TALES OF THREE HEMISPHERES Lord Dunsany CONTENTS The Last Dream Of Bwona Khubla How the Office of Postman Fell Vacant In Otford-under-the-Wold The Prayer Of Boob Aheera East And West A Pretty Quarrel How The Gods Avenged Meoul Ki Ning The Gift Of The Gods The Sack Of Emeralds The Old Brown Coat An Archive Of The Older Mysteries A City Of Wonder Beyond the Fields We Know Publisher's Note First Tale: Idle Days on the Yann Second Tale: A Shop In Go-By Street Third Tale: The Avenger Of Perdóndaris [Note that the tale "Idle Days on the Yann" also appears in the collection "A Dreamer's Tales".] THE LAST DREAM OF BWONA KHUBLA From steaming lowlands down by the equator, where monstrous orchids blow, where beetles big as mice sit on the tent-ropes, and fireflies glide about by night like little moving stars, the travelers went three days through forests of cactus till they came to the open plains where the oryx are. And glad they were when they came to the water-hole, where only one white man had gone before, which the natives know as the camp of Bwona Khubla, and found the water there. It lies three days from the nearest other water, and when Bwona Khubla had gone there three years ago, what with malaria with which he was shaking all over, and what with disgust at finding the water-hole dry, he had decided to die there, and in that part of the world such decisions are always fatal. In any case he was overdue to die, but hitherto his amazing resolution, and that terrible strength of character that so astounded his porters, had kept him alive and moved his safari on. He had had a name no doubt, some common name such as hangs as likely as not over scores of shops in London; but that had gone long ago, and nothing identified his memory now to distinguish it from the memories of all the other dead but "Bwona Khubla," the name the Kikuyus gave him. There is not doubt that he was a fearful man, a man that was dreaded still for his personal force when his arm was no longer able to lift the kiboko, when all his men knew he was dying, and to this day though he is dead. Though his temper was embittered by malaria and the equatorial sun, nothing impaired his will, which remained a compulsive force to the very last, impressing itself upon all, and after the last, from what the Kikuyus say. The country must have had powerful laws that drove Bwona Khubla out, whatever country it was. On the morning of the day that they were to come to the camp of Bwona Khubla all the porters came to the travelers' tents asking for dow. Dow is the white man's medicine, that cures all evils; the nastier it tastes, the better it is. They wanted down this morning to keep away devils, for they were near the place where Bwona Khubla died. The travelers gave them quinine.