"On a throne of stone the princess was seated. A few of the higher grade priests were grouped around her. Evidently they had been discussing us, and had made up their minds. We were not going to be tried even.
On a throne of stone the princess was seated, a few of the higher grade priests grouped around her.—Page 215.
"'Stand there!' the princess commanded! 'Dogs, do you want to live?'
"Ralph Ravenspur said nothing. He was ever a man of few words.
"'We have no desire to die,' I replied. 'Nothing that breathes ever has. Even if I were an old man with one foot in the grave the desire for life would be as strong upon me as it is now!'
"The princess smiled. I will not try to describe that smile. If you had seen it you would have given ten years of your life to forget it again.
"It is in your hands to live,' the woman said; 'it is for you to say whether or not you return to your people. But you shall not carry our cherished secrets to the West. You shall live, you shall go free, but you shall take no memory of the past with you!'
"I guessed at once what she meant. There were attendants upon the priests, poor fools who fetched and carried, who would undertake errands one at a time, but who had no reasoning powers, no wits of their own.
"They were not born idiots; they had been made so. They are put under drugs, a portion of the scalp is removed, and then some small fragment of the brain is destroyed. We could have our liberty if we chose, but at what price! We could go free, but for the rest of our lives we should never know the blessed light of reason again.