Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 November 1889 — ALLAN QUATERMAIN. [ARTICLE]

ALLAN QUATERMAIN.

A Rtcord of Rrtnatkakle Adventures and Discoveries.

BY H. RIDER HAGGARD,

J STNOPSIS. [Allan Quatermain, hunter, chafing under the restraints of civilization, and in the death of his son Harry being lonely and disconsolate, without kith or kin. concludes to make another trip into Africa. He had heard indistinctly of a distant part of Africa being peopled with a strange white race, and he proposed to go to Mt. Keriia, thence to Mt. Lekakisera. thence into the unknown beyond, and if possible, discover the the truth or falsity of the report. He broached the subject to his old friends and associate adventurers in Kukuanaland— Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good—who themselves weary of their situation, eagerly join in the proposed expedition. Thereupon the party embark for their new field of adventure. In due season they reached Lamu and with the aid of the consul soon complete arrangements with a party of Wakafi Askai to transport their goods. This party were loth to make the trip, but were induced to do so by the demands and threats Of Umslopogaas, a deposed Zulu chief whom Quatermain had known in other adventures. Ten days after leaving Lapiu. the party found themselves on the Tana river. At Chara they had a quarrel with the headsman of the bearers, whe wanted to extort large extra payment. In the result he threatened to set the Massai on them. The party embarked on the river in canoes. At night .they concluded it unsafe to encamp on shore, and anchored their canoes in midstream. After several hours Quatermain, being awake, felt the boat move, and soon a hand was thrust in the canoe, and one of the Wakwafi was stabbed to the heart. He uttered a frightful yell, and Quatermain, grasping U mslopogaas’ battle-ax. struck a terrific blow at the hand, and severed it from the arm, the hand falling in the boat. Dark objects were then seen moving toward the shore and it was known that the Massai had intended murdering them as they slept. The warning given was just in time to save the lives of all in the canoes.] The reader will be enabled by this synopsis to peruse the thread of the story in the following chapters:

CHAPTER 111. THE MISSION STATION. We made the remains_of our rope fast to the other canoe, and sat waiting for the dawn and congratulating ourselves upon our merciful escape, which really seemed to result more from the special favor of Providence than from our own care and prowess. At last it came, and I have not often been more grateful to see the light, though so far as my canoe was concerned it revealed a ghastly sight. There in the bottom of the boat lay the unfortunate Askari, the sime, or eword, in his bosom, and the severed hand griping the handle. I could not bear the sight, so hauling up the stone which had served as an anchor to the canoe, we made it fast to the murdered man and dropped him overboard, and down he went to the bottom, leaving nothing but a trail of bubbles behind him. Alas! when our time comes, most of us, like him, leave nothing but bubbles behind to show that we have been, and the bubbles soon burst. The- hand of Ills murderer we threw into the stream, and I saw a young crocodile seize it as it was slowly sinking. The sword, of which the handle was ivory, inlaid with gold (evidently Arab work), I kept and used as a hunting-knife, and very useful it proved. Then, a man having been transferred to my canoe, we once more started on in very low spirits and not feeling at all comfortable as to the future, but fondly hoping to fetch up at the Highlands station by night. To make matters worse, within an hour of sunrise it came on to rain in torrents, wetting us to the skin, and even necessitating the occasional baling of the canoes, and as the rain beat down the wind we could not use our sails, and had to get along as best we could with our paddles.

At eleven o’clock we halted on an open piece of ground on the left bank of the river, and, the rain abating a little, managed to make a fire and catch and boil some fish. We did not dare to wander about to search for game. At two o’clock we got off again, taking a supply of boiled fish with us. and shortly afterward the rain came on harder than ever. Also the river became exceedingly difficult to navigate on account of the numerous rocks, reaches of shallow water, and the increased force of the current; so that it soon became clear to us that we should not reach the Rev. Mackenzie’s hosj itable roof that night-—a prospect that did not tend to enliven us. Toil as we would, we could not make more than an average of a mile an hour, and-at five o’clock in theafi temoon (by which time wc were all utterly Worn out) we reckoned that we were still quite ten miles below the station. This being so, we set to work to make the best arrangements we rould for the night. After our recent experience, we simplj' <iid not dare to land, more especially as the banks of Tana were here clothed with dense bush that would have given cover to five thousand Masai, and at first 1 thought we. were going to have another night of it in the canoes. Fortunately, however, we espied a haszcy islet, not tnprp thiwi .-fifteen.. so square, situated nearly in the middle of the river. For this wo paddled, and, rank*

