There was a hush over the hall, the students rigid with delight atseeing the high gods on Olympus quarrelling among themselves.Challenger levered his bulky figure slowly out of his chair.
"I must in turn ask you, Mr. Waldron," he said, "to cease to makeassertions which are not in strict accordance with scientific fact."
The words unloosed a tempest. "Shame! Shame!" "Give him a hearing!""Put him out!" "Shove him off the platform!" "Fair play!" emergedfrom a general roar of amusement or execration. The chairman was onhis feet flapping both his hands and bleating excitedly. "ProfessorChallenger--personal--views--later," were the solid peaks above hisclouds of inaudible mutter. The interrupter bowed, smiled, stroked hisbeard, and relapsed into his chair. Waldron, very flushed and warlike,continued his observations. Now and then, as he made an assertion, heshot a venomous glance at his opponent, who seemed to be slumberingdeeply, with the same broad, happy smile upon his face.
At last the lecture came to an end--I am inclined to think that it wasa premature one, as the peroration was hurried and disconnected. Thethread of the argument had been rudely broken, and the audience wasrestless and expectant. Waldron sat down, and, after a chirrup fromthe chairman, Professor Challenger rose and advanced to the edge of theplatform. In the interests of my paper I took down his speech verbatim.
"Ladies and Gentlemen," he began, amid a sustained interruption fromthe back. "I beg pardon--Ladies, Gentlemen, and Children--I mustapologize, I had inadvertently omitted a considerable section of thisaudience" (tumult, during which the Professor stood with one handraised and his enormous head nodding sympathetically, as if he werebestowing a pontifical blessing upon the crowd), "I have been selectedto move a vote of thanks to Mr. Waldron for the very picturesque andimaginative address to which we have just listened. There are pointsin it with which I disagree, and it has been my duty to indicate themas they arose, but, none the less, Mr. Waldron has accomplished hisobject well, that object being to give a simple and interesting accountof what he conceives to have been the history of our planet. Popularlectures are the easiest to listen to, but Mr. Waldron" (here he beamedand blinked at the lecturer) "will excuse me when I say that they arenecessarily both superficial and misleading, since they have to begraded to the comprehension of an ignorant audience." (Ironicalcheering.) "Popular lecturers are in their nature parasitic." (Angrygesture of protest from Mr. Waldron.) "They exploit for fame or cashthe work which has been done by their indigent and unknown brethren.One smallest new fact obtained in the laboratory, one brick built intothe temple of science, far outweighs any second-hand exposition whichpasses an idle hour, but can leave no useful result behind it. I putforward this obvious reflection, not out of any desire to disparage Mr.Waldron in particular, but that you may not lose your sense ofproportion and mistake the acolyte for the high priest." (At this pointMr. Waldron whispered to the chairman, who half rose and said somethingseverely to his water-carafe.) "But enough of this!" (Loud andprolonged cheers.) "Let me pass to some subject of wider interest.What is the particular point upon which I, as an original investigator,have challenged our lecturer's accuracy? It is upon the permanence ofcertain types of animal life upon the
earth. I do not speak upon thissubject as an amateur, nor, I may add, as a popular lecturer, but Ispeak as one whose scientific conscience compels him to adhere closelyto facts, when I say that Mr. Waldron is very wrong in supposing thatbecause he has never himself seen a so-called prehistoric animal,therefore these creatures no longer exist. They are indeed, as he hassaid, our ancestors, but they are, if I may use the expression, ourcontemporary ancestors, who can still be found with all their hideousand formidable characteristics if one has but the energy and hardihoodto seek their haunts. Creatures which were supposed to be Jurassic,monsters who would hunt down and devour our largest and fiercestmammals, still exist." (Cries of "Bosh!" "Prove it!" "How do YOU know?""Question!") "How do I know, you ask me? I know because I have visitedtheir secret haunts. I know because I have seen some of them."