CHAPTER XIV
GORE AND DREAMS
It was a two-masted felucca with lateen sails! The craft was long andlow. In it were more than fifty men, twenty or thirty of whom were atoars with which the craft was being propelled from the lee of the land.I was dumbfounded.
Could it be that the savage, painted natives I had seen on shore had soperfected the art of navigation that they were masters of such advancedbuilding and rigging as this craft proclaimed? It seemed impossible!And as I looked I saw another of the same type swing into view andfollow its sister through the narrow strait out into the ocean.
Nor were these all. One after another, following closely upon oneanother's heels, came fifty of the trim, graceful vessels. They werecutting in between Hooja's fleet and our little dugout.
When they came a bit closer my eyes fairly popped from my head at whatI saw, for in the eye of the leading felucca stood a man with asea-glass leveled upon us. Who could they be? Was there a civilizationwithin Pellucidar of such wondrous advancement as this? Were therefar-distant lands of which none of my people had ever heard, where arace had so greatly outstripped all other races of this inner world?
The man with the glass had lowered it and was shouting to us. I couldnot make out his words, but presently I saw that he was pointing aloft.When I looked I saw a pennant fluttering from the peak of the forwardlateen yard--a red, white, and blue pennant, with a single great whitestar in a field of blue.
Then I knew. My eyes went even wider than they had before. It was thenavy! It was the navy of the empire of Pellucidar which I hadinstructed Perry to build in my absence. It was MY navy!
I dropped my paddle and stood up and shouted and waved my hand. Juagand Dian looked at me as if I had gone suddenly mad. When I could stopshouting I told them, and they shared my joy and shouted with me.
But still Hooja was coming nearer, nor could the leading feluccaoverhaul him before he would be along-side or at least within bow-shot.
Hooja must have been as much mystified as we were as to the identity ofthe strange fleet; but when he saw me waving to them he evidentlyguessed that they were friendly to us, so he urged his men to redoubletheir efforts to reach us before the felucca cut him off.
He shouted word back to others of his fleet--word that was passed backuntil it had reached them all--directing them to run alongside thestrangers and board them, for with his two hundred craft and his eightor ten thousand warriors he evidently felt equal to overcoming thefifty vessels of the enemy, which did not seem to carry over threethousand men all told.
His own personal energies he bent to reaching Dian and me first,leaving the rest of the work to his other boats. I thought that therecould be little doubt that he would be successful in so far as we wereconcerned, and I feared for the revenge that he might take upon usshould the battle go against his force, as I was sure it would; for Iknew that Perry and his Mezops must have brought with them all the armsand ammunition that had been contained in the prospector. But I wasnot prepared for what happened next.
As Hooja's canoe reached a point some twenty yards from us a great puffof smoke broke from the bow of the leading felucca, followed almostsimultaneously by a terrific explosion, and a solid shot screamed closeover the heads of the men in Hooja's craft, raising a great splashwhere it clove the water just beyond them.
Perry had perfected gunpowder and built cannon! It was marvelous!Dian and Juag, as much surprised as Hooja, turned wondering eyes towardme. Again the cannon spoke. I suppose that by comparison with thegreat guns of modern naval vessels of the outer world it was apitifully small and inadequate thing; but here in Pellucidar, where itwas the first of its kind, it was about as awe-inspiring as anythingyou might imagine.
With the report an iron cannonball about five inches in diameter struckHooja's dugout just above the water-line, tore a great splintering holein its side, turned it over, and dumped its occupants into the sea.
The four dugouts that had been abreast of Hooja had turned to interceptthe leading felucca. Even now, in the face of what must have been awithering catastrophe to them, they kept bravely on toward the strangeand terrible craft.
In them were fully two hundred men, while but fifty lined the gunwaleof the felucca to repel them. The commander of the felucca, who provedto be Ja, let them come quite close and then turned loose upon them avolley of shots from small-arms.
