soldierin' is mine. We are,
accordin' to my ideas, invadin' a new country, which may or may not
be chock-full of enemies of sorts. To barge blindly into it for want
of a little common sense and patience isn't my notion of management.''

The remonstrance was too reasonable to be disregarded.

Challenger tossed his head and shrugged his heavy shoulders.

{}``Well, sir, what do you propose?''\ 

{}``For all I know there may be a tribe of cannibals waitin' for
lunch-time among those very bushes,'' said Lord John, looking across
the bridge. {}``It's better to learn wisdom before you get into a
cookin'-pot; so we will content ourselves with hopin' that there is
no trouble waitin' for us, and at the same time we will act as if
there were. Malone and I will go down again, therefore, and we will
fetch up the four rifles, together with Gomez and the other. One man
can then go across and the rest will cover him with guns, until he
sees that it is safe for the whole crowd to come along.''

Challenger sat down upon the cut stump and groaned his impatience;
but Summerlee and I were of one mind that Lord John was our leader
when such practical details were in question. The climb was a more
simple thing now that the rope dangled down the face of the worst
part of the ascent. Within an hour we had brought up the rifles and
a shot-gun. The half-breeds had ascended also, and under Lord John's
orders they had carried up a bale of provisions in case our first
exploration should be a long one. We had each bandoliers of cartridges.

{}``Now, Challenger, if you really insist upon being the first man
in,'' said Lord John, when every preparation was complete.

{}``I am much indebted to you for your gracious permission,'' said
the angry Professor; for never was a man so intolerant of every form
of authority. {}``Since you are good enough to allow it, I shall
most certainly take it upon myself to act as pioneer upon this occasion.''

Seating himself with a leg overhanging the abyss on each side, and
his hatchet slung upon his back, Challenger hopped his way across
the trunk and was soon at the other side. He clambered up and waved
his arms in the air.

{}``At last!''\ he cried; {}``at last!''\ 

I gazed anxiously at him, with a vague expectation that some terrible
fate would dart at him from the curtain of green behind him. But all
was quiet, save that a strange, many-colored bird flew up from under
his feet and vanished among the trees.

Summerlee was the second. His wiry energy is wonderful in so frail
a frame. He insisted upon having two rifles slung upon his back, so
that both Professors were armed when he had made his transit. I came
next, and tried hard not to look down into the horrible gulf over
which I was passing. Summerlee held out the butt-end of his rifle,
and an instant later I was able to grasp his hand. As to Lord John,
he walked across\mbox{---}actually walked without support! He must
have nerves of iron.

And there we were, the four of us, upon the dreamland, the lost world,
of Maple White. To all of us it seemed the moment of our supreme triumph.
Who could have guessed that it was the prelude to our supreme disaster?
Let me say in a few words how the crushing blow fell upon us.

We had turned away from the edge, and had penetrated about fifty yards
of close brushwood, when there came a frightful rending crash from
behind us. With one impulse we rushed back the way that we had come.
The bridge was gone!

Far down at the base of the cliff I saw, as I looked over, a tangled
mass of branches and splintered trunk. It was our beech tree. Had
the edge of the platform crumbled and let it through? For a moment
this explanation was in all our minds. The next, from the farther
side of the rocky pinnacle before us a swarthy face, the face of Gomez
the half-breed, was slowly protruded. Yes, it was Gomez, but no longer
the Gomez of the demure smile and the mask-like expression. Here was
a face with flashing eyes and distorted features, a face convulsed
with hatred and with the mad joy of gratified revenge.

{}``Lord Roxton!''\ he shouted. {}``Lord John Roxton!''\ 

{}``Well,'' said our companion, {}``here I am.''

A shriek of laughter came across the abyss.

{}``Yes, there you are, you English dog, and there you will remain!
I have waited and waited, and now has come my chance. You found it
hard to get up; you will find it harder to get down. You cursed fools,
you are trapped, every one of you!''\ 

We were too astounded to speak. We could only stand there staring
in amazement. A great broken bough upon the grass showed whence he
had gained his leverage to tilt over our bridge. The face had vanished,
but presently it was up again, more frantic than before.

{}``We nearly killed you with a stone at the cave,'' he cried; {}``but
this is better. It is slower and more terrible. Your bones will whiten
up there, and none will know where you lie or come to cover them.
As you lie dying, think of Lopez, whom you shot five years ago on
the Putomayo River. I am his brother, and, come what will I will die
happy now, for his memory has been avenged.'' A furious hand was
shaken at us, and then all was quiet.

Had the half-breed simply wrought his vengeance and then escaped,
all might have been well with him. It was that foolish, irresistible
Latin impulse to be dramatic which brought his own downfall. Roxton,
the man who had earned himself the name of the Flail of the Lord through
three countries, was not one who could be safely taunted. The half-breed
was descending on the farther side of the pinnacle; but before he
could reach the ground Lord John had run along the edge of the plateau
and gained a point from which he could see his man. There was a single
crack of his rifle, and, though we saw nothing, we heard the scream
and then the distant thud of the falling body. Roxton came back to
us with a face of granite.

{}``I have been a blind simpleton,'' said he, bitterly, {}``It's
my folly that has brought you all into this trouble. I should have
remembered that these people have long memories for blood-feuds, and
have been more upon my guard.''

{}``What about the other one? It took two of them to lever that tree
over the edge.''

{}``I could have shot him, but I let him go. He may have had no part
in it. Perhaps it would have been better if I had killed him, for
he must, as you say, have lent a hand.''

Now that we had the clue to his action, each of us could cast back
and remember some sinister act upon the part of the half-breed\mbox{---}his
constant desire to know our plans, his arrest outside our tent when
he was over-hearing them, the furtive looks of hatred which from time
to time one or other of us had surprised. We were still discussing
it, endeavoring to adjust our minds to these new conditions, when
a singular scene in the plain below arrested our attention.

A man in white clothes, who could only be the surviving half-breed,
was running as one does run when Death is the pacemaker. Behind him,
only a few yards in his rear, bounded the huge ebony figure of Zambo,
our devoted \textit{\emph{negro}}. Even as we looked, he sprang upon
the back of the fugitive and flung his arms round his neck. They rolled
on the ground together. An instant afterwards Zambo rose, looked at
the prostrate man, and then, waving his hand joyously to us, came
running in our direction. The white figure lay motionless in the middle
of the great plain.

Our two traitors had been destroyed, but the mischief that they had
done lived after them. By no possible means could we get back to the
pinnacle. We had been natives of the world; now we were natives of
the plateau. The two things were separate and apart. There was the
plain which led to the canoes. Yonder, beyond the violet, hazy horizon,
was the stream which led back to civilization. But the link between
was missing. No human ingenuity could suggest a means of bridging
the chasm which yawned between ourselves and our past lives. One instant
had altered the whole conditions of our existence.

It was at such a moment that I learned the stuff of which my three
comrades were composed. They were grave, it is true, and thoughtful,
but of an invincible serenity. For the moment we could only sit among
the bushes in patience and wait the coming of Zambo. Presently his
honest black face topped the rocks and his Herculean figure emerged
upon the top of the pinnacle.

{}``What I do now?''\ he cried. {}``You tell me and I do it.''

It was a question which it was easier to ask than to answer. One thing
only was clear. He was our one trusty link with the outside world.
On no account must he leave us.

{}``No no!''\ he cried. {}``I not leave you. Whatever come, you
always find me here. But no able to keep Indians. Already they say
too much Curupuri live on this place, and they go home. Now you leave
them me no able to keep them.''

It was a fact that our Indians had shown in many ways of late that
they were weary of their journey and anxious to return. We realized
that Zambo spoke the truth, and that it would be impossible for him
to keep them.

{}``Make them wait till to-morrow, Zambo,'' I shouted; {}``then
I can send letter back by them.''

{}``Very good, sarr! I promise they wait till to-morrow, said the
\textit{\emph{negro}}. {}``But what I do for you now?''\ 

There was plenty for him to do, and admirably the faithful fellow
did it. First of all, under our directions, he undid the rope from
the tree-stump and threw one end of it across to us. It was not thicker
than a clothes-line, but it was of great strength, and though we could
not make a bridge of it, we might well find it invaluable if we had
any climbing to do. He then fastened his end of the rope to the package
of supplies which had been carried up, and we were able to drag it
across. This gave us the means of life for at least a week, even if
we found nothing else. Finally he descended and carried up two other
packets of mixed goods\mbox{---}a box of ammunition and a number
of other things, all of which we got across by throwing our rope to
him and hauling it back. It was evening when he at last climbed down,
with a final assurance that he would keep the Indians till next morning.

And so it is that I have spent nearly the whole of this our first
night upon the plateau writing up our experiences by the light of
a single candle-lantern.

We supped and camped at the very edge of the cliff, quenching our
thirst with two bottles of Apollinaris which were in one of the cases.
It is vital to us to find water, but I think even Lord John himself
had had adventures enough for one day, and none of us felt inclined
to make the first push into the unknown. We forbore to light a fire
or to make any unnecessary sound.

To-morrow (or to-day, rather, for it is already dawn as I write) we
shall make our first venture into this strange land. When I shall
be able to write again\mbox{---}or if I ever shall write again\mbox{---}I
know not. Meanwhile, I can see that the Indians are still in their
place, and I am sure that the faithful Zambo will be here presently
to get my letter. I only trust that it will come to hand.

\emph{P.S.}\mbox{---}The more I think the more desperate does our
position seem. I see no possible hope of our return. If there were
a high tree near the edge of the plateau we might drop a return bridge
across, but there is none within fifty yards. Our united strength
could not carry a trunk which would serve our purpose. The rope, of
course, is far too short that we could descend by it. No, our position
is hopeless\mbox{---}hopeless!


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER X. {}``The Most Wonderful Things Have Happened''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``The Most Wonderful Things\\
Have Happened''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Wonderful Things Have Happened''}

The most wonderful things have happened and are continually happening
to us. All the paper that I possess consists of five old note-books
and a lot of scraps, and I have only the one stylographic pencil;
but so long as I can move my hand I will continue to set down our
experiences and impressions, for, since we are the only men of the
whole human race to see such things, it is of enormous importance
that I should record them whilst they are fresh in my memory and before
that fate which seems to be constantly impending does actually overtake
us. Whether Zambo can at last take these letters to the river, or
whether I shall myself in some miraculous way carry them back with
me, or, finally, whether some daring explorer, coming upon our tracks
with the advantage, perhaps, of a perfected monoplane, should find
this bundle of manuscript, in any case I can see that what I am writing
is destined to immortality as a classic of true adventure.

On the morning after our being trapped upon the plateau by the villainous
Gomez we began a new stage in our experiences. The first incident
in it was not such as to give me a very favorable opinion of the place
to which we had wandered. As I roused myself from a short nap after
day had dawned, my eyes fell upon a most singular appearance upon
my own leg. My trouser had slipped up, exposing a few inches of my
skin above my sock. On this there rested a large, purplish grape.
Astonished at the sight, I leaned forward to pick it off, when, to
my horror, it burst between my finger and thumb, squirting blood in
every direction. My cry of disgust had brought the two professors
to my side.

{}``Most interesting,'' said Summerlee, bending over my shin. {}``An
enormous blood-tick, as yet, I believe, unclassified.''

{}``The first-fruits of our labors,'' said Challenger in his booming,
pedantic fashion. {}``We cannot do less than call it \textit{Ixodes}
\emph{Maloni}. The very small inconvenience of being bitten, my young
friend, cannot, I am sure, weigh with you as against the glorious
privilege of having your name inscribed in the deathless roll of zoology.
Unhappily you have crushed this fine specimen at the moment of satiation.''

{}``Filthy vermin!''\ I cried.

Professor Challenger raised his great eyebrows in protest, and placed
a soothing paw upon my shoulder.

{}``You should cultivate the scientific eye and the detached scientific
mind,'' said he. {}``To a man of philosophic temperament like myself
the blood-tick, with its lancet-like proboscis and its distending
stomach, is as beautiful a work of Nature as the peacock or, for that
matter, the \textit{aurora} \textit{borealis}. It pains me to hear
you speak of it in so unappreciative a fashion. No doubt, with due
diligence, we can secure some other specimen.''

{}``There can be no doubt of that,'' said Summerlee, grimly, {}``for
one has just disappeared behind your shirt-collar.''

Challenger sprang into the air bellowing like a bull, and tore frantically
at his coat and shirt to get them off. Summerlee and I laughed so
that we could hardly help him. At last we exposed that monstrous torso
(fifty-four inches, by the tailor's tape). His body was all matted
with black hair, out of which jungle we picked the wandering tick
before it had bitten him. But the bushes round were full of the horrible
pests, and it was clear that we must shift our camp.

But first of all it was necessary to make our arrangements with the
faithful \textit{\emph{negro}}, who appeared presently on the pinnacle
with a number of tins of cocoa and biscuits, which he tossed over
to us. Of the stores which remained below he was ordered to retain
as much as would keep him for two months. The Indians were to have
the remainder as a reward for their services and as payment for taking
our letters back to the Amazon. Some hours later we saw them in single
file far out upon the plain, each with a bundle on his head, making
their way back along the path we had come. Zambo occupied our little
tent at the base of the pinnacle, and there he remained, our one link
with the world below.

And now we had to decide upon our immediate movements. We shifted
our position from among the tick-laden bushes until we came to a small
clearing thickly surrounded by trees upon all sides. There were some
flat slabs of rock in the center, with an excellent well close by,
and there we sat in cleanly comfort while we made our first plans
for the invasion of this new country. Birds were calling among the
foliage\mbox{---}especially one with a peculiar whooping cry which
was new to us\mbox{---}but beyond these sounds there were no signs
of life.

Our first care was to make some sort of list of our own stores, so
that we might know what we had to rely upon. What with the things
we had ourselves brought up and those which Zambo had sent across
on the rope, we were fairly well supplied. Most important of all,
in view of the dangers which might surround us, we had our four rifles
and one thousand three hundred rounds, also a shot-gun, but not more
than a hundred and fifty medium pellet cartridges. In the matter of
provisions we had enough to last for several weeks, with a sufficiency
of tobacco and a few scientific implements, including a large telescope
and a good field-glass. All these things we collected together in
the clearing, and as a first precaution, we cut down with our hatchet
and knives a number of thorny bushes, which we piled round in a circle
some fifteen yards in diameter. This was to be our headquarters for
the time\mbox{---}our place of refuge against sudden danger and
the guard-house for our stores. Fort Challenger, we called it.

\textit{\emph{It}} was midday before we had made ourselves secure,
but the heat was not oppressive, and the general character of the
plateau, both in its temperature and in its vegetation, was almost
temperate. The beech, the oak, and even the birch were to be found
among the tangle of trees which girt us in. One huge gingko tree,
topping all the others, shot its great limbs and maidenhair foliage
over the fort which we had constructed. In its shade we continued
our discussion, while Lord John, who had quickly taken command in
the hour of action, gave us his views.

{}``So long as neither man nor beast has seen or heard us, we are
safe,'' said he. {}``From the time they know we are here our troubles
begin. There are no signs that they have found us out as yet. So our
game surely is to lie low for a time and spy out the land. We want
to have a good look at our neighbors before we get on visitin' terms.''

{}``But we must advance,'' I ventured to remark.

{}``By all means, sonny my boy! We will advance. But with common
sense. We must never go so far that we can't get back to our base.
Above all, we must never, unless it is life or death, fire off our
guns.''

{}``But \textit{you} fired yesterday,'' said Summerlee.

{}``Well, it couldn't be helped. However, the wind was strong and
blew outwards. It is not likely that the sound could have traveled
far into the plateau. By the way, what shall we call this place? I
suppose it is up to us to give it a name?''\ 

There were several suggestions, more or less happy, but Challenger's
was final.

{}``It can only have one name,'' said he. {}``It is called after
the pioneer who discovered it. It is Maple White Land.''

Maple White Land it became, and so it is named in that chart which
has become my special task. So it will, I trust, appear in the atlas
of the future.

The peaceful penetration of Maple White Land was the pressing subject
before us. We had the evidence of our own eyes that the place was
inhabited by some unknown creatures, and there was that of Maple White's
sketch-book to show that more dreadful and more dangerous monsters
might still appear. That there might also prove to be human occupants
and that they were of a malevolent character was suggested by the
skeleton impaled upon the bamboos, which could not have got there
had it not been dropped from above. Our situation, stranded without
possibility of escape in such a land, was clearly full of danger,
and our reasons endorsed every measure of caution which Lord John's
experience could suggest. Yet it was surely impossible that we should
halt on the edge of this world of mystery when our very souls were
tingling with impatience to push forward and to pluck the heart from
it.

We therefore blocked the entrance to our zareba by filling it up with
several thorny bushes, and left our camp with the stores entirely
surrounded by this protecting hedge. We then slowly and cautiously
set forth into the unknown, following the course of the little stream
which flowed from our spring, as it should always serve us as a guide
on our return.

Hardly had we started when we came across signs that there were indeed
wonders awaiting us. After a few hundred yards of thick forest, containing
many trees which were quite unknown to me, but which Summerlee, who
was the botanist of the party, recognized as forms of \textit{conifera}
and of cycadaceous plants which have long passed away in the world
below, we entered a region where the stream widened out and formed
a considerable bog. High reeds of a peculiar type grew thickly before
us, which were pronounced to be equisetacea, or mare's-tails, with
tree-ferns scattered amongst them, all of them swaying in a brisk
wind. Suddenly Lord John, who was walking first, halted with uplifted
hand.

{}``Look at this!''\ said he. {}``By George, this must be the
trail of the father of all birds!''\ 

An enormous three-toed track was imprinted in the soft mud before
us. The creature, whatever it was, had crossed the swamp and had passed
on into the forest. We all stopped to examine that monstrous spoor.
If it were indeed a bird\mbox{---}and what animal could leave such
a mark?\mbox{---}its foot was so much larger than an ostrich's that
its height upon the same scale must be enormous. Lord John looked
eagerly round him and slipped two cartridges into his elephant-gun.

{}``I'll stake my good name as a shikarree,'' said he, {}``that
the track is a fresh one. The creature has not passed ten minutes.
Look how the water is still oozing into that deeper print! By Jove!
See, here is the mark of a little one!''\ 

Sure enough, smaller tracks of the same general form were running
parallel to the large ones.

{}``But what do you make of this?''\ cried Professor Summerlee,
triumphantly, pointing to what looked like the huge print of a five-fingered
human hand appearing among the three-toed marks.

{}``Wealden!''\ cried Challenger, in an ecstasy. {}``I've seen
them in the Wealden clay. It is a creature walking erect upon three-toed
feet, and occasionally putting one of its five-fingered forepaws upon
the ground. Not a bird, my dear Roxton\mbox{---}not a bird.''

{}``A beast?''\ 

{}``No; a reptile\mbox{---}a dinosaur. Nothing else could have
left such a track. They puzzled a worthy Sussex doctor some ninety
years ago; but who in the world could have hoped\mbox{---}hoped\mbox{---}to
have seen a sight like that?''\ 

His words died away into a whisper, and we all stood in motionless
amazement. Following the tracks, we had left the morass and passed
through a screen of brushwood and trees. Beyond was an open glade,
and in this were five of the most extraordinary creatures that I have
ever seen. Crouching down among the bushes, we observed them at our
leisure.

There were, as I say, five of them, two being adults and three young
ones. In size they were enormous. Even the babies were as big as elephants,
while the two large ones were far beyond all creatures I have ever
seen. They had slate-colored skin, which was scaled like a lizard's
and shimmered where the sun shone upon it. All five were sitting up,
balancing themselves upon their broad, powerful tails and their huge
three-toed hind-feet, while with their small five-fingered front-feet
they pulled down the branches upon which they browsed. I do not know
that I can bring their appearance home to you better than by saying
that they looked like monstrous kangaroos, twenty feet in length,
and with skins like black crocodiles.

I do not know how long we stayed motionless gazing at this marvelous
spectacle. A strong wind blew towards us and we were well concealed,
so there was no chance of discovery. From time to time the little
ones played round their parents in unwieldy gambols, the great beasts
bounding into the air and falling with dull thuds upon the earth.
The strength of the parents seemed to be limitless, for one of them,
having some difficulty in reaching a bunch of foliage which grew upon
a considerable-sized tree, put his fore-legs round the trunk and tore
it down as if it had been a sapling. The action seemed, as I thought,
to show not only the great development of its muscles, but also the
small one of its brain, for the whole weight came crashing down upon
the top of it, and it uttered a series of shrill yelps to show that,
big as it was, there was a limit to what it could endure. The incident
made it think, apparently, that the neighborhood was dangerous, for
it slowly lurched off through the wood, followed by its mate and its
three enormous infants. We saw the shimmering slaty gleam of their
skins between the tree-trunks, and their heads undulating high above
the brush-wood. Then they vanished from our sight.

I looked at my comrades. Lord John was standing at gaze with his finger
on the trigger of his elephant-gun, his eager hunter's soul shining
from his fierce eyes. What would he not give for one such head to
place between the two crossed oars above the mantelpiece in his snuggery
at the Albany! And yet his reason held him in, for all our exploration
of the wonders of this unknown land depended upon our presence being
concealed from its inhabitants. The two professors were in silent
ecstasy. In their excitement they had unconsciously seized each other
by the hand, and stood like two little children in the presence of
a marvel, Challenger's cheeks bunched up into a seraphic smile, and
Summerlee's sardonic face softening for the moment into wonder and
reverence.

{}``\emph{Nunc dimittis}!''\ he cried at last. {}``What will they
say in England of this?''\ 

{}``My dear Summerlee, I will tell you with great confidence exactly
what they will say in England,'' said Challenger. {}``They will
say that you are an infernal liar and a scientific charlatan, exactly
as you and others said of me.''

{}``In the face of photographs?''\ 

{}``Faked, Summerlee! Clumsily faked!''\ 

{}``In the face of specimens?''\ 

{}``Ah, there we may have them! Malone and his filthy Fleet Street
crew may be all yelping our praises yet. August the twenty-eighth\mbox{---}the
day we saw five \textit{\emph{live}} \textit{\emph{iguanodons}} in
a glade of Maple White Land. Put it down in your diary, my young friend,
and send it to your rag.''

{}``And be ready to get the toe-end of the editorial boot in return,''
said Lord John. {}``Things look a bit different from the latitude
of London, young fellah my lad. There's many a man who never tells
his adventures, for he can't hope to be believed. Who's to blame them?
For this will seem a bit of a dream to ourselves in a month or two.
\textit{What} did you say they were?''\ 

{}``Iguanodons,'' said Summerlee. {}``You'll find their footmarks
all over the Hastings sands, in Kent, and in Sussex. The South of
England was alive with them when there was plenty of good lush green-stuff
to keep them going. Conditions have changed, and the beasts died.
Here it seems that the conditions have not changed, and the beasts
have lived.''

{}``If ever we get out of this alive, I must have a head with me,''
said Lord John. {}``Lord, how some of that Somaliland-Uganda crowd
would turn a beautiful pea-green if they saw it! I don't know what
you chaps think, but it strikes me that we are on mighty thin ice
all this time.''

I had the same feeling of mystery and danger around us. In the gloom
of the trees there seemed a constant menace and as we looked up into
their shadowy foliage vague terrors crept into one's heart. It is
true that these monstrous creatures which we had seen were lumbering,
inoffensive brutes which were unlikely to hurt anyone, but in this
world of wonders what other survivals might there not be\mbox{---}what
fierce, active horrors ready to pounce upon us from their lair among
the rocks or brushwood? I knew little of prehistoric life, but I had
a clear remembrance of one book which I had read in which it spoke
of creatures who would live upon our lions and tigers as a cat lives
upon mice. What if these also were to be found in the woods of Maple
White Land!

It was destined that on this very morning\mbox{---}our first in
the new country\mbox{---}we were to find out what strange hazards
lay around us. It was a loathsome adventure, and one of which I hate
to think. If, as Lord John said, the glade of the \textit{\emph{iguanodons}}
will remain with us as a dream, then surely the swamp of the pterodactyls
will forever be our nightmare. Let me set down exactly what occurred.