(Applause, uproar, and a voice, "Liar!") "Am I a liar?" (Generalhearty and noisy assent.) "Did I hear someone say that I was a liar?Will the person who called me a liar kindly stand up that I may knowhim?" (A voice, "Here he is, sir!" and an inoffensive little person inspectacles, struggling violently, was held up among a group ofstudents.) "Did you venture to call me a liar?" ("No, sir, no!"shouted the accused, and disappeared like a jack-in-the-box.) "If anyperson in this hall dares to doubt my veracity, I shall be glad to havea few words with him after the lecture." ("Liar!") "Who said that?"(Again the inoffensive one plunging desperately, was elevated high intothe air.) "If I come down among you----" (General chorus of "Come,love, come!" which interrupted the proceedings for some moments, whilethe chairman, standing up and waving both his arms, seemed to beconducting the music. The Professor, with his face flushed, hisnostrils dilated, and his beard bristling, was now in a proper Berserkmood.) "Every great discoverer has been met with the sameincredulity--the sure brand of a generation of fools. When great factsare laid before you, you have not the intuition, the imagination whichwould help you to understand them. You can only throw mud at the menwho have risked their lives to open new fields to science. Youpersecute the prophets! Galileo! Darwin, and I----" (Prolongedcheering and complete interruption.)
All this is from my hurried notes taken at the time, which give littlenotion of the absolute chaos to which the assembly had by this timebeen reduced. So terrific was the uproar that several ladies hadalready beaten a hurried retreat. Grave and reverend seniors seemed tohave caught the prevailing spirit as badly as the students, and I sawwhite-bearded men rising and shaking their fists at the obdurateProfessor. The whole great audience seethed and simmered like aboiling pot. The Professor took a step forward and raised both hishands. There was something so big and arresting and virile in the manthat the clatter and shouting died gradually away before his commandinggesture and his masterful eyes. He seemed to have a definite message.They hushed to hear it.
"I will not detain you," he said. "It is not worth it. Truth istruth, and the noise of a number of foolish young men--and, I fear Imust add, of their equally foolish seniors--cannot affect the matter.I claim that I have opened a new field of science. You dispute it."(Cheers.) "Then I put you to the test. Will you accredit one or moreof your own number to go out as your representatives and test mystatement in your name?"
Mr. Summerlee, the veteran Professor of Comparative Anatomy, rose amongthe audience, a tall, thin, bitter man, with the withered aspect of atheologian. He wished, he said, to ask Professor Challenger whetherthe results to which he had alluded in his remarks had been obtainedduring a journey to the headwaters of the Amazon made by him two yearsbefore.
Professor Challenger answered that they had.
Mr. Summerlee desired to know how it was that Professor Challengerclaimed to have made discoveries in those regions which had beenoverlooked by Wallace, Bates, and other previous explorers ofestablished scientific repute.
Professor Challenger answered that Mr. Summerlee appeared to beconfusing the Amazon with the Thames; that it was in reality a somewhatlarger river; that Mr. Summerlee might be interested to know that withthe Orinoco, which communicated with it, some fifty thousand miles ofcountry were opened up, and that in so vast a space it was notimpossible for one person to find what another had missed.
Mr. Summerlee declared, with an acid smile, that he fully appreciatedthe difference between the Thames and the Amazon, which lay in the factthat any assertion about the former could be tested, while about thelatter it could not. He would be obliged if Professor Challenger wouldgive the latitude and the longitude of the country in which prehistoricanimals were to be found.
Professor Challenger replied that he reserved such information for goodreasons of his own, but would be prepared to give it with properprecautions to a committee chosen from the audience. Would Mr.Summerlee serve on such a committee and test his story in person?
Mr. Summerlee: "Yes, I will." (Great cheering.)
Professor Challenger: "Then I guarantee that I will place in yourhands such material as will enable you to find your way. It is onlyright, however, since Mr. Summerlee goes to check my statement that Ishould have one or more with him who may check his. I will notdisguise from you that there are difficulties and dangers. Mr.Summerlee will need a younger colleague. May I ask for volunteers?"
