King Solomon's Mines

I MEET SIR HENRY CURTIS.

It is a curious thing that at my age-fifty-five

last birthday-I should find myself taking up a pen to try and write a history. I wonder what sort of a

history it will be when I have done it, if I ever come to the end of the trip! I have done a good many

things in my life, which seems a long one to me,

owing to my having begun so young, perhaps. At an age when other boys were at school, I was earning my

living as a trader in the old colony. I have been

trading, hunting, fighting, or mining ever since. And yet it was only eight months ago that I made my pile.

It is a big pile now I have got it-I don't yet know how big-but I don't think I would go through the last fifteen or sixteen months again for it; no, not if

I knew that I should come out safe at the end, pile

and all. But then I am a timid man, and I don't like

violence, and I am pretty sick of adventure. I wonder

why I am going to write this book: it is not in my line. I am not a literary man, though very devoted to the Old Testament and also to the " IngoldsbyLegends. " Let me try and set down my reasons, just to see if I have any.

First reason: Because Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good asked me to.

There must be

Second reason: Because I am laid up here at

Durban with the pain and trouble in my left leg.

Ever since that confounded lion got hold of me, I have been liable to it, and it's rather bad just

now makes me limp more than ever.

some poison in a lion's teeth. Otherwise, how is it that

when your wounds are healed, they break out again,

generally, mark you at the same time of year that you got your mauling? It is a hard thing that when one has shot sixty-five lions as I have in the course

of my life , that the sixty-sixth should chew your leg

like a quid of tobacco. It breaks the routine of the

thing, and putting other considerations aside, I am

an orderly man and don't like that. This is by the

way.

Third reason : Because I want my boy Harry, who is over there at the hospital in London studying to

become a doctor, to have something to amuse him.

and keep him out of mischief for a week or so.

Hospital work must sometimes pall and get rather

dull, for even of cutting up dead bodies, there must come satiety , and as this history won't be dull, what-

ever else it may be, it may put a little life into things for a day or two while he is reading it.

Fourth reason and last : Because I am going to tell the strangest story that I know of. It may seem a

queer thing to say that, especially considering that there is no woman in it-except Foulata. Stop,

though! there is Gagaoola, if she was a woman and not a fiend. But she was a hundred at least , and

therefore, it is not marriageable, so I don't count her. At any rate, I can safely say that there is not a petticoat

in the whole history. Well, I had better come to the yoke. It's a stiff place, and I feel as though I were

bogged up to the axle. But " sutjes , sutjes," as the

Boers say (I'm sure I don't know how they spell it),

softly does it. A strong team will come through at

last, that is if they ain't too poor. You will never do

anything with poor oxen. Now, to begin.

I, Allan Quatermain, of Durban, Natal, Gentleman,

make oath and say-That's how I began my deposi-

tion before the magistrate, about poor Khiva's and Ventvögel's sad deaths; but somehow it doesn't seem

quite the right way to begin a book. And, besides,

am I a gentleman? What is a gentleman? I don't quite know, and yet I have had to do with niggers-

no, I'll scratch that word "niggers " out, for I don't like it. I've known natives who are, and so you'll

say, Harry, my boy, before you're done with this tale,

and I have known mean whites with lots of money

and fresh out from home, too , who ain't. Well, at

any rate, I was born a gentleman, though I've been nothing but a poor travelling trader and hunter all

my life. Whether I have remained so I know not,

you must judge of that. Heaven knows I've tried.

I've killed many men in my time, but I have never

slain wantonly or stained my hand in innocent blood,

only in self-defence. The Almighty gave us our lives,

and I suppose he meant us to defend them, at least

I have always acted on that, and I hope it won't be

brought up against me when my clock strikes. There,

there, it is a cruel and a wicked world, and for atimid man I have been mixed up in a deal of

slaughter. I can't tell the rights of it, but at any rate I have never stolen , though I once cheated a

Kafir out of a herd of cattle. But then he had done

me a dirty turn, and it has troubled me ever since into the bargain. R.