We passed very slowly through the woods, partly because Lord Roxton
acted as scout before he would let us advance, and partly because
at every second step one or other of our professors would fall, with
a cry of wonder, before some flower or insect which presented him
with a new type. We may have traveled two or three miles in all, keeping
to the right of the line of the stream, when we came upon a considerable
opening in the trees. A belt of brushwood led up to a tangle of rocks\mbox{---}the
whole plateau was strewn with boulders. We were walking slowly towards
these rocks, among bushes which reached over our waists, when we became
aware of a strange low gabbling and whistling sound, which filled
the air with a constant clamor and appeared to come from some spot
immediately before us. Lord John held up his hand as a signal for
us to stop, and he made his way swiftly, stooping and running, to
the line of rocks. We saw him peep over them and give a gesture of
amazement. Then he stood staring as if forgetting us, so utterly entranced
was he by what he saw. Finally he waved us to come on, holding up
his hand as a signal for caution. His whole bearing made me feel that
something wonderful but dangerous lay before us.

Creeping to his side, we looked over the rocks. The place into which
we gazed was a pit, and may, in the early days, have been one of the
smaller volcanic blow-holes of the plateau. It was bowl-shaped and
at the bottom, some hundreds of yards from where we lay, were pools
of green-scummed, stagnant water, fringed with bullrushes. It was
a weird place in itself, but its occupants made it seem like a scene
from the Seven Circles of Dante. The place was a rookery of pterodactyls.
There were hundreds of them congregated within view. All the bottom
area round the water-edge was alive with their young ones, and with
hideous mothers brooding upon their leathery, yellowish eggs. From
this crawling flapping mass of obscene reptilian life came the shocking
clamor which filled the air and the mephitic, horrible, musty odor
which turned us sick. But above, perched each upon its own stone,
tall, gray, and withered, more like dead and dried specimens than
actual living creatures, sat the horrible males, absolutely motionless
save for the rolling of their red eyes or an occasional snap of their
rat-trap beaks as a dragon-fly went past them. Their huge, membranous
wings were closed by folding their fore-arms, so that they sat like
gigantic old women, wrapped in hideous web-colored shawls, and with
their ferocious heads protruding above them. Large and small, not
less than a thousand of these filthy creatures lay in the hollow before
us.

Our professors would gladly have stayed there all day, so entranced
were they by this opportunity of studying the life of a prehistoric
age. They pointed out the fish and dead birds lying about among the
rocks as proving the nature of the food of these creatures, and I
heard them congratulating each other on having cleared up the point
why the bones of this flying dragon are found in such great numbers
in certain well-defined areas, as in the Cambridge Green-sand, since
it was now seen that, like penguins, they lived in gregarious fashion.

Finally, however, Challenger, bent upon proving some point which Summerlee
had contested, thrust his head over the rock and nearly brought destruction
upon us all. In an instant the nearest male gave a shrill, whistling
cry, and flapped its twenty-foot span of leathery wings as it soared
up into the air. The females and young ones huddled together beside
the water, while the whole circle of sentinels rose one after the
other and sailed off into the sky. It was a wonderful sight to see
at least a hundred creatures of such enormous size and hideous appearance
all swooping like swallows with swift, shearing wing-strokes above
us; but soon we realized that it was not one on which we could afford
to linger. At first the great brutes flew round in a huge ring, as
if to make sure what the exact extent of the danger might be. Then,
the flight grew lower and the circle narrower, until they were whizzing
round and round us, the dry, rustling flap of their huge slate-colored
wings filling the air with a volume of sound that made me think of
Hendon aerodrome upon a race day.

{}``Make for the wood and keep together,'' cried Lord John, clubbing
his rifle. {}``The brutes mean mischief.''

The moment we attempted to retreat the circle closed in upon us, until
the tips of the wings of those nearest to us nearly touched our faces.
We beat at them with the stocks of our guns, but there was nothing
solid or vulnerable to strike. Then suddenly out of the whizzing,
slate-colored circle a long neck shot out, and a fierce beak made
a thrust at us. Another and another followed. Summerlee gave a cry
and put his hand to his face, from which the blood was streaming.
I felt a prod at the back of my neck, and turned dizzy with the shock.
Challenger fell, and as I stooped to pick him up I was again struck
from behind and dropped on the top of him. At the same instant I heard
the crash of Lord John's elephant-gun, and, looking up, saw one of
the creatures with a broken wing struggling upon the ground, spitting
and gurgling at us with a wide-opened beak and blood-shot, goggled
eyes, like some devil in a medieval picture. Its comrades had flown
higher at the sudden sound, and were circling above our heads.

{}``Now,'' cried Lord John, {}``now for our lives!''\ 

We staggered through the brushwood, and even as we reached the trees
the harpies were on us again. Summerlee was knocked down, but we tore
him up and rushed among the trunks. Once there we were safe, for those
huge wings had no space for their sweep beneath the branches. As we
limped homewards, sadly mauled and discomfited, we saw them for a
long time flying at a great height against the deep blue sky above
our heads, soaring round and round, no bigger than wood-pigeons, with
their eyes no doubt still following our progress. At last, however,
as we reached the thicker woods they gave up the chase, and we saw
them no more.

{}``A most interesting and convincing experience,'' said Challenger,
as we halted beside the brook and he bathed a swollen knee. {}``We
are exceptionally well informed, Summerlee, as to the habits of the
enraged pterodactyl.''

Summerlee was wiping the blood from a cut in his forehead, while I
was tying up a nasty stab in the muscle of the neck. Lord John had
the shoulder of his coat torn away, but the creature's teeth had only
grazed the flesh.

{}``It is worth noting,'' Challenger continued, {}``that our young
friend has received an undoubted stab, while Lord John's coat could
only have been torn by a bite. In my own case, I was beaten about
the head by their wings, so we have had a remarkable exhibition of
their various methods of offence.''

{}``It has been touch and go for our lives,'' said Lord John, gravely,
{}``and I could not think of a more rotten sort of death than to
be outed by such filthy vermin. I was sorry to fire my rifle, but,
by Jove! there was no great choice.''

{}``We should not be here if you hadn't,'' said I, with conviction.

{}``It may do no harm,'' said he. {}``Among these woods there must
be many loud cracks from splitting or falling trees which would be
just like the sound of a gun. But now, if you are of my opinion, we
have had thrills enough for one day, and had best get back to the
surgical box at the camp for some carbolic. Who knows what venom these
beasts may have in their hideous jaws?''\ 

But surely no men ever had just such a day since the world began.
Some fresh surprise was ever in store for us. When, following the
course of our brook, we at last reached our glade and saw the thorny
barricade of our camp, we thought that our adventures were at an end.
But we had something more to think of before we could rest. The gate
of Fort Challenger had been untouched, the walls were unbroken, and
yet it had been visited by some strange and powerful creature in our
absence. No foot-mark showed a trace of its nature, and only the overhanging
branch of the enormous ginko tree suggested how it might have come
and gone; but of its malevolent strength there was ample evidence
in the condition of our stores. They were strewn at random all over
the ground, and one tin of meat had been crushed into pieces so as
to extract the contents. A case of cartridges had been shattered into
matchwood, and one of the brass shells lay shredded into pieces beside
it. Again the feeling of vague horror came upon our souls, and we
gazed round with frightened eyes at the dark shadows which lay around
us, in all of which some fearsome shape might be lurking. How good
it was when we were hailed by the voice of Zambo, and, going to the
edge of the plateau, saw him sitting grinning at us upon the top of
the opposite pinnacle.

{}``All well, Massa Challenger, all well!''\ he cried. {}``Me
stay here. No fear. You always find me when you want.''

His honest black face, and the immense view before us, which carried
us half-way back to the affluent of the Amazon, helped us to remember
that we really were upon this earth in the twentieth century, and
had not by some magic been conveyed to some raw planet in its earliest
and wildest state. How difficult it was to realize that the violet
line upon the far horizon was well advanced to that great river upon
which huge steamers ran, and folk talked of the small affairs of life,
while we, marooned among the creatures of a bygone age, could but
gaze towards it and yearn for all that it meant!

One other memory remains with me of this wonderful day, and with it
I will close this letter. The two professors, their tempers aggravated
no doubt by their injuries, had fallen out as to whether our assailants
were of the genus pterodactylus or dimorphodon, and high words had
ensued. To avoid their wrangling I moved some little way apart, and
was seated smoking upon the trunk of a fallen tree, when Lord John
strolled over in my direction.

{}``I say, Malone,'' said he, {}``do you remember that place where
those beasts were?''\ 

{}``Very clearly.''

{}``A sort of volcanic pit, was it not?''\ 

{}``Exactly,'' said I.

{}``Did you notice the soil?''\ 

{}``Rocks.''

{}``But round the water\mbox{---}where the reeds were?''\ 

{}``It was a bluish soil. It looked like clay.''

{}``Exactly. A volcanic tube full of blue clay.''

{}``What of that?''\ I asked.

{}``Oh, nothing, nothing,'' said he, and strolled back to where
the voices of the contending men of science rose in a prolonged duet,
the high, strident note of Summerlee rising and falling to the sonorous
bass of Challenger. I should have thought no more of Lord John's remark
were it not that once again that night I heard him mutter to himself:
{}``Blue clay\mbox{---}clay in a volcanic tube!''\ They were
the last words I heard before I dropped into an exhausted sleep.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XI. {}``For Once I was the Hero''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``For Once I was the Hero''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``For Once I was the Hero''}

Lord John Roxton was right when he thought that some specially toxic
quality might lie in the bite of the horrible creatures which had
attacked us. On the morning after our first adventure upon the plateau,
both Summerlee and I were in great pain and fever, while Challenger's
knee was so bruised that he could hardly limp. We kept to our camp
all day, therefore, Lord John busying himself, with such help as we
could give him, in raising the height and thickness of the thorny
walls which were our only defense. I remember that during the whole
long day I was haunted by the feeling that we were closely observed,
though by whom or whence I could give no guess.

So strong was the impression that I told Professor Challenger of it,
who put it down to the cerebral excitement caused by my fever. Again
and again I glanced round swiftly, with the conviction that I was
about to see something, but only to meet the dark tangle of our hedge
or the solemn and cavernous gloom of the great trees which arched
above our heads. And yet the feeling grew ever stronger in my own
mind that something observant and something malevolent was at our
very elbow. I thought of the Indian superstition of the Curupuri\mbox{---}the
dreadful, lurking spirit of the woods\mbox{---}and I could have
imagined that his terrible presence haunted those who had invaded
his most remote and sacred retreat.

That night (our third in Maple White Land) we had an experience which
left a fearful impression upon our minds, and made us thankful that
Lord John had worked so hard in making our retreat impregnable. We
were all sleeping round our dying fire when we were aroused\mbox{---}or,
rather, I should say, shot out of our slumbers\mbox{---}by a succession
of the most frightful cries and screams to which I have ever listened.
I know no sound to which I could compare this amazing tumult, which
seemed to come from some spot within a few hundred yards of our camp.
It was as ear-splitting as any whistle of a railway-engine; but whereas
the whistle is a clear, mechanical, sharp-edged sound, this was far
deeper in volume and vibrant with the uttermost strain of agony and
horror. We clapped our hands to our ears to shut out that nerve-shaking
appeal. A cold sweat broke out over my body, and my heart turned sick
at the misery of it. All the woes of tortured life, all its stupendous
indictment of high heaven, its innumerable sorrows, seemed to be centered
and condensed into that one dreadful, agonized cry. And then, under
this high-pitched, ringing sound there was another, more intermittent,
a low, deep-chested laugh, a growling, throaty gurgle of merriment
which formed a grotesque accompaniment to the shriek with which it
was blended. For three or four minutes on end the fearsome duet continued,
while all the foliage rustled with the rising of startled birds. Then
it shut off as suddenly as it began. For a long time we sat in horrified
silence. Then Lord John threw a bundle of twigs upon the fire, and
their red glare lit up the intent faces of my companions and flickered
over the great boughs above our heads.

{}``What was it?''\ I whispered.

{}``We shall know in the morning,'' said Lord John. {}``It was
close to us\mbox{---}not farther than the glade.''

{}``We have been privileged to overhear a prehistoric tragedy, the
sort of drama which occurred among the reeds upon the border of some
Jurassic lagoon, when the greater dragon pinned the lesser among the
slime,'' said Challenger, with more solemnity than I had ever heard
in his voice. {}``It was surely well for man that he came late in
the order of creation. There were powers abroad in earlier days which
no courage and no mechanism of his could have met. What could his
sling, his throwing-stick, or his arrow avail him against such forces
as have been loose to-night? Even with a modern rifle it would be
all odds on the monster.''

{}``I think I should back my little friend,'' said Lord John, caressing
his Express. {}``But the beast would certainly have a good sporting
chance.''

Summerlee raised his hand.

{}``Hush!''\ he cried. {}``Surely I hear something?''\ 

From the utter silence there emerged a deep, regular pat-pat. It was
the tread of some animal\mbox{---}the rhythm of soft but heavy pads
placed cautiously upon the ground. It stole slowly round the camp,
and then halted near our gateway. There was a low, sibilant rise and
fall\mbox{---}the breathing of the creature. Only our feeble hedge
separated us from this horror of the night. Each of us had seized
his rifle, and Lord John had pulled out a small bush to make an embrasure
in the hedge.

{}``By George!''\ he whispered. {}``I think I can see it!''\ 

I stooped and peered over his shoulder through the gap. Yes, I could
see it, too. In the deep shadow of the tree there was a deeper shadow
yet, black, inchoate, vague\mbox{---}a crouching form full of savage
vigor and menace. It was no higher than a horse, but the dim outline
suggested vast bulk and strength. That hissing pant, as regular and
full-volumed as the exhaust of an engine, spoke of a monstrous organism.
Once, as it moved, I thought I saw the glint of two terrible, greenish
eyes. There was an uneasy rustling, as if it were crawling slowly
forward.

{}``I believe it is going to spring!''\ said I, cocking my rifle.

{}``Don't fire! Don't fire!''\ whispered Lord John. {}``The crash
of a gun in this silent night would be heard for miles. Keep it as
a last card.''

{}``If it gets over the hedge we're done,'' said Summerlee, and
his voice crackled into a nervous laugh as he spoke.

{}``No, it must not get over,'' cried Lord John; {}``but hold your
fire to the last. Perhaps I can make something of the fellow. I'll
chance it, anyhow.''

It was as brave an act as ever I saw a man do. He stooped to the fire,
picked up a blazing branch, and slipped in an instant through a sallyport
which he had made in our gateway. The thing moved forward with a dreadful
snarl. Lord John never hesitated, but, running towards it with a quick,
light step, he dashed the flaming wood into the brute's face. For
one moment I had a vision of a horrible mask like a giant toad's,
of a warty, leprous skin, and of a loose mouth all beslobbered with
fresh blood. The next, there was a crash in the underwood and our
dreadful visitor was gone.

{}``I thought he wouldn't face the fire,'' said Lord John, laughing,
as he came back and threw his branch among the faggots.

{}``You should not have taken such a risk!''\ we all cried.

{}``There was nothin' else to be done. If he had got among us we
should have shot each other in tryin' to down him. On the other hand,
if we had fired through the hedge and wounded him he would soon have
been on the top of us\mbox{---}to say nothin' of giving ourselves
away. On the whole, I think that we are jolly well out of it. What
was he, then?''\ 

Our learned men looked at each other with some hesitation.

{}``Personally, I am unable to classify the creature with any certainty,''
said Summerlee, lighting his pipe from the fire.

{}``In refusing to commit yourself you are but showing a proper scientific
reserve,'' said Challenger, with massive condescension. {}``I am
not myself prepared to go farther than to say in general terms that
we have almost certainly been in contact to-night with some form of
carnivorous dinosaur. I have already expressed my anticipation that
something of the sort might exist upon this plateau.''

{}``We have to bear in mind,'' remarked Summerlee, {}``that there
are many prehistoric forms which have never come down to us. It would
be rash to suppose that we can give a name to all that we are likely
to meet.''

{}``Exactly. A rough classification may be the best that we can attempt.
To-morrow some further evidence may help us to an identification.
Meantime we can only renew our interrupted slumbers.''

{}``But not without a sentinel,'' said Lord John, with decision.
{}``We can't afford to take chances in a country like this. Two-hour
spells in the future, for each of us.''

{}``Then I'll just finish my pipe in starting the first one,'' said
Professor Summerlee; and from that time onwards we never trusted ourselves
again without a watchman.

In the morning it was not long before we discovered the source of
the hideous uproar which had aroused us in the night. The \textit{\emph{iguanodon}}
glade was the scene of a horrible butchery. From the pools of blood
and the enormous lumps of flesh scattered in every direction over
the green sward we imagined at first that a number of animals had
been killed, but on examining the remains more closely we discovered
that all this carnage came from one of these unwieldy monsters, which
had been literally torn to pieces by some creature not larger, perhaps,
but far more ferocious, than itself.

Our two professors sat in absorbed argument, examining piece after
piece, which showed the marks of savage teeth and of enormous claws.

{}``Our judgment must still be in abeyance,'' said Professor Challenger,
with a huge slab of whitish-colored flesh across his knee. {}``The
indications would be consistent with the presence of a saber-toothed
tiger, such as are still found among the breccia of our caverns; but
the creature actually seen was undoubtedly of a larger and more reptilian
character. Personally, I should pronounce for allosaurus.''

{}``Or megalosaurus,'' said Summerlee.

{}``Exactly. Any one of the larger carnivorous dinosaurs would meet
the case. Among them are to be found all the most terrible types of
animal life that have ever cursed the earth or blessed a museum.''
He laughed sonorously at his own conceit, for, though he had little
sense of humor, the crudest pleasantry from his own lips moved him
always to roars of appreciation.

{}``The less noise the better,'' said Lord Roxton, curtly. {}``We
don't know who or what may be near us. If this fellah comes back for
his breakfast and catches us here we won't have so much to laugh at.
By the way, what is this mark upon the \textit{\emph{iguanodon's}}
hide?''\ 

On the dull, scaly, slate-colored skin somewhere above the shoulder,
there was a singular black circle of some substance which looked like
asphalt. None of us could suggest what it meant, though Summerlee
was of opinion that he had seen something similar upon one of the
young ones two days before. Challenger said nothing, but looked pompous
and puffy, as if he could if he would, so that finally Lord John asked
his opinion direct.

{}``If your lordship will graciously permit me to open my mouth,
I shall be happy to express my sentiments,'' said he, with elaborate
sarcasm. I am not in the habit of being taken to task in the fashion
which seems to be customary with your lordship. I was not aware that
it was necessary to ask your permission before smiling at a harmless
pleasantry.''

It was not until he had received his apology that our touchy friend
would suffer himself to be appeased. When at last his ruffled feelings
were at ease, he addressed us at some length from his seat upon a
fallen tree, speaking, as his habit was, as if he were imparting most
precious information to a class of a thousand.

{}``With regard to the marking,'' said he, {}``I am inclined to
agree with my friend and colleague, Professor Summerlee, that the
stains are from asphalt. As this plateau is, in its very nature, highly
volcanic, and as asphalt is a substance which one associates with
Plutonic forces, I cannot doubt that it exists in the free liquid
state, and that the creatures may have come in contact with it. A
much more important problem is the question as to the existence of
the carnivorous monster which has left its traces in this glade. We
know roughly that this plateau is not larger than an average English
county. Within this confined space a certain number of creatures,
mostly types which have passed away in the world below, have lived
together for innumerable years. Now, it is very clear to me that in
so long a period one would have expected that the carnivorous creatures,
multiplying unchecked, would have exhausted their food supply and
have been compelled to either modify their flesh-eating habits or
die of hunger. This we see has not been so. We can only imagine, therefore,
that the balance of Nature is preserved by some check which limits
the numbers of these ferocious creatures. One of the many interesting
problems, therefore, which await our solution is to discover what
that check may be and how it operates. I venture to trust that we
may have some future opportunity for the closer study of the carnivorous
dinosaurs.''

{}``And I venture to trust we may not,'' I observed.

The Professor only raised his great eyebrows, as the schoolmaster
meets the irrelevant observation of the naughty boy.

{}``Perhaps Professor Summerlee may have an observation to make,''
he said, and the two savants ascended together into some rarefied
scientific atmosphere, where the possibilities of a modification of
the birth-rate were weighed against the decline of the food supply
as a check in the struggle for existence.

That morning we mapped out a small portion of the plateau, avoiding
the swamp of the pterodactyls, and keeping to the east of our brook
instead of to the west. In that direction the country was still thickly
wooded, with so much undergrowth that our progress was very slow.

I have dwelt up to now upon the terrors of Maple White Land; but there
was another side to the subject, for all that morning we wandered
among lovely flowers\mbox{---}mostly, as I observed, white or yellow
in color, these being, as our professors explained, the primitive
flower-shades. In many places the ground was absolutely covered with
them, and as we walked ankle-deep on that wonderful yielding carpet,
the scent was almost intoxicating in its sweetness and intensity.
The homely English bee buzzed everywhere around us. Many of the trees
under which we passed had their branches bowed down with fruit, some
of which were of familiar sorts, while other varieties were new. By
observing which of them were pecked by the birds we avoided all danger
of poison and added a delicious variety to our food reserve. In the
jungle which we traversed were numerous hard-trodden paths made by
the wild beasts, and in the more marshy places we saw a profusion
of strange footmarks, including many of the \textit{\emph{iguanodon}}.
Once in a grove we observed several of these great creatures grazing,
and Lord John, with his glass, was able to report that they also were
spotted with asphalt, though in a different place to the one which
we had examined in the morning. What this phenomenon meant we could
not imagine.

We saw many small animals, such as porcupines, a scaly ant-eater,
and a wild pig, piebald in color and with long curved tusks. Once,
through a break in the trees, we saw a clear shoulder of green hill
some distance away, and across this a large dun-colored animal was
traveling at a considerable pace. It passed so swiftly that we were
unable to say what it was; but if it were a deer, as was claimed by
Lord John, it must have been as large as those monstrous Irish elk
which are still dug up from time to time in the bogs of my native
land.

Ever since the mysterious visit which had been paid to our camp we
always returned to it with some misgivings. However, on this occasion
we found everything in order.

That evening we had a grand discussion upon our present situation
and future plans, which I must describe at some length, as it led
to a new departure by which we were enabled to gain a more complete
knowledge of Maple White Land than might have come in many weeks of
exploring. It was Summerlee who opened the debate. All day he had
been querulous in manner, and now some remark of Lord John's as to
what we should do on the morrow brought all his bitterness to a head.

{}``What we ought to be doing to-day, to-morrow, and all the time,''
said he, {}``is finding some way out of the trap into which we have
fallen. You are all turning your brains towards getting into this
country. I say that we should be scheming how to get out of it.''

{}``I am surprised, sir,'' boomed Challenger, stroking his majestic
beard, {}``that any man of science should commit himself to so ignoble
a sentiment. You are in a land which offers such an inducement to
the ambitious naturalist as none ever has since the world began, and
you suggest leaving it before we have acquired more than the most
superficial knowledge of it or of its contents. I expected better
things of you, Professor Summerlee.''

{}``You must remember,'' said Summerlee, sourly, {}``that I have
a large class in London who are at present at the mercy of an extremely
inefficient \emph{locum tenens}. This makes my situation different
from yours, Professor Challenger, since, so far as I know, you have
never been entrusted with any responsible educational work.''

{}``Quite so,'' said Challenger. {}``I have felt it to be a sacrilege
to divert a brain which is capable of the highest original research
to any lesser object. That is why I have sternly set my face against
any proffered scholastic appointment.''

{}``For example?''\ asked Summerlee, with a sneer; but Lord John
hastened to change the conversation.

{}``I must say,'' said he, {}``that I think it would be a mighty
poor thing to go back to London before I know a great deal more of
this place than I do at present.''

{}``I could never dare to walk into the back office of my paper and
face old McArdle,'' said I.\  (You will excuse the frankness of
this report, will you not, sir?) {}``He'd never forgive me for leaving
such unexhausted copy behind me. Besides, so far as I can see it is
not worth discussing, since we can't get down, even if we wanted.''

