40+ Adventure Novels & Lost World Mysteries in One Premium Edition. Henry Rider Haggard

gratification of his passion. Because men have systematically stunted their mental grown and denied them their natural rights, and that equality which is theirs. Weak!--women have become weak because weakness is the passport to the favour of our sex. They have become foolish because education has been withheld from them and ability discouraged; they have become frivolous because frivolity has been declared to be the natural mission of women. There is no male simpleton who does not like to find a bigger simpleton than he is to lord it over. Truly, the triumph of the stronger sex has been complete, for it has even succeeded in enlisting its victims to its service. The great instruments in the suppression of women, and in their retention at their present level, are women themselves. And yet let us be for a minute just. Which is the superior of the two--the woman or the man? In strength we have the advantage, but in intellect she is almost our equal, if only we will give her fair-play. And in purity, in tenderness, in long-suffering, in fidelity, in all the Christian virtues, which is the superior in these things? Oh man, whoever you are, think of your mother and your sisters; think of her who nursed you in sickness, of her who stood by you in trouble when all others would have none of you, and then answer.

      Poor Eva! Yes, give her all your pity, but, if you can, purge it of your contempt. It requires that a woman should possess a mind of unusual robustness to stand out against circumstances such as hemmed her in, and this she did not possess. Nature, which had showered physical gifts upon her with such a lavish hand, had not given her that most useful of all gifts, the power of self-defence. She was made to yield; but this was her only, if an absolutely fatal, fault. For the rest she was pure as the mountain snow, and with a heart of gold. Herself incapable of deceit, it never occurred to her to imagine it in others. She never suspected that Florence could have a motive in her advocacy of Mr. Plowden's cause. On the contrary, she was possessed to the full with that idea of duty and self-sacrifice which in some women amounts almost to madness. The notion so cleverly started by Florence, that she was bound to take this opportunity of giving her sister a home and the permanent protection of a brother-in-law, had taken a firm hold of her mind. As for the cruel wrong and injustice which her marriage with Mr. Plowden would work to Ernest, strange though it may seem, as is usual in such cases it never occurred to her to consider the matter in that light. She knew what her own sufferings were and always must be; she thought that she would rather die than be false to Ernest; but somehow she never looked at the other side of the picture, never considered the matter from Ernest's point of view. After the true womanly fashion she was prepared to throw herself under her Juggernaut called Duty, and let her inner life, the life of her heart, be crushed out of her; but she never thought of the other life which was welded with her own, and which must be crushed too.

      How curious it is that when women talk so much of their duties they often think so little of the higher duty which they owe to the unlucky man whose love they have won, and whom they cherish in their misguided hearts! The only feasible explanation of the mystery--outside of that of innate selfishness--is, that one of the ideas which has been persistently drilled into the female breast is that men have not any real feelings. It is vaguely supposed that they will "get over it." However this may be, when a woman decides to do violence to her natural feelings, and because of pressure or profit contracts herself into an unholy marriage, the lover whom she deserts is generally the last person to be considered. Poor wretch! he will, no doubt, "get over it."

      Fortunately, many do.

      CHAPTER VII

       OVER THE WATER

       Table of Content

      Mr. Alston and Ernest carried out their plans as regarded sport. They went up to Lydenburg and had a month's vilderbeeste and blesbok shooting within three day's "trek" with an ox-waggon from that curious little town. The style of life was quite new to Ernest, and he enjoyed it much. They owned an ox-waggon and a span of sixteen "salted" oxen, that is, oxen which will not die of lung-sickness, and in this lumbering vehicle they travelled about wherever fancy or the presence of buck took them. Mr. Alston and his boy Roger slept in the waggon, and Ernest in a little tent which was pitched every night alongside, and never did he sleep sounder. There was a freshness and freedom about the life which charmed him. It is pleasant after the day's shooting or travelling to partake of a hearty meal, of which the /pièce de résistance/ generally consists of a stew compounded indiscriminately of vilderbeeste beef, bustard, partridges, snipe, rice, and compressed vegetables--a dish, by the way, which is, if properly cooked, fit to set before a king. Then comes the pipe, or rather a succession of pipes, and the talk over the day's sport, and the effect of that long shot, and the hunting-yarn of which it "reminds me." And after the yarn the well-known square bottle is produced, and the tin pannikins, out of which you have been drinking tea, are sent to the spring down in the hollow to be washed by the Zulu "voorlooper," who objects to going because of the "spooks" (ghosts) which he is credibly informed inhabit that hollow; and you indulge in your evening "tot," and smoke your pipes, and talk or ruminate as the fancy takes you. At last comes the splendid African moon like a radiant queen rising from a throne of inky cloud, flooding the whole wide veld with mysterious light, and reveals the long lines of game slowly travelling to their feeding-grounds along the ridges of the rolling plain.

      Well "one more drop," and so to bed, having come to the admirable decision--so easy to make overnight, so hard to adhere to when the time comes--to "trek from the yoke" at dawn. Having undressed yourself outside the tent, all except the flannel shirt in which you are going to sleep--for there is no room to do so inside--you stow your clothes and boots away under your mackintosh sheet--for clothes wet through with dew are unpleasant to wear before the sun is up--creep on your hands and knees into your little tenement, and wriggle between the blankets.

      For awhile, perhaps, you lie so, your pipe still between your lips, gazing up through the opening of the little tent at two bright particular stars shining in the blue depths above, or watching the waving of the tall tambouki-grass as the night-wind goes sighing through it. Behold! the cold far stars draw near, grow warm with life, and change to Eva's eyes--if unluckily, you have an Eva--and the yellow tambouki-grass is her waving hair, and the sad whispering of the wind her voice, which speaks and tells you that she has come from far across the great seas to tell you that she loves you, to lull you to your rest.

      What was it that frightened her so soon? The rattling of chains and the deep lowing of the oxen, rising to be ready for the dawn. It has not come yet; but it is not far off. See, the grey light begins to gleam upon the oxen's horns, and far away, there in the east, the grey is streaked with primrose. Away with dreams, and up to pull the shivering Kafirs from their snug lair beneath the waggon, and to give the good nags, which must gallop vilderbeeste all to-day, a double handful of mealies before you start.

      /Ah neu-yak-trek!/ the great waggon strains and starts, and presently the glorious sun comes up, and you eat a crust of bread as you sit on the waggon-box, and wash it down with a mouthful of spirit, and feel that it is a splendid thing to get up early.

      Then, about half-past eight, comes the halt for breakfast, and the welcome tub in the clear spring that you have been making for, and, after breakfast, saddle up the nags, take your bearings by the kopje, and off after that great herd of vilderbeeste.

      So, my reader, day adds itself to day, and each day will find you healthier, happier, and stronger than the last. No letters, no newspapers, no duns, no women, and no babies. Think of the joy of it, effete Caucasian, then go buy an ox-waggon and do likewise.

      After a month of this life, Mr. Alston came to the conclusion that there would now be no danger in descending into the low country towards Delagoa Bay in search of large game. Accordingly, having added to their party another would-be Nimrod, a gentleman just arrived from England in search of sport, they started. For the first month or so, things went very well with them. They killed a good quantity of buffalo, koodoo, eland, and water-buck, also two giraffes; but to Ernest's great disappointment did not come across any rhinoceros, and only got a shot at one lion, which he missed, though there were plenty round them.

      But soon the luck turned. First their horses died of the terrible scourge of all this part of South Africa, the horse-sickness. They had given large prices for them, about seventy pounds each, as