{"id":1175,"date":"2026-06-25T18:43:25","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T23:43:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aflorebooks.com\/?post_type=digital-library&p=1175"},"modified":"2026-06-27T16:27:42","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T21:27:42","slug":"chapter-13","status":"publish","type":"digital-library","link":"https:\/\/aflorebooks.com\/es\/digital-library\/the-lost-world\/chapter-13\/","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 13: A Sight Which I Shall Never Forget"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
23\u201335 minutes<\/div>\n\n
5.476 words<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2019s 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 labours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 ginkgo 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 grey light I saw Lord John Roxton kneeling beside me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was he\u2014and 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cQuick, young fellah! Quick!\u201d he cried. \u201cEvery 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\u2019s all right! Don\u2019t wait to talk or think. Get a move on, or we are done!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 brushwood. Into this he rushed, regardless of thorns, and threw himself into the heart of it, pulling me down by his side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere!\u201d he panted. \u201cI think we are safe here. They\u2019ll make for the camp as sure as fate. It will be their first idea. But this should puzzle \u2019em.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat is it all?\u201d I asked, when I had got my breath. \u201cWhere are the professors? And who is it that is after us?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe ape-men,\u201d he cried. \u201cMy God, what brutes! Don\u2019t raise your voice, for they have long ears\u2014sharp eyes, too, but no power of scent, so far as I could judge, so I don\u2019t think they can sniff us out. Where have you been, young fellah? You were well out of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a few sentences I whispered what I had done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPretty bad,\u201d said he, when he had heard of the dinosaur and the pit. \u201cIt isn\u2019t 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\u2019 Papuans had me once, but they are Chesterfields compared to this crowd.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow did it happen?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was in the early mornin\u2019. Our learned friends were just stirrin\u2019. Hadn\u2019t even begun to argue yet. Suddenly it rained apes. They came down as thick as apples out of a tree. They had been assemblin\u2019 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\u2019 our hands with creepers, so they are ahead of any beast that I have seen in my wanderin\u2019s. Ape-men\u2014that\u2019s what they are\u2014Missin\u2019 Links, and I wish they had stayed missin\u2019. They carried off their wounded comrade\u2014he was bleedin\u2019 like a pig\u2014and 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 grey 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 favourite Pressmen he could not have slanged them worse.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, what did they do?\u201d 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI 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\u2019ll smile, young fellah, but \u2019pon my word they might have been kinsmen. I couldn\u2019t have believed it if I hadn\u2019t seen it with my own eyes. This old ape-man\u2014he was their chief\u2014was a sort of red Challenger, with every one of our friend\u2019s 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 \u2018What do you<\/em> want, damn you!\u2019 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\u2014or at least they put up the devil of a cacklin\u2019\u2014and they set to work to drag us off through the forest. They wouldn\u2019t touch the guns and things\u2014thought them dangerous, I expect\u2014but they carried away all our loose food. Summerlee and I got some rough handlin\u2019 on the way\u2014there\u2019s my skin and my clothes to prove it\u2014for they took us a beeline 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\u2019s that?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a strange clicking noise in the distance not unlike castanets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere they go!\u201d said my companion, slipping cartridges into the second double-barrelled Express. \u201cLoad them all up, young fellah my lad, for we\u2019re not going to be taken alive, and don\u2019t you think it! That\u2019s the row they make when they are excited. By George! they\u2019ll have something to excite them if they put us up. The \u2018Last Stand of the Greys\u2019 won\u2019t be in it. \u2018With their rifles grasped in their stiffened hands, mid a ring of the dead and dyin\u2019,\u2019 as some fathead sings. Can you hear them now?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cVery far away.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat 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\u2014about a thousand huts of branches and leaves in a great grove of trees near the edge of the cliff. It\u2019s 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\u2014the fellow who handled me could tie like a bosun\u2014and 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 \u2018we\u2019 I mean Summerlee and myself. Old Challenger was up a tree, eatin\u2019 pines and havin\u2019 the time of his life. I\u2019m bound to say that he managed to get some fruit to us, and with his own hands he loosened our bonds. If you\u2019d seen him sitting up in that tree hobnobbin\u2019 with his twin brother\u2014and singin\u2019 in that rollin\u2019 bass of his, \u2018Ring out, wild bells,\u2019 cause music of any kind seemed to put \u2019em in a good humour, you\u2019d have smiled; but we weren\u2019t in much mood for laughin\u2019, 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\u2019 loose and had the archives in your keepin\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, now, young fellah, I\u2019ll 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\u2014over yonder, where you saw the caves\u2014and the ape-men hold this side, and there is bloody war between them all the time. That\u2019s 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\u2019 and shriekin\u2019 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\u2014fairly pulled the arm off one of them\u2014it 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\u2019t you?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think you have had the escape of your life, young fellah my lad. It was catchin\u2019 those Indians that put you<\/em> 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\u2019 us from the beginnin\u2019 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\u2019s the jumpin\u2019-off place of their prisoners. I expect there\u2019s heaps of skeletons there, if we looked for \u2019em. 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 \u2019em like knittin\u2019 needles through a pat of butter. No wonder we found that poor Yankee\u2019s skeleton with the canes growin\u2019 between his ribs. It was horrible\u2014but it was deucedly interestin\u2019 too. We were all fascinated to see them take the dive, even when we thought it would be our turn next on the springboard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, it wasn\u2019t. They kept six of the Indians up for today\u2014that\u2019s how I understood it\u2014but 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\u2019 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\u2019 because they couldn\u2019t agree upon the scientific classification of these red-headed devils that had got hold of us. One said it was the Dryopithecus<\/em> of Java, the other said it was Pithecanthropus<\/em>. Madness, I call it\u2014Loonies, 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\u2019 about guns. I don\u2019t believe they ever understood how the fellow I shot came by his hurt. If we could get at our guns there was no sayin\u2019 what we could do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo I broke away early this mornin\u2019, 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.