The Lost World
wooded, with so much undergrowth that our progress was very slow.
I have dwelt up to now upon the terrors of Maple White Land; but there
was another side to the subject, for all that morning we wandered among
lovely flowers--mostly, as I observed, white or yellow in color, these
being, as our professors explained, the primitive flower-shades. In
many places the ground was absolutely covered with them, and as we
walked ankle-deep on that wonderful yielding carpet, the scent was
almost intoxicating in its sweetness and intensity. The homely English
bee buzzed everywhere around us. Many of the trees under which we
passed had their branches bowed down with fruit, some of which were of
familiar sorts, while other varieties were new. By observing which of
them were pecked by the birds we avoided all danger of poison and added
a delicious variety to our food reserve. In the jungle which we
traversed were numerous hard-trodden paths made by the wild beasts, and
in the more marshy places we saw a profusion of strange footmarks,
including many of the iguanodon. Once in a grove we observed several
of these great creatures grazing, and Lord John, with his glass, was
able to report that they also were spotted with asphalt, though in a
different place to the one which we had examined in the morning. What
this phenomenon meant we could not imagine.
We saw many small animals, such as porcupines, a scaly ant-eater, and a
wild pig, piebald in color and with long curved tusks. Once, through a
break in the trees, we saw a clear shoulder of green hill some distance
away, and across this a large dun-colored animal was traveling at a
considerable pace. It passed so swiftly that we were unable to say
what it was; but if it were a deer, as was claimed by Lord John, it
must have been as large as those monstrous Irish elk which are still
dug up from time to time in the bogs of my native land.
Ever since the mysterious visit which had been paid to our camp we
always returned to it with some misgivings. However, on this occasion
we found everything in order.
That evening we had a grand discussion upon our present situation and
future plans, which I must describe at some length, as it led to a new
departure by which we were enabled to gain a more complete knowledge of
Maple White Land than might have come in many weeks of exploring. It
was Summerlee who opened the debate. All day he had been querulous in
manner, and now some remark of Lord John's as to what we should do on
the morrow brought all his bitterness to a head.
"What we ought to be doing to-day, to-morrow, and all the time," said
he, "is finding some way out of the trap into which we have fallen.
You are all turning your brains towards getting into this country. I
say that we should be scheming how to get out of it."
"I am surprised, sir," boomed Challenger, stroking his majestic beard,
"that any man of science should commit himself to so ignoble a
sentiment. You are in a land which offers such an inducement to the
ambitious naturalist as none ever has since the world began, and you
suggest leaving it before we have acquired more than the most
superficial knowledge of it or of its contents. I expected better
things of you, Professor Summerlee."
"You must remember," said Summerlee, sourly, "that I have a large class
in London who are at present at the mercy of an extremely inefficient
locum tenens. This makes my situation different from yours, Professor
Challenger, since, so far as I know, you have never been entrusted with
any responsible educational work."
"Quite so," said Challenger. "I have felt it to be a sacrilege to
divert a brain which is capable of the highest original research to any
lesser object. That is why I have sternly set my face against any
proffered scholastic appointment."
"For example?" asked Summerlee, with a sneer; but Lord John hastened to
change the conversation.
"I must say," said he, "that I think it would be a mighty poor thing to
go back to London before I know a great deal more of this place than I
do at present."
"I could never dare to walk into the back office of my paper and face
old McArdle," said I. (You will excuse the frankness of this report,
will you not, sir?) "He'd never forgive me for leaving such
unexhausted copy behind me. Besides, so far as I can see it is not
worth discussing, since we can't get down, even if we wanted."
"Our young friend makes up for many obvious mental lacunae by some
measure of primitive common sense," remarked Challenger. "The
interests of his deplorable profession are immaterial to us; but, as he
observes, we cannot get down in any case, so it is a waste of energy to
discuss it."
"It is a waste of energy to do anything else," growled Summerlee from
behind his pipe. "Let me remind you that we came here upon a perfectly
definite mission, entrusted to us at the meeting of the Zoological
Institute in London. That mission was to test the truth of Professor
Challenger's statements. Those statements, as I am bound to admit, we
are now in a position to endorse. Our ostensible work is therefore
done. As to the detail which remains to be worked out upon this
plateau, it is so enormous that only a large expedition, with a very
special equipment, could hope to cope with it. Should we attempt to do
so ourselves, the only possible result must be that we shall never
return with the important contribution to science which we have already
gained. Professor Challenger has devised means for getting us on to
this plateau when it appeared to be inaccessible; I think that we
should now call upon him to use the same ingenuity in getting us back
to the world from which we came."
I confess that as Summerlee stated his view it struck me as altogether
reasonable. Even Challenger was affected by the consideration that his
enemies would never stand confuted if the confirmation of his
statements should never reach those who had doubted them.