{}``Our young friend makes up for many obvious mental \emph{lacunae}
by some measure of primitive common sense, remarked Challenger. {}``The
interests of his deplorable profession are immaterial to us; but,
as he observes, we cannot get down in any case, so it is a waste of
energy to discuss it.''

{}``It is a waste of energy to do anything else,'' growled Summerlee
from behind his pipe. {}``Let me remind you that we came here upon
a perfectly definite mission, entrusted to us at the meeting of the
Zoological Institute in London. That mission was to test the truth
of Professor Challenger's statements. Those statements, as I am bound
to admit, we are now in a position to endorse. Our ostensible work
is therefore done. As to the detail which remains to be worked out
upon this plateau, it is so enormous that only a large expedition,
with a very special equipment, could hope to cope with it. Should
we attempt to do so ourselves, the only possible result must be that
we shall never return with the important contribution to science which
we have already gained. Professor Challenger has devised means for
getting us on to this plateau when it appeared to be inaccessible;
I think that we should now call upon him to use the same ingenuity
in getting us back to the world from which we came.''

I confess that as Summerlee stated his view it struck me as altogether
reasonable. Even Challenger was affected by the consideration that
his enemies would never stand confuted if the confirmation of his
statements should never reach those who had doubted them.

{}``The problem of the descent is at first sight a formidable one,''
said he, {}``and yet I cannot doubt that the intellect can solve
it. I am prepared to agree with our colleague that a protracted stay
in Maple White Land is at present inadvisable, and that the question
of our return will soon have to be faced. I absolutely refuse to leave,
however, until we have made at least a superficial examination of
this country, and are able to take back with us something in the nature
of a chart.''

Professor Summerlee gave a snort of impatience.

{}``We have spent two long days in exploration,'' said he, {}``and
we are no wiser as to the actual geography of the place than when
we started. It is clear that it is all thickly wooded, and it would
take months to penetrate it and to learn the relations of one part
to another. If there were some central peak it would be different,
but it all slopes downwards, so far as we can see. The farther we
go the less likely it is that we will get any general view.''

It was at that moment that I had my inspiration. My eyes chanced to
light upon the enormous gnarled trunk of the gingko tree which cast
its huge branches over us. Surely, if its bole exceeded that of all
others, its height must do the same. If the rim of the plateau was
indeed the highest point, then why should this mighty tree not prove
to be a watchtower which commanded the whole country? Now, ever since
I ran wild as a lad in Ireland I have been a bold and skilled tree-climber.
My comrades might be my masters on the rocks, but I knew that I would
be supreme among those branches. Could I only get my legs on to the
lowest of the giant off-shoots, then it would be strange indeed if
I could not make my way to the top. My comrades were delighted at
my idea.

{}``Our young friend,'' said Challenger, bunching up the red apples
of his cheeks, {}``is capable of acrobatic exertions which would
be impossible to a man of a more solid, though possibly of a more
commanding, appearance. I applaud his resolution.''

{}``By George, young fellah, you've put your hand on it!''\ said
Lord John, clapping me on the back. {}``How we never came to think
of it before I can't imagine! There's not more than an hour of daylight
left, but if you take your notebook you may be able to get some rough
sketch of the place. If we put these three ammunition cases under
the branch, I will soon hoist you on to it.''

He stood on the boxes while I faced the trunk, and was gently raising
me when Challenger sprang forward and gave me such a thrust with his
huge hand that he fairly shot me into the tree. With both arms clasping
the branch, I scrambled hard with my feet until I had worked, first
my body, and then my knees, onto it. There were three excellent off-shoots,
like huge rungs of a ladder, above my head, and a tangle of convenient
branches beyond, so that I clambered onwards with such speed that
I soon lost sight of the ground and had nothing but foliage beneath
me. Now and then I encountered a check, and once I had to shin up
a creeper for eight or ten feet, but I made excellent progress, and
the booming of Challenger's voice seemed to be a great distance beneath
me. The tree was, however, enormous, and, looking upwards, I could
see no thinning of the leaves above my head. There was some thick,
bush-like clump which seemed to be a parasite upon a branch up which
I was swarming. I leaned my head round it in order to see what was
beyond, and I nearly fell out of the tree in my surprise and horror
at what I saw.

A face was gazing into mine\mbox{---}at the distance of only a foot
or two. The creature that owned it had been crouching behind the parasite,
and had looked round it at the same instant that I did. It was a human
face\mbox{---}or at least it was far more human than any monkey's
that I have ever seen. It was long, whitish, and blotched with pimples,
the nose flattened, and the lower jaw projecting, with a bristle of
coarse whiskers round the chin. The eyes, which were under thick and
heavy brows, were bestial and ferocious, and as it opened its mouth
to snarl what sounded like a curse at me I observed that it had curved,
sharp canine teeth. For an instant I read hatred and menace in the
evil eyes. Then, as quick as a flash, came an expression of overpowering
fear. There was a crash of broken boughs as it dived wildly down into
the tangle of green. I caught a glimpse of a hairy body like that
of a reddish pig, and then it was gone amid a swirl of leaves and
branches.

{}``What's the matter?''\ shouted Roxton from below. {}``Anything
wrong with you?''\ 

{}``Did you see it?''\ I cried, with my arms round the branch and
all my nerves tingling.

{}``We heard a row, as if your foot had slipped. What was it?''\ 

I was so shocked at the sudden and strange appearance of this ape-man
that I hesitated whether I should not climb down again and tell my
experience to my companions. But I was already so far up the great
tree that it seemed a humiliation to return without having carried
out my mission.

After a long pause, therefore, to recover my breath and my courage,
I continued my ascent. Once I put my weight upon a rotten branch and
swung for a few seconds by my hands, but in the main it was all easy
climbing. Gradually the leaves thinned around me, and I was aware,
from the wind upon my face, that I had topped all the trees of the
forest. I was determined, however, not to look about me before I had
reached the very highest point, so I scrambled on until I had got
so far that the topmost branch was bending beneath my weight. There
I settled into a convenient fork, and, balancing myself securely,
I found myself looking down at a most wonderful panorama of this strange
country in which we found ourselves.

The sun was just above the western sky-line, and the evening was a
particularly bright and clear one, so that the whole extent of the
plateau was visible beneath me. It was, as seen from this height,
of an oval contour, with a breadth of about thirty miles and a width
of twenty. Its general shape was that of a shallow funnel, all the
sides sloping down to a considerable lake in the center. This lake
may have been ten miles in circumference, and lay very green and beautiful
in the evening light, with a thick fringe of reeds at its edges, and
with its surface broken by several yellow sandbanks, which gleamed
golden in the mellow sunshine. A number of long dark objects, which
were too large for alligators and too long for canoes, lay upon the
edges of these patches of sand. With my glass I could clearly see
that they were alive, but what their nature might be I could not imagine.

From the side of the plateau on which we were, slopes of woodland,
with occasional glades, stretched down for five or six miles to the
central lake. I could see at my very feet the glade of the \textit{\emph{iguanodons}},
and farther off was a round opening in the trees which marked the
swamp of the pterodactyls. On the side facing me, however, the plateau
presented a very different aspect. There the basalt cliffs of the
outside were reproduced upon the inside, forming an escarpment about
two hundred feet high, with a woody slope beneath it. Along the base
of these red cliffs, some distance above the ground, I could see a
number of dark holes through the glass, which I conjectured to be
the mouths of caves. At the opening of one of these something white
was shimmering, but I was unable to make out what it was. I sat charting
the country until the sun had set and it was so dark that I could
no longer distinguish details. Then I climbed down to my companions
waiting for me so eagerly at the bottom of the great tree. For once
I was the hero of the expedition. Alone I had thought of it, and alone
I had done it; and here was the chart which would save us a month's
blind groping among unknown dangers. Each of them shook me solemnly
by the hand.

But before they discussed the details of my map I had to tell them
of my encounter with the ape-man among the branches.

{}``He has been there all the time,'' said I.

{}``How do you know that?''\ asked Lord John.

{}``Because I have never been without that feeling that something
malevolent was watching us. I mentioned it to you, Professor Challenger.''

{}``Our young friend certainly said something of the kind. He is
also the one among us who is endowed with that Celtic temperament
which would make him sensitive to such impressions.''

{}``The whole theory of telepathy\mbox{---}'' began Summerlee,
filling his pipe.

{}``Is too vast to be now discussed,'' said Challenger, with decision.
{}``Tell me, now,'' he added, with the air of a bishop addressing
a Sunday-school, {}``did you happen to observe whether the creature
could cross its thumb over its palm?''\ 

{}``No, indeed.''

{}``Had it a tail?''\ 

{}``No.''

{}``Was the foot prehensile?''\ 

{}``I do not think it could have made off so fast among the branches
if it could not get a grip with its feet.''

{}``In South America there are, if my memory serves me\mbox{---}you
will check the observation, Professor Summerlee\mbox{---}some thirty-six
species of monkeys, but the anthropoid ape is unknown. It is clear,
however, that he exists in this country, and that he is not the hairy,
gorilla-like variety, which is never seen out of Africa or the East.''
(I was inclined to interpolate, as I looked at him, that I had seen
his first cousin in Kensington.) {}``This is a whiskered and colorless
type, the latter characteristic pointing to the fact that he spends
his days in arboreal seclusion. The question which we have to face
is whether he approaches more closely to the ape or the man. In the
latter case, he may well approximate to what the vulgar have called
the `missing link.' The solution of this problem is our immediate
duty.''

{}``It is nothing of the sort,'' said Summerlee, abruptly. {}``Now
that, through the intelligence and activity of Mr.\ Malone'' (I
cannot help quoting the words), {}``we have got our chart, our one
and only immediate duty is to get ourselves safe and sound out of
this awful place.''

{}``The flesh-pots of civilization,'' groaned Challenger.

{}``The ink-pots of civilization, sir. It is our task to put on record
what we have seen, and to leave the further exploration to others.
You all agreed as much before Mr.\ Malone got us the chart.''

{}``Well,'' said Challenger, {}``I admit that my mind will be more
at ease when I am assured that the result of our expedition has been
conveyed to our friends. How we are to get down from this place I
have not as yet an idea. I have never yet encountered any problem,
however, which my inventive brain was unable to solve, and I promise
you that to-morrow I will turn my attention to the question of our
descent.'' And so the matter was allowed to rest.

But that evening, by the light of the fire and of a single candle,
the first map of the lost world was elaborated. Every detail which
I had roughly noted from my watch-tower was drawn out in its relative
place. Challenger's pencil hovered over the great blank which marked
the lake.

{}``What shall we call it?''\ he asked.

{}``Why should you not take the chance of perpetuating your own name?''\ 
said Summerlee, with his usual touch of acidity.

{}``I trust, sir, that my name will have other and more personal
claims upon posterity,'' said Challenger, severely. {}``Any ignoramus
can hand down his worthless memory by imposing it upon a mountain
or a river. I need no such monument.''

Summerlee, with a twisted smile, was about to make some fresh assault
when Lord John hastened to intervene.

{}``It's up to you, young fellah, to name the lake,'' said he. {}``You
saw it first, and, by George, if you choose to put `Lake Malone' on
it, no one has a better right.''

{}``By all means. Let our young friend give it a name,'' said Challenger.

{}``Then, said I, blushing, I dare say, as I said it, {}``let it
be named Lake Gladys.''

{}``Don't you think the Central Lake would be more descriptive?''\ 
remarked Summerlee.

{}``I should prefer Lake Gladys.''

Challenger looked at me sympathetically, and shook his great head
in mock disapproval. {}``Boys will be boys,'' said he. {}``Lake
Gladys let it be.''


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XII. {}``It was Dreadful in the Forest''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``It was Dreadful in the Forest''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``It was Dreadful in the Forest''}

I have said\mbox{---}or perhaps I have not said, for my memory plays
me sad tricks these days\mbox{---}that I glowed with pride when
three such men as my comrades thanked me for having saved, or at least
greatly helped, the situation. As the youngster of the party, not
merely in years, but in experience, character, knowledge, and all
that goes to make a man, I had been overshadowed from the first. And
now I was coming into my own. I warmed at the thought. Alas! for the
pride which goes before a fall! That little glow of self-satisfaction,
that added measure of self-confidence, were to lead me on that very
night to the most dreadful experience of my life, ending with a shock
which turns my heart sick when I think of it.

It came about in this way. I had been unduly excited by the adventure
of the tree, and sleep seemed to be impossible. Summerlee was on guard,
sitting hunched over our small fire, a quaint, angular figure, his
rifle across his knees and his pointed, goat-like beard wagging with
each weary nod of his head. Lord John lay silent, wrapped in the South
American poncho which he wore, while Challenger snored with a roll
and rattle which reverberated through the woods. The full moon was
shining brightly, and the air was crisply cold. What a night for a
walk! And then suddenly came the thought, {}``Why not?''\ Suppose
I stole softly away, suppose I made my way down to the central lake,
suppose I was back at breakfast with some record of the place\mbox{---}would
I not in that case be thought an even more worthy associate? Then,
if Summerlee carried the day and some means of escape were found,
we should return to London with first-hand knowledge of the central
mystery of the plateau, to which I alone, of all men, would have penetrated.
I thought of Gladys, with her {}``There are heroisms all round us.''
I seemed to hear her voice as she said it. I thought also of McArdle.
What a three column article for the paper! What a foundation for a
career! A correspondentship in the next great war might be within
my reach. I clutched at a gun\mbox{---}my pockets were full of cartridges\mbox{---}and,
parting the thorn bushes at the gate of our zareba, quickly slipped
out. My last glance showed me the unconscious Summerlee, most futile
of sentinels, still nodding away like a queer mechanical toy in front
of the smouldering fire.

I had not gone a hundred yards before I deeply repented my rashness.
I may have said somewhere in this chronicle that I am too imaginative
to be a really courageous man, but that I have an overpowering fear
of seeming afraid. This was the power which now carried me onwards.
I simply could not slink back with nothing done. Even if my comrades
should not have missed me, and should never know of my weakness, there
would still remain some intolerable self-shame in my own soul. And
yet I shuddered at the position in which I found myself, and would
have given all I possessed at that moment to have been honorably free
of the whole business.

It was dreadful in the forest. The trees grew so thickly and their
foliage spread so widely that I could see nothing of the moon-light
save that here and there the high branches made a tangled filigree
against the starry sky. As the eyes became more used to the obscurity
one learned that there were different degrees of darkness among the
trees\mbox{---}that some were dimly visible, while between and among
them there were coal-black shadowed patches, like the mouths of caves,
from which I shrank in horror as I passed. I thought of the despairing
yell of the tortured \textit{\emph{iguanodon}}\mbox{---}that dreadful
cry which had echoed through the woods. I thought, too, of the glimpse
I had in the light of Lord John's torch of that bloated, warty, blood-slavering
muzzle. Even now I was on its hunting-ground. At any instant it might
spring upon me from the shadows\mbox{---}this nameless and horrible
monster. I stopped, and, picking a cartridge from my pocket, I opened
the breech of my gun. As I touched the lever my heart leaped within
me. It was the shot-gun, not the rifle, which I had taken!

Again the impulse to return swept over me. Here, surely, was a most
excellent reason for my failure\mbox{---}one for which no one would
think the less of me. But again the foolish pride fought against that
very word. I could not\mbox{---}must not\mbox{---}fail. After
all, my rifle would probably have been as useless as a shot-gun against
such dangers as I might meet. If I were to go back to camp to change
my weapon I could hardly expect to enter and to leave again without
being seen. In that case there would be explanations, and my attempt
would no longer be all my own. After a little hesitation, then, I
screwed up my courage and continued upon my way, my useless gun under
my arm.

The darkness of the forest had been alarming, but even worse was the
white, still flood of moonlight in the open glade of the \textit{\emph{iguanodons}}.
Hid among the bushes, I looked out at it. None of the great brutes
were in sight. Perhaps the tragedy which had befallen one of them
had driven them from their feeding-ground. In the misty, silvery night
I could see no sign of any living thing. Taking courage, therefore,
I slipped rapidly across it, and among the jungle on the farther side
I picked up once again the brook which was my guide. It was a cheery
companion, gurgling and chuckling as it ran, like the dear old trout-stream
in the West Country where I have fished at night in my boyhood. So
long as I followed it down I must come to the lake, and so long as
I followed it back I must come to the camp. Often I had to lose sight
of it on account of the tangled brush-wood, but I was always within
earshot of its tinkle and splash.

As one descended the slope the woods became thinner, and bushes, with
occasional high trees, took the place of the forest. I could make
good progress, therefore, and I could see without being seen. I passed
close to the pterodactyl swamp, and as I did so, with a dry, crisp,
leathery rattle of wings, one of these great creatures\mbox{---}it
was twenty feet at least from tip to tip\mbox{---}rose up from somewhere
near me and soared into the air. As it passed across the face of the
moon the light shone clearly through the membranous wings, and it
looked like a flying skeleton against the white, tropical radiance.
I crouched low among the bushes, for I knew from past experience that
with a single cry the creature could bring a hundred of its loathsome
mates about my ears. It was not until it had settled again that I
dared to steal onwards upon my journey.

The night had been exceedingly still, but as I advanced I became conscious
of a low, rumbling sound, a continuous murmur, somewhere in front
of me. This grew louder as I proceeded, until at last it was clearly
quite close to me. When I stood still the sound was constant, so that
it seemed to come from some stationary cause. It was like a boiling
kettle or the bubbling of some great pot. Soon I came upon the source
of it, for in the center of a small clearing I found a lake\mbox{---}or
a pool, rather, for it was not larger than the basin of the Trafalgar
Square fountain\mbox{---}of some black, pitch-like stuff, the surface
of which rose and fell in great blisters of bursting gas. The air
above it was shimmering with heat, and the ground round was so hot
that I could hardly bear to lay my hand on it. It was clear that the
great volcanic outburst which had raised this strange plateau so many
years ago had not yet entirely spent its forces. Blackened rocks and
mounds of lava I had already seen everywhere peeping out from amid
the luxuriant vegetation which draped them, but this asphalt pool
in the jungle was the first sign that we had of actual existing activity
on the slopes of the ancient crater. I had no time to examine it further
for I had need to hurry if I were to be back in camp in the morning.

It was a fearsome walk, and one which will be with me so long as memory
holds. In the great moonlight clearings I slunk along among the shadows
on the margin. In the jungle I crept forward, stopping with a beating
heart whenever I heard, as I often did, the crash of breaking branches
as some wild beast went past. Now and then great shadows loomed up
for an instant and were gone\mbox{---}great, silent shadows which
seemed to prowl upon padded feet. How often I stopped with the intention
of returning, and yet every time my pride conquered my fear, and sent
me on again until my object should be attained.

At last (my watch showed that it was one in the morning) I saw the
gleam of water amid the openings of the jungle, and ten minutes later
I was among the reeds upon the borders of the central lake. I was
exceedingly dry, so I lay down and took a long draught of its waters,
which were fresh and cold. There was a broad pathway with many tracks
upon it at the spot which I had found, so that it was clearly one
of the drinking-places of the animals. Close to the water's edge there
was a huge isolated block of lava. Up this I climbed, and, lying on
the top, I had an excellent view in every direction.

The first thing which I saw filled me with amazement. When I described
the view from the summit of the great tree, I said that on the farther
cliff I could see a number of dark spots, which appeared to be the
mouths of caves. Now, as I looked up at the same cliffs, I saw discs
of light in every direction, ruddy, clearly-defined patches, like
the port-holes of a liner in the darkness. For a moment I thought
it was the lava-glow from some volcanic action; but this could not
be so. Any volcanic action would surely be down in the hollow and
not high among the rocks. What, then, was the alternative? It was
wonderful, and yet it must surely be. These ruddy spots must be the
reflection of fires within the caves\mbox{---}fires which could
only be lit by the hand of man. There were human beings, then, upon
the plateau. How gloriously my expedition was justified! Here was
news indeed for us to bear back with us to London!

For a long time I lay and watched these red, quivering blotches of
light. I suppose they were ten miles off from me, yet even at that
distance one could observe how, from time to time, they twinkled or
were obscured as someone passed before them. What would I not have
given to be able to crawl up to them, to peep in, and to take back
some word to my comrades as to the appearance and character of the
race who lived in so strange a place! It was out of the question for
the moment, and yet surely we could not leave the plateau until we
had some definite knowledge upon the point.

Lake Gladys\mbox{---}my own lake\mbox{---}lay like a sheet of
quicksilver before me, with a reflected moon shining brightly in the
center of it. It was shallow, for in many places I saw low sandbanks
protruding above the water. Everywhere upon the still surface I could
see signs of life, sometimes mere rings and ripples in the water,
sometimes the gleam of a great silver-sided fish in the air, sometimes
the arched, slate-colored back of some passing monster. Once upon
a yellow sandbank I saw a creature like a huge swan, with a clumsy
body and a high, flexible neck, shuffling about upon the margin. Presently
it plunged in, and for some time I could see the arched neck and darting
head undulating over the water. Then it dived, and I saw it no more.

My attention was soon drawn away from these distant sights and brought
back to what was going on at my very feet. Two creatures like large
armadillos had come down to the drinking-place, and were squatting
at the edge of the water, their long, flexible tongues like red ribbons
shooting in and out as they lapped. A huge deer, with branching horns,
a magnificent creature which carried itself like a king, came down
with its doe and two fawns and drank beside the armadillos. No such
deer exist anywhere else upon earth, for the moose or elks which I
have seen would hardly have reached its shoulders. Presently it gave
a warning snort, and was off with its family among the reeds, while
the armadillos also scuttled for shelter. A new-comer, a most monstrous
animal, was coming down the path.

For a moment I wondered where I could have seen that ungainly shape,
that arched back with triangular fringes along it, that strange bird-like
head held close to the ground. Then it came back, to me. It was the
stegosaurus\mbox{---}the very creature which Maple White had preserved
in his sketch-book, and which had been the first object which arrested
the attention of Challenger! There he was\mbox{---}perhaps the very
specimen which the American artist had encountered. The ground shook
beneath his tremendous weight, and his gulpings of water resounded
through the still night. For five minutes he was so close to my rock
that by stretching out my hand I could have touched the hideous waving
hackles upon his back. Then he lumbered away and was lost among the
boulders.

Looking at my watch, I saw that it was half-past two o'clock, and
high time, therefore, that I started upon my homeward journey. There
was no difficulty about the direction in which I should return for
all along I had kept the little brook upon my left, and it opened
into the central lake within a stone's-throw of the boulder upon which
I had been lying. I set off, therefore, in high spirits, for I felt
that I had done good work and was bringing back a fine budget of news
for my companions. Foremost of all, of course, were the sight of the
fiery caves and the certainty that some troglodytic race inhabited
them. But besides that I could speak from experience of the central
lake. I could testify that it was full of strange creatures, and I
had seen several land forms of primeval life which we had not before
encountered. I reflected as I walked that few men in the world could
have spent a stranger night or added more to human knowledge in the
course of it.

I was plodding up the slope, turning these thoughts over in my mind,
and had reached a point which may have been half-way to home, when
my mind was brought back to my own position by a strange noise behind
me. It was something between a snore and a growl, low, deep, and exceedingly
menacing. Some strange creature was evidently near me, but nothing
could be seen, so I hastened more rapidly upon my way. I had traversed
half a mile or so when suddenly the sound was repeated, still behind
me, but louder and more menacing than before. My heart stood still
within me as it flashed across me that the beast, whatever it was,
must surely be after \textit{me}. My skin grew cold and my hair rose
at the thought. That these monsters should tear each other to pieces
was a part of the strange struggle for existence, but that they should
turn upon modern man, that they should deliberately track and hunt
down the predominant human, was a staggering and fearsome thought.
I remembered again the blood-beslobbered face which we had seen in
the glare of Lord John's torch, like some horrible vision from the
deepest circle of Dante's hell. With my knees shaking beneath me,
I stood and glared with starting eyes down the moonlit path which
lay behind me. All was quiet as in a dream landscape. Silver clearings
and the black patches of the bushes\mbox{---}nothing else could
I see. Then from out of the silence, imminent and threatening, there
came once more that low, throaty croaking, far louder and closer than
before. There could no longer be a doubt. Something was on my trail,
and was closing in upon me every minute.