Well it's eighteen months or so ago since I first met Sir Henry Curtis and Captain Good, and it was

in this way. I had been up elephant hunting beyond

Bamangwato , and had had bad luck. Everything

went wrong that trip , and to top up with I got the

fever badly. So soon as I was well enough I trekked

down to the Diamond Fields, sold such ivory as I had,

and also my waggon and oxen, discharged my hunters,

and took the post-cart to the Cape. After spending a

week in Cape Town, finding that they overcharged me at the hotel, and having seen everything there

was to see , including the botanical gardens , which

seem to me likely to confer a great benefit on the

country , and the new Houses of Parliament , which I

expect will do nothing of the sort, I determined to go

on back to Natal by the Dunkeld, then lying in the docks waiting for the Edinburgh Castle due in from England. I took my berth and went abroad, and that afternoon the Natal passengers from the Edinburgh

Castle transhipped, and we weighed and put out to sea.

Among the passengers who came on board there

were two who excited my curiosity. One, a man of about thirty, was one of the biggest- chested and longest- armed men I ever saw. He had yellow hair, a big

yellow beard, clear- cut features, and large grey eyes

set deep into his head. I never saw a finer-lookingman, and somehow he reminded me of an ancient

Dane. Not that I know much of ancient Danes, though

I remember a modern Dane who did me out of ten

pounds; but I remember once seeing a picture of some

of those gentry, who, I take it, were a kind of white

Zulus. They were drinking out of big horns , and their long hair hung down their backs, and as I looked at my friend standing there by the companion-ladder,

I thought that if one only let his hair grow a bit, put

one of those chain shirts on to those great shoulders

of his, and gave him a big battle-axe and a horn mug,

he might have sat as a model for that picture. And

by the way it is a curious thing, and just shows how

the blood will show out, I found out afterwards that

Sir Henry Curtis, for that was the big man's name,

was of Danish blood. * He also reminded me strongly

of somebody else, but at the time I could not remember who it was.

The other man who stood talking to Sir Henry was short, stout, and dark, and of quite a different cut. I

suspected at once that he was a naval officer. I don't

know why, but it is difficult to mistake a navy man.

I have gone shooting trips with several of them in the course of my life, and they have always been just the

best and bravest and nicest fellows I ever met, though

given to the use of profane language.

I asked a page or two back, what is a gentleman ?

I'll answer it now: a Royal Naval officer is, in a general sort of a way, though, of course, there may be a black sheep among them here and there. I fancy it is just

* Mr. Quatermain's ideas about ancient Danes seem to be rather confused; we have always understood that they were dark- haired

people. Probably he was thinking of Saxons. -EDITOR.the wide sea and the breath of God's winds that

washes their hearts and blows the bitterness out of

their minds and makes them what men ought to be.

Well, to return, I was right again; I found out that he was a naval officer, a lieutenant of thirty- one, who,

after seventeen years' service, had been turned out of her Majesty's employ with the barren honour of a

commander's rank, because it was impossible that he should be promoted. That is what people who serve

the Queen have to expect: to be shot out into the

cold world to find a living just when they are be-

ginning to really understand their work, and to get to the prime of life. Well, I suppose they don't mind it,

but for my part I had rather earn my bread as a

hunter. One's halfpence are as scarce perhaps, but you don't get so many kicks. His name I found out

-by referring to the passenger's list was Good- Captain John Good. He was broad, of medium height,

dark, stout, and rather a curious man to look at. He

was so very neat and so very clean shaved, and he

always wore an eye-glass in his right eye. It seemed

to grow there, for it had no string, and he never took it out except to wipe it. At first I thought he used

to sleep in it, but I afterwards found that this was a

mistake. He put it in his trousers pocket when he

went to bed, together with his false teeth, of which he

had two beautiful sets that have often, my own being

none of the best, caused me to break the tenth com-

mandment. But I am anticipating.

