________________________________________________
_ THE PLAIN OF KÔR
About an hour before sundown we at last, to my unbounded gratitude,
emerged from the great belt of marsh on to land that swelled upwards
in a succession of rolling waves. Just on the hither side of the crest
of the first wave we halted for the night. My first act was to examine
Leo's condition. It was, if anything, worse than in the morning, and a
new and very distressing feature, vomiting, set in, and continued till
dawn. Not one wink of sleep did I get that night, for I passed it in
assisting Ustane, who was one of the most gentle and indefatigable
nurses I ever saw, to wait upon Leo and Job. However, the air here was
warm and genial without being too hot, and there were no mosquitoes to
speak of. Also we were above the level of the marsh mist, which lay
stretched beneath us like the dim smoke-pall over a city, lit up here
and there by the wandering globes of fen fire. Thus it will be seen
that we were, speaking comparatively, in clover.
By dawn on the following morning Leo was quite light-headed, and
fancied that he was divided into halves. I was dreadfully distressed,
and began to wonder with a sort of sick fear what the end of the
attack would be. Alas! I had heard but too much of how these attacks
generally terminate. As I was wondering Billali came up and said that
we must be getting on, more especially as, in his opinion, if Leo did
not reach some spot where he could be quiet, and have proper nursing,
within the next twelve hours, his life would only be a matter of a day
or two. I could not but agree with him, so we got Leo into the litter,
and started on, Ustane walking by his side to keep the flies off him,
and see that he did not throw himself out on to the ground.
Within half an hour of sunrise we had reached the top of the rise of
which I have spoken, and a most beautiful view broke upon our gaze.
Beneath us was a rich stretch of country, verdant with grass and
lovely with foliage and flowers. In the background, at a distance, so
far as I could judge, of some eighteen miles from where we then stood,
a huge and extraordinary mountain rose abruptly from the plain. The
base of this great mountain appeared to consist of a grassy slope, but
rising from this, I should say, from subsequent observation, at a
height of about five hundred feet above the level of the plain, was a
most tremendous and absolutely precipitous wall of bare rock, quite
twelve or fifteen hundred feet in height. The shape of the mountain,
which was undoubtedly of volcanic origin, was round, and of course, as
only a segment of its circle was visible, it was difficult to estimate
its exact size, which was enormous. I afterwards discovered that it
could cover less than fifty square miles of ground. Anything more
grand and imposing than the sight presented by this great natural
castle, starting in solitary grandeur from the level of the plain, I
never saw, and I suppose I never shall. Its very solitude added to its
majesty, and its towering cliffs seemed to kiss the sky. Indeed,
generally speaking, they were clothed in clouds that lay in fleecy
masses upon their broad and level battlements.
I sat up in my hammock and gazed out across the plain at this
thrilling and majestic sight, and I suppose that Billali noticed it,
for he brought his litter alongside.
"Behold the house of '/She-who-must-be-obeyed/!'" he said. "Had ever a
queen such a throne before?"
"It is wonderful, my father," I answered. "But how do we enter. Those
cliffs look hard to climb."
"Thou shalt see, my Baboon. Look now at the path below us. What
thinkest thou that it is? Thou art a wise man. Come, tell me."
I looked, and saw what appeared to be the line of roadway running
straight towards the base of the mountain, though it was covered with
turf. There were high banks on each side of it, broken here and there,
but fairly continuous on the whole, the meaning of which I did not
understand. It seemed so very odd that anybody should embank a
roadway.
"Well, my father," I answered, "I suppose that it is a road, otherwise
I should have been inclined to say that it was the bed of a river, or
rather," I added, observing the extraordinary directness of the
cutting, "of a canal."
Billali--who, by the way, was none the worse for his immersion of the
day before--nodded his head sagely as he replied--
"Thou art right, my son. It is a channel cut out by those who were
before us in this place to carry away water. Of this I am sure: within
the rocky circle of the mountain whither we journey was once a great
lake. But those who were before us, by wonderful arts of which I know
naught, hewed a path for the water through the solid rock of the
mountain, piercing even to the bed of the lake. But first they cut the
channel that thou seest across the plain. Then, when at last the water
burst out, it rushed down the channel that had been made to receive
it, and crossed this plain till it reached the low land behind the
rise, and there, perchance, it made the swamp through which we have
come. Then when the lake was drained dry, the people whereof I speak
built a mighty city on its bed, whereof naught but ruins and the name
of Kôr yet remaineth, and from age to age hewed the caves and passages
that thou wilt see."