The cave men and Sagoths in the dugouts seemed to wither before thatblast of death like dry grass before a prairie fire. Those who werenot hit dropped their bows and javelins and, seizing upon paddles,attempted to escape. But the felucca pursued them relentlessly, hercrew firing at will.
At last I heard Ja shouting to the survivors in the dugouts--they wereall quite close to us now--offering them their lives if they wouldsurrender. Perry was standing close behind Ja, and I knew that thismerciful action was prompted, perhaps commanded, by the old man; for noPellucidarian would have thought of showing leniency to a defeated foe.
As there was no alternative save death, the survivors surrendered and amoment later were taken aboard the Amoz, the name that I could now seeprinted in large letters upon the felucca's bow, and which no one inthat whole world could read except Perry and I.
When the prisoners were aboard, Ja brought the felucca alongside ourdugout. Many were the willing hands that reached down to lift us toher decks. The bronze faces of the Mezops were broad with smiles, andPerry was fairly beside himself with joy.
Dian went aboard first and then Juag, as I wished to help Raja andRanee aboard myself, well knowing that it would fare ill with any Mezopwho touched them. We got them aboard at last, and a great commotionthey caused among the crew, who had never seen a wild beast thushandled by man before.
Perry and Dian and I were so full of questions that we fairly burst,but we had to contain ourselves for a while, since the battle with therest of Hooja's fleet had scarce commenced. From the small forwarddecks of the feluccas Perry's crude cannon were belching smoke, flame,thunder, and death. The air trembled to the roar of them. Hooja'shorde, intrepid, savage fighters that they were, were closing in tograpple in a last death-struggle with the Mezops who manned our vessels.
The handling of our fleet by the red island warriors of Ja's clan wasfar from perfect. I could see that Perry had lost no time after thecompletion of the boats in setting out upon this cruise. What littlethe captains and crews had learned of handling feluccas they must havelearned principally since they embarked upon this voyage, and whileexperience is an excellent teacher and had done much for them, theystill had a great deal to learn. In maneuvering for position they werecontinually fouling one another, and on two occasions shots from ourbatteries came near to striking our own ships.
No sooner, however, was I aboard the flagship than I attempted torectify this trouble to some extent. By passing commands by word ofmouth from one ship to another I managed to get the fifty feluccas intosome sort of line, with the flag-ship in the lead. In this formationwe commenced slowly to circle the position of the enemy. The dugoutscame for us right along in an attempt to board us, but by keeping onthe move in one direction and circling, we managed to avoid getting ineach other's way, and were enabled to fire our cannon and our smallarms with less danger to our own comrades.
When I had a moment to look about me, I took in the felucca on which Iwas. I am free to confess that I marveled at the excellentconstruction and stanch yet speedy lines of the little craft. ThatPerry had chosen this type of vessel seemed rather remarkable, forthough I had warned him against turreted battle-ships, armor, and likeuseless show, I had fully expected that when I beheld his navy I shouldfind considerable attempt at grim and terrible magnificence, for it wasalways Perry's idea to overawe these ignorant cave men when we had tocontend with them in battle. But I had soon learned that while onemight easily astonish them with some new engine of war, it was an utterimpossibility to frighten them into surrender.
I learned later that Ja had gone carefully
over the plans of variouscraft with Perry. The old man had explained in detail all that thetext told him of them. The two had measured out dimensions upon theground, that Ja might see the sizes of different boats. Perry hadbuilt models, and Ja had had him read carefully and explain all thatthey could find relative to the handling of sailing vessels. Theresult of this was that Ja was the one who had chosen the felucca. Itwas well that Perry had had so excellent a balance wheel, for he hadbeen wild to build a huge frigate of the Nelsonian era--he told me sohimself.
One thing that had inclined Ja particularly to the felucca was the factthat it included oars in its equipment. He realized the limitationsof his people in the matter of sails, and while they had never usedoars, the implement was so similar to a paddle that he was sure theyquickly could master the art--and they did. As soon as one hull wascompleted Ja kept it on the water constantly, first with one crew andthen with another, until two thousand red warriors had learned to row.Then they stepped their masts and a crew was told off for the firstship.