Soon after we had got under weigh evening closed

in, and brought with it very dirty weather. A keen breeze sprang up off land, and a kind of aggravated

Scotch mist soon drove everybody from the deck. Andas for that Dunkeld, she is a flat-bottomed punt, and

going up light as she was, she rolled very heavily. It

almost seemed as though she would go right over, but she never did. It was quite impossible to walk about,

so I stood near the engines where it was warm, and

amused myself with watching the pendulum, which was fixed opposite to me, swinging slowly backwards and forwards as the vessel rolled, and marking the

angle she touched at each lurch.

"That pendulum's wrong; it is not properly weighted," suddenly said a voice at my shoulder,

somewhat testily. Looking round I saw the naval

officer I had noticed when the passengers came aboard.

"Indeed, now what makes you think so? " I asked.

"Think so. I don't think at all. Why there "-as

she righted herself after a roll-" if the ship had really rolled to the degree that thing pointed to then she would never have rolled again, that's all. But it is just like these merchant skippers, they always are so

confoundedly careless."

Just then the dinner-bell rang, and I was not sorry,

for it is a dreadful thing to have to listen to an officer

of the Royal Navy when he gets on to that subject. I

only know one worse thing, and that is to hear a

merchant skipper express his candid opinion of officers

of the Royal Navy.

Captain Good and I went down to dinner together,

and there we found Sir Henry Curtis already seated.

He and Captain Good sat together, and I sat opposite to them. The captain and I soon got into talk about

shooting and what not; he asking me many questions,

and I answering as well as I could. Presently he got

on to elephants.

"Ah, sir," called out somebody who was sitting near me, "you've got to the right man for that; Hunter Quatermain should be able to tell you about elephants if anybody can. "

Sir Henry, who had been sitting quite quiet listen-

ing to our talk, started visibly.

"Excuse me, sir," he said, leaning forward across

the table, and speaking in a low, deep voice, a very

suitable voice it seemed to me, to come out of those

great lungs. "Excuse me, sir, but is your name Allan Quatermain ? "

I said it was.

The big man made no further remark, but I heard

him mutter " fortunate" into his beard.

Presently dinner came to an end, and as we were leaving the saloon Sir Henry came up and asked me if I would come into his cabin and smoke a pipe. I

accepted, and he led the way to the Dunkeld deck cabin, and a very good cabin it was. It had been

two cabins, but when Sir Garnet or one of those big swells went down the coast in the Dunkeld, they had

knocked away the partition and never put it up again.

There was a sofa in the cabin, and a little table in

front of it. Sir Henry sent the steward for a bottle

of whisky, and the three of us sat down and lit our

pipes.

"Mr. Quatermain," said Sir Henry Curtis, when the steward had brought the whisky and lit the lamp,

"the year before last about this time you were, I be-

lieve, at a place called Bamangwato, to the north of the Transvaal."

"I was," I answered, rather surprised that this

gentleman should be so well acquainted with my movements, which were not, so far as I was aware, con-

sidered of general interest.

"You were trading there, were you not?" put in

Captain Good, in his quick way.

"I was. I took up a wagon load of goods, and

made a camp outside the settlement, and stopped till

I had sold them."

Sir Henry was sitting opposite to me in a Madeira

chair, his arms leaning on the table. He now looked

up, fixing his large grey eyes full upon my face. There was a curious anxiety in them I thought.

"Did you happen to meet a man called Neville

there?"

" Oh, yes; he outspanned alongside of me for a

fortnight to rest his oxen before going on to the in-

terior. I had a letter from a lawyer a few months

back asking me if I knew what had become of him,

which I answered to the best of my ability at the

time."

"Yes," said Sir Henry, "your letter was forwarded to me. You said in it that the gentleman called

Neville left Bamangwato in the beginning of May in a wagon with a driver, a voorlooper, and a Kafir hunter

called Jim , announcing his intention of trekking if

possible as far as Inyati, the extreme trading post in

the Matabele country, where he would sell his wagon and proceed on foot. You also said that he did sell

his wagon, for six months afterwards you saw the

wagon in the possession of a Portuguese trader, who

told you that he had bought it at Inyati from a white

man whose name he had forgotten, and that the white

man with a native servant had started off for the in-

terior on a shooting trip, he believed."

