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“Thou art my chosen” [see p. 101.]
Maurice Greiffenhagen
1888
Lithograph
10.5 cm high by 8.3 cm wide (4 ⅛ by 3 ¼ inches), facing p. 97, framed
Fifth regular illustration for H. Rider Haggard's SHE: A History of Adventure, facing page 97 in the Longman's British edition (1888).
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Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham
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We three and Ustane were sitting round a fire in the cave just before bedtime, when suddenly the woman, who had been brooding in silence, rose, and laid her hand upon Leo’s golden curls, and addressed him. Even now, when I shut my eyes, I can see her proud, imperial form, clothed alternately in dense shadow and the red flickering of the fire, as she stood, the wild centre of as weird a scene as I ever witnessed, and delivered herself of the burden of her thoughts and forebodings in a kind of rhythmical speech that ran something as follows: —
Thou art my chosen — I have waited for thee from the beginning!
Thou art very beautiful. Who hath hair like unto thee, or skin so white?
Who hath so strong an arm, who is so much a man?
Thine eyes are the sky, and the light in them is the stars.
Thou art perfect and of a happy face, and my heart turned itself towards thee.
Ay, when mine eyes fell upon thee I did desire thee,—
Then did I take thee to me — oh, thou Beloved,
And hold thee fast, lest harm should come unto thee.
Ay, I did cover thine head with mine hair, lest the sun should strike it;
And altogether was I thine, and thou wast altogether mine.
And so it went for a little space, till Time was in labour with an evil Day;
And then what befell on that day? Alas! my Beloved, I know not!
But I, I saw thee no more — I, I was lost in the blackness.
And she who is stronger did take thee; ay, she who is fairer than Ustane.
Yet didst thou turn and call upon me, and let thine eyes wander in the darkness.
But, nevertheless, she prevailed by Beauty, and led thee down horrible places,
And then, ah! then my Beloved ——
Here this extraordinary woman broke off her speech, or chant, which was so much musical gibberish to us, for all that we understood of what she was talking about, and seemed to fix her flashing eyes upon the deep shadow before her. Then in a moment they acquired a vacant, terrified stare, as though they were striving to realise some half-seen horror. She lifted her hand from Leo’s head, and pointed into the darkness. We all looked, and could see nothing; but she saw something, or thought she did, and something evidently that affected even her iron nerves, for, without another sound, down she fell senseless between us. [Chapter VII, "Ustane Sings," 101]
In “An Early Christian Ceremony,” a hundred miles inland from the eastern coast of Africa, beyond the swamps in which the three adventurers had to cope with clouds of mosquitos, the party of fifty yellow-skinned Amahagger bearing the litters for Job, Leo, and Holly halts in a cultivated, cup-shape hollow of volcanic origins. A rather forward maiden, Ustane, smitten with Leo’s Grecian features and blond hair, embraces and kisses him on the lips to signify that she has chosen him as her mate: this behaviour signifies the “Early Christian Ceremony” that Holly announces in the title for Chapter VI. The matriarchal nature of this society, ruled by the distant and shadowy She-who-must-be-obeyed, means that “women among the Amahagger live upon conditions of perfect equality with the men” (90-91); in delineating this unusual social organisation, Haggard seems to be reflecting contemporary notions of the New Woman in Great Britain in the final decades of the nineteenth century.
The atmospheric setting of the illustration is a private cavern off the greater cave that serves as the Amahaggers’ community centre, for their name in Arabic apparently signifies that they are “The People of the Rocks.” The maiden who has chosen Leo as her mate is singing. The other figures are now familiar to us: Leo in the background, left; the bearded Holly, sitting wrapped in an animal hide, in the foreground; and the common Englishman who provides necessary comic relief, Job.
Haggard, H. Rider. "SHE:" A History of Adventure. Illustrated by E. K. Johnson. The Graphic Magazine, Vols. XXXIV and XXXV. 2 October 1886 to 8 January 1887.
Haggard. H. Rider. SHE: A History of Adventure. Illustrated by E. K. Johnson. New York: Harper & Bros., 1887.
Haggard, H. Rider. SHE: A History of Adventure. Illustrated by Maurice Greiffenhagen and Charles H. M. Kerr. London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1888, rpt. 1927.
Created 7 May 2025