Part 1 (1/2)

Marie

by H Rider Haggard

DEDICATION

Ditchingham, 1912

My dear Sir Henry,--

Nearly thirty-seven years have gone by, eneration, since firstthe shores of Southern Africa rising from the sea Since then how much has happened: the Annexation of the Transvaal, the Zulu War, the first Boer War, the discovery of the Rand, the taking of Rhodesia, the second Boer War, andtimes are now reckoned as ancient history

Alas! I fear that e to re-visit that country we should find but few faces which we knew Yet of one thing we lad Those historical events, in soreat part, and I, as it chanced, a sht a period of peace to Southern Africa

To-day the flag of England flies from the Zambesi to the Cape Beneath its shadow otten

May the natives prosper also and be justly ruled, for after all in the beginning the land was theirs Such, I know, are your hopes, as they are mine

It is, however, with an earlier Africa that this story deals In 1836, hate and suspicion ran high between the Ho of the slaves and s, the Cape Colony was then in tuht new hoe-peopled North Of this blood-stained tiedies, such as the massacre of the true-hearted Retief and his coaan

But you have read the tale and know its substance What, then, re-past days I dedicate it to you whose ilish gentleet; in memory of it, I offer you this book

Ever sincerely yours,

H RIDER HAGGARD

To Sir Henry Bulwer, GCMG

PREFACE

The Author hopes that the reader may find soes of the eneral, Retief, and his coaan

Save for some added circumstances, he believes it to be accurate in its details

The sas of the trek-Boers andered into the fever veld, there to perish in the neighbourhood of Delagoa Bay Of these sufferings, especially those that were endured by Triechard and his companions, a few brief contemporary records still exist, buried in scarce works of reference Itthe Boers of that generation that the cruel death of Retief and his companions, and other misfortunes which befell thelishaan

EDITOR'S NOTE

The following extract explains how the manuscript of ”Marie,” and with it some others, one of which is named ”Child of Storm,” came into the hands of the Editor