Adventure

Marie: An Episode in the Life of the Late Allan Quatermain

Nearly thirty-seven years have gone by, more than a generation, since first we saw the shores of Southern Africa rising from the sea. Since then how much has happened: the Annexation of the Transvaal, the Zulu War, the first Boer War, the discovery of the Rand, the taking of R...

Chapters

24. Chapter 24

After I had been taken away it seems that the court summoned Hernan Pereira and Henri Marais to accompany them to a lonely spot at a distance, where they thought that their deli...

23. Chapter 23

One hour, two hours, three hours, and then suddenly from the top of a rise the sight of the beautiful Mooi River winding through the plain like a vast snake of silver, and there...

20. Chapter 20

Our journey to Umgungundhlovu was prosperous and without incident. When we were within half a day’s march from the Great Kraal we overtook the herd of cattle that we had recaptu...

6. Chapter 6

My journey back to the Mission Station was a strange contrast to that which I had made thence a few days before. Then, the darkness, the swift mare beneath me rushing through it...

17. Chapter 17

Now and again during our troubled journey through life we reach little oases of almost perfect happiness, set jewel-like here and there in the thorny wilderness of time. Sometim...

3. Chapter 3

I do not propose to set out the history of the years which I spent in acquiring a knowledge of French and various other subjects, under the tuition of the learned but prejudiced...

22. Chapter 22

“Hearken, little Son of George. The king would save you, if he can, because you are not Dutch, but English. Yet, know that if you try to cry out, if you even struggle, you die,”...

5. Chapter 5

Several more days passed before I was allowed out of that little war-stained room of which I grew to hate the very sight. I entreated my father to take me into the air, but he w...

8. Chapter 8

A fortnight later Marais, Pereira and their companions, a little band in all of about twenty men, thirty women and children, and say fifty half-breeds and Hottentot after-riders...

12. Chapter 12

I think it was about three weeks after these events that we began our southward trek. On the morning subsequent to our arrival at Marais’s camp, Pereira came up to me when sever...

18. Chapter 18

Two days later we started to recover Dingaan’s cattle, sixty or seventy of us, all well armed and mounted. With us went two of Dingaan’s captains and a number of Zulus, perhaps...

11. Chapter 11

Now, when the Hottentot’s story was finished a discussion arose. Marais said that someone must go to see whether his nephew still lived, to which the other Boers replied “_Ja_”...

16. Chapter 16

After them came the head executioner, a great brute who wore a curiously shaped leopard-skin cap—I suppose as a badge of office—and held in his hand a heavy kerry, the shaft of...

9. Chapter 9

Everything went well upon that voyage, except with me personally. Not having been on the ocean since I was a child, I, who am naturally no good sailor, was extremely ill as day...

13. Chapter 13

As I advanced to the wagons accompanied by Kambula and his two companions, I saw that Marais, in a state of great excitement, was engaged in haranguing the two Prinsloo men and...

7. Chapter 7

The Boers, who ostensibly had come to the kloof to see the shooting match, although, in fact, for a very different purpose, now began to disperse. Some of them rode straight awa...

2. Chapter 2

Although in my old age I, Allan Quatermain, have taken to writing—after a fashion—never yet have I set down a single word of the tale of my first love and of the adventures that...

10. Chapter 10

Of the original thirty-five souls, not reckoning natives, who had accompanied Henri Marais upon his ill-fated expedition, there now remained but nine alive at the new Maraisfont...

4. Chapter 4

The second Quabie advance did not begin till about half-past seven. Even savages love their lives and appreciate the fact that wounds hurt very much, and these were no exception...

14. Chapter 14

By the women’s wagon we found the liver cooked in its frying-pan, as the vrouw had said. Indeed, it was just done to a turn. Selecting a particularly massive slice, she proceede...

19. Chapter 19

I was awakened on my wedding morning by the crash and bellowing of a great thunderstorm. The lightning flashed fearfully all about us, killing two oxen quite near to my wagon, a...

1. Chapter 1

Nearly thirty-seven years have gone by, more than a generation, since first we saw the shores of Southern Africa rising from the sea. Since then how much has happened: the Annex...

21. Chapter 21

“I will not stay here, where such foul accusations are laid on me by black Kaffirs and the Englishman, Allan Quatermain, who, like all his race, is an enemy of us Boers, and, al...

15. Chapter 15

from my victim and hid myself in a bush on the edge of the plateau at a distance of forty yards. After this there was a pause. The place was intensely bright with sunshine and i...