Adventure stories; Fantasy fiction; Tarzan (Fictitious character) -- Fiction
"War and wine, then, would restore Veltopismakus to her former pride
and happiness, you think?" laughed Gofoloso. "What a fire-brand you
have become since you came to the command of all the warriors of our
city!"
"You misunderstand me, Gofoloso," said Gefasto, patiently. "War and
wine alone will accomplish nothing but our ruin. I have no quarrel
with peace or virtue or temperance. My quarrel is with the misguided
theorists who think that peace alone, or virtue alone, or temperance
alone will make a strong, a virile, a contented nation. They must
be mixed with war and wine and sin and a great measure of hard
work--especially hard work--and with nothing but peace and prosperity
there is little necessity for hard work, and only the exceptional man
works hard when he does not have to.
"But come, you must hasten to deliver the hundred slaves to Vestako
before the Sun enters the Warriors' Corridor, or he will tell your
little joke to Elkomoelhago."
Gofoloso smiled ruefully. "Some day he shall pay for these hundred
slaves," he said, "and the price will be very high."
"If his master falls," said Gefasto.
"_When_ his master falls!" Gofoloso corrected.
The Chief of Warriors shrugged his shoulders, but he smiled
contentedly, and he was still smiling after his friend had turned into
an intersecting corridor and gone his way.
CHAPTER XI
Tarzan of the Apes was led directly from the Royal Dome to the quarries
of Veltopismakus, which lie a quarter of a mile from the nearer of
the eight domes which constitute the city. A ninth dome was in course
of construction and it was toward this that the line of burdened
slaves wound from the entrance to the quarry to which the ape-man was
conducted. Just below the surface, in a well-lighted chamber, he was
turned over to the officer in charge of the quarry guard, to whom the
king's instructions concerning him were communicated.
"Your name?" demanded the officer, opening a large book that lay upon
the table at which he was seated.
"He is as dumb as the Zertalacolols," explained the commander of the
escort that had brought him to the quarry. "Therefore he has no name."
"We will call him The Giant, then," said the officer, "for as such
has he been known since his capture," and he wrote in his book,
_Zuanthrol_, with Zoanthrohago as the owner, and Trohanadalmakus as the
city of his origin, and then he turned to one of the warriors lolling
upon a nearby bench. "Take him to the timbering crew in the extension
of tunnel thirteen at the thirty-sixth level and tell the Vental in
charge to give him light work and see that no harm befalls him, for
such are the commands of the thagosto--go! But wait! here is his
number. Fasten it upon his shoulder."
The warrior took the circular piece of fabric with black hieroglyphics
stamped upon it and affixed it with a metal clasp to the left shoulder
of Tarzan's green tunic and then, motioning the ape-man to precede him,
quit the chamber.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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