Search Worlds Without End

Continuing the saga of Pellucidar, the empire located in the Earth's hollow center, Tarzan at the Earth's Core is the fourth work in this classic series.

The American explorer and emperor of Pellucidar, David Innes, has been captured by the deadly Korsar pirates. Picking up on the desperate cries for help emanating from Pellucidar, Jason Gridley of Tarzana brings the message to the only person who can help, Tarzan of the Apes. Together young Gridley and Lord Greystoke travel to the exotic and strange realm within the Earth to save the imprisoned ruler. Unaccustomed to the difficulties of Pellucidar, the two struggle in its savage environment, with its eternal noon and bizarre monsters, in their quest to save Innes and the precarious rule he has established. Sean McMullen provides an introduction for this Bison Books edition.

Raised by a fierce she-ape of the tribe of Kerchak deep in the African jungle, the baby Tarzan grew to learn the secrets of the wild to survive--how to talk with animals, swing through trees, and fight against the great predators. He grew to the strength and courage of his fellow apes. And in time, his human intelligence promised him the kingship of the tribe. He became truly Lord of the Jungle.

Then civilized men entered the jungle, and Tarzan was forced to choose between two worlds...

Disconsolate over the loss of Jane Porter's hand to his cousin William Cecil Clayton, Tarzan renounces his title of Lord Greystoke and returns to Paris to visit his friend Paul d'Arnot. Realizing the ape-man is not suited to the vicissitudes of civilization, d'Arnot helps his grieving comrade acquire a post in the French Secret Service that better fits Tarzan's adventurous nature. After disrupting a Russian espionage operation, the ape-man is tossed overboard during his ocean passage to South Africa and resumes his primitive life on the West Coast. He befriends the Waziri tribe and leads them on a trek to explore the lost city of Opar, a forgotten land populated by a bestial race, ruled by the mercurial high priestess La. There, Tarzan's path will cross once again with that of Jane Porter, but can the two realize their love is destined before they meet death on the altar of the Flaming God?

After settling at their London estate as Lord and Lady Greystoke, Tarzan and Jane find their contentment shattered by the ape-man's former enemies, the Russian spies Nikolas Rokoff and Alexis Paulvitch. Bent on revenge, the two villians kidnap Jane and the couple's infant son Jack, stranding Tarzan naked and alone on a remote jungle island while fleeing to the African interior.

Tarzan's savage nature reemerges as he recruits Sheeta the panther, Akut and his tribe of great apes, and the mighty warrior Mugambi to pursue the criminals up the Ugambi River into the heart of the jungle, where cannibal tribes hold sway and his desperate adversaries pursue their cruel vendetta.

Unaware of his father's savage past, Tarzan and Jane's young son Jack becomes captivated by Ajax, the star of a trained ape act. Ajax--actually Tarzan's longtime friend Akut--has been brought to London by Tarzan's old enemy Alexis Paulvitch, who hopes to wreak vengeance on the ape-man.

After killing Paulvitch in self-defense, Jack and Akut flee to Africa, where they assume the wild life of Jack's mighty sire. Growing to manhood in the jungle, the Greystoke heir earns the name Korak the Killer, and befriends Meriem, an Arab waif rescued from a life of torment in her adoptive father's village.

The couple's idyllic jungle life is challenged by the arrival of evil men, whose schemes to separate the pair--and the ensuing perils--only strengthen Korak and Meriem's bond.

When fate deals a devastating blow to Tarzan and Jane's fortunes, the ape-man must once again refill their coffers from the legendary treasure vaults of Opar, forgotten outpost of lost Atlantis. There awaits the high priestess La, ready to sacrifice Tarzan upon the altar of the Flaming God for having spurned her love, even while the traitorous, half-bestial high priest of Opar schemes to usurp her rule.

Meanwhile, Jane faces her own troubles when she falls victim to the machinations of disgraced Belgian officer Lieutenant Werper and a band of ivory and slave traders. But when an earthquake strikes down Tarzan and leaves him with only the memory of his youth as an ape, how will he unravel the nefarious plot that imperils Jane's life and recover the stolen jewels of Opar?

How did the helpless child of the shipwrecked couple John and Alice Clayton become the superhuman legend that is Tarzan of the Apes, Lord of the Jungle? The twelve archetypal coming-of-age tales that compose this book tell the full story, finding their place alongside the richest and most meaningful allegories of mythology.

