of the dancers, and joining in the chant of
the warriors. In the center of the circle sat Tarzan of the
Apes--Waziri, king of the Waziri, for, like his predecessor, he was to
take the name of his tribe as his own.

Faster and faster grew the pace of the dancers, louder and louder their
wild and savage shouts. The women rose and fell in unison, shrieking
now at the tops of their voices. The spears were brandishing fiercely,
and as the dancers stooped down and beat their shields upon the
hard-tramped earth of the village street the whole sight was as
terribly primeval and savage as though it were being staged in the dim
dawn of humanity, countless ages in the past.

As the excitement waxed the ape-man sprang to his feet and joined in
the wild ceremony. In the center of the circle of glittering black
bodies he leaped and roared and shook his heavy spear in the same mad
abandon that enthralled his fellow savages. The last remnant of his
civilization was forgotten--he was a primitive man to the fullest now;
reveling in the freedom of the fierce, wild life he loved, gloating in
his kingship among these wild blacks.

Ah, if Olga de Coude had but seen him then--could she have recognized
the well-dressed, quiet young man whose well-bred face and
irreproachable manners had so captivated her but a few short months
ago? And Jane Porter! Would she have still loved this savage warrior
chieftain, dancing naked among his naked savage subjects? And D'Arnot!
Could D'Arnot have believed that this was the same man he had
introduced into half a dozen of the most select clubs of Paris? What
would his fellow peers in the House of Lords have said had one pointed
to this dancing giant, with his barbaric headdress and his metal
ornaments, and said: "There, my lords, is John Clayton, Lord Greystoke."

And so Tarzan of the Apes came into a real kingship among men--slowly
but surely was he following the evolution of his ancestors, for had he
not started at the very bottom?

Chapter 18

The Lottery of Death

Jane Porter had been the first of those in the lifeboat to awaken the
morning after the wreck of the LADY ALICE. The other members of the
party were asleep upon the thwarts or huddled in cramped positions in
the bottom of the boat.

When the girl realized that they had become separated from the other
boats she was filled with alarm. The sense of utter loneliness and
helplessness which the vast expanse of deserted oc