ing fast the canoes, landed and made ourselves as comfortable as circumstances would permit, which was very uncomfortable indeed. As z for the weather, it continued to be simply vile, the rain coining down in sheets tiil we were chilled to the marrow, and utterly preventing us from lighting a fire. There was, however, one consoling circymstance about this rain; our Askari declared that nothing would induce the Masai to make an attack in it, as they intensely disliked moving about in the wet, perhaps, as Good suggested, because they hate the idea of washing. We eat some insipid and sodden gold fish—that is, with the exception of Umslopogaas, who, like most Zulus, can not bear fish—and took a pull of brandy, of which we fortunately had a few botlles left, and then commenced what, with one exception—when ‘we same three- white men nearly perished of cold on the snow of Sheba’s Breast in the course of our jburney to Kukuanaland - was, I think, the most trying night I ever experienced. It seemed absolutely endless, and once or twice I feared that two of ztte Askari would have died of the wet. cold, and exposure.' Indeed, had it not been for timely doses of brandy I am sure that they would have died, for ho African people can stand much exposure which first paralyzes and then kills them. I could see that even that iron old warrior Umslopogaas felt it keenly; though, in strange contrast to the Wakwafis L who groaned and bemoaned their fate unceasingly, he never uttered a single complaint. To make matters worse, about one in the morning we again heard the owl’s ominous hooting, and had at once to prepare ourselves for another attack; though, if it had been attempted, I do not think that we could have offered a very effective resistance. But either the owl was a real one this time, or else the Masai were themselves too miserable to think of offensive operations, which, indeed, they rarely, if ever, undertake in bush velt. At any rate, we saw nothing of them.

At last the dawn came gliding across the water, wrapped in wreathes of ghostly mist, and, with the daylight, the rain ceased, and then, oh, joy! out came the glorious sun, sucking up the mists and warming the chill air. Benumbed, and utterly exhausted, we dragged ourselves to our feet, and went and stood in the bright rays, and were thankful for them. I can quite understand how it is that primitive people become sun worshippers, especially if their conditions of life render them liable to exposure. In half an hour more we were once again making fair progress with the help of a good wind. Our spirits had returned with the sunshine, and we were ready to laugh at difficulties and dangers that had been almost crushing on the previous day. And so we went on cheerily till about eleven o’clock. Just as we were thinking of halting as usual, to rest and try to shoot something to eat, a sudden bend in the river brought us in sight of a substantial-looking European house with a veranda round it, splendidly situated upon a hill, and surrounded by a high stone wall with a ditch on the outer side. Right against and overshadowing the house was an enormous pine, the top of which we had seen through a glass for the last two days, but of course without knowing that it marked the sight of the mission station. I was the first to see the house, and could not restrain myself from giving a hearty cheer, in which the others, including the natives, joined lustily. There was no thought of halting now. On we labored. for, unfortunately, though the house seemed quite near, it was still a long way off by river, until at last, by one o’clock, we*found ourselves at the bottom of the slope on which the building stood. Running the canoes to the bank, we disembarked, and were just hauling them up on to the shore, when we perceived three figures, dressed in ordinary English-looking clothes, hurrying down through a grove to meet us. “A gentleman, a lady, and a little girl,” ejaculated Good, after surveying the trio through his eyeglass, “walking in a civilized fashion, through a civilized garden, to meet us in this place. Hang me, if it isn’t the most curious thing we have seen yet.” Good was right; it certainly did seem odd and out of place—more like a scene out of a dream or an Italian opera than a real tangible fact; and the sense of unreality was not lessened when we heard ourgelves addressed in good broad Scotch, which, however. I can not produce. ■•How do you do. sirs.’’said Mr. Mackenzie, a gray-haired, angular man. with a kindly face and red cheeks; -I hope I see you very well. My natives told me an hour ago they spied two canoes with white meuin them coming up the river; SO we have just come down to meet you.” • -And it is very glad that we are to see a white face again, let me tell you,” put in the lady—a charming and re-fined-looking person. We took off our hats in acknowledgement, and proceeded to introduce.burselves. '. > “And now.” said Mr. Mackenzie, •■you must all be hungry and weary: so come on. gentlemen, come on, and right glad we are to see you. The last white who visited us was Alphonse - you will see Alphonse presently—and that wa* a, year ago.” Meanwliile we had been walking up the slope of the hljl. the lower portion

