The Lost Continent | Page 4

known to these ancient Canarios, and I
took your word for it. For anything I knew the stuff might have been
something to eat."
"It isn't Guanche work at all," said he testily. "You ought to have
known that from the talc. Great heavens, man, have you no eyes?
Haven't you seen the general formation of the island? Don't you know
there's no talc here?"
"I'm no geologist. Is this imported literature then?"
"Of course. It's Egyptian: that's obvious at a glance. Though how it's
got here I can't tell yet. It isn't stuff you can read off like a newspaper.
The character's a variant on any of those that have been discovered so
far. And as for this waxy stuff spread over the talc, it's unique. It's some
sort of a mineral, I think: perhaps asphalt. It doesn't scratch up like
animal wax. I'll analyse that later. Why they once invented it, and then
let such a splendid notion drop out of use, is just a marvel. I could stay
gloating over this all day."
"Well," I said, "if it's all the same for you, I'd rather gloat over a meal.
It's a good ten miles hard going to the fonda, and I'm as hungry as a
hawk already. Look here, do you know it is four o'clock already? It
takes longer than you think climbing down to each of these caves, and
then getting up again for the next."
Coppinger spread his coat on the ground, and wrapped the lump of
sheets with tender care, but would not allow it to be tied with a rope for
fear of breaking more of the edges. He insisted on carrying it himself
too, and did so for the larger part of the way to Santa Brigida, and it
was only when he was within an ace of dropping himself with sheer
tiredness that he condescended to let me take my turn. He was tolerably
ungracious about it too. "I suppose you may as well carry the stuff," he
snapped, "seeing that after all it's your own."

Personally, when we got to the fonda, I had as good a dinner as was
procurable, and a bottle of that old Canary wine, and turned into bed
after a final pipe. Coppinger dined also, but I have reason to believe he
did not sleep much. At any rate I found him still poring over the find
next morning, and looking very heavy- eyed, but brimming with
enthusiasm.
"Do you know," he said, "that you've blundered upon the most valuable
historical manuscript that the modern world has ever yet seen? Of
course, with your clumsy way of getting it out, you've done an infinity
of damage. For instance, those top sheets you shelled away and spoiled,
contained probably an absolutely unique account of the ancient
civilisation of Yucatan."
"Where's that, anyway?"
"In the middle of the Gulf of Mexico. It's all ruins to-day, but once it
was a very prosperous colony of the Atlanteans."
"Never heard of them. Oh yes, I have though. They were the people
Herodotus wrote about, didn't he? But I thought they were mythical."
"They were very real, and so was Atlantis, the continent where they
lived, which lay just north of the Canaries here."
"What's that crocodile sort of thing with wings drawn in the margin?"
"Some sort of beast that lived in those bygone days. The pages are full
of them. That's a cave-tiger. And that's some sort of colossal bat. Thank
goodness he had the sense to illustrate fully, the man who wrote this, or
we should never have been able to reconstruct the tale, or at any rate we
could not have understood half of it. Whole species have died out since
this was written, just as a whole continent has been swept away and
three civilisations quenched. The worst of it is, it was written by a
highly-educated man who somewhat naturally writes a very bad fist.
I've hammered at it all the night through, and have only managed to
make out a few sentences here and there"--he rubbed his hands
appreciatively. "It will take me a year's hard work to translate this

properly."
"Every man to his taste. I'm afraid my interest in the thing wouldn't last
as long as that. But how did it get there? Did your ancient Egyptian
come to Grand Canary for the good of his lungs, and write it because he
felt dull up in that cave?"
"I made a mistake there. The author was not an Egyptian. It was the
similarity of the inscribed character which misled me. The book was
written by one Deucalion, who seems to have been a priest or
general--or perhaps both--and he was an Atlantean. How it got there, I
don't know yet. Probably that