"It may be," I answered; "but if so, how is it that the lake does not
fill up again with the rains and the water of the springs?"
"Nay, my son, the people were a wise people, and they left a drain to
keep it clear. Seest thou the river to the right?" and he pointed to a
fair-sized stream that wound away across the plain, some four miles
from us. "That is the drain, and it comes out through the mountain
wall where this cutting goes in. At first, perhaps, the water ran down
this canal, but afterwards the people turned it, and used the cutting
for a road."
"And is there then no other place where one may enter into the great
mountain," I asked, "except through that drain?"
"There is a place," he answered, "where cattle and men on foot may
cross with much labour, but it is secret. A year mightest thou search
and shouldst never find it. It is only used once a year, when the
herds of cattle that have been fatting on the slopes of the mountain,
and on this plain, are driven into the space within."
"And does /She/ live there always?" I asked, "or does she come at
times without the mountain?"
"Nay, my son, where she is, there she is."
By now we were well on to the great plain, and I was examining with
delight the varied beauty of its semi-tropical flowers and trees, the
latter of which grew singly, or at most in clumps of three or four,
much of the timber being of large size, and belonging apparently to a
variety of evergreen oak. There were also many palms, some of them
more than one hundred feet high, and the largest and most beautiful
tree ferns that I ever saw, about which hung clouds of jewelled
honeysuckers and great-winged butterflies. Wandering about among the
trees or crouching in the long and feathered grass were all varieties
of game, from rhinocerotes down. I saw a rhinoceros, buffalo (a large
herd), eland, quagga, and sable antelope, the most beautiful of all
the bucks, not to mention many smaller varieties of game, and three
ostriches which scudded away at our approach like white drift before a
gale. So plentiful was the game that at last I could stand it no
longer. I had a single barrel sporting Martini with me in the litter,
the "Express" being too cumbersome, and espying a beautiful fat eland
rubbing himself under one of the oak-like trees, I jumped out of the
litter, and proceeded to creep as near to him as I could. He let me
come within eighty yards, and then turned his head, and stared at me,
preparatory to running away. I lifted the rifle, and taking him about
midway down the shoulder, for he was side on to me, fired. I never
made a cleaner shot or a better kill in all my small experience, for
the great buck sprang right up into the air and fell dead. The
bearers, who had all halted to see the performance, gave a murmur of
surprise, an unwonted compliment from these sullen people, who never
appear to be surprised at anything, and a party of the guard at once
ran off to cut the animal up. As for myself, though I was longing to
have a look at him, I sauntered back to my litter as though I had been
in the habit of killing eland all my life, feeling that I had gone up
several degrees in the estimation of the Amahagger, who looked on the
whole thing as a very high-class manifestation of witchcraft. As a
matter of fact, however, I had never seen an eland in a wild state
before. Billali received me with enthusiasm.
"It is wonderful, my son the Baboon," he cried; "wonderful! Thou art a
very great man, though so ugly. Had I not seen, surely I would never
have believed. And thou sayest that thou wilt teach me to slay in this
fashion?"
"Certainly, my father," I said airily; "it is nothing."
But all the same I firmly made up my mind that when "my father"
Billali began to fire I would without fail lie down or take refuge
behind a tree.
After this little incident nothing happened of any note till about an
hour and a half before sundown, when we arrived beneath the shadow of
the towering volcanic mass that I have already described. It is quite
impossible for me to describe its grim grandeur as it appeared to me
while my patient bearers toiled along the bed of the ancient
watercourse towards the spot where the rich brown-hued cliff shot up
from precipice to precipice till its crown lost itself in a cloud. All
I can say is that it almost awed me by the intensity of its lonesome
and most solemn greatness. On we went up the bright and sunny slope,
till at last the creeping shadows from above swallowed up its
brightness, and presently we began to pass through a cutting hewn in
the living rock. Deeper and deeper grew this marvellous work, which
must, I should say, have employed thousands of men for many years.
