Tarzan of the Apes

Tarzan of the Apes
By Edgar Rice Burroughs

CONTENTS
I Out to Sea
II The Savage Home
III Life and Death
IV The Apes
V The White Ape
VI Jungle Battles
VII The Light of Knowledge
VIII The Tree-top Hunter
IX Man and Man
X The Fear-Phantom
XI "King of the Apes"
XII Man's Reason
XIII His Own Kind
XIV At the Mercy of the Jungle

XV The Forest God
XVI "Most Remarkable"
XVII Burials
XVIII The Jungle Toll
XIX The Call of the Primitive
XX Heredity
XXI The Village of Torture
XXII The Search Party
XXIII Brother Men
XXIV Lost Treasure
XXV The Outpost of the World
XXVI The Height of Civilization
XXVII The Giant Again
XXVIII Conclusion
Chapter 1
Out to Sea
I had this story from one who had no business to tell it to me, or to any
other. I may credit the seductive influence of an old vintage upon the
narrator for the beginning of it, and my own skeptical incredulity
during the days that followed for the balance of the strange tale.
When my convivial host discovered that he had told me so much, and
that I was prone to doubtfulness, his foolish pride assumed the task the

old vintage had commenced, and so he unearthed written evidence in
the form of musty manuscript, and dry official records of the British
Colonial Office to support many of the salient features of his
remarkable narrative.
I do not say the story is true, for I did not witness the happenings which
it portrays, but the fact that in the telling of it to you I have taken
fictitious names for the principal characters quite sufficiently evidences
the sincerity of my own belief that it MAY be true.
The yellow, mildewed pages of the diary of a man long dead, and the
records of the Colonial Office dovetail perfectly with the narrative of
my convivial host, and so I give you the story as I painstakingly pieced
it out from these several various agencies.
If you do not find it credible you will at least be as one with me in
acknowledging that it is unique, remarkable, and interesting.
From the records of the Colonial Office and from the dead man's diary
we learn that a certain young English nobleman, whom we shall call
John Clayton, Lord Greystoke, was commissioned to make a peculiarly
delicate investigation of conditions in a British West Coast African
Colony from whose simple native inhabitants another European power
was known to be recruiting soldiers for its native army, which it used
solely for the forcible collection of rubber and ivory from the savage
tribes along the Congo and the Aruwimi. The natives of the British
Colony complained that many of their young men were enticed away
through the medium of fair and glowing promises, but that few if any
ever returned to their families.
The Englishmen in Africa went even further, saying that these poor
blacks were held in virtual slavery, since after their terms of enlistment
expired their ignorance was imposed upon by their white officers, and
they were told that they had yet several years to serve.
And so the Colonial Office appointed John Clayton to a new post in
British West Africa, but his confidential instructions centered on a
thorough investigation of the unfair treatment of black British subjects

by the officers of a friendly European power. Why he was sent, is,
however, of little moment to this story, for he never made an
investigation, nor, in fact, did he ever reach his destination.
Clayton was the type of Englishman that one likes best to associate
with the noblest monuments of historic achievement upon a thousand
victorious battlefields--a strong, virile man --mentally, morally, and
physically.
In stature he was above the average height; his eyes were gray, his
features regular and strong; his carriage that of perfect, robust health
influenced by his years of army training.
Political ambition had caused him to seek transference from the army
to the Colonial Office and so we find him, still young, entrusted with a
delicate and important commission in the service of the Queen.
When he received this appointment he was both elated and appalled.
The preferment seemed to him in the nature of a well-merited reward
for painstaking and intelligent service, and as a stepping stone to posts
of greater importance and responsibility; but, on the other hand, he had
been married to the Hon. Alice Rutherford for scarce a three months,
and it was the thought of taking this fair young girl into the dangers and
isolation of tropical Africa that appalled him.
For her sake he would have refused the appointment, but she would not
have it so. Instead she insisted that he accept, and, indeed, take her with
him.