"Yes".

Then came a pause.

" Mr. Quatermain," said Sir Henry, suddenly , " I

suppose you know or can guess nothing more of the

reasons of my-of Mr. Neville's journey to the northwards, or as to what point that journey was directed? "

" I heard something," I answered and stopped.

The subject was one which I did not care to discuss.

Sir Henry and Captain Good looked at each other,

and Captain Good nodded.

"Mr. Quatermain," said the former, " I am going

to tell you a story, and ask your advice, and perhaps

your assistance. The agent who forwarded me your

letter told me that I might implicitly rely upon it, as

you were," he said, " well known and universally re- spected in Natal, and especially noted for your discretion."

I bowed and drank some whisky and water to hide

my confusion, for I am a modest man-and Sir Henry

went on.

"Mr. Neville was my brother."

" Oh, " I said, starting, for now I knew who Sir

Henry had reminded me of when I first saw him. His

brother was a much smaller man and had a dark

beard, but now I thought of it. He possessed eyes of the same shade of grey and with the same keen look

in them, and the features, too, were not unlike.

"He was," went on Sir Henry, " my only and

younger brother, and until five years ago, I do not sup- pose we were ever a month away from each other.

But just about five years ago, a misfortune befell us,

as sometimes does happen in families. We had quarrelled bitterly , and I behaved very unjustly to my brother in my anger." Here, Captain Good nodded his head vigorously to himself. The ship gave a big

roll just then, so that the looking-glass , which was fixed opposite us to starboard, was for a moment

nearly over our heads, and as I was sitting with my

hands in my pockets and staring upwards, I could see him nodding like anything.

"As I daresay you know," went on Sir Henry, " if

a man dies intestate and has no property but land,

real property it is called in England, and it all descends to his eldest son. It so happened that just at the

time when we quarrelled, our father died intestate.

He had put off making his will until it was too late.

The result was that my brother, who had not been brought up to any profession, was left without a penny.

Of course, it would have been my duty to provide for him, but at the time, the quarrel between us was so

bitter that I did not to my shame I say it (and he sighed deeply) offer to do anything. It was not that I grudged him anything, but I waited for him to make advances, and he made none. I am sorry to trouble

you with all this, Mr. Quatermain, but I must make

things clear, eh, Good ? "

" Quite so, quite so," said the captain. “Mr.

Quatermain will, I am sure, keep this history to himself."

" Of course," said I, for I rather pride myself on

my discretion.

"Well ," went on Sir Henry, " my brother had a

few hundred pounds to his account at the time, and

without saying anything to me, he drew out this paltry

sum, and, having adopted the name of Neville, started

off for South Africa in the wild hope of making a fortune. This I heard afterwards. Some three years

passed, and I heard nothing of my brother, though I

wrote several times. Doubtless, the letters never reached

him. But as time went on I grew more and more

troubled about him. I found out, Mr. Quatermain,

that blood is thicker than water."

"That's true," said I, thinking of my boy Harry.

"I found out, Mr. Quatermain, that I would have given half my fortune to know that my brother George,

the only relation I have was safe and well, and I

should see him again."

"But you never did , Curtis," jerked out Captain

Good, glancing at the big man's face.

"Well, Mr. Quatermain, as time went on, I became

more and more anxious to find out if my brother was

alive or dead, and if alive, to get him home again. I

set inquiries on foot, and your letter was one of the results. So far as it went, it was satisfactory, for it

shewed that till lately George was alive, but it did

not go far enough. So, to cut a long story short, I

made up my mind to come out and look for him myself, and Captain Good was so kind as to come

with me."

"Yes," said the captain; " nothing else to do, you see. Turned out by my Lords of the Admiralty to

starve on half pay. And now, perhaps, sir, you will

tell us what you know or have heard of the gentlemancalled Neville. "