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut the professors!\u201d I cried, in consternation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, we must just go back and fetch \u2019em. I couldn\u2019t bring \u2019em 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\u2019t think they would touch Challenger, but I wouldn\u2019t answer for Summerlee. But they would have had him in any case. Of that I am certain. So I haven\u2019t made matters any worse by boltin\u2019. But we are honour 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\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have tried to imitate here Lord Roxton\u2019s 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\u2014all the more intense for being held tightly in\u2014his 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBy George!\u201d he whispered, \u201chere they come!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNot this time,\u201d said Lord John, who had caught up his rifle. \u201cOur best chance is to lie quiet until they have given up the search. Then we shall see whether we can\u2019t get back to their town and hit \u2019em where it hurts most. Give \u2019em an hour and we\u2019ll march.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 brushwood 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo long as we are among the thick trees these swine are our masters,\u201d said he. \u201cThey 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\u2019s 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\u2014that\u2019s my last word to you, young fellah.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCome!\u201d said he. \u201cCome quick! I hope to the Lord we are not too late already!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a sight which I shall never forget until my dying day\u2014so weird, so impossible, that I do not know how I am to make you realise 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A wide, open space lay before us\u2014some hundreds of yards across\u2014all green turf and low bracken growing to the very edge of the cliff. Round this clearing there was a semicircle 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2014little, 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 civilisation 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 colouring 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2019s 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\u2019s rifle cracked, and the king sank down, a tangled red sprawling thing, upon the ground.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShoot into the thick of them! Shoot! sonny, shoot!\u201d cried my companion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are strange red depths in the soul of the most commonplace man. I am tender-hearted 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 reload, 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 realise that he was a free man. The dense mob of ape-men ran about in bewilderment, marvelling 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Challenger\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So it seemed to us; and yet we were mistaken. We had hardly closed the thornbush door of our zareba, clasped each other\u2019s 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\u2019s legs, and rested his face upon them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBy George!\u201d cried our peer, pulling at his moustache in great perplexity, \u201cI say\u2014what the deuce are we to do with these people? Get up, little chappie, and take your face off my boots.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Summerlee was sitting up and stuffing some tobacco into his old briar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got to see them safe,\u201d said he. \u201cYou\u2019ve pulled us all out of the jaws of death. My word! it was a good bit of work!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAdmirable!\u201d cried Challenger. \u201cAdmirable! 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.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2019s leg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDon\u2019t you be scared, my bonnie boy,\u201d said Lord John, patting the matted head in front of him. \u201cHe can\u2019t stick your appearance, Challenger; and, by George! I don\u2019t wonder. All right, little chap, he\u2019s only a human, just the same as the rest of us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cReally, sir!\u201d cried the Professor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, it\u2019s lucky for you, Challenger, that you are<\/em> a little out of the ordinary. If you hadn\u2019t been so like the king\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUpon my word, Lord John, you allow yourself great latitude.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, it\u2019s a fact.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI 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.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is no difficulty about that,\u201d said I. \u201cThey live in the caves on the other side of the central lake.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur young friend here knows where they live. I gather that it is some distance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA good twenty miles,\u201d said I.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Summerlee gave a groan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI, for one, could never get there. Surely I hear those brutes still howling upon our track.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe must move, and move quick!\u201d said Lord John. \u201cYou help Summerlee, young fellah. These Indians will carry stores. Now, then, come along before they can see us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou keep a diary of these events, and you expect eventually to publish it, Mr. Malone,\u201d said he, with solemnity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am only here as a Press reporter,\u201d I answered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cExactly. You may have heard some rather fatuous remarks of Lord John Roxton\u2019s which seemed to imply that there was some\u2014some resemblance\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes, I heard them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI need not say that any publicity given to such an idea\u2014any levity in your narrative of what occurred\u2014would be exceedingly offensive to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI will keep well within the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLord John\u2019s 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?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEntirely.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI leave the matter to your discretion.\u201d Then, after a long pause, he added: \u201cThe king of the ape-men was really a creature of great distinction\u2014a most remarkably handsome and intelligent personality. Did it not strike you?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA most remarkable creature,\u201d said I.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the Professor, much eased in his mind, settled down to his slumber once more.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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