Again at the work of making the former nest of Da Sylva a place safe for themselves, Lane called a meeting of all of the surviving warriors. They stood before him, weary, disheartened at their terrible losses; behind them the ranks of the Votan, ragged, starved wrecks of men; and in their faces the knowledge that they expected of these newcomers only a return to life and perhaps freedom.
Lane realized he had to put heart and hope into these men. He knew the Votans understood English from their long watching of the growing civilization over their heads on the surface; knew, too, that he must not let them return to their old ways of repressive hiding and non-development that had made them easy conquest for Da Sylva's gang.
From these few hundred grim-faced weary men, Lane knew he had to build an organization that would ever after make the wisdom of the caverns safe for future men. He lifted both hands in Indian fashion:
"Men of the Red Race, this struggle seems now to have cost too much. We have paid too highly for what we have won. But that is not true. Nowhere on this dark earth does a band of men exist who have won more for their fellow men with their battle. Nowhere have the dead paid with their lives for more than we have won this day.
The Red Race has won here an opportunity to again become a great world power. Here in this den of lust, here in these forgotten and disregarded caverns, we have paid with our blood for a glorious future for all men. We shall bring modern science into these caverns, studying the ancient science and bringing to us all the value of the wisdom of the glorious race. If we remain as one striving toward a greater and more intelligent organization of red men everywhere, these ancient machines and rays, coupled with modern science, will give the red man such power and prestige as has not been his since the first Spaniard drew sword in Mexico."
The Votan Indians, listening and realizing that here was a man and a leader different in aims from any they had known, gave forth with a shout of approbation. Lane continued, glad to see in their faces a shining hope that had not been there before.
"You Votans, here in your former homes as our allies and friends, will be not the least pillar of the coming new order in the underworld. As time goes on, and you understand that the ancient ways of vegetating and doing nothing here in these wonder caverns but enjoy the pleasure mech of the Gods and sneer at the poor surface people, are gone; that the modern red man has a greater duty to man on earth and the will to perform that duty. Then you will find yourselves glad to be part of the new Red Legion, a Red Legion using all the mighty science of the Gods for building a new way of life for all men.
AFTERWORD
THE REST OF this story the future of the world will have to tell. The red men of America are active in the caverns, sometimes ignorant, sometimes backward and too worshipful of the age-old secrecy, but also containing modern men of education and the modern aims of all scientific men everywhere. Even the "creeps" and those people even more changed by the caverns than the creeps, the spider men of the western caverns, are not to be despised because of their knowledge of the wonder world under the rocks of Mother Earth. They will find a way to be useful as civilization comes more and more swiftly to the ancient savage ways of the backward life of the underworld.
The Indians of the underworld are a factor in the coming struggle for power over Earth, and they have a knowledge of the ancient secrets. They have in some areas complete possession of and domination of those mighty mechanisms of the Elder race. Such battles as the one portrayed are taking place in the west today between the white ray and the red; between modern ray people and those who cling to the ancient tradition of secrecy and suppression of all surface peoples. It seems natural to assume that the red men are on the side of progress, on the side of surface sanity in promoting study and use of the ancient Elder race wisdom for surface men.
For those who seek more knowledge of the Elder world I can tell you the red men know much of it from their legends and from such secret groups as the Red Legion, the Black Legion and others. Whether they will tell you about it is another thing.
The history of the Red Men in the caverns is a fascinating thing. For the next story I am going to select a figure you all