Indeed, how it was ever executed at all without the aid of blasting-
powder or dynamite I cannot to this day imagine. It is and must remain
one of the mysteries of that wild land. I can only suppose that these
cuttings and the vast caves that had been hollowed out of the rocks
they pierced were the State undertakings of the people of Kôr, who
lived here in the dim lost ages of the world, and, as in the case of
the Egyptian monuments, were executed by the forced labour of tens of
thousands of captives, carried on through an indefinite number of
centuries. But who were the people?
At last we reached the face of the precipice itself, and found
ourselves looking into the mouth of a dark tunnel that forcibly
reminded me of those undertaken by our nineteenth-century engineers in
the construction of railway lines. Out of this tunnel flowed a
considerable stream of water. Indeed, though I do not think that I
have mentioned it, we had followed this stream, which ultimately
developed into the river I have already described as winding away to
the right, from the spot where the cutting in the solid rock
commenced. Half of this cutting formed a channel for the stream, and
half, which was placed on a slightly higher level--eight feet perhaps
--was devoted to the purposes of a roadway. At the termination of the
cutting, however, the stream turned off across the plain and followed
a channel of its own. At the mouth of the cave the cavalcade was
halted, and, while the men employed themselves in lighting some
earthenware lamps they had brought with them, Billali, descending from
his litter, informed me politely but firmly that the orders of /She/
were that we were now to be blindfolded, so that we should not learn
the secret of the paths through the bowels of the mountains. To this
I, of course, assented cheerfully enough, but Job, who was now very
much better, notwithstanding the journey, did not like it at all,
fancying, I believe, that it was but a preliminary step to being hot-
potted. He was, however, a little consoled when I pointed out to him
that there were no hot pots at hand, and, so far as I knew, no fire to
heat them in. As for poor Leo, after turning restlessly for hours, he
had, to my deep thankfulness, at last dropped off into a sleep or
stupor, I do not know which, so there was no need to blindfold him.
The blindfolding was performed by binding a piece of the yellowish
linen whereof those of the Amahagger who condescended to wear anything
in particular made their dresses, tightly round the eyes. This linen I
afterwards discovered was taken from the tombs, and was not, as I had
at first supposed, of native manufacture. The bandage was then knotted
at the back of the head, and finally brought down again and the ends
bound under the chin to prevent its slipping. Ustane was, by the way,
also blindfolded, I do not know why, unless it was from fear that she
should impart the secrets of the route to us.
This operation performed we started on once more, and soon, by the
echoing sound of the footsteps of the bearers and the increased noise
of the water caused by reverberation in a confined space, I knew that
we were entering into the bowels of the great mountain. It was an
eerie sensation, being borne along into the dead heart of the rock we
knew not whither, but I was getting used to eerie sensations by this
time, and by now was pretty well prepared for anything. So I lay
still, and listened to the tramp, tramp of the bearers and the rushing
of the water, and tried to believe that I was enjoying myself.
Presently the men set up the melancholy little chant that I had heard
on the first night when we were captured in the whaleboat, and the
effect produced by their voices was very curious, and quite
indescribable. After a while the air began to get exceedingly thick
and heavy, so much so, indeed, that I felt as though I were going to
choke, till at length the litter took a sharp turn, then another and
another, and the sound of the running water ceased. After this the air
was fresher again, but the turns were continuous, and to me,
blindfolded as I was, most bewildering. I tried to keep a map of them
in my mind in case it might ever be necessary for us to try and escape
by this route, but, needless to say, failed utterly. Another half-hour
or so passed, and then suddenly I became aware that we were once more
in the open air. I could see the light through my bandage and feel its
freshness on my face. A few more minutes and the caravan halted, and I
heard Billali order Ustane to remove her bandage and undo ours.
Without waiting for her attentions I got the knot of mine loose, and
looked out.
As I anticipated, we had passed right through the precipice, and were
now on the farther side, and immediately beneath its beetling face.