While the others were building they learned to handle theirs. As eachsucceeding boat was launched its crew took it out and practiced with itunder the tutorage of those who had graduated from the first ship, andso on until a full complement of men had been trained for every boat.
Well, to get back to the battle: The Hoojans kept on coming at us, andas fast as they came we mowed them down. It was little else thanslaughter. Time and time again I cried to them to surrender, promisingthem their lives if they would do so. At last there were but tenboatloads left. These turned in flight. They thought they couldpaddle away from us--it was pitiful! I passed the word from boat toboat to cease firing--not to kill another Hoojan unless they fired onus. Then we set out after them. There was a nice little breezeblowing and we bowled along after our quarry as gracefully and aslightly as swans upon a park lagoon. As we approached them I could seenot only wonder but admiration in their eyes. I hailed the nearestdugout.
"Throw down your arms and come aboard us," I cried, "and you shall notbe harmed. We will feed you and return you to the mainland. Then youshall go free upon your promise never to bear arms against the Emperorof Pellucidar again!"
I think it was the promise of food that interested them most. Theycould scarce believe that we would not kill them. But when I exhibitedthe prisoners we already had taken, and showed them that they werealive and unharmed, a great Sagoth in one of the boats asked me whatguarantee I could give that I would keep my word.
"None other than my word," I replied. "That I do not break."
The Pellucidarians themselves are rather punctilious about this samematter, so the Sagoth could understand that I might possibly bespeaking the truth. But he could not understand why we should not killthem unless we meant to enslave them, which I had as much as deniedalready when I had promised to set them free. Ja couldn't exactly seethe wisdom of my plan, either. He thought that we ought to follow upthe ten remaining dugouts and sink them all; but I insisted that wemust free as many as possible of our enemies upon the mainland.
"You see," I explained, "these men will return at once to Hooja'sIsland, to the Mahar cities from which they come, or to the countriesfrom which they were stolen by the Mahars. They are men of two racesand of many countries. They will spread the story of our victory farand wide, and while they are with us, we will let them see and hearmany other wonderful things which they may carry back to their friendsand their chiefs. It's the finest chance for free publicity, Perry," Iadded to the old man, "that you or I have seen in many a day."
Perry agreed with me. As a matter of fact, he would have agreed toanything that would have restrained us from killing the poor devils whofell into our hands. He was a great fellow to invent gunpowder andfirearms and cannon; but when it came to using these things to killpeople, he was as tender-hearted as a chicken.
The Sagoth who had spoken was talking to other Sagoths in his boat.Evidently they were holding a council over the question of the wisdomof surrendering.
"What will become of you if you don't surrender to us?" I asked. "Ifwe do not open up our batteries on you again and kill you all, you willsimply drift about the sea helplessly until you die of thirst andstarvation. You cannot return to the islands, for you have seen aswell as we that the natives there are very numerous and warlike. Theywould kill you the moment you landed."
The upshot of it was that the boat of which the Sagoth speaker was incharge surrendered. The Sagoths threw down their weapons, and we tookthem aboard the ship next in line behind the Amoz. First Ja had toimpress upon the captain and crew of the ship that the prisoners werenot to be abused or killed. After that the remaining dugouts paddledup and surrendered. We distributed them among the entire fleet lestthere be too many upon any one vessel. Thus ended the first real navalengagement that the Pellucidarian seas had ever witnessed--though Perrystill insists that the action in which the Sari took part was a battleof the first magnitude.
The battle over and the prisoners disposed of and fed--and do notimagine that Dian, Juag, and I, as well as the two hounds were not fedalso--I turned my attention to the fleet. We had the feluccas close inabout the flag-ship, and with all the ceremony of a medieval potentateon parade I received the commanders of the forty-nine feluccas thataccompanied the flag-ship--Dian and I together--the empress and theemperor of Pellucidar.