I stood like a man paralyzed, still staring at the ground which I
had traversed. Then suddenly I saw it. There was movement among the
bushes at the far end of the clearing which I had just traversed.
A great dark shadow disengaged itself and hopped out into the clear
moonlight. I say {}``hopped'' advisedly, for the beast moved like
a kangaroo, springing along in an erect position upon its powerful
hind legs, while its front ones were held bent in front of it. It
was of enormous size and power, like an erect elephant, but its movements,
in spite of its bulk, were exceedingly alert. For a moment, as I saw
its shape, I hoped that it was an \textit{\emph{iguanodon}}, which
I knew to be harmless, but, ignorant as I was, I soon saw that this
was a very different creature. Instead of the gentle, deer-shaped
head of the great three-toed leaf-eater, this beast had a broad, squat,
toad-like face like that which had alarmed us in our camp. His ferocious
cry and the horrible energy of his pursuit both assured me that this
was surely one of the great flesh-eating dinosaurs, the most terrible
beasts which have ever walked this earth. As the huge brute loped
along it dropped forward upon its fore-paws and brought its nose to
the ground every twenty yards or so. It was smelling out my trail.
Sometimes, for an instant, it was at fault. Then it would catch it
up again and come bounding swiftly along the path I had taken.

Even now when I think of that nightmare the sweat breaks out upon
my brow. What could I do? My useless fowling-piece was in my hand.
What help could I get from that? I looked desperately round for some
rock or tree, but I was in a bushy jungle with nothing higher than
a sapling within sight, while I knew that the creature behind me could
tear down an ordinary tree as though it were a reed. My only possible
chance lay in flight. I could not move swiftly over the rough, broken
ground, but as I looked round me in despair I saw a well-marked, hard-beaten
path which ran across in front of me. We had seen several of the sort,
the runs of various wild beasts, during our expeditions. Along this
I could perhaps hold my own, for I was a fast runner, and in excellent
condition. Flinging away my useless gun, I set myself to do such a
half-mile as I have never done before or since. My limbs ached, my
chest heaved, I felt that my throat would burst for want of air, and
yet with that horror behind me I ran and I ran and ran. At last I
paused, hardly able to move. For a moment I thought that I had thrown
him off. The path lay still behind me. And then suddenly, with a crashing
and a rending, a thudding of giant feet and a panting of monster lungs
the beast was upon me once more. He was at my very heels. I was lost.

Madman that I was to linger so long before I fled! Up to then he had
hunted by scent, and his movement was slow. But he had actually seen
me as I started to run. From then onwards he had hunted by sight,
for the path showed him where I had gone. Now, as he came round the
curve, he was springing in great bounds. The moonlight shone upon
his huge projecting eyes, the row of enormous teeth in his open mouth,
and the gleaming fringe of claws upon his short, powerful forearms.
With a scream of terror I turned and rushed wildly down the path.
Behind me the thick, gasping breathing of the creature sounded louder
and louder. His heavy footfall was beside me. Every instant I expected
to feel his grip upon my back. And then suddenly there came a crash\mbox{---}I
was falling through space, and everything beyond was darkness and
rest.

As I emerged from my un\-con\-s\-cious\-ness\mbox{---}which
could not, I think, have lasted more than a few minutes\mbox{---}I
was aware of a most dreadful and penetrating smell. Putting out my
hand in the darkness I came upon something which felt like a huge
lump of meat, while my other hand closed upon a large bone. Up above
me there was a circle of starlit sky, which showed me that I was lying
at the bottom of a deep pit. Slowly I staggered to my feet and felt
myself all over. I was stiff and sore from head to foot, but there
was no limb which would not move, no joint which would not bend. As
the circumstances of my fall came back into my confused brain, I looked
up in terror, expecting to see that dreadful head silhouetted against
the paling sky. There was no sign of the monster, however, nor could
I hear any sound from above. I began to walk slowly round, therefore,
feeling in every direction to find out what this strange place could
be into which I had been so opportunely precipitated.

It was, as I have said, a pit, with sharply-sloping walls and a level
bottom about twenty feet across. This bottom was littered with great
gobbets of flesh, most of which was in the last state of putridity.
The atmosphere was poisonous and horrible. After tripping and stumbling
over these lumps of decay, I came suddenly against something hard,
and I found that an upright post was firmly fixed in the center of
the hollow. It was so high that I could not reach the top of it with
my hand, and it appeared to be covered with grease.

Suddenly I remembered that I had a tin box of wax-\textit{\emph{vestas}}
in my pocket. Striking one of them, I was able at last to form some
opinion of this place into which I had fallen. There could be no question
as to its nature. It was a trap\mbox{---}made by the hand of man.
The post in the center, some nine feet long, was sharpened at the
upper end, and was black with the stale blood of the creatures who
had been impaled upon it. The remains scattered about were fragments
of the victims, which had been cut away in order to clear the stake
for the next who might blunder in. I remembered that Challenger had
declared that man could not exist upon the plateau, since with his
feeble weapons he could not hold his own against the monsters who
roamed over it. But now it was clear enough how it could be done.
In their narrow-mouthed caves the natives, whoever they might be,
had refuges into which the huge saurians could not penetrate, while
with their developed brains they were capable of setting such traps,
covered with branches, across the paths which marked the run of the
animals as would destroy them in spite of all their strength and activity.
Man was always the master.

The sloping wall of the pit was not difficult for an active man to
climb, but I hesitated long before I trusted myself within reach of
the dreadful creature which had so nearly destroyed me. How did I
know that he was not lurking in the nearest clump of bushes, waiting
for my reappearance? I took heart, however, as I recalled a conversation
between Challenger and Summerlee upon the habits of the great saurians.
Both were agreed that the monsters were practically brainless, that
there was no room for reason in their tiny cranial cavities, and that
if they have disappeared from the rest of the world it was assuredly
on account of their own stupidity, which made it impossible for them
to adapt themselves to changing conditions.

To lie in wait for me now would mean that the creature had appreciated
what had happened to me, and this in turn would argue some power connecting
cause and effect. Surely it was more likely that a brainless creature,
acting solely by vague predatory instinct, would give up the chase
when I disappeared, and, after a pause of astonishment, would wander
away in search of some other prey? I clambered to the edge of the
pit and looked over. The stars were fading, the sky was whitening,
and the cold wind of morning blew pleasantly upon my face. I could
see or hear nothing of my enemy. Slowly I climbed out and sat for
a while upon the ground, ready to spring back into my refuge if any
danger should appear. Then, reassured by the absolute stillness and
by the growing light, I took my courage in both hands and stole back
along the path which I had come. Some distance down it I picked up
my gun, and shortly afterwards struck the brook which was my guide.
So, with many a frightened backward glance, I made for home.

And suddenly there came something to remind me of my absent companions.
In the clear, still morning air there sounded far away the sharp,
hard note of a single rifle-shot. I paused and listened, but there
was nothing more. For a moment I was shocked at the thought that some
sudden danger might have befallen them. But then a simpler and more
natural explanation came to my mind. It was now broad daylight. No
doubt my absence had been noticed. They had imagined, that I was lost
in the woods, and had fired this shot to guide me home. It is true
that we had made a strict resolution against firing, but if it seemed
to them that I might be in danger they would not hesitate. It was
for me now to hurry on as fast as possible, and so to reassure them.

I was weary and spent, so my progress was not so fast as I wished;
but at last I came into regions which I knew. There was the swamp
of the pterodactyls upon my left; there in front of me was the glade
of the \textit{\emph{iguanodons}}. Now I was in the last belt of trees
which separated me from Fort Challenger. I raised my voice in a cheery
shout to allay their fears. No answering greeting came back to me.
My heart sank at that ominous stillness. I quickened my pace into
a run. The zareba rose before me, even as I had left it, but the gate
was open. I rushed in. In the cold, morning light it was a fearful
sight which met my eyes. Our effects were scattered in wild confusion
over the ground; my comrades had disappeared, and close to the smouldering
ashes of our fire the grass was stained crimson with a hideous pool
of blood.

I was so stunned by this sudden shock that for a time I must have
nearly lost my reason. I have a vague recollection, as one remembers
a bad dream, of rushing about through the woods all round the empty
camp, calling wildly for my companions. No answer came back from the
silent shadows. The horrible thought that I might never see them again,
that I might find myself abandoned all alone in that dreadful place,
with no possible way of descending into the world below, that I might
live and die in that nightmare country, drove me to desperation. I
could have torn my hair and beaten my head in my despair. Only now
did I realize how I had learned to lean upon my companions, upon the
serene self-confidence of Challenger, and upon the masterful, humorous
coolness of Lord John Roxton. Without them I was like a child in the
dark, helpless and powerless. I did not know which way to turn or
what I should do first.

After a period, during which I sat in bewilderment, I set myself to
try and discover what sudden misfortune could have befallen my companions.
The whole disordered appearance of the camp showed that there had
been some sort of attack, and the rifle-shot no doubt marked the time
when it had occurred. That there should have been only one shot showed
that it had been all over in an instant. The rifles still lay upon
the ground, and one of them\mbox{---}Lord John's\mbox{---}had
the empty cartridge in the breech. The blankets of Challenger and
of Summerlee beside the fire suggested that they had been asleep at
the time. The cases of ammunition and of food were scattered about
in a wild litter, together with our unfortunate cameras and plate-carriers,
but none of them were missing. On the other hand, all the exposed
provisions\mbox{---}and I remembered that there were a considerable
quantity of them\mbox{---}were gone. They were animals, then, and
not natives, who had made the inroad, for surely the latter would
have left nothing behind.

But if animals, or some single terrible animal, then what had become
of my comrades? A ferocious beast would surely have destroyed them
and left their remains. It is true that there was that one hideous
pool of blood, which told of violence. Such a monster as had pursued
me during the night could have carried away a victim as easily as
a cat would a mouse. In that case the others would have followed in
pursuit. But then they would assuredly have taken their rifles with
them. The more I tried to think it out with my confused and weary
brain the less could I find any plausible explanation. I searched
round in the forest, but could see no tracks which could help me to
a conclusion. Once I lost myself, and it was only by good luck, and
after an hour of wandering, that I found the camp once more.

Suddenly a thought came to me and brought some little comfort to my
heart. I was not absolutely alone in the world. Down at the bottom
of the cliff, and within call of me, was waiting the faithful Zambo.
I went to the edge of the plateau and looked over. Sure enough, he
was squatting among his blankets beside his fire in his little camp.
But, to my amazement, a second man was seated in front of him. For
an instant my heart leaped for joy, as I thought that one of my comrades
had made his way safely down. But a second glance dispelled the hope.
The rising sun shone red upon the man's skin. He was an Indian. I
shouted loudly and waved my handkerchief. Presently Zambo looked up,
waved his hand, and turned to ascend the pinnacle. In a short time
he was standing close to me and listening with deep distress to the
story which I told him.

{}``Devil got them for sure, Massa Malone,'' said he. {}``You got
into the devil's country, \textit{\emph{sah}}, and he take you all
to himself. You take advice, Massa Malone, and come down quick, else
he get you as well.''

{}``How can I come down, Zambo?''\ 

{}``You get creepers from trees, Massa Malone. Throw them over here.
I make fast to this stump, and so you have bridge.''

{}``We have thought of that. There are no creepers here which could
bear us.''

{}``Send for ropes, Massa Malone.''

{}``Who can I send, and where?''\ 

{}``Send to Indian villages, \textit{\emph{sah}}. Plenty hide rope
in Indian village. Indian down below; send him.''

{}``Who is he?''

{}``One of our Indians. Other ones beat him and take away his pay.
He come back to us. Ready now to take letter, bring rope,\mbox{---}anything.''

To take a letter! Why not? Perhaps he might bring help; but in any
case he would ensure that our lives were not spent for nothing, and
that news of all that we had won for Science should reach our friends
at home. I had two completed letters already waiting. I would spend
the day in writing a third, which would bring my experiences absolutely
up to date. The Indian could bear this back to the world. I ordered
Zambo, therefore, to come again in the evening, and I spent my miserable
and lonely day in recording my own adventures of the night before.
I also drew up a note, to be given to any white merchant or captain
of a steam-boat whom the Indian could find, imploring them to see
that ropes were sent to us, since our lives must depend upon it. These
documents I threw to Zambo in the evening, and also my purse, which
contained three English sovereigns. These were to be given to the
Indian, and he was promised twice as much if he returned with the
ropes.

So now you will understand, my dear Mr.\ McArdle, how this communication
reaches you, and you will also know the truth, in case you never hear
again from your unfortunate correspondent. To-night I am too weary
and too depressed to make my plans. To-morrow I must think out some
way by which I shall keep in touch with this camp, and yet search
round for any traces of my unhappy friends.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XIII. {}``A Sight Which I Shall Never Forget''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``A Sight Which I Shall Never
Forget''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``A Sight Which I Shall Never Forget''}

Just as the sun was setting upon that melancholy night I saw the lonely
figure of the Indian upon the vast plain beneath me, and I watched
him, our one faint hope of salvation, until he disappeared in the
rising mists of evening which lay, rose-tinted from the setting sun,
between the far-off river and me.

It was quite dark when I at last turned back to our stricken camp,
and my last vision as I went was the red gleam of Zambo's fire, the
one point of light in the wide world below, as was his faithful presence
in my own shadowed soul. And yet I felt happier than I had done since
this crushing blow had fallen upon me, for it was good to think that
the world should know what we had done, so that at the worst our names
should not perish with our bodies, but should go down to posterity
associated with the result of our labors.

It was an awesome thing to sleep in that ill-fated camp; and yet it
was even more unnerving to do so in the jungle. One or the other it
must be. Prudence, on the one hand, warned me that I should remain
on guard, but exhausted Nature, on the other, declared that I should
do nothing of the kind. I climbed up on to a limb of the great gingko
tree, but there was no secure perch on its rounded surface, and I
should certainly have fallen off and broken my neck the moment I began
to doze. I got down, therefore, and pondered over what I should do.
Finally, I closed the door of the zareba, lit three separate fires
in a triangle, and having eaten a hearty supper dropped off into a
profound sleep, from which I had a strange and most welcome awakening.
In the early morning, just as day was breaking, a hand was laid upon
my arm, and starting up, with all my nerves in a tingle and my hand
feeling for a rifle, I gave a cry of joy as in the cold gray light
I saw Lord John Roxton kneeling beside me.

It was he\mbox{---}and yet it was not he. I had left him calm in
his bearing, correct in his person, prim in his dress. Now he was
pale and wild-eyed, gasping as he breathed like one who has run far
and fast. His gaunt face was scratched and bloody, his clothes were
hanging in rags, and his hat was gone. I stared in amazement, but
he gave me no chance for questions. He was grabbing at our stores
all the time he spoke.

{}``Quick, young fellah! Quick!''\ he cried. {}``Every moment
counts. Get the rifles, both of them. I have the other two. Now, all
the cartridges you can gather. Fill up your pockets. Now, some food.
Half a dozen tins will do. That's all right! Don't wait to talk or
think. Get a move on, or we are done!''\ 

Still half-awake, and unable to imagine what it all might mean, I
found myself hurrying madly after him through the wood, a rifle under
each arm and a pile of various stores in my hands. He dodged in and
out through the thickest of the scrub until he came to a dense clump
of brush-wood. Into this he rushed, regardless of thorns, and threw
himself into the heart of it, pulling me down by his side.

{}``There!''\ he panted. {}``I think we are safe here. They'll
make for the camp as sure as fate. It will be their first idea. But
this should puzzle 'em.''

{}``What is it all?''\ I asked, when I had got my breath. {}``Where
are the professors? And who is it that is after us?''\ 

{}``The ape-men,'' he cried. {}``My God, what brutes! Don't raise
your voice, for they have long ears\mbox{---}sharp eyes, too, but
no power of scent, so far as I could judge, so I don't think they
can sniff us out. Where have you been, young fellah? You were well
out of it.''

In a few sentences I whispered what I had done.

{}``Pretty bad,'' said he, when he had heard of the dinosaur and
the pit. {}``It isn't quite the place for a rest cure. What? But
I had no idea what its possibilities were until those devils got hold
of us. The man-eatin' Papuans had me once, but they are Chesterfields
compared to this crowd.''

{}``How did it happen?''\ I asked.

{}``It was in the early mornin'. Our learned friends were just stirrin'.
Hadn't even begun to argue yet. Suddenly it rained apes. They came
down as thick as apples out of a tree. They had been assemblin' in
the dark, I suppose, until that great tree over our heads was heavy
with them. I shot one of them through the belly, but before we knew
where we were they had us spread-eagled on our backs. I call them
apes, but they carried sticks and stones in their hands and jabbered
talk to each other, and ended up by tyin' our hands with creepers,
so they are ahead of any beast that I have seen in my wanderin's.
Ape-men\mbox{---}that's what they are\mbox{---}Missin' Links,
and I wish they had stayed missin'. They carried off their wounded
comrade\mbox{---}he was bleedin' like a pig\mbox{---}and then
they sat around us, and if ever I saw frozen murder it was in their
faces. They were big fellows, as big as a man and a deal stronger.
Curious glassy gray eyes they have, under red tufts, and they just
sat and gloated and gloated. Challenger is no chicken, but even he
was cowed. He managed to struggle to his feet, and yelled out at them
to have done with it and get it over. I think he had gone a bit off
his head at the suddenness of it, for he raged and cursed at them
like a lunatic. If they had been a row of his favorite Pressmen he
could not have slanged them worse.''

{}``Well, what did they do?''\ I was enthralled by the strange
story which my companion was whispering into my ear, while all the
time his keen eyes were shooting in every direction and his hand grasping
his cocked rifle.

{}``I thought it was the end of us, but instead of that it started
them on a new line. They all jabbered and chattered together. Then
one of them stood out beside Challenger. You'll smile, young fellah,
but 'pon my word they might have been kinsmen. I couldn't have believed
it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. This old ape-man\mbox{---}he
was their chief\mbox{---}was a sort of red Challenger, with every
one of our friend's beauty points, only just a trifle more so. He
had the short body, the big shoulders, the round chest, no neck, a
great ruddy frill of a beard, the tufted eyebrows, the `What do you
want, damn you!' look about the eyes, and the whole catalogue. When
the ape-man stood by Challenger and put his paw on his shoulder, the
thing was complete. Summerlee was a bit hysterical, and he laughed
till he cried. The ape-men laughed too\mbox{---}or at least they
put up the devil of a cacklin'\mbox{---}and they set to work to
drag us off through the forest. They wouldn't touch the guns and things\mbox{---}thought
them dangerous, I expect\mbox{---}but they carried away all our
loose food. Summerlee and I got some rough handlin' on the way\mbox{---}there's
my skin and my clothes to prove it\mbox{---}for they took us a bee-line
through the brambles, and their own hides are like leather. But Challenger
was all right. Four of them carried him shoulder high, and he went
like a Roman emperor. What's that?''\ 

It was a strange clicking noise in the distance not unlike castanets.

{}``There they go!''\ said my companion, slipping cartridges into
the second double barrelled {}``Express.'' {}``Load them all up,
young fellah my lad, for we're not going to be taken alive, and don't
you think it! That's the row they make when they are excited. By George!
they'll have something to excite them if they put us up. The `Last
Stand of the Grays' won't be in it.\  `With their rifles grasped
in their stiffened hands, mid a ring of the dead and dyin',' as some
fathead sings. Can you hear them now?''\ 

{}``Very far away.''

{}``That little lot will do no good, but I expect their search parties
are all over the wood. Well, I was telling you my tale of woe. They
got us soon to this town of theirs\mbox{---}about a thousand huts
of branches and leaves in a great grove of trees near the edge of
the cliff. It's three or four miles from here. The filthy beasts fingered
me all over, and I feel as if I should never be clean again. They
tied us up\mbox{---}the fellow who handled me could tie like a bosun\mbox{---}and
there we lay with our toes up, beneath a tree, while a great brute
stood guard over us with a club in his hand. When I say `we' I mean
Summerlee and myself. Old Challenger was up a tree, eatin' pines and
havin' the time of his life. I'm bound to say that he managed to get
some fruit to us, and with his own hands he loosened our bonds. If
you'd seen him sitting up in that tree hob-nobbin' with his twin brother\mbox{---}and
singin' in that rollin' bass of his, `Ring out, wild bells,' cause
music of any kind seemed to put 'em in a good humor, you'd have smiled;
but we weren't in much mood for laughin', as you can guess. They were
inclined, within limits, to let him do what he liked, but they drew
the line pretty sharply at us. It was a mighty consolation to us all
to know that you were runnin' loose and had the archives in your keepin'.

{}``Well, now, young fellah, I'll tell you what will surprise you.
You say you saw signs of men, and fires, traps, and the like. Well,
we have seen the natives themselves. Poor devils they were, down-faced
little chaps, and had enough to make them so. It seems that the humans
hold one side of this plateau\mbox{---}over yonder, where you saw
the caves\mbox{---}and the ape-men hold this side, and there is
bloody war between them all the time. That's the situation, so far
as I could follow it. Well, yesterday the ape-men got hold of a dozen
of the humans and brought them in as prisoners. You never heard such
a jabberin' and shriekin' in your life. The men were little red fellows,
and had been bitten and clawed so that they could hardly walk. The
ape-men put two of them to death there and then\mbox{---}fairly
pulled the arm off one of them\mbox{---}it was perfectly beastly.
Plucky little chaps they are, and hardly gave a squeak. But it turned
us absolutely sick. Summerlee fainted, and even Challenger had as
much as he could stand. I think they have cleared, don't you?''\ 

We listened intently, but nothing save the calling of the birds broke
the deep peace of the forest. Lord Roxton went on with his story.

{}``I think you have had the escape of your life, young fellah my
lad. It was catchin' those Indians that put you clean out of their
heads, else they would have been back to the camp for you as sure
as fate and gathered you in. Of course, as you said, they have been
watchin' us from the beginnin' out of that tree, and they knew perfectly
well that we were one short. However, they could think only of this
new haul; so it was I, and not a bunch of apes, that dropped in on
you in the morning. Well, we had a horrid business afterwards. My
God! what a nightmare the whole thing is! You remember the great bristle
of sharp canes down below where we found the skeleton of the American?
Well, that is just under ape-town, and that's the jumpin'-off place
of their prisoners. I expect there's heaps of skeletons there, if
we looked for 'em. They have a sort of clear parade-ground on the
top, and they make a proper ceremony about it. One by one the poor
devils have to jump, and the game is to see whether they are merely
dashed to pieces or whether they get skewered on the canes. They took
us out to see it, and the whole tribe lined up on the edge. Four of
the Indians jumped, and the canes went through 'em like knittin' needles
through a pat of butter. No wonder we found that poor Yankee's skeleton
with the canes growin' between his ribs. It was horrible\mbox{---}but
it was doocedly interestin' too. We were all fascinated to see them
take the dive, even when we thought it would be our turn next on the
spring-board.

{}``Well, it wasn't. They kept six of the Indians up for to-day\mbox{---}that's
how I understood it\mbox{---}but I fancy we were to be the star
performers in the show. Challenger might get off, but Summerlee and
I were in the bill. Their language is more than half signs, and it
was not hard to follow them. So I thought it was time we made a break
for it. I had been plottin' it out a bit, and had one or two things
clear in my mind. It was all on me, for Summerlee was useless and
Challenger not much better. The only time they got together they got
slangin' because they couldn't agree upon the scientific classification
of these red-headed devils that had got hold of us. One said it was
the dryopithecus of Java, the other said it was pithecanthropus. Madness,
I call it\mbox{---}Loonies, both. But, as I say, I had thought out
one or two points that were helpful. One was that these brutes could
not run as fast as a man in the open. They have short, bandy legs,
you see, and heavy bodies. Even Challenger could give a few yards
in a hundred to the best of them, and you or I would be a perfect
Shrubb. Another point was that they knew nothin' about guns. I don't
believe they ever understood how the fellow I shot came by his hurt.
If we could get at our guns there was no sayin' what we could do.

{}``So I broke away early this mornin', gave my guard a kick in the
tummy that laid him out, and sprinted for the camp. There I got you
and the guns, and here we are.''

{}``But the professors!''\ I cried, in consternation.

