Preface
_ Dedication
In memory of Oodnadatta and many wanderings oversea I offer these pictures from the past, my dear Vincent, to you, a lover of the present if an aspirant who can look upon the future with more of hope than fear. Your colleague,
H. Rider Haggard. To Sir Edgar Vincent, K.C.M.G.
Ditchingham,
November, 1913.
NOTE BY THE EDITOR
It chances that I, the Editor of these pages--for, in truth, that is my humble function--have recovered a considerable knowledge of a bygone life of mine. This life ended in times that are comparatively recent, namely, early in the ninth century, as is fixed by the fact that the Byzantine Empress, Irene, plays a part in the story.
The narrative, it will be observed, is not absolutely consecutive； that is to say, all the details are not filled in. Indeed, it has returned to me in a series of scenes or pictures, and although each scene or picture has to do with every other, there are sometimes gaps between them. To take one example a

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