Tarzan grows to adulthood among the apes of the jungle, facing the dawning realization that he is not like them--he is a man. As he battles for survival against savage beasts and merciless cannibals, he experiences a growing intellectual maturity that includes the pangs of his first love, an emerging spirituality, and a longing to discover his place among his own kind.

This book contains the following Edgar Rice Burroughs' short stories:

• Tarzan's First Love - (1916)
• The Capture of Tarzan - (1916)
• The Fight for the Balu - (1916)
• The God of Tarzan - (1916)
• Tarzan and the Black Boy - (1917)
• The Witch-Doctor Seeks Vengeance - (1917)
• The End of Bukawai - (1917)
• The Lion - (1917)
• The Nightmare - (1917)
• The Battle for Teeka - (1917)
• A Jungle Joke - (1917)
• Tarzan Rescues the Moon - (1917)

World War I enflames East Africa as German troops raze the Greystokes' estate, where Tarzan returns to find the charred, lifeless remains of his beloved Jane. Consumed by vengeance, the ape-man wages guerrilla warfare against the hated enemy, using his most savage tactics to help the Allies drive the invaders from his land.

As the British army prevails, Tarzan departs to rejoin the great apes that are his family--only to be confronted by a trackless wasteland that stands in his way. Having endured a trial of unimaginable torment, he enters the inaccessible valley of Xuja, the city of maniacs. Outnumbered by crazed foes and their lion and parrot familiars, the ape-man must liberate his friends from a city where madness rules.

Driven by the single-minded purpose of tracking the missing Jane and her German abductor, Tarzan braves the forbidding wastes of the great barrier swamps to enter the primeval land of Pal-ul-don--an unforgiving world of tailed humanoids pitted in unrelenting war, where the fierce reptilian gryf stalks its prey.

As Jane battles to free herself from captivity in A-lur, the City of Light, and flees deeper into the deadly environs of the strange land, she must learn to hone her own jungle skills and emerge as a heroine in her own right... or succumb to the merciless perils of savage Pal-ul-don. Meanwhile, a fierce stranger follows Tarzan into the interior, bearing a rifle and bandoliers, bent on a mysterious quest.

Betrayed by a band of international conspirators, Tarzan is drugged and left to die in the jungle. But then a quirk of fate delivers him into the hands of the frightful priests of Opar, the last bastion of lost Atlantis. La, High Priestess of the Flaming God, spares his life once again, driven by her hopeless love for the ape-man, only to find her act rewarded by the betrayal of her own people. To save her, Tarzan flees with La into the legendary Valley of Diamonds, while Jad-bal-ja, his faithful golden lion, follows. Ahead lies a land where sentient gorillas rule over servile humans. And behind, Esteban Miranda--who looks exactly like Tarzan--plots further treachery.

No man had ever penetrated the Great Thorn Forest until Tarzan of the Apes crashed his plane behind it on his solo flight. Within he finds a beautiful country. But in it lives the Alali, strange Stone Age giants whose women regard all men as less than slaves. And beyond the Alali lies the country of the Ant Men--little people only eighteen inches tall. There, in Trohanadalmakus, Tarzan is an honored guest, until he is captured by the warriors of Veltopismakus in one of the Ant Men's wars. But unknown to the ape-man, they have plans for him--by the advanced science of the little people, Tarzan is shrunk to their size and set to work as a quarry slave.

Cruel slave traders have invaded the jungle domain of Tarzan of the Apes. Now they head toward a fabled empire of riches that no outsider has ever seen, intent on looting its great treasures. And toward the same legendary land stumbles the lost James Blake, an American whom Tarzan has vowed to rescue. Following their spoors, the ape-man comes upon the lost Valley of the Sepulcher, where Knights Templar still fight to resume their holy crusade to free Jerusalem. Soon Tarzan, the true lord of their ancient motherland, finds himself armed with lance and shield, partaking of jousting and ancient combat. And then it is that the slavers strike!

Somewhere in the heart of Africa, a young archaeologist disappeared in the remote jungle mountains--Erich von Harben, son of an old missionary friend of Tarzan of the Apes. Now the ape-man seeks to rescue the lost scholar. The trail leads to a mysterious valley where Tarzan discovers two surviving outposts of ancient Rome, virtually unchanged by time. And there, Tarzan is thrust into the bloody gladiatorial arena, doomed to face every peril the cruel and corrupt emperor of Castra Sanguinarius can devise to ensure the ape-man's death. Miles away in Castrum Mare, Erich von Harben also awaits execution upon the sands of another tyrant's arena, destined to die before he can pledge his heart to the fair Favonia, daughter of one of the emperor's favored patricians.