It was a great occasion. The savage, bronze warriors entered into thespirit of it, for as I learned later dear old Perry had left noopportunity neglected for impressing upon them that David was emperorof Pellucidar, and that all that they were accomplishing and all thathe was accomplishing was due to the power, and redounded to the gloryof David. The old man must have rubbed it in pretty strong, for thosefierce warriors nearly came to blows in their efforts to be among thefirst of those to kneel before me and kiss my hand. When it came tokissing Dian's I think they enjoyed it more; I know I should have.
A happy thought occurred to me as I stood upon the little deck of theAmoz with the first of Perry's primitive cannon behind me. When Jakneeled at my feet, and first to do me homage, I drew from its scabbardat his side the sword of hammered iron that Perry had taught him tofashion. Striking him lightly on the shoulder I created him king ofAnoroc. Each captain of the forty-nine other feluccas I made a duke.I left it to Perry to enlighten them as to the value of the honors Ihad bestowed upon them.
During these ceremonies Raja and Ranee had stood beside Dian and me.Their bellies had been well filled, but still they had difficulty inpermitting so much edible humanity to pass unchallenged. It was a goodeducation for them though, and never after did they find it difficultto associate with the human race without arousing their appetites.
After the ceremonies were over we had a chance to talk with Perry andJa. The former told me that Ghak, king of Sari, had sent my letter andmap to him by a runner, and that he and Ja had at once decided to setout on the completion of the fleet to ascertain the correctness of mytheory that the Lural Az, in which the Anoroc Islands lay, was inreality the same ocean as that which lapped the shores of Thuria underthe name of Sojar Az, or Great Sea.
Their destination had been the island retreat of Hooja, and they hadsent word to Ghak of their plans that we might work in harmony withthem. The tempest that had blown us off the coast of the continent hadblown them far to the south also. Shortly before discovering us theyhad come into a great group of islands, from between the largest two ofwhich they were sailing when they saw Hooja's fleet pursuing our dugout.
I asked Perry if he had any idea as to where we were, or in whatdirection lay Hooja's island or the continent. He replied by producinghis map, on which he had carefully marked the newly discoveredislands--there described as the Unfriendly Isles--which showed Hooja'sisland northwest of us about two points West.
He then explained that with compass, chronometer, log and reel, theyhad kept a fairly accurate record of their course from the time theyhad set out. Four of the feluccas were equipped wit
h theseinstruments, and all of the captains had been instructed in their use.
I was very greatly surprised at the ease with which these savages hadmastered the rather intricate detail of this unusual work, but Perryassured me that they were a wonderfully intelligent race, and had beenquick to grasp all that he had tried to teach them.
Another thing that surprised me was the fact that so much had beenaccomplished in so short a time, for I could not believe that I hadbeen gone from Anoroc for a sufficient period to permit of building afleet of fifty feluccas and mining iron ore for the cannon and balls,to say nothing of manufacturing these guns and the crude muzzle-loadingrifles with which every Mezop was armed, as well as the gunpowder andammunition they had in such ample quantities.
"Time!" exclaimed Perry. "Well, how long were you gone from Anorocbefore we picked you up in the Sojar Az?"
That was a puzzler, and I had to admit it. I didn't know how much timehad elapsed and neither did Perry, for time is nonexistent inPellucidar.
"Then, you see, David," he continued, "I had almost unbelievableresources at my disposal. The Mezops inhabiting the Anoroc Islands,which stretch far out to sea beyond the three principal isles withwhich you are familiar, number well into the millions, and by far thegreater part of them are friendly to Ja. Men, women, and childrenturned to and worked the moment Ja explained the nature of ourenterprise.
"And not only were they anxious to do all in their power to hasten theday when the Mahars should be overthrown, but--and this counted formost of all--they are simply ravenous for greater knowledge and forbetter ways of doing things.