"The problem of the descent is at first sight a formidable one," said
he, "and yet I cannot doubt that the intellect can solve it. I am
prepared to agree with our colleague that a protracted stay in Maple
White Land is at present inadvisable, and that the question of our
return will soon have to be faced. I absolutely refuse to leave,
however, until we have made at least a superficial examination of this
country, and are able to take back with us something in the nature of a
chart."
Professor Summerlee gave a snort of impatience.
"We have spent two long days in exploration," said he, "and we are no
wiser as to the actual geography of the place than when we started. It
is clear that it is all thickly wooded, and it would take months to
penetrate it and to learn the relations of one part to another. If
there were some central peak it would be different, but it all slopes
downwards, so far as we can see. The farther we go the less likely it
is that we will get any general view."
It was at that moment that I had my inspiration. My eyes chanced to
light upon the enormous gnarled trunk of the gingko tree which cast its
huge branches over us. Surely, if its bole exceeded that of all
others, its height must do the same. If the rim of the plateau was
indeed the highest point, then why should this mighty tree not prove to
be a watchtower which commanded the whole country? Now, ever since I
ran wild as a lad in Ireland I have been a bold and skilled
tree-climber. My comrades might be my masters on the rocks, but I knew
that I would be supreme among those branches. Could I only get my legs
on to the lowest of the giant off-shoots, then it would be strange
indeed if I could not make my way to the top. My comrades were
delighted at my idea.
"Our young friend," said Challenger, bunching up the red apples of his
cheeks, "is capable of acrobatic exertions which would be impossible to
a man of a more solid, though possibly of a more commanding,
appearance. I applaud his resolution."
"By George, young fellah, you've put your hand on it!" said Lord John,
clapping me on the back. "How we never came to think of it before I
can't imagine! There's not more than an hour of daylight left, but if
you take your notebook you may be able to get some rough sketch of the
place. If we put these three ammunition cases under the branch, I will
soon hoist you on to it."
He stood on the boxes while I faced the trunk, and was gently raising
me when Challenger sprang forward and gave me such a thrust with his
huge hand that he fairly shot me into the tree. With both arms
clasping the branch, I scrambled hard with my feet until I had worked,
first my body, and then my knees, onto it. There were three excellent
off-shoots, like huge rungs of a ladder, above my head, and a tangle of
convenient branches beyond, so that I clambered onwards with such speed
that I soon lost sight of the ground and had nothing but foliage
beneath me. Now and then I encountered a check, and once I had to shin
up a creeper for eight or ten feet, but I made excellent progress, and
the booming of Challenger's voice seemed to be a great distance beneath
me. The tree was, however, enormous, and, looking upwards, I could see
no thinning of the leaves above my head. There was some thick,
bush-like clump which seemed to be a parasite upon a branch up which I
was swarming. I leaned my head round it in order to see what was
beyond, and I nearly fell out of the tree in my surprise and horror at
what I saw.
A face was gazing into mine--at the distance of only a foot or two.
The creature that owned it had been crouching behind the parasite, and
had looked round it at the same instant that I did. It was a human
face--or at least it was far more human than any monkey's that I have
ever seen. It was long, whitish, and blotched with pimples, the nose
flattened, and the lower jaw projecting, with a bristle of coarse
whiskers round the chin. The eyes, which were under thick and heavy
brows, were bestial and ferocious, and as it opened its mouth to snarl
what sounded like a curse at me I observed that it had curved, sharp
canine teeth. For an instant I read hatred and menace in the evil
eyes. Then, as quick as a flash, came an expression of overpowering
fear. There was a crash of broken boughs as it dived wildly down into
the tangle of green. I caught a glimpse of a hairy body like that of a
reddish pig, and then it was gone amid a swirl of leaves and branches.
"What's the matter?" shouted Roxton from below. "Anything wrong with
you?"
"Did you see it?" I cried, with my arms round the branch and all my
nerves tingling.
"We heard a row, as if your foot had slipped. What was it?"
I was so shocked at the sudden and strange appearance of this ape-man
that I hesitated whether I should not climb down again and tell my
experience to my companions. But I was already so far up the great
tree that it seemed a humiliation to return without having carried out
my mission.
After a long pause, therefore, to recover my breath and my courage, I
continued my ascent. Once I put my weight upon a rotten branch and
swung for a few seconds by my hands, but in the main it was all easy
climbing. Gradually the leaves thinned around me, and I was aware,
from the wind upon my face, that I had topped all the trees of the
forest. I was determined, however, not to look about me before I had
reached the very highest point, so I scrambled on until I had got so
far that the topmost branch was bending beneath my weight. There I
settled into a convenient fork, and, balancing myself securely, I found
myself looking down at a most wonderful panorama of this strange
country in which we found ourselves.
The sun was just above the western sky-line, and the evening was a