He saw before him a great walled enclosure roofed by a lofty azure
dome, and beyond the walls the tops of green trees swaying gently in
the soft breezes. His nostrils tasted the incense of fresh earth and
growing things. For the first time he felt the breath of Nature, free
and unconfined, upon his brow.
He drew his giant frame to its full height and drank in the freedom and
the sweetness of it all, filling his great lungs to their fullest; and
with the first taste he learned to hate the close and stuffy confines
of his prison.
His virgin mind was filled with wonder at the wealth of new impressions
which surged to his brain through every sense. He longed for more, and
the open gateway of the campong was a scarce needed invitation to pass
to the wide world beyond. With the free and easy tread of utter
unconsciousness of self, he passed across the enclosure and stepped out
into the clearing which lay between the palisade and the jungle.
Ah, here was a still more beautiful world! The green leaves nodded to
him, and at their invitation he came and the jungle reached out its
million arms to embrace him. Now before him, behind, on either side
there was naught but glorious green beauty shot with splashes of
gorgeous color that made him gasp in wonderment.
Brilliant birds rose from amidst it all, skimming hither and thither
above his head—he thought that the flowers and the birds were the same,
and when he reached out and plucked a blossom, tenderly, he wondered
that it did not flutter in his hand. On and on he walked, but slowly,
for he must not miss a single sight in the strange and wonderful place;
and then, of a sudden, the quiet beauty of the scene was harshly broken
by the crashing of a monster through the underbrush.
Number Thirteen was standing in a little open place in the jungle when
the discordant note first fell upon his ears, and as he turned his head
in the direction of the sound he was startled at the hideous aspect of
the thing which broke through the foliage before him.
What a horrid creature! But on the same instant his eyes fell upon
another borne in the arms of the terrible one. This one was
different—very different,—soft and beautiful and white. He wondered
what it all meant, for everything was strange and new to him; but when
he saw the eyes of the lovely one upon him, and her arms outstretched
toward him, though he did not understand the words upon her lips, he
knew that she was in distress. Something told him that it was the ugly
thing that carried her that was the author of her suffering.
Virginia Maxon had been half unconscious from fright when she suddenly
saw a white man, clothed in coarse, white, native pajamas, confronting
her and the misshapen beast that was bearing her away to what frightful
fate she could but conjecture.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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