The Lost Continent

Extract: THE LEGATEES OF DEUCALION We were both of us not a little stiff as the result of sleeping out in the open all that night, for even in Grand Canary the dew-fall and the comparative chill of darkness are not to be trifled with. For myself on these occasions I like a bit of a run as an early refresher. But here on this rough ground in the middle of the island there were not three yards of level to be found, and so as Coppinger proceeded to go through some sort of dumb-bell exercises with a couple of lumps of bristly lava, I followed his example. Coppinger has done a good deal of roughing it in his time, but being a doctor of medicine amongst other things-he takes out a new degree of some sort on an average every other year-he is great on health theories, and practises them like a religion. There had been rain two days before, and as there was still a bit of stream trickling along at the bottom of the barranca, we went down there and had a wash, and brushed our teeth. Greatest luxury imaginable, a toothbrush, on this sort of expedition. "Now," said Coppinger when we had emptied our pockets, "there's precious little grub left, and it's none the better for being carried in a local Spanish newspaper." Charles John Cutcliffe Wright Hyne (11 May 1866 - 10 March 1944) was a novelist who was also known by the pen name Weatherby Chesney. He is perhaps best remembered as the author of The Lost Continent: The Story of Atlantis. He is also remembered for his Captain Kettle stories and for The Recipe for Diamonds. Captain Kettle first appeared as a side character in the novel Honour of Thieves (1895). His first appearance as a main character was in the short story 'Stealing a President' in vol 1, issue 6 of Pearson's Magazine (1896). This initial short story was followed in 1897 by a series of twelve short stories again in Pearson's Magazine that were later collected and published as Adventures of Captain Kettle. Over the next four years two more sets of twelve stories were published in Pearson's Magazine and subsequently collected as Further Adventures of Captain Kettle ("A master of fortune" in the US) and Captain Kettle K.C.B. respectively. The character of Captain Kettle is said to be based on a South Shields sea captain, Davey Proffit, whose physical appearance closely matched the descriptions in the books, but Cutcliffe Hyne insisted emphatically that this was not the case. However, the most enduring image of Kettle was created by Stanley L. Wood, who provided the illustrations for Pearson's Magazine; they were reprinted in the first book compilations of the stories. He found 'the exact spit and image of our little sailor, pulling beer behind a bar' in a pub in north London. This is noteworthy because Wood's Captain Kettle bears a striking resemblance (particularly in his stance, the set of the head on the shoulders, his beard and the characteristic gaze) to the novelist Joseph Conrad, also a sailor. Among the people who saw this remarkable similarity was H. G. Wells, whose War of the Worlds appeared in Pearson's in instalments, alternating with the Captain Kettle stories. Conrad met Wells at just this time, read Pearson's, and borrowed whole phrases, key episodes, and images from the Kettle stories for Heart of Darkness.