"The contents of the prospector set their imaginations to workingovertime, so that they craved to own, themselves, the knowledge whichhad made it possible for other men to create and build the things whichyou brought back from the outer world.
"And then," continued the old man, "the element of time, or, rather,lack of time, operated to my advantage. There being no nights, therewas no laying off from work--they labored incessantly stopping only toeat and, on rare occasions, to sleep. Once we had discovered iron orewe had enough mined in an incredibly short time to build a thousandcannon. I had only to show them once how a thing should be done, andthey would fall to work by thousands to do it.
"Why, no sooner had we fashioned the first muzzle-loader and they hadseen it work successfully, than fully three thousand Mezops fell towork to make rifles. Of course there was much confusion and lostmotion at first, but eventually Ja got them in hand, detailing squadsof them under competent chiefs to certain work.
"We now have a hundred expert gun-makers. On a little isolated isle wehave a great powder-factory. Near the iron-mine, which is on themainland, is a smelter, and on the eastern shore of Anoroc, a wellequipped ship-yard. All these industries are guarded by forts in whichseveral cannon are mounted and where warriors are always on guard.
"You would be surprised now, David, at the aspect of Anoroc. I amsurprised myself; it seems always to me as I compare it with the daythat I first set foot upon it from the deck of the Sari that only amiracle could have worked the change that has taken place."
"It is a miracle," I said; "it is nothing short of a miracle totransplant all the wondrous possibilities of the twentieth century backto the Stone Age. It is a miracle to think that only five hundredmiles of earth separate two epochs that are really ages and ages apart."
"It is stupendous, Perry! But still more stupendous is the power thatyou and I wield in this great world. These people look upon us aslittle less than supermen. We must show them that we are all of that.
"We must give them the best that we have, Perry."
"Yes," he agreed; "we must. I have been thinking a great deal latelythat some kind of shrapnel shell or explosive bomb would be a mostsplendid innovation in their warfare. Then there are breech-loadingrifles and those with magazines that I must hasten to study out andlearn to reproduce as soon as we get settled down again; and--"
"Hold on, Perry!" I cried. "I didn't mean these sorts of things atall. I said that we must give them the best we have. What we havegiven them so far has been the worst. We have given them war and themunitions of war. In a single day we have made their wars infinitelymore terrible and bloody than in all their past ages they have beenable to make them with their crude, primitive weapons.
"In a period that could scarcely have exceeded two outer earthly hours,our fleet practically annihilated the largest armada of native canoesthat the Pellucidarians ever before had gathered together. Webutchered some eight thousand warriors with the twentieth-century giftswe brought. Why, they wouldn't have killed that many warriors in theentire duration of a dozen of their wars with their own weapons! No,Perry; we've got to give them something better than scientific methodsof killing one another."
The old man looked at me in amazement. There was reproach in his eyes,too.
"Why, David!" he said sorrowfully. "I thought that you would bepleased with what I had done. We planned these things together, and Iam sure that it was you who suggested practically all of it. I havedone only what I thought you wished done and I have done it the bestthat I know how."
I laid my hand on the old man's shoulder.
"Bless your heart, Perry!" I cried. "You've accomplished miracles.You have done precisely what I should have done, only you've done itbetter. I'm not finding fault; but I don't wish to lose sight myself,or let you lose sight, of the greater work which must grow out of thispreliminary and necessary carnage. First we must place the empire upona secure footing, and we can do so only by putting the fear of us inthe hearts of our enemies; but after that--
"Ah, Perry! That is the day I look forward to! When you and I can buildsewing-machines instead of battle-ships, harvesters of crops instead ofharvesters of men, plow-shares and telephones, schools and colleges,printing-presses and paper! When our merchant marine shall ply thegreat Pellucidarian seas, and cargoes of silks and typewriters andbooks shall forge their ways where only hideous saurians have held swaysince time began!"
"Amen!" said Perry.
And Dian, who was standing at my side, pressed my hand.