{}``Well, we must just go back and fetch 'em. I couldn't bring 'em
with me. Challenger was up the tree, and Summerlee was not fit for
the effort. The only chance was to get the guns and try a rescue.
Of course they may scupper them at once in revenge. I don't think
they would touch Challenger, but I wouldn't answer for Summerlee.
But they would have had him in any case. Of that I am certain. So
I haven't made matters any worse by boltin'. But we are honor bound
to go back and have them out or see it through with them. So you can
make up your soul, young fellah my lad, for it will be one way or
the other before evenin'.''

I have tried to imitate here Lord Roxton's jerky talk, his short,
strong sentences, the half-humorous, half-reckless tone that ran through
it all. But he was a born leader. As danger thickened his jaunty manner
would increase, his speech become more racy, his cold eyes glitter
into ardent life, and his Don Quixote moustache bristle with joyous
excitement. His love of danger, his intense appreciation of the drama
of an adventure\mbox{---}all the more intense for being held tightly
in\mbox{---}his consistent view that every peril in life is a form
of sport, a fierce game betwixt you and Fate, with Death as a forfeit,
made him a wonderful companion at such hours. If it were not for our
fears as to the fate of our companions, it would have been a positive
joy to throw myself with such a man into such an affair. We were rising
from our brushwood hiding-place when suddenly I felt his grip upon
my arm.

{}``By George!''\ he whispered, {}``here they come!''\ 

From where we lay we could look down a brown aisle, arched with green,
formed by the trunks and branches. Along this a party of the ape-men
were passing. They went in single file, with bent legs and rounded
backs, their hands occasionally touching the ground, their heads turning
to left and right as they trotted along. Their crouching gait took
away from their height, but I should put them at five feet or so,
with long arms and enormous chests. Many of them carried sticks, and
at the distance they looked like a line of very hairy and deformed
human beings. For a moment I caught this clear glimpse of them. Then
they were lost among the bushes.

{}``Not this time,'' said Lord John, who had caught up his rifle.
{}``Our best chance is to lie quiet until they have given up the
search. Then we shall see whether we can't get back to their town
and hit 'em where it hurts most. Give 'em an hour and we'll march.''

We filled in the time by opening one of our food tins and making sure
of our breakfast. Lord Roxton had had nothing but some fruit since
the morning before and ate like a starving man. Then, at last, our
pockets bulging with cartridges and a rifle in each hand, we started
off upon our mission of rescue. Before leaving it we carefully marked
our little hiding-place among the brush-wood and its bearing to Fort
Challenger, that we might find it again if we needed it. We slunk
through the bushes in silence until we came to the very edge of the
cliff, close to the old camp. There we halted, and Lord John gave
me some idea of his plans.

{}``So long as we are among the thick trees these swine are our masters,''
said he. {}``They can see us and we cannot see them. But in the open
it is different. There we can move faster than they. So we must stick
to the open all we can. The edge of the plateau has fewer large trees
than further inland. So that's our line of advance. Go slowly, keep
your eyes open and your rifle ready. Above all, never let them get
you prisoner while there is a cartridge left\mbox{---}that's my
last word to you, young fellah.''

When we reached the edge of the cliff I looked over and saw our good
old black Zambo sitting smoking on a rock below us. I would have given
a great deal to have hailed him and told him how we were placed, but
it was too dangerous, lest we should be heard. The woods seemed to
be full of the ape-men; again and again we heard their curious clicking
chatter. At such times we plunged into the nearest clump of bushes
and lay still until the sound had passed away. Our advance, therefore,
was very slow, and two hours at least must have passed before I saw
by Lord John's cautious movements that we must be close to our destination.
He motioned to me to lie still, and he crawled forward himself. In
a minute he was back again, his face quivering with eagerness.

{}``Come!''\ said he. {}``Come quick! I hope to the Lord we are
not too late already!

I found myself shaking with nervous excitement as I scrambled forward
and lay down beside him, looking out through the bushes at a clearing
which stretched before us.

It was a sight which I shall never forget until my dying day\mbox{---}so
weird, so impossible, that I do not know how I am to make you realize
it, or how in a few years I shall bring myself to believe in it if
I live to sit once more on a lounge in the Savage Club and look out
on the drab solidity of the Embankment. I know that it will seem then
to be some wild nightmare, some delirium of fever. Yet I will set
it down now, while it is still fresh in my memory, and one at least,
the man who lay in the damp grasses by my side, will know if I have
lied.

A wide, open space lay before us\mbox{---}some hundreds of yards
across\mbox{---}all green turf and low bracken growing to the very
edge of the cliff. Round this clearing there was a semi-circle of
trees with curious huts built of foliage piled one above the other
among the branches. A rookery, with every nest a little house, would
best convey the idea. The openings of these huts and the branches
of the trees were thronged with a dense mob of ape-people, whom from
their size I took to be the females and infants of the tribe. They
formed the background of the picture, and were all looking out with
eager interest at the same scene which fascinated and bewildered us.

In the open, and near the edge of the cliff, there had assembled a
crowd of some hundred of these shaggy, red-haired creatures, many
of them of immense size, and all of them horrible to look upon. There
was a certain discipline among them, for none of them attempted to
break the line which had been formed. In front there stood a small
group of Indians\mbox{---}little, clean-limbed, red fellows, whose
skins glowed like polished bronze in the strong sunlight. A tall,
thin white man was standing beside them, his head bowed, his arms
folded, his whole attitude expressive of his horror and dejection.
There was no mistaking the angular form of Professor Summerlee.

In front of and around this dejected group of prisoners were several
ape-men, who watched them closely and made all escape impossible.
Then, right out from all the others and close to the edge of the cliff,
were two figures, so strange, and under other circumstances so ludicrous,
that they absorbed my attention. The one was our comrade, Professor
Challenger. The remains of his coat still hung in strips from his
shoulders, but his shirt had been all torn out, and his great beard
merged itself in the black tangle which covered his mighty chest.
He had lost his hat, and his hair, which had grown long in our wanderings,
was flying in wild disorder. A single day seemed to have changed him
from the highest product of modern civilization to the most desperate
savage in South America. Beside him stood his master, the king of
the ape-men. In all things he was, as Lord John had said, the very
image of our Professor, save that his coloring was red instead of
black. The same short, broad figure, the same heavy shoulders, the
same forward hang of the arms, the same bristling beard merging itself
in the hairy chest. Only above the eyebrows, where the sloping forehead
and low, curved skull of the ape-man were in sharp contrast to the
broad brow and magnificent cranium of the European, could one see
any marked difference. At every other point the king was an absurd
parody of the Professor.

All this, which takes me so long to describe, impressed itself upon
me in a few seconds. Then we had very different things to think of,
for an active drama was in progress. Two of the ape-men had seized
one of the Indians out of the group and dragged him forward to the
edge of the cliff. The king raised his hand as a signal. They caught
the man by his leg and arm, and swung him three times backwards and
forwards with tremendous violence. Then, with a frightful heave they
shot the poor wretch over the precipice. With such force did they
throw him that he curved high in the air before beginning to drop.
As he vanished from sight, the whole assembly, except the guards,
rushed forward to the edge of the precipice, and there was a long
pause of absolute silence, broken by a mad yell of delight. They sprang
about, tossing their long, hairy arms in the air and howling with
exultation. Then they fell back from the edge, formed themselves again
into line, and waited for the next victim.

This time it was Summerlee. Two of his guards caught him by the wrists
and pulled him brutally to the front. His thin figure and long limbs
struggled and fluttered like a chicken being dragged from a coop.
Challenger had turned to the king and waved his hands frantically
before him. He was begging, pleading, imploring for his comrade's
life. The ape-man pushed him roughly aside and shook his head. It
was the last conscious movement he was to make upon earth. Lord John's
rifle cracked, and the king sank down, a tangled red sprawling thing,
upon the ground.

{}``Shoot into the thick of them! Shoot! sonny, shoot!''\ cried
my companion.

There are strange red depths in the soul of the most commonplace man.
I am tenderhearted by nature, and have found my eyes moist many a
time over the scream of a wounded hare. Yet the blood lust was on
me now. I found myself on my feet emptying one magazine, then the
other, clicking open the breech to re-load, snapping it to again,
while cheering and yelling with pure ferocity and joy of slaughter
as I did so. With our four guns the two of us made a horrible havoc.
Both the guards who held Summerlee were down, and he was staggering
about like a drunken man in his amazement, unable to realize that
he was a free man. The dense mob of ape-men ran about in bewilderment,
marveling whence this storm of death was coming or what it might mean.
They waved, gesticulated, screamed, and tripped up over those who
had fallen. Then, with a sudden impulse, they all rushed in a howling
crowd to the trees for shelter, leaving the ground behind them spotted
with their stricken comrades. The prisoners were left for the moment
standing alone in the middle of the clearing.

Challenger's quick brain had grasped the situation. He seized the
bewildered Summerlee by the arm, and they both ran towards us. Two
of their guards bounded after them and fell to two bullets from Lord
John. We ran forward into the open to meet our friends, and pressed
a loaded rifle into the hands of each. But Summerlee was at the end
of his strength. He could hardly totter. Already the ape-men were
recovering from their panic. They were coming through the brushwood
and threatening to cut us off. Challenger and I ran Summerlee along,
one at each of his elbows, while Lord John covered our retreat, firing
again and again as savage heads snarled at us out of the bushes. For
a mile or more the chattering brutes were at our very heels. Then
the pursuit slackened, for they learned our power and would no longer
face that unerring rifle. When we had at last reached the camp, we
looked back and found ourselves alone.

So it seemed to us; and yet we were mistaken. We had hardly closed
the thornbush door of our zareba, clasped each other's hands, and
thrown ourselves panting upon the ground beside our spring, when we
heard a patter of feet and then a gentle, plaintive crying from outside
our entrance. Lord Roxton rushed forward, rifle in hand, and threw
it open. There, prostrate upon their faces, lay the little red figures
of the four surviving Indians, trembling with fear of us and yet imploring
our protection. With an expressive sweep of his hands one of them
pointed to the woods around them, and indicated that they were full
of danger. Then, darting forward, he threw his arms round Lord John's
legs, and rested his face upon them.

{}``By George!''\ cried our peer, pulling at his moustache in great
perplexity, {}``I say\mbox{---}what the deuce are we to do with
these people? Get up, little chappie, and take your face off my boots.''

Summerlee was sitting up and stuffing some tobacco into his old briar.

{}``We've got to see them safe,'' said he. {}``You've pulled us
all out of the jaws of death. My word! it was a good bit of work!''\ 

{}``Admirable!''\ cried Challenger. {}``Admir\-a\-ble! Not only
we as individuals, but European science collectively, owe you a deep
debt of gratitude for what you have done. I do not hesitate to say
that the disappearance of Professor Summerlee and myself would have
left an appreciable gap in modern zoological history. Our young friend
here and you have done most excellently well.''

He beamed at us with the old paternal smile, but European science
would have been somewhat amazed could they have seen their chosen
child, the hope of the future, with his tangled, unkempt head, his
bare chest, and his tattered clothes. He had one of the meat-tins
between his knees, and sat with a large piece of cold Australian mutton
between his fingers. The Indian looked up at him, and then, with a
little yelp, cringed to the ground and clung to Lord John's leg.

{}``Don't you be scared, my bonnie boy,'' said Lord John, patting
the matted head in front of him. {}``He can't stick your appearance,
Challenger; and, by George! I don't wonder. All right, little chap,
he's only a human, just the same as the rest of us.''

{}``Really, sir!''\ cried the Professor.

{}``Well, it's lucky for you, Challenger, that you \textit{are} a
little out of the ordinary. If you hadn't been so like the king\mbox{---}''

{}``Upon my word, Lord John, you allow yourself great latitude.''

{}``Well, it's a fact.''

{}``I beg, sir, that you will change the subject. Your remarks are
irrelevant and unintelligible. The question before us is what are
we to do with these Indians? The obvious thing is to escort them home,
if we knew where their home was.''

{}``There is no difficulty about that,'' said I. {}``They live
in the caves on the other side of the central lake.''

{}``Our young friend here knows where they live. I gather that it
is some distance.''

{}``A good twenty miles,'' said I.

Summerlee gave a groan.

{}``I, for one, could never get there. Surely I hear those brutes
still howling upon our track.''

As he spoke, from the dark recesses of the woods we heard far away
the jabbering cry of the ape-men. The Indians once more set up a feeble
wail of fear.

{}``We must move, and move quick!''\ said Lord John. {}``You help
Summerlee, young fellah. These Indians will carry stores. Now, then,
come along before they can see us.''

In less than half-an-hour we had reached our brushwood retreat and
concealed ourselves. All day we heard the excited calling of the ape-men
in the direction of our old camp, but none of them came our way, and
the tired fugitives, red and white, had a long, deep sleep. I was
dozing myself in the evening when someone plucked my sleeve, and I
found Challenger kneeling beside me.

{}``You keep a diary of these events, and you expect eventually to
publish it, Mr.\ Malone,'' said he, with solemnity.

{}``I am only here as a Press reporter,'' I answered.

{}``Exactly. You may have heard some rather fatuous remarks of Lord
John Roxton's which seemed to imply that there was some\mbox{---}some
resemblance\mbox{---}''

{}``Yes, I heard them.''

{}``I need not say that any publicity given to such an idea\mbox{---}any
levity in your narrative of what occurred\mbox{---}would be exceedingly
offensive to me.''

{}``I will keep well within the truth.''

{}``Lord John's observations are frequently exceedingly fanciful,
and he is capable of attributing the most absurd reasons to the respect
which is always shown by the most undeveloped races to dignity and
character. You follow my meaning?''\ 

{}``Entirely.''

{}``I leave the matter to your discretion.'' Then, after a long
pause, he added: {}``The king of the ape-men was really a creature
of great distinction\mbox{---}a most remarkably handsome and intelligent
personality. Did it not strike you?''\ 

{}``A most remarkable creature,'' said I.

And the Professor, much eased in his mind, settled down to his slumber
once more.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XIV. {}``Those Were the Real Conquests''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``Those Were the Real Conquests''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Those Were the Real Conquests''}

We had imagined that our pursuers, the ape-men, knew nothing of our
brush-wood hiding-place, but we were soon to find out our mistake.
There was no sound in the woods\mbox{---}not a leaf moved upon the
trees, and all was peace around us\mbox{---}but we should have been
warned by our first experience how cunningly and how patiently these
creatures can watch and wait until their chance comes. Whatever fate
may be mine through life, I am very sure that I shall never be nearer
death than I was that morning. But I will tell you the thing in its
due order.

We all awoke exhausted after the terrific emotions and scanty food
of yesterday. Summerlee was still so weak that it was an effort for
him to stand; but the old man was full of a sort of surly courage
which would never admit defeat. A council was held, and it was agreed
that we should wait quietly for an hour or two where we were, have
our much-needed breakfast, and then make our way across the plateau
and round the central lake to the caves where my observations had
shown that the Indians lived. We relied upon the fact that we could
count upon the good word of those whom we had rescued to ensure a
warm welcome from their fellows. Then, with our mission accomplished
and possessing a fuller knowledge of the secrets of Maple White Land,
we should turn our whole thoughts to the vital problem of our escape
and return. Even Challenger was ready to admit that we should then
have done all for which we had come, and that our first duty from
that time onwards was to carry back to civilization the amazing discoveries
we had made.

We were able now to take a more leisurely view of the Indians whom
we had rescued. They were small men, wiry, active, and well-built,
with lank black hair tied up in a bunch behind their heads with a
leathern thong, and leathern also were their loin-clothes. Their faces
were hairless, well formed, and good-humored. The lobes of their ears,
hanging ragged and bloody, showed that they had been pierced for some
ornaments which their captors had torn out. Their speech, though unintelligible
to us, was fluent among themselves, and as they pointed to each other
and uttered the word {}``Accala'' many times over, we gathered that
this was the name of the nation. Occasionally, with faces which were
convulsed with fear and hatred, they shook their clenched hands at
the woods round and cried: {}``Doda! Doda!''\ which was surely
their term for their enemies.

What do you make of them, Challenger?''\ asked Lord John. {}``One
thing is very clear to me, and that is that the little chap with the
front of his head shaved is a chief among them.''

It was indeed evident that this man stood apart from the others, and
that they never ventured to address him without every sign of deep
respect. He seemed to be the youngest of them all, and yet, so proud
and high was his spirit that, upon Challenger laying his great hand
upon his head, he started like a spurred horse and, with a quick flash
of his dark eyes, moved further away from the Professor. Then, placing
his hand upon his breast and holding himself with great dignity, he
uttered the word {}``\textit{\emph{Maretas}}'' several times. The
Professor, unabashed, seized the nearest Indian by the shoulder and
proceeded to lecture upon him as if he were a potted specimen in a
class-room.

{}``The type of these people,'' said he in his sonorous fashion,
{}``whether judged by cranial capacity, facial angle, or any other
test, cannot be regarded as a low one; on the contrary, we must place
it as considerably higher in the scale than many South American tribes
which I can mention. On no possible supposition can we explain the
evolution of such a race in this place. For that matter, so great
a gap separates these ape-men from the primitive animals which have
survived upon this plateau, that it is inadmissible to think that
they could have developed where we find them.''

{}``Then where the dooce did they drop from?''\ asked Lord John.

{}``A question which will, no doubt, be eagerly discussed in every
scientific society in Europe and America,'' the Professor answered.
{}``My own reading of the situation for what it is worth\mbox{---}''he
inflated his chest enormously and looked insolently around him at
the words\mbox{---}{}``is that evolution has advanced under the
peculiar conditions of this country up to the vertebrate stage, the
old types surviving and living on in company with the newer ones.
Thus we find such modern creatures as the tapir\mbox{---}an animal
with quite a respectable length of pedigree\mbox{---}the great deer,
and the ant-eater in the companionship of reptilian forms of jurassic
type. So much is clear. And now come the ape-men and the Indian. What
is the scientific mind to think of their presence? I can only account
for it by an invasion from outside. It is probable that there existed
an anthropoid ape in South America, who in past ages found his way
to this place, and that he developed into the creatures we have seen,
some of which''\mbox{---}here he looked hard at me\mbox{---}{}``were
of an appearance and shape which, if it had been accompanied by corresponding
intelligence, would, I do not hesitate to say, have reflected credit
upon any living race. As to the Indians I cannot doubt that they are
more recent immigrants from below. Under the stress of famine or of
conquest they have made their way up here. Faced by ferocious creatures
which they had never before seen, they took refuge in the caves which
our young friend has described, but they have no doubt had a bitter
fight to hold their own against wild beasts, and especially against
the ape-men who would regard them as intruders, and wage a merciless
war upon them with a cunning which the larger beasts would lack. Hence
the fact that their numbers appear to be limited. Well, gentlemen,
have I read you the riddle aright, or is there any point which you
would query?''\ 

Professor Summerlee for once was too depressed to argue, though he
shook his head violently as a token of general disagreement. Lord
John merely scratched his scanty locks with the remark that he couldn't
put up a fight as he wasn't in the same weight or class. For my own
part I performed my usual r\^{o}le of bringing things down to a strictly
prosaic and practical level by the remark that one of the Indians
was missing.

{}``He has gone to fetch some water,'' said Lord Roxton. {}``We
fitted him up with an empty beef tin and he is off.''

{}``To the old camp?''\ I asked.

{}``No, to the brook. It's among the trees there. It can't be more
than a couple of hundred yards. But the beggar is certainly taking
his time.''

{}``I'll go and look after him,'' said I.\  I picked up my rifle
and strolled in the direction of the brook, leaving my friends to
lay out the scanty breakfast. It may seem to you rash that even for
so short a distance I should quit the shelter of our friendly thicket,
but you will remember that we were many miles from Ape-town, that
so far as we knew the creatures had not discovered our retreat, and
that in any case with a rifle in my hands I had no fear of them. I
had not yet learned their cunning or their strength.

I could hear the murmur of our brook somewhere ahead of me, but there
was a tangle of trees and brushwood between me and it. I was making
my way through this at a point which was just out of sight of my companions,
when, under one of the trees, I noticed something red huddled among
the bushes. As I approached it, I was shocked to see that it was the
dead body of the missing Indian. He lay upon his side, his limbs drawn
up, and his head screwed round at a most unnatural angle, so that
he seemed to be looking straight over his own shoulder. I gave a cry
to warn my friends that something was amiss, and running forwards
I stooped over the body. Surely my guardian angel was very near me
then, for some instinct of fear, or it may have been some faint rustle
of leaves, made me glance upwards. Out of the thick green foliage
which hung low over my head, two long muscular arms covered with reddish
hair were slowly descending. Another instant and the great stealthy
hands would have been round my throat. I sprang backwards, but quick
as I was, those hands were quicker still. Through my sudden spring
they missed a fatal grip, but one of them caught the back of my neck
and the other one my face. I threw my hands up to protect my throat,
and the next moment the huge paw had slid down my face and closed
over them. I was lifted lightly from the ground, and I felt an intolerable
pressure forcing my head back and back until the strain upon the cervical
spine was more than I could bear. My senses swam, but I still tore
at the hand and forced it out from my chin. Looking up I saw a frightful
face with cold inexorable light blue eyes looking down into mine.
There was something hypnotic in those terrible eyes. I could struggle
no longer. As the creature felt me grow limp in his grasp, two white
canines gleamed for a moment at each side of the vile mouth, and the
grip tightened still more upon my chin, forcing it always upwards
and back. A thin, oval-tinted mist formed before my eyes and little
silvery bells tinkled in my ears. Dully and far off I heard the crack
of a rifle and was feebly aware of the shock as I was dropped to the
earth, where I lay without sense or motion.

I awoke to find myself on my back upon the grass in our lair within
the thicket. Someone had brought the water from the brook, and Lord
John was sprinkling my head with it, while Challenger and Summerlee
were propping me up, with concern in their faces. For a moment I had
a glimpse of the human spirits behind their scientific masks. It was
really shock, rather than any injury, which had prostrated me, and
in half-an-hour, in spite of aching head and stiff neck, I was sitting
up and ready for anything.

{}``But you've had the escape of your life, young fellah my lad,''
said Lord Roxton. {}``When I heard your cry and ran forward, and
saw your head twisted half-off and your stohwassers kickin' in the
air, I thought we were one short. I missed the beast in my flurry,
but he dropped you all right and was off like a streak. By George!
I wish I had fifty men with rifles. I'd clear out the whole infernal
gang of them and leave this country a bit cleaner than we found it.''

It was clear now that the ape-men had in some way marked us down,
and that we were watched on every side. We had not so much to fear
from them during the day, but they would be very likely to rush us
by night; so the sooner we got away from their neighborhood the better.
On three sides of us was absolute forest, and there we might find
ourselves in an ambush. But on the fourth side\mbox{---}that which
sloped down in the direction of the lake\mbox{---}there was only
low scrub, with scattered trees and occasional open glades. It was,
in fact, the route which I had myself taken in my solitary journey,
and it led us straight for the Indian caves. This then must for every
reason be our road.

One great regret we had, and that was to leave our old camp behind
us, not only for the sake of the stores which remained there, but
even more because we were losing touch with Zambo, our link with the
outside world. However, we had a fair supply of cartridges and all
our guns, so, for a time at least, we could look after ourselves,
and we hoped soon to have a chance of returning and restoring our
communications with our \textit{\emph{negro}}. He had faithfully promised
to stay where he was, and we had not a doubt that he would be as good
as his word.

It was in the early afternoon that we started upon our journey. The
young chief walked at our head as our guide, but refused indignantly
to carry any burden. Behind him came the two surviving Indians with
our scanty possessions upon their backs. We four white men walked
in the rear with rifles loaded and ready. As we started there broke
from the thick silent woods behind us a sudden great ululation of
the ape-men, which may have been a cheer of triumph at our departure
or a jeer of contempt at our flight. Looking back we saw only the
dense screen of trees, but that long-drawn yell told us how many of
our enemies lurked among them. We saw no sign of pursuit, however,
and soon we had got into more open country and beyond their power.

