{"product_id":"2940012791092","title":"THE ANCIENT ALLAN","description":"CHAPTER I. AN OLD FRIEND\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNow I, Allan Quatermain, come to the weirdest (with one or two\u003cbr\u003eexceptions perhaps) of all the experiences which it has amused me to\u003cbr\u003eemploy my idle hours in recording here in a strange land, for after all\u003cbr\u003eEngland is strange to me. I grow elderly. I have, as I suppose, passed\u003cbr\u003ethe period of enterprise and adventure and I should be well satisfied\u003cbr\u003ewith the lot that Fate has given to my unworthy self.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo begin with, I am still alive and in health when by all the rules I\u003cbr\u003eshould have been dead many times over. I suppose I ought to be thankful\u003cbr\u003efor that but, before expressing an opinion on the point, I should have\u003cbr\u003eto be quite sure whether it is better to be alive or dead. The religious\u003cbr\u003eplump for the latter, though I have never observed that the religious\u003cbr\u003eare more eager to die than the rest of us poor mortals.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor instance, if they are told that their holy hearts are wrong, they\u003cbr\u003espend time and much money in rushing to a place called Nauheim\u003cbr\u003ein Germany, to put them right by means of water-drinking, thereby\u003cbr\u003eshortening their hours of heavenly bliss and depriving their heirs of\u003cbr\u003ea certain amount of cash. The same thing applies to Buxton in my own\u003cbr\u003eneighbourhood and gout, especially when it threatens the stomach or the\u003cbr\u003ethroat. Even archbishops will do these things, to say nothing of such\u003cbr\u003esmall fry as deans, or stout and prominent lay figures of the Church.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom common sinners like myself such conduct might be expected, but in\u003cbr\u003ethe case of those who are obviously poised on the topmost rungs of the\u003cbr\u003eJacobean--I mean, the heavenly--ladder, it is legitimate to inquire why\u003cbr\u003ethey show such reluctance in jumping off. As a matter of fact the only\u003cbr\u003epersons that, individually, I have seen quite willing to die, except now\u003cbr\u003eand again to save somebody else whom they were so foolish as to care for\u003cbr\u003emore than they did for themselves, have been not those \"upon whom the\u003cbr\u003elight has shined\" to quote an earnest paper I chanced to read this\u003cbr\u003emorning, but, to quote again, \"the sinful heathen wandering in their\u003cbr\u003enative blackness,\" by which I understand the writer to refer to their\u003cbr\u003emoral state and not to their sable skins wherein for the most part they\u003cbr\u003eare also condemned to wander, that is if they happen to have been born\u003cbr\u003esouth of a certain degree of latitude.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTo come to facts, the staff of Faith which each must shape for himself,\u003cbr\u003eis often hewn from unsuitable kinds of wood, yes, even by the very best\u003cbr\u003eamong us. Willow, for instance, is pretty and easy to cut, but try to\u003cbr\u003esupport yourself with it on the edge of a precipice and see where you\u003cbr\u003eare. Then of a truth you will long for ironbark, or even homely oak. I\u003cbr\u003emight carry my parable further, some allusions to the proper material\u003cbr\u003eof which to fashion the helmet of Salvation suggest themselves to me for\u003cbr\u003eexample, but I won't.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe truth is that we fear to die because all the religions are full of\u003cbr\u003euncomfortable hints as to what may happen to us afterwards as a reward\u003cbr\u003efor our deviations from their laws and we half believe in something,\u003cbr\u003ewhereas often the savage, not being troubled with religion, fears less,\u003cbr\u003ebecause he half believes in nothing. For very few inhabitants of this\u003cbr\u003eearth can attain either to complete belief or to its absolute opposite.\u003cbr\u003eThey can seldom lay their hands upon their hearts, and say they _know_\u003cbr\u003ethat they will live for ever, or sleep for ever; there remains in the\u003cbr\u003ecase of most honest men an element of doubt in either hypothesis.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat is what makes this story of mine so interesting, at any rate to\u003cbr\u003eme, since it does seem to suggest that whether or no I have a future,\u003cbr\u003eas personally I hold to be the case and not altogether without evidence,\u003cbr\u003ecertainly I have had a past, though, so far as I know, in this world\u003cbr\u003eonly; a fact, if it be a fact, from which can be deduced all kinds of\u003cbr\u003earguments according to the taste of the reasoner.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd now for my experience, which it is only fair to add, may after all\u003cbr\u003ehave been no more than a long and connected dream. Yet how was I to\u003cbr\u003edream of lands, events and people where of I have only the vaguest\u003cbr\u003eknowledge, or none at all, unless indeed, as some say, being a part of\u003cbr\u003ethis world, we have hidden away somewhere in ourselves an acquaintance\u003cbr\u003ewith everything that has ever happened in the world. However, it does\u003cbr\u003enot much matter and it is useless to discuss that which we cannot prove.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHere at any rate is the story.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn a book or a record which I have written down and put away with others\u003cbr\u003eunder the title of \"The Ivory Child,\" I have told the tale of a certain\u003cbr\u003eexpedition I made in company with Lord Ragnall.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47145442410736,"sku":"2940012791092","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012791092_p0.jpg?v=1763572278","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012791092","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}