of which was fenced off, sometimes with quince fences and sometimes with rough stone walls, into Kafir gardens, just now full of erops of mealies, pumpkins, potatoes, etc. In the corners of these gardens were groups of neat, mushroom-shaped huts, occupied "by Mr. Mackenzie’s mission natives, whose women and children came pouring out to meet us as we walked. Through the center of the gardens ran the roadway up which we were walking. It was bordered on each side by a line of orange trees, which, although they had only been planted ten years, had in the lovely climate of the uplands below Mt. Kenia, the base of which is about 5,0.00 feet above the’ coast line level, already grown to imposing proportions, and were ly laden with the golden fruit. After a stifiish elimb of a quarter of a mile or so—for the hillside was steep—we came to a splendid Quince fence, also covered with fruit, which, inclosed, Mr. Mackenzie told us, a space of about four acres of ground that comprised his private garden, house, church and outbuildings, and, indeed, the whole hill top. And what a garden it was!

I have always loved a and I could have thrown up my hands for joy when I saw Mr. Mackenzie’s First, there were rows upon rows of -standard European fruit trees, all grafted: for on the top of this hill the climate was so temperate that very nearly all the English vegetables,trees and flowers flourished luxuriantly.even, including sevefal'varieties of the apple, which, generally speaking, runs to wood in a warm climate and obstinately declines to fruit. Then there were strawberries, and tomatoes (such tomatoes!),and melons and cucumbers, and, indeed, every sort of vegetable and fruit.

'‘Well, you have something like a garden!” I feid, overpowered with admiration not untouched by envy. “Yes,” answered the missionary, ‘ ‘it is a very good garden, and has weli~repaid my labor; but it is the climate that I have to thank. If you stick a peach stone into the ground it will bear fruit the fourth year, and a rose cutting will bloom in a year. It is a lovely clime.” Just then we came to a ditch about ten feet wide, and full of water, on the other side of which was a loop-holed stone wall eight feet high, and with sharp flints plentifully set in mortar on the coping. “There,” said Mr. Mackenzie,pointing to the ditch and wall, * -this is my ‘magnum opus;’ at least this and the church, which is the other side of the house. It took me and twenty natives two years to dig the ditch and build. the wall, but I never felt safe till it was done; and now I can defy all the savages in Africa, for the spring that fills the ditch is inside the wall, and bubbles out at the top of the hill winter and summer alike, and I always keep a store of four months’ provisions in the house.”

Crossing over a plank and through a very narrow opening in the wall, we entered into what Mrs. Mackenzie called her domain—namely, the flower garden, the beauty of which it is really beyond my power to describe. I do not think I ever saw such roses, gardenias or camellias (all reared from seeds or cuttings sent from England); and there was also a patch given up to a collection of bulbous roots mostly collected by Miss Flossie, Mr. Mackenzie’s little daughter, from the surrounding country, some of which were surpassingly beautiful. In the middle of this garden, and exactly opposite the veranda, a beautiful foukJain of clear water bubbled up from the ground, and fell into a stone work basin which had been carefully built to receive it, whence the overflow found it’s way by means of a drain to the moat round the outer wall, this moat in its turn serving as a reservoir, whence an unfailing supply of water was available to irrigate all the gardens below. The house itself, a massively built, single-storied building, was roofed with slabs of stone, and had a handsome veranda in front. It was built on three sides of a square, the fourth side being taken up by the kitchen, which stood separate from the house—a very good plan in a hot country. In the center of this square thus formed was, perhaps, the most remark-

able object that we had yet seen in this charming place, and that was a single tree of the conifer tribe, varieties of which grow freely on the highlands of this part of Africa. This splendid tree, which Mr. Mackenzie informed us was a landmark for fifty miles around, and which we had ourselves seen for the last forty miles of our journey, must have been nearly three hundred feet in height, the trunk measuring about sixteen feet in diameter at a yard from the ground. For some seventy feet it rose a beautiful tapering brown pillar without a single branch, but at that height splendid dark green boughs, which, looked at from below, had the appearance of gigantic fern leaves, sprung out horizontally from the trunk,, projecting right over the house and flower garden, to both of which they furnished a grateful proportion of shade, without being so high up—offering any impediment to th? passage of light and air. ‘•What a beautiful tree!’’ exclaimed Sir Henry. ••Yes, you arc right; it is a beautiful tree. Them is not another like it in all the country round, that I know of,” answered Mr. Mackenzie. “I call it my watch tower. As you see, I have a rope ladder fixed to the lowest bough; and if I wan* to see anything that is going on within fifteen miles.or. so. all I have to do is to run up it with a >pyglass. Em you must be hungry, and 1 am 'sure the dinner is cooked. Come in. in v friends; ■ it ik bUt-n-nraglTpluee, mit well enough for these savage parts; aud l ean tell you what we have French