As I tramped along, the rearmost of the four, I could not help smiling
at the appearance of my three companions in front. Was this the luxurious
Lord John Roxton who had sat that evening in the Albany amidst his
Persian rugs and his pictures in the pink radiance of the tinted lights?
And was this the imposing Professor who had swelled behind the great
desk in his massive study at Enmore Park? And, finally, could this
be the austere and prim figure which had risen before the meeting
at the Zoological Institute? No three tramps that one could have met
in a Surrey lane could have looked more hopeless and bedraggled. We
had, it is true, been only a week or so upon the top of the plateau,
but all our spare clothing was in our camp below, and the one week
had been a severe one upon us all, though least to me who had not
to endure the handling of the ape-men. My three friends had all lost
their hats, and had now bound handkerchiefs round their heads, their
clothes hung in ribbons about them, and their unshaven grimy faces
were hardly to be recognized. Both Summerlee and Challenger were limping
heavily, while I still dragged my feet from weakness after the shock
of the morning, and my neck was as stiff as a board from the murderous
grip that held it. We were indeed a sorry crew, and I did not wonder
to see our Indian companions glance back at us occasionally with horror
and amazement on their faces.

In the late afternoon we reached the margin of the lake, and as we
emerged from the bush and saw the sheet of water stretching before
us our native friends set up a shrill cry of joy and pointed eagerly
in front of them. It was indeed a wonderful sight which lay before
us. Sweeping over the glassy surface was a great flotilla of canoes
coming straight for the shore upon which we stood. They were some
miles out when we first saw them, but they shot forward with great
swiftness, and were soon so near that the rowers could distinguish
our persons. Instantly a thunderous shout of delight burst from them,
and we saw them rise from their seats, waving their paddles and spears
madly in the air. Then bending to their work once more, they flew
across the intervening water, beached their boats upon the sloping
sand, and rushed up to us, prostrating themselves with loud cries
of greeting before the young chief. Finally one of them, an elderly
man, with a necklace and bracelet of great lustrous glass beads and
the skin of some beautiful mottled amber-colored animal slung over
his shoulders, ran forward and embraced most tenderly the youth whom
we had saved. He then looked at us and asked some questions, after
which he stepped up with much dignity and embraced us also each in
turn. Then, at his order, the whole tribe lay down upon the ground
before us in homage. Personally I felt shy and uncomfortable at this
obsequious adoration, and I read the same feeling in the faces of
Roxton and Summerlee, but Challenger expanded like a flower in the
sun.

{}``They may be undeveloped types,'' said he, stroking his beard
and looking round at them, {}``but their deportment in the presence
of their superiors might be a lesson to some of our more advanced
Europeans. Strange how correct are the instincts of the natural man!''\ 

It was clear that the natives had come out upon the war-path, for
every man carried his spear\mbox{---}a long bamboo tipped with bone\mbox{---}his
bow and arrows, and some sort of club or stone battle-axe slung at
his side. Their dark, angry glances at the woods from which we had
come, and the frequent repetition of the word {}``Doda,'' made it
clear enough that this was a rescue party who had set forth to save
or revenge the old chief's son, for such we gathered that the youth
must be. A council was now held by the whole tribe squatting in a
circle, whilst we sat near on a slab of basalt and watched their proceedings.
Two or three warriors spoke, and finally our young friend made a spirited
harangue with such eloquent features and gestures that we could understand
it all as clearly as if we had known his language.

{}``What is the use of returning?''\ he said. {}``Sooner or later
the thing must be done. Your comrades have been murdered. What if
I have returned safe? These others have been done to death. There
is no safety for any of us. We are assembled now and ready.'' Then
he pointed to us. {}``These strange men are our friends. They are
great fighters, and they hate the ape-men even as we do. They command,''
here he pointed up to heaven, {}``the thunder and the lightning.
When shall we have such a chance again? Let us go forward, and either
die now or live for the future in safety. How else shall we go back
unashamed to our women?''\ 

The little red warriors hung upon the words of the speaker, and when
he had finished they burst into a roar of applause, waving their rude
weapons in the air. The old chief stepped forward to us, and asked
us some questions, pointing at the same time to the woods. Lord John
made a sign to him that he should wait for an answer and then he turned
to us.

{}``Well, it's up to you to say what you will do,'' said he; {}``for
my part I have a score to settle with these monkey-folk, and if it
ends by wiping them off the face of the earth I don't see that the
earth need fret about it. I'm goin' with our little red pals and I
mean to see them through the scrap. What do you say, young fellah?''\ 

{}``Of course I will come.''

{}``And you, Challenger?''\ 

{}``I will assuredly co-operate.''

{}``And you, Summerlee?''\ 

{}``We seem to be drifting very far from the object of this expedition,
Lord John. I assure you that I little thought when I left my professional
chair in London that it was for the purpose of heading a raid of savages
upon a colony of anthropoid apes.''

{}``To such base uses do we come,'' said Lord John, smiling. {}``But
we are up against it, so what's the decision?''\ 

{}``It seems a most questionable step,'' said Summerlee, argumentative
to the last, {}``but if you are all going, I hardly see how I can
remain behind.''

{}``Then it is settled,'' said Lord John, and turning to the chief
he nodded and slapped his rifle.

The old fellow clasped our hands, each in turn, while his men cheered
louder than ever. It was too late to advance that night, so the Indians
settled down into a rude bivouac. On all sides their fires began to
glimmer and smoke. Some of them who had disappeared into the jungle
came back presently driving a young \textit{\emph{iguanodon}} before
them. Like the others, it had a daub of asphalt upon its shoulder,
and it was only when we saw one of the natives step forward with the
air of an owner and give his consent to the beast's slaughter that
we understood at last that these great creatures were as much private
property as a herd of cattle, and that these symbols which had so
perplexed us were nothing more than the marks of the owner. Helpless,
torpid, and vegetarian, with great limbs but a minute brain, they
could be rounded up and driven by a child. In a few minutes the huge
beast had been cut up and slabs of him were hanging over a dozen camp
fires, together with great scaly ganoid fish which had been speared
in the lake.

Summerlee had lain down and slept upon the sand, but we others roamed
round the edge of the water, seeking to learn something more of this
strange country. Twice we found pits of blue clay, such as we had
already seen in the swamp of the pterodactyls. These were old volcanic
vents, and for some reason excited the greatest interest in Lord John.
What attracted Challenger, on the other hand, was a bubbling, gurgling
mud geyser, where some strange gas formed great bursting bubbles upon
the surface. He thrust a hollow reed into it and cried out with delight
like a schoolboy then he was able, on touching it with a lighted match,
to cause a sharp explosion and a blue flame at the far end of the
tube. Still more pleased was he when, inverting a leathern pouch over
the end of the reed, and so filling it with the gas, he was able to
send it soaring up into the air.

{}``An inflammable gas, and one markedly lighter than the atmosphere.
I should say beyond doubt that it contained a considerable proportion
of free hydrogen. The resources of G.\ E.\ C.\ are not yet exhausted,
my young friend. I may yet show you how a great mind molds all Nature
to its use.'' He swelled with some secret purpose, but would say
no more.

There was nothing which we could see upon the shore which seemed to
me so wonderful as the great sheet of water before us. Our numbers
and our noise had frightened all living creatures away, and save for
a few pterodactyls, which soared round high above our heads while
they waited for the carrion, all was still around the camp. But it
was different out upon the rose-tinted waters of the central lake.
It boiled and heaved with strange life. Great slate-colored backs
and high serrated dorsal fins shot up with a fringe of silver, and
then rolled down into the depths again. The sand-banks far out were
spotted with uncouth crawling forms, huge turtles, strange saurians,
and one great flat creature like a writhing, palpitating mat of black
greasy leather, which flopped its way slowly to the lake. Here and
there high serpent heads projected out of the water, cutting swiftly
through it with a little collar of foam in front, and a long swirling
wake behind, rising and falling in graceful, swan-like undulations
as they went. It was not until one of these creatures wriggled on
to a sand-bank within a few hundred yards of us, and exposed a barrel-shaped
body and huge flippers behind the long serpent neck, that Challenger,
and Summerlee, who had joined us, broke out into their duet of wonder
and admiration.

{}``Plesiosaurus! A fresh-water plesi\-o\-sau\-r\-us!''\ cried
Summerlee. {}``That I should have lived to see such a sight! We are
blessed, my dear Challenger, above all zoologists since the world
began!''\ 

It was not until the night had fallen, and the fires of our savage
allies glowed red in the shadows, that our two men of science could
be dragged away from the fascinations of that primeval lake. Even
in the darkness as we lay upon the strand, we heard from time to time
the snort and plunge of the huge creatures who lived therein.

At earliest dawn our camp was astir and an hour later we had started
upon our memorable expedition. Often in my dreams have I thought that
I might live to be a war correspondent. In what wildest one could
I have conceived the nature of the campaign which it should be my
lot to report! Here then is my first despatch from a field of battle:

Our numbers had been reinforced during the night by a fresh batch
of natives from the caves, and we may have been four or five hundred
strong when we made our advance. A fringe of scouts was thrown out
in front, and behind them the whole force in a solid column made their
way up the long slope of the bush country until we were near the edge
of the forest. Here they spread out into a long straggling line of
spearmen and bowmen. Roxton and Summerlee took their position upon
the right flank, while Challenger and I were on the left. It was a
host of the stone age that we were accompanying to battle\mbox{---}we
with the last word of the gunsmith's art from St.\ James' Street
and the Strand.

We had not long to wait for our enemy. A wild shrill clamor rose from
the edge of the wood and suddenly a body of ape-men rushed out with
clubs and stones, and made for the center of the Indian line. It was
a valiant move but a foolish one, for the great bandy-legged creatures
were slow of foot, while their opponents were as active as cats. It
was horrible to see the fierce brutes with foaming mouths and glaring
eyes, rushing and grasping, but forever missing their elusive enemies,
while arrow after arrow buried itself in their hides. One great fellow
ran past me roaring with pain, with a dozen darts sticking from his
chest and ribs. In mercy I put a bullet through his skull, and he
fell sprawling among the aloes. But this was the only shot fired,
for the attack had been on the center of the line, and the Indians
there had needed no help of ours in repulsing it. Of all the ape-men
who had rushed out into the open, I do not think that one got back
to cover.

But the matter was more deadly when we came among the trees. For an
hour or more after we entered the wood, there was a desperate struggle
in which for a time we hardly held our own. Springing out from among
the scrub the ape-men with huge clubs broke in upon the Indians and
often felled three or four of them before they could be speared. Their
frightful blows shattered everything upon which they fell. One of
them knocked Summerlee's rifle to matchwood and the next would have
crushed his skull had an Indian not stabbed the beast to the heart.
Other ape-men in the trees above us hurled down stones and logs of
wood, occasionally dropping bodily on to our ranks and fighting furiously
until they were felled. Once our allies broke under the pressure,
and had it not been for the execution done by our rifles they would
certainly have taken to their heels. But they were gallantly rallied
by their old chief and came on with such a rush that the ape-men began
in turn to give way. Summerlee was weaponless, but I was emptying
my magazine as quick as I could fire, and on the further flank we
heard the continuous cracking of our companion's rifles.

Then in a moment came the panic and the collapse. Screaming and howling,
the great creatures rushed away in all directions through the brushwood,
while our allies yelled in their savage delight, following swiftly
after their flying enemies. All the feuds of countless generations,
all the hatreds and cruelties of their narrow history, all the memories
of ill-usage and persecution were to be purged that day. At last man
was to be supreme and the man-beast to find forever his allotted place.
Fly as they would the fugitives were too slow to escape from the active
savages, and from every side in the tangled woods we heard the exultant
yells, the twanging of bows, and the crash and thud as ape-men were
brought down from their hiding-places in the trees.

I was following the others, when I found that Lord John and Challenger
had come across to join us.

{}``It's over,'' said Lord John. {}``I think we can leave the tidying
up to them. Perhaps the less we see of it the better we shall sleep.''

Challenger's eyes were shining with the lust of slaughter.

{}``We have been privileged,'' he cried, strutting about like a
gamecock, {}``to be present at one of the typical decisive battles
of history\mbox{---}the battles which have determined the fate of
the world. What, my friends, is the conquest of one nation by another?
It is meaningless. Each produces the same result. But those fierce
fights, when in the dawn of the ages the cave-dwellers held their
own against the tiger folk, or the elephants first found that they
had a master, those were the real conquests\mbox{---}the victories
that count. By this strange turn of fate we have seen and helped to
decide even such a contest. Now upon this plateau the future must
ever be for man.''

It needed a robust faith in the end to justify such tragic means.
As we advanced together through the woods we found the ape-men lying
thick, transfixed with spears or arrows. Here and there a little group
of shattered Indians marked where one of the anthropoids had turned
to bay, and sold his life dearly. Always in front of us we heard the
yelling and roaring which showed the direction of the pursuit. The
ape-men had been driven back to their city, they had made a last stand
there, once again they had been broken, and now we were in time to
see the final fearful scene of all. Some eighty or a hundred males,
the last survivors, had been driven across that same little clearing
which led to the edge of the cliff, the scene of our own exploit two
days before. As we arrived the Indians, a semicircle of spearmen,
had closed in on them, and in a minute it was over, Thirty or forty
died where they stood. The others, screaming and clawing, were thrust
over the precipice, and went hurtling down, as their prisoners had
of old, on to the sharp bamboos six hundred feet below. It was as
Challenger had said, and the reign of man was assured forever in Maple
White Land. The males were exterminated, Ape Town was destroyed, the
females and young were driven away to live in bondage, and the long
rivalry of untold centuries had reached its bloody end.

For us the victory brought much advantage. Once again we were able
to visit our camp and get at our stores. Once more also we were able
to communicate with Zambo, who had been terrified by the spectacle
from afar of an avalanche of apes falling from the edge of the cliff.

{}``Come away, Massas, come away!''\ he cried, his eyes starting
from his head. {}``The debbil get you sure if you stay up there.''

{}``It is the voice of sanity!''\ said Summerlee with conviction.
{}``We have had adventures enough and they are neither suitable to
our character or our position. I hold you to your word, Challenger.
From now onwards you devote your energies to getting us out of this
horrible country and back once more to civilization.''


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XV. {}``Our Eyes Have Seen Great Wonders''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``Our Eyes Have Seen Great Wonders''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``Our Eyes Have Seen Great Wonders''}

I write this from day to day, but I trust that before I come to the
end of it, I may be able to say that the light shines, at last, through
our clouds. We are held here with no clear means of making our escape,
and bitterly we chafe against it. Yet, I can well imagine that the
day may come when we may be glad that we were kept, against our will,
to see something more of the wonders of this singular place, and of
the creatures who inhabit it.

The victory of the Indians and the annihilation of the ape-men, marked
the turning point of our fortunes. From then onwards, we were in truth
masters of the plateau, for the natives looked upon us with a mixture
of fear and gratitude, since by our strange powers we had aided them
to destroy their hereditary foe. For their own sakes they would, perhaps,
be glad to see the departure of such formidable and incalculable people,
but they have not themselves suggested any way by which we may reach
the plains below. There had been, so far as we could follow their
signs, a tunnel by which the place could be approached, the lower
exit of which we had seen from below. By this, no doubt, both ape-men
and Indians had at different epochs reached the top, and Maple White
with his companion had taken the same way. Only the year before, however,
there had been a terrific earthquake, and the upper end of the tunnel
had fallen in and completely disappeared. The Indians now could only
shake their heads and shrug their shoulders when we expressed by signs
our desire to descend. It may be that they cannot, but it may also
be that they will not, help us to get away.

At the end of the victorious campaign the surviving ape-folk were
driven across the plateau (their wailings were horrible) and established
in the neighborhood of the Indian caves, where they would, from now
onwards, be a servile race under the eyes of their masters. It was
a rude, raw, primeval version of the Jews in Babylon or the Israelites
in Egypt. At night we could hear from amid the trees the long-drawn
cry, as some primitive Ezekiel mourned for fallen greatness and recalled
the departed glories of Ape Town. Hewers of wood and drawers of water,
such were they from now onwards.

We had returned across the plateau with our allies two days after
the battle, and made our camp at the foot of their cliffs. They would
have had us share their caves with them, but Lord John would by no
means consent to it considering that to do so would put us in their
power if they were treacherously disposed. We kept our independence,
therefore, and had our weapons ready for any emergency, while preserving
the most friendly relations. We also continually visited their caves,
which were most remarkable places, though whether made by man or by
Nature we have never been able to determine. They were all on the
one stratum, hollowed out of some soft rock which lay between the
volcanic basalt forming the ruddy cliffs above them, and the hard
granite which formed their base.

The openings were about eighty feet above the ground, and were led
up to by long stone stairs, so narrow and steep that no large animal
could mount them. Inside they were warm and dry, running in straight
passages of varying length into the side of the hill, with smooth
gray walls decorated with many excellent pictures done with charred
sticks and representing the various animals of the plateau. If every
living thing were swept from the country the future explorer would
find upon the walls of these caves ample evidence of the strange fauna\mbox{---}the
dinosaurs, \textit{\emph{iguanodons}}, and fish lizards\mbox{---}which
had lived so recently upon earth.

Since we had learned that the huge \textit{\emph{iguanodons}} were
kept as tame herds by their owners, and were simply walking meat-stores,
we had conceived that man, even with his primitive weapons, had established
his ascendancy upon the plateau. We were soon to discover that it
was not so, and that he was still there upon tolerance.

It was on the third day after our forming our camp near the Indian
caves that the tragedy occurred. Challenger and Summerlee had gone
off together that day to the lake where some of the natives, under
their direction, were engaged in harpooning specimens of the great
lizards. Lord John and I had remained in our camp, while a number
of the Indians were scattered about upon the grassy slope in front
of the caves engaged in different ways. Suddenly there was a shrill
cry of alarm, with the word {}``Stoa'' resounding from a hundred
tongues. From every side men, women, and children were rushing wildly
for shelter, swarming up the staircases and into the caves in a mad
stampede.

Looking up, we could see them waving their arms from the rocks above
and beckoning to us to join them in their refuge. We had both seized
our magazine rifles and ran out to see what the danger could be. Suddenly
from the near belt of trees there broke forth a group of twelve or
fifteen Indians, running for their lives, and at their very heels
two of those frightful monsters which had disturbed our camp and pursued
me upon my solitary journey. In shape they were like horrible toads,
and moved in a succession of springs, but in size they were of an
incredible bulk, larger than the largest elephant. We had never before
seen them save at night, and indeed they are nocturnal animals save
when disturbed in their lairs, as these had been. We now stood amazed
at the sight, for their blotched and warty skins were of a curious
fish-like iridescence, and the sunlight struck them with an ever-varying
rainbow bloom as they moved.

We had little time to watch them, however, for in an instant they
had overtaken the fugitives and were making a dire slaughter among
them. Their method was to fall forward with their full weight upon
each in turn, leaving him crushed and mangled, to bound on after the
others. The wretched Indians screamed with terror, but were helpless,
run as they would, before the relentless purpose and horrible activity
of these monstrous creatures. One after another they went down, and
there were not half-a-dozen surviving by the time my companion and
I could come to their help. But our aid was of little avail and only
involved us in the same peril. At the range of a couple of hundred
yards we emptied our magazines, firing bullet after bullet into the
beasts, but with no more effect than if we were pelting them with
pellets of paper. Their slow reptilian natures cared nothing for wounds,
and the springs of their lives, with no special brain center but scattered
throughout their spinal cords, could not be tapped by any modern weapons.
The most that we could do was to check their progress by distracting
their attention with the flash and roar of our guns, and so to give
both the natives and ourselves time to reach the steps which led to
safety. But where the conical explosive bullets of the twentieth century
were of no avail, the poisoned arrows of the natives, dipped in the
juice of strophanthus and steeped afterwards in decayed carrion, could
succeed. Such arrows were of little avail to the hunter who attacked
the beast, because their action in that torpid circulation was slow,
and before its powers failed it could certainly overtake and slay
its assailant. But now, as the two monsters hounded us to the very
foot of the stairs, a drift of darts came whistling from every chink
in the cliff above them. In a minute they were feathered with them,
and yet with no sign of pain they clawed and slobbered with impotent
rage at the steps which would lead them to their victims, mounting
clumsily up for a few yards and then sliding down again to the ground.
But at last the poison worked. One of them gave a deep rumbling groan
and dropped his huge squat head on to the earth. The other bounded
round in an eccentric circle with shrill, wailing cries, and then
lying down writhed in agony for some minutes before it also stiffened
and lay still. With yells of triumph the Indians came flocking down
from their caves and danced a frenzied dance of victory round the
dead bodies, in mad joy that two more of the most dangerous of all
their enemies had been slain. That night they cut up and removed the
bodies, not to eat\mbox{---}for the poison was still active\mbox{---}but
lest they should breed a pestilence. The great reptilian hearts, however,
each as large as a cushion, still lay there, beating slowly and steadily,
with a gentle rise and fall, in horrible independent life. It was
only upon the third day that the ganglia ran down and the dreadful
things were still.

Some day, when I have a better desk than a meat-tin and more helpful
tools than a worn stub of pencil and a last, tattered note-book, I
will write some fuller account of the Accala Indians\mbox{---}of
our life amongst them, and of the glimpses which we had of the strange
conditions of wondrous Maple White Land. Memory, at least, will never
fail me, for so long as the breath of life is in me, every hour and
every action of that period will stand out as hard and clear as do
the first strange happenings of our childhood. No new impressions
could efface those which are so deeply cut. When the time comes I
will describe that wondrous moonlit night upon the great lake when
a young ichthyosaurus\mbox{---}a strange creature, half seal, half
fish, to look at, with bone-covered eyes on each side of his snout,
and a third eye fixed upon the top of his head\mbox{---}was entangled
in an Indian net, and nearly upset our canoe before we towed it ashore;
the same night that a green water-snake shot out from the rushes and
carried off in its coils the steersman of Challenger's canoe. I will
tell, too, of the great nocturnal white thing\mbox{---}to this day
we do not know whether it was beast or reptile\mbox{---}which lived
in a vile swamp to the east of the lake, and flitted about with a
faint phosphorescent glimmer in the darkness. The Indians were so
terrified at it that they would not go near the place, and, though
we twice made expeditions and saw it each time, we could not make
our way through the deep marsh in which it lived. I can only say that
it seemed to be larger than a cow and had the strangest musky odor.
I will tell also of the huge bird which chased Challenger to the shelter
of the rocks one day\mbox{---}a great running bird, far taller than
an ostrich, with a vulture-like neck and cruel head which made it
a walking death. As Challenger climbed to safety one dart of that
savage curving beak shore off the heel of his boot as if it had been
cut with a chisel. This time at least modern weapons prevailed and
the great creature, twelve feet from head to foot\mbox{---}phororachus
its name, according to our panting but exultant Professor\mbox{---}went
down before Lord Roxton's rifle in a flurry of waving feathers and
kicking limbs, with two remorseless yellow eyes glaring up from the
midst of it. May I live to see that flattened vicious skull in its
own niche amid the trophies of the Albany. Finally, I will assuredly
give some account of the toxodon, the giant ten-foot guinea pig, with
projecting chisel teeth, which we killed as it drank in the gray of
the morning by the side of the lake.

All this I shall some day write at fuller length, and amidst these
more stirring days I would tenderly sketch in these lovely summer
evenings, when with the deep blue sky above us we lay in good comradeship
among the long grasses by the wood and marveled at the strange fowl
that swept over us and the quaint new creatures which crept from their
burrows to watch us, while above us the boughs of the bushes were
heavy with luscious fruit, and below us strange and lovely flowers
peeped at us from among the herbage; or those long moonlit nights
when we lay out upon the shimmering surface of the great lake and
watched with wonder and awe the huge circles rippling out from the
sudden splash of some fantastic monster; or the greenish gleam, far
down in the deep water, of some strange creature upon the confines
of darkness. These are the scenes which my mind and my pen will dwell
upon in every detail at some future day.