La was in trouble. The high priestess of the Flaming God in the ancient city of Opar--forgotten outpost of Atlantis--had been betrayed by her people and locked in the eon-haunted dungeons until Tarzan came to rescue her. La still loved Tarzan, but Tarzan brought her to his people and then left her. Now, together with a strange woman of Tarzan's kind, she lies bound in the tent of an Arab slave trader, dreading her certain fate. Meanwhile, Tarzan is beset by a strange band of men who have invaded his land... led by a madman bent on evil subversion!

Evil men have come to the land of Tarzan of the Apes, looting and killing as they move. But other evil lurks in a small valley of the Ghenzi Mountains, where the last remnants of an ugly, perverted people dwell in what they call their faith--an ancient belief that came from Rome nearly 2,000 years before. Now they are wicked and many of them are insane. And now they have captured Lady Barbara Collis and mean to use her as a human sacrifice--unless Tarzan arrives in time!

When Tarzan of the Apes frees a man being tortured by cruel bandits, he is surprised to learn that the stranger comes from no race or country the ape-man knows. He is from the fabled land of Onthar, where lie two ancient cities unknown to the outside world. One is Athne, city of ivory; the other is Cathne, city of gold and evil. There great prides of trained lions are used to hunt down men and wage eternal war. And there Tarzan meets the beautiful queen Nemone, who is determined to have Tarzan as her king... or feed him to the lions!

jungle in great ten-ton trucks, equipped with all the advantages of civilization. But now it is halted, almost destroyed by the poisoned arrows of the savage Bansuto tribe. There is no way to return. Ahead lies the strange valley of diamonds, where hairy gorillas live in their town of London on the Thames, ruled by King Henry the Eighth. And behind them comes Tarzan of the Apes with the Golden Lion, seeking the man who might have been his twin brother in looks--though hardly in courage!

As the steel-clawed Leopard Men look for victims for their savage rites, the secret cult strikes terror into the hearts of all the villagers. Only Orando of the Utengi dares to declare war on them. And with Orando goes Tarzan of the Apes--but a strangely changed Tarzan, who now believes that he is Muzimo, a spirit or demon who was Orando's ancestor. But there are traitors among Orando's people. And in the village of the Leopard Men is Kali Bwana, a young American woman who has come to Africa to find a missing man. Only Tarzan can save her...

Tarzan of the Apes had heard only rumors of the Kavuru--a strange, evil tribe said to have long reaped their human prey from among the local natives. But when they stole the daughter of Muviro, chief of the Waziri, the Lord of the Jungle sets out in search of their legend-shrouded village on a mission of rescue--or, if need be, revenge. He does not know that his trail runs close to that of a strange group of survivors of a crashed plane--including his beloved mate, Jane, who must call upon all the skills she has learned from Tarzan to keep herself and her companions alive amid the terrors of the jungle and an even worse danger lurking in their own party. But the stranded Europeans and the ape-man are destined for a rendezvous with blood and fire--in the dreaded temple of the Kavuru.

Tarzan cared little for the fate of adventurer Brian Gregory, drawn to the legendary city of Ashair by the rumor of the Father of Diamonds, the world's hugest gem. But to the ape-man the tie of friendship is unbreakable, and Paul d'Arnot's pleas move him to agree to guide the expedition Gregory's father and sister have organized for his rescue. The enigmatic Atan Thome is also obsessed with the Father of Diamonds, and has planted agents in the Gregory safari to spy out its route and sabotage its efforts. Both parties reach their goal, remote Ashair... as prisoners of its priests, doomed to die in loathsome rites.

The half-dead American raved of an unknown city... of women warriors ruled by a malignant wizard... of a great diamond, the Gonfal, with strange hypnotic powers... of a long-lost English nobleman... of the savage queen who had betrayed her duty and helped him to escape. Tarzan puts little faith into Stanley Wood's story--until he sees the power of the Gonfal draw the American in spite of himself back into the clutches of the Amazons of Kaji. Then it is that the ape-man becomes once more the implacable hunter--for though he cares nothing for diamonds or lost civilizations, no one may be allowed to harm a man the Lord of the Jungle has taken under his protection.