cook. ” And he led the way on to the veranda, As I was following him and wondering what on earth he could mean by this, there suddenly appeared, through the door that opened on to the veraudressed in a neat blue cotton suit, and shoes made of tanned hide, and remarkable for a bustling air and most enormous black mustaches, shaped into an upward curve, and coming to a point for all the world like a pair of buffalo horns. “Madame bids me for to say that dinnar is sarved. Messieurs, my compliments;” then suddenly perceiving Umslopogaas, who was loitering along after us and playing with his battle-ax he threw up his hands in astonishment. “Ah, mais quel homme!” he ejaculated, in French, “quel sauvag affreux! Take but note of his huge choppare and the great pit in his head.” “Ay,” said Mr. Mackenzie; ••what

are you talking about, ‘ ‘Talking about!” replied the little Frenchman, his eyes still fixed upon Umslopogaas. whose general appearance seemed to fascinate him: why I talk of him"—and he rudely pointed—“of ze monsieur noir.” Atlhis everybody began to laugh ~ahd Umslopogaas, perceiving that he. was the object of remark, frowned ferociously, for he had a most lordly dislike of anything like a personal liberty. “Parbleu!” said Alphonse, “he is angered—he makes the grimaces. I like no his air. And he did with considerable rapidity.

Mr. Mackenzie joined heartily in the shout of laughter which we indulged in. “He is a queer character -Alphonse,” he said. “By and by I will tell you his history; in the meanwhile let us try his cooking.” “Might I ask,” said Sir Henry, after we had eaten a most excellent dinner, “how you came to have a French cook in these wilds?” '' “Oh.” answered Mrs. Mackenzie, “he arrived here of his own accord about a year ago, and asked to be taken into our service. He had got into some trouble in France, and fled to Zanzibar, where he found an application had been made by the' French Government for his extradition. Whereupon he rushed off up-country, And fell in, when nearly starved, with our caravan of men. who were bringing us our annual supply of goods, and was brought on here. You should get him to tell you the story. ” When dinner was over we lighted our pipes, and Sir Henry proceeded to give our host a description of our journey up here,over which he looked very grave. “It is evident to me,” he said, that those rascally Masai are following you and I am very thankful that you have reached this house in safety. Ido not think that they will dare to attack you here. It is unfortunate, though, that nearly all my men have gone down to

the coast with ivory and goods. There are two hundred of them in the caravan, and the consequence is that I have not more than twenty men available for defensive purposes in case they should attack us. But, still, I will just give a few orders;” and, calling a black man who was loitering about outside in the garden, he went to the window, and addressed him in a Swahili dialect. The man listened, and then saluted and departed. ’‘l am sure I devoutly hope that we shall bring no such calamity upon you,” said I, anxiously, when he had taken his seat again. ‘ ‘Rather than bring those blood-thirsty villlains about your ears, we will move on and “You will do nothing of the sort. If the Masai come they come, and there is an end of it; and I think we can give them a pretty warm greeting. I would not show any man the door for all the Masai in the world.” “That reminds me,” I said, “the consul at Lamu told me that he had had a letter from you, in which you said that a man had arrived here who reported that he had come across a white people in the interior. Do you think that there was any truth in his story? I ask, because I have once or twice in my life heard rumors from natives who have come down from the far north of the existence of such a race.”

