Edgar Rice Burroughs

At the Earth's Core Edgar Rice Burroughs

I WAS BORN IN CONNECTICUT ABOUT THIRTY YEARS ago. My name is DavidInnes. My father was a wealthy mine owner. When I was nineteen he died. All hisproperty was to be mine when I had attained my majority-provided that I haddevoted the two years intervening in close application to the great business I wasto inherit. I did my best to fulfil the last wishes of my parent-not because of theinheritance, but because I loved and honored my father. For six months I toiled inthe mines and in the counting-rooms, for I wished to know every minute detail ofthe business. Then Perry interested me in his invention. He was an old fellow who haddevoted the better part of a long life to the perfection of a mechanical subterraneanprospector. As relaxation he studied paleontology. I looked over his plans, listenedto his arguments, inspected his working model-and then, convinced, I advancedthe funds necessary to construct a full-sized, practical prospector.