The first thing I noticed was that the cliff is not nearly so high
here, not so high I should say by five hundred feet, which proved that
the bed of the lake, or rather of the vast ancient crater in which we
stood, was much above the level of the surrounding plain. For the
rest, we found ourselves in a huge rock-surrounded cup, not unlike
that of the first place where we had sojourned, only ten times the
size. Indeed, I could only just make out the frowning line of the
opposite cliffs. A great portion of the plain thus enclosed by nature
was cultivated, and fenced in with walls of stone placed there to keep
the cattle and goats, of which there were large herds about, from
breaking into the gardens. Here and there rose great grass mounds, and
some miles away towards the centre I thought that I could see the
outline of colossal ruins. I had no time to observe anything more at
the moment, for we were instantly surrounded by crowds of Amahagger,
similar in every particular to those with whom we were already
familiar, who, though they spoke little, pressed round us so closely
as to obscure the view to a person lying in a hammock. Then all of a
sudden a number of armed men arranged in companies, and marshalled by
officers who held ivory wands in their hands, came running swiftly
towards us, having, so far as I could make out, emerged from the face
of the precipice like ants from their burrows. These men as well as
their officers were all robed in addition to the usual leopard skin,
and, as I gathered, formed the bodyguard of /She/ herself.
Their leader advanced to Billali, saluted him by placing his ivory
wand transversely across his forehead, and then asked some question
which I could not catch, and Billali having answered him the whole
regiment turned and marched along the side of the cliff, our cavalcade
of litters following in their track. After going thus for about half a
mile we halted once more in front of the mouth of a tremendous cave,
measuring about sixty feet in height by eighty wide, and here Billali
descended finally, and requested Job and myself to do the same. Leo,
of course, was far too ill to do anything of the sort. I did so, and
we entered the great cave, into which the light of the setting sun
penetrated for some distance, while beyond the reach of the daylight
it was faintly illuminated with lamps which seemed to me to stretch
away for an almost immeasurable distance, like the gas lights of an
empty London street. The first thing I noticed was that the walls were
covered with sculptures in bas-relief, of a sort, pictorially
speaking, similar to those that I have described upon the vases;--
love-scenes principally, then hunting pictures, pictures of
executions, and the torture of criminals by the placing of a,
presumably, red-hot pot upon the head, showing whence our hosts had
derived this pleasant practice. There were very few battle-pieces,
though many of duels, and men running and wrestling, and from this
fact I am led to believe that this people were not much subject to
attack by exterior foes, either on account of the isolation of their
position or because of their great strength. Between the pictures were
columns of stone characters of a formation absolutely new to me; at
any rate, they were neither Greek nor Egyptian, nor Hebrew, nor
Assyrian--that I am sure of. They looked more like Chinese writings
than any other that I am acquainted with. Near to the entrance of the
cave both pictures and writings were worn away, but further in they
were in many cases absolutely fresh and perfect as the day on which
the sculptor had ceased work on them.
The regiment of guards did not come further than the entrance to the
cave, where they formed up to let us pass through. On entering the
place itself we were, however, met by a man robed in white, who bowed
humbly, but said nothing, which, as it afterwards appeared that he was
a deaf mute, was not very wonderful.
Running at right angles to the great cave, at a distance of some
twenty feet from the entrance, was a smaller cave or wide gallery,
that was pierced into the rock both to the right and to the left of
the main cavern. In front of the gallery to our left stood two guards,
from which circumstance I argued that it was the entrance to the
apartments of /She/ herself. The mouth of the right-hand gallery was
unguarded, and along it the mute indicated that we were to go. Walking
a few yards down this passage, which was lighted with lamps, we came
to the entrance of a chamber having a curtain made of some grass
material, not unlike a Zanzibar mat in appearance, hung over the
doorway. This the mute drew back with another profound obeisance, and
led the way into a good-sized apartment, hewn, of course, out of the
solid rock, but to my great relief lighted by means of a shaft pierced
in the face of the precipice. In this room was a stone bedstead, pots
full of water for washing, and beautifully tanned leopard skins to
serve as blankets.
Here we left Leo, who was still sleeping heavily, and with him stopped
Ustane. I noticed that the mute gave her a very sharp look, as much as
to say, "Who are you, and by whose order do you come here?" Then he
conducted us to another similar room which Job took, and then to two
more that were respectively occupied by Billali and myself. _
Read next: CHAPTER XII - "SHE"
Read previous: CHAPTER X - SPECULATIONS
Table of content of She
GO TO TOP OF SCREEN
Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book