It is thus that the great crisis of a man's life springs out at him.Could I have imagined when I entered that hall that I was about topledge myself to a wilder adventure than had ever come to me in mydreams? But Gladys--was it not the very opportunity of which shespoke? Gladys would have told me to go. I had sprung to my feet. Iwas speaking, and yet I had prepared no words. Tarp Henry, mycompanion, was plucking at my skirts and I heard him whispering, "Sitdown, Malone! Don't make a public ass of yourself." At the same time Iwas aware that a tall, thin man, with dark gingery hair, a few seats infront of me, was also upon his feet. He glared back at me with hardangry eyes, but I refused to give way.
"I will go, Mr. Chairman," I kept repeating over and over again.
"Name! Name!" cried the audience.
"My name is Edward Dunn Malone. I am the reporter of the DailyGazette. I claim to be an absolutely unprejudiced witness."
"What is YOUR name, sir?" the chairman asked of my tall rival.
"I am Lord John Roxton. I have already been up the Amazon, I know allthe ground, and have special qualifications for this investigation."
"Lord John Roxton's reputation as a sportsman and a traveler is, ofcourse, world-famous," said the chairman; "at the same time it wouldcertainly be as well to have a member of the Press upon such anexpedition."
"Then I move," said Professor Challenger, "that both these gentlemen beelected, as representatives of this meeting, to accompany ProfessorSummerlee upon his journey to investigate and to report upon the truthof my statements."
And so, amid shouting and cheering, our fate was decided, and I foundmyself borne away in the human current which swirled towards the door,with my mind half stunned by the vast new project which had risen sosuddenly before it. As I emerged from the hall I was conscious for amoment of a rush of laughing students--down the pavement, and of an armwielding a heavy umbrella, which rose and fell in the midst of them.Then, amid a mixture of groans and cheers, Professor Challenger'selectric brougham slid from the curb, and I found myself walking underthe silvery lights of Regent Street, full of thoughts of Gladys and ofwonder as to my future.
Suddenly there was a touch at my elbow. I turned, and found myselflooking into the humorous, masterful eyes of the tall, thin man who hadvolunteered to be my companion on this strange quest.
"Mr. Malone, I understand," said he. "We are to be companions--what?My rooms are just over the road, in the Albany. Perhaps you would havethe kindness to spare me half an hour, for there are one or two thingsthat I badly want to say to you."
CHAPTER VI
"I was the Flail of the Lord"
Lord John Roxton and I turned down Vigo Street together and through thedingy portals of the famous aristocratic rookery. At the end of a longdrab passage my new acquaintance pushed open a door and turned on anelectric switch. A number of lamps shining through tinted shadesbathed the whole great room before us in a ruddy radiance. Standing inthe doorway and glancing round me, I had a general impression ofextraordinary comfort and elegance combined with an atmosphere ofmasculine virility. Everywhere there were mingled the luxury of thewealthy man of taste and the careless untidiness of the bachelor. Richfurs and strange iridescent mats from some Oriental bazaar werescattered upon the floor. Pictures and prints which even myunpractised eyes could recognize as being of great price and rarityhung thick upon the walls. Sketches of boxers, of ballet-girls, and ofracehorses alternated with a sensuous Fragonard, a martial Girardet,and a dreamy Turner. But amid these varied ornaments there werescattered the trophies which brought back strongly to my recollectionthe fact that Lord John Roxton was one of the great all-round sportsmenand athletes of his day. A dark-blue oar crossed with a cherry-pinkone above his mantel-piece spoke of the old Oxonian and Leander man,while the foils and boxing-gloves above and below them were the toolsof a man who had won supremacy with each. Like a dado round the roomwas the jutting line of splendid heavy game-heads, the best of theirsort from every quarter of the world, with the rare white rhinoceros ofthe Lado Enclave drooping its supercilious lip above them all.