A Princess of Mars

"What is the matter with Dejah Thoris?" I blurted out at her. "Why

will she not speak to me?"

Sola seemed puzzled herself, as though such strange actions on the part

of two humans were quite beyond her, as indeed they were, poor child.

"She says you have angered her, and that is all she will say, except

that she is the daughter of a jed and the granddaughter of a jeddak and

she has been humiliated by a creature who could not polish the teeth of

her grandmother's sorak."

I pondered over this report for some time, finally asking, "What might

a sorak be, Sola?"

"A little animal about as big as my hand, which the red Martian women

keep to play with," explained Sola.

Not fit to polish the teeth of her grandmother's cat! I must rank

pretty low in the consideration of Dejah Thoris, I thought; but I could

not help laughing at the strange figure of speech, so homely and in

this respect so earthly. It made me homesick, for it sounded very much

like "not fit to polish her shoes." And then commenced a train of

thought quite new to me. I began to wonder what my people at home were

doing. I had not seen them for years. There was a family of Carters

in Virginia who claimed close relationship with me; I was supposed to

be a great uncle, or something of the kind equally foolish. I could

pass anywhere for twenty-five to thirty years of age, and to be a great

uncle always seemed the height of incongruity, for my thoughts and

feelings were those of a boy. There was two little kiddies in the

Carter family whom I had loved and who had thought there was no one on

Earth like Uncle Jack; I could see them just as plainly, as I stood

there under the moonlit skies of Barsoom, and I longed for them as I

had never longed for any mortals before. By nature a wanderer, I had

never known the true meaning of the word home, but the great hall of

the Carters had always stood for all that the word did mean to me, and

now my heart turned toward it from the cold and unfriendly peoples I

had been thrown amongst. For did not even Dejah Thoris despise me! I

was a low creature, so low in fact that I was not even fit to polish

the teeth of her grandmother's cat; and then my saving sense of humor

came to my rescue, and laughing I turned into my silks and furs and

slept upon the moon-haunted ground the sleep of a tired and healthy

fighting man.

We broke camp the next day at an early hour and marched with only a

single halt until just before dark. Two incidents broke the

tediousness of the march. About noon we espied far to our right what

was evidently an incubator, and Lorquas Ptomel directed Tars Tarkas to

investigate it. The latter took a dozen warriors, including myself,

and we raced across the velvety carpeting of moss to the little

enclosure.