Page 1 of 139 THE LAST GALLEY - The Last Galley Impressions and Tales Impressions and Tales

The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Last Galley Impressions and Tales Impressions and Tales, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Produced by Lionel G. Sear of Truro, Cornwall, England.

THE LAST GALLEY.

IMPRESSIONS AND TALES

Arthur Conan Doyle.

PREFACE

I have written "Impressions and Tales" upon the title-page of this volume, because I have included within the same cover two styles of work which present an essential difference.

The second half of the collection consists of eight stories, which explain themselves.

The first half is made up of a series of pictures of the past which maybe regarded as trial flights towards a larger ideal which I have long had in my mind. It has seemed to me that there is a region between actual story and actual history which has never been adequately exploited. I could imagine, for example, a work dealing with some great historical epoch, and finding its interest not in the happenings to particular individuals, their adventures and their loves, but in the fascination of the actual facts of history themselves. These facts might be coloured with the glamour which the writer of fiction can give, and fictitious characters and conversations might illustrate them; but none the less the actual drama of history and not the drama of invention should claim the attention of the reader. I have been tempted sometimes to try the effect upon a larger scale; but meanwhile these short sketches, portraying various crises in the story of the human race, are to be judged as experiments in that direction.

ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE.

WINDLESHAM,
CROWBOROUGH,
April, 1911.

CONTENTS

PART I

THE LAST GALLEY
THE CONTEST
THROUGH THE VEIL
AN ICONOCLAST
GIANT MAXIMIN
THE COMING OF THE HUNS
THE LAST OF THE LEGIONS
THE FIRST CARGO
THE HOME-COMING
THE RED STAR

PART II

THE SILVER MIRROR
THE BLIGHTING OF SHARKEY
THE MARRIAGE OF THE BRIGADIER
THE LORD OF FALCONBRIDGE
OUT OF THE RUNNING
"DE PROFUNDIS"
THE GREAT BROWN-PERICORD MOTOR
THE TERROR OF BLUE JOHN GAP

PART I

THE LAST GALLEY

"Mutato nomine, de te, Britannia, fabula narratur."

It was a spring morning, one hundred and forty-six years before the coming of Christ. The North African Coast, with its broad hem of golden sand, its green belt of feathery palm trees, and its background of barren, red-scarped hills, shimmered like a dream country in the opal light. Save for a narrow edge of snow-white surf, the Mediterranean lay blue and serene as far as the eye could reach. In all its vast expanse there was no break but for a single galley, which was slowly making its way from the direction of Sicily and heading for the distant harbour of Carthage.

		"If you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married." Katherine Hepburn