But, you will ask, why these experiences and why this delay, when
you and your comrades should have been occupied day and night in the
devising of some means by which you could return to the outer world?
My answer is, that there was not one of us who was not working for
this end, but that our work had been in vain. One fact we had very
speedily discovered: The Indians would do nothing to help us. In every
other way they were our friends\mbox{---}one might almost say our
devoted slaves\mbox{---}but when it was suggested that they should
help us to make and carry a plank which would bridge the chasm, or
when we wished to get from them thongs of leather or liana to weave
ropes which might help us, we were met by a good-humored, but an invincible,
refusal. They would smile, twinkle their eyes, shake their heads,
and there was the end of it. Even the old chief met us with the same
obstinate denial, and it was only \textit{\emph{Maretas}}, the youngster
whom we had saved, who looked wistfully at us and told us by his gestures
that he was grieved for our thwarted wishes. Ever since their crowning
triumph with the ape-men they looked upon us as \textit{\emph{supermen}},
who bore victory in the tubes of strange weapons, and they believed
that so long as we remained with them good fortune would be theirs.
A little red-skinned wife and a cave of our own were freely offered
to each of us if we would but forget our own people and dwell forever
upon the plateau. So far all had been kindly, however far apart our
desires might be; but we felt well assured that our actual plans of
a descent must be kept secret, for we had reason to fear that at the
last they might try to hold us by force.

In spite of the danger from dinosaurs (which is not great save at
night, for, as I may have said before, they are mostly nocturnal in
their habits) I have twice in the last three weeks been over to our
old camp in order to see our \textit{\emph{negro}} who still kept
watch and ward below the cliff. My eyes strained eagerly across the
great plain in the hope of seeing afar off the help for which we had
prayed. But the long cactus-strewn levels still stretched away, empty
and bare, to the distant line of the cane-brake.

{}``They will soon come now, Massa Malone. Before another week pass
Indian come back and bring rope and fetch you down.'' Such was the
cheery cry of our excellent Zambo.

I had one strange experience as I came from this second visit which
had involved my being away for a night from my companions. I was returning
along the well-remembered route, and had reached a spot within a mile
or so of the marsh of the pterodactyls, when I saw an extraordinary
object approaching me. It was a man who walked inside a framework
made of bent canes so that he was enclosed on all sides in a bell-shaped
cage. As I drew nearer I was more amazed still to see that it was
Lord John Roxton. When he saw me he slipped from under his curious
protection and came towards me laughing, and yet, as I thought, with
some confusion in his manner.

{}``Well, young fellah,'' said he, {}``who would have thought of
meetin' you up here?''\ 

{}``What in the world are you doing?''\ I asked.

{}``Visitin' my friends, the pterodactyls,'' said he.

{}``But why?''\ 

{}``Interestin' beasts, don't you think? But unsociable! Nasty rude
ways with strangers, as you may remember. So I rigged this framework
which keeps them from bein' too pressin' in their attentions.''

{}``But what do you want in the swamp?''\ 

He looked at me with a very questioning eye, and I read hesitation
in his face.

{}``Don't you think other people besides Professors can want to know
things?''\ he said at last. {}``I'm studyin' the pretty dears.
That's enough for you.''

{}``No offense,'' said I.

His good-humor returned and he laughed.

{}``No offense, young fellah. I'm goin' to get a young devil chick
for Challenger. That's one of my jobs. No, I don't want your company.
I'm safe in this cage, and you are not. So long, and I'll be back
in camp by night-fall.''

He turned away and I left him wandering on through the wood with his
extraordinary cage around him.

If Lord John's behavior at this time was strange, that of Challenger
was more so. I may say that he seemed to possess an extraordinary
fascination for the Indian women, and that he always carried a large
spreading palm branch with which he beat them off as if they were
flies, when their attentions became too pressing. To see him walking
like a comic opera Sultan, with this badge of authority in his hand,
his black beard bristling in front of him, his toes pointing at each
step, and a train of wide-eyed Indian girls behind him, clad in their
slender drapery of bark cloth, is one of the most grotesque of all
the pictures which I will carry back with me. As to Summerlee, he
was absorbed in the insect and bird life of the plateau, and spent
his whole time (save that considerable portion which was devoted to
abusing Challenger for not getting us out of our difficulties) in
cleaning and mounting his specimens.

Challenger had been in the habit of walking off by himself every morning
and returning from time to time with looks of portentous solemnity,
as one who bears the full weight of a great enterprise upon his shoulders.
One day, palm branch in hand, and his crowd of adoring devotees behind
him, he led us down to his hidden work-shop and took us into the secret
of his plans.

The place was a small clearing in the center of a palm grove. In this
was one of those boiling mud geysers which I have already described.
Around its edge were scattered a number of leathern thongs cut from
\textit{\emph{iguanodon}} hide, and a large collapsed membrane which
proved to be the dried and scraped stomach of one of the great fish
lizards from the lake. This huge sack had been sewn up at one end
and only a small orifice left at the other. Into this opening several
bamboo canes had been inserted and the other ends of these canes were
in contact with conical clay funnels which collected the gas bubbling
up through the mud of the geyser. Soon the flaccid organ began to
slowly expand and show such a tendency to upward movements that Challenger
fastened the cords which held it to the trunks of the surrounding
trees. In half an hour a good-sized gas-bag had been formed, and the
jerking and straining upon the thongs showed that it was capable of
considerable lift. Challenger, like a glad father in the presence
of his first-born, stood smiling and stroking his beard, in silent,
self-satisfied content as he gazed at the creation of his brain. It
was Summerlee who first broke the silence.

{}``You don't mean us to go up in that thing, Challenger?''\ said
he, in an acid voice.

{}``I mean, my dear Summerlee, to give you such a demonstration of
its powers that after seeing it you will, I am sure, have no hesitation
in trusting yourself to it.''

{}``You can put it right out of your head now, at once,'' said Summerlee
with decision, {}``nothing on earth would induce me to commit such
a folly. Lord John, I trust that you will not countenance such madness?''\ 

{}``Dooced ingenious, I call it,'' said our peer. {}``I'd like
to see how it works.''

{}``So you shall,'' said Challenger. {}``For some days I have exerted
my whole brain force upon the problem of how we shall descend from
these cliffs. We have satisfied ourselves that we cannot climb down
and that there is no tunnel. We are also unable to construct any kind
of bridge which may take us back to the pinnacle from which we came.
How then shall I find a means to convey us? Some little time ago I
had remarked to our young friend here that free hydrogen was evolved
from the geyser. The idea of a balloon naturally followed. I was,
I will admit, somewhat baffled by the difficulty of discovering an
envelope to contain the gas, but the contemplation of the immense
entrails of these reptiles supplied me with a solution to the problem.
Behold the result!''\ 

He put one hand in the front of his ragged jacket and pointed proudly
with the other.

By this time the gas-bag had swollen to a goodly rotundity and was
jerking strongly upon its lashings.

{}``Midsummer madness!''\ snorted Summerlee.

Lord John was delighted with the whole idea. {}``Clever old dear,
ain't he?''\ he whispered to me, and then louder to Challenger.
{}``What about a car?''\ 

{}``The car will be my next care. I have already planned how it is
to be made and attached. Meanwhile I will simply show you how capable
my apparatus is of supporting the weight of each of us.''

{}``All of us, surely?''\ 

{}``No, it is part of my plan that each in turn shall descend as
in a parachute, and the balloon be drawn back by means which I shall
have no difficulty in perfecting. If it will support the weight of
one and let him gently down, it will have done all that is required
of it. I will now show you its capacity in that direction.''

He brought out a lump of basalt of a considerable size, constructed
in the middle so that a cord could be easily attached to it. This
cord was the one which we had brought with us on to the plateau after
we had used it for climbing the pinnacle. It was over a hundred feet
long, and though it was thin it was very strong. He had prepared a
sort of collar of leather with many straps depending from it. This
collar was placed over the dome of the balloon, and the hanging thongs
were gathered together below, so that the pressure of any weight would
be diffused over a considerable surface. Then the lump of basalt was
fastened to the thongs, and the rope was allowed to hang from the
end of it, being passed three times round the Professor's arm.

{}``I will now,'' said Challenger, with a smile of pleased anticipation,
{}``demonstrate the carrying power of my balloon.'' As he said so
he cut with a knife the various lashings that held it.

Never was our expedition in more imminent danger of complete annihilation.
The inflated membrane shot up with frightful velocity into the air.
In an instant Challenger was pulled off his feet and dragged after
it. I had just time to throw my arms round his ascending waist when
I was myself whipped up into the air. Lord John had me with a rat-trap
grip round the legs, but I felt that he also was coming off the ground.
For a moment I had a vision of four adventurers floating like a string
of sausages over the land that they had explored. But, happily, there
were limits to the strain which the rope would stand, though none
apparently to the lifting powers of this infernal machine. There was
a sharp crack, and we were in a heap upon the ground with coils of
rope all over us. When we were able to stagger to our feet we saw
far off in the deep blue sky one dark spot where the lump of basalt
was speeding upon its way.

{}``Splendid!''\ cried the undaunted Challenger, rubbing his injured
arm. {}``A most thorough and satisfactory demonstration! I could
not have anticipated such a success. Within a week, gentlemen, I promise
that a second balloon will be prepared, and that you can count upon
taking in safety and comfort the first stage of our homeward journey.''
So far I have written each of the foregoing events as it occurred.
Now I am rounding off my narrative from the old camp, where Zambo
has waited so long, with all our difficulties and dangers left like
a dream behind us upon the summit of those vast ruddy crags which
tower above our heads. We have descended in safety, though in a most
unexpected fashion, and all is well with us. In six weeks or two months
we shall be in London, and it is possible that this letter may not
reach you much earlier than we do ourselves. Already our hearts yearn
and our spirits fly towards the great mother city which holds so much
that is dear to us.

It was on the very evening of our perilous adventure with Challenger's
home-made balloon that the change came in our fortunes. I have said
that the one person from whom we had had some sign of sympathy in
our attempts to get away was the young chief whom we had rescued.
He alone had no desire to hold us against our will in a strange land.
He had told us as much by his expressive language of signs. That evening,
after dusk, he came down to our little camp, handed me (for some reason
he had always shown his attentions to me, perhaps because I was the
one who was nearest his age) a small roll of the bark of a tree, and
then pointing solemnly up at the row of caves above him, he had put
his finger to his lips as a sign of secrecy and had stolen back again
to his people.

I took the slip of bark to the firelight and we examined it together.
It was about a foot square, and on the inner side there was a singular
arrangement of lines, which I here reproduce:

\noindent \begin{center}\includegraphics[%
  width=1\columnwidth]{lostw10-fig1.jpg}\end{center}

They were neatly done in charcoal upon the white surface, and looked
to me at first sight like some sort of rough musical score.

{}``Whatever it is, I can swear that it is of importance to us,''
said I. {}``I could read that on his face as he gave it.''

{}``Unless we have come upon a primitive practical joker,'' Summerlee
suggested, {}``which I should think would be one of the most elementary
developments of man.''

{}``It is clearly some sort of script,'' said Challenger.

{}``Looks like a guinea puzzle competition,'' remarked Lord John,
craning his neck to have a look at it. Then suddenly he stretched
out his hand and seized the puzzle.

{}``By George!''\ he cried, {}``I believe I've got it. The boy
guessed right the very first time. See here! How many marks are on
that paper? Eighteen. Well, if you come to think of it there are eighteen
cave openings on the hill-side above us.''

{}``He pointed up to the caves when he gave it to me,'' said I.

{}``Well, that settles it. This is a chart of the caves. What! Eighteen
of them all in a row, some short, some deep, some branching, same
as we saw them. It's a map, and here's a cross on it. What's the cross
for? It is placed to mark one that is much deeper than the others.''

{}``One that goes through,'' I cried.

{}``I believe our young friend has read the riddle,'' said Challenger.
{}``If the cave does not go through I do not understand why this
person, who has every reason to mean us well, should have drawn our
attention to it. But if it does go through and comes out at the corresponding
point on the other side, we should not have more than a hundred feet
to descend.''

{}``A hundred feet!''\ grumbled Summerlee.

{}``Well, our rope is still more than a hundred feet long,'' I cried.
{}``Surely we could get down.''

{}``How about the Indians in the cave?''\ Summerlee objected.

{}``There are no Indians in any of the caves above our heads,''
said I. {}``They are all used as barns and store-houses. Why should
we not go up now at once and spy out the land?''\ 

There is a dry bituminous wood upon the plateau\mbox{---}a species
of \textit{araucaria}, according to our botanist\mbox{---}which
is always used by the Indians for torches. Each of us picked up a
faggot of this, and we made our way up weed-covered steps to the particular
cave which was marked in the drawing. It was, as I had said, empty,
save for a great number of enormous bats, which flapped round our
heads as we advanced into it. As we had no desire to draw the attention
of the Indians to our proceedings, we stumbled along in the dark until
we had gone round several curves and penetrated a considerable distance
into the cavern. Then, at last, we lit our torches. It was a beautiful
dry tunnel with smooth gray walls covered with native symbols, a curved
roof which arched over our heads, and white glistening sand beneath
our feet. We hurried eagerly along it until, with a deep groan of
bitter disappointment, we were brought to a halt. A sheer wall of
rock had appeared before us, with no chink through which a mouse could
have slipped. There was no escape for us there.

We stood with bitter hearts staring at this unexpected obstacle. It
was not the result of any convulsion, as in the case of the ascending
tunnel. The end wall was exactly like the side ones. It was, and had
always been, a \textit{cul}-\textit{de}-\textit{sac}.

{}``Never mind, my friends,'' said the indomitable Challenger. {}``You
have still my firm promise of a balloon.''

Summerlee groaned.

{}``Can we be in the wrong cave?''\ I suggested.

{}``No use, young fellah,'' said Lord John, with his finger on the
chart. {}``Seventeen from the right and second from the left. This
is the cave sure enough.''

I looked at the mark to which his finger pointed, and I gave a sudden
cry of joy.

{}``I believe I have it! Follow me! Follow me!''\ 

I hurried back along the way we had come, my torch in my hand. {}``Here,''
said I, pointing to some matches upon the ground, {}``is where we
lit up.''

{}``Exactly.''

{}``Well, it is marked as a forked cave, and in the darkness we passed
the fork before the torches were lit. On the right side as we go out
we should find the longer arm.''

It was as I had said. We had not gone thirty yards before a great
black opening loomed in the wall. We turned into it to find that we
were in a much larger passage than before. Along it we hurried in
breathless impatience for many hundreds of yards. Then, suddenly,
in the black darkness of the arch in front of us we saw a gleam of
dark red light. We stared in amazement. A sheet of steady flame seemed
to cross the passage and to bar our way. We hastened towards it. No
sound, no heat, no movement came from it, but still the great luminous
curtain glowed before us, silvering all the cave and turning the sand
to powdered jewels, until as we drew closer it discovered a circular
edge.

{}``The moon, by George!''\ cried Lord John. {}``We are through,
boys! We are through!''\ 

It was indeed the full moon which shone straight down the aperture
which opened upon the cliffs. It was a small rift, not larger than
a window, but it was enough for all our purposes. As we craned our
necks through it we could see that the descent was not a very difficult
one, and that the level ground was no very great way below us. It
was no wonder that from below we had not observed the place, as the
cliffs curved overhead and an ascent at the spot would have seemed
so impossible as to discourage close inspection. We satisfied ourselves
that with the help of our rope we could find our way down, and then
returned, rejoicing, to our camp to make our preparations for the
next evening.

What we did we had to do quickly and secretly, since even at this
last hour the Indians might hold us back. Our stores we would leave
behind us, save only our guns and cartridges. But Challenger had some
unwieldy stuff which he ardently desired to take with him, and one
particular package, of which I may not speak, which gave us more labor
than any. Slowly the day passed, but when the darkness fell we were
ready for our departure. With much labor we got our things up the
steps, and then, looking back, took one last long survey of that strange
land, soon I fear to be vulgarized, the prey of hunter and prospector,
but to each of us a dreamland of glamour and romance, a land where
we had dared much, suffered much, and learned much\mbox{---}\textit{our}
land, as we shall ever fondly call it. Along upon our left the neighboring
caves each threw out its ruddy cheery firelight into the gloom. From
the slope below us rose the voices of the Indians as they laughed
and sang. Beyond was the long sweep of the woods, and in the center,
shimmering vaguely through the gloom, was the great lake, the mother
of strange monsters. Even as we looked a high whickering cry, the
call of some weird animal, rang clear out of the darkness. It was
the very voice of Maple White Land bidding us good-bye. We turned
and plunged into the cave which led to home.

Two hours later, we, our packages, and all we owned, were at the foot
of the cliff. Save for Challenger's luggage we had never a difficulty.
Leaving it all where we descended, we started at once for Zambo's
camp. In the early morning we approached it, but only to find, to
our amazement, not one fire but a dozen upon the plain. The rescue
party had arrived. There were twenty Indians from the river, with
stakes, ropes, and all that could be useful for bridging the chasm.
At least we shall have no difficulty now in carrying our packages,
when to-morrow we begin to make our way back to the Amazon.

And so, in humble and thankful mood, I close this account. Our eyes
have seen great wonders and our souls are chastened by what we have
endured. Each is in his own way a better and deeper man. It may be
that when we reach Para we shall stop to refit. If we do, this letter
will be a mail ahead. If not, it will reach London on the very day
that I do. In either case, my dear Mr.\ McArdle, I hope very soon
to shake you by the hand.


\chapter*{\raggedright CHAPTER XVI. {}``A Procession! A Procession!''}

\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{ {}``A Procession! A Procession!''}

\markboth{The Lost World}{{}``A Procession! A Procession!''}

I should wish to place upon record here our gratitude to all our friends
upon the Amazon for the very great kindness and hospitality which
was shown to us upon our return journey. Very particularly would I
thank Senhor Penalosa and other officials of the Brazilian Government
for the special arrangements by which we were helped upon our way,
and Senhor Pereira of Para, to whose forethought we owe the complete
outfit for a decent appearance in the civilized world which we found
ready for us at that town. It seemed a poor return for all the courtesy
which we encountered that we should deceive our hosts and benefactors,
but under the circumstances we had really no alternative, and I hereby
tell them that they will only waste their time and their money if
they attempt to follow upon our traces. Even the names have been altered
in our accounts, and I am very sure that no one, from the most careful
study of them, could come within a thousand miles of our unknown land.

The excitement which had been caused through those parts of South
America which we had to traverse was imagined by us to be purely local,
and I can assure our friends in England that we had no notion of the
uproar which the mere rumor of our experiences had caused through
Europe. It was not until the \emph{Ivernia} was within five hundred
miles of Southampton that the wireless messages from paper after paper
and agency after agency, offering huge prices for a short return message
as to our actual results, showed us how strained was the attention
not only of the scientific world but of the general public. It was
agreed among us, however, that no definite statement should be given
to the Press until we had met the members of the Zoological Institute,
since as delegates it was our clear duty to give our first report
to the body from which we had received our commission of investigation.
Thus, although we found Southampton full of Pressmen, we absolutely
refused to give any information, which had the natural effect of focussing
public attention upon the meeting which was advertised for the evening
of November 7th. For this gathering, the Zoological Hall which had
been the scene of the inception of our task was found to be far too
small, and it was only in the Queen's Hall in Regent Street that accommodation
could be found. It is now common knowledge the promoters might have
ventured upon the Albert Hall and still found their space too scanty.

It was for the second evening after our arrival that the great meeting
had been fixed. For the first, we had each, no doubt, our own pressing
personal affairs to absorb us. Of mine I cannot yet speak. It may
be that as it stands further from me I may think of it, and even speak
of it, with less emotion. I have shown the reader in the beginning
of this narrative where lay the springs of my action. It is but right,
perhaps, that I should carry on the tale and show also the results.
And yet the day may come when I would not have it otherwise. At least
I have been driven forth to take part in a wondrous adventure, and
I cannot but be thankful to the force that drove me.

And now I turn to the last supreme eventful moment of our adventure.
As I was racking my brain as to how I should best describe it, my
eyes fell upon the issue of my own Journal for the morning of the
8th of November with the full and excellent account of my friend and
fellow-reporter Macdona. What can I do better than transcribe his
narrative\mbox{---}head-lines and all? I admit that the paper was
exuberant in the matter, out of compliment to its own enterprise in
sending a correspondent, but the other great dailies were hardly less
full in their account. Thus, then, friend Mac in his report:

\noindent \begin{center}\noun{\large THE NEW WORLD}\noun{}\\
\textit{\noun{\small Great}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Meeting}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small at}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small the}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Queen's}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Hall}}\\
\textit{\noun{\small Scenes}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small of}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Uproar}}\\
\textit{\noun{\small Extraordinary}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Incident}}\\
\textit{\noun{\small What}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small was}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small it}}\noun{\small ?}\\
\textit{\noun{\small Nocturnal}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Riot}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small in}} \noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Regent}}
\noun{\small }\textit{\noun{\small Street}}\textit{}\\
(Special)\end{center}

\begin{quotation}
{}``The much-discussed meeting of the Zoological Institute, convened
to hear the report of the Committee of Investigation sent out last
year to South America to test the assertions made by Professor Challenger
as to the continued existence of prehistoric life upon that Continent,
was held last night in the greater Queen's Hall, and it is safe to
say that it is likely to be a red letter date in the history of Science,
for the proceedings were of so remarkable and sensational a character
that no one present is ever likely to forget them.'' (Oh, brother
scribe Macdona, what a monstrous opening sentence!) {}``The tickets
were theoretically confined to members and their friends, but the
latter is an elastic term, and long before eight o'clock, the hour
fixed for the commencement of the proceedings, all parts of the Great
Hall were tightly packed. The general public, however, which most
unreasonably entertained a grievance at having been excluded, stormed
the doors at a quarter to eight, after a prolonged melee in which
several people were injured, including Inspector Scoble of H.\ Division,
whose leg was unfortunately broken. After this unwarrantable invasion,
which not only filled every passage, but even intruded upon the space
set apart for the Press, it is estimated that nearly five thousand
people awaited the arrival of the travelers. When they eventually
appeared, they took their places in the front of a platform which
already contained all the leading scientific men, not only of this
country, but of France and of Germany. Sweden was also represented,
in the person of Professor Sergius, the famous Zoologist of the University
of Upsala. The entrance of the four heroes of the occasion was the
signal for a remarkable demonstration of welcome, the whole audience
rising and cheering for some minutes. An acute observer might, however,
have detected some signs of dissent amid the applause, and gathered
that the proceedings were likely to become more lively than harmonious.
It may safely be prophesied, however, that no one could have foreseen
the extraordinary turn which they were actually to take.

{}``Of the appearance of the four wanderers little need be said,
since their photographs have for some time been appearing in all the
papers. They bear few traces of the hardships which they are said
to have undergone. Professor Challenger's beard may be more shaggy,
Professor Summerlee's features more ascetic, Lord John Roxton's figure
more gaunt, and all three may be burned to a darker tint than when
they left our shores, but each appeared to be in most excellent health.
As to our own representative, the well-known athlete and international
Rugby football player, E.\ D. Malone, he looks trained to a hair,
and as he surveyed the crowd a smile of good-humored contentment pervaded
his honest but homely face.'' (All right, Mac, wait till I get you
alone!)

{}``When quiet had been restored and the audience resumed their seats
after the ovation which they had given to the travelers, the chairman,
the Duke of Durham, addressed the meeting.\  `He would not,' he said,
`stand for more than a moment between that vast assembly and the treat
which lay before them. It was not for him to anticipate what Professor
Summerlee, who was the spokesman of the committee, had to say to them,
but it was common rumor that their expedition had been crowned by
extraordinary success.' (Applause.) `Apparently the age of romance
was not dead, and there was common ground upon which the wildest imaginings
of the novelist could meet the actual scientific investigations of
the searcher for truth. He would only add, before he sat down, that
he rejoiced\mbox{---}and all of them would rejoice\mbox{---}that
these gentlemen had returned safe and sound from their difficult and
dangerous task, for it cannot be denied that any disaster to such
an expedition would have inflicted a well-nigh irreparable loss to
the cause of Zoological science.' (Great applause, in which Professor
Challenger was observed to join.)

