Dedication

My dear Mother,

I have for a long while hoped to be allowed to dedicate some book
of mine to you, and now I bring you this work, because whatever
its shortcomings, and whatever judgment may be passed upon it by
yourself and others, it is yet the one I should wish you to
accept.

I trust that you will receive from my romance of "Cleopatra" some
such pleasure as lightened the labour of its building up; and that
it may convey to your mind a picture, however imperfect, of the
old and mysterious Egypt in whose lost glories you are so deeply
interested.

Your affectionate and dutiful Son, H. Rider Haggard.

January 21, 1889.