So to all who have known me, or known of me, to all who can think
one kindly thought of the old hunter, I stretch out my hand from
the far-off shore and bid a long farewell.
And now into the hands of Almighty God, who sent it, do I commit
my spirit.
'_I have spoken,_' as the Zulus say.
CHAPTER XXIV
BY ANOTHER HAND
A year has elapsed since our most dear friend Allan Quatermain
wrote the words '_I have spoken_' at the end of his record of
our adventures. Nor should I have ventured to make any additions
to the record had it not happened that by a most strange accident
a chance has arisen of its being conveyed to England. The chance
is but a faint one, it is true; but, as it is not probable that
another will arise in our lifetimes, Good and myself think that
we may as well avail ourselves of it, such as it is. During the
last six months several Frontier Commissions have been at work
on the various boundaries of Zu-Vendis, with a view of discovering
whether there exists any possible means of ingress or egress from
the country, with the result that a channel of communication
with the outer world hitherto overlooked has been discovered.
This channel, apparently the only one (for I have discovered that
it was by it that the native who ultimately reached Mr Mackenzie's
mission station, and whose arrival in the country, together with
the fact of his expulsion -- for he _did_ arrive about three
years before ourselves -- was for reasons of their own kept a
dead secret by the priests to whom he was brought), is about
to be effectually closed.
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