AYESHA

"Here ends this history so far as it concerns science and the
outside world. What its end will be as regards Leo and myself is
more than I can guess. But we feel that it is not reached. . . .
Often I sit alone at night, staring with the eyes of my mind into
the blackness of unborn time, and wondering in what shape and form
the great drama will be finally developed, and where the scene of
its next act will be laid. And when, ultimately, that _final_
development occurs, as I have no doubt it must and will occur, in
obedience to a fate that never swerves and a purpose which cannot
be altered, what will be the part played therein by that beautiful
Egyptian Amenar-tas, the Princess of the royal house of the
Pharaohs, for the love of whom the priest Kallikrates broke his
vows to Isis, and, pursued by the vengeance of the outraged
goddess, fled down the coast of Lybia to meet his doom at Kor?"--
_She_, Silver Library Edition, p. 277.

DEDICATION

My dear Lang,

The appointed years--alas! how many of them--are gone by, leaving Ayesha
lovely and loving and ourselves alive. As it was promised in the Caves
of Kor _She_ has returned again.

To you therefore who accepted the first, I offer this further history of
one of the various incarnations of that Immortal.

My hope is that after you have read her record, notwithstanding her
subtleties and sins and the shortcomings of her chronicler (no easy
office!) you may continue to wear your chain of "loyalty to our lady
Ayesha." Such, I confess, is still the fate of your old friend

H. RIDER HAGGARD.

DITCHINGHAM, 1905.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Not with a view of conciliating those readers who on principle object to
sequels, but as a matter of fact, the Author wishes to say that he does
not so regard this book.

Rather does he venture to ask that it should be considered as the
conclusion of an imaginative tragedy (if he may so call it) whereof one
half has been already published.

This conclusion it was always his desire to write should he be destined
to live through those many years which, in obedience to his original
design, must be allowed to lapse between the events of the first and
second parts of the romance.

In response to many enquiries he may add that the name Ayesha, which
since the days of the prophet Mahomet, who had a wife so called, and
perhaps before them, has been common in the East, should be pronounced
_Assha_.

INTRODUCTION

Verily and indeed it is the unexpected that happens! Probably if there
was one person upon the earth from whom the Editor of this, and of a
certain previous history, did not expect to hear again, that person was
Ludwig Horace Holly. This, too, for a good reason; he believed him to
have taken his departure from the earth.

When Mr. Holly last wrote, many, many years ago, it was to transmit the
manuscript of _She_, and to announce that he and his ward, Leo Vincey,
the beloved of the divine Ayesha, were about to travel to Central Asia
in the hope, I suppose, that there she would fulfil her promise and
appear to them again.

Often I have wondered, idly enough, what happened to them there; whether
they were dead, or perhaps droning their lives away as monks in some
Thibetan Lamasery, or studying magic and practising asceticism under
the tuition of the Eastern Masters trusting that thus they would build a
bridge by which they might pass to the side of their adored Immortal.

Now at length, when I had not thought of them for months, without a
single warning sign, out of the blue as it were, comes the answer to
these wonderings!

To think--only to think--that I, the Editor aforesaid, from its
appearance suspecting something quite familiar and without interest,
pushed aside that dingy, unregistered, brown-paper parcel directed in an
unknown hand, and for two whole days let it lie forgotten. Indeed there
it might be lying now, had not another person been moved to curiosity,
and opening it, found within a bundle of manuscript badly burned upon
the back, and with this two letters addressed to myself.

Although so great a time had passed since I saw it, and it was shaky
now because of the author's age or sickness, I knew the writing at
once--nobody ever made an "H" with that peculiar twirl under it except
Mr. Holly. I tore open the sealed envelope, and sure enough the first
thing my eye fell upon was the signature, _L. H. Holly_. It is long
since I read anything so eagerly as I did that letter. Here it is:--

AYESHA