{}``Professor Summerlee's rising was the signal for another extraordinary
outbreak of enthusiasm, which broke out again at intervals throughout
his address. That address will not be given \emph{in} \textit{extenso}
in these columns, for the reason that a full account of the whole
adventures of the expedition is being published as a supplement from
the pen of our own special correspondent. Some general indications
will therefore suffice. Having described the genesis of their journey,
and paid a handsome tribute to his friend Professor Challenger, coupled
with an apology for the incredulity with which his assertions, now
fully vindicated, had been received, he gave the actual course of
their journey, carefully withholding such information as would aid
the public in any attempt to locate this remarkable plateau. Having
described, in general terms, their course from the main river up to
the time that they actually reached the base of the cliffs, he enthralled
his hearers by his account of the difficulties encountered by the
expedition in their repeated attempts to mount them, and finally described
how they succeeded in their desperate endeavors, which cost the lives
of their two devoted half-breed servants.'' (This amazing reading
of the affair was the result of Summerlee's endeavors to avoid raising
any questionable matter at the meeting.)

{}``Having conducted his audience in fancy to the summit, and marooned
them there by reason of the fall of their bridge, the Professor proceeded
to describe both the horrors and the attractions of that remarkable
land. Of personal adventures he said little, but laid stress upon
the rich harvest reaped by Science in the observations of the wonderful
beast, bird, insect, and plant life of the plateau. Peculiarly rich
in the coleoptera and in the lepidoptera, forty-six new species of
the one and ninety-four of the other had been secured in the course
of a few weeks. It was, however, in the larger animals, and especially
in the larger animals supposed to have been long extinct, that the
interest of the public was naturally centered. Of these he was able
to give a goodly list, but had little doubt that it would be largely
extended when the place had been more thoroughly investigated. He
and his companions had seen at least a dozen creatures, most of them
at a distance, which corresponded with nothing at present known to
Science. These would in time be duly classified and examined. He instanced
a snake, the cast skin of which, deep purple in color, was fifty-one
feet in length, and mentioned a white creature, supposed to be mammalian,
which gave forth well-marked phosphorescence in the darkness; also
a large black moth, the bite of which was supposed by the Indians
to be highly poisonous. Setting aside these entirely new forms of
life, the plateau was very rich in known prehistoric forms, dating
back in some cases to early Jurassic times. Among these he mentioned
the gigantic and grotesque stegosaurus, seen once by Mr.\ Malone
at a drinking-place by the lake, and drawn in the sketch-book of that
adventurous American who had first penetrated this unknown world.
He described also the \textit{\emph{iguanodon}} and the pterodactyl\mbox{---}two
of the first of the wonders which they had encountered. He then thrilled
the assembly by some account of the terrible carnivorous dinosaurs,
which had on more than one occasion pursued members of the party,
and which were the most formidable of all the creatures which they
had encountered. Thence he passed to the huge and ferocious bird,
the phororachus, and to the great elk which still roams upon this
upland. It was not, however, until he sketched the mysteries of the
central lake that the full interest and enthusiasm of the audience
were aroused. One had to pinch oneself to be sure that one was awake
as one heard this sane and practical Professor in cold measured tones
describing the monstrous three-eyed fish-lizards and the huge water-snakes
which inhabit this enchanted sheet of water. Next he touched upon
the Indians, and upon the extraordinary colony of anthropoid apes,
which might be looked upon as an advance upon the pithecanthropus
of Java, and as coming therefore nearer than any known form to that
hypothetical creation, the missing link. Finally he described, amongst
some merriment, the ingenious but highly dangerous aeronautic invention
of Professor Challenger, and wound up a most memorable address by
an account of the methods by which the committee did at last find
their way back to civilization.

{}``It had been hoped that the proceedings would end there, and that
a vote of thanks and congratulation, moved by Professor Sergius, of
Upsala University, would be duly seconded and carried; but it was
soon evident that the course of events was not destined to flow so
smoothly. Symptoms of opposition had been evident from time to time
during the evening, and now Dr.\ James Illingworth, of Edinburgh,
rose in the center of the hall. Dr.\ Illingworth asked whether an
amendment should not be taken before a resolution.

{}``\textit{The} \textit{Chairman}: `Yes, sir, if there must be an
amendment.'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth}: `Your Grace, there must
be an amendment.'

{}``\textit{The} \textit{Chairman}: `Then let us take it at once.'

{}``\textit{Professor} \textit{Summerlee} (springing to his feet):
`Might I explain, your Grace, that this man is my personal enemy ever
since our controversy in the Quarterly Journal of Science as to the
true nature of Bathybius?'

{}``\textit{The} \textit{Chairman}: `I fear I cannot go into personal
matters. Proceed.'

{}``Dr.\ Illingworth was imperfectly heard in part of his remarks
on account of the strenuous opposition of the friends of the explorers.
Some attempts were also made to pull him down. Being a man of enormous
physique, however, and possessed of a very powerful voice, he dominated
the tumult and succeeded in finishing his speech. It was clear, from
the moment of his rising, that he had a number of friends and sympathizers
in the hall, though they formed a minority in the audience. The attitude
of the greater part of the public might be described as one of attentive
neutrality.

{}``Dr.\ Illingworth began his remarks by expressing his high appreciation
of the scientific work both of Professor Challenger and of Professor
Summerlee. He much regretted that any personal bias should have been
read into his remarks, which were entirely dictated by his desire
for scientific truth. His position, in fact, was substantially the
same as that taken up by Professor Summerlee at the last meeting.
At that last meeting Professor Challenger had made certain assertions
which had been queried by his colleague. Now this colleague came forward
himself with the same assertions and expected them to remain unquestioned.
Was this reasonable? (`Yes,' `No,' and prolonged interruption, during
which Professor Challenger was heard from the Press box to ask leave
from the chairman to put Dr.\ Illingworth into the street.) A year
ago one man said certain things. Now four men said other and more
startling ones. Was this to constitute a final proof where the matters
in question were of the most revolutionary and incredible character?
There had been recent examples of travelers arriving from the unknown
with certain tales which had been too readily accepted. Was the London
Zoological Institute to place itself in this position? He admitted
that the members of the committee were men of character. But human
nature was very complex. Even Professors might be misled by the desire
for notoriety. Like moths, we all love best to flutter in the light.
Heavy-game shots liked to be in a position to cap the tales of their
rivals, and journalists were not averse from sensational coups, even
when imagination had to aid fact in the process. Each member of the
committee had his own motive for making the most of his results.\ 
(`Shame!\ shame!') He had no desire to be offensive.\  (`You are!'
and interruption.) The corroboration of these wondrous tales was really
of the most slender description. What did it amount to? Some photographs.
Was it possible that in this age of ingenious manipulation photographs
could be accepted as evidence? What more? We have a story of a flight
and a descent by ropes which precluded the production of larger specimens.
It was ingenious, but not convincing. It was understood that Lord
John Roxton claimed to have the skull of a phororachus. He could only
say that he would like to see that skull.

{}``\textit{Lord} \textit{John} \textit{Roxton}: `Is this fellow
calling me a liar?' (Uproar.)

{}``\textit{The} \textit{Chairman}: `Order!\ order! Dr.\ Illingworth,
I must direct you to bring your remarks to a conclusion and to move
your amendment.'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth}: `Your Grace, I have more
to say, but I bow to your ruling. I move, then, that, while Professor
Summerlee be thanked for his interesting address, the whole matter
shall be regarded as `non-proven,' and shall be referred back to a
larger, and possibly more reliable Committee of Investigation.'

{}``It is difficult to describe the confusion caused by this amendment.
A large section of the audience expressed their indignation at such
a slur upon the travelers by noisy shouts of dissent and cries of,
`Don't put it!'\ `Withdraw!'\ `Turn him out!' On the other hand,
the malcontents\mbox{---}and it cannot be denied that they were
fairly numerous\mbox{---}cheered for the amendment, with cries of
`Order!'\ `Chair!'\ and `Fair play!' A scuffle broke out in the
back benches, and blows were freely exchanged among the medical students
who crowded that part of the hall. It was only the moderating influence
of the presence of large numbers of ladies which prevented an absolute
riot. Suddenly, however, there was a pause, a hush, and then complete
silence. Professor Challenger was on his feet. His appearance and
manner are peculiarly arresting, and as he raised his hand for order
the whole audience settled down expectantly to give him a hearing.

{}```It will be within the recollection of many present,' said Professor
Challenger, `that similar foolish and unmannerly scenes marked the
last meeting at which I have been able to address them. On that occasion
Professor Summerlee was the chief offender, and though he is now chastened
and contrite, the matter could not be entirely forgotten. I have heard
to-night similar, but even more offensive, sentiments from the person
who has just sat down, and though it is a conscious effort of self-effacement
to come down to that person's mental level, I will endeavor to do
so, in order to allay any reasonable doubt which could possibly exist
in the minds of anyone.' (Laughter and interruption.) `I need not
remind this audience that, though Professor Summerlee, as the head
of the Committee of Investigation, has been put up to speak to-night,
still it is I who am the real prime mover in this business, and that
it is mainly to me that any successful result must be ascribed. I
have safely conducted these three gentlemen to the spot mentioned,
and I have, as you have heard, convinced them of the accuracy of my
previous account. We had hoped that we should find upon our return
that no one was so dense as to dispute our joint conclusions. Warned,
however, by my previous experience, I have not come without such proofs
as may convince a reasonable man. As explained by Professor Summerlee,
our cameras have been tampered with by the ape-men when they ransacked
our camp, and most of our negatives ruined.' (Jeers, laughter, and
`Tell us another!'\ from the back.) `I have mentioned the ape-men,
and I cannot forbear from saying that some of the sounds which now
meet my ears bring back most vividly to my recollection my experiences
with those interesting creatures.' (Laughter.) `In spite of the destruction
of so many invaluable negatives, there still remains in our collection
a certain number of corroborative photographs showing the conditions
of life upon the plateau. Did they accuse them of having forged these
photographs?' (A voice, `Yes,' and considerable interruption which
ended in several men being put out of the hall.) `The negatives were
open to the inspection of experts. But what other evidence had they?
Under the conditions of their escape it was naturally impossible to
bring a large amount of baggage, but they had rescued Professor Summerlee's
collections of butterflies and beetles, containing many new species.
Was this not evidence?' (Several voices, `No.') `Who said no?'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth} (rising): `Our point is that
such a collection might have been made in other places than a prehistoric
plateau.' (Applause.)

{}``\textit{Professor} \textit{Challenger}: `No doubt, sir, we have
to bow to your scientific authority, although I must admit that the
name is unfamiliar. Passing, then, both the photographs and the entomological
collection, I come to the varied and accurate information which we
bring with us upon points which have never before been elucidated.
For example, upon the domestic habits of the pterodactyl'\mbox{---}(a
voice: `Bosh,' and uproar)\mbox{---}`I say, that upon the domestic
habits of the pterodactyl we can throw a flood of light. I can exhibit
to you from my portfolio a picture of that creature taken from life
which would convince you\mbox{---}'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth}: `No picture could convince
us of anything.'

{}``\textit{Professor} \textit{Challenger}: `You would require to
see the thing itself?'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth}: `Undoubtedly.'

{}``\textit{Professor} \textit{Challenger}: `And you would accept
that?'

{}``\textit{Dr}.\ \textit{Illingworth} (laughing): `Beyond a doubt.'

{}``It was at this point that the sensation of the evening arose\mbox{---}a
sensation so dramatic that it can never have been paralleled in the
history of scientific gatherings. Professor Challenger raised his
hand in the air as a signal, and at once our colleague, Mr.\ E.\ D.\ Malone,
was observed to rise and to make his way to the back of the platform.
An instant later he re-appeared in company of a gigantic \textit{\emph{negro}},
the two of them bearing between them a large square packing-case.
It was evidently of great weight, and was slowly carried forward and
placed in front of the Professor's chair. All sound had hushed in
the audience and everyone was absorbed in the spectacle before them.
Professor Challenger drew off the top of the case, which formed a
sliding lid. Peering down into the box he snapped his fingers several
times and was heard from the Press seat to say, `Come, then, pretty,
pretty!'\ in a coaxing voice. An instant later, with a scratching,
rattling sound, a most horrible and loathsome creature appeared from
below and perched itself upon the side of the case. Even the unexpected
fall of the Duke of Durham into the orchestra, which occurred at this
moment, could not distract the petrified attention of the vast audience.
The face of the creature was like the wildest gargoyle that the imagination
of a mad medieval builder could have conceived. It was malicious,
horrible, with two small red eyes as bright as points of burning coal.
Its long, savage mouth, which was held half-open, was full of a double
row of shark-like teeth. Its shoulders were humped, and round them
were draped what appeared to be a faded gray shawl. It was the devil
of our childhood in person. There was a turmoil in the audience\mbox{---}someone
screamed, two ladies in the front row fell senseless from their chairs,
and there was a general movement upon the platform to follow their
chairman into the orchestra. For a moment there was danger of a general
panic. Professor Challenger threw up his hands to still the commotion,
but the movement alarmed the creature beside him. Its strange shawl
suddenly unfurled, spread, and fluttered as a pair of leathery wings.
Its owner grabbed at its legs, but too late to hold it. It had sprung
from the perch and was circling slowly round the Queen's Hall with
a dry, leathery flapping of its ten-foot wings, while a putrid and
insidious odor pervaded the room. The cries of the people in the galleries,
who were alarmed at the near approach of those glowing eyes and that
murderous beak, excited the creature to a frenzy. Faster and faster
it flew, beating against walls and chandeliers in a blind frenzy of
alarm.\  `The window! For heaven's sake shut that window!'\ roared
the Professor from the platform, dancing and wringing his hands in
an agony of apprehension. Alas, his warning was too late! In a moment
the creature, beating and bumping along the wall like a huge moth
within a gas-shade, came upon the opening, squeezed its hideous bulk
through it, and was gone. Professor Challenger fell back into his
chair with his face buried in his hands, while the audience gave one
long, deep sigh of relief as they realized that the incident was over.

{}``Then\mbox{---}oh!\ how shall one describe what took place
then\mbox{---} when the full exuberance of the majority and the
full reaction of the minority united to make one great wave of enthusiasm,
which rolled from the back of the hall, gathering volume as it came,
swept over the orchestra, submerged the platform, and carried the
four heroes away upon its crest?''\ (Good for you, Mac!) {}``If
the audience had done less than justice, surely it made ample amends.
Every one was on his feet. Every one was moving, shouting, gesticulating.
A dense crowd of cheering men were round the four travelers.\  `Up
with them! up with them!'\ cried a hundred voices. In a moment four
figures shot up above the crowd. In vain they strove to break loose.
They were held in their lofty places of honor. It would have been
hard to let them down if it had been wished, so dense was the crowd
around them.\  `Regent Street! Regent Street!'\ sounded the voices.
There was a swirl in the packed multitude, and a slow current, bearing
the four upon their shoulders, made for the door. Out in the street
the scene was extraordinary. An assemblage of not less than a hundred
thousand people was waiting. The close-packed throng extended from
the other side of the Langham Hotel to Oxford Circus. A roar of acclamation
greeted the four adventurers as they appeared, high above the heads
of the people, under the vivid electric lamps outside the hall.\ 
`A procession! A procession!'\ was the cry. In a dense phalanx, blocking
the streets from side to side, the crowd set forth, taking the route
of Regent Street, Pall Mall, St.\ James's Street, and Piccadilly.
The whole central traffic of London was held up, and many collisions
were reported between the demonstrators upon the one side and the
police and taxi-cabmen upon the other. Finally, it was not until after
midnight that the four travelers were released at the entrance to
Lord John Roxton's chambers in the Albany, and that the exuberant
crowd, having sung `They are Jolly Good Fellows'\ in chorus, concluded
their program with `God Save the King.' So ended one of the most remarkable
evenings that London has seen for a considerable time.'' 
\end{quotation}
So far my friend Macdona; and it may be taken as a fairly accurate,
if florid, account of the proceedings. As to the main incident, it
was a bewildering surprise to the audience, but not, I need hardly
say, to us. The reader will remember how I met Lord John Roxton upon
the very occasion when, in his protective crinoline, he had gone to
bring the {}``Devil's chick'' as he called it, for Professor Challenger.
I have hinted also at the trouble which the Professor's baggage gave
us when we left the plateau, and had I described our voyage I might
have said a good deal of the worry we had to coax with putrid fish
the appetite of our filthy companion. If I have not said much about
it before, it was, of course, that the Professor's earnest desire
was that no possible rumor of the unanswerable argument which we carried
should be allowed to leak out until the moment came when his enemies
were to be confuted.

One word as to the fate of the London pterodactyl. Nothing can be
said to be certain upon this point. There is the evidence of two frightened
women that it perched upon the roof of the Queen's Hall and remained
there like a diabolical statue for some hours. The next day it came
out in the evening papers that Private Miles, of the Coldstream Guards,
on duty outside Marlborough House, had deserted his post without leave,
and was therefore court-martialed. Private Miles' account, that he
dropped his rifle and took to his heels down the Mall because on looking
up he had suddenly seen the devil between him and the moon, was not
accepted by the Court, and yet it may have a direct bearing upon the
point at issue. The only other evidence which I can adduce is from
the log of the S.S.\ \emph{Friesland}, a Dutch-American liner, which
asserts that at nine next morning, Start Point being at the time ten
miles upon their starboard quarter, they were passed by something
between a flying goat and a monstrous bat, which was heading at a
prodigious pace south and west. If its homing instinct led it upon
the right line, there can be no doubt that somewhere out in the wastes
of the Atlantic the last European pterodactyl found its end.

And Gladys\mbox{---}oh, my Gladys!\mbox{---}Gladys of the mystic
lake, now to be re-named the Central, for never shall she have immortality
through me. Did I not always see some hard fiber in her nature? Did
I not, even at the time when I was proud to obey her behest, feel
that it was surely a poor love which could drive a lover to his death
or the danger of it? Did I not, in my truest thoughts, always recurring
and always dismissed, see past the beauty of the face, and, peering
into the soul, discern the twin shadows of selfishness and of fickleness
glooming at the back of it? Did she love the heroic and the spectacular
for its own noble sake, or was it for the glory which might, without
effort or sacrifice, be reflected upon herself? Or are these thoughts
the vain wisdom which comes after the event? It was the shock of my
life. For a moment it had turned me to a cynic. But already, as I
write, a week has passed, and we have had our momentous interview
with Lord John Roxton and\mbox{---}well, perhaps things might be
worse.

Let me tell it in a few words. No letter or telegram had come to me
at Southampton, and I reached the little villa at Streatham about
ten o'clock that night in a fever of alarm. Was she dead or alive?
Where were all my nightly dreams of the open arms, the smiling face,
the words of praise for her man who had risked his life to humor her
whim? Already I was down from the high peaks and standing flat-footed
upon earth. Yet some good reasons given might still lift me to the
clouds once more. I rushed down the garden path, hammered at the door,
heard the voice of Gladys within, pushed past the staring maid, and
strode into the sitting-room. She was seated in a low settee under
the shaded standard lamp by the piano. In three steps I was across
the room and had both her hands in mine.

{}``Gladys!''\ I cried, {}``Gladys!''\ 

She looked up with amazement in her face. She was altered in some
subtle way. The expression of her eyes, the hard upward stare, the
set of the lips, was new to me. She drew back her hands.

{}``What do you mean?''\ she said.

{}``Gladys!''\ I cried. {}``What is the matter? You are my Gladys,
are you not\mbox{---}little Gladys Hungerton?''\ 

{}``No,'' said she, {}``I am Gladys Potts. Let me introduce you
to my husband.''

How absurd life is! I found myself mechanically bowing and shaking
hands with a little ginger-haired man who was coiled up in the deep
arm-chair which had once been sacred to my own use. We bobbed and
grinned in front of each other.

{}``Father lets us stay here. We are getting our house ready,''
said Gladys.

{}``Oh, yes,'' said I.

{}``You didn't get my letter at Para, then?''\ 

{}``No, I got no letter.''

{}``Oh, what a pity! It would have made all clear.''

{}``It is quite clear,'' said I.

{}``I've told William all about you,'' said she. {}``We have no
secrets. I am so sorry about it. But it couldn't have been so very
deep, could it, if you could go off to the other end of the world
and leave me here alone. You're not crabby, are you?''\ 

{}``No, no, not at all. I think I'll go.''

{}``Have some refreshment,'' said the little man, and he added,
in a confidential way, {}``It's always like this, ain't it? And must
be unless you had polygamy, only the other way round; you understand.''
He laughed like an idiot, while I made for the door.

I was through it, when a sudden fantastic impulse came upon me, and
I went back to my successful rival, who looked nervously at the electric
push.

{}``Will you answer a question?''\ I asked.

{}``Well, within reason,'' said he.

{}``How did you do it? Have you searched for hidden treasure, or
discovered a pole, or done time on a pirate, or flown the Channel,
or what? Where is the glamour of romance? How did you get it?''\ 

He stared at me with a hopeless expression upon his vacuous, good-natured,
scrubby little face.

{}``Don't you think all this is a little too personal?''\ he said.

{}``Well, just one question,'' I cried. {}``What are you? What
is your profession?''\ 

{}``I am a solicitor's clerk,'' said he. {}``Second man at Johnson
and Merivale's, 41 Chancery Lane.''

{}``Good-night!''\ said I, and vanished, like all disconsolate
and broken-hearted heroes, into the darkness, with grief and rage
and laughter all simmering within me like a boiling pot.

One more little scene, and I have done. Last night we all supped at
Lord John Roxton's rooms, and sitting together afterwards we smoked
in good comradeship and talked our adventures over. It was strange
under these altered surroundings to see the old, well-known faces
and figures. There was Challenger, with his smile of condescension,
his drooping eyelids, his intolerant eyes, his aggressive beard, his
huge chest, swelling and puffing as he laid down the law to Summerlee.
And Summerlee, too, there he was with his short briar between his
thin moustache and his gray goat's-beard, his worn face protruded
in eager debate as he queried all Challenger's propositions. Finally,
there was our host, with his rugged, eagle face, and his cold, blue,
glacier eyes with always a shimmer of devilment and of humor down
in the depths of them. Such is the last picture of them that I have
carried away.

It was after supper, in his own sanc\-tum\mbox{---}the room of
the pink radiance and the innumerable trophies\mbox{---}that Lord
John Roxton had something to say to us. From a cupboard he had brought
an old cigar-box, and this he laid before him on the table.

{}``There's one thing,'' said he, {}``that maybe I should have
spoken about before this, but I wanted to know a little more clearly
where I was. No use to raise hopes and let them down again. But it's
facts, not hopes, with us now. You may remember that day we found
the pterodactyl rookery in the swamp\mbox{---}what? Well, somethin'
in the lie of the land took my notice. Perhaps it has escaped you,
so I will tell you. It was a volcanic vent full of blue clay.'' The
Professors nodded.

{}``Well, now, in the whole world I've only had to do with one place
that was a volcanic vent of blue clay. That was the great De Beers
Diamond Mine of Kimberley\mbox{---}what? So you see I got diamonds
into my head. I rigged up a contraption to hold off those stinking
beasts, and I spent a happy day there with a spud. This is what I
got.''

He opened his cigar-box, and tilting it over he poured about twenty
or thirty rough stones, varying from the size of beans to that of
chestnuts, on the table.

{}``Perhaps you think I should have told you then. Well, so I should,
only I know there are a lot of traps for the unwary, and that stones
may be of any size and yet of little value where color and consistency
are clean off. Therefore, I brought them back, and on the first day
at home I took one round to Spink's, and asked him to have it roughly
cut and valued.''

He took a pill-box from his pocket, and spilled out of it a beautiful
glittering diamond, one of the finest stones that I have ever seen.

{}``There's the result,'' said he. {}``He prices the lot at a minimum
of two hundred thousand pounds. Of course it is fair shares between
us. I won't hear of anythin' else. Well, Challenger, what will you
do with your fifty thousand?''\ 

{}``If you really persist in your generous view,'' said the Professor,
{}``I should found a private museum, which has long been one of my
dreams.''

{}``And you, Summerlee?''\ 

{}``I would retire from teaching, and so find time for my final classification
of the chalk fossils.''

{}``I'll use my own,'' said Lord John Roxton, {}``in fitting a
well-formed expedition and having another look at the dear old plateau.
As to you, young fellah, you, of course, will spend yours in gettin'
married.''

{}``Not just yet,'' said I, with a rueful smile. {}``I think, if
you will have me, that I would rather go with you.''

Lord Roxton said nothing, but a brown hand was stretched out to me
across the table. 
\end{document}