Mr. Mackenzie, by way of answer, went out of the room and returned, bringing with him a most curious sword. It was long, and all the blade, which was very thick and heavy, was to within a quarter of an inch of the cutting edge worked in an ornamental pattern exactly as we work soft wood with a fret-saw, the steel, however, being invariably pierced in sudh a way as not to interfere with the strength of the sword. This in itself was sufficiently curious, but what was still more so was that all of the edges of the hollow spaces cut through the substance of the blade were most beautifully inlaid with gold, which was in some way that I cannot understand welded on to the steel.* ••There.” said Mr. Mackenzie, -‘did you ever see a sword like that?” We all examined it and shook our heads. _■ •’Well, I have got it to show you, because this is what the man who said he had seen the white people brought with him, and because it does more or less give an air of truth to what I should otherwise haveset fiowir as a lie. Look here; I will tell you all that I kno w abbuFthe matter, which is not much. One afternoon, just before sundown, 1 was sitting on the veranda, when a poor, miserable, starved-look-ing man came limping up and squatted down before me. I asked him where he came from and whixt he wanted, and thereon ho plunged into a long rumbling narrative about how he belonged to a tribe far in the north, and and how his tribe was destroyed by another tribe, and he with a few other

survivors driven still further north' past a lake named Laga. Thence, it appears, he made his way to another lake that lay up in the mountains, ‘a lake without a bottom,’ he called it, - and here his wife and brother died of an iufectiQus»sickness—probably etnallpox—whereon the people drove him out of their villages into the wilderness, where he wandered miserably over mountains for ten days, after whieh he got into a dense thorn forest, and was one day found there by some white men who were hunting, and who took him to a place where all the people were white and lived in stone houses. Here he remained a week shut up in a house, till one night a man with a white beard, whom he understood to be a ‘medicine man,’ came and inspected him, after which he was led off and taken through the thorn forest to the confines of the wilderness, and given food and this sword (at least so he said), and turned loose.” I

‘TV ell," said Sir Henry, who had been listening with breathless interest, “and what did he do tljen?” 1 ‘ ‘Oh! he seems, according to his account, to have gone th rough sufferings and hardships innumerable, and to have lived for weeks on roots and berries. and such things as he could catch and kill. But somehow he did live and at last by slow degrees made his way south and reached this place What the details of his-journeywerel hover learned, for I told him to retnrn. on the morrow, bidding one of my headmen look after him for the night. The headman took him away, but the poor man had the itch so badly that the headman’s wife would not have him in the hut for fear of catching it* so he was given a blanket and told to sleep outside. As it happened, we had a lion hanging about here just then, and most unhappily he winded this unfortunate wanderer, and, springing on him, bit his head right off without the people in the hut knowing anything about it, and there was an end of him and his story about the white people; and whether or no there is any truth in it is more than I can tell you. What do you think, Mr. Quatermain?

I shook my head, and answered, “I don’t know. There are so many queer things hidden away in the heart of this great continent that I should be sorry to assert that there was no truth in it. Anyhow, we mean to try and find out. We intend to journey to Lekakisera, and thence, if we live to get so far, to this Lake Laga; and, if there are any white people beyond, we will do our best to find.them.” • -You are very venturesome people,” said Mr. Mackenzie, with a smile, and the subject dropped. ■’Sin e I saw the above I have examined hundreds of these swords but have ne\er been able t > discover now t-e gold plates were inlaid in the f etwork. The armorers who make them in Zu-vendis bind themselves by oath not to reveal the secret.—A. Q. ; TO BE CONTINUED.

The Result Resulted. In the last Ohio legislature was a represenative who had been elected and re-elected until he was serving ' his fifteenth term, says the New York Sun. At the opening of the session the first bill introduced was to grant authority to a certain Thomas Shields to construct a mill-dam on a certain river. Some one hunted up the fact that this bill had been regularly introduced and as regularly killed Through the efforts "of the old-timer at every session for a dozen years, and when he was asked to explain he said: I “It’s just this way: A dam there would be all right,-but Shields is down

on me. and the minute a bill is passed _ ■ K--x —4————-—_ - ' _ - ~ms—he will lay for me and give me a whaling. So long as I can stave off his bill he will let me alone, hoping to get it through the next session.” “But the people favor a dam there, and it is hardly fair to keep them out of one because you and Shields have a quarrel.” “But I don’t propose to invite a pounding.” Later on when the bill came up, a number of members rushed it through against the protests of the old-timer. When he found himself defeated he said: “Well, you will see what the result will be. I’ve got to get ready for a licking,” Three days later, as some members were going home from an evening session, they found a bundel of something against the fence. When lifted up and undone it proved to be the mashed remains of the objector to the mill-dam. They recovered consciousness when handled, and when one of the finders asked what had— happened a voice faintly answered: • T met Shields here about half a libur ago, and the result resulted, just as I said it would. He not only pounded me, but he added the twelve years’ interest. ”