C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne (1866-1944) was famous in the day (now largely forgotten) for a series of stories about a sailor named Captain Kettle. These appeared in Pearson’s Magazine as stories then were collected into books. I guess it should not be surprising that when Hyne wrote a giant Fantasy novel that is should be serialized in the same magazine, from July–December 1899. It would appear in America in Harper’s a year later. The novel was illustrated by Ernest Prater.
The book had many reprints but three are important, first in Famous fantastic Mysteries 1944, then as part of Lin Carter’s Ballantine Fantasy Series in 1972, and last in The Rivals of H. G. Wells in 1979. This third one was wonderful because it reprinted the actual pages from Pearson’s with the Prater illustrations. All of these versions helped to keep the book in the minds of Fantasy and SF fans. But why has this elderly novel remained in the public interest? As George T. Dodds says in his review: “Well mostly because it’s — as one would say in Brit-speak — a ripping good yarn.”
One of the things that makes this tale of Deucalon, a warrior, and his rivalry with the evil Queen Phorenice so much fun is the monsters that dot the world of sunken Atlantis.
Cave Tigers
“One of the cave-tigers crouched, lashed its tail, and launched forth on a terrific spring. The chain tautened, the massive links sang to the strain, and the great beast gave a roar which shook the walls. It had missed the prone man by a hand’s breadth, and the watchers behind the arrow-slits shrieked forth their delight. The other tiger sprang also and missed, and again there were shouts of pleasure, which mingled with the bellowing voices of the beasts…”
The cave-tigers are part of the defense of the capital city of Atlantis, being guards of the two gates. Each animal has a collar and is chained to a winch, allowing the city dwellers to control them.
Hyne’s novel would have a profound influence on Edgar Rice Burroughs fifteen year later. Burroughs features several large cats including the Pellucidarian tarag and the barsoomian banth.
Mammoths
“But presently came the two wonders of all that dazzling spectacle. From out of the eclipse of the houses there swung into the open no less a beast than a huge bull mammoth. The sight had sufficient surprise in it almost to make me start. Many a time during my life had I led hunts to kill the mammoth, when a herd of them had raided some village or cornland under my charge. I had seen the huge brutes in the wild ground, shaggy, horrid, monstrous; more fierce than even the cave-tiger or the cave-bear; most dangerous beast of all that fight with man for dominion of the earth, save only for a few of the greater lizards. And here was this creature, a giant even amongst mammoths, yet tame as any well-whipped slave, and bearing upon its back a great half-castle of gold, stamped with the outstretched hand, and bedecked with silver snakes. Its murderous tusks were gilded, its hairy neck was garlanded with flowers, and it trod on in the procession as though assisting at such pageantry was the beginning and end of its existence. Its tameness seemed a fitting symbol of the masterful strength of this new ruler of Atlantis.”
The second wonder mentioned in the next paragraph is the queen, Phorenice.
Giant Lizards
“Still here, upon this desolate sea, although the giant lizards were new to me, it was a pleasure to pit my knowledge of war against their brute strength and courage. Ever since the first men did their business upon the great waters, they fulfilled their instincts in fighting the beasts with desperation. Hiding coward-like in a hold was useless, for if this enemy could not find men above decks to glut them, they would break a ship with their paddles, and so all would be slain. And so it was recognised that the fight should go forward as desperately as might be, and that it could only end when the beasts had got their prey and had gone away satisfied. It was in a one-sided conflict after this fashion then, that I found myself, and felt the joy once more to have my thews in action. But after my axe had got in some dozen lusty blows, which, for all the harm they did, might have been delivered against some city wall, or, indeed, against the ark of the Mysteries itself, I sought about me till I found a lance, and with that made very different play. The eyes of these lizards are small, and set deep in a bony socket, but I judged them to be vulnerable, and it was upon the eyes of the beast that I made my attack…”
The seas about Atlantis are infested with dinosaurs and other dangerous reptiles. This scene is again so inspirational for Edgar Rice Burroughs. He would use it in the novel The Land That Time Forgot, when the U-boat gets attacked by a water dinosaur as well as in other novels. ERB would also use it on a smaller scale in At the Earth’s Core when David Innes fights a serpent in a canoe. Notice how little the artist knows about dinosaur physiology. It was 1899 after all.
Giant Turtle
“A huge long-necked turtle that was stirred out of the mud by the turmoil, came up to daylight, and swung its great horn-lipped mouth to this side and that, seeking for a prey. The fishers near it dodged and dived. I, thrusting at the stern of the boat, could only hope it would pass me by and so offered an easy mark. It scurried towards me, champing its noisy lips, and beating the water into spray with its flippers. But Phorenice was quick with a remedy and a rescue. She passed her sword through one of the fishers that pressed her, and then thrust the body towards the turtle. The great neck swooped towards it; the long slimy feelers which protruded from its head quivered and snuffled; and then the horny green jaws crunched on it, and drew it down out of sight…”
The green turtle is a peaceful creature. It has feelers on its nose. Feelers on its nose? Don’t ask me…
Man-eating Birds
“The body he threw over the side, and one of the great man-eating birds that hovered near, picked it up and flew away with it to its nest amongst the crags…”
Atlantis is inhabited by many dangerous animals including these raptorous birds. I have to wonder if Hyne had the Arabian Roc in mind when he thought up these creatures?
Monstrous Lizard
“Here I harboured, till one night some monstrous lizard, whose sheer weight made the tree rock like a sapling, endeavoured to suck me forth as a bird picks a worm from a hollow log…”
The forests around Atlantis are inhabited by dinosaurs. The artist who illustrated, The Lost Continent, Ernest Prater, handles ancient people wonderfully. When it comes to monsters he seems largely out of his depths. This illo above is the worst of the bunch. Ick.
Edgar Rice Burroughs would write a novel that was retitled The Lost Continent (1916) but he only had lions roaming over Europe in the future after war sends the Continent back to the stone age. His Atlanteans are to be found in The Return of Tarzan (1915), where a group of the survivors have a kingdom named Opar, hidden in the jungle. Their queen is a bit of Phorenice-type named La.